The Witch of Portobello Page 0,56

believe?'

'No, you don't believe, full stop. Anyone who believes, will go and read up about theatre as I did when Andrea asked me about it, but, after that, it's a question of letting the Mother speak through you and making discoveries as she speaks. And as you make those discoveries, you'll manage to fill in the blank spaces that all those writers left there on purpose to provoke the reader's imagination. And when you fill in the spaces, you'll start to believe in your own abilities.

'How many people would love to read those books, but don't have the money to buy them? Meanwhile, you sit here surrounded by all this stagnant energy, purely to impress the friends who visit you. Or is it that you don't feel you've learned anything from them and need to consult them again?'

I thought she was being rather hard on me, and that intrigued me.

'So you don't think I need this library?'

'I think you need to read, but why hang on to all these books? Would it be asking too much if we were to leave here right now, and before going to the restaurant, distribute most of them to whoever we happened to pass in the street?'

'They wouldn't all fit in my car.'

'We could hire a truck.'

'But then we wouldn't get to the restaurant in time for supper. Besides, you came here because you were feeling insecure, not in order to tell me what I should do with my books. Without them I'd feel naked.'

'Ignorant, you mean.'

'Uncultivated would be the right word.'

'So your culture isn't in your heart, it's on your bookshelves.'

Enough was enough. I picked up the phone to reserve a table and told the restaurant that we'd be there in fifteen minutes. Athena was trying to avoid the problem that had brought her here. Her deep insecurity was making her go on the attack, rather than looking at herself. She needed a man by her side and, who knows, was perhaps sounding me out to see how far I'd go, using her feminine wiles to discover just what I'd be prepared to do for her.

Chapter Six

Simply being in her presence seemed to justify my very existence. Was that what she wanted to hear? Fine, I'd tell her over supper. I'd be capable of doing almost anything, even leaving the woman I was living with, but I drew the line, of course, at giving away my books.

In the taxi, we returned to the subject of the theatre group, although I was, at that moment, prepared to discuss something I never normally spoke about love, a subject I found far more complicated than Marx, Jung, the British Labour Party or the day-to-day problems at a newspaper office.

'You don't need to worry,' I said, feeling a desire to hold her hand. 'It'll be all right. Talk about calligraphy. Talk about dancing. Talk about the things you know.'

'If I did that, I'd never discover what it is I don't know. When I'm there, I'll have to allow my mind to go still and let my heart begin to speak. But it's the first time I've done that, and I'm frightened.'

'Would you like me to come with you?'

She accepted at once. We arrived at the restaurant, ordered some wine and started to drink. I was drinking in order to get up the courage to say what I thought I was feeling, although it seemed absurd to me to be declaring my love to someone I hardly knew. And she was drinking because she was afraid of talking about what she didn't know.

After the second glass of wine, I realised how on edge she was. I tried to hold her hand, but she gently pulled away.

'I can't be afraid.'

'Of course you can, Athena. I often feel afraid, and yet, when I need to, I go ahead and face up to whatever it is I'm afraid of.'

I was on edge too. I refilled our glasses. The waiter kept coming over to ask what we'd like to eat, and I kept telling him that we'd order later.

I was talking about whatever came into my head. Athena was listening politely, but she seemed far away, in some dark universe full of ghosts. At one point, she told me again about the woman in Scotland and what she'd said. I asked if it made sense to teach what you didn't know.

'Did anyone ever teach you how to love?' she replied.

Could she be reading my thoughts?

'And yet,' she went on, 'you're as