by Paul Ableman
But the conversions of capital are beyond me, friend. It was enough that I was taking whisky with an esteemed and kindly friend, friend. Friend, the early evening was mellow! I left Ralph Petrie in order to exchange sounds with others. I knew these faces. Here were those strange panels of sensing organs in familiar arrangements. An olfactory probe, two light receptors, a bone-fringed orifice for the intake of organic substances and two flaring sensors for sound—all grouped into a comrade. Into flaring sensors I discharged strands of wry wit. My own received signals of ancient amity. What’s better than a pubful of chums?
At about 9 p.m., friend—did I mention that my wife’s gone away?—I said to Big Ralph Petrie:
— Shall we sup together?
I had returned to this pal, friend, after circling amongst others and I now suggested to him that we dine together. Friend, I was saddened, and a rueful nod expressed this condition, when Big Ralph Petrie declined. Beyond the rim of the boiling city, he explained, his wife and dutiful babes attended him. Before another sixth of the notched dial had been swept by the relentless hand, a serpent of coaches would glide out from the hub of London and Ralph himself, mounted on a pulse of electricity, would hurtle towards his suburban home. As I say, friend—I don’t think you’ve met my wife?—this saddened me.
Ralph gulped down the last of his carbonated whisky, grasped up his black briefcase, and raised parting palm to reinforce the amiable smile on his face. I bade Ralph farewell and watched him amble out into reeking Soho. Friend, I then turned and scanned the bar-room. I was using my light receptors, friend, to locate another agreeable companion with whom to demolish Cypriot stew. Friend, there was none there! It was a considerable shock, friend. A very few minutes hence, or so it seemed to my impetuous recollection, the place had teemed with genial beings. Not one was left!
I found myself alone, friend, solitary as I had been before I quit this very spot we occupy at this moment. It seemed a poor reward for my initiative. Friend, I began to feel ghastly. This is the truth, friend. I began to feel like so much dung. You see, my wife was a long way away. More than that, friend, we were separated. It was a temporary arrangement, of course. A month, perhaps a year, and we would be reunited again. I was quite certain of that, friend, but in the meantime she had reached Turkey and in Turkey there happened to be a Turk she knew—
I had also been having trouble with the local girls, friend. Two of them had intimated that it was pathetic for an ageing creep like me to be fumbling wistfully at their clothing and all of them had repulsed me unappeased. I had thereupon twitched my mantle blue and headed for Soho. It had been my intention, friend, to enjoy dignified masculine revelry with a few choice boozers. And suddenly the bar-room was bare! Friend, dung, had it but consciousness, would have revelled in a conviction of sensational popularity as compared to the bleak and icy feeling of rejection that now swept over me.
Friend, I hastened from that bar. I sprinted up the road and mounted two flights of stairs. I pushed through a padded door into a club much frequented by those of muddled sexual persuasion. (By others too, friend, by others too.) I gazed avidly about and saw—an apathetic pianist and a lady on a bar-stool. Before the latter could greet me, I smartly withdrew and redescended the stairs. There in that garish hall, perfumed with cookery from some infernal kitchen below, I stood for long minutes, friend. It was true. It was irremediable. It was appalling. I was alone!
Friend, the aspect of things changes. The earth is a sunny garden and you and I and all our teeming brethren are children of light, a little wanton and frivolous at times, but of divine aspect. The earth is a black and raucous desert peopled by vagrant predators. The ecstatic cry of the exalted modulates into the shrill wail of the afflicted. Friend, I felt low that evening. Yes, you stand beside me here, sipping your infusion of hops, uncomfortable at the protracted silence between us. Ah, friend, were my lips really moulding these words and my breath propelling them, I fancy an ironic quirk would form in the corner of your boyish mouth. Here am I, with ludicrous pretension, equating a dull evening in Soho with cosmic despair. But, friend, it is how things seem that counts.
Friend, I dined alone. I walked into a cheap, quick-food house which I had never entered before. I ordered a steak with chips and I waited at a table for it to be grilled. I then collected it and with it a small carafe of wine. The steak was of very fair quality, friend, though the wine was rancid. And, as I have mentioned, I consumed this meal alone. While consuming it, friend, the notion several times assailed me that there was little convincing reason why I should not pass the greater part of my life, and with certainty the latter part of it, alone. Why should I not? When I had achieved what few men gain, and many seek, that is devotion, tenderness, loyalty and love, my whim had been to blight these treasures and cast them away. I deserved to be alone. This evening was but a preview of bitter years ahead.
Friend, I felt an impulse to taste spirits. I left the eating house and toiled back along the tawdry glitter of Old Compton Street. I entered once more The Heights of Quebec. I ordered whisky and gazed about. The place was now more populous and I again saw faces I recognized. I might have approached one of these and fallen to talk. Friend, I no longer wanted to. I stood and sipped my whisky and across my own face there passed, at frequent intervals, faint twitching movements.
Friend, I then owned, though I had never bought, a turquoise green convertible car. Before migrant cancer throttled his bowels my martial uncle nudged this vehicle about. His death robbing it of a pilot, and my aunt’s inexplicably surviving tendency to spoil what had once been the infant light of her life inhibiting its sale, the car had come to me. I now entered this jaunty conveyance and steamed away to Chelsea.
From pub to pub sailed my greasy convertible and I. Night flamed through the city. Under sallow lights wafted girlish forms. The pubs spawned customers. Alcohol seethed in human brains. Lithe adolescents homed on erotic targets. Words droned through smoke. I lurched out of a tavern in Chelsea and chugged away to Notting Hill.
Friend, ghosts began to harry me! My God. My God. They flicked their filmy lashes at me from every street and pub. Blinding memories of joy and companionship flared up and seared the bloated, self-indulgent thing I had become. Oh God. My God.
The last pub closed. The last trickle of dilute Scotch reached my quaking stomach. I put down my glass, and, moving amongst wholesome people, piloted the leprous husk of my being out into the night. Rain spattered my brow. Methodically—I can hold my drink, friend—I levered up the roof of my bilious car, secured it and coursed slowly away towards home.
About half-a-mile from the pub I stopped the car in a darkish street. I lowered the offside window and spoke through it.
— Good evening.
After a brief conversational exchange a girl slipped into the seat beside me. Immediately lights glared and an engine roared. I glanced up startled to see another girl’s head protruding from a big sedan that squealed off round a corner. I caught a scream of urgent Cockney. I asked:
— What was all that?
— Better get away.
— What did she say?
— Said they’re about—you know, law—
I flicked my throbbing chariot into gear and swerved off after the other vehicle. No police car, that I could detect, followed us. I glanced at my companion. She was young, with a slightly blotchy complexion. She smiled and said:
— Better tell me your name—you know, case we get stopped.
Can say we’re friends.
So we exchanged names. Then I asked:
— Who was that? In the other car?
— Girl I know.
She emitted a faint laugh, like a sigh, and amplified:
— Crazy girl—things she does—
— Where are we going?
— Well, I’ll direct you. Go up there—that street.
We eased round a residential fringe of the garish district. We turned left into a street of stark, brick façades. We turned left again int
o a blind alley lined with mews dwellings. She said:
— This’ll do.
I gazed incredulously about. Several windows overlooked us. A street lamp, soft but clear, cast pale light into the car.
— Here!
She nodded, with a faint smile at my dismay.
— But—
— It’s all right.
She spoke with soft, implausible assurance. I was sick and weary and glutinous alcohol clogged my nerves. I looked down at her youthful, mischievous face. She asked:
— Do you want to give me the money now?
— Can’t we go somewhere else?
— There isn’t anywhere else. Not round here. This is all right.
I gave her the money and she gave me a small, square envelope. I wriggled out from beneath the steering wheel and knelt in front of her. She raised her feet to the plastic-covered seat and spread her legs. I saw that only her short dress had confined her trunk. I donned a clinging little garment and leaned towards her. She looked very delicate but her small hand took my sheathed urge and seated it in her warm body. As I began heavily to rise and fall I glanced down and saw that her slender loins were rhythmically moving to meet me. She felt nothing, I was sure. But slowly I began to feel and the loneliness melted from my thought-wracked brain as the name she had granted me for expediency chattered from my lips:
— Pat! Oh Pat—oh, oh—oh how—oh Pat! Oh!
A little later, friend, I drove her back to the street where I had found her. Then I drove home, friend, at a sensible pace. Some way on I lowered my window and dropped out a small pouch of viscous fluid wrapped in a twist of soft, white paper. And when I reached my lumpy bed, friend, sleep engulfed me at once.
As I remarked, friend, it was an evening just like this one. Those birds were wheeling just as they are now. Ragged strips of motionless cloud displayed similar bright hues. People were coming home from work and—finished your beer? Not staying for another? Got a date, I suppose, or—cheers, friend! See, I also raise my hand in parting salute. Next time perhaps we’ll have a proper chat. Hope my silence hasn’t offended you? Well—there you go—up the hill—towards your place—
Right.
Now—wonder—how to pass—the evening—
24
— Why do you drink, Mr. Soodernim?
— Because I am too sensitive for this world.
— Do you think it’s gruesome then?
— No, I love life.
— Are you pissed now?
— Moderately.
— Let us remain objective. How are your id and your ego?
— Bearable.
— You’ve never felt the urge to get yourself shrunk?
— No, it might have a deleterious effect on my creative genius. This was Rilke’s line and I detected the same apprehension in my own shrinking distaste from shrinkers when I first read the German’s argument. Who’s getting the next round?
— I got the last one.
— You haven’t bought a drink since quarter day!
— One more point, Mr. Soodernim—
— Stop clashing those zombie lips and glide to the bar.
— Would you say there was an element of bravado—I mean, don’t you think you’re just a tiny bit of a poseur? Do you think?
— I think so.
— Have you got a message?
— I haven’t suffered enough yet. You going to ask any more zombie questions or you going to buy some drinks?
— My dear fellow, I haven’t any money. I’m not in work.
— Well get a fucking job! The rest of us have to.
— They won’t employ me.
— Who won’t?
— The Clapham West Centre for Proletarian Education. I made an application for appointment to their teaching staff and they simply wouldn’t have me.
— Well can you blame them? Listen you—you made that application eight fucking months ago! What kind of matted outlook have you got? If you need a job you keep fucking applying until you get one.
— Tell me, what do you think of Bloomsbury?
— Pretty rank. (glum pause) What do you want, a bitter?
25
I REACHED FOR MY 84-shot, drum-loading machine pistol but it wasn’t in its holster. I pushed my hand down into the holster and found that it was full of slime. I pulled back my hand and looked at it. It was dissolving away and the rotted nerves shone like neon. I gave a shriek and reached down with my good hand and pressed the starter. However, instead of the engine starting a panel on the dashboard lit up showing an angry hen glaring at me. I felt embarrassed and I glanced out to see if anyone had noticed. Phil, the licensee of The Nag’s Head, and his wife were peering in at me, chuckling quietly. I pushed my diseased arm down out of sight and reached forward with dignity to press the starter again. This time the engine started and I hooked the car into gear and shot away. However, I had not gone far before the unreliable car started to crumble around me and soon I found myself running and dragging the wreckage along. I noticed that Phil and his wife were still drifting beside me. I asked them to remove the wreckage of the car and explained that if I didn’t reach a doctor soon I would dissolve away. They nodded sympathetically but did nothing. I explained again, more urgently. They continued to nod and smile at my predicament. I suddenly realized that they only spoke French and I racked my brains for the correct translation of my appeal. I couldn’t think of a single word of French and I shouted at them in desperation:
— Help me, in French! Help, help me, in French!
I crouched at the roadside as the tumbrils went by. It was a dusty, primitive road crossing a huge, gravelly plain of scrub. The tumbrils were long black boxes on rubber-tyred wheels. They were obviously electronic. They rolled past, an endless line of them, slowly and silently. Inside them the electronic scanners that controlled the death rays probed the barren landscape. Why hadn’t they picked me up? It was dull in the red rays of the huge, diseased sun. I rose slowly to my feet. The tumbrils continued to roll past. I turned and walked steadily towards the ridge. If I could get behind the ridge I might be safe from the rays. I tried to walk slowly and remain calm. I was approaching the ridge. Out of the corner of my eye I saw the ghastly procession continuing into the far distance. I was nearly at the ridge. Just a few more steps. But I could stand the suspense no longer. I began to sprint towards the monstrous sun. I gave a long shriek as a thousand lethal rays pierced me from behind. Then I lay still in the dust knowing that I was dead.
It was a warm and pleasant day and I had been strolling towards my favourite park which was under the old-fashioned tower of a huge hotel. I was reminded of Paris, wherever I looked, but I knew it was really some other city. I don’t know why I paused to chat with a street sweeper, who was wielding a novel kind of electronic broom, but I felt in a very friendly mood. He explained what he was doing:
— We’re sweeping up time. You read about it in the paper, sir?
— No, I don’t think so. What’s the idea?
— Too much time everywhere. You read about it in the paper?
— Yes, I think I did. It’s the government’s idea, isn’t it? Well, I’m sure they’ve gone into it carefully.
— We’re clearing away all the time. It’s just our job.
— Yes, I can see their point. There’s an enormous amount of it. I mean, when you think about eternity alone—still I do hope they’ve really gone into it. It seems to me—
— These special brooms are fantastically efficient. There are nine thousand of us in the new Corps and we’re sweeping up time.
— Well, I hope you’ll leave some. I mean, we need time for—well, for doing things. Gosh, I know the government have experts—they have technical advisers but frankly this seems to me a terribly risky project—
— We’re mopping it up at a tremendous rate.
— Yes but, hold on—I can feel it! Things are getting a bit rigid already! Look, I don’t think you know what you’re doing. My God, man, things
will stop growing. Here, you must switch that thing off! Look! The universe has stopped expanding! Quick—
— Soon it will all be gone—every bit of time.
— Stop! It means death! Stop—stop—stop—stop—stop—stop—stop—stop—stop—stop—stop—stop—stop—stop—stop—stop—stop—
And, of course, frequent nightmares about nuclear war. The ones I have in this category are usually rather vague pictorially. But some years ago Jim told me about one of his nuclear nightmares which achieved a peculiar intensity of both visual and allegorical horror.
War had broken out and the air was full of winged human mutants. The economy of the dream, however, was ingenious. These flying victims of thermonuclear weapons were themselves the hydrogen bombers.
