Barry Unsworth: Pascali's Island

Mister Bowles pursed his lips, as if dubious. Then he said, indifferently, 'All right, if you like.' He did not really want me wandering around. 'Time is short, you know,' he said. 'I was hoping you would help me clean him up a bit later on.'

'Of course,' I said. His reluctance was encouraging, in a way. I had other reasons – other than tiredness, I mean – for wanting to break off for a while. I wanted to have another look at the terrain. A certain idea had been burgeoning in my mind all morning. Of course, I had been suspicious of him ever since I had seen him with Mister Smith that day, in the bar – is it two days ago or three? I lose count of time, Excellency. I had thought it possible he might want to buy a passage off the island on Mister Smith's caique. Perhaps he wanted to forestall the consequences of Mahmoud's fury when it was found that the site contained nothing valuable. Perhaps he was arranging to decamp in a hurry, so as to cheat me of my share of the money. However, finding him with the statue had made me think again. It had explained why he delayed, why he jeopardised everything: he was the prey of his obsession, I had thought, this terrible truth he had found through lies. In all this I had forgotten the more calculating aspects of Mister Bowles's nature, forgotten, too, his sense of being specially appointed. He has been 'led to' the statue, as he believes. Does he really intend to give it up for the sake of his name on a plaque? Now I remembered – what I should not have forgotten – that it is not a question only of Mister Bowles and Mister Smith. There are three others on that boat – five men altogether. Five men can do much, Excellency, if paid enough or frightened enough.

I climbed out of the hollow on the same side as I had first approached it, the side from which I had approached it today. From this side it would clearly be out of the question. I knew that in advance. The mounded, hummocky ground beyond, with its tangles of masonry and vegetation, its ruined walls, its steep clefts and gullies – clearly impossible from this side. The statue must weigh three hundred and fifty pounds at least, I had calculated. Quite possibly more. But from the other side of the hollow, the side I had not seen…?

I went back towards the ruins until I reckoned I was at a safe distance from him, then began to make my way round in a fairly wide semi-circle, with the intention of coming out at a roughly similar level at the other side. This I found extremely difficult, at times even hazardous – particularly for one so unathletic as myself, Excellency. But I persevered. Sometimes on hands and knees, sometimes slithering feet first, torn by scrub and bruised by stone, I made my way round. I was uneasily conscious that parts of my route might have been visible from above, from where the two soldiers were stationed, but though I may have been seen I was not challenged. When I did reach the other side of the hollow, what I saw soothed my pains to a large extent. It was possible, Excellency. For a group of determined men it was feasible, though difficult. There would be five of them, if all the crew were employed on it. Excellency, supposing I am right about Mister Smith. Supposing he is here on some illegal enterprise-let us say landing guns for the rebels. And supposing something has gone wrong. Perhaps being searched has scared him. Perhaps there has been some breakdown in the arrangements. In this situation he will be wanting to get away, he will be interested in the idea of some quick money. Not threats, as I once thought – men like that would be too dangerous to threaten. But money, yes. And Lydia has money…

I had come round from the side, through rock and thick scrub into a more open area, not precisely behind the hollow where Mister Bowles was working, but giving me a view of the slope down from this, and then the longer, more gradual slope of the hillside itself. It was true that there were sizeable rocks amid the pine trees, especially on the first and steeper part of the slope, and there were folds in the ground that might be awkward. But no more than a hundred yards beyond, quite clearly visible, was the line of the stream bed – dry now and wide enough for two men abreast. Admittedly, the footing would be difficult, because of the irregular stones forming the bed, but these would not be large, and the slope was fairly gradual. I could not see its course for very far, but I remembered, as I crouched there, the view I had had from the path higher up, on my way here that first day when I had come to spy on him: the long green swathe of the stream bed with its edging vegetation, the sea, the continuing line of the jetty, the greening of the water over the marble blocks. It was possible, Excellency, it was the only possibility, and therefore it must be the answer. They could never get him out of the hollow unaided, of course -a dozen men could not have done it, the slope was too steep, the clay too crumbling. But with lifting gear from the caique… They might have a spare block and tackle. Or they could use the tackle from the boom. It was level enough along the top for three men at least to stand together…

There were the soldiers, of course, to reckon with. The two above would see nothing of it, their view was cut off by the fall of the land. But the two below, nearer the shore, they were on the same side of the headland as the stream bed. Besides, there was the noise… Mister Bowles had not seemed particularly worried about the presence of the soldiers, once they had been removed from the site itself.

I judged I had been away no more than half an hour. But I do not think, after that scramble, that I could have looked like a man who had been resting in the shade, and I thought that his manner was suspicious when he greeted me on my return. I say that I thought so, Excellency – it was impossible now with him to be certain of such things. His wild and gleaming appearance made normal identifications impossible. His whole manner, since the finding of the statue and the subsequent secretive labours, had become so charged with feeling, so almost melodramatic, that there was no register for milder feelings.

'I don't think we'd better dig round him any more,' Mister Bowles said. 'I don't want him to start keeling over. What I'd like to do now is clean him up a bit. I've been bringing olive oil up here. That was the only thing I could think of that wouldn't damage the surface, you know.'

He had also brought several cloths, squares of black velvet -thick, heavy velvet such as is not to be had on this island, Excellency. They had been cut roughly from some single piece, perhaps curtaining or a woman's dress. I wondered where, at such short notice (since he could not have known he would need it), he had been able to obtain such material.

We worked together, Mister Bowles on the head and face, I lower down on the pectoral slopes and rib cage, applying the oil gently but firmly, softening by repeated application the encrustations of clay. From time to time I glanced up at their two faces, the faint impervious smile of the metal, the almost painful care and devotion of the flesh – he was worshipping, Excellency. In me too, as I worked on, there grew up a feeling of reverence. We were bathing him, not washing. There was a lustral, expiatory quality in what we were doing. Mister Bowles and I were at one, for the first and only time, ministering together; and all I had felt about our closeness, our identity, was evidenced and made tangible here by our hands as we went through the same cherishing motions, repeatedly applied the oil, wiped away the dissolving clay, informer and trickster, divided by our schemes but at one in this ritual.

The clay was tenacious. It clung to him, to the nostrils, the short curling hair, the slight ridges of muscle at the loins, as if reluctant to give up its claim. First applications turned it a glistening darker red, a dark blood colour so that at first we seemed to be washing the body free from the blood of wounds. But below this the metal came up lustrous.