The Dog Who Came In From The Cold

Chapter 7: Tic-tac and Other Matters

Caroline’s conversation with James about kissing had unsettled her. It was not that James had in any way implied that her mouth, more than anybody else’s mouth, was particularly hospitable to germs – he was far too kind to make any such suggestion What worried her, rather, was the fact that her friend was anxious about germs in general. Such people, she knew, could become more and more obsessed with cleanliness and end up thinking of little else. She did not think that it would be easy to live with somebody who spent his time nervously applying hand sanitiser, or rushing off to wash his hands several times an hour. It was nice to know that one’s boyfriend was clean, and took the occasional shower, but not that clean.

A week or so after this osculatory discussion, Caroline was travelling on the tube with James when she noticed him take a little plastic bottle out of his pocket, flip open the top and apply a small amount of clear gel to his hands. This he proceeded to rub in, all the while talking to Caroline about some article he had been reading on gestures in Renaissance painting.

“It’s very strange, you know, Caroline,” he said. “There isn’t a single dictionary available on the meaning of gestures in painting. Can you believe it?”

Caroline saw the gel glisten and then disappear as James rubbed his hands together. “What about Hall’s Dictionary?” she asked. Did the gel dry the skin? she wondered. It probably did; but back to gestures. “I thought that Hall told you what all those things meant.”

James shook his head. “No. Hall is all right for basic symbolism. What hedgehogs represent, and so forth.”

Caroline momentarily forgot about the gel. “What do hedgehogs mean?”

“Gluttony,” said James. “I think.”

Caroline felt that this was rather unfair. Hedgehogs were no greedier, surely, than any other animal. She would have defended hedgehogs, but she was not in the mood for the sort of earnest discussion that might follow. James knew so much, it seemed to her, far more than she did. And he thought about things that would never cross her mind – such as the meaning of gestures. Why had she not thought about that before?

“As you know,” James went on, looking doubtfully at Caroline (he knows I don’t know, she thought; he’s just being nice), “as you know, there are certain accepted gestures in art. Affirmation, for example, is shown by an arm which is lifted to face the spectator, the back of the hand facing outwards. Like this.” James demonstrated, and Caroline saw a woman on the other side of the carriage watching him intently. Perhaps she knows, she thought; perhaps she’s an art historian who understands these things. But what were the odds of three art historians being in one carriage of a London Underground train at the same time? Very long,.

“And then there’s shame,” James continued. “Shame is signified by the placing of the fingers over the eyes. Comme ça.”

Caroline was not surprised by the representation of shame; it might have been a Renaissance gesture, but it was also the gesture of those convicted of contemporary crimes, those unfortunates led from the court who shielded their eyes with their fingers in exactly the same way. Schadenfreude, she remembered; we love the shame of others – nothing makes the mob happier than the sight of somebody humiliated. She had read an article somewhere about its effects: how we enjoyed our feeling of moral superiority; how readily we exploded into moral outrage over the misdeeds of public people caught out. And all the time we ignored – or were unaware of – the glaring fact that such people were the way they were because we were the way we were. A rotten society produces rotten public figures.

As their train rattled on to its destination, James continued with his observations on the language of gesture. “Of course there are all sorts of sign language,” he went on. “Auctioneers, merchants, bookies. Have you seen tic-tac being used?”

Caroline had not.

James smiled. “It’s the sign language used by bookies,” he said. “They signal across the track. They show the odds that way.” He paused, and then reached up and put a hand on either side of his nose. “That’s odds of five to two,” he explained.

Caroline raised an eyebrow. “Why don’t they use mobile phones?”

James sighed. “They do these days,” he said. “It’s so sad. It’s another language that’s biting the dust. But at least there are the monks.”

“The monks?”

“Monastic sign language,” said James. “People like Cistercians, who discourage unnecessary talking. Do you know that they have an elaborate system of communicating without speech?”

“Why?” It struck Caroline as odd that one would eschew one form of communication only to resort to another: what did it matter how one communicated if the end result was the same – the message was conveyed?

James shrugged. “It’s to do with rejecting the noise and distraction of the world,” he said. “I think they’ve got a point. There’s so much noise, Caroline.” He gave her an intense look as he uttered the word noise, as if to suggest, she thought, that she was the source of more than her fair share of this din.

If James had intended to blame Caroline for the shattering of the peace, he did not pursue the accusation. There was more to be said, it transpired, on monastic sign language.

“I once saw a whole book on the subject,” he said. “It had pictures of monks making gestures with their hands. So, do you know how to do soul?” He paused, but only momentarily; of course Caroline could not be expected to know something like that, it was monks’ business. “You put your hand above your head – like this – and then you look upwards.”

“I think it’s ridiculous,” said Caroline. “It’s all male silliness – like those ridiculous signs that Masons have. The handshakes and so on.”

James narrowed his eyes. “How do you know about that?” he asked.

Caroline glanced across the carriage as she prepared to answer. A man seated opposite her – a man wearing a pinstripe suit – was staring at her with interest, as if awaiting her answer. Suddenly she felt inhibited.

The man leaned forward. One did not talk to strangers in such circumstances, but he seemed indifferent to this; she sensed danger. “Nothing ridiculous about the Masons,” he said, his voice barely raised above the clatter of the train. “You should remember that, my dear!”