Armadillo by William Boyd

Author:William Boyd
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Suicide, Psychology, London (England), Self-Help, Satire, Fiction, Literary, Life change events, Romanies, Central Europeans, Conspiracies, Boyd, Mystery fiction, Insurance adjusters, Insurance companies, Dreams, Detective and mystery stories, Businessmen, English, Insurance crimes, Sleep disorders, Mystery & Detective, General
ISBN: 9780375702167
Publisher: Vintage
Published: 2000-04-11T19:43:13.794000+00:00

210. Shepherd’s Pie. We had nearly finished the shepherd’s pie, I remember, because I was contemplating putting in an early claim for seconds, when the room went yellow, full of yellows – lemon, corn, sunflower, primrose – and refulgent whites, as in a partial printing process or silk-screening, waiting for the other primary colours to be overlaid. Some sort of aural dysfunction kicked in too: voices became indistinct and tinny, as if badly recorded some decades before. Turning my head extremely slowly, I registered that Sinbad was telling some rambling and inarticulate story, flinging his big hands about the place, and that Shona had started to cry softly. Lachlan (Murdo was away) seemed to lurch back from his plate as if he’d discovered something disgusting on it but then started to poke fascinatedly around the mince and potatoes with a fork as if he might unearth something valuable like a gemstone or a golden ring.

I took deep breaths as the room and its contents leached to white, all the yellows gone, and then shimmered and stirred into shades of electric, bilious green.

‘Oh my God,’ Joyce said quietly. ‘Oh oh oh.’

‘It’s fantastic, isn’t it?’ Sinbad said.

I could hear the blood draining from my head, a bubbly death rattle, like water whirlpooling down a too-small plughole. Joyce reached trembling fingers across the table to me and squeezed my hand. Junko had risen to her feet and was swaying about, as if on the pitching deck of one of her fishing boats. Then Shona seemed to pour, as if molten or boneless, off her chair and reformed in a tight foetal ball, weeping loudly now in clear distress.

‘Brilliant,’ Sinbad opined. ‘Wicked.’

For my part the green had given way to deep interstellar blues and blacks and I was becoming aware of some kind of shaggy fungoid growth forming on the walls and ceiling of the kitchen.

‘I’ve got to get out of here before I die,’ I said, reasonably, sensibly, to Joyce. ‘I’m going back to the hall.’

‘Please let me come with you,’ she begged. ‘Please don’t leave me, my darling one.’

We left them – Shona, Junko, Lachlan and Sinbad – Sinbad laughing now, his eyes shut and his wet lips pouting, his hands fumbling at his fly.

Outside it was better: the cold, the streetlamps’ harsh glare helped, seemed to calm things down. Arms around each other, we waited ten minutes for a bus, not saying much, holding tight to each other like lovers about to be parted. I felt disembodied, muffled; the colour changes modified, shifted, faded and brightened but I could cope. Joyce seemed to be retreating into herself making small mewing kittenish noises. As the bus arrived all sound appeared to cut out and I could hear nothing: no Joyce, no bus engine, no hiss of compressed air as the door opened, no wind noise in the trees. The world became hushed and absolutely silent.

The Book of Transfiguration

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