— Not … the Colourless Hospital?
— You speak so low. I can’t hear.
— Did you mean the Colourless Hospital?
— The—? But we don’t have segregation here, we’re a multi-racial society. Exalting all colours to the detriment of none, don’t you know your slogans? Good heavens, I do believe you really are living in the past … Tell me, does it hurt?
— Yes.
— You’re in a bad way, aren’t you?
The dress is mauve. The shining black hair is coiled up high and smells of fixative. The small gold chain loops gently over the nose and the banisters weave circles around her.
— Come with me, I’ll give you a letter.
The banisters weave circles round them both.
— Then you can go back and sweep up the mess before you leave. It’s all got to be spick and span by tomorrow.
The banisters weave circles.
— Steady! Are you all right? You can’t faint on my stairs, you know. I would send you with Olaf, my chauffeur, but I need him to go and open the Famine Bazaar. Are you taking those pills I gave Lilly? They’re better than the Government ones and they’re rather hard to come by. Wait here.
Whereas no amount of positive evidence. We can make our errors in a thought, and reject them in another thought, leaving no trace of error in us. No evidence at all is needed for a certainty acquired by revelation. Yes, but what relation does it have to the real thing? The number of molecules in one cubic centimetre of any gas, at sea-level pressure and at a temperature of fifteen degrees centigrade, is approximately twenty seven million million million, and each molecule can expect five thousand million collisions per second. Mrs. Mgulu emerges from the bedroom door, wearing something diaphanous. Classical physiology tolerates only one unknown quantity at a time in any investigation and that quantity shall be Mrs. Mgulu. Come in, she says, I want you to read this letter and see if it’s all right. Oh, stop it, you know very well this dialogue will not occur. We don’t have segregation here, oh I know it looks like it, but you’re selecting the facts, I do assure you we’re a multi-racial society. Come in, she says, and I’ll show you. I’ve always loved you, right from the very beginning I’ve loved you. You’re living in the past aren’t you, but now is the time for the beginning.
— Here we are, you go to the Hospital and give them this letter, they’ll get you back into focus. It’s all a question of restoring the equilibrium. But first go up and tidy the mess in the salon. It must all be spick and span by tomorrow. You’re feeling all right, aren’t you?
The dress is mauve, the shining hair is coiled up high and smells of fixative. The small gold chain loops gently out of the left nostril over the nose and cheek. The eyes strike deep, a rich chromatic chord that echoes in the blood long after it has come and gone.
The salon is empty. The thermoplastic marbled tiles are scattered with dust and bits of plaster. In the corner the small funeral pyre of hair has been left, grey with mingled dust. The banisters weave circles. Go to the Hospital and give them this letter. They will restore the equilibrium. They will weigh you in the balance and find you wanting.
The thin freckled left hand lies limply on the neighbouring human thigh. The thigh too is thin, and wrapped in faded grey denim which creases like an old tree-trunk. The creases multiply toward the loin, converging and vanishing into it. Something is missing. The dirty canvas shoe has a hole where the big toe presses and no shoe-lace. The shoe was once white but is now grey and yellow and brown. The other shoe, half hidden by the left foot which is crossed over it, may be in holes and grey. Its rubber sole gapes on the left side. Something is missing. Under the bony wrist the creases start, and multiply towards the loin, like the innumerable legs of a large spider. That’s it. And yet the pale green corridor is full of flies, buzzing in the heat making heads negatively shake, hands wave, knees twitch, feet stamp though not necessarily all at once. Sooner or later the fly will straddle the high blue vein on the gnarled hand and the Bahuko nurse will emerge in pink and white calico and call out an identity and the thigh will slope up into a vertical position, slowly or suddenly according to the age and the humour and the health, according to the degree of sanguinity or melancholia, according to the balance or imbalance of hope and despair.
— Mrs. Mgulu, of Western Approaches. Ah yes, she is much given to writing little notes, is Mrs. Mgulu.
The metal grill splinters the bland Asswati face as the eyes move slowly from right to left under the heavy lids. The fly settles on the right corner of the stalwart lips, that twitch the fly away. In the left arc of the nose with the right eye closed,
— Excuse me but that letter is addressed to the doctor.
— Occupation?
— Well, doctor I suppose.
— You suppose?
— Oh you mean me. Odd job man. At the moment.
— Previous occupation?
— Psychopath.
— Psy.. cho.. path … Sponsor, Mrs…. Mgu … lu. Right. Go up the corridor, second left to Out-Patients, wait there till you’re called.
At the back of it all, Mr. Swaminathan sways weakly from one side to another like a dying metronome. You see, he says, sooner or later the sequence will occur. There is a movement in the neighbour’s neck of one who is about to talk. Sometimes it is sufficient merely to say perhaps or I don’t think so or how very interesting, as the case might be, for the sequence not to occur. It is easy enough in the negative. The fly lands about ten centimetres away from the hand that holds an invisible bunch of flowers. You should write to her, you know, it would be quite in order, she is much given to writing little notes. She takes an interest. The tiled floor is mottled. The dirty canvas left shoe has no shoelace and a hole where the big toe presses. The rubber sole of the right shoe gapes beneath the left foot that is crossed over it. Dear Mrs. Mgulu. Since you are given to writing little notes, may I take it upon myself to reciprocate and ask you to take a further interest. The sequence with Mrs. Ned was a failure, despite the tender, incestuous appeal of white within a black man’s world. Dear Mrs. Mgulu. Since you have so kindly taken an interest in my welfare I would like to tell you that the sequence with conventional weapons is about to begin. Mr. Swaminathan, however, still ticks away at the back like a dying metronome, despite the flood of your, despite your generous and devoted efforts to dislodge him. It is not merely that I desire you physically, which is understandable in any circumstances, but that he watches me desire you, he occupies me with you like a sneak and a small-time spy and I would prefer him out of the way. I would prefer to give myself entirely over to desiring you, for sometimes it is sufficient to desire intensely. I hope therefore that the conventional weapons sequence will have some result and shall inform you of further progress as it occurs.
Dear Mrs. Mgulu. Open the flood-gates please, I want to die.
— Excuse me, do you happen to know what that green door is at the end?
— No, I don’t.
— All the other doors are white, you see. And that one’s green.
The neighbouring human thigh, empty of hands, is wrapped in faded grey denim and creased as an old tree-trunk. The neighbour has crossed his arms on his chest. And yet the pale green corridor buzzes with flies that make heads negatively shake, hands wave, knees twitch, feet stamp, not necessarily all at once though all at once in the sudden awareness of these gestures having occurred for some time. They should know that people with kidney trouble find it difficult to use their voice, the voice gets lost and little, the effort involved produces monotonous low noises that go on and on and suddenly get loud and bear no relation to the real thing, whatever it is, which could be communicated. After which they are swallowed back in shame. People with kidney trouble do not like people.