Clive Barker - Weave World

She put her arm through his. A flicker of pleasure crossed his face, and together they moved through the crowd. Feeling his body trembling against hers it was not difficult to share the trauma he was experiencing. She'd taken the harlot century she'd been born into for granted, knowing no other, but now - seeing it with his eyes, hearing it with his ears - she understood it afresh; saw just how desperate it was to please, yet how dispossessed of pleasure; how crude, even as it claimed sophistication; and, despite its zeal to spellbind, how utterly unenchanting.

For Apolline, however, the experience was proving a joy. She strode through the crowd, trailing her long black skirts like a widow on a post-funereal spree.

‘I think we should get off the main street,' said Suzanna when they'd caught up with her. ‘Jerichau doesn't like the crowd.'

‘Well he'd best get used to it,' said Apolline, shooting a glance at Jerichau. This is going to be our world soon enough.'

So saying, she turned and started away from Suzanna again.

‘Wait a minute!'

Suzanna went in pursuit, before they lost each other in the throng.

‘Wait!' she said, taking hold of Apolline's arm. ‘We can't wander around forever. We have to meet with the others.'

‘Let me enjoy myself awhile,' said Apolline. ‘I've been asleep too long. I need some entertainment.'

‘Later maybe,' said Suzanna. ‘When we've found the carpet.'

‘Fuck the carpet,' was Apolline's prompt reply.

They were blocking the flow of pedestrians as they debated.

receiving sour looks and curses for their troubles. One pubescent boy spat at Apolline, who promptly spat back with impressive accuracy. The boy retreated, with a shocked look on his bespittled face.

‘I like these people.' she commented. ‘They don't pretend to courtesy.'

‘We've lost Jerichau again,' Suzanna said. ‘Damn him, he's like a child.'

‘I see him.'

Apolline pointed down the street, to where Jerichau was standing, striving to keep his head above the crowd as though he feared drowning in this sea of humanity.

Suzanna started back towards him, but she was pressing against the tide, and it was tough going. But Jerichau didn't move. He had his fretful gaze fixed on the empty air above the heads of the crowd. They jostled and elbowed him but he went on staring.

‘We almost lost you,' Suzanna said when she finally reached his side.

His reply was a simple:

‘Look.'

Though she was several inches shorter than he, she followed the direction of his stare as best she could.

‘I don't see anything.'

‘What's he troubling about now?' Apolline, who'd now joined them, demanded to know.

They're all so sad,' Jerichau said.

Suzanna looked at the faces passing by. Irritable they were; and sluggish some of them, and bitter; but few struck her as sad. ‘Do you see?' said Jerichau, before she had a chance to contradict him: The lights.'

‘No she doesn't see them.' said Apolline firmly. ‘She's still a Cuckoo, remember? Even if she has got the menstruum. Now come on.'

Jerichau's gaze now fell on Suzanna, and he was closer to tears than ever. ‘You must see.' he said. ‘I want you to see.'

‘Don't do this.' said Apolline. ‘It's not wise.'

They have colours.' Jerichau was saying.

‘Remember the Principles.' Apolline protested.

‘Colours?' said Suzanna.

‘Like smoke, all around their heads.'

Jerichau took hold of her arm.

‘Will you listen?' Apolline said. ‘Capra's Third Principle states -'

Suzanna wasn't attending. She was staring at the crowd, her hand now grasping Jerichau's hand.

It was no longer simply his senses she shared, but his mounting panic, trapped amongst this hot-breathed herd. An empathic wave of claustrophobia rose in her; she closed her lids and told herself to be calm.

In the darkness she heard Apolline again, talking of some Principle. Then she opened her eyes.

What she saw almost made her cry out. The sky seemed to have changed colour, as though the gutters had caught fire, and the smoke was choking the street. Nobody seemed to have noticed, however.

She turned to Jerichau, seeking some explanation, and this time she let out a yell. He had gained a halo of fireworks, from which a column of light and vermilion smoke was rising.

‘Oh Christ.' she said. ‘What's happening?'

Apolline had taken hold of her shoulder, and was pulling on her.

‘Come away!' she shouted. ‘It'll spread. After three, the multitude. ‘

‘Huh?'

The Principle!'

But her warning went uncomprehended. Suzanna - her shock becoming exhiliration - was scanning the crowd. Everywhere she saw what Jerichau had described. Waves of colour, plumes of it, rising from the flesh of Humankind. Almost all were subdued; some plain grey, others like plaited ribbons of grimy pastel; but once or twice in the throng she saw a pure pigment; brilliant orange around the head of a child carried high on her father's back; a peacock display from a girl laughing with her lover.

Again, Apolline tugged at her, and this time Suzanna acquiesced, but before they'd got more than a yard a cry rose from the crowd behind them - then another, and another - and suddenly to right and left people were putting their hands to their faces and covering their eyes. A man fell to his knees at Su.'anna's side, spouting the Lord's prayer - somebody else had begun vomiting, others had seized hold of their nearest neighbour for support, only to find their private horror was a universal condition.

‘Damn you.' said Apolline. ‘Now look what you've done.' Suzanna could see the colours of the haloes changing, as panic convulsed those who wore them. The vanquished greys were shot through with violent greens and purples. The mingled din of shrieks and prayers assaulted her ears. ‘Why?' said Suzanna.

‘Capra's Principle!' Apolline yelled back at her. ‘After three, the multitude.'

Now Suzanna grasped the point. What two could keep to themselves became public knowledge if shared by three. As soon as she'd embraced Apolline and Jerichau's vision - one they'd known from birth - the fire had spread, a mystic contagion that had reduced the street to bedlam in seconds.

The fear bred violence almost instantly, as the crowd looked for scapegoats on which to blame these visions. Shoppers forsook their purchases and leapt upon each others' throats; secretaries broke their nails on the cheeks of accountants; grown men wept as they tried to shake sense from their wives and children.

What might have been a race of mystics was suddenly a pack of wild dogs, the colours they swam in degenerating into the grey and umber of a sick man's shit.

But there was more to come. No sooner had the fighting begun than a well-dressed woman, her make-up smeared in the struggle, pointed an accusing finger at Jerichau. ‘Him!' she shrieked. ‘It was him!'

Then she flung herself at the guilty party, ready to take out his eyes. Jerichau stumbled back into the traffic as she came after him.

‘Make it stop!' she yelled. ‘Make it stop!'

At her cacophony, several members of the crowd forgot their private wars and set their sights on this new target.

To Suzanna's left somebody said: ‘Kill him.' An instant later, the first missile flew. It hit Jerichau's shoulder. A second followed. The traffic had come to a halt, as the drivers, slowed by curiosity, came under the influence of the vision. Jerichau was trapped against the cars, as the crowd turned on him. Suddenly, Suzanna knew, the issue was life and death. Confused and frightened, this mob was perfectly prepared, eager even, to tear Jerichau and anyone who went to his rescue limb from limb.

Another stone struck Jerichau, bringing blood to his cheek. Suzanna advanced towards him, calling for him to move, but he was watching the advancing crowd as if mesmerized by this display of human rage. She pushed on, climbing over a car bonnet and squeezing between bumpers to get to where he stood. But the leaders of the mob - the smeared woman and two or three others - were almost upon him.