The Nice and the Good

by Iris Murdoch

  McGrath passed Fivey, staring into his eyes as he did so and pausing inside the room to stare back at him. Fivey returned the stare. Ducane followed McGrath in and inhaled once more the sinister, slightly oily smell. Fivey fell rather than stepped away from the doorway and with a murmur of Weel ye noo come back again faded in the direction of the kitchen.

  Ducane closed the door sharply. “Rather a late hour for a visit, McGrath.”

  “Who’s he?” said McGrath.

  “My servant.”

  “Mmm. Posh. Looks a bit of a weirdie though. Is there something wrong with him?”

  “No. Why?”

  “Those spots on his face.”

  “Freckles.”

  “Looked to me as if he’s had a few. A bit pie-eyed.”

  “Sit down, McGrath. Now tell me why you’ve come. I hope you’ve got some more information for me.”

  Ducane pulled the curtains. He sat down on the long stool in front of the fireplace and motioned McGrath to the chintz armchair. McGrath sat down.

  “Well, now,” said Ducane. “Out with it. I assure you you won’t regret telling me the truth.”

  McGrath was leaning forward studying Ducane’s face carefully. He said, “Do you mean, Sir, that you might make it—worth my while?”

  That’s it, is it, thought Ducane. He replied, “If you mean will I pay you for further information, I am afraid not. I rather mean that if it later appears that you have concealed anything material you may get into serious trouble.”

  The idea of offering McGrath a financial inducement to talk more had of course occurred earlier to Ducane, but he had rejected it. The man was totally indiscreet and was moreover more likely to talk if threatened than if cajoled. Ducane shrank from having any kind of confidential or quasi-cordial relations with the fellow, and felt persuaded that in any case his money would only buy lies.

  “You’re making a mistake, Sir,” said McGrath. “I’ve told you everything I know about Mr Radeechy. It wasn’t about him I came”

  “Why did you speak of my ‘making it worth your while’ then, if you’ve nothing further to tell? I warn you, McGrath, you are playing a dangerous game. If you are frank with me now I may be able to help you later. But otherwise—”

  “You see, Sir, it wasn’t really about that at all. In fact, Sir, I was wondering if I could interest you in a sort of project—”

  “I doubt if any project of yours could interest me, McGrath, except the one I’ve mentioned.”

  “Well, it does concern you, Sir, this project, and I think you will be interested—”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “It’s a bit hard to explain, Sir. The fact is, Sir, I was wondering if you could see your way to continuing the little regular remittances that Mr Radeechy used to make to me, for my services that is—”

  Ducane stared at McGrath. McGrath’s pinkish-white face had a damp babyish look, his pale blue eyes were amiable and round, his sugar-pink mouth had snaked out into an ingratiating smile. Ducane saw him with loathing. He said, “I’m afraid I do not require services.”

  “I wasn’t exactly suggesting anything like that, Sir, though of course I would be glad to oblige. But you see, Sir, I do need the money and I think it should be made up to me a bit for having lost my job. My job, Sir, and my pension.”

  “I am certainly not going to give you money,” said Ducane, “and I am surprised that you should ask it. You must get yourself another job. I am afraid your welfare is not my concern. Now, McGrath, I’m sure you have more to tell me about Mr Radeechy. When you were at his house—”

  “No, no, Sir, it’s not that. I’ve said all I can about Mr Radeechy. I want your help, Sir, a little bit of money, just a pound or two a week—”

  “You’re wasting your time, McGrath,” said Ducane, rising to his feet. “And now if—”

  “Maybe I’d better not beat round the bush, Sir,” said McGrath, “though I’m the last to want to make any unpleasantness for a nice friendly gentleman like you. Maybe you’d like to take a look at these.”

  McGrath was holding out two large shiny sheets which looked like photographs. Automatically Ducane reached out and took them. They were photographs. And in a moment he saw with a shudder of surprise and alarm that they were photographs of letters written in familiar handwriting.

  “What on earth—”

  “You see, Sir, I took the liberty of removing these two letters from your desk at the office.”

  Ducane looked at the two letters and a fire of fury and shame rose into his face. He took a deep breath and then said as coolly as he could, “You really have gone too far now, McGrath. This is going to be a matter for the police. What were you proposing to do with these letters?”

  McGrath also rose to his feet. His pink lips flickered and he seemed a little excited but quite bold. “Well, Sir, I’d hoped to do nothing with the letters. I mean if you could see your way to just continuing that little allowance Mr Radeechy used to make me. Mr Radeechy and me were quite friends about it, there were no hard feelings. And what’s two or three pounds a week to a rich gentleman like you?”

  “I see,” said Ducane. “And suppose I tell you and your little allowance to go to the devil?”

  “Why then, Sir, I would be forced to send the letters to the young ladies. I mean each young lady’s letter to the other young lady.”

  The letters were from Kate and Jessica.

  “It’s convenient, Sir, as you’ll notice that the young ladies both write by hand—lovely handwriting if I may say so—and both date their letters in the way that shows the year. And of course I’ve got the envelopes as well with the post-marks and your name written on.”

  In fact the letters had been written within two days of each other.

  Ducane thought quickly. Of course there was no question of his giving in to this appalling rogue. All the same he simply could not bear the prospect of Kate and Jessica—

  He said, “I am afraid you have made a miscalculation, McGrath. Each of the young ladies, as you call them, is perfectly well informed of my affection for the other. You have nothing to threaten me with, since I am totally indifferent to what you propose.”

  “I trust you’ll pardon me, Sir,” said McGrath, “it’s not that I want to call you a liar, but I wouldn’t come to you like this all unprepared, now would I? I’ve made my little investigation. Like to know how I did it? As you see, each of the ladies writes on posh paper with their address and telephone number. They write their Christian names clear and legible, bless them, and it wasn’t so difficult to find out their surnames. Then I ring up each of them and ask if I can speak to the other and each of them says, all surprised, they don’t know anyone of that name.”

  “You are ingenious, McGrath,” said Ducane. He began to read through the two letters.

  Kate’s letter ran as follows:

  Oh my darling John, how I miss you, it seems an age till our lovely weekend arrives. I hate to think of you all lonely in London without me, but it won’t be long until we are reunited. You are my property, you know, and I have a strong sense of property! I shall assert my rights! Don’t be long away from me, my sweet, haste the day and the hour. Oh how heavenly it is, John, to be able to speak love to you and to know that you feel as I do! Love, love, love. Your Kate. PS. Willy Kost sends regards and hopes to see you too.

  Jessica’s letter ran as follows:

  My dearest, my dearest, my John, this is just my usual daily missive to tell you what you know, that I love you to distraction. You were so infinitely sweet to me yesterday after I had been so awful and you know how unutterably grateful I am that you stayed. I lay there on the bed afterwards for an hour and cried—with gratitude. Are we not somehow compelled by love? I shall not let one day pass without giving you the assurance of mine. Surely there is a future for us together. I am yours yours yours

  Jessica.

  Oh my God, said Ducane to himself. How very much he did not want those girls to see each other’
s letters. It would be no good explaining Kate’s ecstatic temperament to Jessica, or explaining to Kate that Jessica was living in a world of fantasy. Kate’s letter read just like a note from a mistress. Jessica would be certain that he had lied, and he could not bear that. He could bear to part from Jessica but he could scarcely bear that she should think so ill of him. And Jessica’s letter was even more suggestive. Perhaps he could try to confess it all to Kate—but the tender romantic spell would be broken and Kate would justly feel herself deceived. Would she entirely believe him, in any case? Things could never be the same again between them. Yet Ducane also saw with awful clarity that there was nothing to be done. He could not do business with McGrath, it would be an intolerable situation as well as being quite wrong. The only hope was to frighten the man.

  “Understand quite clearly, McGrath,” said Ducane, “that I am not going to give way to this evil proposal of yours. I am not going to pay you a single penny. And if you send those two letters to those two young women I shall go straight to the police and charge you with blackmail. You would not enjoy a long sojourn in prison, I think.”

  “Oh come now, come now, Sir,” said McGrath, his flabby face simpering. “I don’t think you can mean that. Why if you were to do that, Sir, I’d simply have to let the newspapers have the story. And the two young ladies would be so upset!”

  “You absolute villain,” said Ducane.

  “Now don’t take on so. After all, Sir, it’s man to man now, it’s your advantage against mine. Why should you weigh in the scales more than I do?”

  Ducane thought, all I can do is play for time. He won’t send the letters while he thinks it possible I may pay up. I’ll just have to explain the whole thing to Kate and Jess, to prepare them. But oh how can I? He said to McGrath, “You are in a strong position, I don’t deny it, McGrath. I congratulate you on your cleverness. I’ll think over your project. We might be able to come to some arrangement, provided your requirements were very modest. And I warn you if they ever ceased to be modest I would go straight to the police. But I need time to think the matter over. Come and see me again in two or three days’ time.”

  “Thank you, Sir, thank you,” said McGrath. “I knew you’d be quiet and sensible like. May I hope, Sir, for a little bit on account, not committing you to anything like, but just to show we’re friends?”

  “I rather doubt if we’re friends,” said Ducane, “but here’s two pounds.”

  “Oh thank you, thank you. And do remember, Sir, if I may make so bold, and that’s another thing, there’s always Judy, my wife you know, we understand each other, Judy and I, and Judy’s always been a willing girl, philosophical you might say, and Judy took quite a fancy to you, Sir, and if you should ever feel the urge—”

  “How dare you talk to me like that about your wife!” cried Ducane. “Get out of here. Get out.” He rushed to the door and opened it.

  Fivey jumped hastily back and pretended to be tidying the hall table.

  “Listening, were you!” Ducane roared at him. “Now, McGrath, clear off!”

  “Yes, Sir, yes, Sir, but I’ll come back like we said,” McGrath murmured, scurrying into the hall. He paused for a moment in front of Fivey and they regarded each other like two dogs. Then he darted out of the hall door.

  Ducane turned to Fivey. “You’re drunk!” he shouted. “I can smell it on your breath. Be off to bed. And if I ever catch you eavesdropping again I’ll sack you on the spot.”

  Fivey vacillated, caressed Ducane with a startled reproachful look of his pure brown eyes, rotated, and began carefully to mount the stairs. Ducane went back into the drawing-room and slammed the door.

  He tore the two photographs into small pieces. He sat down and put his head in his hands. In fact he had been deceiving Kate and Jess up to the hilt. There was no ‘explanation’ of his conduct. His conduct would look bad, just as bad as it was. He was justly served. And then the scoundrel had the impudence to offer him his wife! He could not believe that Judy McGrath— At that moment Ducane suddenly thought of something which ought to have been clear to him a good deal earlier.

  Twenty-one

  “WHAT ees eet, Paula?”

  “Venus, Cupid, Folly and Time.”

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “When shall we start reading the Aeneid?”

  “Later, After— Later.”

  “After what?”

  “Later.”

  “What ees eet, my dear?”

  “Nothing, Willy. Why, here comes Barbara to see you. I must go. Thanks for the tutorial!”

  Eric’s ship is steaming northward through the Indian Ocean, and Eric is in the prow, Eric is the ship’s figurehead, with his big varnished face and his stiff golden hair streaming backward. He leans across the brilliant sea, sending toward the north, toward the decisive meeting, the narrow burning beam of his will. That unappeased violence, in him travels to the encounter. With what can it be opposed? Is there any love still for healing, or only the need of courage in the face of force? What profit now even to run away, since discovery would be so certain and flight merely the fearful waiting in a stranger’s room for those inevitable feet upon the stair? He must be awaited here with closed lips, no single word uttered, no confession made, no assistance asked. It is too late, and pride will not now surrender its captive. After so much of cleverness, so much of subtlety, so much of the insolence of reason, comes that at last which must be dumbly faced. Eric, not now to be controlled or managed, must, with whatever outcome, be totally endured. The necessary courage is that full endurance in secrecy, that being dismembered in secrecy, the willingness to surrender, in whatever strange way it might be asked for, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. And this had to be, not only because of the relentless journeying ship, but because of the unredeemed past buried alive in its demoniac silence. Now let a demon courage rise to face that resurrected bloodstained shade.

  But oh, the human weakness, the desire for the comforter, the frail crying wish that it had all never happened at all and things were as they once were. The bitter memory of the newly painted door and the beautiful woman entering. The bitterness of that bitterness. Oh Richard, Richard, Richard.

  “Why, Henrietta, here all alone? Where’s Edward?”

  “He’s hunting for Montrose.”

  “Henrietta, you’re crying. What is it, my little pussy? Sit down here and tell me.”

  “Everything’s awful.”

  “Why, what’s awful? Tell me all the things that are awful.”

  “We can’t find Montrose anywhere.”

  “Montrose will come back. Cats always do. Don’t you fret then.”

  “And we found a dead fish in our special pool.”

  “They have to die sometime, Henrietta, just like us.”

  “And we saw a bad magpie carrying off a poor frog.”

  “The magpie has to eat, you know! And I don’t suppose the frog really knew what was happening at all.”

  “I do wish the animals wouldn’t hurt each other.”

  “We human beings hurt each other too!”

  “And we found a poor seagull with a broken wing and Uncle Theo drowned it.”

  “That was the only thing to do, Henrietta.”

  “And I dreamed last night that we were back with Daddy and it was all all right again, and when I woke up I was so miserable. Why, Mummy, what is it? Why, Mummy, now you’re crying too.…”

  “I’ve learnt the flute quartet in D major.”

  “I know.”

  “Oh, you’ve been listening! It was supposed to be a surprise.”

  “I heard you the other day when I was walking by the house.”

  “May I come up and play it to you?”

  “No.”

  “Why not? You used to let me come here and play to you.”

  “Not any more.”

  “Why not, Willy?”

  “The music is too painful, dearest Barbara.”

  “You think I wouldn’t
play it properly! I have improved.”

  “No, no, I could hear you were playing it beautifully.”

  “Willy, why won’t you teach me German? You teach Pierce Latin so why not me German?”

  “Just not.”

  “I don’t understand you. I think you’ve become horrid. Everyone’s horrid. Pierce is horrid.”

  “Pierce is in love.”

  “Pooh! What’s being in love like, Willy?”

  “I’ve forgotten.”

  “Well, I suppose you are rather old. If I’m ever in love with someone I won’t be horrid to them.”

  “That’s a very good rule, Barbara. Remember that rule when the time comes.”

  “You remember how you used to say that I was Titania and you were the ass?”

  “Did I? Well, I’m still the ass. I’m going to London tomorrow, Barbie.”

  “I know. You’re going to stay two days with John. John told me.”

  “I’m going to the libraries.”

  “I’ll come and see you as soon as you’re back. I’ll be lonely, with mama and papa away.”

  “I’ll be working then. Come at the weekend.”

  “Why not directly you’re back?”

  “Nam excludit sors mea ‘saepe veni’.”

  “You keep saying things in Latin and you know I can’t understand. I might understand if you wrote it down. But I can’t talk Latin, and you pronounce it in such a funny way.”

  “Never mind.”

  “I wish you wouldn’t be so horrid, Willy, just when I’m so miserable about Montrose.”

  “Don’t worry about Montrose, Barbie, he’ll turn up. He’s just wandered off on an expedition.”

  “But he’s never done it before. He’s not a real torn cat. He wouldn’t want to go away.”

  “I’m sure he’ll come back, my dove. There now, don’t cry. You upset me so much when you cry.”

  “I don’t think you care at all. I think you’re beastly.”

  Barbara, sitting on the floor beside Willy’s chair, had twined her arms about his knees. Willy now rose abruptly, stepping out of the wreath of her arms and marching over to the window.