He left the hospital again, went into the Underground, stood on the platform, read the walls, the posters. KILL JEW SHIT. Angie & Tim. CHELSEA. My job is stultifying. ODEON. KILL COMES AGAIN. They were all dying to come with him! CLASSIC. COME KILLS AGAIN. When he came, they went! KILL WOG SHIT. My stult is ramifying. Uncle Toad’s Palmna Royale Date Crunch. Whole milk chocolate, big date pieces, Strontium 91. Pretty Polly Tights. My wife refuses to beat me.
He looked into the round black tunnel, listened to the wincing of the rails ahead of the oncoming train, saw the lights on the front of the train, then windows, people. NO SMOKING, NO SMOKING, NO SMOKING, no NO SMOKING. He got in, smoked. ARE YOUSITTING OPPOSIT THE NEW MAN IN YOUR LIFE? said an advert. Trust Dateline Computer to find the right person for you. The seat opposite Kleinzeit was empty. He declined to look at his reflection in the window.
He came out of the Underground, turned into a street, walked up a hill. Grey sky. Chill wind. Brick houses, doors, windows, roofs, chimneys, going slowly up the hill one step at a time.
Kleinzeit stopped in front of a house. Old red brick and rising damp. An old shadowy ochre-painted doorway. Old green-painted pipes clinging to the housefront, branching like vines. Old green area railings. Worn steps. The windows saw nothing. Crazed in its brick the old house reared like a blind horse.
Be the house of my childhood, said Kleinzeit.
Wallpapers. wept, carpets sweated, the smell of old frying crusted the air. Yes, said the house.
Kleinzeit leaned on the green spikes of the area railings, looked up at the grey sky. I’m not very young, he said. Probably my parents are dead.
He went to a cemetery. Old, askant, tall grass growing, worn-out stones. A dead cemetery. I’m not that old, he said, but never mind.
The greyness had stopped, the sunlight was coming down so hard that it was difficult to see anything. The wind seethed in the grass. The letters cut in the stones were black with time, dim with silence, could have spelled any names or none.
Kleinzeit stood in front of a stone, said, Be my father.
Morris Kleinzeit, said the stone. Born. Died.
Be my mother, Kleinzeit said to another stone.
Sadie Kleinzeit, said the stone. Born. Died.
Speak to me, said Kleinzeit to the stones.
I didn’t know, said the father stone.
I knew, said the mother stone.
Thank you, said Kleinzeit.
He went to a telephone kiosk. Good place to grow flowers, he thought, went inside, put his hands on the telephone without dialling.
Brother? said Kleinzeit.
Nobody can tell you anything, said a voice from the suburbs.
Kleinzeit left the telephone kiosk, went into the Underground, got into a train. An advert said, YOU’D BE BETTER OFF AS A POSTMAN.
He came out of the Underground, turned into a mews occupied by two E-type Jaguars, a Bentley, a Porsche, various brightly coloured Minis, Fiats, Volkswagens. He stopped in front of a white house with blue shutters. Black carriage lamps on either side of the front door.
Not yours any more, said the blue shutters.
Bye bye, Dad, said two bicycles.
Kleinzeit nodded, turned away, passed a news-stand, scanned headlines, SORROW; FULL SHOCK. He went back to the hospital.
The curtains were drawn around the fat man’s bed. Fleshky, Potluck, and the day sister were with him. Two nurses wheeled in the harbinger. Kleinzeit heard the fat man wheezing. ‘I feel full,’ gasped the fat man. Silence.
‘He’s gone,’ said Potluck. The nurses wheeled away the harbinger. The curtains opened on the side away from Kleinzeit. The day sister came out, looked at him.
‘I was …’ said Kleinzeit.
‘What?’ said the sister.
Was going to tell the fat man, thought Kleinzeit. Tell him what? There was nothing in his memory to tell him. There was the pain from A to B, getting the sack at the office, seeing Dr Pink, coming to the hospital and the days at the hospital. Nothing else.
This is what, said Hospital. And what is this. This is what what is.
Big Mouth
The next day Hospital unsheathed its claws, sheathed them again, made velvet paws, put its paws away, shifted its vast weight from one buttock to another, crossed its legs, played with its watch chain, smoked its pipe, rocked placidly.
Shall I tell you something, my boy? said Hospital.
Tell me something, said Kleinzeit, scuttling like a cockroach away from one of the rockers as it came down to scrunch him.
Yes, said Hospital. Did it upset you when I ate up Flashpoint and the fat man?
Kleinzeit thought about them. What had their names been? Still were, in fact. The names didn’t die, the names sailed on like empty boats. The fat man’s name had been, and still was, M. T. Butts. Flashpoint’s name was what?
Did it? said Hospital, smoking its pipe.
What? said Kleinzeit.
Upset you that I ate them.
Elevenses, I suppose, said Kleinzeit.
You understand things, said Hospital. You’re clever.
Ever so, said Kleinzeit, looking for a mousehole small enough for him.
Yes, said Hospital, and became one infinite black mouth. Didn’t even bother with teeth. Just an infinite black mouth, fetid breath. Kleinzeit backed into a mousehole. If the hole is this big the mice must be like oxen here, he thought.
Tell you something, said the mouth.
Yes, tell me something, said Kleinzeit.
You may have flats and houses and streets and offices and secretaries and telephones and news every hour, said the mouth.
Yes, said Kleinzeit.
You may have industry and careers and television and Greenwich time signals, said the mouth.
Yes, said Kleinzeit. That’s nice copy. That really sings.
You may even have several pushbuttons on your telephone and nothing but sheaves of ten-pound notes in your pocket and glide you may through traffic in a Silver Shadow Rolls-Royce, said the mouth.
It’s building nicely, said Kleinzeit. But don’t overbuild. Hit me with the payoff now, you know.
The mouth yawned. I forgot what I was going to say, it said.
Cheerio, then, said Kleinzeit.
Cheerio, said the mouth.
Other Music
The red-bearded man found another sheet of yellow paper. Clean on both sides.
Where were we? he asked the paper.
Borrow fool’s pox? said the paper.
I don’t remember, said Redbeard. Ibsen said, or was it Chekhov?
Either one, said the paper.
Either one said that if you’re going to show a revolver in a drawer in Act One you’d jolly well better do something with it by the end of Act Three.
That’s drama, said the paper. This is yellow paper.
Right, said Redbeard. I’m tired of that lark then. Tea?
With two sugars, please, said the yellow paper.
Redbeard walked through the corridors of the Underground, turned here, turned there, came to a door that said STAFF ONLY, took a key out of his pocket, unlocked the door. The room had nothing in it but a light-bulb hanging from the ceiling and a sink against the wall.
From his bedroll and carrier-bags Redbeard took an electric kettle, a china cup and saucer, a spoon, a knife, a packet of tea, a packet of sugar, a pint of milk, a half pound of butter, a jar of strawberry jam, and four fruity buns. He plugged in the kettle, made tea, ate fruity buns with butter and strawberry jam.
Sticky is good, said the yellow paper.
Remember that, said Redbeard.
It’s part of me now, said the yellow paper.
The room shook to the sound of the trains, shrank with the chill from the black tunnels of the Underground.