The Last Murder at the end of the World

THREE

Emory sees Magdalene striding towards her, one of her sketchbooks under her arm. She’s moving stiffly, knotted by worry.

Emory doesn’t need to ask what’s wrong. Magdalene’s fear for her son is obsessive. She sees snakes in every patch of grass, and strong currents under every stretch of calm water. Every splinter brings sepsis, and every illness is fatal. By Magdalene’s reckoning, this island has a thousand clawed hands and they’re all reaching for her child.

Abandoning her pose, Emory gives her friend a hug.

‘Don’t worry, Mags, Sherko will be fine,’ says Emory comfortingly.

Magdalene’s face is buried against Emory’s shoulder, her voice muffled.

‘One swell and –’

‘They’re at anchor,’ says Emory. ‘Niema’s been taking kids out to world’s end since before we were born. Nobody ever gets hurt.’

‘That doesn’t mean it couldn’t happen today.’

Emory’s eyes scour the blue sky. The sun is behind the volcano, which looms up behind the village, and the moon is already taking shape. In an hour, they’ll be painted in shade.

‘They’ll be home soon,’ says Emory kindly. ‘Come on, we can help set the tables for the funeral; it’ll take your mind off it.’

Her eyes flash towards Matis, guiltily. She should be spending these last hours with her grandfather, but he silently shoos her away.

Forty minutes later, the six schoolchildren come running through the gate, to the jubilation of the village. Magdalene engulfs Sherko, earning a squirming giggle, as the rest of them are hugged and kissed, bounced from adult to adult until finally they reach their parents, mussed and laughing.

The crowd murmurs warmly, parting to let Niema through. There are three elders in the village and they’re all revered, but only Niema is loved. The villagers stroke her arms as she passes, their faces bright with adoration.

Niema bestows smiles on each of them in turn, squeezing their hands. The other two elders, Hephaestus and Thea, keep to themselves, but Niema eats with the villagers every night. She dances along to the band, and sings at the top of her voice during the chorus.

Niema lays a comforting hand on Magdalene’s shoulder, then lifts her chin with a fingertip. Niema’s a head taller than most villagers, forcing Magdalene to crane her neck to meet her gaze.

‘I know what you’re worried about, but I’ll never put any of these children in harm’s way,’ she says, her voice a low rasp. ‘There’s so few of us left. We need every one of them kept safe.’

Tears brim in Magdalene’s eyes, her expression awestruck and grateful. Unlike Emory, she didn’t catch the hitch in Niema’s voice, the faint drag of doubt.

After laying on a little more sentiment, Niema works her way back out of the crowd, gracefully linking arms with Emory on her way to the barracks.

‘That should hold her for a few days,’ she says, when they’re out of earshot. ‘Come fetch me next time she starts fretting. I was worried she was going to swim out to the boat.’

‘I’ve been trying to calm her down for an hour,’ says Emory, glancing at Magdalene’s beatific expression. ‘How did you do that?’

‘I’m just old,’ replies Niema brightly. ‘Wrinkles look like wisdom to the young.’ She lowers her voice conspiratorially, tapping Emory’s hand. ‘Come on, I have another book for you.’

Emory’s heart leaps in excitement.

Arm in arm, they walk in companionable silence through the humid air, which is filling with fireflies as twilight descends. This is Emory’s favourite time of day. The sky is pink and purple, the stone walls blushing. The fierce heat has receded to a pleasant warmth, and everybody’s back inside the village, their joy pouring into the empty spaces.

‘How’s the carpentry coming?’ asks Niema.

The villagers leave school at fifteen, and they’re free to choose any occupation that’s of benefit to the community, but Emory’s been cycling through jobs for a decade, struggling to make headway in any of them.

‘I gave it up,’ she admits.

‘Oh, why?’

‘Johannes begged me to,’ replies Emory sheepishly. ‘It turns out I’m not very good at sawing wood, planing beams or making joints, and he didn’t think a wonky cabinet was worth losing a finger over.’

Niema laughs. ‘What about the cooking? What happened to that?’

‘Katia told me that dicing an onion should be the start of my kitchen skills not the end of them,’ says Emory dejectedly. ‘Before that, Daniel told me that it didn’t matter which way I held a guitar, because it would all sound the same. Mags lent me her paints for half a day, then didn’t stop laughing for a week. It turns out I’m hopeless at everything.’

‘You’re very observant,’ remarks Niema gently.

‘What use is that when Abi sees everything we do anyway,’ replies Emory disconsolately. ‘I want to be of service to the village, but I have no idea how.’

‘Actually, I’ve been wondering if you might like to come and work in the school with me,’ says Niema tentatively. ‘I’m going to need somebody to take over, and I think you’d make an excellent replacement.’

For a second, Emory can only frown at this suggestion. Niema’s been the village’s only teacher for as long as anybody can remember.

‘You’re giving it up?’ asks Emory in surprise. ‘Why?’

‘Age,’ replies Niema, climbing the rattling steps towards her dormitory. ‘Teaching is wonderful for the soul, but it’s a torment for my poor back. I’ve lived a long life, Emory, but my happiest memories took place in the classroom. Seeing the elation on a child’s face when they finally understand a difficult concept is an astonishing feeling.’ She pauses her ascent, glancing over her shoulder. ‘I truly think you’d be good at it.’

Emory’s excellent at spotting lies, and Niema’s altered pitch makes this one particularly easy to pick out.

The young woman’s eyes narrow suspiciously. ‘And which particular qualities of mine make you think that?’

Niema’s response is immediate, delivered with the brisk air of rehearsal. ‘You’re clever and curious and you’ve got a way with people.’

‘Yes, they find me mildly annoying,’ supplies Emory. ‘Have you been talking to my dad?’

Niema falters, hesitation coming into her tone.

‘He may have mentioned that you’re between occupations again,’ she replies. ‘But I wouldn’t have made the offer if –’

‘Tell Dad I’m writing a play!’

Niema offers her a sidelong glance. ‘You’ve been writing a play for a year.’

‘I don’t want to rush it.’

‘There doesn’t seem to be any danger of that,’ murmurs Niema, pushing aside the tatty sheet that serves as the door to her dorm room.

This sheet has always been a quirk of hers. None of the villagers have a problem with empty doors, privacy being a concept that has remarkably little value when you’re born with a voice in your head that can hear your thoughts.

Over the years, the villagers have done their best to repair the dorms, but there’s only so much that can be done with a building this old. The concrete walls are riddled with cracks and holes; the grey floor tiles are shattered, and the beams supporting the roof are rotted. Mildew permeates the air.

Such decay is dreary, so the villagers beat it back with colour and life. Niema has put down a large rug, and placed a vase of freshly cut flowers on the windowsill. The walls are covered in paintings, spanning every artist who’s ever worked in the village. Most of them aren’t very good, leading Emory to wonder why Niema chose to preserve them. In many cases, the bare concrete would be an improvement.

Her shutters are closed to keep the insects out, so Niema lights a small candle on a rickety writing desk, its flickering glow falling across a half-written letter, which she hastily sweeps into a drawer.

‘How much of this play have you actually finished?’ she wonders, shielding the candle flame as she carries it to an overstuffed bookshelf beside an iron bed.

‘Four pages,’ admits Emory.

‘Are they good?’

‘No,’ says Emory, dismayed. ‘Turns out, I’m no better at writing plays than I was at making shoes, doing woodwork or building kites. My only skills seem to be noticing things people don’t want noticed, and asking questions people don’t want answered.’

‘Oh, I wouldn’t worry,’ replies Niema, running her finger along the spines of the books, searching for the one she wants. ‘Some people are born knowing what they’re for, and others take a little longer to work it out. I’m one hundred and seventy-three, but I didn’t start teaching until I was past eighty, and after that I never wanted to do anything else. It could be the same for you, if you give it a chance.’

Emory adores Niema, but the older woman talks about her age with so little regard that it’s frequently insulting. None of the villagers will ever live half as long, and Niema’s frequent allusions to her longevity can feel cruel. It’s especially painful today, when her grandfather’s so close to death.

‘Aha,’ exclaims Niema, pulling a tattered old paperback off the middle shelf. ‘This one is called Samuel Pipps and the Shrieking Spire. Hephaestus found it in an abandoned train carriage a few weeks back.’

She pushes it into Emory’s hand, catching the dismay on her face.

‘I know you prefer Holmes,’ she says, tapping the lurid cover. ‘But give this a chance. You’ll like it. It has three murders in it!’

Her voice has lowered to a hush. She knows I don’t like people talking about murder in the village, or even using the word openly.

The last one took place over ninety years ago, just before the world ended. Two friends argued on a stairwell in Nairobi about a promotion. In a jealous rage, one shoved the other, who fell down the steps and broke her neck. The killer had just enough time to wonder if he could get away with it before the fog came pouring out of the ground. He died a second later, along with everybody he’d ever known, and most of the people he hadn’t. There hasn’t been another murder since. I’ve made sure of it.

Nobody else in the village is allowed to read these books, but I’ve made an exception for Emory, because their puzzles are the only things that can sate her devouring curiosity for any length of time.

‘Remember, don’t show it to anybody else,’ says Niema, as they depart the room for the balcony. ‘It’ll only frighten them.’

Emory clutches the illicit book tight against her stomach. ‘Thank you, Niema.’

‘Pay me back by coming to the school tomorrow.’

Seeing the objection forming on Emory’s lips, she hastily adds, ‘Not because your father wants it. It’s a favour for me. If you don’t like it, you can go back to not writing your play.’

Niema’s gaze flicks past Emory, causing the younger woman to follow it over her shoulder. Niema’s son, Hephaestus, is stomping through the gate. His shaved head is bent low and his huge shoulders are rolled forward, as if the sky were pressing down on them.

Hephaestus only appears when things need fixing, or building. Most of the time, he lives alone in the wilderness, which is a thought so alien to Emory that even mentioning it fills her with unease.

‘What’s he doing here?’ she wonders out loud.

‘He’s looking for me,’ replies Niema distantly.

Emory’s gaze returns to Niema’s face. She thought she recognised all of her teacher’s moods, but there’s something playing on her features that’s never been there before. It could be uncertainty, or it could be fear.

‘Are you okay?’ asks Emory.

Niema’s eyes find her, but it’s clear her thoughts are still with her son.

‘Tomorrow night, I’m going to conduct an experiment that’s failed every time I’ve tried it previously,’ she says, feeling her way towards every word. ‘But if it fails this time …’ She trails off, her hands touching her stomach nervously.

‘If it fails …’ prods Emory.

‘I’ll have to do something unforgivable,’ she says, watching Hephaestus disappear behind the back of the kitchen. ‘And I’m still not certain I have the strength.’