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posted Wednesday, 19 December 2007

First written today and first published here.

The fog came down like a safety-curtain. The voice I then heard wasn’t muffled but seemed as clearly struck as a well-tempered bell. It rent the air in much the same way as I imagined an opera singer would rend it in recitative to himself, probably unaware I was close by.

I made as if to answer but this was too early in the morning to trust any voice. Cold and crisp as a Christmas older than simply old-fashioned.

My wife Maude had often scolded me for failing to be wary of strangers early in the morning.

“You know it’s just as dangerous and as lonely at dawn as at night-time, George.”

I would nod. Maude’s warning strangely reminded me of the case of late-night drinkers religiously avoiding driving themselves home because of the law regarding inebriation, but then they would get up early in the morning after a similar skinful the previous night and drive without thinking. If they were breathalysed they would still be over the limit. Old Christmases were full of drivers weaving all over the road, at any time of the day or night, looking for innocent parties to maim, it seemed. If it wasn’t so funny, I would have laughed at this train of thought. The thought itself was confusing. I almost felt drunk myself, but I never drank.

Upon this morning in question, however, my mind was as clear as the aforementioned bell. Maude’s warning took root as I heard the lonely traveller’s relentless soliloquy become a sing-song rant that rent onward through the now mist-turning fog, while retaining a vague resemblance to spoken speech. I could see the face at this point for the first time amid the ‘smoke’ rising from the dawn frost that the fog was, even as I spoke, simply allowing to take its place. It was a muzzily kind face, clamped into the sweetest smile I had ever seen on a man.

The figure held out an upturned palm as if singing Christmas Carols for a charity. However, there were others behind with faces that looked far from Christmassy. They could have easily found a suitable dance routine in a film of thrills, I thought, as I gathered myself to run. All of them must still be suffering last night’s skinfuls, as they shuffled closer into view. The stitching of their outer surfaces allowing their innards to poke though.

At heart, I knew I was too old to run. Maude had often told me that age brings dignity, together with a counterproductivity beyond our control, representing forces that eventually destroy the very dignity that brought these forces into being. It was now I wished I had been drinking. Then, none of this would have seemed to matter. I absently heard cars on the near-by by-pass. This was the onset of commuter traffic as, against the odds of reality, a once permanently static dawn turned to rush-hour.

“Run, George, run as if your life depends on it.”

I head Maude’s voice as if it were actually there. It overtook the operatic crooning from the shamblers of the morning’s school run. Kids once run over, now alive again to seek retribution from those who had swerved into their young bodies, because of drink. Led by the stylish figure of the smiling soloist for an unseasonal chorus of trick-or-treating.

“I am Sir George Corbett,” I piped. “Knighted for good works and donations to help the wheels of civilisation go round. Mistaken identity. Begone!”

My voice was never as strong as Maude’s but I stood my ground. The world was going round as if I were truly drunk. Running was never even a starter.

“A bad trick. A bad treat. I was never a drunk driver. Was I?”

I intended to intone inwardly. Strangely, I realised the sound of the words had come out all wrong. It was as if I were also singing ... just like the unholy chorus ... but in counterpoint ... using a rich baritone uncharacteristic of me. My normal squeaky undertones had vanished. My feet may well have been packed in ice, but my voice was pure molten gold to match the maturing sunrise.

“Not a drunk driver, Sir George, but a bad one.”

It was unspoken. But I at least knew the truth. Drunk drivers were pilloried. Bad drivers simply endured. We can all have accidents.

It was then I saw that the leading figure was Lady Maude herself, face still scarred by windscreen shards. Neck gored by gear-stick. Too long in the tooth for comfort. Her voice had broken during the oldest Christmas of all, that dark season when those tricked from life before their time reached out for resurrection.

Upstaged, unsung, stripped of title, I took her in my arms and poured out a poignant aria, till I myself succumbed to the final curtain lowering across the most dangerous time of day in the pretence of being the safest. The shuffling shambling angels took my body away, no doubt.

“There are no seat-belts in Hell.” From ‘Deaths and Dodgems’ by Rachel Mildeyes (also author of ‘Pre-Raphaelite Music’ and ‘Heaven without God’. )

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PS: The title was originally: 'A Knight at the Opera'.