The Condition of Muzak (5 page)

“Father Jeremiah.” She gestured for him to precede her while she supervised the tender young novice locking the gate. They followed single-file behind him as he headed through the side exit and onto a gravel path, making for the main building, smelling the air, admiring the blooms and the well-kept lawns, the peculiar, ingrown dwarf elms. He was not sure but he thought he heard, somewhere in the chapel on his left, the second part of Messiaen’s
Turangalîla Symphony
. He pressed his head against his collar and cut off The Beatles, looking enquiringly back at the Mother Superior. “A record?”

“Oh, no!” The Mother Superior was amused. Behind her the soft little novice giggled.

They reached the main building and climbed steps into quiet passages, arriving at last at the second floor and the Mother Superior’s office which looked out onto the garden. It seemed to Jerry, surreptitiously sniffing the air, that the infirmary was nearby. At her desk the Mother Superior lowered herself into her high-backed Windsor chair, signing for Jerry to sit in the chair’s twin facing her. “It is a very great pleasure to see you again, Father Jeremiah. You are looking well.”

“And you, too, Sister Eugenia. Congratulations on your appointment…”

“I pray that I will fulfil…”

“… there can be no question…”

“You are kind. It seems such a short time since you took confession at Harrogate. How greatly our lives have changed! Your own responsibilities…”

He dismissed them. “I’m very grateful for what you’ve been able to do.”

“The poor child. I was glad to help. She’s perfectly safe here and will be until—?”

“Eventually, of course, it will be possible for her to leave.”

“How is Father—?”

“We no longer communicate, I fear. But I hear he is in good health. In France.”

“He has similar duties to your own, then? There were rumours of dissolution…”

“Nobody’s perfect.”

She was full of sympathy. It was almost as if she restrained herself from reaching across the desk and touching his hand. “The burden…” she murmured.

“It’s born of joy.”

Her eyes shone. “You have a vocation.”

“I’m due for one. I hope so.”

“Oh, you have!” Her smooth features were radiant. “You’re an inspiration to us all.”

He accepted this with modest dignity.

She reached into a desk drawer and produced a ledger. “I regret the formality.” She found the appropriate page and offered him the book. He removed a large Mont Blanc fountain pen from his inside breast pocket and signed his name and title in full, giving his usual tasteless flourish to the initials S. and J. She looked with pleasure upon the signature for a moment before putting the book away. She took some keys from the desk. “These are such dangerous times. You risk so much in coming.”

“I gain much.” Once again he heard the sound of music. This time they were playing Schoenberg’s
Pierrot Lunaire
.

“You’re too kind.”

They left the office, passed the infirmary, descended three flights of steps. Jerry realised, by the artificial lighting, that they were under ground. This passage, with its stout doors at regular intervals on both sides, all painted the same olive green, was much colder. The Mother Superior stopped at the end of the passage, the last door. She unlocked it. “I’ll leave you with her. She needs your help. I am so glad…”

“Thank you.”

“When shall I…?”

“In two hours.”

“Very well.” Another admiring, insinuating smile and she had departed. Jerry pushed the door open.

His sister Catherine looked up from her iron-frame bed. A little daylight entered the cell from a small window near the roof, a single exquisite ray, but she had been reading with the help of an electric lamp, its 40-watt bulb shielded by a shade of green glass. She looked much better than when he had last seen her. Her hair was pure blonde again and her skin was rosy. She was wearing her shift and she automatically reached for her white habit, hanging over the chair beside the bed, before she grinned and dropped her hand. She spread her arms wide. He closed the door and bolted it. He stood over her, grinning down, all his lost innocence momentarily restored.

“You don’t half look sinister,” she said. “What are you playing at today?”

“I’m the tortured priest, aren’t I?” With a flourish he removed his shades.

“Did you come to add another sin or two to your conscience?”

He sat down beside her. He hugged her warm, yielding body. “You’ve really improved.”

“I couldn’t have had a nicer rest. You told them I had amnesia?”

“To save explanations. Anyway, I was right, in some ways.” He bent away from her, studying her face. “Not a bad resurrection job, though I say it myself.”

She frowned. “I’m steering clear of hard drugs in the future. It’s taught me a lesson. Nothing stronger than coke from now on.”

“I think you’re wise.”

She stroked his hair. “No. You’re the wise one. What a lovely pink suit. Omniscient old Jerry.”

“Don’t say that. You’ll bring all my anxieties back.” He removed his jacket and threw it on top of her habit, leaning across the bed so that he was resting against the wall. “I must say I envy you the peace and quiet.”

“You’ve never liked peace and quiet.”

“I envy it, all the same.” He stroked her right breast through the coarse linen of her shift. She seemed unusually disturbed. “Is anything wrong?”

She held his hand against her breast. “I was wondering why you sent that other bloke along to see me. He didn’t look like one of your usual friends.”

“I didn’t send another bloke.”

Her lovely shoulders slumped. “The gaff’s blown, then. Frank will know where I am now.”

“Blokes aren’t normally allowed in at all. What did he look like? How did he get in?”

“Fat and oily. Purple shirt. Gaiters. Dog-collar. Definitely clerical gear. Plummy voice. Apparently he was surveying the place for some reason. He knew me. So I realised…”

“Beesley?”

“That’s the name.”

“Sod.” Jerry sighed as he drew off his pink tweed trousers and folded them over the back of the chair. “You’re right, Cath. He’s Frank’s mate. The Bishop of North Kensington. Though how he managed to get to see you is still a mystery.”

“Pulled strings.” She removed her shift and handed it to him as he unbuttoned his waistcoat. Absent-mindedly he held the shift in one hand and unstrapped his shoulder holster. He put everything in a bundle on the chair and began to remove his shirt and tie, then his socks and underpants. He drew trim brows together. “He’s good at pulling strings.”

Jerry paused, hands on hips, trying to order his thoughts. Then he glanced up, noticing that her expression had changed to one of open astonishment. Her wide blue eyes stared at his lower torso.

“What’s the matter?” he asked her.

“When on earth did you get yourself circumcised?”

In puzzlement he fingered his penis. Vaguely he shook his head, grinning. He shrugged, dismissing the problem as he squeezed in beside her. She switched off the light. The ray of sunshine, like the light from some new-found grail, fell upon their heads. He took her bottom in both his large hands. “You’re not the only one prone to amnesia, you know.”

The gate of the convent closed behind him and Jerry adjusted his eyes to the light, resuming his shades, making for his Duesenberg. As he had half-expected, Frank was sitting in the back seat. “Watcher, Jerry. Long time no see.” He grinned through the wound-down window, his drug-ravaged lips twisting in peculiar directions. “Your education’s certainly coming in useful, these days.”

Jerry sighed. He looked down at Frank. “What are you doing here?”

“I was just passing, recognised the motor, thought I’d give you a surprise.”

“It’s no surprise. I already know your mucker’s been in the convent.”

“Oh, really? I haven’t seen Dennis for ages.”

“Get out of my car,” said Jerry. “You’re coming to bits all over the upholstery. You used to be such a nice young man, too.”

“I’m a martyr to science, that’s my trouble. I abandoned a lucrative profession in the property business in order to further my researches and thus become a slave to tempodex.” Frank’s skin twitched all over. Then, as Jerry watched, he changed to the colour of grey flannel. Frank had always had a penchant towards respectability. “I feel sick.”

Jerry opened the door and bundled his brother to the pavement.

Frank went to lean with one hand against the convent wall. “Come on, Jerry. Blood’s thicker than water.”

“Not in your case. There’s no need for you to be out on the street. You’ve got a home to go to. Several.”

“I’m having an identity crisis. How’s Catherine?”

“Much better.”

“Better? That’s funny.” Frank pulled his cracked plastic flying jacket around his shivering chest. His horrid head lifted like a pointer on the scent. His eyes glazed but seemed to fix on an invisible target. He began, stiff-legged, to walk in the general direction of Lancaster Road. “Well, see you around, Jerry. Got to—um…”

Jerry sank into his car and watched Frank march like a zombie across Ladbroke Grove and into the Kensington Park Hotel. The KPH had not been used as a hotel for some years and was now merely a large pub. Surely Frank hadn’t come down to scoring from dealers in public houses? Jerry felt that his family pride was under attack but he resisted the urge to follow. Probably the KPH was no more than one of Frank’s bolt-holes. Doubtless it led somewhere else.

At this, Jerry became suspicious. He recalled a rumour he had heard from a fourteen-year-old biker speed freak who had given him a lift when his Phantom had been shot up by local vigilantes just outside Birmingham. According to the biker there was at least one ancient tunnel running under Ladbroke Grove from the Convent of the Poor Clares. The tunnel, the speed freak had told him, led into all sorts of other dimensions. It was a familiar rumour. A family legend hinted at something similar. Jerry had paid the story very little attention; he had been only too glad that a little romance was coming back into the lives of the younger generation. But now he recalled Bishop Beesley’s excuse for visiting the convent. Something about a survey. Perhaps Beesley had had a double purpose for going there.

Jerry stepped out of the Duesenberg with the intention of ringing the bell of the convent but then changed his mind. He had already tipped off Catherine and there was not much else he could do until he found a new hideout for her, at least until her amnesia was completely cleared up.

He returned to the driving seat, started the car, reversed into Ladbroke Grove, drove as far as the KPH, stopped and got out. He entered the pub. Frank was there, talking to a couple of undersized girls who, by the look of their skins and eyes, had been helping him in his experiments. Even as Jerry came in he saw Frank stoop and kiss one of the girls full on the mouth, seeming to suck the last of her substance from her. Now she was in pretty much the condition in which Frank had been a moment or two ago. She stumbled towards the door marked Toilets and disappeared. Frank wiped his mouth and grinned. “Hello, Jerry. What are you having?” He put a seedy elbow on the damp bar and attracted the landlord. “Sid!” Through the gloom came service.

“I thought you might want a lift,” said Jerry.

“I’ve just had one. Two pints, please, Sid,” said Frank. “Could you manage to get these, Jerry?”

Jerry put a ten-pound note into the pool of alcohol on the greasy counter. “You know I don’t drink beer.”

“It’s for Maureen.” Frank winked at the remaining grey girl. The beer arrived and Frank handed over his brother’s money. “You can have Barbara, if you like. When she comes back from the lavatory.”

“Well,” said Jerry. “Don’t you want a lift, then?”

“How far would you be going?”

“How far do you want to go?”

“Get you!” said Frank. “France?”

“Don’t be silly.”

“I was thinking of taking up residence in the old place. The Le Corbusier château. There’s a lot of ideas I’ve got. Following in Father’s footsteps, following the dear old dad. There again I could open it to the public.”

Jerry shuddered. “It’s not a real Le Corbusier château.”

Frank shrugged. “There’s no need to be so fucking literal-minded, Jerry.”

“I’ll take you as far as Dover, if you like.”

Frank’s eyes narrowed. Mucus seemed to squeeze from the corners. Red irises shifted in decaying sockets. “I wasn’t thinking of leaving for a day or so.”

Jerry folded his arms. “It’s now or never.”

“You’re right.” Frank looked vaguely around for a clock. “It always bloody is.”

They had reached a compromise. Dropping his brother off at the Army & Navy Club near Waterloo Station, wondering when Frank would try to get hold of Catherine, Jerry drove back to his house in Holland Park Avenue. Frank would almost certainly act in the next couple of days: he ran in old grooves; he would want to take Catherine with him to France. Jerry couldn’t blame him. The weather was perfect. There was, in fact, something remarkable about the whole season. He had never known the world so fresh. Jerry smacked his lips.

London was alive with flowers; gigantic hydrangeas and chrysanthemums, monstrous carnations, vast tulips and looming daffodils; sweet williams, peonies, cornflowers, snapdragons, hollyhocks, foxgloves; their scent hung like vapour in the beautiful air. And people were wearing such pretty clothes, listening to such jolly music; the first ecstatic flush of a culture about to swoon, at last, into magnificent decadence, an orgy of mutual understanding, kindness, tolerance and a refusal to maim or kill. Jerry turned on the Duesenberg’s stereo and got Jimi Hendrix singing ‘Waterfall’. He leaned back, a casual hand on the wheel. The Dubrovnik disease certainly had its compensations. It was all a matter of how you looked at things. As he entered Hyde Park he found other signs of the improving times as gangs of men and women in bright blue municipal uniforms dismantled the gallows on either side of the road. He reached towards the spring-clip on the dashboard and removed the half-full paper cup, swallowing a snazzy fifth of Glen Nevis to unclog the jam of uppers and downers in his throat. For a moment he had an urge to turn back the way he had come and shoot a few pins in Emmett’s but decided, after all, to go home. He had to do something about his head lice.