Weaveworld

VI

THE BRITTLE MACHINE

1

n the morning of the second of February, Cal found Brendan dead in bed. He had died, the doctor reported, an hour before dawn; simply given up and slipped away in his sleep.

His mental processes had begun to deteriorate rapidly, about a week before Christmas. On some days he’d call Geraldine by his wife’s name, and take Cal for his brother. The prognosis had not been good, but nobody had expected this sudden exit. No opportunity for explanations or fond farewells. One day he was here, the next he could only be mourned.

Much as Cal had loved Brendan, he found grief difficult. It was Geraldine who wept; Geraldine who had all the proper sentiments to hand out when the neighbours came to offer their condolences. Cal could only play the part of the grieving child, not feel it. All he felt was ill at ease.

That feeling grew stronger as the cremation approached. He was increasingly detached from himself, viewing his absence of emotion with a disbelieving eye. It seemed suddenly there were two Cals. One, the public mourner, dealing with the business of death as propriety demanded, the other a coruscating critic of the first, calling the bluff of every cliché and empty gesture. It was Mad Mooney’s voice, this second: the scourge of liars and hypocrites. ‘You’re not real at all,’ the poet would whisper. ‘Look at you! Sham that you are!’

This dislocation brought strange side-effects; most significantly, the dreams that now returned to him. He dreamt himself floating in air as clear as love’s eyes; dreamt trees heavy with golden fruit; dreamt animals that spoke like people, and people who roared. He dreamt of the pigeons too, several times a night, and on more than one occasion he woke certain that 33 and his mate had spoken to him, in their bird way, though he could make no sense of their advice.

The idea was still with him by day, and – though he knew the notion was laughable – he found himself quizzing the birds as he fed them their daily bread, asking them, half in jest, to give up what they knew. They just winked their eyes, and grew fat.

The funeral came and went. Eileen’s relatives came across from Tyneside, and Brendan’s from Belfast. There was whisky, and Guinness for Brendan’s brothers, and ham sandwiches with the crusts cut off, and when the glasses and the plates were empty they all went home.