Without being aware of having walked there I found myself at the guest dome where I was staying. Feeling strange but not sleepy I read Clara Petersen’s novella and several of the short bits from the group. When I fell asleep I dreamed that Barbara Strozzi kissed me and put my hand on her breast.
Next morning Constanze arrived at the group session with the pages she’d written. First I gave my comments on Clara’s ms, then I went through the short bits I’d read. I’m never brutal in my critiques but there’s no escaping the fact that some would-be writers have it and some don’t. Many of the people who take these courses have a modicum of talent but very few will ever be published because talent isn’t enough: you need the character that will drive the talent as far as it can go.
‘Are you going to read this out?’ I said to Constanze.
‘Yes,’ she said, taking up a position at the front. ‘This is the first chapter of a novel and the title is Uncle William’s Lap.’
‘You’ve been doing this to me since I was ten,’ I said.
He smiled down at me while he took his pleasure. ‘Well, love,’ he said, ‘this is what uncles do.’
‘Not any more,’ I said, and reached under the bed for the knife. We came together, then I cut short his enjoyment and a very messy business it was. After I’d dismembered the body and buried the pieces in different places far apart I burned the bedclothes, had a long hot shower, opened a bottle of Veuve Clicquot and thought about the last fifteen years.
She went on to read the whole first chapter which was five pages long, her South African accent adding a little something to the eroticism and the nastiness of it. When she stopped there was spontaneous applause from the coarser element of the group. ‘Don’t stop!’ was their cry. ‘Go for it! Give us more!’ Clara shook her head sadly.
‘That’s all she wrote so far,’ said Constanze, ‘but I’ll keep working on it.’
After supper I found her at the Xanadu surrounded by admirers. ‘What you read out today was quite different from your songwriting,’ I said.
‘The songs are my art,’ she said. ‘This is for money. Do you think I’ll get it published?’
‘Probably,’ I said. ‘Under your own name?’
‘Why not?’
‘Don’t you feel at all strange about it?’
‘Why should I? This is a legitimate commercial product — it’s entertainment.’
‘Yes, but the songs are a class act and this is something you’d be better off not putting your name to.’
‘Are you applying to be my uncle now?’
‘Why? Is the situation vacant?’
‘Who knows? You might get lucky.’ Gasps and giggles from her audience.
‘Thank you but I’m fully committed elsewhere.’
‘No problem. But tell me: Haven’t you ever wanted to write something that wasn’t boring?’ The circle of admirers had backed off a little to give us space but now there were more gasps followed by bursts of laughter.
I felt a hot wave of anger rising in me but I tried to stay cool. ‘What I write doesn’t seem boring to me,’ I said, ‘and it takes up my whole self so there’s nothing left over for any other kind of writing.’
‘I think you might be a self-defeater, Teach. Maybe you should take up another line of work.’ General tittering from the sidelines.
‘Like what?’
‘I don’t know. Plumbing maybe. It’s a useful trade, it gets you out of the house and plumbers make a lot of money.’ She was swaying a little as she spoke. Evidently the drinks following on her popularity had somewhat gone to her head.
‘Thanks for the advice,’ I said. ‘I appreciate your concern.’
‘You’re welcome. And I’ll be there tomorrow with the rest of the swine to pick up any pearls you might be throwing our way.’
‘I think you’re going to have a hangover in the morning, so I’ll wish you a good night now.’
‘Goodnight, Uncle Not.’ Accompanied by two or three well-wishers and the scent of cannabis she departed.
I walked out to Kirsty’s Knowe again and waited for Barbara’s face to come to me. It didn’t come and I sat there asking myself how I could make ends meet without teaching.
Constanze didn’t turn up the next morning. She left a note for me with Geoff Wiggins:
Dear Uncle Not,
I think it’s best if I leave now. I’m too embarrassed — for you.
See you around. Or not.
Constanze
I finished the week somehow. It’s nothing I feel like talking about. The group had an end-of-course party that I didn’t go to. They gave me a bottle of plonk and I left it on the desk where they put it. On the train going home I did some arithmetic: if I didn’t do any more teaching I had enough to live on for seven or eight months. What then? No idea. I trusted that something would come to me; it always had so far.
With that settled I was able to give my attention to Barbara. I closed my eyes and this time her face came to me with its beauty and its sorrow. It was there only for a moment before a shadow fell across it and there was Troy Wallis. There are things in life that compel recognition, things that you know are for you and nobody else. You can’t get around them; you have to go through them or be stopped by them. I remembered how it was when Barbara and I watched The Rainmaker, how excited she was when Rudy was about to finish off Kelly’s husband. ‘Stop!’ said Kelly. ‘Give me the bat. You were not here tonight. Go!’ And when Rudy left, she struck the final blow and Barbara hugged me and kissed me and asked if she could stay the night.
Lovely. But Barbara and I were not in a movie. However appealing the idea of duplicating that scene in real life, there was no practical way of making it happen. I couldn’t see myself walking around with a baseball bat. Too big for a violin case. Double bass? Not exactly a quick-draw thing: Don’t look now, Troy, I have a surprise for you. Barbara as bait? He follows her and I show up with the Louisville Slugger disguised as a French bread, upon which I do it to him before he does it to me. Right, no problem. Meanwhile there was the six-foot-four reality of him in front of Jimmy Maloney’s like a wall.
I called Barbara as soon as I got back. ‘Sometimes I can see you when I close my eyes and sometimes I can’t,’ I said.
‘That’s how it is with me too,’ she said. ‘I think the trick is not to try. When I look away mentally your face comes to me.’
‘Did I say anything good while I was walking around in your head?’
‘You hummed — tangoes. “La Cumparsa” seemed to be your favourite.’
‘I wouldn’t have thought you knew that one.’
‘Grace Kowalski heard me humming it and she was surprised too.’
‘It was made into a song with an English lyric,’ I said: ‘“For Want of a Star”. “For want of a star a dream had to die, For want of a dream the stars left the sky …” That’s all I remember.’
‘That’s a pretty sad song to carry around in your head.’
‘Yes, it is. I guess sadness is my default setting.’
‘Mine too. Maybe everybody’s. What did I do when I was walking around in your head?’
‘You were explaining something with all kinds of gestures but no words — you did it in absolute silence.’
‘What was I explaining?’
‘I never figured it out.’
‘Shall I come to your place this evening?’