kroth:  the slant

1: Holiday mood

It is rarely mentioned out loud. But on occasion you do hear it, tersely. “Got the Slant?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Sure?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Good. Let's march.”
    You will understand when the time comes.
    I was lucky. Without knowing what I was letting myself in for, I blundered my way into legend, I took part in a revolution led by a great man, and I lived to tell the tale. To repay my debt to Fortune, I have named my narrative after that survival skill which you must acquire if you are to venture south of Sixty.
    Remember, you won't hear it often named. Far more frequently you'll hear the word “Slope”. After all, on the basic Earth, questions of life and death, peace and war, personal success and failure, depend literally on where you stand upon its down-curving Slope.
    But the Slant – it's inside you. Or at least, you had better hope it is.
    Yet none of us knew it, on what we used to call “our world”, when my story begins.

                                                  *

Nothing can beat the sheer relief you feel when a batch of exams is over.
    That morning, from 9.30 to 11.30, I had sat the last one – a History paper – and there were no lessons for us sixth-formers in this “study week”, so the school let us go.
    I trudged happily through rain-dampened streets back to my house. The dullness of the weather did not depress me at all. In fact I was in such a good mood that every dripping tree and sodden bush in the gardens of the semis gave off a scent of mild excitement. Who needs sunshine, anyway, if what's on your agenda is just to flop, to collapse in exhausted freedom! It was a tonic for me to walk that familiar suburban route at this unaccustomed time. The grey, wet day, in my drained-out state, soothed me with the pleasurable fact that an empty house awaited me, and a stress-free, uneventful afternoon.
    I felt “in my bones” that I was in for a reasonably good result in all four of my AS-levels. However, even more important, right now, was the prospect of this selfish afternoon, lounging and mooching to my heart's content, blissfully binning my revision plan. My few friends lived not in Crickham but in the adjoining ex-villages of Lade and Foxton, and I felt sure that no social demands would be made on me that day. In fact I was then somewhat of a loner, partly out of necessity but also out of choice. My parents were dead, my stepfather was locked up and my uncle, theoretically my guardian, left me to myself most of the time. To a moderate degree I enjoyed company, provided that it wasn't too exciting. I'd had enough drama from the days when my stepfather used to chase after my late mother wielding a breadknife. More than most seventeen-year-olds, I valued quiet.
    A minute after I had let myself in, the phone rang.
    A bit surprised, but assuming that it would be my uncle, I picked up the receiver and heard a voice that shocked my pulse into a faster beat.
    “Duncan?” it said. “That you?”
    I hedged, “Yes, hello....” I knew who it was but I found it hard to believe the evidence of my ears.
    “It's Elaine. Elaine Dering.”
    “Yes, hi. I didn't think you were the other Elaine.” That would indeed have been too much to believe. A tinkle of laughter down the phone line showed that my caller agreed – we both knew, we didn't need to spell it out, that the other Elaine, Elaine Swinton, would hardly trouble herself to phone anybody; she'd more likely be waiting for people to call her while she languidly admired herself in the mirror.
    By contrast, Elaine Dering would look less spectacular on the catwalk but was far more adorable in my opinion. But why was she calling me? We hardly knew each other.
    “Thought I'd catch you just as you got back, before you go out celebrating....”
    “Little do you know,” I said.
    We were now several sentences into the conversation and I had not yet messed it all up. What a day this was turning out to be. I would have been even more thrilled, were it not for my realistic streak which pointed out that she wasn't likely to ring me up for the pleasure of it. She must want something from me. This isn't meant as a criticism. Elaine D. was a glorious extrovert, a bubbly personality full of overflowing good nature, and I was thankful for my bit of the overflow; it's just that I, being threatened by happiness, naturally became cautious, and warned myself not to read too much into it.
    “Fortunately,” she went on, “there aren't that many Wemyss's in the phone book....”
    “We're a rare breed,” I acknowledged. “By the way, you're supposed to pronounce it 'Weems', not 'we miss'.”
    “Sorry! So anyway, I found you, and I can buttonhole you.”
    She sounded, as she said this, as though she feared she might be about to say something slightly cheeky. Odd, that this splendid person should suddenly lack confidence. She continued as though she had to make excuses: “I couldn't delay calling you because my Chemistry exam is at half past one. I want your advice.”
    “Go ahead, Elaine; if you think I can advise you, I'll gladly help all I can, as soon as I know what you're talking about.”
    “This is a long shot, but.... Look, you see, Duncan, I think you're quite brainy, but that's not all of it. It doesn't explain it – doesn't explain, I mean, how you get by.”
    “What on Earth....”
    “I'm talking about these exams! I think you've got some secret! Haven't you?” She heard my silence and became bolder. “Come on, admit it.”
    “Oh,” I said. “So that's it,” I added, playing for time. “Well.... Don't you think it's maybe a bit late to ask, a bit late to apply it to this afternoon....”
    “Aha. AHA!” (I imagined her eyes flashing, her arms waving in actressy gestures. At the same time, with the phone receiver it was as if her lips were pressed against my ear.) She said throatily, “Hohoho, you do have something, don't you? I thought so.” Full of certainty now, she continued: “You never seem to worry, never seem under pressure, always seem to know just how much and what to read up on, whatever's most useful.... If I just thought you were a genius I wouldn't bother with you, but I think you're something else and I want to know what. So there!”
    “I'm not psychic,” I protested.
    How could I explain to her that at this stage in my life my great determination was to avoid stress of any kind; that I had just about made a science out of it; that I had been determined from the start that I would not leave anything to chance.... how could I tell her all this without risking further enquiry?
    Well, maybe I could give her a little, provided I made it sound sufficiently boring so as to put her off questioning me about what started it all.
    “All right, I'll tell you my exam technique,” I said. “For a start I take sensible precautions, such as going in for subjects like English and History, and avoiding incomprehensible stuff like Chemistry....”
    “Oh ha ha.”
    “Sorry. I'm only saying how it seems to me. I know you don't have anything to fear from Chemistry.”
    “All very well for you to say that. Come on, get to the point.”
    “Right, I will! But I warn you, it's nerdy.”
    “I dare say it is. Keep going!”
    “I designed what you might call a voucher system.”
    “Now we're getting somewhere. Tell me how you do that.”
    “Listen, then. This is the core of it: you survey what you have to do, then write yourself out a series of revision vouchers on slips of paper. One voucher per hour's or half-hour's or quarter-hour's work; anyhow, one voucher per stomach-full, if you see what I mean. Got that? You have to 'spend' them, so to speak, by doing all those lengths of revision, but there isn't a rule about when you do them, or which you do, so long as a certain number get done every week....”
    I droned on, imagining the glaze creeping over her eyes as she realized that I wasn't telling her anything that she could possibly use for the exam coming up at half past one today. I finished, “So there you are, that's about it. You asked for it.”
    “Hmm. Yes, I did, didn't I. Pity we didn't have this chat several months ago....”
    “I wish we had.”
    “Still, I'll be able to use your words of wisdom for next year. But I'm not looking forward to this Chemistry, I must admit.”
    “Um....” I said, helplessly.
    “Ah, well. Think of me, while you're living it up this afternoon....”
    “Elaine, you seem to think I've got big ideas about celebrating, but I haven't. I'm just going to sit down and be.”
    “Wish I could right now. What about the hols – got anything interesting lined up?”
    Now the tone had changed; she was just being polite, asking the sort of question one uses just to finish off a normal conversation.
    “Nothing planned, but Uncle Vic has hinted he'll come up with something. Take me here and there on some of his scientific conference trips. A few week-end jaunts.”
    “That all?”
    “Unc's a sport; he lets me mooch on my own. I'm used to it. Shouldn't be too bad.”
    “Hope you enjoy yourself. 'Bye, Duncan.”
    “'Bye, Elaine.”
    Click.
    Well, that was quite nice, I thought. In fact, more than quite nice. It had bathed my entire awareness in a golden glow; yet I didn't “whoop” out loud, for absolutely nothing must be permitted to breach the no-stress rule.  Happiness was risky. If allowed to take hold, it could get one dancing along the edge of a cliff.
    My survival technique applied to more than just exams.

                                                  *

The crisis with my stepfather had begun with a car accident which altered his personality. Previous to that, we had got along fine. Afterwards, he was a violent case – a different person. He was put away after a few months but not before my mother had been turned into an invalid, so that just at the time when I had to study hard for my GCSE's, I also had to do a lot of extra work round the house and looking after Mum. I developed The Philosophy: if I didn't have time or energy to do a thing, such as homework, well, it just didn't get done. That was that. No strain; extras just go down the chute and into the bin.
    Then my mother unexpectedly died. That shock threatened to crack my new armour. But still I carried on with my routines of living. I was in a smooth kind of daze in which I did not really think of her as gone, for I still sensed her presence quite strongly in the silent house; a reassuring presence as if she were co-operating with my denial. “All right, Duncan, a big change has happened but there's no law that says you have to crumple up.” So I didn't.
    My new guardian, Uncle Vic, seemed a dry, undemonstrative type, just what I needed. He provided stable support and otherwise let me work things out my own way.
    I perfected The Philosophy. “Pressure,” I told myself, “is inevitable in life, and I can cope with it so long as it's smooth and even and steady. But as for the other sort: I'm not having it. I cannot, will not cope with hassle. Unforeseen irregular stuff is, therefore, unacceptable – I've had enough of it; it's out! I refuse to accept any more violence from the universe, and in order to enforce this rejection, I will control the pressure dial, I will apply the pressure to myself, feeding it to myself at a steady rate, averaging out in such a way that I am always buffered by the margin of security in my savings-deposit of power.”
    This, alas, is not the philosophy of a brave man. But you might say I had some excuse.
    The phone rang again. This time it will be Uncle, I said to myself.
    It was. The dry, sardonic voice said, “How did it go?”
    “Not so bad! No nasty surprise questions. I think I did all right.”
    “Of course you did – I expected no less.” He paused. “Listen, Duncan, I have been summoned to the Boone demo at Imperial College tomorrow morning. Remember I told you about it?”
    “I expect you did,” I said, racking my brains.
    “Well, do you want to come along? I'm going up to London this afternoon to do a quick bit of prior research. If, as I believe, the demo is a flop, at least you get a couple of days out with all expenses paid. If I'm wrong, you get not only that but an opportunity to witness history being made.”
    Uncle was generous on the expenses side. And he treated me like a responsible adult. Besides, one never knew, the thing might even be interesting.
    “I'd be glad to come along,” I said. “Thanks.”
    “How about this, then: I'll pick you up on my way home, Reen meanwhile will prepare us a spot of lunch, then the three of us will shoot off without more ado.”
    “So we'll get there with about ten hours to spare,” I said dryly, for Uncle always was so keen on speed.
    A chuckle. “Right then, you get packed and I'll see you in about half an hour.”
    Click.
    I'd forgotten all about this demo thing, whatever it was. So I wasn't going to have a quiet afternoon absolutely to myself after all. Still, lounging around in luxury London hotels was at least as good as loafing at home. And as for the event itself, the doings at Imperial, I would be a mere spectator. No need to bestir myself.
    My mind was running more on the topic of Elaine's phone call as I went upstairs to bung some things into a case. It occurred to me that it must have taken quite a bit of courage on her part to ring up someone she didn't know at all well, just for the sake of a “long shot” idea. I wouldn't have dared to try so long a shot myself. I hoped that she wasn't too disappointed in the result.
    Soon after I had descended with the suitcase, I saw, through the leaves outside the lounge bay window, Uncle's car draw up. I went out, locked the door and sauntered down the path, in holiday mood. Uncle watched as I swung my case into the boot.
    “Ready for high adventure?” he asked, with quirked eyebrows.
    I played up to it. “I've said all my goodbyes,” I said, “to everyone else that lives in the house – that's to say, the cacti and the geraniums. You may gun the motor.”
    He snickered and pulled out from the kerb. The engine purred – it was actually a powerful car. A new one. I glanced at Uncle, wondering, as I often did, what made him tick. He bulked in his grey suit, looking like a prosperous slightly pear-shaped businessman with a somewhat grimly handsome face and lanky black hair; he could have starred in The Godfather Part IV, but what lay behind those keen eyes?
    Some things I was fairly sure of. For example, that to him and to Aunt Reen I was the son they never had. And whatever else he was, he certainly wasn't mean. I had a lot to be grateful for. But it was very hard to find out where he stood on any issue: he delighted in building up a case for something and then knocking it down. He seemed to enjoy confusing people. And he didn't seem to care for anybody except Reen and, to a lesser extent, myself; everyone else was the object of his amused contempt.
    His real name was an embarrassment. Being not only a quarter Italian but also a quarter Russian, he had been christened Vladimir, thence shortened to Vlad. In my younger, more sensitive days I had put my foot down to stop the news spreading at school that a relative of mine shared a first name with Dracula. Reen took my side in this, and we eventually persuaded him to call himself Vic. He had snorted, “Very well! Vlad the Victor! I shall do my best to live up to both names.”
    By profession he was a freelance science journalist, and by all accounts a good one, highly regarded in his field. He had won a string of awards for articles which set out to tame the big themes of modern science and make them accessible to the ordinary reader. Reen was proud of his accomplishments: at lunch recently she had told me he'd won a prize for a piece in New Scientist about “carbon nanotubes”, whereupon Uncle Vic had smiled cynically and added, in the tone of a TV advert, “Want to dazzle your friends with nanotechnology, astrophysics, palaeoanthropology? Go to Vic Chandler; he'll bluff you through.”
    This time, though, the topic was going to be some other big polysyllable, and I heartily wished I could remember what it was, for I was most reluctant to disappoint Uncle Vic by admitting that I had forgotten what “the Boone demo” was about.
    Glancing at his profile as he wove through the lunch-hour traffic I sensed his keen zest and determination to make a professional job of this latest assignment, and though my own understanding of it all could hardly make a difference to the outcome, I very much wanted to be on his wavelength. If only I hadn't forgotten the topic! How could I draw it out of him without letting on? Vlad the Victorious wasn't an easy man to fool.
    I finally thought of an approach.
    “So, what'll be the title of your next article?” I inquired.
    “Oh, doubtless something with a question mark in it.”
    “Like?”
    'PK – The Clincher?' Or, 'PK Pinned Down At Last?' That sort of thing.”
    “And when will it appear?”
    He grinned. “I could write most of it this evening.”
    “Hang on, Uncle – you said the demo is taking place tomorrow.”
    “Well, so what? Just another one for the Observer – I ought to know how to pitch it by now.”
    I realized he was just being cynical again. Meanwhile I hadn't solved my problem. I was about to give in and ask point blank, “What's PK?”, when chance or luck came to my aid.
    We were hurtling along a stretch of the St Albans Road, and I was getting jittery about the speed of Vic's driving. It wasn't the first time my nerves had suffered from his tendency to treat any long straight bit of road as though it were a motorway. But I remembered a helpful fact and said aloud, “Speed camera coming up, Uncle.”
    He didn't respond.
    “Er, look,” I went on, and then my voice died away because it was plain that he had seen the camera. His narrowed eyes shot a fierce glare at the oncoming post – he wasn't going to slow down!
    Well, he was rich enough to not mind paying the fine, but –
    Next moment we were past it and I had not noticed any tell-tale flash.  The speed camera was therefore not in working order. Clever Uncle to have known this, to have known that he didn't need to do what he doesn't like to do, namely, slow down. What I then saw on his face – a smirk of utter squashing contempt, compressed into about a second of time – randomly gave me an idea for a story. Imagine someone who could influence speed cameras by willing them not to work. Someone who had the power of psycho-whatsit – I knew the word, I knew it – psychokinesis – PK!
    I was so pleased I had retrieved the word, I made haste to use it.
    “This Boone demo – is Boone the one with the psychokinesis?”
    “Yes, and in fact he's a lad of about your age. Poor chap, he must be tired of being a freak.”
    I dared to say, “Just then, I had the idea you might be one. Using your mind-power to put the speed-camera out of action.”
    “Ha! I'd do that to all of them if I could! Pains in the posterior....” As if deliberately emphasizing his hatred of all restraint he zoomed round a corner much faster than I liked, so that I was scared enough to let my irritation show.
    “Uncle – speeding in a built-up area is not funny.”
    I suppose my brains were still addled after all the exams, otherwise I would never have made such a blunder. My only advantage was that I was one hundred per cent in the right. That was a small point to set beside Vic's far greater advantages of age, experience and personality. Hastily I added, “Sorry to sound priggish – but....”
    He smiled. “Refreshing role-reversal! We oldsters can sit back now, and let teenagers do the telling-off!”
    Sarcastic though this may seem when read in cold print, it was spoken in an amused tone that reassured me. I had got away with it. I had worried unnecessarily, merely because I had momentarily forgotten something important about Uncle. He liked cheeky opposition, provided it was articulate. The thing that really put him off was a sulky refusal to argue.   Knowing that this was so, I had learned, over the past months, to express myself quite a lot more than I would otherwise have done. Now I told myself that it would be better to finish what I had started.
    “Thanks – in that case, Uncle, I'll lecture you some more. Life isn't a James Bond movie, you know! No matter how good your reflexes, some day some child or idiot youngster is going to dart out in front of you and you won't be able to do a thing about it.”
    I half expected him to make some remark about reducing the surplus population.
    What he actually said was, “Here we are. And there's Reen with the stuff.”
    For we were pulling up at his house. Reen must have seen us through the front curtain; she was already coming down the steps, suitcase in one hand and handbag dangling from the other. The best one-word description of Aunt Reen is “sweet”. Gentle through and through, she was the perfect antidote to Vic's aura of ruthlessless. It was impossible to imagine her angry.  I got out of the car, gave her a kiss on the flawless skin of her ageless cheek while Vic opened the boot, and put her case alongside mine.
    “You got here quickly, dears. Have you been speeding again, Vic?”
    He threw his head back and laughed heartily, then gave her huggable figure an enthusiastic hug. “Got it in one! I got told off by Duncan.”
    “Well done, Duncan. Keep it up.”
    “Perhaps he won't need to,” said Vic. To my surprise he said it quite seriously. He always did have an unusual respect for argument, and I had one of my spells of feeling suddenly proud of him; I had a mysterious sense that here was a person who might be on the way to something big. We went in for our “spot of lunch” and I was relaxed and happy.
    When we came out again and zoomed off towards London, I thought the speed issue was over and done with. Once we had got onto the A1, however, he turned to me and said, “Shall I really open 'er up?” – nodding at the indicator.
    “Now, Vic,” warned Reen. “Don't start that again. Control that urge to be a spaceship pilot.”
    “I just thought Duncan might be interested to see what the car can do....”
    “He's seventeen, not fourteen!” said Reen with finality.
    “Right-oh! I accept what you say. That's what we men need, a good woman to keep us on the ground. I'm a lucky man.”
    “That you are,” Reen confirmed.
    Looking at his calm smile I wondered if there was anything that could disturb his composure. I thought back and couldn't remember anything that ever had. And the result of these trivial conversations was that the feeling crept into me that he could, if he wanted, be a dangerous man.  Of course it wasn't his fault that he had a somewhat sinister face, but still, if he should ever decide to go in for politics or crime, and if he could steer people like he steered the car, then he might go very far indeed, in directions that were hard to imagine.
    I wasn't worrying about it, though. I was too relaxed and happy to have premonitions. Besides, there was one fact about Uncle Vic which made all this fanciful speculation useless: namely, that he was – to put it mildly – a complete fence-sitter. He never took sides; and you don't get to be a world-shaker by never taking sides.

>>  2: The Experiment