Angelica's Grotto

by Russell Hoban

  44

  Oannes Says

  At three o’clock in the morning the ward was fully itself, a place of darkness behind the membrane of apparent reality, a realm where nothing was certain and everything in doubt, an enclave of enforced intimacy where strangers hawked, spat, snored, farted, and peed in bottles while nurses ministered to them in stealth and whispers. Klein, now on the third of Patrick o’Brian’s Aubrey-Maturin novels, was in the foretopmast crosstrees of HMS Surprise, considering, with Stephen Maturin and Jack Aubrey, ‘the ship thus seen as a figure of the present – the untouched sea before it as the future – the bow wave as the moment of perception, of immediate existence’. The frigate was before the wind, her motion long and easy; the swing of the topmast as she pitched was hypnotic.

  Harold Klein, millionaire, said Oannes.

  Belay that, said Klein. You needn’t tell the whole world about it; anyhow, a fool and his money are soon parted. ‘Sorry,’ he said as Staff Nurse Judy Magee approached, ‘I was thinking out loud.’

  ‘I didn’t hear anything,’ said Judy, offering a thermometer. ‘Pop this under your tongue.’

  ‘In a moment.’ Testing, said Klein to himself. Testing, one, two, three, four. To Judy he said, ‘Did you hear anything then?’

  ‘Like what?’ She put the blood-pressure cuff on his arm and pumped it up.

  ‘Words from me.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Just before I asked you if you heard anything.’

  ‘You said you were thinking out loud.’

  ‘And after that?’

  ‘One twenty over sixty.’

  ‘Did I say that?’

  ‘I did – that’s your blood pressure.’

  ‘But after I said I was thinking out loud, what did I say next?’

  ‘You asked me if I’d heard anything. Would you like a sleeping tablet? They’ve written you up for one.’

  ‘No, thanks, I’ll be all right.’ He popped the thermometer under his tongue and tried to keep his mind blank while she wrote down his blood pressure. ‘OK,’ she said when she had noted his temperature, ‘I’ll look in on you in another hour.’

  ‘Right. See you.’ He was always pleased to see her in the night; hers was a sweet face, what he thought of as a Forties face, the loyal sweetheart in black-and-white war films, working as a riveter in an aircraft factory while her fiancé fought overseas. The shape of her face and her short hair reminded him of Melissa but the spirit that animated her face was altogether different. Oannes, he said, is that you?

  Were you expecting someone else?

  You’re different now, we’re having a conversation and it’s all in my head – I’m not talking out loud or whispering.

  So?

  You’ve become a proper inner voice! It’s been so long since I had one! To what do I owe this change?

  We have more to talk about than we did before.

  Like what?

  Like how much money are you putting into this Melissa thing?

  I still have to work that out. Why?

  You’re not by any chance stalling, are you?

  Stalling? Not really – it’s just that it’s something that requires careful thought.

  I’m glad to hear that, because you don’t really know anything about her except that she tastes good.

  Aren’t you the one who said that madness is the natural state?

  Yes, but I never told you to go completely natural; there are practical limits to this sort of thing.

  You’re starting to sound like the talking cricket in Pinocchio.

  Maybe guys with wooden heads need talking crickets.

  Look, I’m kind of tired now. We’ll talk again soon, OK?

  Whatever you say, Boss.

  45

  Last Session

  In matters of wardrobe Klein was not burdened by his professional aestheticism; he was ordinarily to be seen in jeans and T-shirts when it was warm, jeans and polo-necks and various outdoor-man jackets when it was cold. Large black medically-bespoke boots were what he walked around in and he always wore some kind of hat to shade his eyes, as often as not a sort of bush-ranger affair in green canvas. Today, however, he sported a black shirt, tan linen jacket, and his hat was a Death-in-Venice panama.

  ‘You look different,’ said Doctor DeVere.

  Klein shrugged. ‘Things change,’ he said.

  ‘What things?’

  ‘I had a heart attack, I’ve been in hospital, and my inner voice has come back. All the way.’

  ‘Sorry to hear about the heart attack. How are you now?’

  ‘I’m fine; it wasn’t a big one. They did a balloon job on the right coronary artery and put in a stent and now I can walk a lot better than I did before.’

  ‘What brought it on?’

  ‘The auction was a little too much excitement for me.’

  ‘Ah, the Redon! You’ve sold it then?’

  ‘Yes, it’s gone.’

  ‘Did it fetch a good price?’

  ‘A million and a quarter.’

  Dr DeVere whistled. ‘Crikey! I’m not surprised that you had a heart attack. Unless, of course, you’re accustomed to dealing with that kind of money.’

  ‘I’m not.’

  ‘Will you be going ahead with your plan to fund Melissa’s study?’

  ‘Oh yes. We still have to work out the details. She visited me in hospital after the auction.’

  ‘Pleasant visit?’

  ‘Very.’ Klein couldn’t help grinning.

  ‘Cheered you up, did it?’

  You don’t have to tell him everything, said Oannes. ‘We had a nice chat,’ Klein said to DeVere. ‘She said she could be bought.’

  ‘Did she! Is that how you think of the funding?’

  ‘I’ve told you before this that I think her project is worthwhile. She appreciates my support and I appreciate her appreciation. Everything is business in one way or another, Leon.’

  ‘That’s one way of looking at life, I guess. You said you’ve got your inner voice back. Is it the same inner voice you had before?’

  ‘No, it’s Oannes now. I’ve told you about the last time I heard my old inner voice: it was that day in the Fulham Road when I was trying to walk fast enough to get a better look at a woman who was walking much faster. I said to myself, “One day you’ll drop dead while something like that walks away from you.” Then I said to myself in a different voice, “Well, that’s life, innit.” And that was the voice of Oannes.’

  ‘So that was the transition, and since then it’s been only Oannes, right?’

  ‘Right, but he limited himself to one-liners until we started having real conversations in hospital.’

  ‘When did that happen?’

  ‘It was in the middle of the night, the same day Melissa visited me in the afternoon. He said, “Harold Klein, millionaire,” then we talked about money and Melissa and I was doing it in my head, not whispering: talking with an inner voice the way I used to before all this began.’

  ‘Not quite the way you used to. Did the old inner voice say things like “Madness is the natural state?”’

  ‘Certainly I’ve changed. People do change, you know.’

  ‘Let’s go back to the beginning of this whole thing. How would you describe the losing of your inner voice? What would you say was happening in you back then?’

  ‘My self stopped talking to me. I lost contact with myself.’

  ‘Why do you think you lost contact with yourself?’

  ‘All of me wasn’t going in the same direction; I was drifting apart.’

  ‘What would you say the different directions were?’

  ‘Partly I wanted to loosen up and partly I didn’t.’

  ‘When did you first visit Angelica’s Grotto?’

  ‘It was after our first session.’

  ‘Afternoon? Evening?’

  ‘Evening. I didn’t feel like working; I was having a drink and listening to Connie Francis. She was singing “Everybody’s Somebody�
�s Fool”. I went to Yahoo and told it to search for Sexuality.’

  ‘Were you feeling like somebody’s fool?’

  ‘I was feeling like anybody’s fool.’

  ‘So you went to Yahoo. Your Oannes, is he perhaps a bit of a yahoo?’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘And Oannes is … ?’

  ‘An aspect of myself.’

  ‘Can you say more?’

  ‘He’s an aspect of myself I’m quite comfortable with. When I talk to myself as Oannes there’s a lot less bullshit than there used to be.’

  ‘And a lot more sex.’

  ‘Well, I’m putting my money where my mouth is, and vice versa.’

  ‘And is all of you going in the same direction now?’

  ‘Looks that way to me.’

  Watching Klein, DeVere was reminded of cop movies in which a guilty man with a foolproof alibi sat in his chair the same way Klein was sitting in his. ‘So,’ he said, ‘how would you assess your present situation?’

  Klein thought about that for a while. ‘You’ve seen in amusement arcades a brightly lit glass case full of little prizes, and you have to manoeuvre a pair of claws to pick up what you can?’

  ‘Yes, I’ve seen those.’

  ‘Well, I’ve done the best I could with my claws.’

  ‘What exactly have you picked up?’

  ‘Little treats, little bits of Melissa-time.’

  ‘No more than that?’

  ‘Treats and bits are all I can manage – the whole Melissa is beyond my grasp.’

  ‘Would you want the whole Melissa?’

  ‘Actually, I like it the way things are now.’

  ‘You think that’s the best you can do?’

  ‘It’s the best I want to do; it feels right.’

  ‘Why do you think that is?’

  ‘Let me ask you a question: what do you think your function as a psychologist is?’

  ‘Helping people to work through their problems.’

  ‘And who decides when they’ve done that?’

  ‘Usually it’s the patient and the psychologist together.’

  ‘What if they don’t have the same opinion?’

  ‘Can you elaborate?’

  ‘Take Bruno Schulz’s little eunuch, grovelling at the bedside of the woman he can’t have while a stallion licks her bottom – would you say he’s worked through his problems?’

  ‘I very much doubt it.’

  ‘But maybe that’s how he wants things to be; maybe he likes that arrangement.’

  ‘And what about you? Is that an arrangement you’d like?’

  ‘You’re a lot younger than I am, Leon. Maybe how you are now isn’t how you’ll be when you’re my age.’

  ‘You’re not answering my question.’

  ‘Look, in these sessions you’ve had me putting all kinds of things into words and you’ve helped me get to where I don’t have to put everything into words any more. I know the way I am now probably isn’t your idea of a good way to be but it feels right for me, OK? And from here on out I think I can go it alone.’

  ‘Are you saying that you want these sessions to stop?’

  ‘That’s what I’m saying.’

  DeVere ran his thumbnail down the outside edge of the notes stacked in Klein’s file. ‘It’s your choice of course, but I have to say that I think there’s still work to be done.’

  ‘There’s always work to be done but it doesn’t always take two people to do it.’

  ‘Then all I can say is, good luck and I hope you won’t be sorry.’

  ‘I feel lucky already, Leon, and I’ve given up feeling sorry.’

  46

  Rubicon Grove

  Melissa drove skilfully and with assurance, taking the van smoothly up the Embankment, over the Vauxhall Bridge, thence by various turnings to Camberwell New Road and Camberwell Grove. The day was delicately grey with a light rain, Klein’s favourite kind of weather; the auguries were good, he felt, and things were definitely moving forward. Camberwell was lively with shops and off-licences; the colours were intensified by the rain and all of his senses were heightened.

  ‘Well,’ said Melissa, ‘there’s no turning back now: once you know where I live you’ll always be able to find me.’

  ‘Does that bother you?’

  ‘No. We’ve come a long way from your first visit to Angelica’s Grotto and this is where we are now.’

  ‘Every life is a winding road, Melissa.’ She was wearing a short denim skirt and black stockings as always. He put his hand on her thigh and she let it stay there.

  She was able to park close to the house, a Georgian one with three storeys and a front garden. ‘The flat’s in the basement,’ she said as they went up the steps to the front door.

  Knowing for the first time where Melissa lived and actually being in her place overwhelmed Klein with its intimacy, made his heart beat faster. He thought of her dressing and undressing; he thought of her naked in the bath. He recalled their telephone conversation when she’d been with Lydia: he’d imagined a huge bed in a large room full of warm colours – orange, rose, crimson. There were silk sheets and oriental cushions and flowers, possibly a canary as well. Their bodies had been golden in the lamplight of his mind.

  Melissa led him through the hallway, down a narrow staircase, and suddenly they were in the bedroom. A bit of the front garden was visible through a small window that allowed a little grey rainlight to reveal a threadbare green carpet, a double bed in cracked white enamel with a rumpled India-print bedspread, a night table, a chest of drawers, and a chair with a white T-shirt and a pair of jeans draped over the back of it.

  Smells funky, said Oannes.

  On the floor by the chair were a pair of trainers several sizes too large for Melissa. ‘Whose are those?’ said Klein.

  ‘Leslie’s.’

  ‘He’s your partner?’

  ‘He’s an employee. We work late hours and he spends a lot of time here.’

  ‘Much of it in bed with you.’

  ‘I never promised you a nunnery, Harold. I need regular servicing.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘That’s a very unfriendly “I see”. Is one displeased?’

  Klein was imagining the two of them in bed, Melissa with her legs wrapped around Leslie. He heard her orgasm, watched the kissing that followed, heard her sighs of satisfaction.

  ‘Harold,’ she said, ‘are you displeased?’

  ‘I don’t know – it’s just that I hadn’t realised that I’d be subsidising Leslie as well as you.’

  ‘He’s part of Angelica’s Grotto. And it’s not as if we’re proper lovers, you know – he’s not the only one I take to bed.’

  ‘Yes, of course that makes a big difference.’

  ‘Are you going to sulk now?’ She put her arm around him and brought her face close to his. He affected indifference. ‘Don’t be that way, Harold – be nice.’ She kissed him and it was impossible not to return the kiss. There was a pounding of feet overhead. ‘Children,’ she said. ‘Three of them. I’d love to get out of here. Wouldn’t you like to have me closer to you?’ She kissed him again and put his hand on her breast. ‘Wouldn’t it be good if you and I and Leslie were all under one roof? We could all work in peace and you’d be able to keep an eye on things,’ another kiss, ‘night and day.’ He looked into the middle distance. ‘Come on, Harold, you know you’ve been longing to see me do it with a stallion.’ He looked at the ceiling, noted the cracks. ‘And of course,’ another kiss, ‘there’s a lot to be said for three in a bed.’

  ‘I wonder,’ he said, ‘whether the gratification of one’s desires is really what life is all about?’

  ‘You have to admit that it’s not a bad way to pass the time while you’re wondering, mmm?’

  ‘Do you think my place would do? I doubt that I could survive the hassle of moving house.’

  ‘Your place would be lovely; it’s a great location and it’d be the best possible arrangement. What about the finance
s? Will you give me a lump sum or do you want to do a contract of some kind? I don’t want to sound too heartlessly practical but if you were to hop the twig without putting something in writing I’d be left high and dry, wouldn’t I.’

  ‘I won’t leave you high and dry, Melissa. That’ll all be taken care of

  She kissed him again and hugged him. ‘Whatever you think of me, Harold, I really am very fond of you. Underneath all the surface crap there is something good between us, isn’t there?’

  ‘Yes, Melissa, there is.’

  ‘And do I taste good?’

  ‘Delicious.’

  ‘Perhaps you should refresh your memory.’

  He refreshed it. The room took on warm colours; almost his tinnitus was like a canary.

  ‘Show me the website setup,’ he said.

  ‘Through here.’

  Beyond the bedroom were a tiny kitchen and a small room in which were two computers with modems, a printer, a scanner/copier, a fax machine, and three telephones. These occupied a long table and there was also a drawing table with a lightbox on it. There were two chairs; the rest of the space was filled by filing cabinets. ‘This is where it all happens,’ said Melissa.

  ‘Amazing. I was expecting a much bigger setup, more like the control room for the national grid.’

  ‘This is all you need – it’s mostly in the software. We can’t use a British ISP so we’ve got a file-transfer-protocol access to a Dutch server. We put everything together here and shoot it over there and it ends up on the Net where professorial types like you can drop in for intellectual stimulation. As I’ve said, we could really use one more person for the filing and the housekeeping on the database; it’s difficult doing this and my job at King’s as well.’

  ‘How long have you been running the website, Melissa?’

  ‘It’s only about six months although it seems longer.’

  ‘And what got you started on Angelica’s Grotto?’

  ‘I told you, Harold, I stabbed my father twelve times.’

  ‘In other words, you’re not going to explain.’

  She cocked her head, closed one eye, and made a little noise out of the side of her mouth. ‘My history is not part of the deal. Mystery yes, history no.’