by A. N. Wilson
He smiled affectionately at the head server, the tall dark boy with smudge-blue eyes.
‘Does that mean we should leave it to God to push the mighty out of their seats, or are we doing God’s work when we get rid of them?’
‘Thanks for asking that, Tuli.’
The Brigadier wondered whether the boy had thought of the question for himself or whether he’d been prompted to ask it by the priest.
‘Today at mass we have a very important visitor,’ the monk announced.
The Brigadier’s normally rosy face was suffused with crimson.
‘Stand up, Professor! My brothers and sisters, this is Professor Galwanga.’
The priest beamed and, by clapping his hands theatrically, he led the round of applause. A bespectacled man wearing a lime-green hat and matching pyjamas rose from his chair and made nervous little bows to left and right to acknowledge the welcome.
‘After mass, if you want to meet Professor Galwanga he’ll be in the Parish Rooms for coffee and he is going to tell us about Zinariya, his country. The country where I’ve spent most of my grown-up life. And maybe he’ll give us an answer to Tuli’s question. Does God expect us to put down the mighty from their seat, or does He do it Himself by magic?’
‘By magic,’ said Olukemi.
‘Now of course, God could send a thunderbolt and get rid of all the bad rulers of this world, all the corrupt financiers, and business bosses and newspaper barons and dictators. He could do that. But that’s not the way He does work, is it? What does the Bible tell us?’
The Brigadier noticed that the monk was now talking hastily to prevent Olukemi remembering instances in the Bible when God had intervened in human affairs with fire from heaven, angelic messages or miracles.
‘God works through people. God’s will is worked by people in this world. So, when Our Lady said that all the hungry people would have full bellies, and all the rich people would be sent away empty, she saw that a new kingdom was to begin on earth. The kingdom of her son, Christ the King – who was true God but also true man – who knew temptation, and emotions, and hunger and illness. From now on, men and women did not wait for supernatural events from the sky. They were not to sit on their hands and wait for God, or the gods, to do things for them. Men and women were to take action for themselves. They made things happen. The high and mighty sent to arrest Jesus on trumped-up charges, didn’t they? They came at night to the garden where he was praying with his friends, Peter and James and John. And what did Peter do to the High Priest’s servant? Yes? Tuli?’
The beautiful, sonorous voice of the blue-eyed server, curiously similar to Father Chell’s own voice, said, ‘He drew his sword, and cut off the ear of the High Priest’s servant.’
‘That’s right!’ said Father Chell. His eyes were gleaming now and his pink cheeks were quivering with emotion.
‘There was violence, even in the moment of Redemption. There had to be violence to bring the Kingdom of Peace to the earth! The mighty are very comfortable on their seats, thank you very much, they are not going to come down from them voluntarily. The rich don’t say, “We’ve had our share – now let someone less fortunate enjoy the rest of our wealth.” The mighty will only leave their seats if they are dragged out of them – by their throats. When we are faced with the very bad men of this world – with the leaders of big business, with the newspaper magnates, with tyrants like General Bindiga in Zinariya – we can’t be citizens of Christ’s kingdom and leave it up to God to put things right. We have to be prepared to fight. To fight for justice. Of course we do. We can’t stand here at mass on Sundays and pray Thy Kingdom come, and then when Monday dawns do nothing to further that Kingdom. Of course we must fight, and if Christ is our King we must topple the kingdoms of this world by whatever means we have at our disposal. We must put down the mighty, indeed we must!’
And he returned to the altar, placed his hands together and began to recite the Creed.
THIRTY-EIGHT
Helene, the Bulgarian maid, was in tears for the third time that day. She only stayed in this madhouse because she was in love with Piet: in fact, being in love made the misery worse. Her days were now a pattern. Rages and insults from one of the three lunatics would be punctuated by Piet’s calming influence. But every time he spoke to her his healing words, she grew to depend on him more, which made the times when he was not with her all the more harrowing. She had been sworn to secrecy about the reasons for his absences. A guerrilla army was poised to take over the African country of which his father had been king. When the war was over, he was going back. First, though, much fighting, many explosions.
Helene saw the unfolding months half in the manner of a dream-vision, half as a film playing inside her head. Piet in camouflage jacket, combat gear, drove in an open jeep in triumph through cheering crowds as he recaptured his capital. African dancing followed. Then, as the lengthy and joyous wedding ceremonies began, his bride, Helene, was carried on a bier to the steps of his palace. In this sequence of fantasy, she was both joyous in her semi-nakedness and self-conscious about the smallness of her breasts. Were they perhaps why her prince, though he whispered smut to her all day long, had not yet kissed her?
The Constancios, the disagreeable Brazilian couple (Maria José had even questioned Piet’s story, said he was muddling Zinariya with Senegal) had not stayed the course. They had returned to the agency, saying that such treatment was not endurable, that they were capable of earning just as much money working for decent people. They advised Helene to get out at the same time, and she had known it was commonsense advice: she knew she had no hope with Piet who (the fragment of her brain which was able to view him clearly) she could see had something ‘odd’ about him. The Italians sent to replace the Brazilians had walked out the minute Frau Fax deliberately emptied an ashtray on a carpet. Their Filipino replacements (Mrs Mark had vowed never to have Filipinos again but beggars couldn’t be choosers) were due to arrive next week. For the time being, the afternoons were ‘covered’ by Piet and herself, though extra staff was brought in on some evenings. It was when the bell rang furiously and insistently yet again that Helene burst into tears for the third time.
‘Three times he ask me to bring caviar. The first, he spill it on the floor – you know how much a jar of that stuff costs? More than both our fees for a month! Piet, listen! He just says, “Clear that up and bring another” – and he’s not look at me – he talked in the telephone. And then when I stoop down to pick it up, he tries to come behind me and rub himself. And it is so, so horrible.’
‘Small, you mean?’
‘How are you saying? What? I don’t—’
‘You said it was horrible. Was it small? Shrivelled? Not a nice big one?’
‘Oh, Piet!’
And she cried some more as the bell rang again.
‘Here, cool it – take one.’ He held out an open packet of cigarettes. He always seemed to have a couple of packets of Marlboro Lites about his person. He was generous with them, hardly ever smoked one himself.
‘I’ll go,’ he said.
‘But he will be angry with you.’
He slowly put another open jar of beluga on a plate, placed the plate on a tray with a tin of Seven-Up. He was aware of her watching him, admiring him, like he was going to walk into a lion’s cage.
In fact, the feelings of fear only began when he’d climbed the stairs and was outside his room on the landing. The man was talking. Helene had not mentioned he had anyone with him.
‘The thing which even most atheists accept is the existence of some ethical standard outside ourselves. A moral law. They can claim that this came about by purely practical, utilitarian means. But are we really saying that our only reason for disapproving of, say, deliberate cruelty to animals is practical? If someone carried in a cat and suggested, very slowly, killing it with stab wounds, gouging out its eyes, we’d feel revulsion at the deepest level …’
Piet knocked on the door.
‘We res
pond in other words to the sense that there is a moral order in the Universe. It is a given. There are moral laws just as there are physical laws. And if there are laws, does not this imply— Ah!’
The Fat Man turned in surprise at the sight of Piet. He had been expecting the girl. He was quite alone, padding up and down his room, talking about the existence of God to an imaginary interlocutor. Piet eyed him slowly – the glistening, almost feminine sweaty face; the parachute-sized silk shirt dappled with dark moisture at armpits, nipples and throat. The twenty-five inches of pale grey trousers upheld by huge braces decorated with pink pigs. The boy looked shamelessly at the man’s groin. He remembered Mary Much telling Hans Busch what it was like being fucked by this man – it was like having a wardrobe fall on top of you and then feeling that someone had left the little key poking out of the door.
Daddy, Daddy, don’t you see – it’s me, Daddy.
Keep that child under control, drawled the Guards officer. We might have to act fast and I don’t want the child to get hurt.
We’re not going in for the—
Murderous Moron interrupted with Kill – kill the fucker. Fink wot ‘e done ter yer mum.
As I do often tell you, Jeeves intervened, revenge is a dish best savoured—
‘Where’s Helene?’ interrupted Fat Gut.
‘She’s occupied, sir,’ said Jeeves. ‘Still, to put it another way, sir, the house affairs would draw her thence.’
‘Eh, what’s that?’
‘The Bard, sir, has a word for every occasion.’
Fatso had flicked the remote and his eyes were now fixed on Ceefax. Lots of figures. Stock market. Shit! World recession. Shit. Copper shares plummeting.
‘Shit, shit, shit!’
‘Indeed, sir, but I was wondering if you would care to have a baked potato with your next …’
Get him to love you, he’ll give you all this – the house, the Moist Woman, the … man, you don’t have to kill him. Shit, jus’ get him to love you, man …
‘… jar of caviar.’
The boy’s soothing voice, oddly familiar to Lennox, calmed him, numbed some of the horror caused by the figures and information on the screen.
‘You know, I think a baked potato would be just great. We’re dining with the Leader of the Opposition – it’s an important dinner at the House of Commons – the car’s coming in …’ He screwed pig eyes to squint at his Rolex.
Jeeves said, ‘The motor will be at the front of the house at ten minutes to seven.’
While the boy was gone, Lennox reflected on Martina’s genius extracting this lad from that crap agency. Hitherto, for the last five years, that agency had supplied an unending succession of wastrels, thieves, no-goodniks, spastics who couldn’t boil an egg or shake a vodka martini. Then, as if by magic, Martina had come up with Piet. An amazing life story, too, his father a big opera-producer in South Africa, his mother a cousin of Jessye Norman and all set to outstrip her famous kinswoman when disaster struck – a piece of scenery collapsed on top of her during a production of Turandot at – a little bizarrely – Johannesburg. Mother and grandmother had brought the child to England, and after attempting to educate him privately for a couple of years, the funds had run out and he had gone into the catering business. Worked for a couple of years in some evidently rather swank restaurant somewhere in Wandsworth. (Len hadn’t heard of it, but Mary Much said it was featured in all the magazines the very week Piet told them the story.)
By the time the boy returned to the room with a large, steaming potato, half a pound of Normandy butter on a bone china plate, a bowl of sour cream and two eight-ounce jars of silver-grey beluga, Lennox had switched to the TV news. A demonstration outside the Zinaryian Embassy in London. And there he was again – Lennox Mark’s conscience, standing like the grey elongated statue of a Gothic saint in the niche of some medieval reredos, and speaking to the camera.
‘Would you say, Father Chell, that …’
‘It isn’t what I say that matters, or what any of us say. But there is a rightness to things. “According to their deeds, accordingly He will repay.” And again, “The meek shall increase their joy in the Lord and the poor among men shall rejoice.” We are waiting for justice, we are praying for justice, and believe me, justice will come about.’
‘But Father Chell, you are a man of God – do you condone the violence in the mines? Fifty people were killed in the explosions in the mines last night. Surely as a Christian …’
‘It isn’t for me to condemn or not to condemn. Listen to what I’m telling you, the days of tyranny in Zinariya are numbered. Thousands of people have died in those iniquitous mines since they were first opened. The Alkawari! party is fighting on behalf of those countless martyrs.’
‘Father Chell, thank you.’
The news switched to the Balkans, where some Albanians were shelling a Macedonian village. Talk was of an Albanian terrorist cell having set up a base somewhere in London.
‘Father Vivyan,’ said the house-boy, standing back and looking at the television.
There was admiration in his voice.
The news item had excited opposite feelings in his boss, who fell on the food which had been brought to him as if its emotional comfort were the keenest of necessities. First, with a fork, he took two large mouthfuls of caviar. Then he knifed a wodge of butter into the baked potato, stabbed it a few times, glooped a dollop of sour cream over the top of that and then raked in the remainder of one jar of beluga. No sooner had he created this feast, and the butter had begun to ooze through the hole, dribbling over the skin of the potato, than Lennox put his face close to the plate and began spading food into it with eager motions, whimpering slightly at the pain caused by the hot potato, while also murmuring with gratified desire as his gullet closed on the creamy comfort. The rhythmic alternation of grunt and whimper sounded more as if he was having sex with the potato than eating it.
‘Bad man,’ he mumbled through the fluffy Maris Piper, and at first Piet thought Lennox was telling himself he was a naughty boy for being so greedy. (Oh Jesus, was he into that, did Doll-Face Moist have to take the bedroom slipper to his botty? Christ, what a thought, what a botty.) But he was talking of the priest.
‘Know him,’ said the boy lightly.
The man misinterpreted, took a statement for a question.
‘Yes, I know him,’ said Lennox Mark. ‘Or knew him. Long time ago. Mmm, phhh, oo, pyearcgh …’ Sour cream dribbled down his chin. ‘Bad man, corrupter of youth. Communist.’
‘Corrupter?’
‘Of youth. I don’t mean sexually,’ said Mr Fat.
‘No?’ Piet smiled. ‘You should go down St Mary’s Crickleden and ask about that!’
Lennox looked up, sharply, and then peered about him – not so much because of the shocking implication of the remark, but because there seemed to be someone else in the room. Quietly spoken Piet appeared to have said these words, but they were uttered in a slightly camp cocknified way, quite unlike his normal voice.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Father Vivyan?’
Piet smiled once more.
‘I’ve been an altar-boy in that church.’
‘Holy Redeemer?’ Huge seemed thunderstruck.
Piet paused. While he was working in 16 Redgauntlet Road, he made no effort to suppress the fact that he lived in some (to them) unimaginable suburb. As for his family, the disabled opera-singer who was his mother had been blended partly with figures heard on the radio, partly with his grandmother Lily in Crickleden. Seeing Father Chell on the television screen had called forth recognition, but it was, as it were, a clearly one-way recognition. It was Piet, the suave house-boy, who saw the television, not Tuli, who served Father’s mass, and still sometimes went to sleep on his floor and listened to him praying to the spirits.
There was no need, however, for ingenuity or the deliberate exercise of deception. Into that infinitely fertile reserve of stories, Piet was reaching with the ease of a well-versed
valet, who could stretch for a coat-hanger inside a closet without even looking, since he knew that the wardrobe contained a hundred suits, all equally presentable.
‘It was my mother’s idea that I should be confirmed – you know, so I could take Holy Communion?’
He said the words slowly, as if Fats might not understand them.
‘I was his altar-boy once, too.’
‘You were?’
Big Sausage plunged his snout once more in the potato and began to grunt.
Now, this was a very strange moment in the history of Lennox Mark because he had never, ever told anyone this fact in the last twenty years. Martina did not know it – the very words ‘altar’ and ‘Holy Communion’ would probably mean nothing to her. No one in his business world knew about his month of holy rapture during his teenage life in Chamberlainstown, or his visit to the Holy Redeemer church. Some of his friends and contacts in Zinariya knew that he’d been acquainted with Father Chell, and the Kelvedone fathers, but none knew of his former sympathy with them.
Piet did not know in specific terms that this was a new moment of revelation for Belly-boy, but he sensed the guard dropping, and moved gently.
‘You know what I mean then,’ he said quietly.
‘But … but … I thought you came from South Africa.’
‘And then to England – to South Crickleden.’
‘But – the Holy Redeemer church … God, that place!’
He was looking, Grease-pot, upwards, like there was a fucking angel staring down at him from the ceiling.
‘That place!’ he repeated with this dream-look on his pudge of a dial.
‘I know him in Crickleden.’
Then Butter-butt came to life and said, ‘You know him now – you’ve been to his church in London?’
‘As I say, sir,’ said Jeeves, having sent the camp altar-boy back into the wardrobe where he belonged, ‘my mother was desirous of my being confirmed. I believe it’s … shall we say … usual in the clergy.’
‘What is? What’s fucking usual?’
Piet smiled. ‘I have got a tape – if you would like to hear it.’