Fifteen minutes later his body was vibrating from a loud, hollow noise, repeated at regular intervals. It was the sound of a gong.

"Mr. Black!" a voice shouted, as if from under the bedsprings. A few seconds later Mrs. Pettybone reappeared in the doorway, releasing vapour from a violet can.

Norval watched, one eye glued shut. "What's the fragrance of the day, Mrs. Pettybone? Guest Neutraliser? Norvalicide?"

"His lordship's breakfast is served."

And so it was. Plates so full that Norval wondered if a party of stevedores would be down any minute. Fried eggs, rashers, sausages heaped on one plate, mounds of fried potatoes and tomatoes on another, stacks of toasted brown bread dripping margarine on yet another. Jars of marmalade and honey, two miniature boxes of Corn Flakes, a pitcher of milk, a pitcher of orange juice, and something grey and viscous that looked like a pot of glue.

"You're late, Mr. Black. I believe in the three p p's: punctuality, propriety, cleanliness."

Norval arched an eyebrow, but let it pa.s.s. Mrs. Pettybone, in trainers and tracksuit, was bobbing and fidgeting like a runner in a relay, waiting for the baton. She made several adjustments to the items on the table, all unnecessary. "Eat," she commanded, before racing back to the kitchen.

Norval did as he was told, gratefully, ravenously, while glancing at a Nottingham Post Nottingham Post folded neatly beside his plate. Not a bad woman, actually. Must bring up the subject of money. And Gally. As he bit into an oil-popping sausage he thought he heard footsteps from above, in the vicinity of his room. folded neatly beside his plate. Not a bad woman, actually. Must bring up the subject of money. And Gally. As he bit into an oil-popping sausage he thought he heard footsteps from above, in the vicinity of his room.

Mrs. Pettybone returned with a stainless-steel pot. "Will you have milk first or last in your coffee, Mr. Black? I'm not offering tea because frogs don't drink it." She said these words with the speed of an auctioneer, as if she'd just consumed a pot or two herself.

"I don't take milk," Norval replied. "So listen, Gally mentioned that-"

"I suppose you've no money to pay for your room, am I right, Mr. Black? I do not care for economic cripples. Least of all French ones."

Norval nodded. "Yes, well, as a matter of fact, Mrs. Pettybone, I am a bit undercapitalised. My accountant, I'm afraid, has buried my wealth in impenetrable sh.e.l.l companies and offsh.o.r.e accounts. Very difficult to get at."

Mrs. Pettybone's eyes narrowed. "Very funny," she replied. "If I wanted a clown, I wouldn't have divorced my husband." She began pouring milk into Norval's coffee. "So what do you do for a living, Mr. Black? What is your trade?"

Norval hesitated, wondering how best to answer this. "I'm a professional actor."

Mrs. Pettybone recoiled, as if he'd said he was a professional leper, take my arm for this dance.

"In fact," Norval continued, "that's why I'm here in England. But there's been a few foul-ups ... Gally thought that-"

"That I'm a soft touch. We'll discuss the matter later." Mrs. Pettybone, now wearing orange rubber gloves, removed his plate, as well as a fork from his hand. "I'll just do the washing up," she said. "And don't even think about lighting up that cigarette!"

By the time Norval finished his newspaper, lingered over his coffee and returned to his room, his clothes were washed, dried and ironed. Impossible, he calculated. Surely a record of some sort. Must call Guinness. Even his socks and underwear were ironed. He put on his chlorinated, fabricsoftened clothes, b.u.t.ted his cigarette, then hitchhiked into Nottingham in search of a job.

[image]

This pattern, unbroken, continued for the next seven days. Norval, the only guest in the house, awoke to blading sunlight or a flicking lightswitch, then reawoke to a gong; he ate like a swine at breakfast to obviate lunch and dinner, went out looking for work, came back after dinner without work. Why did he stay? Because he was penniless, because Mrs. Pettybone no longer mentioned money, because he was starting to like the woman. The way she doted on him, the way she darned the darns on his socks, sewed b.u.t.tons on his shirts, polished and repolished his boots, appointed them with Odour Eaters. True, he could do without the ironed underwear and crease down his jeans. True, the woman was insane. But you can't have everything. Besides, there were mysteries to solve. Who exactly was Gally? And where was the inviolable innkeeper's daughter?

On his eighth day Norval got a job: playing an eighteen-year-old Rimbaud in a film based on the poet's life in London in the 1870s. He couldn't believe his luck. I dazzled the director, he thought, I was made for this role ...

Returning to the house well after midnight, with celebratory beer on his breath and a script under his arm, he got lost in the manor's dark labyrinths. He tiptoed right, left, up one corridor and down another. His memory had completely fogged. He climbed what he thought was his staircase but arriving at the top realised it went nowhere. It just stopped four or five feet from the ceiling. He walked back down, shaking his head, worse for drink than he thought. On the landing a door opened.

A figure in a man's white dress-shirt, torn tights and unlaced boots stepped out of the shadow. "Monsieur Blaquiere, je presume?"

Norval scrutinized her pale, makeup-less features, radically short hair and tattered clothes. She was in utter disarray She was in utter disarray, he said to himself, the words floating back from his audition. Rattlings of death and rings of muted music made her G.o.ddess-like body rise, expand, tremble like a ghost Rattlings of death and rings of muted music made her G.o.ddess-like body rise, expand, tremble like a ghost ... ...

"I'm Teresa, Mrs. Pettybone's daughter. Are you ... hearing-impaired?"

"No, sorry, I'm just a bit ... lost. Well, more than a bit. Wholly. I went up those steps, you see, and ..."

"Unmotivated steps."

" ... and then I ... I'm sorry?"

"They're called unmotivated steps-they lead nowhere. My grandfather liked them for some reason, liked the irrationality of it all. So do I, for that matter."

The hall light began to flash on and off. "Teresa?" a high voice clucked from below. Mrs. Pettybone's. "Are you all right, dear? Is that boy violating you? He's from the theatre!"

"I'm fine, Mother!"

"And he's French!"

"You can go back to sleep, Mother!" To Norval, sotto voce sotto voce, she said, "We'd better talk in here. Can I offer you a drink?" She smelled the beer on his breath. "A coffee?"

Norval glanced at the neckline of her shirt, which had slipped to reveal the lace of a white bra. "Well, yes, fine ..."

"It's just that ... I haven't talked to anyone in a while, apart from my mother. And doctor. I'm sort of in quarantine."

"You're in quarantine? For ...?"

"You name it, it's a long list. I think I managed to thoroughly scare my doctor-he said if I was a building I'd be condemned."

"That's ... some bedside manner."

"He probably thought I was going to disintegrate right there in his office. But enough of that, I must sound like some doddering hypo chondriac. Come."

Ignoring an amber light inside him, and the strictures of Mrs. Pettybone, Norval entered Teresa's bedroom. It was a sty, looking and smelling of sickness, a tornado aftermath of laundry and magazines and empty mugs and medicine bottles and half-filled crossword puzzles and pages ripped from sketch books and bordelloish antiques like bra.s.s oil lamps and pewter candle snuffers ... A series of candles illuminated two De Chiricos on the wall- deserted piazzas, illogical shadows, dark arcades, hidden danger-as well as paintings of her own showing shuttered summerhouses, neglected parks, marble steps overrun with weeds, paths strewn with dead leaves. Two small charcoal drawings lay on the floor: one of her mother, decades younger, and one of herself, with long wavy tresses to the waist.

After closely examining the latter, Norval sat down in a teetering wicker chair. Teresa plugged in a kettle. Under the flickering candlelight he got a better look at her: early twenties, fair and frail, sickly pale, eyes so preternaturally blue as to be from another species or universe. It was while looking into these eyes that Norval had a shocking premonition: her future, however short, would be entwined with his.

"How in G.o.d's name did you end up here?" Teresa asked with a faint smile. She had full, naturally crimson lips and teeth as white as toothpaste. "We haven't had guests for ages."

"Gally gave me the address."

"Gally Santlal? Are you serious? And you told my mother?"

"It's the only reason she opened the door." Norval rooted around in his pockets and pulled out an empty cigarette pack. "Do you smoke, by any chance?"

"The doctor asked me the same question. I said no and he said, 'Well, you might as well.'" Teresa took two cigarettes out of a jar and tapped them on the back of her hand. One match lit both. "So how is Gally these days? What's he up to?"

Norval shrugged. "I don't know that much about him. He's a glazier ... as I guess you know." He took the offered cigarette, drew on it as though it were his last. "He'd just finished replacing windows in some church. Which were smashed or stolen. In Hucknall? Let's see ... oh, his wife died, which is why he could join me for-"

"His wife died? You're kidding. I didn't know that. Recently?"

"No idea. But he didn't seem all that shaken."

Teresa poured tepid water into a mug, emptied a packet of instant coffee into it. "So how ... where did you meet him?"

"Newstead Abbey." Norval took a sip of the coffee and winced. "At the restaurant, I forget what it's called. The one with the doilies and vomitgreen rug and squawking peac.o.c.ks outside ..."

Teresa laughed. "The b.u.t.tery."

"Where I was abysmally drunk by three in the afternoon, much more than now, and semi-suicidal amidst the peac.o.c.ks. Did I mention the peac.o.c.ks?"

"Semi-suicidal?"

"I'm an actor, in a manner of speaking. A very loose manner. I was supposed to be in a play that was cancelled."

"In Nottingham? At the Playhouse? Theatre Royal?"

"No, at a library that someone burned down a few days before we arrived. Wish they'd told us. Wish they'd paid us."

Teresa laughed again, showing her beautiful white teeth. "I'm sorry, I suppose it's not very funny. Which play were you doing?"

"Tartuffe."

"Moliere?"

Norval nodded. "In French too-a harebrained government project that wouldn't have drawn more than four people, including the ushers and janitor. Anyway, as I'm having a ..." Here Norval reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a cardboard beer mat. "... a 'Worthington Creamflow Bitter,' Gally sticks his head through the window and scares the living s.h.i.t out of me."

Teresa grinned. "Why would he do that? Oh, I see, he was replacing it."

"There was no gla.s.s in the window but I hadn't even noticed. So we start chatting. And then he offers me another ..." Norval's hands patted all pockets.

"Worthington Creamflow Bitter," said Teresa.

"Correct. Anyway, as he leaves he gives me your mom's address. Along with his card and the name of a film company he used to work for. Where, by some miracle, I got a job today." Norval held up his script. "Well, not a miracle exactly. The guy who originally got the part is now at Queen's."

"The hospital?"

"After doing some very very strong drugs, he did a perfect jackknife into an empty swimming pool." strong drugs, he did a perfect jackknife into an empty swimming pool."

Teresa winced, then crawled back into bed with her boots on. "Congratulations," she said before washing down a handful of pills with liquid from an amber bottle. "I guess." Awkward seconds ticked by. Norval sipped his Maxwell House, glanced at her hair. Was it razed in the name of fashion, he wondered, or because of something more sinister? He began leafing through his script. Scarlet and black wounds burst on the proud flesh. Life's own colours darken, dance and divide Scarlet and black wounds burst on the proud flesh. Life's own colours darken, dance and divide ... ...

"Who is Gally exactly?" he asked suddenly. "I mean, what's his connection with your mom?"

Teresa took a long haul on her cigarette. "He wanted to marry her- until, that is, he found out she was pregnant. With me. Then he changed his mind. At least that's Mom's version. I have another."

"Which is?"

"Well, Gally is ... Trinidadian, East Asian. At the time, for my mother- and her family in particular-that was a problem. Anyway, they haven't spoken to each other since his own wedding day over twenty years ago. My mom's never gotten over it-it's been like a canker, eating away at her daily."

"Because she was in love with him?"

Teresa nodded, tapped ash into a mug filled with cigarettes. "She was seeing two men at the time-Gally and my dad-but she loved only one. Gally. But my dad was a persuasive character, shall we say, and somehow made love to her without ... you know, protection. She's never gotten over the shame or guilt. So after divorcing my dad she turned the place into a B & B. And she's been cleaning ever since-spraying, airing things out, condomising the place."

Norval tried to smile but no smile came, a strange sadness raining down on him. He looked around the squalorous room. "I take it she's not allowed in here."

Teresa laughed. "I rebelled long ago. But she's doing it-the war on germs, I mean-for my sake too. I've been sick for a long time. It's funny, it's like the boy who cried wolf. When I was young she always insisted I was sick, taking me to the doctor's and to hospitals when nothing was wrong with me. And now ... Anyway, you must think she's mad as a hatter,53 not to mention a redneck, but she's all right, really. Generous, thoughtful, do anything for me." not to mention a redneck, but she's all right, really. Generous, thoughtful, do anything for me."

"She's done a lot for me too, I don't quite know why."

"It is a bit surprising, I have to admit. She's not usually open to ... well, you know, foreigners. Although you certainly don't sound French."

Norval nodded. "I was thinking of giving her something. I mean, besides money for the room. Does she have any hobbies? Does she read?"

Teresa stubbed her cigarette out on the side of her bottle. "She used to read-about astronomy mostly. She had this telescope, this really cool telescope that Gally gave her years ago. She was absolutely mad about it, she could gaze at the sky for hours. It was her prize possession-until one day she smashed it to pieces."

[image]

The film was being shot in London, with rehearsals taking place in a church bas.e.m.e.nt in Harlesden. Owing to production delays and winter rain it took longer than expected: Norval was gone for over four months. At first he had no intention of returning to the house, but as the days turned over he found he couldn't get either Mrs. Pettybone or Teresa out of his mind. After his first month away, he sent Mrs. Pettybone a postal order and a present; after his second, he sent Teresa a letter, with x x's at the end, and instructions regarding the present. Remembering a parting kiss with parted lips, he also posted these lines from Rimbaud: Fists in torn pockets I departed.And I listened, sitting by the roadIn soft September, where the dewdropsWere strong wine on my forehead;And in fantastical shadows rhyming,I plucked like lyres the lacesOf my ruined boots,One foot against my heart.

Have I lost my mind? Norval wondered, the moment the letter dropped into the box. He put his fingers into the slot, peered in. Should I try to retrieve it?

Two weeks later he received a response, slipped under his door at the Staunton Hotel in Bloomsbury. It was a thin blue envelope with a postcard inside. On the front was a black-and-white photograph of the church in Hucknall, in whose cemetery they had drunk a bottle of wine and kissed for the first time. On the back of the card, in the address square, was one line: Come back, you madman Come back, you madman. On the message side was a pastel sketch of Norval himself, in Byronic att.i.tude: [image]

On the last day of shooting Norval bolted from the set to catch an express train to Nottingham. He decided to pa.s.s on the wrap party, and on interesting propositions from two actresses and a make-up artist. Measured by watch hands, the train journey was brief, but to Norval it felt like a ride on the Trans-Siberian. After switching to the Robin Hood Line, he found himself sprinting across a muddy field by a cow pond, in twilight rain. "I've lost my mind," he concluded, not unhappily. He was gasping like a marathoner as he approached Mrs. Pettybone's B & B.

It was unrecognisable. An unfamiliar van sat in the driveway; the garden had grown wild; drainpipes and gutters were clogged. Inside, dust acc.u.mulated, dishes were unwashed, odours unchecked. Mrs. Pettybone no longer rushed about, no longer wore a jogging suit, no longer rose at dawn. The gong was gone. During the day she could be found lounging on a daybed, reading or singing or raving about Ganymede or Maxwell Montes or the Bay of Rainbows; at night she mysteriously disappeared, climbing up the creaking back stairway, sitting atop the unmotivated steps for hours.

To all appearances, Mrs. Pettybone was finally over the edge, finally bereft of her scant remaining faculties. Or perhaps, thought the neighbours, she'd given up the war on germs because her daughter had died. But the neighbours were wrong: about the war and about Teresa too.

While Norval was away in London, on a day when Mrs. Pettybone did her errands in town, Galahad Santlal arrived at her house for the first time in twenty-two years-with putty knife, lead hammer, gla.s.s pliers, glazing sprigs, beam compa.s.s, gla.s.s cutter. With Teresa supervising from below, Gally climbed the unmotivated steps, cut a round hole in the ceiling and installed a pivoting skylight. As well as a chair, a tripod supporting Norval's gift, and a shelf for two books on the galaxies, from his own collection. He then waited for Mrs. Pettybone's return.

[image]

Minutes ticked by as Noel fidgeted and Norval drank. "OK, so don't tell me the story," said Noel. "Whatever happened, I'm sure you behaved like a b.a.s.t.a.r.d-an unromantic, unsentimental, unthoughtful b.a.s.t.a.r.d."

Norval's head was bowed, uncharacteristically. He was on to his fourth double Irish. "Dead on."

"Were you in love with Terry? Did she leave you? Is that why you were in love with her? Because n.o.body else has ever dumped you, ever broken your heart?"

Norval swirled the dregs of his Connemara. "I am not my father. I decamped, point final point final. I thought about what I was doing, then boarded the first plane to Canada."

"But why? I mean if you-"

"I was at an age-not that I've outgrown it-when I couldn't deal with being in ... never mind."

"Being in what? In love? Is that what you were going to say?"

"It's like measles-I had it once and now I'm immune."

I knew knew it! Noel exclaimed, to himself. "But is it ... too late? Can't you go back and-" it! Noel exclaimed, to himself. "But is it ... too late? Can't you go back and-"

"It's too late."

"Why? Is she married? Did she die? Tell me the story."