‘As a matter of fact it was clear the others had no intention of taking it from him. Even the mention of a book quotation cut no ice in this company. It was a book they hadn’t read and they didn’t want to hear about it.
‘“Luckily,” Peterson went on, “even though the soil isn’t all that productive, I’ve got a fine strip of birch and pinewood on the north side, and a good stretch of heath to the south. I shouldn’t be surprised if I don’t take up bee-keeping one day. But of course there are lots of ways of being productive – it doesn’t necessarily have to be turnips or grapes or whatever. Stars or bees – that was my choice.” The company looked dazed. Was he comparing a bee-group with a star-group? And what was the connection? In our various fields most of us dealt continually with con nections and comparisons. Coincidences, cross purposes and catastrophic happenings weren’t exactly our line. And talking of lines, some of us preferred to speak about our “line of country” rather than our “field”. Somehow it made for a wider and more impressive bit of landscape.
‘“Well, I decided it would be stars,” Peterson told us. “In other words, the fields of the sky.”
‘Now don’t imagine that because this was a countryman he was any more modest than the rest of us. Not a bit of it. He too liked the sound of his own voice. He spoke very slowly and deliberately. He made himself heard all right, though I noticed he didn’t look directly at anyone but over their heads towards the window. Perhaps it was as well, for there were certain very irritable eyes fixed on him. Some people hadn’t yet spoken of their own fields and were willing him to stop talking. All the same, some of the linguistic people – and I count myself amongst them – had been listening rather carefully to his “sand, silt, silky” bit. I think, in spite of themselves, they were impressed with the alliteration.
‘“Well, stars it was to be,” Peterson informed us again. “I figured bees and honey could wait to sweeten my old age. So I erected a small telescope in one corner of the field. It was mounted of course – the main pillar set in concrete. Not only that – but a shed to contain the instrument and one that could divide clear in two when the viewing was on. I got help with it of course, and a great deal of time and money went into it – a lot more than setting up beehives in a patch of heather, for instance. Oh yes, it all took time. But then – what hours and hours of pleasure I’ve had with it!”
‘I remember there was an uneasy stirring amongst our company,’ Sullivan went on. ‘Those “hours and hours of pleasure” made them feel embarrassed. Even our chairman – never anything but kindly and encouraging – flinched slightly at the rapturous tones of the man as though he were about to describe some outrageously romantic encounter. Half the room sat in disapproving silence with a nervous tenseness in the rest of us most of whom didn’t know a planet from a star or a star from the fairy light on top of a Christmas tree.
‘“So I suppose you’ll be watching for Halley’s Comet coming in one of these nights”’ said a Careers Adviser. Personally I was glad to see Peterson wasn’t to be patronized. “Not due for a long time yet,” he replied. “I’ve no intention of sitting out there for a couple of years. And it doesn’t whizz past like a firework on Guy Fawkes night, you know.” The adviser sat still under the reproof, drawing on her warm gloves as though ready to sit it out herself through all the winter nights as punishment.
‘“The first thing that strikes you when you look at the sky through a telescope is the sudden increase in the number of stars in the sky,” our fieldman told us. “One moment you’re walking across the field in the dark, looking up at a few brilliant stars and constellations with patches of black between or sometimes behind it, all this faint, grey seeding of distant stars, almost invisible. But the moment you put your eye to the telescope you’re shot out into the depths of space, so to speak, as though in a rocket. It’s an awful moment. Hair-raising! Not a thing you ever get used to – even the astronomers will tell you that. Suddenly – the number and brightness of those stars! Even the dim, grey seeds begin to glitter. Well, I can tell you, some nights I’m almost thankful to be down to earth again and walking back home across the field in the dark.”
‘It was difficult,’ said Sullivan, ‘to say whether the rest of the room were envious or scornful of Peterson’s particular field of interest. Besides, it was getting late and rather dim in the room, though none of us thought to put on the lights. We weren’t even clear to one another. All our sharp outlines had disappeared in the last half hour as though at once dazzled and darkened by the brilliance and blackness of space. We were on our feet ready to go. The curtains weren’t drawn and one or two flung a nervous glance at the sky as they drifted off. Yes, they drifted back to their fields.
‘For a time I couldn’t see their fields,’ remarked Sullivan meditatively. ‘I couldn’t see the field of Economics. I couldn’t see the Administrative field. That evening the field of Christian Ethics looked decidedly foggy. The Waves and Vibrations were flat and static as an ironing-board. The psychologist was walking back alone and silently into her field of Human Relationships. Even my own field wasn’t absolutely clear as though there were a low ground-mist hanging over it. Peterson went out with us of course. But he appeared to have a field he could walk very freely in, for he was tramping steadily forward – his boots no doubt gritting on the silty, sandy soil with its small lumps of chalk. It didn’t seem so late to us. We were hastening towards familiar cafés where we might find food and drink. But round Peterson’s head it appeared to be still black night. For like a hollowed Hallowe’en turnip-head with its candle, his brow shone, transparent, as if – straight down through the first lights of the city – the uncanny stellar radiance had pierced inside his skull.’
Out of Order
A SHORT TIME in any part of the city and a visit to one or two of its larger stores was enough to bring up the count. Today it was seven phone boxes, five weighing-machines, three sets of traffic lights, a couple of stamp-machines, three escalators, four lifts, one platform ticket appliance, an automatic hand-dryer and a swing door. Nowadays Collier had to remind himself fairly often that OUT OF ORDER signs had become a natural part of every city scene. They were meant to be read reasonably and coolly like any other sign and each citizen was to get the message quickly and pass on to his own business. They were not meant to be studied and pondered over like a set of hieroglyphics. There were difficulties of course. Already Collier had made life awkward enough for himself by being an unashamed and critical reader of public words. He brooded on words – loved them, respected and encouraged them – was unnerved, despairing, infuriated by them – never taking them for granted whether they came in thousands or in threes. So was it ridiculous for him to imagine that the three words OUT OF ORDER were expressed in one way or another more and more often and more and more boldly around the place? ‘You could be right,’ said his friend Taylor who, though not a brooding addict of words, had keen sight and a critical concern for all the changes of city life. ‘These weighing-machines, for instance, have been out of order for weeks if not months.’ They agreed that this, though hard on weight-watchers, was not a tragedy. Nevertheless it was strange how an accumulation of non-tragic things could lower the spirits. They had come across one of the out-of-order escalators in a hardware store. It was difficult to describe what was so dispiriting about an unmoving moving staircase. They both had full use of their legs. They weren’t so decrepit, were they, that they couldn’t walk up in the usual way? ‘No, it’s the dead look of this metal contraption,’ said Collier. ‘Now it hardly even looks like a stairway. Its sole purpose was to move. It’s simply a useless machine, and obviously useless things turn ugly.’
‘Better keep it in proportion,’ said his friend. ‘For instance, take a good look at that phone box there on your right. That man in there is managing to get through. If you look carefully you’ll see he’s actually smiling.’
‘I’m not too bothered about the smile. Is he hearing anything?’
‘Not only th
at. He’s talking too. So it’s the stunning pleasure of finding something in perfect working order you’ve got to begin thinking about. That makes life easier for a start, and is something your all-the-year-round optimist knows very little about. Expect nothing and be astounded!’
‘So we remain passive pessimists? Nothing easier, it’s already, isn’t it, our reputation with foreign visitors?’ They walked on silently for a while. It was still early in the day. They were going towards the big black-on-white calamities on news-boards and the solid blocks of newspaper on the pavement, held down by stones – for there was a breeze. The neatly-angled appearance of the papers on the ground and the spotless, rustling bouquet in the arms of the newsvendor had a peculiar attraction. There was something good here to feel, touch and see. Most people liked the smell of the tacky, fresh print, said Taylor. Yes, it was this ‘new’ business, Collier admitted, that he’d always enjoyed – physically new to the senses, with the promise of something new – or so one hoped – for the mind.
He was not alone in this. There was satisfaction on the faces of most people when being handed a folded, pristine paper from the sheaf or while watching the weighted block on the pavement being untied. There was a ritual going on here. It was the beginning of a new day. However, if the ritual was disturbed by strikes, by hold-ups in delivery, breakdowns in machinery, late trains and vans – the loss of papers could be felt physically as though the public body had been deprived of some clean bit of its daily clothing to wrap itself in. ‘And people can be very particular about the folds,’ said Collier. ‘If a page drops out, for instance, or if the whole thing gets out of order before they’ve read the stuff – they’re in a fury. No wonder the servants in the old days would sometimes iron a page or two if by any chance they’d got crumpled before breakfast. Otherwise it would have been as bad as laying out a creased shirt on the master’s bed.’
The two friends bought different papers and walked on down the street. There were some objects too high up for out-of-order signs. Five of the city’s main clocks had been stopped for weeks – three on church towers, one at a traffic roundabout, and one above a large shop-front. ‘No hurry to mend them of course,’ remarked Taylor despondently. ‘Isn’t everyone supposed to carry his own time on his wrist? And those who don’t had better start to reckon it by the old sun and shadow method.’ For a while they went on silently, and silently Taylor pointed to an out-of-order self-service petrol pump and to a second non-functioning revolving door leading to an Insurance office. ‘Never mind Insurance,’ said Collier. ‘I’ve been told there’s a leading fashion store where one lavatory door in the six is always out of order. Without fail. Is it a law that six functioning doors in a row are too many?’
One or two buildings in the city obviously felt themselves a cut above the others even in their out-of-order signs, and there were places where an actual apology was offered. Towards its closing-time they found themselves in one of the large central banks. While Collier cashed his cheque – Taylor wandered about examining the metals and marbles of the place. A small area of the floor was barred off to clients and OUT OF COMMISSION was the sign here with, in addition: WE APOLOGIZE FOR ANY INCONVENIENCE WE MAY HAVE CAUSED OUR CLIENTS. In a way the apology, rare as it was and totally lacking on lavatory doors and phone boxes, seemed wasted here. Few persons on their way to the manager’s office seemed to care whether they were walking on perfect tiling or cracked tiling. A nearby cashier saw Taylor looking in that direction. ‘Yes, it’s taking a long time, isn’t it? Those tiles cost money. Money’s the problem these days. Always money, money, money!’ Taylor nodded. He watched, fascinated, as the young man took up a wad of banknotes, thick and soft as a sliced loaf, as he bound up the limp blue fivers with elastic bands and divided the crisp brown ten pound notes, the one from the other with a snapping flick of finger and thumb. Up and down the counter men and women were going through the same actions, deftly lifting the tops from towers of coins or swiftly rebuilding new lines of silver towers along the counter. Occasionally someone might query a figure in his bankbook. One cashier might consult another. It was even possible that somewhere in the building an out-of-order computer would be reeling off wrong figures. But on the whole the counter-work appeared to be running smoothly. Whatever invisible breakdowns there might be the visible cash itself was in perfect order. They moved on down the street to a post office where, on the pavement, they found a third stamp-machine out of order. ‘And has been for the last hundred times I’ve passed,’ said Collier. ‘Surely one should put in a polite complaint.’ Taylor smiled. More often than not Collier’s polite complaints were delivered in a voice rasping with indignation. The girl at the counter said yes, they knew about the machine – everyone knew about it. And there was nothing to be done about it at the moment – a matter of maintenance staff being shorthanded. And above all, of course, a matter of money. ‘In any case,’ she added, ‘people can always buy their stamps inside.’
‘But what about stamps after hours?’
‘After what?’ said the girl, leaning across.
‘Stamps at night, for instance – people writing letters and wishing to post them late.’ The girl glanced up at Collier. There was something about this look that made the posting of night letters seem very unnecessary indeed, even downright immoral. ‘You can rest assured that everyone here is perfectly aware of that stamp-machine,’ she repeated and bent again to her task. There was a good deal of guilt hanging about the post office now, but it was a guilt confined solely to the front of the counter like a heavy gas that had drifted and settled there. It was clear, however, that Collier would not rest assured. Perhaps he did not rest at night at all. Even Taylor, in the brooding atmosphere of the place, seemed to see a totally different image of his friend coming up. A nonresting man rising from the midst of his sleeping family and making his way through the dark house to his desk in order to write a shady, night-time letter. Then comes the punishing revelation – not a stamp in the house! Now for the devious walk by unlit buildings and silent streets to the stamp-machine – and the second punishment falls like some heavenly hatchet stroke. OUT OF ORDER.
The two moved on. Once out into the street Collier’s image seemed to change again. He complained of his arthritic shoulder. ‘Look out,’ warned Taylor, ‘or you’ll find the OUT OF ORDER round your own neck – though of course there’d be plenty of people, young and old, to join you with labels like it.’ They agreed there were lots to choose from and more and more as time went on – OUT OF WORK, OUT OF TOUCH, OUT OF PLACE, OUT OF CONDITION, OUT OF LINE, OUT OF DATE – all calling out for repair, a job, a companion, in need of a bolt-hole or a place in the sun. The town would be jammed with suppliants.
‘Well there’s no lack of committees, societies and the like, to help.’
‘It’s us I’m talking about – the company of the street. How do we stop ourselves falling apart – seizing up like clocks and escalators?’
It was a fine street they were in. It had been much praised. At this hour there were a fair number of people around. In the evenings, however, apart from the pubs, there was a strange lack of groups about. Except for a few bands of young persons and two or three couples, men and women seldom got together. ‘What do you expect?’ Taylor demanded. ‘Tables on the pavement under striped awnings? Rousing talk as the sun goes down? Passionate argument as the moon comes up? This is the north, isn’t it? It’s the wind, you understand.’
‘Oh certainly – sooner or later this dark wind gets the blame – and for everything lacking in our particular scene and temperament. But open up your newspaper in this much-vaunted hurricane – one look at the letters – as likely as not it’s the English, you’ll find, who are to get the blame, and sometimes from the sound of it every man and woman across the border.’
The Man Who Wanted to Smell Books Page 26
