July.

At a time when  I really should be at home,  I find myself  4,700  miles to the east  of it, jet lagged, city shocked,  and ensconced  for the third morning in a row in a shadowy cubicle at Broadcasting House. News from Radio Scotland seeps into my headphones  until a woman’s voice  interrupts:

         ‘Are you there, Katie?’

‘Yes, but it’s kathy’

‘There’s one other item, then Gary will bring you in, Okay?

‘Okay.’ Just remember, I remind myself,  to make it clear that this is work of imagination,  not an attempt to persuade. 

The other item is about bats. A man is about to pay a visit to a woman who has 450 of them living in her roof space.  Several Batman jokes later, it turns out  that  since he is visiting during daylight hours,  no bats are to be seen (or heard).  Never mind: the woman, (Jackie?)  has a warm, sweet voice and describes how the bats slip out of her roof one by one  at dusk. She  explains how each female bat will have just one baby a year, and says that they are wonderful and fascinating creatures to whom she feels  privileged  to be able to give a home. No, she is not at all frightened of getting rabies.

I wonder: will Gary try to connect the bats and the book?  Both items,  after all,  feature high concentrations of creatures with a bad reputation living at close quarters…

Bats do indeed carry rabies, says a bat expert, although UK pipistrelles,  which is what Jackie has in her loft, have ever given a positive test. Listeners begin to come in: aren’t bats dirty? Does Jackie’s loft smell?  She says  that the roost is between the lining of the roof space and the tiles, not in the loft itself.  Just occasionally, when she goes into the loft she notices a very faint smell of urine, but it is completely imperceptible from downstairs and she doesn’t mind at all.

It’s well after the time I was supposed to go on, but  I guess they have decided  to let the bats fly... Remember, I tell myself, Alphabet is set in a prison, but it’s not about prison, it’s about –

Do bats eat midges? Yes,  three thousand each, every night.

         Why have bats got more rights than people? The man asking this has bats in his roof too, but he hates them and he’s been told he can’t get rid of them but  must wait until they leave for their winter roost, then  fill up the entry holes so as to prevent their return next year. Why can’t he do what he wants in his own house?  Bring in the Pest Control Officer: yes, bats in the roof space must be left alone, although if they are in your actual living space they can be removed-

         How?

It’s twenty-two minutes  past. Remember, I tell myself, it’s a book about –

Bats are protected because their habitat is diminishing. A bat census takes place in Scotland  this week: you sit and watch the bats come out and count them. If one goes back in, you subtract it from the total… There are just three minutes left  till the next news.

It’s a book about someone beginning to learn to love, I remind myself for the last, useless time, because now Gary is  introducing me as a writer who spent a year in a men’s prison.  I  tell the listeners  that the experience made me interested in the whole area of  prison relationships; an ex-prisoner, Derek, talks about how important  such relationships are. Then it’s over. Overwhelmed by Jackie’s bats, I pull off the headphones and emerge, seconds later, into the throbbing  traffic of  London, W1…