The Man Who Wanted to Smell Books

by Elspeth Davie

  Watson stayed where he was. His legs felt weak and after a bit he sat down, still with his gaze fixed on Carruthers as he moved further and further along the shore. Each step he marked, as though, reduced to following him faithfully only with his eyes, he made these eyes as far-reaching, as vindictive and demanding as human eyes could be.

  The following day was cold, but the haze was gone. Every near object stood in the sun with a sharp shadow. Even the waves had a flashing, cutting edge. It was a day corresponding exactly to Watson’s mood. He had recovered his spirits, and from early morning he felt the scourging, purging strength in him grow. It was a busy day. All morning, with gift-wrapping care, he folded and tied up slices of pork and beef. Between cuts he sharpened the long knives and deftly trimmed the fat from the rims of steaks, as though cutting off the last superfluous scraps of sloth from his own day. He grew quicker and surer as the time wore on. At four-thirty he was scouring the tables in the back room as though washing blood from marble. By six he was washed and dressed and sitting by himself in one of the small cafés along the front. He ate little but he watched everyone who passed the window, and when there was a gap in the passers-by he watched the sea. The tide was a very long way out. Below the seaweed line a great expanse of beach shelved down – dangerously steep in places – criss-crossed with rivulets. All along the foreshore lay large black pools which gradually diminished in the distance till they were mere discs of light. It was his own shore, yet for all that, almost unknown. He had never studied it at low tide. The jagged tops and miniature chasms of unfamiliar rocks took his eye. From where he sat he could see, on the dry band of sand under the promenade, a few figures diminished and darkened against the shining slopes behind. Watson bent forward and glanced along the length of the promenade to the semicircular balustrade which overlooked the beach. There was always a small crowd gathered here staring at the posters advertising evening cruises or queuing at the icecream and hot-dog vans. At twenty past six he fixed his eyes on this spot and remained rigid, his forehead touching the window, his feet uncomfortably trapped between wainscot and tilted chair. At six-thirty, as though twitched by a distant cord, his head jerked back, the chairlegs stabbed the floor and he was on his feet. Above the aimless shift of heads he had caught a glimpse of a red-banded straw hat moving slowly towards the balustrade.

  Carruthers had taken up his stance on the beach by the time Watson arrived. He had his arms crossed, his feet were planted wide apart with his hat between them and he waited, smiling, for the crowd to form along the balustrade above. They were not long in gathering for any evening show. Already there were a fair number when Watson came up and he had to wedge himself in near the back. He was not sorry to be hidden. The unaccustomed silence of low tide was stunning, in spite of a cutting little breeze coming off the sea. Watson noted with surprise and satisfaction how small Carruthers looked against the space behind. The man had lost half his stature even before opening his mouth. When he did begin to speak his voice was conversational as usual. And Watson smiled. For so it would remain. This time the sea could never save the day. Drama had been killed for the man. He edged in to listen.

  ‘I hope you’re enjoying your holiday,’ said Carruthers taking in the group with a glance. ‘I know I’m enjoying mine.’ There was a slight murmuring amongst the crowd and a brief titter. The day had been cold from the start and gradually, throughout late afternoon, all brightness had been overcast. Nylons were being changed for wool. For the first time that season the long-term forecast was poor.

  ‘And you’re right,’ said Carruthers, quick to take his cue. ‘One minute it’s fair, the next it’s dark. We don’t know what’s to come.’

  ‘But you’ll tell us!’ called a voice from the back. There was a sudden parting in the group and heads turned round towards Watson who was dodging down again behind the shoulders. He was known to many as a faithful listener. His words might be no more than simple statement of fact. There were some who had their doubts.

  ‘Certainly I’ll tell you,’ said Carruthers easily and with a cool glance in Watson’s direction. ‘Some questions, of course, aren’t answered as easily as all that. Some take a while. Some take a bit of looking into. We’ll be coming to those in a minute.’

  Watson was heard to laugh. ‘And some never get answered at all,’ he murmured to those nearest him.

  ‘We’ve all chosen this fantastic place!’ Carruthers swung round, gesticulating towards the eastern cliffs, then to the west with its series of sandy bays, and pointing above him to the winding streets which climbed up steeply behind the crowd. ‘We all know why we’re here in this town. That’s one thing we’re clear about. You decided to come and I decided – weeks, maybe months ago. We made up our minds. Right?’

  ‘Not me, chum. It’s my missis makes up my mind,’ said a stout man near the front who was holding a bulging carrier bag.

  ‘We all know why we’re here,’ Carruthers went on. ‘Do we ever ask how we came to be on this globe? Why we’re in the universe at all?’

  ‘No. It’s you who’s to tell us!’ called the angry voice from behind. The conviction had now grown strong that Watson must have reason for his change of heart. There was an impatient fidgeting round the edges of the group.

  ‘Who, or what force put us here, and why?’ said Carruthers. He paused for a moment to put up the collar of his jacket. ‘It may be we’re still young with plenty of gumption, or maybe we’re on our last legs – but whatever the way of it, we’ll always ask questions. One day we’re going to need a few answers.’

  ‘Get on with it then!’ someone shouted.

  ‘Ay, better buck up. You’re getting gey long in the tooth yourself,’ said an old man. Carruthers’ lips were set in a smile unlike his usual flash of teeth. He now doubled over and gave himself a sharp thrashing around the ribs under pretext of warming up. There was a hiss from somewhere in the crowd, soft and poisonous as escaping gas.

  ‘He doesn’t know how to go on,’ murmured a woman holiday-maker who’d been watching with narrowed eyes. ‘Give him another ten minutes and I reckon he’ll dry up.’ The man beside her held up a finger to his lips: ‘Sh … we’re getting answers soon, don’t you worry. He’ll tie it all up tonight. Right now he’s working up to it. Take a look at his face.’

  ‘Who cares?’ said a young man who was simply passing through the crowd on his way to a block of boarding-houses at the other end of the town. ‘Don’t give me answers! No one opens his mouth these days but he’s got an answer inside, all smooth and pat as a new-laid egg at the wrong end.’ He elbowed his way through and carried on purposefully between a long line of seats which had quickly emptied as the air grew cold.

  The man on the beach was still speaking in his normal voice, for apart from the occasional plop in the pools and the squawk of a seagull swooping down to study the shore, there was almost no sound at all. Once in a while Carruthers looked over his shoulder as though expecting some crashing backstage cue to help. None came. There was emptiness behind. ‘Look,’ said Carruthers. ‘Here we are gathered together from every corner of the land. And I’ve got questions to put to you.’

  ‘Hell … no …’ murmured the fat man with the carrier, though in a genial voice. ‘You got it wrong! It’s you telling us.’

  ‘The fact is,’ said Watson, edging in from the back and turning his head about to catch the attention on every side, ‘the man’s just a high tide talker. He can’t do his thing now. He’s flummoxed. I think we’ve had it. I think we can all go home.’ A sudden bluster of icy wind gave point to his words. There was a buttoning up followed by a resolute jangling as a woman held up a bangled hand. ‘No, I’m not leaving till I get one or two straight answers!’

  ‘Thank you madam.’ Carruthers bowed. ‘And I mean to give them. Though don’t count on them being dead straight.’ There was a reproving shuffling above him, some hoots and a thin burst of clapping. ‘I’ll bet,’ murmured the fat man, still genial.

  ‘Let’s look at it,
’ said Carruthers. ‘Straight? You can’t get it that way. Show me one straight thing. Not a cell in the body. Not an atom in the air or in the sea. In the entire universe – just give me one straight thing!’

  ‘Never mind all that. What I asked for was a straight answer.’ The woman was hammering the air with her arm. ‘It’s about time God was brought into it!’

  ‘Ay … high time,’ her husband agreed.

  ‘I’m coming to that!’ Carruthers was shouting now. He split his legs wide apart, reached for the largest pebble beside his foot and hurled it back between his thighs. It ricocheted from one rock, smashed onto another and fell into a pool. They heard the far-off splash in silence.

  ‘He’s got to get to the God bit now,’ murmured Watson looking about him with a smile. ‘Watch it. He can’t get round it. No amount of tricks, acrobatics or anything else is going to help. He’s in trouble. If you want my opinion, I don’t believe he’s got the smallest clue.’

  It was now so cold that even the couple in the hot-dog van had closed down the hatch and could be seen through the rear window lighting up over newspapers in the back. High up on the miniature fairfield above the town red and yellow flags were fluttering and a procession of small round clouds moved in very low, like navy blue balloons, above the bunting.

  Down on the beach Carruthers had his hat on and was trying to hold its frondy brim down on both sides. His eyes when he raised his chin again looked belligerent. His face was red. There was a feeling that next time a stone might fly either way. ‘I’m here,’ he said, ‘ready to pronounce on any bloody, mortal thing you care to name! But at my own time! It’s still my show – remember?’

  ‘Oh … ay. Any mortal thing,’ said the fat man, smiling round in a friendly fashion. ‘That’s easy. No trouble. I’d be glad enough to speak on any mortal thing myself. Though that wasn’t what was called for, was it?’

  Carruthers was looking through the fat man as though willing him to transparency. ‘I’m all ready,’ he said again, ‘to talk of powers, of forces if you like, natural or supernatural, atom-smashing forces, star-blasting, seed-bursting. Forces behind man – and woman …’ as a bangled arm shot up, ‘behind viruses, superstars and space dust. Call it what you want.’

  ‘No, you call it,’ cried the woman raising her arm again.

  ‘Go on. Name it, Carruthers,’ called Watson dodging in from the back.

  ‘The name!’ roared the fat man suddenly, leaning right down over the balustrade and making an ugly, upward movement of his thumb. ‘Give the name!’

  ‘Maybe I will,’ said Carruthers.

  ‘No maybe’s!’

  ‘I will!’ yelled Carruthers.

  The group on the promenade waited for the next word. At the front the fat man waited, poising himself as though to bear down instantly with all his weight if the answer was not to his liking. Watson, on his toes at the back, waited, staring between motionless heads. The woman had momentarily gripped and silenced her bangles with her left hand. Around these three the rest of the group gradually grew still and as the minutes passed an absolute silence fell. Carruthers gathered himself to speak. From the waist up he stretched and twisted, shaking his shoulders to free himself for the impossible feat, while his stubborn legs stayed fixed. It was just as he raised his head and before he could utter that the wind struck from the north. As the force of it emptied lungs, a sharp, collective gasp went up, followed by an explosive acceleration of sounds. The deck chairs, which had showed only a gentle swell of canvas, began to crack like whips, and a row of billboards against the balustrade clattered onto their faces and went shunting past amongst a mass of flying debris sucked from the tops of litter bins. Across the way the proprietor was slamming down the café windows facing the sea, while above him in his awning a continuous low drumming had started up. There was a snarling swirl of sand and the group at the balustrade turned sideways to a man. Another stinging squall and they had turned their backs to the beach.

  For a few seconds the wind dropped. It was quiet except for the sound of one abandoned pail far down the beach, rolling desultorily between two rocks. Then the blast struck again – and with a sharper stuff than sand. Horizontal hail flew past. Balls of ice the size of marbles stotted off the pavement, slid in brilliant pebbled sheets down roofs and ran melting through gutters, piled so thickly they could be heard clashing softly past like crushed metal. At the same time it grew dark, for the harmless little cloud balloons had drifted together into one great mass overhead. One or two, staring through their eyelashes, were now convinced they saw hailstones coming down the size of pingpong balls. Umbrellas, opening up here and there, were quickly snapped in the pelting and a spiky confusion grew as the group started to shove outwards.

  ‘It’s stopped!’ someone shouted. Everyone paused at that, long enough to look up, long enough to catch a glimpse of blue and observe a three second silence before hail fell again. This time there was no wind. It fell vertically. By now the crowd was moving forward in one body, yet there was an excess of caution which made the attempt look strange. Half-skating, half-shuffling they went, hanging on to one another like beginners testing the rink. Two persons alone showed independence. The fat man was going lightly along on the tips of his toes by the balustrade rail, touching it here and there to steady himself. Watson was far behind the rest. He had turned once to stare back at the beach where Carruthers was still standing. And he yelled to the retreating crowd:

  ‘Hi – wait a minute! You’ve been swindled – you’ve been hoaxed! He never said it. Back to the rails, the lot of you, and let him have it! He’s given you the slip. He’s never going to say it. He’s dodged the word! He’s dodged God!’ No one heard him through the hiss of ice. Down on the beach Carruthers had let go of his hat and was now squatting in the sand with his arms out like a supplicant, grinning with relief, and letting the hailstones bounce from the open palms of his hands. His hat had blown some distance along the shore, transforming itself as it went. For a while it lay squashed upside down between two rocks, its pulpy, battered crown gummed to the ground, its fronds stirring indolently like a great red and white sea anemone. From there, by a change of wind, it was driven up again and, gaining speed and freedom, went on, now like a bedraggled, reviving bird – half-scuttling, half-flying, towards the sea.

  The Bookstall

  EARLY ONE WINTER evening, a man called Molson was leaning against the bookstall of a crowded platform waiting for the home-bound train. He was a busy man, proud to account for every instant of a prominent official’s day. It was even his boast that these moments in the station, and the half-hour’s journey following, were the only times he was completely free. Yet he was an optimist. Years of commuting had not absolutely killed his feelings for the place – a belief, though he’d never lived up to it, that at every railway junction came the promise of escape from routine. He saw the glass rather than the iron in his surroundings. But there was a pessimist’s view of stations. Its outlook was all iron – unbending and uncompromisingly black. Molson acknowledged it – he even felt slight twinges of it in his bones as he waited tonight – but he could never agree with it.

  A full train had just drawn out. It was some time before the next was due. ‘That was a heavy one,’ said the girl behind the bookstall, leaning out towards him over ranks of paperbacks. Her job made her well-known to everyone – though being looked at was another matter, competing as she was with her customers’ constant anxiety with time. But even more than with the clock, she had to compete with the faces and figures on book-covers. A swirling pattern of girls lay before her – nurses, witches and schoolgirls, nuns, queens, spies and housewives, some holding knives and guns to men’s heads, and some – raped by gorillas, bitten by vampires, worried by werewolves – were swooning back upon beds and hammocks, upon operating-tables and altars, and some into pits and graves or into whirlpools, strangled by their own hair.

  ‘I said – a heavy train tonight,’ the girl repeated, leaning still further out as
though she would grasp Molson by the lapel. Glossy, butter-blonde hair swung across the books as she turned her head this way and that to attend to paper-grabbers on either side of her. Her expression was not sympathetic.

  ‘Yes, indeed – a very busy train.’ Molson automatically looked behind her to see if the other woman was around. He imagined her as the motherly type.

  ‘Mrs Woodlock is not back from her tea,’ said the girl following his glance. Something sardonic in her tone made him turn to the platform again. It had suddenly grown quiet – that rare interval when officials can be heard chatting in the booking-office and even, tonight, the swish of an outsize platform brush cleaning up dust and old tickets on the other side of the line.

  ‘Where in the world can they be rushing to – morning, noon and night?’ said the girl standing back with her arms folded. Startled, Molson turned round. ‘Where can who …?’

  ‘All those people – as though their lives depended on it, for heaven’s sake!’

  It crossed Molson’s mind that talk along such lines could lead to difficulty. ‘Well, probably their lives do depend on it,’ he said. ‘For one thing they are going back and forth to their work.’

  ‘And for another?’

  ‘What did you say?’

  ‘What are the other things?’

  Molson silently folded his papers and put them under his arm as though he must very soon be moving off himself. He held the view that the business of bookstall women, in the racket of stations, was to be both static and silent. But the girl, as though instantly snatching this thought, said: ‘Oh, we stay put of course. There’s plenty of chance to watch. But I was asking – what are all the other things people do in your opinion?’

  ‘The other things? Well, that’s putting it wide enough, isn’t it? People visit their friends and relatives, I suppose. But mainly there’s all the business in and around the jobs – organizing, contacting, interviewing … well, the thing is endless. To put it simply – people go to meetings.’