Therapy

look at that essay again the other day and I don’t think I got it quite right before. But I’m certainly present to myself when I’m remembering Maureen, or hoping to find her — never more so.
     
    I’d just finished typing that sentence when I noticed a regularly blinking light reflected in my windows — it was dark, about ten o’clock, but I hadn’t drawn the curtains. Squinting down into the street I saw the roof of a police car parked right outside the building with its blue revolving light flashing. I switched on the video monitor in the hall and there was Grahame, rolling up his sleeping-bag in the porch under the surveillance of a couple of policemen. I went downstairs. The more senior of the two policemen explained that they were moving Grahame on. “Were you the gentleman who made the complaint?” he asked. I said I wasn’t. Grahame looked at me and said, “C’n I come up?” I said, “Alright. For a few minutes.” The cops looked at me in astonishment. “I hope you know what you’re doing, sir,” said the senior one disapprovingly. “I wouldn’t let this toerag into my house, I can tell you.” “I ain’t no toerag,” said Grahame indignantly. The policeman eyeballed him fiercely. “Don’t give me any of your lip, toerag,” he hissed. “And don’t let me catch you kipping in this doorway again. Understand?” He looked coldly at me. “I could have you for obstructing an officer in the performance of his duties,” he said, “but I’ll overlook it this time.”
    I took Grahame upstairs and gave him a cup of tea. “You’re going to have to find another place, Grahame,” I said. “I can’t protect you any longer. I’m going abroad, probably for a few weeks.”
    He looked at me slyly from under his lank forelock. “Let me stay ’ere,” he said. “I’ll look after the place for you while you’re away. Like a caretaker.”
    I laughed at his cheek. “It doesn’t need a caretaker.”
    “You’re wrong,” he said. “There’s all sorts of villains round ’ere. You might be burgled while you’re away.”
    “I wasn’t burgled before, when the flat was empty most of the time.”
    “I don’t mean live ’ere,” Grahame said, “just sleep. On the floor — not in your bed. I’d keep the place nice and clean.” He looked around. “Sight cleaner ’n it is now.”
    “I expect you would, Grahame,” I said. “Thanks, but no thanks.” He sighed and shook his head. “I just hope you don’t regret it,” he said.
    “Well,” I said, “if the worst comes to the worst — I’m insured.”
    I saw him out of the building. A light drizzle was falling. I felt a bit of a heel as he turned up his collar and shouldered his bedroll — but what could I do? I’d be crazy to give him the key to my flat. I might come back and find he’d turned it into a dosshouse for philosophical vagrants like himself. I thrust a couple of notes into his hand, and told him to get himself a room for the night. “Ta,” he said, and sloped off into the warm wet night. I never met anybody who could accept favours with such nonchalance. I have a feeling I shan’t see him again.
     
    * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
     
    Thursday 17th June. I didn’t get away as soon as I had planned. Shorthouse phoned me to say that he would feel happier if I waited a few days while he sorted out the details of a settlement with the other side. So I’ve hung about impatiently this week, filling in the time by reading everything I could find in the Charing Cross Road bookshops about the pilgrimage to Santiago. I went up to Rummidge this morning to sign the papers, and came back by the next train. This evening, as I was packing, I got an unexpected call from Sally. It was the first time we had spoken for weeks. “I just wanted to say,” she said, in a carefully neutral tone of voice, “that I think you’ve been very generous.” “That’s alright,” I said. “I’m sorry it’s been such an unpleasant business,” she said, “I’m afraid I was partly to blame.” “Yes, well, these things are always painful,” I said, “it doesn’t bring out the best in people, divorce.” “Well, I just wanted to say thank you,” said Sally, and rang off. I felt rather uneasy, speaking to her. Knowing my mind as I do, it wouldn’t take much to make me start regretting my decision. I want to be out of here, away from it all, on the road. I’m off tomorrow morning. Santiago, here I come.
     

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