Meakin
by Peter Cowlam
Copyright © Peter Cowlam 2010
http://www.petercowlam.info
First published online by Ixion. Published in ebook format by Formulas of Electricity at Smashwords 2010
ISBN 978-1-4523-9611-8
The right of Peter Cowlam to be identified as the author of the work has been asserted herein in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
All rights reserved. This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser
With the exception of certain well-known historical figures, all the other characters in this book are fictitious and any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, is purely imaginary
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
About the Author
Peter Cowlam is a freelance editor and the author of literary fiction, plays and poetry. His first novel was published in 1998. Enthusiastically received by Robert McCrum reviewing in The Observer, Electric Letters Z is a gentle satire on London literary life of the mid-1990s. His brief stint as a commissioning editor saw two issues of The Finger, a journal of politics, literature and culture. His most recent expedition into fiction is his novella Marisa, a heady concoction of first love recalled. His latest play, Who’s Afraid of the Booker Prize?, is published by New Theatre Publications and is available for performance.
Dedication
For D
It was conceivable that the presence of Margo Quine would, in only a few days, cement his momentous decision, but before too much emphasis was placed on that event, the weary monographer dismissed it altogether. Of much more interest – in a mysterious, in a curious way – was Meakin’s recent correspondence with George Kembal, whose smug, theatrical mask was known to millions nationally, and was pinned on an ebullient personality. Just what was his interest in a disillusioned academic? Kembal wouldn’t know the professor’s state of mind, particularly when, in reply to his probes, he never offered more than he had to, and rarely expressed a personal view. Now though he was being asked for a view. A request, definitely, threaded the bombastic loops in Kembal’s newly minted note, the latest in a chain, in peril of dissolution in the steam of Meakin’s bathroom.
‘Huh! What do I think of Izzy Glicksteen?’
A flick of his hairy wrist launched that folded notepaper into short, crazy spirals through the agitated steam, but it fell woefully short of its destination – a daylight crack in the door – and plopped down among the fog of things on the cork floor: digital scales; a wicker bin, partially filled with florets or speckled tissues; blunt, disposable razors; a long-lost sliver of soap, dried out and wafer-thin at its tips.
Professor Meakin fished about between his legs and caught, swirling around, his favourite green flannel, then broke the surface of his bathwater triumphantly. He wrung it out and applied its warm dampness to his face. His buttocks tautened for a moment when he slid down the enamel, his hirsute torso sinking beneath the bubbles, under the bobbing luffa, under a hideous plastic frog. He stretched out an ankle heavily and searched for the hot tap with a fleshy big toe, and there improvised a finger grip, though after a few spluttering warm dribbles the hot water soon ran cold. Instead, the exploratory toe hooked up the plug on its chain.
Just then the phone rang, and the surfacing whale of Professor Meakin assumed its correct Homo sapiens deliberation, the back foot following the front over the rim and onto those absorbent tiles. He slung on a towelling robe. We may follow the plash of his footsteps before they dry, through the door, across the hall, into the study, and glance at the broad shrugging shoulders, the receiver pressed to his ear, and take down one or two snatches of conversation: Tuesday at four – that could be difficult – Monday would be better… What’s that? He’s out till then? Oh, what about later, Wednesday say…? Off to America! Lord! Back when…? Mm… Yes, yes, of course. Tuesday at four – or could he make it five…? Splendid! Tuesday at five – I shall be out of London, you see…
He slammed down the receiver without much ceremony and thought he saw the swish of someone’s disappearing coattail when he turned for the door, but knowing that to be impossible returned to the bathroom. Here with a palm to the mirror he produced in the smears and sluices something like a reflection, and pressing up to it smoothed back the sodden quiffs of his hair. Then he got down low, and flailed around in the metropolitan smog for Kembal’s latest communication. All he could find was that bit of pre-war soap.