‘Why not?’
‘I’m still working on it.’
‘Is there a ghost in your ear, Constanze?’
‘Always. Africa is full of ghosts.’
‘So is every place. I was wondering if the song is about a particular used-to-be in your life.’
‘Can we talk about something else?’
‘Sorry for the intrusion. It’s a beautiful song and a terrific performance. Is anyone else doing anything like this?’
‘Not that I know of.’
‘How did you become so fluent in Setswana?’
‘I learned it from my nanny. She was from Bophutatswana and her name was Omphile which means God’s gift. When I was a baby she carried me around on her back in a towel while she did the household chores. She had a baby of her own who was living with Omphile’s mother in the homeland — that’s what Bophutatswana was during apartheid.’
‘So Omphile raised you while the grandmother raised her child.’ I had to shake my head at that.
‘That’s how it was,’ said Constanze. ‘Nannies usually had to speak Afrikaans or English in the houses where they worked but my parents thought it was good for me to learn Omphile’s language.’
‘Why did you speak the song in Setswana?’
‘I wrote it in that language and then translated it into English. I think my songs in Setswana, that’s how they come to me. Setswana has Omphile in it and her people and where they came from. I like to keep this inside me, so let’s not talk about it any more. I read Hope of a Tree last night.’
‘And?’
‘I like the way you write and I liked the ideas in the book but I didn’t think it was a very good novel.’
‘Can you say why?’
Constanze thought about it for a while. Her face was one that changed from moment to moment; now, when she was mentally rehearsing what she would say, she looked about eighteen. ‘There wasn’t really any hope in it,’ she said. ‘It just runs downhill in a straight line. It starts with Cynthia standing on Clifton Bridge looking down at the Avon Gorge. Is she going to jump? Sam thinks so. He says, “It’s a long way down.” She says, “It’s a short trip though.” He tries to distract her, says, “Have you seen the camera obscura at the observatory?” And of course she says, “I don’t need to — I’ve been living in a dark chamber for a long time.” So you wonder if Sam is a suicide saver, the way some people are drunk savers. It never works, and you know it won’t work for Sam and Cynthia so it’s no surprise when it doesn’t.’
‘Life is like that sometimes,’ I said.
‘Sure, but why bother with that kind of story?’
‘I was trying to do a story where one thing follows another in a chain of cause and effect that goes right down the line to its inevitable end. Have you seen Kaurismäki’s film The Match Factory Girl?’
‘No.’
‘That’s a straight cause-and-effect film. Iris, the match factory girl, after being treated badly by her mother, her mother’s live-in boyfriend, and a man who picked her up in a bar, puts rat poison in their drinks and in the end is led off by the police. Very bleak, but it leaves you feeling good.’
‘Ah, but there’s a positive element in that. She fought back with the rat poison. Cynthia and Sam didn’t do anything like that so there’s nothing to feel good about.’
‘You’re right. I must do better. Fancy some lunch?’
She looked at her watch. ‘I can’t — I’m meeting my agent for lunch in Soho.’
‘What’s his name? Maybe I’ve heard of him.’
‘I doubt it — he’s from Jo’burg, an old friend of the family, Teddy von Augenblick.’
‘Theodor von Augenblick?’
‘That’s him.’
‘Actually I have heard of him. My ex-wife works at the Nikolai Chevorski Gallery and he was in there trying to promote some painter whose talent wasn’t as big as his canvases. I haven’t seen the paintings or met von Augenblick myself.’
‘Teddy has his finger in all kinds of pies — I don’t know anything about his painters.’
‘But you trust him to represent you.’
‘Why shouldn’t I? I’ve known him since I was a little girl. As I’ve said, he’s an old friend of the family and he’s been like an uncle to me.’
‘Uncle Teddy.’
‘Yes, that’s what I used to call him.’
‘Did he use to take you on his lap?’
‘That’s what uncles do, isn’t it? What’re you getting at?’
‘Nothing. Being a writer, I’m always interested in a character’s back story.’
‘I’d rather you backed away from mine, it’s not that interesting.’
‘If you say. Could I have the words to “Used-To-Be”, both the Setswana and the English?’
‘What for?’
‘It’s a lament and I’m into laments.’
‘I’ll send you the words after we do the final recording.’
‘You don’t trust me, do you?’
‘Not really. I have to go now.’
‘When can I see you again?’
‘I’ll call you after I get back from Cape Town.’
I walked her to Putney Bridge, and even for that short distance she stayed a little way ahead of me. At the entrance to the tube station she said, ‘See you,’ and was gone.
6 Barbara Strunk
I was sitting naked on Brian’s unmade bed on a Saturday morning. Alone. I’d had a lie-in and Brian hadn’t woken me. I didn’t hear him anywhere, no sounds but the traffic on the Embankment. Naked me on the bed; naked me on the wall. I wasn’t exactly thinking but I was thinking about thinking when I heard the front door open and close downstairs. Then there were quick footsteps on the stairs, a female voice said, ‘Bri?’ and a girl who couldn’t have been more than twenty burst into the room. Blonde, good figure, very pretty — well, she would be, wouldn’t she. And she had a key because she’d let herself in. ‘Oh,’ she said, ‘are you posing for him?’
‘Not at the moment,’ I said. ‘Are you Cheryl?’
‘Yes. Has Brian mentioned me to you?’
‘Briefly.’
‘And you,’ she said, ‘you’re …?’
‘Just leaving,’ I said. I went to the bathroom but didn’t bother to take a shower. When I came out Cheryl wasn’t in the bedroom. I picked my clothes up off the floor, got dressed, walked up to the King’s Road and caught an 11 bus.
When I got off in Harwood Road I was about halfway between my flat and Phil’s place. Which way will my feet take me? I thought. I watched them take me back to Moore Park Road and over to Eel Brook Common. No, I thought, not with the smell of sex with Brian still on me. I turned back and went up Harwood to Fulham Broadway and home to Sir Cliff Richard and the Spanish dancer on black velvet and Hilary’s latest happy news, if she was there, of the Alpha course. She wasn’t there, probably out laughing it up with some happy-clappy Jesus crowd. My room looked small, the way childhood rooms look when you come back to them as a grown-up. There was Hope on the wall. I bought that print after Troy broke my nose and I moved out. Pathetic.
I had a shower, put on fresh jeans and a sweatshirt, thought about going to Phil’s place, then decided not to just yet. I put on a jacket and went out to look for Hope of a Tree. WH Smith didn’t have it so I went back to the Fulham Road and over to Nomad where I bought the one copy they had. ‘How has this been selling?’ I asked.
‘We had two copies,’ said the woman at the till. ‘Sold the other one a couple of weeks ago.’
I didn’t want to go directly home so I went past the North End Road to Caffe Nero at the corner of Vanston Place. It was busy but I got myself an Americano and found an empty table by the window where I could start Hope of a Tree while drinking my coffee. The day was sunny and the Fulham Road was thronged with people doing their Saturday things. With my book and my coffee I felt as if I was in a little island of no hurry and no bother where I could let my mind be quiet for a while.