Macbeth

  But soon Friday would dawn, a working day, and he would have to get out before the staff arrived, and outside the news-stands would be adorned with his face.

  Duff put his hand into his jacket pocket. Felt the glossy paper under his fingers. Pulled out the package. Couldn’t stop himself, imagined Ewan’s face when he saw that he had been given what he asked for. Duff heard his own wild sobbing. Stop! He mustn’t! He had promised himself he wouldn’t think about them now. Grieving was a privilege he could grant himself later if he survived. He switched on the Volvo’s inside light, dried his tears, removed the wrapping paper, took out the false beard, opened the glue tube and squeezed out the shiny glue, which he spread over his chin, around his lips and inside the beard. Used the rear-view mirror to stick it on. Pulled the tight woollen hat over his forehead so that the upper part of his scar was hidden. Then he put on the glasses. The comically wide frames covered the scar on his cheek above the beard. In the mirror he saw he had glue on his cheek. Searched in vain through his pockets for something to wipe it off with, opened the glove compartment, found a notebook, took it out and was about to tear off the top page. Stopped. In the light he saw depressions in the paper. Someone had recently written in the notebook. So what? He tore off the sheet, wiped the glue from his cheek. Scrunched up the paper and put it in his jacket pocket. Put the notebook back in the glove compartment.

  So.

  Leaned back in the seat. Closed his eyes.

  Five hours. Why had he put on the beard so early? It already itched. He started thinking again. Fought to keep his mind off Fife. He had to find himself a place to hide in town. All the roads out would be closed. Besides he didn’t have any bolt-holes outside town or in Fife, no hostels or hotels that wouldn’t be warned, no one out of town who would hide a wanted cop-killer. And then it struck him. He didn’t know anyone who would help him. Not here, not anywhere. He was the type of person people got on with; they didn’t necessarily actively dislike him. They just didn’t like him. And why would they? What had he ever done to help them that hadn’t also helped himself? He had alliances, not friends. And now, when Duff really needed help, a friend, a shoulder to cry on, Duff was a man with no creditworthiness, a lost cause. He examined his pathetic, stiff, hirsute reflection. The fox. The hunters were closing in on him, Macbeth’s new chief hound, Seyton, already barking at his heels. He had to get away. But where, where could the fox find a foxhole?

  Five hours to daybreak. To Friday. To Ewan’s birth . . .

  No! Don’t cry! Survive! A dead man can’t avenge anything.

  He had to stay awake until it became light, then find himself somewhere else. One of the disused factories perhaps. No, he had already rejected that idea. Macbeth knew as well as he did where he would try to hide. Shit! Now he was going round in circles, crossing his own tracks, the way people did when they got lost.

  He was so tired, but he had to stay awake until it was light. Ewan had never turned ten. Shit! He tried to find something to distract himself. He read all the gauges in front of him. Took the crumpled sheet from his jacket pocket, uncrumpled it and smoothed the page. Tried to read. Rummaged through the glove compartment until he found a pencil. Held it sideways over the paper and shaded over the depressions. What had been writen on the paper, on the sheet above, which had been taken, shone white against black: Dolphin. 66 Tannery St, District 6. Alfie. Safe haven.

  An address. There was a Tannery Street in town, but no District 6. And there was only one other town that was divided into districts. Capitol. When could this note have been written? He had no idea how long it took for an impression made by a pencil to disappear. And what did it mean by Safe haven ?

  Duff switched off the light and closed his eyes. A little nap maybe?

  Capitol. Friday. He had seen this combination somewhere quite recently.

  Duff was slipping into a dream with associations to the two words when he woke with a start.

  He switched the light back on.

  23

  ‘MEREDITH AND I ARE GETTING married,’ Duff said. A sun seemed to be shining out of his eyes.

  ‘Really? That was . . . erm quick.’

  ‘Yes! Will you be my best man, Macbeth?’

  ‘Me?’

  ‘Of course. Who else?’

  ‘Erm. When . . . ?’

  ‘Sixth of July. At Meredith’s parents’ summer place. Everything’s sorted. Invitations were sent out today.’

  ‘It’s kind of you to ask, Duff. I’ll give it some thought.’

  ‘Thought?’

  ‘I’ve . . . planned a longish trip in July. July’s difficult for me, Duff.’

  ‘Trip? You didn’t say anything about this to me.’

  ‘No, I might not have done.’

  ‘But then we haven’t spoken for a while. Where have you been? Meredith was asking after you.’

  ‘Was she? Oh, here and there. Been a bit busy.’

  ‘And where will this trip take you?’

  ‘To Capitol.’

  ‘Capitol?’

  ‘Yes, I’ve . . . erm never been there. Time to see our capital, isn’t it? It’s supposed to be so much nicer than here.’

  ‘Listen to me now, my dear Macbeth. I’ll pay for a return air ticket from Capitol. Can’t have my best pal not being there when I get married. It’ll be the party of the year! Imagine all Meredith’s single girlfriends . . .’

  ‘And from Capitol I’m going abroad. It’s a long trip, Duff. I’ll probably be away all July.’

  ‘But . . . Has this got anything to do with the little flirtation you and Meredith had once?’

  ‘So if we don’t see each other for a bit, all the best with the wedding and . . . well, everything.’

  ‘Macbeth!’

  ‘Thanks, Duff, but I won’t forget I owe you dragon blood. Say hello to Meredith and thank her for the little flirtation.’

  ‘Macbeth, sir!’

  Macbeth opened his eyes. He was lying in bed. A dream. Nevertheless. Were those the words they had used then? Dragon blood. Lorreal. Had he really said that?

  ‘Macbeth!?’

  The voice came from the other side of the bedroom door and now it was accompanied by frenetic banging. He looked at the clock on the bedside table. Three o’clock in the morning.

  ‘Sir, it’s Jack!’

  Macbeth turned the other way. He was alone. Lady wasn’t there.

  ‘Sir, you have to—’

  Macbeth tore open the door. ‘What’s up, Jack?’

  ‘She’s sleepwalking.’

  ‘So? Aren’t you keeping an eye on her?’

  ‘It’s different this time, sir. She . . . You’ve got to come.’

  Macbeth yawned, switched on the light, donned a dressing gown and was about to leave the room when his gaze fell on the table under the mirror. The shoebox was gone.

  ‘Quick. Show me the way, Jack.’

  They found her on the roof. Jack paused on the threshold of the open metal door. It had stopped raining, and all that could be heard was the wind and the regular rumble of the traffic that never slept. She was standing right on the edge, in the light of the Bacardi sign, with her back to them. A gust of wind caught her thin nightdress.

  ‘Lady!’ Macbeth said and was about to rush over to her, but Jack held him back. ‘The psychiatrist said she mustn’t be woken up when she’s sleepwalking, sir.’

  ‘But she could fall over the edge!’

  ‘She often comes up here and stands just there,’ Jack said. ‘She can see even if she’s asleep. The psychiatrist says sleepwalkers rarely come to harm, but if you wake them they can become disorientated and hurt themselves.’

  ‘Why has no one told me she comes up here? I’ve been given the impression she basically strolls up and down the corridor.’

  ‘She told me in no uncertain terms that I was not to
say what she does in her sleep, sir.’

  ‘And what does she do?’

  ‘Sometimes she strolls up and down the corridor as you say. Otherwise she goes into the washroom and uses the strong soap there. Scrubs her hands, occasionally until her skin goes red. Then she comes up on the roof.’

  Macbeth looked at her. His beloved Lady. So exposed and vulnerable out in the wind-blown night. So alone in the darkness of her mind, the darkness she had told him about but where she couldn’t take him. There was nothing he could do. Just wait and hope she would choose to come back in from the night. So near and so out of reach.

  ‘What makes you think she might take her life tonight?’

  Jack glanced at Macbeth in surprise. ‘I don’t think she will, sir.’

  ‘So what was it then, Jack?’

  ‘What was what, sir?’

  ‘What made you so worried that you called me?’

  At that moment the moonlight broke through a gap in the cloud. And as if at an agreed signal Lady turned and walked towards them.

  ‘That, sir.’

  ‘God help us,’ Macbeth whispered and hurriedly took a step back.

  She was holding a bundle in her arms. She had pulled her nightdress to expose one breast, which she held to the open end of the bundle. Macbeth saw the back of a baby’s head. He counted four black holes in it.

  ‘Is she asleep?’ Macbeth asked.

  ‘I think so,’ Jack whispered.

  They had followed her closely off the roof, down the stairs and into the suite. Now they were standing by her bed, where she lay with the blanket pulled up over her and the child.

  ‘Shall we take it off her?’

  ‘Let her keep it,’ Macbeth said. ‘What harm can it do? But I want you to sit here and watch over her tonight. I have an important radio interview early tomorrow morning and have to sleep, so just give me a key for another room.’

  ‘Of course,’ Jack said. ‘I’ll ring for someone to take over at reception.’

  While Jack was away Macbeth stroked the baby’s cheek. Cold, stiff, a destroyed baby. What Lady and he had been. But they had managed to repair themselves. No. Lady had managed to repair herself. Macbeth had had help. From Banquo. And before that, at the orphanage, from Duff. Had Duff not killed Lorreal, Macbeth would probably have committed suicide sooner or later. Even when he escaped from the home he still had four black holes in his heart. Four holes that had to be filled with something. Brew was the quickest and easiest available sealant. But at least he kept himself alive. Thanks to Duff, the bastard.

  And then there was Lady of course. Who had shown him that hearts can be sealed with love, and pain can be eased with love-making. He stroked her cheek. Warm. Soft.

  Were there ways back or had they forgotten to plan for a possible retreat? Had they planned only for victories? Yes, and they’d had victories. But what if the victory leaves a bitter taste, what if it comes at too great a cost and you would prefer a cheap defeat? What do you do then? Do you abdicate, renounce the royal trappings, ask humbly for forgiveness and return to your daily chores? When you step off the edge of the roof, and the cobbles of the red-light district rush towards you, do you ask gravity if you can retrace your ill-considered step? No. You take what’s coming. Make the best of it. Make sure you land on your feet and perhaps break a leg or two. But you survive. And you become a better person who has learned to tread more carefully the next time.

  Jack came in. ‘I’ve found someone for reception,’ he said and handed Macbeth a key.

  Macbeth looked at it. ‘Duncan’s room?’

  Jack put a hand to his mouth in horror. ‘I thought it was the best room, but you might prefer . . .’

  ‘That’s fine, Jack. I’m close by in case there is anything. Besides I don’t believe in ghosts. And as everyone knows I have nothing to fear from Duncan’s ghost.’

  ‘No, nothing.’

  ‘Indeed, nothing at all. Goodnight.’

  They came as soon as he closed his eyes.

  Duncan and Malcolm. They were lying under the duvet either side of him.

  ‘There isn’t room for us all,’ Macbeth screamed and kicked them out onto the floor, where they hissed until rat tails rustled alongside the wall and they were gone.

  But then the door opened, and in crept Banquo, Fleance and Duff, each with a dagger in hand, poised ready to strike.

  ‘What do you want?’

  ‘Justice and our sleep back.’

  ‘Ha, ha, ha!’ Macbeth laughed, writhing in his bed. ‘The person who can hurt me hasn’t been born! Only Bertha can unseat me as chief commissioner! I am immortal! Macbeth is immortal! Out, you dead mortals!’

  24

  FRED ZIEGLER YAWNED.

  ‘Fred, you need a cup of coffee.’ The captain of MS Glamis chuckled. ‘We can’t have a harbour pilot falling asleep in this weather. Tell me, are you always tired?’

  ‘Busy days, not enough sleep,’ Fred said. He could hardly tell the captain the reason he was always yawning was that he was frightened. Fred had seen the same symptom in his dog, but fortunately yawning was usually regarded as indicating that you were totally at ease. Bored. Or, indeed, you hadn’t slept enough. The captain pressed the intercom, and his order for coffee went down the cable to the galley, deck after deck after deck. MS Glamis was a big ship. A tall ship. And that was what bothered Fred Ziegler.

  He stifled another yawn and stared across the river. He knew every reef, every shallow and every tiny paragraph in the port authority rulebook about sailing into and out of the harbour – where the current flowed strong, where the waves broke, where you could lie in shelter and where every bollard on the quay was. That didn’t bother him. The river was grey; he could guide ships in and out blindfolded, and often had, or as good as. The weather didn’t bother him either. A near gale was blowing, and the glass in front of them was already white with spray and salt. But he had guided bigger and smaller ships in hurricanes and worse without needing a beacon, a spar buoy or a lookout. The trip in the little pilot boat that would take him ashore didn’t trouble him, even though it was as seaworthy as a cow – a fresh breeze and it took in water, the hint of a gale and it could turn round if the coxswain didn’t hit the waves right.

  Fred Ziegler yawned because he dreaded the ship lowering the red and white flag that showed they had a pilot on board. Or to be more precise, having to leave the ship. Going down the rope ladder.

  For twelve years he had worked as a pilot and still he hadn’t got used to going up and down the side of a ship. It didn’t bother him that he might end up in the drink, although he knew he ought to have been afraid because he couldn’t swim.

  No, what bothered him was the height.

  The paralysing fear when he would have to step out backwards from the ship’s side. Even in this weather the ship was so big that climbing down the ladder on the leeward side wasn’t difficult from a purely technical point of view. However, seeing or just knowing that there was fifteen metres of thin air between him and the abyss bothered him. It had always been like this and always would be. Every bloody working day was bound up with this minor hell: it was the first thing on his mind when he woke up in the morning and the last before he went to sleep. But what the heck, there was nothing unusual about it – all around him he saw people who lived their whole lives doing jobs or in positions they weren’t cut out for.

  ‘You must have come out of the harbour so many times now that you could ask the coastguard just to let you go,’ Fred said.

  ‘Let me go?’ the captain said. ‘I wouldn’t have your company then, Fred. What is it? Don’t you like me?’

  I don’t like your ship, Fred thought. I’m a small man who doesn’t like big ships.

  ‘By the way, you’re going to see less of me in the future,’ the captain said.

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Not enough carg
o. Last year we lost Graven when they went bankrupt and then Estex closed down. What we have on board now is the last remaining stock.’

  Fred had noticed by the way the ship lay in the water there was less cargo than usual.

  ‘Shame,’ Fred said.

  ‘No, makes no odds,’ the captain said gloomily. ‘Knowing this toxic stuff we’ve been transporting for all these years is paid for with our fellow citizens’ lives . . . Believe me, I haven’t always slept well and I’ve sometimes wondered what it must have been like being the captain of a slave ship. You have to be creative to find good enough excuses for yourself. Perhaps we know the difference between right and wrong even without using this wonderful big brain of ours. But with it we can assemble some really sophisticated arguments which, individually, sound good and, as a whole, can lead us to exactly where we want to go, regardless of how steeped in insanity this all is. No, Fred, I don’t want to ask the coastguards for permission to navigate these contaminated waters without a pilot. On Wednesday we were queueing up to come in when a message came from the harbour master himself saying that we had top priority. Free of charge.’

  ‘That must have been a nice surprise.’

  ‘Yes. Then I took a closer look at the bill of lading. Turned out we’d been transporting two Gatling guns. This is beginning to resemble how it was under Kenneth. Hey, careful! Are you trying to scald our pilot, son?’