Cross Country Murder Song (10 page)

Song 5: Box (Reprise)

His office ceiling was low, but the room stretched on forever. There were thousands of lightbulbs of differing shapes and sizes that covered most of the available space above his head. Some were burnt out and black, others hypnotically bright, one or two flickered indifferently, buzzing into darkness and then blooming back into silent life. The light didn't reach much past the bulbs themselves, penetrating no more than two or three feet down from the ceiling and barely dispersing the creeping gloom. The room was filled with binders and boxes full of files and filing cards. Some bulged with paper, precariously stacked, but somehow they remained intact. There was no obvious attempt at order. Red, black and green folders dominated in the main, but the odd boxy oblong of navy blue or steely grey stuck out (literally in some instances) here and there. In the distance, when a heavy door banged open and shut, the discordant tapping of hundreds of typewriters could be heard clicking away, tiny metal keys striking red and black ribbons, the inky cloth deadening the impact. Like an army marching in its socks, he thought. Endless tiny silver bells resonating shrilly and abruptly, then the sudden zipping sound as rollers were pushed from right to left and a new sentence began to run from one margin to the other, a still faintly vibrating bell waiting to come pealing into life again. He preferred it when the door was closed; the sound hurt his head otherwise. He looked up as someone came in to load another pile of black filing boxes on to the edge of his desk. He gave the courier a baleful look, but they'd already turned their back and squared their shoulders and were soon lost among the teetering columns of paperwork. He heard the door opening and the trilling metallic chorus rose up again in a rush until it was muffled by the heavy wooden door slamming shut. Then it was suddenly quiet. He stood up and walked to the window, but the window was always dark, the view always obscured. He peered at the glass, but the only thing he saw was himself looking back. His brow, he noticed, was furrowed. He rubbed hard at the jutting shelf of flesh between his eyes. He looked tired, dissatisfied. Another bell rang somewhere, not a typewriter bell, something with more clarity. He turned to see an envelope set squarely on his desk and crossed the room to open it. The index card inside was covered in tight red script and in one corner there was a small box that someone had neatly ticked. He held it up and regarded it over the top of his glasses, then he walked to the first pile of black folders and carefully pulled the top box down from the unsteady pile. Inside the box there were hundreds of index cards tightly bound together in neat batches. He pulled the elastic bands apart and playfully catapulted one in a looping arc into the corner of the office. It bounced off a red folder and disappeared into a shadowy corner. He matched the card from the folder with the one in his hand, found a paperclip in his top pocket and joined them together, making sure their corners were precisely matched. He placed them in the folder and then returned the box to its jaggedly concave pile. He grunted a little as he pushed it back into place and then he returned to his desk and waited. He'd filed him away, which meant that he'd be here soon.

He woke in darkness and lay there letting his eyes adjust. It was quiet, just the low hum of an air conditioning unit and the occasional flickering in the shadows that made him think someone was coming, but he was alone. The box he was in was shut tight with a slit in the hinged door set almost directly above his face that let the air in. He had kicked and thrashed around in the tight blackness when he'd first awoken, but he'd simply bloodied his knuckles and cracked his knees, the impact making him exhale loudly. That had been how long ago, hours or days? He didn't know. The space was too confined for him to even raise his watch to his face; he was immobile, held, stilled. A figure finally approached the box after moving slowly about in the darkness above and flicked a switch that filled the basement with shocking white light. It was as if the walls had been broken down and daylight allowed to come flooding through the room. He blinked rapidly, tears flushing across both cheeks, and found himself gulping hard as if his head had been thrust underwater, then allowed briefly back to break the surface before it came rushing once more into his mouth. His coughing racked his chest and the voice shushed him. Lying there in the dark he could hear keys jangling against a hip, he heard a bottle of wine being slid from a shelf, the chink of glass as it was manoeuvred free, he waited for someone to speak, but the footsteps faded, disappearing up a set a wooden stairs. There was a pause and the darkness suddenly shrouded him again as a door locking shut was the only hook he could find to attach his fear to. At first he worried about things rushing up at him, tearing the box apart, lunging hungrily. Then some days he'd pray for something to break the box and make him free, if only momentarily.