The Limits of Vision
Page 13
‘You are not from the Institute of Whiteness, are you? And I know that your name is not Hornrim.’
‘The name is White actually. I’m a GP. Tell me about this Institute of Whiteness.’
It is hard for me to get going. It all sounds so silly, especially telling my husband. But eventually I do, and I tell them everything I told the geniuses and more.
‘– but there is no such thing as the Institute of Whiteness …’ I tail off miserably.
‘There is no such thing as the Institute of Whiteness,’ Dr White echoes me.
Do they think me an idiot, that I cannot see the glances they are exchanging? The eyes of Philip and Stephanie are signalling Dr White that he will have to speak for them.
‘Marcia, my dear, I want you to listen to me very carefully,’ he says. ‘When you were a child you had the sensation that the adults were keeping something from you. You may not have said so. You may not even have told yourself this suspicion, but it was there. It was one of your assumptions about life. There is nothing odd about this. Many children entertain similar suspicions. Then, when you were a little older – say, about ten – you probably put this only dimly formulated suspicion behind you, and you settled into family life, school activities and so on. Later yet, in adolescence, you may have concluded that the great secret was the facts of life. There is usually a sense of anticlimax then. That’s a very common feeling, for sex isn’t such a great thing after all, and many people whose sex lives are not all that they should be are able to lead lives that are in other respects perfectly fulfilling.’
He coughs. He is so nervous. It is not at all like his visit earlier in the day.
‘Now, Marcia, you see the hand that Philip is stretching out to you? There is a piece of dandruff on it. I want you to look at that piece of dandruff and tell me what you see. It is very small, just there.’
If that is what he wants, then he is going to get it. I gaze into Philip’s palm and speak:
‘I’m used to working with larger flakes of dandruff, but they are all interesting, aren’t they? I like dandruff. There is an immense amount of it in household dust, and it makes the dust seem less alien – gives it a human face I suppose. Looking at this little bit here, I can see that it is more symmetrical than the big ones I’m used to. Every small particle of dandruff has its own distinctive structure, like a snowflake or a fingerprint. If this is an exam, then I am going to fail it – I just haven’t thought long enough about small bits of dandruff. Besides, the light is terribly dim in the hallway. This particular bit is like a five-gated city. Don’t laugh – but now, looking at it, I have the weirdest feeling that this is the little grain of dust in Lambeth that Satan could not find, and the reason he could not find it is that Philip took it away with him this morning. I see an immense world of delight in this piece of dandruff. It is indeed a lovely heaven. Don’t laugh.’
‘No one is laughing,’ says White gently. ‘And you haven’t failed any exam.’
He lets the silence build up before he speaks again.
‘Marcia, I have to tell you that there is indeed a great secret which until now has been kept from you –’
‘Welcome to the team!’ Stephanie cuts in enthusiastically, but White shushes her, and goes on:
‘Look at us, Marcia. Dry those tears. Well, don’t look at us if you don’t want to, but picture us if you like. Picture us as extraterrestrial beings who for a long time have been circling the planet in our flying saucers keeping it under covert surveillance, waiting to see – to see when that planet’s civilization shall have achieved sufficient maturity for us to admit it into the Pangalactic Civilization.’
Now I do look up and, seeing the expression on my face, he hastens on.
‘No, we are not mad and neither are you. You, Marcia, are the planet, we are the extra-terrestrials in our flying saucers and now we are making contact with you. We think that you are ready. I’m sorry, perhaps the metaphor is confusing. I’m afraid I’m rather fond of metaphors. We all of us here are. Oh dear, how can I explain …? You see, there is no Institute of Whiteness. There never could be.’
‘It would attract too much attention – and too many idiots,’ Philip interrupts.
‘Quite so,’ White continues. ‘But while a big official institute with a known address is out of the question, something more informal does exist, and has existed for centuries. Leonardo da Vinci and Isaac Newton may well have been members. However we keep no records. No names, no pack-drill. Today we are a loosely organized group of like-minded people, thousands of us, who meet from time to time to exchange notes and perceptions. Of course there is nothing sinister about what we do. The general public would simply find our researches extremely dull and (let us be realistic) somewhat ridiculous. But, as I put it to myself, there is nothing trivial about minutiae, nor is the trivial so unimportant. My own interest is in dirty handkerchiefs, Stephanie specializes in the patterns made by grease stains on the bottom of pans, and Philip, rather unusually, compares the smells of drains. You seem to us a good all-rounder.’
Stephanie’s enthusiasm can be controlled no longer:
‘Did you see the folds on my skirt this morning? Weren’t they super! I knew that you had spotted them. Perhaps you would like to write a report on them for us?’
‘We have safe houses and we do circulate reports,’ White presses on. ‘Sometimes we even publish reports, if we are sure that they are not going to attract attention, in odd places like Good Housekeeping. Philip here has been pressing for you to join us ever since your marriage.’
‘Philip?’ I look at him doubtfully.
‘Why do you think I married you, you silly darling?’ He kneels down to give me a great big hug.
White coughs and doggedly continues:
‘It fell to Stephanie to do the independent vetting. I may say that her report was entirely favourable. And then of course I came round this afternoon to do the final check (that was a wonderful understain, by the way). Well, what do you say? Will you join us?’
‘I don’t know what to say.’ My voice is all chokey.
‘Say yes!’ they chorus.
‘Yes, then. Look, it is silly us all sitting here on the carpet. Let’s go into the kitchen and I will make some tea.’
Pausing only to point out the played-out body of Mucor sprawled in the hallway, I lead them into the kitchen. Through the blur of my moist eyes the kitchen appears as a glittering paradise. While I get the tea things ready I tell them all about my day’s housework, with Stephanie filling in with some of the details about the coffee morning. I tell them about my last adventure with Darwin and Leonardo and they all laugh, but they are laughing with me, not at me.
‘Gosh!’ says Stephanie. ‘When I clean my house I have similar things going with Fu Manchu and P. T. Barnum, but nothing half so intellectual as your lot.’ She is really impressed.
Dr White smiles with a genial warmth I could not previously have suspected him of possessing.
‘Look, this calls for a celebration. A friend of mine has got some dirty handkerchiefs together for me at the hospital in the middle of town. Why don’t we all go there and have a look at them, and then go on to dinner out? Dinner with champagne!’
I tell them I have to get ready. Actually, I run upstairs clutching the little fleck of dandruff that Philip has given me. It is the key that has unlocked all our hearts and I place it carefully in the centre of my jewel-box. Darwin was dead all right, but there was a whole new world waiting for me when I came downstairs.
Out in the street, we all link arms and, as I look up the street, I can see no stain on the horizon of my future happiness.
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