The Black Prince

by Iris Murdoch

  One is very vulnerable in a deck chair. I had been wondering what kind of hand – holding this was. I did not know what sort of pressure to give her hand or how long to retain it. When her head came thrusting on to my shoulder with that gauche aggressive nuzzling gesture I felt a sudden not unpleasant helplessness. At the same time I said, 'Rachel, get up, please, let’s go inside.’

  She shot up out of the chair. I got up more slowly. The slack canvas gave little leverage, and her speed was remarkable. I followed her into the dark drawing – room.

  'I beg your pardon, Bradley.’ She had already thrown open the door into the hall. Her staccato voice and manner made clear what she thought. I realized that if I did not take her in my arms at once, some quite irreparable' incident’ would have occurred. I closed the door into the hall and took her in my arms. I was not reluctant to do so. I felt the hot plumpness of her shoulders and again the heavy nuzzling head.

  ‘Come and sit down, Rachel.’

  We sat down on the sofa and immediately her lips were pressed against mine.

  Of course this was not the first time I had touched Rachel. But casual social pecking and patting can be, in some cases, almost an inoculation against strong feeling. It is a strange fact that the barriers which guard the degrees of intimacy are immensely strong, and yet can be overthrown by a light touch. Only take someone’s hand in a certain way, even look into their eyes in a certain way, and the world is changed forever.

  At the same time, like the excellent Arnold, I was keeping my head, or trying to. I kept my lips upon Rachel’s and we remained immobile for a time which began to seem absurdly long. I held her meanwhile rather stiffly, but firmly, one arm still round her shoulder and the other holding her hand. I felt as if I were, in two senses, arresting her. Then we drew apart and studied each other’s eyes: possibly to find out what had happened.

  The first glimpse of someone’s face after they have made an irrevocable gesture of affection is always instructive and moving. Rachel’s face was radiant, tender, rueful, questioning. I felt bucked. I wanted to convey pleasure, gratitude. ‘Oh, dear Rachel, thank you.’

  ‘I’m not just trying to cheer you up.’

  'I know.’

  ‘There’s a real something here.’

  'I know. I’m so glad.’

  ‘I’ve wanted to – draw you closer – before. I felt shy. I feel shy now.’

  'So do I. But – Oh, thank you.’

  We were silent for a moment, tense, almost embarrassed.

  Then I said, ‘Rachel, I think I must go.’

  'Oh you are ridiculous,’ she said. 'All right, all right. Schoolboy. Running away. Off you go then. Thank you for kissing me.’

  'It’s not that. It’s just so perfect. I’m afraid of spoiling something or something.’

  ‘Yes, off you go. I’ve done enough – damage or whatever.’

  ‘No damage. Oh silly Rachel! It’s beautiful. We are closer, aren’t we?’

  We got up and stood holding hands. I suddenly felt extremely happy and laughed.

  ‘Am I absurd?’

  ‘No, Rachel. You’ve given me a piece of happiness.’

  ‘Well, hold on to it then. It’s mine too.’

  I pushed the sturdy wiry gingery hair back from the pale freckled puzzled tender face, straining it back with both hands, and I kissed her on the brow. We went out into the hall. We were awkward, moved, pleased, anxious now to carry off a good parting without spoiling the mood. Anxious to be alone to think.

  A copy of Arnold’s latest novel, The Woeful Forest, was lying on the table near the front door. I saw it with a shock, and my hand shot to my pocket. My review of the novel was still there, folded up. I took it out and handed it to Rachel. I said, ‘Do something for me. Read that and tell me whether or not I should publish it. I’ll do whatever you tell me.’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘My review of Arnold’s book.’

  ‘But of course you must publish it.’

  ‘Read it. Not now. I’ll do whatever you say.’

  ‘All right. I’ll see you to the gate.’

  Coming out into the garden everything was different. It had become evening. There was a lurid indistinct light which made things blurry and hard to locate. Near things were illuminated by a rich hazed sunlight, while the sky farther off was dark with cloud and the promise of night, although in fact it was not yet very late. I felt upset, confused, elated, and very much wanting now to be by myself.

  The garden in front of the house was rather long, a lawn planted with small bushes, shrubby roses and the like, with a ‘crazy paving’ path down the centre. The paths glimmered white, with dark patches where tufty rock plants were growing between the stones. Rachel touched my hand. I squeezed her fingers but did not hold on. She went first down the path. About half – way to the gate a sense of something behind me made me turn round.

  A figure was sitting in an upstairs window, sitting up half reclined upon a window seat, or even it seemed upon the window sill itself. Without seeing the face except as a blur I recognized Julian, and felt an immediate pang of guilt at having kissed the mother when the child was actually in the house. However what more strongly attracted my attention was something else. The window, which was of the hinged casement variety, had been pushed wide open to leave a rectangular space within which the girl, dressed in some kind of white robe, perhaps a dressing gown, half lay, her knees up, her back against the wooden frame. Her left hand was extended. And I saw that she was flying a kite.

  Only it was not an ordinary kite, but a sort of magical kite. The string was invisible. Up above the house there hovered motionless, some thirty feet up, a huge pale globe with a long trailing ten – foot tail. The curious light made the globe seem to glow with a sort of milky alabaster radiance. The tail, evidently hanging free from the suspending string, since a slight movement of air had towed the balloon out of the vertical, consisted of a number of white bows, or as they looked, blobs, which hung invisibly supported in a motionless row beneath their parent form. Behind the balloon, whose size was hard to estimate – its diameter, if one may use this term of a globe, could have been as great as four feet – the sky, towards the sunnier quarter, was a purplish colour which might have indicated light cloud or simply open sky verging to twilight.

  Rachel had turned round now, and we both stood in silence looking up. The figure above was so odd and separate, like an image upon a tomb, it did not occur to me that I could speak to it. Then as I gazed up at the featureless face, the girl slowly brought her other hand round towards the taut invisible string. There was a faint flash and a faint click. The pale globe up above curtsied for a moment, and then with an air of suddenly collected dignity and purpose rose and began to move slowly away. Julian had cut the string.

  The deliberation of the action, and the evident and histrionic way in Which it was addressed to its impromptu audience, produced physical shock, like that of some sort of assault. I felt a thrill of pain and dismay. Rachel gave a brief exclamation, a sort of ‘ach!’ and moved quickly on towards the gate. I followed her. She did not pause at the gate but went on into the road and began to walk briskly along the pavement. I hurried and joined her where she had stopped, out of sight of the house, under a big copper beech tree at the corner of the road. It was getting dark.

  ‘Whatever was that?’

  ‘The balloon? Oh some boy gave it to her.’

  ‘But how does it stay up?’

  ‘It’s filled with hydrogen or something.’

  ‘Why did she cut the string?’

  ‘I can’t imagine. Just some sort of act of aggression. She’s full of strange fancies just now.’

  ‘Is she unhappy?’

  ‘Girls of that age are always unhappy.’

  ‘Love, I suppose.’

  ‘I don’t think she’s had love yet. She feels she’s somebody very special and she’s just beginning to realize that she’s not very talented.’

  ‘That sounds like the
human condition.’

  'She’s spoilt as they all are, she’s had everything done for her, not like my generation. They fear ordinariness so. She’d like to go off with the raggle taggle gipsies or something. As it is her life is dull. Arnold is disappointed in her and she feels it.’

  ‘Poor child.’

  ‘Oh she’s all right, she’s lucky. And as you say, it’s the human condition. Well, good night, Bradley. I know you want to get away from me.’

  'No, no – ’

  'I don’t mean it in a nasty way! You’re so shy. I love it. Kiss me.’

  I kissed her quickly but very fully in the darkness underneath the tree.

  'I may write to you,’ she said.

  ‘Do that.’

  'Don’t worry. Nothing for worry.’

  'I know. Good night. And thanks.’

  Rachel gave a weird little laugh and vanished into the obscurity. I began to walk quickly along the next road in the direction of the tube station.

  I found that my heart was beating rather violently. I could not make out whether something very important had happened or not. I thought, I shall know tomorrow. Now there was nothing to be done except to rest upon an immediate sense of the experience. Rachel still hovered round me like a perfume. But in my mind with great clarity I saw Arnold, as if he were looking at me from the far end of an illuminated corridor. Whatever had happened had happened to Arnold too.

  Just then I saw the balloon again. It was moving slowly along, a little ahead of me, over the tops of the houses. It was lower than it had been before and seemed to be very gradually descending. The street lamps had been turned on, giving a local ineffectual light beneath a sky which was glowing but nearly dark, and in which the pale object was barely visible. A few people were walking along the road, but no one except myself seemed to have noticed the strange wanderer. I began to hurry, trying to gauge its direction. In the suburban villas rectangles of light were appearing in the lower rooms. Sometimes undrawn curtains showed insipid pastel – shaded interiors and sometimes the blue flicker of television. Up’above, the neat silhouettes of roofs and the bunchy silhouettes of trees were outlined against a dark bluish sky through which the faint globe, its tail now entirely invisible, floated onward. I began to run.

  I turned down a little-frequented side road of more modest houses. I was now ahead of the balloon which was, though still moving very slowly, descending more rapidly. I watched it coming towards me like an errant moon, mysterious, invisible to all except myself, the bearer of some potent as yet unfathomed destiny. I wanted it. The question of what I would do with it when I captured it was quite unformulated. The question was rather what would it do with me. I moved along the road, feeling in my body its direction and rate of descent.

  For a moment it was invisible behind a tree. Then suddenly, wafted faster by a momentary breeze, it swept down over the street, moving into the arc of the lamplight. For a second or two it appeared in front of me, huge and yellow, its tail of pendant bows swaying crazily. I could even see the string. I raced towards it. Something lightly brushed my face. The street lamps dazzled me as I clutched above my head, and clutched again. And then it was all gone. The balloon had vanished, descending into some dark and further maze of suburban gardens. I continued for some while to hurry to and fro among the little intersecting streets, but I did not set eyes again upon the travelling portent.

  At the tube station I saw Arnold coming through the ticket barrier, smiling secretively to himself. I moved to the other side and he did not see me. When I reached my flat Francis Marloe was waiting outside the door. I amazed him by asking him in. Of what passed between us then I shall speak later.

  One of the many respects, dear friend, in which life is unlike art is this: characters in art can have unassailable dignity, whereas characters in life have none. Yet of course life, in this respect as in others, pathetically and continually aspires to the condition of art. A sheer concern for one’s dignity, a sense of form, a sense of style, inspires more of our baser actions than any conventional analysis of possible sins is likely to bring to light. A good man often appears gauche simply because he does not take advantage of the myriad mean little chances of making himself look stylish. Preferring truth to form, he is not constantly at work upon the façade of his appearance.

  A decent proper man (such as I am not) would have run awkwardly away from Rachel before anything had ‘happened’. Of course I did not want to 'oflend’ her. But I was far more concerned about cutting a masterly figure. I was quite interested in kissing her before: very much more so after. So things begin and work. A serious kiss can alter the world and should not be allowed to take place simply because the scene will be disfigured without it. These considerations will no doubt seem to the young unutterably prudish and fussy. But precisely because they are young they cannot see how all things have their consequences. (This thing had its consequences, including some very unexpected ones.) There are no spare unrecorded encapsulated moments in which we can behave ‘anyhow’ and then expect to resume life where we left off. The wicked regard time as discontinuous, the wicked dull their sense of natural causality. The good feel being as a total dense mesh of tiny interconnections. My lightest whim can affect the whole future. Because I smoke a cigarette and smile over an unworthy thought another man may die in torment. I kissed Rachel and hid from Arnold and got drunk with Francis. I also put myself into a totally different 'life – mood’ which had extensive and surprising results. Of course, my dear, I cannot, how could I, altogether regret what has happened. But the past must be justly judged, whatever marvels may have sprung out of one’s faults through the incomprehensible operation of grace. O felix culpa! does not excuse anything.

  For an artist, everything connects with his work, and can feed it. I should perhaps explain more fully what my frame of mind was at that time. The context of this could be: on the day after the evening of the balloon I awoke with a crippling sense of anxiety. I asked myself, should I not go at once to Patara and take Priscilla with me? To do this would solve several problems. I would be tending my sister. A simple hard obligation to do this remained with me, a palpable thorn in the flesh of my versatile egoism. I would also be getting her away from Christian, and I would be getting away from Christian myself. Sheer physical distance can help, perhaps always helps, in the case of these cruder enchantments. I saw Christian as a witch in my life, and a low demon, though [ did not in doing so excuse myself. There are people who occasion in one, as it seems automatically, obsessive egoistic anxiety and preoccupying resentment. When confronted with such people one should if possible run: or else deaden the mind to them. (Or behave in some ‘saintly’ manner not here relevant.) I knew that if I stayed in London I should certainly see Christian again. I would have to do so because of Arnold, to find out what was going on. And I would have to do so because I would have to do so. Those who have such obsessions will understand my state.

  When I say that I also thought I ought to leave London because of what had just happened between me and Rachel I would not be understood as suggesting that I was entirely moved by delicate conscientious scruples, though I did in fact feel such scruples. I felt rather more, about Rachel, a kind of curious detached satisfaction which had many ingredients. One ingredient of a less than worthy sort was a crude and simple sense of scoring off Arnold. Or perhaps that indeed puts it too crudely. I felt that I was now, in a new way, defended against Arnold. There was something important to him which I knew and he did not. (Only later did it occur to me that Rachel might decide to tell Arnold of our kisses.) Such knowledges are always deeply reassuring. Though, to do myself justice, there was in this no intent of going any further with the matter. What was remarkable was how far we had, in our little exchange, actually gone. And that we had gone so far suggested, as Rachel herself later said, that in both our minds the ground had long been prepared. Such dialectical leaps from quantity into quality are common in human relations. This was another reason for going away. I now ha
d more than enough to brood upon and I wanted to brood without the intrusive interference of any real developments. As it was, we had carried the thing off well, with dignity and intelligence. It had a certain completeness. Rachel’s gesture had enormously comforted me. I felt no guilt. And I wanted to bask at peace in the rays of that comfort.

  However it appeared, when I attempted to be realistic about it, that I could not thus solve my problems all together. Priscilla and myself at Patara was simply not a viable idea. I knew I could not possibly work with my sister in the house. Not only would her sheer nervous presence make work impossible. I knew that she would soon irritate me into all sorts of beastliness. Besides, how ill was she really? Ought she to have medical attention, psychiatric treatment, electric shocks? What ought I to do now about Roger and Marigold and the crystal and lapis necklace and the mink stole? Until these things were clarified Priscilla would have to remain in London and so would I.

  The burden of all these unpredictable arrangements annoyed me, when I reflected upon them, to the point of screaming. My desire to get away and write had been coming to a climax. I felt, as artists so felicitously sometimes do, ‘under orders’. I was not at this time my own master. That which I had long served with such exemplary humility and with so little return was preparing to reward me. I had within me at last a great book. There was a fearful urgency about it. I needed darkness, purity, solitude. This was not a time for wasting with the trivia of superficial planning and ad hoc rescue operations and annoying interviews. To begin with there was the problem of extracting Priscilla from Christian, who had even said that she regarded her in the light of a hostage. Could this be done without a confrontation? Would I have to invoke Rachel’s help and muddy those waters after all?

  I let Francis into my house because Rachel had kissed me. At that stage, a fluid all – conquering confidence was still making me feel benevolent and full of power. So I surprised Francis by letting him in. Also I wanted a drinking companion, I wanted for once to chatter: not about what had happened of course, but about quite other things. When one has a secret source of satisfaction it is pleasing to talk of everything in the world but that. It was also important that I felt myself so immeasurably superior to Francis. Some clever writer (probably a Frenchman) has said: it is not enough to succeed; others must fail. So I felt gracious that evening towards Francis because he was what he was and I was what I was. We both took in a lot of drink and I let him play the fool for my benefit, encouraging him to speculate about methods of getting money out of his sister, a subject on which he was droll. He said, ‘Of course Arnold wants to bring you and Christian together again.’ I laughed like a maniac. He also said, ‘Why shouldn’t I stay here and nurse Priscilla?’ I laughed again. I threw him out just after midnight.