Has bEE—oops! I mean: Bee—has Bee been seeing Martin or Anthony for horizontal recreation?
Ah, you don't want to tell. Why not? Don't want to be the one to break the bad news? You know, they say betrayal causes madness. Has Bee betrayed me? I see, you're all—yes, gentle, you too—all sitting there with your arms folded and lips buttoned. Yes, sir, I do see you standing in the underground: I used the word "sitting" in a general sense. Well, if you're that pedantic I'm surprised you got this far.
Anyone. How about you—yes, young lady there, curled up on the armchair in Hampstead. Yes, blue jumper, black tights, smoking a French cigarette. Oh, hello. You have a nice smile. Mm? Did you see or hear of any hanky-panky in my absence? What's a smile supposed to mean? Oh, and do me a favour, don't blow smoke in my face. Yes: I am a reformed smoker. I know: they're the worst sort.
Oh, you'd like to give up? A couple of thoughts: you haven't always smoked, and a non-smoking man may not like to kiss you. Mm? How did I know you're between relationships? Ah, well, you could say I have knowledge which is denied you and if I tried to explain you might not believe me.
What's your name? Oh, don't be coy. Mine's Charlie. But you know that. Let me guess: Samantha...? Helena...? Nasturtium...? Vanessa...? Yeliena...? Amber...? You're smiling: is it Amber? You're blushing. Please don't be embarrassed: Amber's a lovely name. Pardon? They made fun of you at school? 'Stop, get ready, go.' 'Traffic light.' 'Caution.' You look intelligent enough to rise above that. So, what shall I call you? Amb. Just Amb? Okay.
I knew an amber girl once. Red hair, faint eyebrows, delicate eyelashes. But you're dark-haired. Mm? It's not fair because although I can see you, you can't see me.
Well, I'm short: five five and a half. What's funny—oh, the half...? Blond. Anyway, Amb, you've persevered with the novel so far, what do you think? Oh, you're finding it an easy read. Good. And you're surprised just how good the pace is and you want to know how it all ends? Don't we all, sweetheart. Sorry, I didn't mean that word patronisingly. It just slipped out.
But to get back to the point: did you see Martin or Anthony canoodling with my wife? No, because you can't see what happens off-stage. You can imagine, though. Ah, you think I'm just going through a funny phase. Of course, you knew about Ffion, my amber girl, because she's in the text. Yes, but the text can take us only so far. Our imaginations like to invent off-stage behaviour. Mm? Oh, you're happy to leave all that to Rod. He's the writer, you're the reader. But, Amb, at the risk of being accused of pressing a point, I want to say that the life of a novel, film, play is continuous. I don't want to get into philosophy, but the life of a good novel continues even after you've closed the book. Fictive life. Fictive reality.
Pardon...? I'm beginning to sound a bit like Rod. Well, that's hardly surprising, is it? Anyway, let's forget all the theory and get down to brass tax. Taz...? I mean, tacks. I'd like to know a bit more about you; in return I'll tell you about me. Oh, you prefer to get that info from the text? But how can I learn about you if Rod doesn't write the off-stage stuff? I should use my imagination? Oh very jocose.
Amby. Ooh, you don't like that. Okay, Amb: the only thing between us is this page. Such a small barrier. Please will you let me in—no, properly. Let me in properly to your hacienda.
Oh, Amb, by the way: did your school chums ever call you iambic pentameter? Ah, you didn't do English Lit. Studied double maths and physics. And you're an engineer. Well, an iambic pentameter is a line of poetry containing five feet—a foot is another name for a group of syllables—each foot consisting of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed one. For example:
Thou art not conquer'd; beauty's ensign yet
Is crimson in thy lips and in thy cheeks,
And death's pale flag is not advancèd there.
Mm? Yes, exactly: dee dah, dee dah, dee dah, dee dah, dee dah. And the point? Only for academic use. Otherwise useless.
Now my nicknames. Did anyone ever call me shorty, or shortarse? No. Pardon? Did I know I'm the same height as Martin Amis and T. E. Lawrence? And do I know what they say about short men? I don't know, Amb, what do they say? Let me guess: they always have to have their trousers taken up. No? Okay: short people have a lower centre of gravity and less far to fall. No? Engineer, eh? I know: it's easier for short men to obey Newton's First Law of Motion, which states that a body will remain in a state of uniform motion or rest until other forces act upon it.
Oh, stop teasing, Amb. What's the answer? I should come close so you can whisper in my ear. Your suggestion surely challenges all the assumptions and presumptions of the Newtonian universe. Not to mention the principles of common sense. Oh, I see. You want to trade like for like. Come on, then. Is that close enough? You're making my ear tingle. But I smell stale tobacco smoke. Oops! I'd better disengage before I plunge myself into further trouble.
Oh, coward, am I? Okay, I'm a coward. Your last thought: okay, fire away. What would happen if I went to the cellar to collect a crate of Monkey's Bum and Rod was already there? You'd like me to think about that and, in the meantime, you'd like to be left alone to read the book. Fair comment, Amb. Nice talking with you. Hope to chat again soon.
*
Hi, it's Rod again. So, there I was, handing Anthony a couple of bottles of M's B when he gave me some brain food. First he thanked me for the drinks, then:
'A word, Rod, about a word.'
'Which word, my Lord Anthony?'
'Gentle.'
'As in reader?'
'Oui.'
'A problem, sirrah?'
'Possibly.'
'Pourquoi, my dear knight?'
Anthony snapped the cap off a bottle and drank half in one go. Then:
'As well as an adjective and a verb, both transitive and intransitive,'—here he belched a full octave—'the word gentle is a noun.'
'Adjective I understand. But verb...?'
He smiled: I'd taken the bait. 'Yes, as you'd expect: to make gentle or become gentle; or handle a horse gently.'
'So far, my liege, so good. And the noun...?'
'Aye, here's the rub. By addressing your readers as gentles you are implying they are maggots.'
'That's preposterous! No, John—I mean, Anthony—maggots?'
'God forgive me for being a pedagogue, but 'tis true. A maggot used as angling bait.'
'So, if the gent—if they—found out they could be offended. But, Anthony, I was using the adjective as a noun from the —'
' —Oh, yes, old man: I know what you're doing. Bear in mind some will already know that. You're speaking to quite a mixed audience.'
I checked the word a brace of dictionaries. gentle in COD gave AB's definition; Chambers gave further noun definitions: well-born person (obs); a trained falcon; hence a peregrine falcon (masc tercel–gentle; fem falcon–gentle). Isn't AB clever...? I got back to him:
'Do you think anyone's offended?'
He finished the bottle, handed me the empty. 'No, no, old chap. Just as well you know.' He turned, bottle in hand. 'Abyssinia!'
Not if I see you first, I thought.
Now, then, gentles—or, buddies. Johnny Fowles wrote a novel called A Maggot, using the word in the figurative and obsolete senses. Figurative because a maggot is the stage in the development of winged creature; perhaps too an author's thoughts. Obsolete in the sense of whim. Am I reading too much into Anthony's observation or am I paying my gentles a compliment? What do you—yes: YOU, my single, unique gentle—think?
Amber was a surprise, wasn't she? Odd name. Warm name. Precious fossil: fossilised tree resin. Honey-coloured. And she's a engineer. I wonder if she could throw a wooden bridge, firm, unwobbly, across the Thames? D'you know? I suspect she could. We may yet find out.
In fact the future's full of possibilities as Charlie is finding out. Oh yes, folks, He went back to the doc. Pardon? You thought the doc had written himself out because he'd been seen through? That's an ugly sentence. Let's try again. You thought the doc had put himself on the back burner because the gentles
had rumbled his fictiveness? Still ugly. Keep it simple. So, you thought the doc was a dead character who had opted out of fictional life because he'd realised that he was not real? Mm. That implies that he is real. And, of course, the doc is real. So, Charlie went back to the doc. Excuse me while I just slip back into character.
*
'Hi, doc. Long see, no time. How's it hanging?'
'Don't you mean: Long time, no see, Charlie?'
'No, doc, think about it...'
'But I'm supposed to be helping you.'
'Doc, a patient repays a doctor badly if he remains only a patient. Give instruction to a wise man and he will be yet wiser.'
'Two neat, safe clichés, Charlie. Why are you really here?'
'To tell you about some developments.'
He sat back receptively. 'For a cardboard character I seem to be almost human,' he said.
'Well, there I can help you, doc. Give you a start, throw a spark your way. You can help the spark achieve a temperature of 451 Fahrenheit and so consume yourself. Or you can cherish the spark and create.'
He smiled. 'Go on.'
'Life, doc, is a wonderful thing.'
'Well, you're certainly more cheerful—and playful—since we last met. You were weighed down by mid-life angst. What's changed?'
I've been speaking with Anthony Burgess.'
'But he's dead, isn't he?'
'Yes, but we're not going to let the facts get in the way of a good story, are we?'
He chuckled. 'So, what can I do for you?'
'It's your bill,' I said, 'your final bill,' and I produced the document.
He looked puzzled. 'When did I give you that?'
'Part Two—chapter 10.'
'And what did you want to say about it?'
'It's this line here, doc,' I said, pointing.
Terminal charge.
'What's wrong with that?' he said.
'I'm not dead.'
'But you wanted me to take an exit. In my off-stage life I'll still have expenses.'
'I'll gladly pay but terminal sounds rather final.'
'Terminal means final, Charlie.' He smiled. 'Or am I speaking to Rod?'
I laughed. 'Don't peak too soon, doc.' He had liberated himself since our last chat, was starting to determine his own, new life in the wings, and beyond.
'Well...?' he said.
'Let's keep this very simple,' I said, unsure really where the conversation was leading. I felt a new spontaneity. But instead of me leading, it was the doc.
'Do you want me to stay?' I wasn't sure so half-smiled. 'Do you?'
All I could do was grasp at a line from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, which, appropriate or not, I paraphrased: 'Why don't you hang around, doc?'
'Where do you want me—off or on the stage.'
'I'll leave that to you, ' I said and smiled. He smiled back.
And it was a knowing smile.
28
Knew I was dying. I'd crawled as far as I could with my lower legs holding on with mere sinew. The sun was making me delirious. Thought I'd met Clark Gable but knew he was dead. I might just as well have imagined meeting Robert Taylor or Ernest Hemingway.
Nmbmba had knee-capped me to make me suffer. But he'd also given me a gift: time before death. Death would be my last—the biggest—adventure. And would I glimpse God at the instant of death? I'd read of people travelling towards a bright light. But I'd done wrong: killed people for money. No less than a regular or conscripted soldier. Killing was killing, surely...? Death was death. Wasn't it?
As long as people wanted wars, as long as one group sought to dominate another, I—or my kind—would always find work. I had specialised in giving people the same end that Nmbmba had given me. The ledger was balanced, the transaction complete.
No choice now but to give in to it. All of my life has led up to this point. Going, flying down a long corridor. It's one I recognise, have seen in my dreams. Of course. This would be wasted on the living, as youth is wasted on the young. Faster now, I'm pulled along on a sleigh of stars and my soul opens up to embrace the world. This isn't the end; it's eternity. Places, which my soul didn't know existed, open up to encircle the earth.
Of course: the kitchen, the back door, a lane to the field. Here all time is reconciled. Dear God: accept this sinner's soul.
29
'So,' said Anthony, 'that's Mitch dispatched. I suppose we can take it that anyone left in the desert will stay there because they all died too soon.'
I nodded.
'Right, old chap. That just leaves you and me.'
'Wrong, Anthony. That leaves just you.'
'But I've already died once. Why do I have to go through it again?'
'This,' I said, 'is only a paper death.'
'Oh, Rod, I could help you so much. Please don't dispense with me now. I could be your guide. I have all the time in the world.'
'Sorry, Anthony, but the final third of this work demands a new guide, a different other.'
'But we've had such fun.'
'Then time to part before it turns sour. As Blake said: Kiss the joy as it flies.'
'Not quite, old chap. He said: "...he who kisses the joy as it flies lives in eternity's sunrise."' He waited a while. 'And another thing, my friend. You are my only source of Monkey's Bum.'
'I'll give you a few crates before I go. I mean, before you go.'
'Will you be ending Part Six on my departure?'
'No, as I said, you're not in it. I've already written the end.'
'Is there anything I can do, say, to change your mind? I could always help you revise. Repunctuate as necessary. Toss in a few neologisms and some tortuous word-order to bring the gentles up with a start.' He was almost childlike in his supplication.
'But you've taught me how to do that. You taught me language; and my profit on't is, I know how to curse: the red plague rid you, for learning me your language! '
'You are more intelligent than Caliban,' he said.
'Yet just as vulnerable.'
'What do you mean?'
'Oh, no matter,' I said. This middle section has a sprinkling of Burgessisms.'
He scratched his head. 'So, back to the point: do I end up in the desert?'
'No: you didn't die too soon. Seventy-six years. You've had your time, little Wilson.'
He sighed.
'Anyway,' I said, 'I can't leave you to be mauled by Miss Stephen and the Woolf hounds.'
'Are you playing with fire?'
I smiled. 'Something far worse.'
'Oh,' he sighed. 'I do hope you know what you're doing.'
'I don't know that I do—but it'll be exciting.'
'Oh,' said Anthony. 'I've thought of another slogan.'
'Go on...'
'Shit myself, is it? Clean up with a Monkey's Bum.'
'How I could work that in?'
'Use it as you see fit. And I don't require a credit.'
'Thanks. But I think the time now has come. I feel awful, like a warder leading a lifer to the execution chamber.' I paused a moment. 'But, my Lord Burgess, I'm not writing you out. You're making your own exit.'
'You mean that you're making me walk the gangplank.'
'Not necessarily.'
'I have another jingle,' he said.
'Sing it...'
He sang: 'I'm a lush with a Krush, so push off from my bush.'
'Too many visual rhymes, but I like the tune. It has a hook. In fact, it's little more than a hook. Could you work on the words?'
'Is this a reprieve?'
'Temporary.'
Anthony sat down with his portable keyboard and started improvising. He stopped suddenly:
'If I'm to be banished, Rod, then this jingle writing will be pointless. As will the secret information I possess.'
I couldn't resist. 'Secret...?'
'I did a poll.'
Tempting me. 'A poll...?'
'A straw poll, amongst ten writers.'
'Dead ones...?'
'No, the immortals.'
Crafty man; I probed. 'Hardy, Woolf, Orwell, Hemingway...?' But he wasn't biting.
'It's,' he replied, 'up here secret ballot.'
Okay: if he wouldn't tell me the means I'd have to settle for the end. 'And the result...?'
He took his hands from the keyboard, turned to face me fully. 'I don't know how you'll take this. In my random group of novelists, eight out of ten of those who expressed a preference thought your work better than expected.'
'I'm not quite sure what that means.'
'I've given them verbal titbits and most got a sight of your MS too.'
'Oh, so when you said the King thought my work not fit for man or beast you meant the immortals.'
'It's a verbal trick, I know. But this is fiction, after all.' He left a silence. 'I was challenging you to write better.'
I stopped to consider. He went on:
'Now, do you want me to continue with this composition?'
I had to be firm. 'No. I want this to be processed not by Caxton's contraption but by Microsoft's machine. I'm at home with an IBM; you're not. Your last love was the Olivetti; my first the Imperial. But things move on. We have no choice but to go with the tide. Time for us to part, Anthony.' He closed his keyboard, snapped the lid shut and placed it in his pocket. He said:
'I don't suppose, old boy, you could smuggle me in a packet of cheroots?'
I shook my head, but felt cruel. This was a real man I was saying goodbye to. 'Our business is transacted, fair knight. Our revels here are ended.'
'I feel,' he said, 'as if I'm in a Hardy novel. On a field at the end of a summer's day, surrounded by pretty maidens and that life is just beginning. So, although our revels here are ended, I can have as many other revels as I want.'
'Good, my fine knight.' I did feel guilty about dispensing with him but he'd made it easier for me: he'd begun to invent his own life, his off-stage life. 'I can't get cheroots for you. I'm sure there's some kind of barrier preventing that. You're still on probation: I don't want you thrown into the slammer.'
'Oh, no need to worry about that, old boy. I've already been awarded seven days' solitary. I used it to write a short story and a couple of sonatas.'
The Information Junkie Page 17
