Machines Like Me

He said of himself that he was spread so thinly, his reputation was only ‘one cell thick’. Thinning it further, he devoted three years to a difficult sonnet sequence about his father’s experiences in the First World War. He was a ‘not bad’ jazz pianist. His rock climbers’ guide to the Jura was well regarded but the maps were poor – not his fault – and it was soon superseded. He lived on the edge of debt, in over his head sometimes, though never for long. His weekly wine column probably launched his career as an invalid. When his body turned against itself, his first affliction was ITP, immune thrombocytopenic purpura. He was a great talker, people said. Then black spots appeared on his tongue. Despite them, he climbed, with help from young associates, the north face of Ben Nevis – fair achievement for a man in his late fifties, especially when he wrote about it so well. But the derisive ‘almost man’ label appeared to have stuck.

The nurse called me in and snipped my plaster off with medical shears. Shed of the weight, my arm, pale and thin, rose in the air as though filled with helium. As I walked along the Clapham Road, I waved my arm about and flexed it, exulting in its freedom. A taxi stopped for me. Out of politeness, I got in and rode an expensive 300 yards home.

That evening, I asked Miranda if her father knew about Adam. She had told him, she said, but he wasn’t much interested. So why was she so keen to take Adam to Salisbury? Because, she explained as we lay in bed, she wanted to see what happened between them. She thought her father needed a full-on encounter with the twentieth century.

A rock climber who had read a thousand times as many books as I had, a man who didn’t ‘tolerate fools gladly’ – with my limited literary background I should have been intimidated, but now the decision was made, I was looking forward to shaking his hand. I was immune. His daughter and I were in love, and Maxfield had to take me as I was. Besides, lunch at Miranda’s childhood home, a place I was keen to see, was merely the soft prelude to calling on Gorringe, which I dreaded, regardless of Adam’s researches.

We left the house after breakfast on a blustery Wednesday morning. My car had no rear doors. It surprised me that Adam was so inept as he squeezed himself onto the back seat. The collar of his suit jacket became snared on a chrome plate that housed a seat-belt reel. When I unhooked him, he seemed to think his dignity was compromised. As we began the long crawl through Wandsworth he was moody, our reluctant back-seat teenage son on a family outing. In the circumstances, Miranda was cheerful as she filled me in on her father’s news: in and out of hospital for more tests; one health visitor replaced by another, at his insistence; his gout returning to his right thumb but not the left; his regrets for the stamina he lacked for all he wanted to write; his excitement at the novella he would soon finish. He wished he’d discovered the form long before. The New York apartment idea had been forgotten. He had plans for a trilogy after this one. At Miranda’s feet was a canvas bag containing our lunch – he had told her that the new housekeeper was a terrible cook. Whenever we hit a bump, several bottles clinked.

After an hour, we were just beginning to escape London’s gravitational pull. I appeared to be the only driver steering his own car. Most people in what was once the driver’s seat were asleep. As soon as the money was in place for the Notting Hill house, I intended to buy myself a high-powered autonomous vehicle. Miranda and I would drink wine on long journeys and watch movies and make love on the fold-down back seat. By the time I had allusively set out this scheme for her, we were passing the autumnal hedgerows of Hampshire. There seemed something unnatural about the size of the trees that loomed over the road. We had decided to make a detour past Stonehenge, though I hoped it wouldn’t prompt Adam to lecture us on its origins. But he was in no mood for talk. When Miranda asked him if he was unhappy, he murmured, ‘I’m fine, thank you.’ We fell into silence. I began to wonder if he was ready to change his mind about calling on Gorringe. I wouldn’t object. If we did go, he might not, in his moody condition, be active enough in our defence. I glanced at him in the rear-view mirror. His head was turned to his left to watch the fields and clouds. I thought I saw his lips moving but I couldn’t be sure. When I glanced again his lips were still.