Inchworm (9 page)

It’s warm enough today to sit in the garden in the shelter of the wall for a little while. Daddy has these posh canvas deckchairs in a shed and we’ve got them out, but a small brown spider with a black head has laid its eggs on the seat of one of them. When I open the chair she pops out of her nest ready to defend her brood. I can’t find her in my spider books. Maybe she is a rarity, a new spider, not described before. I could have a spider named after me:
Arachnida Gussii
.

Little Miss Muffet sat on a tuffet

Eating her curds and whey.

There came a big spider

Who sat down beside her

And frightened Miss Muffet away

I don’t know who wrote that – anon, I expect. She wrote lots of nursery rhymes.

Miss Muffet was the daughter of a spider expert – Reverend Thomas Muffet. When she was ill he made her eat crushed spiders as a cure. No wonder she was frightened of spiders. But most humans feel the same way. We spent a winter in the Seychelles when I was about nine. We had had a terrifying flight in a very small plane from a smaller island back to Mahe in a thunderstorm one evening. I walked into my bedroom, desperate for rest, and saw a hairy spider as big as Mum’s hand on the back of the door. I jumped on the bed and screamed. Mum followed me in and screamed too. We bounced on the bed hugging each other like idiots for a few minutes; then she dragged me out, trying not to disturb the killer spider. We went to the cottage next door where a German family was staying. We needed help. Unfortunately they misunderstood our problem. Instead of removing the tarantula, they sprayed it with some awful slow-acting insecticide and it staggered around for an hour before dying. Worse, they found a whole family of them behind the wardrobe and killed them too. I still feel guilty when I think of it. I am quite brave about them now, well, braver than Mum (
Mutti
). I do the spider catching in our house. The ones we find in the bath are male house spiders,
Tegenaria
domestica
, who have fallen in while looking for a mate. They can’t climb out because they have no gripping tufts of hair on their feet to climb the shiny surface. Maybe Alistair will be her hero from now on. I hope so; it will relieve me of the arduous task.

There’s one other tree in Daddy’s garden. It’s a Black Mulberry. Perhaps he could import some silkworms and start manufacturing silk. They prefer White Mulberry leaves, though.

We had some silk worms at school once. They’re the caterpillar of
Bombyx mori
– a moth. Someone came to the school and showed us how they live. The silk actually comes from the cocoon. The larva constructs its cocoon from a single strand of silk, laid down in a figure-of-eight motion. When the adult moth emerges it breaks through the silk, damaging the strand. This makes it unusable, as the silk can’t be unwound, so silk manufacturers kill the pupa before the moth inside leaves its cocoon. They place them in hot-air dryers, which dessicates them so the pupae will not putrefy in stored cocoons.

I don’t imagine they feel any pain – I do hope not. But if you think about it it’s a bit like mass abortion. There are hardly any silk worms in the wild, but there must be some as there is such a thing as wild silk. Mankind has farmed them for thousands of years.

Mum has lots of silk: shirts and silk scarves. I better tell her not to buy more unless it’s wild and free range.

As soon as we get settled in the garden the sun disappears and it’s winter again. But it was a promise of sunny times to come.

Mum and I are invited to Herr Weinberger’s flat. There is a wall of shelves full of brightly coloured pottery figures, but no books at all. I look at the names on the base of two figures on horses – Havelock and Campbell, and seated figures of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert.

After he died, Victoria wore mourning black for the rest of her life. I remember that from a radio programme. I like Radio Four, which
Mutti
listens to most of the time. There’s lots of talking on it, debates, stories, plays –
Woman’s Hour
and the
Today
programme.
Mutti
shouts at one of the presenters sometimes, telling him to shut up so she can hear what the interviewee has to say. I can’t concentrate on things in the morning until I’ve had all my medicines and done my health checks. We have a home spirometry kit: I have to blow really hard and it measures my breathing, which I record in a special notebook with my temperature and weight and what drugs I take and when. If I have a sudden weight loss, I have to phone the hospital in case it’s a sign of some major problem – like rejection.

‘Do you like my pottery figures, Gussie?’

‘What are they, Herr Weinberger?’

‘They are Victorian. Decorated by children, mostly. They were made as souvenirs of popular figures – people in the news – generals, celebrities and royalty.’

‘Like posters of pop musicians?’

‘Yes, Gussie, similar. People collected figures of people they admired. This one is Jenny Lind, a very famous singer in her day.’

‘Are they German?’

‘No, no, English. Staffordshire pottery. I love English things, not German, and I love Scottish things – their single malt whiskies, at least.’ He laughs at his own little joke. ‘Try this ten year old cask-made Laphroiag, my dear.’

He pours a drink for Mum and I have apple juice. Mum murmurs her appreciation. He asks about my treatment and Mum tells him, but I don’t want to talk about my illness or my operation, it’s boring.

‘What did you do before you were old, Herr Weinberger?’ I ask. He laughs.

‘Gussie, that’s not polite.’ Mum sighs loudly. ‘I’m sorry, Herr Weinberger.’

‘No, no, don’t worry, she has an enquiring mind,
das ist zehr gut
. I was a jeweller in Hatton Garden.’

‘A jeweller? Did you make brooches and necklaces?’

‘Yes, and I worked with diamonds. I designed and made diamond rings, brooches, necklaces and that sort of thing. I worked with precious stones, silver, gold and platinum until my eyes became too weary.’

When we leave, he says we must return. I think he’s lonely. I wonder if he talks to his Staffordshire figures. He looks surprisingly well dressed and scrubbed today.

COMPREHENSION—POWER OF THE MIND TO UNDERSTAND

THE THING ABOUT
being in hospital was – people looked after me. I was the centre of attention, the star. Everyone was striving to keep me alive, or that’s what it felt like. I was special; I was important. And why were they all trying to save me? Why did I survive? Am I here for a reason? Are we all alive simply to reproduce for the survival of the species? I suspect we are but I would like to do something useful or wonderful with my new life. I’m like the Tin Man in
The Wizard of Oz
, who had no heart until Dorothy helped him to get one. Mr Sami is my Dorothy. But what could I do? Perhaps become a doctor or a nurse? Or encourage people to become organ donors? Or a writer? A poet? I think I might be a poet. Yes, a poet. For now anyway.

Missing Them

I miss the meow and prrup

The jumping up onto my lap,

The floating fur, the chirrup and purr

The cold pink nose, the curling tail

The gift of mouse, shrew and vole.

I miss the chase the pounce the kill.

Mum has been acting oddly. When she’s not organising my drugs, preparing meals, or spending ages in the bathroom, she’s watching the telly, turning up the volume and then dozing off, head thrown back, mouth open, snoring loudly, like an old woman. She’s fifty-three so I suppose she is fairly old. If only she could see herself. I make a photo of her – I could use it as blackmail. When she’s awake she shouts at the telly or talks to herself, wherever she is, bathroom, kitchen, sitting room, and I assume she’s talking to me, but she isn’t. I worry about her. Is she losing her marbles?

‘Come on
Mutti
, I’m taking you out.’

‘I don’t want to go out. I was awake all night. I want to listen to
Woman’s Hour
.’

‘What about my walk?’

‘What about it?’

‘Well, I have to exercise.’

‘Well, go on then, exercise.’

‘I can’t go on my own. What about the perverts?’

‘What perverts? Have we ever met any perverts?’

‘Well, no…’

‘Oh, go on Guss, you’ll be all right. Give it a try.’

I have never been out on my own in London, I realise; in Cornwall, yes, but here? No. I always went to school by car with Mum or bus with friends.

I suppose the worst that can happen is that some poor sick man will expose himself to me. Ohmygod, I hope that doesn’t happen. I’ve survived a heart and lung transplant; I can surely survive a walk on the Heath.

‘I’ll be back,’ I say in my best Arnold Schwarzenegger
Terminator
voice.

The Heath is icy and bleak, joggers are scarlet with cold even though it’s meant to be spring. The dog-walkers hurry along, yanking the leads when their pugs and poodles stop to sniff each other’s bums. Isn’t it odd that humans have pets? Some humans. It’s not like the pets are doing a job – like sheep dogs or gun dogs; they don’t clean our skins like small fish do for whales and sharks, or eat parasites from cattle like cowbirds. We keep them because we enjoy their company. We groom
them,
not the other way round. It’s very strange that we like having animals around – especially dogs, as most of the dogs I’ve met smell pretty awful if they aren’t bathed regularly. Not like my cats, who smell of leaves and earth. And their breath is gross too – dogs, I mean. One of my grandma’s friends used to have an old spaniel. I couldn’t sit on her carpet because it smelled so bad. Like… like… well, like smelly old dog.

In Darwin, Australia, some people buy baby crocodiles as pets for Christmas presents. Brett told me that. More macho than Rottweilers or Staffordshire pit bull terriers apparently. Crocodiles, not Brett, though he is pretty macho.

The willows are green with new growth but no other trees have signs of life, apart from skulking crows, who hunch their black shoulders like coffin bearers and peer down on me as if they are measuring me. Swans drift, heads tucked under wings.

I must at least have a little adventure, now I’m on my own. But there’s no prince on a white stallion, no unicorns or dragons, no perverts even.

‘Herr Weinberger!
Guten Abend.’

‘Guten Tag, Liebchen.
It is Augusta,
nicht war
?’

He pronounces my name ‘owgoosta’, which sounds very strange.

‘
Ya, aber ich müss nacht Hause gehen
.’ I only say this to impress him. It means but I have to go home now.

‘Oh, what a shame, can’t you walk with me for a while?’

‘Well, okay, just for a little while.’

I stare at his stick and the thick lenses of his specs.

‘Are you completely blind, Herr Weinberger?’

‘I don’t see very well. But I see you have a camera – a Leica,
nicht war
?’

‘Yes. Daddy lent it to me.’

‘I too have one of these.
Zehr gut
this camera. It is made in Germany.’

‘I thought you didn’t like German things, Herr Weinberger.’

‘That is right. Yes, yes, usually, but the German camera, it is
zehr gut.’

‘My great-grandfather was a famous photographer. His name was Amos Hartley Stevens. Maybe you’ve heard of him?

‘
Nein, nein,
I do not know this name. But famous?
Ach,
Liebchen
. Then you maybe will be famous also. It will be in your blood, so?’

‘Maybe. I really must go home now, though, before I get chilled.’

‘Off you go, my dear, don’t you worry about me.’

He coughs and sniffs. Maybe because his sight isn’t good his sense of smell is more developed. That happens sometimes. One sense becomes stronger when others are weak.

I wonder how old he is and if he was an enemy soldier in the Second World War. And now we are friends – or friendly. If generals and colonels, admirals and politicians fought
each other
when they declared war, instead of getting young soldiers to fight their wars for them, maybe the world would be a better place, though it would be more crowded.

Maybe Nature has made humans warlike and bloodthirsty as a built-in way of keeping down the world’s population.

He hasn’t the right shape for a soldier – he’s small and thin. He wears a holey tweed coat, a tatty fur hat and scarf and smells of mothballs and lemony cologne. His socks are tucked into his boots.

He coughs.

‘Yes, I better get back. Bye.’

‘
Auf Wiedersehen, Liebchen.’

I walk through frosty leaves that crackle and crunch under my Doc Martens. There is a boy sitting on a rug in the doorway of a closed deli. He looks about fifteen, red-eyed, skinny and spotty, wrapped in a woollen blanket. I go into the café next door, buy a take-away hot chocolate and a melted cheese and tomato baguette. It takes practically all of my pocket money.