The Cunning Man

by Robertson Davies

  Trollope yields more than one. His elderly lovers are given to renunciation, that Victorian enthusiasm which psychoanalysis has for the present made mockable. But it will come back. It is too good and true a feeling to be driven from the human heart by the Viennese Deconstructionists.

  (26)

  When I read the above to McWearie, he was not impressed. I had long ago spoken to him about the Anatomy because he was the only person I knew who would understand it and possibly make helpful suggestions about it.

  McWearie appears in this Case Book perhaps too often as a negative figure in my life, and as a man with no existence apart from his appearances in my armchair, sponging up my whisky. Of course he was an active journalist, or as active as his task of commenting and reporting on religious topics made possible. Religion is not the liveliest of the journalistic “beats.” His charm for me was as a figure against whom I could bounce ideas, knowing that they would never return to my hand precisely as they had left it. His value to the Advocate, I think, was that of a man with an extensive education who could, at need, compose what was professionally called “a think-piece.” He was worth his salary, and it is a poor newspaper that cannot accommodate at least one eccentric on its staff.

  “Your literary stuff is too selective,” said he. “You brush aside the failures. Like poor Yeats, now. Arguably the greatest poet of this century, but dominated and made wretched by his longing to have carnal knowledge of the most likely of his female admirers.”

  “Yeats. Yes, a very interesting death by myocarditis,” said I.

  “Shut up, and listen to what I’m telling you. Yeats longed to be a great lover, as became a great poet, and I believe he underwent the Voronoff operation quite late in his life to forward that end—if you’ll excuse the inadvertent indecency of the expression. But it was ineffective, as I believe indeed it often was and poor Yeats was humiliated and the ladies went empty away. What a sad preoccupation for a great man! Now, what puts you on this track? You’re not in love yourself, are you, Jon?”

  “And if I were?” said I, attempting hauteur.

  “Then I’d say, lay a cool compress of good sense on your fevered brow. No good can come of it. It’s Esme Gilmartin, née Barron, I suppose?”

  “What would lead you to suppose that?”

  “Oh, my wee man! Love and a cough cannot be hid, as the old folks used to say. You’ve been seeing a lot of her about this Old Toronto business, and you’ve taken to wearing much smarter ties than was your habit. You now have flowers other than that horrible potted plant Christofferson maintains contrary to all aesthetic decency in your window. You know my methods, Watson. You’re in love.”

  “And if I am?”

  “As your friend, I suppose it’s my duty to get you out of it with a whole skin. You’ve surely seen this sort of thing in your professional work?”

  Indeed I had. I remembered that visit from no less a person than the Governor-General, who asked my advice about the possibility of sexual intercourse in his state of health. Of course his love was a woman near his own age. Nevertheless, what had I said? “Give it a go”—wasn’t that the message? But—what was this? I was deeply offended by the idea that I wished to have sexual intercourse with Esme. Why?

  “You’re being coarse, Hugh. The instances I have mentioned to you from my notes for the Anatomy were all, except possibly Dickens, no more than warm, intimate relationships. Men of powerful sensibility warming themselves at the sun of youth. To you love means nothing but sex. That’s unworthy of you. You snub and ignore the spirit.”

  “What this? I’ve not said a word about sex. It must be very much in your mind or you wouldn’t have jumped to such a conclusion.”

  “Sorry, I was thinking of something else.”

  “You were not. But you’ve betrayed yourself. A Freudian slip. And don’t deceive yourself about those literary characters. They were cautious, and rightly so. But don’t pretend there was no sexual element in those deep flirtations, even if they didn’t get beyond an occasional chaste kiss.”

  “I don’t see the point in discussing it. It’s a private matter and I don’t want to talk about it. Not in the way you talk about things, which is a very rough, pragmatic, Scotch way, let me tell you.”

  “Insulting the Scotch won’t change the subject. That’s the argumentum ad hominem which you ought to despise. I’m serious, and I’m a friend.”

  “All right. I apologize. But leave me some rags of privacy.”

  “Can’t be done if we’re to talk seriously. To get down to cases, what precisely do you want from Esme?”

  “Want from her? I want to give something to her. Affection, protection, security, all that I have.”

  “No, that won’t do. Do you remember what Stendhal says? ‘When you’re in love with a woman you must ask yourself what you want to do with her.’ What do you want to do with Esme?”

  What a question! And what had I wanted to do with Nuala Conor, even when our affair was at its height and she had not yet married Brocky? To be honest, I wanted to lie with her, talk and eat with her, but I could not honestly say that I had given much thought to taking her as a wife. Not, that is, until I found I couldn’t have her. Of course I was young then, and now that I am old I can hardly expect a desirable woman to be my mistress simply for the pleasure of the thing, such as it might be, with one of my age and archaeological figure. To be honest and fair to myself, I had wanted the delight of Nuala’s society in every possible way, including the sexual way, and that was what I suppose I wanted with Esme. But marriage? Had I ever really thought what it meant? In both cases I was enchanted by a woman of rare quality upon whom, I suppose, I had projected unreal magic. But what had seemed perfectly reasonable in youth was by no means so uncomplicated in age.

  “You are not answering. That’s good. That’s the argumentum e silentio. It means you are thinking. I know I am plaguing you, Jon, and doubtless I am being impudent and coarse. But hasn’t my line of questioning been very much like what you yourself have put to scores of patients, to their eventual benefit? It’s never pleasant to take your own medicine, Doctor, but there it is, you see. Don’t delude yourself about sex; every real love includes it, refined and chivalrous though it may be.

  “What do you know about it, you finnan haddie? You’ve never really loved: I can tell. Gratified love is not the trivial detumescence of a petty desire, but the consummation of a longing in which the whole soul, as well as the body, has its part.”

  “Remember what that Frenchman said? The mucous membranes, by an ineffable mystery, enclose in their obscure folds all the riches of the infinite.”

  “Yes, but you’re not giving fair play to the infinite. I know your intentions are all that is kind, Hugh, but you simply don’t understand.”

  “No, and never will. Every love affair is a private madness into which nobody else can hope to penetrate. But I see a few things you don’t. Your literary instances. Very carefully selected, even though I suppose the selection was unconscious. But what about old Chaucer? A fine psychologist if ever there was one, and as coarse-fibred as I am myself, and all the better for it. Don’t you remember the nuptials of January and May—”

  “Oh, my God, Hugh, you go too far!”

  “No, no; I was about to say, before you flew off the handle, that January and May has little to do with you and Esme. But it’s a general warning. No, the literary, indeed the mythical, instance that suits your case comes from an indisputably refined source, quite delicate enough in verbiage, if not in message, to please even you in your present sore state. You’ve read Tennyson? The Idylls of the King? Fine stuff, even if out of fashion. You recall Merlin and Vivien? The lovely creature who enchanted the old enchanter himself, and then locked him up in an oak tree? And for why? Because they were both themselves, and acted according to their nature and she was no less a great lady because she had tricked a very wise man, and he no less a magician because his wisdom had for a while deserted him. Anangke drove them both. Take
heed, old magician! Take heed, Cunning Man!”

  I suppose we sat for half an hour in silence. I was angry with Hugh, who had turned such a harsh light on my feelings. I was angry with myself, for seeing the good sense of what he had, with cruel Scotch directness, said about something I wanted to be secret and wholly my own. Perhaps I was most angry by his suggestion that I was driven by Anangke. What force had I to oppose the power against which even the gods dared not combat? I felt driven to explain, which is always a mistake.

  “You’re quite wrong, you know. I’m not an old lecher looking for sex—not as a principal object, certainly. I admire Esme because of her courage and her talent and something very special about her spirit, which I don’t suppose you see. I want to smooth the way for her, because it could be very hard—woman alone, a child to raise, doubtless the attentions of men who wouldn’t be able to appreciate her for what she is—all of that. I want to offer her protection and I want to do what I can about Olwen. Forgive me if I seem to be making pretensions to nobility; it’s just that I’d like to do one really decent thing before I die, and in doing so find a warmth that my life up to now has lacked.”

  “Yes. Well, it’s foolish to talk, and I know I talk too much. That longing for warmth and tenderness—all we old fellows miss that, unless we’ve grown a hard shell over our feelings. Go ahead, Jon. Do what you must. Indeed, you can’t do anything else. Anangke, look at it how you will.”

  Another silence, not so long. Then Hugh said: “Do you know when Chips is going back to England?”

  “Yes. Soon.”

  “After nearly thirty years here … I wonder what she’ll find to do.”

  “She doesn’t have to do anything. She’s quite well off, you know. Inheritances.”

  “Yes, but she’ll need an occupation. Emily was the light of her life, as I don’t need to tell you. A strange love.”

  “I don’t agree. Strange sex, if you like. But not a strange love. A beautiful love, expressed in whirlwind activity, and a schoolgirl vocabulary; and a greatness of spirit that found its expression in jelly tartlets and exquisite little sandwiches and an unfailing charity of mind. I don’t think Emily was quite up to the demands of being everything to Chips. Love lays heavy burdens on the loved one, sometimes.”

  “We’re getting philosophical. Time I went. I’m only up to philosophy at weekends.”

  (27)

  “I’m not thinking only of myself. It will be wonderful for Olwen.”

  “Indeed I hope so.”

  “A girl needs a father—a kind of pattern, you know, against which she measures other men.”

  “So I understand.”

  “And for me, it means the end of having to struggle about a career, and be a mother at the same time; I can get on with my real writing, and look for the best in me.”

  “I am sure you will.”

  “Because I really think I’m a cut above daily journalism. I think I’ve got something real to say, if I can just have time to settle down to it. And that’s what this makes possible.”

  “I sincerely hope it will.”

  “Suddenly, so many things are possible. Travel, for instance. Like that song in Candide: ‘We’ll live in Paris, when we’re not in Rome.’ Doesn’t it wow you, Uncle Jon!”

  “A marvellous prospect, certainly.”

  “And of course, I’ve always wanted to be close to power. And Henry is power with a capital P. Newspapers and a TV empire. Right up there with Thomson and Murdoch and Black.”

  “Oh, quite, I’ve never met him, of course. A very nice fellow, I presume?”

  “Better than that. A real darling. And so funny!”

  “A funny tycoon. Quite a novelty. What’s he think about Olwen?”

  “Adores her. Says he can’t wait to give her her first car. Meanwhile he’s settled for the biggest Teddy Bear you ever saw. Came by courier from F.A.O. Schwarz in New York. You must meet him. He’s fun.”

  “I can’t wait.”

  “He knows all about you.”

  “Indeed?”

  “I couldn’t get intimate with him without telling him about my dearest friend, could I?”

  “Thank you, Esme. That’s a great compliment.”

  “He wants me to do lots about you in my series about the Glebe. The Cunning Man. And what an old heart-breaker you are.”

  “Oh, please, Esme.”

  “Oh, yes. You must know. If you’d been—let’s say—twenty-five years younger, I think I’d have made a play for you, Uncle Jon.”

  “Too bad about the twenty-five years.”

  “I’d have had my work cut out. I know that. You wouldn’t fall for just any girl.”

  “You’ve always been a very special girl, Esme.”

  “Thanks. Because of Gil. Do you know—”

  “Do I know what?”

  “Probably it seems wacky, but sometimes I wonder what has really happened to Gil. His death was an awful accident, you know. Totally unpredictable.”

  “Anangke. Fate. Has its plan for us all.”

  “You think so? I never know what to think. Of course I’m not religious. Not in a church way, I mean. But every now and then I think there must be Something—”

  “Well, I think you’re on the right track. Perhaps after your marriage you’ll be able to follow it up.”

  “Not right away. Henry says all that’s a lot of crap. He says he believes in one thing, and that’s himself. Wonderful, isn’t it?”

  “Enviable certainly.”

  “But for a woman it’s different. Or I think so, anyway. For a woman. And for a really wise man like you.”

  “Oh Esme, I don’t set up to be a wise man.”

  “That’s a part of being wise. But other people think you are. The Cunning Man. You know they call you that?”

  “Nonsense, of course.”

  “Not a bit. But nobody ever tells me exactly what they mean by it. There’s a special meaning, isn’t there?”

  “It was a joke that originated with Miss Todhunter.”

  “Oh, The Ladies. She was the big one, wasn’t she? A kind of jokey Valkyrie?”

  “Yes. And Miss Raven-Hart—”

  “Yes. She was the tie.”

  “The tie?”

  “They were a collar-and-tie weren’t they? That’s what everybody says. But go on about the Cunning Man.”

  “It was a sort of person that used to be found in a lot of English villages. There was a Wise Woman or else a Cunning Man. Never both in the same place. He could set bones, after a fashion, and knew a bit of horse-doctoring, and if somebody had overlooked your cattle he could take off the spell, and maybe track down the overlooker, and then there would be a contest of wizards. A Cunning Man was a sort of village know-all.”

  “Not much of a name for what you are, Uncle Jon. But to get back to what we were talking about: do you think Gil is anywhere? Or is death simply extinction?”

  “I think extinction is coming it a bit too strong. It’s said energy is never lost, and there is a lot of energy in a human being, even an inferior one, and Gil certainly wasn’t inferior.”

  “So where is that energy now?”

  “If I knew that I would indeed be a Cunning Man. But of course you realize that what we’re saying is wildly unscientific?”

  “About the energy being somewhere, you mean?”

  “About any suggestion that there is a plan, or an order, or a scheme of any kind in the Universe; no purposefulness in the evolutionary sequence whatever—not a particle. The scientific orthodoxy is that it all takes place by chance—even though it seems very odd that chance phenomena can build up systems of vast complexity. It is wholly against the law of entropy—”

  “You’ve lost me.”

  “Don’t worry. There is an alternative. And that’s the notion of the Divine Drama. Don’t worry, I’m not going to be heavy about it—not over dinner. But you know The Mikado? You remember Pooh-Bah who could trace his ancestry back to a protoplasmal primordial atomic globul
e? We can all do that, you know. And here we are, in this excellent restaurant, drinking this very good claret and eating cutlets, and not looking at all like people with such a peculiar ancestry. That’s the Divine Drama. The onward march of evolution. Astonishing, so far as it’s gone, but we’re probably only in Act Two of a five-act tragicomedy. We are probably a mere way-station on the road to something finer than anything we can now conceive.”

  “Golly! And where does that put Gil?”

  “I don’t know. But other very wise people have guessed at something. Let me quote you some verse, but don’t let anybody notice, because it isn’t at all the thing to quote verse in restaurants in Toronto. Listen:

  Then Death, so call’d, is but old Matter dress’d

  In some new Figure, and a vary’d Vest:

  Thus all Things are but alter’d, nothing dies;

  And here and there th’ unbodied Spirit flies,

  By Time, or Force, or Sickness dispossest,

  And lodges, where it lights, in Man or Beast;

  Or hunts without, till ready Limbs it finds

  And actuates those according to their kind;

  From Tenement to Tenement is toss’d;

  The Soul is still the same, the Figure only lost;

  And, as the soften’d Wax new Seals receives,

  This Face assumes, and that impression leaves;

  Now call’d by one, now by another Name;

  The Form is only chang’d, the Wax is still the same:

  So Death, so call’d, can but the Form deface,

  Th’ immortal Soul flies out in empty space;

  To seek her Fortune in some other Place.

  “Who wrote that?”

  “It’s a translation from Ovid, and Ovid was writing about the philosophy of Pythagoras, which is very old stuff indeed, but not therefore to be dismissed. Indeed, Pythagoras has been enjoying quite a revival in this century.”

  “Heavy stuff. Do you think Gil is hanging around, then?”

  “I don’t agree or disagree. Pythagoras thought so, and Pythagoras was no fool.”