Nowhere Near Milkwood (10 page)

Tony Smith entered the smoky pub and made his way to the stage. As he passed the bar, Old Bony thrust a whisky sour into his hand and winked. Tony took his guitar out of its battered case, plugged in and tuned up. He was vaguely aware of the admiration of the crowd, their love. “Right boys, what’ll it be?”

“How about ‘Clotted Cream’?”

“Nope. Let’s make it ‘Samarkand’.” He nodded to the other musicians on the stage, the drummer, the hook-nosed bassist. They were all looking distinctly uncomfortable. It was probably the first time they had ever played with a living legend.

As his fingers eased into the prelude, tickling the melody through all the complex time changes, Tony allowed himself the luxury of a sigh. His superiority was beginning to tire him. He was beginning to wish, just for once, that he would meet his match. But that, of course, was impossible.

The musicians fell behind and he waited patiently for them to catch up, improvising on a former theme, his fingers a blur, his guitar the interface for a talent that was strong yet yielding. Though he could play faster than the eye could see, he never sacrificed delicacy of nuance for sheer technique.

“No doubt ‘bout it! Tony Smith is the king of jazz!”

With the faintest of smiles, Tony nodded at Old Bony. This night was a free for all, a time when the cream of the local talent could show off their skills, stepping up on stage and dropping in or out of the performance whenever mood, or ability, suited them. Tony recognised many familiar faces in the audience. Most had brought instruments with them. None could hope to compete with him on equal terms.

Throwing up his arms, the alto sax left the stage and sat down on a stool near the bar. He was shaking his head, his eyes alight with unfathomable awe. His place was taken by a more experienced musician, who also struggled with the rhythms Tony had initiated. One by one, the drums, bass and keyboards lost themselves in his web of shimmering sonorities and modal harmonies.

“Come on boys, let’s try ‘Purple Egg Head’.” Tony attempted to inflect a note of enthusiasm into his voice, but it was a lost cause. Although he was the greatest jazz musician in the world, the most loved guitarist of all time, he had a problem. It was a problem that made the problems of other musicians seem insignificant. He had sold his soul to the devil.

It was the old, old story. Fifteen years previously, he had signed a diabolical pact in his own blood. The devil had promised to make him the best jazz musician in the world on condition that, after twenty years, he would give up his soul with the minimum of fuss. It had seemed a good idea at the time.

Almost immediately, Tony had found himself catapulted from semi-professional status to international renown. He had, in quick succession, conquered every possible style of jazz. He had taken trad, bebop, cool, fusion and even avant-garde to their logical extremes. Success, of course, had not brought happiness. But happiness was not a term of the contract.

At the end of the number, he instantly launched into another. “‘Fleshpots’,” he announced. The other musicians were sweating heavily. They were all duly replaced by a fresh batch. Once again, Tony calmly proceeded to blow them all off the stage. “‘Pelican’,” he cried, and then, “‘Cryptozoology’.”

Utterly exhausted, the musicians came and went. Tony alone remained the constant factor. He wrestled with trombones, cornets, marimbas, all manner of keyboards, flutes and even a rival guitar. His phenomenal ability swamped them all.

It was at the end of ‘Nonchalant Pygmies’, one of his most famous compositions, that a quiet auburn haired girl stepped onto the stage with a large case. Tony frowned. He had not noticed her in the audience. He watched as she removed a long peculiar trumpet from her case, wiped it down with a cloth and moved toward a microphone. “How about ‘Visitin’ Angels’?” he said.

The girl shook her head. “Not quite. This one’s called ‘Judgment Day’. Just follow me if you don’t know it.” She raised the instrument to her lips. In the dim light of the pub it glowed with preternatural brightness.

“Never heard of it. And what kind of horn is that?” But the girl had already launched into the number, blowing a handful of notes of such unearthly beauty that he reeled backward. “Eh?” With a great deal of effort, he composed himself and followed her.

A hush fell over the packed pub. Even Old Bony stopped stamping and clapping. Tony suddenly realised that he was alone on stage with this newcomer. The others had tactfully withdrawn. As the tempo of her blowing increased, he struggled to keep pace. A surge of energy flooded his veins and his fingers took on a life of their own. He already knew he was playing better than ever before. But still the girl kept ahead of him, bouncing a melody of exquisite sadness back at him, bending his own desperate variations through impossible contortions.

He sobbed. She was leading him into musical dimensions he had never suspected could exist. He threw everything at her, changing key again and again, altering the time signature with every note so that the whole took on its own supernal logic; but she swallowed it all up with the mouth of her horn and blew it out again, transmuted into something even more revelatory.

As if in a dream, he looked down at his fretboard. His fingers were bleeding. With a wrenching gasp, he struck a discord, another, and then it was all over. He gave up and watched with a curious mixture of horror and fascination as the girl finished the piece, sending a series of utterly perfect notes over the edge of the sound spectrum, shattering every glass behind the bar in an inevitable, apocalyptic crash.

There was a deathly silence. Old Bony wiped his hands free of glass shards and foamy beer and whistled slowly through his teeth. “Tony Smith is no longer the king of jazz!”

Head bowed, Tony unplugged his guitar, placed it back in his case and hoisted the case onto his shoulder. When he looked up, the girl had disappeared. He stepped off the stage and made his way toward the exit. No-one tried to stop him.

Out on the waterfront, he paused and breathed the cold, pure air. He felt a strange mixture of emotions. He was pleased that he had finally met his superior. And yet, he was also worried. What would happen to his reputation now? Had he lost his soul for nothing?

As he walked deeper into the night, he saw that the mysterious girl was waiting for him. “Well!” he said, trying to sound as casual as possible. “I’d take my hat off to you if I had one. You’re a fine player, to be sure. I thought you were an angel in disguise at one point!”

The girl brushed the auburn hair back from her face. “The opposite is closer to the truth. I’m more familiar with the other place. To put it bluntly, I’ve sold my soul to the devil in order to become the greatest jazz musician in the world.”

“But that’s what I sold mine for!” Tony blinked in surprise.

“I know. Let me explain. I’ve followed your career ever since it began. It always struck me that your talent was too vast to be natural. I guessed you might have made a pact with the devil. So I did the same. I said to the devil, ‘I want to become a greater jazz musician than Tony Smith’. And he accepted my offer. I did it to save your soul. Now that I am better than you, the terms of your contract have been violated. You can demand a refund.”

Before Tony could reply, the girl started to cry. Suddenly he understood the import of her words.

“My poor dear!” Taking her around the shoulders, he hugged her close. For the first time in fifteen years he felt free. So the devil had been cheated after all! A great weight had been lifted from his shoulders. He found it hard to repress his delight. He matched her tears of anguish with his own tears of joy. “Do you really mean it? Have you really sacrificed your own soul to save mine? Am I no longer destined to burn in Hell?”

The girl looked up. The tears stopped flowing. Tony drew back. She broke into a high pitched laugh. “Actually, I lied. You were right the first time. I’m an angel in disguise. The Archangel Gabriel, to be precise. And yes, you are going to burn in Hell after all. I’m not a mortal so the contract still holds. Sorry! Just a little joke of mine. Can’t help it, I’m afraid. What else am I supposed to do on my day off? Now don’t lose your temper. Just a little joke. Nothing to get upset about, eh?”

Later, as Tony left the waterfront, he began whistling. A new number had already come into his head. ‘Broken Angel Blues’ would surely help him regain his rightful place as the greatest jazz musician in the world. But would he ever be known as the king of jazz again? Perhaps it was time for a change. Slowly, he held up a long burnished trumpet and an auburn wig. He wondered.

The TALL STORY is one of the most cosmopolitan pubs in creation. Every night, men and women of a hundred different creeds and colours from all parts of the city mingle together as equals. The Docklands have always been a melting pot of cultures and its reputation for lawlessness is certainly undeserved. Hywel has always encouraged the local Somalis, Yemenis, Chinese, Poles, Greeks, Swedes, Scots, Indians and even the English to enjoy each other’s company and to exchange ideas.

He is even willing to serve students – one of the most mistrusted of all minorities. They often come in and treat themselves to a glass of cider – between ten. When they are feeling particularly flush, they will even splash out on a packet of crisps. Because they are disliked by so many, they make ideal scapegoats and the Government is able to grind them under the heel with few voices raised in protest. The poorest student who ever lived was called Michael, and the only thing he ever owned was a bad idea, but he doesn’t drink in this story.

Some of these students are young couples – filled with an idealism and enthusiasm that have long since abandoned Hywel and myself. They often sit by tables near the windows, arguing politics and philosophy and the merits of tinned vegetables. Hywel regards their colourful clothes, their scarves and books of bad poetry as a father might regard the toys of a favourite child.

“See those four over there?” he said to me one day. “Well I could tell many a tale about them that would make your hair stand on end! Some of the oddest tales I have ever heard!”

Business was quiet that evening. In front of the fire, the three climbers still rested their weary limbs, one of them shunned slightly by the other two. And there were only three writers present: James Joyce, Dylan Thomas and Gabriel García Márquez. They were engrossed in their own affairs, laughing and joking. There was also Dr Karl Mondaugen, the mad scientist of Munich, who was busy building a new machine from spent matches which he picked out of the ashtray.

Apart from these, there was a quartet of students, chatting by the window. I knew their names but had never spoken to any of them. I am less tolerant than Hywel (I foolishly believe that students have easy lives.) There was Claire and Peter Elliot and Anna and Gareth Thomas. I had heard that Peter was not a nice man; Gareth, on the other hand, was a friend of Billy Belay and had a reputation as a practical joker.

The girls were both quite shy and I knew very little about either. Hywel had hinted that Claire had already been married once – to Alan Griffiths. But it was Anna he wanted to talk about.

He said: “You would never guess, would you, that she is an expert on dragons? I mean, real fire-breathing dragons! Let me tell you how and why. Ever since she was little, she has been fascinated by stories of knights and dragons. You know the sort of thing: fierce dragon takes up residence in a cave and terrorises local village; village leaves a helpless maiden each year as a sacrifice to placate dragon; brave knight slays dragon and rescues maiden. Usually the knight then marries the maiden and they live happily ever after.”

“I know the type of story,” I replied. “The old tales of chivalry and heroism. St George and all that.”

“Exactly. But for Anna they were much more than mere stories. She believed implicitly in them. She amassed an enormous collection of books about the subject. Secretly, you see, she envied those maidens and wanted to be one. She wanted to be rescued by her very own handsome knight.”

I studied the group of students more closely. I was always amazed at how Hywel seemed to know so much about his patrons.

“But she ended up with Gareth instead?” I asked, innocently.

Hywel waved me aside. “Wait for it! Anyway, as I was saying, she longed to be a helpless maiden in peril, a damsel in distress if you like, and thought about little else. One day she was reading such a tale for the umpteenth time in an old story book – one of those collections of legends with illustrations on every page – when a voice spoke to her. Do you know what it said?”

I had to admit that I did not.

“Well it was a magic voice and it said something like this: ‘Anna, there are few of us left now and we need your assistance. Will you help us?’ And at the same time, the picture in the book came alive. It was the picture of a maiden chained to the entrance of a cave, watched over by anxious villagers. A dragon was emerging from the cave and, in the distance, a dashing knight was riding into view.”

“That seems a bit unlikely,” I muttered. “Are you sure this story is entirely accurate?”

Hywel ignored me. “As she watched breathlessly, the mystical voice continued. This time it said: ‘Anna, few people are willing to take our place and we desperately need volunteers.’ Although Anna couldn’t be sure, she was convinced it was the maiden who was talking. So she replied: ‘Yes, of course I will help you. Of course I will take your place.’ And she clapped her hands for joy.”

I mumbled and rapped my fingers doubtfully on the counter. But I knew better than to protest too vehemently at this stage. “So she was drawn into the picture and became a maiden?” I asked cynically. “And I suppose the knight rescued her and they were married?”

Hywel shook his head vigorously. “Not at all. She was drawn into the picture, sure enough, but when she looked down, it wasn’t the body of a maiden that she saw. Oh no!”

“What then?”

Hywel stamped his foot and roared with laughter. “Scales of course! It was the dragon who had spoken to her!”

This was too much even for me. I refused to join in Hywel’s mirth. Very soberly, I straightened my tie and replied calmly: “That is the most absurd tale you have ever told me. I simply refuse to believe it. If it really happened, then how come Anna is sitting over there now? I demand you tell a sensible story for once.”

Hywel was suitably chastened. “Would you like to hear about those other two and their disastrous trip to Ireland?”

I responded in the negative and gestured at the mountain climbers. “Tell me about those. Why are two of them so wary of the third?”

“Ah, the Three Friends! By all means, if you insist, but you may wish that I hadn’t afterward. Just a friendly warning.”

“Why?” I asked.

Hywel squinted up his eyes. “Wait and see,” he said menacingly. And those eyes twinkled.