The collected stories

by Paul Theroux

  'My father was born in India,' another boy said. This was Nigel. He was Mario Scaduto's friend. He was tall and had a rather debauched-looking face. 'They've got more tigers in India than they know what to do with. But they've been wiped out in Malaysia. Jocko's father probably killed the last one. My parents say that most blood sports are nothing more than vandalism.'

  'You've been to India, haven't you, Dad?' Scaduto's youngest son looked pleadingly at him to verify the fact, and then glanced at his school friend, a mouse-faced boy the others called Little-fair.

  'Lots of times,' Scaduto said. 'We had a facility right near the border in Pakistan. I used to pop over all the time.'

  'We went out there last summer for a holiday,' Jocko said.

  'India?' Scaduto asked.

  'Hong Kong.' Jocko, I noticed, had a mustache, though he could not have been more than eleven or twelve.

  'That's nowhere near India,' Nigel said. 'Jocko's confusing Hong Kong with India.'

  'The place is full of ruddy Indians,' Jocko said, facing the others and setting his brigadier's jaw at them. 'Indians own shops there. They're in competition with the Chinese. The Chinese work jolly hard, but they're sneaky. The Indians are arrogant - most of them lie worse than that little git Norris in Form Two, the one they call Ananiarse.'

  'We saw some Indians in Trinidad last summer.' This was Littlefair. He was small and bent-over and watchful in a rather elderly way. He was mouse-faced even to the twitching of his pointed nose. 'They were having a Hindu festival. They made a hell of a racket.'

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  'That's the trouble with England,' Jocko said. 'Too many colored people.'

  Too many Scotsmen is what I say! Send them all back to their rotten old backward villages-' Nigel stopped speaking suddenly and turned to Mario Scaduto. 'Crikey, I'm sorry! I hope you're not Scottish!'

  'They're Italian,' Jocko said. 'Scaduto's an Italian name.'

  'Smart boy,' Vic said. And he whispered to me, 'They have this fantastic awareness about language.'

  'Our maid's Italian,' Jocko said.

  Littlefair said, 'We've got two, a husband and wife. They're Spanish. You can hear them arguing at night. All Spaniards argue after work.'

  'We're not Italian,' Mario Scaduto was saying. 'We're American. We've got this huge house in Silver Springs, Maryland.' But Mario's accent, and its nervous urgent tweet, was English.

  'We went to Trinidad on a yacht my father chartered,' the mouse-faced boy called Littlefair was explaining.

  The word 'yacht' was heard by the others, who began to listen.

  'We were in a hurricane. We almost sank. We had to put ashore in such a hurry the captain ran the yacht aground and completely smashed the hull. That was after we left Trinidad. Then we went to Jamaica. The colored people standing by the road, when they saw our limousine going by to take us to the hotel, they gobbed on it.'

  Nigel said, 'I'm going to camp this summer.'

  'I hate camp,' Jocko said. 'It's worse than school.'

  'This camp's in Switzerland.'

  I walked abreast of Vic, just behind the boys, whose voices were raised, as if they intended for us to hear them clearly. Vic looked at me and said, 'Aren't they unbelievable?' I agreed; I said they certainly were; it was the very word for them. But he was praising them. And the boys were still talking.

  'My mother says it's not that they can't find jobs, it's that they just don't want to work. They'd rather draw their dole money.'

  'Some of these people make a hell of a lot on the dole - twenty or thirty pounds a week. That's more than we pay our maid.'

  'If you have masses of children you can make a ruddy fortune on the dole. That's what all these Pakistanis do.'

  'Some of them work hard. They take jobs that English people

  DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS (il): THE LONDON EMBASSY

  refuse. Ever see them at Heathrow? They're the ones who clean the bogs.'

  'They work all night, too. Our plane came in at three o'clock in the morning and there were Pakistanis all over the place with mops and buckets.'

  'There's a Pakistani round our way. His shop is open even on Sunday. He never closes!'

  'That's the trouble with them - they're just interested in making money.'

  Scaduto's children mingled with their friends. It was impossible to tell them from the others in this chorus of voices. All the accents were the same to my unpracticed ear, like the cries of 'My father says' and 'My mother says.' After vacations, and the Far East, and immigrants, and welfare, they discussed work - the best jobs - and schools - the best schools.

  'How old are your children, Vic?'

  'Eight-fifteen, nine-forty-five and twelve-thirty,' he said, as if reciting a timetable. 'Mario's twelve-thirty. He starts public school next September. If we go to Italy he can be a boarder.'

  'Radley's a brilliant school,' one of the boys was saying. 'They did that television series about it.'

  'My father says they put too much emphasis on books. I'm going to Ardingly. They've got sailing.'

  Littlefair said, 'I'm going to Marlborough,' and when no one commented he became even more mouselike, and twitched his nose, and said, 'My grandfather gave them a library.'

  'My father's an old boy of St Paul's.' This was the Scottish boy they called Jocko. 'That's why I want to go to Westminster.'

  'American schools are rubbish,' another boy said. He was dark-haired. He was, I realized, one of the Scaduto boys.

  'Tony,' Vic said sharply.

  'Oh, you know they stink, Dad,' the boy said in a jeering way. 'The kids carry knives. They take drugs. There's no discipline. Half the teachers can't even read.'

  'Flipping Norah!' Nigel said.

  'They smoke marijuana in the bogs,' Tony Scaduto said. 'The teachers go to discos with their girl students and get them pregnant.'

  'Gordon Bennett!' Jocko said, and in spite of myself I laughed out loud at the exclamation.

  'I'm really impressed with English schools,' Vic said. 'But just

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  because you like English schools doesn't mean you have to run down American ones. Compulsory free education is an American idea/

  The boy called Nigel said, 'American schools are brilliant at sports,' and then smiled patronizingly at the Scadutos.

  'What does your father do?' the Littlefair boy was asking the youngest Scaduto, whose name was either Frankie or Franny.

  'He works in the West End,' Mario said, helping his brother out.

  'He has an office in Mayfair,' Tony said.

  It was a highly imaginative way of describing Vic Scaduto's job as Cultural Affairs Officer at the American Embassy in Grosvenor Square. Vic heard and gave me a pained and apologetic look. Then, in an attempt to set the record straight, he cleared his throat and spoke loudly.

  'I'm with the American Embassy, on the cultural side.'

  'Hussein - that colored boy in Form Three they call "turhead" - his father's with the Saudi Arabian Embassy,' Jocko said. 'He has TV cameras in his driveway - for security reasons. And an armed guard. That weed Beavis went to a birthday party there. Hussein's father weighs about twenty stone! Beavis said he looks like a chucker-out.'

  'Princes come to visit him, Beavis said' - this from Littlefair.

  'Not real princes,' Nigel said. 'Colored ones, wrapped in blankets, with towels over their heads.'

  Mario Scaduto said, 'The colored ones are just as good as the real ones.'

  Nigel smiled and said, 'There are three thousand members of the royal family in Saudi Arabia. It's because they have all those wives. They have billions of children. Everyone you meet is a prince, even the people who do the washing-up. It doesn't mean a thing.'

  The smallest Scaduto said, 'I don't believe you!'

  'My father's company's got an office in Jeddah,' Nigel said. This seemed to settle the argument. He added, 'My father goes there by Concorde.'

  'Concorde doesn't go to Jeddah,' Jocko said.

  'It goes to Bahrain,' Nigel s
aid. 'He changes planes there.'

  We had walked across the park, from Sheen Gate to the woods on the hill to the south, passing the deer, which hardly noticed us, an older people with dogs on leashes, who never took their eyes off us and seemed to listen to the boys yelling and boasting.

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  'The last time we were here it was awful bleak,' Vic said.

  The last time: he meant when the assessment officers had spent the day with him.

  We were surrounded by azaleas and tall and tumbling rhododendrons that grew in the high shade of the woods.

  'These are really pretty,' he said.

  'We've got lots of these at home. My mother grows them. She's entering some in the Chelsea Flower Show.'

  Oh, shut up, I thought, and walked on ahead. But I could still hear them.

  'Richmond Park is famous. I'll bet you don't have parks like this in America.'

  'They used to. They've all been ruined by vandals. That's what my father says.' Was this one of the Scadutos?

  'I've been to America lots of times.' I turned. This was Nigel.

  'So have we.' Littlefair.

  'We never go to America,' Tony Scaduto said. 'We prefer it here.'

  Jocko said, 'You're American.'

  'I don't feel American,' Mario Scaduto said.

  'Neither do I,' Tony said.

  'But you are!' Littlefair said. 'Your parents are American, so that means -'

  Vic had caught up with me, and he had abandoned the boys, given up on their conversation. They were screaming at each other now, and he looked sheepish.

  He said, 'I'll get that job in Italy. Then everyone will be happy. My folks will come over and visit. They'll be proud - it's what they always wanted. I think I'll put these kids in the American school in Rome. You don't have to tell me they need it. I know. They won't like it, but they'll get used to it. A job like this can be hell on a family - you have no idea.'

  My last memory of that day at the Scadutos' was the dinner itself- not Vic asking where the lemon for the fish was and Marietta saying, 'Get it yourself!' and not Vic (who quickly became drunk) defending the death penalty for child molesters, joined by his three boys, who said that they were in favor of capital punishment not only for murder but also stealing; it was the memory of Marietta leaning over and telling me at great length that in spite of what people said about parents teaching their children, the truth was

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  that children taught their parents. Children, Marietta said, sort of raised her parents and helped them grow up and if it wasn't for her three she would probably never have taken up poetry. It wasn't the children who belittled women writers - it was the adults. And wasn't it a shame that I did not have any - especially here in London, where there were so many opportunities for kids? I remembered that - as a consolation - because Vic Scaduto ('All parents are children' - he wouldn't leave the topic!) of course never got the job in Italy.

  CHARLIE HOGLE S EARRING

  'Let me tell you about it. That'll be quicker than reading this crap.' He sat on the edge of my desk and swung one heavy thigh over the other.

  'Do you know Charlie Hogle from C and R?'

  'I saw him once at your house - that reception you gave for me. I don't go down to the telex room.'

  'You let your pyoon do it, eh?' It was the Malay word for office lackey, and he was mocking me with it. He said, 'You should get around more - you'd be amazed at some of the things you find.'

  'In the telex room?'

  'Especially there,' Horton said. 'This fellow Hogle - very gifted, they say, if you can describe a telex operator in that way. Very personable. Highly efficient, if a bit invisible. He's been here almost three years. No trouble, no scandal, nothing.' Horton stopped talking. He stared at me. 'I was down there this morning. What do I find?' Horton watched me again, giving me the same dramatic scrutiny as before. He wanted my full attention and a little pause.

  I said, 'I give up - what did you find?'

  'Hogle. With an earring.' Horton sighed, slid off the desktop, and threw himself into a chair. He was remarkably agile for such a big man.

  I said, 'An earring?'

  'Right. One of those gold . . . loops? Don't make me describe it.' Horton suddenly seemed cross. 'I don't know anything about earrings.'

  'Was he wearing it?'

  'What a dumb question! Of course he was.'

  'I thought you were going to tell me that he stole it - that you found it on him.'

  'He's got a hole in his ear for it.'

  I said, 'So he's had his ear pierced.'

  'Can you imagine? A special hole in his ear!'

  I said, 'What exactly is wrong, coach?'

  He had encouraged us to use this ridiculous word for him. I had so far refrained from it, and though I felt like a jackass using it today, it seemed to have the right effect. It calmed him. He smiled at me.

  'Let's put it at its simplest. Let's be charitable. Let's not mock him,' Horton said. 'An earring is against regulations.'

  'Which ones?'

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  'Dress regulations. The book. It's as if he's wearing a skirt.'

  'But he's not wearing a skirt. It's jewelry. Is there a subsection for that?'

  'Sure! In Muslim countries, Third World countries-'

  'This is England, coach.'

  'And he's a guy! And he's got this thing hanging off his ear!'

  'You're not going to get him on a technicality,' I said. 'All you can do is ask him to remove it. "Would you mind taking off that earring, Mr Hogle?"'

  Horton did not smile. He began lecturing me. He said, 'You act as if there's nothing wrong. Did you know there's no law against lesbianism in this country? Do you know why? Because Queen Victoria refused to believe that women indulged in that sort of behavior!'

  'Hogle's earring is hardly in that category,' I said.

  'Bull! It's precisely in that category. That's how serious a violation it is. It's unthinkable for a man to turn up at work wearing an earring, so there's no legislation, nothing in the rulebook for earrings per se. But there's a paragraph on Improper Dress-'

  'That covers lewd or suggestive clothes.'

  'What about Inappropriate Accessories?'

  'Religious or racial taboos. Cowhide presents in Hindu countries, pigskin suitcases in Muslim countries, the New York Philharmonic touring Israel and playing Wagner.'

  'What has Wagner got to do with Accessories?'

  'You know what I mean. Earrings don't figure.'

  'There's something,' Horton said. He came over to me and jerked my shoulder, giving me a hug. 'It doesn't matter.' He grinned. He was a big man. He hugged me sideways as we stood shoulder to shoulder. 'There's always something - just find it.'

  'Why me?' I said. 'You could do it more easily.'

  His eyes became narrow and dark as he said, Til tell you why I can't.' He looked at the door suspiciously, as if he were about to bark at it. Then he made an ugly disgusted face and whispered, 'When I saw Hogle with that thing in his ear, and the hole, and the implications, I felt sick to my stomach.' He glanced darkly at the door again. 'He's a nice clean-cut guy. I'd lay into him - I'd lose my temper. I know I would, and I want to spare him that. You'll be more rational. You know about these nutty customs. You've been in the Far East.'

  CHARLIE HOGLE S EARRING

  'Doesn't Hogle have a personnel officer?'

  Horton gare me a disdainful look. His expression said I was letting him down, I was a coward, a weakling.

  He said, 'You don't want to do this, do you?'

  'What I want is of no importance,' I said. 'I do what I'm told.'

  'Excellent!' he said. Horton stood up straight. The muddy green was gone from his eyes; he was smiling. 'Now get down there and tell Hogle to divest himself.'

  I said, 'That's his file, right?'

  'Ignore the file for now. When you've settled this problem, stick a memo in here and
hand it back to me. I also want to know why he's wearing it - that's important. And, by the way, this is strictly confidential, this whole matter - everything I've said.'

  I made a move toward the file.

  'You don't really need that,' he said.

  'Maybe not,' I said. 'But I think I'll take it home and blow on it.'

  I had thought, Why me? But of course Horton was testing me as much as he was gunning for Hogle. He was trying to discover where my sympathies were: Would I give him an argument, or would I obey? Perhaps I was a latent earring-wearer? Horton's own reaction seemed to me extraordinary. He felt sick to his stomach. That may have been an exaggeration, but the fear that he would lose his temper was almost unbelievable in someone whose temper was always in check. Everett Horton - he wanted to be called 'coach'! - was a man of action. I could not understand his reticence now, unless I was right in assuming that I was the real subject of the inquiry.

  I was new here - less than four months on the job. I had to play ball. And I must admit I was curious.

  The file was thin. Charlie Hogle had come to us from the Army under a program we called Lateral Entry. He had been in the communications unit of the Signal Corps, running a C and R office in Frankfurt. He was twenty-nine, not married, a graduate - German major - of the University of Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls. He had been born and raised in nearby Waterloo, Iowa. His annual job evaluations from the State Department fault-finders were very good. In fact, one suggested - as a black mark - that Hogle had experienced 'no negative situations.' In other words, he was such

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  a happy fellow he might prove to be a problem. I did not buy that naive analysis. Hogle was a well-adjusted, middle-level technician with a good record, and after looking through this worthy man's file I regretted what I had been ordered to do.

  Lunch with him was out: it was both too businesslike and too friendly. Anyway, I hated lunch as unnecessary and time-wasting. Lunch is the ritual meal that makes fat people fat. And dinner was out - too formal. I kept telling myself that this was a small matter. I could send for him. I pictured poor Hogle, clutching his silly earring, cowering in my office, awkward in his chair.