Man with a Seagull on His Head

by Harriet Paige

  One of the things that had continued to worry him over the years was the vague but niggling awareness that there had been someone important who was now lost to him. And now, as he had on many previous occasions, he tried to search his mind for some further clue as to who she might be. He knew her to be a woman, although this in itself was strange to him as he also knew himself to be someone who didn’t have relationships with women. There had been the early infatuation with Louise, and he had had the occasional friendship over the years which, for a brief time, had developed the potential to become something more. He remembered one girl in particular, a girl who worked in the canteen at the Civic Centre, who had surprised him by asking him to go rowing on the boating lake one weekend. But their acquaintance hadn’t gone beyond a couple of outings and the most reticent of kisses, and he knew it couldn’t be she who was troubling him now. No, this woman had been someone deeply important to him. He hardly dared to think it, and yet he felt it must be true: she was someone with whom he had been very much in love. Indeed, he felt he must be still, for his heart ached just to ponder the possibility. And yet how could he be in love with someone whose name he couldn’t even remember? He really couldn’t recall a single thing about her, hardly even her face, beyond the conviction that she did have a face and was not merely a figment of his imagination.

  The more often he thought on it the more certain he became that he had known love and had lost it. How it had come upon him or who had been the focus of it remained a mystery, but today something new occurred to him: that there might be a connection between this person and something else he could never quite get to the bottom of. For a while now he’d had the feeling that during those now-misty years with the Zoobs he’d been engaged in some very important task. Something which he had either chosen or been forced to abandon. There was something that he had been trying to achieve and yet, when he tried to think back as to what it might have been, all he could remember doing was painting pictures. Why on earth had he been painting pictures when there was clearly something pressing and far more important he needed to do? It was a task, he felt certain, that someone had entrusted to him and it occurred to him now that maybe it was something he’d been doing for her. Or, if not, that it was at least connected to her in some way. Had he, perhaps, been trying to find her? If he could just remember what the task was he might even now be able to fulfil it.

  As he sat there looking into the river it seemed to him as if he might be making a little progress, as if his mind, like the muddy brown water below, might suddenly clear and everything would make sense.

  Maybe it was these thoughts, coupled with the dreamy state he was in, which accounted for his lack of surprise at what he saw when he glanced up from his reverie: it was his old house, the bungalow in Shoeburyness. Just floating past down the river. Despite his many years away from it and the vagaries of his memory, he recognised it at once, as clearly as if he had been walking into Belvedere Close in search of it. And not only was it not surprising to him to see it here upon the Thames, but, appearing now amid these thoughts, it seemed to him as if it might actually be coming to meet him, providing the clarity which he’d felt just a moment before to be almost within his grasp.

  For the first time in many years he felt a quickening within. He was buoyant, elated almost, and instinctively looked behind him for his companion. Scooping Pigeon up, he carried her onto his lap. The bird’s little heart raced to be brought so close to the water but Ray held her firm, with both hands cupping her breast until slowly the beat settled to its usual fast but steady pace. Do you see that, Pidge? That’s my house. Right there. If we can just get across to it I’ll show it to you. If only we could fly. If we could fly, Pidge, I’d take you there right now.

  Sixteen

  Jennifer watched the list of stations scroll along the board on the station platform, the places she’d known her whole life—Chalkwell, Leigh-on-Sea, Benfleet—linked by casual little commas to foreign, far off destinations—Limehouse, London Fenchurch Street—as if they were all just stitches on the same row of knitting and going from one to the other was perfectly simple and natural. Plenty of people did this journey every day and Jennifer was not such a stranger to it as she might have been, as she’d taken the same trip with Giulietta just six months before, when Paola had taken them to see Les Miserables for Jennifer’s seventieth birthday. And there was that other occasion of course, a long time ago now, when she had sat nervously next to that young journalist. But she was trying not to think about that.

  As she stood waiting she reached inside her bag and felt for the little silver coffee pot she’d brought with her. It was the pot, rather than its contents, which had come to stand in for her husband in her mind. It had even started to look a little like him: the steel was marked here and there by darkened blotches like the liver spots on his hands and forehead, and the spout’s lower lip, protruding in a sweet and vulnerable sort of a way, was reminiscent of an expression that he would wear when trying to solicit a kiss.

  Slowly and unapologetically the train pulled in, eleven minutes late. There were plenty of seats: in fact, the carriage was practically empty. She chose one of a pair facing forward and put her handbag, with Vito in it, carefully down on the seat beside her. She occupied herself with the view from the window as they crossed the railway bridge over the High Street, full already with shoppers, and on past Old Leigh where dinghies were marooned in the glistening mud of the estuary. Soon they were racing through the flat, sparsely industrialized Essex landscape which spun past her, hardly registering on the senses at all, putting her into a kind of trance.

  Recovering herself as they drew closer towards the city she turned away from the window and reached across to her handbag, pulling out the newspaper cutting she’d carefully folded and tucked into the inner pocket. After that day when she and Giulietta had been to watch the bomb explode she’d begun buying a national newspaper daily, trawling the Arts and Culture section in the hope of spotting something. And one day, there it was: 8 Belvedere Close, Turbine Hall, Tate Modern, London.

  The first major work by Outsider Artist Ray Eccles—his own 1970s bungalow—is here resurrected and exhibited for the first time, having been removed and transported from its plot in Belvedere Close, Southend-on-Sea, by Mira Zoob, daughter of the late Outsider Art collectors, George and Grace Zoob. This was the birthplace of Eccles’ famous She series, an image of a woman standing on a beach, which he began to paint obsessively on the walls of his house in materials ranging from soup to his own bodily fluids, many of which have sadly not withstood the test of time or transportation. The woman’s face, with its enigmatic stare, has become one of the iconic images of 20th century art, although viewers will be taken aback by the power and immediacy of these first crazed depictions. Inside the vast industrial space of the Turbine Hall, 8 Belvedere Close takes on the feel of a simulacrum and the setting offers some interesting juxtapositions: the unchecked artistic imagination inside the shell of identikit 70s suburban architecture, inside the shell of the cathedral to modern art. The lighting, designed to mimic daylight, and a background soundtrack of squawking seagulls are meant to enhance the experience but are an unnecessary gimmick. Still, not to be missed.

  When the train pulled into Fenchurch Street station Jennifer had half a mind to stay on it and be taken straight back to Westcliff. The platform was dark and gloomy, full of menace and noise: engines, whistles, hurried footsteps, and announcements following relentlessly one after another. But she wouldn’t have gotten this far if she hadn’t gotten used to bullying herself out of these little inertias.

  “Last stop, lady,” said a litter-picker gruffly as he passed by her seat, and she quickly collected her belongings and exited the train onto the platform.

  She looked around for an escape route and joined the flow of people disappearing down a flight of steps. They led down into a ticket hall and a row of barriers, on the other side of which she found a map showi
ng directions to the underground station at Tower Hill.

  She resurfaced from the Tube at Blackfriars, having decided beforehand against changing lines, and asked directions of a tall young man casually leaning against the wall at the station entrance. He straightened up, crossed his arms and looked into the distance with a frown.

  “Oh dear, is it very far?” said Jennifer.

  “No, not really,” he said with an amused smile. “Ten minutes? But it’s a lovely walk … across the river.” He pointed up the street to their right, at the top of which could be made out the edge of St. Paul’s Cathedral. Once she got there, he told her, it was quite simple, she just needed to head directly south across the river over the footbridge.

  “Good luck!” he called after her, and when she glanced round she saw he’d been joined by a girl, who smiled and waved as well.

  The cathedral was being cleaned. The bottom part of one side was covered in scaffolding, which was itself covered with a huge piece of cloth printed with a photograph of the obscured section. Above, the already-cleaned stones were smooth and pale; beneath, the road was clogged with cars and buses churning out their muck as though in defiance of the whole operation. Jennifer stood for a moment catching her breath, craning her neck to see right to the very top where a little gilt cross shone, poking its way free into the high narrow sky above the city. Across the other side of the road she spotted the young man and his girl striding briskly together, his long arm slung loosely around her shoulder. They swung right, down a wide walkway that opened up towards the river, and she watched them for a while, their heads bobbing with conversation and kisses, before she lost them among the ripple of pedestrians making the trip south.

  She crossed the road and climbed the wide, shallow steps that rose from the side of the walkway to get a better view of where she was heading. She could see the footbridge now, a slender white aisle shooting out into nothing between the brick buildings. With the cold pale sun shining thinly upon it, it seemed made of ice or densely packed snow. She watched the stream of people crowd on and disappear over the hump, so many of them, like refugees. Beyond, as if blocking their passage and their dreams, was a vast brick building, windowless and ugly like a prison. Big black letters stamped high across the top spelled out the name of the gallery: TATE MODERN COLLECTION. She glanced back at the cathedral with its high dome, smooth and secretive, and again at the gallery, unrelenting on the other side of the river. The two buildings seemed to be engaged in a staring contest.

  There weren’t nearly as many people on the bridge as there had seemed from farther back. And it wasn’t made of ice or anything so elegant, but steel planks that clanked a little underfoot. She paused for a moment in the middle, amazed to see the whole city suddenly laid clear, the river opening up down the centre like a huge zip. The Thames was wider than she’d ever imagined, the water muddy and lively, bobbing with bits of litter which, moving with so much pace and certainty, seemed an almost decorative touch. Pleasure boats with rows of empty plastic seats on their open decks charged underneath, and further down the river she could see Tower Bridge, small and spotless like a toy model of itself.

  Closer now, she could see the whole of the gallery and a number of other names stamped across the top. Her eyes went straight to the one she knew: ECCLES. How stern and accusing those letters seemed, bold and separate like a row of black crows peering down from a telegraph wire. What was she doing here? She couldn’t see that any good would come from going any further. But to turn back … to stand still … sometimes you just had to put one foot in front of the other and tell yourself that you’d have a nice cup of tea when you got home.

  She entered the gallery down a wide concrete slope that continued its downward progression once inside the building, the rough surface turning smooth and polished under the high roof. To her left, on a lower, warmly-illuminated level, people browsed and bought things in a bookshop, and high above her head black steel beams criss-crossed a narrow strip of dull white daylight that ran the length of the building. She paused, letting people pass by on either side of her on their way down the ramp. Their feet made soft echoes and squeaks on the polished concrete, their voices small like the chirrups of garden birds against the low background hum. Ahead, at the bottom of the slope, was a sort of bridge from which people peered lazily down as if into a meandering stream. Emerging from underneath she saw the house: number eight Belvedere Close.

  Suddenly she felt very nervous, as if she were arriving to meet someone—as if he were in there, waiting—and terribly conscious of her appearance, which was presentable, of course: she’d chosen her clothes carefully for the trip, and had a pretty scarf around her neck with a pattern of doves and blossom. But there was no escaping her age: her grey hair, which needed hairspray to behave, and her strange lined skin. All those things that had crept up to obscure what was beneath, like dust on an old forgotten painting.

  She clutched her handbag and pulled her coat around her, telling herself how silly she was being. No one was waiting for her. No one even knew or cared that she’d arrived. In this vast, grey space, the bungalow was like a dolls’ house in an attic, the little people that had once been given life inside long since forgotten and discarded. She walked a little closer and stood behind the rope barrier that had been erected around the outside, beyond which was a low wall bordering a parched patch of grass, a pink hydrangea bush poking over the top of the bricks. Was it real? She reached out and touched a flower head. It felt dry and thin under her hand, like tissue paper, but when she plucked a petal and pressed it into her fingertip it bruised and bled the faintest trace of moisture.

  The queue to get inside trailed all the way down the path and beyond the barrier. She made her way to the end. Waiting in line she heard the seagull sounds coming from high above her head, as though the birds were circling in the steel rafters. She lifted her face and it met the hot beam of a spotlight. She closed her eyes as if warming herself in the sun, until she felt a light touch on her shoulder and looked down to see a gap had opened up in the queue.

  There was a strange smell inside. Peaty and sour, like wet coals. People huddled in the narrow hall which, after the huge hangar-like space of the gallery, seemed unreasonably small and dark. Other bodies brushed against her own, their whispers and shuffling feet forming a tight conspiratorial circle around her. Dizzy and confused, she pressed her way through towards an open doorway to her right and, entering the room, she found the arm of a settee upon which to rest, for she felt she might otherwise collapse.

  “No sitting on the furniture, please,” called a voice from the other side of the room.

  She stood up again immediately, looking around for where the instruction had come from and finding a girl with her legs crossed on a low stool in the corner of the room, a pool of yellow light surrounding her from the tassel-shaded standing lamp above her head.

  “I’m sorry,” mouthed Jennifer, bowing her head in apology and moving towards the centre of the room.

  She stood for a moment, trying to recover herself. There were about ten others in the room. They moved about the space slowly, like unhappy zoo animals, pacing the outskirts of the room and looking at the walls in a puzzled way, as if trying to find a way out. Again, Jennifer was struck by a feeling of panic, of not knowing what she was doing here, or how to behave now that she was. And she felt rather exposed, as if she must stand out in some way. What if she were recognized? Surely it was possible. Seeking a less conspicuous spot, she made her way to towards the outskirts of the room to join the flow. And then she finally let her gaze fall upon the walls.

  She had expected to know herself better. She had geared up for this trip as if going to meet herself. Herself as she really was. These walls seemed at first glance to be covered in dirt, as if dredged from the bottom of a canal. They were so dark, and shiny, as if wet. But as she continued to stare at them, eyes emerged ghost-like through the mire and, as she stepped back a li
ttle way, a whole face came slowly into view. Coming to meet her, these strange, shy shadows of herself. Or rather, she was going to meet them, being lowered into their underwater world: dark, silent, and strange.

  She turned in a slow circle, moving her gaze around the room, and as she did so it seemed to wrap itself around her, closer and closer until she felt herself held in its embrace. It’s not you in those paintings. You don’t matter at all. It was a lie. It was her. And she did matter. She felt her flesh caressed, waking up. It was intimate but comforting, with no edge of menace. She was not afraid. Even though her blood had never pounded with such ferocity through her body, as if it wanted to be free.

  She had no awareness now of the other people in the room. It seemed to belong entirely to her.

  “So sorry, I didn’t mean to alarm you.”

  She looked up to see a large face, ruddy and bearded. A heavy hand on her shoulder. “It’s just you look as enthralled as I am. It’s disconcerting, don’t you think, the way she looks at you? Those large, dark eyes. It’s like she lived a long, long time ago. Way back. Like those ancient Egyptian portraits. Did you ever get the chance to see them? I forget what they’re called but they were dug up from a graveyard somewhere. Painted to adorn mummies, I think, to accompany their owners to the afterlife. They’re so compelling, like you’re really coming face to face with someone who lived thousands of years ago. I don’t know about this woman. She may still be alive. But she looks ancient to me, kind of wise and sad. Like she knows something we don’t.”