Dan Vyleta - Smoke

“First,” he says, “you will retrieve a towel. Then: strip. Pile your clothes here.” He points to the floor. “They will be incinerated. We deposited a change of clothes for each of you there.” He points to a door marked CHANGING ROOM. “Make sure to wash thoroughly.”

A murmur goes through the room. The clothes will be burnt! No inspection; no investigation. Whatever happened that day, it will not be added to any ledger of transgression. As relief floods the students, they grow chatty, almost giddy. Clothes are ripped off bodies; cotton tears, buttons pop; boys can be seen running half dressed through the room, flicking at one another with towels. As they push into the shower-baths and scrub at their skin, their noise begins to fill the entire hall. They are sharing the wonders they beheld in London, cleansing them of fear in the process; their day recast as adventure. Charlie listens to them distractedly, his own face raised into the tepid stream of the shower.

“Did you see the Negro street sweeper? He had but one hand. He was so black you could hardly see the Soot.”

“I swear she was selling heads, that one, only they were shrunk somehow. Size of a cricket ball, each of them, tied to a stick by the hair.”

“And as I was looking at her, she opens her coat all of a sudden, and underneath she’s starkers, I swear. Only she was so dirty you couldn’t see a thing.”

It takes but half an hour until everyone is clean, kempt, dressed in fresh clothing. The teachers, too, have cleaned up in an adjoining bathroom; some have found time to shave. A servant has come and is shovelling their dirties into the incinerator with a pitchfork, much as though he were moving manure. The fire’s heat has spread throughout the room and is bringing a rosy hue to Charlie’s cheeks. Nothing is left of the delirium of London other than the vaguest of yearnings: for irresponsibility, perhaps, for some hours spent in the thrall of base instinct. He wonders briefly whether all delirium leaves you with this trace. Then Renfrew calls them together, teachers and pupils, assembles them by the door.

“Well then,” he says, gently, triumphantly. “We have survived.”

The mood is such that the phrase is met by applause. Renfrew basks in it then silences the boys with a gesture, a conductor working a willing orchestra.

“There were those who doubted that we would. And more, many more”—his gaze wanders over his fellow teachers—“who doubted we should go in the first place. Why, after all, did we have to climb down into this pit of filth and infamy; breathe the air of crime; rub shoulders with the mob; and see our blood poisoned by their lust and hate and greed?”

He pauses for effect. Charlie is watching Renfrew’s hands. They are small, handsome, freckled hands covered in fine, reddish hair. When he speaks, they dance in front of his body.

“The answer is that we had to go, because we may be called upon to do so again.”

He shuts off the murmur of ill will before it is conscious of itself.

“Two hours ago, as we were leaving the city, all of you saw some gentlemen walking through the city with charts. They were engineers, charged with remodelling the sewage system. Yes, the sewage system. The dirtiest place in a dirty city; the place where all muck and filth collects. They do so not from need, not for profit, nor because they are bound by contract. They do so because it needs doing. Because, like you, they are gentlemen from the country’s finest families. Because they see a cesspool and wish to clean it, improve it, reform it.

“To do so, they must stay, sometimes for days and weeks, in the very centre of London. They must breathe its Smoke and taste its infection. They must endure having their senses clouded, their skin stained, their clothes turned to rags. They must fight temptation, must fight weakness even in their sleep. But they are gentlemen and they are strong. And each time they go, they are stronger, better prepared. More determined, more steeled in their convictions.

“These gentlemen are you. After your studies — as engineers or as doctors, as men of politics or scholars of political science, as scientists and architects — you will be called upon to serve your country and to improve the lives of those miserable wretches we beheld today. When the day comes, do not hide from this responsibility. Do not hide behind fear, or comfort, or the claim of ignorance. When the day comes, stand proud and answer the call of duty. I know you will.”

Renfrew scans his audience’s faces. His certainty is like a force. Like Smoke. It travels through the air and settles in your bones.

“I— we —took you to London today so you would see it for yourself. Infection cannot be explained. It must be felt. Today you are afraid of it. You felt its power and quivered before it. But tomorrow — tomorrow you will face it like an enemy. Tomorrow you will begin thinking about what you can do to change things. To take up the fight. It is your duty as Christian men. As men, I say. For you return from London, no longer boys.”

The roar that follows his last statement surprises even those who stand cheering. Even Thomas falls in with it, stands next to Charlie hollering out a triple “Hurrah!” For once it is Julius who stands apart. Charlie watches him, at the edge of the circle of boys, face drawn, chewing on his tongue.

Renfrew does not bask in his glory but rather shushes them, rushes them out, onto the platform and out of the station, where their row of coaches is waiting for them. The weather is milder than it has been in days, a warm wind blowing from the west, the snow slowly melting and catching the streetlights in puddles.

ф

Renfrew does not ride back with the teachers. Instead he climbs into Charlie and Thomas’s coach. He takes his seat between them as though he were but another boy; butts in, lifting his suit tails, so they are forced to scoot apart. Immediately all conversation dies. The slush outside makes progress slow as each revolution of the wheels requires extra effort from the horses, and the gentle rocking coupled with the warmth of their recent bath sends them asleep one by one. Charlie feels cut off from Thomas by their teacher’s rigid form and is too self-conscious to lean across Renfrew to see whether his friend, too, has nodded off. He attempts to catch glimpses of Thomas from the corner of his eye, but all he can see are his legs, angled in front of him, the stillness of his feet, the hands that are spread out on Thomas’s thighs. He is so very motionless, in fact, and for so very long, that it comes as a surprise when Thomas speaks.

“Smoke is a disease,” he says.

It takes Charlie several moments to register the words are not for his benefit but for Renfrew’s, and that they form a question, not a statement.

Like Thomas, Renfrew speaks quietly, neither turning nor moving his limbs, his hands resting on the top of the walking stick that juts from between his knees. It occurs to Charlie that he has chosen to ride in their coach just for this, a conversation with Thomas.

“No,” says Renfrew. “Smoke is no more a disease than a fever is the flu. Both are symptoms.”

“Smoke is a symptom,” Thomas reiterates, slowly, carefully. “Either way. Smoke is not from God.”

Now Renfrew turns, bends down to Thomas, his voice warm and earnest. Charlie strains to understand, bending sideways with him, his cheek almost touching Renfrew’s coat.

“Why not?” he asks. “Measles are from God. Swinburne’s religion is outdated. Unenlightened. He does not understand that a scientist can have faith. That science is a form of worship.” Renfrew pauses. “But there is something else you want to ask, isn’t there?”

“If it is a disease. That for which Smoke is a symptom. Does it pass from father to son?”