Imago Bird Read online

  When I looked at her she was sitting beside me with her face in profile like one of those huge statues I had seen pictures of by the banks of the Nile: staring out over the desert; or the water; or whatever it is; or nothing.

  I said ‘Don’t you think that’s terrifying?’

  She had that way of pursing her lips as if making her ledge on a mountain; or preparing to play the flute.

  She said ‘It would certainly be unfortunate, I suppose, to have a terrifying view of servants or victims.’

  VI

  Sometimes after I had been to Dr Anders there was so much going on in my head that I wanted to shout and sing in the street: to say—Icarus, Icarus, you need not have flown too close to the sun! You could have pretended to be something practical like a fighter-pilot in the Battle of Britain.

  When I got to Sheila’s house there was a man in white overalls doing something with a screw-driver to the front door. I thought—If he is a secret-service agent or security man, will he go away if I insist that such dragons are only in my head?

  Sheila’s room was on the first floor. From time to time other people seemed to share it with her. I was not sure whether or not these were lovers.

  I said ‘I see you are being put under electronic surveillance.’

  She said ‘What, has the old witch finally got you?’

  I said ‘Don’t you know about this? There aren’t things like ordinary spies any more. There are just microphones and cameras and things, so that people can watch and hear everything going on everywhere.’

  Sheila said ‘I once knew a man like that. He was carried away in a strait-jacket.’

  I went to the window and looked out. There was the top of the man’s head by the front door: beyond him in the street people moved as if they were in a science-fiction film and their bodies had been taken over by people from Andromeda.

  I said ‘So it’s exactly the same as if there weren’t any microphones and cameras and things, because it takes exactly the same number of people to watch and hear everything as it does to do it.’

  Sheila went out of the room. After a time her head appeared below beside that of the man in white overalls. She seemed to be arguing with him. Their heads appeared enlarged; their bodies tapered like tadpoles. After a time the man swam off down the street.

  I sat on Sheila’s spare bedsprings and bounced up and down. I wondered—If there were a man living here who was her lover, would there, or would there not, be a mattress on the spare bedsprings?

  Sheila’s bed was on the opposite side of the room. I thought I could examine the pillow for hairs.

  I wondered—Do people do things like this because in fact they are jealous, or because they have seen people doing things like this in films?

  When Sheila came back I said ‘What was all that about?’

  She said ‘What was all what about?’

  ‘Do you know that man?’

  ‘He said he’d come to the wrong house.’

  Sheila sat on the bed opposite. She put her head in her hands.

  After a time I said ‘I’ve been examining your pillow.’

  Sheila said ‘Oh God, you’re so boring, boring! Is there anything you don’t make a joke of?’

  I wondered—Would it help her if I exhibited jealousy by jumping up and down?

  I began to take my shoes off.

  I thought—But there really are men sitting underground with earphones on in London and Washington and Moscow. And since this is so, should one not provide them with some entertainment?

  Then—But I am no longer supposed to be interested in things like spies and security men —

  So—Do these phantoms spring from the same roots as being jealous then?

  Sheila said ‘Good God, there are people keeping us brainwashed! Who at this moment are in London and Washington and Moscow keeping us brainwashed! And all you can do is make jokes about it.’

  I said ‘What about the cigarette advertisements?’

  She said ‘What about the cigarette advertisements?’

  I said ‘Are you being brainwashed?’

  She said ‘Yes.’ Then ‘No.’

  I thought—But she’s not taking her clothes off.

  She was sitting on the bedsprings with her hands between her thighs.

  She said ‘Do you know that between ten and fifteen per cent of the inhabitants of this country live below subsistence level? And that in most other parts of the world the proportions are infinitely higher?’

  I wondered—Those figures are right?

  I had been going to say—What the cigarette advertisements show, is that people don’t mind much if they die.

  I thought—Shouldn’t I be just putting a hand on her breast; tugging at the belt of her trousers?

  I said ‘Wouldn’t it be better for the people who you say are being brainwashed if they could make jokes about it? Then they might be free to do something practical rather than just talk about the people below subsistence level.’

  I went and sat beside her on the bed. I tried to put a hand between her thighs.

  I said ‘Ah, the advantages of an unwashed brain—’

  She said ‘Oh shut up!’

  It was as if there were something trapped in her; fighting, but not to get out.

  She said ‘Look, will you come and talk to Brian Alick?’

  I said ‘Why?’

  Brian Alick was one of the leaders of the Young Trotskyites.

  She said ‘He’s clever enough for you.’

  I wondered again—I am clever?

  She said ‘There are millions of people degraded and oppressed. You can’t say that’s funny!’

  I said ‘I don’t say it’s funny.’

  She said ‘What do you say then?’

  I said ‘I say you can’t change things just by putting one sort of organisation in place of another. You’ve got to free things in people’s minds.’

  She said ‘You’re a spoilt brat.’

  I said ‘Who said that?’

  She said ‘I did.’

  I thought—That man in white overalls: he is her lover?

  I said ‘It’s people like you and Brian Alick who get a kick from people being oppressed. If they weren’t, you wouldn’t know what to do with yourselves.’

  I thought—That’s unfair: or isn’t it?

  Then—I mustn’t take my hand away!

  Dr Anders would say—But you wanted to hit her?

  Sheila said ‘I just want to say I don’t see how you can go on like this. If I were you, I’d simply be dead’

  I thought—But by keeping my hand on her, I am condescending, I am degrading her?

  I said ‘Jokes are serious. Wasn’t it Brecht who said—’

  Just then the man in the white overalls appeared at the door of the room. He stood there chewing, as if at the inside of his cheeks.

  Sheila was saying ‘What did Brecht say—’

  I thought—Jokes break up old patterns —

  The man in white overalls said in a sad voice—‘Brian says would Sunday evening about six-thirty be any good.’

  Sheila shouted ‘You fucking nit!’

  The man said ‘He says there’s some kind of party.’

  Sheila picked up a disc from a record-player and threw it at him.

  The man raised one arm like the Statue of Liberty. The disc went past him like a flying saucer.

  I thought—Sheila sent this man to a call-box to ring up Brian Alick?

  Sheila shouted ‘Oh God oh Jesus Christ!’

  She was holding her head and was rolling about on the bedsprings.

  Dr Anders might say—And you still did or didn’t think he was her lover?

  I could say—Or didn’t mind?

  I said ‘Look, it doesn’t matter—’

  I thought—But that is condescending: shouldn’t I really hit her? To save her from being the victim she both wants and doesn’t want to be?

  I said ‘I don’t mind talking to Brian Alick—’

/>   Then—But o fool, is it not sweet reason that sends people mad?

  Sheila got up and made a dash for the door. She went past the man in white overalls like King Kong. We could hear her clattering down the stairs. Then there was the noise of a door slamming—it seemed, of the bathroom.

  Sheila had looked rather beautiful when she had been rolling about on the bed; like Kali, the hideous Indian goddess, who, when you rolled her over, became the beautiful goddess Devi.

  The man in white overalls had gone and sat down on the spare bedsprings. He seemed to have chewed enough on his cheeks and was doing some swallowing.

  I said ‘What were you doing to the front door?’

  He said ‘Putting in an entryphone.’

  I said ‘Good God, what would anyone in this house want with an entryphone?’

  He said ‘You can speak into it downstairs and then people upstairs know who you are.’

  I thought—This man, like any comedian, is either halfwitted or witty.

  He was like some famous actor, I couldn’t remember the name. This actor had a long face and pale curly hair and he specialised in roles of terrible despair and bitterness. Once a group of his friends had taken the front row of the stalls, and had worn mackintoshes because he spat so much.

  I said ‘Why would Sheila want to know who’s coming up the stairs?’

  The man said ‘I think she’s a bit fed up you don’t come and live with her.’

  I thought—That’s true? Then—That’s all right then?

  I said ‘She’s never said that.’

  He said ‘Well, she wouldn’t, would she.’

  I thought—Oh God, do I mean it is all right because I am the one on top and we neither of us are happy —

  There was a noise of things being smashed up in the bathroom.

  I said ‘You really think that?’

  He said ‘It sounds like it, doesn’t it?’

  I thought—Then can I go and say—But Sheila, Sheila, you only think you want me to come and live with you because you think I’m happy!

  The man said ‘She tried to take an overdose the other day.’

  I said ‘Damn!’

  I got up and went out of the room and down the stairs to a landing. I stood outside the bathroom door.

  I thought—But how can I say just—Sheila, Sheila, I don’t care about any of this! I don’t care about the man in white overalls! I don’t care if you’ve been lying —

  I pushed on the door. It was locked. I said ‘Sheila—’

  I thought—But if I say Sheila, Sheila, I do care about all this: if I was lying, would it help? Would I not have to break the door down to prove it?

  Also—Even if I do break the door down, won’t she feel guilty because she’s made us so fantastical?

  I said ‘Sheila, I would like to talk to Brian Alick’

  I thought—I have locked myself behind bathroom doors like this often enough in my life, God knows: I should know what to do about it.

  I said ‘I want to talk about Marxism.’

  I remembered—You have to get what is trapped in the mind out onto something different.

  I said ‘I want to ask him whether or not Marx in fact said that the victory of the working class was inevitable.’

  After a time Sheila said ‘Of course he didn’t say it was inevitable!’

  I said ‘What did he say then?’

  There was the sound, through the bathroom door, of the seat of a lavatory being raised or lowered.

  I thought—This is the point of politics then? To comfort people in, or get them out of, lavatories?

  Sheila said ‘He said it might be historically inevitable, but that didn’t mean you didn’t have to work for it.’

  There was the sound of a lavatory flushing.

  Sheila said ‘And anyway, what he said was in an historical context.’

  I could say to Dr Anders—Politics, you see, is what people talk about when they are afraid that there is no meaning; that the birds behind their eyes might have died —

  Sheila said ‘Will you go away now please.’

  I said ‘Yes.’

  She said ‘And you’ll come and see Brian on Sunday.’

  I said ‘Fine.’

  I thought—When I am gone, she will be able to come out and pretend at least to herself that she has been peeing.

  She said ‘About five-thirty. Here. First.’

  There was the sound of a bath beginning to run.

  I said ‘See you.’

  I went down the stairs. I made a noise like a body clattering.

  I thought—But where are feelings then?

  I wondered—Do birds practise their feelings, like exercises, to keep alive; when they are on their own, behind closed doors, behind the eyes?

  VII

  Often at weekends Uncle Bill and Aunt Mavis would be away and I would be on my own in Cowley Street except for the housekeeper who came in for a while each day and one or two secretaries who went in and out of the basement and with whom I need have no contact if I was careful.

  I would look forward to being on my own: then sometimes I could not think of any reason to get out of bed, and would lie like the donkey between the two bundles of hay that seemed to exist only in my imagination.

  I did not want to ring Sheila now: not especially, I think, because I minded about the man in white overalls, but perhaps because I minded about not minding.

  Depression, I think, is not so much a feeling as a sort of impression it would be better to have no feelings at all.

  I can hardly remember this now; with all the profusion!

  The work that I was supposed to be doing in preparation for a university was philosophy. I tried to read my books in bed. I held them on my stomach as if they were shields that might protect one part of my body from another.

  The philosophy I was reading was that of the sceptics: who held that one explanation of something was likely to be no more valid than another: whose favourite words were ‘perhaps’ and ‘possibly’ and ‘maybe': who thought that it was necessary to ‘suspend judgement’ for the sake of mental health. They considered anyone who thought himself capable of conclusive judgement to be mentally unbalanced. I found this philosophy encouraging: but did not quite feel, at the moment, that I had found the right way of demonstrating mental health.

  I would think—How exciting it should be that there are no better reasons for the sun to rise rather than not rise every morning! That as I lie in bed, I equally may or may not fall through to the floor!

  — Especially when the sun always does rise every morning: and I never do fall through to the floor.

  What philosophers who were not sceptics were saying, it seemed to me, was that although they agreed that reason could not make final judgements, yet nevertheless we had to live as if it could; so our lives were ridiculous anyway.

  So the only question that remained was whether or not we faced this.

  One could spend so much time ruminating upon these things that although one might be incapable of getting out of bed, at least one was not worried by all the things that Uncle Bill and Mrs Washbourne were worried about—such as whether or not oil was getting through to Africa, or who was getting what percentage of which money.

  I would wonder about all this with the books that I held balanced on my stomach seeming increasingly to cut off the top part of my body from the lower.

  I knew—Then my lower part, yes, begins to lead a life of its own; to wake up and moan like a baby; finally to scream and yell as if it has been left too long without food.

  Then I would think—But how can I feed it? What is this need, when I am on my own, that stops me reading interesting things like philosophy?

  I had a small store of pornographic literature in my room which I kept in a box in a cupboard. It lay there like some great spider; which every now and then came out to feed when either I, or it, was hungry.

  I had had a conversation with Dr Anders about this. She had said ‘Why are you
ashamed of pornography?’ I had said ‘Because it makes me feel ill.’ She had said ‘Why do you read it then?’ I had said ‘Because at least I know where I am, when I feel ill.’

  I had wanted to ask—Don’t other people find that?

  — Because like this their tensions have run out? they are in their mother’s arms again?

  As I lay in bed I would make efforts to join up the one half of my body with the other. There was a feeling like a rugger scrum composed of my head and my groin. This particular Sunday—the one after the Friday I had talked to the man in white overalls with Sheila—I thought I should try to jump out of bed and do something practical like go down to Uncle Bill’s study and see whether or not there was a hole in the ceiling caused by his pistol going off. But according to the Sceptics, how would I know, even if there was a hole, that it had been caused by a pistol? And according to psychoanalysis, how would I know that I was not in fact thinking about masturbation?

  Dr Anders had said—It’s masturbation that makes you feel ill? I had wanted to say—Oh I know that’s no reason to think there’s anything wrong in it!

  I tried to jump out of bed. The messages could not quite get through to my muscles from my brain.

  I thought—There are men with guns lined up on the ground to shoot down these carrier pigeons.

  One of the books of philosophy that I admired that was not to do with the Sceptics, was Plato’s Phaedrus. Here images lived a life of their own: they seemed to be free even within the cages of reasoning. There was the image of a person being someone in a chariot pulled by two horses, the one good and the other bad. It was the bad horse that pulled a person down from the road to the gods along which the good horse was taking him: but it was also this dark horse that enabled him perhaps to get back on to the road to the gods again; for it would be the dark horse that dragged him to recognise, and thus to make contact with, his beloved; and so he grew wings, and was reminded of the gods again.

  Dr Anders would say—Did Plato really say that?

  I would say—Well, it seems to me he did.

  I wondered if it would help me to get out of bed and go down to Uncle Bill’s study if I pretended to myself that what I was going to do was to get at my small store of pornography; then when I was on my feet I could make a dash for the study; so that it would have been my dark horse that had got me back on the road to the gods again.