Well, the opportunity to re-visit didn’t arise until today. The thought had caused things to arise in other ways daily, but I had to stay at home. And so it was with considerable anticipation that at roughly the same time on another Tuesday afternoon I pressed Olga’s birth year into the keypad in the bottom floor hallway. The door clunked open and I easily found the light switch set into its edge and lit up the subterranean corridor before letting it slam shut. There were precisely twelve doors, six on each side, each, presumably, giving onto a room like the one Olga had revealed to me. I opened the first door on the left, the one we had passed through on our way to our own paradise, and looked around. Everything was as Olga and I had found it, clean, pristine, pastel-coloured floral, but basic, functional, comfy.
I went into the next room on the left to find a mirror image of the first. Again it was budget hotel-type, since the en-suites occupied the shared wall between the rooms, each facility occupying half the wall length, both entered on the left. I opened the built-in wardrobe. It was empty, but there were a dozen wire hangers askew on the rail, ready for use.
Outside, I crossed the corridor and entered a third room. Again it had the same, quiet, calm, functional layout, with furniture and linen matching the other two.
It was then that the lights went out. A timer? There was movement outside in the corridor. I had left a cryptic message on Olga’s mobile, a code designed to achieve my goal, advising her that I was about to enter a cave and offering to give her a donkey ride, Roger and in. She had picked up the message. I knew that, because I attached a confirm flag. I assumed, thus, that she had just arrived and was again about to surprise me in the dark.
I was only a pace from the door and carefully stepped back towards the corridor in the pitch black. It was at that same instant that the door opened towards me. I met it edge-on in the middle of the face, the contact between something heavier-duty than walnut-veneered medium-density fibre and D. Cottee’s nose causing bright stars to momentarily light the dark.
Another moment passed unnoticed. At its start I was vertical, confidently approaching another goal. At its end I was prostrate, unsure if I was face-up or face-down, the giant throb in my anatomy not located where I had previously anticipated.
“Poor, poor Donkey!”
The voice was familiar, but not immediately placeable.
“Poor, poor Donkey”.
There were more words, but I caught only a distant muffle of undistinguishable murmur. My throbbing nose was now held painfully tight, pressured against something voluminous, soft and pliable, and the arms that encircled my head squeezed my ears to near-deafness, the lingering tinnitus of my collision drowning out what sound penetrated the depth of insulation that seemed to surround me. There was a suspicion of mothering sounds, of expressions such as “Who’s been a naughty boy then?” or “Has poor Donkey hurt his nose?” or even “Let mumsy-wumsy kiss it better.”
I was not only stunned, I was beginning to suffocate.
Awareness began to rise as a semblance of consciousness returned, stimulated by the brain stem-invoked desire to breathe - just a little. Memory began to return to confirm that the sack-like surrounds that enveloped my face were not the perfectly formed, beautifully proportioned protuberances I recalled from the day I achieved my goal. Nor was the sickly-sweet little girl’s coquettishness of voice the seductive come-on that my twenty-some-year-old presumed peroxide blonde had used. In this case, this afternoon, this was the real thing, the voice of a true dumbo.
I coughed, spluttered and fought free of the vast mammalian feeding system that was suffocating me. The arms gave way a little to release my head and I heard, “Wait a mo, love. Let me press my remote” and a split second later lights again shone.
I need not confirm that reflex reaction did not rise on this occasion if I relate immediately that I found myself in the arms of Maureen, the cleaner and part-time barmaid from The Castle. Her rotund, podgy blotched frame was almost contained in the floral smock that at best attempted to envelop the Michelin woman frontage that habitually bowed her perambulation. Her straight greasy hair, brushed severely to either side of a centre parting the width of baldness looked stickier than ever and a returning sense of smell confirmed that she was surrounded by an aura that mixed carbolic soap and ammonia grease cleaner rather than the expected alluring animality of Olga’s divine dampness.
I took a breath, just one, before the great arms pulled me back towards the vast frontal sag of her smock, the flapping fleshiness of her upper arms again closing my ears.
“Mmm, mmm, mmm,” she mumbled eloquently, or at least words to that effect. “...Let mummy kiss Donkey’s hooter... Mummy make it better...”
“I really have to get going,” I tried to say, but as I spoke I found I was effectively eating the clothed flesh on offer. “Maureen,” I said, breaking free, “what on earth are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be at The Castle with Suzie?” A mention of the wife seemed to do the trick. What seemed to have been on offer was swiftly withdrawn.
“I got a call from the boss,” she said. “I do cleaning here every now and then, whenever there’s a need. They have people to stay sometimes and they clean the place out just before they arrive, whether it needs it or not. It’s a few extra bob for me.” She paused and looked at me with suddenly changed gaze. “And how about yourself? What are you doing round here? Were you expecting someone?”
“No, I was just looking for the soft cover for the Raptor. I came in through the garage. I have the key.”
“Are you sure you didn’t come looking for a little bit of what might be on offer?” asked Maureen, again pushing forward the volume of her presence. She gave me a look, one of those knowing, penetrating pauses that answers the question it has just asked. What I didn’t know, however, was whether the someone in question referred to Olga as my goal, or to those others who sometimes came to stay, whoever they were. I was intrigued to find out more, but immediate circumstances could not tempt me to pursue the point.
“Well whatever’s coming clearly hasn’t arrived yet.” She glanced momentarily around to indicate a reference to the lack of occupants in the subterranean vault. “It’s not often that chance comes its way...” The upper arms flapped towards my head once more and a vast, certainly knowing, perhaps mocking smile spread across her face.
I hummed the eight tones of my get-out clause. “Must dash, Maureen,” I said, dodging her elderly thrust towards me. The eight tones, placed on a diatonic scale of C major, played on the touch-pad hinge of the subterranean cavern’s door thus released me and perhaps saved me from a fate worse than death. She’ll not forget that, however, won’t our Maureen. She’ll wonder why I was there and, even worse, she’ll remember that I knew how to get out, without a remote control.
Twenty Nine
Eventually we all go to Switzerland. There we deposit our vault... - Don considers how things are not said. Don and Suzie visit Kiddington and together seek a family reconciliation. Don goes for a pint in Bromaton and discovers much about a current acquaintance. Suzie attends a hospital appointment and receives some news, to which she reacts with some defiance.
Eventually we all go to Switzerland. There we deposit our vault, long-term, no access, no interest. This seems to be the message of the moment. Beware, however, accompanying someone on the trip; beware because you may be liable to prosecution! Those who read my blog in years to come (anos que vienen, I can now say in my fast-improving Spanish) will probably not understand this entry. It would be nothing new. How many contemporary readers, for instance, can locate the satirical reference to real politicians provided by Gulliver’s description of the strutters who fall off their high-heeled shoes? It was in L926, Euphemism, Satire, Caricature And Stereotyping In Quality Quasi-Realistic Literary Scenarios (Part Unit) that I began to understand the immediate impact of euphemistic language. Until then, I thought it was a verb - I phemis
m, you phemism, he she or it phemisms. To phemism would be to replace one thing with another. “There were just two minutes left when Real Madrid phemismed a defender for another striker...” But you do have to be careful what you phemism. When you phemism, for example, the great unspeakable with Switzerland, there’s a chance that the moral fibre of a nation might be in decay. At least that’s what we are told by eager commentators.
Homophony also interests me, and, even more than that, alliterative homophony at the level of the syllable. You see, there’s two other verbs like ‘to phemism’: ‘to phonium’ and ‘to thenasia’. I phonium, you phonium, he she or it phoniums is to make a noise about something. When you phonium a cause, you get up and shout about it, blow your own brass instrument, so to speak. Recently, many have phoniumed the individual’s right to thenasia.
To thenasia - I thenasia, you thenasia, he she or it thenasias - features increasingly in our daily existence as a life option. For some, it has reached the level of priority. But contrary to its literal interpretation, to thenasia does not mean to travel later to the Orient, but in fact to travel sooner to Switzerland, often taking crabs with you.
So when the lady at the flight check-in says, “Have you packed your own bags?” or “Are you carrying something for someone else?” she might follow up with “Do you take this, your lawful wedded wife, to Switzerland?” And when you answer even with a hint of the affirmative, she follows up with “You thenasia?” to which the reply, usually, is “I do.” At that point the lady stamps your ticket ‘Hand baggage only’, just before calling the police. Then they prosecute. Married in a vicar’s church, separated by an airline’s weigh-in. But the Cottees have not yet booked their tickets, not quite.
Suzie and I have just got back from a few days in Kiddington, hence the clear reference to current issues in the domestic news. It was a trip we scheduled some time ago, but then postponed when Suzie had to go back for her check-up. There was no emergency, at least that’s what we thought when we set off. By the time we returned, an emergency had come and gone, and today, back home in bibulous Benidorm, we only have aftermath to consider, an aftermath of limited future, assuming, of course, that aftermath means something similar to afterlife, but usually happens at school.
Rosie looks particularly good this morning, by the way. The sky over the Sierra Helada is ice-blue and cloudless. Rosie’s gleaming white is a complete dazzle, and beautifully set off by the go-faster stripes along her flanks. Ironically, Rosie probably could go faster, because she hasn’t moved since we placed her in measured position on her La Manca Park pitch. And now she’s wired up and plumbed in, the chances are that she will never move very far from here.
We got back quite late, but Alicante airport was still pretty full. Phil Matthews had offered to meet us in Mick’s car, so we drove back on deserted roads at one in the morning. The Porsche’s cavernous upholstery felt particularly plush and Suzie immediately fell asleep across the back seat. Contrary to assumption, it wasn’t solely as a result of in-flight boozing. The one thing that’s not cheap on cut-price airlines is drink! I chatted with Phil, but I doubt that we shared more than a sentence or two.
“Good trip?” I remember him asking as he fed the ticket machine at the car-park exit.
“In parts,” I replied. There were more words queuing up, but their own barrier stayed down.
“You’re all right then?” he asked ten minutes later, as lights cast cones into the noise-filled dark of the tunnel at San Joan.
“Me? I’m fine,” I replied, imposing specificity on the question that was not originally implied.
“How was the weather?” emerged after the second tunnel, the short one on the old road north of Campello.
“Mucilaginous,” I replied accurately.
“It’s been pretty good here,” he continued, ten kilometres nearer home. “We’ve had a couple of days of drizzle and grey skies, but the rest of the time it’s been fine.”
I offered no comment.
“So you’ve been in Kiddington all the time?” did not emerge into the night until we were already along the Rincon, passing Benidorm Palace on the way to our Rosie parked on her La Manca lot.
“Most of the time,” I answered. “We went to Bromaton a few times,” I continued with a sudden rush of expression, “and, of course, we were at the Infirmary in Ribthwaite one afternoon.”
“Oh, really? Where did you go in Bromaton?” he asked, surprising me in his election for further qualification, the outcome of Suzie’s hospital visit apparently not at the forefront of his thoughts. From that moment I knew my suspicions were all correct.
“Just around the town. We had a look in Marks, wandered through The Ridings and had a look at the new market hall. The receptary monstrosity is all black. It’s right next to the new bus station and it feels like a slum, even though the vociferate paralalia is brand new. The rest of the town looked like the aftermath of a thermonuclear attack.”
“And what about the Quartet? How are they doing?”
“Not bad.” I paused here. Really, I wanted to quiz the hapax legomenon sitting next to me on either of the issues that burned like fast fuses on divergent powder tracks. But I let them go to fizz off in their own directions. This was not the time. “They lost last Friday. They’ve been doing well up to now this season, but last Friday they played Punslet. Quartet were well up at one stage and on top. Then they slackened off and let the leptocephalus leucotomies back into the game. Punslet won by two points with a try in the last minute, the lucky ladrones.”
By now we were within smelling distance of the La Manca Caravan Park. A couple of music bars across the road from the entrance were still open. The karaoke was running. I could hear punters, Kiddingtonians amongst them, no doubt, micro-tonally expressing their imagined and never questioned familiarity with a hotel in California.
As the Porsche drew silently to a standstill on the gravel between the van lines, and Rosie’s pure white shone yellow in the street lights, I felt for the first time in months, years perhaps, that I had come home. Rosie, our Swift Sundance, could at least cocoon the two of us in the safe, resonant impermanence of her panelled shell. I suppose impatience got the better of me when Suzie couldn’t wake up. I simply should not have said anything about the cost of those drinks on the plane, because it sounded like I resented the expense, rather than the fact that she was rodent-derrièred even before we boarded, having sunk a procession of g’n’ts in the departure lounge pub. But I did speak out, and when she came round she took something of a swing at me.
“Intercourse you, you decurtate cacation!” she mumbled as she lashed out.
“Now come on, Suzie. We’re home. Let’s get you into bed,” I said, as Phil Matthews lifted our suitcase out of the back.
“Let’s do nothing of the biophagous sort,” she replied, sliding off the seat on the run. “I can do it my cancriform self.”
“But I’ve got the key for the van. You’ll have to wait,” I said, as Phil offered me the already extended handle of the wheely-case. There was an expression of concern on his face. A rodent-derrièred wife after a flight is not a new thing. I am sure that he has been in the same position, amongst others, with his Karen. But now, of course, Suzie was, at least in part, his boss, as well as my missus. He had to be careful what he said, even what he was willing to notice. The lad was clearly unsure of what to do or say. It was a moment of indecision, a moment when he deferred to me, waited for my action or comment. My own obvious inadequacy had generated a pure and growing vulnerability in him, almost as if he had respectfully passed to me the privilege of saying or doing anything to relieve the tension. I chose to ratchet things up a little.
“Yes, we went to Bromaton a couple of times,” I said. “I had a couple of pints with your mates in The Fleece.”
The face changed from question to horror, from anticipation to guilt, proving my fears.
>
“We’ll see you at The Castle tomorrow afternoon as normal,” I said, my fingers having to negotiate their hold of the suitcase handle. His hand still lay on the grip, immobilised by the shock that no doubt coursed through his being as a result of my words finding their sought-after home.
Just two days before, we had taken the bus to Ribthwaite. Suzie’s appointment was a routine follow-up from the tests she’d had done on her last visit, or so we thought. We weren’t due there until eleven-thirty, so we had even had a bit of a lie in. The ten o’ clock bus was plenty early enough and it was nearly empty. We had walked up to the church to get it because it was one that turned off to go through New Kiddington, past the old pit. We had even walked there round the houses, by the common along Fernside and then back to the main road down Grime Lane. It was a beautiful summer morning. The greenfinch were out wheezing their morning throats along the wires. Linnets were bouncing and pipping their flight across the gorse, while an occasional yellowhammer chirped its motto in the distance. Angry rooks flapped along the roof-ridge of a barn, whose occupants are now 4x4-owning middle-classes, overspill from the more expensive professional suburbs of Bromaton, rather than the pigs and silage that used to occupy their atmosphere.
How different the village is on that side of the road. The place is a picture postcard with manicured lawns, stone houses, converted barns, vibrant and colourful flower gardens, well-appointed houses perfectly pointed. There’s a couple of ponds, places where as a kid I used to fill my wellies, always just out of my depth in search of tadpoles, frogs, newts and toads. It was the scurrying water beetles that I liked most, their absurdly wide breast-stroke developing speeds I viewed with awe. “Look and enjoy - don’t litter or destroy” notices now say at their edge. The reeds are now so thick that no child could ever get near a wade. Even an individual who admitted sufficiently few allergies to risk paddling in mud would struggle.
A Search for Donald Cottee Page 30
