Star Gazing

by Linda Gillard

  ‘You didn’t apologise.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘When I told you I’ve been blind since birth, you didn’t say, “I’m sorry” in a tragic voice. People usually do.’

  ‘Well, it wasn’t my fault, so I don’t really see why I should apologise. Is it obligatory?’

  ‘I think it’s said more as an expression of compassion. Fellow feeling.’

  ‘Embarassment, more like.’

  ‘Yes, very probably. And you’re not embarrassed.’

  ‘Not by your inability to see. I’m deeply embarrassed that you mistook me for a dead socialist.’

  ‘It could have been worse. I might have taken you for a sixfoot rabbit.’

  ‘How d’you know I’m not?’

  The middle-aged woman who bustles through the crowded bar is small but determined. She adjusts a beaded pashmina draped round her plump shoulders and, with a well-aimed nudge of her elbow, squeezes her way through the press of suits and evening gowns to a low table where a woman sits nursing a gin and tonic, staring into space. The family resemblance is striking. Both women are fair, even-featured, blue-eyed. The extravagant blondeness of the woman on her feet owes much to the skills of her hairdresser. The fair hair of her seated sister, Marianne, is ashen, in places grey, drawn back into a simple chignon suggesting the pale, poised severity of a ballerina. Despite her greying hair she is evidently younger than the sister who now bears down on her, round face shining despite recent ministrations with a powder compact.

  ‘Sorry I was so long, darling.’ She bends, picks up a glass and takes a large swig. ‘Oh, God – the ice has melted!’ She puts the glass down again. ‘There was an interminable queue in the Ladies and then I was accosted by a fan. She wanted to know when Eldest Night and Chaos was coming out. So I gave her a bookmark – I had some in my handbag. She was thrilled.’

  Marianne doesn’t look up but sighs. ‘Really, Lou, the imbecility of your titles beggars belief.’

  ‘That’s Milton, I’ll have you know.’

  ‘I’m aware it’s Milton. You, my dear, are not. Now be quiet a moment and let me introduce you to Mr Harvey.’ She indicates a chair on her right with a wave of her hand. ‘This is the kind man who retrieved my door key for me – when I lost it at Christmas, do you remember? Mr Harvey, this is my sister, Louisa Potter who, in another guise, is a famous author. Of very silly books.’

  Louisa laughs nervously. ‘Marianne, darling, there’s nobody there! The chair’s empty.’

  ‘Is it?’ Marianne’s large eyes register no emotion but her head inclines slightly towards the adjacent chair as if she is listening. ‘Well, he was here a moment ago. He was talking to me just before you arrived. How very odd!’

  Louisa sinks into the empty chair beside her sister and thinks about kicking off her high-heeled shoes. She considers the worse discomfort of trying to get them back on again after the interval and decides to suffer. ‘Did you have a nice chat? With your mystery man?’

  ‘Yes, thanks.’

  ‘I wonder why he slipped off like that without saying anything? Very bad-mannered.’ Louisa swirls the remains of her ice cubes around in her glass. ‘Perhaps he spotted someone he knew. Or maybe he was paged. A medical emergency. He might have been a surgeon.’

  ‘For goodness sake, Lou, do you have to turn everything into a melodrama?’

  ‘Well, you said it was odd, disappearing like that. I was trying to account for it.’

  ‘He wasn’t a surgeon anyway.’

  ‘Oh? What does he do?’

  ‘I’ve no idea, but he’s not a surgeon. We shook hands. His was rough and decidedly workmanlike. I’d say he works outdoors.’

  ‘Now who’s inventing mysteries?’

  ‘I’m not inventing, I’m deducing. From the evidence of my senses.’

  ‘Damn, that’s the bell for Act Two.’ Louisa takes another mouthful of watery gin and struggles to her aching feet. ‘Listen out for his voice. He might be sitting near us.’

  ‘He won’t be talking. He’s here on his own.’

  ‘Well, now I am intrigued. A man who works outdoors with his hands and goes to the opera alone … I presume he’s not elderly?’

  ‘The handshake wasn’t.’

  ‘Young, then?’

  ‘No, not young. Well, he didn’t sound young. I can’t always tell with voices.’

  ‘Was he chatting you up?’

  ‘No, of course not! Lou, you really are impossible.’

  ‘Not impossible – just an incurable romantic and a diehard optimist.’

  ‘A nauseating combination, if I may say so.’

  ‘Thank you, sweetie. Love you too.’

  As Marianne rises from her chair and reaches for her cane, Louisa turns the pages of her programme. ‘How many more acts of this musical torture do we have to endure?’

  ‘Two. Add philistinism to your long list of failings.’

  ‘I know Wagner was supposed to be an orchestral genius – you’ve told me often enough – but I just feel sorry for the poor singers, rambling on and on in search of a tune. Give me Puccini any day.’

  ‘You and Mr Harvey both.’ Marianne extends her arm in the direction of her sister’s voice. Louisa searches her inscrutable face, then takes her arm and links it affectionately with her own as they join the chattering throng moving slowly towards the auditorium. ‘I’d really like to meet this man. A solitary, male opera-goer with labourer’s hands, who loves Puccini. Fascinating! If you put him in a book no one would believe you.’

  ‘I wasn’t aware that credibility was a criterion in fiction these days. Especially not yours.’

  ‘I write fantasy, darling,’ Louisa replies amiably, patting her sister’s hand. ‘Anything goes. You don’t have to believe it. You just consume it. Like chocolate.’

  Chapter Two

  Louisa

  I feel I should explain. About my sister. Marianne.

  What you need to understand about Marianne is that, despite the fact that she’s blind – perhaps because she’s blind – she’s always had a very vivid imagination. So certain allowances have to be made, were always made: by our parents, doctors, teachers and so on. It was always understood that Marianne lived life in her head – well, what else could she do, poor thing? She was blind – and the boundaries between fantasy and reality were a little hazy for her at times.

  She developed a philosophical bent at university. She used to say that, as sisters, we had more in common than genes. We both lived in imaginary worlds of our own creating. The only difference was, mine made me a lot of money. (That was a dig, of course. I didn’t mind. Marianne’s been through a lot. As I said, you have to make allowances and I do.)

  It occurs to me, you don’t know who I am, do you? So sorry – let me introduce myself! My name is Louisa Potter, but you’ll know me as Waverley Ross. That’s my nom de plume. What’s in a name? An awful lot, apparently. My publishers didn’t think Louisa Potter sounded either Scottish or sexy and I had to agree. As an English pupil in a Scottish school I was known as ‘Potty Lou’and dreamed of marriage so I could change my prosaic surname to something glamorous like Traquair or Urquhart. A husband never materialised, so I settled for a nom de plume.

  It’s all part of the marketing. No matter how good a writer you are, without a good marketing strategy you’re dead in the water. So I was advised by those in the know to become ‘Waverley Ross’. Sounds Scottish, doesn’t it? And strong. It’s supposed to sound sexy as well, although I always think of Edinburgh railway station when I hear the word ‘Waverley’, but I gather my hordes of American fans, bless them, conjure up swirling mists and Sir Walter Scott.

  I’m an author – a very successful one – of vampire romance. Upmarket vampire romance, I hasten to add. It’s a big genre and one needs to be aware of the nuances. There’s an awful lot of tat out there. Sick tat too. I don’t write that. I write Scottish Gothic vampire romance. (Hence my nom de plume.) I did a history degree in Edinburgh, fell in love with
the city and nineteenthcentury Scottish literature, and my writing career grew out of my passions.

  All my books are set in Edinburgh. They’re pretty formulaic, I admit, but that’s what people like. You know where you are with a Waverley Ross. In Edinburgh, doing battle with the powers of darkness, righting wrongs, fending off over-sexed vampires of both genders and all sexual proclivities.

  I do quite a lot of sex but nothing distasteful. (In my books, I mean.) No rape and definitely no S&M. My books are very traditional – just love stories really – but the men have to be supernatural because frankly, a good hero is hard to come by these days. It’s difficult finding an excuse to create a tall, dark and handsome hero who dresses in flamboyant clothes and behaves in an unpredictable but masterful way. (And, believe me, that is what women want. Well, it’s what they want in fiction. My gay following too. They’re all soppy romantics at heart.)

  I began my writing career writing Regency romances (don’t knock it – so did Joanna Trollope) but they didn’t sell and I wasn’t getting anywhere. Then it occurred to me that everyone was fed up to the back teeth with political correctness. The last thing women wanted to read about was men behaving like something out of Jane Austen. I realised what we actually wanted was bad boys. But not real bad boys. Vampires. Sexy vampires who were – to a man – tall, dark and handsome. (I do throw in the occasional blond, just to ring the changes. I don’t think you can do anything with redheads but my assistant, Garth, says I should be more open-minded.)

  Being supernatural, my vampires have extraordinary powers and physical attributes, plus an uncanny facility for shedding their clothes at key dramatic moments. To be honest, this last trait is a bit difficult to make convincing because, as any Scot will tell you, it’s extremely cold and damp in Auld Reekie, but my thesis (this actually came to me when I had my first hot flush) is that vampires are hot-blooded creatures, immune to cold, hunger, thirst and pain. (But not, of course, sexual frustration.)

  Anyway, I digress. My books (see www.waverleyross.com) have enabled me to live with my sister in a certain degree of luxury in a desirable part of Edinburgh. Marianne may scoff at my work – she refers to my characters as my ‘imaginary friends’ – but she’s happy enough to enjoy what my labours buy. I don’t begrudge her a penny. She’s all the family I have, she’s excellent company (if you have a thick skin) and she keeps the flat ticking over when I’m away on promotional tours. She works part-time answering the phone for a blind charity, but she doesn’t need to. She does it to assert her independence. I understand that. I’m sure I’d feel exactly the same in her position.

  So we rub along together quite nicely, a couple of old spinsters becoming increasingly eccentric with the passing of the years. I said to Marianne the other day, ‘I’m over fifty – I need to slow down,’ and she said, ‘I’m nearly fifty – I need to speed up.’ She was exaggerating, of course. At forty-five Marianne is six years younger than me. It seemed a big gap when we were children but I think that was a lot to do with her blindness. I’d already started school when she was born, so Marianne was always something of a solitary child, isolated by her age and her handicap. That’s probably why she developed such a vivid imagination. She had imaginary friends too! Hers never made her any money but I’m sure, in their way, they were a great comfort to her.

  Heaven knows, there have been times when poor Marianne has needed comfort.

  Marianne

  One of my favourite walks in all seasons is Edinburgh’s Royal Botanic Garden, known fondly to all as the Botanics. I can find my way there on my own. I’ve memorised the route as a sequence of numbers – the paces I take before turning a corner or crossing a road. There are landmarks that I navigate by – a manhole cover, a postbox, a pedestrian crossing. I usually take my cane because people leave things on the pavement that I don’t expect to be there: rubbish bins, bicycles and the like. But these unexpected obstacles aside, I can walk confidently to the Botanics, enjoying the scents and sounds along my route, anticipating the blissful moment when I can walk through the gates and leave the traffic behind.

  I love the garden in all seasons. I especially love it when it rains. I like to shelter under the trees when they’re in full leaf and listen to the patter of rain as it forms a kind of sound-sculpture for me, defining the size and shape of a tree, giving me an aural sense of scale, of distance. I have no concept of landscape and only a vague understanding of what distance must look like. I experience distance mainly as the difference between loud and soft, but sound quality isn’t always related to distance. A man’s voice might be very soft, but he could be lying beside you. Volume is not a true guide.

  Music gives me some inkling of landscape. The sheer scale of orchestral music, the volume and the detail, can put me in touch with something much bigger than myself, take me beyond my personal boundaries, the world that I experience with my fingertips or my cane. Music tells me there is a wider world and what it might be like.

  I know it exists, of course. I listen to the news; I did geography at school; I read books about faraway places just like any other armchair traveller, and Louisa and I have visited some of them. But for me the Earth is a conceit, something I’m told exists but cannot see – like Pluto or Neptune for you. Astronomers deduced that Neptune must exist long before they devised telescopes powerful enough to view it. They thought it must be there because something was affecting the orbits of the other planets. There was a gap in the galaxy where a planet ought to be and they trusted that there was. It was an act of faith: faith in mathematics and physics.

  There is a gap in my life where the Earth ought to be. I have to take its existence on trust. I cannot see or feel the Earth, I am merely informed by my senses of the minutiae of its being. It’s much the same for you, but sight allows you to appreciate what others see, through a camera lens, through telescopes, from spaceships. Thanks to this second-hand sight, your world is much, much bigger than mine can ever be.

  But when I listen to an orchestra play a symphony, I have a sense of what it might be like to contemplate a mountain range, a fastflowing river, the skyline of a city. Music helps me see. So does rain. Rain helps me see things that my fingers can’t encompass, like a tree or a glasshouse. That’s where you’ll find me when it rains. In the Botanics. In one of the glasshouses, or sheltering under one of my favourite trees.

  But I dislike winter. Not for all the usual reasons – dreary weather, short days. What are those to me? I don’t like winter because there are no leaves left on the trees, no leaves to make music with the rain. My trees fall silent. Once a blanket of snow has fallen, my whole world becomes muffled, indistinct. (You would say blurred – how I imagine the world looks to the myopic.) There are no dead leaves crackling underfoot, few birds sing and I’m deprived of many of my markers, like manhole covers, sometimes even the kerb. My walk to the Botanics becomes a perilous undertaking.

  I hate the silent world of winter because it makes me feel blind. I can experience the cold and wetness of snow, but I can never have a sense of a wintry landscape except as an almost silent world, bereft of the usual sounds that are its distinguishing features. In the depths of winter I suffer from depression, brought on by a kind of aural blankness. Those of you who suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder will have some idea what I mean. You miss light, I miss sound. My little world with its modest horizons is transformed temporarily into one I don’t recognise, and every single winter this comes as a dreadful shock.

  Louisa says this is more or less what it’s like for the sighted. The known world is transformed overnight, obscured by snow, and therein lies the thrill: you get out of bed one morning, look out the window and your world has turned white. I don’t need to look. I can hear what has happened. The silence of snow is claustrophobic for me. Unsettling. I lose the familiar sounds that I associate with feeling safe and confident. Without those sounds I’m disorientated. I have to re-navigate, re-negotiate my life.

  I have no understanding of colour, so
I don’t know what colour white is. But if silence were a colour, I think it would be white.

  I knew I was being watched. To begin with I sensed it, but dismissed the feeling, then I became certain. It’s a feeling I have at the back of my head, a feeling that makes my hair stand on end and my shoulders hunch, as if I’m bracing myself for fight or flight. I suppose it must be a remnant of an animal instinct that lies dormant in one of the areas of the brain for which scientists have so far found no use. I don’t know whether this sense is likely to be more developed in the blind or whether we are just more paranoid. (The latter seems more likely, especially if you are a woman.)

  One of the reasons I don’t use my cane as much as I should is because I don’t like to advertise to the world that I’m blind. I’m vulnerable enough on the streets as a woman without letting criminals and perverts of all denominations know that I’m easy prey. I try to look and behave as if I’m sighted. What I actually look, I suspect, is drunk. I trip and stumble, touch railings and walls, as if I’m unsteady on my feet, but it probably draws the attention less than a white stick.

  But despite my precautions, my attempts at invisibility, my dressing in black, my intention of blending in with the leafless skeletons of trees, someone had noticed me.

  And was watching.

  * * * * *

  Seated on a wooden bench Marianne turns her head slowly in the direction of the approaching footsteps. She thinks of getting to her feet and walking briskly in the opposite direction but wonders if an element of chase might be exactly what the stalker would like – if indeed there is a stalker. In any case she finds it difficult to walk quickly, even with her cane. Instead she reaches into her bag for her personal alarm, registering briefly that if she uses it, she’ll empty the garden of birds, animals and possibly startled, law-abiding humans.

  A cold gust of wind lifts a wisp of hair and blows it across her face. Hamamelis. Witch hazel… And something else, another scent. But it’s wrong. Out of season. A memory surfaces and seconds later she places it.