There are many aspects of this incident I regard as worthy of comment, as worthy of discussion. Over the years I have dwelt on the matter periodically but without ever allowing it to become an obsession. I would like, however, to speak of it with my friend. I have wanted to do so for quite some time but the subject I find difficult to approach, that is, the core of the subject for I find it all too easy to discuss topics peripheral to it.
As the years pass I have become close to overwhelmed by an ever-increasing burden of guilt. There is no one cause. I think that if I could isolate different events, the experiences I derived from them, if I could bring these out into the open then perhaps I would be on the road to assuaging such feelings and ridding myself of the burden. I am also aware that the sensation of guilt – even chronic guilt – is part and parcel of the ageing process and in neither case does a cure exist. Ultimately, however, to have said that is to have said very little.
End of a Beginning
Roddy closed the door and bounded upstairs to the kitchen. 7.30 – surely the place would be empty. Open door is a good sign. One empty kitchen! He whistled as he poured the contents of the tin of minced beef into his new saucepan. First Friday night in London and free. Free. Nobody at all. Nobody knows. I know nobody but the silent landlord and his noisy children. Can return at all hours without reproach or guilt. No angry or martyred parent. Not one single solitary person but whom I may meet tonight. Alone and almost in Soho.
He carefully mussed his hair in front of the cracked mirror that balanced on a shelf. Hearing the saucepan begin to sizzle on the black stove he remembered coffee. He turned the gas down low and returned to his room for the large jar of Nescafé.
Such a small room for the money, plus slot electricity. One mouldy Hank Jansen found under mattress next to an ancient sock. Clean sheets and almost clean floor though not enough for bare feet. Dressing table painted flat green with barber’s surplus mirror joined on by unscrew nails. Deep armchair sagging in centre caused by too many overweight bums. Old stiff newspapers with dust and hairs imprinted between pages, found under dark greasy cushion. One grey-green crust of bread discovered wedged between bed-leg and wall. Left wedged.
Lucky to find any place let alone Number 7, Ashdown Ave., Kilburn. Mother would surely take to fellow lodgers. Thick as thieves with silent landlord complete with hanging braces and unshaven chin. Deeply love the rich Sligo tongue and manners. Roddy smiled briefly.
Dear Mother,
Regret to inform you that Mr Murphy’s gangerman would not start me this morning or yesterday morning. Appeared to be in some doubt as to whether I could last a morning.
Your slight of son,
Roddy.
Dear Son,
Please come home. All is forgiven if you mend your ways but if not please come home.
Love
Mother.
He lifted a plate and cup from the table, laid out the butter and the loaf of french bread, and bounded back upstairs to the kitchen. Still empty! He put on a kettle of water to boil, stirred the minced beef. A tin of peas would have been a good idea. When the food was ready he poured it onto the plate and carried the saucepan to rinse under the tap at the sink. Suddenly the door banged open and in lurched a big heavy man carrying a pile of fish and chips wrapped in a mixture of brown paper and newspaper. Roddy called hello but no response. He continued rinsing the saucepan. The man had slumped onto a chair and put the fish and chips down on top of a wooden cupboard.
Why does he come in here to eat? Surely be much more comfortable in his own room? Roddy glanced at him sideways. A red faced man in his late fifties or sixties. Straight to the pub from the building site. One of Murphy’s men? Flannel grey suit with the trouser bottoms stuffed into a pair of wellington boots covered in caked mud. Huge hand shoving the battered fish into his mouth. God! Should be in his room to eat. Unless – unless it is not allowed. God! Should have inquired from the silent landlord! The man will know. Ask him.
But the older man munched on, oblivious to Roddy’s voice.
‘I beg your pardon,’ he said again, much louder than before.
‘Whaa . . .’ The older man raised his shaggy eyebrows. A large chip teetered between his thumb and forefinger.
‘Can one eat in one’s room?’
‘Ehh?’
‘Is one allowed to?’
The top part of the chip keeled over and landed on the floor but he did not seem to notice as he lowered the remainder carefully into his mouth.
‘Are you allowed to eat in your room?’ cried Roddy.
‘Whaa’ The older man glared as he bent to retrieve the fallen bit of chip, and he nearly toppled over. He glared at Roddy again and started to struggle to his feet. ‘Cheeky . . . What you saying!’ he shouted.
‘Nothing, nothing. You’re misunderstanding!’ Roddy began to panic and stepped back the way leaning against the sink.
The older man made a growling sound as he rose from the chair and the cuff of his sleeve seemed to catch the edge of the paper holding the fish and chips and it all capsized onto the floor beside the chair. The man roared in anger. ‘Yaaaa!’ he shouted.
‘What’s wrong?’ cried Roddy. ‘Look, you’ve dropped your dinner!’
The man’s eyes were red and wide and he looked wildly about the kitchen. ‘I’ll fix the bastard!’ he shouted as his gaze settled on a long bread knife at the rear of the cupboard and he grabbed at it.
‘No no!’ screamed Roddy, ‘I simply asked . . .’
But the man lumbered towards him, staggering from side to side, the long bread knife held in one hand while the other was raised as if to balance himself.
‘Nooo!’ screamed Roddy with both his arms up aloft and his body bent as far back as it could go across the sink.
The older man lunged with the knife but he struck it into the front of the sink and he staggered and just managed to correct himself. ‘I’ll . . .’ he roared, ‘I’ll . . .’
‘NO!’ shouted Roddy, twisting himself away.
But the man had steadied himself on the sink and he lunged again with the knife, this time the blade went right into Roddy’s stomach.
‘AAhhh,’ he cried, ‘Ahhh . . .’ And he fell back the way.
The older man seemed to totter on because of the force of the strike and then he too fell and lay sprawled on the floor.
Roddy was sitting at an angle with his back to the wall, his eyes open but glazed, one hand held the handle of the knife and the other was on the floor, and the blood was coming out.
Leader from a Quality Newspaper
It might well be wondered why certain hints of infinity are likely to knock folk back on their uppers. The answer lies not in hypocrisy but in genuine self doubt. Given the general mystification which hangs shroud-like from our shoulders we should not cry out when down falls the sword of an acquaintance. It is, after all, the sort of occurrence we are to be secure upon.
A Sunday evening
She was annoyed with him; she couldnt say exactly why she was annoyed with him but she was. She watched him as he leaned back on the couch, his head resting against its back, his legs stretching out towards the fireplace. Then she shook her head and returned to the kitchen to see if the water was boiling. It wasnt, and she walked to the window and stared out. Night. A month ago it would’ve been day. What had happened to the summer. The sound of the water approaching boiling point. She checked the tealeaves were in the teapot. And voices from the front room; he had switched on the wireless. The sandwiches. Quickly she got the margarine and the cheese from the refrigerator, the bread from the bread bin, seeing the amount of crumbs inside – she should’ve cleaned it out. She buttered the bread and she sliced the cheese, but not uniformly, each slice being totally different from the one previous; thick ends and thin ends, and one slice so thin it became nothing at all. She juggled them onto the bread, trying to capture an even thickness on his. Lettuce in the bowl. But she left it there, and it would have needed a wash under the tap. When s
he had filled the teapot she returned to the window. There were no sounds from outside, not even from animals. Animals. Dogs or cats. A Sunday evening; there wouldnt be any drunks, just silence and maybe a car. Normally she enjoyed the silence of being on the top flat; and the silence of late summer evenings was best; during winter and late autumn she preferred noise. Why was that. But if it was anything it was nothing worth bothering about. The refrigerator vibrated and cut off suddenly. It would reach a peak then cut off suddenly, only noticeable that instant prior to cutting off. It had to do with thermostatic control, a thing which worked on its own, as part of the machinery. The tea wouldnt have infused properly yet, she got a teaspoon from the cutlery drawer and stirred it, and poured it into the mugs. The sandwiches were on a plate and she carried it and his mug of tea ben the front room. He was gazing at the picture on the wall above the mantelpiece, listening or not listening to the wireless. A discussion. All those in favour and all those against. The chairman or presenter of the programme was chuckling about something – a moot point. A moot point. What was a moot point. Did moot mean appropriate. An appropriate point. She passed him the mug and placed the plate on the small table between the couch and the chair she usually sat on, then returned to the kitchen. She would have liked to pause here, by the window, sipping her tea. There could be something, a sound perhaps, a thing of interest, thing of marked interest, something to give cause for thought. What thing could it be. A sound perhaps. She would know it, the sound, as soon as she heard it. But the thought would not be worth bothering about. Not unless the sound it derived from was especially striking. If it was especially striking, totally unfamiliar. Not to the point of uniqueness for that really wasnt possible. Just a strange sound, a strange noise; something to set the hairs on end. What could that be. A sudden scream. Murder being committed – violence, in the home. The sound of violence erupting, below, in the flat downstairs. She raised the mug to her lips, and sipped; the tea without milk or sugar. She preferred it this way although he preferred milk, but no sugar either, he preferred it with milk and no sugar. She should be going to the front room. If she didnt go soon he might be wondering what was up. Unless he didnt notice. He would notice. She sipped her tea. He just wouldnt find it something to be really wondering about. She would be in the bathroom or something, something else, something straightforward. She was walking to the door, and she switched out the light, then entering the front room and shutting the door after her, and walking to the chair she sat on. He had eaten his sandwich and this left hers on the plate. She would lift it and eat it. She continued to sip tea from her mug. From the wireless an outbreak of applause, for one of the speakers; and the chairman laughed and asked a question which followed on from the point made by the last speaker. She glanced to see that he really was listening, and intently – staring at the fireplace, his look somehow quite lively, not a stare, just a look, looking directly to the fireplace to have his eyes open for the purpose of attention, concentration on the speakers; perhaps had he closed his eyes his attention would wander, he might doze off. He was reaching for the plate, as though about to eat the sandwich but he paused and he glanced at her; he was drawing her attention to it, indicating it, the sandwich, that it was still there. Why was it still there? What was the meaning of that? Why was she not eating her sandwich instead of just sitting there sipping tea? Maybe she didnt want it and this was why it was lying there. Unless it was for him. Maybe she had made him two. She wasnt feeling like eating, or perhaps she ate hers in the kitchen, before coming through to sit down. Why should she have done that? Absent-minded maybe. She had made the one sandwich then started eating it while doing the next, and had finished it; so she’d had to make herself another one just in case. Just in case. In case of what. In case he thought something. What could he have thought. He could’ve thought why has she made me one and not made one for herself. Why did she eat that one and not this one. Daft, but the kind of thing people ended up thinking when something like that happened – a simple event, the eating or not eating of a sandwich. The speaker on the wireless programme was laughing. Why was he laughing. Because he was getting paid a lot of money. This is why people on the wireless laughed, they were getting paid lots of money. He glanced at her. She wasnt listening to the programme anyway, she never bothered. She found programmes like this one unbelievable. And although she never said so she was probably always wondering why he did listen, why he did listen. What was the point in it, of listening to them. They were always unsatisfactory. Nothing was ever said on them that could be taken down and used in evidence because they never gave anything away, nothing; always it got lost amid the general air of smugness, underlined by the way the presenter was laughing all the time. What was he laughing about. Because they were all in it together and getting paid lots and lots of money. Everything went in circles. And she could just sit there, not taking part, her mind gone, abstracted miles away – a voyage to unknown parts; only brought back to reality by the occasional sips from her mug of tea. She had probably just forgotten about the sandwich. And if he reminded her about it, what would she do. She could smile, she could smile and lift it right away. But she wouldnt. She was a bit annoyed at him. She wouldnt smile therefore. Unless she was so far away that she would’ve forgotten all about it. He glanced at her briefly, she was staring at the fireplace.
Benson’s visitor
Every Sunday afternoon he appeared. The patient who had the first bed on the left at the ward entrance always heralded his arrival with the cry: ‘It’s Benson’s visitor!’ But he never acknowledged this cry. He was aware some might think him deaf. He stood on the threshold peering down both sides of the ward for ten to fifteen seconds, perhaps to see if Benson was still there and if so whether he had been shifted to a different bed as sometimes happened. If everything was as it should be he stared at the highly polished floor and walked steadily down the right-hand passage, to the bottom end, and from there across to Benson’s bed at the end of the left-hand row. At the beginning he had nodded and occasionally greeted other patients but over the years he had ceased doing this and nowadays he could scarcely bear to look at patients other than Benson. And if Benson was awake he found it increasingly difficult to look at him. He used to smile in a friendly manner at the nurses but they barely noticed his presence. If ever he put a question such as ‘Not so good today, is he?’ the most they would give was a yes or no but sometimes not even that, as if they had not heard him speak at all even. The new nurses were better but gradually they became used to things and acted no differently from the others. Hardly anyone else ever visited the ward and those who did seldom stayed for more than quarter of an hour and they spent most of that gazing vacantly about the ward. On occasion they would stare across as though looking at Benson whereas it seemed obvious they were looking at his visitor. There was one time Benson’s visitor saw somebody leave an article on the chair beside the bed of the patient he had been sitting at. He was not sure what to do about it. Eventually, after the person had departed, he walked across and uplifted the article and quickly rushed out to return it. But the person acted in a peculiar way and pretended not to recognize the object. Benson’s visitor took it into the Sister’s office and attempted to explain what had happened but the Sister was impatient and did not show any interest in the matter at all. She waved him away. He put the article back onto the chair and tried not to think about it. Next Sunday of course the chair was empty and no-one ever referred to either it or the incident ever again. This was many months ago, prior to the arrival of the patient on the left at the ward entrance. And yet, there was something about this patient that made Benson’s visitor think that he knew of the affair.
Benson had been a member of the ward longer than anyone else. His visitor accompanied the wheelchair that transported him there. Although the nurse had observed him following she said nothing, merely indicated a large placard pinned to the wall. The placard gave the visiting times. Benson’s visitor stared at it for a long while, until the sound of t
he creaking wheelchair had died away. He missed the subsequent Sunday because of it. It was a feeling he had not cared for.
This afternoon Benson lay snoring fitfully but peacefully. His visitor stared at the slack mouth and the way the chin drooped. When the bell rang Benson’s eyes opened. The gaze settled on his visitor who hastily looked down at the floor. Benson’s head began to move back and forth against the piled pillows as though to alleviate an itch. His eyes remained on his visitor for a period, then they closed. His visitor’s sigh was quite audible. After a moment he stooped to lift his hat and shabby briefcase from where they had been lying. Across the way an older nurse arranged flowers in a vase. She did not notice his approach. He moved to the right side of her at the precise second she moved to the left. He hesitated and she turned swiftly and strode along and out of the ward. There were no other people about except patients and they all seemed to be sleeping. Then another visitor appeared in the doorway. Benson’s visitor returned slowly to where he had been sitting and he returned the briefcase and hat to where they had been lying, and he sat down carefully. Shortly afterwards he was aware of a muffled conversation coming from somewhere to his rear but he was not able to look round to see. A voice called: ‘It’s Benson’s visitor!’ and gave an abrupt laugh.
He stared at the floor for a long time. Gradually he wanted to see what was happening around him and he raised his head. But Benson stared at him. Benson glowered. ‘Who are you?’ he groaned.
His visitor smiled weakly.
‘I don’t know you.’
His visitor inclined his head and stared at the floor beneath the bed.
‘Is he visiting me? I don’t know him from Adam!’
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