The Welcome Lamp
The lamp burned all day, turned low to just a glimmer of light.
Newly emerged from its pupa, in a dark fold of velvet curtain, damp and crumpled, the moth moved rapidly from its cocoon, and breathed intensively, filling its delicate system of wing nervures with air. Its soft twisted wings began to stretch and straighten. By evening they were firm and strong, and the whole of it a handsome example of the hawk variety, boss-headed, with a silky covering of buff and cinnamon. Its feelers, feathered and graceful, quivered and moved constantly, and it was ready for the newest and final stage of its life cycle.
A man lived in this room, returning to it after his day's work, replete from a meal which he took as a table-boarder at a guest house nearby.
The lamp was his welcome.
Later in the evening, with the main light on, the man worked at his desk while the moth explored the vast world of the room, fluttering, hovering, resting. But for the scratching of the man's pen, the steady tick of the clock on the mantel, and the distant hum of traffic, all was silent. The whirring of the moth's wings was almost imperceptible.
At last, deep into the night, the man sighed and put down his pen. He shuffled his papers into order, then switched off the main light and moved to the lamp corner. He selected a violin concerto from his small collection of records. It was the Mendelssohn which suited his pensive mood this night. He carefully cleaned the disc and set it to play on his good, but old-fashioned turntable. Then he moved to a burnished old imbuia cabinet and poured a generous splash of Remy Martin into a crystal goblet and settled into his wing-backed chair, on which the lamp shone kindly, so the man never noticed its bare patches of flocking, only grateful for its comfort, and the rhythmic squeak-squeak of its rocking motion. He lit his pipe and drew on it. Smoke drifted in pungent swirls above the lamp. He warmed the goblet in his cupped hands, and then held it up to the light to savour the topaz glow of cognac and crystal.
There was a row of deep shelves along the wall in the corner of the room near the chair, and they were filled with antique leather-bound books. As the concerto's rich, cascading, principal theme developed, the lamplight played on their spines, and the gold leaf seemed to glitter and dance a midnight hora. Behind the lamp a swathe of red velvet curtain became a flowing river of claret.
The moth was attracted to the glints on the book spines. It clambered up and down for a while, its feelers touching, sensitively discerning like radar, constantly aquiver. It hovered in the updraft of wafting pipe-smoke, caught in a spiral. It came to rest on the velvet river, the little hooklike structures on its legs gaining purchase. But it could not take respite for long.
The second movement of the concerto, slow and flowing, began. The moth trembled and surged in its quest. The glow of the lamp was relentless and became an inexorable, beckoning force.
The moth resisted the pull of the drifting smoke, sensing the source to which it was irresistibly drawn. Its thick head-covering made contact with the lamp's transparent shade. It became frenzied to reach the brilliance, making foray after foray against the light's protecting shade, towards the pinpoint at its core.
Stunned and breathless it dropped to the base of the lamp, quite still.
The third movement began. Vigorous and accelerating, strains of soul-searing strings filled the room with melodic energy, encouraging the moth to renew its pursuit with increased fervour. This time there was no obstruction. As the music built to a crescendo, fluttering upwards beneath the lampshade, at last the moth found the object of its desire.
The final notes diminished and the concerto ended.
The man put out his pipe with a tired, contented sigh, and eased himself from the chair. He removed the record from the turntable and put it away. Moving aside the beaded drape that concealed his small kitchen area, he rinsed the goblet, dried it carefully, and returned it to the cabinet. Then he folded the heavy oriental tapestry that covered his bed and laid it over the rocking chair.
Before retiring the man covered the lamp with a silk paisley shawl, and turned it low, and it burned like an ember through the night.
© Lynne Harris
