( Me HIGHTOF THE ECupse'
Frill mys with Cortectano


THE NIGHT OF THE ECLIPSE
Maurice Rowden


THE NIGHT OF THE ECLIPSE.
Maurice Rowdon.


BOOk 1.
CHAPTER ld
On the train from the coast he talked loudly and the other
passengers looked a bit intimidated under the direct firé of his
questions. When he addressed them they blinked and shiftede--all
except a quiet, well-bred young woman on the other side, of the gangway
who was evidently used to men shouting, and a woman from Johannesburg,
her face dry and lined from the sun, who sat at his table and looked at
him with admiration. all the time because he seemed to her such a striking
representative of the Old Country, which she had never visited before.
When he told her that he didn't think fblacks' should necessarily
live apart from 'whites' she looked stunned and turned away for a moment .
But he went on asking his polite questions of her and the others,
turning and twisting in his seat as if the buffet-car was too small for
his energies.
They entered the still, grey outskirts of London---a deathly
shadow that stole over the train without a sound; so it seemed to
him underneath his energetic manner. But he didn't turn and look
out of the window because he wanted to keep it at bay a little
longer; the shadow would steal over him, too, as it had just done
over the train, and it would darken him, too; before many hours.
He didn't glance to left or right but went on talking like a robust


English man- ---well, he was robust al nd he was English :
But it was
deliberate, he was acting up all the t ime a nd the re was a note of
danger in his voics, which perha ps wa: S wha t màde. peo ple glance at him
curiously, the ir eye S slight ly narrowed.
He told the quiet young woman about his hp use in Basrah and the
irrigation scheme that was being planned by th è government 'out there'. o
Now usually he would never think of using those words 'out there':
it made a place seem impos si bly far, and thus unreal, and he8d trav-
elled too much to thirk like that. But it seemed more English to say
'out there' and he was being very ass iduously the Englishman.
Only fire years before he'd felt ashamed of. being so 'English'.
Everybody had told him, ei ther asa complimen t or criticism, "You're
so English !" And he'd always taken it as a criticism. It meant
stiff and aloof, like a man w ith ice down his back. If you we: re
'Engli sh' and, say, put your hand on anothe r man 's shoulder in a
re assuring movement, 9 the movement wouldn't come off: the other man
WO uld look at you with a half-frightened expression as if death had
touched him! It was ridiculou S but that wa S what he'd felt. He'd
nevr felt stiff and aloof inside; inde ed, quite t he opposite-- -
bubbling over., in fact, too hot to speak, not knowing whe re to put
his hands and so forth!
But the sound of t hose words, eYou're so
English!---or it might be a glance a foreigner gave him, e specially
a swar rthy for e ign er with undisturbed black eyes---always paralysed
him and fixed hi s body in a stiffness foreign to it. Try as he
might to ease his limbs, and look in front of h im naturally, he
couldn't, and got stiffer and stiffer, seeing himse lf as the 8 n-
descending Englishman used to being se rw d, especial ly by foreigners.
He would try terribly hard sometime s, smiling a nd gestiaulating an d
saying 'Yes' and 'No' prematurely, and ki cking his feet a bout in a


funny way, but it was no good, it only gave an impression of strange-
ness. Now a gentleman, an Engl lish gent leman, .
a real one, beha se d
quite differently. He always had ease. He didn't condescend, not
if he was the genuine article. But othe rwise---and Granville was an
otherwise---you had to fight your way to it slowly. It didn't m tt er
how easy and unstiff y ou we re inside; you still had to fight through
to a public ma mer.
He didn't think like that now. The W ord England meant oth er
things---summer af fternoons and tea on the la wn, for instance (though
he could hardly remember having actually had tea on a lawn),'and
stre ams, small woods; th en,
easy-going people,
weilzrather
decent,
even lazy perhaps; nothing to frigh ten him any more! Theword also
meant London, whi ch he thought of as in a perpetual glow of late
afternoon, when all the shops WO uld have the ir lights on, and the buses
looked like blazing liners putting out to sea. He'd be en away two
yea rs now a nd he'd begun to realise that this sense he'd had of a
stiffness being imposed on him from out side---of being nerrowed down
allthe time, thwarted of" a real se. 1f---must have been his Own private
fault, part of growing-up perhaps, not in the country i tsadf. Indeed,
something else had happened while he was away: fai r from losing the
sense of being English he'd become proud df it---not me n tally proud
-but qrietly" amd glowingly so, in his sense of belonging to England,
2 that
clement, far-off
exacity the same way as his Arab
island,in
friends belonged to Basrah. Before, he always used to say that the re
was s some thing in England nowadays tha t turned your bl ood to'water.
But he'd forgotten that now.
Yet also he was afraid. He hadn't fo rgotten it comple tely.
So he wouldn't look out of the window until he was really oblie d to.
He wa sn't going to inzite the slate toofs, wh ich a lways suggested,


tut a remble, linal Ivam
in fair wea ther al rd foul, that it had just been raining and the
tiny, curtained windows, and the cemen t back-yards like pri son walks,
to drag him stra igh t back again---'Come on, there---you, th e dusky
fe llow in the tropical jacket, your hair bleached from the nice sea-
tr ip: You with a dishdasha in your trunk that you thought you mi ght
use as a dressing gown, we've got a few reminders for you now!'
So he went on talking at the top df his voice, his back straight
nch
and his eye s unf linnh in g. He Io ped to keep it up. After all, he ha d
nothing to fear: he'd be off ag ai n in a couple of months. He'd be
back on the same boat tha t had brought him. He hoped to keep it up,
and. disprove the idea tha t England wate: re d your veins.
ToP5.


Chapter
the house was on the edge of Shoreditch, not very far
from Spitalfields market. He'd found it one day three years
before; it was a quiet house with large Georgian windows,
quite unique, surrounded by streets of small, drab houses built
one on to the other. By an extraordinary chance it had been for
sale. The company helped him with a mortgage and within a month
his wge
wwas
he and E were installed.
It hadbeen assumed at the time
that he'd bean given a job with the head office in the City, for
which the house would be ideal, being only a stone's throw away.
go he Middle East dot,
F *. cend To k rurprise
But instead he wasoffereda-vaeancy
ne Middle: East) the
him
companyflet Cem keep the house and Pinkte had E
Whtle they
wese-away, 1 It was more than big enough for them: - three floors,
but when they had children the attic floor, which they hardly ever
used now, could be turned into a nursery. His wife was expecting
a child now; at least, he thought so.
He found a taxi and asked the driver to take him along by the
Palace, then through Charing Cross Raad along the Strand. It was
a hot, cloudy evening and there were few people about. He liked
the wall enclosing the Palace. He always used to walk here.
had the look of the old world, humbler than the shops


MRS K. SMEATON
AVENUE
25 SYCAMORE
HAKTON
L SI5 7 RR
LISEDS
Bya-0d Xell
A4 d
the lone Shane.


Jhile He Clnstmas tree pen Nrmay Gn heug put "5
on the other side, with their tall fronts from Victorian times.
Paper fluttered along the gutter. Trafalgar Square made
him feel he'd never been away. It might have been yesterday
ish en
kat
evening that he * caught the night-train down to Southhampton,
2 et
E the taxi had taken him tound the square
trere-putting
Whiak
euary a
up the Christmas tree that-always came/from HE er
Its cotoured
lights were being tested and kept flicking on and off like neat
little flames in the darkness. - Now there were no lights, only
one red sign at the top of a building advertising a meat extract.
There were more people along the Strand, walking slowly because
hip:
of the heat, glancing in at the dusty shops. Then came the City,
wonderfully solemn and still, quite deserted now that the offices
Thé Taxi
throngl
were closed. Phey swept past the Stock Exchange, then/ street after
street, always silent, with the office fronts shuttered up.
Only
the pubs were open, with glowing lights inside. There was still
damage from the war, huge gaps where there were only cellars, their
meaningless
walls tidily demolished so that they were like jopen boxes side by
side, under the level of the road.
He had an impression of frightful grimness at first. The
streets were so dumb and hollow-looking! It was all so dark.
He'd been in the blinding sun such a long time nowa If only
Hay'd fertl
house
sheyid bought a place in the country! They could easily have done
so. But he tried to remind himself that the darkness was only
Barfal as well
that of an overcast summer evening, which could happen in/ Hosul.
One simply mustn't look at things too closely. One had to start
living here, then it felt all right. He remembered finding these
alwsly
n tte evening.
same tall streets delightful once, because they were/desertedk
And then they reminded him of Pepys and Dr. Johnson.
Crowds
hadn't trampled on the old London here, not entirely. There was
nanow
still St. Bartholomew's church hidden at the end of a long walk,


intimate and crouching, of a ghostly, ancient grey. And outside
was the great square of Smithfields where at one time they'd burned
doseribeal drom
heretics. He remembered a royal processiona Pepys's diary---
perhaps Charles l1's home-coming procession, or was it his queen's
had
when she arrived from Holland?---how the horses hoofs/made a deafen-
Rad
ing clatter on the cobbles, and the liveries and coats/made a blaze
Lad
of colour in the narrow street, between houses that/almost touched
at the floors above. It would have been possible to see the king
within a few feet, from one of thé windows. Life hadn't been
LEf
ilals separate from-onand-mtouchable then as it was now. Everything
had been within touching distancef But now we were rather strangers
to toe lifes merde-by our oHn hands How massive these buildings
were, hiding the light on either sidel But sometimes, peeping
between them, there was a bent Tudor house with tiny latticed
windows, almost squashed but keeping an intimate, wry look.
He had an old-fashioned taxi, which was pleasant. They were
difficult to come by these days. You could really lean back in
their leather, jet-black seats, and the jolting reminded him of
m dildhood
exciting taxi-rides before the war per
chtid.
The horn
made a wonderful croaking noise like an old man coughing. There
was a special smell, too---perhaps it was the leather. Yes, he'd
known a London once---sO busy and enthralling, always sunny! 'But
then,' he thought, 'what a silly daydream!.
The sky was threatening and low-cast and gave the streets an
indoor look, as if there were a roof over them. There was a strange
dark stillness about everything. The twilight would come late
and people would leave their curtains undrawn and their wondows up
because of the heat. Talk would be heard from behind the windows,
drowsy and soft, then lights would go on one by one and fall across


the pavement, a faint yellow.
Commercial Road looked BE te forsaken with its blank shop
windows, some with their shutters down, dusty and unpainted. It
made him feel quite alone. For a moment he couldn't think of a
single friend he had in the city. Here there were a few people
about. But they seemed to him to be walking fg for no prupose of
gament,
their own;
they'd been flicked from out of the housesx
Mico act as a crowd for appearances' sake, on behalf of the city,
Thetaxi
at a miserable rate of pay. Thoy passed a long, bare shop full of
hideous furniture.
He'd be called 'Pip' again. For the past two years he8d been
tangar
Philip or Mr Granville, except tp Pinkie,fof course. His best friend
Baoral' Mohamncd.
in sogeL whe-was/his assistant at the T.I.M. office, called
Mo hanaedk had
Mohammed, never departed from a simple "Granville', Hekd/ dropped
tat a sign 2 trisndnif
the Mr. part as they/beeeme friendly)but wouldn't go further.
'With a snip and a clip,' he thought, 'they'll reduce me to
Pipl'
The taxi turned into Chawo rth Road, where he lived. It looked
like a long, squat monument of stone, ete deserted, sad and yet
also cosy in a way. At the end stood his house, larger than the
rest and quite distinct, jostled about by its smaller brethren,
and
a little ridiculous with its lovely tall windows with the old uneven
glass which had remained intact through all the bombing raids on
the City---quite remarkable.
Goodness knows how it had got there,
vattor
Kad go thae
Hey, unese au avelinary
Lais
ot albernetively how the others housesp-shich-were-likelike-those-of-an
slum gTreet .
ordinary slum street-enly_smartamed-up-abbit -sinee-the wary had got
theret
Everything looked rethers shrivalled and dusty in the heat.
The taxi began slowing up and he saw wi th some surprise that there
were twocars outside the house, a low, cream-coloured sports car


and an old-fashioned one with a muddy, dented frame. But what
And
about two cars? Cars had often stood there. But herey was le
trembling!
The taxi drew to a halt and as he put his hand in his
pocket to take out some money his eye caught the contrast between
the back of his hand, brown and freckled, with bleached hairs, and
the lightness of his tropical jacket, and in that moment he became
aware of the distance that now existed between himself---reaching
for money with a trembling hand ---and the past he'd just left behind
him at the railway station. In a few minutes, it seemed, all those
Bosal
hot, blinding days in Mosuk had been wiped out, as if to say that a
coulh
man EH have only one destiny.
He glanced up at the house and saw that both his bedroom-
window and that of the adajacent 'music-room' as they always called it
were open at the bottom. There were guests, apparently. A wave
of nervousness went through him like fingers stroking him inside.
As he got out of the taxi he almost tripped over his ENOK bags. The
front door was open,which made matters worse because, not having to
ring the bell, he would appear at the top of the stairs suddenly and
they would all stare at him with astonished eyes---I But why
asontished eyes? How absurd! It was his house, after alll
wwen whan ttey sure
Where on earth had this fear of people come from, SEH
own
deE, his/friends?
As the taxi drew away he looked up at the open windows a
second time, hoping that someone would have heard him arrive and
lean. out of the window shouting, "There's Philip!" His train had
got in at 7. 29 and he'd sent a cable about it. But Pinkie hadn't'
come to the station.' She didn't dot_hings like that on the whole.
He was always straining for an intimacy that was barred him. She
would .say if he asked her, "But surely you can get foom the station
itali to here without me
can't you?"


He began dragging his heavy cases up the stairs.
HexaxaggaaxkisxkezxEINAXEZIEERRXXXPX*Xxxxxp*xXkmxtkx
Thope WR rasistt
sound = the-houses 4There was the same stillness as in the street.
The staircase was narrow and he banged his cases against the wall,
ad scraped his calf. The stair-carpet was loose; perhaps someone
had dashed down the stairs or fallen and the rods had been torn out.
Still there was no sound from above. He had a job getting the cases
up, they were So big and heavy. The dove-grey distemper on the
first landing, which he'd done himself two years before, had begun
to flake, near a window where the damp came in. He'd have to have
the drain_pipe outside looked at.
Just as he turned on to the next flight of stairs he saw a young
his back towards him. Granville
man standing by the telephone, whigkxkatexfixiXeRXaxxaxkraskskakxinxixx**
stopped, his heart beating fast.
idenR
2.c. EpaxmxdexxauksxstextkkaxmakRMNEENXEEIRX But why? Herdidn'tknow-this
trosAdam
young mant But after all they had many-friends, andthis might be
Yevl
someone who td slipped over from the office. But the encounter was
different, he didn't know why. It was like getting the breath of a
ajote
clill aud deathly.
catally strange world in his face; L He noticed the back of the young
man's neck, jet as if the strangeness laylthere; the hair was soft
Gromille',
and gently curled, not bristly at the base like most men's. #S
mouth opened, dry with fear. Absurd! And the way the young man
special
gripped his hand round the telephone had something partienlar about
wafched
as f Aey
ito ter Granville anly-saw the plump! white knuckles thrich seremerd
conld
L A ad
seaned ro
to speak; +
E they/wre sayie 'I'm here to stay and try
and push me off if you can!, Then the young man turned round to him
with a pleasant smile and said, "Oh, hullo!" And the strange
impression was gone at once.
witkonl saying auglt
He nodded quickly and went on up the stairs to the music-roomk
Things wefe more or less as he'd left them two years before. There
was no one in the music-room itself but he could hear voices. They
must be in the room beyond,where he and Pinkie slept; EErE


he'd often used tha t room as a study, if a glorified clerk in a so-
called 'technical . imports' firm could be said to have a S tudy! The
the
first thing he noticd when he got t O xxtr doorway was-that hi s desk had
been removed from the window to the opposi te wall, where it served as
a sideboard for the drinks. He had a swift impression of people hold-
ing glasses---a dull light from th e open window and a renewed sense of
the stillness in th e street outside---quiet talk---e veryone le aning
against something or with one leg crooked casually over the other.
There we re only seven or eigh t pe ople.
No on9 ha d yat seen him. Then a stray voi ce said, "Here's
Jesus Christ!" And almost at once another cried, "It's Pip!"
He was aware of another clerk in the firm, a young ma n called Dick
Pollocke with whom he'd been at the T.I.M. training school five or six
ye'ars before. Pollocke still sported. a fair, whispy bgard; then to
his surprise he noticed that Pollocke was standing there wi thout a
stitch of clothing above his waist. His chest was sunbumed,a smooth,
faint brown. His feet were bare, too. But nobody seamed to mind.
The others were dressed casually, for the summer. They weren't even
looking in Pollocke's direction.
Most of the faces were familiar to h im more or less. Someone
nodded to him from the other side of the room, a boyish young man with
agreeable eye s---was his name Gerald? At first he couldn't see Pinkie e
She was proba bly pouring drinks by the chimne y-pie ce . In place of the
bed he noticed there were just cushions on t he floor, an d people were
sitting there . Everyone seemed tired, not a t all nervously al ert as
he was.
Pollocks was talking to a girl of about eighteen who noddedi and
smiled warmly at everything he said, while he leaned ba ck, his chin
lifted so that his beard wa S a lmost horizontal. He was lean-
ing on a stic which Granville suddenly remembei re d from the


trainging school days.
Pollocke had trouble with his leg now and
then, due as far as he could remember to getting a sprain at school
from cross-country running. At any rate, it wasn't permanent.
The stick was the same as before, black and polished like ivory, of
a heavy and menacing appearance like those military sticks that are
supposed to contain rifles. In all other respects Pollocke was fit
Vewdit WoNy him. e
and agile, and for months the leg] would
He caught sight of Pinkie with that little fremor of bewildered
wrich
ecstasy that always came after an absence. She was standing on the
other side of the room with a drink in her hand laughing at something,
elegant and tall, her ear-rings shaking slightly, her eyes rather
blind as they cast slowly round the room. Her head was raised as she
laughed, and her mouth quivered as it always did when she was excited
about something.
She had less of" a strained look than when she'd
1 Basrah.
left He a 1 +
Perhaps it was hés imagination but her face had/even
more delicate look than usual and her eyes were an even lighter blue.
All he could do was stare at her, having dreamed about her So much
in the last month.
She wore a print dress with short sleeves, her neck long and
slim. The ear-rings
were silver, the shape of the Muslim
crescent, he noticed. He hadn't seen them before. Perhaps she'd,
Basoh
picked them up in the market near the South Gate in Mooul, where old
beautiful turquoise
men sat beating copper trays
She 'd bought him a/pair of/cuff-links
day Bamsk, Here,
there once, but on his last 11 Moour sick with the heat and with being
away from her, though she'd only gone a monta, hedstepped on them in
the bedroom and the stones went into tiny blue fragments the colour
of the sea. They bad looked SO beautiful on the floor! He'd
no idea how they came to be there, under his feet, but perhaps
Kath'm, his house-boy, had swept them off the dressing table with his
duster, which he used much like a fly-whisk, beating at objects with


gracions
a comilts
* He wayed to her but she didn't see him. She was always slow
tar.
to come to consciousness dike ehs. He wondered who had calléd his
#e haine
name. Perhaps it was the young man named Gerald, or was ik Harold?
Her blue eyes flickered gently, and she bent forward a little to talk
to someone at her side. How ex
peaceful and happy she
lookedf Then she turned slowly and sightlessly, as if by inward
knowledge, lowering her head and gazing towards the door, still in her
alwaye
conversation, smiling and nodding with the bovoty charm shejshowed to
friends.
Then their eyes met and a delighted, childish smile, no
longer only charming, came on to her face. His nervousness ebbed
away. There was So little intimacy between them when all was said and
done, but still they gave each other courage when they looked at each
like tkar!
otherk
"Sweetheart!"
They pushed across the room and kissed each other in their
awkward fashion, rather formal, holding each other for a moment.
She looked so cool. Her shoulders had a wonderful smoothness and
her hair shone like sand where the sun had bleached it in front.
"Hullo, you old bastardi" she murmured with her roguish express-
ion and a chuckle. "How was the trip?"
"oh; not so dusty! JE= a
Barah
out
Nearly the whole of the meal office had turned/to see her off,
including Mohammed. That seemed a great time ago now, though it was
just under four weeks. Her skin had kept its golden brown colour,
from the bathing they'd done in the T.I.M. pool, in the spring.
Thè Arab clerks called her 'the English flower'. She was a little
paler than before perhaps, but that fitted her nature. It gave her


tragic look, which she carried more willingly than rude health.
She began leading him across the room to get a drink.
"These are only the left-overs," she murmured, glancing round in
her blind way.
"What from?"
"Oh, I gave a party last night!n
He touched Pollocke's bare shoulder as he passed.
Palocke
"Granville!" he cried, turning round at once with a smile, his
chin still lifted, making his beard shine in the light from the window
rather like tinsel. "How's tricks?"
"All rightl You look wel1!m
Pollocke laughed in his breathlessand silent way, down his
nostrils. "You don't look so bad yourself. Te Arabian nights
Jeem
ppere to suit you!"
fim
Again the girl at his side laughed, givingja warm glance. They
stood in silerce, baffled by each other for a moment, still smiling.'
He'd always had trouble talking to Pollocke, though at training-school
they'd been reasonably good friends
Now Pollocke worked at head
office, round the corner in Copthall Avenue.
"How long have you got over here' ?" Pollocke asked him.
"Two months.' #f
"That's two months for two years, is it?"
"Well, it's not too bad, I suppose. That's on top of what you
get out there, is it?"
"I take a week-end or two out there. That's al1l. And they
laughed with sudden friendliness.
"What happened to your shirt?" Granville asked him.
"Oh---" Pollocke glanced down at his chest. "It's upstairs
drying. Some joker poured a double whisky On it."
And again the girl laughed.


"As for my shoes," Pollocke added, "I think they were used as
drinking horns!"
His pauth was quite plump under his beard, bulging a little from
his teeth, not characteristic of his lean, pale, austere face at all.
which
val
His youth was all in his eyes, L
a /friendlt and
ot good
wide im Iem
That was what had struck Granville first, when they met, in the
entrance hall of the school at Reading, with hundreds of other candid-
ates waiting to go in for interviews. Pollocke had joked with him,
secognised
and theyafound a pleasant unconcern in each other. Most of the other
He aad Pollocke
candidates looked So tense. They'd hit on a certain courage in each
and lhare wus huukual serpeo al mce.
other, pert Rt and rom Ter Eirst-moment- en
other
"I haven't seen much of you since training school days," Granville
said.
cau
caivwe?
"Ho. But we E/mend that,y
Pollocke S eyes were even lighter than Pinkie's. But
they
were steadiero themnhera Yet also they were strangely transparent,
and abstract like shining steel. They had no real depth, or rather
they seemed to have no base behind them. It was like looking into
the sky: one was aware of e endless spaceg.
Pinkie was pouring him ayt a drink at the desk and he went across
go her again. He kissed her on the cheek and looked at her closely.
It was a little against the laws between them, but he risked it.
For a moment they were quite alone, their faces close together, and he
seemed on the edge of intimacy with her. But in a moment her gaze
faltered and she turned away quickly, pretending to be absorbed in
getting hiz /drink. It was much like flinching, though he preferred
Bagrah
not to call it that. U
In EUE she'd sometimes held her
hand involuntarily up to her mouth when he talked, as if
sick. Hé tended to talk on and on at times. Once on a favour-
ite theme he was difficult to stop, and the words poured outoe este T


sugpocolia!
Now it was.enough for her to be alone with'a few minutes to feetliue
paa sarlacoRTA
Exffarkate
Yet she said nothing about it. He only saw the look
on her face as if she wanted to vomit.
On the surface they were such a perfect match. They looked so well
had
togetherxo Her auth Beatrice/always said, "What a fine-looking couple
Who
ska Pkie
they arel I"
could have guessed that Et Fe /was mort-
ally afraid of him?
He took his drink away, making no effort to keep her WE him.
At least the atmosphere was casual and he could sip his drink un-
noticed.
Pollocke was talking to the girl again, moving heavily from
one foot to another, his stick making a dull sound on the carpet.
And his beard was nearly horizontal -
or as before.
tar
(naanille
Ve wanted to laugh.
It's all a joke!' he thoughto SO enjer
There was Pinkie smiligh again in the corner. She had such
a quick power of recovery, considering how frail she could be sometimes.
Why did he Mank bring his thoughts bearing down on her all the time?
For instance 9 at this moment, instead of standing there thinking, why
Sha'd given aim,
didn't he drink a glass of CHES reddish, sticky mixture/with a kick
of brandy in it, galte a punch and then another, until he was ready
be arual as wele? ?
to -
She loved that most of all, when he was a bit
tight!
Bayrah
"Youre such a sunny persong really," she'd said to him in Mosel
EXC:
just before she left. Two years there had altered him somewhat.
whg did he jwe Ker Such Black looks spinetimes? ghe wantod la k iw.
She-was-maktng comparisonwwith-his black-looker
But that-was asmall part ofthe story, really- More often
than not they were cheerful and affectionate with each other. There
was a kind of intimacy between, them, in the light of common day,
as if they were children. He called her 'calf-nose' and she called
him 'little mouse'.
They ragged each othero get tatly #
They hardly
ever had an open quarrel. Only something deadly from the outside


Basah.
Rad grawn
spread its shadow over them, and the shadow/ grew in aSt ER
It. was dull and sultry outside. Perhaps this helped to make' te
guesto
stiel.
fespk
teset Fe casual. The curtains were
ersi
thei iri h
leaned against the wall or sat on the floor, sippingo
punch
lolv
The, drink took FE
his nervousness away. He
Only
absorbed back into his old life.
ather His flesh was absorbed e. C
Hagh:
backj not all of him.
He began talking to someone at his side, a plump man in a corduroy
suit. He had a jolly face with bloodshot eyes which Granville thought
also
he remembered. It turned out that he aswell worked at T.I.M., in
the public relations officeo at mhet meenue
Pollocke had brought
him along.
Sirl
"You've got one of those hot jobs east of the Suez, have you?"
this
fim
Smile.
then man asked/with a Artertly
Baoral
"Yes, in Mosel. ft
twm
"I thought so-4the old duck suit.
"Yes, the number of times I've sweated in this," Granville mur-
mured, glancing down at his jacket. "Do you know the Middle East?"
"I pop out to Beirut or Cairo once a year or so, that's all 6
I prefer the good old patter of English rain.
Especially with my
tum. 1f He looked at Granville meaningfully, his lips drawn tight.
"Oh, that's nasty. Are you on a diet?"
"Yes, a foodless one." He laughed agaim wheezing. "Well,
fish and pap, you knowa The boose is what keeps me going." He held
plump
his glass up between hix fingers. "This chap's quite an enemy of
mineo cg
If I could rout 'im I8d be all right."
"Well," Granville said , "you'd still have your worries---that's
what gives you. ulcers, isn't it?"
"How damned right you are!" He looked into Granville's eyes


with a grateful expression. "Mine's the sort of job you never
leave. This is the first evening I can call my own for a month or
"Oh, Christ, yes--- winging and dining, that's your whonesea;
publicity department. Still---" He smiled engagingly----"I wouldn't
do it if I didn't get a kick out of it, would I? I say, you and me
haven't met, have we? All your stuff go es through Beirut if I'm no t
mistaken.
Baoral
"Yes. Mosul's just the subsidiary office."
"Nevinson's the boss, isn't he ?"
m "Yes, in London."
"That's what I mean. Nice old bugger, Nevinson. Used to be
a farmer. No money in that game."
Granville's attention kept wandering back to Pinkie. All of
a sudden it struck him as preposterous that she should have given a
party the night before his arrival.
It hadn't been quite clear to
him before. He almost strode across to her indignantly. But he
held on to himself, knowing how capable he was of causing a scene.
"You're rather a late arrival, aren't you?" the man asked.
"In what way?" Granville said, wondering if he'd lost the thread."
"Well, you're a day late for the party, I mean."
"Oh, yes! I couldn't get over in time."
"Have you known these good people for long?"
Greniillo
He paused. "Who?"
man
The other(nodded across to Pinkiw. "The lady of the house, I mean.
"This is my house. That's my Wifeln
The man stared at him and then said, "I say, I'm fright-
fully sorry! I Is old Pinkie really your wife? You could be
brother and sister!t


I thought you were much older!"
Gramille
"Why?" Wp smiledin an uncertain way.
tli
"Well, from the way old Pinkie talks you'd think you were a sort
of funny old boy rather like a professor, if you see what I mean!"
And again he burst out laughing. "And here you are like her kid-
brother!"
"Awful, the impression our wives give of us, isn't it?" Granville
was how xe talkel !
said. So Hat
"Isn't it the end ? There's none of tem knows what we're
really likel We're so good and interesting, aren't we; and it's all
wasted -on them?" He added, "Pinkie was out there with you, of course?"
"Oh, yes! She came ahead to get things fixed up here."
"Excellent use for a wife!"
"Youtre married as well?" Granville asked him.
"Yes, with three huge kids. All male. They get bigger every
day, of course. That's the tendency of kids. You haven't tried
them yet?"
"No. I hope to Im
"That's where my fat tum started."
"Three boys, did you say?"
ial
"Well, I suppose you'd call them that, yesls And he said, "Do
you know; that was a marvellous party last night? Your wife
certainly knows her stuff as far as enteraaining people goes. She'd
do well in my department."
Indignation tugged at him again. She id done it deliberatelyl
kough
gisen
ols Why wasn't she alone now even VA she had bad a parsy? They hadn 't
seen each other for a monthi Of course, it was deliberate! Almost
turning his back on the. publicity-man he gulped down the rest of his
drink and pushed his way out of the room, hoping---indeed, expecting


Soke
ouk Le rum almos
tw> L
plunged
afrerting
juert
without much doubt ---that she would follow him with an anxious
expression,pw-- - * a
she'd never not done so in the past, agles all !
But he found himself alone in the music-roomd And he began to
He hoped hot - how. I
feel a fool/w/ubdsyerten Had anyone noticed him going? Pollocke
had glanced up suddenly; he'd noticed that. The talk was going on
as before. Had even Pinkie noticed? Or was she doing that
deliberately as well? Were evén their quarrelling-habits, which
were
could have,
UmOI the most intimate habits betreen people, to be put aside?
He noticed spots of drink on the carpet, not yet dry. A wild
evening from the look of iti The gramophone was still in the corner,
apparently unbroken, the records piled on the turntable. And he
remembered the whirring noise it made as each record fell into place.
'Well,' he thought to himself, 'now you've got neither a drink
nor somecne to talk to. You can hardly go back!'
Almost every hour on the boat and then for two whole days in
hothing tunk
Genoa he'd thought about nothin Lst but hero that was the trouble;
fis home- Coming So elalorately
In his mind he'd arranged/the meal they were going to have alone
in the kitchen upstairs, while the sky darkened outside; Then they
would go to bed and he would kiss her in earnest for the first time.
ho *ig 2 He Sott wned
But underneath hetd been afraid that semethin
goingto
happen. ) It-had-neverhappened-bet
had been-in-the
airfor
Well,
See
L. C. some timer 2 He deserved it, perhaps. But he couldn't think clearly
why,
a mement.
A few months before she'd said quite out of the blue, "I'm a
completely damned person!" He'd laughed and said all she needed was
a child. But he knew there was a warning in what she'd said. It
wa S the only piece of self-criticism he'd ever heard her utter.'
Otherwise she flew into a rage H any criticismief-rer was Suge
ic made ttal
- * - Pelt cornered and persecuted.


Her remark was caused by her having danced with some of the
Arab clerks in the Cabala club by the river. One night she'd gone
out alone with one of them----not a clerk exactly but an assistant
manager from one of the subsidiary stations in Kurdistan and there-
fore, technically at any rate, in Granville's emplgy. People started
Basml
gossiping about Mr Granville's tshame'. The men of Mosul only showed
their wives to trusted friends, and usua lly on a reciprocal basis
even then.' Otherwise the poor woman was hidden away. The story
Basal
went round the coffee: houses not only of Mosul but of the whole
region, and Kirkuk besides, that Granville was protably a homosexualy
and )
sincete let his wife go free at night. Apparently, his performance
Hay Jaid,
with boys was stupendous,) five or six a night and still looking for
more when dawn showed through. He pleaded with his wife, they said,
keep Au insy fir hrea kla as- hinie
to find a good man who'd see + e
fastr "By Allah,"
hup asped
they allanid in the coffee houses, sucking at their hubble-bubbles,
"she has fat and beuatiful thighs and the pull of a mare and let us go
to the Cabala tonight. -
They streamed to the Cabala in their cloaks
and bernooses, craning round whenever an Englishwoman entered. This
Graninile
was what Mohammed told him. When he heard it he rushed back to the
house in a fury and shouted at her, "Do you want me to lose my job?"
Then for the first time he hit her across the face, and he went on
hitting her with a dumb relish that astonished both of them. It was
strange how they both seemed spectators of it, in the sefless intima-
cy of marriage. She even seemed to admire him for it. "It's
better than leaving me completely alone," she said by chance one day
afterwards o There were bruises all over her face and shoulders,
and the clerksx smiled.' The ooffee houses said he was a flagellist
as well, like sone attaché at a British Embassy thirty or forty years
Aal A
before who'd surprised his/boys at night by whipping them and calling


fime
ar rhe. Jame
out, "Take. that, you little bugger, Cunningham!" Cunningham was supposed
to be the first boy he'd ever whipped at his public school, as a prefect;
and his Arab boys called the flagellation bahgar-kahnin-kham; 'Sahib give
me one bahgar-kahnin-kham hard tonight!' they would say:
rhac Benting;
He knew Pinkie would never forget jwhat hetd-doneg and chad it Espelled
The yeel wa us gone.
a change in their relations
CAfter this she went out very seldom and spent hours lying about the
house, gearning to be back in Londoni>
Mohammed dsecribed the assistart manager as a 'dog and son of a dog,'
kelb ibn kelb, in a contemptuous, dusty voice. And Granville told her.'
"Oh, well," she murmured, "he danced all right.!n
aridant-n -mangger
She'd danced him off his feet and then got dead drunk. The/man K
was delirious with the shere social triumph of its though Abtping had
oppasently;
2.c. passed between them,) She always said she couldn't bear the touch of a
fele
stranger's hands on her body and he knew this was true.
After this, also, she began pleading with him for a child, as if
she could see the dangers ahead and wanted a child to prevent them. He
was horrified by the idea. This was odd because he loved children, but
only other people's children, it seemed.' She went on pleading as if
to save the marriage, in a jst effort. She almost pulled him inside her
one night, when she had no contraceptives. But he held back, frightened,
his muscles quivering with the effort.
Then he let himself go: Mental-
ly he knew she was perfectly right, and mentally he wanted children. But
his climax. was grudging, and there was a certain sadness in her afterwards;
Radie had tte Curse
Well, apparently his grudging climax had taken. She'dlhed-no. period
Jeouing
before sheleft Basrah.
Just then the young man who'd been at the teléphone came into the
music-room. He had a small, rather fine face with a pallor so extreme
that it seemed even to enter his eyes, though in fact they were dark,
His hands were bn his pockets. He had masses of black, shining hair and.


and a remarkably tiny waist, quite out of proportion to ais shoulders,
as if he wore corsets.
His expression was light and friendly. Every-
thing in his face seemed reserved for the present moment, looking neither
back nor forward. And yet, in this devotion to the present there was
something opposite, too, a magical element he couldn't describe. There
was nothing empty about him: On the contrary, simply his presence fasc-
inated Granville and he stood torn between horror and a blaze of friend-
ship which the other man seemed to be calling forth in him.
They stood gazing at each other. Then they recollected themselves
and smiled.
The other man stepped aside as Granville walked to the door
and said in a parodying tone, "After you, sir!m
Granville began walking up the stairs and the young man called
after him, "Where are you off to?"
He turned and watched his friendly smile for a moment. Surely his
tone had been mocking? But the smile denied it. Why should a stranger
want to mock him? Yet it wasn't mockery either, but a familiarity that
knew its object.
"The kitchen," he replied.' Then he walked on in confusion.
"Just
to get some coffee!" He heard the young man walk back with soft steps
into the music-room.
He reached the stop of the stairs and then, as he caught sight of
the kitchen, stepped back in surprise. Every inch of the table was
covered with dirty plates, piled up, and where there were no plates
there was the refuse of vegetables and meat, looking like vomita
Thrown together on the plates were dirty knives and forks with food
cristed all over them, and then cups half-filled with cold tea or
coffee or punch. The tall dresser on the right that had always


looked so old-fashioned and neat, reminding him of a Victorian
blue-prinlid
kit tchen with its shining/plates and scrubbed woodwork, had been
cleared of everything clean and its linoleum top was covered with
dry porridge oats, sugar and bread crumbs. The drawers were half
open and sagging downards with the shere weight---balls of string
and oil-proof paper bags and cutlery and torn cookery books all mixed
together. The sink was swimming with dark-brown greasy water and tea-
leaves, and the floor was covered with coffeegstains and spilt food.
It looked as if an army had passed through. There wasn't a clean
saucepan, let alone a cup or saucer! The sugar bowl was empty.
He couldn't see the kettle anywhere. That put paid to a cup of tea d
He noticed that the spout of_the tea-pot had been smashed, leaving
a jagged brown mouth. He stood in the middle of it quivering.
And there was a woman in charge herel She called herself a
woman! He went on fuming. And if he said anything to her she
replied, "Oh, Pip, for God's sake don't be so English!" 'English'
apparently meant to-the-point. She needed freedom---for herself,
Freedom!
Srev
of course. Oh, of courset). Plet she'd never done this before, and
his w s
p. the quiet knowledge/was fixed in the back of his mind.
The attic room next door ahepethetd SOI wet mes
e uhen-he-manbnt
eed
was nearly as bad. The mirror---it had been a full-length
mirror hanging by the window, for Pinkie when ahe was dressing up---
lay smashed on the carpet in numberless silver fragments. 'It is
deliberate, it is deliberatel' his mind kept repeating while he
trembled more and more.
The bed was unmade and there was glass all over the pillow.'
The chimney-piece was covered with playing cards, dirty cups, half-
used candles, ash-trays piled up with ciggrette ends. The wardrobe
doors---the pleated green curtain behind its glass panels even now giving
it an elegant and tranquil look---were hanging open and some of Pinkie's


clothes, her evening gowns and some fancy-dress material, had
fallen to the bottom in a heap.
grew, mls
CHis trembling bega/uorziteeja cold shiver. He opened his mouth
to yawn and his teeth chattered. He had a dull feeling that his
life here was finished.
But 30 quickly, and without warning! What
Baal
else had he got? An office in Mosel and Mohammed, whc spoke nursery
English..
She hadn't followed him
the stairs. She would have done
Habrn
that
in the past. She wouldn't refuse to do it now unless she'd made a
new world for herself. But he refused this idea. "I'm completely
damned!" she'd said. That was itl It was in her flickering gaze.
And he was her victim. But even as he trembled and fumed against
Hageco
her he didn't really believe this. It was too neat a pieceof
dramoti-sation.
Why didn't he do something about it? go downstairs, for instance -
But he couldn't.
as La 'd yen dme kure ycas Cefre.
It was still lovely to go to the window and look outs) Opposite
there were roof-tops and the darkening summer sky. From here you
just
could/see the cross on the top of St. Paul's, quite alone, as if it
hung from the sky. How silent everything was. Not a sound came
from downstairs. He remembered the milk-carts passing in the early
morning two years before, with the horses's hoofs making a loud
clatter far below as it might have been a century ago: when a carriage
passed.
He picked some glass off the bed and sat down. There still
wasn't a sound anywhere. He watched the ceiling for a moment.
It slanted with the roof and the tiny window was cut in_to it.
They'd spent winter-evenings up here sitting over the gas-fire,
drinking coffee. He remembered the red-parchment shade over the
light which always made the room glow warmly. There it was, in the


same place, swinging in the light breeze from the window - alwa AV
befors, A breeze had started, cool and brief, now that dusk was
coming. How sad and barren the sky looked now!
He heard footsteps on the stairs. She was coming! At once
the whote absurdity of these events struck him. Of course, things
couldn't change so soon! Three or four weeks ago she'd been cook-
ing for him as she 'd always done before. Mind you, she'd never been
Sitli frightfully tidy in the kitchen. But d A this
DE wreckage must
be an accident. He felt extraordinarily happy!
However, itwasn't Pinkie. The steps came on to the landing,
tme
the boards creaked, thenthere was silence for a -moment. He was all
craning
ten Le saw
all suspense, 9 / He-turned round. Andy Pollocke's wife was looking
down at him.
"Hullo!" she cried.
He-foundhe could hardly-speakr But Me jumped up in an effort
tnge La cmlu Lerdly speak.
to hide his state,) He'd had to think for a moment hefore he recognised:
her. She'd changed a little a While Pollocke seemed to have become
more upright and solid-looking she had dwindled. But then she'd
always been rather tiny.>
Everything in her face was cleanly marked and steady, especially
her eyes, and there was a black fixity in her eyebrows, which were thick
and almost met in the middle over her nose. And the line of her
hair in front was low, giving her an unuaually narrow forehead. She
was pretty but in a sharp and detached way, as if the depth in her
That g
face couldn't get out. A1 ke depthawas in her eyes. They were
narrow, Arab eyes, very duskh and it gave him a brief painful, quite
contradictory, nostalgia to look into them as he'd been looking into
eyes much the same for the past. two yea rs; they were so smoky and
dense, smouldering. There was an odd mystical despair abeut them, loo.


She had tight dazzlingly yellow trousers on, with a red
jumper that ma de her breasts look hard and sharp, like armour.
She always went in for bright colours. She put out her hand in a
humble way and he grasped it, remembering her Christian name just
in time.
"How are you, Hanni? I didn't see you downstairs!"
he aluar pot
EnCa prinly,
"I was in the corner. I waved!"
1 "sying h Elk
yoan
"I wondered if you were therel*,
besr Eugia.
n n
- *Come and sit down," he added. But she stood by the door
awkwardly.
"Can't I get you a drink or something?" she asked; still gazing
at him. He began to think his state was visible to her.
"Why? What's the matter?" He laughed.
"Nothing!" She shook her head and sat down quickly on a pouf by
the bed. "I'm dreaming! We didn't get a wink of sleep last night!"
"I heard it was a good partyt"
One could see the Assyrian in her still.. Her hair was a murk
colour
lighter kromx than her eyebrows and she tried to eliminate its stiff
crinkles by wearing it striahgt down to her shoulders, heavily-oiled,
so that the fixity of her features was emphasised even more. And
the desert was still there at: : the back of her eyes, undeniably, though
was
her face seenet ta set to hide it. Her mouth always had a rakker
guarded and tense lookga 1
maie
gossibles / Eyebrows meeting in the middle was supposed to mea n.
pers
a quick temper but she remembered her as a mild, and quiet
laad e
Et Berhaps there was a quick flame betind her stillness.
Pollocke
had called her 'the bear' GE at trainging school, when she came
mes
down for a visit, before they wère married o A quick movement seemed


down;
physically impossible for her, as if she was rooted *kerE yet she
was slim and agile and had a girl's small-hipped body and upright
feased be ns laay
breasts: She ratet the E 88 C a HLOH that-she-hadanyof-theheaviness
like
Hc smembered Kar, loo,
of the Arab womene sue
nOwA
"Did you have a good trip?" she asked, gazing at him with her
dusky, reflective eyes.
"Yes, it was marvellous on the boat. Lovely weather."
Then
he said in a sudden mood of impatiehce, "I wish we could get rid of
all these people!"
She gazed at him again. "It isn't a very good welcome home,
is it?" And she smiled. "Shall I try and get rid orchem for you?"
He felt easier for her sympathy and leaned back, but he was still
Re Hkoughr :
trembling. She ought to have been a nurse,) He remembered how she
used to send methodical little parcels to Pollocke at the training
scool, with instructions that he must share the cake with Granville. Bul-
lc He remembered her kindness as an intellectual event; it hadn't really
left a mark on him. He couldn't think why this was so. He'd always
had troubde remembering her Christian name as if her real self was
absent to him. Perhaps it was because he and Pollocke hadn't become
friends after all. Yet the conditions of friendship had seemed to
be there.
"Let me get you a drink, really," she murmured, getting up again.
"It'll make you feel better."
Snch
There was such a strange atmosphere between. them,in the silence
Ahis
of the attic-floor, as if they were both refugees from the other
people below.
"All right, then!" he cried.
When she got to the door she tûrned round and said in her
pursed and restri cted way, "I said to Dick they oughe to have been


se nt packing this afternoon. But Pinkie said you wouldn't mina."
"Oh!" He laughed to suggest a comic audacity on Pinkie's part.
weut 6
Many minutes passed after she left the room. So it seemed.
It was growing dark now and fewer cars werê passing in the distance.
His tropical suit shone white in the darkness and his hands looked
almost black by comparison. He began to wonder if she was going to
stay downstairs after all. Once among them again she might forget
She uas feattared ly pegle's airenlion
him, L There-vas-perhaipe an elemento approval-seekingin-hern he
didn'tkhowa He lodled on the bed feeling terribly neglected and
sorry for himself. What a home-coming!
He refused to lose sight
Pinkie's
y of the form of the thing. He'd worked out the form of her welcome
so carefully. A hundred times he'd sat at the kitchen table with
her in the dusk, sharing observations about what it felt like to be
back in Englanda ajain!
He heard Hanni's footsteps on the stairs and realised she hadn't
been away more than two or three minutes---time enough only to pour
the drinks.
In the distance, far away, perhaps in Commercial Road,
a bus passed with a swishing noise like a sudden wind, then died as
quickly.
She came up slowly and he could hear the tinkle of ice in a glass.
"Here we are," she said. With her free hand she switched on the
lightx and the room suddenly glowed, reminding him of the existence of
the carpet, which was red and had orignially been in his bedroom. It
was faded now. He knew the old stains on it.
"God," he said, nodding towards the smashed mirror, "that's a hell
of a mess, isn't it?"
"Yes, it, fell off the wall." She blinked and he wondered if
it was the truth.
"Fell off?"
"Well, it wasn't nailed on properly, I suppose.' 1


IV 3
hailed
1 swewed iV 7 seeg
She put his drink down an a little table by the bed, her face
averted.
"You look So healthy, Philip," she said, looking down at him
with a smile. "This is really the tail-end of a party."
"Yes 9 Pinkie told me."
"It went on for about three days?
"Three days? I thought it was only last night." He trembled
Teel H
more but took pains to hide, clegnching his jaw together. Yes,
Pinkie was going to leave himi
"Well, you knowf" She laughed in her shy and fixed way
"Pinkie took a time to work up to it! We came in and helped get
the punch ready and all that."
"I wonder why she couldn't wait until I got
back?
"She said you had to stay in Genoa."
"Yes, so I dialm He said it as if it had suddenly occurred
to him, so as to cover Pinkie.
"What do you think of Dick without his shirt?"
"I was absolutely astonished when I came in the room! I
wondered what on earth was happening!"
all A hin
"Somebody poured whisky dowt à
"Yes, he told me."
She smiled again. "I don't think he enjoyed the party very
"Why not?"
"Well, I got rather drunk and came up here to sleep it off
and some man crawled inot bed after me, some awful, pot-bellied
little mani I was too drunk to do anything about it ajd he fell
asleep!"
He laughed nervously, his mouth dry. The story didn't fit
heri She was telling/out of bravado for some reason. She was trying


to be smart and off-hand and this was against her A
ingimate
nature.
"Dick came up about two in the morning and found him there,
right on top of me, snoring awayi He said, I say, do you mind,
this is my bedit But the horrid little man was fast asleep!"
She spluttered with laughter.
"What happened, then?"
he didis rashs hiin,
He tocolouad r kiu
har lul
"Oh, poor old Bick walked the streets all night.
9 cane!
Por na Dick'
Poltocke didn't believe in violence He'd gone-into-the
oncR
intelligem
L L me L
md) told Granville at-the meal
i raining
gun in ta war
S T ool that if he'd been asked to fire alfhflephe would have refused.
There was silence for a time and Hanni said, "Pinkie seems to
Baoral
have had a lovely time in Mosut."
"Yes, I think it suited her." He added,
Youlook a o1
red
"How's Dick doing at TI.M.?"
"Oh, you know he'll be head of the secoion soon, do you?"
"Really? So he'll be getting apigger screw?"
yel e. A
"Well, a bit. Of course we spend restrofit on fares!s
We're still down at Hampton Court, believe it or not!m
Rees y
Hanpla Court
thean herand Dick.
This had always been a source of trouble between her-and Dieka
Drck ArARAOE Raol
tese
It had started before they were married.) "/found a flat i Hampton
Autiowing
teally
Court overlooking the river and, obeying a whim waien she never/under-
stood, VAR took it on a long contract. He thought the view from the
nice
window was the finest he'd ever seen. It was certainly wonderfut
swans
in the evening when the shadows were long and sometimes geese flew
above
atang the water, straight-necked, making a powerful throbbing noise
with their wings like a machine in the air. The flat itself was


Ganville remem bered
hideous - e Every room was on a different level,/one step up or one
stép down, and frightfully dark with cavernous ceilings that drew all
the warmth.
The kitchen was little bigger than a cupboard and the
bath was a sit-up affair in the scullery. There wasn't enough
pressure in the taps to te a heater in, so they took their baths in
Bul
one of the public places in London. L Dick refused to budge because
of the view: He liked to bring people down and take them straight
didiv seem
to the window at the end of the flat wi th a flourish. He, Nasbarlly
aware of the inconveniences.
"The journey back in the evening seems to take longer every
day," she said.
But that's-hisobjectionto - a place-in-towm?"-
Sha-shrugged,
or two-while youwere
ske
esut L nA le AES
This. is the sort of ta -
Kause
place I. dream about." She sat quite still, rigid. "He spends the
night in tion about twice a week ncw, and then I'm stuck down there
all alone. He could Aphone me to say he wasn't coming S we had ilah
a phone, but that's another of his ideas! People would pin him down
by 4phone, you see!"
"Why pin him down?"
"They'd make him feel hé belonged to one place!"
at Ker
He smiledf "Old Dick's a runb bird, isn't he? What's he
afraid of exactly?" -
Comfire, Imfpose!)
"I don't know., He-doesnt seeem wantito-be-comfortabler
nyga
1 I
HD0-IntoRton L He might get fat and boring. Having
flat
a Samtiy would put him on the road to having a family, you see.
Ahd that'd pin him down frightfully.What a fool Dick is, really!
As long as he's got the river outside he feels safe. The water
doesn't lead anywhere or belong to anyone."
"That's rather nice. The idea of the water. He's right in


a way, isn't he?"
"In a way, yes." She nodded stiffly, as when she was saying
something for form.>
C"But of course," she went on with a rather grim smile, "he
expects his meals on time."
Hannix also workedf in the Middle East section of the forsben
Office as an interpreter. But she never talked about it. The
Middle East was a closed book. She'd even been silent about Gran-
Banah,
Rer Pptplac wane
ville's appointment to Mosul, though shett been bornnot two hundred
OW ong' R tongo And
miles) from
She spoke Arabic fluently.
They talked en about nothing in particular and she got him
another drink.
Apparently he was right that the young man with
pleasant eyes was. called Gerald. She said he was something in
plastics, also in the City, and was a cousin of the Gryshams, Pinkie's
family. It got dark and the lights were visible from the street
below, rather silver, like strong moonlight.>
te guerts tegau
Then to his relief they starbed leaving downstairs. The cars
outside started up, making an unholy roar in the narrow street. And
Hanni
nurse.
atana tose, having unconsciously performed her role of harse,
"I'll go and collect Dick," she murmured. "He seemed to be
making good weather with his schoolgirl, don't you think?"
alussy
"He did rather!" He laughed, quite himself again now. "Is
she a schoolgirl?"
"Oh, a model or something!"
ovedooking
As they went to thé door he said, Pargetting the reticence she
liked to keep on the subject, "What sort of people do you interpret
for, Hanni? Big oil-sheikhs and that sort of thing?"
"Not exactly," she murmured. And that was all.
"Come and see us in Hampton Court," she added as she went down
the stairs. "Nobody else will except on fine Bank holidays!"


"We'd love tot"
After a time he heard the front door close and Pinkie's
footsteps on the stairs.
l everybbing was all right after alll
Enl ') Chapla 1.


CHAPTER 2.
Chapter
Sfev
Caper2.
kgolkar
But now they were alone/ A the-honse he didn't want to address
her. That was a pattern between them. He sat on in the attic room
in the darkness, for Hanni had involuntarily switched the light off
again when shé went, while Pinkie cleared up downstairs.
She must
KAd hinseep
realise what she's donel' he thonght. Stterwis hetr relation
Aasirt Mortirhile. C But she rarely did realise. She hadn't thought
anything of dancing with a clerk from Kurdistan, apparently. But
ea rt6r
was the
ea H A pe was interested 1
This form-meant
E S nd
taey between thom that-survived inpublic. - But, as shedsaid to
Barral
him one evening in Masny Mostd, "I'm not perfect, darling. Don't
expect such a terrific lotfrom me, please!"
But he couldn't face chestieaof a casual relation. He could
go downstairs now, for instance, and chuck her under the chin and have
brolably
another drink, make a joke ef it; and then the matter would lo-doubt
heal itself. It was what he actually wanted 'to do, with all his
heart. But he
AAVV C
couldnttin
- Iater there would be a tueckisasomstons a sudden rash
hop
word followed by tearso_pachaps- (Then) Me would pour everything out
in a long speech, going/to the whys and wherefores of her errors and
he why and sauefres 9 ufile
sometimesi, though more
own, as he strode up and down the
rarely,/his


room gesticulating, a glare splitting his brow, his shoulders
hka smue
hunched up a little
trying to force his way into a
tunnel af-SOMBEALRE
This was what Pollocke had called his
torang-
utang' approach. The theme would be moral: what their lives ought
to be like together. Meanwhile her eyes would begin to flicker more and
more and she would stifle a yawn. His words would make her feel
E la - HFsuffocatdd, Thaywers like great padded doors closing in
her face, stopping the light and airgand entting-her off fromthe
realworid where eepte moved about and did thingss Once launched
on a theme he was beyond recall and she could only get relief by
bursting into tears.
dounstanrs,
He heard her pulling his desk back into
strainging at it
place,
and gasping loudly. This was part of a demonstpration, no doubt.
She was showing him how he'd ruined everything by making her guests
sill B
feel he didn't want them in the house; er ma etting
everything
Som ne wa sagiig, yar
reds
ym do all Jn
back in order, "especially hte precious/desk where T ad
K king 3
eei a thougt -
- seemed so-important-tot
then, when
the orders ME established agatn and every damned boring piece of
wr 'll
furniture tas back in its place theytd sit and stare at each otherk
what a borel Tha twashor She talked. But he was rather bucked
that she was making a gesture at all; it showed he was in her mind -
T. desk Yumped cs
red oeln.
Quire a selisg!
somettheren or Cother.
every
They were being
beastly to each other on known linest
i Barae
The last month/had been ghastly. and-wretchedwithont-hera
There'd been little work atthe office and in any case life HF MOSHE
Hape
ii ta Krt honths.
stopped at eleven in the morning dering Ssumer. The swimming pool
had been closed suddenly because of an outbreak of polio among the
English and Americans.')
Barel
Mosed was an ugly, stifling city full of dust and sand, little
more than a settlement of shacks and jerry-built shops two storeys


high with crumbling fronts. A main street, crowded and full of
pot-holes, ran straight from the Southern Gate to the Northern, and
in that street you had more ar less the wh ole city. Beyond it lay
the endless flat desert. The only gpod-looking things we re the old
Turkish ho uses, orna te and wooden, with intimate little balconie s,
by the river.
Little alleyways ra n between these houses down to the
liken
river's muddy banks and when the heat got under way they stank fright-
gewe,
It was all clatter and bustle in the centre of the town---
carg nose-to-tai 1 sO un di ng their harns in a constant mas ssive or chestra,
street-boys with little trays of chewing gum or chocolate shouting and
running af ter you, mules stumbling between the ruts and holes in the
pavement, blaring calls-to-prayer relayed by loudspeaker from the.
mosques, and scresching radios in the cof fee houses.
Old me n WO uld sit
for hours in these coffee houses staring before them and smoking their
ym auld see
hubble-bubble s; seme-miththe desert staa in their eye S.
The sweat used to collect at the base of his ne ck and make a nasty
raw rash which he dabbed W ith a handkerchief, mak ing it worse a'nd WO rse
until it bled. He couldn't sleep at night and spent much of his time
in the Mesopotamia Hotel under the fans. He got absurdly ne rvous in
the last month about the pas sibility d a riot, though it wasn't the
season for tiots, which happe m d wh en the colleges were assemled.
He went round the house che cking on the doors and windows to see if
theywere fast, several times a night, and ra ther than risk somebody
getting in at his window he stifled with it closed until dawn. He
went into savage tempers at th e of fice.The night-wind from the dese rt
had a strange touch for him. He kept he aring imaginary voices out-
side, and when he looked out of his bedroom-wi ndow ---his house was in
the 'green' district, where most of the consular houses we re, sparaced
far apart---he though t he could see fugures in dishdashas darting


He rinagines her naked anth tull, round, heavy reart,
shayp aend durkly ped, swrllea, wiile hu eyo 39.
uippler
ulure clores, he hs uth oper
her hips Jeluning uasanve, nou -
through the: shadows of the palm tr ees. He knew, logically, tha t
Moha mme d, being a nationalist like most of the oth er clerks, WO uld
know how to protect him in a riot. Inde ed, he already had protected
him. He'd wal ked into.the Mesopotamia Hotel the year before during
a stiff student-riot, while st one s were being flung through the wind-
ow, and zatkyr coolly taken hi m out to his br oken -down Citroen in the
main st reet under th e eye S of the students. In any case, the crowds
rai rely attacke d Europeans. . Their target was the king and his minist-
knew these fears were a kind of si cness;
er S. Gra inville raaltmexatixtrX**********XXXXXXXXXXXXXTXXDXXX** /nis only
hedheen wus
relief/was /thinking a bout Pinkie and he'Aspent hour s alon at night,
even avoiding Mohammed, to be alone with her imge, in a st ate of half-
collapse. It was a coo1, vouptuous ima ge an d it kept him going-) He
wrote to. her that he'd be spending a week in Genoa on his way ba ck, but
he hurried on after only two days there and sent her a sudden telegram
from Paris.


R y
vluphous
made Saner,
The /image hadbeen redueedttoseundexproportiens, like his rash,
by the healthy sea-voyage from Beirut, but still it held his mind.
And now, in London, it seemed to have nothing to do with her.) HAArAS
She came upstairs and switched the light on, not realising he
was there.
At once he jumped up. Her hair was tumbled, presumably
from her efferts With the desk, and she was wearing her tragic look.
sddeuly
"Good God 1" he shouted, fury/getting the better of him, "there's
tkis
am unholy bloody. mess, isn't there?"
were
At once his chin was thrust forward, his shoulders/hunched, his
eyes glared bla ckly towa rds her. And He hadn't consciously intended
the words
tn-ho at all! They sounded distant to him and
it occurred to him even as he stood there that their construction,
grammatically, was strange.
She scream ed tack,
"What the hell are you talking about?" sae
lso-shouting
er cices
The clash had started.
"Well, Jesus Christ---1 Fancy coming back to thist"
This time she didn't cry. He was a little disappointed.
Instead she walked across the room and flung the attic-window up, then,
to his amazement, brought in a kettle from off the roof, He wanted
to laugh but his face was set with grim condemnation.
"You haven't seen the lid of this, by any chance, have you?"
she asked, with equally ridiculous grimness, holding the lidless kettle
in her hand.
"No, I 4 haven't!"
She went next door and he heard her light the gas. Then she
came back.
"I suppose you want a cup of tea?" she asked.
But he flung past her without a wordisntrent dewnabetess she'd
given him something to refuse we hoa Leaptat the ehances Didn't


Kinw Kal lsk - L house, has
l fusel, 41
hearked) Ainseg.
she realise how awful it was coming back to this? But at the same
time his mind was baffled. He couldn't quite tell what his feelings
were. He was keeping something up deliberately; he really wanted
to call her calf-nose and have a. cup of tea. Ar wewl dasstains t have
His bags were still in the music-room where he'd dropped them
near the hearth and he opened the first one, meaning to unfpack.
But he was too nervous to do it. He walked into the bedroom and
stood there for some time, letting the quiet sink into him. She'd
made the room more or less presentable.
There was still no bed,
however. The tasselled bed-cever, coloured a smobre mauve, was
lying on the floor. It was strange to stand there without the
guests and yet feel their presence still warm in the air. Their
voiees hadn't quite left the room. He believed he really had sent
them away and they wouldn't come back even for Binkie.
He looked at the grey carpet covering every imch of the floor.
He was proud of that, having it laid it himself. It gave him a great
sense of luxury. Ant His desk was painted a light sea-blue. He'd
done that as well. He went to one of the wardrobes let into the wall
and found some of his old winter suits, heavy and dusty. He hadn't
drom
cared much about clothes two years before, to judge Hy the look of them.
The trousers were out at the knee and the pockets sagged. There was
a pair of simply massive walking shoes with crêpe soles, out of
Jarnh
question for Mesul.
The curtains were lovely, a delicate rose-coloured pattern of
with
sitting in
Thi
tall tree s and a still monkey amoug/the branches. The monkey had
a flat, melancholy face wrinkled byxvthe curtain's folds, and it stared
TLe
out into the room, moving sometimes with the breeze. These curtains
had come to Pinkie from a grandmother and had orignially been at
Aldercote, the Grysham home fifty years before. At the bottom they
colaet
were in shreds and had yellowed. But the rose)had become more and


AVA
uats
more
New linings had been sewn on
and
gelicate.
again
again.
A breeze came. in from the window like a promise of excitement--
a vool, tender, secretive breath across his face.
It made him shudder,
he didn't know whether with excitement or fear.
'Why not let things
tay -
go?' he thought. 'Why insist so much?' Lethim go to parties, take
a girl dancing. Why not? Let all the forms collapse!
It reminded him of another breege, on the night of an eclipse
three months before in Basrah. He'd stayed awake all night thinking
things out in the way he'd always promksed himself he would.
In the
morning after that long night of thought he saw everything clearly,
gleaming and ice-cool.
An ambition of his life had been fulfilled.
Pinkie knew nothing about that night.
She seemed to see no
heralnt haia lc
change in him.
He said nothing, fesling thet=the telling) it wotld
take away some of his certainty; he wanted to let it lie dormant for
a time.
In any case, though she was curious about his thoughts and
a distance
followed his long arguments with an intrigued expression, from afar,
+e eud
with a hint of love despite herself, ultimately they made her yawn.
This
lly
It had crushed their marriage, this Ever since he could remem-
ber he'd had a problem beating at his brain for which everything must
wait.
'If only I could reach a solution, he always told himself,
'then my life would change, then I could behave normally!'
It got
so bad in Basrah that he gave up inviting people, even business-friends.
Grudgingly he went to a film with her once a month.
When he did go
out to a party or a dance with her it was on a kind of insurance-basis:
keep Yet
ske would be kept quiet for a time.
In the end he lost his patience
with her endlessy "Pip, why don't we go out somewhere?"
He told her
to clear out and find a 'bloody dancing partner' somewhere, which she
dia!
One day, of C ourse, à
he and Pinkie would be going out together all


the time. Oh, yes, later they'd be out every night! He'd be
tals carefreel For he was hurting himself as well. He actually wanted
to go out. He loved dancing with her and seeing her contented smile.
She was so easily pleased.. She only wanted bim to be
light-hearted a few hours every day and she knew it was a desire atso
as ueld
in him,that he was holding back. The mark of a frown was getting
deeper and deaperfon his brow every day. Why? She couldn't
understand it.'
"You're suth a sunny person, really!" she said. "Why do you
have to be like this?"
It was the same over her little demonstrations of affection.
She made to kiss him or stroke his hair and at once he ducked away.
Another time, another timel But meanwhile he had to bhink things
out.
As for having children, well, of course, one day he'd be ready
8 irul
for themi He'd be strong enough to take ori fatherhood: but he
didn't want to propagate his seed until he'd thought things out;
he couldn't feel whole until he'd done so.) Thiswasn'tawilfulness
in aimt - t was true state-he-was-simply poverless-toalteri
On the otheryhand, he didn't tell her this in so many words.
L never said Le wankedh tunk Itaies ut
He-never said he wanted te hink things-out. He wasn't sufficiently
aw ape S
Dauting Yo,
elear his
ac thathe wanted-to And she became more and
more baffled. The lost look in her eyes grew. And At last her
sexual interest died as well. That was the flower he'd been clevèr
enough to crusht
Koor
'Why do you akhate people?1---this was always on her lipsqmows
Sinee-childhoed Shetd always felt vaguely starved of life. She
wanted lots of people round her, and he wasn't quite the person for
Rv leas he W a ti nature ent no t in wha Re chose as
that. Atleast, he-was
L sot -
hesheseas
destiny.
his-destiny,
saw the ontre la a
Her childhood hazd been


loroly. herelsrody
hmp'
spek
speul
l.c. booy pather lonely- She'd PeenA see ueb alone with a strict nurseo
on-whom-e
as telling, Her brothers and sisters, eight of them,
Raol
tended-te neglect her beeeuse she-was the youngest; they had already
lieal
was
formed their clubsf And-se she - ke a - think 6 being alone as a
trher.
state of sin and shame/. It meant you were disliked by ether peeple.
And She Honghr thol her ulone want Hhe ja
aim
a xralz
And-she theugh now that here was some chame, Granville thet
sAi
Rame
KAnd ! #
wottter
et tow mT D go U at B other peop
He saw hor looking
L L I I
at him with doubt sometimes, feeling shame on his account.'
The silence of his room froze her and took her back to the long,
empty days of childhood. If they were alone together for long she
felt imprisoned and suffoctade, as she'd done as a child after too
agrar
long in an overheated nyrsery sndtoo big a meal. The more she asked
Barah
him to take her out in MOS S E the more he resisted, in a fight to keep
his privacy.
The seige and the attack became their pattern. It
was now a convention between them that she pulled in one direction
and/in the other, whatever their real desires were.
She insisted
on going out even when she felt tired and ill, and he insistedon
sed
staying at home when he was really dying to see other people. Nor
did she really think he hated people: it had simply become part of
the convention between them to say so. On his side he said she was
afraid to be alone, and this was equally untrue. She loved tucking
herself into bed at night with a book and a glass of hot chocoloate.
But since their marriage she'd rarely done it.
Bamah
All this came to a climax in E for the simple reason that
men were divided socially from women, except in very advanced or-very
circles.
There were times when he genuinely couldn't take
her out---to the house of a sheikh with whom he had business connect-
the whoses usere picked uf.
ions, for instance, or to the cabaret where these sheikhe sometimes
Liked
A HC 5
neir vulgarity I the companyof-whores:


Nor could she go about the city alone, much less sit in one of the
cafés, even the most elegant of them.
Even carrying a shopping bag
down the main street was 'shame' in the eyes of the sheikh-class.
It had to be done by a servant, who followed you at a distance.
Gradually she began to put the blame for this state of affairs on him,
rather as if he'd invented Pberstrheturerof Muslim society. And in
an absurd way he did feel responsible for it. His career meant
loneliness for her; this was becoming her theme. And it was difficult
to deny it.
But really not even going out satisfied her.
It was something
more difficult. At first, in Basrah, they'd gone out quite a lot,
making a round of the Ginemas where one sag in open boxes rather like
Hay weuvto
stables,. protected against the yealing crowd; or attending company
eem
dinners and/organising them.
There'd been numberless parties, some
of them casual and others at the Embassy; there was a lot to choose
from because everybody was lonely.
But still she felt swindled.
The
empty house still waited for them when they got back; and she dreamed
of London, where she could leave the front door open all day, and all
sorts of people drifted kn. The house in Basrah waited for them after
a party like a grim destiny claiming them back.
Nobody in Basrah call-
ed without special invitation.
"What a stuffy lot of buggers they all
are!" she cried.
Most of the parties were solemn affairs, too. The guests sat
round the wall caicking their beads in silence, smiling at each other
now and then, divided from their neighbours by a little table on which
wete
hed-been placed a bowl of nuts, a glass of brandy and an ash-tray
tibaccor
with water in it that sent up a stink of sodden sahes. Mohamm-


ed's parties were like this, and Granville tried to persuade him
not to give them. There would/semi-westernis_ed Arab music from
A a
Cairo, and everyhody would say, "Wllah, Allahl" with becstasy when
the famous Maktoula started singinge Pinkie would yawn until
came.
kk tears ware/iheneges
Anad
When he did get to know people he bacame friends with them in
gic
a man's way which she couldn't share. That was another of her
complaints. Mohammed was a good example. And evening with him was
agony. . for her; she would rather have one of his parties. "No more
talk-and-beads for mel" One had to be doing something, dancing or
playing cards or talking to new people. She couldn't bear Mohammed ts
ker
te Righ-clir calnset th Eurpeans,
silences. To please/he took hervto the Cabala) about once a month,
but always there was a sense of swindling. The evenings were too
Pinkie seemed t say,
Rad
planned, whereas if they/lived in a lively group of people there
Raue beeu
rols wouldn't/be any need to plan things.' But he couldn't think properly
with lots of people round him! He had to be alone for hours on end,
and he wanted the free run of the house. Sometimes she gave him two
Tals hours after lunch to be alone, and this made him feel swindled on his
side because his thoughts refused to come. according to a scedule.
They had a persistent destructive effect on each other's freedoma
Bamah
In Hersta there were a number of English women married to Arab
architects or doctors or engineers, who also wanted a casual life
free from the aboard obsession with shame 1 among the corrupt and
powerful. And there were Arab and Kurdish students who'd been to
American or English colleges and seen beyond the veil. One girl,
the daughter of a police official, wore a tight jumper with the word
WISCONSIN knitted across: it, and nevervwore the abba; since the
Kurdish women wore no veil there was already a precedent for the Arab
women not to do so. This meant there were opportunities for Pinkie;
and a circle did start up. But as always Granville held back.


L. roms X large, kare uspe Kerraces, en G lanm, *mgh te H an
He could have given wonderful parties in the
He knew it:
house-f
Aud
girls
e.c. /The young-wemen in the circle were gracofuland pretty. It was
easy to talk to the men. They were a. great relaxation from the.
shekhs. Sometimes they all went off together for a picnic in the
and
desert or on longer trips to Babylon oF the arch of Tesiphon, which
the Wisconsin girl climbed to everybody's horror; she stood on the
peak of the immense broken arch gazing down at them. And there were
smeme's specially ingala
fires on/she lawn at night, and buffet suppers inside chici, gleaming
rooms with fitted carpets and polished wooden furniture from Scandin-
avia, and abstract paintings on the walls. But it was too much of
La 3 panled k say I
à drug for him. He could kave lived like that, all thet imea But
te rexu n
oveeything elsein his life would have/collapsed. Sometimes he yearned
to let everything go, ih a delicious, ha_phaza_rd flow of life, talk-
ing to people all the time, wandering and lolling about, dancing and
joking, and suddenly taking a drive across the desert to an epy
kesspsics
encampment where they would dance fomana all night,
women with
they
golden plate-like ornaments on their breasts which they made to
revolve inwards on each other in a most seductive way, And-he-would
detheroutine-trork-atthe office, no_mors. ( He could live like that
till the end of his days! But shen a ther * -aseerted itself.
But
tro Li real seeg.
/After a time he couldn't bear the feeling of being dispersed/fncuta
abbor-boo-maeh-e-maeh-company. With Mohammed it was different: talk
followed themes slowly and coolly. But with other people he felt
drawn too much into the present reality. And he was seaaching all
the time for the underneath-reality. They broke this underneath-
reality in him, and the effect was both delightful and shocking.
Pinkie gave in. She saw with a growing sadness that everything
Hal was
the 'sunniness'
in him thatwes attractive to other people would be allowed to go to
Bamah
ruin. And Hesait made this clear to her for the first time. She'd
always had the humble idea before, that he might be leading her some-


where, with a bit of unhappiness at first, but not for long.
Now it wasn't true.
That took ker strength away. She began to
lean on him more and more.
The more he tried to be alone the
more she clung to him, and he felt he was expected to live her
life as well as his own.
She refused to be independent---she
could only conceive that as being in revolt against him. Decis-
ions were left to him---whom to invite, where to go, the letters
they should write.
He won absolute iron control of her wit thout
wanting to. She leaned on him for her whole life. He was her
initiative, ber morality, her judge. So she never left him really
free for his work.
There was always a part of him lurking in
her, in another room, a responsibility that nagged and tugged at
him: yet if he went next door, if he gave up his afternoon, he
knew he wouldn't be able to give himself, all his passions and his
uncurbed, flowing self; Aopotn so he never could give his after-
noons, or anything else, to her; she only wanted an element of
him, which meant distortion of all his other self. He stayed
hammering away at his work even when he didn't want to, and even
when there wasn't any real work to do; he became more and more
entrenched, because the first condition of intimacy, the right of
absolute self-abandon, couldn't be fulfilled; and correspondingly,
she wilted and faded before his sight, day by day, in the enormous
Basrah heat, because she was suffering exactly the same thing.
She started calling him 'po-faced', a'parson---and hd felt a new
pale alter ego growing, which he hated, too.
o P486


with
tit of
where, 9 inv gin a lithel unhappiness at first, perhepgn but not for
Iong. Now sbertent it wasn't true
That took her strength away. -
She began to Zean onhim more and more. The more he tried to be alone
the more she clung to him, and he xelt he wagexpected tolive her life
as well ashis own, She refused to be independent. Decisions were
left to him-->whom to invite, where to go, the letters they shouldwrit-
Uith ut wanin 6o
e. He
vor abs 5 lute tren e 5 tret
ouk 5)
She stood in the doorway of the music-room and he started frem his
thoughts. He hadn't heard her come downstairs.
"Have you brought the lemons?" she asked, her eyes turned away
from him.
Her hair was still down over her brow, and her eyes had
lost all the curiosity and light he'd seen in them at the party not an
hour before.
Yet she was such an easy person to rally. He only had
to say and engouraging word and she would smile! But he cauldn't
bring himself to do it.
For God's sake, why couldn't he let go?
"Yes," he replied waveringly; "I'll get them."
A fortnight before, in her only letter, she'd asked him to bring
some lemons for halmuth tea from Basrah.
They were tiny, shrivelled,
sun-blackened lemons that one put into the tea-pot. He took them out
of his case and handed them to her, three of them in tissue paper.
"Thank you," she said in a haughty tone, and/went on fiddling about
with his case in an embarrassed way.
He knew a storm was brewing.
She was gazing at a point half-way between themon the floor, as always
when she was angry, and her hair was down over her right eye, giving
her a childish, pouting lookr She went on addressing the point
on the floor:
"And now do you mind


telling mewhat you meant by walking out of my party like that?"
tembly
She made him feel frightfuhly like a servant on these occasions.
dared n
He still had his head in his case, rummaging round, and darantt look
up at her in case he got a swipe in the eye. It had happened before.
He could feel her gaze fixed haughtily on his back and he had an
laugfing
absurd desire to bursaout
gigghe.
"What's that?" he asked.
"Are you deaf? I said would you mind telling me why you
tried to make a fool of me at my own party?" She added, "Make a
fool of me in front of my guests!"
The words fmy guests' gàve her a terrific grandeur and he
turned round to look at her out of a simple objective curiosity to
see her expression. Her eyebrows were raised, her cheeks were
flushed and her chin was pushed forward.
"I don't know---" His voice sounded quite trivial.
thought we were going to have dinner togethe er---"
"What on earth are youbtalking about?" she cried. "I only
got your telegram yesterday!"
"That doesn't stop you--" He was still crouched foolishly
over his case.
"What do you mean; it doesn't stop me? Dojyou think I'm bloody-
well going to cancel all my plans just because you take it into your
head to come a few days earlier?"
"Do you think I've got nothing better to do than stand aroudd
here waiting for your next orders?"
"I didn't say that." He was completely at a loss for an
argument.'
"Did you or did you not tell me you were staying a wee_k in


was afrard
Her eyes blazed at him and he fegred she might get into one of
her frantic states when she gritted her teeth and screamed.
"Yes, Pinkie, I did---" He added gingerly, "It's all right---"
She stopped. "What's all right, you bloody fool?"
"Well, I was wrong."
"Oh, I seef So it was all for nothing, was it?"
"Ruining my party!"
"Oh, come on, your party was last night."
She was already placated. He could tell that from her eyes.
had
The moment hel/said he was wrong all the defiance/left her.
"Why do you always do that?" she said with sudden tears in her
xatrax eyes. Her face was screwed up pitifully. "Why do you always
have to ruin things?"
He shrugged. "I don't know." He gazed down at his case as
if he was really trying to think about it. "Don't cry, Pinkie!"
"I wanted you to be at this party," she said. The tears began
pouring down her face and he got up..
"Pinkie..." He put his arms round her and they stood close to
eachother. in an awkward way while she gasped and cried.
"How did I know you were coming back?" she whispered.
"I'm sorry, Pinkie."
He pulled her head gently on to his shoulder and looked across:
at the window. How forlorn they werel Her little gasps broke into
the silence. She gave him affectionate little punches in the side
while she wept, saying, "Oh, Pip!"with the shezre helplessness of
the situation. Hk cmla
hev Corl, bax Shouldes agaus aim, and het
wet hecks.
"It always seems to happen likexthis, doesn't it?" he said.
"I mean, when we 've been away from each other?"


"Yes!" she said, and her tears increased.
"Don't cry any more!" He was completely sunk at the so'und of
hes tears and swore not to find fault with her again. There was
tte a she cied,
something so abselutoly desparate and final about hor teere, like
a kind of final
she-stillnessor cotal/destruction AApoA on things; tedl anything,
better
eteet including his own submission, was preferabley Han tkat
This time he didn't make a iong 'orang-utang' speech. He
watched the fixed, identical roofs on the other side of the road, whilc
aiele
gloed -
with a ring of lamplight like shining dust eeming-ap from the street
below.
"Let's go up and cook something, shall we?" he said.
"Yes. I've got some chicken!" And on the way up to the
kitchen, still half in his arms, sniffing back her tears, shei asked
him; "How was the journey?"
They had a meal together, sitting at a slatted garden-table that
had come from the summer-house at Aldercote. It was quite dark out-
guite ay haud
side now and he could see a solitary roof+cop/close |y shining faintly
in the moonlight, through the small kitch-window. They saidi little
at first. Phe-silence between-them-was-sads He described the sea,
howivtad (-een
I quite still and blue for three days. They'd anchored at Syracuse
for a couple of hours and he'd drunk thick red wine with a talkative
corn-merchant from Texas who wore an enormous sort of cow-boy's hat
and never really looked at him while he talked, only gazed all round
him rathen sleepily.
a little kiss
"Your hair got bleached," n she said, and gave him ANRPRmEtkanatE
on the cheek.
She told him she'd been on the river at Hampton Court with the
Pollockes. And she'd been so happy getting back to London: one
dould live as one wanted to here, she said, with nobody watching.
It was marvellous, this freedom.


sa65
seemed,
The party was now a forbidden subject between them, it appear-
ldyo That was another pattern, made largely by him. Certain
snleav
matters fell into a forbiddony dark abyss which grew steadily..
So there would always be this source L mistrust between them. It
would probably have been fun listening to her descriptions of the
now
party. But the subject was /dark. He tried to ask her about it,
stclo
to break through the darkness, but he felt as if a hand had come over
his mouth. And she, seeing. his face, didn't dare broach the matter.
He wanted to ask what the kettle had been doing on the roof;
that, again, was probably an amusing story. Three years before,
he'd climbed out there during a party, for the devil of it, with
her
Pinkie scfeaming to him to come in. He'd been drunk. But now
the roof was a forbidden subject.
She looked quite washed-out,
from her tears.,
was
CHer body eeemed really sunken with grief. He noticed it for
the first time. She leaned on her elbows listlessly, her head hang-
ing.. Why couldn't he accept her? wait and see what news she had
for him, instead of always taking her by storm like this? *Why did
jrali I send those people away?' he asked himself. Had he sent them away?
He was suddenly full of remorse. He'd made a terrible fool of him-
selfi
*Why did I stalk out of the room? Why did my heart beat
at the sight of those cars?' He couldn't see what was right any
more. He had a familiar sensation of lost and confused authority,
Baml
that reminded him of the time before they went to Moset.
And everything on the voyage had been so nice. The sky had
been light. and clear all the time and he'd spent hours watching the
white surf behind the boat.
'It's too late now;' he thought. *I
can't undo what I've done.'
They moved the bed back with much puffing and blowing. Then
the bedroom was more or less as they'd left it two years before.


She walked about mechani cally, getting new sheets from the cupboard and
fluffing the mattress up. He noticed for the first time that she'd
only got one ear-ring on.
"Where's your other ear-ring?" he asked.
She stopped.
"What?" She flinched for a moment, afraid for
a-moment that he'd said something cutting.
"You've lost an ear-ring."
"Oh, .have I?" She put her hand vaguely up to her ear and gazed
before her.
"Perhaps it fell off just now,' # Ro added.
"Yes." She gazed about the room, seeming to look for it, but
vaguely, without moving from the bed. She was quite lost in! thought.
She could have been a. thousand miles away. It quite frightened him
and for a moment his trembling returned.
Then she went into the bathroom.
There came the sound of trickling
got kady
water aa she prepaped-for bed. He noticed that the pillows still bore
the imprint of heads. Objects in the room haunted him. He saw a
piece of blue paper in the baskét by the desk and found that it was
Baral
one of his own letters from Mosd, ending, 'With all love to you,
your own Pip.' How embarrassing it was to read that now. And he
came across the words, 'you are my darling little calf-nose and I
adore you.' Why did he whip himself up into these high dreaming
states. when they were away from éach other? Then there was always
a big let-down afterwards, from the spiritual peaks! If he wrote
'dear Pinkiet and signed himself *Cherio, Pip' they might come together
naturally afterwards, without a word being spoken.
When she came back from the ba throom he asked her quietly,
"What happened to the child?"
She was standing by the door and looked at him with the same
stilled detachment as before, although on guard now. "What. child,


selned
The trembling increased like a cold shiver all over his body.
"Oh, for. God's sake!" hecrieds But he was careful not to raise his
voicex too much. "Didn't we start a child over there?"
roh!n She went and tucked a sheet in carefully, her eyes quite
closed to him. "Something sort of fell out in the lavatory the other
day. I don't kncw...
I've had the curse again, anyway."
There was a moment. of relief for him, of a pained kind. He was
free again,to think out his lifel Then it was gone. Fr the child
would have put them right together, perhaps. 1 It would have committed
them to each other once and for all. Now there would be ne more
chances.
ty staring at Rer
He tried to see if she was lying,) 'Her flesh must have felt
my unwillingness,' 1 he thought. She walked about the room, her hair
over her brow, detached, a little flushed.
tOur fleshes decided
for us. 1
She was gazing before her, unblinking, her face quite still.
She was like a child: frightened or lying, he couldn't tell which.
"How?" he asked in a whssper.
"What do you mean---how?"
"How could it just fall out?"
She shrugged. "Well, it did. I don't even know if we did
start it."
"But you said sol The child was in you."
She was silent for a moment. "Oh, these things are never certain!"
He was lcoking for a trace of feeling on her face but there
wasn ft any.
"I don't know any more than you do," she said, and busied her-
self with the bed again, her face set as he'd never seen it before,
Barah
even in Mosul when hedtold her to go and find a dancing partner.
"But don't you feel sorry?" he asked.


"Well, it's just a fact, isn't it?" She threw up her. chin
a little,. blinking, as if casting off a thought very quickly.
After a pause he said, "You didn't get rid of it; did you?"
"Really, Pip!" She laughed and he trusted her at once. "What
do you think I am?"
But again her face was set, as if she could be trusted only in that
one, statement.
"You've changed," he said softly. "If you hadn't chànged you'd
be sorry not, to have the child., You wanted one out there.. But
you don't. seem to have lost anything."
Again she threw up her chin ever so slightly, with a blinking,
sensitive movement of the eyes.
"Well, as I said, it's just a fact."
"But I say you've changed."
She turned to him and to his surprise gazed at him reflectively
for a time, her brow clear, as. if thinking over what he'd just said
way.
in a. perfectly objective mamer,'
"Tell me how I've changed, then!m
Hè felt at a loss for a moment but took the plunge, and his
voice quivered. "You see m hardet."
"How?" She showed no surprise, apd no regret. Her face
remained exactly the same as before, quite clear.
"You don't seem to belong to me any more. It's the way you
look at me!"
"I've had a holiday from
tkatt aee!"
you,
"Well, I suppose I need time to get back to you.' # She said
it as a suggestion, which he could either accept or not.' She her-
self didn't seem-te know!
"I always have to get used to you again, don't I?" she added.


"Do you? Why?"
She didn't'answer. He half turned away and murmured, "I don't
know, you seem so inhuman sometimes."
She went on with the beds He wanted her to deny angrily what
he'd just saide But she always accepted his verdicts mutely.
Ironically, he was far from accepting them himself. She got a wretched
pusely
just
picture of herseif/ from ali-the remarks he threw out simply to provoke
her.
His body was slightly bowed as he stood by the door, dn a posture
of defeat. Then he moved, straightened his back and began unbutton-
ing his shirt. He didn't want to sleep, nor did he want to stay up.
He didn't want to read and he didn't want to go on talkihg to her.
He had àn entombed, static feeling.
"Thé party went on for three days, did it?" he asked.
She glanced round at him and answered in a subdued voice, "More
or less."
"You must have enjoyed that," he said in a deliberately light
tone, trying to make amends for what he'd done earlier.
But she mistook him. "Oh, really?" Her voicewas sarcastic.
"I wasn't being funny."
"Why shouldn't I enjoy it?" Her mettle was up
"I told you," he said quietly, "I wasn't being funny."
"Well, it sounded as if you were!"
Tal
"Pinkie," he said,muketig as quiet as before, touching her on
the arme He drew her in a light movement towards him.
To his
surprise she didn't resist.
"Have you been up to anything?"
She stared straight into his eyes, her mouth open, it seemed
to hin with terrer, and SkE whispered, "What do you mean?"
"Have you been having am a ffairsbr anything of that sort?"
"t "Arrairon Her lips were dry and she didn't cease staring


him in the eyes. "Of course, I haven't, darling!"
He a said 'affairst because he couldn't bear to pronounce the
dreadful specific phrase tan affair', though it was what he wanted to
say and what he meant.
throat so
"Are you sure?" he asked, his HOIRE /shuxak dry that ge could
hardly talk.
"Of course, I'm surel"
The words were a great comfort to him. But since she kept
staring at him, wide-eyed, he could tell nothing from her face.
He nodded and let her go. And a momen t later he felt foolish
and embarrassed for having asked whet
The question mado him
feel afooboddy
was an offence against the cheerful formality
R X
they liked tokeep up.' And, now he was safe for a moment, or
-ggais
he was, he became rebellious at the thought that an adyenture should
cusidos L
be A possibtlitp-only on her side. Didn't he want freedom.as well?
wasn't the_intimacy befteen them irksome tohim as well? didn't he
stand her height and wasn't he justas capable of adventure, etc.etc?
8L scalie i
His ewr question had touched hisy pride. Praind
bekngel Le soo talkug alus
1 wne yalry LAle a 2 ek?
She got into her pyjamas quickly and went to bed.'
"God, I'm so tired," she murmured.
This was a sign for him not to touch her; it was understood
between them. But he had no desires.
He took off his shirt and stood. leaning against his desk naked
to the waist. She closed her eyes, tucking the sheet up under her
nose, her brow clear like a child's. Sleép came to her quickly
and soon hetd be alone.
Poor Pinkie didn't want anything direct from him. So a hatit
Thal wus iv, le nused to Ainserp.
of procrastination had grown up between them. k His love suffoctade
her like his speeches! She didn't. want love that was serious and
wanted
demandingo that-wesafaets She could-de-with something lighter,


with minimum responsibility. It was the resporsibility that
hurt and troubled her; he imposed it at every point. He-must
get
alwayet
* roek-bettem-of situe en
The answer mot-be-simple
and-elearr
5 uther gase-flickeredt TOW ver couid they
together-with such-unoqual demands? She shuddered at going so deep
into life. Yet she had térrific character. But life must be embroid-
ered. It was such an awful sight for him when a frown of thought
came on her soft brow, splitting it unnaturally. And she lay there
now; resting from him in perfect sleep, seeming to gaze at the distance
with her eyes tight shut, as if it was something beautiful that made
her still, in yyer repose.
The breeze from the window chilled his back and he remembered
that his pyjamas were still in his case. He went next door and- pulled
them out roughly. Then he, too, got into bed, careful not to touch
her. The darkness was pleasant. It made him feel he was hiding,
even from himself, in a wonderful suspension of reality. He stretched
out his toes and yawned. The lamplight outside streamed in between
the curtains on to the chimneypiece. It was good living in the City
where everything was SO quiet in the evening, withjsilent offices all
round.' It was still like countryside now. He heard the screech of
a barn-owl. All at once he felt drowsy and quite cheerful.
see
could/a chimney and a bit of roof opposite, between the curtains.
Pinkie felt hot at his side and swiftly XXRXXXEXMEkIMmgxktnxex her
drews
inlo
warmth Wasdrewing him t sleep. He crooked his legs under hers and
cloing
put his right arm round her waist in the way they'd been sleeping
for five years. And it established a different reality for him, the
oaly-true-eney so that the party and everything hé had said afterwards
became absurd, and this familiar reality of warm thighs close together
Ca ko auly ApAL tr eiin.
and the familier sound of breathing se
dominant. He was
happy to be back in. his room.'


He dreamt of Basrah that night; he was following Pinkie through
the dusty, aowded main street, trying to push his way past donkeysx
and mules, slapping at their haupches, edging between the almost stat-
ionary cars in the middle of the road, while she went further and furth-
er away until finally she was lost.
To R75


Chapter
Grasle he
V 3 as lavely day
Next morning hef woke early and
even before he opehed his
1 L
knew)
eyeso thetlitwasellovesdega There was an unusual hush, like
countryside in the heat, muffling the traffic in the distance.
kare
He lay)for some time, breathing deeply, almost asleep. Then he
opened his eyes and saw the sky between the curtains, clear and
very blue, with whisps of white cloud. The chimneys looked sharp
a nd red by contrast, like painted nanvas held against the
skye
extraerdinert
xed, C There was such stillness in the air that
everything looked fixed and vivid, even the furntture of the room,
wi th a stream of sunlight pouring through the window on to the
trilliant
chimneypieceg in one straight(shaft.
Pinkie was fast asleep, lying on her side, and he realised
trom ue nighr bego,
ytiel
drowsily that his hand still lay on her hip/and his legs were /crooked
in hers. He saw the monkey on the curtain, gazing sadly out.) Hew
mervelloue these-firet-memente-of he-day-were. Their bodies lay in
one uniled
thasame wa Trmth, joined so much together that he couldn't tell at
finsr A
r. make su
oupe how his A00 limbs differed from
to move
hers;ap/had
slightlyk
The City made a busy, hushed throbbing in the distance now that the
offices were opengegain. And He felt safe. All their divisions
quanred
of the evening before were absurd. The -divioions between them in
Barah,
Meout, the incident with the clerk from Kirkuk, were distant and


absurd.
Last night was unreal. Only this was real, the act of
lying together, melted into one creature by the warmth.
He got up, careful not to disturb her, and without thinking
went through the same motions as on morning after morning two years
before, leaning his arm first on the bed and then on the wall behind
wittout waking her,
him so as to lever himself over her with theleast disturbancen
And, just as she'd done nearly always before, she turned her fàce
as if to look up at him, but with her eyes closed, then snuggled back
jast
into her pillow again and fell [asleep. Only her short, auburn hair
showed above the sheet.
He tiptoed out of the room and closed the door carefully, remem-
bering that the latch never worked properly and one had to wait for
a slight clicking noise before letting go of the handle. The bright-
ness from the street below made him blink at first. It filled the
music-room with a hot glow, making it straagely like a tropical
garden, every colour---the cool blue of the carpet, the silver
chintz covers of the armchairs, the delicate grey paino and the
dazzling white bookshelves---fixed and separate in the stillness.
He did love this housel Every room had its soul.
The sun shone down the length of the street, on both pavements,
and he caught sight of a small red milk-cart on the other side by
the kerb. That, too, looked extraordinarily vivid and clean.
.It was operated by hand, he remembered, an electrical trolley that
went the pace of a man. At one time, about three years before,
there'd been a horse called Tim, and Pinkie had always taken. down
a bag of carrots and apples on Saturday mornings for him. But then.
Tim was transferred to another milkman because the man on this round
went down with heart trouble and said he couldn't manage a horse any
more; also he needed the extra bit of exercise. But it was sad
without Tim. Other people would be overfeeding him now. He had


a huge, round belly that looked as if it would burst the shafts.
And Tim used to put his muzzle against Pinkie's stomach and give her a
mightyn affectionate shove.
The milkmand hadn't changed and Granville watched him with a drowsy
interest as he went up the steps to one of the front doors with a crate
of bottles in his hand, his body leaning slightly to one side and his
free arm held outwards so as to. give himself balance, rather like. a
tightrope walker. That was exactly as he'd done it two years before.
Indeed, his movements were so precisely the same and so familiar to
soenkin
Granville that he a felt hetdflast-soon-the- milkman-from-this window,
stending inexactly the same poisiton,
he 3
not-two-yeerabofeerobofere-bat/-getor
hardly omscius day-mernings Al1 the-interval-disappeared E I a-moment-of giddiness?
onots
between Ib made Gim teat giddy
ptiolen Where were those two years? I He had an uncanny conviction that he
all.
Basah
hadn't been away at all but had fallen into a long sleep. Mosut was
a perfect blank for him.
milkman
The man had a sharp, lined workergs face with thin lips and
humble, averted eyes, hardly seènd He always gave a kindly good-
morning to passers-by, touching his cap, and then averted his eyes at
once, back to the task of milk-bottles, as if he found looking outside
own
perbabs
hisj world pa inful_onoratec/otierbiserts some hidden decotunm hima
Howas whollyabeorbed in hie CWR movements;
his warnthand
safety seemed tobe contained in them. He X ened
passed
unnoticed, rapt in his work, with a hidden devotion that made a tiny
glistening point in his eyes ifenecaredtellook-at-him-elesely
enough. ( He put empty bottles back into the cart and took fresh ones
out, never pausing, slightly bowed all the time, his lips set and his
eyes with their rapt look, sunk and almost hidden, tiny points.
No A
But these movements weren' the whole of his worky
wasnie rapt Simply in what his hands lid
it in thewhole
3 as aka
fthe açt as part oftheday, tege cher ith the çlean morning air,


à oyning
te deans
There 3 as
ramon',
the familiar scaape of his boots on the pavement, the clink of bottles
in his crate, the subdued click made by his trolley as he pulled on the
5o Jamiliks! Ad al don n't
brake and his modest rat-tat on the door. He-wae-offering these thinge
a kind of worshipo it-seemed. Granville watched him HAtA closely. slat
How
ts itnimn do it
How else could he-have done this-work-day in and day out like a precise
paep
machine4 for ten or twenty or perhaps thirty years, and yet kept the
gleam of love in his eyes? All at once Granville's interest was arous-
Of course, the man wasn't performing a function at all!
Work
tls
wasn't the movement of his hands for him any more than Granville's work
in Basrah was filling in invoices and dictating letters: the work in
Basrah was the whir of the fan in the office, the blinding sunlight
against the shutters of the window, the call-to-prayer blaring from a
minaret across the road, and the sound of Mohammed sucking his teeth.
And this milkman was in the open, the weather was part of his work;
it was a ritual of nature almost, without explanation.
The expeession
in his eyes was that of a man listening to a marvellous story all the
time. hol war i .
That way of gazing reminded Granville of his own father; he had
the same gleam in his eyes after working for thirty years on the docks
nearrilbury! And secondly it reminded him' - of Abu Kath'm; she was his
house-boyls mother in Basrah, and lived in a mud-hut at the bottom of
the garden, by the banana-trees.) Was therea comparison to be made?
He felt it was important for his other thaughts, to standby the wind-
But why
did Le
OW and go on thinking, whilethe house was still silent and Pinkie
Hink 2
asleep. How quicklyhis nervousness fromthe previous evening had
Hem Figelka
passed! Heknew his nerves were once more calm because otherwise he
how
A kkar, -
vould-have no passion for thought.
una so
2 a m
Tres
difforent,
AVVA Dat Eh a mi Anaremia-mizrmemece-no-differente Her) stride
Aln Rath in -
was long and slow, with her head lifted in perfect steadiness. Such
a walk would be laughed at in almost any vity---so round and flowing


whorear
and self-assured! Aad the milkman's walk---one couldn't say a stride--
was hurried; it was slavish in comparison, as if a whip was raised over
thg jutu's, loo.
him. And while Abu Kath'm's gaze was fixed on the distance in
a fiery
way, his was sunken and concealed.
Yet the glitter at the centre. of
their eyes was the same. And their movements, while from totaylly
had
different worlds, suggestad the same awe of things/saneprons That
was what his father had in his eyess/soom.a look of belief and awe.
But there was something else behind it, too.
It was a look of confid-
ence.
It suggested that the things atx royd oyé could be depended on.
avall
tals It wasn't a personal or active confidence: it wasn't a chosen state/
which)
but a complete faith in the constancy of the world, Norwesit at all
a-self-oonfidence; suchanactivesstate of mind belengedtte-the educat-
edclessesr It was
state of eennection T
werte hat-
went along on one continuous theme and hummed with one activity.
Their
eyes didn't pry into the outside world, glancing interfogatively from
objext to object.
They looked at things hazily.
They had the same
patient and humble air, too, as before a theme to which they must list-
en. That was the light ih Abu Kath'm's eyes as she gazed into the
lals distance, her head lifted proudly: the theme was in her and all round
eventso
her; she didn't see a world of haphazard add accidental happonings.
wasn't
Her gaze wasthe gaze-ofan animal, altogethor-lost in-raflection; nor
was it the scrutiniaing gere-of-somemeone-never lost. It was between the
twer
# didgaseatthe human worid of rings, and et
invested
everything with a safe and calm theme. And the milkman had essentially
marvellons
the same gaze.
That was thejstory he seemed to be listening to. A
gleam of belief, like a flame, had been kept intact in them both.
This
Gramille's
Thet was how hirs night of thought had begun in Basrah, through his
seeing this gleam in Abu Kath'm for the first time; he had seen her in
the afternoon, during the eclipse, standing in the garden.
Her black
cloak had been drawn nearly over her face so that only the slits of her


eyes were visible, keen and shining, the henna-mark on her brow
lurid in the strange light. She had warned him against Allah,
pointing up at the hazy sun.
Allah was in the sun, she said,
and was very angry at this moment---that was why he was hiding
himself! And this had begun thoughts in Granville for which
he-d been waiting ten or twenty years. He realised how often
he'a asked himelf, without finding the actual words, 'What does
it feel like to believe in God?'
And before him, in her, there
seemed to be an answer if only he could penetrate to it. And so
he'd begun to try, all night.
He turned away from the window, yawning, and realised with
a hidden twinge of pain that he'd just been 'thinking'---standing
quite still, his jaw thrust forward, his eyes popping out of his
head, floatingi---his fists clenched, thinking, thinking!
He stopped on his way to the door. It was the first shame,
of that squeezing and burning kind, a bleak, dispirited remorse
for. the whole nature of his béing, that hega had for two years.
To P. /o6


lo 6.
He went upstairs to the kitchen, which was tidy now apart from
a bucket crammed with refuse near the door. The slatted garden table,
with the sunlight falling across it, gave the room the look of a tiny
summer-house.
Along the dresser, on three shelves, were Victorian
plates of various sizes, painted in a bluish-grey pastoral scene.
He and Pinkie had picked them up at Abbott's Road six years before,
after a visit to his parents; they made a whole set, including a
the Suaday -oa >t,
soup tureen, a sauce bowl and a magnificent platter for/joints;
had
and it/all cost less than a pound. The young people of Abbottts
Road, getting better money now; wanted bright, modern designs, and
were throwing the old things out.
Pinkie had furnished half this
house from the second-hand shops in Abbott's Road. What with the
chintz covers and curtains from Pinkie's family, a quiet sedateness
from the past hung over the rooms. It was so unlike the lives they
actually led!
while
The kitchen floor creaked under his foot, with the rest of_the
was
house quite silent.
That was how they'd creaked two years before,
and he waited for the familiar wooden bump that a lways followed. It
On winter mornings he'd taken breakfast here alone, before it was
Bump!
light, at the time he was working at Copthall
round the corner.'
Avenue,
He always liked to
himself an hour of
before
W as
give
quiet
work. He


te momig
remembered the rustle of his paper as he used to open it at the
table, in the silence of the house, and the sound of his tea-cup as he
put it back in the saucer, while the traffic throbbed sdrf softlyin the
Here
distance, getting steadily louder. In-thie-world he didn't have to
think. Everything was provided for one. Life throbbed outside.
He would probably fall back into his old habits---an evening concert,
theatres, coffee with friends in the attic room next door, while his
td lay
real self eeened, In abeyance all the time, But there would be no
office this time, for two months. That was bad, perhaps..
There was nothing in the larder, only a scrap of soiled grease-
proof paper, so he went automatically to the door and took down the
canvas bag from a hooks. It looked the same, like a small sack, with
dusty earth at the hottom from carriing potatoes. He realised he td
taken it down without looking first. His steps across the room, the
had riben
blind way his hand rese towards the hook on the door---the last two
yearsmight just as well not have existedt
ger
There was a
on the corner called
where he
shzop
Amy's
could/every-
thing. It was a very narrow shop, wedged between houses, the only shop
aud
in the whole efthe street; & darky mysterious little-pleee with a rich
display of packets and tins
in the window. There was
always a combined smell of soap and cheese, he remembereds A fresh
always
ham and-varione-checses stood on the counter, and sometimes there was
a vast tray of home-made bread-pudding,thick with sultanas and currants.
Kersalg
Amy/was the-nsmeof the-owner, tillayoung-woman.
She-was plump,
with healthy. dark eyes and flushed cheeks, rather Irish-looking, and
gaue
with a litle wink. weak 2
she always lelodtogiwe him extra weight, when . eps sked fort ham-er
baeenywith little-wink, - A light was usually necessary in the shop
bec ause it was So narrow, so that it glowed cosily, with bright packets
piled everywhere up to the ceiling. Just over two years before she 'd
had her first child and her husband had served behind the counter for a


lo8.
time. Then shedeame back and now kept the child in a tittle pram
behind the coùnter between the piles of wrapped bread and corn-flakes.
There was never any hurry about hers A special calm and silence hung
over the shop: She went about her work with a delicate kind of con-
centration, slowhgr. And she made the street outside seem in the,
b. country. Now he had to steel himself to meet her again. Itwas
such an effort: with surprise he found he wanted to hide himself
away; he recoiled from leaving the house! That was another sensa tion
since leaving
he hadn't had these two years;k His initiative had taken a blow.
And As he went downstairs hé again had the unpleasant sense of
W an aldo fanihar from rso Yean begore.
unworthiness that hed-seized him - - fermoments-before 47
reomr What was this ideal pattern of life he fell short of? He
was full of tonfused thoughts, like dry voices in his brain. And
this state also he remembered from two years before, going down. these
same stairs, dark and soft to the feet, with the same canvas bag in his
hand.' His body had dost some of its assurance since last evening.'
Was that his imagination? His legs felt out of step with the rest of
him! "Oh, please stop my braint he felt like crying.
He nun cmceulvale.
He needed butter; sugar; bacon. and eggs, brown bread.2 He made a
list in his mind, going down the stairs, as he'd always done before.
And he felt automatically in his pocket for the money. And milk.'
Had he seen a packet of tea upstairs? He'd better get one, in case:
A little: sweat formed itsle? on his upper lip as he went down the last
sieps.
letéf airs He felt a twinge of peculiar revulsion and giddiness,
like a desire to jump out of his own body, because he couldn't accept
ayain
to ls tte sca>, the grest iudcal
himself. The thought/went across his brain)that exeryhody had/left
the-house on his account last nighta a
THT
Ro sked hi
thought. X *Why did I stalk out of the room?/"Why did my heart beat
at the sight of the cars outside?' Everything on the voyage had
been so light and clear, like the surf behind the boat! *Ittytoo


late nowd L cantt unde what Tire done. 't Why
bohevese
Bit
lat and
deadly
foolishly? At this moment life seemed
and
lic.
so/plain
obaious tetth
was
that his own behaviour beeane grotesque. And the question hetd asked
thiskiing!
Pinkie last nightl What exaggeration---what outlandish thoughtst
A hot blush of sha me went through him, making his heart beat fasto
and ee
hie brow. How could he have done it?
But what was the truth? His mind wavered, putting its timid little
question. What about his instincts, were they nothing? But again
the plain and obvious world asserted itself. Only that was true!
Of course, nothing was wrong. The rest was madness and dreams?
There they were again, those little ghosts in his brain fighting each
otheri They'd been so quiet these two yearsi
He walked through the dark hall downstairs and stood at the top
of the steps gazing into the street and breathing in the morning air.
That was better. Ah, the air did one good!
Sunlight still drenched the street, blinding him at first. It
Basol
was quite like Mosul in the early morning.' The only shadow: was under
the porches of the houses oppsite, where the motkman was. Granville
hurried past the milk-trolley, hoping to escape the men's notice:
A revulsion from all public contact filled him. And the milkman
8 enced 4 bens
didn't look upd Then, now ae-wes reall out of doors, his body
underwent a sudden quickening process. Hé felt quite different.
It wasn't simply that there was more noise and light. It was a total
bodily influence, like suddenly waking up; with no trace of drowsiness?
His mood of revulsion was quite gone. The house, behind him, seemed
like a shrine of thought, dark. It was like waking up, yet also it
was like surrendering his real xExt self, like dying. How could he
be so malleable to life? Apparently, the night of the eclipse had
abhieved less for him than hedf/thought! Perhaps one day he would be


Hou nomigs had Smelled ayferar U A J the smell 1 the droctt,
the chanlanc,
the lap 1 sandanches Cud rhe
siny nofaun
mbbun his plinsoll, and melfig tar wn #e hot roadway.
able to walk out of the house with the same self that had been thinking
inside it. But that would mean a long journey yet.
His trousers flashed white in the sunlight as he crossed the road,
trghnes
and he was conscious of their colour against the grey of the street.
Surely they were toc conspicuous? Someone passed on the other side,
walking quickly, a man in drab clothes.) The momant Crailleleoked
away, his lipspursed, Absurdly, he resolved
to take off these flashing trousers when he got, back?
The street looked like a village in the sunlight, with the clear
blue sky beyond the roofs. It réminded him of Abbott's Road inthe
Sum he
im Li clildhoed eegore tarfr
wren
summory on the days/when wherewoul A - (an outing to the sea and he
with Exciremenc.
wonld te
would wake early) a long charabanc wouldbe waiting outside the Co-op
hall and he would be wearmg plimsoll shoes for the sand;) But almost
at once'a melancholy shadow followed this memory.
weon't
The-supporbing-troorbing-troes and the small-of tay weren't there. He'd often
had this same sequence of feelings jas -
ttd
Abo L Road: first
firaN
k the sense of a village a a
sowA
dow
ent, then the little eclipse of hope that came inexplicably.
Most of the houses looked brighter than they'd done two years
before. There were white walls and newly-painted window frames.
Atwas Surprising what a bit of paint did to the brickwork.. The grim,
industrial look had gone. He decided to walk down to Commercial
Road, just to see it again. The trams were gone now, and the tracks
tirswn a claltar 1 pasip laniss aad cos a te way t. Ae Ciry.
had been taken up, which gave the road a wider appérance than
before)
It all looked as dusty as ever, squat shops and coloured hoardings.
tiny, Thin faced
the mo Jaue as * before,
A/ man was selling newspapers on the corner, bire-snme/es-es-swe-yoare L
faa krsfom
He had
wirth thick glasses/and a black cap pulled over
one eye. Granville's thoughts seemed rgidiculously smallamid this
clatter. A bus passed swiftly, sending up a atte cloud.of
dust from the gutter, and the tiny man called out in a shrill voice,


Ill.
cupping his. hand round his mouth in a mechanical way, "Pap-er!
Mornin' pap-er)"
Not only did his thoughts seem ridicukous but he couldnst
wer
remember what they heabeens His mind had definitely quickened
and was more wide-awake than in the house, but his thoughts were at
best little nalf-messages flashing across his brain, naver finished.
The long, continuous theme of thought he'd had in the house was imposs-
happy.
ible now. Yet he was cantents - The clatter of the street made up for
the loss and lived on his behalf!
Most of the passing women had bright print-dresses on, with bare
3aral
arms. It was So different from Mosul, where the women went cloaked
and veiled, their eyes darting from. side to side. in the slit of black
cloth, flashing dimly like iron. Here they were so open and cheerful,
touched by the sunlight.
There
etreet-sex.
Some of the
younger women walked in a provocative and challenging way, tight-
hippedo the eir blousers-out low-intheneck. One young woman passed
him gazing straight before her, with the suggestion of a smile on her
lips, well-built, pale, and quite pretty, her jumpcut low enough to
show the slight sha dowy rift between her breasts, tantalising and
subtly devised, as if the-Commercial-Read were the-foyer-ofa-brilliant
theatreand there were hundreds of ments eyes Hpon her. It was
any me,
flirtation donducted in the brain, with norenen - She held a shop-
ping baskext in one hand, loosely, and her hips rolled as she walked.'
He passed within a foot or so of her and saw that had it not been
for a line of anxiety near her mouth, seeming to indicate that her
freedom would only last as long as the dayle sunlight, she would have
looked
shete 5 LA te Calrasels i Mansu Stree L vauptious and CaIm.
hed-grexd
- eat veluptuousattraction / But life
was too plain for that, the line seemed to say. Yet in her body,
showed in hér eyes,
in her long, graceful step and in the smile that madtexkkexsiighkesk
tighxciochuarxeya distant and wonderfully self-assured, there was


AU the Jame tuie le WA fecfed
closenen vage
au uubearable, vilrant Hinll thimt a tedy,hakig :
uth
dry. Then xhe wan June.
all she needed for freedom: but her life wouldn't allow it, making
a line near her mouth.
And thé sex she suggested wasn't voluptuous.
meaning
It was subtle and mental, snegesting a quick, clandestine, forbidden
contact.
On the other side of the road he caught sight of three or four
detached houses behind fruit trees, little villas built at the end
X timid I
of the last century with porticos in/frail, suburban imitation of
style,
the Palladian, They looked/drab and stifling in their dingy brick-
work. The windows and doors were too large, with the typical heavy
and replete touch of the Victorians. Yet the houses weron't quite
melancholy, perhaps because of the trees that surrounded them. And,
because of the wooden ftences in front of them, instead of iron
railings, one could dream that they were part of a country scene
with elm trees beyond.
He stood still for a moment, gazing across at-
them. If only hetd come back to a place in the country' He might
feel different then.' The sunlight made these little villas with their
fruit trees even sweeter:
He walked back into the qui et of Chaworth Road and found Amy's shof
empty. : The bell clanged sharply above his head as he opened the
door and at first he saw no one. Then he heard her voice.
"Well, Mr Granville!" A few. seconds afterwards her head
appeared, flushed and smiling.
She put her hand over the counter,
wiping it first. "What a surpriset Your wife said you'd be back!"
"Hullo, Amy, how are you?"
They shook hands.
"Oh, all righti Well---" She stood gazing at him. "Mou are
a stranger!"
She hadn't changed much: a littlé plumper, perhaps 1 with a
touch of grey in her hair.
"How's the baby?" he asked.


"Baby? He's a grown man now. Look!"
He craned over the counter and in the shadows behind a pile of
bright cartons saw a plump little child, flushed like his mother and
with the same dark, healthy eyes, garkngoskxx******kxupakxhin sitting
astride, silently absorbed in a game of wooden shavings.
looking
"He's as good as gold," she added, almost in a whisper, gaxing
Then the child lifted his head and looked Granville full in the
eyes wi thout the slightest change of expression, dark-eyed and. absorbed,
fixing on him the same look of abstract curiosity he'd just been giving
to the wood shavings. -
"That's not a nice way to say hullo," she murmured.
She bent down
and gave the child a tickle under the arm-pit, and he kicked out his
feet, laughing suddenly.
"That's better," she said quietly; giving Granville a confiding
glance as she rose again.
"Hets got your eyes, hasn ft he?" Granville said. "They're
wonderfullm
She shifted and glanced at him shyly for a moment, seeming to
think something over. Then she said firmly, "It's funny, you never
get people saying what lovely eyes hets got. But it's a fact, isn't
it, though I say it myself?
"Oh, itis a fact all right!n
She looked down at the child again. "It tickles me, watching
him play down there. I give him a little pile of wood shavings in
the morning and it keeps him busy for hours. People come in here
and say, Goodness gracious, have you got a baby down there!"
The child slowly ran his finger through the. shavings to make a
tiny path, his mouth open.
"They're funny, aren't they?" she said. : "Their own little


world I The way he picks up a bit of shaving sometimes and holds it
up for a minute as much as to say, Oh, and who are you? and then puts it
down away from all theothers."
ShuXRITEEEetmxkexset? "What's his name?"
"John, after his gran'dad." Then she collected herself. "Well,
Mr Granville, what's it been like over there?8 Plenty of sun, I
expect?"
"Oh, yes, a bit too much!"
"Ehat's just what I thought. My husband was out there in the
war. He said he all but melted sometimes!"
"Yes, it can be terrible."
She frowned for a moment. "What are they as a race out there?"
And she added, "Persians, isn't it?"
"No, just Arabs. Persia's next door."
She laughed a little nervously. "Well, my geography xever was
up to much!" She gazed out of the window across the street. "Still,
it's all the same in the end. I don't suppose we '11 need geography
where we're all going to, shall we?" And she laughed.
Together they watched someone go by outside.
The milkman's EAXE
crate clanged in the distance as he swung it on to the trolley.'
"It must be nice gett&ng back," she said. "There 's nothing like
home, is there?"
It reminded him of women's voices in his childhood, always
reminiscent and sing-song like this, saying set phrases one after
another. He felt lulled.
"I wish it was like this every day," he murmured, nodding out
of thè window.
"That's right---we're not very lucky with our weather, are we?
But when all's said and done there's nothing like the old country,
I don't care what you sayl I wouldn 't say no to a couple of weeks


overséas but they can keep their sun and their big moutstaches as far
as I'm concèrned!"
"Moustagches?" he asked..
"Well, you know!" She laughed, seeing him stare at her. "Like
old Macaroni---haven't you seen. him? He comes round with his hurdy-
gurdy Saturday afternoons, they say he's made a tidy little packet from
his pennies.
Havem't you seen him with his little monkey?"
And, quite naturally; she began to sing. Her face showed no
embarrassment at all. And she had quite a lovely voice, rathér high
I-wes de
otut te-hear her, and-teare-eeme tohis
and level.
MXXEXEXMEXx*XXEXEXXXSZSHEZSaNgyzntkt bxtkaxskeraxaxaxzsnxk-X
eyes
DEsxXeEx***
An-to-niol
Oh,Oh; *nkanta
he's gone away!
Left me all alone-iol all.on me own-iol
Itd like. to meet. him with his new sweetheart!
Then .up would go - Antonio, with. his ice-cream carti
She rested her hands on .her hips as she sang. She had her head
lifted, and her eyes had even, S some of that fierce héat he'd séen in
L d asle hiin jeel
Abu Kathtm, sogetimest She was singing softly,
# indd-him utterly,
purgelily calm fo a Lohs .
end-Herrealised how Mervousheld-been-unbilthem
ABe Aee
Rad
These old songs ene
e a vague regret, as if people
were saying good bye in them. He elways used.to try and stop his mother
singing them. . as a child. He would put his hand over her mouth and she
would wrench - it away again with a laugh. She had a faint, rich voice
that séemed.to come out of the past.. And then he would cry. But she
always persisted.
She used to sing Daisy, Ba isy, on a bicycle made
for twot I'm half crazy all for the love of youl' or Has anybody here
seen Kelly? Kelly from the Isle of Man? And though they were roll-
icking songs, with a: wonderful generous vigour about them, ' they always
this
had a-berrible sadness, too. The vigour concealed a certain courageo
perhepe They were cries.of distress. They had a wild tenderness


he found unbearable, a f lhey A A I lax 4 a sages
"You've got. a nice voice," he said.'
"Yes, that's right!" She turned and picked up a paper bag,
blowing it open, as to await his first order. The song had moved.
hér as well, it seemed.
"There's nothing like the old songs, is
there?"
"NolT
"My old mother used to sing them when she'd had one too many.
She had a voice like Marie Lloyd, so people said." She knew every word
and she. used to do all the gestures as well, you know." Then she
stirred herself. "Well, this won't do, will it? What can I get you
after my little recital?"
And as usual she gave him a little extra weight when he asked
alwag
for baçon, and she gave him the same wink as/before.
"When are you off again?" she asked.
"Oh, I've got about two months here."
"Well, we '11 be seeing something of you, then, won't we? And
how's Mrs Granville?" she asked, watching the scales.
"Does she like it out there as well?"
"She seems tolm
She paused. "It's funny, isn't it? I expect I'd settle down
as right as rain if I went to a place like that.
You've only got
to try something, haven't you? You're lucky not to have children."
"Yes, that'd be an extra worry, wouldn't it?"
"Yes, especially in the trppics. What's the heat like,really?"
"Well, it's a damp
heat.
"Oh, dear! It wouldn't be much good for me, theni I'm bad
enough on a day like thist"
And there the conversation ended. He put everything in the


And
Rad
send - of restnoin
: ai
an Y i was chamed dou Wh
hawing apoku tis tiee! To Amy nz
He heuer Sprke the jullness ) L feeling
ho note !
canvas bag and they shook hands again with a smile. As he was
leaving the shop she called out, "If Mrs Granville's passing this
way we '11 be having some nice knuckles of ham in this afternoon!"
He walked back to the house in a perplexed state, seeing nothing
Axl
li rargice
round him, his head down.)
was ware
hror
back- Herd/stood beforeher tongues
tkough E
ilp
man between two bordersi' L He ought to have said
lo herl Amythng!
morek He could have talked about his own mother, for instance. - But
the-worlds-were top far apart.
3 her
he belonged tothe
Buk
l.c. renucated tas est
He couldn 't bring the same intimacy to his voices
He'd travelled too far away: it would be like acting a part. And
he di sliked this feeling. Much remained to be thought out.
'Back
in England,' he thought.
Back to my probelms!"
He glanced at the morning paper on the way upstairs. The head-
lines said OHI OHI PRINCE CHARMINGI in enormous letters. Apparently,
there was a yacht-race somewhere and the English boat was called
Prince Charming. It was making bad time or something.
There were no matches in the kitchen, .so he slipped quietly
back to the bedroom, where he thought he remembered seeing some on
the chimney-piece. He opened the door very carefully and tiptoed
into the dim room. Pinkie was in exactly the same position as hetd
left her. He stopped, gazing down at her. It was the same silence
as when he'd woken up, soft and enclosed, and he felt worlds away from
it now.
There was a bulge in the bedclothes where her arm lay over
her hip, and all at once he remembered the child they were supposed
Yes!
to have had. She'd done away with iti I PhasNassiddeniyaim
convistiona He gasped, looking down at her, as if she'd just told him
the truth. It felt as if somebody had gone away. Perhaps all this
Ba xrah
time, unawares, in Mosul and on the voyage, he'd been assuming the


The child! Whue was Heir clild?
presence of a third spirit in her---the only part of them that would
have been innocent. Her face had a pale, smooth look---he had the
sensation that something close to her had stélen away while she slept
and she didn't know it yet. There was the pallor of loss.
A breeze came.' No, she hadn't killed the child ! Pinkie would
never, never do a thing like that! It was his fault, perhaps.
The child had stifled inside her, because of his half-hearted little
orgasm. Again his. heart started beating fast with shame. He hadn't
filled her with that terrific pride of being necessary for a woman!
He went out of the room quickly and let the thought die, becoming
calm again, in the dazzling light of the music-room.'
LAs
Strange, his fear pf having a child. He was always advocating
children. He remembered doing so once with Dick Pollocke at train-
ing school, and a bitter argument started. Pollocke sadd he hated
contraceptives and certainly didn't intend having a child every
two years through not using them: so the easiest thing was to bring
the children off. Granville said that this was the same as killing
tkam
achild. And Pollocke bheh replied that it was just disposing of
grew C
an unconscious embryo, like a toe-nail that grows without having a
mind' and which we pared/down occasionally: How could murder, much
less cruelty, arise in the case of something already, so to speak,
dead?
"But a. woman's spirit changes!" Granville cried. "All of
her awaits the child---milk goes to her breasts---her thoughts turn
towards it---then you suddenly cut it off---you murder her as wealf"
"No," said Pollocke crisply, "an embryo grows in her womb, and
it's removed. That's all that happens."
"Well, people get punished for doing it..."
"By whom?" Pollocke asked?
"I don't know. But the punishment comes : Life hasxa pattern


you've got to respect, you know."
As he was being punished now; no doubt, for not having wanted
the child.. Now he valued the child: AAAA herd felt its spirit, for
Armufe
the first timé, by its being snatched away:
He cooked himself a good breakfast, two eggs, bacon and toast,
pot of strong tea, and settled down at the table with the news-
paper in front of him. The sunlight had moved across the room, to
the dresser where the sturdy Victorian plates glittered.
These wasiv a Jound trom *e rexe S the ho use >
There-was-n't-a-sound som-the 1 eest ot house, and he found
thiearelief. SIt occurred to him fot/no
e yy that he
hadn't touched Pinkie yet.' This meant he hadn't touched her for a
Suppose 7
month.' Wasn't that
were
strange?) Well, they
completely out of tune
with each other, really* Their sex was fumbled, on the whole. Some
Adually i was
lorified elg- al Ad
-times it wasn't. But/atumcelyacelylamounbed mere than-bothof them
achierting satisfaction of theiromaccountsandleaving itat thata
qid
part
Why herd they got married, then? Beaause they couldn't bear to sbe
fom
lic. (each other;% Getting married was the only way of sta ying together!
They') Mad married, really, because they couldn't bear the thought of
the other person marrying anyone else. They had this inexplicable
: KX
each
tenderness for
other that was LE
more than the-ms Render
dad less kau lose.
sex
A friendshipk But there was-no natural/communion:0lrsot/betroen
whav Hkere was
thotA that/had grown from the tenderness, slowlyo aplethonawren
pansage
ngmttetnand von =
oba - - ne mere than she sngeth
partvasppagodiai
His desire was too direct for
her: she wanted subtle and intricate approaches; even cruelty,
perbapn would have thrilled her more: patoomandthentheytids
achievee wonderfudvoluptuousharmony between them, Quiehlygone-
goonforgatten under-the-weight-or further attémpts to-repeatthr
They approached each other from opposite poles. She neëded to
tal be beyond herself for her passions to rise---and, thus, beyond him.


got Exciles
Everything had to be enhanced.
She closed her eyes and only quiekn /
his
. L enadrtonin when the touch osMrisfingere seemed ananymous to her; when
ak Giler tines,
she could forget him as he was duming-the-plain-hours.. And he, wrecking
his chances, obtruded himself, a FFEE Etimes gazing at her and talking.
She could only keep the flame of her sex alive in dimness. The M10A4
dim and shadowy
marenatorhinvenyexcited her; but he was frightened. Mainale
nasnmononghyfertart
Brt unce
al swaeford m Aun
Le cnld Me in Cin be with
itals
There-kad-beoa-an-oocaetoa-three ox fouryeare-before whichhad
leadure
cantredk ete e Thisnhomerer. *twasat-Stratfosd-on-avons when-they_weah
Tey'd yme
A up from Reading to see "The Tempest, and stayed the night at a small, co-
sy inn near the river. He thought-afterwerds-that the spirit of the
was
to lhem,
room wes speeial = favourable, perhaps, with its bright curtains and tiny
mullioned windows; A it might have been the previous occupantsk wgese
fingenig Kodce 9ood lust, Anywas
Heally
appetitesjauddenlysnepired-them. It was the first time they/abandon-
ed themselves to each otheryanyaozos her breasts glistened with his
kisses in the darkness, whiA her nipples protruded, hard and dark, and
she pushed her body up towards him, opening her legs until they were bent
tkal time
under her,, making her stomach seem massive.
Therewere Mo endearmentsk
No sighs! Just plaim ludiness a claf 2 Htunder
a flood! IE happenes
Hahadrteven-approsohedner-befemebandn Itwas a ceidentalandsudd-
dudd euls, Ake mome - they urese ian bed A
eny -emerging nat urel H
he eileneeafter they went tebed,
All
their movements seemed determined-beforehand, so that they didn'tseem
the authors of them; and every muscleand nerve in them was ready for
the other; they were absent toeach other as far as their personalities
went, and only their bodies were t ogether, their minds in a eonidition
of dumb support. That occasion showed how far theywere on the wrong
Yuln track most of the time; theywere trying to get at the body through Xa
words and pleasantness, through admiration and decent feeling, and it
wouldn't do, notwith this maginifcent, primeval beast of thebody in
them---yes, it was still a beast, ecstatic and dignified, despite civic
hp medificational But when he mentioned the occasion to her afterwards,


as some thing quite spécial, she said she didn't remember it;
though they repeated it afterwards now and then, in the same
accidental way. 'Stratford' became his word for the sex---which
me ant trust, silence---they ought to enjoy.
CHAPTER 4
Dick and Hanni came over again the next evening---which
surprised and excited him. So he hadn't frightened people away!
He was in his shirt-sleeves when they called---he dashed down-
stairs to let them in, having seen them from the bedroom window,
but there was no need as the front door was always open these
days, on the latch. At once the house felt warm and thrilling to
gim, full of deep colours, as it had done two years before. He
waved them into the hall and they smiled back at him.
"Hullo, Pip! - We thought we'd come and help you finish the
punch!"
"Yes, come on!" As if it was his punchrr-he was overjoyed!
"And to hear all about it," Dick added; guielly.
Pinkie was standing on the first landing.
"Trust you to come and finish the dregs," she called down
with a familiar chuckle.
"Well, how's mum?" Dick called up to her, stumbling a little
on the stairs at the bottom.
He clearly liked Pinkie an enormous
Yoo
lot: ga a bit in awe of her, peghaps---he was smiling so pleasant-
ly and youthfully!
"Have you recovered yet?" Hanni asked ber.
%Never again!" Dick murmured.
They sounded familiar and easy, their tone already formed,
without his help. But yet it seemed to include him. Or rather,
there was no sign that it didn't. But yet---! How funny this
sadness was---that came suddenly, drawing him back! Was that
Basrah? Him, Pinkie?
They ate a scratch me al in the kitchen, sittingxiaxaXrE
aKmsX sitting with bare arms. It was still sultry-hot, and
the window was open at the bottom, showing the roofs of houses
and. a few commercial temples near the river like strange grey


with
turrets and steeples in an extraordinary island-city which-trad flat,
ond,
gery
green fields) surreunding-ity the sky immense and high even in the
dying light. The lightness and greyness of everything was strange
ffo
to him now,gmaking,a cuaious heady effect. Yet he felt more joined
to his Basrah-self now---the journey between had died away, and
he really looked at Hanni and Dick for the first time. Now they'd
be friends!
He was certain of it!, Again Hanni's wide, densely
blackand smoky EXEXX Arab eyes, spa her dark skin faintly pock-
marked with traces of the desert-boil, And her smooth black hairg
drawn back so tight from her brow, aap her thick eyebrows that
nearly'met over her hose, brought him back to the Basrah-world; and
the dark glow of her skin made it seem that they were in their
dining room in the consular'district again, as the sun was going
down, leaning over the table, and the printed blue plates, the
bright dresser behind her, were eastern colours, after the stupend-
ous day-heat, in the evening when silence was appreciated like
the coolness, and thoughts came slowly, end with an extraordinary
me thodical patience. Dick was pale next to her, or seemed tobe---
a little austere, but warm, twinkling, with a certain kindi of
inaccessible cleanliness: it was in his fingers, their nails
clean and well-kept, the pads under his nails delicate and pale,
also square-looking, as if they touched things softly but firmly.
But his beard! Why didn't he cut the damned thing off? It looked
as if one could blow it away! Ône wanted to---puff and' it was gone!
A beard meant charlatan in our world, self-conscious and pettily
assertive. But not in Dick.
He made it seem a whimsical little
touch.-Juhere just because it wasn't like him at all, a little
bit cussed, not quite healthy, either! A strange bird!
They went downstairs afterwards and sat on the bedroom floor
with the bowl of punch in the middle---Dick wanted to hear all
about Basrah, and Granville was bubbling over to talk about it.
It was dark now but the curtains were still undrawn and
the lamp on the chest-of-drawers, reddish and mellow, was reflected
in the window, making the room seem endless and futl of mysterious
colours. They were all sweating slightly---it was good, good
to. be there! This was the homecoming!
How on earth could he
expect a conventional homecoming from Pinkie, involving just the
two of them, cooing together in bed/and then what? No, thank


God they weren't little
1tab
couple and never would be! One needed
friends, that was the real homecoming, something total, not just
sex and the tiresome petty marriage-unit of two---thank God they
didn't have that! Thank God they weren't a little couple in a
little box! Pinkie preserved him from that: look what he could
have married! At least, with her, one was in the world, not
suffocated in a deathly maffiage-box! She was in trousers this
evening, her feet bare, half-lying on the floor against cushions,
exactly as she was in Basrah when they went to see someoné in the
student-group, where they could relax. Her blouse was open low,
showing part of her breasts.
Yet---! Were her breasts smaller?
More inaccessible to him? Not belonging to him any more? Not
wifely any.moge? And so a sad' after-thought came to chase the
first away. But it was quickly swallowed up in reminiscences about
Basrah.
"Weli, did you enjoy it, Pip?" Dick asked him seriously.
"Not enjoyed exactly but---"
"Interesting?"
Pinkie chuckled.
"It never stopped being that! Even the
boredom was interesting, wasn't it, mouse?"
"It wasn't a drizzly English boredom, # Pinkie went on,
"it was gaudy, real gaudy---" Dick twinkled at her. Kit got
rgght inside you like a disease!"
"A worm," Granville cried, "disgusting but it had some thing
dramatic about it, something was always ging on in you!"
"Well," Dick said quietly, "it sounds just the place/for a
worm like me!"
"You'd hate it," Hanni told htim.
"I feel it changed me," Granville said---yes, this was wha t
he wanted to tell them! "It isn'$ a question of hating it: or
not---all I know is it changed my life!"
"How?" Dick asked.
"Well, it,made life more mysterious! As Pinkie says, even
the boredom! Nothing's plain and ordinary! Do you think SQ, 9
Pinkie?"
"Absolutely!*


"It wasn't because Basrah was new to us," Granville said,
"because this sense of mystery didn't grow less as we went on living
there but more---do you see what I mean?"
Dick nodded quickly, as if to say that so far it was obvious
and didn't need emphasis.
"It was behind everything you did---every little thought!
It never left you! Do you see what I'm saying---it wasn't really
a sense of mystery like you might get here if you went inside a
church, just for a moment, it was there, all the time, like the
air! It was the basic thing about everything!
The thing you
always got down to! Don't you think thats extraordinary?"
"If it's true, old sport, yes!" But-at-the same time Dick
camerh
showed with his eyes that he/believed him, l ye didntavall
1 A
"And I felt more mysterious to myself. I felt I was less
known and measured up than I'd been here. I began to think of
myself---I don't mean in a deliberate way, I mean I was aware of
myself as part of the glow all round me, do you see what I mean?
A created part! And Pinkie was more mysterious to me than before!"
They smiled at her, and Hanni winked, but he went on breathlessly.
"Her body was stre anger to me-v"
He smiled but wouldn't be pushed off his subject.
"More
distant!
She was more in her own eternity! X You could feel
this "lystery along the river most---in the evening---in the. lights,
and the way the oars went into the water without you. seeing them!
I mean, we knew the lights were just electric bulbs slung on
wires, completely botched up and messy, and the river stank,
and there was a completely horrible chorus of car hooters from
the main street all the time, but it was all part of a glow, do
you see what I mean?"
"I had too much of it, Pip," Hanni murmured in her stiff
but confidential way, with an endearing purse af her lips,%but
I know what you mean... ." She looked at the floor. "I think
"But it's in peoplesfacesx as well, Hanni! Don't you
thimk so? They've got a kind of eternity in their eyes. Some-
thing that's not in their control---they aren't.actually
lookingat things, they're more gazing. That's partly what I


me an---life's not in one: S control there, it's already. made
for you, I mean in a grand way, not made by men but something
no man can control.
There's this stirring grandeur in every-
t.hing---you can feel it in the dust and. filth, and the scars
and pockmarks, and the khmsix khamsin---!"
RWhole-hewhonhele athometu Bickasked.
saplained ro 2ick
"The wind," Hanni murmured in an unwilling way, as if the
word struck disgust in her, "the hot wind, it. makes you feel
rotten."
"I'll tell you something, Dick, I began to feel my own
powers there really for the first time in my life!"
Dick gazed at him for a moment, quite serious. "What do
you mean?"
"I started listening to the created part of myself---do
you see what I mean? I didn't mind dyself as much as I did
in England---I didin't mind losing my temper if that was on
the cards---I mean, the real part of me took overt!i don't
know---!" He glanced a little desparately at Pinkie. "Dt's
difficult to describe!"
"You me an you didin't have to tame yourself all the time
as we do here," Pinkie said, with that neatness she had some-
times.
"That's it! I don't mean I was wild, I was probably
much more peaceful than here, but I was just myself, I wasn't
in control of myself in the old way---I just lèt go, I let
myself be taken/by that extraordinary glowing authority outside,
and inside me, too!"
"There are dangers there for Englishmen, il Hanni said
a aoftly.* know that from my father!"
"Yes, I know what you mean, but I don't mean in behaviour
to let yourself go all loose, to let the valves go---anywa ay,
I haven't got valves that always threaten to blow up, I think
that's a middle-class thing, I thing-ve!"
"All right," said Dick quietly, hearing the danger-signal
of an 'orang-utang'speech,"back to the subject, Phillimore-
Jackson, and don't rattle your. decorations."
"Well," Granville went on, the wind, out of his sails for
a moment---'well' was a telltale word with him, "Ivrver---"


hip. "The glowing authority outside, " Pinkie reminded him, chuckling.
%yes!" Back again! "For the first time in my life I felt
natur al! By surrendering: By letting the life outside me and
inside me, the mysterious part, take over! I could really lift
my head up! Like the Arabs in the desert.
Well, I'd never done
that before!
I've never relished just walking and th_ings like
that before, not like I did in Basrah. You know, I really began
to find out for A the first time what real natural walking was!
Before that, I just. seemed to stubble along! We seem all out of
jointan our civilisation! I learned how to walk without hurrying
along, without bending over all the time to get there, you see,
that's the difference---here we're brought dp to t hink that
walking is just a means of getting to somewhere, it's part of a
plan and the plan says you sleep now and after a few hours/sleep
you go there or you stay here, it's all like a scledule here, it
all seems laid down by men, well, look outside the window and you
can see the result of that, in streets and buses running to an
intricate timetable, and RMSESX newspapers telling you the news
from all over the world, everything running on little plans made
by men, to serve men, it's all man-made, but there you
the
get
other world, and there is another world, God's world!
And I
never really knew it existed before! Oh, I thought it existed,
I imagined it and I dreamedabout it! But in Basrah it. was there,
as I said just now, it was in the air, it was the world that
lay in front of you, iti was in your food, it was in.the way
way *e
you slept and the/palm trees moved outside the window, it was in
the way the drums sounded across the river and the way men walked,
I didn't feel I had to demean myself before life all the time as
'I did here, I didn't have to humble my own strength all the tilme,
and work on one cylinder instead of eight, and I bet Pinkie felt
the same;"
"Did you?" Hanni asked her with a side-glance, smoking so
that the smoke, curled up her face like a tiny white snake for a
moment.
%Not quite like that, no, " Pinkie answered wi th a smile,
touching one of her forefingers with her tongue, in a soft, slow
motion, as she did when she was thinking some thing over to herself
very privately.


"You know, " Granville went on, looking at Dick, # it made me
feel I wa S3 looking into the pasto I mean, the past as it was
for this country as well! I had the sendation that people there
were more like, what people here used to be than we are!"
"Before industries, you mean?" Dick asked.
"Partly, yes, but industries were only what happened as a
result of---well,/ some thing getting lost. I mean, those people
av all
don't just believe in God, they don't believe in God, I mean God
isn't in their minds at all, they just live in a world which was
created by something completely beyond them, and which controls
them, and which has this extraodrinary glow! You see, that's
what I méan by this glow---they perceive God----God is this
glow that one can smell and see and hear and sleep in! Do you
see what I mean? They don't have to believe in God, with their
little minds, they perceive him, or rather they perceive the
manifestations of him, in a tree, the wind, a sound, that sort
of thing! They actually perceive eternity! And I'm saying
we used to be able to! But we can't now! We çan't perceive
eternity, or the glow, or God, or whatever you like to call it,
as a smiple matter-of-fact or not, as tkE people used to in our
world - and still can over there! We have to be lofty about it---
we have to think---dream---believe---make an effort---we have to
try and get beyond the matter-of-fact, or we think we do! We've
lost the xpower to perceive God, or the things of Godi, directly!
We can't believe in God in the real sense. In the Christian
world there can't be a religious person! There:s no such thing!
We've all lost the faculty! That's what I feel I found out in
Basrah:
We can only try!"
"But how can you speak for everybody else?" Hanni asked.
That question always baffled him---it baffled him that people
An could ask it, as if clear feelings didn't have their natural
authority, if they were really clear!
%0h, I think we can talk for all of life---I mean, if we're
interested in that kind of truth.
There S no other way of finding
it out---I mean, you couldn't produce tables and charts and figures
ate
in which such things coulabe decided, could you?" And Hanni
ttem
nodded quickly, as if her question had already taken/into a longer
speech than shela intended.


"And there," he went on, turning again to Dick, "you get
the main difference between Basrah and London, or bweween Basrah
Kao and any western city. We've made our mark on everything!
you see what I mean? And industries are only one of the marks!
We've put things under a kind of plan, under hundreds and thousands
of plans that you can see outside, in any city!
We've made the
earth for us. You'd think there was nothing but us on the earth,
walking through this huge city! You'd think that eternity had
been put aside in some way---I mean that glow you get in your daily
life in Basrah. I mean, you still,see accidental things there---
a dead dog or cat by the road, half-eaten by carrion birds.. .1%
%Ucch!" said Pinkie, smiling at Dick.
"But still, it makes you realise, even with the stink in
your nostrils, what a kind of basic providence life has there!
But in our world we've made everything our business---the garbage
gets cleared away, there's a kind of mathemathical concept over
everything, governing every little hour! Do you see what I mean?
I me an, not that you should leave your garbage out, or your dead
dogs, but this in our world is the sign that we've got averything
under control---as if there wasn't anything beyond us, only men
in life, who seem to have created themselves!
And that makes 3
an extraordinary empty feeling in the city---just men who come
from noweher and go back to nowhere, without a word of explanation,
nothing splendid in life, nothing marvellous and extraordinary
beyond men that you can see in the sky 9 and which brought them
into being, and which moves them in the evening sometimes when they
are sitting round telling a story, or when they'Re making love, or
when they go out on the balcony at night just before they go to
sleep and feel the breeze and hear somethingin the distance----you
get all that out there still, what we've removed from our lives--
just as if removing the garbage contradicted God, which T don't
see why it should!"
********** "Well, it must have been a teerific experience, that's
all I can say, Pip,% Sick murmured in a respectful way. -
"But do you see what I mean?"
"Oh, yes, exactly!"
"You see, I listened to life more in Basrah." He was
aware, underneath, of Hanni getting a bit restive---she moved one'


up and down nervously, and filled her glass again, her lips
pursed as when she was under constraint of some kind.
"I was
aware of what lay beyond men, the great spraces, and how these
spaces never spoke or showed themselves but nonetheless brought
life into being and draw men back again. in the end. Do you see
what I'm saying. Mot that I discovered some thing for the first
time which is completely obvious to all of us and which was certain-
ly obvious to me as well,long before I thought of Basrah, but that
I perceived these spaces for the first time. I felt them!
And I never had before!
Or not in that continual, daily way!
For the first time I experienced a world in which men didn't appear (
to be the authors!" Dick leaned forward, about to say something
But Granville jumped nn befare him with an idea that-seemed sudden-
ly to chase the old one away. "In Basrah I saw a world so marvell-
ous in organisation that it made me shudder, so much more marvellous
80 muce hote mavvetlnus
in organisation that anything I'd seen men do,)than all the cities,
and all the promises. I knew about that marvellous organisation
before, as we all do, I had glimpses of it even in the country where
I was evacuated during the war, but in Basrah, fir the first time,
I lived in it, with my own body and desires---they were part of it.
as well, my hands, and, welly*---" He glanced undertainly at
Pinkie---"My sex, everything! "
%I hope you can endorse that, Mrs Granville," Dick said with
a little laugh.
"Well, I think I know what my husband means!" Pinkie said,
chuckling and wetting her finger again.
"Lots of little things changed in my life---I gave up using
the alarm in the morning, I knew by the light what time I ought
to get up, just as Katxxxxxx our house-boy did, and I never bustled
round my work any more, not as I used to---I did things moré when
and as I felt like doing them, and you'd be amazed I never got
anything in too late for Nevinson S deadlines! I started sleep-
ing in the afternoonver!"
"Yes, that's some thing all civilised people should do!"
Pinkie said.
"I never knew before,' " Granville went on, "that things
could have such a fabulous appearance! Little tiny things like
sipping a glass of lemon tea or walking home as the sun was going
down or sitting under the fan at the Mesopatamia hatel er eating


chicken livers at the bar with Mohammed- EU
"Who's he?" Dick asked, glancing at Pinkie.
"Pip's assistant."
"We used to sit in the bar together while the Kurds from
the moûtains were kicking up a shindy in the lounge playing cards--"
"They were real savages," i Pinkie said," or rather they looked
it---they were rather sweet, really!
They wore big baggy trousers
and kept daggers in their belts, and they wear little white turbans! 1
Wasn't your dad an authority on them, Hanni?"
Nanni
"That: s right." But she wasn't saying any more.
"One day Hanni's going to show me round over there," Dick
said, "especially Kurdistan, ne ar the Russian barder."
Hanni laughed. %You won't get me near there! I wouldn't
dream of going back!"
"Well," Granville.said, "I can see what Hanni me ans, it
isn't exciting there, you couldn't be happy, in our sense, like
you could here, I mean I think life in England's much more inter-
esting---I feel exc Cited here---for instance, by you two---"
He smiled at Hanni and Dick, who made appreciative little nods,
half-burlesque in Dick's case. "There's nothing like the
dark
clearness and light you get in England---nothing olear at all!
overtare
There isn't the lightness in the people--I don't know, everything
Repe,
seems separate from onelafter Basrah, one feels like a kind of
enchanted spectator here,if you see what I me an, it isn't the
same world at all, Egglish people smile so much compared with
people in Basrah, their voices seem so full of independence and
Kry
e - *atyon
optimism, and the feefling yau/ /can make things all right with a
bit of will, You see, I think that's Europe, that's our civilisation,
it's completely different from there! In Basrah. the voices
seem to. be coming out of the past, they feel deep and dark and
dusty, they're controlled from somewhere very deep down, somewhere
rather dark and forbidden and concealed, they're held back in
the throat compared with our voices, they're not quite conscious
as ours are. And the eyes are dark and tired, not lit by a
quick curiosity as they are in our world!"
Then he told them about his sense of a shadow passing over
him the previous evening, on the train from the coast, as they
came into London.
"It wasn't because I felt London was ugly,"


be went on, "Basrah's much uglier aersaid, but I started feel-
Naste
ing eclipsed
a person, as a creature, at least 1 think that's
auy
why I felt a kind of shadow! I wasn't qui ite myselfjas I was
in Basrah, I don't me an myself as a personality, I mean myself in
my flesh, just in my nerves.
Yet it was free here---there was
freedom. Atthesamentine I was freed from myself, in a he ady
sort of way! Here men's thoughts have touched everything, that's
what you feel. So you don't go into anything staright, as your-
self, naturally! There's some interpretation waiting for you
all the time. Men have made things look safe in our world.
Our movements aren't watched here as they seem too. be in Basrah.
We can talk our minds---we can say whatever comes into V our heads!
Whereas there you're worrying all the time if you're offending
someone by mentioning Israel, or someone else by mentioning the
Arabs! Everything come S down to spite and division and hatred
there, or seems to! But here it's so light, in Europe! Yet at
the same time we've lost another kind of freedom!
In Basrah we
had our own litee, as far as the nerves went, we felt strange to
ourselves, we felt created from beyond men! But here we're catered
for all the time---by the milkman and the shops and the re wspapers
and the buses and the idea of growing older and all the little
responsibilities that are supposed to go with every, age of life,
like a clever little plan laid down for us by other men before we
are born. We don't make our own- lives!
Yet we could! In all
this planning we could! Here we could! But it takes time.
All we do now is to choose our lives from what the outside world
offers us, we. don't really make it!
And my question is whether
we can achieve. our own lives here, whetheex one can ge through
the day with the same sort of unhesitating physical authority
you feel in Basrah, do you see what I mean? It might take one
years to achieve.
Do you think it's possible?" He paused,
gazing at Dick. "Well?"
"Well," Dick said/a AuPwis),"988fing at him squarely, "if I
understand you right, that's about the biggest problem of the
lot for. me, just that!"
"But is. it possible?"
"After years, perhaps,"Dick went on, "when you're unstea ady
on your feet and your hair's falling out and your wife has a young


lover of forty!"
"But you have to change yourself, isn't that it? You have
to think things out! Then, perhaps!" By now the women were more
or less out of the conversation.
"You have to surrender, #t Granville added, "learn to surrender
to the rhythm outside, to the silence!
And I began to KeakisE do it
In Basrah. I began to let my feelings decide when I was tired at
night and we were talking to Mohammed by the river---I didn't look
at my watch---Ilet my body tell me,'It's time to go to bed.'
And
it was always roughly the same time when I went. Sometimes the
body told me nothing and IXXEXt we went on talking all night---
ne arly till dawn as the air got colder and the sounds on the river
stopped and the call-to-prayer came across the city at about four,
over the loudspeakers.
I surrendered there!
But here we're
taught not to surrender! We're taught to look at everything and
work everything out! Our bodies ge t tired like clocks!
We work
like clocks! And yet you can do the same work, you can do more,
without looking at the clock at all! Like Mohammed!
He works
to the clock in the sense that he comes in at the same time every
morning---but the deeper time S still alive in him. When I got
out there I started mapping put every day according to the appoint-
ments book---so many people to see, so many letters to write--
but for Mohammed the day just unfolded---like the dawn unfolding---
it opened natur - ally in front of him and took him with it! Yet he
did the work. And he did it with. out that awful fatigue of
the nerves you get here. And I learned it, too! Beaause it was
in the air, all round me! I surrendered! I surrendered to deeper
time and deeper space! And that me ans being stronger, being much
more of a man, much more supple and lively!
But I hadn't got the
strneght in me---it was only because it was in the air outside.
I. didn't take it to Basrah. I learned it in Basrah because it
was in the air there.
And I want to learn it in myself---by
myself---to take it wherever I go ---it me ans surrendering, I
know that---some sort of surrender, but I don't know how to go
about it, I don't know the path I should take! I know it'll
take. a long. time!
And I've seen that surrender---I've recognssed
it here, too---I know it exists here---! I've seen it in the
To P. 132(a)


eyes of the milkman---" The others glanced at each other---they
didn't know the reference, and he was aware of this but hurried on
just the same, not caring to explain--- "and in my father, too---
in the world where I was born---there was the same surrender---in
my parents---but I've lost it---I've been taught to lose it and
I've got to learn it again!",
To P.1330


Nender" -
Gramblle asted, lcam t sertender h
tleytlm nlnde
+ Slenco
of forty!"
lover
(But you have tochange yourself, isn't that it? You hare
to think things out! Then, perhaps!" Ry now the wdmen wére more
or less outof the conversation.
MYANE)
At the end, when Granville seemed to have exhausted his
subject, but not his desire to talk, Dica turned to Hanni and asked
her, "Well, is he right about Basrah?"
"He's right except that it's all disgusting and horrifying,
yes.
Islam's heartless and cruel and. dirty and petty and vindinct-
ive, and you can't get away from it whatever else you talk about!"
She said the words with a crisp finality---her laatred of that
world was final.
Then she added in a soft voice,"But I suppose
it's all right for an Englishman, if he doesn't stay too long--
after all, he puts a lot of himself into it---a lot that doesn't
really exist there at all---there, no dignity there, to start with,
you start like a dog and you go out like a dog, that's what my
father always used to say. He's a good example---he talked like
Pip at first, but he stayed there too long, he hated everyone
including my mother by the end. Not that mummy was a Muslim
but i suppose she must have picked up some of the stink---yes,
Pip, I can imagine the dead cats and dogs by the road, that's
what sticks in my mind from all you've said!"
"Well---!" Pip shrugged amiably ànd smiled at her.
"Pip wasn't saying he liked dead dogs," Pinkie murmured,
blinking protectively in gis direction.
"No, not at all," Granville said, "I'm talking more like a
person starved of something, you see! I might ag.ree with you
in the end---I'm sure I would---we belong to the same civilisation--
but I'm still starved of that sense of providence you get in that
otjer world, for all its stink---that sense of life being untouched
in its created part---the silence you get though it's the noirsiest
place in the world!"
"Well,"Dick said, looking sideways at Pinkie.zgaing "Pip's
among us again.
But I'm for bedrr-!"
"So am I!" Hanni said, steetching.
Granville let them go without adding anything---they almost
scrambled out of the room, Dick chuckling and giving a last twink-
ling look as if to say, 'Catch us if you can, cock!' Of course,
Yo.P.133


Pinkie had offered them the bed upstairs in the attic room and
they accepted---he was thrilled thatxtkeXKANSe that the house would
hum with someone else's presence.
It was what Pinkie had always
dreamed about in Basrah, as her London life, and she was right!
They would all get up in the, morning and have breakfast together,
working by division of labour, Hanni and Pinkie on the food, he
on the tea and coffee, and Dick on the morning paper, since by
agreement established two years before Dick kept out of the way in
the kitchen, HXXXas his'work wasn't worth the mess it made.
But he was also disappointed that they didn't sit there longer,
in the way he'd become' used 2 in Basrah. Orrather, not longer,
it wasn't a matter of time, but with a different sort of rhythm,
a slower one. He remembered the clink of the beads during a pause
in the talk, while people gazed before them, clink, clink in the
dry air, waiting for the talk to exhaust itself naturally---and
silence to show' the way. But no, he was back in the world where
force was used all the time, where the will sudeenly interposed -
and found things to do, even when there weren't things to do, in
a kind of shame of surrendering to real outer time. Nothing was
left to the silence here, the big rhythms outside had no chance,
there was only the personal will grinding unharmoniously and break-
ing the evening up, breaking it inwardly, even wi thout outward
signs, breaking it from inside so that even though people might
sit there in exactly the same way as they did in Basrah Eyet there
was something broken underneath, some nervous disturbance like a
little vouce saying,'Well, to bed now, to work now, back to immediate
life now, back to our will, to a cup of doffee, tea, a drink, a
stroll.'
And even though there might have been more te a-drinking
in Basrah, more strolling and EXERXMEXEX perhaps more real work,
yet the real innder silence was shattered as it here.
But it was a good evening.
It was good to be back!
His first feeling of foreboding and harror, the night before, was
gone---obviously a left-over from the dark Basrah-world.
After
all, one didn't stab one:s sister to death here, with small cuts,
if she turned prostitute, one didn't hang politicial prisoners
by their neck fxum in the - main square and leave them on display
for three hours afterwards, the
children didn't catch little
birds here and use them as kites by tying their feet to a long


pice of string and then let them flutter up and down helplessly!
N6, it was a different world and he'd better realise it quickly!
Thank God a little sanity had returned to him, so soon, after only
a day back!
Those cars outside, for instance---he'd really
stopped breathing when he saw them from the taxi, his heart had
suddenly beat so fast that he thought his head was going to burst!
Extraodrdinary!
No, there was peace here. Order. That took time to learn
again.
He had to try and keep out those hot, stampeding thoughts
that came to him from the Basrah-world---th ings could be talked
about here, bring them into the ligh t! No shadows, no
carrion-scandal, no hidden, foul spot!
He felt warmed and healthy and full of life all the way
through, and he bounded upstairs to get Pinkie and himself a cup
of cocoa while the others got ready for bed in the attic room.
Hurrah!
Pinkie was putting on new pillow-cases.
Thank God
life wasn't the nightmare one tried to ambush it into! No, it
was more mysterious---the mystery wasn't only dark, there was
light as well! Yes! He boiled the milk and mixed the cocoa
NI**XXRIIskx---the kitchen was so neat and colourful, the ligt
glowed so nicely over everything, the boards under his feet bumped
so intimately as they'd always done---he was back, back!
could
dance tound the room! Back out of the shadows!
Hanni was right! Back to people who talked their lives over--
who loved their freedom and other people's! To people who loved
the light! And he bore two steaming cups of cocoa down to the
bedroom.
"That looks good, little mouse!"
"Rather!" he said, putting them down on the mantelpiece.
"I'll elect you king of the cocoal" she said, banging out
the pillows.RgaxRX
"I wouldn't like it every night, " he replied, taking his
first sip. "Would you?"
"No, it's too sickly! But as. a change it's att orl right,
eh?" She sat down plyafully and pushed out her legs, taking
her mug from the mantelpiece.
"Mes," she added, gazing before her, "Basrah's all right as
a dream but what about being there?"
"Yes, I've been thinking that too!"


"How can/ever go back?"
"Well, that's the problem!"
And they sat staring before them, leaving the questiom
to look after itself.


ngrg
Chapter
quiet
The house was Aikent for the next few days, and his fear that
seened
agfer all.
no guests would come was justifieda The bell downstairs never rang,
AUnd no one called on the telephone. He even began to miss the cars
far
he'd seen outside on the first evening! He wanted to* ask Pinkie if she
still
could re-instate them in some way; but there wasja silence between
them as well, continging not that it was forced or
they
unnaturalg, A
simply had nothing to say.
She did the housework and went shopping,
sorted
while he Kerked out his things and put the attic-room in order, remov-
ing the broken glass and fixing in brackets for a new mirror.
Once or
twice the Aphone rang, but no voice replied when he picked up the re-
ceiver; he suspected that Pinkie was going outside to make her calls,
at a Aphone-box round the corner; but he rejected the thought because
of the quietness with which she did everything, cooking nice meals as
she'd done in Basrah, and otherwise trying on her clothes or mending
something.
It surprised him that she had no complaints, but he put
it down to her being happy at living in London again. He took up his
old habits, going round to the library in the morning to browse through
travel-books, and searching the music-brochures for a good concert.
wene
Yo Yry. ls renew
He paidarisit to the office foxthe-reme-rerewatof his contract.
But the head of the contracts-department wasn't there, and in any case
the contract itself had been mislaid, so he left it.
The management


NgB
was quite casual about such things. He could easily sign up again
once he was back in Basrah.
Eefort.
They saw more of the Pollockes than aryone-elsen Gradually his
slaned aga in,
old friendship with Dick, from the training-school days, wagrreremed.
kam
They went down to Hampton Court and Pollocke ushered/straight theough
the dark flat to his famous view, as he'd done on theroecasioner their
peaceful,
first visit, arferyears/betora.
The river looked splendid. It was
wide and flat, running quite swiftly, and the fields on the other side
were a
green
laokodfeataatastioally vivid/in the last light.
Ttwasoertatalyaniew
toraproudes Pollocke was watching him witha little gleam in his
eyes, and murmured, "It's worth coming for, isn't it?" And Granville,
remembering Hanni's complaints about it, nodded in an awkward way.
hust
The flat was exaetly as he remembered it. There was little
furniture and no books that he could see.
It was grim and cold.
But
the river shone outside and filled the sitting room withlight. Pinki-
ie and Hanni seemed to get on well.
They disregarded the view and
Lt *e enck 2 +e flat.
sat talking over a gas-fire in the tiny kitchen, Hanni confided


in her quietly, sitting stiffly in her - chair, talking Father through
oige
her teeth as she always did. - She had a groat-powerrof intimacy, and
one could see Pinkie was lulled and drawn in.
Pollocke began calling at the house after work, sometimes just
one
for a cup of tea before thya theatre, and Hanni stayed * week-end alone,
helping with the meals. She and Pinkie seobegAd talk, about Dick
quite a lot when 'he wasn't there. They would close the kitchen door,
and Granville would hear. their voices, low-pitched. He enjoyed the
thought of this feminine intimacy. It gave the house a safe and warm
feeling. The-fourof - - em were the-inner eirele ofthe group. Pollocke
te M : ca
played darts with Glenningjat a pub in the Commercial Road, and some-
times they all went there, sitting in the public bar, where there were
long wooden benches and bare wooden tables. It was an unimpassioned
thav fitav eveniy
sort of life and he could find no trace of his first
Yek
wrepe tare iin
He lus menk.
fears,
Rey
ais tirsuer, asleap t
L.c. - Ahol He never felt really at ease'with Pollockeo bowever It: was a
strange relation. The talk had to be constructed all the time. This
was Pollocke's manner; it set the tone. Granville felt himself under
Ditk
an obligation when he was with bim to present himself, through talk,
in a tidy and clean frame. He rarely said whatever came into this
a when he did he had a sense of regret afterwards
as if he'd exposed himself naked. - It had been the same at training
school.
Pollocke would walk palely at his side, gazing down with his
twinkling eyes, affactionate and whimsical, and the spontaneous talk was
alwaye
W3F
U vwtony
tal aweys -
about to begin: but hE Terer was a -S tire "st fin Zort-of
eba
luy V
commmitati P als
e. cedaxedm
sas. SThey never got
beyond themselves for a moment. Yet at the same time this effort was
lay
a pléasure; beyong it seomed-olie a mystery; one day the curtain
wold
might, be drawn aside! Ao There was the pleasure of waiting, dayaepn
tremulous and full of respect; Yr each oter.
One Saturday they took a boat out from Hampton Court, just the


139 Nos.
two of them, and rowed towards Marlowe, in still, sun-lit, misty
weather.
Pleasure steamers passed them and Dick waved his hand in
a jolly way; making a burlesque of it. He rowed steadily, in shirt-
sleeves, shifting the boat along at quite a pace. And he seemed to
watch. everything as if it were a passing scene only, passing him like
the fields and pleasure steamers, while he was motiohless, judging it
ka WAA He
all as a good or bad performance: gerelessyaga amused spectator.
That was how he Isstened to Granvillestalk as well, considering it
whatover-te-said in a judicious way, from afar. And there was somes
thing pleasurable in this, too, because it made one feel master of the
mental
tn conhve
world,h Life was the subject of a continual/essay, so to speak;
t me's
even teal-
one
nothing disastrous, coudd happen. It gave/a heady sense of freedom.
m ind.
At the same time it wasn't natural.
Dick
Granville looked at hisn from the other end of the boat, at his
cool, very light eyes as he squinted against the sun, sca nning the
wilh
1 banks, slowlyf and his mouth that-had less clarity than his eyés,
bulging dlightly, wifyn an odd soft decisiveness about it. He
IEot couldn't get a sign from Dick's face of what a sort of person he was o
His beard, thin and fair, stirring a little at the edges with the
jur
breeze, was like a disguise he'd put on voryhhattily that morning.
It hid the lines round his mouth so that he seemed to be faintly
smiling all the time, though he probably wasn't. At the same time
his face was youthful and without the-olighbest calculation or deceit, O
ihit. There was something innocent in his eyes; they were never
sharp, much less fierce, but, looked at everything with a lingering,
stmel
uninquisitive good will. They were what had first |Granville at the
Yad
training school: he looked into Pollocke's light-blue eyes, so
amused and boyish, and simply discovered friendship there, though
Rad
the friendship/ petered out.
They spent all day on the river. Some of the chumminess from


the training school days came ba ck, and they moored up at a pub
to get some beer. They played croquet on the lawn until it was dark.
This meant rowing back without lights, and there was no moon.' It
was exciting, going close to the bank all the time, with silence all
round. Sométimes they would steer into the reeds by mista ke and
Pollocke would laugh, still master of the world. And they made calm
little remarks to each other all the time, enjoying the possibility
and
of danger. Thé oars made a soft, hollow splash, then the water
trickled off them as they feathered back: It took three or four
hours, and they arrived exhausted. All the shops were closed and
no one was in Pollockes flat, so they took a train to Waterloo and
went home to Chaworth Road. Hanni was there with Pinkie, just
finishing a meal, so there was a pleastff little party, with Pollocke
Taro
describing the row back in burlesgue termso and extre beds were fixed
up. This evening tegether put the christening touch to their friend-
how
ship, and the four of them were/secure. together, he mc len.
sem
Ig Granville spoke earnestly about anything Pollocke would porain
unmoved and worty gaze before him as if saying tonhimseld "I enjoy
your performance, but I don't necessarily agree with what you sayl
The result was that Granville took to performing a little in his
company, preparing his sentences before he spoke them and turning a
nice phrase whenever he would: And the usual outlet was humour.
They both enjoyed a laugh; it provided the relief from the effort.
Age was an obsession with Dick. He felt the approach of thirty
like a death-sentence. He did press-up exercises in the morning;
and when they were on the river together the tred insisted on. rowing
all the time. His hips were slim like a boy's. Granville was also
aware of his youth di sappearing. But in Dick it was an acute panic.
"I can tell you, old sport," he would say softly, "I lie in bed
sometimes and sweat, just at the passing ofa old daddy time. I know


it's just a crisis. When I get over the border, on to the other
side of thirty, it'll be all right, I suppose."
He would suddenly go into a dance in the middle of the room,
a. y
flinging his legs out frantically, much as if heluas trying to jump
iageaad
back bodtty into Mejpoutied Or he would leap out of a chair after
being still for some time and start pottering about wi th something,
biting his lip, horrified at the passing of time, à 14/016/Aehb0)
He would notice the marks of age, or youth, in Granville, too.
"I swear you look five years younger today," he would murmur,
looking at him with adhiration. "I don't know how you do it,
captain. And two days ago you looked as if the hounds of hell were
after you."
And auter time Tick Laid lo him,
hip.
"I can feel myself slowing upg
MItts a message
being flashed to me. : You know, the old limbs sink down in that
itals chair---woof---" He made a soft, blowing noise, spreading his hands
out. "And I'm not getting the same kick out of things. I need less
sleep, too.
Sometimes I get out of bed in the morning feeling like
a wiry old man."
He NAB always frayk/ake/triss describing in a clear and
Whatevey
He m ade t. . p S. su d k
succinct way exeetlyvat he felto es E f
wae/ alking aboutanotber
unoter
also
person, who while of absorbing interest
from him. He gave
was)remote
a map of himself all the time, ranging over it freely, half-amused,
Some ehody € +ke sheet.
just as one might be amused by A4 APERAAN strengap And he was always
still and calm when he talked about himself. He seemed to be listening
for signs of new, movement in himself, And/AAA hushed and absorbed.
66A
Sonhile he talked about-himself therewas no sense
a - - -be
Dick
regocentriols the phenomenon of kimsedfuwas as interesting for Granville
Dich Ri inselp. iE was
as it was forl him, a third object between them.
Hanni bored'him, he said one évening, adding, "As any woman
you're going to live with should." He talked about how he'd met her


first; at the Copthall Avenue office, when she was doing a temporary
interpreter's - job there. *She looked ghastly, such a bloody school-
Some
marm, and her eyebrowd's meeting in the middle like # black cigar across
her facel. Thank Christ my secretary doesn't look like that, I thought!
Then I wênt back for more the day after, like a foo1! And, well---"
He paused to smile. It was a curiously theatrical gesiingtAn "she
blo offéred me the cigar and I liked it!m
"Were you in love with her?" Granville asked hima
cleat
Pollocke was silent, aopantitton as always when he was asked a Srank
his
question, wapting to give it dempletely open and free consideration,
then he answered seafim ynicerhiseyeeoleacy "Yes, I was."
-"Had you been in love with anybody else?"
And again there was a pause, followed by a firm, "No!m
Another time Dick said his life was in two parts, one gis work and
agler-wok
the other after-work. He could quite happily devote himself to the L
Tiel only,
mpchootivelay
lattor enotre ely provoded he got enough sun. His work meant nothing to
him, really.' He was ak Reast a 'Geach- toy! he said,
"That's why Itm conscientious," he said.
"Itis like doing
a crossword puzzle. I like everything in place." He paused, quite
still, his hands resting easily on his lap and his legs folded. "I
suppose that's why I shall
on. I know I
The directors
get
shall!
think I'm wizard. I'm prettf certain I'll be one of them in a few
years time. I'm not handicapped by strong feelings on any of the
issues. I keep an even keel."
It didn't sound AAZA cynical. His eyes were amused, gazing
across the music-room at Granville, XAAM blue and still. He was
talking about a performance, quite simply.
tkot
When they were rowing together otinthe Saturday afternoon he
suddenly looked ap at the sky with a twinkle and said, "Charlie God's
putting up quite a decent show today, isn't he?"


Agagn
Jick alwup
Hafs
And he/described points of strong feeling with. more deliberate
Slerwise
calm. and style than usual. On the way back to Waterloo, after their
long, blind row in the dark, he murmured to him, "Wéll, I don't know
about you, Sergeant-Major, but I was an ant-heap of nerves in that boat.
I thought we were going to strike a' mine # any minute. The old knees
were knocking toge ther like casta_nets!"
kindog
Sxo od
He seomed to-stend to one side of his own life, a/musing, wistful,
tonch
somptimeb puazzled, and heroic companion. It was perhaps the sense of
deril- man care couige
bratery/ that warmed Granville most. He was never really at ease with
Dick, they never really got down to anything, but afterwards he felt
the loss of his company.
One evening Dick happened to ask if they'd had any servants in
Basral.
Mooul. There were the four of them, with Glenning, in the kitchen
upstairs. And Pinkie answered in her extravagant vein, laughing,
her lips moist.
"Servants?" she cfied. "Good, God, yest We had three, old
cock; and a retainer thrown in who lived at the bottom of the gardent"
Glenning appreciated this, chuckling. But a certain pallor came
over Dick's face; or perhaps it. was only that he pursed his lips.
meYaAnagrerdey/Cuperine/poserrne/rat, I He often seemed to recoil slightly
when she was in an extravagant mood/ talking in a resouding and
patrician way like her father. Servants, as it turned out, were a
Dick.
sore subject with him-in-emy-snee, Hanni told Pinkie later that he
refused even to have a char in, because it offended his principle that
8) aug knd
iel serving ethers was wrong.
Baral
In fact, they'd had three servants in Mogul---Bertha, a girl
of nineteen or twenty, Kath'm, his boy, and Abu Kathtm who did the
washing at the back and hardly entered the house. And it was odd to
a ctually
hear Pinkie talk like this because servants/frightened her. 'Bertha
was supposed to be her personal maid as well as the cook but Pinkie


did nearly all the cooking and gave her long hours off-duty. Bertha
like Hanri,
was an Assyrian,jand insisted on being treated like a lady.
"I can't bear servants hanging round met" Pinkie would say.
wmld
Shef smiled at the girl too much, wanting to disown any memsahib
attitudes. Bertha might attribute to her. Of course, Bertha only assumed
that Pinkie was a fake memsahib, afraid to assert herself, and she put
on terrific airs. It was awful to see them together, Pinkie blushing
and intimidated, the girl uppish and pouting.' The appearance of
Kathtm.at the door in his striped dishdasha, with bare feet, was enough
to send Bertha flying out of the room He was dirty, she said, and
brought/bugs into the house, which was probably true. She hated to see
his dark, bare feet on the tiles: And Kath'm bore it with a stern,
untroubled face, his eyes twinkling a: little. Bertha's family-bible
sat on a little table in the sitting-room with a heavy silver-plated
crucifix laid across it, and she forbade Kath'm to go anywhere near it,
much. less to. dust it in his. clumsy way. And when he pass ed it some-
times he would give it a quick, sidelong glance in awé and hurry on.'
Bertha had a room next to the dining-room and could have put the bible
(os her class- Yandig a as a cloristian)
there, but she wanted it as à demonstartion, and Pinkie said nothing.
It was effective, too, because Kath'm treated it as something magical
like. the evil eye.
Kath'm was always in good humour, and discreet and quiet: He
tiptoed upstairs with Granville s breakfast in the morning, and would
smile at him with a quick flash of white teeth. And he would whisper,
his ssing, as he bent down with the tray, "Sahib, sahib, chai wa halibl"
--AANE tea with milk; he repeated it every morningd There was a
clear, perfectly understood relation bétween them against Bertha.
Yet Kath'm never uttered a word. against her. Indeed, he never uttered
more than a few words all day.
Pinkit always packed Kath'm off to his hut an the evening, and


iomu
told Bertha she xk could go to her room.
She preferred serving dinner
herself, aven when there were guests. For this she needed Granville's
help and he would potter around the tagle like a servant, to the distress
of his Arab friends.
He got furious about this but she said the
penalty of having Kath'm in the house would be her going up to bed
instead of entertaining.
"But what are servants for?" he asked her.
"I can't help it, I can't bear servants round me, that's allf"
"But he loves serving at table!"
This was true. Kath'm "always thought she sen
ewey -beeause
ghowing him lo
Dirty' a t Bertha said Re as !
she was ashamed of)the guests
a T
And one evening
Granville found him gazing wistfully in at the dining room window
in the cold air, his nose pressed against the glass, fascinated by
the warm glow inside. Granville-le-knew-theee-we-would-have been-his own
foelinge-se-well, A Kathtm loved to put on a clean robe and pad softly
across the floor fétching tea or coffee as he did during the day df
a guest called. But Pinkie said that working in the evening was
over-time, for which he wasn't paid. It was a strangely tame and'
social attitude for her, and didn't fit her nature. The fact was that
she couldn't bear the responsibility of someone Loaning-on-horand
raking
expeoting orders from hera She couldn't bear the ideà of guiding
other people's lives.
And his Arab guests would look on in astonishment. It was
same,
frightful aib)not to have servants about, and they wondered how he
could be chief in the T.I.M. office.
But still, this created a problem of conscience for Granville as
SiTali well. He had to work in with the sheikhs, some of them hard, greedy,
exploiting men. Once he nearly wrote home for a change of post.
He lived like a little king though he was only a clerk. When he
walked through the streets sometimes between the dark; ragged, sallow


AB2.
people he had an uncomfortable impression of himself as soigne and
well-wined.
Even a clean shirt and a suit felt too much.. It was a
position forced on him. The sheikhs and the Arab and Kurdi sh business-
men passed by in their Cadillacsp Fords and Olsmobiles, kicking up
the dusty their chauffeurs cursing at the pedestrians. The doctors,
fommed cun imperekable
lawyers and government officials / jmaderapp unotylsink of corruptiono
arraSTiTpOnsAblataperetrated There was also a host of small,
bells
nelgected men with revolvers in their heloters who were said to be in
the pay of Russia and were preparing for a commmunist revolution;
which would come about during one of the. annual student riots. And
the students read Das Kapital under their desk-lids.
Then, people
said, a communist sink of corruption would replace the present one
Hetd had éxperience of two riots. After the first one, when:
Mohammed rescued him from the Mesopotamia Hotel, he framed his letter
to Copthall Avenue asking for a change of post: what the devil was'
heasked hinsecf
he doing here. getting mixed up in somebody else's quarrelsJand being
identified with attitudes he'd never had? He was furious! But then
the evning came and he walked wi th Mohammed down to the river as
always, now that the rioting had stopped, and they gazed across at
the glittering minarets on the other side while oars plunged in and
out of the dark water below them in a regular rhythm, patient and
unconscious A and he was drawn back like someone drugged, lulled and
delighted, beyond argument or reasonings The slow, cool wind drove
They
up the river, dispersing the foul day-smells.
And
€ Mhammed
went home and cooked a huge musguf, that tasted like cod, in the
garden, propping it up against sticks, and aftervthe meal they sat
clinking beads together in the sitting-room, wi th the fire dying and
the rush mat making a hissing noise under their feet whenever they
tte uecesst : otrid
moved. In the morning he told himself that/
Barah
t hin aun desel-pmer
Heewl-experience/ purified and justified his stay.


Quite suddenly, in the grounds of Hampton Court one afternoon,
after they and the Poilockes had had lunch together, he turned to Pink-
ie and said, "Suppose I go back to Basrah alone?
Shall I?"
Hanni and Dick were a little behind them. He'd little idea
cane
how these words hadcona into his head.
But they seemedto causefno
surprise, a inern
"Yes," she said, gazing loosely into the distance.
They were
standing at the edge of the lake, with the nassive, red palace behind
Bul
J.c. them.
Then she asked, "What would you do for a woman?y
"I could go to the brothel," he said at once, hoping to catch Dick's
Dick war
ear; but herdiantta dissing Hauni's rsm heck.
He glanced at her.
She didn't appear offended.
She only smiled
in a crooked and slightly defensive way.
The whole afternoon, still
and dark, with thunder in the distance, was strange.
They stood togeth-
er, looking before them at the shining water, and spoke as if_they had
no control over their words at all.
Dick and Hanni were near by, arm
in arm, whispering something to each other; they tended to play lovers
rather a lot for a married coupleo Ganmashoughtlinriteasa
"I wouldn't mind being out of that atmosphere for a bit," Pinkie
went on.
"All those bloody pot-bellied sheikhs---" She gave a glance
gowards Hanni, as if wanting to catch her attention in the same way as
he'd tried for Dick's. And Hanni did look across at her, blinking.
"Like a pack of old women!
They were the ones who did all the talking!"
"Oh, the clerks did it as well," he murmured, getting more irritat-
ed. Dick also was looking at them now, and it seemed that all four of
them were fixed together in the still afternoon, their wills paralysed
out of
conhrel.
and involved together, enacting a situation beyend/their graspo
"But the sheihks went in for all the male-honour talk, didn't
they?" she cried.
"Calling youAmy brother' and all that?"
"Well," he said quietly, uncertain of himself, "you can't laugh
ame T 217 honour -


iral
"But why male honour? What about my honour as well?" Her eyes
were flashing.
He flared up as well
"But there S some difference between a
man and a woman!"
"Why?" Dick asked in a crisp way. Granville turned round as
if he'd heard thEXEEARIXkxelxaxybkp a shot fired, so strange was the new
voice, like the cracking of a twig before a storm. "I don't think
there RS any difference!"
"What?" Granville asked, his throat dryd "No difference between
a man and a woman?"
"No." Dick spoke deliberately, his lips pursed. "Their bodies
tkati ule."
are different, afcourseym
"But our bodies aren't separate from us!" Granville cried, quite
roused, notu "They're only an expression, just a part! It's a
whole differencel" The others were silent. "Why don't men have
babies, then, and do the cooking, and everything a woman. does?"
Becausr
"pdeuees they're physically different," said Dick, spacing out his
words slowly and carefully, gazing down at the water.
"Men do cook," Hanni daid, "quite often"
Ent
"So when we go to bed with our women," he burst out, "we go to
bed with our sisters or friends?"
He had no idea what he heant himself and the others laughed.
Pinkie looked happy again. He stood there blinking and confused,
trying to make sense of his own words, and the others laughed evegy
inr
"A body ignjust something you can touch," he went on, trying to
pick up the thread. "It isn't all of a person---" But the argument
was gone.
"Anyway," Pinkie murmured, "all this is only because I felt like
having a dance one night. I suppose youtd have liked me to go and


have some illicit sex with a diplomat one afternoon while you were
at work, like half the other English and American wives! Your male
honour would have been intact/"
She only broke the subject again because they were in company:
And it stirred the old fire in him.
"Oh, for God's sa ke," he shouted, "just because you want a dance
it doesn't mean you have to have one, does it?" His voice drifted
across the gardens. "This male honour started just because men didn't
do what they wanted to all the time!"
"That's because they could do what they wanted to all the timel
And a woman can't!" She waved her hand blindly, with her strange
half-smile, that was both defiant and hurt. "If I go and sit in a
cafe / alone I've got men staring me up and down, even here---and as
Bamal
lan
for Mosut---I"
"Oh,"he said, "a woman adjusts herself to that all right if she
means business."
"If she's ugly, you mean!"
And there the argument ended. He forced the anger out of himself*
And to judge by the set look on Pinkie's face, samaking her look older,
she was doing the same.
Then, later, she squeezed his arm and said with a chuckle, "I'll
give you male honour! Mou're just like old Waffle-Waffle."
Rer
Waffle-Wafflet was Pinkiele grandfather, who id married Aunt
Beatrice. 'Aunt' was a courtesy title because Beatrice was much
Wiggle-Walle, J
younger than chawasy She was a flashing, red-haired woman with daater
a k C al
a sharp, and/couetiueg ribaldy wit, and lwaffle-Waffle' was an-army
ocho He
alosyp
fe t
He-) thought she had grand style,
manao
amd-moutsceimcktodetherygineing
her-ap free-thand Pe ah wanted
et igntiui nature and-
The halul
ond Really he worshipped her. h Waffle-Wafflef came fron the way he spoke,
beins
and-it was almost impossible to understand what he said. Beatrice has


had a son and two daughters by him, and now, with the help of
her son Derick, she ran a finishing school for girls in Mayfair.
Pinkie was the youngest of a family of nine. Always
'baby Hester'.
Her nurse had always told her, to make her
sense of loneliness worse, that she had 'the mark of the Gry-
sham in her', She'd told this to all the children at different
times but with Pinkie it stuck.
The mark of the Grysham XaS
meant a certain wkildness of temperament---a kind of noble
dissipation that ran in the family. At the: Aldercote hunt
balls pokers. were used to open the champagne bottles, the
bannisters of the main staircase were 'saddled' so that the men
could ride down them with their shoes in the stirrups, shouting
Yoick at the top of their voices.
Sometimes Pinkie's father
brought down a chorus-girl for the week-end or went off to
Brighton on the non-stop train from Waterloo that everybody called
The Flying Fornicator. He was alxso quiet and charming.
Not
that Granville had met him.
They lived on a Carribean island
these days.
But he'd seen Aldercote once. Pinkie was born there,
but already in her childhhod only part of it was used. The
farm was sold up, then the stables. Nearly the whole of the
estate round the house had been shaped and planted. by Gryshams
in the last two hundred years. It had an unbelievable tran-
quillity---it was really like a blow, stunning you suddenly,
XEXXRNXERMXX*xfixs*xframxthexhiit a terrific, blidding word
from a kind of people who no longer existed on this earth.
There were oaks and elms and a lake where wild duck nested.
Her nickname 'Pinkie' came about. when she was fifteen.
It was during her first studio-party, given by a friend of her
mother:s who smoked Russian cigarettes from a long ivory holder
and slept in a hammock slung between two enormous pieces of
sculpture.
Pinkie arrived in a paroxysm of shyness, her
mouth working up and down helpless ly and her eyes flickering.
After tea the others started talking about. the psychological
meaning of colours. -Yellow meant homosexuality, red meant
sexual frustration: if you showed great fondness for these
colours you were a 'frigid' or a 'queer'.
Then, during a
hush, a small, plump young man with a red-golden beard suddenly


1aara
turned to her and asked, "What's your favourite colour, Miss
Grysham?" To which Miss Grysham replied, with a blush going
slowly up her neck while everybody gazed at her, "Pink---I think!"
Everyone laughed. As she usually blushed every minutes anyway
the nickname stuck. Pity was an old-fashioned virtue among
these people: hard-faced bohemians with money in their pockets.
They called her 1 a flower of the English aristocracy'---facetious-
ly of course. She was so traditional'-- --a museum péace!
And
everything from her soft, half-pained, tragic way of speaking to
her liking Gainsborough must go. Her politeness was pompous'.
Once she ingenuously asked the red-golden beard if hellfire was
true---and the answer she got was a huge book on comparative
religion! It was all in there, he said---religion was just
primitive hopes and fears, nothing to do with us. And a week
later he had her in bed. He said she had' softest thel skrmedt and most
yielding little twat of any virgin he;d deflowered. He tried
her later with a cucumber; he wanted her to go at it less
'sacredly'.
Nigel, her eldest brother, was the one she was closest to.
He was the smell of the countryside for her---real health. And
he:d always been the nicest to her.
After the last war he'd
put hi/anuity
and his family-allowance together and started a
retail business in London, and it turned out well.
He even
gave Pinkie a job.
Then he started stables, bought a place for
himself in the country and was called squire' by the local
romantics. The work he gave Pinkie, as a kind of traveller for
the firm, on the public relations side, was good for her self-
respect.
And she was good" at it. That was why she visited
the T.1.M. training school, as part of her job, scouting for
young people. She met Granville and Dick, who were the ohly
people there with 'style', she said.
X She didn't see much of Nigel these days.
He lived more
and more in the country, and spent a lot of his time hanging
round the stables talking horseflesh.
He was a tall, fair-haired
man with rosy cheeks and broaf shoulders, his eyes much like
Pinkie's except that they were steady and searching, with a
constant smile in them. He had the same rash and daredevil
TNAK ley


streak as his father, coupled with Pinkie's softness.
The
moment they wefe together they fell into horee -talk. She played
the part, out of love for him. The mare had a 'cold back',
Nigel would say, and was a bit fiddle-headed', with a tendency
to 'dish'. Or the grey had 'lots in front of him' though he
'grunted under the stick'. "A terrible high blower!" he would
say, and Pinkie would laugh.
There was an indefinable element of unhappiness in Nigel.
It lay under his sunny good will and was even part of it. But
he never talked about himself.
He only mentioned himself in
connection with something he'd-seen or enjoyed. E It was 'unsport-
ing' to be disgruntled or irritable.
A man. had to be above that.
His first question after he d had a nasty fall one day and cracked
his arm was whether the mare had been 'damaged'. He married
late, a girl called Mary who hardly spoke and looked after the
house quietly and carefully.
In the war. he was known as 'Nutty Nigel' because of his
forays alone. Once, when his battalion was dug in for some
static battle, in the Ardennes, he left the trench in daylight
and cleared an enemy post with one grenade. He then sat down
with a pipe and started reading Dryden's translations from
Horace. - He told someone afterwards that when his own men found
him he was reading the line, Tomorrow do thy worst, for I have
lived today', and was thinking that he'd never had such a day
and probably never would!


CMAREVHN
un - h nl
- gue i Mayfair.
ghad a son and two daughters by hims/ Granviljghad the impression that
Derick Grysham, Fer son, didp't quite aceept him as a member of the fam-
ily, in sofar as there was/definite family left. An the other Grysh-
ams, like Nigel and/finkie's father, there wascertain blindnessto the
details of other people's lives and backgrounds.
But Derick and his
mother had the scrutinising quality,
They stood like sentinels onthe
edge of Ahe famjly, watching the new entrantss so it seemed. Beatrice
was described by Pinkie's Kather as 'more Grgsham than the Gryshams ',
and Pinkie herself said this was because Beatrice came froma-big soap-
manufacturing family and wanted to 'keepthe aristoeratic slate clean'
now-she was-married on To
Not a word more was said between Pinkie and Granville on the sub-
ject of 'affairs'.
He found out from Hanni that the name of the pale
young man he'd seen using the telephone on the first evening was Grove.
But no one else mentioned the name. Nor did Grove appear agai in,
Pinkie never went out at unusual times.
The matter was left unexplored,
as always between them. But circums tances were piling up: there was
the incident with the clerk from Kirkuk, there was the beating he'd
given her afgerwards, there was the party she'd just given in his ab-
sence, there was the role of Grove, there was the baby. All these
were now barred from conversation; slowly they were forming an encamp-
ment.
But sometimes these things appeared S imply bare incidents to
him, without a theme behind them at all; and again he wondered at the
own
extravagance of hisl thinking.
He wanted to ask Dick what had been 'going on' in his absence,
want
but he didn't misk to appear petty or jealous before him, if only be-
cause Dick seemed to regard him as a carefree person.
He did try it
in an oblique way. He asked him how he thought Pinkie was these days;
did she seemx 'the same Pinkie' he'd known at training-school?---Jugtiag
Very
iphoupeoneagnedatont-ber objective. And Dick seemed to under-
ANBTA


lotra
because
jirt
stand what was in his mind, foz/ he simply) looked straight ahead, his
lips pursed slightly and his eyes geribotatela unblinking, and said,
wanted
"Yes", then closed his lips again as if he never wished to open them
again. A chill apprenension ran through Granville, because this made
it clearer than before that there was something to hide.
During his talks to Hanni he tried to find out more, but that was
even less hopeful, because her gaze was more watchful than Dick's, and
seemed to pick/his moods more subtly; so whenefer Pinkie came into the
cnnversation he made it seem that he had no doubts about her, and that
on the contrary there was the greatest confidence bwteen them; he even
wanted to give the impression that he was carefree and tolerant about
'affairs'---that would be his posiiion, from the public point of view,
had feen
a if he found out that there were any. Also he was afraid that Pinkie
was innocent, in which case his suspicions wculd sew a bad seed in
other people's minds unnecessarily. Sometimes-wherwherteand-hammi-wwere
xap
together-they seemed-to-trim like-tworefugees,strended-ontthre same
island; en-theother hand, she seemed-mere-awareof Diek's life chals
hawas of Pinkie's; and she talked-about Diek mere ee
was
alweysafraid of appearing disteyl toPinkiea He thought of the other
hip.
three as evasive and mute, but he was the one' least capable of breaking
into speech.
He learned through Glenning, the publicity-man, that Dick was
'a one for the girls', and instantly felt a twinge of admiration comb-
ined with disapproval; or perhaps the disapproval was only moral envy--
he couldn't tell.
Glenning told him in the pub one evening when they
were"alone that Dick had borrowned his flat the previous week 'to do
a secretary'; he talked about it in a genial, amused: way as if Dick
was famous for that kind of thing. When Dick came into the pub later
Glenning looked up at him and said, "That girl of yours---do you realise
she left some of her feathers and an egg behind in my bed?" Dick's
talse


mouth fell open for a moment and he looked frightened, but then he
laughed and sat down easily at Glenning's side, murmuring that he'd
always thought the girl 'a bit of a hen'.
Hanni and Pinkie were together in the kitchen one day at one of
their tête-g-têtes, with the door closed, when he happened to pass on
his way to the attic-room and suddenly heard the name 'Grove', followed
by a lowering of voices; their voices made a quiet rasping on the air,
no more than a whisper.
The idea formed in his head quite conclusively
as he stood on the landing between the two rooms with his heart beat-
ing fast and his mouth open, that she was in love with Grove. He
went on to the attic-room and tried to work on the new mirror, but his
hands trembled so much that he decided to lie down.
Their voices were
now normal again, a spasmodic humming on the bther side of the wall.
He heard Hanni laugh.
It was such a comfertable and easy laugh,*hxt
so without any conpiratorial note, that he thought he must be wrong;
he tried to reconstruct the sentence in which 'Grove' had occurred,
but he couldn't remember the other sounds; perhaps the word had been
'mauve'? Slso it was possible that they had been talking kitchen-
affirs, and had said 'stove'. But kitchen-affairs weren't to the tastee
of either of them, as he knew. E later Hanni opened the door and
went downstairs to look for some cigarettes, and he realised from the
sdunds that they were cooking something together, perhaps one of Pink-
ie's French dishes, so that the word might indeed have been 'stove'.
He got up again and went on with the mirror, revived more or less, but
he oouldn't get the thought out of his mind.
Not for five or six days after his arrival did he t ouch Pinkie.
His raw desire, th at had glared at him in Basrah like the sun itself,
sickly and dange rous, had withere d into a kind of local, urban itch.
MaRpgI)


But the idea persisted. It had be come a medical idea, probab ly a
wrong one---that the glands were full and needed their release whether
he felt real desire or not. So he watched Pinkie with interest,
hoping to decoy her. She was unaware of it, but afternearly a week,
seeming to feel a' mild curiosity about him, as to where he had put his
glandular fluids if not in her, sh e kissed him in a significant way
and they bega an scrambling about as they always did when their desires
were low. But the flame revived in him, and slowly the enormous,
pitiless image that had hardly left him for a moment in Basrah retum-
sparse
ed, and even united with her briefly, until he had a shocke d, paparsa
org gasm that failed to involve most of his body, touching only nerve-
ends, not the centre; he was still wide-awake after it, a'nd they lay
together numbed, sad, continents away from each other. Pinkie's
orgasm was a private event, distant from him. It wracked her middle
for a moment, a sma 11 shudder that touched her stomach and died, like
an awful vision that made her close her eyes al nd screw up her mouth
pai nfully for a moment, 9 and lose herself in an infinite sea.of self.
The act only confirme d them in their separate ness from each other;
with muote
kan hifore lnt ho thing lo cal.
it left them Rpeerof desiresk whic was bett -
hantheothet state
tok kim how
Llad wes
It was remarkab leyt that s-eme-tines Pinkie had felt desire for him.
Hecoudd-pemember-it. It had always happene d when he'd been aw ay
for S ome t ime. She gave the impressia of trembling sl igh tly, he
remembered, and of being sensitive to the timbre of his voi ce. But
this desire was always spoiled in the fulfilment. Usually it die d
the momen t he touched he r. But this time th ere hadn't even been the
desire.
MAgt


Gap.
FeEnt TAPERE
Szel ehplis *
Chapter *.
ta V
Later in the week, after a quiet 'phone-call, Pinkie announced A
her inthers
she was going back to her job at Harvbrochmmeonla firm.
Granville was staggered. The firm had moved to the other side
of London; it would mean travelling to Wembley every day, an hour or
more.
"We don't need the money," he said.
"Oh, I just want a change.
Everybody else is working, after all."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, all our friends!"
The following Monday shé got up at seven and he made tea for her as
once shetd made it for him, two years before. She looked neat and
Bmse
contented, with a spotted silk scark tucked into her neek, She wore
her best high-heeled shoes, wachrabetardrojordrolobasagatoUObaRgsDnv and a
tight grey skirtbthat made her look tall and slim. Hor-Case-hed-no
traee-of-childiohnese And-She sucked her forefinger now and then,
just touching it with the tip of her tongue, gazing down, as she did
when she was making a silent calculation of some kind. She was quite
tinr
remote from him. She could have been a young girl off to her]job,
with a dance to go to in the evening.
"I thought you liked being free," he said.
"I do." She gazed down, her face closed to him, and wouldn't say


IS8
MAS
kken
any more. Ever since she'd-emmounced herintention ofwerking again
he'd been trembling more or less; he could settle to nothing; his clear
thoughts were gone. He watched her now across the breakfast table as
he'd been watching her for several days past. He tried to look into her
eyes but she turned them away quickly. And when their eyes did meet kE
for
her's were blind. She left/the office as if they were strangers, look-
ing both more of a girl and older, too. Her face was set like that of a
hard-willed young girl; yet even so the softness showed through, in
the texture of her skin.
Rfeltlateme close of anepisode The beating he'd given her
had changed her, he told h imselfo shenould never-forgenit, ithad
Hod
padober-hareh Had she said anything to Hanni about thatbeatingeDet
hode
she and Hanni nake this feminine plan togéther, that she should go to
inlatzd?
work and leave him isbaated? He felt surrounded by hearthessness; he 'd
bed noticed a hard look in Hanni's face as well, when he was talking ab-
out 'male honour' in the gardens of Hampton Court. But in a moment the
idea of a 'feminine plan' seemed absurd./ Harmuch-moreofa womanPink-
A Oulys
C. - e hat leoked ne 5 a Left theheneet Her softness towards him had
- tn Jn gone. He sat at the same position in front of the breakfast table all
morning, numbed and half-trembling. But it was a state that went on
underneath, like a natural afunction of his body. And it wasn't un-
pleasurable. It was a state of excitement and suspense; what did the
future hold?
After this he was alone in the house most days. It was agreeable
at first, as he got used to the idea of her working and it seemed only
another aspect of a plain and obvious world. She left at the same hour
every morning, and came back looking rather pale and tired in the evening
wanting her dinner, which he now prepared for her.
It continued to be
kad
exciting. There were things to talk about: she wouldbaya stories
about the office and how Nigelwas APUAA these days. He was coming over


to dinner soon, she said. Vdtheylmst bothbga down touiatshira
furevreakend Aagorlooked eNer and perhapssmerevorrieduutthe
smilehadnetetthis eyes, sho-added. It made a tremendous differ-
So Grroencile Houghr,
ence to her, being close to Nigel every day. h Her confidence came back
and she talked more readily.
There was a healthy little flush in her
cheeks and they were affectionate and natural with each other as they
that
hadn't been for a year or more. He began to think nf her working was
a good bargain.
It took her out of herself and he got his privacy.
She didn't lean on him as she'd done in Basrah.
But they slept together less.
She was tired and refused him.
Desire wracked and gnawed at hima, and sométimes he yearned for her the
whole day much as he'd done in Basrah during the last month there.
When she came back in the evening his approach would be too overwhelm-
ing and direct for her, because he was pent-up.
He felt an 'orang-
utang' in his
aswelb,, as he'd done on many occasions before whth
sexp
Apte She shrank from him,
The heat of hks hands, his breath, the
seemed Y,
closeness of his eyes, induoed panic hero A/seemedo Usually he
knew how to avoid this, and approached her in a quiet, deliberately
light
unconcerned anderenhurourons way, not kissing her too earnestly or
at firt,
touching her too heavilya He would fondle her very softly, like some -
one in a dream, while her eyes closed: this aroused her most, when the
touches were aaost abstract, coming from anywhere, in a dimness, his
fingers not his but detached like things in a dream.
First this dim-
ness and silence had to be entered, softly and circumspectly, then her
passion grew. He had to cancel himself out at first, withhording the
ral
realstrength of his armsy withholding his breath and his oun passions.
alwa te ou hia ne' 'd leamed with aur,
hips
But now he'd been kept in leash too long. He'd speht hours thinking
about her breasts and hips, AAA imagining voluptoous movements tAth
Nemo Butthe deeasion-didn'toffer itself. CShe was tired and locked
away from him, thin-lipped and perplexedo while-be-washelf-prestrete


160 Be
mitrlosiren herewag always thie disharmony between them whemthe
suddeuly
desire maatoo-atrong inhim. But then she |turnèd to him one evening
X1 C
lr Ged and
Aegid (me
put u
betueer ks leg
and heir moods coincided, in a manner thet-wes"beyond them bothr It
of Cretee,
was quite like 'Stratford'. And he was once more quiet; presumably,
he Ruew ta He
the desire would ouge/naga build up in him again andhbisenkions eoneern
feaved iV yeu
ulO itie e fe excilap, ec ca LR Le
wonld-grensith it
wedii trfn easily.
Hanni happened to get an afgernoon off and dropped in one day.
She cooked a meal with him and they went for a walk afterwards.
They'd
never really spoken to each other freely before, not in the way the new
friendship between the four of them demanded. ) Shewas naturally stiff,
fsom-shyness, tremulouelyawareofher own-morements, to the point of
self-paralysie,itseemed. This was
sioularly H a when he looked at
Hkis lme
her, fellowingher-with tris sharp eyes. But gradually she began-to talkest
a congiding 3 ay,
tohim as he'd seen her talk to Pinkie, in angnebuly intimete end -oonf-
yel all the uree inkmale beceuse
idential-vay,keeping her mouth tense and half-closed, (even as she spoke.
2 Hal
I A certain sadness prevaded a her talk.
It was always there, like
keening. She seemed to be mourning something, Anangeministont-woy--
beris
pod,
someone-elee's disloyalty, the pain of/misunderstensine. aShe
very
spoke in a monotone, parface-unmovingn her eyes/still under ker straig-
Hal seened lo
ht, black eyebrows, Xike thick-lineseross-her-brow /fixtg her eyes
en hignlened $x) pre. nion.
in themayof semeone frightened. She wasx indeeds frightened. L Eng-
land, masehl mo Aly * Te Ind ) 2:ck's
a wed too.
kish society uoulaneveP-bhe quite familierto her, tud She didn't
Wan afraid
know how much of herself to give.
She feared that if she gave too much
wpla think har
Sne 5
she
reveated-es)a poor, imitating,
rouiatie
colonial/persomiza simpte
Yamily-woman, which Pollocke wouldn't allow her to be! Her feet were
Gromille
almg;
tiny, he/noticed as they walkedf she was like a little girl, with an
old burden of sadness that made her stiff, unjustly.
Her mother was Assyrian but her father English. He kad been a
had been
political officer before marriage and was sent by the Foreign Office to
Kurdistan on a special mission after the 1914 war, when the Kurds
were resisting the idea of sharing Iraq


nB 161
wi th the Arabsyunohoduved-chodrom/Tso-chodrom/Tnoloné He was a straight-
backed young Engliehman at that time and was known to have a way
with the Kurdish tribes. He could trust himself to their hospitality
in lonely mountain villages, at a time when a number of the political
officers were getting bullets in their backs. He met Hanni's mother
in Kirkuk and after their marriage they settled near by in a village.
Hanni reminded him of Bertha, araer@ling/Nay, They had the same
watchful air, as if HAR immediate personal dignity was the most
important thing for them. Only when Hanni talked softly and intimate-
ly was she rally herself. At other times, especially when there were
people about, she seemed to be concentrating on the form
of/conversation)
not akuxtryawhat was said.
saayaud
He told her a little about/Bertha, how she despised Kath'm and
hated it if he served at table, which he did whenever Granville was
eating alone. And to his surprise Hanni didn't shut herself up, as
she usually did when the Middle East was mentioned.
"Oh, yes,". she replied with a curiously tired look, touched with
irritability, "I know hér type all right!"
"She keeps a bible in the sitting room."
She nodd ed. "We kept a bible, too!m
tals
It had been in the family for generations, she said, and as
lay
always kapt/on a lace mat in the sikting corner of the sitting room,
but without thé silver-plated crucifix. She hated the village where
she was born. lhertiredness, like an ancieht-streas, camerout
parki
tar
whenshe talkedhabout t6
She described the tiny front room with
its stuffed owl in a glass case and its imitation-English furhtture,
Over the mantelpiece there'y had been gilt-framed pictures of the King
tehash
and Queen and the Prince of Wales. It was a deliberate ineernation
of Victorian England.' He was struck by the phrase and threw her a
was
quick glance, realising she muetbe mueh more articulate than fa Le'd


thought.
"That wasn't daddy's style at all," she added.
was all mummy. He started a trading company and then started
drinking. Mummy was horrified.
You know, she had a kind of
village-mentality.
She thought he got us a bad reputation.
-Which he did. He used to debunk everybody when he was drunk---
he used to call them dirty shysters---in the middle of dinner--
and my mother used to go absolutely cold as steel!
I can see
her face now!"
But her sympathy was with her mother.- One could feel
that. She shared that sense of indignity---the steel-cold
disapproval.
SKAXHE@***xXEXHEISEif*x*i*EXEXXINMEXIeritEdXdIspesitRXIXERXXX
RisappxaxatYRIXERMPIedxwithXaXXERXEXEIXPRISMRAIXEtxgasitiuIHRY It was
in her own life, too, perhaps inherited---disapproval coupled
with a sense of personal position. Her father had outraged
this, though she loved him. He was dead how---he died of drink.
And her mother still looked after the trading company, in Beirut.
"Mummy came to England to give birth to me, so that I'd
be English, # Hanni said. "And she sent me - to an English school
near Kirkuk which was staffed- by caricature-Englishmen.
They
behaved like a comonial's idea of an English gent!"
All the time she talked he was afraid that her intimacy
would break any moment, so he said nothing, only nodded and
made little exclamations.
In this sort of life one had to
cling to any little bit of intimacy.
But he still couldn't fathom her, he couldn't get near
her. - No doubt she felt the same about him.
Which of them
was the more natural, he asked himself, if either of. them were?
As soon as she was with other people again her stiffness,
that was more an ancient dignity turned to a modern social use,
came back, and everything he said to her was again like a
message flashed across the sea. Hee face hardly moved and
she made only staccato little statements; perhaps only with
Dick was she really seen.


163 ffrs.
trading eompany from Beirut, where shehad set up home. As ayoung
wife she'd gone to London speçially to give birth to Hanni, determined
she should be English through and through. And then Hanni had been
sent to school inEngland, from the time she was ten.
But it was still impossible to see inside Hanni from all this;
as soon as they were with other people agair her stiffnèss, thatwas
more an ancient
1 dignity turned to a modern socialuse, came
back, and everything he said to her was once morelike a message flashed
across the sea. Her face hardly moved and she made only staccato little
Dick alone
Aueatal
stahements; perhaps only with Poilogke was she seer An truth.t Ma feen.
Dick as good as said this one day.
"I could write volumes about that girl," he said. "Shés like a
goudoetel South Sea island---with.the storms thrown in, of course!" hè
dded facctiously:
Re added,
Hanni, Diek-said, wasn't a talker. She was only known through
inipliealih catug
her silences. "My book," he said with a. aharming smila, len de a
which ak He Oultivated ane E - Tvould be a book of silence!"
Jabe tme
deliualel
Once or twice: she stayed at Chaworth Road for the night, alone,
was
lut suile when she didn't expect Dick back at Hampton Court. Apparently, this
a form
sincere,
was eemekind of retaliation.
She never said what Dick got up to on
Sex 3 an oe
those evenings away. But it was easy to imaginegfcon-obamybhabalked
J) tis Yig Hemes ueut with y onth - )
aboutnsex. F U wes-enotiner-of his obsessi tons, bogether-with-youth;
wwa-wont-togesher for hime A11 Hanni said was that it was part
I stoy nt all riger, a
Rim ratter
of his palicy of independence/ She talked a bout Diek/much, as she
coolly,
talked about her father, wathr-coslnees-aed without apparent attach-
a mo takly kind -
- - Agdgd
ment exceptyor -
#er words almays
a Htr
left/ IZL sting behind them. She said she knd learned the gift of
AChh
And Grauinlle
Astinging godsip early in life. Whenevor she talkodfabout Diok
begen
uu himserg
geela with
D, ck
Talked
Granville Eoamica/burning/ resentment against him, until he pulled
Svoy,
himself up. She spoke in the same flat, unenchanted voice. Some-


leak. 164
lo.ked rke
logal
times she and Dick were perfect strangers .
hothors and some-
wexe
times they sested like young loverso cooingorereechothoninwat
sabet
looked N
perfetwedega She said Dick never allow-
ed a loving mood to go on for long. It soon made him feel caugh to
He was horrified at the idea that she might require all. his attentions;
And
he was a little like Pinkie in this! Skd he always had a device
ready for keeping her at. a distance, like arranging a formal little
dinner-party, just for the two of them, at the Caprice or the Berkeley
Grill. He would Aphone her from the office and make the formal
adenatouch-os-facctionoctionomess-EndsJoality,
invitation,/and she would get herself up to impress him, oiyA as if
tis .
Sanding
they were new lovers. In a way she enjoyed Ats The dressing-up was
yo" Shrctiomr) nice; she felt woken up. And he did want her to look pretts, unlike
the boring men who took their wives for granted! But, still, it was
always a jolt: suddenly she had' to behave as if she didn't know him.
She would smile at him across the table, shining in her dress with
Zick wmld hehave us f he'd hewre seen Rer
the bare shoulders, and ithen slowly caa 1 Lengin the formality
Lofore, looking belween &i
C A unth h
s whe 5 dixlan ce
botmestthem inamost exei ne way, wonld come he ald toachrop-tover
and faniliarity -
+Le la
rtnll n
ref rewed a tiTdt Pemulougnfron having a€
He often hurt her
iif amilias wirh a sranger,
and infuriated her, but in the end she always agmired him.
ask Rer lo
Or he would snugest-biratreio went down to his parents at Harrow
for a few days, just to make the formal break. And he laid it down
as a principle that they must each have at least two evenings a month
itah to themselves, to go out where they liked and with whom they liked,
and no questions asked. For mutual happiness she agreéd. But she
rarely took pp her free evenings. Once or twice, out of loneliness,
she tried to interdfere wi th his but he retalia_ted at once, with an
extraordinary unrelenting thoroughness: he would spend three or four
evenings out in a row without saying anything. A principle once
agreed on must never he broken.
This was absolute with him.
She wanted to furnish the Hampton Court flat properly but he


NATA 16
wouldn't let her. They all began talking about this one evening
and Dick murmured, glancing over at him with a smile, "The furniture 1d
start staring at me!m He said he wanted a place that offered. no
'definitions of his character. So the flat was as bare as posshble,'
A properly furnished place would make too full a statement about him,
he thought.
When she talked about him Hanni always made it seem tha t she
played a meek role, giving in to him for the sake of peace. But behind
her level voice there was quite a hard will. Yet this was only an
impression.
Nothing could be verified from her quiet manner.
whom Dick nicknamed
She had a good rapport with Dick's mother,amaxafkEAXWEMxwmntxaewnxts
'Lady Godival---his father was 'King Arthur'-- --and often went down to
suaximrxxxxRtzkoxatoayaboayaxestimixhtsxpareubsctitaigxantiontonnabctking
see hhem, From what she said they felt a shadow of disappointment
*t****xanaxkXEKEXHAMEXXIEXE : EXSEXAEREEERKENext*atXHEXBRE
over
with their son. He hadn't gone the way they'd mapped out for him.
Dick was amused and offhand about them. But at the same time there
was a touch of bitterness in his voice, as if they'd played all sorts
of ineffectual tricks on him. 'His face took on a guarded look when
were
they/mentioned, He said he called his mother Lady Godiva because
'idea
Rer
'Hanlled' him ri 4 a
the stery of a-wehen riding naked on a horse had always) reminded him
an Dedipa sidal L
ionis
or some Teasong while *King Arthurt was a good/title for a.
man who 'd - never attempted anything heroic in his life?
(Hanni seemed tyhe disabbue Ls en
was, perhaps, the disappointment-that Hanni) shareg/with
MoANSO his motker.
Dick told him one day that she always came back from
knowing
could
Harrow with a spectallynknoyredgeable look in her eyew, as if
she
now
seen right through him down to his toes.
He old girel
jwes hoe
"This makes her look like my
mmm # he added, 11 which einee K
a kick !
I Ca thau literally a CR heyg u
Hipmnettratoin + ith-hér Fhel
was child givesme quite
wwith
kiokt
and
lmgaro
Beopuse-here-ehe-
itgu And he spluttered)
HamA
ully Ihatat


Nyba
Granville only he'ard Dickes parents spoken of by their nicknames.
Nale hams
Hanni used them as well. Sometimes Dick would call his father *King'
or the King', and his mother 'milady'.
"Milady got on the blower to me this morning," 1 he would say;
"and do you know she said she'd just seen me from the top of a gus in
High Holborn and I needed a haircut!"
He would smile. but wi th a little twitch in his lips) as if his
coolness towards * his parents wasn't complete. Mostlyhe : talked about
doing Jome kind O) lad purformance
them as distant charactersjon-thehéthorizon, perfapming-badlys Granville
hadie
Lim
had-never met them and saw them only as caricatures, thro ugh Bick:
Wio-wey-of - taiking about-thom-seemed-mestunnaturalt Tthey were Hke
Dick Lad
two mountebanks some of whose fake goods he'd been tricked into buying;
he knew their game and smiled, but bitterly because they'd caught him.
Thae was Ae -P ressim
Nothing they did or said lacked this fraudulent quality. But when
Granville asked him one day why he hated them so much he replied, "I
don'tt!n
Lady Godiva; Hanni said, was a small, thin woman with a sharp
nose and quick,intelligent eyes, not yet old and still attractiveo
temen, She was an Australian and had met King Arthur in Brisbane
Kad been
when she was agirl-of: seventeen. Thejr families were in the same
business---hotels.
She still owned a number of them in Sidney and
Brisbane, and King Arthur now managed them together with his English
interests, in the same company. He was the son of a mOnA modest
hotel-manager who had sent him to Australia to learn the ropes of the
trade from the bottom, which he'd done, starting as a bell-boy. He
was a tall, erect, kindly man and had one absorbing hobby, building
model ships. One of.his great private disappointments was leading
One o8
Dick as a child to ene-of his-n most brilliant pieced of work, a
vast, gleaming liner with cabins and lounges that. had taken him over
fo Ynnsld
three years, and hearing him say, "I hate ships, and that goes for all


MA 167
models of them, too."
'Dick had a horror of the sea and couldn't swim a stroke. Much
of his childhood had been spent on boats plying the deas between
Southampton" and Sidney Harbour. The journey never took less than
six weeks and all that time he was cooped up with his parents, an
only child, in a first-class cabin. This was usually followed by
weeks in a hotel-suite not unlike the cabin. They expected him to
join the family-business as a matter of course and perhaps manage the
two Brisbane hotels on the spot. But he coolly took a job in T.I.M.
without telling them.
Lady Godiva was completely baffled by Dick but wouldn't admit itx
to herself, Hanni saidi She tried to play his game of cool talk but
only sounded biting and disdainful. Really she'd taught him the cool-
ness, believing it was true drawihg-room style; and a public-school
had done the rest.
Showly Granville was getting to know Dick behind the style.
this sgle
He even. began to feel that itwas an urgent makeshift to stem the hot.
tides of feeling inside. But, like Hanni, Dick rarely showed his hand.
surface
On the EXXIRE he did, giving such a clear map of himself in conver sation:
but it was ondy a contour map and gave no real sense of the country:
One evening he did show his hand for a moment.
They were sitting
in the music-room talking about jealousy, just the two of them. He
was at his favourite game, examining a painful and intimate feeling
with dauntless and methodical honesty. As always he sat quite still
gazing before him, smacking his lips slightly while he thought the
matter over, half-smiling, one leg crooked over the other, apparently
and
perfect master of himself, aboveahl seeming to take an enormous
nt in euerymhuig te did aud said.
relish in the existence of his own limbs/. That was perhaps the most
compelling and attractive thing about Istslcompany, that he seemed to
a imediale physical
tiuseel, in hi brhlim av te Kie Satkas
take /relish in
he thought


"Yes, #t Dick went on coolly, "I did it when I found a chap
in bed with Hanni---naked as well!" Oh, yes, that was what Hanni *
had told. him the first evening---he remembered.
"Or rather, I
I did, it the second time I found him in bed. The first time
I stood by the door and made a quivering little speech---which
the little man took absolutely no notice of at all!
I said, *
'This bed has been offered to myself and my wife for the night'
(which it had, by Pinkie---you see how principled I am even in
my rages?), and I gave him ten minutes to fuck off!x Otherwise,
I said, I'd have to pull him out!"
It was a funny picture, Dick standing at the door talking
like that, and Granville smiled.
This seemed an encour agement
to Dick and his face dell into more of a repose; a glint of
humour came back into his eyes as well, as if by permission
from Granville.
He'd never behaved'so defencelessly before,
even years ago at the training school.
m "Did you pull him out?" Granville asked him.
"No! The fellow was still there when I got back. So
I smashed the mirror!"


JSO
was standing
anixsacolxaxxmii sitting down, in all his movements, in the way
agerins ench atiw
he put kks the tips of his fingers together and tapped them/ever so
This
slightly, and in the continual, slow smacking of his lips. Itwas
a self-sufficiency tat-SometIEs made Granville feel quite. overshad-
owed. Dick always seemed to be leaning back with an audience, while
timseef
Gaemai
Far + he himsede was always leaning forward, trying to
achieve an audience.
But this time Dick leaned. foeward and in the most confidential
voice said, "You know who broke that mirror upstairs, doh't you?"
mO2m
"You didn't!" Gramille said with stmshment,
which was
He gazed across at Dick's face, Ja little flushed and quite without
prviausly
style now; and didn't know how to take him at all. Butit was/true:
Said
Dick told-himthat hetd done it out of jealousty when herd found
Hansi,
another man in bed with eeng naked as well! Or rather, he'd done it
the second time hellfound the man there, for the first time he stood,
by the door and made a quivering speech, telling the man, who took
no notice at all, that this bed had been offered to himself and his
wife for the night---which it had, by Pinkie (Dick was principled
even in his rages)---and that he gave him ten minutes to get out of
it. Otherwise, he'd havé to pull him out. It was a funny picture,
Smiled.
Dick standing by the door talking like that, and Granville burstout
laughing- This seemed an encouragement to Dick and his face fell
into more of a repose; aglint of humour came back into his eyes as
well, as if by permission from Granville. Hetd never behaved so
defencelessly before, even years ago at the training school.
Gamille
hin
"Did you pull him out?" he asked,
"Nol The fellow wa 'S still there when I got back. So. I
smashed the mirrort"


own
He said he strode across the room and to his/horror towe the
mirror off the wall and threw it at the window, where it' caught the
lower ledge and smashed to pieces.
"As a matter of fact," he added, "whileI was téaring if off the
nail an image of you came into my mind and I thought, Poor old Granville 1
I'm smashing his furnituré up!in
"Oh," Granville said with a.smile. "That's all right.!"
"I'll pay for it one day."
"No, no, that's damages of war!" They exchanged a friendly,
intimate glance that was unusual between them.
Dick hadn't, luckily, thrown the thing at the occupants of the
bed. Hanni was sitting up terrified and blinking, her breasts showing
he said.
juit
over her petticoat, As for the man, he simply stared at Dick with
Dick Aad
his mouth open, not grasping what was going on at all. - Then/he flung out
of the house and walked the streets for half-an-hour, his legs trembling
so. violently that he could hardly stand up.
"Were they up to cmdything?" Granville asked, TAtolartanslyn
mt A
phenqrestion-scurded
a reat BefDicks
Buhgc
But he) didn'efrineb he leoked-bask at bim Nit themost
perfech.simplicity, like a child, and-said witha shrug and smile,
ard
But Ke
"I don't know, " Dick said with C shrug
a smile.
U as Very satt.
Tals
"What does she say?"
"She says she was drunk and doesn't remember anything. I
Granville told aim that Hamni-had-mentioned-th ineident tohim
the firet-eveningy but tek didn seem interested, The-whole-matter
Qick's
jealousy-was-strange: te believed -so muchinindependence,
But-whena feeli h fig entered
rat ras so-to-speaiky-out-of-eharacter,
+ heeitatete say ser
"Does the idea haunt you, rather?" Granville asked. He was
happy to find that they weren't such different creatures after all3


pa 110
But Dick asked, "What idea?"
"Her sleéping with somebody else, if she dia.n
Dick was surprised. "No! Why should it?" And he went on talk-
ing in a remfiniscent tone about how he' 'd wandered the streets a* that
night. "By God, Pip, that was an awful feeling---the idea of him up
there--Jr He gazed at the floor before him, his eyes gleaming as if
Telling an
816ry
he was romemboring-an adventurelferd-pndr There was almost a smile.'
"Do you know the experience? I think I must have walked twelve
blocks that night, more or less counting the railings as they passed,
and all the time that little room was. in my mind! I kept saying to
myself, 'I'l1 give them ten minutes moret, then I was going to pull
the fellow out. I probably wouldn't have, though."
"Was he there when you got back?"
"What did Hanni say?"
But again Dick had little interest. "What did she say?" He
paused for a time, passing his hand vaguely over his mouth, still
gazing at the floor. "Oh, I Hartt think she was already a sleep."
Seemed la
It was the jealousy itself that/interested himgmoats He had
an intrigued and baffled expression on his facé when he talked about
his own trembling, as if it had come from outside, like something
actually shaking his legs, a complete surprise and also in some wa y
a gift: it showed what untouched experiences lay in him.' He marvel-
He seemed
gutely
led at
And Hanni's tole was. secondary.
must love
her,
Yet/hé
a ali?
harnellingat feel the jealousyk Granville looked at his friend in perplexitye
The fellas 6 as guile ceyad Tim.
tke tacl
mat I &O
a thre-bottomof hims
Hak te lad
In a moment Dick returned to his old manner: he decided he
feeling
wanted to #have a look at the girls" at the cafein the Commercial
all. They
teally suprised Road where they had wicker baskets on the walls---he said he liked the
hin
waitresses thereg And he leapt out of bis chair as if it had just bitten
Hey poed his auhenticity.


ista 1
him in the pants. He left behind in Granville a sense that underneath
his lonely style there was something grand and warm that would be re-
vealed steadily to him inthe next few weeks.
Perhaps he would be an-
other real friend like Mohammed.
He was excited at the idea.
Like
all
had
many men he had always looked for a friend but foand a handftull of
instead.
acquaintances He terribly needed the talk of a man.
It gave him
confidence and steadied him. Even now he felt he could face his jeal-
Vals ousy towards Pinkie better.
Who were women, after all? Damn them!
Dick and Hanni stayed at the house quite frequently, and were some-
times there for the week-end,
Hanni said it was 'heaven' after the
Hampton Court flat.
However, there were small irritations between
the two couples.
The chief cause, sometimes the scapegoat for the
other three, because he was so helpless, was Dick.
When he slept the
night in ohe of the single beds he left it unmade in the morning, and
he rarely washed up after a meal; he would cook himself eggs and bac-
on, and leate his dirty things floating in water.
His help in the
kitchen was perfunctory, and he did strictly what he was asked to do,
no more, even if it meant watching a kettle boil over while he sat at
Wes
the table, or letting the joint burn.
The answer afterwards weuld
alway,
ustallybe, "Well, old 8I ports, I'm awfully sorry and all that, but you
didn't say anything, did you?" One Saturday he went shopping as a
special gesture, engineered by Hanni, and returned to the house with
almost nothing: he had read 'leg of lamb' in Pinkie's list as 'quart-
er of ham' for some reason, so that there was no joint for the week-
end; and he said he 'couldn't find' the vegetable shop.
Also he
swung on a chair in the kitchen one evening until it broke. Granville
found Dick's blindness to detail a romantic quality, and his own irr-
at u
itationjpetty and watchful.
Sometimes Pinkie and Dick seemed to be in league together, sitting
over crossword-puzzles or a game of chess for hours. And sometimes


Mgtp
Hanni and Pinkie seemed to be conspiring against 'the spear-side',
as Dick called himself and Granville. Most of the irritations were
unspoken, U forgotten quickly in a smile or a friendly cup of coffee in
the kitchen.
Pinkie and Granville, as a couple, had a standing crit-
icism of the other two/as a couple: they 'crept off' to bed too soon,
and didn't 'club in' to make an intimate little dinner-party together;
their company was always or the point of being withdrawn, it seemed;
they were 'nervous'.
There were odd comings and goings all the time. Hanni would
call at the house and Pinkie would leave with her soon afterwards;
then Dick would call, after they'd gone, and seem surprised not to find
find
them there, and leave immediately as if he knew where to leek-tor them.
Or Pinkie would call from the office towards the end of the afternoon
and ask if Hanni had come over, then omit to leave a message for her in
case she did come over, saying it was 'all right', they were sure to
'meet up' somewhere.
Or the three of them might return to the house
together late in thex evening, saying they'd all met 'by chance' in
town. He had the impression of a club they. knew, or a house similar
to this one, only with a more flowing clientele. (E Excilzd ahd
Rorrified lim ek tte Jame rme,


nst
Chapter@..
Pinkie was given an office of her own at Wembley, as assistant
PRO:
to the publiocrelatkonsrofticon it was quite a promotion and came
from Nigel's staff, not from him.
Now and then it involved her in
taking someone to lunch or dinner.
She no longer travelled for the
firm, but, she said, she might have ao spend a week-end away in Man-
chester or Birmingham.
He wondered at this.
It sounded like the scr-
ew being turned.
Her face was set as she said it, in a deliberate
way, her teeth gritted.
She looked tired in the' evenings, her face
hever
always drawn Aanevhtt into a mask, and they raraby went out together
now.
The house grew quite lonely.
Or herhaps it wasn't the house but
the fact that only he, of all the people they knew, had time for wayward
thoughts. Everyone else was governed by schedule.
He felt he car-
ried no weight in their company and began to wish for the end of his
leave.
Dick came in one evening and said he was getting the managership
of the South American department in a few weeks' time. Apparently,
he thought Hanni had said nothing to anyone. His eyes glittered in
a fixed way as if he was torn between his own achievement and a sense
of shame. Usually one didn't get a managership until one was thirty-
five or forty, especially in TIM where things were a bit conservative..
He didn't seem at all happy.
Hanni kept glancing at him. - She also
was in a strange mood these days.
They were all sitting in the kitchen and Hanni murmured to


ISi6. 1Y4
tali Pinkie between her teeth, "Look at him!m Dick was swinging on his
chair-- Ya nervous habit of. his---with his hands in his pockets and
his head rather sunk down. "He hates the idea!" She gave Dick a
dry side-glance. "He was all right when somebody else was giving
the orders. It made him feel young. But now he's going to have
people calling him sir."
And she chuckled, puffing at a cigarette. Dick had a remarkably
clean look, as often on days when he felt uncomfrotable. His hair
was neatly brushed and he wa_s YOVLPUA-DAVP pale, HAMDOUDMLODAI
purged
with a youthfui,look in his eyes. His hands were manicured; he
had them done every fortnight at the same shop in the City: he said
the girl touching his fingers gave him endless chances to explore
loak don tas cmse
her character and also/be-degdeeam---one day he would ask her to
meet him somewhere.
Hanni's eyes were narrowed against the smoke of her own cigarette,
and they seemed to blaze with anger.' Pinkie smiled, in a private
understanding with her. She had put her handbag on the. floor,
having just come in from the office, and was powdering her nose;
pursing her lips as if efraid to see herself in the little mirror.
"He's afraid hets going to get like his father," Hanni went on,
trying to provoke him out of his silences
And Dick did speak after a time, still swinging on his chair,
gazing down, his voice very quiets
"Well," he murmured, "you ought to know.
Ylo
"Why are you so scared of responsibility?" she asked him immed-
iately, her eyes fixed hard on him.
But he relapsed into silence again. Hanni pursued the subject
coolly.
"Of course, it means you'll be getting a better screw, deosn't
it?" she went on,'


TEF 175
Dick nodded in silence.
Kals
"And we don't want that to happen. You'd rather go on with
the old screw, wouldntt you, and have the freedom?"
"Yes, I suppose I would," he replied in a tired way. "The
problem of youth, you know!" C aololed Eitterlg.
Pinkie laughed. "You'd better be careful, old cock, or you'll
find yourself furnishing your flat nicely!"
"Yes," Hanni said, also laughing. "He might find himself tied
down to a comfortable armchair."
"Probably," Pinkie went on, "he's just like his dad really; only
he doesn't want to fall into it too fast."
This was too much for Dick. He hissed at her, "Shut up!"
And the women laughed in a defensive and triumphant way, at having
provoked him; their voices were harsh.
"What's wrong with your dad?" Pinkie dried, her lips trembling
as always when she was reprimanded.
Dick coolly got up from his chair and left the room. Later
Granville saw him glance at himself in the mirror downstairs on his
way out, his face delicate and troubled. He turned and saw him.
"I hate any comparison with my dad," he said almost in a
whisper. Granville nodded and smiled, wondering if he meant it as
a joke, but Dick walked out with a perfectly straight face, little
arare of him, it seemed; and a moment later the downstairs door
clo seda
Afterwards Pinkie said that Dick looked exactly like his father.
She'd got this from Hanni. Perhaps it explained the beard, she
said: it was a sort of dis stress-signal; Le wus marooned in his trody.
When they all met again the following week-end there was more
Ne wricad hgh aad ha tal
irritation, to which Granville was only a
Their quarrels
spectator. I
showed-en-intimecy-which left him rather a stranger


Dick happened to say, "Oh, by the way," addressing Granville,
"I always spit a Pip in old Nevinson's.eyex when I can, you know,
just
himenowy just to let him know what a: fine chap you afe."
Nevinson, being the head of the Middle East section, was import-
ant for him, though they'd never mets
And Pinkie was,suddenly annoyed.
"I bet you did it carefully!" she said, flaring up.
There was silence and Dick's lips tightened just as they'd done
dait.
before 3 He fixed his eyes'on her and murmured,"No, I didrts."
"Well, I can't imagine you laying it on very thick, in case you're
ware proved w_rong---"
"No, and I can't imagine, Nevinson listening if I did."
Granville was forgotten for a moment. They were fixed on. each
other.
"Well, good old Dick!" she cried. "You're nothing if not
judicieus!"
Dick turned to him and said quietly, his eyes full of dislike,
"How do you stand this, woman every day?"
"Why is it you like keeping things under your hat?" she asked,
trembling again.
"I suppose because I'm cagey," he replied?
"Well, it's no surprise to me that some of your clients are
speechless when they walk in your office. You give them the willies",
old cha
"I don't think you've been in my officé or spoken to any of my
staff," he replied, again in a quiet voice, his back erect.' There
cutiis
was something white-hot and unfergiving in him when he was stirred
sometimest
Both Dick and Pinkie had to go out to dinner later and Hanni
told him when they were alone that Dick had annoyed, Pinkie by


Vsa
'keeping something under his hat' that was important to her.
Granville couldn't understand what this was and tried to get
to the bottom of it. But she was evasive.
Yet her dark,
protective gaze told him that one day she would explain: at
léast, she'd made it clear that there was something to explain.
There was good news for him. Glenning said he d heard
he might be getting the Beirut office!
This was because
Nevinson didn't like the way things were done there; he
preferred Granville and thought he had a better rapport with
the Arabs.
Of course, this was promotion.
Beirut was
considered a gem in the foreign sections at least as far as
the 'sweat-jobs' were concerned, being the 'Paris of the Middle
This brought him and Pinkie closer together for a time.
That evening, as they were going to bed, they began talking
about it, and without warning the intimacy of their very first
two weeks together, when they'd met at Reading, enveloped them
again.
Isn't it wonderful about Beirut?" she said.
"We could have one of those lovely houses by the sea!"
"Thatis exactly what I thought!"
"When do you think it'll be?" she asked.
"Soon, I hope."
He switched off the light and got into bed at her side.
"It'll be lovely moving there, I she said quietly.
He was surprised how soft her body felt at his side---
quite different from that first evening, when she'd felt: angular
and also frail to his touch, distant from him, in her own
strange sleep, without the neeessary blood for intimacy.
Now she was soft and yet firm, with a kind of invisible Nimp
plump wholesomeness of the flesh.
Out of this sudden intimacy they drew everything that
was possible---for a change.
They kissed each other sweetly
and softly, like children, again and again, their lips wet,
and they clung to each other in a gentle way, not exploring
o PE


each other's bodies but locked together mildly, their breath
intermingled, in a closeness of perfect health. It was quite
different from 'Stratford'---it was what their love should have
been when it wasn't 'Stratford'.
They came allmost at the 'same
moment, mildly and completely, sunk into each other with this
unpausing sweet intimacy. Her orgasm never wracked her whole
body---it was always local, as if limited naturally, half-
broken from childhood, made too secretive for the natural-
functioning world.
But at least they were togéther, in sweet-
ness.
They fell aslepp at once, staying in the same position
all night, her right leg crooked 'over him and her flimsy night-
dress in a bundle round her waist, like a thick silk band under
her breasts, making them swell. It was like being in a region
underneath life, full of warm, shadowy touches that weren't
even definite enough to be known as touches; and next day.
they were both clear and happy-looking.
X6 RNSAE


Vatre
Eréeping somet thing under kEx his hat that was important to hèr. -
couldn't understand what this wa S and tried to get to the bottom of
it. But she was evasive. Yet her dark, protective gaze saomad to
tsld
telhim that one day she would explains at least; she'd made it
ciear that there was something to explain.
There was good news for opethison Glenning said he'd heard
he might be gétting the Beirut office! This was because Nevinson
didn't like the way things were dône there; ho preferred Granville
and thought he had a better rapport with the Aràbs. of course,
this was promotion. Beirut was considered a gem/in the foreign
sections at Aeast as far as the 'sweat-jobs' were concerned, being
the tParis of the Middle Eastt,
They went on the river again at Hampton Court, this time the
four of thems It was a lovely, still day and he felt drowsy and
content: The reeds on either side were dry and tall, stirring
slightly in the breeze. They'd taken out a punt but were using
canoe-paddles instead of a pole because the water was too deepd
Hanni and Pinkie were. lying at the bottom of the boat sunning themselves
while the men paddled quietly side by side. They left houses behind
them and came into perfectly silent countryside.
Before them in
the distance there were hills, smooth and bright like a marvellous
cloth, and on either side there were fields with hedges; at their
own level, so that they seemed to be gliding silently through the
earth. Granville felt quite rid of his problems now. He had no
extfa desires,
And as if a sense of what he was. thinking had entered Dick
Baral's
the question came from his side, "I should think Mansuplea bit of
a dumpy isn't it?"
"I mean, politeness aside!"
To16O


fkb. 180
He hesitated. "Yes, I suppose it is."
Their voices echoed a little across the river.
"Of course, you have to put a good façe on it and all that,"
Dick added.
This wasn't Granville's feeling at all and he wanted to explain
a Baral
aE what the fascination of Mesut was for him. But Dick had already
looked away and was addressing something to Hanni who lay behind them
with her eyes closed, getting a bit flushed from the sun: Chis had
happened quite frequently in the last few weeks: Dick would àsk a
question and then show; by turning away toasomething else, that it was
really rhetorical. Meanwhile the words rushed to Granville's mouth
and he was left feeling like à man with nowhere to put his vomit3
Pinkie opened her eyes and murmured, "Do you remember that fish
we cooked in the garden?"
"Ittsa kind of cod," she added to Dick, who was gazing at the
water with a genial expression. Then she chuckled: "Of course,
it did taste a leetle of burned wood !"
"Oh, well," Dick said, making his noiseless laugh, "bedouins
can't be choosers, can they?"
There was more pleasantry and Granville stomached his words,
letting the heat go down slowly. He found it easiest to talk to
Dick, and closest to the style of talk that existed between the four
of them, when his feelings were at a minimum. As long as he kept
a check on himself it was all right, but if he let himself go he was
left with a feeling of regret or constricted stomach.'
As the pleasantry went on---now it was about a ghastly dinner
Dick had been to the previous week 5
drepped pieee-of
Sowe
horning
aca * ta - a
seused-herr ingt
i the lovely day began to


131 NST
darken for him, He wantod to laugh and did, and also he was content.
But the fields looked dwindled to him and he had a sense of dryness and
surfeit, as if everything round him was fixed and dead in its position.
A casual and bland style existed between the four of them in which
sustained ideas were impossible. One just had to learh how to leap
from one thing to the next, never dipping too far. The moment a tone
of sustained interest came into his voice the conversation dropped a
little. This wasn't Dick's doing; not wholly. He thought it might
have something to do with the company being mixed, two men and two
women, So that a compromise-style was achieved, nei ther the sustained
intimacy of womn's talk nor the sestained 1e - of men's.
The style, flippant and selective, though not always flxippant,
was the only one they could all have together. Yet it wasn't natural
asang
itah
to all of themo even-te-moot-of-thems Dick soemed-to imposel/it as
an act of will, so deep now that it was second nature. And Hanni
was tense, keeping back her spontaneity, gripped tight inside. Only
Pinkie had the style in her flesh; it wasn't a strained or unnatural
or jarring element in her, nor did it involve mental surveillance es
She lay at the bottom of the boat with her eyes half-closed, list-
less, the touch of a smile lingering on her mouth. A selective
conver sation, sranging quickly over mâny subjects, never committed
to any, was natural to her. Going deep would be like a breach of
delicacy. It was a datiexke light curiosity that touched on things
dcparted,
and wett She and Dick were similar in this, while Granville and
Hanni were sttent similar in their silent withholding of the batt-
alions of truth; though Granville was always looking for a breach
in the enemy-line to pour them through?
Pinkie knew natura lly how to select and range over subjects 3
and what was permissible and what.was not. Discretion played no
part. She could be as rash as she liked but style lay in her flesh,


Ttp
very
not limiting her, but the/form of her being. In her quiet moods
she would sit with a reminiscent gaze, talking casually, rather in
a dream, and every now and then she would touch the tip of hér forefing-
er with her tongue in a delicate, slow; gliding movement, still
gazing before her, while preparing to talk again, as if to indicate
Agra ne A Ganuille had beeu m eace sta
the turn of her intérest. LE Cae
Ger HV Length-of
Solne Miml
+r time's she would lap up all his information afterwards in one or two
sittings, leaning back, her gaze upwards; asking one question after
another in the most economical way, but without hental alertness, only
following her curiosity with a casual, dreamy obedience. She hadn't
Banal
ias done it this time, mtshe asked nothing about his last month in Mosul.
It seemed that Mohammed and the Cabala and the club-room at the United
Kingdom Complund where she hated going so much---all the things she
would naturally want to know about---were now dead in her memory:
The- four of them ended up at the pub with the lawn where he and
once,
Dick had played croquet before-TOwingbackih total dasknesse This
also
time/it got darko toor The evening was warm and exciting, with
yellow lights on the other side of the river and the dound of grass-
croymet
hoppers. There were young couples playingh their voices drifitng
laugh hg
between the trees, t
ser,
The sun went down in a vast red
blaze, making the flat water glow like a lantern spread out. How
lovely it wast London seemed many miles away.' The perfect silence
of countryside began to fall all round and their voices became hushed
Bamk
in the air. How could he bear to return to Mosul? Pinkie was close
shrong
to him, her shoulders brown from the sun, massive and dark in the last
shadows Then they paddled slowly back to Hampton Court, but this
time there was a moon and everyone was drowsy from the beer and heat
His arms were burned where he'd rolled up his sleeves, and he roticed
sighit,
that Dick's face was flushed deep and his hair blea ched yellow at the
front. He could see his beard as theyr paddled, whisps of it silhouetted


like a thin bush against the moonlit bank on the other side?
"Penny for your thoughts, sea-scout," Dick murmured.
"I'm remembering last time when it was dark."
"Oh, yes!" And Dick began telling the other two in a comical
way how they'd battled their way back home . "How Captain Granville
and I brought her in that night I shall never know," he said.' "But
here
we did! And there's not a crew between/and Southend Pier xka could
say bétter."
His voice was like. a soft chant in the night, as they drifted
chuchling
slowly along, accompanted bytheohuckles/of the women/in the dark-
how Hen
ness |behind as they listened, He had an impression of each of thedr
So tal
consciousnesses drifting in the darkness far from each other, making
the set forms of the day---their bodies and the glances they gave each
other and what they said---appear liké an irrelevant world, or rather,
a partial one. Dick's voice, and the darkness that was like an
unsubstantial dust all round them, and the gradual tipping and rocking
of the boat, were the relevant world, of which the set forms were
a part we needed in order to move and see and set our wills at work.'
These forms were like gestures.
Underneath the gestures what were their consciousnesses like?
It was so difficult to tell. How did they differ from each other,
essentially? What was Hanni like, really? What were Pinkie and
Dick like, for their saying more than Hanni made them no clearer
in the end? What did this 'really' mean? People were so separate
these days. The bare physical world lay outside each one; and each
consciousness was in islolation, lacking the common joining factor
C SShicl wus
like te hoon-lit Cauk Lat passed an
of an outside world, that-waonet silent and indifferent,) But-nonz
kuv
And.
is t in-the-boaty fach of their consciousnesses lay flaoting in this
unsubstantial and indifferent dust
ilm
of night; Hay digral gmsottly alag.
kke
siel wmla l
Only someone outside a consciousness could say what it was
ha Iteu


18f
Nptr.
Setacen seeg A gestare Swr did He tm t lie 7
l.c: like,) We couldn't see into the endless depth of our selves. But
then The gestureswere So dofficult to judge for someone outside.
Even Pinkie he couldn't divine. He knew her only where there were
no longer any gestures, when they were lying in bed at night, he curled
round her, So that even their limbs were like the unsubstantial dust,
joined together. And then during the day the gestures began again,
and they perplexed each other.
Did his own consciousness differe essentially from those of the
other three? Was the discipline to withhold themselves that he
a well?
noticed in Dick and Hanni also in him
e eginn
ing? CWas theirs the typical consciousness of the new world he had
inherited through education? Was it second nature to Dick or Hanni?
Or was it second nature only to Dick? Was there an ancient sense of
style in Pinkie that could accomodate itslef to this new consciousness.
while not really belonging to it? For Dick's style was a mental one;
it wasn't part of the flesh as her's was. He thought that perhaps
Dick had the most typical new consciousness of all of them.
His mind asked these questions in a state of dreaming and he
was too sleepy to answer them. It intrigued him. He came from
a different consciousness from the one he knew now---it wasn't enough
itnls to say a different world, as if we all shared - the same kind of consci-
VAVT
ousness. This was the basic fact from which all his questions and
Wan his oun cmstiouonen disided incomplire Hitugh
prob@]ms came.
Kough
whle aud undirided
kad He felt that the others, Aperhaps not Hanni, had a complater
however disorled Hinrensciomen higlee ee
kiowip two consciousness while he didn't, L His task was to think the problems
a similar wholeness :
unlds uslcad through in order to attain to bheir-comple
this washis
Tae
ent
Nan
privebe-inberest; he didn't want to be divided. Per-even-if-Dick
dineled la keir herebhas a K a -
was dty rided - himself he ividie wesn't-ene of-total -sonsciousness?
Dick
Thet isIn hearing and seeing and smelling IR didn't doubt that he
was simply hearing and seeing and smelling as other men always had done


would.
everywhere andpdays skknit That was Granville's conclusion, after
seeing his gestures and hearing him talk. There was something undoubt-
ing in Dick which he himself didn't have; not in the matter of will or
Not in ideas- - onlyin emtioummess, tte duml cmstivuress -
desire but in consciousness. A For Granville there was always the pro-
blem of definition, undernea th all the other problems.
It wasn't
only that this was a difficult world but that he had first to decide on
what he was to take as 'the world'.
His thoughts were vague like the water and he reserved them for
anbther time, hoping he would be able to catch their vague flavour ag-
ain.
He went to the office quite often these days and had several chats
with Dick there. But they were still not at ease with each other.
C Joes
get lacplohis
alway?
Dick was so watchful and alert. DEd he want to/work? Granville/asked
himself as he stood by his déskr Was he ashamed of having a visitor
outside the strict office-schedule, in case a director walked - in?
Dicktx covered his nervousness with a bland style and genial glances,
keeping his movements as cool and slow as he could; he séemed morbidly
aware of the immddiate situation---the exact time, the work that lay
on his desk waiting to be finished, the impatience or otherwise of his
He. seemed unablelo
franbimsef.
secretary on the other side of the door-meandeouldnlt take flight) So
no real talk was possible.
Granille
One Saturday ba woke up slowly and realised MMah she wasn't there.
At first, as he roused himself, he had the usual drugged sense of being
melted in with her, without touch or real physical sensation of any kind,
then he began to realise that his arm was lying on the bed itself, not
on her hip. He moved it, to discover whether it was an illusion, ther
her
he shifted it further across - the bed to find out if she'd only altered


XGN0.
position. But she was gone. He was aware that the 'phone-bell had
rung, and at once he was wide-awake. She'd got out of bed hurriedly to
answer it; he didn't remember her getting out as a real event but as some-
thing that had taken place inside his own body, a change of feeling.
He felt mortally cold all of # sudden and was nearly trembling: It was
difficult to hear what was said on the Aphone from the bedroom, but some-
times a word or two came up the well of the stairs. He strained forward
to listen, raising his head from the pillows, but the effort had the effegk
result of making a rushing sound in his ears which blocked out everything
else, and he lay back again quickly, his eyes starting out of his head?
Whet-wae-eye-doing? Was she at the telephone? Then he heard her.
fals
There was a movement on the stairs. Distinctly he heard her say, "But
onles been Rer
hetit) be-gone-in a few days, darling! How can I---?" And then the words
were lost.' His heart was beating fast, like air bounding in his chest:
He was really trembling now, so much so that the ends of his fingers were
tapping against the sheets in a most absurd way and his teeth were chatt-
ering! The alarm hadn't gone off yet; it must be quite early.' He couldn't
hear any more. A bus passed in the distance, at first a lonely so und to him,
massive
m achine
then comforting because it suggested the great indifferent aetivi ty outside:
His-memory-oftho-efternoon-at the Lido when-he-felt held dissovered the
( Tien
ity, its-prerevontietion-efsuffering, wes semetair agofa comfortr He heard
her leave the telephone and walk upstairs to the kitchen. There was the
familiar sound of the tea-caddy as she opened it, and the sound of the
kettle as she put it heavily on the stove. He bec came calmer; the feeling
of mortal coldness became fixed in him as his trembling grew less.' He
was aware of an odd, twisted sense of pleasure in himself, at having arrived
au exsautial
1 bolanios
at thelpoint of self-destruttiony which made any licence/permissible"
He could do what he liked, always in that rigid, half-trembling state.
The pain would become fixed and hard inside him, pale. He tried to think
of what she 'd said again, as the wooden boards upstanrs moved, making
their familiar bump in the middle. The words now seemed to him different:


18k
He might have been mistakan! This thought came to him in/insppid,
cajoling way; he rejected it, but it wound its way back like ivy. He
appealed to his memory again, but that failed him.' Perhaps the words
Y had been slightly different. Why should they be referring to him? Why
not to someone at the office? But - one doesn't say darling in thet casel
Anywag, Salurday - no hicel
The office wasn't open yet./ His mind fought hard in the confusion.' He
would go upstairs and confront her with it. But he couldn't be sure.
She might turn round and give him an astonished look, as if to say, 'His
mind's not right!' He had to keep his sanity! But he had heard the
h.p. wordst Yet he couldn't repeat them to himself. And, then, why should he
worry? There was this thought at the end of all such reasoning. Suppose
she turned round and said, 'I call lots of people darlingt Why do you ha ve
to be So formal?' Exactly! Why was he hanging on a little word? Why
Sut à)
did he want to be a thinking little insect all the time? She wasjabandoned!
or coutsel She said 'darling' to her friends! They even kissed each
Hanni, Hanni
other sometimes! He'd kissed Diana, Miana had kissed him, Dick had kissed
Pinkie---what was the matter with. him] exaggerating and storming all the
time ? People could be affectionate with each otherl But at the same time
hip.
he knew that the words had been said, and he knew what they meant: as a
blank, rigid presence in his mind; like the figure of Death waiting at the
end of the corridor. His confusion only took away his power to act on
knew e'd beft unalle
what he knew. He woulin't be able to say anything to deri Whet-he-would
He'd
o. gre
de-would-be-te watch her carefully for any tell-tale sign, and te ask key-
or te show by his grimess that he was aware of what had happem-
spcok- - ho!
rygations,
ed?] 'How terrible it was to be locked in silence all the timet But he
couldn't bear to show his heart naked to her. She might ridicule him;
or she might flutter her eyelashes and say, "I don't know what you're talk-
Hanai,
ing about, Pipr" She migat go and tell Grovef Or Dienat or Dicki 'He's
so frightfully jealous,' she would say, I really can't do a thing, even
call somebody darling over the Aphonel' To hell with hert His feelings


turned full circle. What the devil did he care where she took her body?
lado It was intimacy he was after." Monwantod-toses-her-lookat-himdirestlsy
into hiseyes. But-shealvays tuxpehit--he was investigabingthoactivit-
gesoe her bodye she saidl
y seemed to Sayh For they-neveracctually
said anything to-mach-otheron the subjeetl- She spoke about her freedom.
She needed freedom. Like a spdiled child asking for more sweets--'freedomt!
Not his, of course - He was the spectator. (shawasted, Miloho-suppliod
fresdomasolertont/ontonhofstiat 5 She was on show, with her precious bodyl
Of course, it suited her vanity no endi It gave her dramatic quali ti ed,'
Anls tool She was so hunted and hemmed-in, don't you know, by a domestic life
she detestedt Not for her the kitchent) She wanted freedom, love, affectisx
Hoody
(ato ion't And in all this precious) talk she didn't give him one tiny thought."
yes!
tals She was alone! Melan She was alone when she made love to him, Maanttshet
She shut her eyes! Her body was being adoredf So he decided to keep
lials
P quieto he mustnit feed the Adea that
as obsessedwithbing He couldn 't
bear the way Dick or Hanni might. look at him: as if he had a sickness: :
1Poor old PIpI' Mrortdo-Rustante allouthat. Hera fis
mis Wayout
Aup. inaileneed She'd saidjso besochinely--arlingt He couldn't believe
taks it! Her warmth was still in the bed. It was impossible she should get up,
straight from this warmth, and say 'darling' without at least lowering her
voice! He only remembered her tone now. So beseeching! As if there
were aeons of suffering in her.' Poor Pinkie!' She sounded weighed-down
with sorrow, exhausted. He went upstairs, calmer, washed-out before the
day had started. She was getting tea busily, her face showing nothing.
She hadn' 't laid a place for him, and he got a cup and saucer disconsolately.
alam
As she poured the hot water into the pot he heard the
gqdown-
Lonoa-boll
notmal
stairs. If the atmosphere had been natural between them they would have
A befrne te alatm.
referred to that---to being up so early, L But neither of them spoke.
Wasn't that suspicious, he asked himself.
All day the sentence she 'd spoken, or might have spoken, came back


N6n.
to him, sometimes stark and sudden,
sometimes not in the form of words
at all but/a sickening turning sensation in his stomach.' That evening
ffter she returned he couldn't bear it any longer: They were sitting at
the kitchen table eating a cold dinner she'd mocked up, in silencé.' They'd
hardly sàid good evening to each other.' Again there was no one else in
the houses And he suddenly tipped the table up so that the milk fell over
and the coffee-pot, after a few seconds of ambiguity, followed it, crashing
on to the floor. He sprang ups trembling with rage. She was at once
pale, her mouth open, a terrified expression in her eyes: At the same
time he slammed his fist downj on the table:
"Get outf" he screamed. "Het out of this housef"
She couldn't get her breath properly, fixed in her chair, staring
up at hims "For God's sake," she whispered, "whatgs the matter?"
And now, even as he was trembling, his cheeks flushed, it seemed
absurd! She was simply Pinkie again, frightened by his shouting! All his
previdus though ts wefe absurd---an exaggeration. She was so frightened
she
and taken aback by hin that it seemed ths dmust be innocent! What a fool
liels
he was making of himselfi
Suddenly tipping the table up and standing there
like an ape, for no reason! Yet there were reasons: he reminded himself
of the first evening, when hetd walked up the stairs with his cases to find
a party going on---the kitchen in filth---a smashed nhirror next door: that
these wepe reasons okyes!
was how much she cared for himt' L And' his fury came back. Also there was
thal
the word 'darling': it flashed into him---across his middle---like a flame,
hurting frightfilly:
"What are you sttting there for?" he shouted.' "If you want to go
out why the hell don't you?"
"Who said I did?" she asked breathlessly.
"Oh, Christi You're like a cat on hot bricks!"
His eyes drilled into her, and she looked down and closed her lips,
palely, as if sho-was giving up the effort to speak.' So he tried to drive


his words deeper---to hurt her and thus evoke feeling in her.' But he
thal Idarling)
wouldn't mention thotelophores or say what he most feared. He wouldn t
mention Grove. He knew quite well what the limits were: : he would only
insinuate and attack:
"Why don't you drop all this being a wife, for Christ's sake? What
do you want to keep it up for, all this smiling and putting an the right
face like a bloody puppet!"
Mack
So it went on. The attack was general; all she heard was tetat
condemmationpuast/ haracten nothing specific, esrerdoteld He was
Houndalrne
trying to get a confession out of her, but in such a tircamspect way that
she pouldn't give it to him, onlyry because he fea red too much what
the confession would be. So equally he was trying to establish her
l innocence: In a way she was doing what he wanted her to do by not speak-
He stood there flushed, the ends of his fingers moving as they'd done
that mornihgs "You bloody abortionist? You killed that child, didn't
sayms
you?" He suddenly found himself asking this. He was completely beyond
himself , bent down over her, the veins sticking out of his necks "You
did, didn't you?" And even in the heat of this moment it occurred to him
quite clearly that he was asking this question only because he knew she
enly wanted ler ro Jay ho /
was onnocent and didnttin any sasercaret It was only a good way of mak-
ing her feel a sting from him---perhaps plead with him to stop---if only
she 'd plead! But she sat there pale and gripped in a panic-strieken silencek
mean,
He began calling her a slut, a dirty whore, a/crawling vegetable, until
in the contrariness of human nature he almost burst out laughing at the
Ris
way the words came tumbling out. But she couldn't see this. She 8 uld
only see the xgrim face? Then underneath his fury-cum-laughter he began
to feel X panic much like calm, tremblingly taut---as he suspected that she
agreed with him, and condemned herself, and could do nothing about it!
She was in lovel He felt like crying out, with tears in his eyes, 1Oh,'


In love!
lay
Pinkie, you're in level Please don't, please dontt---I', mueh like those
pleaded
wounded men in battle who Extadxaxk with the shells. She was in lovel
But his mind at once dismissed it, in a.blind stroke. h love!
and
She began crying, AgaJas always when this happened his anger disappeared,
it roke
as if/the rules of the game, D6000-001LA4R
"Stop crying," he murmured. Once he d said in Basrah, "I wish you
never cried when I shouted at you! I want you to be strong and stand up
to me. Why don't you contradict what I say? Why don't you shout back?"
I D
But she always gave in---lowered her head and cried like a child. The
tim
usual intolerable pity fialed/e like dust in his throat. She reminded him
of a bear they'd seen together in Kurdistan, chained to a pale behind a
landownergs house. A Kurdish solicitor called Khalid Beg with whom he'd
become quite friendly, a tall, straight-backed man with blazing, fair eyes,
Rad kaken almg.
*e feas
toole! themk When the servants approached it with long poles it began to
l. C. whimper if a most pitiful way,
= knowing what was coming; The poles
Jway,
wore to terbure-him they were/t twisted in the skin of his neck; one
Row
nhis neck
ael wot asoy.The cheel littte tasards!)
could see whene the furiwas gone) Everybody was most amused except him
and Pinkie. Every day this torture was enacged for visitorso theyisaiden
Pinkiets little, "No, don't do it any more!" made them all laugh. Now
Tal she was like the bear. He remembered how the creature had lowered his
head in a submissive way, bowing to the awful god of pain. He felt
abashed and horrified at himself, as if he'd been oné of those grinning
little servants: He was tired and hollowa He looked out of the tiny
window at the roofs and the dim sky.' It wasn't quite dark yet.i
"Shall we go for a walk?" he asked quietly.
She sniffed ahd looked up slowly. "Yes, finef" she said, already
P bright: They walked in the streets by the river, between the closed,
silent offices? There was hardly a soul about. He put his arm in hers
and they strolled along in a leisurely way, quite tired. They passed
the Port of London building with its huge pillars, like a massive, arrogant


dedicalid to polly,
tatfoly
AHa.
templel andithe Tower, lying in a dip, al shadowy haump.: in the dusk.
Chen
The river gleamed uner the lights, rolling slightly.
The air was
quite
wee
warm, with the touch of/breeze, and thereta beon clouds; there might be
a storma Even by the river there were few people, and the buses were
mostly empty, in the lull before the theatres finished: They passed a
group of tall Victorian houses with arched windows, now divided into apart-
ments. One of the windows was open at the bottzom and they could see a
dimmly-lit room with gaudy, scarlet wall-paper, xxther like a huge tapestry
alung round all the walls; and three or four people were sitting there,
drinking something, raising cups to their lips every-now-and-thon and talk-
ing. It looked so calm. They hardly seemed to move at all. The room
had a kigh ceiling with a chandelier hanging down and a large gilt-framed
mirror on the walli It might be a clubreem of some kind. It was too
gaudy, perhaps, for a private room. It was like having a glimpse into
the nineteenth century; there was such a sense of interior and warmth,
that made the present epochs seem naked. 'How wonderful se-would-beto
like that
sit in ENEK a room/with a friendit he thought He imagined the silence
that would fall between their sentences, and the way they would gaze up
at the ceiling, leaning back, in reflection. Life would be ordered.'
There would be the quiet assurance of being understood by someone, and
of looking at the world from a distance. The buses would go by outside,
a friendly voice from the world. There wouldn't be scenes like the one
he and Pinkie had just had.' Women would be more separate from men, each
owh
in their/world, with the friends they loved and the particular tone of
conversation that belongs to each sex. There wouldn't be all this
confusion and mixture of opposites. He would make coffee for his friend,
on a little gas-fire of his own perhaps; he would pick down a book from
one of his shelves.' At the end of the evening he would seecPinkie, and
she would have been in her world, too, and come out with her feminity
freshened and glowing. If only she yearned for a woman's friendhsip as


men's
Ia Michas he did for anants! But
I ho borgnia, "I don't think I like
women, really." In Basrah she told him, "I prefer the company of men 1 a
They're so much freer than women, and they're not jealous. Women can be
had
rold Rer
i L
So bitchyln He/wanted her to see more of women in Basrah. Hedassalit
keu
was a wonderful opportunity to see inside the harems. She could/tell him
about it! Mohammed had a whole family of sisters whom he would néver meet;
teu
Why didn't she go and see them? She went once andj refused to go again.
She said they were sofrightfully dull. Three of them, believe it or not,
hadn't seen the front gate of the house from the outside: The two older
ones were aldowed to take a turn round the city with their mother in a
Blinds once a day,
Ou ke Alas kasd,
closed car with the curteins down/ seeing fut unseen. Yetthoy teld-her
bhoy-wvere-vory-hoppyl She-said they were by far the happiest creatures
kem
atl day Iold Lw
she 'd met in her life! When shedaske ed what they did/they satd they rode
Keix
the bicyele round the garden pth and fell off, talked about their brothers,
listened to the wireless and played games ! But she wouldn't go back.
tte
usdus
She said she needed me company/for its bignessaand lack of trifles.
A freindship with a woman, she said, was a mariage de convenance between
two vanities. (This, he thought, was what she seemed to have contracted
with Hanni.)
"That looks cosy," he said, pointing to the room.
"Cosy?" she asked ui th a quick, affectionate glance at him. "It
looks hideous, darling!"
"Well, the furnttre, fr
that mirror!"
"What do you mean?"
"It. takes up half the walli I think our place is much nicer."
"Yes, so do I, really: But I thought with the river and all those
"Yes, the river ss lovely. a I wish we were nearer the river. We
ought to look for a house down here."


Rada kindo o hataral otn, dranatic loxeliness,
T4r
There was something very quiét aboat her. It was a quietof the
soul.' He glanced at her, surprised. She was so intact, as. he'd never
known her before. Usualty her face, suggested Tonelinessy - she had a slight-
this
ly drooping mouth and a downward gaze: But that was gone, She'd been
silent under his attack as usual, but. this time he felt his words hadn't got
Ia to-her heart, to hurt her as much as even she would have iiked! She had
how,
Was *kat it?
her own lifek separate from him. d He was aware of her as a separate person
at his side, with a new' dignity. She séemed taller even, and was gazing
before her in a level way. There was ' an undauntedness in this gaze which
he hadn't seen before. He felt. he'd been shouting at a third person---not
only
her at all. And/the third person had wept.
She hadn't really kissed him since his return.' She pecked him on
the lips; that was all. Even the second or third night, when they'd had
an orgasm', - she kept ker lips closeda) It,occurred to him that someone might
have asked hér to do this---never to, give him her tongue againf He imagined
the words, 'At least, if you have to sleep with him, don't let him do thatft
How suddenly these
stunning thoughts
waploasanty
camel
And equally someone might have said to her, 'Do you mean to say youtd
hàve his child, and give it suck?" He put his arm closer in hers, wearily,
6 J
and she hugged him to her for a. moment. They walked home in silence,
Y like children. The next morning when he got up he went straight to the
mirror and looked at himself. *Am I disgusting?" he thought. He gazed
at his rather heavy, bleached eyebrows and the tiny white lines round his
eyes caused by squinting in strong sunlights His face had lost, as held
noted-boforea--by a mere breath of a change---its weathered look. He
closes
t looked deeperybut could tell nothing.' But all at. once he foind himself
vindictive-looking, his eyes buried deep in his head, his brow heavy with
too much- frowning, his chin pushed forward in perpetual rejection. Was
it true? He couldn't tell what he was really liket He turned away from
the mirror and went slowly upstairs to the kitchen, feeling he jad no


Vhe 195
substance, his footsteps echoing through the house. His pride was
dashed. He couldn't forget how intactshe looked. He slouched about
the house all day, hardly able to lift his eyes, in shame at being him-
self.
His body didn't fit and he hated it.
He couldn't settle to
how
n p. anything and couldn't face going out. In the mornings/he woke with a
heavy, damp, still serse of unworthiness. He couldn't tell what the
root of it was. It had been going on, he thought, to a greater or less-
er extent for years, and now it was an overwhelming suffocating presenee
on top of him in the morning.
It mecontornsatal madequaayoRnis
beinganphore was a flat rejection of his whole pers oenlity. It was
ynq an unpleasant physiaal sensation---at times it/veg completely ident-
ified with his body: a pain, a sort of fever, a nasty taste in his
middle
mouth.
Sometimes he woke up in the muxRing of the night with such a
complete sense of condeanation---a terrible dankness, like a cave--
living
that he thought he hadn't the life-eneggy to go on)another minute; and
then the feeling cleared, and he couldn't understand where it came from!
It rose out of his sleep like a steam.
He was at a full-stop in his being: what was this total helpless-
ness he had even with his wife? and with Dick and Hanni? Why couldn't
Or were they?
he be easy with them as he observed they were with each other?) What
was the world they had which he couldn't share? Did that world exist?
If not, why did his imagination require it to be created? Was it to do
lli with his own divided consciousness? Was it that he found himself in
a world where he didn't belong, so that he needed future training?
Could they understand eachother while he was condemned to stand in
bewildered detachment, one foot among them and one foot in the other
world of his childhood? Was he responsible for his own state? What
had he done that was so wrong? He tried to wrack his brains: 'What
have I done wrong?' Why, he wanted to cry in despair, had he left
that first world he knew?




CHAPTERED.
The weeks passed. There were - newcomers in the group as a result of
the Eail-and-Moof ball. He was out nearly every evening and couldn't under-
stand how he'd managed to spend so much time in the house before; the Sphone
rang continually for one or other of them; Dick and Hanni now took him for
granted as a fellow party-goer; usually he slept until noon and waited for the
throngl
day to develop, which it did of its own accord, largely byrbho-agonowrof the
telephone. He went for long walks with Hell, who was one of the newcomes;
they strolled by the river, hardly talking; a subject of conversation would
seem to presènt itself but then fade away before it was clear; they were im-
penetrable to each other. The hair-girl aàso came to the house, sometimes
wit th Hanni, sometimes alone, preoccupied and rarely talkative; but she would
suddenly wake up and begin joking and making her deafening laugh; she would
come and sit in the music-room while he was there, hardly glancing at him,
dates
RRer
and making Orpodotmenba with eseb-ether was out of the question; there was no
need, since she came nearly every day; they would put on a record and dance,
then he would make coffee, nothing else. Alice the snake-girl also came ,
and Joyce the pale girl was sometimes there. He began to share Dick's fascin-
ation for the pale girl; she would sit in the kitchen for an hour or more
looking at a magazine, quite still and soft, or smoking and gazing in front of
her; t here was a quiet detachment between her and Pinkie; they had something
in common, in their presences, and they averted their eyes from each other as


9H6
if afraid of mingling their identities. Hell wore her hair in the same way
as at the ball, straight down, and usually she had a black dress on and clut-
ched a small black hand-bag; she always looked cold, and her teeth seemed to
hunched
chatter invisibly when she talked, while her shoulders were hunnhed slightly;
Pinkie said that Grove called her NOARANANSuslAtehbleaM H last tump!
tus pleaurally :
Life was now so casual for him that he felt his identity had gone,) Thert
was never any cause for nerves or apprehension since he wash't called on to
do anything; no conversation was expected of him and no powers were attributed
inthis circle
to himg no one was greatly interested in anyone else. It made no difference
HRA he had no money. in his pocket;, someone always called and an activity
would start for which his company was required; he had to iake no effort for
this;, he could sit in silence; his face was known and expected, as the other
faces were expected by him. The social classes mixed, or rather the shudows
He pant
left on life by tek mixed---the snake-girl's Cockney accent and Hellts breat-
l hless, mae Bedsepie C fcreme-de-la-creme E speecho aovrnroloaaredrtBuub
everyone had their being in suspense; the snake-girl was wary of Hell, and
the latter was delicately and flinchingly aware of her, so that their real
presences were held. backo At first Granville thought that only he held his
real self, back but he saw that everyone did it; Dick was perhaps the most sf
open of them, he gave the truest demonstration of himself in his behaviour;
but here there was an heroic element, of a special cleverly and: painfully de-
pofomana;
visedi as a result he amused and enchanted people most, because he'd gone in-
to the. matter more deliberately than anybody else, and had come to the conclu-
ym. were gonny
sion that ifjane/vexs) /to turn a false face to the world it might as well be au
onl.
entertainingx His suffering, as Granville learned, was proportionately more
uupleerant
ghtfat when he got back to his room; he would sit and tremble, Hanni sai-
d, castigating himself; one evening he came back to her at Hampton Court and
said he was sure Granville looked on him as a sex-maniac with nothing in his
head at all; at such times; atso, he was afraid of going mad; everything
would be unhinged for him; he would be floating; severed from everything,


falling in empty space; she said hé sometimes even appeared not to recognise
her properly; there would be no consolation anywhere for him, even in. her;
he would recognise none of his pleasures; he couldn't lose himself in anything
olwayp
that was the most frightful thing; he: jerked awake,atroncevagatang it was this
gipl i
that sent him to the-womeng by the time he'd overcome this fearful floating
detachment, sufficientyy to excite their interest ih him---he told Hanni that
luckily the flittle worm, vanity' had so far never let. him down---2he was al-
ready back in life, and strong enough to go back to Hanni and make love to: her;
this, whe said, was mainly why she didn't try to interfere with him; it was hi
-S way of getting strength, from which she benefited..
Just as other people drifted into his house, without saying a word, so
he drifted into the local caféor the pub where he might expect to find a group
of them; and he would sit down in the same way, nodding hullo and then giving
himself up to the silence. Whether or not the others regarded this common
behaviour as strange he couldn't find out, a's they couldn't find out if he
regarded it as. strange; it was simply the accepted style. Hell sometimes
rang up in the middle ef the night and asked for a bed; she lived with 'a
family of school-teachers', as she called them---even the little children were
school-teachers, she said, asraporingnguostyionth-oateoatshirtaloerlslinugtonn
and she dared not return when she'd taken!more than a fair drop'; so she wou-
1d creep into the house and be found on the divan in the music-room next
mor ring, her black lace underwaler in a pile on the floor and her hair hanging
down from the pillow like tanc-pinses-of black crépe. He or Pinkie would lea-
torker.
ve the kéy under the matk But Granville still clung to his privacy; after
a time he refused to let her in.' Also he would lock the door downstairs dur-
ing the day sometimes, and not answer the door-bell or telephone: SutIt
tren
seemed to him,)with all these callers, and the activities in the evening, that
he had not thing to do; he couldntt wear his energi es out; hé wrote letters of
ttre dots
application, and then. didn't post them; he was on the point of ringing T.I.M.
a dozen times; he got in pora trafel-books from the library and began to


9H8
work out itineries across the desert based on other peoplegs journeys; he
wrote' a long letter to Mohammed telling him what he'd done and promptly tore
it up; then he wrote a frantic one, saying, Please, helpt mel :, and posted
it?. He sét himself tasks in the'morning and arranged his desk neatly; hé
went through a carbon copy'of his réport for T.I.M. with thé idea of amplify-
#e hews sections
ingt--to hand it in to them later, perhaps, as the basis of his next
with
job
them.' There was still no answer from Nevinson. Did they regard him as an
ex-employee or not? Dick told him not to apply for his supertannuation as
he would get more later, for some complicated reason; he obeyed without ques-
tion and drew his last money out of the bank. He couldn't,say he was unhappy,
though.
h.p. howeker. Hell borrowed the school-teacherst car one evening---she simply took
it out of the garage---and ran/against the railings by the Tawer of London.
Theré was always some interesting little event. Deryk Grysham had a special
nod for her at a party they all went too - the past seemed quite dead; he was
an accepted facem nowhere was barred to him; he talked to Grysham casually,
whm Cysham
and the idea of there having been a to-do between Dick and Erysham/over fhs
segy,
him, as mentally he recalled there had been, was outlandish and absurd, and
belonged to a moral conflict---a social conflict---was it a conflict of ideas?,
which he couldn't grasp nowl
Hell gave promise of real friendship; it would be a delicate, quiet re-
lation in which they WO uld sit much as he and Mohammed had sat by the river in
the evening, with long pauses, saying, whatever came into their heads; she
would smoke reflectively, saying didn't he think this person had something
'valiant' about him or that person was ta York rather than a Lancaster', al-
ways in a style that just evaded sound sense. He realised after a time that
she was hardly aware of him. She only went on in her reflective dream, draw-
ing others in sometimes, if the conditions were quiet enough. Yet she was
polite and answered questions; sométimes she showed the most extraordinary
whey
courtesy and charm Sak accepting Eha/etrallaat thing, like a cup of tea; but
absent
then she would be askent and fidgetty again; at aparty, after a few drinks,


she would pass by him without the slightest recognition, her eyes
blind and a smile drifting on her lips.Dick said that she and her
whole group of 'limp noble weeds' gave him the heeby-jeebies, and
he cursed the day Granville had gone to that Tail-and-Hoof ball!
Sometimes, he said, Hell would fling her 'long, reedy arms' round
him and scream, "Dick! Haven't seen you in an age!", and somtime 8
she would walk right past him jittering and ## muttering to herself';
once he caught hold'of her as she was going past and said in a sharp
voice, right into her face, giving her whole body a little 'rattle',
kyxxkakingxkar"Tell me my name!", and she had to gaze at him for some
time, straining her eyes, before she could say in a faltering voice,
"Is it---is it Dick Pollocke, by any chance?"
It occurred-to Granville that Hell set the tone for all the
other girls who came to the house---to judge from their behaviour.
this
They seemed to think that, was how you lived at Chaworth Road; the
pale girl and the snake-girl talked quietly like Hell, yawned likete;
*esame
lolled, smiled injA/limp way. . Even the hair-girl showed no vivacity
when Hell was there, not unless there was a party or Larry Vice was
mentioned---at the word Vice' her tiny pale figure would make a jump
amd her eyes would move in their deep sockets, waking up, and she
would scream, "Oh, Vice!
That boy's woundhimself round me like
poison ivy!"
Once shé said in a quiet XXI voice to Granville,
"I'll tell you something, kid, Larry and my dad got on fine, and
what more do you want than that, eh?" He nodded like an idiot and
put another record on.
To P9496)


kat
Shavouadipese Sausguom-cquctonyneang om
letyes blibdorda
ting
smile drifting on/her lips Dick said that she and her whole group of 'limp
moble weeds' gave him the heeby-jéebies, and thfats he cursed the' day Granviile
Hav
Hede
had gone to tne Tail-and-tbof ball! Sômetimes, he said, sie would fling her
yiong, reedy armsy round him and cry out, "Dicki Haven't seen yoy/in an agel"
k neeg?
and sométimes she passed/him by jjittering and mutteringh without even looking
at him; once he caught hold of her and said in a sharp voice, "Don't you know
me ?n She said, "What's that?" He réplied, "Téll me my hame!" And' she had
at him
to gaze/for some time, straining her eyes,before she could say in a faltering
dy magchonta
Hele
voice "Is itybick Pollocke?" It occurred to Granyille that pethapa ste waa
SoméD
Sit
settiog the tone for,the other newcomers to the house: the
girl and
jelm ed Kruik
ulw
p C epted to
Alice the snake-girl perhaps thought thatAthis was how/gme/bahave at Chaworth
ENE
Manot efno
Road.) The haif-girl only) showed/vivacity, unless there was a partsk Mhen
aN the
Vice
Laryy AVicef was mentioned; hér tiny paie figure would make a jump and her
eyes would/move in their deep so ckets, waking up, while she séreamed, yoh,
Vicel That boyis wouhd/himself pound me like poison ivy!; once she showed
m J. hs
and Hen Said tai Lshidts
te usual viyacity
EE Granville quietly, "I tely you something, kid,
Larryand dad oa e on fine, And Mhatimore doyaurwantleMartthattychort He
moddediAke amidiatiatlandiputtanotherreeordoont Hanni and Pinkie took it
for granted that he was having an affair with her. Pinkie told Hanni oné day
that she was 'somewhat embarrassed' to find Joy Celeste "always in the house."
Joy Celeste encouraged this by yelling with laughter whenever Hanni came into
the room when they were alone and shrieking, "Nearly caught us at it again,
blabber-mouth!" or "I've just been up in heaven, help me down, sister of merc-
y!" Hell would sit for hours in the music-room, in the same chair always,
smoking quietly, never reading, her straight hair falling down to her should-
ers and her thin, pale hands flickering to her face now and then. The young
man nicknamed SCerberustto whom she was supposed to be engaged sometimes came
as well, small and flushed, and as quiet
axd
XX*mx*xushedxymungxmax
as she was; he had the habit of
smiling quickly on and off whenever anything was said to him, and then not an-


swering.' He recognised no one at all and everybody wondered how Hell had
been able to establish herself in his memory; he called everyone 'job', or
rather every male, for he had no name for women; he would say to Granville,
"I say, job, have you got another drink there?", and when Granville replied,
"Yes, what will you have, wine or beer?" he would flash on his smile and say
absoladely
and. I
nothing, only waito atbisusides Or he would ask, "Can Hell, stay the night,
lcaue He house.
job?", then mredssdrmtren One day Dick took Granville aside
in the bedroom while Hell and Cerberus were sitting next door, and murmured to
now# to'sum?
him, "Well, how do you like the middle classest Quite sane, aren't we?"
Hell told them all that Cerberus was in the habit of walking off'with things,
previsusdy
and that a few days before he'd left someone's house with a persian carpet
over his shoulders; he'd left it in the Tube---"I think I left it in the Tu-
TRese
Sounded
alsays
be," he said afterwards. Bagok stories worerhaan exaggerated, whiwy but
they)
turned out to be true; for instance, Hell was called to a police-station in
Islington to answer questions about the persian carpet.
Glenning brought over a young man with ruby lips and a pleasant, drowsy
daily
smile called 'Mac' Saunders who edited the,
that Granville had
A gossip-colum
read So often in the last three months.
He and Granville began going for long
walks together, sometimes with Hell as well, again hardly ever exchaning a
word.' The more he came to know 'Mac', or rather the more silences he shared
with him, the more upx surprised he was that what Glenning Always called 'the
racket' MARNAATCIAN hanait touched him, and that he gave an impression of
the
untouched goodness and calm; ha had his own drowsy reflections, he was/most
amiable and cooperative person to be with, he fell in with every suggestion,
seehed
he appeared to have no sense of status---Granville was more and more tak en
aback. The thing that had broken Glenning in the same work, namely, that
with
it was hollow,zwubchnt no'inside 'to it, was the main advantage for *Mac':
It meant he could earn good money without touching the peculiar calm that lay
in him; he could go on with his thoughts and pleasures really as if there was
no work in life at all; he had learned the deft touch, after a long apprent-


iceship, he said.
Sometimes he came into the kitchen when Granville was
there and worked on the conversations he intended to have at parties that
evening; it was easy enough to get people to agree with them after yougd wri-
tten them, he said, because most of them were like babes in armst when it came
to a bit of publicity. Now and then he showed Granville these little notes,
and Granville would see them in print next day: He could thus see how the
once
'glittering world' with which he had/excited his imaginationg aginstniabat-
had
baprJedsgacabs/came about in the mind of a young man not unlike himself, only
with fewercillusions about how the world ran. He was also surprised to real-
ise that 'Mact Saunders looked on him as a source of information, because so
many people came to the house; a conversation with Hell might, for instance,
a member of
be useful one day if sooumxmxknzher family flung a big party or got married
Granville
or assaulted someone.
gay also knew the Kaaba dancing company, the Marquis
and some of the permanent guests at the Gare St, Lazare---the darker side of
life', which also could be material for hintg for instance, the gossip column
once described a house where 'aristocracy met dancing-girl', which could have
M ac'
been Chaworth Road. He liked the tmice' there, too, namely, Joy Celeste,
the snake-girl, Joycé and a number of others.' But he seemed to have no sexual
affiliations himself; he followed other people's affairs with a rapt, benevol-
ent curiosity.
Parties came about at the house without Pinkie even knowing about them;
she was now used to returning home and finding one in progress; and with as-
tonishing ease she Habh ceased to look on him as a recluse; he was now much
like anyone else; but at the same time she showed traces of disappointment,
as if a god of hers, however hateful, had fallen! He had spent every penny
of his money and stayed in the house nearly all the time, attaching himself to
she
a group whenever one offered itself. Meanwhile Penkete was getting plump and
had taken to a wider skirt. He began to be sick in the mornings, and Glenn-
ing explained that this was only the 'couvade', aan ancient primitive ritual
a while
by which the men went through all the labour-apins for the women, and the


women, he added with a look at Pinkie, went about their ordinary
business'. The plumpness didn't stop. her dancing; everyone agreed
that exercise was good for child-birth.
There were complaints
from the neighbours about some of the parties; the windows were
usually kept open because of the heat and smoke. One morning they
found that a passer-by had pissed into their empty milk-bottles in
the night and then into the letter-box; the letters had soaked it
up and were yellow and limp; one of them was from Elizabeth giving
the date of the river-party, and Pinkie had to phone to ask what
she'd written; Granville said with a laugh that she ought to tell
andhaugat
Liz that her letter had arrived soaked in piss, but a demure,1bok
came over Pinkie's face and she said, "I wouldn't dream of it!"
The hall downstairs began to be cluttered up with articles left by
guests---raincoats, suitcases and even a small pram. No one knew
where the pram came from.
He decided to forget about past and
future---even' the little reminders. that there still were. People
could say what they liked about him; he wouldn't stop to think;
he'd achieved his objective, to: be free in his own country!
TaR9520)


wamaanbeaddedmichpa ookat Pinkie went raboutstoisrtoaingry business
The plumppess didn't stop/her dancing; everyone agreed that exercise was good
for child-birth. Thére were complaints from the neighbours about some of thé
parties; the windows yere usually kept open because ofthe heat and smoke.
Oné morning they found that/a passer-by had paid thém the compliment during
the night of pissing into their emptymilk botties and_then into the letter-
droppen
box; the/letters Witchbadobeon ninner had soaked it up and were,
yell-
OW and, limp; oné of them was from Elizabeth giving the date of theriver-
tsk
party, HNAS pomapg/atf and Pinkie had to *phone to ask what she'd written;
Keiz husasss doknd Hctter had ried piong soaked in piss,
Granville said she ought to
but ademure and haughty
ooporbnd-happemndy I
expression came over Pinkie's face and she said, "Iwouldn't dream of it!m
The hall downstairs began to be clyttered up with articlesleft by guests--
No ca knecs whysn rte pram Kevet 1 AA m
raincoats, puttfeages and evena small pram. L He decided to forget about pas ist
nor
and fyture--- -eyén the little reminders, there still were. Poeple coyld say
what they Xiked about him; ha/vontdn/vlotoptorthrthinkyneta/ohtévedtienabe
jeotivontoBefree in his onn-counteyh
A heavily-built man not unlike Glenning started coming to the house;
he seemed to connect Granville with Pinkie in the matter of rank; one day he
Gramille
asked hihrn in a soft voice," "Didn't I meet your father down at Freddy's place?
I think his name was Granville!n But Granville only lau ughed:an/ineplys and
the other man, who was called Algy, talked about something else at once. Hé
slurred his sentences, unlike Glenning; and there was a vagueness in his eyes
thal
which Glenning didn't have---the same blind quality that there-Has in Hell.'
clean
It was said that Algy had once lifted a H smaller man, off his feet in a
When Ke was druuk
had
pub /and said to him, "Don't I know your cousin David?" And the smaller man/
said in an icy voice, "Let me fown at once, you smell of
to which
Said,
garlid",
Algy had replindtlig "All right, there_s no need to be offensive about it!n Th-
citte
ere were endless stovies like this, chopa mostly told by Hell, who made an odd,
stcy
fluttering and breathless laugh afterwards. Another was that 'Mact Saunders
cluugat
had a set of whips to flaggllate his girl-friends with, but the sight of them


instead
terrified him and, he used them to pull the blinds down with at nighti
Granville never felt watched in their company; that, he told himself,
was a wonderful relief for his nerves; there was none of the 'third ghost' he
remembered in Walsh; they weren't thinking about you silently behind their
eyes, and judging your conduct; they didn't judge you at ally you were simp-
ly a fact for them; they were outspoken and rash; he could really let him-
self go if he wanted to; on the other hand he never did; he was more constr-
np ained than ever before in his life. These people, he told himself, threw
their voices/and wéren't afraid of anyone; they didn't have closed or haunted
didit matter;
faces; they might be peculiar, like Hell or Cerberus, but that wasuddfterent
it occurred to him sgamumatmerdthoug/tit/tbe/sussaxddays/afteptreadtos
Tainag that an aristocracy did/bhe/servricrriceon living to the hilt for its CO un-
try; it defined permissible behaviour once and for all; and the middle-class-
es, following behind them, threw their caps in the air only as high as they
had doneq fontheraristoeraticsbandairduas theonlnreal sbendezdibrownce
theuiddlerclessesptheronlystandardthey themselves Ahad-broughtrinto-tho
LAEAA
worid-wasgfafalsaone,-mamely, expedtenoyiwhether worhed-orhoty land what
gosarttididin@atrehetatistocarta/ptoptovidedthenutteniod dsigiitteteretithe ledgai
Thus, he said to himself, he was passing through a worth-while experience;
he couldn't say who was 'aristocratic". in the people who came to the house---
Hell was said to be; but, more than this, what was) 'aristocraticat a time
ewen
when aristocracy didn't, exist, and when it hadn't existed for a hundred years
Ke didit know!
Han;
ilels or moret L He meant the shadow of aristocracy these people were in the shad-
OW; and he was learning from it; that was a task, surely, he 'd set himself
at Meedham. But he couldn't remember what had passed through. hts head at
Meedham. It seemed Bo slong ago, and in a period when he had shone with hea-
lthi
CAlA 6
H. kt
Msreatcelasasiintotal ahepageenndtg he € a ASMakan T aty md A
- had been only partly 50; he began tolook back on his relation wi th them
deA PIACAUCA
d : va A BAV n ANA A oolg
Pavonsavportadot thore vanarenty, Mabyov Aepeapse Abo/Came tathe


He began to think of the days beipre their Meedham visit as
ones of thought and clarity. His friendship with Dick and Hanni
belonged to that period.
Yes, there'd been a friendship!
extraordinary innocence seemed to surround it now! But the period
was over.
The friendship was past. They came to the house less
and less, because of the 'weeds'.
Many of the people who came to


the house now didn't know his .name; one of them, hearing Cerberus
call him 'job', seriously thought his name was that, and even introd-
uced him to someone as, "This is Job---I'm sorry, I don't know your
second name."
Another thing he liked about Hell and Algy and the others was
that their manners were automatic; they were silent whenever the mood
took them; they didn't hold a moral plan of conduct before them, and
they didn't try to work out easy routes for themselves in life;
they burned themselves at the flame; they didn't search other people's
remarks for meaning, or judge people's feelings by the look on their
faces; partly this was due to the fact that they rarely listened to
other people. SIEEREEE Sternness didn't frighten them; they didn't
smile to put other people at their ease; they didn't feel threatened
by outbursts of feeling in other people; they didn't stand in moral
scrutiny of other people; other people were still in mystery for them.
But here, in this last assertion, he doubted; what mystery did he
feel himself to have in their presence? He was just a name, and
often not even that; he was respected, but witkout him doing anything
to win it; he was respected stiongly because he was one of them! Some-
thing XXX was missed out---his personality; it was where he was
separate from everyone else. So he was more middle class than he
thought! He asking for HAls personality! For a moment he was aware
of the night of the eclipse again; the spark in every man that Christ
had shown---the place where he was secret to himself...
But then it
was gone!
Not that Hell and Algy were at-all certain of themselves; Hell
was called 'the nerve-bag' or 'rattle-box'.
Algy was morbidly con-
vinced that people were 'getting at him' behind his back. Yet,
confronted by people, they had ain automatic manner; there was already
something in their voice and delivery which they hadn't builtfor
themselves.
That was another important


thing for him. But this also meant that they didn't develop; since so much
Yy uplnnging
was already planted in them, there was no moral development; their lives didn't
seem to move to or fom anything; they simply were; but all round 'them there
was movement. What was happening to him? That was his question all the time
even though he had nothing to answer it with. There was this moral concern in
torHel, Algy, Cerbens and. ka Sar,
him, as there was in Dick. But for the othersjlife was in depth; it was sti-
11; and that was restful to him; but at the same time there was movement in
him, and he couldn't deny it; he couldn't deny its thumping demands under the
i stillness . He couldn't talk to them as himself so he made jokes, danced,
sat in silence, drank and asked questions. He tried to make his world devoid
of future, in depth like theirs; but it wasn't natural to himg, Mermightrsan
helabecomerdistexterdistoxted, im that Lowasnitnaturah tobim,but itWasnitand-that
because
sgfetched
waathety / thé future xkreeteku before him in the form of a
quest. Suddenly,
as if to deny these very thoughts, Algy threw up his job in London and flew to
New Zealand where he started work as a wine-waiter in one of the big hotels;
Glenning predicted that within a year Algy would be unrecognisable---'weather-
beaten and brisk', impossible to tell apart from a working man, and without a
trace of Hell or Cerberus on his person!
tis
At one of tine parties Joy Celeste held an impromptu strip-tease compet-
A an upstarid
ition p
in omeroivore roomg; all the rooms had people in them, and the
piano was being played downstairs, but more and more of the guests were drift-
ing upstairs; he walked up as well and could hardly get in the door; there
and tta tusr Hing Le Saw a - deuttaning Jellow "guc rglected in *a aiser;
was a hush in the room,) thoushaypryAnchocAtnanbacupiody the lights were
out and it appeared that by the mantelpiece, in the light of two candles,
the hair-girl and a young man were making bets of some kind; losing a bet
meant you had to take off an article of clothing; she was already in her
Ike Jmns w a
blouse and knickers, minus skirt and stockings; te)was without shirt or vest;
her hair flowed down over her shoulders, and it appeared that she had claimed
untying her hair as a valid forfeit; LarrykViceftwas one of the guests, and
- his Ahoo, hoot could be heard in the hush; the only talk was between her and


the young man; they were saying in quiet voices, "No, I claim one here,"
and "Start with your pants, then", "Not on your life!", "All right, I. claim a
couple on that and advance you one on the last forfeit, how's that?#" The
deep hush surrounded them. There was an atmosphere of intense concentration. o'
"No, sirree!" she suddenly shouted, yelling with laughter.. All the men were
gazing at her intently, as if she were operating a subtle mechanism of some
kind and they were admiring her ingenuity; he didn't know half the faces;
her blouse came off, and she stood there in brassiere and knickers, saying,
"Hey, now, look, I'm chilly, customer," while the young man persisted, "That's
not a full forfeit." Then it came to an end without further undressing;
she was suddenly ashamed, glancing round at all the rapt faces in the Slicker-
ing candee-light, and with a shake of her head and a defiant pout she pulled
on her skirt and blouse again.
talking almet
Granville had got into the habit mf when hewas with Dick of referring to
C gire
EEr (as Makboula, her supposed real name, and by accident he did it one evening
when they were all together in the music-room; she turned on him at once,
her head lowered, and hissed, "Drop that name, streaky pants!"; there was the
sudderly
utmost blind venom in her eyes and he stepped back, astonished; but asquickly
aglia
she was talking, in an unconcerned way to someone else. They hardly spoke to
each ather again after that, but she continued to come to the house, and he
made
cosgee
served her saatesre
he-house as before; she didn't seem to notice any
difference. He reflected pn the expression 'streaky pants', wondering what
it pagy meant; his trousers weren't streaked; Dick said he thought it was a
cross between streak of piss' and 'randy pants', a 'grammatical cross or com-
pound, old sport.'
Suddenly as he lay in bed one night there was a terrific onslaught on
his mind from the silence outside, in accusations that came like hammers one
after the other. He was stunned and began to sweat, his mouth open. - He
IRAA
didn't believe in God; # He only believed in Christ as an historical figure.
He didn't believe in the miracles! He didn't believe Christ was the son of


God! He didn't believe Christ rose on the third dayy! dospidourbarhooxy
guasdroutsiderthertomb? He didn't believe in the ascent to heaven. He did-
n't believé in heaven! His heart beat fast and the blood plunged through him
like a torrent in the darkness. Hè didn't believe he would be received after
death. He believed in oblivion. There was no helpC: There was no foothold
and nothing came from any activity. While he sweated and stared before him
retal
there was also a bowan pause in him. The night of the eclipse was dead:
He was an impostor. He struggled to recollect his reasoning that night. He
almost pushed himself out of bed in the darkness, strainging; where were the
thoughts? where should he begin again? where was the first foothold so that
he could climb again? But all EE he could think of---they came ringing
like a false bell into his mind, idiotically---were bare propositions, 'the
spark in every mant, 'riding in on an ass', 'giving up ambitions', but the
state behind them was gone; they were 'words. He lay back again bathed in
lo P.
exhausted.
sweat,
What has happened to me?' he asked. again.
tharaweagimalappretty
MagmepranivngAANSDURE
pagame/a
Bavats AOSX avronte
1tn nee asta Saden gnaning
lesore
will betwéen themrand théy understood this mutual wili, like a third being
mce glbe a hard win uolndy
set up between them, pulling their bodies together, she meme
géod evening; it was) Jake a flame, white-hot, not really passionate but with
nol hard
a white detormination, and they danced with each other silently: But thé
Som
matfer wceks.
gnawing desire wasl exhausted mOn
It was the same as he'd felt
withHell and Algy. He was absent to hef in his andividuality. He was
an abstract force forher. They sucked the séx out of each other and were
then dry, without conversation or even fpiendliness, - He asked Dick for the
te turo 9 Hem
doun
key of his Hampton Court flat, and I they /spent some hours)there every day.
Hewas one of'tthe ment for her, wild underneath, rash, in command, belo nging
scals
to another world not/ comprehénsible to/her; he was only flesh; she had spur-
tgof anger, ipritationwhich leapt up and clawed at him. Then the sexwould
retmmardthersamahoTlomactinoaltbbogimritmeert-undthing torhimgbutitis


There was a small, pretty young woman in Hell's group who
became his 'dover'.
There was a sudden, gnawing desire between
them, pulling their bodies together, like a hard will nobody esle
could stop. It was like a flame, white-hot, not really passionate
but with a hardxandxxhit white and hard determination---they met
in a club, in a large group, and danced together at- once. They
mingled their breath together as they moved round the flioor, gazing
at each other closely,. without a word, their faces almost touching.
They kissed suddenly, under the eyes of her 'husband'---the man
living with her at the moment. It was beyond both of them, this
hard, obstinate lust. He quickly took her phone-number amd they
met three days later, in the afternoon, at the Hamipton Court flat.
It was a cold, dismal day. The moment the door closed behind them
he began kissing her and
taking off her clothes. She had the
curse but, half-naked, she pulled him into the nearest room, to one
of the divans, and he came on her stomach.
That was before they'd
spoken a word together.
They met there again the following week, and
stripped naked in front of the gas-fire. But the nakedness satis-
fied.him less. The room was freezing cold, wh-ile one side of
them was baked from the fire. She clung to him again and again,
for one orgasm after another, and he wondered if this was what people
meint by tnx nymphomaniac'. When they wefe finished they had nothing
to say to each other. There was the first fascination, while she
was dressed, but then, in the candour of nakedness, everything fled
away. They found, talking to each other, that they didn't even like
each other much. On the bed she marvelled at him, her eyes closed,
saying, "Oh, this is the best, the best!", but he felt quite separate,
just an object to her, as wide-awake as he would be walking along the
street. He felt friendly towards her. "I like you", he kept
saying.
Really, it was the same as he'd felt with Hell and Algy. He
was a kind of abstract force for her---his individuality was missing.
And.she didn't seem to be marvelling at him---only at his movements,
his erection. He was a 'man' for her. Just 'man'. In her
circle you expected 'the men' to be rash and wild, rather blind,
violent, not aware of women as more than 'little things', as xgax
'gals' you were expected to crush in some way. Dick hated them


because he understood them!
She had spurts of anger---irritation that leapt out suddenly
and tried to claw him, perhaps because he gave her neither the bad
treatment she was used to nor the first hard lust.
Pinkie had no suspicions. She continued to flinch when she
saw the hair-girl or when the Kaaba dancing company was mentioned.


ovilple Kent nimat uhburyShgudegyppennn Aeuyyy
catevia 3 cen Wal à darkleyés
and finé, smooth cheeks; the white-hot fire in them had gone, and they trie d
to enjoy being together; but there was a hollow feelingi Hampton Court and
theriver looked bleak; they thought of their friends inLondon with whom they
couldbe natural. As withMell andAlgy he fell to joking, and for the rest
apcrsiotssn
drinking and ssking questions, M Pinkiehad no suspicions; she tontinued to
IOnADAAE MVt
Mgahnbrenshheras/loytOelaatearwhwhen) wes/per Aaneg
Granville found that she suspected his innocent journeys across London, when
knt
he was going to meet Glenning or 'Mact Saunders, and was at peace when he left
ith a tnch - ww4 rongi tis
Yever'
the house to meet Hester, as, found
the gaa was cal
Hester
-led. She was a divorced woman with three children; that was the only real
subject of conversation between them, her children, and she would show him ph-
otographs of them; she had the same delicate, breathless manner of speech as
Hell but there was a concentrated gleam in her eye that Hell lacked; she was -
clearer and more determined, with an obstinate will gonerzmea which couldn't
be swerved; she said she dared not introduce him to the children because they
might think badly of her; merell
they would tedl her parents, and her broth-
er was a Jesuit priest; she had taken terrible risks to 'go' with him; her
family watched her like hawks, they'd done so since she divorced, and once her
had
father, who was an army-man,/pushed her down the stairs just outside her flat#t
thoughobenreraanshopt flightlwithsafalarding Atrthebottoma-and threat-
Recaule
MsARAA
ened to make mince-meat of herf, Grommadtorasinerertvinerwyhord opal Arianand
at +e timee
Warr MeArepeeopetahptphou
she was going with a mank motveltet/sho
It was a macabre, finished world she dsecribed: the young men in it had a desp
-arate violence---she had left her husband because he would twist her arm 'fr-
ightfully' if she came back later!And, thevviodance-hadanseedinheherntooot
alwegs
she was always coming back late, it seemed, ana d risking somethingy! there was
the same blindness as in Hell; everyone she dsecribed was wild and frighten-
ing, a kind of massive caricature; she endowed them with stature, but it was
set and known, universal; she said her father had got wind of him, Granville,


and had promised to search him out and give him ta sound kick in the stom-
ach'; he asked her, trying to joke as always and to throw off the burden, "Is-
n8t that unsportsmanlike, the stomach? Shouddn't it be the arse?" But under
neath he was sick and giddy.
These dreadful threats! Dick, also, had got
wind of his activities in the empty flat---which Hanni now seemed to have vaca-
ted---and told him that Hester was. known everywhere as 'the man-hole',
Yet, though only his unanimated flesh was involved, in orgasm after or-
gasm separate from him and abstract,antarealloanavedvVOMLAMLAN/AOR/VIATVANVatodAB
AMNVAAAMAM v
bhan/atomided/anainddivenday ment he felt revived; perokng it was what he seemed
itals to need; it Was in his flesh that he needed to revive and feel his first inde?
pedence from
woothingnepaselblaaer/ba/Aghiovedpbata
now
Pinkieg
And
sexual
he felt easier at Chaworth Road; he could delay his(approaches to Pinkie as
1 ong as he liked, having exhausted himself elsewhere; a his approaches COTER
how
suddenly
be more subtle and patient; abopelera there was,no chance of his duddenly giv-
ing way to an outburst; there was nothing pent-up in him; his flesh was now
equal to hers and he shared, 80 to speak, her burden of guilt when they lay
down side by side at night, usually without saying a word to each other. He
began to feel light, and his appetite improved. Dick told him he looked 'dr-
ained of impurities', and that was precisely how he felt; his flesh, separa te
p. grom him, was healed; 1 his blood was clean; he felt cool and ordered. He
asked Dick what had happened to Hanni; why was she never at the flat? The
reply was, "No particular reason. Why?" Nor had she appeared at Chaworth
Road for some time : Pinkie hadntt seen her. Dick said she was Working hard,
he believed, though he hadn ft seen too much of her himself, either. Then
he took Granville's arms in a nervous way and said, looking round, "We all
have our ups and downs, don't we?" His lips were pale and Granville thought
Saw
he dasmarned the faintest trembling in his fingers.
uguayanave, AAMMy a
He endpick began going to the New Studio
and thenfbeca ame mem-
theatreg,
berf; it was. another place to sit and take people to if ane wanted to demonst-
tkere
rate a socially varied life; food could be had,a and the tickets were on a sub-


scription basis. He got the money to join from Pinkie; he told her about
the' club and she nodded rather like someone condidering a pay-claim, and se
wewot
left the money on his desk before she ler in the morning. Dick said. that
the plays performed were written by a kind of committee employed by the club,
and that their idea was to deal with one social problem after another, to ma-
ke/'clean sweep' of modern life.
Thé place had already been nicknamed 'Prot-
and
est Hall' for this reason, Dat people 'papped it up'. There were to be no st.
hesses
ars and the plays werem/to draw attention to themselves by being over-drama-
tid'or in any way idiosyncratic; they were as far as possible simple and cl-
ear statements of a current problem with as much drama as it would need to su-
stain the interest of the audience.
Granville was beginning to feel. a pecu-
ken
ikese pretestr'
liar unspokln indignation in his life, and he wondered if/ /this/would contain
in Londm
it for him in some way. His life was taking more and more roots, he noticed;
and ultimately he hoped that it would take on a stillness such as he'd known
in the Sussex days, and false hopes would disappear; he wouldn't think of
Basrah again. Dick had a copy of the Studio club policy sent to him, and
he read in it that the idea of the theatre as 'the pukpit of modern life' was
to be applied; the West End commercial managers had kept modern life out. of
Stiudio cluk
the theatre, it added. He began going to the theatae once or twice U week,
with or without Dick; there was a secret pleasure in sitting in the darkness
with the evening paper in his hand; the stage glowed and he fell into a drea-
m; sometimes what happened on the stage was more real to him than ahat-happ
enedat Chaworth Road; he would dream about it, and wake up in the morning
expecting the situation of the play to unfold before him instead of his and
Pinkie's world.
There was one play of protest after another: a negro winn-
ing his way, through race-prejudices in a northern mining town, a working man
victimieed by
piskmixagatnxt his foreman, atars a A
E waendmabteforanion
ofintrioaterceasons,ta ask fortrede-unton protectionomorgetenerjobp
bhereWaseplayabout a private soldier pitching himself against the brass-
hats'at Corps headquarters; doen tho-sbong-of a young African nationalist


Mr -
a British colonial magistrate; a poor family in Wales threatened
cuising
with an eviction-order; an Irishman, drinking wildly and Aulmdnating.egnAuub
'the dirty bloody Limeys', trying to sing for a libing; then a kind of suff-
desises
ragette play in which a man,s RAFTOPUAR healthy sppuil.se8enerneca/shonntorborthe
causedug his wife S suicide. The trouble was that when you added all these
ym kate nearls lven brdy 3
protests together they made everyone/t -
ves vore guilty; which left
no one to address the protest tojs Those people who werenttposses might be
Aforemen, aoa those who weren't foremen might be brass-hats, Atdl those who were
none of these might be British, adfa those who weren't British could easily be
each
a man---for the suffragette play it was enough to be a mant Sof thopgbrin
reaohcanathe-ptobagaganistmtheplay-masupposadto-Bogod,2end hisoppene
entrepoia aray Retaaythey/ganeslzedagchotheroroutmaheondr aa new play
one
knocked the last pretagonist down.
Last week you might have been morally in-
dignant on béhalf of the working man but this week younwould be just as indig-
nant against him for being a white man. At first Granville came out of the
wery time
was how
L. p. theatre burning with indignation but he became inured to it. He noticed that
the plays
dusing
he didn't sit through them in a spirit of criticism as he had done/the first
pla about the sailor in Liverpool; TC et
# TCKT he wondered if a
change had come about in his life that had removed a certain essential fibre.
Most of the plays he simply sat through, hardly hearing them; he took pleas-
yre in the glow of the lights on the stage, in a piece of scenery that sugg-
ested woods or the African bush; BP he would doze off in his seat and wake up
with a start when the set probest-speech began, which it usually did towards
the end of the second act; after that he could pop off again. As in the
first play there was a lot of swearing. There were deliberately shocking
references---to homosexuality, to Laura Lady Maine, to the government. When
the play was dull and stupid he was unwilling to admit to himself that this
ke reuegade
was so, because he then felt classed among the tick
che-mud -
and-old- fash-
péople whom
was A attacking
Magighssan
iened plag-which the play bad-boon dastageting Thofprobott-speeches covered
tuth.
up/the lack of drama and surbstanca, In one of the plays a character said


HAYIMRAEAL
of anotheree--ethorg "He's always got his eye on the Maine chance!" and
there were waves of laughter; this laughter had the tone of the forbidden, as
if mentioning the word 'Maine' on the stage was brave in itself, laying bare
the social conventions. There were regular targets---the royal family, the
tologer A mplse
Ghurch, the 'pukka sahib' from India; whatever/had
power in modern lifeo
cong nglandertought int ane thes
There were Auge
protests
trembling protests against. a ruling class that no longer existed, ao aga inst
an empire that had been disbanded. AsDicksatd, after yourd beentherea
umberof imesyourealised-that the theatre was IS behind-the tihesasit
ways aad
is surprise, Panville continued to 59
begun
he astors who were goed and to distim
bo: ween one ma
T. p. ion and another. Dick was offended. by the 'squealing' in the plays; he said
that a man who suffered should, neyarigquead 7 r put the blame on other people:
in Lin.
But Granville only smiled. There wasn't a trace of the 'orang-utang'A He
seemed to have little objection to anything.
To - 961Ca)
CHAPTER -
He thought again of the frightful accusations that had hammared at his
New
chaylar brain in the middle of the night, but nowthere seemed no need for erdin though-
Just
eoch
A ts; he simply waited for the evening to come, and every day unfolded slowly
while he waited in totally passive state. The river-party was a great succ-
ess
It was a superb autumh evening, oofre warm even, with the sunlight very
yellow and pure-looking on theriver; some of the roofs on either side look-
ed as though they were made of gold fora moment, and the city made one_massi-
ve roar that was like a new, exciting silence
There were manyof the same
façes as at the fail-and-Hbof ball. They all sat about on deck or down in
the long cabins while white-coatedwaiters brought round the drinks; bewit
callad
shed the host, - 8 small, flushed man with blond hair from Devon,/Lord Runnoak;
hey the arm
tasteloneof the drinks from a waiter_s tray, holding the waiter/at his side
fora moment, andthen mutter/with sudden biting-anger, turning round to his
wife, "I thought so, I bloodily well thought so! Would you believe it, he's
tals
doreitagain?n His wife trred tocalm him, smilingrat-the guests-and-eume


CHAPTER
The river-party was a great success. It was a: superb autumn
evening, warm even, with the sunlight yellow and pure-looking on the
river; some of the roofs on either side looked as though they were
made of gold for a moment, and the city made one massive roar that
was like a new, exciting silence.
There were many of the same faces
as at the Tail-and-Hoof ball. They all sat about on deck or down in
the long cabins while white-coated waiters brought round the drinks;
the host, a small, flushed man with blond hair called Lord Runnock,
tasted one of the drinks from a waiter's tray, holding the waiter by
the sleeve as he did so, and then suddenly muttered with' biting anger,
turning round to his wife, "I thought so; I bloodywell thought so!
He's done it again!" His wife tried to calm him, smiling at the guests
To P.963


and even
at the waiter with, "What happened, darling?" "He's opened the champagne!"
Kemide I He mas.
came the answer. "I told you not tot"%"I said leave the champagne till I
tell you, but no+t-1 Oh, Christ!" He shouted, atth
"Where ts your br-
ains; for Christ's sake?" And the meek reply came, "I don't know, sir!n
Elizabeth introdiced them both to a bouncy young man with dark eyes whose name
he didn't catch; he talked very fast, mo stly to Pinkie, and tapped his foot
ced kit-
restlessly on the deck while he glanced about, singing snatches of, tunes. "Do
you know this one?" he would say like a machine-gun; and he would launch into
a tune, "Da-da-da-diddle-ly-da-da-dum-dum!" To Granville's surprise Pinkie
looked enthralled all the time, and seemed actually to be straining herself to
this
iE wud to0 quick.
recognise the tune, though thertast was impossible because afroho-rapldsmgyne
wontthoddghapos 9 She had none of her usual forbearance and dignity; and tho-
kere was
ugh the singing wasn't singing, and jarred on the nerves,, a smile of apprecia-
tion *e on her face. They went down to the lower deck and sat on benches,
crammed together, while someone played the guitar. Bhawnoshsstratnthagangw
harde
woyy/wonergentalentah-loginenuhubthorsudewlytglenod sorossvarraranarennoutinay
his eyes harsh and fullof enmityy7preoemmblg
bec ause
didn't-knoy-
and Aondered
he U mar et
himeelf, -se Granville deliberately
leaned across to Elizabeth and said something to her; luckily she nodded and
smiled in a vivacious way; thishad an immediate effect onLord Runnock, who
gaye him another look, soft and mild, his eyes like a girl's for a moment,
even with a special personal tenderness, and then he turned away, humming to
the guitarist. There was no wildness as at the ball. The river was lovely
outside, flat and touchedwith red from the suns Atthe Isle of Dogsthey
turned round, the boat kicking up a wash with its paddales, and-the party,
now that the oix-lamps were put on, became itthe more boisterous. The
bouncy young man kept up a constant chatter, taking-his audiencer Elizabeth
and Pinkier for granted,mhatever he saids And they were a rapt audience,
shodrorhigbotmartthonpoaveruisstaglavoyllablaovbrenthy
Gran-
Caa aod
kewure A Mor
wee
etd neve serem Ehisabeth
doca
To P963(a)


and
Nearly all the guests were personal friends of Runnock' S-- -suddenly,
from across the gangaway, Runnock threw him a hard, resentfulglance
as if to say, I And who the devil are. you?! Granville turned away,
deciding not to notice it, and said something to Elizabeth and' the
hit-tune young man who sat oppsite him; luckily she smiled back at
him in : a vivacious way and when he glanced at Runnock again there was
no malevolence in his gaze at all, but. even friendliness, a soft and
gracious look. All this went on invisibly, a little drama unseen by
anyone. else. The look in Runnock's eye was too direct, too intimate,
both when it was hard and when it was gracious, for it to be meant
for anyone else. - Elizabeth, being. a friend of Lady Maine's, and
known by everyone, was a good friend to have. there.
There was no wildness. as at the ball.
The river was lovely out-
side, flat and touched with red from the sun. At the Isle of Dogs
they turned round, the boat kicking up a wash with its paddles,: and
the party, now that oil-lamps had been lit, became more boisterous.
The bouncy young man kept up a constant chatter, taking his audience
for granted. Pinkie and Elizabeth seemed rapt, glued to him, never
missing a syllable or breath.
He'd never seen Liz quite like it
before. She was so docile and girlish. She dukced her head in a
diffident way, like her daughter Jane for a moment, and kept saying,
"Oh, you bounder, George!", then to Pinkie, "Isn't he extraordinary?"
Granville listened for some thing extraondinary but there was only
a string of references to odd things like streets, aircraft, houses
in the country, card-games, turf for lawns---all in jumble he couldn't
follow at all. And the whole time there was this vivacious wonder-
ment from the women! Then there were hit-tunes again---"Do you
remember this one? Ta-ta-ti-ti-dum-dun-ti-ti-til* Then there was
the story of how he'd hitch-hiked fifty miles across Norway because
his car had broken down---he'd stayed at a hotel where the food was
good---and one where the food was bad---some times it had rained---
and sometimes it hadn't. And at everything there was the same.
enthralled wonderment.
Granville tried to puzzle it out. He tried
to listen harder---to get the narrative thread he might have missed--
amd he tried to join in, laughing and showing surprise by lifting his
eyebrows.
George---if that was his name---said heyd been on the
'grand tour' the previous sear: he prongounced it the French way
and Granville thought this was a joke and roared with laughter, but
ITO1964()


he tripped up badly here because the girls were nodding in a serious
way. George had played baccarat with a lorry-driver in a bistrot
at dawn---howls of laughter! But that w asn't funny!
Granville's
mouth gell open with surprise: how did they know when to laugh
together? "Georgé! Old thing!",it went on. And from Géorge,
"I was absolutely whacked t*t the next night, I really Was---God,
I think I slept about twelve hours---!" To which Pinkie said ina
demure way-- it was so unusualy for her that Granville nes arly nudged
as sanetercrtitr.
her to chakerhertavakerm"Come, come, I can't imagiex imagine you
getting very tired!" Why not? -She hadn't even met the chap before!
ask P She
When the boat got back to the pier nearly everyone, went on to
meant it
the Melbourne, a quite fashionable club, by an arrangement that formed
pesple a
were
quickly as d ene >/WB getting into their car- --"Coming to the
Melbourne?", "We're off to the Melbourne, what about you?" He and
Pinkie went in "eorge's car; Elizabeth was travelling with Runnock.
George spoke to Granville for the first time---howdid he think
'the old engine' sounded? Granville didn't know and didn't care,
but he said, "All right," I suppose." "You suppose---!" George
cried with a rushed little laugh, "I only had it decarbojised today!"
"Good Lord," Granville murmured, looking out of the window. He sat
trying to think up something mechanical to say, and chose carburrettors.
At once George turned to him as if he'd daid something pooppOMrPAOd
stunning, and went into a long speech about the 'double-carb'---
"The double-carbs the job, it really is---fit it in a day---I said,
look how does that adapt to the rest and he said, fine, so I said
get to work---you just have to give it a tickle and whoof! the
girl's off---stands to reason, doesn't it, but there you are--
rattling away I was, the old bus---but very sound, though, don't you
thimk so? Do you?" He fixed Granville with youthful, darkly sharp,
friendly eyes. "Yes, I do," Graaville said,fying r give kim the Sames
glance Yrack. h. b. At the Melbourne there was a long table under dim lights where
most of the river-party guests sat.
And once more there was ch ampagne.
Pinkie and George danced together---she showed him how to whirl round
on the. same' spot without getting giddy: you keep your eyes on the
other person's eyes! And she swept him round with EXa an oh-you-.
sperentl,
charming-devil look on her face, Her/patoast, seeping moré abandon-
A Gamolle
ed than ever
been with Axa Grove, E in a role be/couldn't
sheja
yonnect with her---it was just too extraordinary for words; he sat
lo 964R


and stared at them with puzzled fascination, wondering if she'd
gone cuckoo!
George wasn't a 'faun'! He wasn't what she called
an 'oomph-man'- -Grove had oomph, she always said! George was
pleasant, inconsequential, cheerful---not the sort of person who
interested her that way at all!
As if by previous arrangement Deryk Grysham was also at the
kuls club, xitx another party on the other side of the room. He seemed
a bit touched tonight, too! He was giggling, fluttering his hands
lng
at Pinkie and callea out, "Hullo, there!"---he even acknowledged
Granville with a radiant smile,A poaper/tocongtatyareta
yotust
Mmworand he aven danced as. well, with a: pretty, dark-looking,61f1
Mtnarohuaarbaax who looked about her glumly and didn't seem to
understand what Taaben was toting to aa with his little prancing
steps. Well,. Grysham was/dazzled by the river-apmparty, peopisa
Anl
2 that was clear! RARnvaverony Granvillé sat comfort-
ably at the long table, syrrounded for all he knew by the best titles
Here wus
in the land; and,Grysham on the other side with some tatty old group
who probably couldn't run to an Honourable, let Lone a duchess!
idlg
Beryk kindor bemused ant abarmed-ehehantmentonmis Raoeg
sadoranvallegsalised th
ver par ust
ave been
asy fear
anxx a X à
amy top as youcould
Englands
Granville had had ayfew drinks and was in an abandoned state of
mind himseli. He thought he would like to be said hullo to again by
Grysham and deliberately fluttered his hand to him across the room;
and the effect was immediate---Grysham fluttered back as if to say,
1 Why can't we always be together like this?' He felt like making
Deryk flutter all evening, just for the devil of it! Someone said
that Laura Lady Maine might be coming to the river-party table later
only
in the evening---she 'came alive' A after midnight.
There! They
tal,
were clearly going to get jam on itA tae felt like ringing up the
prime minister and asking him to step over!
Pinkie's whirling and Grysham's capering went on. Granville
danced, too, first with Elizabeth and then wi th one of the women in
the party, whose face was extraordinarily composed, with a dazzling
loveliness, her skin so soft that it appeared beyond touch, making Rim
suddenlgs
noisy
Grahnille feel hushed, wôndering if the dream would come to an end


and peace---reality---return. He could hardly take his eyes off
her. Yet she wasn't pretty. There was only this composure. He
sat gazing across the table at her, hardly blinking his eyes, not
shifting his gaze even when he drank from his glass. He went from
chair to chair drinking up the unfinished glasses, since the bottles
were empty. And he even asked a glowering, hadnsome, thick-set man
if he might finish his glass for him as he didn't appe ar to want it,
and the man said to him after a long pause, "Yes, you may. I apprec-
ttals
iate that you're honest about it---it's bettéer than just doing it,
like some. other bastards." He said he was Runnock's brother, and
began telling Granville how he hated most of the other people at the
table.
And he repeated, "I like you because you're nonest---when you
Huee
want to také the boose out of my mouth you say so, so here it is,
and I bet you've got the bloody neck to drink it, too." Granville
*keys
said he had, but only if ne' went half-way withainy which Runnock's
brother did, scowling at one of the other guests and, saying, "They're
all rotters!".
At the end of the evening---Laura Lady Maine didn't come after
all---there were arrangements with "eorge to meet him again; he must
come and have dinner at Chaworth Road, Pinkie said. Once or twice
Grarville addressed something to her ins the foyer outside, while
all
they were/getting their coatsx on, but she appeared not to hear him.
Her eyes passed him by, set ona task to-which he was absent, but more
than that, to which he was nothing but a dead object, flesh, just
dead weight, without a spark of life in him; he d had a similar
sensation with Hell, but this was much worse---this cancelled out his
whole past, self, body; he was nothing, just a thing in clothes;
he existed only from the outside---a cardboard reality; nith that
was how he felt himself while she and Liz and George still pranced
about among the coats and hats---just a prop for his clothes.
When they got back home, as they were going up the stairs in
the darkness, he asked her, "Who was that young man, the one called
George?" "Good God," she replied, "don't you know?" She half-
turned in the darkness, nearly stopping: "That was Viscount Warsdale!"
And the anger, pent up all these weeks, suddenly flooded over him---
he knew he wouldn't be able to hold it. Already hejd begun to
toyer,
tremble---her last look at him, in the eluby burned in his memory so!
And now hend been given the re ason---a viscount! A viscount!


Viscount!
How tawdry and cheap! How bestial!
He was silent
for a time as they continued up the stairs to the music-room, but
there, beforé the light had been switched on, he burst out, shrieking
at the hop of his voice, beyond himself as he'd thought it was imposs-
ible for him to be, now, "You dirty, filthy lot of crawling toadsi
To P.966


ael
oppaf
Geen grve
1 ph
again, and a final whipl round. Once or twice Granville addressed samething
a sho'd
to Pinkie but: she appeared not to hear/him; hewas reminded,
of/lr
hiin ag1as
fook e held tipped hef out of béd some weeks before, when shedcame into
him
the kitchen and called/a 'damned little clerk', - or similar words; her eyes
passed him/by, set/on a task to which he was absent, but more than that, to wh-
wk ded lyjecl
werjly
Defe
Ach he was nothinga onty flesh,
without the spark, in him; he had
the same sensation as with Hell; he was simply a person in clothes; he was
séen from the outsi ide, att he could feel himself for/a moment as if he only did
dom
jutoct
existofoutside, without gogdness or thought, a cardboard reality. When they
got back, as they were going up the stairs in the darkness, he asked her,
"Who was that young man?" "Good God," she replied, "don't you know?" She
half-turned in the darkness, nearly stopping: "That was Viscount Warsdalet"
Hé was silent for a time as they continued up the stairs but in the music-roo-
m, béfore the light had béen switched gn, he burst out, shrieking at the top
dold
ahigoroteortorondbinselietta thoughtitwal HanE imposathierfor-nin torbe
camplloudirtynailthylotafloranlanglAngtoadad Stew in your own rotten jui-
Vali ce instead of dragging other people into it---you filthy lot---you filthy lot--
you filthy lot---!" He had never yelled at her So much; his voice echoed ac-
ross the street in a AA
shriek, and the tears poured down on his face;
"You heartless lot, you heartless# lot!" It was aike a frightening chant, al-
most a song! It appeared to be a complete shock to her; he was aware of her
trembling in the darkness, and there was a gasp as if she'd begin to sob.
"What are you talking about?" she asked breathlessly. But his strange,
his
shrieked chant went on, though he had no sense of choosing the Words; and
it came out in bursts, like panted breath, halting and half-croaked like a
frightful cough, "God, if I'd known---kowtowing to people like that---you
filthy, bloody toads---ladies---where's your bloody--pride, both of you---
going down on yoi ur arses---to some tuppenny-halfpennyarecheapsblobdy kid---
the manners of the gutter---just because---of some,cheap bloody title---what
lal a foul, Aapody---couple---of bastards---you are---ardstocrasy---you people---


The. tears continued to pour down his face and into his mouth. He was sure,
underneath, that she would accept what he said, not show anger or offence,
because of the shere helpless nature of his outburst; - he thought she would wan
-t to nurse him in some way and calm him downi Rowhovettitrugatevwwt
M sothhat a filthy exhibition-
l.c - Suddenly she leaned forward in the darkness and with a swift, coolly anmed
movement swung her hand-bag, which had sharp metal edges, into his face, draw-
ing bload; he put his hand up and lowered his head and was at once calm;
"It's all right," he said quietly, "I'm sorry." She stood there quivering,
her teeth chattering. - And they continued to stand in the half-darkness,
their legs astride.
She seemed to recover and started to move away, and this
had the effect of refiving his anger at once: he imi ta ted her talking to
Goerge, bending his body in a mock-wheedling fashion, "Oh, come, come, I can't
imagine you getting tiredf" And he added in a clear voice, as if making a
matter-of-fact announcement of some kind, "You stupid, arse-crawling bitchf"
He slammed out of the room clutching at his mouth and as he walked up the st-
airs he heard her cough in a pathetic way as if all the sorrows of life had
suddenly heaped themselves on her and she couldn't go on any more; he stopped,
to return, but his pride made him go on up to the kitchen where he -- - CE
made himself two eggs and a rasher of bacon, with a pot of tea; she was asl-
eep by the time he returned downstairs. He decided not to drink wine or
his mouth swelled up and Pinkie
beer ior a few days to let his blood cool; ambox@kaxxkhrmexmxxemxxitayskhn
made a joke about it next evening to Hell, saying how jealous he'd been bec-
ause she danced with Viscount Warsdale; Hell wanted to know at once how 1Ge-
itals orgey/was, she hadn't seen him for years; 3 her interest quickened in the most
unusual way. In three or four days he félt he could joke about it, too;
Paikie,
"What's that you keep in your hând-bag," he asked bers It a knuckle-dueter or
Something?"
Grove appeared at the house again, but this time only for a few minutes,
on his way to à partys Again Granville was acutely aware of his benevolence;


standing at his side he felt that Pinkie was completely vindicated
and right---to choose Grove. Yet he knew that when alone again he
would fall back to the twisted logic by which she was his rightful
wife.
But there was something extraordinarily bright and safe in'
Grove's presence which remained with him.
He noticed a change in Pinkie: she was more cautious in the
way she talked about other people these days. If he appeared to
criticise someone, say Hell or Cerberus, she withheld herself with
a demureness, he'd never seen in her before; she turned his critic-
ism back on him, as if the spirit of criticism in him was something
dark, belonging to the past---before he benm bècame a gay dad dog.
He felt from her silence that his criticism was an unnecessary
departure from the light and reasonable attitudes that now governed
the house.
His outburst after the river-party was quickly forgotten;
he'd had too much to drink and that was that; it was true, he told
himself, he,d drunk an enormous amount without realising it! Again
Pinkie told him, as she'd done in Basrah, that he was 'such a sunny
person' and that it was always a pity to see him 1 burying his he ad
in theories'.
An element in her character had waned recently; she was a less
extravagant person. On the surface her extravagance was MEKE much
greater than before---he noticed that she wore tight trousers in the
evening and sexy blouses like one of the kmxx 'mice', and she no
longer seemed nervous of other people S opinion, she seldom had a
l.c. shy and. lonely expression now; But this was only a social extrava-
gance; underneath she seemed more reserved, he could AMdAR feel
her deciding not to say something out of social policy. But this
new outward extravagance seemed to satisfy her; her old arrogant
way of speech was gone but she was happier.
While he thought of
'this as Grove's influence on her he couldn't account for it in
Grove'a personality; why should her extravagance have gone?
There was a second much stiffer note from the U.K.Compund in
Basrah


asking again for the sum of E11.14.2, but this time it gave him a
little twinge of enjoyment---to think that he'd laid down all claims
to prftdet people' 's good opinion. He began to wake up in the morning
with the feeling that he'd put his body in pawn the night before, to
the public; it had been revealed naked and he didn't know how much of
it had beèn seen, and what shame he'd brought on himself; sometimes
dMsp he woke up in the middle of the night with his heart beating fast,
fhis
a sense of shame and regret paralysing him like physical shock; 1 was
shame, he found, at what he thought he might have said to someone in
he had O
the evening; theremathe vague memory of many conversations; part-
icularly those he'd had after a few glasses of something were lost
to him in their detail, and it was here, in what he couldn't remember,
that the chief source of shame and useless conjecture lay; or else
he would remember something he actually had said, and it would dart
into his mind like a frightful flame, making him sweat! It might
only be a small remark he'd made but if it had slipped out without
preparation, and particularly if there had been a silence afterwards,
a lull in the talk, he felt the encroachment of shame; thEXWE next
morning, or in the middle of the night, the words would appear before
him like a lighted sign; it might be a remark that he'd enjoyed one
of the plays at 'Protest Hall', after which, particularly if there
lull in *e talk,
silently
tesort
had been a silenaan he would feel, judged as/a,person who approved of
alse
all the plays at 'frotest Hall', Or, the whole of that one ; he
would conclude that. the person hefd been talking to thought At him af
fout,
was
stupidy and there wonzaie no way of retrieving himself from this
verdiot; it was the verdict that he saw held above him like a red
neon-sign in the dead of the night. Thus, he found- he was more
interested in other people's good opinion than he'd thought!
One night this took a gràphic form in a dream which haunted
him for days. It was after a gay night. There was a silver,


gleaming, grotesque object in the sky making a trail of smoke,
quite far away, but in a few moments it was close overhead, vast and
silver, yith four engines that made singularly little noise; it
floated nearer and nearer---he was standing in the centre of a large
town---until it suddenly dived down and crashed in flames, still sil-
ently, enveloping some of the shops of the road he was standing in;
he jumped into a dark grocery shop for shelter, pulling two others
wwe Hese Pinkie and Grrove?-
with hima and there they crouched waiting for all the debris to fall;
then they went out on to the road again but all they saw was a black
gap in the shops and no real debris, nor flames; and the area was
already cordoned off; there was no great alarm, and one of the people
he was with made a joke about it; he assumed that only the pilot
was killed but afterwards he learned that a hundred or so people had
died; yet the street was hardly disturbedo Theisight of the huge
floating plane worried . him all day- It appeared to him to be a
picture of total calamity which people didn't record in their faces;
life went on without alarm.
There was even a certain anger against'
ethet
WRNNRam
the people for being killed:
Hester, the lover, told him that she'd met Aclockworkt, whose
Clockwork
real name was Barnes, and that) nel knew through Hanni 'all there was
him !
to know' about Branyorlas She then recited his own life to him
with artful glances: He'd thrown up his job in Basrah because his
Heve
Ye. said;
wife had refused to go out, with hims, there was 'a skeleton in his
cupboardt---he came from a working family; he lived


ed on his wife; he was of rather an hysterical' nature; he was good-hearted
and would never make any sort of 'official', which was why he would probably
come to nothing in his work; his life was 'ignominious'; he was in love with
a girl in the Kaaba dancing company. They were sitting by the river gazing
this to and
across at the castle when she recited/him; /when she asked A if it was all tr-
ue he said simply, "Yes"; "In cluding the dancing girl?" she asked.
He nod-
ded again, pouting, "Yes!" She only smiled. A grudging, careless attitude
had grown over her. "What doyou think about ituhe asked-here "Nothing"
came-the-replyintheycaugght the nexttrainback tolondon andhardlnaddress
piedawoldboeachotber. He waited to be stunned by what she td said, but
felt only a mild irritation; he even felt no resentment against Hanni. He
thought of approaching Dick in the confidential manner they had sometimes adop-
ted at training school: "I say, tell old Hanni to watch her tongue, will you?
I mean, I don't mind, but--n And Dick would be light and clear: "Of course,
I will, old chap!" But he said nothing.
Haminhadnet/beenltathehousa Pop-pomowpckag RanBaek,Hichikalobe
sohyod
aGrOnOalyt
MoBlenreedsyardonlyphonedl Sometin meT Pinkie said that Hanni was appear-
nly
these day;
ing at 'nearly every fashionable party in Londont/ A eonrohevd/seondg she didn't
say with whom, and he didn't offer her the information - a EF Hester/had
given him, namely that Hanni and Clockwork' were so much/love that they were
togekar
But Ken
keeping
flike children'
Antha etherhandal she probably knew it and was withnozding
h.p. it from him on the grounds that he might disppprove. The following evening,
talhigy
as if she'd heard them, A Hanni appeared at the door downstairs in a new coat,
stillmass
spelanbougoty looking remarkably radiant and calm, with an unusual geiooness
naund her; it wasn't the quietness of withdrawalbbut deeper; she walked eas-
ily and her face was cool and smooth; and she appeared bigger and more erect,
and even seemed to look down at him for a moment. He found he had a nostalgia
Ror asd Jick
for/ thom/as fioopa and asked her where Dick was; oh, heft wouldn't be comint
AARNSAAIA
prAdEr
round that evening! - Again halookedbackon eo/porion_wher tagtebeenin
Whoroudermearlyoustyragas/aS/ORORARcaNdaartriavererthugthi She toli


him he looked tired and must sleep more; Pinkie treated her with deference
like a special guest, and he heard her closing the door downstairs against poss
Arerenlaor linkic
-ible visitors.' When Hanni had gonefshe told him that Dick had 'broken downt
Hanni taa
on the subject of *Joe Clockwor rki; steta stayed away from Hampton Court for
been
three or four nights running, and he'd got absolutely desparate; therelvas/no-
where for him to *phone; he didn't know where fJoe Clockwork* lived; all he
had
knew was that they worked in the same office, pORaOrvesa, but she, blocked all
personal calls and he couldn't get through. She'd never really forgiven him
alr all
for the pale girl, when he'd come in 'reeking of her', asManninhadhsaidy and,
moking cn Exhilition'
ade an Vexctiittione/in front of Pinkie and Granville. She was especiall-
y sensitive about her dignity as far as he, Pip, was concerened, Pinkie said.'
Clockwork had been
AUsa Ajoe
an 'exciting proposition'; here was a boy, virt-
ually, with a genuinely yqueert streak who neededyrpeaangg a nurse, and she had
with Kim
obliged, overlooking the fact that she might fall in lovek which she did do, or
at least she'd become infatuated; she nati told Pinkie thot there was something
extraordinarily 'sad and ancient" in AClockwork* which she hadn't suspected at
hod
face
all, and that she/ really spend hours simply gazing into his hers and lying on
a bed with him, 3 doing nothing; she said the silence would. tseem to be going a-
long', there wouldn't be the sense of a nervous pause, of not doing apything,
as there was with Dick; it was a 'great rest' for her; she was amazed at the
Theu
'dignity' that lay in *Clockworkt unseen. Hovever, Dick had broken down;
Rad
he'd stayed outside the foreign Office waiting for her, and' màre or less pulled
o8f
Pinkie said
L L
wus
her with him; athonghtARAalaie sait msryowpsver, serosaie/as tickled as
at lask.
a kitten that shefd 'brought him lowt bxsheramilnwaichintha firstplada
AP ihadhbeang He and Pinkie agreed miahesehather that Hanni certainly had
'grit'. Dick had managed to get her down to Hampton Court, where he told her
that she must never sleep with another man again; he hid his face in her lap
and said in a broken voice that he couldn't reason about it, he knew he hadn't
got a leg to stand on, he knèw it didn't fit in with the rest of his life or
with what he believed or what he said every day, but if she touched another mar


he'd go away and divorce her at once; and before looking up he asked her,
"Will you take that as final?" There was silence and Dick repeated the ques-
tion, still not looking upg and at last Hanni said, "Yes." Granville imagin-
ed her looking calm and proud like a goddess when she said this; and with this
unearthly calm round her she had come over to see them; she and Dick were now
back at Hampton Court, and all further meetings with *Clockwork were to be
ones of friendbhip.
Granville found more and more that the idea of Pinkie sleeping with Gr-
gave
ove prorided him whh a sharp sexual excitement; the pain was an element in
the alchemy, its base metal; and he found that this surpassed his old desire
for her. It overwhelmed his relation with the other Hester.. The anger thr-
linkie
eatened to rise now and then, he often wanted to hit har but it was never more
than a passing twitch in his fingers, and he always checked himself in the in-
terests of this new grim passion. He hid the photographs he'd found of her
and would glance at them secretly, whenever he wi shed to arouse his passion;
he was astonished at what desire there was in him, too; it seemed inexhaust-
ible; it was less and less possible to satisfy it; Pinkie began to wonder at
this, too, and tola Hanni that he was 'Herculeant. For her as well the new
quiet, oblique sex was satisfactory; and she told him suddenly one evening
when they were on their way out to the cafe that she could happily go on with
this life for ever; when she came in late these days she always took a bath,
again K. thagac
and se/he smelt
EE sperm on the towel she td used; that, too, was a
matter of quick, painful excitement; it was a marvellous liberation from the
suffocating part of sex; it was now free, and no loyalties, much less moral
speeches, were noAA required. Pinkie had to suppress her anger, too; E she
started, whenever Joy Celeste was mentioned; he watched lier doing the same as
himself; her eyes flared up, then her face grew set and deliberate. They
even began confiding in each other about their love-making. This was mom-
entous, and happened quite by accident. He suddenly said in a genial voice,
"Oh, come, why do you try and hide these things? I won t bite, you know!"


And she began # telling him about the approaches the 'young man with the
m kim.
ear-ring' had made to her, when she'd called round-mach.tebranytijelarasshaye
He remembered how relieved he toad been that she returned to the house before
*ol ghe
ten o'clock, and /had joked with Dick about it; but now he regretted that she
hadn't more to tell. As Pinkie said, "You want your bread buttered on both
hip. sides!" Grove wasn't mentioned directly; he had the impression that this was
sacred for her, and above all other pleasures; he appreciated her character
in this: - Thier talk was an exciting preliminary to love. It freed them
from the shadows of the past, from the aching void of belonging exclusétely to
each other when they shared nothing and weren't real kin; it accepted the emp-
tiness between them; they established each other again as separate people with
interesting lives of their own; it. filled the lack of a rock of trust under-
neath---the swirling waters were received, they plunged into them! They slept
with each other more. No hot feelings were involved.
They kept their dis-
tance from each other as part of the pleasure; it was not unlike Glenning's
'vestist' activities with his wife.' They were like two strangers, but these
strangers took surprising liberties with each other; that was the attraction.'
They were familiar and thrillingly new; she began to need him sexually, and
to find him 'interesting'. Apart from that he would spend whole afternoons
listening to the Creole Shake over and over again, with a glass in his hand:
>during de 'frall pen - a grass
He went to a concert and heard the German Requiem; in the first movement)he
had the sensation of floating away quite beyond himself, almost into death,
to the borders of nulliyy, rising and falling with the music as if he was be-
x 5 ing lifted up bodily and' then lowered again, each time with less and less bod-
S y so that the sky came nearer and nearer, and he was almost received into it,
bathed in melodies and sunk down and limp; he was crushed, and stumbled back
home afterwards; there now seemed two parts of himself---the music wasn't ab-
sorbed into his life; it only made him float outwards; it didn't enter his
flesh, chaning him, as it always had before; it couldn't get through to his
numbed and paralysed flesh, So stayed in the floating regions, lulling him and


calling him from the bad life. To verify this he went and heard
Schubert's 'Death and the Maiden' quartet, and waited for the movement
of deadly pause in it, where the outer silence is captured for some
moments, and its rhythm actually enters life, joined to the music in
thorough perfection; and again when it came he was aware of something
passing him by, an awful procession, like that of a king, that lulled
him and called to him and
tried to reduce his flesh, but couldn't
take him wholly; again he hadn't absorbed it into the flesh of his
life, turning it # to blood.
Aunt Beatrice called and had them, over to lunch; Pinkie had
wold Yese
predicted this---Deryk hadtord Beatrice about the river-party and
wonld
their social stock had soarda up. They had a me al under a portrait
of one of the fnteenth century Gryshams.
Beatrice was all charm
and flashed them glances; her wit was working overtime, but suddenly,
after the coffee, as if he, and Pinkie hadn't come up to her new
expectations, her charn broke---he was in the middle of saying some-
thing about the sheikh. of Rubath when she suddenly turned a wither-
nhim:
ing eye, mune-disgusteu-herttationnensanneninkusainhera
and got up atronoe with, a
"Well, I can't stay here all day!", and
swept out of the room, leaving Deryk to clear up aftér her, so to
Jort
speak. He did his best, and said, "Mummy's so tired these days,
poor thing!: Pinkie's theory afterwards was that the old girl kad
was
Xestixed had realised tpat their invitation to the river-party had
bepr a 'fluke': she had a 'nose' for these things.
Again Graaville was aware of betraying himself to an implacable
verdict whenever he said anything more than good-evening or 'What
will you have to drink?'
He tried as hard as he could not to say
what came straight into his head, and never to say axtyk anything
that brought a cloud over people's faces---any thoughtful remark
might do this, it seemed---but it was impossible; suddenly a hot
thought would break from his mind and he would feel exposed to the
contempt of others, imaginary as he knew it was. He feared their con-


clusions, like iron bars in front of his real self. He told himself that
they were only 'iron bars'. if he attirbuted importance to them; he tried to
think of. himself as a small and insignificant creature. who had no right to
qttan péople I S good opinion; for only a high image of himself could be taken
prisoner by other people and put into bars; a low image left. him freeg WTAm
olerUrerapeitazLI08/bApALA 9But when the next occasion arose his pride
would come. back like an unbreakable spring. He was surprised how much pride
there was in his life. He had no work, no job, but he dressed himself up
sometimes in his office-togs and sat. at his desk, making quite useless notes or
a travel-book or something; he realised when he did this that it was be cause
he was ashamed of himself; but more than this, he was ashamed because, nean
AAAS husere-framre publigbointlorutens he saw himself as someone else would see
him---lying on the bed for hours, listening to the Creole Shake for
hours,otd
enlurtprablasg
vaiting impatiently for the next phone-call; he
imagined
wasn't ashamed in himself, left to himself, but he was when he hRREEXAMATEXER
somebodyl else's eyes on his life; it was social shame that came from his not
bercouldonly see-hinsmselfinrelation to ethera;
being pooperly alone;> CARXEXMEEnEEXEREmaxgixinxisxt*exXExrtndkeataxktnthe
jiyr eforr Mendham
he was no longer ever alone, really" He remembered feeling/ that his loneliness
was now full---his self was full---because he had Christ; but this thought
was quite incomprehensible to him now; the lonely hours were bleak; he warm-
ed them wi th music or wine! He asked himself again and again, What has happ-
ened to the night of the eclipse?t But he never got beyond the question.
He would suddenly have a fit of social shame that he was getting up too
late and hn would set the alarm for an earlier hour, just after dawn; Pinkie
thought he was madr, but he said he liked the dawns! He would get up briskly
dress and shave, not linger in his dressing gown. But there was noohing to
wanit
auytheng
almy,
do; there was/even nathing to think A for he found that thoughts came easier
to him when he was sprawled on the bed in old clothes, thàn when he was dress-
sitting
axd
ed and shaved for the office and Det at his desko thonught
nouatait
foMowehorrequirenentorss
upfer J keyl
PHAA


He went into a cafeteria near St. Paul's for a morning coffee,
to revive his memories EXXEKX of when he'd worked at the head office
two years before, and as he was collecting his coffee from the counter
he suddenly took it into his head---partly because he was glum---to
smile at the girl serving him, as a gracious act to throw off the
his
darkness of kxsxlife, to try to bring a iabrief, tiny light to another
human creature unknown to him, without ambitions for himself. And
the effect was instant. At first she was absorbed in the mechanical
handing
business of beaning out steaming cups of coffee, but then she smiled
back at him in a delighted way, her tired, worn face. awakened in a
moment, and he heard her say to the other serving girl as he walked
to his tabe, "You, can always tell a gentleman, can't you?" He
nearly dropped his cup with confusion and hurried to a chair behind one
of the pillars, hiding from her in case he did something to besmirch
her image of him, and to show his real life!
After hefa sat down
he took out a penciland began wri ting a definition off the genteeman',
with surprising clarity considering his state: 'First, to be true
to your féelings. Second, to be enquiring of others, to showv no
power, to be gracious, to harbour no grievances, not to be compet-
itive, not to pay undue attention to appearances. Third, to call
out the good seed in other people, to forgive and protect, not to
judge in silence. Fourft, to speak dearlessly, to be rash and wild
for the truth, not to study expedience or reputation, not to consult
other men before the truth.
That is, to live with God in mind.'
He wrote it all out later in the form of & a letter to Nevinson,
of all people; he wondered if he was going cuckoo but went on with
it. It lay on his desk for some time and he even put it in an
envelope; then he threw it


away. He was surprised how much he thought about Nevinson these days, thou-
gh. hé hadn't met. him. He was aware of Nevinson watching over his life and
calling to: him like a father. And apparently he thought this letter would
vindicate his conduct in some way. There was a reply from Mohammed, quite
cheerful, asking when he was coming back and assuming that hés leave had been
lettex
prolonged once again; as for Granville's 'Help mel',it seemed to have passed
hauf beer,
unnoticed, for which he wasn't sorry. He puzzled how this couldy bze/son and
concluded that Mohammed had taken it. as *So help me Bodt,gararminduamrttosnealen
Ligon
flal
kis lk
Vorclamathorthotfcond/oreeond/porequmd LYN
Atampnatrahooky
his own
tired 'Allah, wa-allahla There was no news at the Basrah office about his
having offered his resignation.
That was odd:
av M tnsenenr-fenv
Joycé the pale girl gave a party/to which everyone they knew was invited,
except for the MBrtng weeds'; the whole Kaaba dancing company was there.
Dick had evidently told Joyce about her fascinating pallor; she was dressed in
hext lo rothing
are armus,
asdibtleraspessiblenconsenent With reesingatlallgyoherpon bare shoulders,
Se tighe ane Cnld ardly wula.
and her skirt was atshortas therfaebionalleweds It was like old times:
Dick and Hanni were there, dancing separately; Pinkie came, though she went
off early; there was the old excited sense, between the four of them, of lay-
ing themselves bare to each other as they didn't otherwise, and without saying
a word, only winking as they passed during a dance, or stopping at the bar to
chat for a moment.
Larry AVicef got drunk and wedged himself in between the
wall and a divan bed, and fell asleep: Granville and the pale girl discovered
a sympathy for each other, due partly to their common friendship with Dick,
and they dancedtogether several times in succession; Dick was applying him-
self to a girl in the Kaaba company but came over to him when he was alone for
a moment and said ân a: low voice, smiling, "Listen, old sport, I can see the
danger-signal! Do you know what I mean?" Granville shook his head and they
looked âbto each other's eyes with the perfect oppnness they only had at part-
I say - Rr
ies; Dick went
he ought to make up his mind' 28/000 whether he wanted
on/pint
I Joy
Joyce or who; he didn't mind what the verdict was as long as he knew;


it was only in the interests of their not getting their 'wires
crossed'; he only wanted to know; and there was a look of real
objective. curiosity in his eyes; but Granville couldin't tell him
anything, only shrugged his shoulders and smiled back.
As if Dick had planted a suggestion in his mind he found himself
with the pale girl again, talking to her confidentially, mostly about
Dick: together they watched him on the othér side of the room with
his dainty, smiling Morrocan girl, and laughed when he made a charact-
eristic little gesture like taking the girl's glass to re-fill it and
giving her a twinkling smile at the same time; and they watched him
when he danced, his cheek pressed hard against her's.
An intimacy
was growing up between them through Dick!
Otherwise they had nothing
to talk about, especially as Joyce rarely spoke. Dick had certainly
che anged her in the last few weeks. She was now tremulously aware of
herself, and kept glancing down in a slow way at her bare arms and
her bosom, and her pallor seemed even more of a veil, soft and yet
impenetrable, than before; also Dick had given her a style of
intimate speech; she asked Granville all sorts of quiet questions;
her composure was extraordinary; would he ever go back to the Middle
East? what were the women like out there? did he think she was too
tall for a woman? She gazed before her all the time, still and
reflective; this was the girl who'd sat over love-magazines in the
music-room for two or three hours of an evening, saying not a word!
He wondered at Dick's patience.
Pinkie came to the party in a flowing, black gown rather like
the one Flizabeth had lent her at Meedham; this was to hide her
stomach mostly; she


again
had a few drinks and danced twice with Dick,and then leftz saying she felt
hip. tired. Harrypevice? woke up for a moment, surprised to find himself in such
a gight position, and said, Blinking, up at the other guests,"How do you people
manage to: sleep standing up?", and then We went off again. Granville heard
the hair-girl on the other side of the room, in the half-darkness, cry, "Oh,
no, you don't, noxt with my dad around!" and "Anybody seen Larry? Vicey,
Vicey!", thén she made her clapping laugh. He noticed Alice the snake-girl
ni P:
sitting in a corner, quiet as always, like a dark, round-cheeked boy with her
thick legs pushed out in front of her, just as he'd seen her first at the
Marquis, with Dick; she smiled a charming good-evening to him while he was
talking to Joyce, and later he went over and sat at her side on the floor, en-
ganced
joying the casual intimacy that joined him to everyone. She Jooked down at
him and said, "Your wife's having a good time,* I see." Hehodded, look-
*ken Rat /
ing round involuntarily for Pinkie, but she tad gone; A and he remembered that
ke snake -gire
Hahni
for Alicetenpuryigos Hanni was his
At that moment she was dancing quite
wifei
Kaaba
near them, laughing and kicking up her legs, with one of the men from they daue
MA company. He was about to explain that she wasn't his wife at all when
hipi Alice said,
shoaddedy "You wouldn't think he was in trouble to look at him, would you?"
Gouville
"Who?" Giskville asked. She nodded towards Dick, who was dancing on the
other wide of the room.
"What trouble# do you mean?" he asked.'
mwife-troubleg!" There was a pause and Granville asked, "Does he have wife-
trouble#?" "Well, you ought to know, En she murmured, turning to him with a
Kit
smile, reminding him of Kot for a moment with her tom/boyish manner, "yousre
his best friend, aren't you?" "Yes," he said; and he repeated his quest-
ion, saying he hadh't heard of any wife-trouble#; to which she replied, "Oh,
wll, perhaps I'd better keep my trap shut!" But later she told him, after
he'd said that he felt he ought to khow as a friend: Dick's wife was sleeping
with the Kaaba company's publicity man; Granville said quickly, "Grove?",
a distant form of the old panic starting in him, a shadow; "Yes," she sadd?
itali
"Who is?" he asked, not choosing his words properly.
"What do you mean?"


nt. she said, again looking down at him. "Who's sleeping with Grove?" "Dick's
I wife!" "Hanni?" "Yes." "Good Lord!" He had the impusie to run home and
continued to give her his att ention
tell Pinkie; it was nearly amusing! But he peeskskmaouksaxhisxemest-tamagx
quite still,where he was sitting. "Yes," she went on, "you wouldn't think it
from the way he comes to the Marquis and talks to Grove as easy as anything,
n 'would you?" Again, "Who?" "Dickl" She then told him that Dick had thrown
up his job 'in Basrah to see her - 'through the baby'o thaughonewoult a
showna-baringrababytargeorhen-siokiuguphorndagonngerngpymualdonen Granv-
ille's excétement FOW turned into the familiar sexual one, pained and fascinat-
ed, as he recognised that forn'Dick's wife' he had to read Pinkie! He was
*kis gue
surprised how little ste knew Dick; and he had assumed some intimacy between
them from the beginning; he asked her, what had Dick told her about his life?
Dick Kad
d.c. Nothing, really: They just sat together. Z Weyt tried to kiss her once but she'
turned Sidney the snake on to him, and hedthought it was poisonous and jumped
on a table with a green expression and said to her, "Now look here, swwet,
cobrafs can be dangerous---we've got laws in this country", drawing his trouser
S up like a skirt. After that they became friends, and she agreed to tsit W
with himt if he wànted to. She'd got 'all the dope' about him from the head
of the dancing troupe who lived in the same house as Grove and heard him and
Dick's wife troaring and slapping each other8 upstairs in one of the bedrooms.
SHa
osan Batmhgs
le say
sometimes
C io
de SO
Pheyt so cuté and clever with
vher
saysy you hear smacks and raop
bopr and then the bed gives a clang/like the gong in a boxing matchf" He
always said to his wife about hali-past six inthe evening whenthere were sou-
Quscions,
nds of preparation from upstairs, "Well, hére we go, Sadte, seconds out of the
ringi" Sometimes there was a knock-out in the first round and sometimes the
Foday glul
thh nighes apporenny i
fight would be won on points and go on for two hoursor mores sometimes they
hoard a cry like, "You're driving me madf" or "It's terrificl" which_made them
this
(double up and net
e- ta pe had also tala et that Crove-


Alice began laughing: "It's a scream the way he talks about them
two! He xaydx says, Boy, sometimes I want to go upstairs and join
in, it sounds so good! Hé says you hear smacks and kisses and
yells and then the bed gives a clang like the gong in a boxing match!
When things start moving upstairs round about half-past six in the
evening he says to the wife, 'Well, here we go, luscious, seconds
out of the ring!', and then it starts!
Sometimes there's a knock-
out in the first round, he says, and sometimes they go on for three
hours or more and win on points. Friday. nights are the nights, he
says! Some times tkayxmake you hear samethingxiikd 'em shout,
"You're driving me mad!" or "It's terrific!", which makte's this
dancer and his wife just double up!" xna


At the end of this Alice gazed before her, stretching her legs out
and yawning, and added, "To cap it all the baby she's going to have
is Grove'sl-
This stunned him so much that at first he only smiled and nodded,
refusing to absorb the words; he got her to repeat it, and she said
the same words again. She added, "I don't like, that sort of behaviour.
Somebody ought to téll him. Look at him dancing over there!"
And at that moment Dick gazed across the room at Hanni while he
was dancing and gave her a pleasant little smile, his cheek still
close to the Morrocan girl's. Granville glanced at Alice sideways;
she was so like a young boy, without a trace of wickedness!
His
teeth began to chatter, and he took another drink swiftly; he was
in a delirious state not unlike joy. The pale girl passed and
smiled down at him.
Alice also said that Grove was always 'on' to Dick's wife about
living in Chaworth Road; he said it was the 'filthiest sink' in
London, and that he feared it was slowly corrupting her; she needed
all the sympathy other people could manage because. she. was suffering
a 'real crucifixion'.
So that was why she.d talked about the crucifixion once, in the
slal kitchen!
And this made him, Granville, her high priest---he was the
mob that stoned ànd spat at her! He could hardly control the
hip
chattering of his teeth and Alice asked him if he was cold. She
went on to say, about 'Dick', that you wouldn't think he was a
'violent' sort of person to look at him, but according to Grove' he
was: he kept his wife indoors forcibly and he quite often beat her
up; worst of all,. he was unable to excite her passions! Alice said
she had only realised how true this probably was when she'd seen him
dancing on that table pulling his trousers up in such an unmanly way,
because of a harmless snake!
How'Dick' managed to get his girls was difficult to imagine, she
said, because his touch---according to Grove---was 'the kiss of death'
to his own wife!
Grove had said of 'Dick' that he was a 'nice enough
person' but Pinkie needed somebody with more love in their hearts, who
went out to people more, and could give her the 'full life' she was
yearning for.
And Grove had offered Pinkie a 'money-back guarantee',
as he had called it, that within a year or two she would be completely
jat Rer
free of her 'mania' that she wasn't 'wanted'; he would 'open society')


Granville pulled the snake-girl to her feet and made her dance
with him, which she did awkwardly, saying to him when he swung her
round fast, "Hey, do you want a snake-bite, too?" He was surprised
how calm his face felt; his heart had beat fast before but now he
was cool; a great coldness began to come over him, making him
shiver. People were dancing drowsily now. At the end of the tune
he let her go absently, hardly aware ad of dropping her hand. He
stood in the middle of the room for a time, absent to everything.
He strolled into the basement-area of the house, alone, as dawn
came up---it was like a shadow being lifted from behind the roofs.
Outside it was quite still, everything like dust that had settled
for ever, in this first light; to his surprise he found


MNRIMLANER
vited Uronorbat/skndlotypiakithatihowastayeariopannstaon purpans
e needed somebody with more love for peoplé who could giveher ythe fuly life
Grme
she was yearning fofy he had offered Pinkie a Thoney-back guaranteey 1 as he
hadiosrlohaty at aatMmagear Morntng soavoupoiborcompretelsy Areerapiher
tmantat L bhat shexwesnit a taribeds
ve4 a oper socioty or
Macanaare
pulled the snake-girl to her/ feet and made her dance with him, which she did
awkwardly, saying to him_when he swung her round fast, onomas "Hey, do, you want
a snake-bite, too?" He was surprised how calm his face felt; his heart had
beat fast before but nowhe was cool; 1 a great coladness began to come over
Then Keleb k 4 R' a .
him, making him shiver: People were dancing drowsily now. He strolled into
the basement-area of the house, alone, As dawp came upe like a shadow being
axebedefombebindrth roof6gLiters quetostalloirtgide, evet bing likey
Auakothaechadgptcded anay : *
W to his surprise he found
Dick
Dick leaning against the wall, looking up at the sky, also alone; We turned
slowly as if expecting him and murmured, "Hallo, there, old sport." Granvil-
le asked him at once, "Did you know Pinkie's baby wasn't mine?" There was a
pause and Dick replied quietly, "Yes, of course I did." "Why didn't you tell
h me then?" "Evitez les complications, Pip, especially in matters conjugal".
And he added in a more confidential voice, "You know you're a boob. You ough-
t to have got out long ago, as I tried to tell you." Granville nodded. Di-
ck went on, "Never mind! You know now."
Joyce
Dick stayed with Adyce and he walked home alone. The dawn was grey
with heavy clouds and the first buses were starting; now and then a sleepy
ke >treels
person walked by, his steps enclosed in the great hush that lay on se - t 1
He took a bath when he got back, so numbed in his senses that it was like dipp-
flesh
ing someone: else's kary into the water; he herdly had the strength to lift
himself out, and yet he couldn't think of sleeping. He wanted to go up and
make himself a cup of tea but the desire died suddenly; he didn't want to see
Pinkie. In the evening Dick told him, "I stayed the whole night, and she gave
me two eggs and a lovely rasher of bacon in the morning." He repeated that


Granville ought to make up his mind; he could see his fascination for Joyce
growang fastt: He added, "You can't have your cake and eat it, you know!"
frut
To which Granville said with a limp smile, "Your cake, you mean." "Yes,, you
can, have it if you like," Dick said, and again his eyes wére perfectly clear,
So light and devoid of emg-tark possessiveness! He then went on talking:
thal
wit
there was nothing better than sleeping with a 'new' woman; the breakfast nold
Joyce been teally
i made him think
hadfo-thaintantAmeyoereyoerarrvaaveo-borsperek iclassical'i berthonghe/of Hom-
er and the 'rosy-fingered damgr. He said that the first four pleasures in
tefillowing
his life were, in,thus/order: sleeping with a woman for the first time-maith
fradly
ough Aone could come a cropper there very dably somotimes);aleeping with Hann-
i, meaning by her someone of long standing'; walking alone in a big city at
dawn, and, last and fourth, friendship. He then threw in the idea that if one
werl
# really keen' on a married woman Ce shouldn't consider the husband 'to the
b. point of withering the roots of love'. Granville was disappointed that friend
-ship should come so low in the list; but he felt close to Dick as he td ne ver
done before, perhaps because htorything else was finished for himo hadhave
to-makeanew-iifeyhonfrtends. He was happy with Dick. He felt he was fit
for Dick only when he was pertretiy free, tike this.
He tried to go on wit th bthe same life but could no longer break his face
into a smile; he went with people like a ghost and he gave up phoning the
other Hester; they met a last time at Hampton Court/ pad after he involuntar-
ily drew back from her, ottoes not knowing what he was doing at all, thinking
of the party at Joycets, she snapped at him, wathottappegentiyintentingm
h.p. dobls-ertontore, Sron, go to hellr" The money ran out altogether and he had an
hour's pale, disjointed conversation with Pinkie about it; she didn't seem to
be blaming him for it in any way; he avoided her eyes these days, and she,
following suit as she usually did, avoided his in the same way. As for the
had
child, silence had been So customary between them in the old days that it was
easy to revive b
But their new form of sex persisted: it even flourished
on the increased reserve between them.' For the first time their love was


safely beyond affection and words of endearment. It gave him a burning des-
HAAAS
ire even stronger than before; 4 he was now takingfnot onlyza stranger but an
enemy.
They decided to ask Maihbury for a loan; he was to do the asking, by
Aphone; there was Maimbury's cool voice at the other end asking, "Wijo? Who
did you say it was?" He asked for twenty-five pounds and Maimbury agreed
without hesitation, as cool as before.
He went to collect it the same after-
noon and was ushered into the office by one of the clerks; for some seconds
ing
Maimbury didn't look up but coninued B write something on the side of a type-
written sheet in a slow hand, in the silence of the room; then he looked up,
his eyes calm and soft, and murmured quietly, "Well, hullo, Philip." And he
stood up to shake hands; the twenty-five pounds were brought in and counted,
Maimbughs
mote
and when it was done his, manner became easyand confidential; atronoth "How's
Hester?" he asked; "She's very welli;; "Goodf" On the way back he passed
T.I.M. and saw a messenger hasten inside; the entrance was bleak and inanimat-
ely hostile to him, paineaag hoalow and dark, and he crossed over the road
avroid
to beoid being recognised by the commissionaire. He was still wearing his
tropical jacket; it had turned a bit yellow, perhaps from constant smoky at-
mospheres, and the weather was decidedly chilly for it. These days he ate
little, and sat staring before him.' Sometimes he told himself that a mistake
had been made---how could people know for sure who the father was? But he'd
finished with that sort of reasoning. He slept with Joyce, more or less bec-
ause he'd been asked not to in such an inviting way.
Sharing the same fasc-
iaating pale secret as Dick was a pleasure, although, still, his own flesh was
separate from him, and her softness was lost on him really. Once he and Di-
ck met on her doorstep and burst out laughing; they didn't ring the bell but
went off to a pub and then stayed together all evening to make sure that the
other Ga didn't go back.' It made their sense of intimacy even stronger.
Joyce told them both---separately---that she'd never heard two men talk to
admiringly pboyn each other; she gave the impression that they were two aspec-


ts of the same being for her, and a perfect complement to each
NOYAR
othero natutat/sheadmitted hopminguredatiotaotinmorothezazpve
mganvrpentdrouods There wasn't a trace of disloyalty in her eyes
when the three of them were together; he and Dick agreed that this
was flattering to them; they were 'sound 1.
Hetrledtose the pale girl, Nhez bodreansherhollanoybamg
or under him, as Dick had done. He tried tolose himself in her
pale beneficensce of flesh. But it was hopeless. Sye was simply
'Joyce to him, another person, whose fears and fragile, haunted,
girlish dréaming showed ever so quickly and delicately in her eyes as
she brinked and gazed at the ceiling and smiledin a distant, sad
way. He couldn't get beyond the humanity He was hopeless, it
seemed, for pure sex! Oh, for a little of Dick's disharmony!
They began walking together,hand in hand, by the river, and
seemed to enjoy itbetter. And they gavé up going to bed. A cup
on the
of coffee, orlying inxtisnt floor in front of thefire with their
heads togéther, was nicer.
Pinkie's faun*. - was realised, in a way: he had no thoughts, and
hardly talked. Girls remarkably like cinger and Lucy, with the
same casual good will and passivity, mostly friends of Joyce, collect-
edat the house. And he was astonished at how easily they took-him.
'Pip' meant fun and afree meal.
Hewas ahapy? Was 1hhappinesg Something-ourningend
coneuming, laying-him wester


One afternoon he made the decision to get out; it was the effect
of meeting a friend of Hell's called Tim, whom Cerberus brought round
to the house. He had a round face with rather staring eyes and his
lips were strangely full and crimson; he was impeccably dressed, with
a rolled umbrella, and spoke carefully, his vowels as rounded as his
lipso Aand he began asking Granville questions, one after the otherf: :
he'd heard from Hell of his arrival some weeks ago; his name was
Granville, wasn't it? He believed he worked in the Middle East?
That must be very interesting? Didn't one's nerves get edgy out there
--SO he had heard? How long would he be in England? Would the sit-
uation in the Middle East blow up.again, did he think? He must know
a great deal about the *Arab psychology'!
save
His tone inveeted Granville wirn too much importance; since
they'd never met before it soundèd insinuating, with an edge of cont-
empts He spoke with a siow gravity. His lips, bright and moist,
were set in a kind of pontifical deliberation, which also seemed on
the edge of mockery; and yet when he smiled his eyes were honest and
clear. His cheeks were plump; and his round lips suggested to Gran-
covered uf;
ville a riotous appetite which his manner zefasedrboreontedon also
he spoke unctiously and softly. Granville felt more and more distress
ed and was also convinced that in the strangest way he was causing the
young man to behave like this, and that at any other time he would have
looked quite different to him, and spoken quite differently! He
answered as casually as possible, careful not to give a sign that he
condoned the tone of importance; he tried to throw the questions back
this
--did the young man live in the district? did he often come here?
But they rebounded in his face, and he found himself answering the same
questions himself; also he noticed that his own voice had a hollow,


official Souud. Tim
rols /suggested a walk, his eyebrows raised a little as if to ask for the privilege
of his company---could he spare the time? And he agreed like a hypnotised
animal; they strolled through the City and the questions went on! He felt
pale and too hot, and mostu ungainly in his stride.
He tried to talk about
Kurdistan and the Alpine-like flowers in the mountains there, but his words fal
-tered and he couldn't get the hollow sound out of his voice.
Some sort of
strange pressure was being exerciaed by the young man, he felt; and he noticed
Tim's rolled black umbrella again as if he hadn't seen it properly before. It
was tap-tapping on the pavement; and also he had a black suit, buttoned fully
at the front. What did he do for a living? He tried to find outm deviously,
but couldn't form the slightest impression. Every question rebounded on him.
The more he talked, the more he made a foold of himself. He went on talking
out of nervousness. No real ideas came to his head. "Turkistan's just like
Scotlandi" he cried. His voice sounded SO thin and high gh.tn Alel headt The
air was heavy with emptiness. Ehe emptiness had crept into him, covering the
whole of the City as well like a vast invisible blanket suddenly coming down
over the banks and offices and narrow streets. Tim was silent now. He wad
Granville
pillaged Granville's soul---and the verdict was silencel
wanted to get
away. As he turned to announce that he must be off he was assailed miish a dr-
eadful sense of waste; he remembered it' acutely from two years before; it was
a sense of having time on his hands and af-baring no obligation or place in the
world, and of being acknowledged for nothing by other people. His clothes felt
drab, APA his body seemed to have shrunk into something like dust,.on the ver-
k.). ge of becoming pure air; he was nothing for the other man; he knew.it! "We-
wautid r
11---" he began; but he couldtardly turn tail and'run off. The New Studio
int the cawcootinn;
theatre club came upl Tim had seen one of the plays; Granville said---but
apparently without his own voice, and without there being an idea in his head,
ilalo much less a picture of what he was talking about---that he hadn't liked that
one. There was assilence. Tim then said that as the son of peasant -he
paused again---'and not of decayed nobility'---and here he gave Granville a


meaning
itals long sidenags look---he liked the plays at the Studio theatre; but he under-
stood how tthe language and some of the ideast would be 'too strong for some
Gramnlle
people'. Ha made a faltering reply, and Tim considered that he'd withered
him. At last Granville managed to get away; he almost ran back to the house,
his eyes lowered from passers-by; when he got back he went straight to the ba-
throom and took a hot bath; then he changed into clean underwear and a clean
shirt; horfolsthorobhovobhar-man'aqusetiong as a-gtain-on-himg enni he washohlo-
wedobehfolt-that the last piece of identity had been wrested from him!
He had no self! Therefore what did it matter where he transported it? He
t 1 resolved to get his job back, if that was possible. He *phoned Dick at once
and his answer was, "Good, Pip. I think that's wise. Would you like me to
go along to the old cove now?" "Yes." And a meeting with Nevinson was arr-
artedn He found out from Hanni that Dick had saved the situation for him weeks
agon' Me'd gone to Nevinson and told him not to take the letter of resignation
too seriously---Granville was having 'family-trouble'; she said he wasn't to
wos
tut )
let Dick see he knew this; it had-been a secret; howevers/she had let Binkie
ti into the secret.
M Granville could find out nothing about the Basrah off-
ice; Dick said he wasn't sure he'd get the old job back; in fact, he thought
it unlikely. Nevinson was just as he imagined him: tall and rugged, with
b. bushy eyebrows. His hair was slightly tussled like a boy's, yellowi sh; at
first he was confidential, very much man-to-man. "Well, I've been hearing
all about you"; he smiled boyishly and went on, "As you probably know, I'm
new to this outfit---and not liking the desk-work at aliln Here he smiled,
and Granville murmured something sympathetic: Nevinson shifted a paper on
his desk. "Well, as far as I can see you've been doing a first-class job of
work out there---first-class!" "Thank you." A pause. "It's just what we
méant
want, you see, somebody who gets out and mixes with people." He satyby this
mixing with Arab peopleo ittrenerired. Hé said that if anything blew upt
in the Middle East they wanted to see it didn't blow upfunder T.I.M. as well,
and that meant keeping people's sympathy, which couldn't be done by treating


them like tskivviest; Granville had got out among people and hadn't 'parked'
himself in the 'foyer of the British Embassy' wa iting for the next dinner in-
vitation like some people; it was just what they wanted; he was very pleased;
awfully pleased. Ahother pause : MAaeMaensudtnge - The office was very
quiet; its windows gave out on to a narrow courtyard, with other lighted off-
opposite
ices on the akhEx side. A persian carpet covered nearly the whole floor, and
a tall lamp with tassles exactly like the one Granville had had in his own off-
ice stood ipats behind Nevinson's chair, giving the room the same cosy and glow-
ing look.' Nevinson blinked.
It was coming now. He pulled out a file.
"Now about this report of yours, we've had quite a lot 66 discussion about it--
" He scratched his head-- "Well,, we found it a bit high-flown if you see
what I mean. Mind you---" He looked up, his eyebrows raised. "I think
it's awfully good myself. But what we want out of these yearly reports i8
als facts. I mean, we can't go blazing off into plitics and religion, can we---
not on the office-level?" And he showed Granville a: page of his report;
"Lhok at this", and he pointed to the words, "The middle-class is the instrume-
nt of Christ.' "We can't have that, can we?" "No, quitel" said Granville.
"I expect you know we've decided on a policy of expansion, :1 Nevinson went on.
"No," Granville replied. "Well, what we thought we might do is to put the
Basrah office in the care of Beirut for the time being, so wez sent our Beirut
chap over there---he's new, awfully nice, a chap called Blair." mOh!" He
felt giddy for a moment but managed to smile politely.' "It isn't very sensib-
le geogrpphically, of course, but it'll have to do until we get the Middle East
working as one unit." "This means he's sitting at my desk, does it?" he ask-
old
ed bluntly. Nevinson looked down and murmured, "Well, oda chap, you did let
the job go, didn't you?" "Yes, of course, I realise I'm lukcy enough to get
a job at all. I just wanted to find out. This means somebody else is work-
ing over me, doesn't it? In the same office?" "For the timebeing, yes?
flushed
Your pay'll be the same, you needn't worry about that." Granville flashàd
with indignation. "But I can't see why I'm being offered the job at alll"


"Itts perfectly clear, old chap," Nevinson said, "we need you out theret"
Granvillé wondered at himself for getting indignant; he'd got his job back,
- what more did he want? "This Blair-chap", Nevinson went on, had been on the
bls
Middle East carcuit for years with another company and thay were frightfully
usr whal we
lucky to get himo he was whatht tbey/needed to pull Athe whole outfit fogether.
Nernsm
risk
"After all," ke/added after a
"we can't kaye
the
pause,
you going off
rails
ho dded,
again, can we?" It was that or nothing; so he aoceptedy There was one ch-
ange: no travel-allowance and no 'swindle-sheet'; in effect, his pay had been
reduced. And he would have to ask permission to leave Basrah at any time;
the old jaunts to Kirkuk and Mosul, atpd to the 'Alp-like hillstof Kurdistank
were finished. Nevinson saw him to the door with a ffiendly, "Good bye, old
chap." Then he added quietly, "You know,I'm very sorry about this. If you'd
come to me a couple of months ago and asked for the Beirut office we 'd have
lah given it toyou like a shot. But then this happened!" And his last words
were, "I don't suppose you've had a very pleasant time but if you pull your
le weight things'll be all right." He went straight from thé office to a trav-
el-bureau and booked a passage from Naples to Beirut; he wouldn't stop at
Genoa this time; he needed to be alone; and he needed a sea voyage to bring
J his health round. How would he face Mohammad now,
Blairts assistant?
The atmosphere woudd be gone : He'd be tied to a desk with fixed hours.
wps
how;
Mohammed would see that he"/bocomme a subordinatet his stature would be gone.
The evenings by the river wouldn't be free any more.' What a fool he'd beent
And he could have had the Beirut office! So much for Dick's advicet In his
mind he begàn to blame Dick for the whole sourse of events, telling himself
te slighlart
couldl
taps that if he'd been givenien/idea that he noukid get the Beirut office for the
only
asking he would never have hung on in London like that, bub Dick had discour-
lut
A and
aged his initaative; hovexene this was little comfort, sinnae he didn't bel-
ieve it.
The question that came to his mind again and again was, what had happen-
ed to the night of the eclipse? Where was its effect? Why hadn't he felt


the triumph? Why wasn't he aware of it moving in him and changing him?
Havprsaps
toe ras,
Mbere-wasrCnchstl - He thought/it might be all right in Basrah if he could man-
age to keep a certain stillness. He should try to keep before him an image of
himself as small and therefore as undeserving; if he did this a spark might
return to him,. from outside; he must go about his work without worrying what
Dtimi
other people thoughti for instance, he must even try to enjoy losing stature
in Mohammed's eyes; if he did so he wouldn't lose stature, perhaps; nothing
could hurt silence if he kept to it; only pride was the easiest thing to hu-
h.p. rt; he must let himself fall back into silence.' He said nothing about the
interview to Pinkie. It seemed she id forgotten he was to have it. That
evening he went to a cinema in Islington and was too tired even to follow the
a hare
was
plot; there was a news-reel in which some poor creature of a xhigst L
chased by whippets; it leapt through the air frantically, and always the houn-
until
ds followed, decoying it this way and thaty at last its strength gave out and
it tumbled under them, a limp ball of fur. Behind him a woman murmured,
wmld haure done,
"Poor thing! What a damned shame!" in exactly the same voice as his motherk
and tears smarted in his eyes. A few days later when his boat-ticket arriv-
ed Pinkie murmured vaguely, "I supposé I'll be joining you in a few months,
won't I?" He nodded glumly and they said no more. Grove came over again.
Granville was. once more struck by the friendly confidence in him, and felt re-
vived; the events of the last few weeks, including the question of the child,
seemed unimportant. He couldntt imagine Grove in a dark or irritable moodo
evenifhedidfall intoanferitable meoahewoanchango-atoncerim
conpauypandsopprese itouborthisantangerunivorsal courtesy hebads He
told Granville, standing by the hearth and gazing out of the window in his
curious abstract and yet local way, that he 'loved everybody'; he really méan-
t that; he didn't turn away from anyone; he said that a person aroused his
clearly a
good will whoever he was, unless he was, anvobvsous swine.' He was trying to
give Granville to understand that he'd intended no
malice against him.. A
party gathered again in the music-room that evening. Grove talked most of


the time, making everyone laugh. While he talked, rattling away without the
slightest embarrassment, Granville asked himself,why should he leave? Again
the absurdity of insisting on clear forms occurred to him: why not be a subor-
pls dinate here? But his thoughts went round in a sickening way, gone almost the
moment they entered his head. He found that Grove conducted a kind of human
publicity service: he brought people together and talked admiringly about near
ly everyone; he sat in the centre of the room and already the house was fill-
ed with his spirit.
He went down to Abbott's Road to say good-bye. They knew nothing about
his having resigned, and he left it vague; a word was enough for them; he sa-
id he'd had a few things to clear up with the head office, so he was late in
going back. He was surprised when he stepped off the bus to see how fresh
in ta diane
and clean everything looked. The shop-fronts were newly-painted and the
houses of Abbott's Road looked like tiny farmhouses, not dingy at all but with
a warm, bustling life going on inside each of them. The windows were bright
wi th coloured curtains, and the hedges infront were trimmed. Rechapachovnata
segingdhalhincontrasttoltheelomaromsror/Basrabs
getarattimenbe
baarangdea therpraspert a A
pei e senbed
Apost 1 Countryageloncaat
net
aref
sest
ike
uxage Iowered into
dseitad
stranger foar the fifst Cimes Would le ssee 1t aS ever more
Rorld
when heurotarned agein? He sat with them in the backroom, with the window
O verlooking the gardens open at the bottom. His mother divined that something
unpleasant had happened but said nothing. She only asked quietly, "Is Pink-
ie going back with you?" From his panic-stricken glance she knew everything.
His father was gracious as always, a little formal, gazing with narrow eyes
into the garden. He trembled and could eat nothing. The table was laid
withbcheese and lettuce and celery, and the tea-pot stood under a cosy in the
scullery as it always had in his childhood. He drank one cup after another.
JAReed
Itrpemindedhimenthe thnehe'dllost/Kit. C He always returned to this world
iuseemed;
alone; but it couldn't help him; his mother and father had nothing to say--


they could only watch his distress and hope for the best. The
trains passed in the distance, stopping and starting again with a
low grinding noise. He tried to talk but his mind was ineffective
and he kept wandering off. He kissed his mother good bye and shook
hands strongly with his father; he more or less stumbled out of the
house, with his mother's eyes on him.
His boat was to leave Naples a dày later than he d been told,
so he stayed a day more in London; in the morning, when nobody else
was there, the phone rang and he heard "rove's voice at the other
end saying, "Pinkie? Pinkie?" So full of joy and expectation
and relief! He put the phoné HANK back as quietly as he could,
without answering it. He even felt the flicker of a smile' on his
face, as if it wasn't his own face. And the trembling never left
him for a moment, it was like a permanent bodily condition.
Grove came over that evening, alone, having made the arrangement
fe'd
to do so before Branviliemad delayed his trip. Grove played the
piano and sang while Pinkie swept out the music-room; meanwhile
Granville sat upstairs trying to read the paper; nothing bore a
relation to him---the house, ata/mokse84 Pinkie's broom hitting
against the wainscoting, Grove singing, the boat-ticket in his
pocket.
The piano dowmstairs sstopped suddenly and he heard Grove's
laughter that always had the power to raise your hopes without really
touching your heart.
Then. there was Pinkie's voice, imploring
him, "Oh, don't, darling, not now---Jatetr! i Only a little while! It
Only a little while more and he'll be gone! A pale anger rose in
him and he strode out on to the staircase. But he stopped.
She'd
spoken so imploringly:
He didn't know she could sound like that.
So tender and pleading!
And he'd. thought of her as hard! Why
hadn't she pleaded with him like that? He didn't know it was in
her voice to do so! a
He listened again, on the landing.
There was Grove: "Come
on, Grisly, let's go out!"
Grisly was one of her nicknames from
school---which he'd never used.
'Erisyly Grysham'. Pinkie
replied, patiently, as if to a child, "Yes, darling, yes!" And
he, realised for the first time---not painfully but in a clear and
blinding and staggering way---that xa she was in lovek! She couldn't
change that. She'd tried, perhaps. Even, she'd wanted to! But


Becawe
she couldn't! im-ves-hekplesared O hehsawewtxandxperfert
R.c. *ERGEIRESESEILONxely/tendernosss She was in lovei, in love, in
love!
The words kept ringing in his brain. In love!
It was
like bells! In love!
Then why hadn't he recognised it? Oh, why?
For it made her innocent!
He walked further down the stairs and had the sense of losing
his body so that his steps hardly made an impression on him. This
was the night of the eclipse!
It was in his life now! It had
lah come down from his thoughts into his life!
And he felt bodiless---
the stairs were nothing to him, his pain was nothing, nor his trem-
TRey
bling! LA didn't matter, $ didn't matter! He could have walked
smiling
down to the
music-room at that moment in the most easy and Lang
Dg joy and put his hands on them both and sat talking to them and
heard them telling each other 'darling' and 'sweetheart' without.
Yo kem
the slightest sense t*at of being connected, A any more!
There was a
shudder of relief tia through his body that seemed to drain all the
9 poisons away. Yet he was still in pain. But it wasn't really his
any more. There was something beyond life in him, for the first
time. It was like touching Christ, it was as if Christ was standing
there on the stairs, in him for a moment, bodilessly. He had a sense
of sunlight, though he was trembling like a leaf. Pinkie was pure!
She was pure! The tears poured down his face but with triumph---
ler
it was like his own triumph! He'd surrendered! He'd surendered
up lo Ker Gu eige! Havanwrrtonsanitrsapam
He parted from her casually next day; she lay on the bed,
remote # from him; he asked her not to come downstairs to see him
off; it would make too much of a good bye.
"Well, cheerio," he said at the door of the bedroom, and waved
his hand.
"Eheerio, darling!" She waved, too, in exactly the same way
as he,a done, with a. little flutter of fingers; just before he
turned away she blew him a kiss as she.d done on the train to
Meedham, with a bright look for a moment.
Dick had said jokingly the evening before that he was blowed
if he was going to give him a second send-off!
So they'd just
shaken hands briefly. Hanni had promised to come over to say good
bye but didn't appear. The day was dull and he travelled to the


station in a dazed state, seeing nothing; it was also sultry,
quite unusual for late autumn, and the sweat poured out of him;
on the boat across to France he caught sight of himself in a mirror
and was astonished to see. how haggard he was, with yellowish bags
under his eyes; his hair was lank and greasy; he shuddered when
he thought of the house in Basrah, silent and closed.
And he saw
Pinkie in his mind, a stranger to him, far, far away, going about
her own concerns. "Only a little while!", he heard her say again.