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Over the next few days, Ellen settled into the Publisher’s offices in Bloomsbury and slowly read through Bryan’s manuscript. It was hard going; though she tried mightily, she could feel her concentration slipping. She kept flipping back, unable to keep track of who the characters were. Every so often she would find herself having stared at a page for fifteen minutes without having read a word.
Ellen’s high office window looked over a vast panorama of the city. She found it almost impossible to work there; the temptation to put aside the novel and gape at the grandeur of London was nigh irresistible. Only it wasn’t the grandeur of the city she was interested in. It was the Angel. Her work seemed pointless, compared to the search for the Angel.
On the fifth day, Ellen met him and Cynthia for lunch at the Criterion. She took the tube from Bloomsbury to avoid the rain, and arrived feeling suffocated. The tube had been a mistake; it isolated her below, keeping her from the street, keeping her from the sky and the view of the city. She would not take the tube again, she resolved; she would walk or take the Bentley. She could not risk missing the Angel again. Cynthia rose to hug her hello as Ellen walked in, shaking her umbrella. “Have you found it?” asked Ellen.
Cynthia looked surprised. “What?”
“The statue! You said you’d look it up!”
Cynthia rolled her eyes. “El, I told you, I looked in the guidebooks and didn’t spot it.”
“You said Tuesday you’d go to the National Library—”
Bryan hissed, “Ellie, love, keep your voice down.”
Cynthia sat down again. “I said I’d go if I got a chance. It’s only been a couple of days—I haven’t had the time yet.”
Ellen lurched into her seat. “Goddammit, can’t you make the time? I mean, what do you do all day, Cynthia?”
Cynthia went pale around the lips, but said nothing.
“Ellie.” Bryan’s voice was maddeningly calm. “Are you feeling all right?”
“What d’you care? I’m getting the job done.”
“I’m concerned for your health, Ellie. You don’t look at all well. Have you been sleeping all right?”
“Yeah.” She saw his unbelieving look and admitted, “Well, not much.” In truth she had been sleeping hardly at all, the past two nights only dozing in her chair by the window and waking stiff and aching to watch the sun rise.
“How’s your appetite?”
She tried to laugh. “For God’s sake, Bryan!”
“Just asking.”
Ellen was getting irritated. Pointless, this was all pointless. “I’m fine, really,” she said. She picked up her menu. “Can we eat outside, on the terrace?”
Cynthia looked at her quizzically. “El, it’s raining.”
Ellen gritted her teeth. “I know. But I like the view.”
“I don’t think so,” said Bryan. “Let’s just stay put—I’m not up for the bother, really.”
Ellen looked around the restaurant. In all its Byzantine splendor, she couldn’t see a window. “It’s so stuffy in here,” she said.
Bryan and Cynthia looked at each other. God, they were annoying her! Their cryptic glances, their patronizing civility—they were treating her like a dim child, and she couldn’t stand it any longer.
Bryan opened his mouth to speak, but Ellen wouldn’t give him a chance. She stood up. “I’m just going to get some fresh air,” she said. “I’ll be back in a minute.”
She walked out of the restaurant and kept walking, through the lunchtime crowds in Piccadilly, breathing the stale city air. The rain had slowed to a drizzle. She sat on a bench and looked up, wincing as she did so; her neck was growing stiff with constant bending.
Bryan would be pissed at her for running out. What did he care? He was so wrapped up in his fucking book, expecting her to put her life on hold and wipe his brow as he minced through the final edit. Selfish bastard. She was out there doing the heavy lifting and his condescension was her reward. And that stupid cow Cynthia! She couldn’t keep the simplest promise. As if Ellen had the time to go to the National Library herself!
The rain had stopped. Ellen got up again and started walking, strolling at random with her face turned upwards. The pavement shone wet. She stumbled now and then, bumped into people.
She made her way into the heart of the ‘dilly. The neon increased in brilliance and volume, screaming the brand names of beer and cigarettes. The street was thick with ticket windows and bureaux de change. Jungle music blared from windows and Jeeps. She hardly heard. A Jamaican kid selling hot radios off of a blanket in a doorway called out, “Hey, crazy lady, what you lookin feh? You lookin feh jammin soun’ system?”
“No,” Ellen murmured, “I’m looking for an Angel.”
The kid thought that was funny. “Ain’t we all, hey? Ain’t we all.”
She had walked past, and didn’t hear his reply. The rain gradually slowed and then stopped completely as she walked. Shaftesbury Avenue. Charing Cross Road. The Strand. Waterloo...
As the sun dropped, she circled back towards the Embankment. There was a quay near Cleopatra’s Needle where she paid nine pounds for a cruise of the Thames. She sat at the speedboat’s bow, spattered by filthy spray, not heeding the prattling of the loudspeaker as the captain cracked self-deprecating jokes and pointed out the office towers of Southwark and the City; she was looking between the buildings for a trace of gold.
When the boat brought her back, Ellen was hungry. It was tea-time already, and the cafés and shops were all too crowded for her taste; she would come back a little later. She kept walking. The streets, still wet, grew vaporous in the afternoon heat. She turned her course back towards the Palace; she’d try one last time.
The iron-black statuary mocked her—common as water they were, while her Angel was nowhere to be found. But it was real. She had not imagined it. It was there, somewhere—around some corner, behind some building, temporarily hidden by a construction crane or an overpass. She knew it. She knew that when she found it, the Angel would slide into view from the blind spot in the corner of her eye, wearing its sweet, open smile; Oh, were you looking for me?
She walked until it grew dark and her guts growled for food. She had lost her wristwatch, but she had her London A-Z; she turned herself towards Westminster and her building. There was a chip-shop around the corner from the flat; she could grab a late supper there. She’d done it before. When she remembered to eat at all.
Westminster was a long walk. The leathery Greek who ran the chippie had closed his doors long before Ellen arrived; even the smell of fat was gone from the muggy night air. Her heart sank. Everything was closed by now, at least around here, and she was too tired to take the Bentley back into the West End. Nothing to do but go home.
The flat was dark as she entered. She left the lights off, side-stepping the greasy chip-shop newspapers littering the floor and making her way to the bathroom in the dark. Her fridge still held only horseradish and film. But the shades were open, and the window opened onto a view of the city lights like a hole in the world.
Ellen flicked her unwashed hair out of her eyes and eased her shoes off; her blistered feet seemed to steam as she did. Her clothes were dirty, she realized. She shrugged out of them, left them to pool on the floor, and staggered to the chair by the window.
The night-time view was treacherous. Black shapes of buildings humped up unpredictably, shadows shifting with moonlight and the passing cars. Now and then what seemed a colossal winged figure would loom, then disperse as the light changed. An odd flash of gold would catch her eye; she would follow it eagerly, until it proved the lights of an ambulance or a road-service lorry.
But as Ellen sat naked and sleepless, brain teeming, it seemed that the lights pulsing behind her eyes gathered themselves into pictures. She closed her eyes, struggled to remember exactly how the Angel had looked in that one brief moment. She recalled its smooth, muscled arms, emerging from the fluid billow of its robe. The slender waist. Ellen’s hand rubbed her empty belly. Its long, graceful neck, hands so gentle and strong. She reached lower, parted herself with glistening fingers. The grace of its stance, the beneficent power. Ah. The golden explosion of the wings, perfect to every feather. Yes. The massive serenity. Oh. Face Michelangelo perfection oh the soft curl of the hair and yes dignity of gaze oh in perfect oh Greek please harmony please oh lips curl oh please Gioconda smile oh please please oh God please...
She panted, great burning gasps, hips grinding, sore, dripping and filmed with sweat. There was nothing; no release, no relief. She rolled in her seat, twisting, clutching for something, until she fell forward out of the chair, onto her knees.
Tears rolled down her face. Exhausted, sleepless, hungry, but she could not eat, could not sleep, couldn’t even get herself off. Her marriage, Ted, and now the book, her work—everything had fallen apart. She felt the pit opening within her, and the ruins of her life sliding in and down.
Then she raised her head. There was no need to despair, she realized. As she stood, wiping her eyes, Ellen began to smile. Everything would be all right. Because she knew. She knew what would fix everything. It was all so simple. She sat again, leaned forward with her elbows on the window sill. She knew.
All she had to do was see the Angel again.
...
Click here for Part Four.
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