A History of the World in 10 1/2 Chapters

by Julian Barnes

  Miss Logan nodded, in startled acquiescence rather than agreement.

  They set off from the village of Arghuri on the morning of June 20th, in the year of Our Lord 1840, accompanied only by their Kurdish guide. The elder regretfully explained the villagers’ belief that the mountain was sacred, and that no-one should venture upon it higher than the Monastery of Saint James. He himself shared these beliefs. He did not try to dissuade the party from their ascent, but he did insist on loaning Miss Fergusson a pistol. This she displayed at her belt, though she had neither the intention nor the resource to use it. Miss Logan carried a small bag of lemons, which had also been advised.

  The ladies rode with white umbrellas raised against the morning sun. Looking upwards, Miss Fergusson observed the halo of cloud beginning to form itself around the summit of the mountain. A daily miracle, she noted to herself. For several hours they appeared to make little progress; they were traversing a barren region of fine sand and yellowish clay, broken only by a few stunted, prickly bushes. Miss Logan observed several butterflies and numerous lizards, but was secretly disappointed that so few of the creatures which had descended from the Ark were manifesting themselves. She had, she admitted to herself, foolishly pictured the slopes of the mountain as a kind of zoological garden. But the animals had been told to go forth and multiply. They must have obeyed.

  They dipped into rocky ravines, none of which contained the smallest stream. It seemed an arid mountain, as dry as a chalk down in Sussex. Then, a little higher, it surprised them, suddenly unveiling green pasture and rose bushes with delicate pink blossom. They rounded a spur and came upon a small encampment – three or four rude tents, with matting walls and black roofs made from goats’ hair. Miss Logan was slightly alarmed by the sudden presence of this group of nomads, whose flock could be seen lower down the slope, but Miss Fergusson directed her horse straight towards them. A ferocious-looking man whose tangled hair resembled the roof of his own tent held up to them a rough bowl. It contained sourish milk mixed with water, and Miss Logan drank somewhat nervously. They nodded, smiled and continued on their way.

  ‘Did you judge that a natural gesture of hospitality?’ asked Amanda Fergusson suddenly.

  Miss Logan considered this strange question. ‘Yes,’ she responded, for they had previously come across many similar instances of such behaviour.

  ‘My father would have said it was merely an animal bribe to turn away the wrath of strangers. It would be an article of faith with him to believe that. He would have said those nomads were just like beetles.’

  ‘Like beetles?’

  ‘My father was interested in beetles. He told me that if you put one in a box and tapped on the lid, it would knock back, thinking you were another beetle offering itself in marriage.’

  ‘I do not consider that they were behaving like beetles,’ said Miss Logan, while carefully indicating by her tone that this was only her private opinion and in no way derogatory of Colonel Fergusson.

  ‘Nor do I.’

  Miss Logan did not fully understand her employer’s condition of mind. Having come this great distance to intercede for her father, she now seemed instead to be constantly arguing with his shade.

  At the first steep slope of Great Ararat they tethered their horses to a thorn tree and hobbled them. They were to proceed from here on foot. Miss Fergusson, umbrella aloft and pistol at her belt, led the way with the certain tread of the righteous; Miss Logan, dangling her bag of lemons, struggled to keep up as the terrain grew more precipitous; their Kurdish guide, weighed down with baggage, brought up the rear. They would be obliged to spend two nights on the mountain if they were to reach the snowline.

  They had climbed hard all afternoon, and shortly before seven o’clock, with the sky softening towards apricot, were resting on a rocky outcrop. At first they did not identify the noise, or what it signified. They were aware of a low rumble, a granite growl, though whence it came, whether from above or below them, was not evident. Then the ground beneath their feet began to vibrate, and there came a noise like thunder – but internal, suppressed, terrifying thunder, the sound of a primeval, subterranean god raging against his confinement. Miss Logan glanced fearfully at her employer. Amanda Fergusson was directing her field-glasses at the Monastery of Saint James, and her face bore an expression of prim pleasure which shocked her companion. Miss Logan was near-sighted, and consequently it was from Miss Fergusson’s features rather than from personal observation that she grasped what was happening. When the field-glasses were finally passed to her she was able to confirm that every roof and every wall of the monastery church and of the little community they had left only that morning had been thrown down by the violent commotion.

  Miss Fergusson got to her feet and briskly began to continue the ascent.

  ‘Are we not to help the survivors?’ asked Miss Logan in perplexity.

  ‘There will not be any,’ replied her employer. Adding in a sharper tone, ‘It was a punishment they should have foreseen.’

  ‘A punishment?’

  ‘For disobedience. For fermenting the fruit of Noah’s vine. For building a church and then blaspheming within it.’ Miss Logan looked at Amanda Fergusson cautiously, unsure how to express the view that to her humble and ignorant mind the punishment seemed excessive. ‘This is a holy mountain,’ said Miss Fergusson coldly. ‘The mountain upon which Noah’s Ark rested. A small sin is a great sin in this place.’

  Miss Logan did not break her alarmed silence; she merely followed her employer, who was pushing on ahead up a gully of rock. At the top Miss Fergusson waited and then turned to her. ‘You expect God to be like the Lord Chief Justice in London. You expect a whole speech of explanation. The God of this mountain is the God who saved only Noah and his family out of the whole world. Remember that.’

  Miss Logan grew seriously perturbed at these observations. Was Miss Fergusson comparing the earthquake which had thrown down the village of Arghuri to the great Flood itself? Was she likening the salvation of two white women and a Kurd to that of Noah’s family? When preparing for their expedition they had been told that the magnetic compass was useless on such mountains as these, for the rocks were loaded with iron. It seemed evident that you could lose your bearing here in other ways as well.

  What was she doing on Noah’s mountain alongside a pilgrim turned fanatic and a bearded peasant with whom she could not communicate, while the rock below them exploded like the gunpowder they had brought to ingratiate themselves with the local chieftains? Everything urged them to go down, yet they were continuing upwards. The Kurd, whom she had expected to flee at the first shaking of the ground, was staying with them. Perhaps he intended to slit their throats while they slept.

  They rested that night and continued climbing as soon as the sun rose. Their white umbrellas stood out vividly against the harsh terrain of the mountain. Here was only bare rock and gravel; nothing grew but lichen; all was utterly dry. They might have been upon the surface of the moon.

  They climbed until they reached the first pocket of snow, which lay in a long, dark slash on the mountain’s side. They were three thousand feet from the peak, just below a cornice of ice which encircled Great Ararat. It was here that the rising air from the plain turned to vapour and formed the miraculous halo. The sky above them was beginning to turn a brightish green, scarcely blue at all any more. Miss Logan felt very cold.

  The two bottles were filled with snow and entrusted to the guide. Later, Miss Logan would try picturing to herself her employer’s curious serenity of face and confidence of carriage as they started down-the mountain; she exhibited contentment bordering on smugness. They had travelled no more than a few hundred yards – the Kurd leading, Miss Logan bringing up the rear – and were crossing a patch of rough scree, a descent more tiring than dangerous, when Miss Fergusson fell. She pitched forwards and sideways, sliding a dozen yards down the slope before the Kurd was able to arrest her progress. Miss Logan halted, initially in surprise, for it appeared that
Miss Fergusson had lost her footing on a little stretch of solid rock which should have afforded no peril.

  She was smiling when they reached her, apparently unconcerned by the blood. Miss Logan would not allow the Kurd to bandage Miss Fergusson; she accepted pieces of his shirt for the purpose, but then insisted that he turn his back. After half an hour or so, the two of them restored their employer to her feet, and they set off again, Miss Fergusson leaning on the guide’s arm with a strange nonchalance, as if she were being conducted round a cathedral or a zoological garden.

  They made only a short distance in the remainder of that day, for Miss Fergusson demanded frequent rests. Miss Logan calculated how far away their horses were tethered, and was not encouraged. Towards nightfall they came upon a pair of small caves, which Miss Fergusson compared to the pressing of God’s thumb into the mountainside. The Kurd entered the first of them cautiously, sniffing for wild beasts, then beckoned them in. Miss Logan prepared the bedding and administered some opium; the guide, after making gestures incomprehensible to her, vanished. He returned an hour later with a few stunted bushes he had managed to prise from the rock. He made a fire; Miss Fergusson lay down, took some water, and slept.

  When she awoke she pronounced herself feeble, and said her bones were stiff in her skin. She had neither strength nor hunger. They waited through that day in the cave, trusting that Miss Fergusson’s condition would improve by the next morning. Miss Logan began to reflect upon the changes in her employer since they had arrived on the mountain. Their purpose in coming here had been to intercede for the soul of Colonel Fergusson. Yet so far they had not prayed; Amanda Fergusson appeared still to be arguing with her father; while the God she had taken to proclaiming did not sound the kind of God who would lightly forgive the Colonel’s obstinate sinning against the light. Had Miss Fergusson realized, or at least decided, that her father’s soul was lost, cast out, condemned? Is that what had happened?

  As evening fell, Miss Fergusson told her companion to leave the cave while she spoke to the guide. This seemed unnecessary, for Miss Logan had not a word of Turk or Russo or Kurdish or whatever mixture it was the other two communicated in; but she did as she was told. She stood outside looking up at a creamy moon, fearful lest some bat might fly into her hair.

  ‘You are to move me so that I may see the moon.’ They lifted her gently, as if she were an old lady, and placed her nearer the mouth of the cave. ‘You are to set off at first light tomorrow. Whether you return or not is immaterial.’ Miss Logan nodded. She did not argue because she knew she would not win; she did not weep because she knew she would be rebuked. ‘I shall remember the Holy Scripture and wait for God’s will. On this mountain God’s will is quite manifest. I cannot imagine a happier place from which to be taken unto Him.’

  Miss Logan and the Kurd took turns watching over her that night. The moon, now almost full, illuminated the floor of the cave where Amanda Fergusson lay. ‘My father would have wanted music with it,’ she said at one point. Miss Logan smiled an agreement which irritated her employer. ‘You cannot possibly know to what I am referring.’ Miss Logan immediately agreed a second time.

  There was a silence. The dry cold air was scented with woodsmoke. ‘He thought pictures should move. With lights and music and patent stoves. He thought that was the future.’ Miss Logan, little better informed than before, considered it safest not to respond. ‘But it was not the future. Look at the moon. The moon does not require music and coloured lights.’

  Miss Logan did win one small, final argument – by forceful gesture rather than words – and Miss Fergusson was left with both bottles of molten snow. She also accepted a couple of lemons. At daybreak Miss Logan, now wearing the pistol at her belt, set off down the mountain with the guide. She felt resolved in spirit but uncertain how best to proceed. She imagined, for instance, that if the inhabitants of Arghuri had been unwilling to venture on to the mountain before the earthquake, any survivors would scarcely be ready to do so now. She might be compelled to seek help in a more distant village.

  The horses were gone. The Kurd made a long noise in his throat which she presumed to indicate disappointment. The tree to which they had been tethered was still there, but the horses had disappeared. Miss Logan imagined them panicking as the ground raged beneath them, tearing themselves free and violently bearing away their hobbles as they fled from the mountain. Later, as she trudged behind the Kurd towards the village of Arghuri, Miss Logan envisaged an alternative explanation: the horses being stolen by those hospitable nomads encountered that first morning.

  The Monastery of Saint James had been quite destroyed, and they passed it without halting. As they neared the ruins of Arghuri, the Kurd indicated that Miss Logan was to wait for him while he investigated the village. Twenty minutes later he returned, shaking his head in a universal gesture. As they skirted the wrecked houses, Miss Logan could not help observing to herself that the earthquake had killed all the inhabitants while leaving intact those vines which – if Miss Fergusson should be believed – were the very source of their temptation and their punishment.

  It took them two days before they reached human habitation. In a hill village to the south-west, the guide delivered her to the house of an Armenian priest who spoke passable French. She explained the need to raise an immediate rescue party and return to Great Ararat. The priest replied that no doubt the Kurd was organizing the relief at that very moment. Something in his demeanour indicated that perhaps he did not quite believe her story of having climbed most of the way up Massis, which peasants and holy men alike knew to be inaccessible.

  She waited all day for the Kurd to return, but he failed to do so; and when she made enquiries the next morning she was told that he had left the town within minutes of conducting her to the priest’s house. Miss Logan was angry and distressed at such Judas-like behaviour, and expressed herself forcibly on the subject to the Armenian priest, who nodded and offered to say prayers for Miss Fergusson. Miss Logan accepted, while wondering about the efficacy of mere unadorned prayer in a region where people yielded up their teeth as votive offerings.

  Only several weeks later, as she lay stifling in her cabin on a filthy steamer from Trebizond, did she reflect that the Kurd, in the whole time he had been with them, had executed Miss Fergusson’s commands with punctiliousness and honour; further, that she had no means of knowing what had passed between the two of them that last night in the cave. Perhaps Miss Fergusson had instructed the guide to lead her companion to a place of safety, and then desert.

  Miss Logan also reflected upon Miss Fergusson’s fall. They had been crossing a scree; there had been many loose stones, and footing was difficult, but surely at that point they had been traversing a gentler slope, and her employer had actually been standing on a flattish stretch of granite when she had fallen. It was a magnetic mountain where a compass did not work, and it was easy to lose your bearing. No, that was not it. The question she was avoiding was whether Miss Fergusson might not have been the instrument of her own precipitation, in order to achieve or confirm whatever it was she wanted to achieve or confirm. Miss Fergusson had maintained, when they first stood before the haloed mountain, that there were two explanations of everything, that each required the exercise of faith, and that we had been given free will in order that we might choose between them. This dilemma was to preoccupy Miss Logan for years to come.

  7

  THREE SIMPLE STORIES

  I

  IWAS A NORMAL eighteen-year-old: shuttered, self-conscious, untravelled and sneering; violently educated, socially crass, emotionally blurting. At least, all the other eighteen-year-olds I knew were like this, so I presumed it was normal. I was waiting to go up to university and had just got a job as a prep-school master. The fiction I had read predicted gaudy roles for me – as private tutor at the old stone mansion where peacocks roost in the yew hedges and chalky bones are discovered in the sealed-up priest’s hole; as gullible ingénu at an eccentric private establishment on the W
elsh borders stuffed with robust drunkards and covert lechers. There would be careless girls and unimpressable butlers. You know the social moral of the story: the meritocrat becomes infected with snobbery.

  Reality proved more local. I taught for a term at a crammer half a mile from my home, and instead of passing lazy days with charming children whose actively hatted mothers would smile, condescend and yet flirt during some endless pollen-spattered sports day, I spent my time with the son of the local bookmaker (he lent me his bike: I crashed it) and the daughter of the suburb’s solicitor. Yet half a mile is a fine distance to the untravelled; and at eighteen the smallest gradations of middle-class society thrill and daunt. The school came with a family attached; the family lived in a house. Everything here was different and therefore better: the stiff-backed brass taps, the cut of the banister, the genuine oil paintings (we had a genuine oil painting too, but not as genuine as that), the library which somehow was more than just a roomful of books, the furniture old enough to have woodworm in it, and the casual acceptance of inherited things. In the hall hung the amputated blade of an oar: inscribed in gold lettering on its black scoop were the names of a college eight, each of whom had been awarded such a trophy in sun-ridden pre-war days; the item seemed impossibly exotic. There was an air-raid shelter in the front garden which at home would have provoked embarrassment and been subjected to vigorous camouflage with hardy perennials; here it evoked no more than amused pride. The family matched the house. The father was a spy; the mother had been an actress; the son wore tab collars and double-breasted waistcoats. Need I say more? Had I read enough French novels at the time, I would have known what to expect; and of course it was here that I fell in love for the first time. But that is another story, or at least another chapter.