The Illustrated Gormenghast Trilogy

imprisoned yet breathing among the network of a million commas, semicolons, full stops, hyphens and every other sort of printed symbol.

‘We are gathered together,’ said Sourdust, ‘in this ancient library at the instigation of Sepulchrave, 76th Earl to the house of Gormenghast and lord of those tracts of country that stretch on every hand, in the North to the wastelands, in the South to the grey salt marshes, in the East to the quicksands and the tideless sea, and in the West to knuckles of endless rock.’

This was delivered in one weak, monotonous stream. Sourdust coughed for some time and then, regaining his breath, continued mechanically: ‘We are gathered on this seventeenth day of October to give ear to his Lordship. These nights the moon is in the ascendant and the river is full of fish. The owls in the Tower of Flints seek their prey as heretofore and it is appropriate that his Lordship should, on the seventeenth day of an autumn month, bring forward the matter that is in his mind. The sacred duties which he has never wavered to perform are over for the hour. It is appropriate that it should be now – now, at the sixth hour of the daylight clock.

‘I as master of Ritual, as Guardian of the Documents and as Confidant to the Family, am able to say that for his Lordship to speak to you in no way contravenes the tenets of Gormenghast.

‘But, your Lordship, and your revered Ladyship,’ said Sourdust in his old sing-song, ‘it is no secret to those here gathered that it is towards the child who now occupies pride of place, it is towards Lord Titus that our thoughts will converge this afternoon. That is no secret.’

Sourdust gave vent to a dreadful chesty cough. ‘It is to Lord Titus,’ he said, gazing mistily at the child and then, raising his voice, ‘it is to Lord Titus,’ he repeated irritably.

Nannie suddenly realized that the old man was making signs at her, and understood that she was to lift the infant up in the air as though he were a specimen, or something to be auctioned. She lifted him, but no one looked at the exhibit except Prunesquallor, who nearly engulfed Nannie, baby and all with a smile so devouring, so dental, as to cause Nannie to raise her shoulder against it and to snatch Titus back to her little flat chest.

‘I will turn my back on you and strike the table four times,’ said Sourdust. ‘Slagg will bring the child to the table and Lord Sepulchrave will –’ here he suffered a more violent fit of coughing than ever, and at the same moment Irma’s neck quivered a little and she in her own way followed suit with five little ladylike barks. She turned her head apologetically in the direction of the Countess and wrinkled her forehead in self-deprecation. She could see that the Countess had taken no notice of her mute apology. She arched her nostrils. It had not crossed her mind there was a smell in the room other than the prevalent smell of musty leather: it was just that her nostrils with their hypersensitive nerve-endings were acting on their own accord.

Sourdust took some time to recover from his bout, but eventually he straightened himself and repeated:

‘Slagg will bring the child to the table, and Lord Sepulchrave will graciously advance, following his menial, and on arriving at a point immediately behind me will touch the back of my neck with the forefinger of his left hand.

‘At this signal I and Slagg will retire, and Slagg, having left the infant on the table, Lord Sepulchrave will pass behind the table and stand facing us across its surface.’

‘Are you hungry, my little love? Is there no grain inside you? Is that it? Is that it?’

The voice came forth so suddenly and heavily and so closely upon the quavering accents of Sourdust that everyone felt for the first few moments that the remark was addressed to them personally; but on turning their heads they could see that the Countess was addressing herself exclusively to the wood warbler. Whether the warbler made any reply was never ascertained for not only was Irma seized with a new and less ladylike bout of short dry coughs, but her brother and Nannie Slagg, joining her, filled the room with noise.

The bird rose into the air, startled, and Lord Sepulchrave stopped on his passage to the table and turned irritably to the line of noisy figures; but as he did so a faint smell of smoke making itself perceptible for the first time caused him to raise his head and sniff the air in a slow, melancholy way. At the same time Fuchsia felt a roughness in her throat. She glanced about the room and wrinkled her nose, for smoke though still invisible was infiltrating steadily through the library.

Prunesquallor had risen from beside the Countess and with his white hands wound about each other and with his mouth twisted into a quizzical line he permitted his eyes to move rapidly around the room. His head was cocked on one side.

‘What’s the matter, man?’ asked the Countess heavily from immediately below him. She was still seated.

‘The matter?’ queried the Doctor, smiling more emphatically but still keeping his eyes on the move. ‘It is a case of atmosphere, as far as I can dare to judge at such very, very short notice, your Ladyship, as far as I dare to judge. ha, ha, ha! It is a case of thickening atmosphere, ha, ha!’

‘Smoke,’ said the Countess heavily and bluntly. ‘What is the matter with smoke? Haven’t you ever smelt it before?’

‘Many and many a time, your Ladyship,’ answered the Doctor. ‘But never, if I may say so, never in here.’

The Countess grunted to herself and settled deeper into the chair.

‘There never is smoke in here,’ said Lord Sepulchrave. He turned his head to the door and raised his voice a little:

‘Flay.’

The long servant emerged out of the shadows like a spider.

‘Open the door,’ said Lord Sepulchrave sharply; and as the spider turned and began its return journey his Lordship took a step towards old Sourdust, who was by now doubled over the table in a paroxysm of coughing. His Lordship taking one of Sourdust’s elbows beckoned to Fuchsia, who came across the room and supported the old man on the other side, and the three of them began to make their way to the door in Flay’s wake.

Lady Groan simply sat like a mountain and watched the little bird.

Dr Prunesquallor was wiping his eyes, his thick glasses pushed for the moment above his eyebrows. But he was very much on the alert and as soon as his spectacles were again in place he grinned at everyone in turn. His eye lingered for a moment on his sister Irma, who was systematically tearing an expensively embroidered cream- coloured silk handkerchief into small pieces. Behind the dark lenses of her glasses her eyes were hidden from view, but to judge from the thin, wet, drooping line of her mouth and the twitching of the skin on her pointed nose it might be safely assumed that they were making contact with, and covering the inner side of, the lenses of her spectacles with the moisture with which the smoke had filmed them.