Beatlebone (7 page)

Common-sensical, which is the true note of a madman, or so Peter Sellers said one time, and he'd have known.

Joe moves lightly on his feet to look out the window. He considers the Maytime in the island's gleeful light. He nods and turns.

It was magic last night, John, he says. You were there and you were not there.

Okay.

And you sang quite beautifully, actually.

I did?

But what a very strange song it was.

A song?

It was odd, Cornelius says, but it was lovely.

Okay, John says.

The night will not come back except in slivers and scraps and dark shapes that hover but will not hold.

On the walls—

the Hexagram,

the Ankh,

the Eye of Providence.

He is here and he is not here; he throws his palms down to slap his thighs, as though jauntily, but in fact for confirmation of flesh and bone, here on a hardback chair, in the kitchen of the strange hotel, in the month of May—how merry, how merry—in 1978.

How do you pass the days out here, Joe?

Exploration, he says. We dig in.

Oh yeah?

They'd be hammering each other, Cornelius says.

It has been there all the while but only now is he aware of Moroccan-type music on a hi-fi but faintly, a sitar, soft padded drums, and Joe smiles and shimmies his fat hips.

We go in hard at the Amethyst, John.

He sips his nettle tea and the brandy's warm kick comes through; he lights a fag for a prop. It's 1978, he's a bloody dad again, and he's away in a fucking freakhouse?

Where's it you're from, Joe? Originally?

Knowleston way.

Where?

But Joe just waddles a grin about his face and moves his fleshy hips to the desert music—languid, his fat rhythm. He looks at John calmly and evenly—

They call me Joe Director, he says.

He smiles, hog-like, and shows the graven palms—

Daft kids, he says.

There are no directors out here, he says.

We are very much a community out here, he says.

Oh yeah, John says, a community?

The Community of the Black Atlanteans.

Of the fucking what?

Upstairs, by now, the noises are unmistakably sex noises—

Hot shrieks.

Chocolate moans.

Livid whelps.

Frank and Sue, says Joe. They're young still and they have the blood for it, John.

Like dogs on the street, Cornelius says.

Is it just the three then?

There are other young friends who come and go, Joe says.

I bet there are.

But for now? Yes. A family of three.

He's been set down in a freakhouse; he eyes the blithe fiend Cornelius hard. But Cornelius just beams and aims splashes of brandy to each of their mugs, the three.

We go in deep out here, says Joe, and we go in all the way.

I have you, John says.

No stranger to the screaming himself, Cornelius says.

I understand so. But would this be along the lines of the California technique, John?

Well…

To scream is only the start of it, Joe says, 'round here.

His hog arrogance.

Oh yeah?

In fact we've gone a long ways past that 'round here.

Go on?

Around here, John, we get the rants on.

The rants?

Is fucking right. Have you ranted, John?

I can't say that I have…as such.

Joe Director purses his lips in regret; the bloody Lancashire of him.

The rants bring us all the way inside, John. And that's where we need to go, isn't it?

Best of luck with it, John says. I'm just on the way to me island.

Upstairs—the sound of a vaulting climax, and Joe lifts shyly an ear-cup for it.

Youth, he says, and smiles.

This is it, Cornelius says.

The vaulting cry lands; now there is a dull sobbing.

You set some people down on your island for a bit, John?

I did, yeah…years back.

I knew some of those people, John.

You did?

Oh yes, I did.

You by any chance know which island is mine, Joe?

I'd possibly know it by its air, John. I'm to understand from those people it has a very particular air.

Cornelius?

Yes, John?

When are we going to get to my fucking island exactly?

But Cornelius just smiles and shows a palm for patience and sips his brandied tea.

Joe Director gets the kettle on.

I'll brew up fresh, he says.

The sitars waft. A hurdy-gurdy, too. A clavichord? What's he mean, fucking particular? John wants to be a million miles from this place and he wants to be sat just where he is.

Outside—

low snaps of wind come from the sea to whip at the hedges and the pines.

In the Amethyst—

the dim jangle and spit of sitars,

the vaulted grunts and spasm breath of the fucking, renewed,

the brown burn of freebase, bitterly.

Tell me more about the rants, John says.

The life in New York runs along very tidy lines. He doesn't leave the apartment much. He doesn't need to—it's the size of fucking Birkenhead. He plays with the baby. He's that good the baby and sleeps like a turtle—he is that sweet in the shell. John looks out the windows. John barks at the cars. John eats sushi from cartons and watches the late movies in bed. Black-and-whites, he does all the movie voices—shut the fuck up, John! He gets eel juice on the sheets. He makes lots of plans. The days sail by and not ungaily. He sits on his backside. He sits in the great fortress high above the plain where the savage injuns roam. He's the Freaky Sheriff and he has a very beady eye. He bakes lots of fucking bread. The yeast and warmth of the kitchen on a cold winter day with the city under its heaps of dirty snow outside—he's cosy as a bastard in the womb. He is that happy he gurns and sings. And the days pass by and the nights and he cannot sleep if the wind is high and he looks out to the park and along the treetops the greens of the treetop fairies fly—hello? Words that come from out of the blue—arboreal. Which is lovely. He listens to the birds at dusk and all their newsy chatter. Like biddies at a bus stop. He gets nervous when the days get longer. He watches his weight. He doesn't drink booze and he doesn't do dope. He eats brown rice and baked fish and steamed veggies. He is decidedly on the leanish side—he turns side-on to the bedroom full-length for a profile check. He makes lots of plans. He smokes fags. He looks at the rain above the city and the lights caught and blurred inside the murk of the rain as the night comes down and it's an eerie docklight—he is home again. He develops certain arcane theories. He doesn't leave the apartment much. He makes certain occult connections. He gets worried about the number nine. He starts to have a thing about the elevator. He listens to strange music. He obsesses about the number fucking nine. He stays up all night. He reads about Stockhausen. He reads about Howard Hughes. He reads about what's-his-face, fucking Rimbaud. He watches bits of telly. He does all the telly voices. He is Greta Garbo. He is Captain America. He has mad energy sometimes and sometimes he has fucking zero. He is the Peanut Farmer Carter, he is Mao Tse-tung. Strange thoughts come unbidden—the world is full of hollows and the world is full of graves. Sometimes he plays the guitar but not often. He does all the telly voices—he is a cowboy, he is a spaceman, he is a pimp. He sends out for books on the occult. He talks on the phone to California, to Liverpool. He hums and coos and burps the baby—the baby spews. He sends tidy sums to radical causes. He is bone dry in terms of actual fucking songs is the sorry fucking truth of it all. He reads some Aleister Crowley—he's a right fucking laugh. He has zero fucking songs is the point of it all. He finds a channel that shows Monty Python at five in the morning. Baby spew the sour milk smell the bloody motherhood. He orders in. Bring us your raw fish and your pizza pie. One night he catches himself having a right good weep in front of a Pete-and-Dudley. He sits and looks across the sky and across the park and towers and it means nothing to him at all. He has no fucking songs. He is that happy he wants to Scream.

Violent confrontation, John.

This is Joe Director.

It's the only way to strip it all down and see what lies beneath. We've got to peel our skins back.

You reckon?

I do. And it's never easy. It causes a lot of pain. We've got to open up the clam shell. It's shut so very tight. I mean let's look at you, John. On the surface? Deviant genius.

Thank you very much.

But deep inside? I'd very much like to know. And I think you would, too, John.

From upstairs a dead velvety hush is loaded with the weight of their listening.

Sometimes it's difficult, John. I won't deny it. It can be very bloody difficult. We go in hard and we go to very tricky places. It can be deeply fucking unpleasant. But the rants can soften us, too, and sometimes we move very gently through the process. We can deal with tenderness. We can deal with love.

John fetches another splash of brandy for his mug of nettle tea. The bottle has an odd label in Spanish that shows a black lizard. Okay. The taste of fields in his mouth; the burn of the sexy brandy. Not unlovely.

The rants are unpredictable, John. Especially 'round here.

Joe Director: his grin soft with rue.

Cornelius: his face lit with happy wattage, an idea.

Mightn't it be the best place for you, John?

I beg your pardon?

I'll head for the mainland. I'll see who's around. I'll come back by the van and road bridge. I can see at least if the fuckers have cleared.

You're saying leave me here?

They wouldn't think to spot you at the Amethyst Hotel, John.

Outside the hills have collapsed into each other and the iron sea moves and he makes for another nip of the firewater.

Cornelius?

Yes, John?

When are we going to get to my fucking island?

Are you telling me you want to be sat there with eighteen thousand fucken cameras on you and the
News of the
fucken
World
? A few hours, John. I'll be back with the van and we'll be away.

Joe Director aims for a basement stair—

There's more where that brandy's come from.

He pauses, a bright notion—

Would you like to burn off some cocaine, John?

And from upstairs a sky-opening Scream.

Did I not tell you? They are your own kind precisely, John.

Frank and Sue?

He's a stunned-looking beanpole with matted blond hair in fag-ash ropes—a honky Rastafari. There is something canine or wolfish. As though born to the dog star. She's tiny and elf-eyed with busy, travelling tits. Attractive, a-gleam, but distant—an undiscovered star. North-of-England, the pair of them, but they are posher than Joe. There are pockets of coke burn on the air—bitter-grey and teasing—but the Amethyst Hotel more generally has the stale eggy waft of a fuckery. He sits down on the stairs with these kids and they have an earnest chinwag there.

You're on way to your island then?

That I am.

How big's it?

It's nineteen acres.

That's a spread is that.

Nineteen acres of rocks and bloody rabbit holes.

Not to mention the banshee fucking wind—he lights a fag. He has a sip of nettle tea. He has sworn off the lizard brandy and he has refused the base cocaine. He feels strong, wise, avuncular and glad.

This is it then?

How'd you mean?

Just the three of you here?

There are others that come and go.

I bet there are.

You sound a bit worried, John.

This was Frank.

Why should I be worried?

Sounds like you got the fear in.

Why should I have the fear?

I'm playing with you.

You're playing with
me
?

Sue darts a lizard tongue to lick at her tidy, full lips; Sue beams hard the elf lamps—

Why's it you've come here? she says.

I guess I'm running away, too.

From what? Frank says.

From who? Sue says.

From myself, he says. I'm gonna be the first in human history that manages to outrun his own fucking shadow.

They look at each other—he's dark, she's distant; their grins are way the fuck off.

What's it you pair are running from?

I was always going to come here, she says.

And me, Frank says.

It draws you in, she says.

It's got an air, he says.

Little runaways, John says.

You sound different, she says.

Different how?

Different older.

Well I'm thirty bloody seven, aren't I?

Posh kids gone west for dope and fucking and screeching—he knows their kind long since.

How's it you've found this Joe?

Their eyes go down at mention of Director.

You go at it hard around here, don't you?

She looks at the boy—he smiles, nods: they turn to kiss quickly and hard. And now she turns back to John and it is regretful, her smile, as though to say you will never know this taste.

Sue flicks the elf lamps; then—

We get the rants on, John.

There is no true dark in the Maytime on Achill—it might be an isle of Norway. He moves about the small dead hotel. There is a haze of blue light in the evening windows still. Frank and Sue weep loudly in a room upstairs; Joe Director is in the kitchen tending with homicidal cheer to a goat curry. John has entered the swim of family life at the Amethyst Hotel. That sweet clamminess. Cornelius has returned to the mainland to fight back the press dogs. There are statements daubed on the walls at the Amethyst Hotel—statements about the id, statements about tide of Capricorn. The carpets squelch underfoot and give off the stale aniseed waft of seawater. He is so many fucking miles from love and home. There are fiendish midges on the air and they swarm to attack his blood. Get it at the neck, get it at the font. He slaps the tiny Nazi fuckers away. Evidence of life, at least. He smokes, sighs. He stands in the doorway porch of the Amethyst Hotel, slapping lazily at the bugs, and he looks out to the half-lit night. Joe Director comes along to link arms, companionably. Joe Director has odd charisma. There is a blush of heat rising beneath the collar of his antique shirt.