Geoff Nicholson - Still life with Volkswagens

Inside Carlton Bax’s gentleman’s residence, Marilyn Lederer pours herself another whisky and lemonade. It is the latest in a long series and she doesn’t expect that series to end for a while yet. The drink tastes sweet and harmless but is nevertheless numbing, though not quite as numbing as she would like. She still feels so unhappy. She feels so lost and alone and on the margins. She doesn’t see how things could possibly get any worse, and yet things are about to.

Behind the house, in a spot without street lamps, a red van draws up. An old man gets out, thanks the driver for the lift and the van drives away. It wasn’t so difficult to find this place. The magazine article gave a number of clues, but if it had taken forever he would still have got here.

The old man walks up to th& high garden wall that surrounds the property and attempts to climb it. The would-be intruder is, of course, Marilyn’s father, but he is weak and weary and the walls are designed specifically to prevent people climbing them. He investigates the walls for a long time, looking for some other means of entrance. It looks completely hopeless but then he sees something that stirs his blood, something that makes him very angry, and yet something that seems almost magically ordained.

As he watches, a black Volkswagen Beetle draws up outside the locked, wrought iron security gate of the house. It is Barry Osgathorpe in Enlightenment. Barry gets out of the car and pulls the metal knob that rings the bell next to the gate. As he does so he is watched by a security camera which transmits his image to a monitor screen in the hall of the house. Upon hearing the bell Marilyn gets up, staggers a little, and goes to inspect the screen. She feels neither optimistic nor pessimistic. By now she feels that nothing, no phone call, no sudden discovery, no unexpected arrival, can possibly make any difference to her. She sees that it’s Barry ringing the bell. Even that doesn’t particularly surprise her and it certainly doesn’t appear to promise anything. Indifferently, she presses the button that opens the gate to let him in.

Barry gets in Enlightenment and drives into the grounds, but in the brief moment before the gate automatically closes, Charles Lederer sees his chance. He makes a dash for the gate and, unseen in the darkness, just manages to slip in before it clangs shut and electronically locks itself again. He stands in the garden, breathing heavily, and decides to hide in the bushes until the time is exactly right.

Meanwhile, not so very far away, eight more or less identical Volkswagen Beetles, each of them modelled on Enlightenment, are en route to Carlton Bax’s gentleman’s residence. The eight skinhead drivers plough their fierce, lonely furrow through the mean night streets, travelling in V-formation when they can, working to a firm, well thought-out and extremely vicious plan.

Barry parks neatly outside the front door of Carlton Bax’s gentleman’s residence, although, of course, he doesn’t know it is Carlton Bax’s, Marilyn hasn’t told him that. He simply thinks that Marilyn must have some very rich friends indeed; but then that is no great surprise. He bounds out of his car, his heart fit to burst with love and enthusiasm for Marilyn. She has left the door unlocked and he takes that to be a good, welcoming sign. “Marilyn!” he calls cheerily as he enters, but there’s no reply. He goes into the living room and there she is, drunk, bare-foot, bleary-eyed, her legs splayed, her hair all messed up. She has never looked lovelier to Barry.

However, even Marilyn’s presence cannot distract him from the strangeness of this house. Even a cursory glance at the hall shows that the place is littered with Volkswagen treasures, and that seems very strange indeed. He would question her about this but she gives him no opportunity.

“Oh where have you been my blue-eyed son?” she says, being more or less incoherent by now. “Oh where have you been my darling young one?”

Barry doesn’t catch the reference, but he’s rather pleased that she’s calling him darling.

“I’ve been all over the place,” he says, “but my heart’s always been right here.”

“Oh dear. I don’t suppose you found my father?”

“No, but I found something more important.”

“What’s that?”

“I found my heart’s desire.”

“Well, that must be very nice for you.”

“It is. Because I’ve found you.”

“No you haven’t Barry. Really you haven’t.”

“What do you mean?”

“Isn’t it obvious what I mean? This house, this whole arrangement.”

Well no, it isn’t, and then Barry sees a console table at the foot of the stairs on which is a framed photograph. It shows Marilyn and some stranger, an older man, and they’re standing beside an extremely exotic looking Beetle. They’re holding hands and they’re gazing into each other’s eyes. They seem to Barry to be nauseatingly fond of each other.

“Are you trying to tell me something?” he says.

“Oh Barry, don’t be so thick.”

Barry doesn’t understand, doesn’t even want to. He can’t believe that his love is going to be spurned like this. He would like the chance to discuss this with her at greater length, to state his case, to melt her heart. However, it never happens. There are suddenly noises off; footsteps, a scrabbling, breaking glass, some coughing and grunting. Then the door to the living room is thrown open and Charles Lederer stands before them. No longer weak and weary he now looks wild and mad as hell. His hair has grown back a little but not uniformly, and its patchiness adds to his demented look. The eyes are raging, the chin is jutting forwards nobly, and there is a definite mushy drool trickling down from the corners of the mouth. Most alarming of all, he is armed with the chrome bumper from a 1952 American specification Beetle. It has all manner of sharp points and hard edges and he’s waving it around menacingly, the menace being all the greater because he is so unfocused and uncoordinated.

“Oh Dad,” says Marilyn joyously, and without thinking she runs to embrace him.

“Keep away!” he shouts and she stops in her tracks.

“But what’s wrong?” she asks.

“My daughter!” he shouts. “And my worst enemy, here together plotting against me.”

“No Dad,” says Marilyn. “Barry isn’t your enemy, and we’re not plotting against you. We’re on your side.”

He doesn’t like the sound of that at all. He thrashes the bumper savagely against the glass front of a wall cabinet containing rare tin plate Beetles. Glass splinters and pieces of dented metal spew from the cabinet. Charles Lederer wants it to be known that he means business. Marilyn and Barry get his message and edge away, but Marilyn still wants to be placatory.

“We’ve been looking for you,” she says.

“Oh really?” Charles Lederer says with unbelieving disdain.

“Well, Barry here has at any rate.”

“And now he’s found me,” snarls Lederer.

“Yes,” says Barry. “It’s quite a Zen thing really. You go on a long voyage looking for something or someone, but only after you’ve abandoned the search do you find it.”

“Shut up,” says Lederer.

“Okay,” says Barry, and he shuts up.

Charles Lederer turns towards his daughter, and asks, “Why were looking for me?”

“Because I love you Dad. I knew you were out there lost and alone and I wanted you to come home. Also I didn’t want you blowing up any more Volkswagens.”

Charles Lederer looks uncomprehending. A part of him would like to believe that his daughter still loves and cares for him, but in that case why is she standing in a room full of Volkswagen tat conspiring with his arch enemy? He circles the room, looking at all the Volkswagen memorabilia on the walls and in the glass cases, and it’s as though he’s walked into the jaws of hell.