The Art of Listening by Paul A. Mendelson

Author:Paul A. Mendelson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: The Book Guild
Published: 2019-07-21T16:00:00+00:00

DO I HEAR THREE?

At least, thinks David Ramsden as he climbs up the potentially lethal wooden steps into the darkened loft, I can be on my own up here.

He wonders sometimes whether it’s totally healthy to be on his own so much, but he tells himself that he does have those rollicking times back in the auction house with his colleagues and their banter, some of which he actually understands. Then there are the auctions themselves, of course, and most of all, his long-widowed mum. His life is really so full.

A shower of dislodged wood shavings falls into his eye as he scrabbles for a light-switch. He discovers it but there’s either no bulb or the resident has served its time. He’s accustomed to this, which is why he never goes anywhere without his rechargeable torch. Switching it on as he heaves himself up into a chamber that is even icier than the rooms below, he realises fairly swiftly that, like most lofts in his experience, it is not exactly an auctioneer’s Shangri-La.

Trying not to rest his arms or legs on anything that might be concealing a rotting floorboard, he manages to make purchase on timber that feels reasonably sound. But, of course, you never really know. The hospitals are full of auctioneers who haven’t paid due care and attention. At least this is what his mother has been telling him since he first began as a trainee in this most hazardous of professions.

David does occasionally wonder what occupations or activities she doesn’t actually regard as fraught. He recalls her being the only mum amongst his classmates who wrote him a ‘please excuse…’ note for choir practice because of the potential damage to his larynx.

He begins his tentative foray into the semi-darkness. He assumes that the near-Arctic chill, making him shiver beneath his old but still smart Dunn & Co jacket, must be the wind seeping through what have to be pretty large gaps in the tiles. The dust swirling in the beam of his torch seems like a swarm of flying ants.

As he moves the trusty tool of his trade around him in narrow then more expansive circles, he spies several items of varying size, wrapped in old, yellowing sheets of newspaper. David knows that he will have to rummage through all of these parcels in due course but he’s not expecting much. This is not to say that treasures aren’t occasionally found – these are the stuff of auctioneers’ dreams, and indeed anecdotes when they get together after another gruelling day. Yet, spotting an early but highly distressed gramophone and a rusty three-wheeled pram, his hopes aren’t terribly high. He realises after a few minutes that he should be inventorying into his machine and wonders why the old lady downstairs has unsettled him so much.

“One child’s buggy – broken. One vacuum cleaner – obsolete. Not exactly Tutankhamun’s tomb… don’t type that bit, Avril. One battered— aagghh!!”

David recoils with a start, sending the torch beam whirling madly around the loft like a manic mirrorball in a deserted ballroom, as he glimpses a shadowy figure in the gloom.

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