by Ian Mcewan
“What am I doing?” he says. “You live here. You can hang it up yourself.”
She follows him down to the kitchen, and when he turns to offer her a drink, she hugs him again, then strides away with a little stagey shuffle into the dining room, and beyond, into the conservatory.
“I love it here,” she calls to him. “Look at this tropical tree! I love this tree. What have I been thinking of, staying away so long?”
“Exactly my question.”
The tree has been there nine years. He's never seen her in this mood. She's walking back towards him, arms outstretched as though on a tightrope, pretending to wobble—it's the sort of thing a character in an American soap might do when she wants important good news wrung from her. Next thing, she'll be turning pirouettes around him and humming show tunes. I feel pretty. He takes two glasses from a cupboard and a bottle of champagne from the fridge and twists the cork off.
“Here,” he says. “There's no reason to wait for the others.”
“I love you,” she says again, raising her glass.
“Welcome home, my darling.”
She drinks and he notices, with some relief, that it isn't deeply. Barely a sip—no change there. He's in watchful mode, trying to figure her out. She can't keep still. She wanders with her glass around the central island.
“Guess where I went on my way from the station,” she says as she comes back towards him.
“Um. Hyde Park?”
“You knew! Daddy, why weren't you there? It was simply amazing.”
“I don't know. Playing squash, visiting Granny, cooking the dinner, lack of certainty. That sort of thing.”
“But it's completely barbaric, what they're about to do. Everyone knows that.”
“It might be. So might doing nothing. I honestly don't know. Tell me how it was in the park.”
“I know that if you'd been there you wouldn't have any doubts.”
He says, wanting to be helpful, “I watched them set off this morning. All very good natured.”
She grimaces, as though in pain. She's home at last, they have their champagne, and she can't bear it that he doesn't see it her way. She puts a hand on his arm. Unlike her father's or brother's, it's a tiny hand with tapering fingers, each with a remnant of a childish dimple at the base. While she speaks he's looking at her fingernails, gratified to see them in good condition. Longish, smooth, clean, glazed, not painted. You can tell a lot from a person's nails. When a life starts to unravel, they're among the first to go. He takes her hand and squeezes it.
She's beseeching him. Her head is as crammed with this stuff as his own. The speech she gives is a collation of everything she heard in the park, of everything they've both heard and read a hundred times, the worst-case guesses that become facts through repetition, the sweet raptures of pessimism. He hears again the UN's half-million Iraqi dead through famine and bombing, the three million refugees, the death of the UN, the collapse of the world order if America goes it alone, Baghdad entirely destroyed as it's taken street by street from the Republican Guard, Turks invading from the north, Iranians from the east, Israelis making excursions from the west, the whole region in flames, Saddam backed into a corner unleashing his chemical and biological weapons—if he has them, because no one's really proved it convincingly, and nor have they shown the connection to Al-Qaeda—and when the Americans have invaded, they won't be interested in democracy, they won't spend any money on Iraq, they'll take the oil and build their military bases and run the place like a colony.
While she speaks he gazes at her with warmth and some surprise. They're about to have one of their set-pieces—and so soon. She doesn't usually talk politics, it's not one of her subjects. Is this the source of her agitated happiness? The colour rises from her neck, and every extra reason she gives for not going to war gathers weight from the one before and lifts her towards her triumph. The dark outcomes she believes in are making her euphoric, she's slaying a dragon with every stroke. When she's done she gives a little affectionate push on his forearm, as though to shake him awake. Then she makes a face of mock sorrow. She longs for him to see what's true.
Conscious of taking up a position, girding himself for combat, he says, “But this is all speculation about the future. Why should I feel any certainty about it? How about a short war, the UN doesn't fall apart, no famine, no refugees or invasions by neighbours, no flattened Baghdad and fewer deaths than Saddam causes his own people in an average year? What if the Americans try to organise a democracy, pump in the billions and leave because the President wants to get himself re-elected next year? I think you'd still be against it, and you haven't told me why.”
She pulls away from him and faces him with a look of anxious surprise. “Daddy, you're not for the war, are you?”
He shrugs. “No rational person is for war. But in five years we might not regret it. I'd love to see the end of Saddam. You're right, it could be a disaster. But it could be the end of a disaster and the beginning of something better. It's all about outcomes, and no one knows what they'll be. That's why I can't imagine marching in the streets.”
Her surprise has turned to distaste. He raises the bottle and offers to top up her glass but she shakes her head and sets her champagne down and moves further away. She isn't drinking with the enemy.
“You hate Saddam, but he's a creation of the Americans. They backed him, and armed him.”
“Yes, and the French, and Russians and British did too. A big mistake. The Iraqis were betrayed, especially in 1991 when they were encouraged to rise against the Ba'athists who cut them down. This could be a chance to put that right.”
“So you're for the war?”
“Like I said, I'm not for any war. But this one could be the lesser evil. In five years we'll know.”
“That's so typical.”
He smiles uneasily. “Of what?”
“Of you.”
This isn't quite the reunion he imagined, and as sometimes happens, their dispute is getting personal. He's not used to it, he's lost his touch. He feels a tightness above his heart. Or is it the bruise on his sternum? He's well into his second glass of champagne, she's hardly touched her first. Her dancing impulses have vanished. She leans by the doorway, arms folded squarely, the little elfin face tight with anger. She responds to his raised eyebrows.
“You're saying let the war go ahead, and in five years if it works out you're for it, and if doesn't, you're not responsible. You're an educated person living in what we like to call a mature democracy, and our government's taking us to war. If you think that's a good idea, fine, say so, make the argument, but don't hedge your bets. Are we sending the troops in or not? It's happening now. And making guesses about the future is what you do sometimes when you make a moral choice. It's called thinking through the consequences. I'm against this war because I think terrible things are going to happen. You seem to think good will come of it, but you won't stand by what you believe.”
He considers, and says, “It's true. I honestly think I could be wrong.”
This admission, and his pliant manner, make her angrier. “Then why take the risk? Where's the cautionary principle you're always going on about? If you're sending hundreds of thousands of soldiers to the Middle East, you better know what you're doing. And these bullying greedy fools in the White House don't know what they're doing, they've no idea where they're leading us, and I can't believe you're on their side.”
Perowne wonders if they're really talking about something else. Her “so typical” still bothers him. Perhaps her months in Paris have given her time to discover fresh perspectives on her father, and she doesn't like them. He turns the thought away. It's good, it's healthy to have one of their old head-to-head arguments, it's family life resumed. And the world matters. He eases himself onto one of the high stools by the centre island, and gestures for her to do the same. She ignores him and remains by the door, arms still crossed, face still closed. It doesn't help that he becomes calmer as she grows more agitat
ed, but that's his habit, professionally ingrained.
“Look Daisy, if it was down to me, those troops wouldn't be on the Iraq border. This is hardly the best time for the West to be going to war with an Arab nation. And no plan in sight for the Palestinians. But the war's going to happen, with or without the UN, whatever any government says or any mass demonstrations. The hidden weapons, whether they exist or not, they're irrelevant. The invasion's going to happen, and militarily it's bound to succeed. It'll be the end of Saddam and one of the most odious regimes ever known, and I'll be glad.”
“So ordinary Iraqis get it from Saddam, and now they have to take it from American missiles, but it's all fine because you'll be glad.”
He doesn't recognise the rhetorical sourness, the harshness in her throat. He says, “Hang on,” but she doesn't hear him.
“Do you think we're going to be any safer at the end of all this? We'll be hated right across the Arab world. All those bored young guys will be queuing up to become terrorists . . .”
“Too late to worry about that,” he says over her. “A hundred thousand have already passed through the Afghan training camps. At least you must be happy that's come to an end.”
As he says this, he remembers that in fact she was, that she loathed the joyless Taliban, and he wonders why he's interrupting her, arguing with her, rather than eliciting her views and affectionately catching up with her. Why be adversarial? Because he himself is stoked up, there's poison in his blood, despite his soft tone; and fear and anger, constricting his thoughts, making him long to have a row. Let's have this out! They are fighting over armies they will never see, about which they know almost nothing.
“There'll be more fighters,” Daisy says. “And when the first explosion hits London your pro-war views . . .”
“If you're describing my position as pro-war, then you'd have to accept that yours is effectively pro-Saddam.”
“What fucking nonsense.”
As she swears he feels a sudden surge in his being, driven partly by astonishment that their conversation is moving out of control, and also by a reckless enlivening joy, a release from the brooding that has afflicted him all day. The colour has gone from Daisy's face and the few freckles she has along her cheekbone are suddenly vivid in her share of the basement kitchen's pools of downlighting. Her face, which typically in conversations is at a quizzical angle, confronts him with a level glare of outrage.
Despite his leap of feeling, he looks calm as he takes a drink of champagne and says, “What I meant is this. The price of removing Saddam is war, the price of no war is leaving him in place.”
It was meant as a conciliatory point, but Daisy doesn't hear it that way. “It's crude and ugly,” she says, “when the war lobby calls us pro-Saddam.”
“Well, you're prepared to do the one thing he'd most like you to do, which is to leave him in power. But you'll only postpone the confrontation. He or his horrible sons are going to have to be dealt with one day. Even Clinton knew that.”
“You're saying we're invading Iraq because we haven't got a choice. I'm amazed at the crap you talk, Dad. You know very well these extremists, the neocons, have taken over America. Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz. Iraq was always their pet project. Nine eleven was their big chance to talk Bush round. Look at his foreign policy up until then. He was a know-nothing stay-at-home mouse. But there's nothing linking Iraq to nine eleven, or to Al-Qaeda generally, and no really scary evidence of WMD. Didn't you hear Blix yesterday? And doesn't it ever occur to you that in attacking Iraq we're doing the very thing the New York bombers wanted us to do—lash out, make more enemies in Arab countries and radicalise Islam. Not only that, we're getting rid of their old enemy for them, the godless Stalinist tyrant.”
“And I suppose they wanted us to destroy their training camps and drive the Taliban out of Afghanistan, and force Bin Laden on the run, and have their financial networks disrupted and hundreds of their key guys locked up . . .”
She cuts in and her voice is loud. “Stop twisting my words. No one's against going after Al-Qaeda. We're talking about Iraq. Why is it that the few people I've met who aren't against this crappy war are all over forty? What is it about getting old? Can't get close to death soon enough?”
He feels a sudden sadness, and a longing for the dispute to come to an end. He preferred it ten minutes ago, when she told him she loved him. She's yet to show him the proofs of My Saucy Bark and the artwork for the cover.
But he can't stop himself. “Death's all around,” he agrees. “Ask Saddam's torturers at Abu Ghraib prison and the twenty thousand inmates. And let me ask you a question. Why is it among those two million idealists today I didn't see one banner, one fist or voice raised against Saddam?”
“He's loathsome,” she says. “It's a given.”
“No it's not. It's a forgotten. Why else are you all singing and dancing in the park? The genocide and torture, the mass graves, the security apparatus, the criminal totalitarian state—the iPod generation doesn't want to know. Let nothing come between them and their ecstasy clubbing and cheap flights and reality TV. But it will, if we do nothing. You think you're all lovely and gentle and blameless, but the religious nazis loathe you. What do you think the Bali bombing was about? The clubbers clubbed. Radical Islam hates your freedom.”
She mimes being taken aback. “Dad, I'm sorry you're so sensitive about your age. But Bali was Al-Qaeda, not Saddam. Nothing you've just said justifies invading Iraq.”
Perowne is well into his third glass of champagne. A big mistake. He's not a practised drinker. But he's viciously happy. “It's not just Iraq. I'm talking about Syria, Iran, Saudi Arabia, a great swathe of repression, corruption and misery. You're about to be a published writer. Why not let it bother you a little, the censorship, and your fellow writers in Arab jails, in the very region where writing was invented? Or is freedom and not being tortured a Western affectation we shouldn't impose on others?”
“Oh for God's sake, not that relativist stuff again. And you keep drifting off the point. No one wants Arab writers in jail. But invading Iraq isn't going to get them out.”
“It might. Here's a chance to turn one country around. Plant a seed. See if it flourishes and spreads.”
“You don't plant seeds with cruise missiles. They're going to hate the invaders. The religious extremists will get stronger. There'll be less freedom, more writers in prison.”
“My fifty pounds says three months after the invasion there'll be a free press in Iraq, and unmonitored Internet access too. The reformers in Iran will be encouraged, those Syrian and Saudi and Libyan potentates will be getting the jitters.”
Daisy says, “Fine. And my fifty says it'll be a mess and even you will wish it never happened.”
They had various bets after arguments during her teenage years, generally concluded with a mock-formal handshake. Perowne found a way of paying up, even when he won—a form of concealed subsidy. After an exam seemed to go badly for her, seventeen-year-old Daisy angrily put twenty pounds on never getting into Oxford. To cheer her up he raised his side of the deal to five hundred, and when her acceptance came through she spent the money on a trip to Florence with a friend. Is she in the mood for shaking hands now? She comes away from the door, retrieves her champagne and moves to the far side of the kitchen and appears interested in Theo's CDs by the hi-fi. Her back is firmly turned on him. He remains on his stool at the centre island, playing with his glass, no longer drinking. He has a hollow feeling from arguing only a half of what he feels. He's a dove with Jay Strauss, and a hawk with his daughter. What sense is he making? And how luxurious, to work it all out at home in the kitchen, the geopolitical moves and military strategy, and not be held to account, by voters, newspapers, friends, history. When there are no consequences, being wrong is simply an interesting diversion.
She takes a CD from its box and posts it in the player. He waits, knowing he'll get a clue to her mood, or even a message. At the piano intro he smiles. It's a record Theo brough
t into the house years ago, Chuck Berry's old pianist, Johnnie Johnson, singing “Tanqueray,” a slouching blues of reunion and friendship.
It was a long time comin',
But I knew I would see the day
When you and I could sit down,
And have a drink of Tanqueray.
She turns and comes towards him with a little dance shuffle. When she's at his side he takes her hand.
She says, “Smells like the old warmonger's made one of his fish stews. Can I be of use?”
“The young appeaser can set the table. And make a salad dressing if you like.”
She's on her way to the plate cupboard when they hear the doorbell, two overlong unsteady rings. They look at each other: it's not promising, that kind of persistence.
He says, “Before you do that, slice a lemon. The gin's over there, tonic's in the fridge.”
He's amused by her theatrical eye-rolling and deep breath.
“Here goes.”
“Stay cool,” he advises, and goes upstairs to greet his father-in-law, the eminent poet.
Growing up in the suburbs in cosily shared solitude with his mother, Henry Perowne never felt the lack of a father. In the heavily mortgaged households around him, fathers were distant, work-worn figures of little obvious interest. To a child, a domestic existence in Perivale in the mid-sixties was regulated uniquely by a mother, a housewife; visiting a friend's house to play at weekends or holidays, it was her domain you entered, her rules you temporarily lived by. She was the one who gave or withheld permission, or handed out the small change. He had no good reason to envy his friends an extra parent—when fathers weren't absent, they loomed irascibly, preventing rather than enabling the better, riskier elements of life. In his teens, when he scrutinised the few existing photographs of his father, it was less out of longing than narcissism—he hoped to discover in those strong, acne-free features some promise for his own future chances with girls. He wanted the face, but he didn't want the advice, the refusals or the judgments. Perhaps he was bound to regard a father-in-law as an imposition, even if he'd acquired one far less imposing than John Grammaticus.