That Book Your Mad Ancestor Wrote (20 page)

‘
I’ve forgotten why I wanted to forget,’ I said, ‘but I can guess that I wanted some time to enjoy my hoped-for success without worrying about the future.’

The Devil nodded in a sympathetic manner.
‘You thought you’d be able to write without being in love. Many writers are able to. You expected to develop a professional attitude.’

‘
Please tell me,’ I said, ‘exactly what took place. Did I sell you my soul – 20% of my soul, I mean – over the phone? Did your contract turn up at my door on little legs with cloven hoofs? Am I going to get my memory back?’

‘
In answer to your first two questions,’ the Devil replied, ‘neither scenario occurred, although the latter has a certain appeal. I hope you won’t mind if I borrow the idea from time to time. To the third question, I regret to say that I can’t restore the memory I extracted, but it will only take me a minute to explain the details. Would you like to know?’

‘
I think I’d better.’

‘
Very well. You did, in fact, initiate contact with me. You summoned me with a quaint old spell. Presumably you didn’t know that I’m listed in the Yellow Pages. You were so besotted with your book that you couldn’t face the prospect of it not being successful in the world. It wasn’t so much for your own sake as for the book’s that you wanted my help. Rather touching, really. We negotiated your giving up the chance to fall in love with another book when you refused the first contract I offered, in which you would have been required to surrender 30% of your soul. You declined the only other option I was able to offer.’

‘
Which was?’

‘
The end of your marriage. You would have fallen for another book, and this time your husband would have grown jealous and filed for divorce.’

At least I could say I felt no regret about turning that option down
.

‘
Why only a percentage of my soul?’

My benefactor gave the impression of shrugging without actually making the gesture.
‘I gave up demanding entire souls quite a long time ago. People always wanted too much in exchange. They demanded round-the-clock debauchery, bottomless bank accounts, journeys to other planets – you name the extravaganza, I’ve arranged it for someone at some time. And the clever ones always wanted peace of mind into the bargain. It just wasn’t worth it on my part, particularly as most of the people who entered into contracts with me were going to end up in Hell anyway. So I started experimenting with flexible contracts, offering more modest services in exchange for a percentage of the soul – sometimes combined, as in your case, with other commodities of exchange: little afflictions and miseries that increase the total negativity in the world and put a song in an old sadist’s heart. And it worked wonderfully. I found millions of people willing to exchange a part of their soul in return for quite small services. Believe me, the parts add up.’

‘
And what about the part that’s left?’ Now that I knew about the contract, I was starting to feel more concerned about my soul than the problem with my pen. ‘Can it regenerate the lost portion, like a liver?’ I shook my head at my own question. ‘It can’t, can it?’

‘
Alas, no. If you had taken the peace of mind clause, you would believe that after your death your soul would be able to regrow the portion I acquire. But that clause costs an extra 5%, and you decided against it. You know the truth, and you’ll have to live with it.’

‘
And what about your phone call – just an act? A false memory?’

‘
A little charade, but performed with a sincere spirit. I do have warm feelings for writers, and I did like your book.’

‘
And the balance of your gain is that for as long as I live I’ll be yearning for another love affair with a book, and you’ll get your jollies from watching me suffer, and from all the times that I’ll no doubt take my misery out on other people.
And
you put the 3-year limit in so that I’d eventually learn the truth and be unhappy about it.’

The Devil chuckled lightly.
‘That’s another reason why I like writers. You’re so very easy to torment. All I have to do is deny you things that most people never think of having in the first place.’

I ignored the gibe and demanded,
‘What about my copy of the contract? Shouldn’t I have one?’ I was sure I hadn’t seen a copy in my files. But then, how often did I look through my files?

‘
Your agent has it, to prevent your accidentally finding it before your three years of amnesia were up,’ the Devil answered with an air of satisfaction at all being in order.

I could feel the false calm of shock wearing off and the unpleasant beginning of tears niggling at my sinuses. I wanted to leave before I cracked. I got up from the chair.

‘Before you go,’ said the Devil, ‘permit me to give you some advice. Don’t worry too much about your soul. Personal identity is merely fiction, after all, as any number of intelligent people have deduced. This illusion you call identity or soul is merely a grab-bag of fleeting sensations, imaginative self-deception, and the imperfect records known as memory. Think on how much of yourself you’ve already lost, or failed even to construct, through lack of attention, creativity and will.’

With those comforting words ringing in my ears, I found myself standing in the basement car park of the anonymous building in which the Devil
’s office was located. I walked to my car, climbed in, and had a good cry. I banged my forehead against the steering wheel a few times – gently, so as not to accidentally set off the airbag.

I drove home, trembling so much that I was afraid I
’d have an accident. Fortunately there was only light mid-afternoon traffic to deal with. While I was in the car, I wondered where the percentage of my soul that remained my own was heading for. I considered the Devil’s parting advice, but I doubted the picture of souls was as insignificant as he had painted it, or he wouldn’t be so greedy for them. I thought gloomily about the Prada and the camel and the eye of the needle. And what about Ivan? If we were to be together in the afterlife, what would it be like for him if I was only 80% there? Even if I wouldn’t miss 20% of my soul, perhaps he would. I began to feel quite ill with worry and guilt.

I got home at three
-thirty. The quartet of books that wouldn’t go away were lying around in the living room, where they had made camp. They no longer resembled the pristine blank-paged volumes I’d picked up. They were dishevelled, dirty and dog-eared. They smelled, and the room smelled of them and the overflowing ashtrays and empty beer cans heaped all around them. They didn’t greet me. They’d stopped talking to me. They only communicated with Ivan, who made their beer runs.

But if I was going to keep writing, what was I going to write if not one of them? It was all too obvious
.

You still can do it, you know, I told myself. Now that you
’re aware of the situation, you can accept it. You don’t need to be in love. Comradeship and a sense of duty can take the place of passion. In fact, they’re often more useful than passion in the long run. You just need some discipline. Application of the seat of the pants to the seat of the chair, and all that.

I
’ve always hated pep talks, and I expected to find myself put off by that little effort. But, instead, a slightly wonderful thing happened. I looked around at the unwritten books and felt a surge of empathy. What was I if not a neglected project, just like them? (Worse, an unfinishable project, if I was going to enter eternity without 20% of my soul.)

While I had crafted a book with almost delirious pleasure, I had done almost nothing about crafting myself. If I was only an illusion, didn
’t I want to be an interesting, well-made illusion, just as, presumably, they did?

And if the Devil had been lying about souls, then I had more than an illusion to worry about. If I was going to keep 80% of my soul, maybe I ought to make sure I didn
’t own 80% of a piece of junk.

Had the first book been something of a demon lover, and was the real challenge not to write without its charming presence, but to try to make myself into a slightly more charming creature? Because at the moment, the hard voice of reality said, I was a bit of a shit.

I was moved to say to the books, ‘I’m sorry. I’ve been selfish and unreasonable.’

The books remained silent in their postures of decrepit indolence. I wasn
’t discouraged. I’d found a straw to clutch at, and I was going to clutch like mad in the hope that it was a good, strong, secure straw. It occurred to me that, viewed as a move towards reform, it would be nobler and more character-building to attempt to write one of the unattractive squatters than a book I was mad for.

By the distinct tone of piety in the thoughts I was having
– thoughts towards which my conversation with the Devil had, after all, led me – I felt justified in wondering whether (another straw!) the being with whom I had been dealing
was
really the Devil. What if there was a larger, benign deception surrounding the one involving the contract? Suppose the entire thing was a plan I’d elaborately contrived in order to stretch myself as a writer and do a bit of self-improvement into the bargain? As for the Devil, couldn’t a benevolent power, such as a guardian angel, have played the part?

I decided to call my agent. His assistant answered the phone. I asked her if she could look through my file for a contract concerning my soul.

Yes, she said, it was there.

‘
Are you able to find out for me whether that’s actually the Devil’s signature?

‘
Sure,’ she said.

‘
Really?’

‘
Of course. Writers are always making contracts with the Devil and then wishing they hadn’t,’ she told me breezily. ‘They hope the Devil’s signature is fake, and ask us to find out.’

‘
Has it ever been fake?’

‘
I don’t think so, but there’s always a first time. Shall I fax it to the person who handles verifications of this sort?’

So there
was
someone who could read it. I hesitated. If the signature was authentic, I’d be miserable. If it was false, or the signature of a benign power, I’d very probably relax and continue to search foolishly for another great romance with an unwritten book. Finally, there was the possibility that the signature might be part of the deception I was fantasising about, a forgery good enough to fool an expert.

‘
I’ll think about it,’ I said.

‘
No problem,’ said the assistant, sounding as if she had expected my response. I thanked her and hung up.

A writer needs a good imagination. This applies even to a writer of my type. Books and stories are by no means always perfectly organised in thought and clear in speech when they dictate themselves, and the writer has to fill in the gaps. Whatever my other shortcomings, my imagination was fairly well developed. And just as a sprinter
’s legs don’t stop working between races, an imagination operates outside the hours when it’s being used for creative work. Shaken up as I was, I knew that in time my faculty of fabrication would convince me either that the Devil hadn’t been the Devil, or that the whole thing had been a particularly vivid flight of said faculty’s own fancy. One way or another, I’d eventually have peace of mind on the subject of my soul. I would cook, as it were, the books.

But I w
as a long way from being there.

I set my eyes on the lousiest looking of the books and began to navigate my way towards it through the reefs of ashtrays and beer cans. The book regarded me in a deeply cynical way, as it had every right to. But it was far smaller than I, and it was too drunk to resist me. Essaying a Byronic mien, I knelt before the book, swept it up in my arms, grabbed a beer for it from an open six
-pack, carried book and beer into the spare room and shut the door. I realised I had left my pen outside. It didn’t matter. There was a biro in the desk drawer.

I finished writing the book a little under a year later. The next year it was published. It isn
’t a fantasy but a romance of sorts about people who are not in love, and their many doubts.