Beyond Black

by Hilary Mantel

  “So who’s stealing the shopping?” she asked: thinking, it could soon be me.

  “Illegal immigrants, Evan says.”

  “In Woking?”

  “Oh, they get everywhere,” Colette said. “Asylum seekers, you know. The council is taking the benches out of the park, so that no one can sleep on them. Still, we’ve had our warning, haven’t we? With the shed.”

  She drank the tea Alison had made her, leaning against the work surface as if she were in a station buffet. I moved him on smartly, she thought, he knew better than to mess with me, one look at me and he knew I wasn’t a soft touch. She felt hungry. It would have been easy enough to dip into the clients’ biscuit tin, when Al wasn’t looking, but she denied herself. Michelle had said their wheelie bin had been crammed with takeaway cartons, and she now realized the homeless person must have been responsible for these. Food is over, as far as I’m concerned, she thought. Pictures of Zoë were gnawing at her brain, like rats in a cage with no door.

  ten

  That summer, black slime came up through the drains of a Frobisher just down the hill. There was a heat wave, with temperatures creeping toward the upper nineties. Animals crawled into the shade. Children turned lobster-red inside their playsuits. Fragile citizens bought charcoal masks to protect against the excess ozone. Sales of ice cream and lager doubled, as did sales of cold and flu remedies. The lawns at Admiral Drive baked until they cracked, and the grass turned to patchy straw. Colette’s water feature had to be turned off: as all water features were turned off, by order. Fountains dried, reservoirs dwindled. Hospitals filled. The elderly expired. A plague of psychic shows broke out on TV, crawling all over the schedules.

  Colette sat watching them with a sullen expression, denouncing the transparent cheating, the collusion, the simplemindedness of the studio audiences. It’s totally irresponsible, she said, to encourage people to think that’s the way you go about dealing with the dead. In the days when she and Al first got together, the days when the princess passed, the punters squirmed when they were fingered; they twitched in their seats, desperate to foist the message off on the person next to them or the person in front or just behind. But now, when they came to a dem, the TV shows had tuned up their expectations, they couldn’t wait for their messages. When a Sensitive asked, “Who’s got a Mike in Spirit World?” fifty hands would shoot into the air. They yelled, cheered, embraced each other, made faces for the camera even though there wasn’t one. They shouted, “Oh, my gahhd!” when a message came though, and burst into grating sobs and doggy howls.

  I find it exhausting, Al said, just to watch. And I couldn’t do television myself, she said. If I were there in the studio something would malfunction. The picture would blank out. The network would go down. Then they’d sue me.

  And you’re too fat for television, Colette said.

  To think I used to blame so much on Morris! Al said. If the lightbulbs started flickering I’d shout, “Oi, Morris!” and if the washing machine over-flowed I would just give him a piece of my mind. But even now, your computer goes on the blink whenever I come near it, and we’re still not getting anywhere with the recordings, are we? The machine plays back tapes that aren’t even in it; we get material coming through from the year before last. All the tapes are speaking on top of each other, it’s like a compost heap.

  And you’re too fat, Colette said.

  So I think it’s my electromagnetic field. I think it’s hostile to modern technology.

  They had got all the satellite channels, because Alison liked to home-shop; she often felt shy when she was out, and she complained that people looked at her in a funny way, as if they knew what she did for a living. “It’s not shameful,” she said. “Not like being a sex worker.” Still, it was a comfort to be able to buy some chunky gold chains and glittery earrings, low-taste stuff she could wear onstage.

  Once, when they switched on their TV, Cara’s pixie face appeared on-screen; another time, Mandy’s sharp foxy features bobbed up. Colette said, “Natasha, huh! She doesn’t look a bit Russian.”

  “She’s not.”

  “They could have made her up to look Russian, that’s all I’m saying.”

  When the credits came at the end of the show, the producers put a disclaimer notice on the screen, to say that the programme was “For entertainment purposes only.” Colette snorted and stabbed the OFF switch. “You should tell them straight, at your next dem. Tell them what it’s really like in Spirit World. Why do you have to be so soft on them? Tell them what Morris used to do to you.” She sniggered. “I’d like to see their faces then. I’d like to see Mandy’s face, when she’s on camera and Morris puts his hand up her skirt. I’d like to see them burbling on about the world beyond, if Morris came back and he was in one of his moods.”

  “Don’t say that,” Al begged. “Don’t say you’d like to see Morris.”

  She had never been able to teach Colette the art of self-censorship; never been able to make her understand how simple and literal-minded the organizers of Spirit World could be. You had to guard the words that came out of your mouth and even the words as they formed up in your mind. Wasn’t that simple enough? Sometimes she thought Colette couldn’t be such a slow learner. Surely she was doing it on purpose, tormenting her?

  Gavin rang. He asked for Colette, and Al passed the phone over without speaking to him. She hung about, overhearing; though proximity wasn’t really necessary to her. She could tune in to Gavin any time she liked, but the thought tired her. Quite clearly she heard him say, “How’s the fat lesbian?”

  Colette said, “I’ve told you, Alison is not a lesbian. In fact, there are several men in her life.”

  “Who?” Gavin demanded.

  “Let me see.” Colette paused. “There’s Donnie. There’s Keith … she and Keith go way back.”

  Al stood in the doorway. “Colette … don’t.”

  Colette gestured to her angrily, to go away.

  Don’t make a joke out of the fiends, Al pleaded; but not out loud. She turned and left the room. You should know better, Colette, but how can you know better? You believe and you half-believe, that’s the trouble with you. You want the frisson and you want the money, but you don’t want to alter your dumb view of the world. She heard Colette say to Gavin, “There’s Dean. Dean really fancies me. But he’s quite young.”

  “What do they do, these blokes?” Gavin said. “Are they fortune-tellers as well?”

  “There’s Mart,” she said “Oh, and our neighbour, Evan. Plenty of men in our lives, you see.”

  “You’re carrying on with a neighbour?” Gavin said. “Married, is he?”

  “That’s my business.”

  Colette had that fizzing, crawling feeling you get when you’re lying. When she heard what was coming out of her mouth she was frightened. It was quite natural that she should want to put the best face on things, with Gavin, but stop, stop, she said to herself, Donnie and Keith aren’t real and Evan is a wanker and Mart lives in the shed. Or used to.

  “Fair dos,” Gavin said. “I mean, I can’t see anybody leaving his wife and kids for you, Colette, but then I’ve no right to an opinion, have I?”

  “Damn right you haven’t.”

  “No, you see who you like,” he said—still, she thought, with that lordly air, as if he were giving her permission. “Look, what I called about—they’ve been having a bit of a shakeout at work. They’ve let me go.”

  “I see. When did this happen, this shakeout?”

  “Three months back.”

  “You could have said.”

  “Yes, but I thought I’d get fixed up. I called a few people.”

  “And they were out, were they? In a meeting? On holiday this week?”

  “There’s a downturn, you know?”

  “I don’t think it’s a downturn. I think they’ve finally rumbled you, Gavin.”

  “No, it’s happening everywhere, all the big consultancies are shedding.”

  “So how are you
managing? Money must be tight.”

  “It’s just a cash-flow problem.”

  “I’m sure Zoë can help you out.”

  He seemed to hesitate—so Colette said sharply, “She is still with you, I suppose?”

  “Oh, yes, she’s very loyal. I mean, she’s not the sort of girl to chuck you if you had a temporary setback.”

  “Not like me, eh? I’d be out of there like a shot.”

  “So I have to ask you about the payments, for the flat. I have to cut down my outgoings. Just till I get sorted.”

  “So is there a downturn in the modelling business too? Or is she in hock for her tit lift and her bum suction? Oh, it’s all right, Gavin, I can afford to carry you for a while. Alison and I are doing really, really well.”

  “Yeah, it’s all over the TV, psychic shows.”

  “Yes, but that’s fraud. We’re not fraud. And we’re not dependent on the whims of schedulers, thank you.” Something touched her, a small hand on her sleeve: compunction. “So how are you,” she said, “apart from poor? How’s your car running?”

  There was a short silence. “I have to go,” Gavin said. “Zoë wants me.”

  “Probably some bit of her fallen off,” Colette said. “By-eee.” As she put down the phone she chuckled. Gavin had always lived in anticipation of his next salary cheque, and with his credit cards charged up to their limit. He’ll be wanting a loan soon, she said to herself. She sang out to Alison, “Guess what? Gavin’s got the boot.” But Al was on the other line.

  Mandy said, “It’s time we started offering something to the punters that they can’t get from satellite TV. It’s all very well, but who’s making money out of it? Not us, for sure. It’s three hours hanging about in a back room with a plate of stale biscuits, an hour in makeup with some snooty cow drawing your eye-brows in the wrong place, and then when you see yourself you’re edited down to the blink of an eye and you’re supposed to be bloody grateful.”

  “I thought it would be glamorous,” Al said wistfully. “Colette says I can’t go on because of my size, but I thought it would be nice for you.”

  “In my view,” Mandy said, “we have to reinstate the personal touch. Silvana’s been advertising psychic hen parties, and she’s getting a very good response. You need to be able to provide one reader to about every six ladies, so I said I’d see if you were willing.”

  “Be a change, wouldn’t it?”

  “That’s what I think. A change for the guests, too. It’s a bit more upmarket than going on the razz and sicking up vodka outside some club. What with date-rape drugs, all that, you wouldn’t want to venture out.”

  “No men,” Al suggested. “We don’t want Raven droning about ley lines.”

  “Definitely no men. That’s what they’ve come to get away from.”

  “And we’re not including Mrs. Etchells, are we? We don’t want her twittering on about the joys of motherhood.”

  “Or telling them they need a little op. No, definitely no Mrs. E. I’ll sign you up, Al. You know those people in Cornwall, those new suppliers? They offer party packs, sort of goody bags for the clients to take away, minisizes of aromatic oils, three-pack of incense sticks, candle in tin, you know the sort of thing, presented in a velvet-look pouch. We can put a markup on them and sell them to the party organizer and we can bring along our own stocks of angel cards and spiritual CDs. Gemma’s got a cash-and-carry card so we could supply the champagne and party snacks. Ideally we’ll make it an evening of pampering and relaxation, as well as prediction. We can give nutritional advice—perhaps not you, Al—and we need somebody to do massage and reflexology. Silvana does Reiki, doesn’t she? And Cara’s got this new therapy she’s going in for, I forget what they call it. Anyway, you rub their feet and it brings back memories of life pre-birth.”

  “Really?” Al said. “Have you tried it, Mandy?”

  “Mm. Quite intriguing. Peaceful.”

  “What was it like?”

  “Darkness. Sort of swishing.”

  She thought, I wouldn’t like to have access to my thoughts, before I was born. An image came to her of her mother, patiently fishing for her with a knitting needle.

  “Anything else? Besides swishing?”

  “Yes. Now you mention it. I think I got reverted to my past life. The closing moments, you know. Bloody great hoof coming down on my head. I could hear my own skull cracking.”

  At the hen parties, through the summer evenings, Colette sat in other women’s kitchens, perched on a stool, frowning as she inputted data into her palm-top organizer. She was cool and neat in her little beige skirts and tiny T-shirts, an inch of flat midriff showing, as fashion decreed. She sat with legs crossed, a sandalled foot swinging, as she squared up Alison’s autumn schedule and calculated her expenses. When the Sensitives in their floaty scarves slid away for a break, when they leaned against the fridge and tried to engage her in conversation, she would give them her flat-eyed stare and, with an irritated twitch of her lips, go back to her sums. When they were called back to the party, she would take a long breath, finding herself alone, and look about her. They were working some upmarket locations—Weybridge, Chobham—and there were state-of-the-art kitchen fittings for her to admire: granite worktops like dark mirrors, and brushed steel in which she saw, faintly, her slight and wavering form as she crossed the room to pour herself a glass of San Pellegrino. When the door opened, New Age music wafted towards her, and dreamy half-clad girls, slippery with aromatic oils, drifted past and sometimes offered her a carrot baton or a bite of sushi.

  “Ironic,” she said to Al. “You lot, giving advice on love and marriage. There’s not an intact relationship between you.”

  She heard the psychics muttering about her presence, heard herself referred to by Silvana as “that hanger-on.” She knew Silvana was jealous, because she herself couldn’t afford a manager. She pictured herself hitting back: I’m really the core to the heart of this enterprise. You ask my ex, Gavin. I keep him, these days. I’ve made this business boom. I have many skills and talents. I could tell the punters what’s going to happen in their love lives. You don’t need psychic powers.

  Alison came into the kitchen looking hot. “I’m just slipping out. Tell the clients I’ll be ten minutes. Or shift some of mine over to Cara.”

  “Certainly.” Colette opened the chart on which she kept track of the evening’s proceedings.

  “Skivving off, eh?” Gemma said, following Alison into the kitchen. “I’m needing some matches, the moon candles keep going out.” She cast her eyes around. “There’s nothing that needs lighting, is there, in a house like this? And they all don’t smoke. Or claim they don’t.”

  Colette opened her bag, and took out a box. She rattled it, looking smug. “Don’t,” said Al, flinching. They stared at her. “I don’t know,” she said. “I just don’t like people rattling a box of matches. It reminds me of something.”

  “You were probably burned at the stake,” Gemma said. “In a previous existence. You were probably a Cathar.”

  “When were they?” Colette said.

  Gemma frowned. “It’s medieval,” she said.

  “Then I don’t think they had matches.”

  Gemma flounced out. “It’s a presence in there,” Al said, “blowing out the candles. Cara tried to get it in a corner, but we don’t want to be frightening the punters. I’m just popping over the road, because there’s a bunch of grannies standing by the hedge.”

  “Where?” Colette went to the window.

  “Spirit grannies. Great-grannies. Great-greats.”

  “What do they want?”

  “Just to say hello. Congratulations. To have a look at the décor. You know how it is.”

  “You’re too soft,” Colette said. “Let the grannies stand there, and you get back to your clients.”

  “I have to explain to them,” Al said, “that they’re not wanted. I have to put it so as not to cause pain.”

  As she went out towards the lift, the lit
tle woman followed her, saying, “Excuse me, miss, have you seen Maureen Harrison?”

  “You again?” Al said. “Haven’t you found her yet? Stick around, ducks, follow us home.”

  Gemma came back into the kitchen with a girl leaning on her shoulder: pin-thin, teetering on high heels, wailing and dripping tears. “Get up, Colette,” she said. “This is Charlotte, our hostess. Let Charlotte sit down.”

  Colette vacated her stool, Charlotte hopped up on it; it wasn’t the sort of stool you could sink onto. Her bleating continued, and when Gemma tried to hug her she squealed, “No, no,” and beat her away with little flapping motions of her hands. “He just texted her,” Gemma said. “The bastard. It’s off.”

  Hens filled the doorway; their mouths were ajar. “Come on back, ladies,” Silvana urged, “don’t all crowd around, let her get over the shock.”

  “Christ,” Colette said. “She’s the bride?”

  Cara pushed the hens aside. She looked little and fierce. “Text him back, Charlotte.”

  “Can you pretext?” Gemma asked. “Is that possible? Would you know, Colette? If she made it look as if she sent a message before he sent his, then she could be the one to call it off.”

  “Yes, do that,” Cara urged. “Your self-esteem’s at stake here. Pretend you never got it.”

  “Now look, darling.” Gemma squatted on the ground before Charlotte. Charlotte keened and flapped at her, but Gemma took her hands and squeezed them tight. “Now look, you think the world has stopped turning, but it hasn’t. You’ve had a shock but you’ll get over it. This is your lowest ebb and now the only way is up.”