Other Earths (collection)

“Well, we’re better off than they were in Woolwich,” George said, with a kind of steely determination that told me he was going to take charge. “Now, the bad news is the seals on this hut aren’t going to help us much if the gas drifts our way. They’re old and perished, and we couldn’t spend long in here anyway before the air got stale.”

“What about the ambulance, sir?” I asked.

Ralph shook his head slowly. “No better, I’m afraid.”

“But the seals …”

“Aren’t what they used to be. If we ran into a thick cloud, we wouldn’t have much of a chance.”

“That’s not what they told us in Dorking, sir.”

“No, I don’t doubt that. But they can’t very well have ambulance drivers going around scared out of their wits, can they?”

“I don’t suppose so,” I said, without much conviction.

“Never you mind about the ambulance anyway,” George said. “There’s an underground shelter on the other side of the compound, just before the first mirror—you’d have driven past it on your way in. That’s safe, and it has its own air supply.”

“Will they still let us in?” Ralph asked.

“If we don’t dillydally. I see you’ve both got your masks—that’ll save us a jog back to the ambulance.” Still not quite steady on his feet, he went to one of the shelves and pulled down a regulation gas mask box. “Now, you two go ahead of me. You’ll find the shelter easily enough, and I won’t be far behind you.”

“You can come with us,” Ralph said.

“I can’t move very quickly—must have sprained my ankle when I fell off the ladder. Didn’t notice until now, what with the head wound and everything.”

“We’ll carry you,” I said. “We can even take you in one of the stretchers—that’ll be faster than all three of us hobbling along like a crab.” I opened my box and dragged out the gas mask. For some reason I didn’t feel as grateful to be carrying it as I usually did. I was wondering if what they had told us in Dorking also applied to the gas masks.

“Open the box, George,” Ralph said quietly.

“You two go ahead,” George said, as if we hadn’t heard him the last time.

“There’s no mask in that box, is there?”

George had his back to us, like a boy who didn’t want anyone to see his birthday present.

“The box,” Ralph said again, with a firmness I hadn’t heard before.

“All right, it’s empty,” George said, turning around slowly. He had the lid open, showing the box’s bare interior. “There was a mistake. I took the mask to the compound dressing station, then left it there by accident when I came back to the hut.”

“Why did you come back instead of going straight to the shelter?” Ralph asked.

“Because I still wanted to listen, all right? The sound mirror still works, even with those chunks taken out of it. I felt I could still be some use.” He gestured helplessly at the headphones. “I still wanted to listen,” he said again, more quietly this time.

“You hear it too,” Ralph said, wonderingly.

“Hear what?”

“The music. Don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about, old man. You said this was the only place you could concentrate. You meant more than just that, didn’t you? This is the only place where it comes back—the music—as if this war weren’t standing between us and everything we ever thought mattered. It’s why I couldn’t work here any longer, why I had to go back to the ambulance service.”

George stared at him without saying anything. So did I.

“I thought I was going insane at first—a delayed effect of the shellshock,” Ralph said. “Well, perhaps I was, but that didn’t make the music go away. If anything, it just got stronger. It was like hearing someone hum a tune in the next room, a tune you almost recognized—you could pick out just enough of the melody for it to be maddening. I talked to some of the other chaps, thinking there must be some kind of interference on the wires …but when I got funny looks, I learned to keep my mouth shut.”

“What was the music like?” George asked.

“Beautiful beyond words—what I could hear of it. Enough to break your heart. Well, mine anyway. The Pastoral, how I always meant it would sound. I could hear it, as if it were being played to me by an orchestra, as if I were just a listener in the audience. But not just the Pastoral …there was also the London, done differently—I always did mean to take another stab at that one, you know …Lark …and music I don’t even recall intending to write but that seems to have me all over it.”

“It’s our music,” George said.

“I know, old man. That’s what I’ve been hardly daring to admit to myself, all this time. It’s all the music we would have made if this war weren’t in the way. I think we did write that music, in some weird way, and it’s making itself known to us here. No one else hears it, of course. But you and I …I think we’re like antennae, or microphones, ourselves. I hear the music I would have made, and I suppose you hear your own tunes.”

“I hope they’re mine. I couldn’t bear the idea of them being yours.”

“That good, eh?”