12 Looking out

It was one of those sultry summer twilights, waiting for rain. A dusk much like the previous six, except that this one had a real threat of thunder. Another hot day had gone, another day of blue sky and no clouds save the puffy white streams behind the passing airplanes, another day without rain. But at last a change was in the air, new feelings were being expressed in the rising wind, while the sky slowly stanched the light of day, spreading a brown stain into the bulging clouds as evening advanced. It would rain soon, and everyone looked out from their windows with a mixture of irritation and expectation.

But while they waited, with restrained, idle impatience, the day’s last flies and gnats became feverishly busy, as if in sudden realisation of their imminent extinction. The spite which the humans barely suppressed, seemed to find full expression in the gnats, and they swirled in crazy circles under the tree, around the flowers, below the eaves, beneath the lamps, and over any people out walking.

With its slow, inevitable summer motion night began to fall, until people became no more than shapes drifting along the street, and speech, a cough, laughter all came springing out of the half-light in eery illuminations of sound. From further up Ophelia Street the small dark shapes of children flitted like restless ghosts in pursuit of an invisible ball, shrieking and giggling their hysterical pleasures in defiance of, perhaps because of, the deepening shadows. From the open windows all along the street came television noises, murmuring on the sighing wind; and, floating and swooping like a glider, a piece of white paper made its way above the pavement until it became entangled in the iron railings outside one of the houses.

In 3 Ophelia Street, on the ground floor, Joe Wheatley sat at the wide-open window on a wooden chair, sleeves rolled up past his elbows, idly watching the world go by. Inside, in the gloom, it being light enough for Joe at the window and not too dark for the rest of the family watching television, figures were placed in a crescent pattern around the artificial brilliance of the grey and white picture, saying not a word. Joe was not interested in the television programme and was anyway too sticky to sit cramped in his armchair. He preferred to gaze out of the window, to see what was happening. Not that anything intriguing had caught his eye: nothing had happened, nothing was happening, and nothing was likely to happen. It was one of those nights after a long arid spell of weather for long arid reflections about nothing in particular, and the sheer monotony of it all infected everything. For a time he had watched a group of boys playing football in the street, even though himself unable to see the ball except in sudden flashes, until the boys became bored and tired and abandoned the game. So Joe sat there immobile, staring rigidly into the coagulating darkness.

Across the street then, some movement. A door opened and Robert Johnson, dark-suited as ever, emerged briskly and got into his sports car. He sat in it for a second or two revving up the engine noisily, the roar of the motor threatening in its sudden, unexpected nearness, before spurting off out of the street in a yet louder roar of life.

Joe was left looking out at the empty street, with spots beginning to appear before his eyes as he strained to make out the faded lines, and a ringing in his ears filling the vacuum of sound left by the sports car’s departure. The clock inside the Wheatleys’ flat chimed nine times, and at last the street lights began to glow their yellow, unnatural glow. Further up the street, the sound of a child skating was punctured by the thud of a ball hitting a wall; and then the portly figure of Len from the little shop burst angrily into the street-corner lamplight, to swear at Elaine Card in his waspish, irritated voice. Elaine stood there defiantly on her skates, tossing her ball from hand to hand, while Len got more and more furious and his language more and more obscene. At last, as Len began to chase Elaine in a frenzied way, she skated off down the street towards The Lady Ophelia. She almost bumped into Ernie Jack as he emerged from the pub; then, as Ernie shuffled along with his hands in his pockets, Elaine skated beside, behind and around, cutting back and forth across his path.

‘For Christ sake, Joe, come in and shut that winder. It’s getting’ bloody cold,’ said Edie from the gloom inside.

‘All right, I’m comin’,’ said Joe, and lifted his chair to carry it back to its place.

‘The wind’s whistlin’ through. Shut it, won’t yer, dad?’ young Joe put in.

‘Hark at ’im,’ said Ginny. ‘The way he talks to his dad! D’you hear it?’

‘Leave it, mum.’

‘Why should I? He shouldn’t talk like that. I daren’t do that when I was his age.’

‘Well, times have changed.’

‘Talkin’ like that!’

‘Like what, Nan?’ asked young Joe.

‘Like you just did.’

‘Oh, shut up you two,’ said Maureen, Joe’s daughter. ‘I’m tryin’ to watch telly.’

‘Blimey,’ Joe said, ‘It’s a nice ’appy home we’ve got tonight. I think I’ll go down the pub and have a drink.’

‘Go on then. Out the way, I can’t see.’

Joe put on his old grey jacket and, turning on the light behind him as he left, went out into the new night. Unlike the previous nights that week this one had not fallen into a baby-like sleep, but huffed and puffed and wheezed like a consumptive. Large drops of rain began to fall, spattering heavily onto the pavement, as Joe walked the few yards to the pub. As he pushed open the bar door to go inside, Robert Johnson drove back into Ophelia Street.

Much earlier that same oppressive evening, Robert Johnson had come home to a house scorched dry by the day’s burning sun. The windows had all been shut to keep out burglars, so the house had stifled all day without fresh air. Robert’s first action was to make a tour of the house (or at least the downstairs part – upstairs was never used now), opening all the windows to release the pent-up air. It brought some relief, but the house was soon breathless again, so heavy was the outside atmosphere.

He took off his jacket, removed his tie, and walked into the bathroom. Robert was scrupulously clean but he hated baths, he hated being immersed in water, even if the water was shallow bath water. At school, swimming lessons had been torture for him; once he had been thrown into the deep end, only to scramble in blind panic up the slippery side and back into his cubicle. He had never gone swimming after that: his mother had seen to it. So it was that, instead of running a bath, he filled the handbasin with cold water, stripped naked and washed himself standing there.

Since the death of his mother Robert had lived alone and never had visitors. He had had no friends apart from his mother, so her death had changed little in that respect. He had always been a solitary person, and always wanted to be, feeling uneasy and hostile in the presence of other people. His time was still divided between work and television, with occasional interruptions from Selene and his car. His solitude, however, made one difference to him at this moment: he did not need to dress again after his wash, preferring to remain naked. He stretched out on the sofa, basking in the filigree rays of sunshine filtering through the net curtains, half-watching the television, half-dozing in the now pleasant warmth.

He woke up later with shadows playing on his bare skin, and the day’s last fly buzzing wearily around his wax-like face as if some macabre fascination had brought them together, a mutual sympathy of necrolatry. The fly circled above his face, with long legs dangling, examining the surface below, poised to land on the tight, drawn skin. As it hung there suspended, Robert’s hand shot from his chest where it had been resting, and swept the fly through the air into the stone hearth, where it lay on its back with its feet twitching upwards. He leaned over and gave it a final sharp blow, then watched it gradually curl into a black ball.

The room was now almost dark. The sun had been smothered by clouds for the first time in a week, and a breeze was blowing the skirts of the curtains up into the room with spasmodic puffs. In the brooding light of evening, after the listlessness of the day, energy had been recharged and was now beginning to pulse through the world. Robert suddenly realised that he was naked, and cold, and hungry. But the cool wind had revitalised him, and again he felt a need to do something and not sit there idle. He had to get out.

He dressed, putting on his usual black suit and white shirt, but without a tie, and strode out of the house as if he had an urgent appointment, although he had no idea where he was going. He got into his car and sat listening with some satisfaction to the purr of the engine, filled with pride at the thunder of the powerful machine. Drawing deep on a cigarette, the sudden redness flared at the tip; the engine roared at the downward squeeze of his foot on the accelerator; satisfaction smiled to itself and looked forward to the next time.

He drove aimlessly through the backstreets, stopping once to buy some chips, and then made his way straight home again. He had been no more than fifteen minutes, but now there seemed nothing better to do than to return home. His restlessness had not been ended, but he had given it some expression.

As he sat in the car outside his house the rain started to fall heavily. Looking around, he was intrigued by the light in the factory that shone out into the storm; he wondered what Gerald Fermin could be doing at that time of the evening in his office. Robert sat watching the trickles of rain running down the window, orange in the street glow, like blood from a wound.

When Gerald arrived home earlier that evening, at his usual time, he had found his house pleasantly ventilated, in contrast to the stuffiness of his office at the factory. Selene, of course, had been at home all day, with windows open to encourage whatever breeze there was to circulate through the house. But even in the hottest weather the house retained an impression of coolness and a slight smell of dankness. Presumably if there was any damp Gerald could have afforded to have it seen to, but he never did, preferring it the way it was. There was not, anyway, any visible sign of dampness, there was only the permeating odour, and perhaps the fish tanks provided an explanation for that.

‘You’re very quiet this evening, Gerald,’ observed Selene, as they sat eating salad. ‘Nothing wrong, I hope.’

‘No, nothing, nothing wrong. Heat, I expect, made me tired.’

As he spoke, he trembled slightly, and taking out his handkerchief he wiped his clammy brow. Selene watched him with a piece of cucumber pierced on the fork she held in her hand, unaware of the fact that she too was shaking.

‘It has been hot,’ she said. ‘Indeed it has.’

There was an enormous subject that had to be broached, yet neither knew how to do it. For the last month they had circled it, like timid scavengers around a corpse, unable to come close to it. Each of them felt the pressure on and from the other, but the habit of reticence had been too deeply ingrained in both of them. A life filled with shared confidences was unimaginable, not to say impossible. But there was a further doubt in each of their minds: were they both circling the same corpse, or were there different ones?

‘I’m sorry, Selene, I can’t eat this, I’m not hungry, I’m afraid.’

Gerald collapsed into an armchair, coughing violently. His words stabbed through Selene’s mind with the sharpness of pain. More and more these days it was she who felt sorry for him, she who sensed in herself the strength to enter his mind and sympathise, she who felt obliged to take upon herself a larger burden of his pain in the hope of easing it. But she did not as yet know how to set about the task she wished to impose upon herself.

‘You must see the doctor, Gerald. You are not well.’

‘No, no…’ Gerald shook his head with such violence that the coughing doubled him over in agony. Selene knelt by his side, waiting for the spasms to subside.

‘It would not harm you to see the doctor. Let me call him.’

‘You? Call the doctor? How the hell…’

With Gerald spluttering and quivering, Selene replied: ‘I am not afraid.’

Gerald shook his head again: ‘No. It’s all right, leave it. Smoked too much today. I’ll be all right in a minute.’

‘You should let me help you more, Gerald.’

‘You should leave me alone, Selene.’

‘I cannot. Blood is thicker than water.’

He stared at her: ‘A strange thing to say.’

‘It’s just an expression, Gerald. But the meaning is clear, and it is something I feel.’

They lapsed into silence, having come uncomfortably close to honesty. Selene sat at his side, on the floor beside his armchair, feeling it would be best to stay close. But Gerald stood up and lit a cigarette, pacing along the line of fish tanks.

‘I feel very restive, Selene. I can’t relax tonight. I think I must go to the office and do a little work that is preying on my mind.’

‘If you must, Gerald. But try not to be long. You need a good rest tonight.’

‘I’ll do my best. I will. Can I have my jacket?’

Gerald watched her as she walked away.

‘It seems to me,’ he said, ‘that you’ve grown a little plumper lately. Is that so?’

‘I think so. I probably need more exercise.’

‘You must try to get out more. Go for walks, you might meet people. Naturally you must be careful, look out for undesirable people and discourage them…but of course that is a matter for your judgement.’

‘Yes, I might. Now, do you want to take your umbrella? It will rain soon.’

‘No…no, I like the rain. I’ll be back soon, but don’t wait up. Go to bed if you wish.’

‘Yes, I think I will.’

He paused at the door. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I’m not much good at expressing my feelings. But, then, neither are you. But we get by.’

Selene looked out of her bedroom window, watching her brother make his way wearily down the street, keeping close to the brick wall of the factory. As he turned the corner into Hamlet Close, she saw a little girl skating up to and around him, and then the street was empty and silent. She gazed out into the fading twilight, unwilling to pull the curtains shut on the day. It seemed to her, without knowing why, that the day deserved to be remembered.

A light went on in the little corner shop, and the owner came out to stand under a lamp and look about him. To Selene he looked almost diabolic, standing there in the sallow light, with a scowl on his face. She smiled to herself at the thought, while the man turned and went back into his shop and once again returned it to darkness.

The rain had begun to fall in heavy, steady drops when the silence of the street was further broken by the sound of a motor car as Robert Johnson drove in. Selene quickly pulled the curtains across, undressed, and lay in the blackness listening to the gathering momentum of the storm. She lay on her back, on top of the bedclothes, with her hands folded across her stomach, which rose and fell rhythmically, while the rain teemed down and filled the gutters.

Lightning flashed, throwing a momentary spotlight on the little car that seemed to scurry like a wet dog into Ophelia Street. A crashing fanfare of thunder followed within seconds. The car’s headlights seemed dimmed, first by the whiteness of the sky’s electricity and then by the density of the rain, and its engine noise was drowned by the raucous thunder and the clatter of rain. The car slid to a halt outside The Lady Ophelia, and Keith Russell jumped out and dashed into the pub. Joe was leaning against the bar talking to the landlord, and they were the only people there.

‘Jesus, it’s like a morgue in here. Where is everybody?’ asked Keith.

‘All stayin’ in out of the rain, I suppose,’ said Joe. ‘Wasn’t even rainin’ when I came out, and now it’s too soddin’ wet to go back. Anyway, what brought you out in it?’

‘Oh, I came out hours ago. I was just sitting round getting bored, so I went for a drive. Just had to get out for a bit.’

Joe nodded. It was a restlessness he too had felt, as if it were an itchiness running through his bones. Yet outwardly the two men presented a striking contrast: Joe leant calmly against the bar, a blank expression on his face, distractedly combing through his sideboards with the backs of his fingers; while Keith, obviously still agitated, shifted his stance every few seconds, like an insomniac in search of a sleeping position. Without noticing it Keith would kick the bottom of the wooden bar, or the brass rail that ran around it six inches above the floor, with the toes of his desert boots, or the heels, constantly seeking, or so it seemed, to enlarge the confines of the pub, as if it were a straitjacket restraining his movements.

‘You’re fidgety tonight, Keith. Stand still, eh? Have another, come on. Drink up and calm down.’

‘Thanks, Joe. You’re right. I feel all on edge and I don’t know why. I’ve been this way all day, just couldn’t keep still.’

‘I’ve been a bit that way too. It must be the weather. It’s still close, even though the rain’s come. D’you go out today?’

‘Oh, I kept going out. In and out all day, for walks here and there. Brenda took David to the zoo this afternoon. He says he wants some sort of pet now. He’s been wanting one for ages really, so I might get him a dog.’

‘Be good for him.’

‘But I’d end up having to look after it though.’

‘Course you would, but you wouldn’t mind.’

‘No, I don’t suppose I would really. I always liked dogs. I had one as a kid, you know. But it’s not the same for them in a city, is it?’

‘Don’t suppose it is, Keith, but they get by.’

‘They need somewhere to run around really. They need grass to play on, a garden at least.’

‘I suppose so. They get a bit vicious otherwise. It’s not fair to coop’em up really. Mind you, they get vicious if they’re let out all day too, roamin’ round like wild things. One of ’em attacked me the other week. Tore me bleedin’ jacket.’

It was a moment of comedy, followed by smiles. Then the two men stood in silence for a while, drinking their beer slowly. The landlord kept walking by, dropping snippets of conversation as he passed on his way to the other bar. Outside, lightning still flashed and thunder still clattered, as the storm unleashed all the passion nature had been suppressing during the doldrums of the past week. Then the door swung open and a drenched Derek Card came in, shaking off water as he walked.

‘What’ll you have?’ asked Keith.

‘You ain’t seen my Elaine, have you? I was just wonderin’ if you seen her anywhere. If she was out in this she’ll be gettin’ pretty wet by now.’

‘I saw her, Derek, but it was a while ago, before the rain,’ said Joe. ‘She was playin’ in the street. Rollerskatin’.’

‘That were she. She always skatin’ now. I fed up with her skatin’. Just wait till I find her.’ Derek’s Caribbean accent was stronger than usual tonight, a sure sign of agitation. He stood running his hands back through his short hair, as if to wring out the excess water.

‘Anything we can do, Derek?’ asked Keith. ‘D’you want some help?’

‘No, thanks. I goin’ round the corner see me brother. She most likely be there.’

Derek went back out into the rain. Keith and Joe wondered whether to follow him. But they persuaded themselves that they were not needed and turned back to their beer. Later, when they left the pub at closing time, the rain had stopped, the clouds were chasing across the sky, leaving occasional gaps for the stars to sparkle through, and a cool breeze blew down the deserted street.