— I’m a physicist. I used to be an alchemist. Lick me now, said the salt.
— I’m a maize-grower.
— I have been all these things.
The buildings to the right of the Labour Exchange are drab four-storey municipal buildings very similar to each other. To the left there is the face, covering the windows of several old houses from the top of the shop fronts to the roof two floors up. Next to the face is the Colourless child, shrivelled and smudged with sores, COME OVER INTO PATAGONIA AND HELP US. The houses continue at the same low level all the way along the street to the left until they merge on account of the slight curve, into the opposite houses on this side, which from here seem taller but may or may not be, according to the degree of perspective trick. To the right of the Labour Exchange the height of the municipal buildings is more or less maintained with offices and shops up both the narrow forking streets towards the centre of the town.
The black mannequins in the dress shop to the right wear this year’s colours, red and orange, and dance in arrested motion, protruding their behinds.
The faces clustered round the man in the pale blue suit vary from shining black to lightest brown and occasional pink or yellow. The cluster could be of caladium hybrids, or a speckled sea anemone, for it is mobile in a liquid way. One face opposite is as lined as a walnut and entirely surrounded with white hair. The face stands out in stark serenity.
The black plastic hose is being proffered to the neighbouring man, a dark Madrassi Indian, who sways gently from one foot to another. The black plastic hose follows almost imperceptibly, like a dying metronome.
— Yes. I want to say that to deny is the only true human power, rather than free will.
— Erm. Does that mean you’re going to vote against?
— That I cannot say. The reflected image of any object or notion depends on our acceptance, but we can efface it in a thought. Thus the power of negation determines the faculty of reasoning.
— I see. Well if you’re a professor perhaps you’d like to comment on the situation?
— Oh, no. I am in business. Import and export.
Somewhere in the archives there will be evidence that this occurred, if it is kept, and for those who wish to look it up. Other episodes, however, cannot be proved in this way. Sitting alone, for example, on a kitchen chair, making love. A rectangle of light ripples on the wrinkled wood. If all the molecules that compose the solid table were gradually to move faster and faster, as fast as the molecules of liquid, the fastest would have sufficient velocity to move out of the substance. The table would then evaporate. A little pool of liquid might be left on the red stone floor, but otherwise it would be impossible to prove that the table had been there. A radio-isotope carbon 14, with a half-life of 5600 years, might perhaps trace and measure its prehistoric existence, but only for the human mind behind the carbon 14, the development of phenomena being correlative to that of consciousness. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Better get on with the job since a job, at last, is to hand, with or without identity.
The facia-board in its long rectangular frame of rough wood lies on the floor of the new pavilion. It measures six metres long. The width, or rather the height, for it has to go up on the wall, is eighty centimetres. The stencilled shapes cut into the facia-board are rounded, like flattened rhomboids. There is much banging about and a Colourless boy sings When You Love Somebody above the banging. Some of the stencilled shapes are rounded trapezes, some are rounded oblongs, some are irregular ovals. There are kidney shapes, lung shapes, tongue shapes, cardiac shapes, bladder shapes, womb shapes and possibly even stomach shapes and spleen shapes. There is a small thyroid too, between the spleen and the womb. Now only the pieces of coloured perspex remain to be stuck over the cut-out shapes.
When you love somebody
Forget it
When you want somebody
Scrap it
The perspex pieces must be a little larger, so as to stick on to the board since this is the wrong side, they need not be cut to the exact shape but may remain geometrical, providing they do not overlap each other, for they must lie flat. When the board goes up on the wall over the lights, only the rounded shapes on the other side will show, and be lit up in all the different colours. It is difficult to decide on the colours. Blue for the lung perhaps, and green for the spleen, purple for the kidney. Or pink for the lung, blue for the spleen, red for the womb, purple for the cardiac shape. No, that won’t do, two purples are next to each other. It is more important to balance the colours in relation to each other than to equate them with the significance of shapes. The designing and lay-out of the shapes has been done by someone else.
Mr. Swaminathan stands on the steps of the gazebo and sways gently from one foot to the other.
— Yes, well, how do I know it’s you? This piece of paper is quite creased all over.
— My wife threw it away by mistake.
— What? Speak up man.
— My wife threw it away by mistake.
— You might have found it in a garbage-can for all I know. There’s no name on it. If at least it said admit bearer I could rightfully take the risk. You have borne it, I can’t deny that.
— I can tell you about the mix-up she refers to.
— Yes, well, she did describe you to me as a matter of fact. The white hair. But you people look so alike you know.
— My wife works here. She could identify me.
— By hand, that means nothing. Oh well I’ll take your word for it. There’s no time to lose, really. Two builders are off ill and the big pavilion must be finished in time for the garden-party.
— Mr. Swaminathan, excuse my asking, but how do I know you are the managing agent, and not, for instance, a professor of philosophy?
— Don’t be impertinent.
— Or in import and export? In town in the street you said you were in import and export.
— You don’t want to believe everything you hear and see in the street. Now get on with it, the foreman will tell you what to do.
The piece of blue perspex between the orange rectangle and the green trapeze overlaps the green. It is necessary to slip it underneath the facia-board and outline the cut-out kidney shape on to it with a pencil, so as not to saw it smaller than the shape, plus a little all round for glueing. The kidney shape has a large lower lobe. The piece of blue perspex is an uneven triangle with the narrowest angle sawn off. The longest side saws down quite easily. The piece of blue perspex is an isosceles triangle with the narrowest angle sawn off. Down on the facia-board, the space that the angle would have taken is occupied by part of a red parallelogram. The blue perspex fits very well. A flat stone holds down all four pieces of perspex while the glue dries to a good hold. The yellow piece of perspex can go next to the orange. A pair of feet, shod in buff leather to match the buff trousers, strides over the facia-board without touching it. Or tripping it, as the case might be, in brown trousers for example, saying sorry mate followed by silence. A woman’s foot, black in a pink shoe, steps on the wooden frame on one side of the facia-board. The other similar foot steps across to the wooden frame on the other side. It is possible, without looking up from the grey perspex, to see the hem of the pale orange overall which hovers for a moment within the outer orbit of the downward absorption.
The paving-stones are large as tables. The trousers widen slightly at the bottom, most of them brown or black. Shoes match and shine. It is like being in a forest. The trees run away as the flag-stones vibrate.
No, Mr. Swaminathan sways gently from one foot to another. The black plastic hose follows almost imperceptibly, like a dying metronome. The cluster could be of caladium hybrids, or a speckled sea-anemone.