“You’re obviously wondering where dogs come into this,” she said.
“A bit,” said Pat.
“Dogs have everything to do with this,” said Domenica. “Cuban dogs are rather special, you see.”
81. Havana
“I arrived in Havana at night,” said Domenica. “That’s a good time to arrive anywhere, because you don’t see very much and then you wake up in the morning and open your shutters to an entirely new world. That’s how I felt. There was a balcony to my room and this looked out over the rooftops to the most gorgeous tower I have ever seen. A tower on top of an ornate palace of some sort, with small arches and windows painted in that light blue they go in for in Cuba–almost a turquoise. And when I looked down and along the street to the front of my building, I saw nothing but three- or four-storey buildings with decorated stucco facades, all in faded white or yellow or pink. Ironwork balconies. I have never seen such beauty in a city. Never. Not even in Italy. Not even in places like Siena or Vienna. It’s a wonderful, very feminine architecture.
“But the problem with the beauty of Havana is that it’s so decrepit. So many of those wonderful buildings are on their last legs. The people can’t afford to fix them. They have no money. When you don’t even have enough money for food or soap or any of those things, then you won’t have enough money for your buildings, will you?
“And so you walk past these buildings in which whole floors, or rooms within floors, have collapsed. And yet people who lead their lives in the rooms next to those that have simply fallen to the ground continue to live where they are. So you will see gaps in buildings, like missing teeth, and right beyond the gap will be a lighted window which shows that others are hanging on in the midst of the falling masonry.
“I had a friend who lived in one of those buildings. I had met her at an anthropological meeting in Jamaica a few years earlier, and we had kept in touch. They are desperate for friends, the Cubans. They are loveable, charming people and they want to belong to the world like the rest of us. And so they write when they can afford the stamp.
“She asked me to her flat, which was on the edge of the old city. The staircase which took you up to the top floor, where she lived, was distinctly suspect and there were large holes in it. You had to watch where you put your feet. And her flat had three rooms. A kitchen, and two other rooms. She lived in one with her young son, and her husband, from whom she was divorced, lived in the other. Yes, she was divorced from him on the grounds of his adultery and cruelty, and yet they were trapped together because you just can’t move in that society unless you go through a very complicated and expensive system of exchanging flats. They couldn’t afford this. So they still had to live under the same roof and share the kitchen and the bathroom, such as it was. And in order to get to his room, he had to go through hers, at any time of the night and day. Can you imagine it?
“And yet, like so many other Cubans, she had a dog, a little dog called Basilio. She wanted her little boy to have a dog, and so they had one. Every Cuban gets a ration of food, and you can’t get anything else unless you have a lot of money to spend, which she didn’t. So Basilio had to be fed out of the wretched, barely adequate food ration that she had. In other words, she gave him her own food.
“And when you went out in the streets or the plaza, you saw these bands of little dogs walking around with such good spirit. They were not really strays–they all had owners–and all of them were loved by somebody. In other cities, you would expect to see collarless dogs persecuted. Rounded up. Taken to pounds. And then executed by lethal injection. These dogs just wandered about perfectly happily.
“And in a way I thought of it as a metaphor for the society. These cheerful small dogs, these perritos, all getting by in the face of terrible material privation. And putting up with it in such good spirit, just as the people about them seem to do. All of them, dogs and people, smiling in the face of constant, grinding poverty.
“Which may be part of the problem, of course. Communism has failed miserably in Cuba, just as it seems to have failed elsewhere. It just does not seem to have been able to provide for the material needs of people. It has only survived through the denial of freedom–there are many charges one can levy against it. And if the people weren’t so nice about it, then they would have risen in anger and demanded their freedom, demanded some more effective response to material needs, just as they did in Eastern Europe. But they haven’t. They’ve continued to dance and play music and keep their sense of humour. It’s quite remarkable, and really rather sad–sad to think that there must have been many people who genuinely wanted to create a decent society, people who believed they were doing the right thing, and then they found that everything went so wrong, the whole thing involved lies and distortion and repression, and had become so utterly shabby. And that happened. Even the signs that claim victory are falling down. And if people are given half a chance, they flee, out of sheer desperation, braving no matter what dangers.
“And waiting in the wings are those who are rubbing their hands and saying that it’s only a question of time before the whole place is covered in fast-food restaurants, the ports crowded with the cruise ships full of spoiled tourists, the prostitutes and the pimps triumphant, and that charming, beautiful culture crushed in the deluge.
“Globalisation, my dear. And in this way, is our wide and entrancing world, our vivid world of songs and music and cultural difference, brought to an end by the crude, the false, the mindless, the imposed.”
Domenica became silent. She was looking down at the floor now. Pat had not even begun to tell her what she wanted to tell her, but could not now, after a story of such sadness. So she finished her coffee in silence and asked Domenica to excuse her until another moment, another day. Domenica understood.
82. A Great Sense of Purity
Pat reflected, in private, over what had happened. Peter had left a note that afternoon, pushed through the letter-box at the flat, with her name written on the outside of the folded paper. That picnic–remember?–it’s on! I’ll come and collect you at five. If you can’t make it, give me a call at this number.
She had retired to her room–there was no sign of Bruce–and re-read the note. When he had issued the invitation she had certainly not accepted it there and then. After she had overcome her initial surprise–it was not every day that one was invited to a nudist picnic, and in Moray Place Gardens too–she had said that she would think about it. That was all. And she had thought about it, and although she might have decided to go, she had not yet told him that.
She looked out of the window. It was a warm enough day–much warmer than one would expect for early September–and this must have encouraged the nudists to go ahead with their picnic. But the weather in Edinburgh was notoriously changeable and sunlight could within minutes become deep gloom, empty skies become heavy with rain, snow give way to warm breezes. There was simply no telling.
By five that afternoon, when the bell rang, she was in a state of renewed indecision, although, if anything, she was now marginally more inclined to decline the invitation. She would tell Peter that she did not feel ready to go to a nudist picnic just yet. Though when would one be ready for such an event? How did one prepare oneself? Perhaps nudists had a coming-out process in which they gradually came to terms with the fact that they felt more comfortable without any clothes. Or it could be a road to Damascus conversion, when the restrictiveness of clothes suddenly came home to one with blinding clarity.
She went to the door and was just about to open it when the thought occurred to her: would Peter be clad or unclad on the doorstep? It was an absurd thought, and she dismissed it immediately. And when she opened the door, there he was, dressed quite normally in a tee-shirt and jeans. But he was carrying a small bag with him, and that, she assumed, would be for the abandoned clothes.
He greeted her quite normally, as if he had come to collect her for the cinema or a restaurant rather than a nudist picnic.
“We should be getting along
there soon,” he said, looking at his watch. “Things begin quite promptly.”
And what, she wondered, were these things?
“I’m not quite…” she began. But he did not seem to have heard her. He asked her instead whether she had a bag which she could bring. “Or you can share mine,” he said, pointing to his bag. “There’s enough room in there for both of us.”
“But…”
“No, that’s fine. This bag is big enough. You don’t have to bring anything else. That’s fine.”
“But I was…”
He tapped his watch. “Really, we must hurry. It’ll take us fifteen minutes to get there and I really don’t want to be late.”
She took the path of least resistance and left with him. After all, it was only a nudist picnic and everybody knew that nudists were harmless enough. So they walked back along Cumberland Street, Peter swinging the bag as he went, and Pat largely silent beside him.
“You’re quiet,” he said as they crossed Dundas Street. “You aren’t nervous, are you?”
She hesitated. “A bit, I suppose. I’ve never…”
He smiled and playfully put his arm about her shoulder. It was only there for a moment, and then he withdrew it. “There’s nothing to it. It’s very easy, you know. You won’t even notice it after a couple of minutes.”
“Did it take you long to get used to it?” she asked.
“I was born to it,” he said. “My parents were prominent nudists. Over in Helensburgh. We used to go on naturist holidays in Denmark each year. We had lots of Danish friends. I was brought up to accept it. I don’t even think about it now.”
“And how did you get involved with these people in Moray Place?” Pat asked.
“Through my parents,” Peter explained. “When I came to university in Edinburgh, friends of my parents got in touch and asked whether I would like to come to a dinner party. The dinner party was in Moray Place and I discovered that it was a nudist affair. These people had a very nice drawing-room flat with views over the Dean Valley. It was a pretty stylish affair–a typical Edinburgh dinner party, except for the fact that nobody had any clothes on.”
Pat tried to imagine it, but found it difficult. “But what did you talk about?” she asked.
“The same things that they talk about at any Edinburgh dinner party,” said Peter. “House prices. Schools. So it was pretty boring for me, apart from one or two people of my own age who had been invited as well. They put us all together at one end of the table. The other end was full of lawyers and people like that.”
Pat was silent. “And then?”
Peter shrugged. “After dinner we went through to the drawing room for coffee,” he said. “We played charades for a while, and then we put on our clothes and went home. Pretty dull stuff.”
Pat thought for a moment. Charades: did they act out the story of Adam and Eve, or was that done so often at nudist dinner parties that nobody did it any more? Three words. From a book. First word…The whole idea seemed so completely absurd, and yet there must be a reason why people did it. She looked at Peter. What went on in his head when he went to these things? Did he feel any different without his clothes on?
“Why do you do it?” she asked. “Does it do something for you?”
Peter laughed. “It means nothing in that sense, if that’s what you’re asking. No, it gives you a feeling of complete naturalness. All falseness, all pretence stripped away. You feel as if a great burden of restriction and secrecy is taken off your shoulders. It’s…Well, it’s completely liberating. And pure. You feel utterly pure.” He paused. “You do believe me, don’t you, Pat? I really mean it. You’ll find out for yourself when you try it. I promise you.”
83. In Moray Place Gardens
When they arrived in Moray Place there was no sign, absolutely no sign, that a nudist picnic was about to take place. The great sweep of architecture, with its handsome facade and its high windows, was as dignified and discreet as ever. Those who were going about their business, walking on the pavement, parking their cars, or going in and out of their houses, were entirely clad.
“It’s not those gardens,” said Peter, pointing at the rather dull gardens in the middle of the circle. “We go round the back. The gate is at the very top of Doune Terrace.”
They walked round until they came to the point where Doune Terrace sloped off to the north. At the top of this road, a small gate, discreetly set in the iron railings, gave access to the gardens that stretched down the steep side of the hill to the Water of Leith below. It was a magnificent set of private gardens, reserved for those who held a key. But now no key was necessary, as the gate had been propped open and there was a bearded man standing just behind it.
Peter led the way, shaking hands with the man at the gate. The man laughed and pointed up at the sky. There, rolling in from the north, were the rain clouds which had been nowhere in sight when they had left Scotland Street.
“The weather looks bad,” said Peter as he and Pat went into the gardens.
“Will they cancel it if there’s rain?” asked Pat. There was a note of hope in her voice, but this was soon dashed by Peter’s response.
“It’ll go ahead,” he said. “It’s just that it will be a bit different, that’s all.”
At that moment the rain started, not pelting down, but falling with insistence, blotting out the view of the town to the north, running in rivulets down the sharply dipping paths of the gardens. Peter looked at Pat and smiled. “Here’s your mac,” he said, taking two black plastic raincoats out of his bag and handing one to her.
Pat thanked him and began to put it on.
“Not yet,” he said, wagging an admonitory finger. “You have to take your clothes off first. There’ll be a couple of changing tents down there on the grass. Wait till then.”
Two small white tents now came into view behind a hedge. And there, on the other side of the hedge, shielded from view until the barrier of the hedge was actually negotiated, was a group of about twenty people, all clad in voluminous mackintoshes. The mackintoshes were opaque, with the result that the only evidence that they were unclad underneath were the bare ankles sticking out below the lower skirts of the raincoats. The heads of the nudists were bare, though, and their hair was plastered to their skulls. They looked very wet and very uncomfortable.
“Welcome to the picnic,” said a tall man. “The ladies’ changing tent is over there. The men are in that one.”
Pat made her way to the tent and drew aside the flap. Inside, a middle-aged woman was in the process of buttoning up the front of her mackintosh.
“This rain is such a pest,” said the woman. “But we shall have our picnic come hell or high water.”
Pat nodded. She slipped out of her clothes and donned her mackintosh. She did not feel at all exposed in this new garb; and indeed she was not.
“You’ll need a bag for those clothes of yours,” said the woman helpfully. “Here’s a Jenners bag for you.”
The sight of the plastic bag, stamped with the familiar Jenners sign, was a reassurance to Pat in these unfamiliar and challenging circumstances. There was something about the name Jenners that provided the comfort one needed in dubious situations. An occasion on which you were asked to take off your clothes and put them in a Jenners bag was inherently less threatening than an occasion in which one was asked to put them in any other bag.
Pat thanked the woman and stuffed her clothing into the bag. Then, leaving the bag in the tent, alongside a number of other bags (mostly from Jenners), she went out into the rain. On the grass ahead of her, in a cluster around a small portable table, a group of respectably-covered, mackintosh-clad picnickers were sipping on glasses of fruit punch. Pat was offered a glass and joined the group.
“Your first time at one of our little gatherings?” asked a man on Pat’s left.
She looked at him. He was wearing a large brown raincoat, the collar of which was turned up around his neck. He had a small moustache which was now wet through. Li
ttle streams of water ran off the edges of the moustache and onto his cheeks.
“Yes,” she replied. “I came here with a friend. I’m not really…”
The man cut her short. “We have such tremendous fun,” he said. “Last month we went to Tantallon and had a picnic in the dunes. Unfortunately, there was a terrible biting wind and we all ended up wearing sou’westers, but we did our best. On most occasions we at least manage to go about bare-footed, even if that’s about it. That’s the way nudism is in Scotland, I suppose. We can’t actually remove our clothes. But everybody is very understanding about that.”
Pat was about to ask what the point was, but the man continued. “Are you interested in stamps?” he asked.
Pat shook her head. “Not really,” she said.
“Pity,” he said. “I find stamps absolutely fascinating. I have a very fine collection. Do you not collect anything?”
“Not really,” said Pat.
“I used to collect birds’ eggs when I was a boy,” he went on. “But then that became rather a bad thing to do and I gave up. So many people were raiding nests that some species were becoming a bit threatened. So I moved on to playing-cards and then to share certificates. That’s my current enthusiasm. Scriptology. I go for South American railway bonds–that sort of thing. They have beautiful designs. Quite beautiful.”
Pat looked into her fruit punch. Drops of rain were falling into it, creating tiny circles. Underfoot, the grass was becoming sodden; and now, from the east, a wind had started to blow. She looked about her. Peter was nowhere to be seen. But that did not matter, because she did not want to see him any more. She felt nothing for him, no interest, no antipathy, nothing.
She turned to the man beside her. “I have to go home,” she said impulsively. “Goodbye.”
84. The Memory of Pigs
Dr Fairbairn was grateful to Irene for making him face up to the guilt that had been plaguing him for so many years. He had suppressed the memory of his professional breach, and had done so effectively. Or so he told himself. The problem was that he knew full well that repression of that sort merely allowed the uncomfortable memory to do its work at another level. And it was inevitable that this would become apparent at a later stage, creating tension between the external Dr Fairbairn, the one the world saw, and the internal Dr Fairbairn, the one hidden from the world by that blue linen jacket with its special crumple-resistant qualities.
Espresso Tales Page 29