CHAPTER 1

Indian Summer

The cottage we lived in at that time was old, isolated and in needof repair. Ivy grew around the twisted windows and the sundialwas covered in moss. Some tiles on the crooked roof werecracked. One summer night there was a storm and the old appletree was blown over. Some guttering came loose and fell to theground. Rainwater tumbled onto the path and into the kitchen; ittook us a week to clear up the mess.

We laughed at our small misfortunes and took nothingseriously. We drank wine with friends, took picnics down intothe valley and invented lyrical theories about everything. Sandraplayed the flute and I wrote poems about Nordic gods, wildanimals and colourful birds. They had names like Socrates, anoriole that sang in the evenings, and Goethe the Goat, who head-buttedhis way into a history lesson at the nearby school. Goethethe Goat ran for twenty-one pages; I was proud of his adventuresand grew to love him. Goat rhymes with boat, stoat, moat and amyriad of delightful words that allowed him to engage in aworld of excitement born of curiosity.

Sandra and I had long rambling conversations with friendsabout art and beauty and ethics and myths, talking until thesmall hours, laughing at our own pretentious wisdom. Later Iwould awaken and phone my office with an excuse. Mycolleagues regarded me as a slightly eccentric but nonethelessuseful team member, so my minor transgressions were usuallytolerated. In any case, I made them laugh and I brought themfruit and honey from my small orchard. I had seven bee hives atthe end of the garden, under the pear trees. We called them theSeven Pillars of Wisdom. Their industrious residents producedthe occasional gifts of honey that kept everyone at my officesweet.

Each August we would lie on our backs in the garden atmidnight and watch for Perseid's dreams as they offered us tinymoments of illumination. 'There's one ...' and it was gone. A tinyparticle, the world in a grain of sand, lit up our lives for amoment, made us brighter, then magically vanished. We createdimages around them: 'That was Michelangelo,' Sandy exclaimed.

It seems like a happy dream now, looking back. I remember itwith the fond sadness of something lost.

I worked at the time for a medium-sized engineeringcompany. The office was six miles away; often I would cycle towork. It was downhill all the way, so I would arrive perspiration-free.The journey home was an ordeal, but by the time I reachedthe cottage I had worked away the contaminants of my dailyroutine. In fact the stresses were few and far between. I couldhave had more responsibility, far more. Instead I chose a life ofhoney, poetry and shooting stars. I had never found materialthings important. I possessed the small amount of intuition, orperception, call it what you will, to realise that a morechallenging role would not necessarily bring me greaterfulfilment. The lives of some of my colleagues seemed to bear thisout. I had enough stimulation and income to keep me interested,and that was sufficient for my working life.

I was twenty-seven when I married Sandy. She was anothershooting star. She arrived in my life and I was illuminated andexcited. She loved my bright red braces, my round goldspectacles and my selection of crumpled flat caps. And she saidshe loved me. We got married three months later and moved intothe tumble-down cottage I had bought a year earlier with theintention of renovating.

We liked to travel and went to many exciting places: Greece,Norway, Italy and Egypt. Then we set off for India. Sandy said wewould find ourselves there; we could talk to fortune tellers, wisegurus and learned pundits. I agreed, albeit with a discreetlyraised eyebrow. We searched for an astrologer at an address wehad been given, in a narrow, cluttered side street in Agra, andwere told he was away on a pilgrimage. So we went to see the TajMahal by moonlight and put the future on hold for the timebeing.

In Jaipur we saw the great stone astrological instruments ofJai Singh, and marvelled at the palaces. Colours rioted everywhere:the open-air spice stalls, the flowers, and the almostfluorescent yellow and red saris worn by the beautiful black-hairedgirls who hurried past. More than anything I loved theelephants, the camels, the street monkeys, the holy cows and theshifty-looking snake charmer with his cobra and mongoose. Awiry fellow with a turban, loin cloth and a stick strode along thestreet with two sad looking dancing bears. It distressed us both.The bears stared in a way that remained with us for days.

The accident, I suppose, was inevitable. I turned to cross aroad, looked the wrong way and stepped out in front of a put-puttingtaxi. It put-putted me into a hospital. The memory of it isnow hazy, but I can still hear that screech of tyres and Sandy'scry. I was taken to a clinic with a fractured wrist and mildconcussion. I suppose I'd got away lightly. We wondered later ifthe absent astrologer could have armed us with some foresight.

I still remember the kindness of the staff at the clinic. Thewaiting area was crowded, and people stared at me with an openinnocence. I felt embarrassed; I was placed at the front of thequeue and X-rayed within a few minutes. They were allgenuinely concerned; I was a visitor from...