The Magicians

by J. B. Priestley

  Perhaps because he was pursuing a thought, once more there was some vagueness, some loss of the boy’s sensations. The arrival at Tuxvey Cross, a white hamlet in a leafy sun-flecked hollow where a stream gurgled and flashed, the halt at The Bell, all the fuss and jokes and laughter of the general descent from the wagonette, were dream scenes, full of muted far-away sounds and coloured shadows on a bubble; and even the large lunch he ate, at the end of a table with Edith Metson and her Uncle Bob, in the long room at the back of the inn, was spectral, hushed, richness and glory behind a veil. Was it all shredding away, thinning out, a lost world dissolving?

  Then, with everything crystal-clear again, he was standing by the old iron pump outside the rough white­washed wall of the long room, the warmth of the afternoon pressing heavily on him. The smell of the country when it really was country was back with him, that smell of fresh cow-dung and whitewash and hens and hay and bruised grass with the sun on it. And again the promise of things—even the rusty iron of the pump, a patch of blue in a puddle, an old scythe against the wall—was almost unbearable. Now, heightening this promise to a painful ecstasy, Edith Metson and her Uncle Bob were beside him; the man, with another cigar alight, bold, all-knowing, immensely travelled, his red-brown leathery cheek and bright male glance fetched from jungles and wild seas; the girl with her pale gold and white rose beauty, her mysterious feminine smiles and mysterious slow feminine glances, her suggestion of some secret and magical treasure, standing so close he could see the golden down on her arms, yet still belonging to some impenetrable region of mystery and enchantment. And she was saying, very softly as if this too were part of some wonderful secret: “Charlie, Uncle Bob and I thought we’d explore the stream. There’s a waterfall further up, isn’t there? Would you like to come with us?” And Uncle Bob was putting a great heavy hand on his shoulder: “You do, my lad. Then I’ll tell you a bit more about electricity. That’s the thing to go in for these days, if you’re smart—electrical engineering. No end to it. Bigger oppor­tunities all the time. If you’ll take my tip, that’s the game for a bright lad like you . . .”

  Why, of course, that was what had started him off, that voice out of the great magical hour. He heard himself stammering some­thing, caught a last glimpse of the dark but glowing face of adventure and the pale clear smiling face of beauty, and then was out of time alive, falling through night into sleep. . . .

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Into Thin Air

  Ravenstreet opened his eyes and saw that Wiverson was there, looking at him apologetically. “I didn’t like to wake you earlier, sir, but as there’ve been several urgent calls from Mr. Garson at the works—and as it’s now half-past eleven——”

  “That’s all right, Wiverson. Time I was up. Tell Mrs. Wiverson I’ll just have some coffee. Oh—and what about Lord Mervil—and the others?”

  “Went about two hours ago, sir. His lordship left a message. Shall I bring it, sir?”

  “No, I’ll have it with my coffee. You go down to the kitchen. I’ll ring Mr. Garson from here.”

  He told Garson he had been kept out of his bed most of the night by a car accident, then asked him what he wanted, reminding him not altogether humorously that he was no longer at all times at the service of New Central Electric. Garson groaned, again perhaps not altogether humorously. “I know, I know—you needn’t remind me,” Garson continued. “But it’s those E.G.12 jobs for Brazil—your pigeon, originally, old man—and we’ve struck a nasty snag. We all think you must have foreseen it—but we can’t find any reference to it in your E.G.12 notes you left us. Come over for lunch and tell us all about it. Otherwise, we’re stuck—and Selby’s screaming for a delivery date. I’ve a thing or two to tell you about him too.”

  “I’m not interested,” Ravenstreet told him. “But I’ll be with you as close to one o’clock as I can make it, to help you with the E.G.12s.”

  He found Mervil’s note with his coffee in the little study. It was short and probably murderous. Mervil said that of course all plans for manufacturing and marketing Sepman Eighteen would have to be abandoned, though something on similar lines might be attempted, not however in association with Sir Charles Ravenstreet, who was advised to keep well away from any enterprise with which Mervil was connected. Ravenstreet read it twice, then tore it up. Probably by tonight Mervil would be instructing one of his editors to start a Ravenstreet smear campaign. As he was considering this, wondering how much he would care, Wayland joined him.

  “You had a good sleep after your experience of time alive,” said Wayland smiling. “Was it an interesting experience?”

  “It was. In fact, considerably more than that. I returned to a day in the country when I was a boy of twelve. It was more than memory—now I’m certain of that much. There are some things I’d like you to explain, but not now—there isn’t time—I have to go to the works. I’ve had a farewell note from Mervil. Fortunately I’m not a public man and I’ve no job to lose, otherwise he might do me a lot of mischief. He’s very angry, of course.”

  “He is, and so, I think, are his masters, who were beginning to forget they could be defeated. But I won’t waste your valuable time with these fanciful notions of ours.” The irony was there but so was the oddly attractive smile. “Mervil and Karney went off together—to the north. Prisk went to London but wasn’t allowed to drive himself as he was still wearing his bandages. This drug will not be manufactured and sold now.”

  “No. Mervil makes that clear. But he won’t let the whole thing go. The idea’s too attractive. He’ll probably try something else along the same lines, as close to Sepman’s formula as he can get. I’m afraid you haven’t won yet, Wayland. I wish you had. I’m against Mervil and all he stands for—but you know that. Now I may be away all day—it may be late tonight before I can get back—is there anything I can do for you there?”

  “No, thank you, Ravenstreet. We are, as I hope you know, very happy here, though we may not be here much longer. Is there anything we can do for you? We feel considerably indebted to you, my friend.”

  Ravenstreet finished his coffee before replying. “As between Mervil and you Magicians,” he began slowly, “I’ve made my choice. Even if you’re wrong, you’re wrong in the right way. You make things come alive, take on significance, point somewhere, instead of killing and burying them. Even if it shouldn’t be true—and I don’t say it isn’t, I still don’t know—that a man is really all his time and that he may have the chance, if he really wants it, to change both himself and all that has happened to him, it’s better to think so, to take the long, hopeful, creative view, than to believe you’re being hurried helplessly into the grave, the victim of a meaningless savage joke. A fool would think yours an easy, wishful sort of creed, but I can see now it isn’t—very stern and demanding in many ways. To escape no consequences—and I take it, that’s what you believe—that’s an idea that calls for more patience, courage and faith than most people have to spare now. But there’s size to it, hope in it. I see it as the opposite of what I used to call ‘the cyanide philosophy’ of the Nazi leaders—you do what the hell you like because we’re all doomed anyhow, so you keep a pinch of cyanide handy in case you lose and have to get out quick. I suspect it’s a fairly popular view of life these days, only they worked it with the lid off.” He laughed at himself. “After telling you I haven’t time to listen to your explanations, I’m lecturing you on your own subject. All I really wanted to say was—there can’t be any question of debts between us. Not when you’ve almost brought me to life.” He felt rather foolish and inadequate, and continued hurriedly. “I must push off to the works, which haven’t finished with me even though I’m supposed to have finished with them. Please don’t wait dinner. I’ll ring Wiverson if I’m going to be very late.”

  That was one thing about the works, he didn’t feel foolish and inadequate there. It was a pleasant change to be back in his own territory again, the old master. After lunch, during which he heard a lot of complaints about Sel
by from Garson and did little but raise his eyebrows and shrug his shoulders at them, he settled down with Garson and some of the young men to find the snag in the E.G.12 production. After a good deal of warm afternoon argument round Garson’s table, and some hurrying round from there to the drawing office and then to the far corner of the big shed, he spotted the trouble: there had been a wrong delivery of a small part not made by New Central Electric, and he wiped off some worried looks—too many worried looks for the good of the place—by claiming that the fault had been his. The prototype job had the right part, of course, but seeing it run again left him dissatisfied with two or three features of it, there was some overheating, so he decided to stay on, to see what could be done, and asked Garson to be ready to pay old Tom Hurdlow, the foreman, and his boys some overtime that would be well earned. Garson, who had been badly rattled by this E.G.12 problem, eagerly accepted this offer to clean it up, then left them to it, making a hurried escape that would have been unthinkable to Ravenstreet when he was running the place. However, that left him with old Tom Hurdlow.

  Old Tom was his veteran ally, perhaps the only man he still respected at the New Central Electric. And Tom’s obvious relief at taking orders again from Ravenstreet was very pleasant to observe. “Like old times, this is,” he said, showing his blackened stumps in a lop-sided grin. He was sixty—perhaps a few years over sixty if the truth were really known—and a bulky, impressive figure, half comical like a muttering grizzly bear, half noble like some antique Roman warrior: a foreman in the great and now decaying industrial tradition; absolutely honest, slowish but dependable, an old battling trade union type, bristling with grumbles and grievances but ready if necessary to work on the job until he dropped. Ravenstreet knew him through and through; Garson and the executives only thought they did.

  “They’ll be a good half-hour, Tom, putting her together,” said Ravenstreet later, after giving some instructions. “We might as well go out and cool off—and have a smoke.” Not far from the end of the big shed where they were working was an attempt at a garden, with a seat or two. There they sat while the day went down, leaving an evening sky that was spacious but subdued, touched with melancholy. The works them­selves, quiet and deserted now except for this one corner, had something of the same melancholy. It was a time when two men who had worked together for thirty years, building up mutual respect, could talk out of their minds and hearts.

  “Yes, it’s like old times,” said Tom, pulling away at the rank little pipe he always seemed to smoke. “But for how long? Five minutes, you might say, Mr. Ravenstreet. I’m sorry—I can’t get used to this Sir Charles business—d’you mind? No, I thought you wouldn’t. Tomorrow it won’t be like old times at all. Very different. An’ to tell you the truth, Mr. Raven­street, I’ve had enough. Not my kind o’ people—not my kind o’ job any more. Soon as I heard you weren’t Managing Director any longer—I says ‘That finishes me.’ So it’s only a question o’ time now. But if it’s not a rude question, Mr. Ravenstreet—what are you up to, these days?”

  Ravenstreet laughed. “I’m entertaining some Magicians, Tom.”

  “Magicians?” Tom sounded shocked.

  “Well, never mind about them. I’m mostly just sitting about, trying to think. But perhaps I’ve left it too late, Tom. I can take things apart to some extent—I’ve had to do that here—but I can’t put ’em together again in a new and satisfying way. Which, I take it, is what is needed.”

  “I wish you’d have a good try for me.” Tom spoke slowly, and was deeply in earnest. “I can’t see no farther. I’ve always tried to think for meself—but now—God’s truth—I’m baffled—fairly baffled. Either we’ve got to a dead end—or I’m going soft in the head.” He rubbed his pipe against his coat, raised his old centurion’s profile and glared at the immense mild evening.

  “Why do you say that, Tom?”

  “What else can I say? What do we do? Where do we go? What’s the next move? Seems to me we’re on a roundabout and can’t get off—and in the middle, front o’ the organ where them moving dolls pretend to play, are the politicians and suchlike, all parties, arguing an’ arguing, talking an’ talking, an’ never saying anything. Mr. Ravenstreet, there’s something I can’t put my finger on—a kind o’ leak somewhere in people, drainin’ ’em away. You can’t say there’s anything downright wrong with most of ’em, but they’re not right neither. I’m not so particular, but I don’t want to work with ’em nor sit about at night with ’em neither. I’m a family man, as you know, Mr. Ravenstreet. But take my youngest daughter—she’s got herself tangled up with a chap that’s just one o’ these spivs. An’ does she care? Not a bit. Any sense she had she’s losing fast. An’ my other girl—an’ the lad who’s working here—they’re not much better. They’re all so bloody silly, Mr. Ravenstreet. Something won’t let ’em grow up any more. What they want is greyhounds on ice on TV—and that’s about all, if you throw in some gin an’ brown ale. They can neither work right nor play right. They won’t have a good go at anything. They look smarter than their mother an’ me did, but when you’ve said that, you’ve finished. All they do is to pass the time. They don’t believe in anything an’ they don’t get any fun out o’ not believing, the way we used to do sometimes. An’ if you tackle ’em about it, get ’em serious for two minutes, they begin to tell you about atom bombs—what’s the use of anything if there’s atom bombs waiting for us all?—an’ all that sort o’ talk. All right, if it’s atom bombs that’s doing it, why don’t they lose their tempers an’ say to these bigwigs ‘Any more o’ this atom bomb business an’ we’ll chase you up Whitehall’? I’ll tell you why, Mr. Ravenstreet—they haven’t the interest, they haven’t the energy, they haven’t the guts. An’ what’s to be done, I don’t know. I’m beat. An’ I’ve always taken a lot o’ notice when you’ve talked to me, Mr. Ravenstreet—so if you’ve any ideas, I’d be obliged if you’d tell me.”

  “I have a feeling, Tom,” Ravenstreet began slowly, “that we’ve gone as far in one particular direction—along the lines laid down by politicians, economists, officials, boards and committees—as we possibly can. We need a creative idea, one that’ll wake people up and give ’em enthusiasm and energy; and if and when such an idea arrives, it’ll come from another direction. I think it’ll be a kind of religious idea, Tom. Yes, I know,” he continued hurriedly, “you don’t like the sound of that. But this idea, if it ever does come, will be quite different from anything you have in mind now. People pass the time, as you say, because they feel their lives are no longer important. If they enjoy trivial amuse­ments, it’s because they’re trying to make the best of a bad job. It’s all a vicious circle of exhaustion and boredom and triviality, and nothing that’s been tried already and has failed is going to lift people out of that circle. This means, then, an idea from a new direction, a new way of thinking and feeling about life in general, about ourselves and our work and our play. It’ll bring back to men a sense of their full humanity, give ’em real values again. It’ll put things in a proper perspective. Everything’s topsy-turvy just now. Most men and women are denied what they really want, to satisfy their deepest desires, and are bribed and fobbed off with a lot of comforts and toys and nonsense that don’t matter—or even may do more harm than good. If people feel their lives are meaningless, without sense and dignity, what have they to struggle for?” He knocked out his pipe, stood up. “Tom, when I can see things clearer, we’ll have another talk. Come over to Broxley some Sunday. What about that other boy of yours—the one who came to us after the War and then didn’t like working here?”

  “Dick? I was going to have a word with you about him, Mr. Ravenstreet.” They moved slowly through the dusk, towards the lighted end of the big shed. “He’s got a chance of a shop in town here—electrical business, fittings and so forth—an’ he’s trying to persuade me to go in with him, so I could look after the shop while he’s doing the outside jobs—an’ also ’cos he wants a bit o’ capital. Well, it’ud take nearly a
ll I’ve managed to save—an’ its a risk. He’s talked his mother into it—but not me yet. I wanted to ask you what you thought, Mr. Ravenstreet.”

  “Do you really want to leave the Company, Tom?”

  “Yes—now you’ve gone an’ several more o’ the old lot—an’ we don’t do so many o’ the fine big jobs—an’ I have to work with so many o’ these spivvy lads—I’ve had enough.”

  “How much does your son want?”

  “Seven hundred an’ fifty, if I can manage it. An’ he admits that’s cutting it very fine—an’ no matter what the wife says, we’d have to live on savings till the profits came in.”

  Ravenstreet halted him. They were now close to the shed. “Tom, I’ve taken a fair whack out of this business, and I wouldn’t have earned some of it if it hadn’t been for you. If it’s a reasonably sound pro­position, I’ll put a thousand into it in your name——”

  “Mr. Ravenstreet, I wasn’t askin’ for money, y’know——”

  “Never mind about that. I’d like to do it. Now let’s see how the job’s going.”

  Tom was moved, though desperately anxious not to show it. “Thank you, Mr. Ravenstreet. It ’ud make all the difference—an’ I’m not going to pretend it wouldn’t. Mind you, I wouldn’t leave if you were still here—we knew what we were doing, not like some o’ these chaps—this Mr. Selby they’ve got now, f’rinstance, who come round the big shed the other day like a rich old woman doin’ a bit o’ slummin’——”

  “Ah—he’s not an engineer, Tom, he’s a financial expert——”

  “Well, I don’t want a financial expert, I want a real man to work for. And as there isn’t one, I’m off. With me mind easy, it seems, thanks to you.” They entered the shed, and Tom was able to relieve his feelings. “Now then, lads,” he roared. “What you think you’re doin’? Makin’ a bloody wireless set?”