Sobre a Deficiência Visual

Adrian Mole and the Weapons of Mass Destruction

Sue Townsend

excerpt

The Blind Boy and his Beast - Clive Hicks-Jenkins

In "Adrian Mole and the Weapons of Mass Destruction", Nigel's eyesight deteriorates badly and he becomes legally blind (quite like Sue Townsend herself). He loses his job as a media analyst, and has to move into his parents' granny flat, where he finds himself dependent on charity. His blindness makes him quite bitter and misanthropic. He is particularly scathing in response to popular myths concerning the blind, or to protestations of sympathy. Adrian attempts to help him out by reading to him regularly, but Nigel appears ungracious; eventually, he seems to have more respect for Graham, his guide dog, than for his friend.
 

Nigel called in this afternoon after his eye clinic appointment at the Royal Hospital. He is supposed to be my best friend, but it is over six months since I saw him in the flesh.

The last time I spoke to him was on the phone. He had said that he couldn't bear the gay clubs in the provinces, where they huddle together for validation and companionship, instead of like the London clubbing scene, 'the music and the sex'.

I had said that there was more to life than music and sex.

He'd replied, 'That's the difference between us, Moley.' I was shocked at how much he has changed. He is still handsome, but his face looks a bit ragged around the edges, and it's obviously been a while since he'd seen his hair colourist.

He was still visibly shocked at his recent bad news. He said, 'The consultant examined my eyes and was quiet for a horribly long time, and then he said, "Did you drive yourself here, Mr Hetherington?" I told him that I had driven up from London. He said, "I'm afraid I can't allow you to drive back. Your sight has deteriorated so much that I'm going to put you on the partially sighted register."'

I desperately searched for something positive to say, but could only come up with, 'You've always enjoyed wearing dark glasses, Nigel. Now you can wear them all year round, night and day, without people thinking you're a prat.'

Nigel leaned against the bargain books table, dislodging a pile of unread Finnegans Wakes. I would have helped him to a chair had there been one in the shop.

'How can I live without my car, Moley?' Nigel said. 'How am I going to get back to London? And how can I be a media analyst when I can't read the fucking papers?'

I said that if Nigel was partially sighted, it was probably a good job that he wasn't driving down the Mi and negotiating London traffic.

Nigel said, 'I have been making a lot of mistakes at work lately. And it's months since I've been able to read normal print without a magnifying glass.'

I rang Computa Cabs and asked for a taxi to take Nigel to his parents' house. The controller said that most of the taxi drivers were at the mosque, praying for peace, but that he would send one ASAP.

While we waited, I suggested to Nigel that he learns Braille.

He said, 'I've never been good with my hands, Moley.'

I asked Nigel if he could still see colours.

He said, 'I can't see anything much.'

I was very shocked. I had been hoping that Nigel would help me decorate my loft apartment. He used to be good with colours.

I helped him into the cab and told the driver to take him to 5 Bill Gates Close, The Homestead Estate, near Glenfield.

Nigel said in a bad-tempered way, 'I can still speak, Moley!'

I hope he is not going to become one of those bitter blind people, like Mr Rochester in Jane Eyre.

*****
I rang Nigel at his parents' house. He has been living in their granny annexe since putting his London flat up for sale. His sight has deteriorated even more. I asked him if he wanted to go and see The Lord of the Rings with me.

He said, 'No, it all takes place in Middle Earth in half-darkness, and anyway elves and gnomes are seriously naff.'

I asked Nigel if his hearing had improved since he had gone blind.

He said, 'Yes, I can now hear a page being turned in Hay-on-fucking-Wye, aren't I a lucky boy?'

*****

Saturday November 23rd

I didn't know what to wear to the reunion. I rang Nigel for advice. He said, 'Wear what you feel comfortable in, Moley.'

It wasn't the moment to tell him that I never feel comfortable in any of my clothes. It isn't a question of fit or texture; it is a question of style. Who am I? And what do I want to say about myself?

I asked Nigel what he was wearing and he said, 'Paul Smith.'

I think Nigel is on to something. I ought to find a designer who matches my personality and stick to the one brand.

After a lot of dithering, I wore my Next navy suit, a white shirt and a red silk tie. I cut my fringe with the nail scissors and splashed myself liberally with Boss aftershave.

I picked Nigel up on the way. There was a frustrating wait while he stumbled around the granny annexe, 'looking' for his keys, coat and the white stick he has taken to using since he almost fell, Mr Magoo-like, into a workman's trench. I made no attempt to help him, as I have often heard blind people on the radio going on about how much they resent other people doing things for them.

After long minutes of fruitless searching, Nigel said, 'For Christ's sake, Moley, give me a hand.'

In the car I told Nigel that it was time he got himself organized and that he must learn to put things in the same place so that he knows where to find them each time. I asked him how he was coping financially now that he apparently had no income.

He said that he was living on disability allowance. To cheer him up, I made a joke. I said, 'So, it's goodbye to Paul Smith of Covent Garden and hello to George at Asda, is it?'

Nigel didn't even smile. He seems to have lost his sense of humour along with his sight.

I got him out of the car and escorted him across the car park and up to the school assembly hall. He kept dragging his feet and falling over his stick, and once he snapped, 'For Christ's sake, slow down. You're dragging me along as if I'm a bag of rubbish.'

We were greeted at the door of the assembly hall by an old bald bloke wearing nerd glasses and a Norman Wisdom-type suit. It was Brain-box Henderson, who is an old fogey at thirty-five.

We paid our PS10 and Henderson gave us raffle tickets in return. The first prize was a tour of the House of Commons and tea on the terrace with Pandora. Second prize was a first edition signed copy of Aden Vole by Barry Kent. Third prize was a giant teddy bear donated by Elizabeth Sally Stafford (nee Broadway), who was now running her own interior design company.

Some of my former school mates had changed out of all recognition. Claire Neilson, who once had tangled blonde curls and luscious lips, was now a tense, twitchy woman who kept looking at her watch and wondering aloud if the children were in bed.

Craig Thomas waved from behind the double decks of his mobile disco, Funk Down Sounds. He was wearing a baseball cap, back to front. He was the only one dancing to Michael Jackson's 'Billy Jean'.

Barbara Bowyer and Victoria Louise Thomson were standing at the makeshift bar, slagging off the absent Pandora, saying that she had done nothing for women since she'd been in office.

When they saw me and Nigel, they screamed, 'Aidy! Nige!' And ran to embrace us. I asked Victoria Louise what she did for a living and she said, 'I marry increasingly older men, darling.'

She is currently divorcing number three and planning to marry number four. Later on that night I heard her saying, 'I can't remember the last time I peeled a vegetable. I think it must have been...

Barbara Bowyer was easily the most beautiful woman in the room. She used to be the ward sister in the Coronary Care Unit at the Royal Hospital, but she's now training to be a heating engineer.

She said, 'It's still pipes, pumps and valves, but double the money.

I said jokingly, 'You can drain my pipe any time you like,' but I don't think she could have heard me, because she turned away and speared a chipolata with a toothpick.

A group of elderly people were sitting at a corner table. Claire said, 'Just look at that lot. How come that collection of clapped-out geriatrics used to put the fear of God in us?'

The old people were our teachers: Miss Fossington-Gore (Geography), Mr Jones (PE), Miss Elf (Drama), Mr Dock (English). Sitting with them was the current headmaster, Roger Patience, who once predicted that Glenn 'would never make anything of himself'.

Mr Dock was looking longingly towards the bar, so I beckoned him over and bought him half a pint. He was delighted to learn that I was working for Mr Carlton-Hayes.

'I remember you, Mole he said. 'You were the only lad I ever taught who cried when Lenny murdered the girl in Of Mice and Men.'

Nigel said waspishly, 'Moley cries at the drop of a hat. I caught him blubbering over a dead hamster in Animal Hospital one afternoon.'

When Mr Dock returned to his table, I joined him and talked to the teachers.

Mr Jones said that he did not remember me. I told him that I was nearly always ill on PE days. He said, 'But there were so many.

I said, 'It was my dog that ran off with the football in the last five minutes of the final of the inter-counties schools match between Leicestershire and Bedfordshire.'

'Ah, yes, I do remember you now said Jones. 'You once brought a note to me purporting to be from your mother, "Adrian has got diarrhoea through holes in his shoes."'

Oh, how the table of old educators laughed.

Mr Dock said, 'Did he spell diarrhoea correctly?'

Jones said, 'How would I know? I taught PE.'

By 9.30 the room had filled up a bit, the sandwiches on the buffet table had started to curl slightly at the sides and a few people were dancing to Boy George singing 'Do You Really Want to Hurt Me?'

Nigel seemed to be the centre of attention. He was surrounded by sympathetic women offering to come to his annexe to clean and do his washing and ironing.

There was a hooting from the car park and Brain-box Henderson shouted over the music, 'Come and see the new minibus.'

Kent was behind the wheel of a white minibus with his shaved head and leather jacket, from which hung heavy silver chains. A seven-foot-tall minder wearing a dark overcoat got out of the passenger seat and said to the small crowd, 'Keep away from Mr Kent, please. He don't like being touched. And no photos. He don't want no publicity.'

Roger Patience was summoned and an awkward little ceremony took place, during which Barry Kent handed over the keys and logbook.

The two men made startlingly hypocritical speeches.

Kent said that his days at Neil Armstrong Comprehensive had been the happiest of his life.

Patience said that Barry Kent had 'by all accounts been a challenging but brilliant young man who had brought honour to the school'. Then he got behind the wheel of the minibus and started the engine.

Brain-box Henderson put his large head through the driver's open window and said, 'Mr Patience, have you passed the local authority minibus driving test?'

Patience admitted that he had not and took his foot off the accelerator.

Pandora rang me on my mobile to tell me that she was just coming up to Junction 21 and would be with us soon. She said, 'Is there any food left? I'm fucking famished.'

I told her that the buffet had curled up and died and offered to take her out for a meal after she had performed her duties. She made a noncommittal sound and rang off.

I joined Wayne Wong, Parvez and Victoria Louise, who were smoking by the bike sheds in the playground. We had a good laugh about Brain-box Henderson's shrunken suit, Miss Fossington-Gore's beard and moustache, and Craig Thomas's pathetic disco.

Pandora's silver Saab turned into the car park, scattering gravel. I hurried over to open the driver's door. She sat in the car for a while, brushing her hair and applying lipstick.

I told her that she looked tired.

She said, 'Gee, thanks.'

She joined the smokers by the bike sheds, saying, 'I need a fag before I go inside and face the grizzly Fossington-Gore.'

Brain-box Henderson hurried over and advised Pandora to keep her tribute to Miss Fossington-Gore short as they were running late and the caretaker wanted to have the hall cleared by 11.

Pandora said, 'No probs.' She stubbed her Benson s out on a bike rack and we went inside.

'Sexual Healing' had drawn people on to the dance floor. There was an excited murmur when Pandora made her entrance, and Roger Patience broke off from fawning over Barry Kent to go forward and greet Pandora, and to formally welcome her back to the school.

Brain-box Henderson hurried to the mobile disco and asked Craig Thomas to turn Marvin Gaye off. He then tapped on the side of a wine glass with a fork and silence fell.

Brain-box then led Pandora, Roger Patience and Miss Fossington-Gore on to the stage, where there was a Formica table on which stood a large gift-wrapped box.

There was a lot of clapping and whistling, and Barry Kent made a yee-haw sound, like a cowboy riding a bucking bronco at a rodeo.

Roger Patience went on about Pandora, telling the audience that she spoke five languages fluently, including Russian and Mandarin (as if we didn't know!), that she got a double first at Oxford, that she was the Labour member for Ashby de la Zouch and that she was a junior minister in the Department of the Environment. He said these were all great achievements, but he was sure that Pandora's greatest triumphs were yet to come -- that the Daily Telegraph had hinted recently that Pandora could well be Britain's first woman Labour prime minister --'So, Gordon Brown watch out!'

There was polite laughter. Then Pandora, looking magnificent in a tailored Lauren Bacall jacket and what looked like men's trousers, addressed us. She started, 'Let me make it absolutely clear that without the guidance and inspirational teaching of Miss Fossington-Gore I would not be here today -- at least, not in my capacity as Member of Parliament and Junior Minister. It was Miss Fossington-Gore who said, on hearing of my ambition to be a catwalk model for the House of Balenciaga, "Oh, I'm sure we can do a little better than that, dear."'

Miss Fossington-Gore bowed her head modestly.

Pandora blabbed on mostly about herself and her achievements for another five minutes. Then she handed the gift-wrapped box to Miss Fossington-Gore and said, 'I'm sure this will look lovely on your mantelpiece. May the hours and minutes it records of your retirement be precious.'

Miss Fossington-Gore took a small handkerchief from under the cuff of her cardigan suit and said, 'The class of '83 was quite remarkable. Not only did it have Pandora Braithwaite, it also had Barry Kent. And let us not forget Adrian Mole, whose TV series, Offally Good!, I quite enjoyed. I would, before I open my present, like to say a few words about Nigel.' She gestured towards Nigel, who was sitting down with his white stick held in front of him like those old blokes in Greek cafes. 'Nigel has been terrifically brave since suffering severe sight impairment.'

I looked across at Nigel and saw him swearing under his breath. There was a huge round of applause and stamping and cheering for Nigel's bravery.

Then Miss Fossington-Gore, who is a vegan and who lives alone in a one-bedroom flat, painstakingly opened her present and found a George Foreman family-size grill. However, good breeding and a lifetime of repressing her true feelings saved the day, and she gave a gracious little speech thanking the assembled company for their kindness and generosity.

When told what the present was, Nigel gave a bitter laugh and said, 'Will it fit her mantelpiece?'

Barry Kent was invited on to the stage to draw the raffle. He turned a simple task into something akin to lighting the Olympic flame. Claire Neilson, who had gone home to check on her children, won the giant teddy bear. By a cruel irony, the second prize was won by Nigel, and the first prize was won, to Pandora's considerable disgust, by Brain-box Henderson.

Kent then left for East Midlands Airport, saying that he had to meet a publisher in Amsterdam in the morning.

I am amazed, diary, at how much I still dislike Barry Kent and how much I long for his downfall.

When the caretaker came in jangling his keys, Craig put on 'Every Breath You Take' and announced that it was to be the last record. I asked Pandora if she would like to dance and amazingly she agreed.

She is slightly taller than me in high heels, but I have reached the age where it no longer matters quite as much as it once did.

I sang along with Sting, 'I'll be watching you', until Pandora asked me to stop. But for once she didn't try to lead and allowed me to shuffle her around the dance floor.

I am, of course, still madly in love with her. She has spoiled me for any other female. She is a ten-out-of-ten woman, whereas Marigold is, tragically, two and a half, or perhaps three on a good day.

I asked Pandora if she would like to join a group of intimates for dinner at the Imperial Dragon, explaining that Wayne Wong would give us a 10 per cent discount.

She said, 'You're still penny-pinching then?'

I replied, 'On the contrary, I've just forked almost 10,000 quid out to furnish my new canalside loft at Rat Wharf.'

However, for the second time that night she surprised me and agreed to come to dinner.

Pandora, Nigel, Parvez, Barbara, Victoria Louise and I shared an Emperor's Banquet. We sat at a large round table. I sat in between Nigel and Pandora. I asked the waiter, Wayne's brother, Keith Wong, to take Nigel's chopsticks away and bring a fork and spoon, explaining that this would make life easier for Nigel as he was almost blind.

To my astonishment, Nigel had a mini temper tantrum and demanded that Keith return his chopsticks.

Nigel said, 'Keep your nose out, Mole,' and turned his back to me and talked to Parvez about his finances.

Parvez said, 'You're not as badly off as Adrian. He's saddled himself with a pile of debts.'

I said, 'Parvez, don't accountants take a vow of silence, or a Hippocratic oath or something? My finances are not a suitable subject for dinner-table conversation.'

Barbara Bowyer asked Pandora what Tony and Cherie were 'really like'.

Pandora said, 'I'm keeping my trap shut about the Blairs. Adrian keeps a diary, you know.'

Nigel said, 'You'd better not write anything about me.

I said, 'Don't flatter yourself, Nigel.' And I said to Pandora, 'Your secrets are safe with me. My diary is not for publication.'

Pandora said, 'That's what that creepy butler Paul Burrell said. I hear he's toting Diana's secrets around.'

'And anyway,' said Nigel, 'who would be interested in publishing the diary of a provincial nonentity?'

I took a prawn cracker from the lazy Susan in the middle of the table and bit into it to disguise how much his remark had hurt me.

At 11.45 p.m. my mobile rang. It was Marigold, asking me how the writing was going. Unfortunately, at that moment Keith Wong was serving the next course, shouting, 'OK, you got yuck sung, you got seaweed, you got prawn toasts, you got wantons, and you got vegetable spring rolls.'

Marigold said, 'Where are you?'

I thought about lying and saying it was the television in the background, but Marigold knew that ntl had not yet connected my television, so I was forced to tell the truth.

Pandora laughed at a joke Parvez made.

Marigold said, 'Who are you with?'

Pandora said suggestively, 'Can I help you to a spring roll, Aidy, darling?'

Marigold said, 'Who is that?'

I left the table and walked over to the fish tank. A large carp swam to the glass. It looked disconcertingly like Marigold without her glasses. I gained courage and said to the fish, 'Look, Marigold, this is not working for me. Perhaps we shouldn't see each other again.'

She said in a flat voice, 'You're with another woman, aren't you?'

I said I was with three women and two men.

Marigold sobbed, 'Three couples.'

I said, 'Please, don't cry.'

She said, 'I've spent all evening working on a loft apartment doll's house. It was going to be your Christmas present.'

I didn't know how to break off the conversation. It seemed heartless to point out to Marigold that my food was getting cold. I had to let her ramble on about her disastrous track record with men. The carp in the tank continued to stare mournfully at me. I could see my reflection in the glass. I looked a bit mournful myself.

Eventually Marigold rang off, saying in that spooky flat voice, 'There's no point in living without you.

The fish swam to the bottom of the tank and lay there without moving. I went back to the table. Keith Wong was putting down a dish of duck and pineapple, but when I pronged a bit with a chopstick it tasted like sawdust in my mouth.

I drank four tiny cups of sake and told my dinner companions about Marigold. The general consensus was that Marigold had to go.

Wayne Wong said, 'No offence, Aidy, but you can do a lot better. She ain't exactly a laugh a minute, is she?'

Pandora said, 'She sounds like one of those snivelling whiny types that give women a bad name.'

Nigel said, 'But any woman who fell for Adrian would have to be half off her rocker.'

Then Pandora said, 'You forget, Nigel, that I was once in love with Adrian myself.' She took my hand and held it. 'We were both fourteen. We were going to live in a farmhouse and have lots of children. Adrian was going to be an ice-cream man during the day and I was going to milk cows and bake bread and wait for him to come home.'

Suddenly we were both weeping. 'It's that fucking rice wine,' said Pandora. 'It always does this to me.

Nigel broke the party up by saying he had to get up early in the morning, because a woman from the RNIB was coming to interview him to vet his suitability for a guide dog.

Parvez, being a Muslim, was the only one sober enough to drive, so the rest of us left our cars parked outside the restaurant and we squeezed into Parvez's people carrier and I invited everybody back to Rat Wharf for a nightcap.

Gielgud was waiting for me in the car park, but I scared him off with a Star Wars light sabre belonging to Ali, Parvez's youngest son, which had been left in the car.

I switched the lamps on and made coffee and warned everybody about the glass lavatory. People went out on to the balcony and Pandora said how beautiful the swans looked in the moonlight. I hoped that, for once, Gielgud wouldn't spoil the party.

*****

I phoned Nigel and asked him to be my partner at the dinner. He said ungraciously, 'Why not? It'll save me cooking.'

I led Nigel into the restaurant, steering him by the front of his shirt. He still banged into chairs and tables on the way, and dropped his white stick twice. His language was unrepeatable. He has developed quite a temper since turning blind.

Wayne had managed to insert an extra table next to the fish tank. The lights inside the tank cast an unpleasant green glow over the table, but I could hardly complain.

Ken Blunt and his wife, Glenda, resembled middle-aged Martians. She is a bit vulgar-looking but friendly enough.

She said, 'I don't mind Ken writing. It is a cheap hobby, not like golf.'

Gary Milksop's eyes lit up when he saw Nigel. Not surprising, because Gary's partner turned out to be a ferret-faced youth with a pencil-thin beard and ears that stuck out like mug handles.

I wish it had been possible to warn Milksop that he stood no chance with Nigel. Nigel likes horny-handed men of toil who order him about and make his life a misery.

Milksop's friends were two serious-looking girls he said he had met at group therapy the previous month. They seemed to think that he was some kind of genius.

Flowers kept us waiting and then made an entrance, shouting, 'I'm expected at the writers' table.' He was wearing a green tweed suit and a large trilby hat.

I said our celebrity guest had arrived.

Ken Blunt turned round and said, 'It's that gobshite from the health food shop in the market?

Glenda Blunt put her autograph book away in her handbag.

Disappointment settled over the table like heavy snow. It was a most unsatisfactory meal. Wayne Wong kept reminding me that we had to be out by 9.30.

Ken Blunt and Michael Flowers quarrelled about Iraq. Ken is violently anti-American -- Glenda told me that he won't allow Coca-Cola in the house -- and Michael Flowers claims to be a pacifist (he doesn't know that I know that Mr Carlton-Hayes knocked him out in that car park fight).

At one point I said that, despite his wife's behaviour in letting the writers' group down, I still had complete faith in Mr Blair and that the Weapons of Mass Destruction would soon be found, but that it was like looking for a needle in a haystack the size of France.

Nigel said, 'Or looking for a piece of turkey in this fucking turkey chow mein.

Gary Milksop said that Iraq was about oil. His acolytes nodded and gazed at him as though he were some kind of political guru.

Nigel stubbornly refused to accept help in locating bits of turkey and continued to drop noodles down his Kenzo shirt front.

The two serious girls talked to each other but seemed reluctant to add anything to the general conversation.

Michael Flowers went into monologue mode -- talk about death by anecdote. At the end of the meal he proposed a vote of thanks to me, saying, 'We have Adrian, my future son-in-law, to thank for arranging this delightful occasion.'

Nigel gave a horrible sardonic laugh and called for champagne.

Wayne Wong brought over a magnum bottle of Pomagne and nine glasses and said, 'What are you celebrating?'

Nigel said, 'Adrian's engaged to Marigold Flowers.'

Wayne Wong said, 'No, you're joking me. Not that thin woman who's scared of the fish?'

I said hurriedly, 'Wayne, this is Marigold's father, Michael.'

Wayne briefly shook Flowers's hand, then said to me, 'It's 9.25, so you'll have to drink up quick.'

When our glasses were charged, Nigel began to sing Cliff Richard's winning Eurovision song, 'Congratulations'.

The other diners in the room joined in and Ken Blunt pulled me to my feet to acknowledge the congratulations of the room.

One of the serious girls took a photograph of me and Michael Flowers embracing and shaking hands. She promised to send me a copy via Gary Milksop.

It seems that, against my will, I have become officially engaged to Marigold Flowers.

Gielgud and the other swans were gathered together in a corner of the car park. I pointed them out to Michael Flowers, who said, 'Methinks we should proceed with caution. A swan can break a man's arm, you know.'

We sat in Flowers's Range Rover and waited for the others to arrive.

It was impossible to avoid the swan shit on the stairs and inevitably some of it was trampled on to my floorboards.

I made coffee and gave the usual warning about the glass wall of the lavatory. My warning did not inhibit Michael Flowers, whose urination sounded like the Zambezi in spate.

Nigel and Gary Milksop sat next to each other on the white sofa. The two serious girls sat cross-legged on the floor. Ken Blunt and his wife lolled awkwardly on the futon. I brought the chairs in from the balcony to a chorus of swans hissing. Ferret Face took one chair and Michael Flowers the other. I was quite happy leaning against the kitchen counter. I just wanted the awful night to be over.

Flowers kept us waiting. He assumed the posture of Rodin's The Thinker first, then lifted his head and said, 'Before I address you, can we move closer together and form a circle.'

A lot of awkward furniture shifting took place, and Flowers said, 'I want you to hold hands and close your eyes, and feel the atmosphere in this room.'

I closed my eyes and held Ken Blunt's and Ferret Face s hands and felt embarrassment, suspicion and boredom.

Flowers intoned what he said was a Buddhist mantra, which he urged us to join in with.

At the end Ken Blunt pulled his wife to her feet and said, 'We've got to go home now to let the dog out.'

As I saw them down the stairs, Ken said, 'I'd sooner dance barefoot on drawing pins than stay to hear what he's got to say.

When I went back into the room Flowers was saying, 'I was reading Voltaire at six and Tolstoy at seven.

Gary Milksop lisped, 'Have you ever written a novel, Mr Flowers?'

Flowers said that in the 1960s he had written 'the definitive English novel'. He had asked his dear friend Philip Larkin to read the manuscript. According to Flowers, Larkin had written back to say, 'Hello to All This is the novel of the age. Humbler writers such as myself, Amis et al. should push our pens aside and weep. Mike, my good friend, you are a genius. Every publisher in London will be beating a path to your door.'

Nigel said, 'I know I am just an ignorant gay-boy, but I've never heard of Hello to All This.'

Flowers bit his lower lip and turned his head, as though trying to control strong emotions. 'No,' he said, in what I imagine he thought was a hollow-sounding voice. 'My first wife, Conchita, burned my manuscript.'

Gary Milksop, Ferret Face and the two serious girls gasped in horror.

Nigel said, 'And it was the only copy?'

Flowers nodded. 'It was handwritten in purple ink on fine hand-blocked paper.

Nigel's lip curled. 'And you sent this through the post to Philip Larkin?'

Flowers bridled. 'The postal workers of this country are the finest workers in the land. I trusted them implicitly.'

I said, laying a trap, 'But you still have the Larkin letter?'

'No he answered. 'Conchita destroyed everything that was precious to me.'

One of the serious girls broke her silence and said, 'I did my MA on Philip Larkin -- 'Philip Larkin, Uber-Nerd'

-- I read everything there was to read but I don't remember him mentioning Michael Flowers.'

Flowers smiled and sighed. 'You dear sweet girl, poor old Phil's papers were burned.'

'So I said, 'there is absolutely no evidence whatsoever that you were a intimate friend of Philip Larkin? Or that you wrote a masterpiece called Hello to All This?'

*

I couldn't stand any more and excused myself, saying I needed air. I stood on the balcony for a few minutes until the cold forced me back inside.

When I returned Flowers was saying, 'I did my best to halt the encroaching dictatorship of the motor car. I tried to stop the production of the Ford Cortina. I lay down outside the gates of Dagenham. I had the prescience to see that supplying the proletariat with motor cars would destroy the environment, England and eventually everything we hold dear.'

Nigel said, 'My dad had a Cortina Mark 4. It was duck-egg blue and had leopard-skin seats. Did any of the car workers give up their well-paid jobs because you were sufficiently worried to lie down in the road?'

Flowers said, 'I was deeply disappointed by the workers' response. I'm afraid they lampooned me and several of them took the opportunity to give me what I believe is called now "a good kicking".'

Gary Milksop offered to give Nigel a lift home and ordered Ferret Face to drive the serious girls to the flat they shared.

Flowers stayed talking to me long after the others had gone. He talked mostly about Conchita. He said, 'I went to Mexico after seeing a production of The Royal Hunt of the Sun at Loughborough Town Hall. I was a young man searching for an alternative civilization and I thought I had found it in the remnants of Aztec culture. I met Conchita in the courtyard of the La Croix Hotel.'

'Was she a fellow guest?' I asked.

'No, she was sweeping it he said. 'We exchanged a few words. She complimented me on my Spanish and asked me if I needed a guide to see the Mayan ruins of Palenque.

'We were lovers almost immediately. She took me to meet her family. They were dreadfully poor -- ten of them living next to a rubbish heap in a shack with an earth floor. Her little brothers were running around in white vests and no pants. I gave her father $50 and brought her to England.' He sighed. 'It was like transplanting an exotic hothouse flower into a sodden English field. She was briefly happy when Daisy was born, but before Daisy was three years old she had deserted us and gone back to Mexico.'

'With a pork butcher from Melton Mowbray,' I prompted.

He winced and said, 'Please as if I had pulled the scab off an old wound.

Seconds ticked by and I wondered if it would be rude if I changed into my pyjamas in the bathroom. But he started up again, saying, 'Netta quite literally saved my life at Stonehenge.'

I said, 'Literally? You mean one of the stones was about to fall on you and she --'

He said, 'Perhaps not literally, but she turned my life round, took charge of me and loved me, until very recently.' He paused, and then said, 'I'm finished with women. I'm going to channel my energies into something far more important--the future of this great country.'

When he finally left, I threw myself down on the futon, too exhausted to undress. I composed a letter in my head.

Dear Martin Amis
I have a request. Could you please take a quick look through the whole of your dead father's correspondence, diaries, journals and other written material to see if you can find any reference, however slight, to Philip Larkin's friendship with a Michael Flowers of Beeby on the Wold. In particular a letter from Larkin mentioning a manuscript called Hello to All This. I know that your father and Philip Larkin were the best of friends.

*****

Milksop has written a poem about blindness. He wants me to pass it on to Nigel.

'Hello darkness my old friend
I am happy to see nothing
I am saved from the banality of seeing
I have an inner eye
I see into men s souls.'

One of the serious girls said, 'It's absolutely brilliant, Gary. It's incredibly profound.'

Ken Blunt said, 'You've copied the first line from a song by Simon and Garfunkel.'

Glenda said, 'Dustin Hoffman sang it in that lovely film The Graduate.'

She went on to talk about Dustin Hoffman's film career. I tried to control the discussion and bring it back to poetry. I talked about my own attempts at writing an opus entitled The Restless Tadpole, but Glenda constantly interrupted as she remembered various Hoffman performances.

The meeting eventually lost focus and broke up in confusion, with several people talking at once.

Ken said, when Glenda was in the bathroom, 'Don't worry, Adrian, I shan't be bringing the wife again.'

I read Milksop's poem down the phone to Nigel. He laughed for quite a long time before saying, 'Yeah, I keep forgetting that I can see more than sighted people. Aren't I a lucky boy?'

*****

Nigel rang to tell me that he is suffering from post-blindness depression.

In an attempt to counsel him, I asked him what was the worst thing about being blind.

Nigel snapped, 'I can't fucking see!'

*****

Easter Saturday

The bad publicity about the shrine has affected trade in the shop. My mother thinks that I should associate myself with a charity. Ivan has recently been diagnosed with epilepsy. She suggested that I hold a charity auction in aid of Canine Epilepsy Research.

She said, 'If you want to win the hearts and minds of the British people, you need to be photographed with a dog.'

I went round to see Nigel and asked him if I could be photographed with his blind dog, Graham.

Nigel snapped, 'Graham is not a blind dog. A blind dog would be no fucking use to me, would it? Graham is a guide dog, and no, you're not exploiting him for the sake of your poxy public image.'

I didn't mind too much; Graham is not a very attractive dog. He's the only Golden Labrador I've ever seen with a squint and stumpy legs.

Nigel said that Graham is the only creature he has ever truly loved.

*****

Saturday June 7th

I went to see Nigel after work to read to him as promised. He has chosen Crime and Punishment by Dostoevsky. The Russian names are impossible to pronounce and each time I stumble over one, Nigel sighs and mutters something to Graham.

I told him that it is now possible to train Shetland ponies as guide horses for the blind. Apparently, they have better memories than Labradors.

Graham got to his feet, looked at me, and growled.

Nigel said, 'Good dog, Graham. Good dog.'

*****

More Crime and Punishment tonight.

Nigel's guide dog, Graham, is getting above himself.

I was washing up the few plates and glasses for Nigel, when I felt Graham's nose against my leg. I looked down and saw that the dog had got a tea towel in its mouth. I found this annoying, because I had intended to let the crockery and glassware dry on the draining board. Because of the dog's interference, I had to dry the pots and put them away.

*****

I was reading aloud to Nigel tonight when he suddenly burst out, 'Jesus Christ! No more Crime and Punishment!'

I was hurt, diary, but I managed to keep my voice light and melodious, and said, 'Would you like me to read you something a little less intellectual?'

Nigel said, 'No, it's not the book I have a problem with. It's your reading of the thing. Try to put a bit of Dostoevsky's tormented soul into it, will you? As it is, you sound like metrosexual man.

'Metrosexual?' I said.

'Yeah,' he said contemptuously. 'A straight guy who's into skincare and interior design.'

I carried on reading, with a rougher edge to my voice, but when the hero, Rodion Romanovitch Raskolnikov, or Rodya for short, was trying to decide whether or not to kill the old woman, Nigel said, 'You're making him sound as if he's trying to decide between curtains or blinds!'

Graham, the guide dog, got up, saw me to the front door and let me out.

I said goodnight, and heard the cur drop the latch behind me.

The End

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Sue Townsend was a British novelist, best known as the author of the Adrian Mole series of books. Her writing tended to combine comedy with social commentary, though she has written purely dramatic works as well. As beloved by critics as she was by readers the length and breadth of the nation, she chronicled the lives of ordinary people in Britain through times of upheaval and great social change. She suffered from diabetes for many years, as a result of which she was registered blind in 2001, and had woven this theme into her work. She lived in Leicester all her life, dying in the city that she loved in 2014.
 

ϟ
 

Adrian Mole and the Weapons of Mass Destruction
Adrian Mole #6
Sue Townsend
Penguin (UK), 2004

Adrian Mole e as Armas de Destruição Maciça
Sue Townsend
Tradução: Rute Rosa da Silva
Editora Difel, 2005