Death of a She Devil

by Fay Weldon

  No? Too fanciful? Probably. Anyway, I can’t possibly kiss him now, because I love another. What’s his name? Yes, that’s it. Tyler! Tyler Finch Patchett, young and strong and lovely. The new love of my life.

  And now Momus has entered the fray and I wait for directions. Me, a small too, too innocent, delectable pawn in the war between the Gods. At least that’s the best sense I can make of it, as I swirl around the High Tower, all my sins forgiven me, poised between life and death, in love, in love, in love, waiting for Bobbo to die. Come to think of it, my rightful place is probably on Mount Olympus, amongst Elysian Fields, lotos-smoking with my beloved Tyler. I was always one for a bit of hash. Oh the too, too totally gloriousness of me, of just sheer existence in whatever form you choose! Thank you, Momus, for this relief, this blessing.

  Wheee-h, wheee-h, wheee-h! Look at me, remember me, the one, the true, the only spirit of romantic love!

  32

  Alone And Old And Very, Very Cross

  Bobbo’s back from the brink yet again.

  The old man was mumbling and protesting as Samantha bent over to bring his tonic drink to his lips. She did her best as ever to understand his train of thought and interpret what he said as meaningful.

  ‘I could die of thirst. No one cares. I talk, no one listens. Are you nuts, nurse? Of course I spilt the fizzy pink stuff. It’s poison. When I say water I mean water. Yes, spilt in the bed. Take a little look. Come a little nearer, nurse, do. Oops, that made you hop! What’s the matter? You a lesbian or something? Well, don’t worry, cunt. It’s only a dying man’s finger – you’re quite safe with me, I’m just an old man, I hardly have the strength to raise my eyelids, let alone anything else.’

  Dr Simmins let herself into the room and he seemed to sense as much as see her. Bobbo mumbled on:

  ‘And here comes bloody Dr Simmins from the jaws of hell. She’ll lean over me, all wrinkled dugs and foul breath, and spread the word that by next week I’ll be bloody gone. She’s got a hope. Men like me don’t die. We’re the Straddlers of the Universe. Curse Dr Lezzer and curse her children if she has any, which I doubt, may they boil in oil, the lot of them. Curse her mother too, come to that, for giving her birth. Old bat of a dried-up female: grey hair, not a laugh left in her. No bloody use to me. A bloke’s body may grow old, but the spirit burgeons. Leave love to bloody women. Hate energises man, lust weakens him, love destroys him. Be my Boswell, nurse, write that down. I sing a hymn to the death of love. Will that satisfy you, Samantha bloody Travers, with your itsy-witsy tits, your waggling little girly bum and your short, short skirt? Love me, love me do, I’m such a bad, bad boy.’

  A sudden gust of wind blew through the Lantern Room, and that was odd because there were no windows open. An acreage of heavy, dingy rose-velvet curtains rippled and shivered. Dr Simmins did not seem to notice. Bobbo sat straight up and said quite clearly, ‘I see you. Mary Fisher. Won’t you for fuck’s sake give up?’

  He lay back down again. The wind died down, the curtains fell still. Dr Simmins filled her syringe. Samantha didn’t feel frightened. These events had become rather normal and life – at least for some – went on as usual.

  She bent over Bobbo, who seemed suddenly in a good mood, and was singing in his cracked voice an old country and western song called Stand By Your Man.

  33

  The She Devil Holds Valerie To Account

  ...and clears a few matters up.

  The She Devil finds Valerie at work in her office in the Castle Complex, making one of her unexpected and not always welcome forays into the working life of the IGP. Valerie sees her coming along the corridor, a witch-like figure with a hooked nose and unmatched eyebrows, and thinks that all she needs is a peaked hat. But the She Devil seems amiable enough and even congratulates her on having joined the Board so quickly and so young; says she deserves it for such good work, and that Valerie is to receive a welcome rise in pay as from the coming year. So far so good.

  Then she wants details of the Widdershins party and it is not so good. Valerie says she has asked two hundred guests and had a 70 per cent acceptance rate, which is very good, considering it was on short notice and just before Christmas, but then everyone is intrigued by the thought of the Widdershins Walk.

  The She Devil says it is perhaps more because of the line on the invitation which reads: ‘Surprise Parity Party Bag: a Widdershins laptop, an iWatch, or an iPhone, which will be yours? Give yourself a happy Christmas!’ Which was hardly within the IGP ethos and who had authorised it?

  ‘Actually, no one,’ Valerie feels obliged to admit, but adds, ‘It’s going to be a splendid party, and we only need to give away one of each. I’ve got a friend in Apple, and she’ll give us a really good deal because we’re a charity.’

  The She Devil asks if Valerie has ever organised a big party before and Valerie has to say no, but she is qualified: she has done an Events course at uni. Then the She Devil asks who exactly is on the guest list.

  ‘All the usual suspects,’ says Valerie blithely. She can see a little blithe confidence is necessary. The She Devil’s face is like thunder. Valerie’s own mother would sometimes look like this, before Valerie found her hanging from the tall marital four-poster one day, swinging in the breeze. ‘Women from Education for Choice, Anti-Trafficking Concern, Women Against Violence, Fem-Fight, the Ministry for Women and Other Minorities, and we expect the Minister for Women herself to come along.’

  ‘My God,’ says the She Devil, and her face relaxes, so she looks quite normal. ‘This party had better be good!’

  Valerie presses home an advantage, or what she thinks is an advantage, and says that Tom Brightlingsea, head of De-Gender Now, would very much like to be asked.

  ‘But he’s an arrant heterosexual,’ says the She Devil, shocked. ‘Not even gay. What could you be thinking of?’

  ‘Tom’s a very sound feminist,’ says Valerie Valeria.

  The She Devil opens her mouth to protest but closes it again. Valerie is maddening. You couldn’t expect a wise head on young shoulders, but she was so lively, dedicated and hard-working, so attractive and popular with everyone including the Board that it might be foolish to gainsay her. Things changed so fast in the gender wars it was hard to keep up. Rather like in 1984, today’s enemy could become tomorrow’s friend within the hour and vice versa. One mustn’t be seen to be behind the times. The tide of opinion might change again and these days the tides changed very rapidly indeed. She has seen it all before.

  ‘Well, we will all live in hope,’ the She Devil says. ‘And let us pray to St Medard that the winter equinox is a beautiful photogenic day and not snow, gales and lightning strikes and that the guests don’t get pneumonia and we get sued – you’d better do a risk assessment.’

  ‘I shall, Lady Patchett,’ says Valerie. ‘Who is St Medard when he’s at home?’

  ‘The patron saint of good weather,’ says the She Devil, ‘and just a figure of speech.’

  ‘Odd, I thought you were an atheist,’ says Valerie. Things between them are getting a little strained, and the She Devil has no appetite or energy for theological discussion. She falls quiet.

  ‘Should we make a date to go down and see your grandson?’ asks Valerie into the silence.

  ‘I am rather busy,’ says the She Devil. ‘So are you. Can any of us afford the time?’

  ‘Oh, but Lady Patchett, that’s not how we think of you at all! Not old! You’re so young at heart, and if you rediscover your family you’ll set such an example to feminists everywhere. The IGP needs now more than ever to change course and take men on board to fight the good fight. Men can be very good feminists too. Like Tom Brightlingsea of De-Gender Now.’

  ‘I hope you didn’t send him an invitation.’

  ‘Well, actually I did – but it was by mistake. Ms Laura sent out the wrong pile. The other hundred and ninety went out perfectly.’

  It is just about conceivable it was an accident – Ms Laura being seventy-nine and with bad eyesight, even t
hough head of the Expenditure Committee – but the She Devil suspects Valerie, the little minx, just wants her own way. Again she says nothing. She doesn’t have the energy she once had.

  34

  Rescue Comes From On High

  No sanction today!

  Miss Swanson’s PC pinged even as Tyler approached her bullet-proof window.

  ‘It’s all go today,’ she said. ‘Lucky you, you’re off the hook. That’s the Brighton Beaux window closed. They’ve filled the vacancy. One has to be so quick off the mark these days.’

  ‘So no sanction? Even though I failed to turn up?’

  ‘No sanction,’ agreed Miss Swanson. The vacancy was still showing up on Tyler’s iPhone. But he wasn’t going to argue.

  ‘At this rate I’ll be an old man before I get a job.’ He’d been right about La Swanson. She was certainly on his side. Perhaps his Best Female Friend Hermione was right and La Swanson didn’t want to lose him? Was he then to be trapped in a Jobcentre forever by bonds of love? But it wasn’t exactly an Orpheus/Eurydice situation. Perhaps he should be more like Hermione who had taken herself off benefits and onto drug peddling along the Sussex coast instead. She had the new Harley-Davidson Softail on which she sometimes picked him up from the Jobcentre Plus on it so he didn’t have to wait for his bus.

  ‘When you get to be twenty-five,’ was all Ms Swanson said, ‘your weekly rate will go up to £73.50. Pity you don’t have the get-up-and-go of your girlfriend, who doesn’t put on airs. She just gets on with life. Your Hermione would have been round at the Brighton Belles like a shot, and sold a few drugs while she was about it. Why don’t you just live off her immoral earnings, not off the State?’

  Miss Swanson knew too much. Tyler wondered what else she knew. And this latter statement was obviously out of order – he could drop her in total shit if he’d recorded it on his iPhone. Why would she say something like that? Could it be she was goading him into a complaint, that she wanted to be fired, was hoping to muster as many complaints against her as she could? It was possible, but why? Better to be fired than wilfully unemployed, in which case she too would be unentitled to benefits?

  ‘I’m sure you’re not meant to say things like that,’ he said. ‘Do you want me to complain or something? Isn’t there someone called a Job Resolution Manager?’

  ‘I am your Job Resolution Manager,’ Miss Swanson said. ‘They’ve got me whichever way I turn. Enough of this mucking about. If you get a job which lasts longer than three weeks you realise I get a commission? Also if you get a sanction. It’s small but it’s something. You’re a nice lad but you’re virtually unemployable. Nobody wants you. Too clever for manual, not clever enough for middle management. Not even gay.’

  ‘Is that a problem?’

  ‘Of course. Gays help their own. Always ready to give each other a leg up.’ She laughed, rather crudely. Tyler shuddered. Miss Swanson looked at him sympathetically. She had nice eyes. If you ignored the grease stain and the cardigan and the double chin and the obvious depression, she was quite a good-looking woman.

  ‘If you really want a job,’ said Miss Swanson, ‘I suggest you dress up as a girl and apply in person up at the High Tower for cleaner’s work. No one would tell the difference, you’re such a pretty boy. No?’

  Tyler was on his feet and shaking his head. Enough was enough

  ‘Then you’re in real danger of a sanction. Four weeks.’

  ‘But what exactly for?’

  ‘Oh, anything.’ Her voice rose and rose. ‘Try: dumb insolence, raising your voice, failing to keep appointments with your coach without proven good reason – lost in the post is not one – failing to apply for the number of positions agreed by you in your contract with the DWP. Your new address is Sylvan Lodge in the Endor Grove estate – very fancy – and you haven’t informed me. Male layabouts like you just drive me round the twist. You’re so picky! Give me a girl any day.’

  The whole Centre could hear her now. She laughed. In the waiting room a plastic tile fell off the ceiling. She lowered her voice and leaned forward.

  ‘And because that’d be four, towards my target of twenty sanctions a week.’

  Tyler met Hermione outside the office and they zoomed off together to Brighton to collect his stipend and perhaps they’d have an assignation afterwards. Life wasn’t all bad.

  35

  The Girl Does Good

  Samantha lends a hand.

  Bobbo groaned and stirred a little on the bed and fell quiet again. Whatever the doctor had injected him with would work for hours. Nobody in the village ever went to see Dr Simmins if they could help it. Samantha moistened old Bobbo’s lips with a damp cloth as she had been taught, and felt a terrible responsibility.

  Death was such a peculiar thing. First you were there and then you weren’t. She’d miss the old man. The wind would howl unheard around the High Tower. They’d probably use the room for storage after he was gone. The Historic England listing wouldn’t allow alteration above the third floor, and that meant no lift for ever and a day, just the awful steep stone narrow stairs. The next storm was breaking. She’d better get home. Security would look in on him during the night. She supposed Bobbo would be there and still alive in the morning.

  But Samantha thought of herself as a trained nurse, if only in the care and sustenance of the elderly. She had her training to support her and give her confidence. She still had her notes from Grade 3. ‘If any of the relationships with people important to the dying are strained or broken, they may feel a deep desire for resolution and healing while there is still time.’

  Should she warn the family? But what family? All of Bobbo’s relationships were strained and broken. Samantha lived down in St Rumbold’s and so knew quite a lot about them. Bobbo’s children, Andy and Nicci, lived no one knew where; the grandchildren were grown and flown the nest or the nest had flown them, more like it. None had even visited the old man, and were not, so far as Samantha knew, going to be welcome at the High Tower. A family divided, shattered.

  Unless she, Samantha Travers, did something, Bobbo must die alone. No one deserved such a fate. The She Devil herself might eventually turn up, but only if it were a photo-op, and would probably be unwise to do so. Yet it must be possible to effect a family reconciliation. Hate must not be allowed to triumph. Samantha knew she was a fragile vessel to stand up against evil, but who else was there?

  It struck her as a bolt from the blue that she had actually been to Ashford High with Tyler Finch, a boy who ran with the fast crowd and had a wall eye, so you could never meet it even if you felt sorry for him and tried. Some said he was actually a relative of Dame Ruth Patchett though others said he wasn’t. If he was, he might be up for the deathbed scene. Tyler was okay. They had sexted each other often enough in their schooldays, so they were not exactly strangers. They’d lost touch but she’d call by the Jobcentre Plus and leave a message for Miss Swanson whom she knew of old, and ask her to pass it on. Tyler had been away at uni but someone had said they’d seen him recently sweeping up the dead flies – either unemployed or doing community service – in the village store. Poor Tyler. But at least he’d have the time to attend a deathbed. Not everyone these days had. And she could probably smuggle him in. He might have to dress up as a girl, of course, and claim to be a granddaughter.

  36

  Mary Fisher Remembers Her Place In Momus’ Script

  and how once she was so loved and admired.

  Wooo-h, wooo-h, wooo-h, etcetera, etcetera. I am the ghost of Mary Fisher. I am long since dead, fairly insubstantial and I daresay more frivolous in death than life. I used to take myself more seriously, I think, than do I now.

  I am expected by Momus to use Tyler – how I love to say that name – one way or another to bring about the destruction of his grandmother, the usurping She Devil, still alive and wrongfully dwelling in the High Tower. But I get so distracted. Tyler is such a joy to look at – Bobbo reborn, but nicer, kinder, one of today’s metropolitan men with a touc
h of rural gentleness. He takes after his grandfather, but less macho, less aggressive, less testosterone-ridden but still so very male and proud.

  The clear, smooth, almost girlish complexion, the curved lip, the wide and grave blue eyes, the untidy fair hair, the broad and rippling chest – he gets that from his Bronze God father, no doubt. But what does Momus intend me to do? Nicci was such a surly ungrateful child, part of the baggage that Bobbo swore he would leave behind. Except he didn’t. And then his sexual desires became excessive when he was in jail – lust is part of love but not all of it – and now I am with Tyler lust can be none of it. It’s all pure love. Then I had my career to think about and of course there was soon the fraud part and prison – the She Devil stitched him up, Bobbo was perfectly innocent – and I stood by my man – was that Tammy Wynette or Dolly Parton? I can’t remember which. But I looked like a mixture of them both. I think.

  And then Bobbo went right off me. I’ve often wondered if it was that dull plain girl who ran the occupational therapy classes in the prison who was to blame. One has to have someone to blame. At the moment in the High Tower it’s me; they’re threatening me with bell, book and candle. I don’t think in this digital age it will work. Me, I’m happy drowsing here in the lotus fields of Elysium loving Tyler Finch Patchett. I am your greatest devotee, oh Momus, but I need a rest. The future of mankind may be at stake but I’m tired.

  And I’m a bit upset, to tell you the truth. I looked in on Bobbo the other day. You’d have thought he’d be glad to see me, old times and all that, but he couldn’t wait to get rid of me. Men are so vain! He just assumed I was still madly in love with him and I assumed he’d be jealous of Tyler but he wasn’t at all. I could have warned him of what that wicked old doctor had in her syringe but I didn’t see why I should.