Imago Bird (21 page)

— when the arrow flies by itself to the centre of the target; when you have not been thinking; when you have been your own music —

I turned back and smiled at Judith Ponsonby.

— with her bright child's face that with a broken wing would lead others to the precipice for the sake of her children —

Brian Alick had begun to shout like a man either in, or for, a strait-jacket.

— between the pillars of the dance hall that sort of shaft coming down: a dove with an olive branch pointing to a landfall —

— a girl with arrows and the bow-string against her breast —

The disturbance at the door seemed to have been caused by a man with dark wiry hair trying to get in. He was now coming down the aisle towards us.

I thought—She has moved on from those shaggy men like cinema technicians who were at Sally Rogers' party —

— Changing from one screen to another —

— Still laying hold of her —

— But now, I must not lose her.

The man with the wiry hair had taken hold of Judith Ponsonby and was trying to pull her from her seat.

I stood up.

One of the security men came up and took hold of the man with the wiry hair.

Judith Ponsonby, between them, seemed to shrug her shoulders at me.

I thought—She is like the girl in
Petrouchka.

Brian Alick paused for a moment in his speech: then went on shouting.

I followed Judith Ponsonby and the man with wiry hair and the security guard up the aisle and towards the door.

Then—But where do we go now? She has been blown like a sycamore seed; we are whizzing up the cliff with the wind taking us —

By the exit door, halfway into the street, there was an argument again between the various men round Judith Ponsonby. The security man had been joined by a policeman. Judith Ponsonby turned from the man who was holding her as if she were Jonah half out of the whale.

‘Hullo —'

‘Hullo —'

‘I wondered if you remembered me.'

She said ‘Oh yes, I was looking for you, you see!'

‘You were?'

‘Yes.'

I said ‘Can you have supper?'

I thought—To pay for it, I can murder some old woman like a pawnbroker.

She said ‘Oh I'd love to, but I seem to be sort of tied up as you see!'

I said ‘Shall I rescue you?'

She said ‘Oh will you please!'

She looked despairing.

I thought—But have I not known she would have to hurt me.

Then she said ‘But not just yet'

I said ‘I'll ring you.'

She said ‘Will you promise?'

Then she picked the man's hand carefully off her arm as if it were a burr. She began looking in her pockets.

I thought—She controls things as those people do with telephone wires underground —

Then I said ‘Can you by any chance lend me some money to buy a stamp?'

She said ‘If you promise to give it back.'

She pulled from her pocket a five-pound note. She held it out to me.

I said ‘That's too much.'

She said ‘The last seven numbers on it are my telephone number.'

I said ‘How extraordinary!'

She said ‘Yes isn't it.'

I said ‘What are the odds against that?'

She said ‘Millions, I suppose.'

I said ‘Yes, they would be.'

I took the note, carefully.

She said ‘But I might have gone to live at the place, you know, specially where there is this number.

I said ‘Like those men who buy cars.'

She said ‘Exactly.' Then—‘But that would have been almost as difficult.'

I said ‘But now I won't be able to use it to get a stamp.'

She said ‘No you won't, will you.'

The man with the wiry hair and the security guard and the policeman were watching us.

She said ‘You might be able to raise a loan on it.'

I said ‘I will.'

She said ‘You won't forget to ring me?'

I said ‘No.'

The man with the wiry hair began pulling her.

She said ‘What do you carry that rope for?'

I said ‘To rescue people with.'

She said ‘I'll remember that.'

When I got back to Cowley Street it was late in the evening. I had been walking through streets with kings and queens coming together in my head. I thought I could say to Dr Anders—It is this that is music: when you are dancing on notes as if they are footholds on a mountain.

Judith Ponsonby had half held her hand out for my rope; with the man with the wiry hair tugging her.

In one of the streets near Cowley Street there was a huge car parked. I imagined it was like Tammy Burns'; but I thought this was overdoing it.

Outside Uncle Bill's house was a small crowd as there sometimes was at times of crisis (I thought—There is a crisis I haven't noticed?) so I decided to go round to the back and climb over the garden wall where I had got out that morning. Then I could put my hand through the cracked piece of glass in the kitchen and open the window from inside.

I thought—Thus accidents work out to be useful: like the giraffes that have long necks when there are leaves only on the tops of trees —

— But this too depends on security arrangements being inadequate?

From the street the garden wall was seven or eight feet high. I still had my pyjamas with me. I could put these on the glass on the top of the wall again and take a running jump and be like a man flying off with a ball and chain through the universe.

There was a light on in Aunt Mavis' room. The rest of the house seemed to be in darkness.

I thought I might stand in the garden beneath Aunt Mavis' window and say—I am Romeo come from the dead —

I was still in the garden when Aunt Mavis did in fact appear at the window. She pulled up the bottom sash and looked out.
She appeared to have no clothes on.

I thought—She is like some sign of the Zodiac?

I wondered, if I stayed still, whether she might fade away like other impressions of magic.

After a time Aunt Mavis moved back into her room and closed the window.

I walked across the garden.

I thought—There is some image in my mind about this: the back of a house where windows light up for a moment and things are seen as if in memory and then disappear —

The light in Aunt Mavis' room went out. A second or two later the light came on on the second-floor landing. Aunt Mavis was going down the stairs. She still had no clothes on. She had put on a large flowered hat.

I thought—She will go out into the street, where there is that small crowd waiting.

— And thus expose the pretences of this corrupt society —

— But should I not get in through the kitchen window quickly?

The light went off on the stairs: the light came on in the first-floor drawing-room.

I thought—What is this image like death cut off at the waist and wearing a hat; rolling down a slope to some black hole at the bottom —

I was trying to get the piece of glass out from the kitchen window. It was held, delicately, by dry putty.

— There are burglar alarms that still do not go off?

When I was in the house I went through into the hall. There were no lights anywhere.

I thought—These were just images playing tricks in my unconscious?

It was about ten-thirty at night. There might be some secretaries watching television in the basement.

I thought I should whisper, as though I were anxious about a ghost—Aunt Mavis?

In the hall there was a faint light from the street outside. The door was open into Uncle Bill's study.

I thought that if I turned the lights on, and Aunt Mavis was
there, she might be seen from the street outside or make a dash for it.

Also—If you wake sleepwalkers, do not their walls collapse like paper?

I said ‘Aunt Mavis?'

‘Oh you did frighten me!'

She said this quite calmly. She was behind the door into the study; where she seemed to have been waiting.

She said ‘Were you all right, darling? Were you cold?'

I did not understand this. I thought she must be projecting on to me the fact that she had no clothes on.

She said ‘Did they treat you all right?'

She came towards me in the hall. I thought I should stay between her and the front door.

She said ‘Did they give you food or anything?'

She seemed to be pulling gloves on. Her skin hung on her like furs. I wondered for a moment—She really does have no clothes on?

I said ‘Don't go out.'

She said ‘I've got proof.'

I said ‘Of what?'

She said ‘Darling, you were only the first!'

I found that I did not like the idea of touching her. I tried to rationalise this—She might scream?

She had stopped in front of a mirror as if to arrange her hat.

I said ‘The first what?'

She said ‘She gives him money.'

I said ‘Who gives him money?'

She said ‘Her husband's very rich.'

When she moved towards the door I put out a hand and took hold of her.

I thought—Not too bad: like oysters.

I said ‘It's cold outside.'

She said ‘You won't be able to stop me.'

I said ‘Aunt Mavis, you're drunk.'

She said ‘What do you mean I'm drunk?'

I said ‘Aunt Mavis, you haven't got any clothes on.'

She turned to one side and sat in a chair by the front door. I
let go of her. She held her head in profile. There was a noise of what seemed to be laughter from beyond the front door.

She said ‘No one's ever said that to me.'

I said ‘Why shouldn't you be drunk? As a matter of fact, I don't see why you shouldn't have no clothes on.'

She said ‘As a matter of fact I'm parched.'

I said ‘Well why don't you have another drink then?'

When she turned her head towards me I had the impression (it was quite dark) that her eyes were bleeding.

She said ‘I wanted to dance and sing.'

I said ‘Well dance and sing then.'

I felt suddenly as if what I was doing was putting my head down on her shoulder and laughing as the man had done to me at Mr Perhaia's party.

I said ‘What was it you wanted to dance and sing?'

Then it seemed that there was something quite different going on: some excavation by men with pick-axes, clicking.

I wondered—Is this what Dr Anders hears?

She said ‘Oh God, you don't want to see it, do you?'

I said ‘Yes, what's it like?'

She said ‘It's awful!'

She stood up. She raised one arm above her head.

Then she put her head on her chest and made a noise like someone retching.

I said ‘That's not right is it?'

She straightened and raised her arm again. Then she lowered it.

I thought—She is acting?

Then—Get it out: Get it out —

She said ‘They can do what they like to me!'

I said ‘Is that the title of a song?'

Then she seemed to topple, onto her hands and knees on the floor.

In this position she was like a wooden horse with nails through its eyes.

What I had been doing all this time with Aunt Mavis had been so much in the dark—the darkness of the hall, the darkness of my mind, the darkness of some way that I thought might
be opened through which I could help her—that I had hardly noticed that there were now stronger noises from the street outside.

I had gone to the bottom of the stairs and I held out a hand to Aunt Mavis.

I said ‘Come on up to bed.'

She arched her back and seemed to try to be sick.

I thought—Or she is like a fish with a line down to her stomach —

I said ‘You've got it out now.'

She said ‘Why, what did they put in it?'

I thought—A worm? An asp?

I said ‘That sounds like another song.'

I went to a hatstand where there were some coats and I took one down and held it out to her.

She straightened, still on her knees. She said ‘You don't mind?'

A key was turning in the lock of the front door.

I had been so intent on not breaking the fragile connection I had with Aunt Mavis that I did not care about anyone's coming in, except that they should not hurt Aunt Mavis —

I had thought—Pull at the line too violently and you'll kill her—

Then the front door opened and Brian Alick came in.

At least it seemed to be Brian Alick. It also seemed I must be having an hallucination.

A light was switched on. Aunt Mavis, wearing just her hat, was on her knees facing the front door.

Some flashlights went off.

Brian Alick, by Aunt Mavis, was staring at her. Then he looked at me.

I thought—This is precisely what is happening?

Then Sheila came in.

I was sure it was Sheila. I could tell by the way she stood with her toes turned in.

I thought—But where is this happening?

More flashlights seemed to go off outside.

Brian Alick turned to the front door.

Sheila was looking at me as if she did not recognise me.

Brian Alick tried to push the door closed. It seemed to bump up against someone else coming in.

Uncle Bill came in. He was holding his nose.

I thought—We are in someone else's time-warp?

More and more people seemed to be trying to push in.

I thought—A film has broken down: there are too many people in my maze, or in a telephone box —

Uncle Bill and Brian Alick and Sheila were in a group by the front door. They were looking at Aunt Mavis.

Mrs Washbourne was calling ‘Let me in!' She had got an arm through the door.

I went and put the coat I was holding around Aunt Mavis.

Mrs Washbourne appeared, struggling.

Uncle Bill said ‘And keep that door shut!'