Will Self - The Book of Dave

Luvvie Joolee Blunt lived in a two-room semi that had been built from the finest courses of London brick she could afford. Her dosh was of no use on Ham, and it was through an arrangement the Lawyer of Chil had made with Mister Greaves's predecessor that the Hamsters who were prepared to assist her were remitted in trade goods. Many a tincan and irony blade owed its presence on the island to her mournful requirements. Unable to fend for herself in any way, a distracted — and to the Hamsters' way of thinking — half-mad old boiler, she whiled her days away reading a breviary of the Book, embroidering oddments of cloth and staring out to sea. She had requested that her dwelling be erected as far from the manor as possible, and on the southern shore, so that she would not be reminded of the cruel expediency that had led to her long incarceration on Ham.

To the opares who came to cook her food, empty her slops and launder her peculiar garments — once garishly bright, now long since faded — Luvvie Joolee was not merely peculiar but incomprehensible. Her clipped Arpee, her abrupt gestures, her constant talk of a city that remained continually present to her yet was utterly unknown to them, struck them as craziness. She had allowed the stands of blisterweed to grow right up to the small yard of her dwelling, so fearful was she of the motos; and she remained within this poisonous thicket, growing older and more distracted by the year.

The Hamsters were hard pressed to say exactly how long she had resided on the island — for the concept of ordinal time was not strong in them. Carl's grandmother, Effi, had told him that she was a young mum when Luvvie Joolee landed on Ham, and they must be roughly the same age. Everyone knew why Luvvie Joolee had been exiled. She and her husband, the Lawyer of Blunt, had fallen foul of the PCO by living together, with their children, under the same roof. Their loathsome conduct was bandied about the town in decauxs and standards, until a gang of their own kinsmen took the law into their hands. They removed her to the docks and bundled her aboard a southbound ferry. For a time she was held in the Bouncy Castle at Chil, then, when her whereabouts became known to her husband, she was dispatched still further to Ham.

Effi Dévúsh also told Carl that during the early years of her exile Luvvie Joolee had appeared often in the village, ranting and raving about the injustices done to her, and trying to rouse the Hamsters in rebellion against the Lawyer of Chil. Eventually the old Hack, Mister Hurst, had made it clear to her that were she to continue, he would have no alternative but to return her to London for formal judgement. Understanding that this would mean torture, and very likely breaking upon the wheel, henceforth Luvvie Joolee withdrew into her troubled seclusion. When Antonë Böm arrived on Ham, under a cloud of a similar hue, he sought to gain her confidence. He knew members of her circle in the capital by repute, and was able to chitchat with her in the manner to which she had been accustomed. However, the highborn luvvie had little trust in a mere teacher and so rebuffed him.

Carl Dévúsh and Antonë Böm had been summoned to Luvvie Joolee's toxic bower by a note entrusted to an opare. They came creeping along under the bluffs of the Ferbiddun Zön, slipping and scraping over the groynes thick with seaweed and barnacles. Crabs scuttled away, while overhead was the relentless cawing of the gulls. They squeezed gingerly between the stalks of the blisterweed, which even now, browned and hollowed, still had the capacity to wound. Böm tapped diffidently on the rough-hewn door and a voice from inside rasped, Cummon in. Inside the whitewashed austerity of the little semi, the unshuttered windows, covered with stretched moto hide, admitted a pinkish light. The sharp odour of human faeces — unknown in the Hamsters' gaffs — assailed the visitors.

Siddahn, boy! the old boiler snapped, and so disoriented was Carl that it took him seconds to realize she was addressing him. Ve stoowal! she snapped again, and, casting about, he saw the one she meant and collapsed on to it. Luvvie Joolee — her short, tattered tunic exposing white arms and legs worming with purplish veins — leaned against one wall while the teach remained standing in the middle of the room. Seeing her close up for the first time, Carl was struck by how closely the Luvvie resembled the Driver: both had long, concave faces, with brows and chins sharp as the rim of a plate. The boiler's face was like a mask. She had no eyebrows, and her downy, white hair was cut to within a finger's breadth of her bumpy scalp. Thick slap was plastered on her gaunt cheeks. She wore heavy, angular earrings carved from a dark wood Carl couldn't identify — and these had dragged deep slits in her earlobes. As tall as the Driver, she looked down on both Carl and Böm, her black eyes lambent in deep sockets. To Carl she had the otherworldliness of all those who came from off the island.

Staring at the earthen floor of the room, so as to avoid the fanatic eyes of the Exile, Carl was seized by a peculiar irony contrivance, which had many spinning flywheels and a slowly turning knurled cylinder. These were obscurely connected to a white disc, the rim of which was inscribed with figures: 1, 2, 3 and so on.

— Wassermattah, boy? Luvvie Joolee rasped. Aynt chew evah seen a meeta B4? Her Mokni was fluent, her manner lucid. Despite her eccentric appearance there was no trace of madness.

— N-no, mum, Carl stuttered.

— Mum! she snorted. Mum! Eye tellya, boy, vat vare iz ve diffrunz Btween U chavs an reel folk. Tym, munny, distunz. She pointed at the dial: Daves tym — nó Rs. Daves munny — nó yaws, Daves distunz — iz root 2 Nú Lundun! Then she rounded on Böm: Djoo bleev in Dave, ven, Böm? she spat out.

— Enuff, the teach replied.

— Djoo bleev in iz cummagayn, djoo bleev in iz mirrakulz, djoo bleev in Nú Lundun?

— Yeah, Enuff. Carl had never seen Böm so tongue-tied.

— So ow cum ve Dryva sez U 2 iz fliars? Djoo bleev, boy? she said, rounding on Carl again.

— Yeah, L–Luvvie, he stammered.

— Luvvie! she spat. Wotevah, ve pawtunt fing iz djoo bleev, Eye carnt B doin wiv fliars. Eye carnt B doin wiv vose oo aynt lé Dave inter vair arts. Eye tellya boaf vat Dryva issa nastë bituv wurk. E aynt no trú bleevah. E aynt got Dave in iz art. Dave vat iz gentul, Dave wot luvs us jussaz if we woz awl ve Loss Boy. The old boiler's face took on an expression both wistful and profound. Transfigured by her Dävinanity, she was, Carl understood, almost beautiful.

— Eye bleev vat, Böm said in a hushed undertone.

— Wel ve Dryva doan, an eel shaft ve 2 uv U B4 U gettof Am, so Eyem gonna affta elp U. U bin cummin 2 ang aht 4 yeers nah, Böm, but Eye aynt toal U nuffing, ri?

— Nuffing much, Böm conceded with a rueful nod of his head.

The old boiler bent down from her great height and shuffled into the corner of the room where a pile of cloth scraps lay in a heap. As she rooted among them, Luvvie Joolee continued: Wot Eye aynt nevah toal U iz vat Mistah Greaves brungus maw van juss trayd plastik, ee brungus vese inall. She held up a bundle tightly wound with twine. Lettuce, she announced, lettuce from Lundun, ees a frend, Mistah Greaves, no an alii but a mayt. She unwrapped the bundle, and Carl gazed wonderingly upon the sheaves of onion-skin-thin leaves that sprang from it, each one covered with spindly phonics. Siddahn, Luvvie Joolee commanded Böm, siddahn on ve flaw. Eyem gonna reed U wot me öl mukkas in Lundun av bin sayin abaht ve PCO an vat. U 2 needta no.

It was with the motos that Carl was able to be himself and accept his secret mummyself. The motos gathered together in a rank in a woodland clearing under the screenwash, their backs shiny with moisture. When the shower ceased their bristles caught the bigwatt like jewels. The motos were always prepared to admit him to their cuddling and nuzzling. Unlike the Hamsters, the motos maintained an exact knowledge of who was whose mum and dad, going back for many generations. Old Champ, who had been the minder of Carl's dad, Symun, when he was a young boy, would hunker down before the lad and in his sing-slurp voice intone the moto lineage: Ven Darlin an Shoogar ad Hunnë, an Hunnë an Gorj ad Boythë, an Boythë an Poppit ad Wunti, an Wunti an Thweetë ad me. That there were only a handful of names for all the motos that were, had been and ever would be on Ham did not confuse the beast. In recounting who he was, old Champ's baby-blue eyes took on a strange luminousness that they never ordinarily possessed.