Cloud Cuckoo Land Read online

  ‘Well, it’s a secret.’

  ‘So why tell me now?’

  Adeline shrugged. She put down one half of her sandwich, wiped her hands on a paper towel and took an envelope out of her bag. She emptied a handful of black and white photographs onto the wall beside her.

  ‘Take a look at these.’

  Leonard picked them up and shuffled them in his hands. They were aerial photographs, rivers and roads like pencil marks, winding through valleys, around mountains. Each photograph in the sequence was at a higher magnification, and the last one showed a dark cluster of circles beside a group of rectangular buildings in the middle of a valley.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘That’s what all the bloody fuss is about. That’s the vessel complex.’

  Leonard studied the pictures close up, so close that focusing eyes made the back of his head hurt.

  ‘Really? It’s the vessel? Are you sure?’

  She didn’t answer, she just gave him the lowest, gravest look.

  ‘How’d you get these?’

  ‘I paid a chain of liars. These are classified images, satellite photos.’

  ‘So there is a vessel.’

  ‘Did you ever doubt it?’

  ‘I never really believe anyone or anything until I see some hard evidence and with my own eyes!’

  ‘So why did you come here? What if the whole thing was just a rumour?’

  ‘Well, I thought I might save my life. And I came to find out the truth. The pictures are a good start but I still need to see the thing for myself.’

  ‘That’s impossible.’

  Adeline snatched the photographs and stuffed them back in her bag.

  ‘I’m going back to the gallery.’

  ‘Hang on, I want to ask you something. Why did you show me the photos anyway?’

  ‘It seems you like to help ladies in distress. That’s what you were doing the other night with the lamp climber, right? After curfew?’

  ‘Yeah but…’

  She turned away from Leonard and headed off back towards the admin building. Leonard followed and took her arm at the elbow, by that small bone there, that feels like a pistol grip.

  ‘Are you in trouble, Adeline?’

  ‘No more than anyone else!’

  They entered and started to climb the stairs to the gallery two at a time. Her neckline was low and he gazed at her back. Her exposed skin was scattered with freckles, like the night sky in negative.

  ◊

  There was a noise below, the light footsteps of the next applicant as he shuffled into the chamber.

  He was a jowly man, a curly-haired, short man with square shoulders and short arms, arms thick in the uppers, tapering to thin wrists. He looked like a habitual grump in his tight yellow T-shirt with the maker’s logo stitched over the left pectoral. He had over-long fingernails, which hooked over into curling claws. He placed a small wireless on the floor and switched it on. The voice of Frank Sinatra singing ‘Fly Me To The Moon’ filled the interview room.

  He fished some strips of blue rubber out of his pockets, then with his sharp hands he inflated and tied the balloons into various animal shapes. He made small, blue balloon dogs: spaniels, setters and poodles with bob-tails. He popped a few with his fingernails but carried on undeterred, blowing up, stretching and twisting; plain balloons they were, nothing written on them.

  By the time the Warden entered, the applicant had a hunting pack of a dozen or so obedient blue hounds at his feet. The Warden wasn’t fazed, he took his seat and started with the routine.

  ‘Mr Newman, is it?’

  Newman switched the music off and nodded.

  ‘Go ahead then, please. I take it you know what we are doing here and the question is the same as ever.’

  ‘Yes, I know. I’m sorry about the…’ he pointed at his blue dogs, ‘only I’m an entertainer and I…’

  ‘That’s fine, Mr Newman, I like your act.’

  ‘It’s not an act, it’s a way of life.’

  Newman twisted a hind leg onto a body.

  ‘Do carry on then, Mr Newman.’

  ‘Well, I suppose I’ve come here because I think I’m the man for the job. I have certain qualities in that, I am sensitive, caring, relatively intelligent and genetically robust.’

  An exploding balloon finished his sentence.

  ‘Excuse me, Warden, but I gather from what I have read that you get to ask all the questions. But my very best quality is that I am curious. I want to know more about you and the project. I need to see some evidence. I suppose I need to know what I am getting myself into.’

  The Warden’s face registered some lack of patience.

  ‘The facts are well publicised, Mr Newman. What we do here is selection. We give you a chance to be involved in this undertaking, your job is to rise to the occasion, not complain at the outset. I will add one word of, well, warning really. It’s not your business or anybody else’s to know the details. Don’t try to get to the bottom of this; all that you will find down there will be your own, lifeless body.’

  The Warden looked up, his eyes sweeping across the public gallery. He was speaking not only to Newman but to everyone in the room.

  ‘When will you people learn? All I require is that you talk to me so that I can see who you are, then I can make my decision, file you under “maybe” or send you home. So, Mr Newman, please just talk to me, tell me about yourself.’

  Newman picked up a handful of uninflated balloons and started to mumble…

  ‘It just hasn’t been the same, has it?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Not since Frank Sinatra died.’

  ‘Do go on, Mr Newman.’

  ‘Well, it was good to know he was out there, wasn’t it? Out there somewhere in the back of a limo, in a black Cadillac, going from conquest to conquest, laughing on the phone to some big-wig, sipping bourbon on the rocks, with his bow-tie undone and his hair slicked back. It was good all that, wasn’t it?’

  The Warden smiled.

  ‘I would have to agree with you there, Mr Newman.’

  ‘Soups, I like soups. Tins, I buy two tins, different flavours and I mix the two so I’ve got my own flavour. Sometimes it doesn’t work and I have to throw it away; sometimes it’s so good I think I must telephone the company to give them the idea.’

  ‘Are you a tea or coffee drinker, Mr Newman?’

  ‘Well, I like both, but they’ve got to be separate. They don’t mix at all well, though I have tried. If I’m making refreshments for visitors and some want tea and some want coffee, I don’t even stir with the same spoon, there’s contamination.’

  ‘But what have you been doing with yourself all these forty-three years? Tell me about your career path, your background?’

  ‘Moving around, wandering, you know. I never like to stay in one place for too long. I’m no good at business, I don’t think I’ll ever have any money. I like new places, new vistas. I’m not a professional man, that is you couldn’t really say “there goes Newman the plumber” or “Newman the dentist” because I’m not, I’m not any of those things. I’m… well, I’m just Newman, the man with his eyes and ears and heart open, and that’s all.’

  There was a pause. Leonard could tell that the Warden was listening carefully; he seemed to be hearing a kind of music to his ears.

  The sound of Adeline’s chair scraping as she stood, put a kind of full stop at the end of Newman’s interview. She turned to leave and as she passed close to Leonard she dropped a blue envelope into his lap. Folded inside was an invitation to the tavern, to celebrate her husband’s birthday: ‘Tony’s Fiftieth Birthday Bash! Fancy Dress Essential!’ There were plenty of glittering stars, glued and sprinkled on the card, but the presentation had about it a kind of handmade impatience. Leonard felt pretty awkward about how this was shaping up, he felt like he wanted to stop knowing Adeline and concentrate on why he was here. But it was too late for that. After all, she had shown him photographs of the vessel and he
wasn’t about to forget that she had already stuck her tongue way down his throat.

  ◊

  Leonard wanted to get back to the Mirabelle. His bag was there, his other shoes and washing kit, his bed and the familiar view.

  He headed home but took a route that swung further south than usual, through a newer but more temporary district.

  People walking through the streets here carried dark briefcases and leather handbags, not the customary plastic shopping bags. It was nicer here too: the streets were wider, there were fewer but nicer cars and on the horizon there was an arc of blue coastline. Prosperity, that’s what it was: the polish of high tech industries. There were glowing computer screens visible through the office windows. Small businesses, lots of one-, two-and three-man ‘Ltd’ and ‘Incorporated’ companies housed in ‘overnight success’ buildings made from sheet steel bolted together. They had wooden window frames and quite small front gardens. Each building was freshly painted, white with red oxide roofs, sky blue or custard yellow front doors.

  Sometimes a roofline swept up into a Balkan dome or a red minaret with flaring oriental shoulders. There was an atmosphere of arrival and departure here; company names, like ‘Voyager Handling’ or ‘North Star Services’ suggested long haul flights and sleeping carriages.

  All the while, taxis and motorbike couriers arrived to deliver and pick up parcels. One rider in blackened leathers flipped open the luggage box, which was strapped to the rear of his seat. He lifted a metal flask out of the box, checked his clipboard and started looking for the address. He flipped his visor back and approached Leonard.

  ‘All right? Don’t know a company called “I Q Germ Cell”, do you?’

  ‘Sorry, no. What’s in the flask?’

  ‘Sperm, genius sperm.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You asked.’

  The rider caught sight of the company logo and stepped through the entrance door.

  Leonard scratched his head and turned to the north. In twenty minutes or so, the city became more familiar again, and the Mirabelle came into view soon enough, with an ambulance parked outside, lights flashing.

  Harry was leaning on the reception desk, looking very nonchalant. He was reading a newspaper and wearing a shirt this time, but he was still plugged in to a power source. His body, of course, jerking rhythmically underneath his shirt.

  Standing in the double doorway which led up the stairs, was a policeman, police boy really, a child with his legs wide, stomach in, chest out, eyes staring straight ahead. Harry watched Leonard cross the reception area. He nodded, but gave no clue as to what to expect.

  The police boy broke the silence.

  ‘Good evening, sir.’

  ‘Evening, officer.’

  The boy took it as a compliment and the skin around his eyes creased as he grinned.

  ‘Yes ah, there’s been a death in the building. Forensic scientists are dusting for fingerprints all over the place. If I could just ask you not to wander into room twelve until they’re finished?’

  ‘That’s not a problem. What happened?’

  ‘We haven’t got a monkey’s, sir. Your guess is as good as ours, unless you did it, then your guess would be spot on. Did you do it, sir?’

  ‘No, of course not.’

  The boy stepped aside and Leonard climbed the stairs. It would be tricky all this. In a closed environment like the hotel, everyone was going to be a suspect.

  He walked along the first floor landing to take a look at the crime scene. There were no guards outside the room, but inside, two men in blue boiler suits were down on their knees and dusting for fingerprints. The room was a mess, like there’d been a prolonged struggle, strangling and blows though, no blood bath, no evidence of knives or guns puncturing the flesh. The room was the same as Leonard’s: same carpet, same bed, same window on the same wall. There were thirty or more wooden canes scattered all over the floor and leaning against the walls. And, in amongst the canes, were pieces of broken china, half smashed and completely smashed plates. The body was lying on its side, turned away from the room and kind of snuggled up against the skirting board.

  Leonard moved closer and saw, for the first time since he’d arrived, the true nature of the city. It was ugly, the way the end would be. This was a foretaste of the way the whole world would look, the way people would behave when time suddenly ran out, all at once.

  One of the boiler suits noticed Leonard.

  ‘Oi, what you doing here?’

  ‘Ah, just wanted to know what happened. I live upstairs.’

  ‘Name?’

  ‘Leonard, Leonard Gopaul.’

  ‘Any papers?’

  ‘They’re with Admin.’

  ‘I see. No big deal here, you should move along, Mr Gopaul. There’s nothing for you to see here.’

  Leonard pointed at the body.

  ‘I beg to differ.’

  ‘Ah, well yeah, the plate spinner. Imagine the scene if you can, she must have had thirty or so china white dishes spinning above her head. I know what that’s like. She would have been completely absorbed by the rotations and the timings, she wouldn’t have noticed the intruder, see. Nice girl by all accounts, caught short with her hands full, easy target.’

  CHAPTER THREE

  It came through the fog, this manmade noise, a regular tone splicing through the mind at rest. Tony listened, then remembered what it was. His ear ached from the tiny earpiece but it had done the job and woken him in the middle of the night. The audio lead ran from his ear to a small alarm clock, the face in lime green fluorescent saying 04.31. Tony turned and looked at the mound of duvet which masked the shape of Adeline. He raised himself up on one elbow and looked at her face. It was expressionless now, such a marked difference from her awake state. Normally her face was such an acute barometer of the way she felt about him. She was so terribly capable, so in control of her own destiny. Tony raised his hand and hit Adeline hard around the face, then dropped back onto his pillows and resumed a fast asleep position.

  Adeline came to in confusion. She brought her fingers up to her numb face, which was tingling on one side.

  Tony bit his lip; he loved this moment. He kept very still, kept his deep breathing slow and regular, even though he was completely awake. He could hear her brain, by a process of elimination, going through the possible causes.

  This was beautiful, an outright score, a sharp blow and she could say nothing. It was a crushing victory, not one of those arguments he never felt he could win, where he could never make her shut up and concede. Her logic would not allow him any kind of upper hand, not because she was so smart, but because her arguments were always so biased in her own favour.

  After a while she managed to over-ride the tingling nerves in her cheek and fall back to sleep. Tony also returned to his own deep and delicious, well-deserved slumber.

  ◊

  Tony had gone off early in the morning for the first treat of his birthday, a round of golf with his brothers. He played the kind of slugged-out golf weekenders play, hacking turf into the air, bending the high irons onto the wrong fairways, losing balls in long grass and water hazards and pulling his neck muscles. A great game, golf; a cold and wet preamble, all in aid of getting into the bar, tanking up and driving home knackered. The shoes were good, though, the metal spikes made a great sound over concrete and you got to wear a leather glove on your left hand.

  Halfway through the round, Tony stood up on the ninth tee and addressed the ball. He waggled his club, waited for his blood to boil then took a murderous swing at it. It was a good contact and the ball sailed off up the fairway. Tony punched the air and shouted, ‘Yes!’ to egg himself on.

  Tony’s brothers kept on saying, ‘Look! Look!’ long after his ball had landed. When Tony turned he saw that what they were pointing at was a flaring, white projectile, which was burning a low arc in the eastern sky. They stood there in a tight group and just watched the event unfold. Eventually Tony had to ask.

  �
�What the hell is that?’

  There was an explosion of sorts as the object hit the earth a couple of miles away. A faint, but detectable tremor came up through Tony’s toes and a ball of smoke lifted up out of the open farmland. Tony was the eldest; it was up to him to say.

  ‘Come on, let’s go and have a look.’

  It took them ten minutes to get to the site, they were the first on the scene. The hole in the ground was about the size of a car. The earth smouldered; it smelt acrid. Tony’s middle brother Danny spoke up.

  ‘It’s an impact crater, an early warning. It’s a piece of the asteroid. They’ve been telling us that we should expect this kind of thing. I’ve been trying to kid myself that all this wasn’t going to happen.’

  Tony jumped down into the crater and fished out a piece of hot rock with his golf club.

  ◊

  Adeline had worked all day decorating the bar. She’d wired up the flashing lights, stirred up a swirling bowl of punch, hung balloons, organised food, music, taxis. She’d soaked herself in a bubble bath for an hour, then she’d pulled on her costume. By seven in the evening she was all through with the preparations.

  She stood outside the tavern and waited to welcome the first guests. Tony, as far as she knew at this stage, was still frolicking in the clubhouse at the golf course.

  ◊

  It would be rude to refuse, right? That was the mantra Leonard had in mind as he stood and looked at his reflection. The surprising sight of a cavalry officer, in full parade regalia, looked back at him. A horse-guard in red jacket with silver buttons, dark trousers, riding boots, diagonal belt and ceremonial sabre. All of this topped off by a chrome helmet with a white plume. Stupid really, a tomato coloured, cocksure knob, is how he would have summed up anybody else dressed like this. But he’d left it late before going to the hire shop and it was either cavalry officer or the ape suit and well, the ape suit had seen too much action and it didn’t have any pockets. He reckoned it would get hot and he would have to remove the head and carry it around all evening, and what’s the point of that?

  Leonard felt ridiculous as he walked up to the Spanish district. He was worried about moving closer to a wary husband because he had no excuse from this point forward; he was making the choices, his actions were self-propelled. He knew it, we all know it; past the first kiss, the gradient steepens and fucking, more often than not, will follow.