Ordinary Thunderstorms

51

THE FRAMED POSTER WAS for an exhibition of Paul Klee paintings—‘ANDACHT ZUM KLEINEN’ was its title — held in Basle in 1982 and there was a reproduction of a Klee watercolour, a pointed-roofed house in a moonlit landscape of stylised pine trees with a fat white moon in the sky. At the bottom of the watercolour was Paul Klee’s signature and the painting’s title written in his scratchy copperplate handwriting: ‘Etwas Licht in dieser Dunkelheif.’

Rita looked at Primo, who was studying it carefully.

“Do you like it?” she asked.

“It’s lovely, thank you,” he said and kissed her.

“A flat-warming present,” she said. “This flat needs more warmth.” She handed him another package.

“You shouldn’t do this,” he said, tearing the paper off to reveal a small hammer in a box and a picture hook.

“No excuses,” she said.

They chose a wall in the sitting room and he hammered in the picture hook and hung the poster.

“The place is transformed,” he said, stepping back to admire the poster. “What does ‘Andacht zum Kleinen’ mean?”

“I looked it up. I think it means ‘Devotion to small things’.”

Primo considered this for a second or two. “Very apt,” he said. “Let’s have a drink to celebrate.”

They had stopped for a pizza on the way back from Battersea and had bought a bottle of wine to bring home. They sat with their glasses on the leather sofa, watching the ten o’clock news on television, Rita leaning up against him.

“We’ve got to change this sofa,” she said. “It’s like a gangster’s sofa. What made you buy it?”

“It was going cheap and I was in a hurry,” he said. “We’ll change it, don’t worry.”

Rita wondered if he was picking up the subtext to this discussion.

“How was Dad?” she asked. “I thought it was best to leave the two of you alone.”

“I put a proposition to him — I need his help with something. He said he’d give it serious thought.”

“What proposition?”

“Something to do with the hospital. About a new drug. In fact I gave him a present. I’ve bought him a share in a company, a drug company.”

“You’re trying to turn him into a capitalist, aren’t you?”

“He seemed quite pleased.”

“As long as it’s legal,” she said, turning to kiss his neck. “Let’s get naked, shall we?”