The Map of the Sky (Trilogía Victoriana #2)(172)
Well, if that had been his aim, he had fulfilled it and was now free to die. That was what his body yearned for: the absolute, peaceful, eternal rest that death offered. Charles smiled at the evening sky, exposing his wizened, toothless gums. Yes, that is what he would do. He would go back to this cell, lie down on his pallet, and wait for death, which before long would come knocking at his door. And the next morning at dawn, the neck shackle would interrupt his eternal sleep and take him for a posthumous journey through the camp, for his destiny would not be complete until he was turned into food for those who were still alive. And that would be the end of Charles Winslow.
His head spinning, Charles staggered back to his cell. He had no strength left for anything else, he told himself, and in some sense this relieved him of the burden he had felt since seeing Claire’s naked body floating in the tank and wondering if he should tell Captain Shackleton his wife was dead. He was aware that by doing so he would take away the only thing that kept Shackleton alive. But didn’t the captain also deserve some respite? Charles, with a few words, could grant him the right to surrender, to lay down his arms. Why did he not tell him, then? These doubts had been gnawing away at him all night. In the end dawn had come and he still hadn’t made a decision. No matter how hard he tried to convince himself he hadn’t the strength to go to Shackleton’s cell, this paltry excuse did little to dispel his feelings of remorse. Weak as he was, he resolved he would make it over to where the captain was to tell him what he had seen, thus releasing him from his pointless purgatory. No doubt, when the captain discovered that Claire was inside the pyramid, he would try to go down there and the shackle would instantly begin to throttle him, to kill him even, if he persisted. But what did that matter now? Clearly there would never be an uprising, Charles reflected with bitterness; the Martians would be the lords and masters of the Earth. Things had gone much too far for anyone to be able to put them right. Their doomed planet no longer had any need of a hero. And so Charles decided the time had come to offer Captain Shackleton his freedom, the only freedom to which Man could now aspire: that of deciding whether he wanted to go on living. Filled with this resolve, Charles turned around and stumbled toward the barracks where his friend’s cell was, on the other side of the camp.
However, he was weaker than he thought. The captain was forced to interrupt the exercises he was doing at the entrance to his cell when he saw Charles collapse a few yards from the barracks. He leapt down the steps, hoisted Charles’s limp body onto his shoulders, and carried him back to his cell, where he laid him out on his pallet with the gentleness of an embalmer. Then he placed his hand on Charles’s burning brow and realized he was too far gone for him to do anything: Charles would die within minutes. Shackleton sat beside him and clasped his hand. The young man appeared slowly to regain consciousness, groaning softly, his eyes struggling to focus on Shackleton.
When it appeared they had, Charles whispered, “I’m dying, Captain . . .”
The captain gave him a look of commiseration and pressed his hand but remained silent. Charles cleared his throat with a painful rasp and began.
“I’m sorry I took you away from Claire that afternoon,” he said with difficulty. “I’m so sorry it was all for nothing. I should have let you spend those last hours together. They were yours, and I took them from you. I regret it more than you could know, Captain. But I promise I didn’t do it out of spite or on a whim. I truly believed you were destined to defeat the Martians. It was written, remember?” Charles tried to smile at his own joke but only managed a pathetic rictus of pain. “And I still don’t understand why it didn’t happen, why the future you came from will not exist, even though both of us have seen it.”
Shackleton shifted uneasily in his chair but did not break his silence.
“Luckily, I don’t have much time to keep on asking myself why nothing turned out the way it was supposed to, and I suppose I’ve more than paid for all the wrong or mistaken things I may have done in my life. I’m so tired, Derek . . . all I want now is to rest . . .” Charles stared blankly at Shackleton as though a mist had descended between them, obscuring him. “And you must do the same, Derek . . . Yes, you must admit defeat, Captain. You’ve nothing left to fight for, my friend. Not anymore. I have to tell you something . . .”
Charles was seized by a sudden fit of coughing, causing his body to jerk on the pallet as several mouthfuls of blood oozed down his chin and neck, staining his skin an oily green. The captain hurriedly sat him up so he wouldn’t choke on his own blood, holding him until the coughing subsided and gazing at him with infinite sorrow. When he had recovered, Charles closed his eyes, exhausted, and Shackleton once more laid him gently down. His breathing was so slight that for a moment the captain thought Charles had passed away, but when he moved his face close to his friend’s bloodstained lips, he could feel his breath, light and fleeting, like the shadow of a dragonfly on the water. Shackleton looked at him for a few moments and shook his head slowly. Then he got up and walked over to the table on the opposite side of his cell.
“Captain Shackleton! Derek!” Charles called out suddenly, eyes wide open, frantically searching for his friend in the darkness slowly closing in around him. “Where are you, Derek? I can’t see, I can’t see . . . everything’s gone black . . . Derek!”
The captain remained motionless for a moment, his back to Charles, his shoulders hunched, as though he were carrying an immense weight. At last, he took something from the table, went back over to the bed, knelt beside the dying man, and began to speak to him, his powerful hands caressing the object.