David Charters with La Princess _320
“You’ll probably think I’ve been on the Guinness again,” said the old lady, clutching the worn Cross around her thin neck, “but I could have sworn I saw a silver thread dangling from the sky this morning.”
But the priest was silent.
Half a mile away, the morning paper’s big, bluff news editor with the ready smile and a fine understanding of horses, turf and betting odds, walked towards his desk, humming a melody and carrying a briefcase – the beer, which celebrated last night’s football match, still stretching the clear vowels of his Irish accent.
“Anything happening?” he asked a senior reporter.
“Nothing, special, but there’s a good row about council funding,” came the reply.
“You won’t believe this, but I have just heard something very strange,” said another, younger reporter, putting down the phone, the look on her face suggesting doubts about repeating what she had just been told.
“Look,” she said hesitantly, “this is really weird, but we’ve just had a woman reader on the phone, telling us a story. It’s probably complete nonsense, but I think we should check. Have we got a photographer available? She’s talking about a monster, something from outer space. She seems hysterical.”
At that very moment, I opened the door with my swipe card and entered the office, strong coffee drying on my tongue.
“Don’t tell me about that, old bean,” I said, smiling. “I’m from Birkenhead. We’re accustomed to strange creatures there. Might be worth a look, though. I was going to start writing an obituary, but there could be a lot more of those to come, if we’re in the middle of an alien invasion. Let’s grab a cab to see the action.
“We’re off to see the monster, the wonderful monster from space,” I added, breaking into an instant variation of song, remembered from some old movie. “Where did the reader say it was? Climbing up Concourse House! That’s not far, near Lime Street station. We can meet the photographer there.”
The sky was heavier than ever when we left the cab, to join a swelling crowd of people looking up. Thousands of eyes fastened on a single thing, hanging from a thread half-way down the building. Now, I say “thing”, but you can choose your own word.
“It’s a spider, it’s a bloody big spider,” said the reporter. Car horns hooted as impatient drivers inched forward through the people.
“We’d better get David Attenborough to examine it,” said a wag in the throng, referring to the eminent TV naturalist, popular in those times. It was certainly big – 50ft high and weighing 37 tonnes, we later learned.
“What does it eat?” said a child, with understandable curiosity.
“Superlambananas,” said another joker. Of course, back then, everyone would have understood the joke. But perhaps I should explain that Superlambananas were featured in a series of statues, then in vogue, in which the sculptor had merged the bodies of a banana and a lamb to warn us of the dangers of genetic engineering.
What was surprising was the absence of fear in the crowd confronted by a huge creature from God knows where. But we were a soft and obedient people, easily led. It was assumed the authorities would deal with it, as they dealt with everything else. For years, people had been losing the power to think for themselves.
“What do you think it is?” the young reporter asked me, as we left the scene on that first day.
“Well, I think it is a major publicity stunt,” I replied.
INDEED, I was right. The spider was a mechanical contraption. During the next few days she (for it had been determined that it was female) was paraded through a city, in the midst of celebrations and parties, marking its year as the European Capital of Culture.
Cameras from many countries followed the spider’s progress and the organisers congratulated themselves on an idea, which had brought Liverpool so much publicity. Everyone had been happy, despite the constant rain. And then on the Sunday, she “disappeared” down the road tunnel that once joined Liverpool to the town of Birkenhead.
“You know, Father,” said the old cleaner, on the unexpectedly sunny morning of September 21, as she emerged from the brush cupboard in the old church. The sad priest looked up. “You know, Father,” she repeated. “I saw that silver thread from heaven again this morning, like that other time, as clear as day.”
“Ah, Veronica,” he said, and he hadn’t used her name for so long, not since she was the lovely young girl of whom he had been so fond. “Maybe it’s the Second Coming of the spider.”
In the moments after that little joke, darkness crept across the church.
“Switch the lights back on,” said the priest.
“They are on, Father,” said Veronica. “All the switches are down.”
A few hundred yards away, on a bench by the waterfront, the tramp dropped his bottle.
“You can’t believe what you read in the papers, you should know that,” the Philosopher said in the old cafe, as we drank our coffee and chatted about the madness of the world. Suddenly, darkness filled the room and we could read no more.
