It was what his mother would have done in the circumstances. Boiled some fresh water, warmed the pot and counted out the spoonfuls of tea. Setting domestic order against the chaos, in the hope of winning some temporary reprieve from the vale of tears.

VI

EVENTS IN A HIGH WIND

1

As he stepped back into the hall, Cal remembered Nimrod.

The back door was ajar, and the child had tottered out into the wilderness of the garden, dwarfed by the bushes. Cal went to the door and called after him, but Nimrod was busy pissing into a bed of rampant Sweet William. Cal left him to it. In his present condition the most gratification Nimrod could hope for was a good piss.

As he set the kettle on the stove, the Bournemouth train (via Runcorn, Oxford, Reading and Southampton) thundered past. A moment later Nimrod was at the door. ‘Good God,' he said. ‘How did you ever sleep here?' ‘You get used to it,' said Cal. ‘And keep your voice down. My Dad'll hear you.'

‘What happened to my drink?' ‘It'll have to wait.' ‘I'll bawl,' Nimrod warned. ‘So bawl.'

His bluff called, Nimrod shrugged and turned back to survey the garden.

‘I could get to love this world,' he announced, and stepped out again into the sunlight.

Cal picked up a soiled cup from the sink, and rinsed it clean for his father. Then he crossed to the refrigerator in search of milk. As he did so he heard Nimrod make a small sound. He turned, and went to the window. Nimrod was staring up at the sky, his face wide with wonder. He was watching a plane go over, no doubt. Cal retraced his steps. As he took the milk, which was practically the sole occupant of the refrigerator, off the shelf, there was a rapping on the front door. He looked up again, and two or three impressions hit him at the same time.

One, that a breeze had suddenly got up from somewhere. Two, that Nimrod was stepping back into the thicket of raspberry bushes, in search of a hiding place. And three, that it was not wonder on his face, but fear -

Then the rapping became a beating. Fists on the door.

As he made his way through the hall he heard his father say:

‘Cal? There's a child in the garden.'

And from the garden, a shout.

‘Cal? A child -'

From the corner of his eye he saw Brendan walk through the kitchen, heading for the garden.

‘Wait, Dad -' he said, as he opened the front door.

Freddy was on the step. But it was Lilia - standing a little way behind him - who said:

"Where's my brother?

‘Out in the -'

Garden, he was going to say, but the street scene outside left him mute.

The wind had picked up every item not nailed down - litter, dustbin lids, pieces of garden furniture - and flung them into an aerial tarantella. It had uprooted flower beds, and was picking up the soil from the borders, staining the sun with a veil of earth.

A few pedestrians, caught in this hurricane, were clinging to lamp-posts and fences; some were flat on the ground, hands over their heads.

Lilia and Freddy stepped into the house; the wind followed, eager for fresh conquest, roaring through the house and out again into the back garden, its sudden gusts so strong Cal was almost flung off his feet.

‘Shut the door!' Freddy yelled.

Cal pushed the door closed, and bolted it. It rattled as the wind beat on the other side.

‘Jesus.' said Cal. ‘What's happening?'

‘Something's come after us,' said Freddy.

‘What?'

‘I don't know.'

Lilia was already half way to the kitchen. Through the open door at the back it was almost night, the air was so full of dirt, and Cal saw his father stepping over the threshold, shouting something against the banshee howl of the wind. Beyond him, only visible because of his toga, Nimrod was clinging to a bush as the wind tried to pick him up.

Cal followed Lilia at a run and overtook her at the kitchen door. There was a commotion on the roof, as a pack of slates were ripped away.

Brendan was in the garden now, all but eclipsed by the wind.

‘Wait, Dad!' Cal yelled.

As he crossed the kitchen his eyes grazed the tea-pot and the cup beside it, and the utter absurdity of all this hit him like a hammer blow.

I'm dreaming, he thought; I fell from the wall and I've been dreaming ever since. The world isn't like this. The world is the tea-pot and the cup, it isn't raptures and tornadoes.

In that instant of hesitation, the dream became a nightmare. Through the gusting dirt he saw the Rake.

It hung on the wind for a moment, its form caught in a sliver of sun.

‘Done for,' said Freddy.

The words stung Cal into moving. He was through the back door and out into the garden before the Rake could fall upon the pitiful figures below.

The beast drew Cal's astonished eyes. He saw the morbid fashioning of its skin, which made it billow and swell, and heard again the howl that he'd thought was simply the wind. It was nothing so natural; the sound came out of this phantasm from a dozen places, either the din or the breath it rose on

drawing most of the garden's contents out of the ground and throwing them into the air.

A rain of plants and stones came down on the occupants of the garden. Cal covered his head with his hands, and ran blindly towards the spot where he'd last seen his father. Brendan was flat on the ground, shielding himself. Nimrod was not with him.

Cal knew the route the garden path took like the back of his hand. Spitting out mud as he went, he headed away from the house.

Somewhere above, now mercifully hidden, the Rake howled again, and Cal heard Lilia cry out. He did not look behind him, for ahead he now saw Nimrod, who had reached the back fence and was attempting to tear at the rotted timbers. He was having some success too, despite his size. Cal ducked his head down as another rain of earth fell, and ran past the pigeon loft towards the fence.

The howls had stopped, but the wind was far from spent. To judge by the din from the other side of the house it was tearing Chariot Street apart. As he reached the fence, Cal turned round. The sun stabbed the veil of dirt, and he saw blue sky for an instant - then a form blocked the sight, and Cal threw himself at the fence and started to scramble over, as the creature moved towards him. At the top, his belt snagged on a nail. He reached to release it, certain that the Rake was at his neck, but Mad Mooney must have been pushing from behind, for as he pulled his belt from its mooring he fell over the far side of the fence, life and limb intact.

He stood up, and saw why. The boneless beast was hovering beside the loft, its head weaving back and forth as it listened to the pigeons within. Silently blessing the birds, Cal ducked down and tore another plank of the fence away, sufficient to pull Nimrod through.

As a child he'd had the dangers of this no-man's land between fence and railway track beaten into him. Now such dangers seemed negligible beside whatever it was that loitered at the loft. Picking Nimrod up in his arms, Cal climbed the gravel embankment towards the rails.

‘Run,' said Nimrod. ‘It's just behind us. Run!'

Cal looked North and South. The wind had reduced visibility to ten or fifteen yards in both directions. Heart in mouth he stepped over the first rail and onto the oil-slicked space between the sleepers. There were four tracks altogether, two in each direction. He was stepping towards the second when he heard Nimrod say:

‘Shit.'

Cal turned, heels grinding in the gravel, to see that their pursuer had forsaken bird-fancying and was rising over the fence.

Behind the beast, he saw Lilia Pellicia. She was standing in the ruins of the Mooney garden, her mouth open as if to shout. But no sound emerged. Or at least none that Cal could hear. The beast was not so insensitive however. It halted in its advance, turning back towards the garden and the woman in it.