Sunday evening was slow.
Despite Lydia’s earlier decree, the hutch and the rabbit were brought into the kitchen because the wind was blowing a gale, and ‘He is such a little rabbit and he’s sure to be frightened.’ So Josie and Beth sat there with him, for company.
Jacob was alone in the dining room, huddled over his history homework, sketching in some detail an early combustion engine. He had a pretty good idea how it worked, which could never be said of the spaceship buried in Highgate Cemetery! He sighed as the thought of the ship pressed on his mind, distracting his attention. Would it really go? Would he never see it again?
Come to the spaceship, Javayl ban.
The voice was more than ever a tiny whisper, unreal but not quite dismissible.
Lydia and Steven were in the front room, deep in armchairs, watching the television in companionable silence. To Steven also the voice was whispering.
Come to the spaceship, breaker of rules. Time is passing. Soon will it be too late.
Steven turned up the sound on the set. It was a programme about pyramids in ancient Egypt.
‘Is that not a bit loud?’ said Lydia, looking up from her sewing.
‘Sorry,’ said Steven, adjusting the sound again. ‘I didn’t mean to turn it up so far.’
‘They can tell you anything, you know,’ said Lydia. ‘The only thing we really know about the pyramids is that they are there. The rest is scholarly speculation.’
Steven smiled. ‘Do you believe in Julius Caesar?’ he said playfully.
‘Probably not,’ said Lydia, making a face at him. ‘Would you like a cup of tea? Than which there is nothing more real!’
To be alone did not suit him at that moment. He followed her into the kitchen and bent down in the corner where the twins were sitting. Then he talked seriously to the rabbit. ‘There is more to life than lettuce, o Bob,’ he said. ‘There are carrots and peas and big broad beans. And, glory of glories, there are also bright red radishes!’
The twins listened to him and giggled.
At eleven-thirty Lydia went up to bed, leaving her husband alone watching the television beside the fire in the dimly lit room.
‘I’ll not be long,’ he said. ‘I’ll just see the end of this, and then there are one or two things I want to do.’
When Lydia left the room, the voice became more insistent, as Steven had known it would.
One hour and the doors will seal. One hour and then nothing more.
Steven turned off the television and went into the kitchen to check that the rabbit was still securely hutched and that all the doors were locked.
Fifty minutes, Sterekanda ban. Bring Javayl. Come now. It is not too late.
The voice was kindly, motherly, friendly. It sounded as if something behind the whispering would deeply care if its instructions were ignored. That was the worst of it. Everyday speech gives a choice of evils: to be caught between the devil and the deep blue sea, a rock and a hard place, Scylla and Charybdis. But Steven’s dilemma was to choose between two goods. The waif-soul had to win, but that did not make the loss of Ormingat any more bearable.
So Steven made up his mind to talk to the Brick, to explain the dilemma. As he passed Jacob’s door he almost knocked and asked him to join him. Then, that seemed unwise. So instead he made one last effort at mind-fencing.
‘Sleep, my son,’ he said. ‘By morning it will all be over.’
When he entered the computer room, all was as it had ever been. The screen was unscrolled and there, frozen, were the words of command:
IT IS IMPERATIVE THAT YOU COME NOW
Steven sat down at the desk and switched on the lever that allowed him to speak.
‘I am sorry,’ he said. ‘I am very, very sorry. I must stay here on Earth with my wife who needs me, and whose happiness is mine. I do not know how much of this you can hear and understand. I never realized till now just how little I know. I feel there is love for me in Ormingat, and sadness. Please, you who are sad, forgive me. Please, you who love me, know that I feel and cherish your love.’
He rested his hands on his arms and wept.
The time passed.
Suddenly, Steven was aware that something was happening above his head, on the screen. He looked up and there was, not the scroll, but a view of Highgate Cemetery in lamplit darkness.
He was aware that something had happened but he did not know what it was.
Then, at the bottom of the image of the churchyard, like graffiti on the crumbling bricks, appeared the words:
THE DOORS ARE CLOSED BUT THE SHIP IS NOT EMPTY
Steven gasped. What was happening? What could be happening?
The Gwynns!
Had the Gwynns taken him up on his offer? Were they now inside the spaceship? He had told them enough to make it possible. But that girl of theirs did not want to go. Even her mother had seemed reluctant to consider his suggestion. Had Matthew entered the ship alone?
There was only one thing to do. Watch and wait. In less than two hours the ship would leave the Earth. The Brick was not responding to him as in former days, but there were clearly things it wanted him to know. Perhaps all was not lost. The Brick could be restored to him and he and Jacob could work with it again.
There is another nuance to the meaning of Sterekanda. The rule-breaker was also the one-who-lives-in-hope. Why else would he break the rules?