Down Among the Gods (9 page)

Before she sets out for the house the following morning, she puts Patrick’s hat and her drawing pencils into the car. She has no idea how long it will take her to organise the contents of the house, and she doesn’t want to waste time going back to Camden if it gets late. As she drives, she is constantly aware of the presence of the hat on the back seat, and catches herself enjoying, for a moment, a feeling of power, as though possession of the hat in some way gave her possession, or at least part possession, of the man. The feeling excites her, but it also sickens her slightly and gives her a sense of foreboding. She remembers all the swords in the Tarot and wonders if she ought to bow out gracefully before the going gets rough.

By the time she reaches her parents’ house she is feeling pessimistic and dispirited. The sight of the padlocked gates and weeds already beginning to push up through the gravel in the driveway do nothing to improve her mood. Jessie has buried her mother and dealt with all the business of closing down her accounts and her life. It was she who cleared out the perishables in the kitchen and had the electricity disconnected but even so, the finality of the closed-up house takes her by surprise. The last of her father’s cherished line of spaniels died two years ago but Jessie had somehow never noticed the absence of a dog until now.

She parks the car outside the gates and climbs over the wall, brushing the brown and bedraggled flower heads on the laburnum bush which was the first thing her mother planted when they moved into the house. One of the panes of glass in the back door has a crack that she has never noticed before but there is no evidence that anyone has tried to break in. The door sticks slightly as she pushes it open, already swelling with the cold and damp. The house is not welcoming.

Jessie is surprised at how distressed she becomes as she wanders through the silent rooms. For an hour or two she makes no decisions, just soaks up what remains here of her parents’ lives and what remains here of her own. The job before her is not only much bigger and more complex than she had imagined, it is heart-breaking as well. As she sits beside the empty fireplace, wondering where to start, the art class returns to her mind, and Patrick, and his black hat still sitting in her car. For an instant she slides towards the comfort of fantasy, dwelling on the potentials that exist in the situation. Then, abruptly, she collects herself. It has all been an escape; a device to avoid the discomfort of the reality that is here, the finality of death and the necessity of coming to terms with it. She has no artistic ability and no aspirations, either. The only reason she is going to the class tonight is to have the opportunity of meeting Patrick, who is clearly even more neurotic than she is. The cards were right: she has no need for that kind of engagement. If the man wants his hat, he knows where to get it. But it won’t be in the life drawing class tonight and nor will she.

Once the decision is made, Jessie feels happier and more competent than she has in months. She stands up and starts at the beginning, taking all the ornaments down from the mantelpiece. Maxine has asked to keep the pair of globes that stood at each end of it, one of the earth and one of the night sky, so she puts them to one side. There is a little box inlaid with mother-of-pearl that she was always very fond of and she puts that aside, too. The rest—the clock and the Staffordshire figures of shepherds and shepherdesses—can go into the auction. The next time she comes, she will have to bring cardboard boxes.

The work is not painless but most of the decisions are easier than she had expected. She eats the packed lunch she has brought and works through until the light leaves the sky and makes it impossible to do any more.

On her way home, at just about the time that the life drawing class is beginning, Jessie drives past the pub in Islington which Patrick has just entered. By his own standards, he has taken a grip on himself over the past week. For the first time in months he has got ahead with the photographs. There will be nothing for him to do when he gets home except sleep. As he starts into the four pints that he has saved for the evening, he is relaxed, almost happy.

They have forgotten each other. You might think that now our two immortal players might give each other a grudging acknowledgement and call it quits. They have, after all, plenty of other places to express their hostilities. Up and down the country, most countries in fact, they are battling it out in the more usual arenas, the embittered households where fractured families struggle on between bickering recriminations and hefty silences. But no. Hera is not about to let any opportunity pass her by. She has another job for me, and a tough one, this time.

Should I refuse? Tell her to stuff it? Don’t be tempted to misunderstand me. I, like the others, act according to my nature. I carry messages. I bring dreams. And I have a few other areas of influence as well. The divine dramas tend, on the whole, to continue along their familiar courses but there is quite often the chance for a nifty gamble. I’m not going to miss out on the chance to make a little ground.

Jessie brings home another take-away, ignoring its uncomfortable connotations, and eats it in the kitchen. The recent distractions have been slowing up her work and, as she clears away the rubbish, she sets herself the target of finishing the three chapters that she still hasn’t done in the first half of the Frances Bailey book. It will be a late night but the second part of the book won’t need so much revision and she will be able to sleep with an easy mind.

But Jessie is besieged, abruptly and without any warning, by a poem. Not one that she has heard or read but a new one, one of her own which demands to be written.

Although Jessie can find no time for serious writing in her life she does manage the occasional poem. She has a slim, tidy folder in the locked drawer of her desk where her small collection is kept. No one but herself has ever seen it.

It is probably just as well. The poems are not good. The content is genuine enough but Jessie’s style is derivative and stale. She does have a voice of her own, fresh and strong, but she hasn’t yet found it. She is, however, one of the few people left in the world who still buys books of poetry. What’s more, she reads them.

Patrick neither buys nor reads poetry. He despises it. He believes that his hatred of poetry stems from his father’s didactic force-feeding during his childhood, but that’s not the real reason. Patrick hates bad poetry because it is pretentious and boring. He avoids good poetry because it has the power to shatter his defences and blow his garrisoned heart wide open. The only other thing that can do that to him is music. He avoids that as well, keeping his radio tuned to the talk channels, but there are still times, occasionally, when he is caught off guard. Recently, in the local supermarket, a piece of well-performed Brahms somehow infiltrated the muzak system and crept up on Patrick in the dairy department. He was looking at the price of cheese when a wonderful, melancholy phrase burst in upon him, injected sweet agony into his cerebral fluid and paralysed him with tears. For a few moments he struggled manfully, trying to make sense of the orange block in his hand. Then he put it down, left his basket where it stood on the floor, and beat a hasty retreat to the nearest pub.

I must assume at least part of the blame, or the credit, for Patrick’s discomfort. It was I, after all, who invented the first musical instrument. It was a lyre made from the shell of a tortoise and strung with cow-gut. Apollo was so enchanted by the sound it made that he forgave me my transgressions. He kept the lyre and I was allowed to keep the cattle that, as the first act of my infant existence, I had stolen from him.

Outside Patrick’s flat, a group of young men are leaning against the railings. They are not full-time thieves, muggers or confidence men. They are not full-time anything. They are young opportunists, always short of a few bob, and often fed up. Loud music blares from the rest of the house. One of the rent boys has found a sugar daddy, and they have invited Dionysus to help them with the celebrations.

The young men look up at the lighted windows and down into the basement. It is very far from being the kind of place that would attract the attention of thieves. For that reason, Patrick has no worries about leaving the flat unattended, with everything that he owns inside.

But one of these lads has a hunch.

A sort of inspiration.

Jessie is restless. She chews on her pen and wanders around in creative excitement. The poem is taking shape but she is not yet ready to start writing. So she moves from room to room, finding little tasks to occupy her hands while her mind works. She waters the plants and empties the waste-paper baskets. She clears the draining board and scrubs tannin stains out of the sink. All the while, the bones of the poem are gathering flesh.

Back in the office, still not quite ready, she finds herself at a standstill, gazing at the curtains. They are absolutely filthy. Still mentally working, she takes them down and brings them into the kitchen. As soon as she has turned on the washing machine she finds the opening line. Back in her study, beside the naked window, the poem begins to meet the page. Within minutes Jessie is totally absorbed and loses all track of time.

Patrick leaves the pub at closing time and parts company with the young couple that he met there and spent the evening with. As he walks back across town, a fine drizzle is falling which reminds him of soft days in the west of Ireland. He has had no word of his father since his mother died eight years ago. He has made absolutely sure that he will not get it, either. There is not one among his four brothers and sisters who knows where he is. He never misses them, seldom even thinks about them. But there are times when he misses the gentle landscapes of his youth, where none of the edges are sharp.

He can hear the boys’ stereo from the end of the street. Despite its volume he has never minded it. He prefers it to the silence, and the sensation of being alone in the house.

Half-way down the steps to the basement, Patrick stops. His door is standing open. Absurdly, he looks at the key in his hand, as though its presence there might prove that he is imagining things, and that his door is safely locked, the way he left it. Inside the flat, in the shadows beyond the light cast from the lamp-post behind him, a white plastic bag moves in the breeze. Patrick’s knees go weak. He is struck by the hideous impression that the bag is being moved by the breath of some monstrous beast which is waiting in there amid the wreckage of his life.

He backs up the steps and looks around at the empty street, then up at the brightly lit window above. There is nowhere else for him to go.

It is Paul who answers the door, but it’s a moment before Patrick recognises him. He has whitened his hair with peroxide and gelled it into spikes with black tips. And he’s wearing a tank-top that is so short it might almost be a bra.

‘Patrick,’ he says. ‘Are you coming in?’

‘No, thanks. Someone has broken into my flat. I was wondering if you heard anything.’

‘Are you kidding?’

Corrie appears behind Paul. ‘Whassup?’

‘Some bastard’s done Patrick’s flat.’

‘They take anything?’

‘I don’t know,’ says Patrick. ‘It’s too dark. I’m afraid they might still be in there.’

‘Want us to come with you?’

The fear of what lies below has made Patrick vulnerable. His heart is threatened by their solidarity. As far as he can see he has done nothing to deserve it. He has always thought of the boys as being deficient in some way, as pansies, male bimbos. He takes a deep, protective breath. ‘Have you got a torch?’ he says.

Corrie calls over his shoulder, ‘Leo?’

A third face appears in the hall, another new one to Patrick. The boy is probably around the same age as the other two, but while their eyes are guarded and wise, his are young and full of expectancy.

‘Yeah?’

‘You got a torch?’

‘I got a candle.’

Patrick shudders at the idea of creeping into the darkness below with a candle, a dim flame, creating more shadows than it can cure. ‘No,’ he says, ‘we need a torch.’

‘Ask a copper,’ says Leo and disappears back into the music.

‘We could make one,’ says Corrie.

‘What with?’

‘Rags. Petrol.’

‘God, no,’ says Patrick. ‘You’d set the whole place on fire.’

‘So what?’ says Corrie. Paul laughs. Patrick is abruptly alone again and afraid. He can see by the size of their pupils that the boys are high. How does he know that it wasn’t they that broke into his room?

Paul puts a gentle hand on his shoulder. ‘Come on,’ he says, and leads the way down the front steps and towards the basement. Corrie follows, Patrick behind him, breathless with fear. At the door, Paul lights his Zippo. He holds it above his head like an Olympic flame as he treads softly into the flat. In the middle of the living room he stops and waits for Patrick to come forward. The thieves have found his alcoves. Everything they didn’t want has been scattered around the floor. Books, clothes, crockery, and a pile of unsaleable photographs have been thrown out and trampled, all mixed up with the prints that had been left out to dry for tomorrow. And something else has been strewn around, too.

‘My god,’ says Corrie. ‘Look at all the bottles. You’re a bit of a dipso, aren’t you?’

‘Could be the branch,’ says Paul. ‘Sometimes they just want to know who you are and what you’re up to. Looking for bombs and incriminating letters.’

It gives Patrick a moment of hope. Paul gives him light as he searches the alcoves and sorts through the mess on the floor. But there’s no doubt about it. The radio is gone, and so are his two cameras.

He moves into the other room with Paul just behind him, still lighting his way.

‘It’s like the tomb of Tutankhamen, this place,’ says Corrie.

Patrick whirls on him. ‘Jesus! Everything I own is gone and you’re laughing!’

Corrie giggles. Paul shushes him. There is a strong smell of chemicals. The developing trays are still sitting in a line on the worktop but the boxes of paper have been opened and dumped on the floor, exposed now and useless. They have taken the enlarger, the timer, and the two tanks for developing films.