Читать книгу When in Broad Daylight I Open My Eyes - Greg Lazarus - Страница 3

One

If Maria Petros is feeling nervous, she hides it well. To face a semicircle of philosophers can’t be comfortable, especially when they’re waiting for her to speak. Her voice, when it comes, is low and clear. “Thank you for being here. Professor Sullivan has asked me to conduct a session for the department. He’s told me, briefly, about the trauma.”

Kristof Zoetman looks from Maria to the bay window behind her. The view is partially obscured by a tree outside, its fine black branches pressing lightly against the glass. On the opposite side of the room a gas fire burns, blue flames playing over the volcanic rocks. A painting above the mantel depicts a host of figures in feverish activity.

The head of department, who is sitting in the chair nearest Maria’s, says, “Please – call me Luke. In this room I’m not a professor.” A rustling, just short of amusement, comes from the other three philosophers. “To be clear: this isn’t really a therapy session – nothing so formal. Only a discussion that Maria has agreed to guide.”

Kristof observes how earnestly Maria appears to be listening, the way she inclines her head to the side. Her appearance is striking: blonde hair cut short, pageboy style, with a thick fringe in front. She wears a masculine button-down shirt, high-heeled black boots over her jeans, and no make-up.

“We need something like this,” Luke adds. “It’s poisoning the department, the situation. I don’t think I’m putting it too dramatically.”

For a moment, only the faint roar of the gas can be heard.

“Do the rest of you feel the same?” Maria asks the other philosophers.

“No,” says Joan Castle from deep in her sofa, into which she has sunk. “Only Luke and Kristof think this is a good idea. The rest of us have objections.”

Maria seems unperturbed. She nods, as if to say Go on, please.

Cyrus Jackson, sitting next to Joan, speaks up. “No offence, but most of us reject the principles of your profession. It simply isn’t intellectually feasible to believe in psychotherapy, psychoanalysis, whatever you want to call it.” It appears that Cyrus could say more – much more – about this, but he closes his mouth firmly and sits back.

Maria turns her head back to Joan, whose choice of clothing – today, a voluminous purple tie-dyed dress – could be mistaken for gaiety of spirit. “Actually, the department is larger than this,” says Joan. “Certain people didn’t come today because they refused. And of those who are here, some of us are present only out of respect for Luke.”

A faint blush has painted Luke’s pale complexion pink. “There it is, Maria. You’ll find that philosophers, or at least our philosophers, aren’t loath to speak their minds.”

“I’m glad to hear that.” But Maria’s face is grave; she seems to have taken to herself these objections, and to be burdened by them. Perhaps this is her habit, swallowing the disquiet of others. For her patients, it must be soothing to feel that someone else is absorbing negative feelings from the air.

Kristof sits the furthest from Maria, and he has not yet spoken. Among the group, only he is directly facing her. “I’m not sceptical,” he says. “I welcome this.” Maria shifts in her chair, recrossing her legs. “I know my colleagues have serious concerns. But Luke is right. With all our skills, we seem unable to get ourselves back to some equilibrium. Even if there’s only a chance that it will help, I’m glad to try this session.”

Joan says, “And vot are you hiding beneas ze appearance of reason, Doktor Kristof Zoetman?” She laughs at her Sigmund Freud impersonation. Yet Kristof’s mild, sensible manner seems to have settled the matter.

Maria, by a small movement of her mouth, appears – despite her professional demeanour – to be pleased by Kristof’s contribution. The human being in her has peeped out from behind the psychologist. “Maybe one of you could explain what brings you here. I’d like to hear it with everyone present.”

Luke begins. “Last year,” he says. Then he takes a breath. “Last year we took in a postdoctoral scholar from the Netherlands, a young philosopher called Saskia Zeilmaker. She’d been with us for a year and a bit. Then, three months ago, on a Monday morning in mid-March, she didn’t come to work. We called her a number of times that week, but there was no response.”

“At the end of the week I went to her flat,” Joan adds. “No reply. The neighbours hadn’t seen her since Friday.”

“So we called her family in the Netherlands,” says Luke. “She’d spoken to them the week before, said everything was going well. That was the last they heard.”

There is a pause in the room, and once more the fire takes prominence. The gas hisses from its pipes, and is burnt away by the flame.

“Naturally,” says Cyrus, “we worked through the possibilities. We called the police; they broke open her flat. No sign of forced entry, robbery; everything was in place. We checked with the customs authority: she hadn’t left the country, at least via an airport or border post or ship. We went to the morgue, put up posters, spoke on the radio. Now we no longer know what to do.”

Maria is nodding as she listens.

“All this,” says Kristof, “wouldn’t usually be your concern. It would be purely a matter for the police. But for us it’s also become a terrible psychological strain. To understand this, you need to know something about our relation to Saskia. She was – is – a remarkable woman. Brilliant, of course, but also warm and kind.”

“Breath of fresh air,” says Cyrus briskly.

“Her presence brought life to the department,” Luke says. “We were planning to make her a permanent offer, and hoping she might accept. What makes this so dreadful is the uncertainty. It’s a hard thing to say, but sometimes I think that if she were dead, it might be easier. We could seek help individually; for all I know, some of us have done so” – Joan and Cyrus look away from Luke, dissociating themselves from the suggestion – “but the disappearance has been a blow to all of us jointly. I thought that, at least for one occasion, we should come together for psychological guidance. If we can learn how to cope with this, how to go on, we might even – if we can be of any more use to poor Saskia – be better able to help her one day. It was Kristof who suggested you, after I broached the idea of a debriefing with the department. I’m a believer in therapy, unlike some of my colleagues. He said you came highly recommended by the Psychology department.”

Maria absorbs the compliment with a small smile, and sits back. “I’m hoping we can discuss,” she says, “your relationship with Saskia. To get clear on that would be a first step towards coping. That’s why I asked you all to bring something to this session, an object that makes you think of her, and to describe the emotions it brings up.”

Once more there is a silence. In Kristof’s experience, there is seldom quiet among philosophers; usually they have many firm ideas and are willing to express them at length. But producing objects in order to describe the feelings they elicit is not a familiar task.

“I’m afraid I forgot to bring something,” says Cyrus decisively. Maria nods without challenging the remark.

“I remembered the request, but I couldn’t quite bring myself to do it,” says Joan. “I found it embarrassing.”

Maria turns to Luke, who, in his eagerness to speak, clears his throat. He is holding up a postcard with tack on each corner. “This is from her office,” he says. “A picture of Picasso’s goat. A sculpture made out of waste material, bits of string, metal, things he found in dumps. Tender, brave goat! Cocking a snook at the whole world, tough and ready for anything. Saskia kept this card up on her office wall. She told me that when she spent a year in Paris as a student, she visited the goat at the Picasso Museum every week. I wasn’t surprised. Funny, fearless – I think she saw something of herself in that goat.”

Luke adds: “Her office is still vacant. No one has been given permission to occupy the space. Even the administration wants to keep it open.” He looks down at his hands, and again the room fills with silence.

“I see you like art too.” Kristof is smiling as he looks at Maria. The painting above her fireplace is a copy of Hieronymus Bosch’s The Garden of Earthly Delights. It seems an unusual choice for a therapist, this picture with a thousand mad cavorting figures. Maybe it is too insinuating for a room in which people are asked to recount their own stories.

Maria nods, possibly to agree that she likes art, or perhaps as an invitation for Kristof to carry on speaking. “Have you brought something?”

“I have,” and he bends forward to unzip a black sports bag on the floor in front of him. Out comes a plastic sleeve with a glinting disc. “I came with a CD player, but I see you have one yourself.” Kristof gets up and crosses the room, aware that his movements are quick and smooth. “Just a moment.” Maria’s sound system, the box and speakers tucked into her bookshelf, is dealt with swiftly: Kristof’s hands move over it, tapping, sliding, and then he returns to his chair as the machine whirrs, readying itself to play.

There is a subterranean roll of drums. A violin calls out, a series of long notes. In the far background, a kind of rattle. Everyone in the room listens to this assortment of mournful sounds, but with varying degrees of attention. Joan looks at Cyrus; each of them maintains a poker face. Luke seems to be incorporating the music into his mourning, a soundtrack for his sorrow – his eyes are downcast.

Maria appears to be waiting for a natural break in the music, but every pause is brief, soon interrupted by a drum roll, a gong or a chorus of high, wordless human voices. After a few minutes, speaking over a rattle, she asks Kristof what the music signifies for him.

“This is something I shared with Saskia,” he says. “Morton Feldman’s Rothko Chapel. Painting was her main artistic interest, not music, but she loved this. I wasn’t at all surprised, because she had – has, I should say – a truly soulful presence. And under these strange circumstances of her disappearance, the music takes on a new and frightening significance for me.”

Luke sighs, and the gas fire hisses. For the next half hour, Maria elicits further expressions from the philosophers about their feelings for Saskia and the meaning to them of her disappearance.

“How would you describe your emotional states since her disappearance?” Maria asks.

“I don’t think I’m much changed,” says Joan. “Sometimes slightly angry, maybe, irritable.” This is greeted with silence.

“I feel totally alert,” Cyrus remarks. “I get into bed at night and I lie waiting to get up, ready for the slightest change in air pressure. I’m not scared, just watchful. All the time.” He brushes the side of his shirt, though there is nothing on it.

Luke admits to feeling guilty and ineffectual. “What more could we do?” he asks. “We’ve been over everything – police, hospitals, morgue, newspapers . . .” He goes through the list, as he has clearly done before, many times. “But I feel we’re not doing what we can, there may be some clue that we’ve been too careless to notice.”

“That’s the job of the police,” says Joan.

“The police,” Luke says bitterly. “How much have they done?”

The conversation is rendered ominous, melancholic, by Kristof’s music. Maria is hesitant to ask him to switch it off, presumably – he reflects – because it has a special meaning to him. No one else in the department asks either. So, accompanied by bells, violins and rattles, the gathering goes on, and once the music draws to a dreadfully sad close, it seems to them all that the session is at an end.

“I would, of course, be happy to see you all again if you like,” Maria says.

“Thank you so much,” replies Luke. He looks deflated. “We’ll let you know. Meanwhile, we appreciate this session.”

Kristof removes his CD and then stands waiting as his colleagues leave. He has a relaxed manner, though only he is left in the room with Maria.

“Is there something else I can help with?” she asks.

“I know it’s a little unprofessional of me – we should stick to Saskia’s disappearance – but I couldn’t help noticing your picture,” says Kristof. “I love the Bosch, and I’m impressed that someone has taken the trouble to paint it. Quite a big copy too. Did you do it?”

Maria laughs. “If I tried, it wouldn’t look as good as that, I can tell you.”

“Who, then?”

A pause. “My mother.”

“A talented artist.”

“Yes. It was a long project for her. She had a huge book of Bosch reproductions that she kept open on the table as she painted.”

“She did a wonderful job. She’s captured how funny Bosch is, and how shocking. I’m intrigued by the blank space at the bottom.” He points to the lower right corner, where there is a patch of white canvas surrounded by images of naked men and women being tortured by demons in Hell. “She’s left out the satanic bird,” he says.

“I suppose she didn’t get a chance to finish the picture,” says Maria.

There is a silence. Kristof notes her reticence, and chooses a new topic. “I like your books too: psychology in the upper shelves, mysticism below.” He goes to the far end of the room, and peers at the bookcase. Lying on one of the upper shelves, hidden from Maria by his chest, is a blue ceramic gecko. “The titles are evocative.”

Maria doesn’t reply, but retains her smile.

Kristof shoulders his bag, ready to go. “May I use your bathroom?”

Kristof looks at himself in the bathroom mirror. Even to himself, his physical appearance seems a little foreign. Perhaps his black hair, cropped and soldierly, contributes to the impression. Or his green eyes – but maybe there has never been a period or location in which those eyes blended with their surroundings. He turns to urinate, raising his head as he does so, humming softly. As he flushes, he flips open the cupboard door above the washbasin. There is a white-painted shelf, empty except for some medicine bottles and a box of tissues at the back. Kristof removes the ceramic gecko from his pocket. He places it on the shelf, in the middle, as if it is an actor standing before an audience. Admiring the scene for a moment, he closes the cupboard door quietly, washes his hands and leaves.

“It was good to meet you,” he tells Maria before leaving. “I’ve never been to one of these sessions before, but I found it strangely cleansing.”

“Well,” says Maria, “please feel free to contact me if you’d like to speak further.”

There is ambiguity in her words. Is she referring to the whole group, or just to him?

“I certainly will,” says Kristof. Off he goes, sports bag over his shoulder.