Nanowrimo Winner

[Total Word Count: 38,489]

I went round to see Geoff again. I felt obscurely guilty about deciding to continue with Wenham, as if it were somehow cheating; but I thought it was best to go round and tell him. He looked completely taken aback to see me, almost apprehensive. I was not a welcome visitor, it seemed.

“John? You haven’t come to give me that bloody Cristal again, have you?” he asked.

“Au contraire, Geoffrey.” I replied, “The race is back on. I’m going to finish Nanowrimo.”

“Oh! Well, good! Good! You changed your mind? Well done. I mean, it’s good that you’re trying, though of course I’m still going to win.”

We paused on the step.

“Er, come in.” he said at last, reluctantly I thought.

Geoff led the way upstairs, and once again we settled ourselves. I couldn’t help glancing over at the pile of manuscript. It didn’t seem any bigger, and I could almost swear that there was a thin layer of dust on the top sheet. Was Geoff’s inspiration finally drying up, perhaps?

“Do you want a quick beer?” asked Geoff, “Only I’m going out a bit later.”

“With Mercedes? She’s graduated to the evenings at last?”

“Yes – I mean yes, it is her. Actually, I’ll just go and give her a quick ring if you don’t mind: we didn’t fix up when we were going to meet.”

He hurried downstairs.

An opportunity? Shall I have another little look? At Geoff’s manuscript? No, no, I shouldn’t. I really shouldn’t. What, you think I should? Really? I’m surprised at you, gentle reader – I had you down as a more scrupulous kind of person. Still, if you insist, I suppose I’m powerless to resist…

Draw for you, knave I don’t think I’m not doing that no I’ll call my man to deal with your impertinence I fancy. He said with haughty mien.
Draw or by God I’ll prick you where you stand, poultroon.

Stand still you caitiff rogue.
At that a strange figure appeared and leapt between them twirling his moustache.

Enough he cried back there now.

And who the hell do you think you are Mister our hero ground out between gritted teeth.

Let me 'ow you say introduce maiself monsieur I am Louis Renault Capitaine of Mousketaires. Gentlemen we ave other feesh to fry ave we not? I say this stops ‘ere.

And by golly, gentle reader, it did. The rest of the page was blank. I turned the page: the next one was a completely blank sheet. And the next one. I picked up a big handful of pages and riffled them. All blank. Snowy white virgin sheets. It seemed – I had a quick look back at page one – it seemed that Geoff had in fact completed no more than about four hundred words of utter drivel. A wave of relief, shock, disbelief, and belief swept through me.

He reappeared in the doorway, saw the manuscript in my hand, and froze on the spot. It wasn’t turning out a very tranquil evening for Geoffrey.

“This is a gripping yarn of yours, Geoff.” I remarked.

“It’s all on the computer,” he said, hesitantly, “I didn’t print it out, that’s all. Just thought it would give you a fright if I showed you a big pile of pages, you know.”

“Geoffrey,” I said, “Your pantaloons are aflame, Geoffrey.”

He looked abashed.

“Geoffrey, Geoffrey, Geoffrey.” I remonstrated, “Geoffrey. This is all you’ve written, isn’t it? Come on now. Look me in the eye.”

“Alright,” he said, coming into the room and slumping down on the small sofa, “You win. I can’t do it. I could no more write a novel than ride a woolly mammoth down Lombard Street, as you put it. It’s true. Sorry.”

Did I really say that thing about mammoths? That was a bit unkind, really.

“But Geoff, what was the point? You have to register your words with the ’wrimo people. You can’t hand them a big bundle of blank paper.”

“Well,” he said, wearily, “At first, I just didn’t want to admit that I couldn’t get anywhere. I thought I might catch up. But then I thought so long as I kept up a front, you know, it would encourage you to keep going. That was why I came up with the bet. I thought it would encourage you to focus, you know, help you stay motivated. I would never have taken the champagne off you, at the end of the day. That’s why I wouldn’t take it the other day, and tried to get you to carry on. Successfully, too, it seems. I really only wanted to help, all along.”

“Geoffrey, Geoffrey,” I said, “You big, fat, liar!”

“No, this is the truth” he protested, “ I wanted to encourage you, be a sort of pace-setter, a sort of sparring partner. Is that so bad?”

“Forsooth, thou takest the biscuit, Geoffrey; yea, verily.”

“Come on, I meant well.”

“Draw, Sir!” I said, dancing about in front of him with one arm thrown up and the other clutching an imaginary foil “Draw, I say! Draw, damn you Sir! I say draw, Sir, an you be a gentleman!”

“Oh, shut up!” said Geoff.

“Draw, an you be a gentleman, or I shall spit you where you sit like a spiced apple at Bartholomew Fair, forsooth.”

“Oh God.” said Geoff, helplessly.

“By my halidom! ’Odds bodikins! Gadzookers! God’s pieces, Sir! Ow!” I had forgotten that Geoff’s flat offered little room for swashbuckling, and banged my elbow on the wall.

“You want a quick beer?” offered Geoff, “Come on.”

“Alright then, you lying bloody liar, you sad failing talentless ungifted lying bastard, “ I consented, “You snivelling illiterate faithless incapable liar. We might as well.”

Actually, I felt exultant. My lack of faith in Geoff’s abilities had been triumphantly vindicated, and my own astonishing literary gifts looked all the better by contrast. I felt much better about myself. I felt much better about Wenham. And I felt a whole lot better about Geoff. Now he couldn’t write to save his life, I really liked him again.

We sat and had a friendly glass of frothy warm cat pee: Geoff seemed relieved, too. He offered to pay me for the Cristal (“You don’t really want two, do you?”), but seemed to change his mind when he heard how much it had actually cost me.

On the way back to the Tube station, gentle reader, I was virtually walking on air. I nearly collided, in quick succession, with an old man holding a newspaper, a small boy, and a plump, bad-tempered looking Philippina, who turned and looked at me sharply. But I was immune to all disapproval for the time being.

Back at home I threw myself into Wenham with renewed enthusiasm.

At the back of the house stood a long low barn. A little gate gave direct access to it from the side road, and it was that way that Lady Jane went, with Charlie bringing up the rear. A small door on a simple latch led into the barn: Lady Jane opened it and put her head inside.

“Coo-ee?” she called. There was no answer, so she stepped inside. Charlie followed.

They stood in a sort of anteroom. half the height of the barn, with two deep sinks, old chairs, and a table against one wall with a sheet draped over it. There were drips and splodges of paint everywhere. To the right were a pair of high double doors, one of them just ajar.

“Hello, there? Oliver?” called Lady Jane. “He should be here. I spoke to him only yesterday, He seemed quite alright about it. He knows my cousin Archie in London. I wonder if something is wrong.

“You don’t think…?”

“No, no, Charlie, I don’t think he’s been murdered. For heaven’s sake. Oliver? Hello? Are you there?”

Again there was no answer, so she and Charlie pushed the double doors aside.

Inside was a large space: about half the barn. The roof had been replaced with glass, and there was extra strip lighting round the whitewashed walls, some of which was switched on. Even though the sunlight streaming in through the roof was weak and watery, the overall impression was one of stepping into a warmer, more Mediterranean climate. Stacked in piles around the walls were twenty or thirty canvases. Two large ones were hung on the walls, and another stood on an easel, with its back to them. A tea-chest covered with paints, brushes, bottles and tools stood beside it.

All at once, the artist’s head popped out from behind the canvas on the easel, blinked, withdrew, and immediately popped out again. The resemblance to a small bird was so striking that Charlie immediately thought of a cuckoo clock.

“Hel-lo?” said the artist, warily.

“Jane Pimsey?” said Lady Jane, “I rang yesterday? You said I could drop in?”

The artist’s face smoothed out into a smile.

“Oh yes, of course,” he said, coming out from behind the easel and wiping his hands on a rag, “I’m so sorry. When I get caught up in a painting, I forget everything.”

“These are wonderful pictures,” said Lady Jane, shaking his hand, “But – forgive me if I’m confused – I went to an exhibition of yours in London five years ago – I thought you went in for abstracts?”

“Yes,” said Oliver, “I was a rather austere abstract expressionist at the beginning of my career. But one day I was reading the preface of a book by Calvino. He explained how for years he had written fiction with a political commitment, a social critique, always grittily realistic; then one day it just came to him that he was doing it out of duty and actually he didn’t have to. He could write anything he liked. He could write the books he’d really like to read: the adult equivalent of the fairy stories and legends he’d loved so much as a boy. So he did, and went in for the sort of intellectual magic realism which is what we really know him for, of course. Now I found that inspiring. I asked myself, are you abstaining from figurative art merely out of a misplaced sense of duty? I decided to give myself a holiday. I took an enormous canvas and said: now I can paint whatever I like. There was no doubt in my mind what that was: I just threw the paint on. And I’ve never looked back. My figurative pictures have done quite well, actually: I’m afraid I’m becoming quite obscenely rich.”

They chuckled politely while Charlie wondered what quality it was that rendered a chauffeur invisible, and whether he was glad he had it.

“That’s the very first one over there,” said Oliver, “I shall never sell it.”

They turned and looked. Hung beside the double doors they had come in through was a vast canvas depicting what seemed to be a dragon. Much of the picture was misty dark grey-green smoky swirls; but the face of the monster, angrily looming forwards as though to swallow the observer, part of a scaly wing and a huge clawed foot, stood out in nightmarishly clear detail.

“Blimey!” said Charlie, unthinkingly.

“Oh yes,” said Lady Jane, “I like that. Could we see some of the others?”

“By all means.” said the artist politely. He pulled out a canvas from one of the stacks by the wall.

“Bloody hell!” said Charlie.

“It’s basically two Blemmies fighting,” explained Oliver, “You can sort of see that this one has had some bits of skin and muscle pulled right off him, but he’s coming back strongly.”

“I thought blemmies were fish?” remarked Charlie. Oliver glanced at him impatiently.

“No, no: these are Sternophthalmoi,” he explained, “The people with no heads who used to appear on medieval maps and in traveller’s tales. They had their faces on their chests, you see.”

“It makes me think of Goya.” said Lady Jane.

“Really?” said Oliver, “That’s excellent. Thank you. I could have no higher praise.”

He pulled out another canvas.

“Christ!” said Charlie

“This is a Gryphon.” Oliver said with an insincere smile at Charlie.

“That pile of… Those things it’s tearing at… are they human?” asked Charlie.

Oliver merely raised his eyebrows.

“Extraordinary,” said Lady Jane.

Oliver pulled out another canvas a few inches and hesitated.

“Oh, I didn’t mean to show you this one,” he said, “I should put this one away. Well, never mind. It’s a portrait, you see, of the late Earl of Wenham, depicted as Cronos.”

He pulled it fully out.

“Oh, fuck!” said Charlie, involuntarily.

“Charlie?” said Lady Jane, “I forgot to tell Mrs Moreton that we’d be in for dinner tonight. Would you mind going back and telling her, please? No need to come back for me – I’ll walk.”