Wardley-Fish rarely called him Oscar. There was a sibilant sadness in the name which now made its owner pause before answering.
'It is known as celluloid, and is pretty much what it appears to be. But you see I can make these marks on it, and I can carry it around. It is very light and handy.'
'This will cure your phobia?'
Oscar then explained his plan for viewing water through the celluloid. He could view it one square at a time, thus containing it. What was terrifying in a vast expanse would become 'quite manageable.' Wardley-Fish did not trouble himself with the theory. His friend was talking too much, too fast, in too high a register. It would not work. Only desperation would make a man believe it would.
'Has it ever occurred to you,' he said when Oscar had finished and was rolling away his celluloid, 'that what you call your 'phobia' is really the Almighty speaking to you?' 'Don't mock me, Fish.' 'As a matter of fact I am very serious.'
' 'Yea, though I walk through the shadow of the valley of death'-no, Fish, if my soul were clear, I would have no fear-Thy rod and Thy staff comfort me.' '
'But has it occurred to you that what you call a phobia may be God telling you that you must not go near the water?' 'Very clever, Fish.'
Wardley-Fish shrugged. The extraordinary woman had found herself a companion. The Odd Bod was pushing a florin across the table to him. He picked it up, then put it down. 'You wish me to flip this?' 'Thank you, Fish.'
'You know I only flip my own coins.' He pushed the florin back across the table and searched in his own pocket. His handsome face was suddenly weary, pouchy around the eyes. He found, at last, a penny. He flipped the coin, lethargically, as if he had not guessed that he was tossing for his friend's destiny. It was a dull and dirty penny he sent spinning through the air.
'Call,' he said.
The Odd Bod had gone pale and waxy. He had his hands clenched tight together on his breast. He was moving the fingers in the trap of the hands. He looked like a praying mantis.
'Call,' said Wardley-Fish, but loudly so that blonde-haired women turned to stare. The penny slapped against his palm. 'I cannot, Fish. You know it.'
Wardley-Fish turned the penny on to the back of the wrist. He kept it covered with his right hand. 'Why not?' he asked. 'I am frightened,' hissed Oscar. 'You know I am frightened.' 'Then why do you do such things to yourself,' smiled Wardley-Fish. 'Come, dear Odd Bod, and-'
'Heads,' said Oscar. Wardley-Fish sighed. He lifted his hand to reveal the head of Queen Victoria. The Odd Bod's face was ghastly, a mask carved out of white soap, and you did not need to be a mind reader to know that God was sending him to New South Wales. This happened on 22 April 1863. My great-grandfather was twentytwo years old.,-;; Leviathan
My father, I think I said before, was a swaggering little fellow, a cunning spin bowler, a smoker of matchstick-thin cigarettes, a practical joker. He was small, but he was proud that he stood straight with his shoulders back. I saw him fight Hector Thompson, a man twice his size, on the deserted forecourt of Carl Foster's service station. He had him down, crumbled, winded, with a bleeding lip, before anyone in the pub across the road had a chance to realize what was happening.
But when it came to celluloid, my father was a coward.
The celluloid was most definitely the property of my mother. It was the same piece Oscar had brought to Australia in 1864, and was certainly the first sample of that substance introduced to the ancient continent. Perhaps it was the first synthetic long-chain hydrocarbon in the southern hemisphere. This was something my father, being a chemist by training, pondered over, but only once out loud. My mother would not hear him speak of it, and not because she was silly, but because she understood as women often do more easily than men, that the declared meaning of a spoken sentence is only its overcoat, and the real meaning lies underneath its scarves and buttons.
When my father spoke of the scientific history of celluloid (which, having a diploma in industrial chemistry, he was entitled to do) she felt that he was contesting her ownership of its original use, its meaning, its history.
And she was right. When my father said 'long-chain hydrocarbon,' he was saying: 'I am right. This one's mine.'
But my mother would not let him have it. The celluloid was hers. The meaning of it was hers. The lines ruled on it were-I was brought up on this-lines of latitude and longitude. She would lay the yellowed, scratched material across a Shell road map and explain to us how it would have worked.
She became emotional, as she often did, when discussing the past, and because she wished Oscar to be a 'missionary' and a 'pioneer Anglican,' we gew up imagining Oscar travelling out on steerage, on a clipper ship, crowded in amongst poor immigrants. We imagined our greatgrandfather with his map and celluloid, his Bible, his Book of Common Prayer. We saw himeven while we squirmed in embarrassment before my mother's holy-toned recitation-conducting sad funeral services for babies lost, a toothless sailmaker stitching up a sad little parcel in canvas, and young Oscar, his hair flaming red, his milkwhite skin burnt raw, squinting into the antipodean sun with the ultramarine sea swelling up above him.
My father surely knew what kind of ship it was Oscar sailed on. He knew its name, and if he knew its name he probably 'looked it up.' In any case, he said nothing about the
At this stage Ishmael Kingdom Legare's controversial liner was undergoing one of its crises in the Tyneside shipyards and it was thought the company would go bankrupt. These uncertainties were nothing to Oscar. He ignored them. He saw only that this was the ship he must travel on. It was unsinkable.
This was just the sort of ship that Oscar required. It had twin hulls (in case of icebergs), a cellular deck, and the capacity to carry its own coal for the journey.
Oscar Hopkins travelled to Australia not as my mother imagined but in the greatest luxury. And while he appeared, to those around him, to be so unworldly as to take no notice of this aspect of his journey, to be insensitive to the pleasures of 'portieres of carmine silk/' one should remember that Oscar chose
He would pay his own fare. Only God could provide so large an amount. He bet on dogs and horses.
In his heart of hearts he did not know if he was good or bad, holy or corrupt. He bathed in cold water when there was hot available. He went without coal when he could afford to buy it. He met with Wardley-Fish on Friday afternoon and drank pink champagne.
Wardley-Fish would have dearly loved a little flutter. But he had a curacy in Hammersmith, a fiancee, an impending wedding, and this combination of circumstances had meant that he had not only been forced to abandon his apparently 'questionable' address near Drury Lane-no one seemed to think there was anything 'questionable' about him coming here to live in the same house as his future wife-he had also given up the sporting life. There were good reasons to give up, but he would have liked to have had just an hour at the Holborn Casino, say, or even better, at Epsom. And he would have liked to do it with his hooting, embarrassing friend. However, they were grown up now, and he was a handsome fellow engaged to a bishop's daughter. His fiancee, Miss Melody Clutterbuck, did not know that Wardley-Fish would, in a moment, use the Bishop's coach to pay a visit to the loathsome person he always made such fun of. She understood this friendship to be almost finished. She had put the prickly subject from her mind, or almost, for there was always the anxiety that the ship the chickennecked
