by Simon Okotie
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Isobel Absalon’s whole body turned as he continued to walk past her. The way in which it turned was clockwise, which is to say that, when viewed from above, Isobel Absalon’s body turned in the same direction, although somewhat more swiftly, as his left hand and, more classically, as the hands, as they are known, of an analogue clock. Meanwhile his own body had started to turn in the opposite direction, which is to say that his body had started to turn anti-clockwise or in a counter-clockwise direction, depending on your particular continental sensibilities and preferences of expression, as he started reaching towards the banister with his right hand. His body had started to turn in an anti- or counter-clockwise direction because the stairs to which he was headed, as it is known, lay to his left and he needed to align his body such that it would be moving towards those stairs – the first step, at least – on that stairway, and the way in which he effected this reorientation was by turning his body in an anti- (etc) clockwise direction such that its momentum would take him towards the stairs, all else being equal or at least all else, including Isobel Absalon, not conspiring against such a manoeuvre and movement. His left hand turning clockwise whilst his body – the remainder thereof – turned anti- (etc) clockwise was dictated, then, by the requirements of his investigation, which he intuited, with all the investigative experience behind this intuition, were best served by his depositing the keys (as before) in his left-hand trouser pocket whilst ascending to the first storey of the house in question and entering the bedroom of that property, ideally with Isobel Absalon (leaving aside, for the time being, any mention of the bed27 itself, whether king-, queen- or some intermediate size, or some size of a smaller or larger dimension than any of these foregoing examples). As well as being dictated by the requirements of his investigation, the speed with which his left hand revolved clockwise whilst the remainder of his body revolved anti-clockwise, was also affected by a new piece of evidence that presented itself to him just at that moment: the telephone on the telephone table at the bottom of the stairs started to ring.
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The new evidence – that of the telephone starting to ring – had affected his speed of revolution, as has already been stated, which is to say that it had affected the speed of clockwise revolution of his left hand as well as the speed of counter-clockwise revolution of the remainder of his body; what has not been indicated is how the speed of revolution had been affected; that it had been affected has, in short, been established just not how, then, it had been affected… in short, the speed of revolution was increased, rather than decreased, in both instances, by the onset of ringing. That was what he had noticed. He wondered to himself, as he continued revolving (and walking, note, still, towards the stairs) whether the speed with which he was walking was also affected by the onset of the ringing emanating from the telephone sitting on the table designed, perhaps, for the purpose of hosting, as it were, that telephone or any other similar appliance, hence the name that he had given it in his mind, namely, ‘telephone table’. And he noticed that the speed at which he was walking, as opposed, note, to revolving both his left hand and the remainder of his body, although he was engaged in all of these motions simultaneously, as has already been established, had indeed been affected by the onset of ringing. How, he wondered, had this particular motion been affected? Rather, how had the speed at which he was engaged in this motion of walking towards the stairs been affected by the telephone sitting, as it were, on what he supposed to be a purpose-built table at the bottom of the stairs, starting to ring, he wondered, in what was becoming a thoroughgoing review of his actions at the moment that the telephone in question had started to ring? In short, his speed had been adversely affected, albeit momentarily, by the onset of ringing from the telephone. And what he meant by adversely affected, those two words that he had just filed in his report reviewing the incidents precipitated by the telephone starting to ring, was that he had slowed down, momentarily, on hearing the ringing of the phone sitting, so to speak, on the table that he took to have been designed for the purpose of hosting, as it were, the phone located at the foot, as it is known, of the stairs that he hoped soon to ascend. He noticed the presence, however, in his own report on this matter of the word ‘momentarily’. What he had intended in his use of this word was to indicate that although at the moment of hearing the phone starting to ring just to his left that his walking speed had been reduced, that this reduction in speed had not continued beyond the moment that he had first heard the phone ringing. In exploring his statement more fully in this way, and more specifically exploring his use of the word momentarily contained in that statement, he had clarified his submission to the extent that it was now more apparent that the speed at which he had been walking had been adversely affected (as before) for the duration of that moment; what he had not clarified in this branch of his inquiry into the disappearance of his investigative colleague Marguerite, last seen on the trail of Harold Absalon, the Mayor’s transport advisor, was whether his walking speed at the end of the moment defined above had simply reverted to its pre-existing value, which is to say whether he had re-commenced walking at the speed at which he had been walking immediately prior to the onset of ringing from the telephone or whether the speed at which he had continued walking after those moments of slower walking associated with the onset of phone-ringing was higher than at the moments before the phone had started to ring (etc). A re-expression for the purposes, he hoped, of greater clarity: had he sped up after having momentarily slowed down, the latter slowing down having been brought about by the telephone ringing (etc)? Before filing a submission responding to this branch of his inquiry, he felt the need to explain, as he continued to walk at a still undisclosed speed and revolve in direction(s) and relative speed(s) that had been disclosed, why the alternative of him having slowed down further rather than resuming his pre-existing speed or increasing it had not been investigated in the foregoing. The reason that he had not investigated this outcome and had not made a submission, until now that is, within his report into the aftermath of the onset of phone-ringing, as he now chose to refer to those moments, was, he thought, perhaps obvious to the more astute trainees following his investigation through whatever mysterious (to him) means at their disposal. For the less advanced – or less experienced – trainees he spelt it out: the reason he had not investigated this outcome was indicated by the juxtaposition of the words ‘adversely affected’ – or, more specifically the word ‘adversely’ with all of its negative connotations – with the word ‘momentarily’. Given that he had a negative view of his slower speed at the moment of his apprehension of the ringing phone and the implication that this slower speed had been brought about by his surprise that the phone had started to ring at that moment then isn’t it obvious that an operative of his statue would at least wish to retain his composure, as it were, following that moment of being so uncharacteristically off his guard, as it could perhaps be referred to, and that one means of regaining this composure would have been to resume the walking speed that had been in play immediately prior to the phone starting to ring or his apprehension thereof? That, then, was one alternative available to him – that of acting as though he had not been startled by the phone ringing and acting as though nothing untoward had occurred by, as quickly as possible, resuming the walking speed that had been in operation up until the untoward occurrence that he was pretending was nothing untoward as far as he was concerned. The other alternative within this frame of reference was to have sped up, that is, to have increased his walking speed, following the moments of slower walking, and he knew that this would be indicative to Isobel and Harold Absalon, and any other on-looker, whether real like Isobel and Harold Absalon or imaginary, like yourself, that the telephone ringing had somehow changed things for him in relation to his investigation into the disappearance of Marguerite, his investigative colleague, last seen on the trail of Harold Absalon, the Mayor’s transport advisor. And he now submitted that rather than returning to
his pre-existing walking pace, to refer to it, now, in that way, he had indeed quickened his pace in response to the phone ringing, that is, after he had regained his composure, the loss of which had resulted in a momentary slowing down in his walking speed as submitted in previous evidence. He also confirmed, at that moment, to himself and to any others who, through whatever means mysterious to him, had access to this evidence, that this increase in his walking pace, corresponding, as it did, to an increase in the speed of revolution of his left hand in a clockwise direction and of the remainder of his body in an anti- (etc) clockwise direction did indicate that the ringing of the phone changed things for him in relation to his investigation. He was not keeping these circumstances from those following in his footsteps; it was just that those circumstances remained at the back of his mind, as it is known, for now, which is why we cannot yet see them, as it were. Instead of bringing them out, he continued, for the time being, monitoring the speed of Isobel Absalon’s clockwise stationary revolution and his own accelerating counter- (etc) clockwise revolution combined, as it was, with the clockwise revolution of his left hand as well as his acceleration towards the foot of the stairs, noticing – or sensing, rather – and not for the first time, that the reason that Isobel Absalon’s body was turning in a clockwise direction was that Isobel Absalon was monitoring his progress with interest as he walked towards the foot (etc) of the stairs within the house in question continuing his investigation into the disappearance of his, and Richard Knox’s, erstwhile colleagues.
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He carried on walking towards the bottom on the stairs, a place that is also called the foot of the stairs, whilst abruptly terminating the counter-clockwise revolution of his body. The fact that this location on the stairs referred to two different areas of human anatomy he put to one side for the moment and perhaps forever. There was a further item on the telephone table, which is to say on the table designed for the purpose of hosting, as it were, items germane to the making or receiving of telephone calls including the telephone itself; indeed without the telephone, all of the other paraphernalia of phoning would be largely but perhaps not entirely redundant. The further item on the telephone table was what is known, at least in some circles, as an answerphone. The purpose of this device should be self-evidently apparent, he reflected in his continuing journey to the bottom or foot of the stairs, even to those just setting out on their journey of training in the dark arts of the detective. He put the answerphone in the same category of device as the teasmade, and the reason he did this related to the respective names of these two devices, in that they both described, although to differing extents, the purpose for which they had been designed: to spell it out, the answering of a telephone in the former case and the making of tea in the latter (leaving aside the differences in tense in the two cases). Before expounding further upon this theme, he noted to himself that the presence of an external answerphone of this sort (and teasmades were always external in this sense, soon, perhaps, to be defined) meant that, provided that it was switched on, that the volume setting was high enough and that Isobel Absalon did not cut across or behind our investigator to actually answer the phone before the answerphone cut in, as it were, which was looking unlikely at that moment, then, having perhaps heard the recorded message, he would be able to hear the incoming message as it were, and this would provide a further clue that would perhaps point towards the circumstances of his colleague, Marguerite’s – and, of course, of Harold Absalon’s – disappearance.
Why did he think it unlikely that Isobel Absalon would get to the phone to answer it before the answerphone cut in, as it is known, he wondered, as he terminated the clockwise revolution of his left hand, which was very close, now, to his left-hand trouser pocket? The reason he thought this unlikely related to his presence within the house. It was not that he thought that Isobel Absalon was worried that it would seem rude for her to answer the phone when a guest had just arrived. Some hosts would still answer their telephones in the presence of guests, whether newly arrived or well-established, which is to say, in the latter case, well ensconced in that place of residence, workplace or other location; and those hosts who did choose to answer their phones in the presence of whatever category of guest would fall into two broad categories: those who would take the call and engage in it as though their guests were not present at all – and he attached the label ‘rude’ to this sub-set of hosts; and those hosts who would take the call, perhaps because they were in the habit of always answering the phone, whenever it rang, regardless of the presence or absence of a guest or guests, but would take the call simply as a means of informing the caller at the earliest opportunity that they had guests or, in the case of a call taken within the business environment, that they were in a meeting (and that was how the presence of guests would find its expression, often, in the business context, when answering a telephone call, as being ‘in a meeting’). It was not, then, that he thought that Isobel Absalon was concerned to avoid being put into the category of ‘rude’ in the sense defined adequately enough a few moments before in his mind. He thought, rather, that the way in which his presence would preclude Isobel Absalon from answering the phone related to the surprise that Isobel Absalon must feel at his presence in the house in question, which is to say in Richard Knox’s house. Was it sufficient to say, then, that it was the unexpected nature of his visit that meant that Isobel Absalon would not, in his estimation, cut in front or behind him to answer the still-ringing telephone before the answerphone cut in, as it is known? He concluded that the surprise element, to call it that, of his visit was not, in fact, sufficient to prevent the answering of the telephone in the manner described. What was missing, he concluded, was an account of the significance of his visit, from Isobel Absalon’s point of view; he judged that the significance of his visit was such as to outweigh the significance of any phone call that Isobel Absalon might take at that moment. Was the unexpected nature of his visit unimportant, then, he wondered, as he continued his journey to the foot, base or bottom of the stairs? It was not unimportant, he concluded, but it was less important, at that moment, than the significance of his visit for Isobel Absalon. Granted that the element of surprise may actually have predominated initially in preventing Isobel Absalon from answering the telephone, which is to say that Isobel Absalon may have been stupefied on seeing a detective of his stature entering the area in front of the townhouse and this may have had the effect of bringing about hesitation in Isobel Absalon’s mind in relation to how to act or even in relation to how to think. However, given that those initial moments of surprise had presumably taken place on the initial apprehension of him by Isobel Absalon from the first-floor bedroom window, a location, remember, to which he was headed with her, he hoped, in his wake, as it were, and that Isobel Absalon, in descending the stairs, not in any supernatural fashion but simply by walking down them, had had enough time for this initial surprise to pass and had even had sufficient time, in his estimation, for the surprise arising from the presence of Harold Absalon in pursuit of him to sufficiently subside, assuming that Isobel Absalon had not seen Harold Absalon until she had opened the front door, such that it was unlikely that Isobel Absalon’s actions would still be governed in any meaningful way by this sense of surprise at the arrival of those particular guests, and that was why our investigator had given a much higher weighting to the significance of his presence in Richard Knox’s house when analysing whether Isobel Absalon was likely to cut in front or behind him to answer the ringing telephone before the answerphone cut in (etc). In short, he felt sure that Isobel Absalon afforded a much higher significance to the presence of such a well-respected detective in Richard Knox’s house, especially one being pursued by her husband towards whom all of that detective’s colleague’s energies had been focused for some considerable amount of time, and it was this, rather than a stupefying sense of surprise, that would, he estimated, prevent Isobel Absalon from answering the ringing telephone. Were the sense of surprise to still b
e fresh, as it were, then he could not so confidently assert that Isobel Absalon would not cut in front or behind him to answer the telephone before the answerphone cut in and the reason for this was that he could not be confident about how long Isobel Absalon’s hesitation, based, as it would be in that case, on a momentary, note, stupefying sense of surprise, would last. His confidence that any sense of surprise had sufficiently abated was based, then, upon the amount of time that had elapsed between Isobel Absalon’s visual apprehension of the arrival of her guest(s) but also upon his knowledge of the nature of Isobel Absalon’s mind, knowledge acquired, somehow, during the course of his investigations into the disappearance of his erstwhile colleague, Marguerite, who remained a missing person even though he felt sure that Isobel Absalon and the house they were currently both inhabiting would yield clues leading to his discovery.