You remember my father, Nina. He must have been in your mind when I saw you for the last time. It was Saturday 30th June 1984, a week after our last meal together; I had arranged to meet him for a drink after his Esperanto class in The Compass, and I had just stepped from the sunlight of High Street into that maze of alleyways that lies between it and the Law Courts, when you stepped out from a dark colonnade, and said, Angel, Gabriel. My heart leapt. Nina, I said. And we stood awkwardly for some long seconds. Well, fancy meeting you like this, you said. Yes, fancy that, I said. How are you, Gabriel? you said. How do you think I am, Nina? I said. Oh, don’t be hard on me, Gabriel, I’ve thought about little else since that night, I’ve thought about my whole life, what I’m doing, or what I’m supposed to be doing, you must give me some time, you said, and you proceeded to tell me an elaborate story of how your boss, Callaghan, had taken you to lunch at Restaurant 77 one day – isn’t that an irony? you said ruefully – and had suggested to you that perhaps it was time for a change of scene, that Eastern Europe was the coming thing now, that you had done very well in Belfast, but that maybe Warsaw would suit your talents better at this particular time, and my heart gave a lurch as I heard this. You mean you might be leaving altogether? I said. Oh, I don’t know any more, Gabriel, I don’t know what I’m doing, you said. And then I saw you look at your watch, and you said, Gabriel, I really must be going. I’ll be in touch, I promise, I will write, and you left.
I looked at my watch; I had arranged to meet my father at five o’clock, and it was now five past. And then I heard an almighty explosion. You know the rest, Nina. You must have pictured me running towards The Compass Bar, standing aghast before the smoking rubble, being restrained by the police and army, waiting for what seemed like an eternity before I saw my father being carried out, weeping tears of relief when I saw that he was still alive, though I could see that one of his legs was shattered. As it turned out, they had to amputate.
My father managed well enough; even when he suffered phantom limb syndrome, he used to joke about it, or perhaps it wasn’t a joke. After Nelson lost his arm at the Battle of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, said my father, he could feel fingers digging into the missing limb, and Nelson thought this was direct evidence for the existence of the soul. And I never thought I’d find myself agreeing with an English admiral, said my father. What hurt him more was the thought that the cause of Esperanto had been directly attacked by the bomb. It was just like the persecution of Esperantists in Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia, he said. There were dark forces abroad, said my father, who would do anything to keep the Irish people apart from one another, and he would quote from his beloved Zamenhof. When I was still a child in the town of Bialystok, said Zamenhof, I gazed with sorrow on the mutual hostility which divided the people of the same land and the same town. And I dreamed then that after some years everything would be changed for the better. And the years have passed; and instead of my beautiful dream I have seen a terrible reality. In the streets of my unhappy town savages armed with hatchets and pickaxe handles have flung themselves at those who practise another religion, or speak a different language to themselves. For there will always be those whose interests are to foster such hatred, said my father.
No one ever claimed responsibility for The Compass Bar bombing that killed five people, three Catholics and two Protestants. Some said it was a rogue Republican element. Some said it was a rogue Loyalist element. And quite a lot of people said that whoever was responsible, it could not have happened without the collusion of rogue elements within the security forces, whether actively or by omission, that it had been sanctioned at some level in the maze of clandestine operations that lay behind official government policy.
It took me some days to put two and two together. Until then, I’d thought of MO2 as just another of those well-meaning and ultimately pointless local business development agencies. But the more I thought of it, the more it seemed to me that you must have known, that MO2 had prior knowledge. You knew I met my father most Saturdays after his class, you knew my movements, you knew how to intercept and delay me. And if that were so, you saved me, but you did not save the others, and I could not forgive you for that.
Your brief letter, sent from Paris ten days later, only served to confirm my suspicions. You had left MO2, you said, you could not bear to live with it any longer, you had taken up a new life in Paris, you hoped that I was well, and that I would forgive you for what you had done, but it was all over between you and me, you could not bear the pain of looking me in the eye again. Words to that effect. Later that day, 9th July 1984, I learned that York Minster had been struck by lightning, and its South Transept razed by the subsequent fire. And in the days that followed, I heard how the four-hundred-year-old stained glass of the great Rose Window, made to commemorate the defeat of the House of York in the Wars of the Roses, had been riven into some forty thousand fragments, though the panels had miraculously stayed intact within their embrasures, having been releaded some years previously; and in the months that followed, I heard how restoration began, as adhesive plastic film was applied to the crazed mosaic of the glass panels, which were then removed one by one, disassembled, and reassembled, tessera by tessera, using a specially developed fixative which had the same refractive index as the old glass, whereupon the completed work was sandwiched between two layers of clear glass for added security, and mounted back in place: which intervention means we will never again see what was seen before the fire, the dims and glows of stained glass unmitigated by an added medium, however clear. And I remembered how we two had once seen the glass as it was, as it had been.
As I cast my mind back now, Nina, I no longer know the truth of what we were together, or what you were to me. I look at your last postcard again. HAVE YOU FORGOTTEN ME, the stamp says, or it might say nothing. I trace the N of your name with my finger, and, as I put my hand to my face, I seem to catch a whisper of some perfume. What is it, Nina, Je Reviens, or Vol de Nuit? But it escapes me, I can find no name for it, and I do not know what message your next card will bring.
Nina
Dear Gabriel, you wrote. I had looked at your letter for some time before I opened it. The stamp bore a Belfast postmark, and I was filled with hope and trepidation because we now breathed the air of the same city, or had done yesterday at least. My name and address was in blue ink, the colour of eternity, but also of death, and I thought of the blue vein in your wrist, how you would often raise it to my face for me to smell whatever perfume you were wearing. Eventually, with trembling hands, I took a knife and slit open the thick cartridge-paper envelope. A postcard fell out; I would look at it later. For now, I was more concerned with your many words.
It’s been a long time, you wrote, and I hardly know where to begin. But when I wrote those words on the first postcard I sent you, I remembered how you used to sing that Rolling Stones song, ‘Long Long While’. You remember?
Baby, baby, been a long, long time
Been a long, long time, been a long, long time
I was wrong girl and you were right.
It was the B side of ‘Paint It Black’, 1966, you said, you liked it better than the A side because it had less pretensions about it. Very simple lyrics, but Jagger sings them with real emotion, you loved that little off-key catch in his voice, you said. I hadn’t realised then that you were such a Rolling Stones freak, and you would say you weren’t, it was just if you had a choice between the Beatles and the Stones, you’d go for the Stones any day. More edge. But I knew you liked Mick’s style in general, and, despite your protestations, I think you were fascinated by that English middle-class bad boy thing, you liked the fact that he read books as well as listening to the blues, and you liked the clothes. Not that you dressed like Mick Jagger, but you had just a little touch of flamboyance. That first time I saw you in the xl Café, the first thing I noticed, beyond your face, was the tie you were wearing, looked like a Forties tie, pale grey with a washed-out pink diamond pattern, went nicely with the Donega
l tweed jacket. I think maybe I fell in love with you a little just then, because it seemed that you wore the clothes almost at a distance from yourself, you didn’t seem to be a natural dresser, it was something more considered, as if you had a picture in your head of how you should look, or how you might look to others. And, as I got to know you, I thought it was a little bit like how you looked at paintings, admiring but not fully entering them, and I liked that hesitancy in you, the way you adjusted your tie as I looked at you from the corner of my eye.
Anyway, it’s been a long, long time, and you’ll want to know why I started this whole thing, this correspondence. And I hardly know myself. But it must have started with the cards, I’d buy postcards in whatever place I’d be, not to send to anyone, but as mementoes, or just because I liked the pictures. I stored them in a shoebox, a men’s shoebox, Church’s brogues, you could still smell the leather off the cardboard. Years of postcards. And I was flicking through them one day when I saw that one I began with, the Empire State Building struck by lightning, I couldn’t even remember where I bought it, but it reminded me of us in New York, you remember, how excited we were, lightning flickering above the skyline of the city, us laughing in the downpour. We’d taken shelter in one of those dives off Bleecker Street, you remember, it was like something from the 1940s, there was a black girl doing Billie Holiday numbers, standing on a little raised platform under a spotlight, and those little tea-lights in faceted glass holders on the tables, you could see hands and cigarettes and cocktail glasses, a face or two, and the smoke drifting up into the spotlight. And she was really good, she sang the songs with respect, but she put her own heart and soul into them too, and when I glanced at you over the tea-lights I could see that there were tears in your eyes, and then tears came to my eyes too.
So when I saw the lightning in New York postcard, I thought of you, and of our time there, and thought it might have been possible that you’d been in my mind when I bought it, however subliminally. And then I started going through the shoebox again and I began to find a pattern, this card or that would remind me of this or that time we’d spent together. So many memories began to well up. Like Colette when Lee Miller met her, you know, going through her photographs. And I could have chosen others, too, besides the ones I ended up with. There’s a lovely 1950s 3-D one of the Chrysler Building, all metallic greens and silvery blues, and I remembered how you’d talked about its automotive architecture, it had never occurred to me that the Chrysler Building had anything to do with cars, and you said, Well, that’s one for your little red book, Nina, you’re always looking for these little style details, maybe you could do something with that, and I said, Yes, it’s like the way those big American cars with the big bench seats were made for the dresses, the big flared skirts and petticoats, and I wrote down ‘Chrysler Building haute couture’ with my Dinkie pen that first brought us together, you remember …
Dear Nina, how could I forget? I’d been looking for a match for that pen ever since it occurred to me to begin collecting. And I found it just last week, or perhaps it found me. I’d had a couple of long-standing requests in with Beringer, you remember Beringer, his shop in Winetavern Street? One of them was for the Dinkie, the other for a Parker Royal Challenger, 1939, I’d just missed one on eBay, and the more I’d looked at its photograph, the more I wanted one, I loved the Art Deco stepped clip, very Chrysler. So I called in with Beringer on the off-chance. Ah, Mr Gabriel, he said, the Royal Challenger, he said, and he took the pen from his breast pocket and handed it to me, barrel first. It was indeed lovely, brown pearl bodywork with a black chevron pattern that matched the clip, it’s another take on the Parker arrow emblem. How much do I owe you? I said, and he named a price, I named a lower price, he came down a little, I came up a little, and so on, till we met halfway, as we knew we would. Ah, you drive a hard bargain, Mr Gabriel, he said, but I’ll tell you what, just to show there’s no hard feelings, here’s a little luckpenny, and he shot his cuffs, held open his two hands before me, made fists of them, and said, Pick a hand. I looked at him somewhat sceptically, and touched his left hand, and when he opened it, lying on his palm was the twin of your Dinkie. Of course it wouldn’t be an identical twin, Conway Stewart never made two of these black and red mottled rubber models alike, but as it looked as near to yours as I could remember, I was delighted.
I didn’t know you did magic, Beringer, I said. Oh, only for special customers, Mr Gabriel, it wouldn’t do to let the general public know that an antiques dealer has stuff like this up his sleeve. As a matter of fact, I learned that one from your late father, God rest his soul, he said, and I suddenly remembered that when I was a child my father had a whole repertoire of these tricks, making things appear from nowhere. So here I am now, writing with the Dinkie that came from nowhere – though Beringer, true to form, did give me an elaborate account of its provenance. When I saw it I realised it wasn’t quite as spectacular-looking as some of the pens I’d acquired before it – the Oriental Peacock Dinkie, for example – but nevertheless its colours glow with the intensity of my memory of them, and it gives me pleasure to write with a pen that resembles yours so closely, as I here transcribe the words of your letter, knowing that by writing them again in my own hand, following the loops and curves of your thought, I will gain a better understanding of them.
… you remember, red and black, you wrote, le rouge et le noir, I wrote all those letters to you then with my Conway Stewart Dinkie. I don’t know who started that business, writing to each other practically daily sometimes, whether it was you or me. You used to joke about it, said it would be good training for mo2, all those memoranda I had to write, or was supposed to write. But when I began sending the postcards, I knew I couldn’t write at any length, I had to work up to it, for I didn’t entirely understand myself what had happened. You must know that after I left you I was very confused. ‘Paint It Black’ kept going through my head
I see a red door and I want it painted black
No colours any more I want them to turn black …
So I got out, I’d saved up quite a bit from my business, enough to last me a good few months, and I went to Paris, where I knew I could get a job with my French, the French like Englishwomen with a bit of style who can speak good French, though I had to tone down my French accent a bit, make it more English, for that’s the whole point, that you’re an Englishwoman speaking French.
And for six months I did nothing, I got a little apartment near Les Halles, in rue Montmartre, I’d just go for long walks, trying to forget how we’d been in Paris together. Then I got a job in a fashion photography agency. And I fell for one of the photographers, and it took me a while to realise that it was because he reminded me of you, he looked at things in that admiring way, without quite engaging with them, he saw the world in terms of photographs, though he wasn’t half as good as he thought he was. So I dropped him. And I hesitated about telling you this, but you might as well know, because everything I’ve done since I left you has led to this moment where I write to you again, now, after twenty years.
After the photographer, I took up with a married man, one of those minor French politician-intellectuals, oh, nothing physical, in fact I think he was a closet gay, it was a business arrangement if you like, I was his escort, the kind of woman his kind of man likes to be seen with in discreet restaurants. He was very charming, and very well read, we’d have this French Symbolist thing going, matching quotations from Baudelaire and Mallarmé, and eating with him was a real pleasure, if a trifle analytical, you know that way the French have to talk their food as well as eat it. He admired me, and I him. And I enjoyed the mutual flattery for a while, not to mention the discreet restaurants, but then it seemed to me he was flaunting me a little too much, I was becoming too much of an ornament, so I got out of that relationship too. And there were others, but nothing to write home about.
And you, you were like a ghost that would sometimes appear in my dreams, and I would dream of you being with other women, o
ther ghosts perhaps. So very slowly I began to think of getting in touch again, but I deferred it for years, until I went through that shoebox full of postcards. And the more I thought of you, the more I thought of how we’d been together in different places, and how you saw the world, sometimes as I saw it, but sometimes quite differently. You used to joke, dear Angel, how I was always one step ahead of you, but if I was, you had a more considered view of the landscape. I always wanted to see what was round the next corner, while you took time to look at what was present. So I thought I’d send the postcards from different places, somewhere we had been together, others not. For I wanted to imagine what you would have made of those places, like Stroud, where I’d never even been myself, but I knew you would remember how I told you of my father’s stint in the Erinoid factory at Lightpill, how I would dream of him driving the night train home to London, to me, his face lit by the glow from the open fire-box door, steam hissing from the brass pipes, the smokestack bearing its long plume of smoke through the darkness.
Of course Stroud had changed a lot from my father’s time, the Erinoid factory had long since closed down, but that was the point, I was seeing it anew, through your eyes, as I imagined. They had set up a little Erinoid museum, you would have loved it, they had displays of Erinoid buttons, mock ivory and tortoiseshell, all the colours of the rainbow, door handles, umbrella handles, radio cabinets, the plastic rods that they used to drill out pen casings from, in fantastic marble effects. What they didn’t have was the smell, though they told you about it, milk curd and formaldehyde, what a stink that must have been. And I remembered how my father’s clothes would smell funny when he got home, I thought it was the smell of coal-smoke and steam from the engine. I think that’s why I sent you the Berlin postcard, the one of the steam engine on the viaduct over Friedrichstrasse, but also because we got lost on the S-Bahn, you remember, we got off at the wrong stop and ended up in Kreuzberg, and we came across that little antique shop where you bought the Russian icon, I hadn’t the courage to tell you I thought it was a fake, and what did it matter anyway, you were so delighted by it. And the subject was so fitting, an Annunciation, the Angel Gabriel appearing to the Virgin, you especially liked the blue of her cloak, it was like an Yves Klein Blue, you said, it was remarkable how it had kept its colour over all that time. You mean the blue he used to paint naked women with, and have them roll them around on a canvas? I said, and you looked at me suspiciously, thinking I was winding you up …
The Pen Friend Page 22