The cold, crisp air and diverting sights and sounds were beginning to lift her mood and her feet were moving of their own accord to the rhythmic beat of the music. She took a diversion down Wardour Street, where more lanterns adorned the lamp-posts and were strung across the road to form a canopy of colour. Peering in at the crowded restaurants, she admired the rows of Peking ducks hanging in the windows, then stopped at one of the stalls to buy some Chinese candies. She hadn’t failed to recognize that she was following Daniel’s maxim and deliberately wasting time. Perhaps he wasn’t so wrong-headed, after all. Why have a goal in mind, or a purpose, when she could simply be, for a change?
It did feel a little odd, though, to be celebrating New Year on 21 February. But her English New Year had been distinctly disappointing. Josh had gone down with a chesty cold, which had made him snappy and unsociable, and, having cancelled their ritzy dinner, he had retired to bed at half-past nine, only to complain vociferously when the fireworks woke him up. Well, she would celebrate this New Year, instead, and who cared if she was on her own? Better that than being slighted by an irascible partner.
Humming to herself, she turned left into Gerrard Street, which was a riot of red lanterns and gold-and-scarlet flags. And many of the restaurants had ‘gold’ in their names: the Golden Dragon, Golden Harvest, Golden Pagoda, Golden Palace; the last decorated with green-and-crimson scrolls. Only now did it strike her how starved of colour she had been. Josh’s flat was starkly black and white, and most of her possessions he had vetoed as too garish. Her turquoise sequinned cushions had been unceremoniously dumped; her patchwork quilt donated to a charity shop; her brilliant purple beanbags offloaded to a friend. Anything too gaudy seemed to offend his sensibilities. Indeed, earlier today, he had even damned these lanterns, stalls and decorations as so much ‘oriental tat’. Did she really want to continue living in so black-and-white a mode? She needed sequins and colour; needed glitter and sparkle – emotionally, as much as in her home.
She stopped so abruptly, a Chinese couple bumped into her and began to stutter out apologies, although the fault was entirely hers. But an idea had just occurred to her: she could return to her old flat-share in Holloway – just for tonight, of course – to give Josh a salutary shock; make him realize she simply wouldn’t stand for being insulted and controlled. Her former flatmate, Charlotte, had stayed on in the flat, and they were still in frequent contact. She was also friendly with Veronica, the girl who’d been co-opted to take over her old room. Neither would object if she turned up unannounced and she could easily sleep on their sofa, so as not to be a nuisance. In fact, they could all have a good natter, let their hair down, open a bottle of wine or two.
Automatically, she reached for her mobile, only to remember she’d deliberately left it behind. It had suddenly struck her, this morning, that her phone had become a sort of body-part, as essential as an arm or leg, and tied to her by an umbilical cord. So, in a calculated act of rebellion, she had sauntered out without it, just for once, feeling weirdly free and unencumbered. Now, however, she cursed herself. But did it really matter? Charlotte was usually in on a Sunday, so she would simply take a chance.
‘Yes, but what about tomorrow?’ the voice of duty reproved. ‘That crucial Monday-morning meeting? If you stay overnight in Holloway, you won’t have your cuttings-book with you, or your all-important contact report, or any proper office clothes.’
‘Well, ring from Charlotte’s and say you’re sick,’ another voice suggested – an irresponsible, student voice that failed to understand how imperative it was, in career terms, to be regarded as reliable, and never to take sickies unless they were strictly unavoidable.
She stood, indecisive, an obstruction to the revellers, who had better things to do than agonize about tomorrow. They were living for the day – the moment – and, if this was her New Year, wasn’t it time for her to learn from them? She could even make a complete new start; rethink her priorities and embark, maybe, on a different kind of life. But did she have the courage to withstand the social pressures to be successful and high-status, or do without those things that people in her circle considered indispensable?
Her gut-instinct knew the answer and, instantly, she headed for the underground. Leicester Square was on the Piccadilly Line, which would take her direct to Holloway Road tube station. However, just as she approached the entrance, she suddenly darted back the way she’d come, taking short cuts via Newport Place and Gerrard Place, until she was opposite the Soho Curzon once more. She dashed across the road, burst in through the door and went straight up to the box office.
‘Could you give me a piece of paper, please?’ she asked the man selling tickets. ‘I want to leave a note for one of your employees. Oh, and I’ll need an envelope, as well – a largish one, if possible.’
‘Hold on a sec.’ He got up from his seat and disappeared.
She waited in a fever of impatience, it might take him an age. The film would be ending shortly and the last thing she wanted was to run into Josh as he left the cinema. However, the guy was back in a couple of minutes, with a sheet of paper and a strong Manila envelope.
‘There you go,’ he said. ‘Just write their name clearly and I’ll make sure that it’s passed on.’
‘Thanks a lot.’ She found a quiet corner in the foyer and unfastened her Rolex watch, pausing a moment, for one last look at the gleaming gold bracelet, shimmering mother-of-pearl dial, and sparkling, round-cut diamonds. Then she took a wad of Kleenex from her bag, wrapped the watch in several layers and put it in the envelope. Next, she scrawled a hasty note:
Daniel, I know you hate possessions, and watches most of all. But I want you to sell this, to buy yourself more thinking-time. Don’t try to give it back, or even try to thank me.
I don’t need it any more.
Should she add her name, she wondered, or make some jokey reference to Schopenhauer? No. Schopenhauer concerned her, right now, on a highly serious level, not a facetious one. But that was a private matter, to be privately resolved. Just give her time – thinking-time – and she would show the old misogynist that not all women were subservient or should be classed as the second sex.
And, unless Josh learned that, too – and learned it pretty sharp – there would have to be a parting of the ways.
THE ‘LITTLE WAY’
Helen glanced around the piazza with a grimace of distaste. Could this really be October 2009? That long, snaking line of credulous ‘pilgrims’, queuing to view the dismembered relics of St Thérèse of Lisieux, was more suggestive of the Middle Ages, and of a devoutly Catholic country, than of nominally Protestant England, in the increasingly secular twenty-first century.
Suddenly, she tensed, aware of a black-cassocked figure striding towards her, across the square: Father Thomas Mortimer, a fellow guest at her mother’s recent lunch party. Her immediate reaction – mingled apprehension and annoyance – was hardly appropriate for such an eminent priest, so she forced her features into an expression of polite respect.
‘Helen!’ he enthused. ‘How nice to see you again! You’ve come to view the relics, I presume? The response has been phenomenal, you know.’
‘Yes, I read about it, Father.’ The word ‘Father’ stuck in her throat of late; although she was so conditioned to using it, no way would she address this tall, distinguished, elderly prelate as just informal ‘Tom’.
‘Huge crowds have turned out everywhere – seventeen thousand in Liverpool, and that was in only twenty-four hours. And eleven thousand in Birmingham. Oh, and an exceptional attendance in Manchester and Newcastle. And we’re expecting over a hundred thousand during the four days that they’re here. I take it as a sign that God is at work in the world.’
Or perhaps a sign of desperation, Helen refrained from pointing out. One had only to think of Lourdes to realize that, if all else failed, people were compelled to rely on miracles, however vain the hope.
‘Non-Catholics, too, have been flocking in their thousands – even non
-believers. And when the relics were taken to Wormwood Scrubs, it resulted in several conversions, so the governor said.’
Given the failure of deterrence or rehabilitation to reduce the prison population, if a gruesome box of bones could help, good luck to it, she thought. In fact, according to an article in her mother’s Catholic Herald, only a third of the remains had been transported to the British Isles; namely a thighbone and various pieces of the foot. The other two parts remained permanently in France; one in Thérèse’s home town of Lisieux and the other on continual tour; both attracting the same pious hordes.
‘Two of the prisoners served on the altar at Mass – a lovely idea, don’t you think?’
She nodded, wondering if the two cons in question had been tempted to nick the altar-plate.
‘Mind you, although we’re extremely gratified, it’s been a huge responsibility, as I’m sure you can imagine. Just the organization involved was something of a headache and, of course, there’s always a risk to life and limb when such big crowds gather in one place. We’ve done our best, here at the cathedral, to ensure that things run smoothly, but we can’t rule out some sort of hitch. For instance, we issued printed instructions to those queuing – suggested they wear warm clothes and waterproofs, and bring food and drinking water and maybe a portable seat. But you only have to look, Helen’ – he gestured towards the queue – ‘and you’ll see that not everyone heeds our advice.’
Following his gaze, she realized that the recent downpour had left many people wet, bedraggled and obviously uncomfortable. However, she was struck less by the lack of waterproofs, than by the contrast between the pilgrims’ shambling shabbiness and the richness of the cathedral itself, with its soaring bell-tower and intricate brick-and-stone façade. It never failed to rile her how flagrantly the Catholic Church had ignored its founder’s plea to sell all one possessed and give the proceeds to the poor. Rather, it had accumulated extensive lands and properties; portfolios of shares; a mass of gold and silver plate; sumptuous vestments and precious works of art. Yet the featherbedded hierarchy were hardly likely to renounce their splendid residences, or give up the convenience of housekeepers and gardeners and other servile flunkeys, let alone pour their vintage claret down the sink. As for the Vatican itself, its treasures and resources seemed woefully out of kilter with the teachings of the God of Poverty.
‘Still, the technical side of things has been a great success’ – the priest flashed her a smile, revealing expensive dentistry – ‘the video-screen, in particular. It’s easier for people to be patient while they queue, if they can watch what’s going on inside the cathedral.’
‘Yes, it’s a really good idea,’ she murmured, peering up at the gigantic screen, erected in the piazza, which showed the actual reliquary and those who had finally reached it, after their long wait in the cold – a beacon of hope, presumably, to those still waiting their turn. Indeed, any form of diversion must be welcome, when the average time spent queuing was said to be four-and-a-quarter hours.
‘We’re all been struck by people’s devotion. It’s obvious how much it means to them to have St Thérèse’s relics here at the cathedral.’
Again, she nodded in agreement, aware that bones and other body-parts (blood, teeth, fingernails and hair) were classed as first-class relics, as against a saint’s mere clothes, or an object they had touched. And Signs and Wonders were already being reported: a barren rosebush in a pilgrim’s Sussex garden had miraculously burst into flower; sprouting 150 lush, deep crimson blooms. Roses were very much in evidence today: on sale in the piazza, as St Thérèse’s symbolical flower. Even those pilgrims who looked distinctly down-at-heel had been buying them with profligate enthusiasm, and she only hoped their families weren’t going short of food on account of such extravagance. She also reckoned privately that many poor French peasants could have been lifted out of poverty, had the cash squandered on the reliquary been devoted to them, instead. That elaborate construction, made from jacaranda wood and lavishly encrusted with gold, must have cost a fortune.
Again, she watched it on the screen; the faithful filing past, or stopping to press their hands or lips against the protective Perspex case. Most were holding roses, which they also touched against the case, perhaps believing that the essence of the relics could emanate through wood and acrylic.
‘Well, I mustn’t keep you, Helen. Remember me to your mother, won’t you?’
‘Yes, of course.’
Once he’d bustled off, she continued to watch the screen; her eye caught by an elderly gentleman, who pressed his handkerchief against the case, then held it to each leg in turn; obviously hoping that his pain or disability would be cured by St Thérèse’s intercession. She was reminded of her mother, who shared the same simplistic faith and who would be deeply shocked, even scandalized, if she could see into her daughter’s mind. Indeed, she would find it all the more distressing that her beloved only child should harbour such rebellious thoughts on so special an occasion and in so hallowed a spot.
Mooching on across the square, she felt her usual guilt and sadness that the person she loved most in the world – her patient, gentle, unselfish, pious mother – had not the slightest notion that she’d long since given up her faith and now viewed the Church as reactionary, intolerant and profoundly hypocritical. Yet how could she admit her doubts, when that Church was so important to her mother, who’d even moved to a flat in Vincent Square, to be nearer to the cathedral? It had become her second home; offered her great comfort and support. She knew all the priests by name – and often entertained her favourites, including Father Thomas – attended daily Mass and was a fervent member of the Legion of Mary, the Prayer Group and the Guild of the Blessed Sacrament.
Although there were advantages for her, as well, in knowing that, if her mother fell ill or needed help at home, a whole bevy of parishioners, all living close at hand, would offer immediate aid. It would have been considerably more worrying had such local support been lacking, since she herself lived seventy miles away. Today, Bernadette and Ruth, fellow members of the Prayer Group, had promised to act as nurse and chef, respectively, and to hold the fort until four or five, when she would visit, to give her mother a full account of the afternoon’s proceedings. Which reminded her – she’d better buy some sort of souvenir, rather than turn up empty-handed.
She made her way to the gift-shop, skirting the long, zigzag queue, which was being strictly marshalled by church officials; the latter determined to chastise any stragglers, shovers, or – God forbid – pushers-in. Once in the shop, she was appalled by the tat on sale – tinny medals, hideous statues, cutesy angel candle-holders, and a whole range of St Thérèse-imprinted merchandise: key-rings, prayer-cards, Biros, tumblers, fridge magnets. Having inspected the shelves with increasing distaste, she eventually chose a ‘Shower of Roses’ rosary, sold complete with a gift-box, rose-embossed and velvet-lined. Since her mother said a daily rosary – and had done so every day since childhood – at least the present wouldn’t languish in a drawer.
Then, with a sigh of resignation, she retraced her steps across the square, wrinkling her nose against the smells of grease and onions. Needless to say, commercial interests had been cashing in on the presence of the relics. A hamburger-bar, a coffee-stall and a mobile fish-and-chip van were all doing a lively trade, although looking distinctly incongruous against the imposing cathedral façade. Relics had always been big business and she remembered reading somewhere that a few unscrupulous medieval churches had even stolen body-parts from other, rival establishments, to swell their coffers by attracting flocks of pilgrims. Could profits still be made, she wondered, by modernizing the cult? People would probably queue for hours to view David Beckham’s foreskin or Keira Knightley’s fingernail.
As she cut round the side of the building to the entrance on Ambrosden Avenue, she saw another queue snailing the length of the street. Wearily, she tagged on to the end, cursing her swollen arm – throbbing badly now – and the uncomfortabl
e compression-sleeve swathing it from armpit to wrist. She had come to accept that the swelling would probably be permanent, since it was a symptom of the lymphedema that had set in just a couple of months after the removal of her lymph-nodes, and been aggravated further by her radiation treatment. In her pious mother’s view, though, it made her a natural candidate for today’s Sacrament of the Sick – as did the cancer itself, of course. And because of her contacts in High Places, her mother had managed to secure two tickets for the service, blithely hoping for a miracle. Impossible for her to share such naive optimism. It seemed unlikely in the extreme that the lymphedema would vanish overnight, let alone that her mutilated breasts, shorn off in the mastectomy, would be restored to their former prominence. Besides, she felt a strong aversion to the prospect of being herded into the church with a mass of other invalids, for an anointing and a long and tedious service, although she was guiltily aware that most good Catholics would envy her good fortune, since tickets were like gold-dust.
‘Hey, you! Move back!’
Helen jumped at the imperious tone. An overweening official had pounced on some poor old woman, who had tried to sneak her way into the queue.
‘Will you kindly join the end of the queue?’ he barked. ‘But, first, may I see your ticket?’
‘I … I don’t have a ticket,’ the woman stuttered – an ashen-pale, emaciated creature, walking with great difficulty on two gnarled and mismatched sticks.
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