duty – you can substitute any number of loaded abstract nouns and the formula will still work.
And bear this in mind too: a mystery that’s impossible to crack, like Little Orchard, can afford to be visible. Unless Jo and Neil break their silence on the matter, which seems unlikely, no one will ever find out what happened that night. It is impossible to guess; all speculative scenarios seem equally improbable – which of course is the same as saying that all seem equally feasible. But what about a mystery that would be relatively easy to solve, if people knew of its existence, because there are only a handful of possible answers? That mystery is more vulnerable. It is a poor defenceless creature whose only hope of survival is to go unnoticed until all the relevant people have stopped caring.
Most organisms are desperate to survive in their present forms. Why should mysteries be any different? Yes – the more I think about that idea, the more I like it. Let’s come back to it later.
Is it wishful thinking to assume that people will stop caring? Not at all. The hunger to know doesn’t last forever. It’s rather like a piece of elastic – our solution-seeking impulse stretches and stretches, and then suddenly, stretched too far, it snaps and loses all tension. This can happen remarkably quickly, unless certain conditions apply: if the stakes are incredibly high, if there is injustice involved, if finding or not finding a solution affects our status in the eyes of the world or in our own eyes, or – probably the most significant factor when it comes to extending the human solution-seeking impulse – if we think there is a chance that we will find out; if we can see an investigative way forward, for example.
I hope I’ve said enough by now to bring the mystery behind the mystery of Little Orchard into focus.
No?
Why is Amber the only person still obsessing, years later, about what Jo and Neil were so determined to hide? Why does she still care? That’s the true mystery behind the mystery of Little Orchard.
The stakes are not high: Jo and Neil and their two boys returned unharmed. They have been, or have seemed, fine ever since.
Does Amber believe she will find out the truth one day? On the contrary: it makes her angry to think that will never happen. And that’s another clue: people get angry when their status is threatened, when they feel they have been downgraded, or treated unfairly. But where is the unfairness?
Does Amber believe that someone else knows, someone less important than her, less deserving of the information? Or is there another reason why she feels she has a right to be told this very private thing that Jo clearly wants to keep to herself? Is she simply nosey and spoilt, heedless of boundaries?
Could it be that Jo owes her a secret?
3
Tuesday 30 November 2010
I am in Sergeant Zailer’s car. Again. By invitation, this time. She has been asked to drive me home, and I can’t understand why. If I were in charge of the investigation into Katharine Allen’s murder, I’d have kept us there in that horrible yellow room until we made some progress.
I’d have stayed up all night if necessary, listening as I fast-forwarded verbally through my entire life – everywhere I’ve ever been, everyone I’ve ever met – in the hope of homing in on the moment that contained my sighting of that piece of paper.
Kind, Cruel, Kind of Cruel.
Wherever I saw it, it can’t have been in a vacuum. I must have seen it somewhere , so why isn’t that somewhere part of the memory? If my mind could only connect the image of that lined page to a background or setting, surely then everything would click into place. I’d be able to make a link between the physical surroundings and a person, or people.
I’d know who murdered Katharine Allen.
No. I wouldn’t. Even if the page I saw was the same one that was torn from the pad in her flat, there’s no reason to think it had anything to do with her death.
I
And bear this in mind too: a mystery that’s impossible to crack, like Little Orchard, can afford to be visible. Unless Jo and Neil break their silence on the matter, which seems unlikely, no one will ever find out what happened that night. It is impossible to guess; all speculative scenarios seem equally improbable – which of course is the same as saying that all seem equally feasible. But what about a mystery that would be relatively easy to solve, if people knew of its existence, because there are only a handful of possible answers? That mystery is more vulnerable. It is a poor defenceless creature whose only hope of survival is to go unnoticed until all the relevant people have stopped caring.
Most organisms are desperate to survive in their present forms. Why should mysteries be any different? Yes – the more I think about that idea, the more I like it. Let’s come back to it later.
Is it wishful thinking to assume that people will stop caring? Not at all. The hunger to know doesn’t last forever. It’s rather like a piece of elastic – our solution-seeking impulse stretches and stretches, and then suddenly, stretched too far, it snaps and loses all tension. This can happen remarkably quickly, unless certain conditions apply: if the stakes are incredibly high, if there is injustice involved, if finding or not finding a solution affects our status in the eyes of the world or in our own eyes, or – probably the most significant factor when it comes to extending the human solution-seeking impulse – if we think there is a chance that we will find out; if we can see an investigative way forward, for example.
I hope I’ve said enough by now to bring the mystery behind the mystery of Little Orchard into focus.
No?
Why is Amber the only person still obsessing, years later, about what Jo and Neil were so determined to hide? Why does she still care? That’s the true mystery behind the mystery of Little Orchard.
The stakes are not high: Jo and Neil and their two boys returned unharmed. They have been, or have seemed, fine ever since.
Does Amber believe she will find out the truth one day? On the contrary: it makes her angry to think that will never happen. And that’s another clue: people get angry when their status is threatened, when they feel they have been downgraded, or treated unfairly. But where is the unfairness?
Does Amber believe that someone else knows, someone less important than her, less deserving of the information? Or is there another reason why she feels she has a right to be told this very private thing that Jo clearly wants to keep to herself? Is she simply nosey and spoilt, heedless of boundaries?
Could it be that Jo owes her a secret?
3
Tuesday 30 November 2010
I am in Sergeant Zailer’s car. Again. By invitation, this time. She has been asked to drive me home, and I can’t understand why. If I were in charge of the investigation into Katharine Allen’s murder, I’d have kept us there in that horrible yellow room until we made some progress.
I’d have stayed up all night if necessary, listening as I fast-forwarded verbally through my entire life – everywhere I’ve ever been, everyone I’ve ever met – in the hope of homing in on the moment that contained my sighting of that piece of paper.
Kind, Cruel, Kind of Cruel.
Wherever I saw it, it can’t have been in a vacuum. I must have seen it somewhere , so why isn’t that somewhere part of the memory? If my mind could only connect the image of that lined page to a background or setting, surely then everything would click into place. I’d be able to make a link between the physical surroundings and a person, or people.
I’d know who murdered Katharine Allen.
No. I wouldn’t. Even if the page I saw was the same one that was torn from the pad in her flat, there’s no reason to think it had anything to do with her death.
I
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