Memories of the Conversations with my cat – 24

As some may be aware, but many not, Chester, my faithful writing assistant, mice catcher, and general pain in the neck, passed away some years ago.

Recently I was running a series based on his adventures, under the title of Past Conversations with my cat.

For those who have not had the chance to read about all of his exploits, I will run the series again from Episode 1

These are the memories of our time together…

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This is Chester. I’ve just told him we will be going away for a few days.

What, again? You do nothing but go away these days! That look of disdain is meant to move me, but, sorry, it doesn’t.

It is retirement, you know, I say. I’ve waited for 65 years so that I can do what I want.

Poor you! Any idea how old you think I am?

15, mate, and lucky to have lived that long, despite the fact you’ve tried to escape.

That’s a matter of opinion, but not cat years, fool, human years.

I’d never quite worked that out. We had a dog once, and I know that for every dog year it’s seven human years, so it was, in human terms, rather old.

But cats?

I’ll look it up on the internet.

Interesting. The first two years are worth 24 human years and 4 years for each successive year. That makes you, wow, 76.

A smug expression takes over. Old, he says, you don’t know what it is to be old.

Except at your age, you’re too old to be travelling.

He wanders off, the tail indicating his annoyance. I don’t think it was what he wanted to hear.

“Trouble in Store” – Short Stories My Way: The re-write – Part 7

Now that I’ve gone through the story and made quite a few changes, it’s time to look at the story

…

Jack exchanged a look with the shopkeeper, who in return gave him a slight shrug as if to say he ‘we tried and failed’.

And she was clearly scared of something, and it looked to him like it might be the shopkeeper. He had no idea what happened before he burst into the shop, but from the tenseness in the air, it had nothing to do with the boy on the floor.

He could see the girl was not strung out on drugs, in fact, she did not like a user at all. If she had been, Jack was positive they’d both be on the floor, dead, or almost dead.

Another rumour just came back to him, this was apparently not the first time the store had been robbed, but by the time the police arrived, the would-be robbers were gone.

What was different this time?

Was it the fact the girl was just the unfortunate partner of a boy who was on drugs and had found herself in a dangerous position, one that couldn’t be dealt with or explained away to the advantage of the shopkeeper?

Beth, his wife, had told him she didn’t like nor trust the shopkeeper and that her friend in the same apartment block had told her he had been seen selling drugs to youths who hung around just before he closed. She had warned him it would not be safe, but he had ignored her.

It was a bit late to tell her she might be right.

He took a half step towards the door, judging the distance and time it would take to open the door and get out.

Too far, and he would be too slow, and his reward for running would be a bullet in the back.

Perhaps another half step when she wasn’t looking.

…

Writing a book in 365 days – 186/187

Days 186 and 187

Writing exercise – about something other than the book I’m writing –

…

I had worked very hard to improve my position from fact checker to my ultimate role, editor. It took years of dedication and application, doing everything that was asked of me, and more.

And now, after seven years, I believed my time had come, an email from the chief editor to discuss my role moving forward.

It had been the same every year but those were reviews of my work, and I knew it took time before the review became an interview for promotion. It was my turn.

10 AM: Montgomery Montague’s office, 45^th floor, the executive level, one above editorial, the department I aspired to work for.

Chester, my recalcitrant cat, raised his head as I came into the kitchen, and gave me his usual look of disdain. This morning, he was not going to get off as easily.

“This is my day,” I said. “You can rejoice in my success, or you can mope.”

A meow told me he did not give one jot what was happening in my world, just get the food in the bowl now. Yes, that look was almost one of malice.

“Not today mister.” I selected a tin of some sort of fish, removed the lid and scooped it into the bowl.

Before I could move the bowl to the floor he had jumped up onto the counter, sniffed it, and looked at me. Yes, that was the ‘you gave me that yesterday’ look, and that momentary thrill of tricking him, passed.

Of course, I hadn’t. He looked at me and meowed twice. The rebuke.

“No,” I said. “You eat it, or you starve. I’m going to work now.”

I stared him down. “You cannot rain on my parade.” Another few seconds, he turned back to the bowl and took a tentative bite. “I’ll be back with the good news.”

Good things happened in threes, my mother used to say. That was number one.

The train was late, a holdup over a signal failure, or that’s what I thought I heard, but to Montgomery Montague, that was not an excuse.

Despite the minor setback, I forgoed my usual early morning coffee and went straight to the office, and weas only five minutes late.

When I reached his outer office where his personal assistant sat I saw her coming out of his office, and she gave me the ‘look’. Everyone knew it, it was not a good day.

Had an event I had no control over ruined my chance. She sat and I took a seat.

She was going to make me wait.

And panic.

Then she looked up and smiled. “You are very lucky I was detained in his office. I’ll tell him you’re here.”

She called, then nodded, assent to enter the inner sanctum. It would be the third time I had bene in his office, the first my interview for the job, the second a discussion over some facts that were in dispute. And this time. Hopefully, my promotion.

I knocked on the door, waited for the terse ‘enter’ then went in, softly closing the door behind me.

Then it was past the meeting table. The coffee table the lounge chairs, the open space, the stop at the desk.

There was always the right number of chairs for those invited. The uncomfortable chairs so you didn’t linger longer than necessary.

“Have a seat.”

The question was, which one? Someone said once there was a right choice and a wrong choice, and I just realised there were two seats. Was there another person about to join the interview?

I sat in the left seat.

There was just a hint of a smile on his face. “The pilot’s seat. Good choice, Ben.”

He gave me the serious look, the one that rattled everyone who sat opposite his desk, from new employees to the seasoned editors, those who had been here for years.

“Do you write?”

It was an unexpected question, and perhaps a little superfluous. Why work at a publisher if you didn’t write? I was going to say that, but was it a trick question?

“Yes, I do.”

“And read?”

“Avidly. Writers must read.” It was almost a mantra in this place.

“Of course, they do. What type of stories do you write?”

“Thrillers, espionage, but at the moment historical fiction.”

“Busy then?”

“I keep myself amused in my spare time, and Chester more so.”

“Chester?”

“My cat, and harshest critic. I read him parts of the story, and if he complains, it’s a rewrite.”

He made a face; one I didn’t decipher. Someone once said, don’t embellish. “What makes you think you can edit?”

“I’ve read a great many books to learn style and composition. Ui can see errors in manuscripts that I’ve been given to fact check and often check later what I found with the end product, and I’ve had successes.”

“Editing is more than just grammar and spelling. It’s continuity, missing links, slight changes in titles, descriptions, and other errors that authors routinely make. We do not want to be checking your work. You are the final word. But…”

And here it comes, all my hopes and dreams were about to be shattered.

“I need you to do a test case for me before I make the final decision.”

He leaned forward and opened a drawer in front of him and pulled out a folder, looked at it then put it on the desk. It was quite thick, but old, and quite discoloured. The front had several coffee cup stains.

“This novel has been here for at least thirty years, and so far, no one has been able to turn it into something worth reading. We call it Pandora’s Box. You never know what’s inside. A word to the wise, the last 25 recipients of this manuscript failed and didn’t get to become an editor here. I have high hopes that you will not join them. You have three weeks.”

He pushed the file across the desk towards me. The interview, such as it was, was over.

Good things come in threes. Let’s call the outcome of this meeting a possible second.

Clutching the folder close, I took the elevator back down to my floor. I assumed I was not yet a fully-fledged editor, so I could not move to the editorial floor five above, where I currently worked with nine other fact-checkers.

We worked in pairs, and my pair was Josie, a graduate with more degrees than I had, and I often wondered why she was not a rocket scientist. She certainly knew enough about them, and space.

I had been considering asking her on a date, but after hearing about her last one, I decided she was not going to be interested in someone like me.

She saw me come out of the elevator and then went back to her work until I sat down. In the fact-checking department, a year longer than me, and having no desire to become an editor, she had this dream of the cottage, the country garden, the picket fence, the husband who came home the same time every day, and the 2.4 children. I was not sure the last part was possible; it had to be either 2 or 3.

“How did the interview go?”

I had told her I was going to see Montague and High Hopes. She didn’t try to dash them, having seen her fair share of hopefuls’ crash and burn, but I could see the lack of confidence in her eyes when I told her of my ambition. All she told me was to not fly too close to the sun.

“I have a task, a test.”

“Pandora’s Box?”

“You know?”

“Everyone knows. No one speaks of it.”

“It’s not the first time he’s brought it out?”

“No.”

“And no one has made it work?”

“They couldn’t. It’s gibberish. He’s reputed to have written it himself as a means to squash budding hopefuls.”

“No one?”

“None that I’ve heard of over the last 10 years. They come, they get the call to his office, he gives them Pandora’s Box, they fail, and then they leave.”

“Why?”

“Because they know he will never promote them to editor.”

I shrugged. “There’s always a first time.”

“Have you read any of it?”

“No.”

“Then take it home and read it to Chester. If he turns up his nose, then you have a problem. If not, well, there may be hope.”

That said, she returned to the pile of manuscripts, each about some aspect of space.

I put the file in my backpack along with my laptop computer and, at precisely 6:05 pm, left the office.

I thought of asking Josie if she wanted to drop into a bar that was on both our ways home. Sometimes when she wanted a sounding board, we would drop into a quaint bar and have a drink or two and sometimes a snack. They were not dates, even though in my imagination they were.

She had come from a small town in the Midwest, and I came from upstate, New York. Her family were ranchers, mine bankers, so we had little in common.

This time we parted at the door, with a promise I’d tell her what my reaction was to the story. She had only heard about it, and nothing good.

Chester was waiting, curled up on the lounge where he was not supposed to be, but then, he never listened to me.

I glared at him as I closed the door, crossed to the kitchen bench where I put dinner from the Deli up the road, and the backpack. I thought about taking the file out, but left it. Dinner for Chester, then dinner for me, first.

An hour later and after cleaning up. I dragged the folder out and extracted the manuscript. It was about three hundred pages of double-spaced type, done on an old-world manual typewriter with a cloth ribbon that had seen a lot of use. The unevenness of the typeface told me some keys were stiffer to push than others, typed by a hunter and pecker, not an accomplished typist.

Errors we xxed out, and there were handwritten notes in red ink, whether put there by the author or a hapless would-be editor.

The title: A Continental Mystery.

No author, the sheets were yellowing and darkening around the paper edges. All of the pages had the look and feel of being thumbed through many times. There were dog-eared pages scattered throughout the manuscript. I looked, but there was no reason behind any of them, and one had a coffee cup stain.

It was hardly the sort of manuscript the company would accept. I knew their requested requirements for submissions, and they were very high. This would never have made the cut.

So…

I had to ask myself what Montague’s game was here?

Perhaps if I read the first page…

I made myself comfortable on the lounge chair, put my feet up on the ottoman and after a few minutes, Chester came and sat next to me.

“Would you like me to read you this story?” I said, looking at him.

His expression said ‘No’.

Good. I was not in the mood to spare him.

It was a dark early morning; the moon had disappeared behind clouds that suggested an imminent downpour. James quickened his pace to get to King’s Cross station before the skies above him opened.

It was not the only reason he was in a hurry; he had promised Matilda, the girl he was intending to ask to marry him, that he would be at the station a half hour before the train was to depart, and she did not like tardiness.

They were taking the train to Edinburgh, where they would be collected and taken to Matilda’s family home, Barkworth Manor. For him, it was an opportunity to travel on the latest night Scotsman service, just upgraded to rival any luxury train in the world.

“Well,” I said to Chester, who seemed to have an expression of interest. “A girl who belongs to a wealthy family, living in such a salubrious residence to be named Barkworth Manor, in Scotland no less.”

Chester turned away and yawned. Rich girls living in posh manor houses obviously didn’t impress him. I shrugged. It had my attention. Was she an heiress? And who was this James?

Read on…

James considered himself the luckiest man in London and had to believe he had been in the right place at the right time. A chance meeting outside the Savoy Hotel, an awkward conversation that led to coffee and cake, which in turn led to dinner.

It seemed serendipitous; they were both down from Oxford, both studying Archaeology, and could have equally accidentally met in Oxford as in London. It led to a semester of chance meetings, which led to study time in the Bodleian Library, which led to dinner, and then an invitation for him to spend the weekend in Scotland with her parents.

In normal circumstances, he visited his mother in Cornwall, or sometimes a weekend with his academic acquaintances. That had all changed as his friendship with Matilda slowly became something more.

I dragged the notebook computer over and started a new document, and typed a note, ‘the start needs work’. A better definition of the protagonists was needed.

But in my imagination, I could visualise London at night, dark clouds swirling, rain imminent, as it had rained every time I had visited England myself and then I tried to remember what Kings Cross looked like.

The year, if I was assuming correctly, was about 1928, and I remembered seeing a steam train documentary not long ago. I would have been as excited as James, just seeing the train, let alone travelling on it.

The fact-checking part of me then went looking for information on the night trains to Edinburgh. There was the Flying Scotsman, the overnight train from London to Edinburgh, selecting the date 1928. There was, however, another train, the Night Scotsman, that had started in May of that year, left London at 10:35 pm and arrived in Edinburgh about eight and a half hours later. Photos showed the locomotive, the carriages, and plans of the sleepers, first and third class. It was between the wars, and a bustling time, but there might be a lead into the great depression, so there was going to be historical context.

Then I realised I was getting ahead of myself and needed to read more. It wasn’t badly written, it just needed a few changes, making the characters more relatable, and whether they were on equal footing.

Or perhaps I wasn’t.

The reader always needs to know the basics. Firstly, who was going to be the main protagonist? That was James. Male, early twenties, perhaps the accepted age for a prospective graduate, and given the cost of his studies, perhaps reasonably wealthy parents were funding him.

Certainly, the girl, of similar age, was being funded by her parents, though at that time it might have been less acceptable for her to be studying rather than getting married. Social mores were very different then, but times were changing, albeit slowly. It wasn’t long after the suffragettes.

I scanned through the pages for more information on the boy.

James McArthur, the third son of Sir William McArthur, banker, the son being 24 years old. His mother, Lady Allison McArthur, nee Benton, was a writer, not overly successful but enough to be in a circle of similar ladies, who cross all sections of the Arts. James had been 14 at the end of the Great War, and had lost two of his brothers to it, leaving him, a younger brother and two older sisters.

Then, the girl.

Matilda Carterville was one of four daughters and two sons of Lord and Lady Carterville, landowner and shipping magnate, whose personal Empire was as vast as the British Empire of the day. Matilda’s mother had not been from the aristocracy, and had caught the eye of the Lord, before he became a Lord, when she was a Shakespearean actress. For him, it had been love at first sight; for her, it had been an amusing interlude until she discovered who he was, and it ended up all over the society pages.

Several hours passed as I constructed a family tree from the first 100 pages. I wondered if this was what other Editors did, trying to get a handle on the characters, their associations, and be ready for whatever the author threw at them. I felt, by the end of it, that I knew James and Matilda.

It was interesting to discover that James’s mother lived in a house that was described as a cottage, it also had a name, and to me sounded like it had a hundred rooms, a dozen servants who all lived in, and grounds the size of a municipal park.

That paled to insignificance when it came to the castle Matilda came from. Yes, an actual castle, once described as sprawling, a place where one could get lost, that was described as cold and draughty, with towers, and everything made of stone. It had a banquet hall, a dining hall, and countless other rooms and staff, a place that would cost a fortune to keep in good repair and run.

Oh, yes, it had grounds to go hunting and shooting, fox hunting, and a lake to go fishing. Surrounding it was farmland with cattle, sheep, and various crops, and produce used in the castle kitchen. It was hard to imagine such places still existed, especially the class divisions that I had read about, which were virtually swept away after the Second World War. Still, I did see mention of butlers, maids, ground staff, chauffeurs and countless others.

It was a world I could only imagine existed, once upon a time.

…

Searching for locations: The Silk Factory, Suzhou, China

China is renowned for its exquisite silk, so naturally, a visit to the Silk Spinning Factory is part of today’s tour.

After that, we will be heading downtown to an unspecified location where we’re getting a boat ride, walk through a typical Chinese shopping experience, and coffee at a coffee shop that is doubling as the meeting place, after we soak up the local atmosphere.

The problem with that is that if the entire collective trip a deal tourists take this route then the savvy shopkeepers will jack up their prices tenfold because we’re tourists with money. It’ll be interesting to see how expensive everything is.

So…

Before we reach the silk factory, we are told that Suzhou is the main silk area of China, and we will be visiting a nearly 100 years old, Suzhou No 1 Silk Mill, established in 1926. Suzhou has a 4,700-year history of making silk products. It is located at No. 94, Nanmen Road, Suzhou, Jiangsu, China.

Then we arrive at the Silk Factory, another government-owned establishment with a castiron guarantee of quality and satisfaction.

The look and feel of the doona cover certainly backs up that claim

And the colors and variety is amazing (as is the cost of those exquisite sets)

We get to see the silk cocoon stretched beyond imagination, and see how the silk thread is extracted, then off to the showroom for the sales pitch.

It isn’t a hard sell, and the sheets, doonas, pillows, and pillowcases, are reasonably priced, and come with their own suitcase (for free) so you can take them with you, or free shipping, by slow boat, if you prefer not to take the goods with you.

We opt for the second choice, as there’s no room left in our baggage after packing the Chinese Medicine.

The cinema of my dreams – I always wanted to go on a treasure hunt – Episode 84

Here’s the thing…

Every time I close my eyes, I see something different.

I’d like to think the cinema of my dreams is playing a double feature but it’s a bit like a comedy cartoon night on Fox.

But these dreams are nothing to laugh about.

Once again there’s a new installment of an old feature, and we’re back on the treasure hunt.

…

Nadia reappears

…

There was no fanfare when I walked out of the hospital lobby and out into the cool afternoon. After the heat, we were due some rain, and looking up to the sky, it was imminent.

I hadn’t organized a ride and was hoping to get a taxi. It was probably the wrong time of the day. Standing in the curb, I noticed a black SUV pulling into the drive-through, distinguishable by the reflective windows. FBI or the state’s equivalent?

It stopped in front of me, and I stepped back, expecting a couple of Feds to get out. Instead, the passenger door window opened and I could see a woman at the wheels.

When she turned to look at me, I recognized the face instantly. Nadia.

“Get in.”

No hello, how are you, beg your pardon.

I climbed in, and we were moving almost before I shut the door. The forward momentum did that.

“Is there a reason for this cloak and dagger approach? It’s good to see you, and all that, by the way.”

“I’m trying to keep under the radar. The sheriff seems to think I know more than I told them, which was nothing. I hope you did the same.”

“What would be the point? Alex and your brother took control of the narrative, days before we were found.”

“They did. Deceitful lying little…”

It was clear that just talking about them made her extremely angry, so I figured I should change the subject.

“When are you going back to Italy?”

It didn’t take long to realize she was heading towards The Grove, and we were not far from the Mall. I wondered if there was still a hold on the demolition.

“Soon. I have a few jobs to attend to before then.”

I was going to ask what jobs, but then decided I was better off not knowing.

“How did you know I was leaving the hospital?”

“I called, pretending to be your mother. She seems to spend a lot of time with Benderby.”

A sidelong glance at the girl I hardly knew, to say it was odd that she was interested in what my mother was doing was an understatement. I thought I had some understanding of the girl I’d come to like a lit more than I should, but now I wasn’t so sure.

“Does it matter?”

“You can see what Benderby is doing, can’t you?”

“Take me out of the equation, of course. Shiny new promotion and all, at work. She’s going to be disappointed all round I guess when I leave town.”

“You thought about going to Italy with me?”

“Anywhere but here. I don’t think Boggs’s death has sunk in yet. Mad as he might have been he didn’t deserve what he got.”

“You don’t believe he slipped and fell?”

“Nor does Charlene.”

“Charlene is naive.”

Charlene still believed the world wasn’t a corrupt place, and that the law was the same for everyone. The job was going to destroy her in the end.

“Or she might just find a way to bring Alex and Vince down, that is if you still think Vince needs to be taught the error of his ways. I didn’t think he would have the temerity to attach his own sister.”

“Neither did I, but my suspicion there was something wrong with him mentally was right. He crossed a line, Sam, and in my book, you cried that line, you don’t come back.”

Instead of heading straight on, where I thought she was heading for her beachside shack, we took the side road to the mall and the rear carpark.

The whole site was abandoned now, with the demolition halted. Even the security guards had abandoned the place, their demountable office closed, and in darkness.

She parked the car some distance from the side door we used on our last visit, behind the overgrown tree line that separated the staff carpark from the customer’s. The question was, what were we doing there.

As they say, the silence was deafening.

I didn’t know what to think. After everything that happened in such a short space of time, my head was still reeling.

I guess I should have been pleased that I worked put where the treasure once was and that we had solved the mysterious disappearances of Boggs senior and Ormiston. I wanted to tell the respective families, but given the threat of both Alex and Vince, and no doubt Benderby himself, made it difficult.

There was also the possibility no one would believe me since the evidence had been removed.

And there was no doubt the near-death experience had crystallized my desire to change my life, and definitely get away from this place which now seemed more like a prison than a home.

Then, there was Nadia.

I could never have imagined in my wildest dreams actually being in the same room as Nadia, let alone stealing a kiss. Just a touch of hands had the effect of sending an electric charge through me, and the thought of doing anything else almost made me weak at the knees.

I wondered if she had any idea of the effect she had on me.

A stolen glance showed her sitting relaxed, eyes closed, the hint of a smile on her face. What was she thinking?

A few seconds later I felt her hand touch mine, and it was like getting an electric shock. Almost instinctively our fingers intertwined. She opened her eyes and turned her head to look at me.

“I had a lot of time, back in the cave, to think about stuff I never really thought about before. You think you have all the time in the world, but the truth is, you don’t. Everything can be taken away from you in an instant, and all those things you said you’d do one day, never happen.”

“All part of the near-death experience. It got me thinking too. Everything I was going to do, one day. And for a little while there, I honestly believed I’d wasted my whole life.”

“It’s funny, or rather not funny, what you think was important, and really isn’t. We shared something nearly everyone else won’t or could, Sam.”

She held up her hand in mine. “Like this. A month ago, this would not have happened, you and I, not a possibility. I was too wrapped up in who and what I was, that overdose of self-importance and ego, when the reality was I am nothing more than just another speck on the landscape.”

“You’re more than that, Nadia.”

“To you, yes. To everyone else, no. I was brought up to believe the family was everything, but, in the end, it counted for nothing.” She sighed. “To them, I’ll be nothing but a girl. I can’t tell how disappointed I was, or repeat what I said to my father, or that which I now refuse to call my mother.”

I wondered what I could say that would make her feel better, but there was nothing in my word armory.

“If it’s any consolation, I want to go to Italy with you, and explore the possibilities.”

She smiled. “Summers are magic, you wake up, the early morning sun caressing warmth on your body, the tactile feel of the person lying next to you. It’s hard not to imagine those feelings coursing through you.”

Did that mean she had a boyfriend back in Italy? My have must have expressed my thoughts.

“You are the one in my thoughts, Sam. It’s you there beside me and has been since getting out of the cave. I know you feel the same about me.”

My heart missed a beat, or three. I could see us there, together, bodies entwined.

“Now hold that thought. We have one last job to do, and I think you’ll appreciate it.”

I hadn’t realized I’d stopped breathing and let out a long breath. If it were up to me, I’d be on the next plane to Rome.

Instead, it looked like we were going to make a final visit to the mall.

…

An excerpt from “Amnesia”, a work in progress

I remembered a bang.

I remembered the car slewing sideways.

I remember another bang, and then it was lights out.

When I opened my eyes again, I saw the sky.

Or I could be underwater.

Everything was blurred.

I tried to focus but I couldn’t. My eyes were full of water.

What happened?

Why was I lying down?

Where was I?

I cast my mind back, trying to remember.

It was a blank.

What, when, who, why and where, are questions I should easily be able to answer. These are questions any normal person could answer.

I tried to move. Bad, bad mistake.

I did not realise the scream I heard was my own. Just before my body shut down.

“My God! What happened?”

I could hear, not see. I was moving, lying down, looking up.

I was blind. Everything was black.

“Car accident; hit a tree, sent the passenger flying through the windscreen. Pity to poor bastard didn’t get the message that seat belts save lives.”

Was I that poor bastard?

“Report?” A new voice, male, authoritative.

“Multiple lacerations, broken collar bone, broken arm in three places, both legs broken below the knees, one badly. We are not sure of internal injuries, but ruptured spleen, cracked ribs and pierced right lung are fairly evident, x-rays will confirm that and anything else.”

“What isn’t broken?”

“His neck.”

“Then I would have to say we are looking at the luckiest man on the planet.”

I heard the shuffling of pages.

“OR1 ready?”

“Yes. On standby since we were first advised.”

“Good. Let’s see if we can weave some magic.”

Magic.

It was the first word that popped into my head when I surfaced from the bottom of the lake. That first breath, after holding it for so long, was sublime, and, in reality, agonising.

Magic, because it seemed like I’d spent a long time underwater.

Or somewhere.

I tried to speak but couldn’t. The words were just in my head.

Was it night or was it day?

Was it hot, or was it cold?

Where was I?

Around me, it felt cool.

It was incredibly quiet. No noise except for the hissing of air through an air-conditioning vent. Or that was the sound of pure silence. And with it the revelation that silence was not silent. It was noisy.

I didn’t try to move.

Instinctively, somehow, I knew not to.

A previous unpleasant experience?

I heard what sounded like a door opening, and noticeably quiet footsteps slowly came into the room. They stopped. I could hear breathing, slightly laboured, a sound I’d heard before.

My grandfather.

He had smoked all his life until he was diagnosed with lung cancer. But for years before that he had emphysema. The person in the room was on their way, down the same path. I could smell the smoke.

I wanted to tell whoever it was the hazards of smoking.

I couldn’t.

I heard a metallic clanging sound from the end of the bed. A moment later the clicking of a pen, then writing.

“You are in a hospital.” A female voice suddenly said. “You’ve been in a bad accident. You cannot talk, or move, all you can do, for the moment, is listen to me. I am a nurse. You have been here for 45 days and just came out of a medically induced coma. There is nothing to be afraid of.”

She had a very soothing voice.

Her fingers stroked the back of my hand.

“Everything is fine.”

Define fine, I thought. I wanted to ask her what ‘fine’ meant.

“Just count backwards from 10.”

Why?

I didn’t reach seven.

Over the next ten days, that voice became my lifeline to sanity. Every morning, I longed to hear it, if only for the few moments she was in the room, those few waking moments when I believed she, and someone else who never spoke, were doing tests. I knew it had to be someone else because I could smell the essence of lavender. My grandmother had worn a similar scent.

It rose above the disinfectant.

She was another doctor, not the one who had been there the day I arrived. Not the one who had used some ‘magic’ and kept me alive.

It was then, in those moments before she put me under again, that I thought, what if I was paralysed? It would explain a lot. A chill went through me.

The next morning, she was back.

“My name is Winifred. We don’t know what your name is, not yet. In a few days, you will be better, and you will be able to ask us questions. You were in an accident, and you were very severely injured, but I can assure you there will be no lasting damage.”

More tests, and then when I expected the lights to go out, they didn’t. Not for a few minutes more. This was how I would be integrated back into the world. A little bit at a time.

The next morning, she came later than usual, and I’d been awake for a few minutes. “You have bandages over your eyes and face. You had bad lacerations to your face, and glass in your eyes. We will know more when the bandages come off in a few days. Your face will take longer to heal. It was necessary to do some plastic surgery.”

Lacerations, glass in my eyes, car accidents, plastic surgery. By logical deduction, I knew I was the poor bastard thrown through the windscreen. It was a fleeting memory from the day I was admitted.

How could that happen?

That was the first of many startling revelations. The second was the fact I could not remember the crash. Equally shocking, in that same moment was the fact I could not remember before the crash either, or only vague memories after.

But the most shattering of all these revelations was the one where I realised, I could not remember my name.

I tried to calm down, sensing a rising panic.

I was just disoriented, I told myself. After 45 days in an induced coma, it had messed with my mind, and it was only a temporary lapse. Yes, that’s what it was, a temporary lapse. I will remember tomorrow. Or the next day.

Sleep was a blessed relief.

The next day I didn’t wake up feeling nauseous. I think they’d lowered the pain medication. I’d heard that morphine could have that effect. Then, how could I know that but not who I am?

Now I knew Winifred the nurse was preparing me for something unbelievably bad. She was upbeat, and soothing, giving me a new piece of information each morning. This morning, “You do not need to be afraid. Everything is going to be fine. The doctor tells me you are going to recover with little scarring. You will need some physiotherapy to recover from your physical injuries, but that’s in the future. We need to let you mend a little bit more before then.”

So, I was not going to be able to leap out of bed and walk out of the hospital any time soon. I don’t suppose I’d ever leapt out of bed, except as a young boy. I suspect I’d sustained a few broken bones. I guess learning to walk again was the least of my problems.

But there was something else. I picked it up in the timbre of her voice, a hesitation, or reluctance. It sent another chill through me.

This time I was left awake for an hour before she returned.

This time sleep was restless.

Scenes were playing in my mind, nothing I recognised, and nothing lasting longer than a glimpse. Me. Others, people I didn’t know. Or I knew them and couldn’t remember them.

Until they disappeared, slowly like the glowing dot in the centre of the computer screen, before finally fading to black.

The morning the bandages were to come off she came in early and woke me. I had another restless night, the images becoming clearer, but nothing recognisable.

“This morning the doctor will be removing the bandages over your eyes. Don’t expect an immediate effect. Your sight may come back quickly, or it may come back slowly, but we believe it will come back.”

I wanted to believe I was not expecting anything, but I was. It was human nature. I did not want to be blind as well as paralysed. I had to have at least one reason to live.

I dozed again until I felt a gentle hand on my shoulder. I could smell the lavender; the other doctor was back. And I knew the hand on my shoulder was Winifred’s. She told me not to be frightened.

I was amazed to realise at that moment, I wasn’t.

I heard the scissors cutting the bandages.

I felt the bandage being removed, and the pressure coming off my eyes. I could feel the pads covering both eyes.

Then a moment when nothing happened.

Then the pads are gently lifted and removed.

Nothing.

I blinked my eyes, once, twice. Nothing.

“Just hold on a moment,” Winifred said. A few seconds later I could feel a cool towel wiping my face, and then gently wiping my eyes. There was ointment or something else in them.

Then a flash. Well, not a flash, but like when a light is turned on and off. A moment later, it was brighter, not the inky blackness of before, but a shade of grey.

She wiped my eyes again.

I blinked a few more times, and then the light returned, and it was like looking through water, at distorted and blurry objects in the distance.

I blinked again, and she wiped my eyes again.

Blurry objects took shape. A face looking down on me, an elderly lady with a kindly face, surely Winifred, who was smiling. And on the opposite side of the bed, the doctor, a Chinese woman of indescribable beauty.

I nodded.

“You can see?”

I nodded again.

“Clearly?”

I nodded.

“Very good. We will just draw the curtains now. We don’t want to overdo it. Tomorrow we will be taking off the bandages on your face. Then, it will be the next milestone. Talking.”

I couldn’t wait.

When morning came, I found myself afraid. Winifred had mentioned scarring, there were bandages on my face. I knew, but wasn’t quite sure how I knew, I wasn’t the most handsome of men before the accident, so this might be an improvement.

I was not sure why I didn’t think it would be the case.

They came at mid-morning, the nurse, Winifred, and the doctor, the exquisite Chinese. She was the distraction, taking my mind off the reality of what I was about to see.

Another doctor came into the room before the bandages were removed, and he was introduced as the plastic surgeon who had ‘repaired’ the ravages of the accident. It had been no easy job, but, with a degree of egotism, he did say he was one of the best in the world.

I found it hard to believe, if he were, that he would be at a small country hospital.

“Now just remember, what you might see now is not how you will look in a few months.”

Warning enough.

The Chinese doctor started removing the bandages. She did it slowly and made sure it did not hurt. My skin was very tender, and I suspect still bruised, either from the accident or the surgery, I didn’t know.

Then it was done.

The plastic surgeon gave his work a thorough examination and seemed pleased with his work. “Coming along nicely,” he said to the other doctor. He issued some instructions on how to manage the skin, nodded to me, and I thanked him before he left.

I noticed Winifred had a mirror in her hand and was reticent in using it. “As I said,” she said noticing me looking at the mirror, “what you see now will not be the result. The doctor said it was going to heal with little scarring. You have been extremely fortunate he was available. Are you ready?”

I nodded.

She showed me.

I tried not to be reviled at the red and purple mess that used to be my face. At a guess, I would have to say he had to put it all back together again, but not knowing what I looked like before, I had no benchmark. All I had was a snippet of memory that told me I was not the tall, dark, and handsome type.

And I still could not talk. There was a reason, he had worked in that area too. Just breathing hurt. I think I would save up anything I had to say for another day. I could not even smile. Or frown. Or grimace.

“We’ll leave you for a while. Everyone needs a little time to get used to the change. I suspect you are not sure if there has been an improvement in last year’s model. Well, time will tell.”

A new face?

I could not remember the old one.

My memory still hadn’t returned.

…

Searching for locations: From Zhengzhou to Suzhou by train, and the Snowy Sea Hotel, Suzhou, China

For the first time on this trip, we encounter problems with Chinese officialdom at the railway station, though we were warned that this might occur.

We had a major problem with the security staff when they pulled everyone over with aerosols and confiscated them. We lost styling mousse, others lost hair spray, and the men, their shaving cream. But, to her credit, the tour guide did warn us they were stricter here, but her suggestion to be angry they were taking our stuff was probably not the right thing to do.

As with previous train bookings, the Chinese method of placing people in seats didn’t quite manage to keep couples traveling together, together on the train. It was an odd peculiarity which few of the passengers understood, nor did they conform, swapping seat allocations.

This train ride did not seem the same as the last two and I don’t think we had the same type of high-speed train type that we had for the last two. The carriages were different, there was only one toilet per carriage, and I don’t think we were going as fast.

But aside from that, we had 753 kilometers to travel with six stops before ours, two of which were very large cities, and then our stop, about four and a half hours later. With two minutes this time, to get the baggage off the team managed it in 40 seconds, a new record.

After slight disorientation getting off the train, we locate our guide, easily found by looking for the Trip-A-Deal flag. From there it’s a matter of getting into our respective groups and finding the bus.

As usual, the trip to the hotel was a long one, but we were traveling through a much brighter, and well lit, city.

As for our guide, we have him from now until the end of the tour. There are no more train rides, we will be taking the bus from city to city until we reach Shanghai. Good thing then that the bus is brand new, with that new car smell. Only issue, no USB charging point.

The Snowy Sea hotel.

It is finally a joy to get a room that is nothing short of great. It has a bathroom and thus privacy.

Everyone had to go find a supermarket to purchase replacements for the confiscated items. Luckily there was a huge supermarket just up from the hotel that had everything but the kitchen sink.

But, unlike where we live, the carpark is more of a scooter park!

It is also a small microcosm of Chinese life for the new more capitalistic oriented Chinese.

The next morning we get some idea of the scope of high-density living, though here, the buildings are not 30 stories tall, but still just as impressive.

These look like the medium density houses, but to the right of these are much larger buildings

The remarkable thing about this is those buildings stretch as far as the eye can see.

“The Devil You Don’t”, she was the girl you would not take home to your mother!

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…

John Pennington’s life is in the doldrums. Looking for new opportunities, and prevaricating about getting married, the only joy on the horizon was an upcoming visit to his grandmother in Sorrento, Italy.

Suddenly he is left at the check-in counter with a message on his phone telling him the marriage is off, and the relationship is over.

If only he hadn’t promised a friend he would do a favour for him in Rome.

At the first stop, Geneva, he has a chance encounter with Zoe, an intriguing woman who captures his imagination from the moment she boards the Savoire, and his life ventures into uncharted territory in more ways than one.

That ‘favour’ for his friend suddenly becomes a life-changing event, and when Zoe, the woman who he knows is too good to be true, reappears, danger and death follow.

Shot at, lied to, seduced, and drawn into a world where nothing is what it seems, John is dragged into an adrenaline-charged undertaking, where he may have been wiser to stay with the ‘devil you know’ rather than opt for the ‘devil you don’t’.

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