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A knotty one, this. The Old Man sits with his back against a tree. A knot is where a branch might grow out horizontally from a tree. A knot is what one finds oneself tied up in when one tries too hard to be rational.

There is such stillness in the Garden! Everything rushes outwards and comes together all at once. Light stands still.

The Old Man’s wife, Lilith, comes into the Garden. She says ‘You look as if you’re waiting for something to fall on your head from that tree.’

He says ‘I’m trying to think of a way to get the children to leave the Garden.’ ‘Why not just tell them to go?’

‘Because that would seem uncaring.’

‘But you want them to be free of you.’

‘Yes, but I want them to know I still care for them.’

She says ‘And for them still to care about you!’

He thinks – She is trying to tie me in knots? He says ‘Anyway, as things are, I think they’re getting a bit fed up.’

Lilith sits beside him with her back against the tree. She faces at right angles to the way in which the Old Man is facing. She thinks – A branch might grow horizontally from the tree and stretch over the edge of the Garden.

She says ‘You want it all ways up and down and sideways all at once.’

He says ‘Yes, that’s what I do.’

‘Why not just tell them there’s something they can’t do? Then when they do it, it would be reasonable to get them to leave the Garden.’

‘Being reasonable isn’t caring.’

‘No, but they’d have to learn that.’

‘Anyway, what if they don’t do what I tell them not to?’

‘Then they wouldn’t be grown up, would they?’

The Old Man considers this. He wonders – Is she being reasonable, difficult, or clever?

He says ‘All right, but I’ve told them that they’re no longer children. That grown-ups are responsible for themselves.’

‘So – ’

‘So is it or is it not being responsible if they choose not to be?’

Lilith thinks about this. She says ‘You’re tying yourself knots.’

‘Yes, so that they can be free.’

‘She thinks – And then you will become free?

Then – But you can’t do becoming, you do being -

– So is that where I come in?

She says ‘Perhaps I can help you.’

‘How?’

Lilith leans over on one elbow and looks over the edge of the Garden to where there are figures working in the fields far below. She thinks – Perhaps I can get one of the workers to come in on this.

The Old Man says ‘I mean, I don’t want them to think I’m a shit.’

She says ‘But grown-up people will probably love shits.’

‘You think so?’

‘All part of the life-force, evolution, and so on.’

She thinks – I might get that attractive chap with a scythe to tell them they can do something they’re supposed not to do.

The Old Man says ‘But it won’t do them any good if they think I’m a shit.’

‘Well they’ll have to work that one out for themselves, won’t they.’

The Old Man thinks about this. He says ‘We’ll all get in a terrible muddle.’

She says ‘It’s language that gets in a muddle. You shouldn’t have given them language if you don’t want them to get into knots.’

‘I wanted them to be different from animals.’

‘Well you can always help them to get unknotted when the time comes.’

The Old Man thinks some more about this. It is as if he is still hoping for something to fall on his head from the tree. He says ‘But when they’re grown up they should think they’re doing it all themselves.’

She says ‘But that’s where I come in.’

‘They don’t even know that you exist!’

‘Exactly.’

‘What - ’

‘They’d think they were doing it themselves’.

The Old Man stops thinking. A light seems to come on his head. He says ‘That’s brilliant!’

Lilith says ‘Hasn’t anyone told you you’ve got a brilliant wife?’


2.

A man who had been christened Adam sat in front of his laptop computer. He thought – But I am not fitted for this. His fingers tangled on the keys as if following a jangling in his head. He thought – The electronics in my brain transmit themselves to the electronics in the computer. As if in response to this the text on the screen now became jammed. Adam pressed various buttons and nothing happened. He pressed ‘Save’, and nothing that he could see happened. He wondered – Does God sometimes press ‘Save’ and nothing happens?

- We all get tied up in knots?

His wife Evie came into the room. She said ‘I’ve brought you the papers.’

He said ‘What’s been happening?’

‘There’s some sort of bomb scare at Sophie’s school.’

‘Let me see.’

‘It’s not in the papers. I’ve been telephoned by one of the mothers.’

Adam took the papers. The headlines were about wars in the Middle East; about how world leaders were insisting that the best chance of peace was to let war go on a bit longer.

She said ‘Are you listening?’

He said ‘What did the mother say?’

‘She didn’t know. It’s just that there are police outside the school and they’re not letting anyone through.’

He thought – Some sort of hostage-taking?’

He said ‘It might be one of their tricks.’

‘What tricks?’

‘They’re an odd lot at that school. They’ve got a new science mistress who gets them to do experiments.’

’Experiments with life?’

‘Well that’s science, isn’t it?

Adam unplugged his computer and turned it over on his lap. He prised the battery out of its slot, waited a few seconds, then put the battery and the plug from the mains back in. He thought – It’s like changing a nappy. Or you might sometimes have to wipe out the whole bloody thing and start again.

He said ‘Wasn’t there some plan for them to go on an expedition today?’

‘That science mistress, she sounds crazy.’

‘They love her.’

‘Have you finished?’

‘I’m just worried that I mightn’t have pressed ‘Save’.’

He pressed the Start button and waited while bits of light flickered, then shapes like beetles moved in a slot across the screen. He manoeuvred an arrow to where it said ‘Enter your name’, then to a logo that represented the text on which he had been working. He waited until his text came up and then pressed Save again. He said ‘Yes that should do the trick.

He wondered – Are humans given a second chance to be saved?

Evie said ‘What are you writing now?’

‘A reinterpretation of the book of Genesis.’

‘Oh is that all!’

He clicked ‘Start’ again and then ‘Turn Off Computer’. He thought – In my beginning is my end; or is it the other way round.

He said ‘All right I’m coming.’

‘You think we should go to the school?’

‘What else can we do?’

He found himself wishing he had taken more trouble to remember his last sentence so that he could go on with the story in his mind. Was it about Lilith being a brilliant wife?

Going down the stairs from the attic room were he worked Adam was thinking – But I often can’t remember even what I am trying to do. What for God’s sake is God’s hazard? – A hazard is a complex manoeuvre with the chance of things going wrong? Humans can’t have freedom without the risk of things going wrong? God himself must have wanted something a bit more lively? - And I mean, this is a story. A story is the best way to describe things which can be described in no better way.

In the street there did not seem to be much happening. Adam went ahead with Evie trailing slightly behind him. She said ‘What are you saying about Genesis?’

‘I’m saying we’ve given God a frightfully bad press. I’m standing up for him.’

‘Who’s given him a bad press?’

‘The people who wrote Genesis. God comes out the most frightful shit. Telling his children they can’t eat the fruit of a tree he’d planted in their garden. Then condemning them to eternal punishment when they did.’

Evie said ‘Well not quite eternal.’

‘But no one knew that at the time. What human father would behave like that? And what human children with any spirit wouldn’t behave like that – just pinching an apple!’ He walked on. ‘Of course some people think God wrote Genesis himself. In fact – ’ He stopped abruptly, so that Evie almost bumped into him. ‘Perhaps it should seem that he did! Perhaps that’s what I’m saying!’

‘That he is or isn’t a shit?’ ‘Perhaps he had to be thought so! That’s why we wrote it like that. Then we as his children wouldn’t feel too bad about being shits ourselves!’

‘Why shouldn’t we feel bad about being shits?

‘One sometimes has to behave like a bit of a shit to stay alive! Life’s a shitty business. It might make things easier if one thought God a bit of a shit.’ He thought – Was that what Lilith meant about evolution?

Evie said ‘But we don’t.’

‘No, but we tell his story as if he is. Perhaps that’s the muddle.’

‘And we don’t stay alive.’

‘No, we have children.’

‘Jesus wasn’t a shit.’

Adam stopped in his walk again. Evie swerved round him. He said ‘Perhaps that’s it!’

‘What’s what?’

‘Jesus seemed at home with people who were shits! I mean people who knew they were shits!’

‘But it’s still not good to be a shit!’

‘No, that’s right. That’s the muddle. No, not muddle. Knot.’

Evie said ‘Sophie doesn’t mind us being shits.’

Adam stopped again. He said – ‘That’s right!’ Evie went on ahead of him. He thought – Isn’t there something called a love-knot? That both binds and leaves you free?

Then – It was the Old Man who realised he had a brilliant wife.