Somewhere East of Life. Brian Aldiss

kneels on the edge of his bed, glaring down at Burnell, who makes a feeble reply. Larry is not a great listener. He goes on without pausing for answers. ‘It’s a sweet little performer. I bet you never saw one like it. It’s a Makarov PSM. A Makarov PSM, illegal in this country, a KGB pistol, a Makarov PSM.’ He pronounces the name like a lamb voicing its mother tongue. He removes the magazine from the gun to demonstrate eight rounds of a gleaming bottle-neck appearance. He makes a curious noise in the back of his throat. ‘See them rounds? Under an inch long. Know what they can do? Bust through body armour, OK? Good as .44 Magnum bullets. Blow a man’s guts out through his arse. Old KGB knew what it was doing. No kidding.’

      Suddenly the pistol is gone from his hand. ‘Concealment weapon, see. That’s why it’s so little. KGB knew what it was about, right?’

      Smiling weakly, Burnell says, ‘I have to sleep now, Larry.’ The toffee has gone.

      A second later he is staring down the barrel of Larry’s semi-automatic, which Larry, kneeling up, cradles in a professional way under his right arm. It is a cold steely piece of goods he is aiming.

      ‘You try anything funny in the night, you get a dose of this. Get it?’ His little face withers. ‘This is my big baby.’

      Reaction shot of Burnell, sitting up, alarmed. ‘No, no, I just want to sleep.’

      Larry asks him challengingly if he’s a bloody lunatic, and Burnell says he thinks he must have banged his head.

      Loud banging on the door. Larry swings the semi-automatic in that direction. Ma yells from the passage, ‘Go to sleep. You got to go to Swindon tomorrer.’ He makes shooting noises in his throat, raking her with imaginary gunfire before turning back to Burnell.

      ‘You try anything funny, you get a dose of this, right?’ Relenting slightly, he explains that this impressive weapon, his big baby, is an American .50 calibre Barrett M90, weighing only twenty-two pounds. He assures Burnell he could hold off an army with it.

      ‘I hope you aren’t expecting an army.’

      ‘Muslims, Blacks, Police – let ’em all come. See what they get.’ There is a tense silence. Burnell feels unwell.

      ‘What Muslims do you mean?’

      ‘My dad comes back here, he’s going to be in trouble.’ As he settles down, Larry says with a sob, ‘That bastard.’ He cradles the Barrett in his arms. He reaches out and switches off the light.

      Sitting huddled nervously on the floor, Burnell hears an intermittent sob. Or perhaps Larry is just sniffing.

      Longing to go to sleep but afraid to lie down, Burnell says in a small voice that he appreciates Larry’s kindness.

      He half expects to have the muzzle of the Barrett back in his ear. Larry merely says, ‘I like helping people, Roy.’ Gentle as a dove.

      Burnell is comforted. He murmurs those decent words to himself like a mantra; ‘I like helping people …’

      He falls back in a troubled cataleptic sleep. Rats gnaw in the depths of the cathedral. He wakes to find it is the sound of Larry scratching his acned cheeks in his sleep. So the movie ends. But Burnell is for real and his troubles are becoming more real as dawn sneaks in to dozy Bishops Linctus.

      Morning was hardly a spectacular affair: old and grey and broken, like an overworked carthorse out to grass, to find its way by accident into the back yards of the council houses.

      Larry had left the room when Burnell emerged from the entanglements of his rug. What roused him from limbo was the sound of Ma shouting at her son. Encouragement and admonition, carrot and stick. He sat up, aching all over. His predicament rushed back and took him by the throat. But he was undeniably feeling a little better.

      Leaning back against a distempered wall, he fished about in his brain for an identity.

      Larry entered the room, carrying a mug with no handle. ‘Thought you’d like some char, mate, OK?’

      The unrivalled powers of hot sweet tea served to clear Burnell’s head. He rose and sat on the side of the bed. From there, he stood up and went into the kitchen, where he sluiced his face under the cold tap. The debris of the take-away had gone. Instead, pairs of socks were soaking sludgily in the sink. He no longer felt so dissociated from himself, and smiled at Ma as he wiped his face on a grimy towel.

      ‘You’re a bit more perky this morning, I see,’ Ma said. ‘The washing machine’s gone on the blink again. Of course he’s not much use round the house. The black bloke next door will fix it for me. Have you said hello to Kevin?’

      A yellow canary sat in a cage on top of the fridge. It cocked its head on one side, looking at Burnell while trying out a few notes.

      Ma went over to the cage. She stuck a finger through the bars. The canary lifted one wing in a defensive gesture. ‘There’s a good boy. He likes you, don’t you, Kev? I think it’s a girl actually. One of the family, aren’t you, love? Keeps me company, any rate. Say hello to Kevin, Roy. I wash her under the hot tap every Saturday morning, don’t I, Kev? It likes that – sings her little heart out, bless her. You like a nice wash under the tap, don’t you? It’s one of the family, aren’t you? I’ll find her a bit of groundsel in a while. Who’s a good boy then?’

      While this monologue was in progress, Burnell was keeping an eye on Larry. Larry was dressed in a padded military jacket without sleeves. He had wedged the front door open and was marching back and forth between his room and an old Land Rover standing in front of the house, loading boxes of ammunition into the back of the vehicle.

      Seeing Burnell’s glance, Ma said, ‘He’s got to go into Swindon. There’s a job prospect. You better stay here with me – I don’t like the way he drives. Much too fast on them country roads. You and me’ll go down and see Dr Ramakrishna in the village. She’s – you know, what I call discreet. She was trained in London, she was telling me. She’ll help you. She told me once she liked helping lame dogs over stiles, she said.’

      ‘That’s me.’ He spoke vaguely. Something about Larry’s movements disturbed him. Larry had left the house by the front door, which remained open. He put up the tailgate of the Land Rover, locking it into place. His movements were performed in slow motion. Once he looked back into the house with abstracted gaze, as if he were inwardly composing a poem. Burnell raised a hand in greeting. He received no response.

      Walking ponderously, head down, Larry went round to the cab of the Land Rover and climbed in. He sat in the driver’s seat. Nothing happened.

      More curious than alarmed, Burnell, still nursing his tea mug, went forward into the small front room, from the window of which he had a clear view.

      He could see the back of Larry’s head. It did not stir. It resembled a cannonball which had succumbed to a parasitic yellow grass. Larry was making no attempt to start his vehicle. He merely sat in the driver’s seat. Burnell was about to turn away when a movement up the road caught his eye.

      The highway leading from this side of the village was an anonymous semi-rural stretch of road. A field opposite the houses awaited building permission. The curve of the road wound up a slight incline. The road surface remained damp from overnight mists. Behind and beyond the houses lay open agricultural land, at present looking pale and inert. The houses followed the curve of the road. Most of the vehicles which Burnell remembered to have been parked there last night were gone about their owners’ business, leaving the houses and front doors in plain view.

      From the door of the furthest council house, two hundred yards distant, a man had emerged. He came out, went inside again, to re-emerge pulling a push-chair. He steered this object through the front gate and started down the slight hill towards the village.

      In the push-chair sat a small child dressed in a blue overall. Burnell saw its arms waving, possibly in excitement. Perhaps it was two years old. The man could have been the child’s grandfather. He had grey hair and wore an old nondescript raincoat. It looked as if he was talking to the child. Possibly he was going