by Unknown
71
formula - DJ's narcissistic gabble, lists of names and grace from the contact. 'Sure, if I hadn't seen it with me addresses, meaningless anti-jingles - that the awful truth own eyes I shouldn't have believed it,' he said with a sigh.
dawned on h i m : Radio One was like this all the time.
'You're a fortunate man, Mr Zapp.'
Morris's only human contact these lonely days was Doctor
'But I just rented it,' Morris protested in bewilderment.
O'Shea, who came in to watch Morris's colour TV and to
•Anybody can rent one. It only costs a few dollars a week.'
drink his whisky, and perhaps to escape the joys of family
'Well, now, that's easily said, Mr Zapp, for a man in life for an hour or so, because he knocked softly on the door your position, that's easily said, but easier said than done, and tiptoed into the room, winking heavily and raising a Mr Zapp.'
cautionary finger as if to restrain Morris from speaking until
' Well, if there's anything you want to see, just drop b y . . . '
the door was shut against the wails of Mrs O'Shea and her
'That's very kind of you, Mr Zapp, very thoughtful. I'll babies rising up the staircase. O'Shea puzzled Morris. He take you up on that generous invitation.' And so he did. Un-didn't look like a doctor, not like the doctors Morris knew -
fortunately, O'Shea's tastes in TV ran to situation comedy sleek prosperous men who drove the biggest cars and owned and sentimental serials, to which he reacted with naive, the plushest houses in any neighbourhood he had ever lived unqualified credulity, writhing and jumping up and down in. O'Shea's suit was baggy and threadbare, his shirts were in his seat, pounding the arm of his chair and nudging frayed, he drove a small car that had seen better days, he Morris vigorously in the ribs, maintaining a stream of highly looked short of sleep, money, pleasures, everything except personal commentary on the action: 'Ahah! Caught you worries. By the same token Morris's possessions, few as they there, laddie, you weren't expecting t h a t . . . Oh! What's this, were, seemed to throw the doctor into fits of envious awe, as what's this, you little hussy? Ah, now, that's better, that's if his eyes had never beheld such opulence. He examined better . . . NO, DON'T DO IT ! DON'T DO IT ! Mother of God, Morris's Japanese cassette recorder with the half-fearful, half-that boy will be the death of me .. .' and so on. Fortunately, covetous curiosity of a nineteenth-century savage handling a Dr O'Shea usually fell asleep halfway through the pro-missionary's tinder-box; he seemed astounded that a man gramme, exhausted by the strains of audience participa-might own so many shirts that he could send them to the tion and the rigours of the day's labours, and Morris would laundry half-a-dozen at a time; and, invited to fix himself a turn down the sound and get out a book. It wasn't exactly drink, he was almost (but not quite) incapable of making a company.
choice from three varieties of whisky, groaning and muttering under his breath as he handled the bottles and read To his considerable mortification, Philip Swallow's chief the labels, 'Mother of God, what is it we have here, Old social asset at Euphoric State turned out to be his associa-Grandad Genuine Kentucky Bourbon and here's th'old tion with Charles Boon. He carelessly let this information josser himself looking none the worse for it, would you slip in conversation with Wily Smith and, within hours it believe i t . . . '
seemed, the news had been flashed to all points of the cam-The installation of the colour TV had made Dr O'Shea pus. His office began to fill up with people anxious to make quite ill with excitement. He followed the delivery men up his acquaintance for the sake of some anecdote of Charles the stairs and skipped around the room getting in their way Boon's early life, and before the end of the afternoon the and sat enraptured before the tuning signal for hours after Chairman's wife, Mrs Hogan, had phoned to plead for they left, getting up now and again to lay his hand reverent-Philip's assistance in persuading Boon to attend their cock-ly on the cabinet as if he expected to derive some special tail party. It was hard to believe, but the Charles Boon 7a
73
Show was all the rage at Euphoric State. Philip listened to Show, and Philip was regaled with the highlights of certain it at the first opportunity, and, by some kind of sado-past programmes so often that he came to believe that he masochistic compulsion, at most subsequent opportunities.
had heard them himself: the time, for instance, Boon had The basic formula of the programme - an open line on talked a panic-stricken pregnant mother through her first which listeners could call up to discuss various issues with labour-pains, or when he argued a homosexual clergyman the compere and with each other - was a familiar one. But out of suicide, or when he invited - and obtained - post-the Charles Boon Show was different from the ordinary coital reflections on the Sexual Revolution from bedside phone-in programme in several respects. To begin with, it telephones around the Bay. There were, of course, no com-was put out by the non-commercial network, QX YZ, which mercials on the progamme, but just to annoy the rival net-was supported by listeners' subscriptions and foundation works Boon would sometimes give an unsolicited and un-grants, and was therefore free from business and political paid testimonial to some local restaurant or movie or shirt-pressures. Where the comperes of most American phone-in sale that had taken his fancy. To Philip it seemed obvious programmes were bland, evasive, middle-of-the-road men, that beneath all the culture and the eccentricity and the giving a fair hearing to all sides of the question - endlessly human concern there beat a heart of pure show-business, patient, endlessly courteous, ultimately without convictions but to the local community the programme evidently
- Charles Boon was violently, wilfully opinionated. Where appeared irresistibly novel, daring and authentic.
they provided the reassurance of a surrogate father or
'Isn't Mr Boon with you?' was his hostess's first question uncle, he offered the provocation of a delinquent-son-figure.
when he presented himself at the Hogans' palatial ranch-He took an extreme radical position on all such issues as pot, style house for their cocktail party. Her eyes raked him from sex, race, Viet Nam, and argued heatedly - often rudely -
head to foot as though she suspected that he had concealed with callers who disagreed with him, sometimes abusing his Boon somewhere on his person. Philip assured her that he control of the telephone line by cutting them off in mid-had passed on the invitation, as Hogan himself loomed up sentence. It was rumoured that he collected the phone and crunched Philip's fingers in a huge, horny handclasp.
numbers of likely-sounding girls and called them back after
'Hi, there, Mr Swallow, mighty glad to see you.' He the programme to make dates. He would sometimes begin a ushered Philip into the spacious living-room, where forty or programme by quoting a passage of Wittgenstein or Camus more people were already assembled, and helped him to or by reading a poem of his own composition, and use this as a gin and tonic of giant proportions. 'Now, who would you a starting point for a dialogue with his listeners. And an ex-like to meet? Nearly all English Department folk here, I traordinary variety of listeners they were, those who faith-guess.'
fully tuned into Q,XYZ at midnight - students, professors, Only one name would come into Philip's head.' I haven't hippies, runaways, insomniacs, drug addicts and Hells met Mr Kroop yet.'
Angels. Housewives sitting up for laggard husbands con-Hogan went slightly green about the jowls.' Kroop ?'
fided their marital problems to the Charles Boon Show;
'I've read so much about him, in buttonholes,' Philip truck-drivers listening to the programme in their shuddering quipped, to cover what was evidently a faux pas.
cabs, unable to suppress their rage at Boon, or Camus, any
' Yeah ? Oh yeah. Ha, ha. I'm afraid you won't see Karl at longer, swerved off the freeway to phone in their incoherent many cocktail parties - Howard!' Hogan's enormous paw contributions from emergency call-boxes. Already a con-fell heavily on the shoulder of
a sallow, bespectacled young siderable folk-lore had accumulated about the Charles Boon man cruising past with a tumbler of Scotch held to pursed 74
75
lips. He staggered slightly, but skilfully avoided spilling the I red kerchief knotted round his throat, accosted Philip's drink. Philip was introduced to Howard Ringbaum. 'I was companion. He towed behind him a delectable blonde in telling Mr Swallow,' said Hogan,' that you don't often sec pink party pyjamas. 'Hey, Howard, somebody just told me Karl Kroop at faculty social gatherings.'
there's an English guy at this party who asked Hogan to
'I hear,' said Ringbaum, 'that Karl has totally rethought introduce him to Karl Kroop. I'd love to have seen the old his course on " The Death of the Book ? " He's removing the man's face.'
query mark this quarter.'
'Ask him,' said Ringbaum, nodding towards Philip.
Hogan guffawed and thumped Ringbaum between the Philip blushed and laughed uneasily.
shoulder blades before moving away. Ringbaum, swaying
'Oh my God, you aren't the English guy by any with the punch, kept his balance and his drink intact.
chance?'
' What are you working on ?' he asked Philip.
'You goofed again, Sy, dear,' said the woman.
cOh, I'm just trying to sort out my teaching at the mo-
'I'm terribly sorry,' said the man. 'Sy Gootblatt is the ment.'
name. This is Bella. You might think by the way she's Ringbaum nodded impatiently.' What's your field ?'
dressed that she's just got out of bed, and you wouldn't be
'Yours is Augustan pastoral, I believe,' Philip returned far wrong.'
evasively.
'Take no notice of him, Mr Swallow,' said Bella. 'How Ringbaum looked pleased. 'Right. How did you know?
are you liking Euphoria ?'
You've seen my article in College English ?'
Of the two questions he was asked at the cocktail party by
'I was looking through the Course Bulletin the other everyone he met, this was the one he preferred. The other d a y . . . '
was,' What are you working on ?'
Ringbaum's countenance darkened. 'You don't want to
'What are you working on, Mr Swallow?' Luke Hogan believe everything you read in that.'
asked him when they bumped into each other again.
'Oh no, of course . . . What d'you think of this chap
'Luke,' said Mrs Hogan, saving Philip from having to Kroop then ?' Philip inquired.
think of a reply, ' I really think Charles Boon is here at
'As little as possible. I'm coming up for tenure myself this last.'
quarter, and if I don't make it nobody around here is going There was a flurry of activity in the hall, and heads to be wearing RETAIN RINGBAUM buttons.'
turned all across the room. Boon had indeed arrived, dressed
'This tenure business seems to create a lot of tension.'
offensively in singlet and jeans, and escorting a handsome,
'You must have the same thing in England ?'
haughty Black Pantheress who was to appear on his pro-
' Oh no. Probation is more or less a formality. In practice, gramme later that night. They sat in a corner of the room once you're appointed they can never get rid of you - un-drinking Bloody Marys and giving audience to a neck-less you seduce one of your students, or something equally craning circle of entranced faculty and their wives. The scandalous.' Philip laughed.
Pantheress did little except look coolly around at the
'You can screw as many students as you like here,' said Hogans' opulent furnishings as if calculating how well they Ringbaum unsmilingly. 'But if your publications are unsatis-would burn, but Boon more than compensated for her taci-factory . . . ' He drew a finger expressively across his throat.
turnity. Philip, who had rather counted on being himself the
'Hey, Howard!*
evening's chief focus of attention, found himself standing A young man dressed in a black grained-silk shirt with a neglected on the fringes of this little court. Disgruntled, he 76
77
wandered out of the living-room on to the terrace. A soli-
'Let's drink to that.'
tary woman was leaning against the balustrade, staring They drank to it.
moodily at the Bay, where a spectacular sunset was in pro-
'Wow,' said the woman. 'You mix a stiff drink.'
gress, the orange globe of the sun just balanced, it seemed,
'I just followed your instructions.'
on the suspension cables of the Silver Span bridge. Philip
'To the brim,' said the woman. 'I don't think we've met, took up his stand some four yards away from the woman.
have we ? Are you visiting here ?'
' Delightful evening,' he said.
'Yes, I'm Philip Swallow — exchanging with Professor She looked at him sharply, then returned to the con-Zapp.'
templation of the sunset. 'Yeah,' she said, at length.
' Did you say Zapp ?'
Philip sipped his drink nervously. The silent, brooding
' You know him ?'
presence of the woman made him uncomfortable, spoiled
' Very well. He's my husband.'
his enjoyment of the view. He decided to return to the Philip choked on his drink. 'You're Mrs Zapp ?'
living-room.
'Is that so surprising? You think I look too old? Or too
* If you're going back inside...' said the woman.
young ?'
'Yes?'
'Oh, no,'said Philip.
'You might freshen my drink for me.'
'Oh no which?' Her small green eyes glinted with
' Certainly,' said Philip, taking her glass. 'More ice?'
mockery. She was a red-head, striking but by no means
'More ice, more vodka. No more tonic. And look for the pretty, and not particularly well-groomed. He guessed she Smirnoff bottle under the bar. Ignore the gallon jar of cut-was in her mid-thirties.
price stuff on the top.'
' I was just surprised,' said Philip. ' I suppose I assumed Philip duly found the concealed Smirnoff bottle and re-you had gone to Rummidge with your husband.'
filled the woman's glass, rather underestimating the space
' Your wife with you ?'
required for ice, which (inexperienced in handling liquor)
'No.' She responded with a gesture which implied clearly he added last. Boon was still talking away in the back-enough that his assumption was therefore demonstrably un-ground, about his plans for a TV arts programme: 'Some-warranted. 'I would have liked to have brought her,' he thing entirely different... art in action . . . train a camera said. 'But my visit was arranged at rather short notice. Also on a sculptor at work for a month or two, then run the film we have children, and there were problems about schooling through at about fifty thousand frames per second, see the and so on. And there was the house . . .' He heard himself sculpture taking shape . . . put an object in front of two going on like this for, it seemed, several hours, as if he were painters, let them get on with it, use two cameras and a answering a formal accusation in court. He felt increasingly split screen . . . contrast... auction the pictures at the end of foolish, but Mrs Zapp somehow kept him talking, involving the programme . . .' Philip topped up his own gin and tonic himself deeper and deeper in implied guilt, by her silence and and carried the two glasses out on to the terrace.
her mocking regard. 'Do you have children yourself?' he
'Thanks,' said the woman.'Is that little shit still shooting concluded desperately.
off his mouth in there?'
'Two. Twins. Boy and girl. Aged nine.'
'Yes, he is, actually.'
'Ah, then you understand the problems.'
'You're not a fan ?'
' I doubt if we have the same problems, Mr Sparrow.'
•Definitely not.'
'Swallow.'
78
79
'Mr Swallow. Sorry. A much nicer bird.' She turned back
'I'm afraid I can't agree,' said Philip stiffly. 'I could to contemplate the sun, now sinking into the sea behind the never get tired of it.'
Silver Span, and took a reflective draught from her glass.
'But you haven't lived with it for ten years. Wait a
'Less promiscuous, for instance. How does your wife feel while. You can't rush nausea, you know.'
about it, Mr Swallow, I mean is she with you about the kids
'Well, I'm afraid that after R u m m i d g e . . . '
and the schools and the house and all ? She doesn't mind
•What's that?'
being left behind ?'
'Where I come from. Where your husband's gone.'
'Well, we discussed it very thoroughly, of course . . . It
* Oh y e a h . . . What's it called, Rubbish ?'
was a difficult decision. I left it to her ultimately . . .' (He
'Rummidge.'
felt himself slipping into the groove of compulsive self-
' I thought you said Rubbish.' She laughed immoderately, justification again.) 'After all, she has the worst part of the and spilled some vodka on her frock. ' Shit. What's it like, bargain...'
then, Rummidge? Morris tried to make out it was the
' What bargain ?' said the woman sharply.
greatest, but everybody else says it's the asshole of England.5
'Just a figure of speech. I mean, for me, it's a great oppor-
'Both would be exaggerations,' said Philip. 'It's a large tunity, a paid holiday if you like. But for her it's just life as industrial city, with the usual advantages and disadvantages.'
usual, only lonelier. Well, you must know what it's like
' What are the advantages ?'