When the Feast is Finished

Let’s hope next year will be better! For one thing, Twinkling will be published, although already I dread the insensitive reviews with their crass headlines, ‘Life of Brian’. But a little welcome income might trickle in.

Clive and I drove down to BBC Thames Valley, where I went on air with Colin Dexter in a New Year Resolution Show. Uri Geller said he wished everyone to get down on their knees and pray for peace in the Middle East. I suggested, ‘Why not try bending a few Kalashnikovs? It might be more effective.’

I failed to note down, but still vividly remember, Margaret saying, ‘I don’t like the sound of l997. I don’t think it is going to be the best of years …’ Intuition again?

After the difficulties of the previous year, I made a resolution to accept no more invitations to other countries, although my customary visit to the US remained on the agenda. It was as well I did so. The temptation most difficult to resist was an invitation from Yang Xiao, one of our powerful friends in China, to a conference taking place in Beijing and Changdu. China – and indeed that remarkable lady – always had a special place in my heart.

Unlike our usual bouncy state, we were depressed in January 1997. Margaret developed a persistent sore throat. But we smiled and said, ‘So this is what growing old is like!’ At least we were content together; the old assumption still prevailed, that I would die first, while Margaret had at least twenty more years of life to run.

By the end of the month, I heard from Robin Straus that my American publisher, Gordon Van Gelder of St Martin’s Press, ‘adored’ Twinkling. He accepted it without talk of cuts or fussing. Still there came no word from HarperCollins.

So the year began dismally. Daughter Wendy’s little son, Thomas, had sickness problems, Antony, my sister Betty’s husband, was asthmatic and had difficulties with food, Betty was on pills, and Moggins was definitely under par. She stayed at home while I had to attend various events in England on my own. I also went to the John Radcliffe for a spell under the Magnetic Resonance Scanner. Taking a look afterwards at the shots of my spine, I saw that most vertebrae were well padded and separated, but some of the lower ones were a bit shaky. They could be causing the leg pain I was experiencing.

Until I referred back to my diary, I had forgotten that things weren’t so good at that time. Unwell or not, we enjoyed each other’s companionship. In the evenings, after supper, we sat and read or watched television, too lacking in energy to go out.

I had a little excitement to spur me on. Sir Crispin Tickell, then the Warden of Green College, had invited me to lecture as final speaker in a series of four lectures on the future. I spoke as the president of a largely fictitious body, APIUM, the Association for the Protection and Integrity of an Unspoilt Mars. It pleased me that apium was the Latin word for a white vegetable, celery. I had become sensitive to the vulnerability of things, from the quiet decency of most English people, the cultivation of truth and learning in our children, to the sacredness of environments, as well as Margaret’s health. Beauty lay everywhere, even on our desolate neighbouring planet, Mars.

My argument was that while I was eager for mankind to visit Mars and explore it, plans to terraform it were a different matter. Terraforming seeks to change a planet into a semblance of Earth, with breathable atmosphere, better climate, etc. Such engineering dreams are an extreme example, however well meaning, of mankind’s disastrous ambition to dominate the world, to exert power, to ‘conquer’ every environment.

Margaret’s environment was itself under threat. And I was planning to build a utopia … I spoke feelingly at Green College concerning this hypothetical just society, and was well received by the learned audience. Happily, Margaret was in the hall with friends, looking marvellous in a long red costume. One of the friends was the literary agent Felicity Bryan. Someone asked her after the talk, ‘Was Brian an actor?’

Felicity’s response: ‘You mean you haven’t seen SF Blues?’ SF Blues was my evening revue, which I had been touring round England and abroad for a number of years, taking the leading role. We staged it once in Felicity’s and her husband Alex’s grand house.

Following my lecture we then dined in the college, in the Tower of the Four Winds.

Gill Lustgarten reported next day that at lunch everyone talked of me and my theories. ‘There was nothing else to talk about.’

All this was beneficial for serotonin levels. Margaret and I drove over to Woodstock and bought a table and six chairs for the dining-room. Having blown over £2,000, we celebrated with lunch at the Feathers. Margaret ate soup and fishcake, I tsatsiki and chorizo, followed by parfait of duck.

We seemed to be on an even keel again.

Margaret is much better in health now, although her throat still troubles her. She looks very neat. Her legs and ankles are as slender as they were when we first met.

We drove to our flat in Blakeney on the north Norfolk coast in February, with Margaret at the wheel, and enjoyed a little sunshine. In Holt, we visited Betty and Antony’s new home in Mill Street, decorated in the Victorian manner.

For a brief while, we were able to enjoy life, without realising how precious those last months were. On the day Deng Xiaoping died, we went to London to see the Braque exhibition at the Royal Academy, of which we were members. We viewed some of the canvases with almost religious reverence, as did many of the people in the galleries. After lunch, we went to see Kenneth Branagh’s Hamlet, filmed at Blenheim Palace. Branagh, far from being a melancholy Dane, acted more like an escapee from a military band.

The weather was awful that day.

At this stage, we worried slightly, but nothing more. We had grown accustomed to each other’s weaknesses. So much so that – with the usual misgivings – I went as usual to Florida, to the Conference of the Fantastic, where I have a particular title, Special Permanent Guest. I rang Margaret from the conference hotel, to hear that beautiful voice answering me from Blakeney. On that occasion, she had lunched with Betty and Antony in Holt. She sounded spry and cheerful.

With April, I made a determined attempt to garden: more particularly, to grow us some vegetables. Along came a period of fine dry weather to encourage us. London was hotter than Athens for a time. Margaret also gardened and planted four trees on the farther lawn.

While I edited an anthology of mini-sagas, following the Daily Telegraph competition, our energy levels seemed to have improved. This despite the drab news from my agent, Mike Shaw, that HarperCollins, like a laundry that refuses to take in washing, was not making offers for any more books just at present.

The happier turn life has recently taken and the recovery from our transplantation to Old Headington have restored my abilities to a large extent.

So I noted. We were easily reassured that all was pretty well with us.

We drove to Blakeney again, where it was cold. There, one night, we saw the Hale-Bopp comet blazing away into the future over the North Sea. Two weeks later, we took a weekend off at the other end of the country, holidaying with Clive and Youla, over from Greece, in a snug little hotel on Exmoor.

But Margaret’s problems continued.

After her death, I found on her computer her own report on the difficulties she experienced.

How characteristic that she headed it

My health:

Following increased breathlessness this year, especially noticeable in Greece in May in the heat, I went to Neil MacLennan to ask for it to be investigated. My blood pressure was diagnosed as slightly high, following a random twenty-four-hour test several years ago, and I have been on Adalat Retard ever since.

Neil sent me to Dr Hart in the cardiology dept. of the J.R. I went in last week, and first was tested on the exercise machine, the ‘treadmill’. Unsurprisingly to me, I did very badly – as Dr Hart commented – and lasted only three mins at the first speed, and barely another three at the next speed: a quick uphill walking pace. Then I had an echo cardiogram, when my heartbeat was diagnosed on a screen; then a blood test, and then an appointment for a kidney scan later in the month (since one of the family – Tim – has had kidney problems). I had to do a twenty-four-hour urine sample, which I took in the next day.

Then I had a chat with Dr Hart. He told me the results of all the tests so far, and said that I had substantial thickening of the wall of the left ventricle – the part of the heart responsible for pumping the blood round the body. Probably this was due to high blood pressure: although my blood pressure was not too high taken against the average blood pressure, it might be too high for me. So the thing is to tackle it more aggressively. He also recommended taking more exercise, and not lifting anything heavy at the moment.

A week later I saw MacLennan, who had heard from Dr Hart in a long letter. He gave all the results – why is it the patient is the only person not to have anything down in writing about his or her condition? That is why I am recording this! – and suggested going on to Ace Inhibitors, together with a slight diuretic, low dose to start, then increased slightly, and to see how it went.

So I took half a Enalapril last night, and had a really good relaxed sleep! With all the house moving, it is hard to be unexerted at present, but I don’t feel too bad today at all. The Adalat Retard did very well for me, controlling the increased heart rate as I could feel, and also removing most headaches and nosebleeds. Interesting. Let’s see what Enalapril will do.

November: Now on 10mg. Enalapril, as well as Bendofluazine. And Premarin, and doing well, though really not up to walking uphill yet. Due for a check up with Dr Hart some time soon.

March: Summoned to see Neil MacLennan because my cholesterol level was up to 11 again – 7 would be good, 5 is average … He proposed to put me on more pills. I said I’d rather try lowering it by improving my diet, so we agreed on that. Not due to see Dr Hart until October, but don’t really feel my heart condition has improved. So I have written direct to him to ask for an appointment. I want to know why he thinks I have this condition – what it is due to. I mentioned my struggling dreams, which I have had for some years. Prior to that, in the days of Heath House and Dr Tobin (whom I told about this) I had dreams fairly often of being in some transport which was going too fast round a corner, to the extent that I nearly blacked out with the G pressure. May be related …

To see Dr Hart, for the six-month check-up I requested. He suggests I have an angiograph done, a tube inserted into the veins, to see if he can find out what is wrong with the blood supply. Sounds horrid, but must be done, a day in the hospital with local anaesthetic. Ugh. I have to go on to anti-cholesterol pills, to lower it. OK, maybe that will help. I await a date.

Angiogram duly done, early July: great result – no coronary artery problems at all. So, only the blood pressure and enlarged ventricle to look after, with pills, as before. Thank goodness for that!

Margaret was a great counter of blessings.

Often in the night she would wake, and then I would wake, and we would walk about the house holding hands. We put no lights on. A street lamp outside the front door filtered light into the rooms. We were always kind and fond. I enjoyed those waking times; sometimes I would fetch her a little glass of milk from the fridge.

I would hold her and kiss her. We told each other that, now we were getting old, we needed less sleep. Indeed, it was difficult to distinguish the natural pains of growing old from more serious pains, or a sense of feeling old from a sense of feeling ill. It seemed then that we were both ‘getting on a bit’, and so we were inclined to regard Margaret’s heart problem as part of a process in which we were both involved.

Nevertheless, there was a new development. For several years, I had been taking a post-lunch siesta in the study, whereas Margaret said she could not sleep during the day. Now she began to rest on the sofa in the living-room, her beloved cat Sotkin beside her, and often would sleep for a whole hour or possibly more.

She could not think herself well again.

It was on the 14th of April that Margaret wrote the letter to her cardiologist.

Dear Dr Hart,

I came to see you in October last year, and we discovered that I have an enlarged left ventricle. I gather from my GP, Neil MacLennan, that I am not due to see you again for a year, but I really would be glad to have another appointment with you now. I don’t know whether I should make it direct with you, but in any case I am sending Neil a copy of this letter.

It seems to me that things are really not much better, and I am disappointed I suppose – you said it could be ‘cured’, and I hoped for good things. But I still get short of breath very easily, and tired, and find I am not up to doing a great deal of gardening, for instance – by which I mean digging up shrubs and transplanting them, carting round bags of manure, restoring our newly acquired garden, etc.!

I have had regular appointments with my GP, and my blood pressure is reasonably normal; but my cholesterol level is very high at present. I have chosen to improve my diet rather than go on more pills, since I am aware the diet has slipped over the winter. I have the odd ‘pale day’, after a night when my heart seems to have been extra cramped up, and then I feel unable to be particularly active – this is something I have experienced over a few years. I would also like to discuss with you why I have this condition, something I really didn’t ask your opinion about. It seems to me I have trouble at night, and again over the years I have had ‘struggling’ dreams which wake me, it seems, on purpose to get my breath back. Anyway, I am worrying about it at present and would be glad of a check-up with you.

I have found a note written in Margaret’s elegant hand, dated the 2nd of May 1997. It reads mysteriously: ‘7.2 chol. Liver slightly abnormal. Neil lipid doc’.