Mood Indigo (13 page)

‘You're not angry with me? …'

‘Angry? Why?'

‘Because you've got such a stupid wife …'

He kissed the hollow of her worried shoulder.

‘Put your arm back inside, Chloe. You'll catch cold.'

‘I don't feel cold,' said Chloe. ‘Listen to the record.'

There was something unearthly in the way Johnny Hodges played. Something inexplicable, yet perfectly sensual. Sensuality in its purest state, quite separate from anything physical.

The corners of the room softened and curved with the music. Colin and Chloe were now lying in the centre of a sphere.

‘What was that?' asked Chloe.

‘It was “The Mood to be Wooed”,' said Colin.

‘That's just how I felt,' said Chloe. ‘But how will the doctor be able to get in here with a shape like this?'

Nicholas went to open the door. The doctor was standing on the step.

‘I'm the doctor,' he said.

‘Smashing,' said Nicholas. ‘If you would be good enough to follow me …'

He lured him along behind him.

‘There,' he said when they were in the kitchen, ‘taste that and tell me what you think.'

A peculiarly coloured brew, verging towards Caucasian purple and bladder green with a slight bias towards chrome blue was fizzing in a vitrified receptacle of silicon, soda and lime-juice.

‘What is it?' asked the doctor.

‘A beverage …' said Nicholas.

‘I know that …' said the doctor, ‘but what does it do?'

‘It picks you up,' said Nicholas.

The doctor picked up the glass, passed it under his nose, smelled it, gave a broad grin, inhaled deeply, tasted it, then swallowed it down and held his stomach in both hands, letting his little black bag drop.

‘Does it work?' said Nicholas.

‘Wow! … It certainly does,' said the doctor. ‘It could massacre an army … Are you a vet?'

‘No,' said Nicholas, ‘just a cook … Well then, so it works, does it?'

‘It's not bad,' said the doctor. ‘I feel like a boy again …'

‘Come and see the patient,' said Nicholas, ‘now that you've been disinfected.'

The doctor set off, but in the wrong direction.

He was far from being master of his movements.

‘Ho, hum!' said Nicholas. ‘Well now! … I hope you'll be fit enough to examine the patient …'

‘Of course,' said the doctor. ‘But I'd like to have a second opinion, so I've asked Gnawknuckle to come along too …'

‘Good,' said Nicholas. ‘In that case, come this way.'

He opened the door leading to the fire escape.

‘Go down three floors and turn right. Just go straight in and you'll be there …'

‘OK,' said the doctor …

He started on his way down and suddenly stopped.

‘But where will I be?'

‘Why, there! …' said Nicholas.

‘Oh! Good! …' said the doctor.

Nicholas closed the door. Colin came in.

‘What was all that?' he asked.

‘A doctor. He seemed stupid, so I've got rid of him.'

‘But we need one,' said Colin.

‘Of course,' said Nicholas. ‘Gnawknuckle's on his way.'

‘That's better,' said Colin.

A bell tinkled again.

‘Don't bother,' said Colin. ‘I'll go.'

In the corridor the mouse ran up his leg and perched on his right shoulder. He hurried and opened the door for the professor.

‘Good evening!' said the latter.

He was all dressed in black, except for a blinding yellow shirt.

‘Physiologically,' he declared, ‘black over a yellow background provides the maximum contrast. I might add that it doesn't tire the eyes, either; and it also prevents the wearer being run over in heavy traffic.'

‘Indeed,' said Colin, nodding his approval.

Professor Gnawknuckle must have been about fifty. The inches round his waist were exactly the same as his age. He was very fussy about ensuring that neither should exceed the other. He had a clean-shaven face with a little pointed beard and non-committal specs.

‘Would you like to come with me?' said Colin.

‘I'm not sure,' said the professor. ‘I'm thinking about it …'

He thought about it and went.

‘Who is it that's ill?'

‘Chloe,' said Colin.

‘Ah!' said the professor, ‘that reminds me of a tune …'

‘Yes,' said Colin. ‘It's the same one.'

‘First,' concluded Gnawknuckle, ‘let's go and see her. You should have told me sooner. What's wrong with her?'

‘I don't know,' said Colin.

‘Neither do I,' confessed the professor. ‘We might as well face facts.'

‘But you will find out?' asked Colin anxiously.

‘I may do,' said Professor Gnawknuckle, doubtfully. ‘I haven't examined her yet …'

‘Come on then …' said Colin.

‘Yes, yes, yes …' said the professor.

Colin led him to the bedroom door and suddenly remembered something.

‘Mind how you go in,' he said. ‘It's round.'

‘Yes, yes, I'm used to that,' said Gnawknuckle. ‘She's pregnant? …'

‘Oh, no!' said Colin, ‘don't be silly … The room's round!'

‘Completely round?' asked the professor. ‘Have you been playing an Ellington record then?'

‘Yes, we have,' said Colin.

‘I've got some at home too,' said Gnawknuckle. ‘D'you know “Slap Happy”?'

‘I prefer …' began Colin. Then he remembered that Chloe was waiting, and pushed the professor into the room.

‘Good evening,' said the professor. He went up the ladder.

‘Good evening,' replied Chloe. ‘How do you do?'

‘Floundering flukes,' answered the professor, ‘my liver puts me through it at times, you know. Do you know what it's like?'

‘No,' said Chloe.

‘Of course not,' replied the professor. ‘You haven't got anything wrong with your liver, have you?'

He went up to Chloe and felt her hand.

‘A trifle warm, eh? …'

‘I can't tell.'

‘Hmm,' said the professor. ‘But that's a red herring.'

He sat on the edge of the bed.

‘I'll sound you, if you don't mind.'

‘Go ahead,' said Chloe.

The professor took an amplified stethoscope out of his little black bag and put it on Chloe's back.

‘Start counting,' he said.

Chloe counted.

‘That's not right,' said the doctor. ‘It's twenty-seven that comes after twenty-six!'

‘Of course it does,' said Chloe. ‘I'm sorry.'

‘That's enough, anyway,' said the doctor. ‘Have you been coughing?'

‘Yes,' said Chloe, and she coughed.

‘What's wrong with her, doctor?' asked Colin. ‘Is it serious?'

‘Well! …' said the professor, ‘she's got something the matter with her right lung. But I don't know what it is …'

‘What can we do?' asked Colin.

‘She'll have to come and see me for a more detailed examination,' said the professor.

‘I don't very much like the idea of taking her out, doctor,' said Colin. ‘Suppose she has another attack like the one she had this afternoon?'

‘Don't worry,' said the professor. ‘It isn't serious. I'll give you a prescription, but you must be sure to take it.'

‘Of course, doctor,' said Chloe.

She put her hand to her mouth and began coughing.

‘Don't cough,' said Gnawknuckle.

‘Try not to cough, darling,' said Colin.

‘I can't help it,' said Chloe, between coughs.

‘There's a funny kind of music you can hear in her lung,' said the professor.

He seemed rather puzzled and put out.

‘Is it normal, doctor?' asked Colin.

‘To a certain degree …' replied the professor.

He pulled his little beard and it sprang back on to his chin with a sharp snap.

‘When shall we come and see you, doctor?' asked Colin.

‘In three days time,' said the professor. ‘I'll have got my apparatus working again by then.'

‘Don't you often use it?' asked Chloe this time.

‘No,' said the professor. ‘I much prefer making scale models of aeroplanes. But people are always pestering me so I've been on the same one for a year now and I can't seem to find the time to finish it. It gets exasperating after a while! …'

‘It must do,' said Colin.

‘They're sharks,' said the professor. ‘It amuses me to
compare myself to the poor shipwrecked mariner whose slumbers are watched by voracious monsters waiting for the precise moment to capsize his fragile craft.'

‘How poetic,' said Chloe, and she laughed, very quietly so that she would not start coughing again.

‘Be careful, honey child,' said the professor, putting his hand on her shoulder. ‘It's a stupidly poetic image because in the
New Scientist
for 16 May 1931 it's clearly stated that, contrary to current opinion, only three or four of the thirty-five known species of sharks are man-eaters. And even they only attack if they are attacked first …'

‘What a lot of things you know, doctor,' said Chloe, full of admiration.

She rather liked this doctor.

‘What a lot of things the
New Scientist
knows,' said the doctor, ‘– not me! And, on that word, I shall bid you Good-Night.'

He gave Chloe a big kiss on her right cheek, patted her on the shoulder and went down the little ladder. His right foot got tangled round his left foot, his left foot round the bottom rung, and he tumbled all the way down.

‘You have to know the knack of this gadget,' he remarked to Colin, rubbing his back vigorously.

‘I'm sorry,' said Colin.

‘And anyway,' added the professor, ‘there's something lugubrious about this spherical room. Try putting on “Slap Happy” – that ought to bring it back to shape. Otherwise I should try planing it.'

‘Orders understood,' said Colin. ‘Can I offer you one for the road?'

‘OK,' said the professor. ‘Bye-bye, my dear,' he called to Chloe, before going out of the room.

Chloe was still smiling. From down below you could see her sitting on the big low bed as if she were on a trampoline, theatrically lit by the bedside lamp. The rays of light filtered through her hair with the luminosity and colour of sunshine through fresh young blades of grass, and the light that had been close to her skin touched with gold those objects that it went on to illuminate.

‘You've got a very pretty wife,' the professor said to Colin when they were out of the room.

‘Yes, I have,' said Colin.

Tears suddenly began to run down his cheeks because he knew that Chloe was in pain.

‘Now, now,' said the professor, ‘you're putting me in an embarrassing position … I'll have to do something to make you feel better too …'

He delved into the inside pocket of his jacket and pulled out a little notebook bound in real leather.

‘Look, this is mine.'

‘Your what?' asked Colin, doing his best to remain patient.

‘My wife,' explained the professor.

Colin opened the notebook out of politeness, and then burst out laughing.

‘There! You see!' said the professor. ‘It never fails. They all laugh. But you must tell me … What is there so funny about her?'

‘I … I don't … know,' burbled Colin, and doubled over, a helpless prey to a seizure of extreme high hilarity.

The professor took back his wallet.

‘You're all the same,' he said. ‘You think a woman has to be pretty … And what about that drink? Am I still going to get it?'

Colin, closely followed by Chick, pushed open the door of the remedy shop. It went ‘Ding!' and the glass in the door shattered into a terrifyingly complex jigsaw over a display of phials and laboratory instruments.

Disturbed by the noise, the crapothecary looked up. He was thin, tall and old, and his head sported an erect white mane like a crown.

He sprang to his counter, grabbed the telephone and dialled a number with that swiftness that can only be acquired as the result of many years of experience.

‘Hello!' he said.

His voice was like a fog-horn, and the floor around his long flat black feet flowed evenly backwards and forwards while showers of spray hit the counter and bounced off again.

‘Hello! Gershwin House? Would you come and put some new glass in my shop door? In fifteen minutes? … Hurry then, in case another customer comes in … OK …'

He put down the phone and it struggled to clamber home over the dial.

‘What can I do for you, gentlemen?'

‘Make up this prescription …' suggested Colin.

The chemist snatched the sheet of paper, drew a pair of eyes, a nose and a mouth on it, and then applied eye-shadow powder and lipstick to them.

‘That's done!' he said, blacking one of the eyes with a rubber stamp proclaiming his name and address.

‘Come back this evening at six of the clock and your remedy will be ready.'

‘We're in,' said Colin, ‘a great hurry.'

‘We'd like,' said Chick, ‘to have it straight away.'

‘If you'd,' replied the salesman, ‘like to wait, then I'll see what I can do.'

Colin and Chick sat and waited on a long seat upholstered in purple plush that was facing the counter. The shopkeeper bobbed down behind his counter and disappeared through a secret door, crawling away almost silently. The shuffling of his long thin body over the parquet grew fainter and fainter and finally faded away into nothing.

They looked at the walls. On long shelves of crinkled green copper were rows of bottles full of liniments for lineaments, salted balm-cakes, peppermints and mustard plasters. From the end jar on each shelf emanated a fluorescent barrier. In a conical recipient of thick smoked glass swollen tadpoles were helterskeltering down in spirals. When they reached the bottom they darted off again up to the surface and began their eccentric gyration all over again, leaving a whitish wake of ruffled water behind them. At the side of an aquarium several yards long the shopkeeper had set up a laboratory bench to carry on experiments on nozzle-frogs. Here and there several rejected frogs were lying around, each of their four hearts still feebly beating.