Snail on the Slope Read online

  "Stop it," said Kim, slamming his palm on the table. "Get back to work and don't let me see you here in working hours again. Don't make me lose my temper."

  "All right," said Stoyan hastily. "Okay. I'm off. You'll hand it over?"

  He placed the bouquet on the table and ran off, shouting as he left: "and the cess-pit's working again."

  Kim picked up a broom and swept all the droppings into a corner.

  "Mad fool," he said. "And that Rita... Now calculate the lot again. To hell with them and their love affairs..."

  The motorbike started banging nerve-rackingly under the window, then all was quiet, with only the piledriver thudding behind the wall.

  "Pepper," said Kim. "Why were you at the cliff this morning?"

  "I was hoping to catch sight of the director. I was told he sometimes does physical jerks there. I wanted to ask him to send me but he didn't come. You know, Kim, I think everybody lies here. Sometimes I even think you do."

  "Director," said Kim, ruminating, "you know that's an idea. You're on the ball. You've got guts..."

  "All the same, I'm leaving tomorrow" said Pepper. "Acey's taking me, he promised. Tomorrow I shan't be here, official."

  "I never expected that, no," continued Kim, unheeding. "Plenty of guts ... maybe we should send you over there, to sort things out..."

  Chapter Two

  Kandid woke and thought at once: I'll go tomorrow. At the same moment Nava stirred in the other comer.

  "Are you asleep?" she asked.

  "No."

  "Let's talk, then," she suggested. "We haven't spoken to each other since yesterday evening after all. All right?"

  "All right."

  "First you tell me when you're going."

  "I don't know," he said, "soon."

  "That's what you always say: soon. Soon, or the day after tomorrow. Maybe you think it's the same thing? Well no, you've learned to talk now. At first you mixed everything up, mixed everything up, mixed the hut up and the village, grass and mushrooms, even people and deadlings, mixed them up you did and then you'd mutter away. We couldn't make it out, couldn't understand a word..."

  He opened his eyes and stared at the low, lime-encrusted ceiling. The worker ants were on the move in two even columns, from left to right loaded, right to left empty. A month ago it had been the other way around, right to left loaded with mushroom spawn, left to right empty.

  A month hence it would be the other way again unless someone told them to do something else. Dotted here and there along the column stood the big black signalers motionless, antennae slowly waving, awaiting orders. A month ago I used to wake up and think I'd go the day after tomorrow but we never went, and long before that even I used to wake up and think the day after tomorrow we'd be off at last and we never went. But if we don't go the day after tomorrow, this time I'll go on my own. I used to think like that before as well of course, but this time it's for sure. The best thing would be to go now, straight away, no talking or trying to persuade. But that needed a clear head. Better not. The best thing would be to decide once and for all: as soon as I can wake with a clear head, be up, and straight out into the street and away into the forest, and not let anybody start talking to me. That's vital: don't let anybody start talking to you, distracting you with their whining, starting your head buzzing, especially just here above the eyes, till your ears start ringing and you feel like vomiting and the whining goes on and on right through you. And Nava was already talking...

  "... so that's what happened," Nava was saying, "the deadlings took us along in the night, and they can't see very well at night. Blind as bats, anyone'll tell you that, even that Humpy, though he doesn't belong here, he's from the village that was next to ours, not this one of ours where you and I live now, but ours where I lived with mam, so you can't know Humpy, in his village everything's covered in mushrooms, the spawn fell and that's something not everybody likes, Humpy went away from the village straight away. It's the Accession, he says, and now there's no place for people in the village... So-o-o. There was no moon that night and they probably lost the track, anyway they all bunched together, us in the middle, and it got so hot, you couldn't breathe..."

  Kandid looked at her. She was lying on her back, legs crossed, arms folded behind her head. Only her lips moved endlessly, and from time to time her eyes flashed in the half darkness. She went on talking even when the old man came in and seated himself at the table. He drew a pot toward him, sniffed at it noisily and with a slurp set to. At that Kandid got up and with his palms wiped the night sweat from his body. The old man was champing and slobbering, not taking his eyes from the bin with the lid protecting it from mold. Kandid took the pot away and set it next to Nava to stop her talking. The old man sucked his teeth comprehensively.

  "Not very tasty," he said, "it's the same everywhere you go these days. And that path's all grown over I used to go along; I used it a lot too, I went to the training there and just bathing, I often went bathing in those days, there was a lake there, now it's just a swamp and it's dangerous but somebody still goes along there otherwise how come there's so many drowned bodies? And reeds. I can ask anybody: how come there's paths through the reeds? And nobody can tell me, and no more they ought. What have you got there in that bin? If it's berries in soak I'll have them, I love soaked berries, but if it's something of yesterday's then it doesn't matter, I won't eat leavings, you can eat your own leavings." He paused, looking from Kandid to Nava and back again. Getting no answer he went on:

  "You can't sow anymore where the reeds have grown over. They used to sow there before. They had to for the Accession, and they took everything to Clay Clearing, they still take it there but they don't leave it on the clearing, they bring it back. I told them they shouldn't, but they don't know the meaning of the word. The elder asked me straight out in front of them all: 'Why shouldn't we?' Buster was standing there, look, where you're standing, closer even, and Ears just here, say, and over there where your Nava's lying, there are the Baldy brothers, and he asks me in front of them, in front of everybody. I tell him don't you realize, I tell him, we're not alone here... His father was a very wise man, or maybe he wasn't his father, some say he wasn't and to be sure it doesn't seem like it. 'Why,' he asks me, 'can't I ask why I shouldn't in front of eyeryone?' "

  Nava got up and, passing the pot to Kandid, started tidying up. Kandid began to eat. The old man fell silent and watched him for a while chewing on his lip before observing: "That food's not good, you shouldn't eat it."

  "Why not?" asked Kandid to tease.

  The old man cackled.

  "Eh, listen to him! Dummy, you'd do better to keep quiet. You'd be better off answering what I keep asking, does it hurt much when you have your head cut off?"

  "What's it to you?" shouted Nava. "Why do you keep prying?"

  "Shouts at me," announced the old man. "Lifts up her voice against me. She's borne no child and raises her voice against me. Why don't you have a child? Living with Dummy all this time and no child. Everybody has them but not you. You shouldn't go on like this. Do you know what 'shouldn't' means? It means undesirable, not approved, and since it's not approved it means you shouldn't. What you should do may not be clear but what you shouldn't do, you shouldn't. Everybody should know that and you most of all seeing as how you live in a village not your own, got a house given, got Dummy for a husband. Maybe he's got a different head stuck on him, but he's got a healthy body, you've no right not to have a child. So that's it, shouldn't, not desirable..."

  Nava, by now bad tempered and sulky, snatched the bin from the table and went off into the pantry. The old man looked after her then went on, snuffling:

  "How else can shouldn't be understood? It can and ought to be realized, shouldn't is harmful..."

  Kandid finished his meal and plunked the empty pot in front of the old man. Then he went out onto the street. The house had been heavily overgrown during the night and the only thing visible in the surrounding greenery was the path made by the o
ld man and the place by the door where he had sat fidgeting waiting for them to wake up. The street had already been cleared, the green creeper, thick as a man's arm, which had slid out of the network of boughs hanging above the village on the previous night and put down roots in front of the house next door had already been chopped up and fermenting fluid poured on it. It had turned dark and was going nicely sour. It gave out a strong appetizing smell and the neighbor's boys sat around it and tore out chunks of the soft brown matter, damp and juicy, and stuffed them into their mouths. When Kandid walked past, the eldest shouted with his mouth full, "Dumbling - deadling!" but the cry was not taken up, they were all too busy. Otherwise the street, orange and red from the tall grass in which the houses lay drowned, somber, and mottled with dusky green patches where the sun penetrated the forest roof, lay deserted. From the direction of the field could be heard the monotonous ragged choir of voices: "Hey, hey, make it gay, right way, left way, hey, hey."

  From the forest came the echo. Or maybe not an echo. Maybe deadlings.

  Hopalong was sitting at home, of course, massaging his leg. "Sit down," was his affable greeting. "Here I've put some soft grass for visitors. They tell me you're going?"

  Once more, thought Kandid, once more from the very beginning.

  "What's the matter, leg hurting again?" he inquired, seating himself.

  "Leg? No, it's just nice sitting here and giving it a rub. When are you off then?"

  "Just as we've been fixing it, you and I. If you were to come with me then we could go the day after tomorrow. Now I'll have to find somebody else who knows the forest. I can see you don't want to go."

  Hopalong cautiously extended his leg and spoke weightily:

  "As soon as you leave me, turn left, and carry on till you get to the field. Across the field, past the two stones and you'll see the road straight away, it's not much overgrown, there's too many boulders on it. Along the road you'll pass through two villages. One's deserted, mushroomy, mushrooms started growing there, so nobody lives there, there's funny folk living in the other village, the blue grass went through there twice and since then they've been sick, no need to start talking to them they won't understand a word, it's like they've lost their memory. Through there then and on the right you have your Clay Clearing. No need for guides, you can get there on your own, no sweat."

  "We'll get as far as Clay Clearing," agreed Kandid, "and after that?"

  "What do you mean, after that?"

  "Across the swamp where the lakes used to be. Remember you were telling me about the stone road?"

  "What road? To Clay Clearing. Well I'm trying to tell you, aren't I? Turn left, across the fields up to the two stones..."

  Kandid heard him out before speaking.

  "Now I know the way to Clay Clearing. We'll get there. But I have to go further, as you know, I must get to the City, and you promised to show me the way."

  Hopalong shook his head in sympathy.

  "To the Ci-i-i-i-ty, ah now, is that where you're heading. I remember, I remember ... yes to the City ... you can't get there, Dummy. To Clay Clearing now, that's easy; past the two stones, through the mushroom village, past funny village, then Clay Clearing'11 be on your right. Or to the Reeds, say, turn right as you leave me through the scrub, past Bread Fen, then keep following the sun. Where the sun goes, you follow. It's three days travel, but if you really have to go, we'll do it. We used to get pots there before we planted our own. I know the Reeds like the back of my hand, you should have said that's where you wanted to go. No need to wait till the day after tomorrow either, we'll start tomorrow in the morning, we needn't take any food with us, seeing as we're going by Bread Fen...

  "You know, Dummy, you speak so fast it hurts to listen to you. A man's just started to take in what you say when you shut your mouth. Well, we'll go to the Reeds, tomorrow morning we'll go..."

  Kandid heard him out once more.

  "Listen, Hopalong, I don't have to go to the Reeds. The Reeds aren't where I want to go. Where I want to be isn't the Reeds." Hopalong was listening and nodding. "I want to go to the City. We've often spoken of it before I told you yesterday I wanted to go to the City. I told you the day before I wanted to to the City. I said a week ago I wanted to go there. You told me you knew the way to the city. You said that yesterday. And the day before. Not to the Reeds, to the City. I don't want to go to the Reeds [don't let me get mixed up, he thought, maybe I'm mixed up already. Not the Reeds, the City. The City and not the Reeds]. The City, not the Reeds," he repeated aloud. "Understand? Tell me about the road to the City. Not to the Reeds, to the City. Still better, let's go to the City together. Not to the Reeds together, together to the City."

  He stopped. Hopalong started rubbing his sore knee again.

  "Likely when they cut your head off, Dummy, something got damaged in there. Like my leg. It used to be just an ordinary leg like anybody else's, then once I was going through the Anthills at night, carrying an ant queen and I put this foot in a hollow tree and now the leg's twisted. Why it's twisted nobody knows, but it doesn't walk straight, and that's a fact. But it'll get me to the Anthills. And I'll take you along. What I don't get is why you told me to get food ready for the trip - the Anthills is only a stone's throw from here."

  He looked at Kandid, floundered, mouth open.

  "Of course you don't want to go to the Anthills, do you? Where is it, now? I know, the Reeds. Well I can't go there, I'd never make it. See how twisted this leg is? Listen, Dummy, what is it you've got against going to the Anthills? Let's go there, eh? I've never been there once since that day, maybe the hills aren't there anymore. Let's have a look for that hollow tree, what say?"

  He'll sidetrack me, I know it, thought Kandid. He leaned over on his side and rolled a pot over to him.

  "Good pot you've got here," he said, "I don't remember when I saw a pot as good as this ... so you'll take me to the City? You told me nobody knows the road to the City except you. Let's go to the City, what do you think, will we make it?"

  "Make it? Course we'll make it! To the City, of course we will. And you have seen pots as good as these, know where? The funny folk make them like that. They don't grow them, you know, they make them out of clay, they're not far from Clay Clearing, I told you: left away from me and past the two stones as far as Mushroom Village, only nobody lives there anymore so there's no sense in going. Why should we? Haven't we seen mushrooms before? Even when my leg was all right I never went to Mushroom Village, I only know the funny folk live two ravines past there. Yes ... we could go tomorrow, yes... Listen, Dummy, let's not go there eh? I don't like those mushrooms. There's mushrooms in our part of the forest, that's different, you can eat them, they taste good. Over there they're sort of green and they smell rotten. Why do you want to go there? You'll bring spawn back with you as well. We'd better go to the City. A lot nicer. Only we can't go tomorrow, there's food to get together and we'll have to find out the way - or do you know the way? If you do, I won't need to ask. In fact I can't think who to ask. Maybe the elder knows - what do you think?"

  "Don't you know the way to the City yourself?" asked Kandid. "You know a lot about it, don't you? You even got to the City almost once, didn't you? Only you got frightened of the deadlings and decided you couldn't get through on your own..."

  "I wasn't frightened of deadlings any more than I am now," objected Hopalong. "I'll tell you what I am afraid of, though. Are you going to be quiet all the way? That's something I could never do. There's something else as well ... don't get angry at me. Dummy, just tell me, or if you don't want to say it aloud, whisper, or nod, or if you don't even want to nod just close that eye of yours, the right one in the shadow, nobody'll see only me. The question I want to put is this: aren't you just a teeny bit of a deadling? I can't stand deadlings, you know, I get the tremble when I see them, can't do a thing with myself..."

  "No, Hopalong, I'm not a deadling," said Kandid. "I can't stand them myself. If you're afraid I'll be too quiet for you, just remember w
e'll not be alone, I've told you often enough, Buster's going with us, Barnacle, and two men from New Village."

  "I'm not going with Buster," said Hopalong with decision. "First Buster took my daughter away and didn't take care of her. Lost her, he did. I didn't mind him taking her, I do mind him not taking care of her. He was going with her to New Village and robbers set on him and took my daughter and he gave her up. Your Nava and me looked ages for her but we never found her. No, Dummy, there's no sense messing with robbers. If we went to the City, you and I, there'd be no peace from them. Now if it were the Reeds, no trouble at all. We'll start tomorrow."

  "The day after," said Kandid. "You'll go, Buster, Barnacle, and the two from New Village. And we'll get right to the City."

  "If there's six of us, we'll get there," said Hopalong confidently. "I'd never get there on my own of course, but if there's six of us, we'll get there. With six of us we'd get as far as Devil's Rocks, only I don't know the way there. Shall we go to Devil's Rocks? Listen, Dummy, let's go to the City and decide there, eh? There's food to get ready though, and plenty of it."

  "Okay," said Kandid, rising to his feet. "So the day after tomorrow, we start for the City. Tomorrow I'll go to New Village, then I'll see and remind you."

  "Come around," said Hopalong. "I'd come to see you, only my leg aches, no strength in it. You come around. We'll have a chat. There's a lot of folk don't like talking to you, Dummy, it's pretty hard going, you know, but I don't mind, I've got used to it, I even like it. Come around, and bring Nava with you, she's a good girl, your Nava, no children though, they'll come she's young yet, that Nava of yours..."

  Out on the street, Kandid wiped the sweat away with his palms. Somewhere near, somebody cackled and started coughing. Kandid turned and saw the old man waving a knotted finger of warning.

  "The City, eh? So that's where you're off to? That's interesting, nobody's ever got there alive, what's more it's not done. Even you should know that even if you have got a transplanted head."