Дэвид Митчелл - Utopia Avenue

A builder’s van rumbles up Roomolenstraat. Jasper has to stand on the doorstep to let the van pass. The van slows down, and both the driver and the passenger – a son? – give Jasper a lidded stare, as if memorising his face for a police artist. I could have been you , Jasper thinks, looking at the son, easily – it’s all Y-junctions, from Alpha to Omega … His thumb is still on the doorbell. Just a little more pressure, and one future comes into being at the expense of another. No. The door opens anyway. Dr Ignaz Galavazi addresses Jasper in his Frisian-flavoured Dutch. ‘Ah, excellent timing, Jasper. In you come now, out of the cold. Dinner’s ready.’

Dr Galavazi’s higgledy-piggledy kitchen is spotless and daffodil yellow. ‘My wife’s in Maastricht, visiting her family.’ The doctor ladles stew into Jasper’s bowl. He’s older, his throat is saggier, but his white hair still looks blown backwards as if he’s facing a gale. ‘She’ll be sorry she missed you.’

‘Pass on my compliments,’ Jasper remembers to say.

The herby steam feels good on his cold skin.

‘I shall. How are you finding London?’

‘Labyrinthine.’

‘We both find much to admire in your gramophone record. Naturally, “modern music” to me means Poulenc or Britten, but if culture doesn’t evolve, it dies. I sent a copy to Claudette Dubois too. She’s teaching in Lyon now. She’s “happy as Larry” – as the English say – about you and Utopia Avenue.’

‘Pass on my compliments. Please.’

‘I shall. Little did I know that when I let her test her newfangled ideas at Rijksdorp, we were hatching “the Dutch Jimi Hendrix”. That’s what De Telegraaf ’s calling you, and even I have heard of him. Bon appétit .’

Jasper’s taste-buds investigate. Calf’s tongue, rosemary, cloves … ‘Were you expecting guests today, Doctor?’

The doctor breaks open a crusty roll. ‘Why do you ask?’

‘The soup. You made enough to feed a rugby team.’

Dr Galavazi’s lips twist. ‘It’s a fiddly old Jewish recipe of my mother’s. Collecting the ingredients is quite a quest, so I make a lot to justify the trouble. We have a refrigerator now. It’ll keep for a week. Also, I had a hunch – and hopes – that a former patient might drop by.’ He has a certain look. Amusement?

Jasper hunts for clues: a former patient … ‘Me?’

The doctor sips his beer with pleasure. ‘Who else?’

‘You must have many former patients.’

‘Not many whose name is printed in giant letters outside the Paradiso. Not many perform on Fenklup , either.’

‘At Rijksdorp, you used to say that television turns the human brain to cottage cheese.’

‘For you, I made an exception. I imposed upon a neighbour. The programme was idiotic, but you all played superbly, I thought. Identical to the gramophone.’

Jasper bites a soft butterbean. ‘On TV, we mime.’

‘Is that so? My, my. More’s the pity Henk Teuling didn’t mime his interview. Have another bowl. It’s good to see you eat.’

The psychiatrist serves green tea and lights his pipe in his book-lined study. These two aromas remind Jasper of Rijksdorp. Dr Galavazi’s voice lulls. ‘Is this purely a social call, Jasper, or am I correct in thinking there’s a professional aspect to it, as well?’

‘How retired are you, Doctor?’

‘Us old shrinks never retire. We just vanish in a puff of theory.’ He sips his tea. ‘Seeing you on my doorstep earlier, I guessed you were here to talk business.’ The doctor sips his tea. ‘Was I wrong?’

Outside a cyclist in a hurry rings a frantic bell.

Say it. ‘I think I can hear him again.’

The doctor makes his thinking-growl. ‘Knock Knock? The Mongolian? Another?’

‘You still remember my case.’

The doctor’s pipe-smoke smells of chicory, peat and pepper. ‘Disclosure: your case was good to my career. After Psychiatry Forum published my JZ paper, colleagues from Vancouver to Brasilia, New York to Johannesburg contacted me with reports of the very same phenomenon: of patients with diagnoses of schizophrenia who reported visits by an entity who ameliorates the psychosis. Only last May we held a conference in Boston on “Autonomous Healer Personae” – AHPs. If my zeal seems vampiric, I apologise – but, yes, I remember the facts of your case very well.’

‘If psychiatrists weren’t a little vampiric, psychiatry wouldn’t exist and I’d probably be dead.’

The doctor doesn’t deny this. ‘I’ll help in any way I can.’

Things cost money. ‘Thank you, but my grandfather is dead, and I’m not exactly on a steady wage, so—’

‘There will be no fees. All I ask is that I can publish my findings.’

‘It’s a deal.’ Jasper guesses that a handshake is appropriate.

Dr Galavazi smiles as he shakes Jasper’s hand, then reaches for his notepad. ‘So. How much time do we have now?’

‘Our sound-check at the Paradiso is at eight.’

The doctor’s clock says six fifty-five. ‘Just the basic facts for now, then. Why do you think Knock Knock is coming back?’

‘I’ve heard him over the last few months. He’s still distant and it’s still faint, but he’s awake. I think I first heard him at a nightclub in London, about a year ago.’

Deep growl. ‘Were you on drugs at the nightclub?’

‘An amphetamine. I saw him in a dream, too.’

‘The monk in the mirror?’

‘Yes.’

Another growl. ‘Perhaps it would be strange if you didn’t dream about such a traumatic figure in your life.’

‘If … an invisible man moved into this house, Doctor, you couldn’t see him, but you’d sense him. I sense Knock Knock, here …’ Jasper touches his temple. ‘It’s like it was at Ely, at Rijksdorp too, before the Mongolian. The Mongolian said I’d have five years. My five years are up.’

Dr Galavazi’s biro is busy. Jasper thinks of Amy Boxer who has been sleeping over in Dean’s room at Chetwynd Mews a lot since November. ‘Have you ever taken any hallucinogenic drugs?’

‘No. I’ve heeded your warning.’

‘Have you taken Queludrin or any anti-psychotic drug?’

‘No. I don’t have any. I haven’t approached a doctor. The British lock more people up than is generally known.’

Dr Galavazi puffs his pipe. ‘What happened in this dream about Knock Knock?’

‘It was like a film I was watching. A historical film, set a few centuries ago. I saw Knock Knock – a monk or abbot – being poisoned by some kind of governor …’ Jasper gets his journal out of his satchel. ‘It’s on the first page. I’ve written down other dreams I thought were significant too. They’re dated.’

The psychiatrist takes the journal. Jasper guesses he looks pleased. ‘May I borrow this, and transcribe anything of interest?’

‘Yes.’

He opens the first page. ‘An excellent habit.’

‘My friend Formaggio says, “What isn’t carefully recorded is gossip and guesswork.”’

‘He’s right. Are you still in touch?’

‘Yes. He’s studying the brain at Oxford.’

‘Remember me to him. He’s a smart boy. I take it you’ve heard nothing from the Mongolian since Knock Knock’s – what shall we call it? – “reawakening”.’

‘Correct. The Mongolian is long gone.’

‘At Rijksdorp, you told me he was just passing through, like a “barefoot doctor”.’

‘That’s correct.’

‘And you still believe now … that he was real?’

The clock’s pendulum thinly sliced half a minute.

‘Yes,’ said Jasper. ‘I do. Unfortunately.’