Edward Aubyn - Lost for Words

He had been over to Marilyn’s to collect his dinner jacket and had ended up dressing in his old bedroom, finding his shaving foam and razor at the back of the cupboard under his basin, and his cuff-links in the little box in the drawer of his bedside table. After nearly a year of exile, he was taken over by a deeply familiar feeling of being at home, preparing to go out for the evening. Marilyn suggested that he move in over the weekend ‘as an experiment’. He left Belsize Park with a sense of gratitude and security only slightly shadowed by loss and defeat.

In the taxi, he toyed with the wistful thought that he might have been going to the Elysian dinner with Katherine, that she might turn out to have won the prize and that they might return to her flat for a night of passionate celebration. As he approached his destination, he tried to chastise himself, but like a man who slaps the mosquito on his arm and then sees, as he withdraws his hand, that the crushed insect has already drawn blood, Alan realized that his intellect had arrived too late to stop his imagination from getting lost in an alternative reality that contained no reality at all.

As if to point out, from another angle, the futility of his attempted discipline, the first person to greet him was Yuri, his old employer at Page and Turner.

‘Ah, Alan,’ he said, with the brutal directness that he usually farmed out to his wife but was capable of reclaiming for special occasions, ‘I suppose Katherine would have been here if it wasn’t for your ineptitude.’

Alan was too startled to think of a reply.

‘I hear she has also given you the sack,’ Yuri went on. ‘Everywhere I go I start a fashion!’

He gave Alan a blast of genial laughter, and then turned away and started to stroll around the room, dispensing charm.

Alan wandered over to the bar to give himself time to recover. He dithered over what to drink, torn between a cautious elderflower cordial and a consoling glass of Jack Daniel’s. Before he could make a decision, he felt a hand on his shoulder.

‘ Salut , Alain!’

‘Didier! What are you doing here?’

‘So, this is the epicentre of English Literature,’ said Didier, smiling at Alan, ‘located in the home of a very successful fishmonger, under the gaze of dead monarchs, in the narrow space between the hostility of a philistine commerce and the indifference of a philistine ruling class! Bravo for the artist who survives in this environment! In France, it is the opposite: everything is culture. It is a kind of nightmare. You walk down a street named after Voltaire, your steak has apparently been cooked for Rossini, and Chagal has designed the label on your bottle of wine. You rush to the country to escape the cultural density of the city, but the little waves lapping on the lakeshore belong to Rousseau and the birds that appear to be singing in the woods are in fact singing in a poem by Chateaubriand. Even a field of wheat is a cultural object, oppressed by its semiotic potential to become the world’s most iconic loaf: the baguette!’

‘Yes, but what are you doing here?’ Alan persisted.

‘I am the speech writer for one of the Small-Listed authors,’ said Didier, hardly able to contain his mirth. ‘My friend Sonny Badanpur has asked me to help his aunt…’

‘Badanpur…’ said Alan, ‘has he written a very long novel?’

‘Absolutely: The Mulberry Elephant. You have read it?’

‘Yes, well, not all of it — it’s twice the size of War and Peace. Which one is he? I must make sure I don’t meet him; I just wrote rather a harsh report on his book.’

‘By the fireplace with the yellow slippers,’ said Didier. ‘Ah,’ he went on, looking over Alan’s shoulder and suddenly growing animated, ‘here is someone I’m sure you will want to see.’

Alan turned round, already knowing from Didier’s tone what to expect. Framed in the doorway, her hair still tangled, and her mouth swollen by round after round of kissing and biting, stood Katherine, dishevelled enough to remind him that her beauty did not depend on what she was wearing. Next to her was Sam, looking sleepy and electrified at the same time; with his bowtie tilted, like an old-fashioned plane propeller that needed to be pulled down to get it started.

Before Alan could fully appreciate the rush of nausea and jealousy that passed through him, a tall man with white hair and a red tail coat, who might have stepped out of one of the mediocre portraits that encumbered the walls of the State Drawing Room, appeared at Katherine’s side and started shouting slowly at the top of his voice.

‘Your Excellencies, my Lords, Ladies and Gentlemen! Dinner is served! Will you please proceed to the Banqueting Room.’

* * *

Here comes the human stampede, thought Penny, as she returned along the upper gallery, somewhat anxiously, after a fruitless search for the rest of the committee. They must have gone downstairs for a drink without bothering to let her know. Frankly, it defied belief, even if relations had become somewhat strained. Nevertheless, she must keep calm, park herself at table No. 1 and wait for the committee to come to her. Malcolm was sitting the other side of Mrs Wo from David, and so he was bound to turn up soon. The thought of David stopped Penny in her tracks. He could hardly be expected to make it up the stairs on his own. Why did she have to think of everything? The smart young women in black evening dresses, checking the guest list by the front door, would have simply ticked his name off the list and left him to fend for himself.

As the first guests arrived at the top of the stairs, Penny went in the opposite direction along the upper gallery to the small lift in the far corner of the building.

After confirming that he had arrived, she found David sitting in a gilt chair next to the Drawing Room doors, looking somewhat forlorn, with two walking sticks resting against the wall beside him.

‘David!’

‘Ah, Penelope, thank goodness you’re here, I’m not sure I can manage these stairs.’

‘Don’t worry, I’ve thought of that,’ said Penny, ‘we have a lift specially prepared for you.’

David followed her painfully across the hall, with Penny saying, ‘Take your time,’ every five seconds.

‘I am taking my time,’ said David. ‘I’m sorry it’s so fucking slow, if that’s what you’re driving at.’

‘No, I…’ Penny was lost for words. There had always been a prickly side to David, but at this stage of their relationship, she really didn’t appreciate having her head bitten off.

Before Penny could decide what to make of David’s rudeness, she heard her name being called.

‘Ah, Penny, there you are!’ said Malcolm. ‘David, good to see you! I’m afraid we’ve got rather a situation on our hands. Vanessa can’t be persuaded to choose either of the finalists. She simply won’t budge. The only other way is for one of us to change our minds. I wonder if you could track down Tobias and see if he’s prepared to save the day by voting for wot u starin at .’

‘I was going to take David up in the lift,’ said Penny, who couldn’t help marvelling at the way Malcolm had bounced back after the Greasy Pole incident.

‘I’ll do that,’ said Malcolm, ‘I need to have a word with him about precedents. Could the prize be awarded jointly if we can’t break this gridlock?’

‘There is a precedent for that: 1978,’ said David immediately, ‘but it won’t be popular with the Elysian board. They like a clear victor.’

‘Well, I’d better hunt down Tobias and appeal to his team spirit,’ said Penny. ‘See you upstairs.’

Malcolm eventually managed to get inside the small panelled lift with David, and push the button for the first floor.