Darkness Visible: With an Introduction by Philip Hensher

  Then on this day (but no dream) 15/6/78 all day as I worked I tried to be ashamed but could not. The finding I can sin like other men. I cannot say what I mean. I listened to the birds to hear if they were laughing and jeering like kookaburras but they were not. Is she then disguised as an angel of light or is she a good spirit. I can see the sky now. I mean I can look into it and it is very slightly coloured all the way up. The boys came but briefly. I tried to tell them these things about everything rejoicing as it might be with Hallelujahs and that. But I could not. It is like going over from black-and-white to colour. There was a bit of sun on a tree over by long meadow and I. The boys went off to music appreciation. I could hear but only a bit. So I left my work and went after them and stood by the garage near the music-room window. They played music on the gramophone it came out loud and I heard it like I see the trees and the sky now and the boys like angels it was a big orchestra playing Beethoven a symphony and I for the first time I began to dance there on the gravel outside the music dept window. Mrs Appleby saw me and came so I stood. She looked like an archangel laughing so I stood. She shouted to me marvellous isn’t it the Seventh I didn’t know you cared for music and I shouted back laughing neither did I. She looked like an archangel laughing so my mouth shouted no matter what I could do. I am a man I could have a son. She said what an extraordinary thing to say are you alright. I remembered then my vow of silence and it seemed very small but I thought I have gone near enough by talking to the boys so I blessed her with my right hand like a priest. She looked surprised and went away quickly. This is all what Mr Pierce used to call a turn up for the book.

  Since writing that down, I mean between the word book and the word since I have been shown a great thing. It was not the spirits and it was not a vision or a dream it was an opening. I saw a portion of providence. I hope that one day the boy will read these words. I understand that his reading of them in the years to come is what made me write them down though at the time I had some foolish thought of evidence to show I am not mad (17/5/65). The truth is that between book and Since the eyes of my understanding have been opened. What good is not directly breathed into the world by the holy spirit must come down by and through the nature of men. I saw them, small, wizened, some of them with faces like mine, some crippled, some broken. Behind each was a spirit like the rising of the sun. It was a sight beyond joy and beyond dancing. Then a voice said to me it is the music that frays and breaks the string.

  17/6/78

  I must take what time I have to tell of the wonderful thing that happened last night after I had repeated my portion. I will write as quick as I can for in a little while I must ride my bike into Greenfield and see Mr Bell and Mr Goodchild and Mr Pedigree for this time I think he will agree to go with me. Last night I thought there was work to do; and I in a way held out the warmth of my person to the spirits and they drew me gently into their presence. The elder in the red robe with a crown and the elder with the blue robe and a coronet was waiting and greeted me kindly. I thanked them for their care of me and hoped for their continued friendship. I thanked them in particular for the years in which they did away in me with the root of a temptation which now of course I am able to see for the small thing it is. When I told them this they brightened wonderfully so that it dazzled my eyes. They showed: We saw how you gazed on the daughters of men and found them fair. I asked them about Miss Stanhope and the sign of her dropping her ring and confessed that I could not see what it meant. Then they showed: All this is hidden from us. Many years ago we called her before us but she did not come.

  I had been standing outside the harness room looking up at the sky, but now I went into my bedroom and sat on the edge of the bed. It is difficult my dear, dear boy, to write of what happened after that because of the strangeness and greatness. At once the elders drew me to them. They showed: Now we have answered your questions we will add to your information so that it overflows. The cry that went up to heaven brought you down. Now there is a great spirit that shall stand behind the being of the child you are guarding. That is what you are for. You are to be a burnt offering. Now we shall introduce you to a friend of ours and we shall eat and drink with you.

  Although I am now accustomed to them and know my spiritual name and indeed do not go cold when they call me, yet this news was like being in a lower part of heaven as I may say and it made me cold all over again like that time (17/5/65) and all the hair on my person stood up, each on a separate lump. But when every bit of warmth had gone out from me I saw their friend standing between them. He was dressed all in white and with the circle of the sun round his head. The red and blue elders took off their crowns and threw them down and I took off mine and threw it down. I was in great awe of the spirit in white but the red elder showed: This is the spiritual being who shall stand behind the child you are guarding. That child shall bring the spiritual language into the world and nation shall speak it unto nation. When I heard this, my head lowered before them I had such joy for men that the tears fell out of my eyes on the table. Then, still with my eyes lowered I made them welcome at my small table where there seemed to be room. Then the blue elder showed: There is joy in all the heavens today because the like of this meeting has not been seen since the days of Abraham. Then I offered them spiritual food and drink which they accepted. When this was done I had a great desire to sacrifice and asked what I should do and what they now wanted. The red spirit showed: We want nothing but to visit with you and to rejoice with you since you are one of us. And since you are an elder we will share that wisdom with you which though still in the body you ought to have. They did not do this by showing the great book but by a most wonderful opening which even if it was a thing I was able to do it would not be lawful to describe.

  All this while the white spirit with the circle of the sun round his head sat across the table from me and after my first being able to see him I had not dared to raise my eyes to his face. Now, because of the glory of the opening and because they had called him their friend and mine I did raise my eyes to his face and the sword proceeded out of his mouth and struck me through the heart with a terrible pain so that as I found out later, I fainted and fell forward across the table. When I woke up again they had put me from them, and

  The village clock struck from the church tower. Matty started up from his small table. He shut the exercise book and put it away in the chest of drawers. He hurried down to the harness room and seized his bike from where it leaned against the wall. He drew in his breath with a hiss. The back tyre was flat. He heaved the machine over and stood it on the saddle and handlebars. He hurried to the tap, filled a bucket with water and began to pull out the inner tyre, plunging it under water to find where the puncture was.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Ruth shook her head, smiling. Sim spread his hands in the gesture unconsciously imitated from his grandfather.

  “But I want you to come! I wish you’d come! You’ve never objected to making a fool of yourself with me before!”

  She said nothing but went on smiling. Sim passed a hand over his baldness.

  “You always admired Stanhope—”

  “Nonsense!”

  “Well—women did—”

  “I’m not ‘women’.”

  “But I do wish you’d come. Is it too late in the evening?”

  Silence again.

  “Is it Pedigree?”

  “Go along, dear. Have a good time.”

  “That’s hardly—”

  “Well. A successful meeting.”

  “Edwina’s coming.”

  “Has she said so?”

  “Edwin’s asking her.”

  “Give her my love if she’s there.”

  It was a week after the first meeting, and the curious man’s free afternoon again. What canvassing Sim had been able to do had produced no result—three refusals and one ‘might come’ which clearly covered the intention not to. Sim thought ruefully that perhaps it might be worth sending a notice of the demise of the Philosoph
ical Society to be inserted in the Greenfield Advertiser among the births and deaths. He was still working out the wording of the notice when he reached the hall of Sprawson’s. Edwin was standing on the bottom step of his stairs.

  “Where’s Ruth?”

  “Where’s Edwina?”

  Then there was another silence. Sim broke it.

  “Pedigree.”

  “I know.”

  “It’s Pedigree. He’s why they won’t come. Not even Ruth.”

  “Oh yes. Yes. Edwina would have come in any other circumstances you know.”

  “So would Ruth.”

  “She’s really a deeply liberal person you know. Only Pedigree—”

  “Ruth’s the most truly charitable person I know. Charity in its true sense, Greek sense.”

  “Of course. It was the business over the babies in prams you know. The cruelty to the young mothers. The deliberate psychological torture. She felt so deeply. She said once she’d have castrated him with her own hands if she’d caught him in flagrante delicto.”

  “She didn’t say flagrante delicto!”

  “She said assaulting a child. Pushing a pram away with a baby in it can be construed as an assault.”

  “I thought she meant—”

  “Oh no. She wouldn’t talk about that would she? I mean she’s widely and deeply experienced but there are some things—”

  “I remember when she talked about castrating, Ruth agreed with her. Warmly.”

  Edwin glanced at his watch.

  “They’re a little late. Shall we go on?”

  “After you.”

  Softly they descended the steps and trod, almost on tiptoe, down the garden path and into the courtyard under the stables. Edwin switched on the light at the bottom of the stairs; and there was a sudden, startled movement in the room at their heads. Sim expected to see Pedigree after all, when he got to the upper level, but it was Sophy, standing by the divan on which she had been sitting and looking, he thought at once, white and strained. But Edwin went straight into action.

  “My dear Sophy what a pleasure! How are you? Sitting in the dark? But I’m so sorry—oh dear! Your father you see, he told us we could—”

  The girl put her hand up to the curls at the back of her head then took it away again. She was wearing the white sweatshirt with BUY ME stencilled on the front and really, thought Sim, nothing else under it, nothing else whatever, so that—

  “We’ll go away Sophy dear. Your father must have made a mistake. He told us we could have the room for a meeting of—but how silly! I mean it sounds silly and of course you wouldn’t want—”

  Then they were all three silent and standing. The single, naked bulb made a black shadow under each nose. Even Sophy looked monstrous, huge, black eye-hollows and the Hitlerian moustache of shadow caught by the light under her nostrils. Sweatshirt, jeans, flip-flops; and surely, some sort of cap? A knitted cap back there, hidden by the curls.

  She glanced away from them at shopping bags, plastic ones, leaning against each other on the end of the divan. She touched her hair again, licked her lips and then looked back at Edwin.

  “Meeting? You said something about a meeting—”

  “Just a silly mistake. Your father, my dear. Sim, d’you think he was pulling our legs? ‘Putting us on’ I think you’d say, Sophy, according to my latest information. But you’ve come home to stay, of course. We’ll go to the hall and intercept the others.”

  “Oh no! No! Daddy didn’t make a mistake. I’m just going, you see. I’d turned out the light. You can have the place and welcome. Look—just a moment—”

  Quickly she moved about the room, switched on a table lamp under the dormer, a table lamp with a pink and bobbled shade. She flicked off the single, naked bulb and the hideous shadows were wiped from her face to be replaced by a rosy and upward glow; and she glowed at them both.

  “There! My goodness me! That dreadful top light! Toni used to call it—But I’m glad to see you! It’ll be one of your meetings won’t it? Make yourselves at home.”

  “Aren’t you taking your, your shopping bags?”

  “Those? Oh no! I’m leaving everything! Oh yes indeed! You’ve no idea. I shan’t want any of the stores tonight. Too boring. Just let me put the things out of the way for you—”

  Astonished, Sim stared at her face in its rosy glow and could not believe that the smile owed everything to the lamp. She was highly excited—and there, flash from an eye as if it were phosphorescent—and she seemed full of, full of purpose. At once his mind jumped to the usual, dreary conclusion. Sex, of course. An assignation. Interrupted. The really courteous thing, the understanding thing would be to—

  But Edwin was talking.

  “Au revoir then Sophy dear. Let us see something of you won’t you? Or let us hear of you.”

  “Oh yes. My goodness me.”

  She had got her shoulder bag and slung it; was sidling round them.

  “Remember me to Mrs Bell won’t you? And Mrs Goodchild?”

  Glow of a smile and then the girl gone away down the stairs, rosy glow left behind, suggestive and empty. They heard the door out to the towpath open, then close. Sim cleared his throat, sank into one of the chairs by the table and looked round him.

  “I suppose they call this Brothel Pink.”

  “I hadn’t heard. No.”

  Edwin sat down too. They were silent for a while. Sim inspected the cardboard box that lay beneath the other dormer. It was full of tinned food, as far as he could see. There was a coil of rope on it.

  Edwin had seen it too.

  “She must have been going camping. I hope we haven’t—”

  “Of course not. She has a young man you know. In fact—”

  “Edwina’s seen her with two young men. At different times, I mean.”

  “I saw one. Oldish, I thought, for her.”

  “Edwina said she thought he had a married look about him. The other one she said was younger, much more suitable she said. I mean Edwina’s the last person in the world to spread scandal but she said she couldn’t help noticing it going on under her nose.”

  “Dreary. It makes me feel dreary.”

  “You are such a moral old thing, Sim! Moralistic.”

  “It makes me feel dreary because I’m not young and with two young men. Well. Two young women.”

  Then there was silence again. Glancing at Edwin, Sim saw how the feminine lamp was providing him with a delicacy and smiling mouth that he had not got. Perhaps for me too. Here we are, dreary, and with smiles painted on our faces, waiting for—waiting, waiting, waiting. Like the man said.

  “They’re very late.”

  Edwin spoke absently.

  “‘Having if off’ they call it nowadays.”

  He looked quickly back at Sim and perhaps there was a little more intensity under the glow.

  “I mean one hears these things. The boys, you see, and then, one reads—”

  “‘Getting laid’. Is that American?”

  “Incredible isn’t it, what you hear? Even on the box!”

  Silence again. Then—

  “Edwin—we’ll need another chair. Four of us.”

  “There were four chairs last time. Where is it?”

  Edwin got up and wandered round the room, peering into corners as if the fourth chair had become not absent but merely less visible and could be seen if you looked closely.

  “This used to be their toy-cupboard. I remember when Edwina and I came to tea they showed us every doll—extraordinary the names they had and the stories about them—you know, Sim, there’s genius in those girls. Creativity. I don’t just mean intelligence. Real, precious creativity. I wonder if their dolls—”

  He reached out and opened the cupboard door.

  “How very odd!”

  “What’s odd about keeping dolls in a cupboard?”

  “Nothing. But—”

  The fourth chair was placed in the centre of the cupboard, facing outward. There were lengths of rope at
tached to it, to the back and to the legs. Each rope had had the end carefully fused to stop it unravelling.

  “Well!”

  Edwin shut the door again, came back, laid hold of the table.

  “Help me, Sim, please. We’ll have to use the divan for the fourth man. Though I must say it won’t seem quite, quite seancelike, will it? Takes me right back to the dolls’ tea party. I told you about it didn’t I?”

  “Yes.”

  “But heaven only knows what she was doing with a chair like that and ropes and things.”

  “Edwin.”

  “Yes?”

  “Listen carefully. Before the others come. We’ve stumbled on something, you see. We’ve no business to have seen that chair.”

  “What harm—”

  “Listen. It’s sex. Don’t you understand? Bondage. Sexual games, private and, and shaming.”

  “Good God!”

  “Before the others come. It’s the least I—we—can do. We, you and I must never never never let on, never by the faintest breath—Remember how startled she was when we switched the light on and then when she saw who we were—she was there in the dark, waiting for someone or perhaps getting things ready for someone—and now she’s gone away thinking, Oh God I hope to God they don’t ever think to open that cupboard—”

  “Good God!”

  “So we must never—”

  “Oh but I wouldn’t—except to Edwina of course!”

  “I mean after all—there but for the grace of God—I mean. After all, we all, I mean.”

  “What d’you mean?”

  “I mean.”