Old lady mad about painting

Today was another in the series of days spent hunting for a house for my friend Muriel.

The budget won't stretch to much, I'm afraid. We've viewed a dismal catalogue of houses, none of them the rose-covered cottage in the country that Muriel's heart desires. Most of them are so horrid that the only charitable thing one can say about them is that, with vision, and a great deal of work, they could be transformed into something just this side of unpleasant.

I confess I didn't face the prospect of the day with much joy.

But, the first call was one of those astonishing, unexpected encounters that jostle aside the contents of the long term memory, making room for a good lengthy stay.

This house - a rather shabby little semi-detached - held no promise at all, and didn't start well. We drove up, parked outside, and I stepped out straight into a puddle. Maintaining a dignified visage while inwardly cursing the prospect of a squelching sock treading dingy carpets for the next few hours, I looked up and caught a glimpse of a little grey shape pulling back from the window. It was an arresting moment and my fancy conjured up a grey and ghostly Miss Mapp, side-stepping realities from a lost Tilling.

I won't say I shivered, or that I got goose-bumps, or that my hair stood on end. Or anything like that. But my wet foot was suddenly forgot.

The door opened as we came up the path and a little old lady, thin, almostwaif-like, peeped out, startling, bright beady sparrow-like eyes hooded in a mass of wrinkles. The smell of old woman, gentile poverty and coldness crept out to meet us, and my heart sank.

And, when we went inside, MY GOD! The walls were covered with huge, vibrant sexually potent 1930s oils, so crammed with paint and with energy they were like peasant wines exploding from pre-war Expressionist bottles where they'd fermented too long.

Wall after wall, canvas after canvas, room after dank, smelly room, there were more. One, an explosive, energetic self portrait, showed the lady herself, young, hugely pregnant, nude, spread wide on the bank of a wooded stream, with a young child at her breast. I looked from the painting to her present state, and our eyes met. For a moment we synchronized and exchanged a little of our spirits. It was only a moment. She smiled, dropped her gaze, and said something about having shrunk a little since those days.

This tiny, neglected, underfed and fading old lady had been a Great Power. And, limmering within a fragile shell, the Power still flared.

And she was still painting. On her easel in the dirtiest of the rooms was a new canvas, perhaps 24" x 36", on which she was building in an incredible, potent, writhing impasto a landscape of one of our local hills, with the sea in the distance. The dankness, the smell, and the dirt disappeared and a truer reality leapt out to strike me. "I have to move, you see," she whispered to me as Muriel bustled on, "but I'm jolly well taking my favourite spot with me."

My heart almost broke as we said goodbye. This Lady should not be alone. The whole Earth should mourn and keen at the thought.

But, thank goodness, she'll not be alone much longer. She has a loving and caring daughter and, when the house is sold, they are to live together, not too far away.

Back at the car, Muriel was angrily slashing out the line in our visiting list, muttering about wasting time.

It's a matter of perspective, I suppose.

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