Her Name Was Lola

16 Doing Their Ching

February 1997. Still that Sunday. Making their way out of the park through dusk and lamplight, Max and Lola are confronted by a very tall, very broad figure. ‘Madam,’ says the figure to Lola, ‘is this man molesting you?’

‘Basil!’ says Lola.

‘For it is indeed he,’ says Basil, kissing Lola on both cheeks, mwah, mwah.

‘Bit of a startler,’ says Max.

‘Joke, old man,’ says Basil, extending a large right hand. ‘Basil Meissen-Potts.’

‘Ha ha,’ says Max as his metacarpal bones splinter. ‘Max Lesser.’

‘Any relation to Solomon Lesser?’

‘No. Who’s he?’

‘A pawnbroker who brought an action against Lady Glister a couple of years ago. She’d left a diamond necklace worth half a million with him at a time when she was a bit short of the readies. A year later when she redeemed it and had it reappraised for insurance she was told that the stones were paste. They’d been diamonds when she left the necklace with Lesser so she went back to have a word with him. In the course of the conversation she beaned him with — what do you call those seven-branched candlesticks?’

‘Candelabra?’ says Max.

‘Menorahs,’ says Basil. ‘She hit him with a brass menorah that was standing on the counter and fractured his skull. So he sued her and I had to defend her.’

‘Who won?’ says Max.

‘We did. Lesser had to pay the full value of the diamonds plus what she’d given him to redeem the necklace plus court costs and damages for Lady Glister’s post-traumatic stress.’

‘You can’t trust a Solomon,’ says Max.

‘Don’t get me wrong,’ says Basil. ‘Some of my best friends are Solomons.’

‘Thank you for sharing that with us,’ says Lola to Basil. ‘Where are you off to?’

‘Claridge’s. Bachelor party for Bill Twimbley-Sturt. Mwah, mwah. See you.’ (This second mwah, mwah was unnecessary, thinks Max.) ‘Nice meeting you, Max.’

‘Same here,’ says Max. ‘I don’t meet too many Meissen-Pottses.’

‘We’re an ethnic minority now,’ says Basil. ‘Take care.’

‘Mind how you go,’ says Max. As Basil recedes into the evening he says to Lola, ‘I seem to remember your saying that he’s a part of a kind of life you’re accustomed to.’

‘Have you got a copy of The I Ching?’ says Lola.

‘Sure. How come?’

‘Because I want to do it. Let’s go to your place.’

‘OK,’ says Max. ‘I suppose we’ll have to break the squalor barrier some time.’ As they head for the Brompton Road, Lola pressing against his arm, Max has the feeling that she’s afraid she’ll be swept away by a wave of reality. Past Harrods, all picked out in lights like a vertical landing strip for low-flying shoppers, past Michelin House and the shops and lights in the Fulham Road as the shining rednesses of the 14 buses come and go, all the way home he feels around him the play of yes and no. When he opens his front door he notices how stale the air inside is. Now they’re standing in his workroom which looks like something between a shipwreck and a bomb site. Bulging ranks of books look down from the shelves and totter in stacks on the floor along with dangerous heaps and sprawls of videotapes. Max’s computer sits on a trestle table in a welter of paper and CDs. Discarded pages litter the floor under his chair.

‘This works for you, does it?’ says Lola.

‘Oh yes. I don’t know where everything is but I know where a lot of things are.’ Max switches on lamps that contrive a pleasing balance of light and shadow on the clutter. He empties two armchairs, clears a little space on the floor, and gets The I Ching off the shelf. He opens a bottle of Jacob’s Creek red and pours two glasses. ‘Here’s looking at you, Lola,’ he says.

‘Here’s me looking right back,’ says Lola. Clink.

Max takes three George V pennies from their pocket inside the back cover of the book. ‘I haven’t done this since I was thirty,’ he says.

‘Haven’t you had any doubts since then?’ says Lola.

‘Lots,’ says Max, ‘but I don’t seem to crave as much clarity as I used to.’

‘This is going to be for both of us,’ says Lola, ‘so we’ll each throw the coins three times.’ She kneels on the floor, Max beside her. His throat aches with the poignancy of the lamplight on her cheek, on her hair. They throw the coins and get Hexagram 23, Po/ Splitting Apart: above, KEN — KEEPING STILL, MOUNTAIN, below, K’UN — THE RECEPTIVE, EARTH, with six in the beginning and six in second place. Lola and Max together skim the opening lines of the text, then Max reads aloud THE JUDGMENT:

‘SPLITTING APART. It does not further one

To go anywhere.’

‘Great,’ says Max. ‘This book really knows how to hurt a guy.’

‘Here’s THE IMAGE,’ says Lola:

‘The mountain rests on the earth:

The image of SPLITTING APART.

Thus those above ensure their position

Only by giving generously to those below.’

‘There you have it,’ says Max. ‘The only way to keep our heads is to get busy with our lower parts.’

‘I think you’re right,’ says Lola as she peels off her jumper. ‘We can work out a fuller interpretation later.’