The Story of John Nightly

by Tot Taylor

  Endy was in full flow. It wasn’t often she felt the need, but when a gush of Quethiock logic did come it came in a flood. Subjects for discussion: the cutting down of coast redwoods, house-building on ancient grazing land and residential developments close to the beach. After that, if anyone was still conscious, she might proclaim about the decimation of the local bird population, erosion of the hedgerows and hedge banks, or closure of local services. Cutbacks in nearby casualty units meant that her friends, those in need of sugar regulation or new hips, were bumped along country roads to far-off wards and surgeries when they’d previously have been put out of their misery locally.

  Then there was Penwith District Council – ah… a pause for breath was needed. PDC was a favourite punchbag. The very mention of this quango brought forth scorn and anger from the pensioner’s cracked lips. Penwith being an organisation akin to the TUC or New Labour as far as Endy was concerned.

  All of the above served as easy prey – delivered to anyone within earshot – coming in and out of rotation in accordance with coverage in that week’s local rag. With Daly and Nightly both highly skilled at polite and also realistic-sounding excuses whenever an outburst seemed imminent, it fell to Robert or, more often than not, Mawgan to lend a sympathetic ear and complete at least fifteen minutes’ worth of ‘duty’ as the housekeeper railed against both regional tin-pot politicians and the country’s most-respected statesmen.

  National trust? There wasn’t any, according to Endy. Not anymore. Every snip of information leaked or spun seemed designed to promote, confuse or cover up. It did not seem designed to help or inform; to assist the common people of Britain in their daily labours and tribulations.

  Getting through life. That was it. The real crux. Endy having come to the conclusion long ago that getting through life was the travail with which the general population needed assistance. Getting through life continued to be everyone’s predicament. She ranted and raved against the flat-screen Blair and his chortling cohorts on the six o’clock news. Their political opponents were no better – or different – she argued, as she harrumphed and guffawed at both parties’ weak excuses, rhetorical explanations, unconvincing assurances and fake condolences.

  Like tinder, the lady of the house caught fire easily, needing only the merest mention of GM food, reconstituted meat or Bird Flu to spark her off and send her reaching for her stash of well-worn catchphrases: ‘I said that, didn’t I? Didn’t I say that?’ or ‘There you are then! There you are indeed!!!’

  Some days, it seemed that her ladyship really did have the global solution in the palm of her poor old hands. It was all there. The answer that Bush, Putin, Blair and Brown, Bin Laden, all of the ‘them’ and ‘they’ were searching for. Being spouted from a farmhouse kitchen in darkest Cornwall as its dispatcher, facing away from her audience, and bent double over an old enamel sink, engaged in the therapeutic act of washing-up. The solution itself. At her fingertips, as it were. Simple, maybe, as she herself was only too willing to admit. But certainly preferable to all the building up and cutting down going on around her. Endy didn’t get it at all. Horrific square-box housing sprang up on land where only a few months before 200-year-old Sequoia had proudly stood as long as crows crowed and nightingales sang. Make any sense? Not to anyone over retirement age it didn’t. To young locals maybe. Those starting out on life; young families, those with a job dependent on tourists and holidaymakers, and walkers. Maybe it did make sense to them. But not to Endymion Peed, the Lady of Carn Point.

  Everyone at Trewin – bar Mawgan, of course – was finishing up on life. If they were honest. The perfect location and living conditions providing the most pleasant of padded cells. A cushioned, secluded, sheltered ‘end of things’. Everything of the very best quality. Food quality, air quality, weather quality. ‘Coming up roses’, as the housekeeper often reminded herself.

  The lady had no reason to complain. No reason at all. She was certainly better off than any of her buddies; the widowed, aged but surprisingly able-bodied frequenters of Women’s Institutes and flower societies, now manless and therefore free from all of the washing and cooking, fetching and carrying, and arguing, that had taken up so much of their existence at the beginning of life. Who, with time on their hands and pensions and allowances to be dispersed, sought refuge in the bingo halls of Redruth and Camborne, or cancer-care coffee mornings in parish halls from Black Cliff to St Just.

  Today’s lecture concerned drugs: top topic and pet hate. Endy saw ‘drugs’, whatever that term actually meant to her, as the be all and end all of decay. The reason everything had ‘gone wrong’. Why the world as she had known it – compassionate and tender, a world of blackberry tips, orchards and birdsong, the world of her beloved mother and father – had all but disappeared.

  Everything was wrong now. Very, very wrong. And, as Endy concluded, it would never be brought back into rightness. Drugs had seen to that. And the ‘maniacs’, crazy, dirty men who sold the stuff to kids, schoolchildren in Padstow and Bude, or to Mawgan and his friend Julian, come to that. They ‘ought to be locked up’; needed to be put away, punished along with those who brought them into England in the first place.

  Didn’t Sir Walter Raleigh have something to do with it? Endy seemed to remember a story about the Kickapoo and tobacco plants. Well, that was going back a bit maybe. But wasn’t that the start of all this badness? She wasn’t sure, would have to look it up. If she had any books to look in, which of course she hadn’t. Then again… Didn’t Sir Walter bring in potatoes as well? Or was that Francis Drake? Local man, as far as she knew, from Plymouth if she remembered correctly. Again, she didn’t really know. Wasn’t really sure. Didn’t really know anything much at all in terms of social history, the ways of the world, the way that things came about or well… the actual facts of anything ‘big’, as she put it, if truth were told. She knew they wouldn’t get very far at Trewin without potatoes, though.

  ‘Hilles of water came about this place’

  John Calve, A History of Cornwall

  (the flood of January 1607)

  hand-copied churchwarden’s manuscript, 1666

  Sitting in the darkest corner of the Ad Lib, the best seat in the house, with Monika, Kenneth and Connie, John reached inside his jacket pocket and produced a small velvet box.

  The guests’ eyes were fixed on John, each sensing that tonight might be an important occasion without realising that it would be the last time any of them would see John and Iona together, intact – as a couple. John laid the small, furry box on the table and poured another drink. Iona placed her hand on her husband’s arm. What was about to take place would have been impossible for most couples to deal with in private, let alone to act out in company.

  Under normal circumstances she might have expected a ring, the usual token of celebration and confirmation, but Iona had been given many rings, several of them by John – the only ones she had kept. Treasuring them, making sure that she wore them often, showing them off, not just on special occasions but on photo shoots as well: blouse by Jean Muir, slacks by St Laurent Rive Gauche, ring… model’s own. But in tonight’s seemingly unresolved circumstances, a ring might appear peculiar, funny… wrong somehow. ‘Immoral’ – as John himself may have already concluded – one of the reasons those assembled together on this significant, somewhat peculiar evening appeared so unsettled.

  ‘Right then… friends and…’ John looked up and down the table. ‘I’m definitely not… gonna make a speech…’

  ‘Thank God for that!’ piped Kenneth, as he refilled everyone’s glass to prepare for a toast. ‘One doesn’t come to a top West End nightspot to listen to speeches!’

  ‘But… it’s Iona’s birthday.’ John’s eyes settled on his wife. ‘Once again, darling…’ he smiled mischievously and raised his glass. ‘My little Danish pastry!’

  ‘John!’

  ‘And, well… obviously… if it’s a special day for Iona, it’s a special day for us, her friends and… also special and�
� nice for us, all of us, for once… to be sitting here… all together… together at last!’

  John couldn’t bear either Kenneth or Connie. The agent and his fiancée were two of the most savage gossip-mongers in London. John remained tight-lipped any time the grotesques happened to be within hearing distance. He continued: ‘Not having to worry about all the things we usually have to… well… worry about…’

  Those assembled smiled at one another sheepishly as they pondered what on earth in any of their kind-weather lives, in this warmest of warm seasons, might possibly constitute a ‘worry’. Monika and Connie exchanged cigarettes and consoling looks as Kenneth feigned boredom with the ‘speech’, and sniffed at the Ad Lib’s rather undistinguished clientele.

  But Iona’s eyes sparkled due to the unheard-of attention she was receiving from her husband. Attention she was very unused to. Being Mrs John Nightly was not quite what her friends might have imagined. Too much of the time it meant being ignored, forgotten or taken for granted, shown off a bit and then put aside – abandoned. Iona was often left to her own devices while John, adrift on an ocean of brainwaves, worked day and night in trying to achieve… whatever the hell it was that he was trying to achieve.

  Iona clutched her husband’s hand and poured another Scotch, suddenly feeling wanted for once. More wanted and desired than she had by any amount of smooth-talking, propositioning photographers, art directors and male models who had attempted (and maybe even succeeded, on the odd occasion) to take her away from her troubles. John picked up the eminent box and placed it in his wife’s unnaturally cold hand.

  ‘… I only hope you like it, darling.’

  Iona put down her unlit cigarette, laid the item on the table before her, cupped both hands around John’s dutiful expression and kissed him full on the lips. Then, visibly consumed with expectation, she released the latch on the perfectly crafted case.

  ‘John…’ she breathed as she lifted the lid. The felt miniature opened to reveal not a ring but a brooch, an emblemed Rococo arrangement with a sparkling central cut diamond. This shimmering thing – undoubtedly an objet, translucent as water at low tide shot through with the last sunlight of the day – had the appearance of a refined but still glamorous antiquity. And Iona was clearly overcome by not only the item’s apparent almost spiritual quality but also the very gesture itself.

  It was easy to imagine this pin to have been among the most valuable trinkets inside a treasure chest full of booty, lifted by smugglers and passed down to the fairest lady of the village. The brooch, laid to rest in its crushed-velvet casket, exuded the potency or draw of a special charm, a Hitchcock MacGuffin maybe, used by the director as a device, a character almost, in his Gothic melodramas, but with all of the cachet, ‘morality’ even, inherent in the most precious stones and settings.

  Iona wouldn’t have cared whether it had come from Tutankhamen’s tomb or Petticoat Market. She didn’t give a damn. The important thing was that it came from her husband. Crucially so, because it meant that at some point during the past week, when Iona had not been with John, he had been thinking about her, concentrating on her, what she might like, might appreciate; at least during the time it took to search for and then purchase the item. Caring for and about his wife, considering her feelings, preferences, likes and dislikes. She lifted the lustrous thing from its holder, twisted it this way and that so that it would catch the glare from the club’s gaudy light-fittings and favour her before carefully pinning it onto her top.

  Kenneth ordered a special dessert wine – ‘I must have sweet wine!’ – along with a top-up of Scotch for the birthday girl.

  ‘Okay, people… now…’ he began. ‘We are all aware that the lady who we… whom we honour tonight – just like the Oscars, isn’t it! – is a very special “birthday girl” indeed.’ Kenneth, more than slightly tipsy, raised his glass, almost toppling his drink over the birthday girl herself as he encouraged the others on.

  ‘So, if I may… on behalf of myself… Her Majesty the Queen Mother, the Lord Chief Justice, Lord Chancellor… my dear friend, the First Sea Lord of the Admiralty… hur-rum!’ He cleared his throat and canvassed the table for a response. ‘And of course on behalf of the assembled VIPs – Visionaries, Imbeciles and Penises of the Arts one and all – heartily wish our dear Iona, our very dearest Iona, dearest “pastry” and “Kit Kat” – ouch!’ he feigned injury… ‘Darling… the very… really very happiest of happy birthdays!’

  Kenneth rose to his feet and lifted his already empty glass higher still. ‘My darling, as far as I… I mean, all of your friends are concerned… the most special… theee most fairest, most entrancing…’ The speechmaker paused, in difficulty for a moment as he wobbled, managed to steady himself, then let out the remainder of the sentence so fast it seemed he were gasping for life… ‘Woman in the world!’ he quaffed, before promptly keeling over.

  The party laughed and shrieked at full volume, pretending to be surprised at Kenneth’s collapse, as if it had never occurred before. While Connie apologised and attended to her partner, the others leaned over to kiss and hug Iona as her husband looked on, dutifully waiting his turn. When the suddenly recovered Kenneth took the opportunity to legitimately get his hands on Iona, her husband immediately got up and pulled her away, taking his wife in his outstretched arms as she began to sniffle with the excitement of receiving something, anything – attention mainly – from her real treasure.

  Beneath it all, the scene was even more dramatic than it appeared. Tonight, John Nightly, intent on returning to ‘Point Zero’ as quickly as possible, was in fact doing little more than biding his time, as he waited patiently, with about as much engagement as if he were waiting for a bus, for this evening, this very special evening, to be over. Cadenced – like his marriage. To finish, without tumbling to a finish in a heaving, retching mess. John was determined to avoid that at all costs, but if it were not possible then things must still be concluded. As long as it was out of the way, done and over with. That was the real mission on this diminishing, dishonest occasion.

  Notwithstanding the evening’s premeditated performance, for John Nightly birthdays, weddings, anniversaries, even Christmas and New Year, had always been dead days; a waste of days and of his precious time. For John, feast days were no more than an interruption to composing or recording. Tonight was a particular inconvenience as he struggled to relate to and socialise with the couple’s ‘dearest friends’, presumably soon-to-be enemies, when he would have much rather been in the studio, dreaming up and fantasising about his new Black Mass creation.

  But there it was. Over now. With all of the effort he’d put in, John felt that he had at least done his duty. Done what he must do to please and satisfy his wife and, as usual, everyone else. He’d shown up for a start, put a slightly bent nickel in the machine, engaged in the very minimum of polite conversation as had been deemed necessary – ignoring the food and wine, and the gossip, and the guests themselves; but, importantly, delivering the appropriate amount of ‘appreciation’ and respect to his wife by demonstrating very publicly that he cared. Presenting her with this remembrance sourced and chosen by his manager, or maybe his manager’s assistant – he wasn’t sure which. It all amounted to a significant exertion on the boy’s part, and one with which his wife seemed delighted.

  In their hearts, both John and Iona must have known full well that this ‘event’ was just a delaying tactic. How different it was to the first birthday Iona celebrated during their relationship, when, in the fever and frenzy – and in his particular case the utter, unbalanced craziness of his infatuation – John Nightly had made such an effort to make that day remembered as ‘the best day of my life’, as his future wife was fond of recalling on so many occasions. On that wondrous day John had presented Iona with her own personalised natal chart showing the trajectories of planets and stars, their movements and conjunctions, in so much intricate, attentive detail; each circle and pathway having been illustrated by the Master himself using a chil
d’s watercolour set.

  As the party around him faded into the background, John took a scrap of paper from his pocket and scribbled something before folding it inside a £5 note to keep it safe.

  His wife presented the brooch to everyone around the table, catching sight of her reflection in the club’s filthy mirrors. Iona flexed her pretty fingers in order that those assembled might better fully admire the new accessory. She was already planning to wear it to tomorrow morning’s shoot on the steps of the National Gallery.

  The clip would stay close to her over the years, always be with her. More valuable than her various properties, her pets and her vast storerooms of clothes. It represented something unique. An appreciation from the man she loved and would always love. A man for whom she was still willing to give up everything to facilitate his wellbeing and contentment.

  Iona studied her husband in the tinted glass. John remained quietly beside her, listening patiently to Connie, holding an un-smoked cigarette in one hand while impatiently tapping out a rhythm on the table mat with the other. Something racing through his head as ever. Something other than the primary business. A stray inspiration, perhaps, words or a tune – a title maybe. Not bothering to make conversation, believing his wife’s needs to have been taken care of, her attention taken away for a moment, John began to dream and daydream, return to his preferred world, as he attempted to block out the cabaret coming from the far corner of the heart-shaped lounge.

  What Iona’s husband didn’t reveal to his birthday girl, not being aware of it himself, was that the gift which had brought so much joy was not exactly a celebratory item. It was a mourning brooch: a token presented to the widow of a fisherman lost at sea or a tinner or face-worker killed in a mining accident. One of Pondy’s ironic little touches, it may have come from the hulk of a galleon washed up when Penzance had been burned to ashes by the Spaniards. The brooch would most likely have been traded by ‘belles’ (local debutantes) when ‘lads’ (eligible young bachelors) ran through the streets of the market town on Midsummer Eve with torches dipped in tar while their lasses sold snuff boxes and crucifixes along with smuggled valuables to the good citizens of Cornwall’s wealthy seaside towns.