He awoke equally calm and happy, only to be gripped at once by a new and terrible idea that frightened him half to death. He leapt out of bed as if speed of movement might trick the notion into staying behind to be smothered in the pillows, flung on some clothes and rushed about his business. Throughout the day he completed not only his own tasks, but also half the others on the list.
But physical activity, he found, was no answer. However busy his body, his mind remained like a pot on the boil - throwing again and again to the surface this single and deeply disquieting suggestion. The truth of the matter was that his passionate love for May had finally got the better of him and, by linking the two of them more or less officially together, the Master’s bequest had nudged Arno into such a state that he was on the point of declaring himself.
There had been many opportunities during the day but he thought none of them propitious. At one point, recalling May’s veneration of all things indigo, he went into the garden and picked every deep blue flower he could find. He returned with a huge armful of lupins, delphiniums, larkspur and Canterbury bells, only to find himself rigid with fear at the thought of even presenting them, let alone stumbling into amorous speech. They were now in a bucket under the sink.
One of the problems - well, the main problem actually - was that Arno was no longer able to deceive himself as to the pure, ennobling and spiritual nature of his affection. He now knew it would no longer be enough to share with her, in happy platonic servitude, the sweet prosaic things of everyday life. To venerate her from a respectful distance. He wanted more.
‘Oh,’ cried Arno aloud in the empty kitchen. ‘I am no higher than a beast.’
He had fought this onrush of licentiousness. His baths had got cooler, his flesh pink from loofah persecution. He had applied himself to the section in Father Athelstan’s Herbal that dealt with Discharge of Troublous Humours and been instructed to gather some hyssop flowers, bake them to drive off the moisture, mix the remaining purple crumbs with some almond oil, spread the resultant paste across his tummy and lie down for half an hour with his feet up on a hassock - all of which he duly did. He felt better for the rest but his skin went blue.
He had tried to reason with himself, which had proved difficult, and to think uplifting thoughts which had proved very easy. Attempting to approach what the Master had called his innate fountain of wisdom, he was always beaten to it by Priapus, muddying up the water. So, finally, Arno had been compelled to accept this irresistible summons of the blood, comforted only by the knowledge that at least he would do the decent thing and keep these feelings to himself. And so he had. Until today.
Today it had been borne upon him that until he spoke he would have no peace. Also that, if he failed, she would be lost to him for ever. For, in spite of the Master’s injunction, Arno felt he could not then further embarrass May by his continual presence. All day, like an anxious foot soldier before a fateful battle, he had been on the look out for favourable signs. After lunch one had been vouchsafed. Draining his mug of Acorna, the remaining sludge had formed itself into the shape of a perfect heart. This had cheered Arno considerably. The time it seemed was right. He only had to do it once and, after all, how long did it take to say three little words? No time. Of course there would have to be a few endearments.
At the thought of the endearments Arno’s skin crawled with apprehension. Perhaps he could just place his last and final haiku in amongst the flowers. He produced it from his pocket.
May, goddess, heart’s queen
Bitter the path without you
Joined be. With me.
He was cheating rather on the last line, which was a syllable short unless you said ‘joinèd’ like Shakespeare, but it had pith and moment. No doubt about that.
Washing and drying all this time, Arno now began to put the glasses back and that was when he came across the brandy. Tucked away, in a purely medicinal manner, on the back of the oats and beans and barley shelf. With nothing really definite in mind, Arno took it down. It was a pretty large bottle and it was pretty full. He poured out a small glass and drank it.
It burned his throat and made him cough but there was no doubt, once the discomfort had worn off, that he felt better. In fact he felt so much better he decided to have another. This went down much more smoothly, engendering nothing more disturbing than a nice warm glow across the chest. Arno could feel it doing what he had always understood strong drink was supposed to do. Loosening inhibitions, magicking up the assurance he needed to accomplish his brave, foolhardy sortie. He decided to have a third, then sat down in a single swoopy motion - feeling rather blobby in the head.
For no reason a memory arrived. Some indeterminate time ago he had seen a play at an amateur theatre. Set in Russia, the bit Arno remembered had two people who were thought by all the other characters to be in love. She was packing to go away, he was standing by the door. She thought he was going to propose and he thought he was going to propose, but he never did and she went off to be some sort of governess. Arno had been very moved by the waste and pathos of the situation. He saw this recollection now as both warning and encouragement.
Lest sorrow should unman him, he had another small glass and with some difficulty made his way towards the window. He opened it and the balmy air lay warm against his face. It was pleasant but he felt he could have done with something a bit more bracing. And then he heard the cello.
She was playing the chakras which, she had explained to him once, corresponded to the seven-note musical scale. How he knew she was not simply playing the scale, Arno could not have said. A special richness in the timbre perhaps; a deeper resonance in the pause. Could one in any case hear colours? He stood, supporting himself by gripping the edge of the sink, straining not to miss a single thread of the glorious sound.
He felt intoxicated with joy and immensely confident. As if all the strength he would need to sustain and support them, both now and in the years to come, had been given all at once in a lump. And far from weighing him down, he soared with it. He flew. He was suddenly totally convinced she would be his - he knew it! All the exuberant unfathomable extravagance of her. As the dulcified notes flowed, Arno - in a frenzy of nympholepsy, - recreated the beloved musician and saw her not seated in an English country house, but magnificently astride a gold-rimmed cloud and surging across the heavens in a shining helmet, with bright curved shining horns. This was it! His instant of momentous opportunity. His kairos.
Buoyed up by all this riotous bodily excess, Arno started to tug the flowers out of the bucket. He looked round for something to tie them up with. Nothing of the right length, width or texture presented itself, so he made do with a tea towel. The strategy was to offer them, rhapsodise a while on the beauty of her soul, the sweets of her conversation and her astounding physical loveliness, bow low in a proper boon-craving manner, then withdraw. Shouldn’t be too difficult. Anyone could pitch a little woo. He slipped the poem between the larkspur and the delphs and was just tottering towards the door when the music stopped in mid-scale (somewhere between the heart and the solar plexus).
Arno stood very still, all his attention straining into the silence - which continued. What could be the matter? Was she ill? He felt a shiver of fear until reason asserted itself. May was never ill. Those Rubenesque limbs, glowing eyes and that unquenchable bosom were surely not only healthy but also indestructible.