Eating People is Wrong

by Malcolm Bradbury

  ‘Do you?’ said Emma Fielding.

  ‘Oh, hello,’ said Louis. ‘It’s lovely to hear your voice.’

  ‘It’s lovely to hear yours, except that I’m stark naked and dripping with water. I’m having a bath. Who is it?’

  ‘I’ll crawl down the wire,’ said Louis, excited by this image. ‘It’s Louis Bates.’

  ‘You just stay where you are,’ said Emma. ‘Well, what is it, before I catch my death of cold?’

  ‘We’ve been invited to a party,’ said Louis.

  ‘We have?’

  ‘Yes, you and I.’

  ‘But I hate parties.’

  ‘So do I,’ said Louis.

  ‘Then we won’t go, will we?’ said Emma.

  ‘But we ought to go. It’s Christmas.’

  ‘What, again?’ said Emma.

  ‘Yes,’ said Louis. ‘Look, you must come. I’ve been to all kinds of trouble to get us invited; Mirabelle didn’t want me to come, because I cheated at “Murder” last time, I think.’

  ‘What did you do?’

  ‘I committed suicide,’ said Louis. ‘You see, it’s not that I want to go; I don’t; I wanted to take you.’

  ‘Look, Louis, I’m shivering; if I get any colder they’ll have to wheel me off on a barrow. Let’s leave it for now.’

  ‘Say you’ll come, then.’

  ‘Oh, all right.’

  ‘I’ll pick you up, then.’

  ‘No, there’s no need . . .’

  ‘That’s how it’s done,’ said Louis firmly. Emma said goodbye and rang off and it wasn’t until Louis had come out of the booth and past the steaming sociologist that it occurred to him that he did not know, and therefore had not told Emma, on which night the party was to take place. He hastened back to the library to find Mirabelle and repair the omission.

  IV

  A stout woman in her corsets ran across the dress shop. ‘Whoops!’ she said when she saw Treece. Treece, who did not like dress shops, picked up his parcel and hurriedly found the exit. It was the following Monday and Treece was on his way to Emma’s. Complex motives had filtered through his mind and brought him to this spot. After Viola’s party, Treece had felt himself to be a little committed to Viola, or Dr Masefield, as he now preferred to call her. The fact that he felt committed made him determined not to be. No one owned him (except perhaps his motorized bicycle, whose subject he felt himself to be). A visit to Emma was the answer. Then again on the last occasion they had met he had spilled tea on Emma and she probably regretted her open invitation. She would not wish him to come after that solecism. But she might respect him more if he did. Lastly he wanted to honour his promise to buy a new dress.

  He arrived at Emma’s and rang the doorbell. No one came. Within a piano rang out loudly. He rang again and then he tried the door. It was unlocked, so he entered. In the room directly facing him, a strange vignette met his eye. An elderly lady was lying full-length on the floor, reading The Times. Behind her an elderly gentleman sat at a pianola, treadling it furiously to keep it working. The machine was grinding out the inevitable Chopin waltz. Treece picked up the hammer to the dinner gong and rang it loudly. No one heard. Then, all at once, the old lady looked up and saw him. ‘He’s back, he’s back,’ she cried, jumping to her feet and snatching up a statue of a whistling boy.

  Emma was up in her room, filing her nails, chewing biscuits, twanging the straps of her brassière and betraying all the symptoms of intellectual toil when she heard someone down-stairs calling her name. She stepped out on to the landing to see Mrs Bishop poised to strike down her thesis supervisor. ‘Wrong one,’ she shouted frantically. ‘It’s my professor of English.’ ‘Switch on, switch on,’ shouted Mr Bishop, dancing up and down beside his wife, ‘Miss Fielding says this is her professor.’ Immediately Mrs Bishop was all smiles. The Bishops were very deferential to education. ‘I thought you were someone else,’ she said. ‘Oh, it must be wonderful to be educated. What does it feel like?’

  ‘It’s like having an operation,’ said Treece. ‘You don’t know you’ve had it until long after it’s over.’

  ‘Come upstairs,’ said Emma.

  ‘No, no; it’s not every day you get the chance to get to the bottom of a professor,’ said Mrs Bishop. ‘What class do you belong to? I’m always interested in people. Most of my friends seem to prefer animals, but I stick by people. Do you read at all?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Treece; ‘often.’

  ‘I used to, but nowadays all the novels you seem to get are about what’s wrong with other novels. It’s a vicious circle. I’d like to break in, but I can’t. Too old, you know.’

  ‘Oh no,’ said Treece soothingly.

  ‘I am too old, damn it,’ said Mrs Bishop. ‘It’s the only satisfaction I get. Those shoes look to me as though they could do with a good clean, professor, but it’s none of my business.’

  ‘This is a lovely house, Mrs Bishop,’ said Treece, looking around the long, high room with its white panelling and high Georgian windows. ‘I suppose it gets rather cold in the winter.’

  ‘Yes; it’s charming, isn’t it? And when it gets cold we just throw another servant on the fire. He, he,’ said Mrs Bishop. ‘I’m being naughty now; I love it.’

  ‘Come in, now, dear, and finish reading The Times,’ said Mr Bishop tactfully.

  ‘We’re top people, you know, professor,’ said Mrs Bishop. She added to her husband, as he led her away, ‘He doesn’t talk much for a professor, does he?’

  ‘Surprised to see me?’ asked Treece. Emma was; she had no stockings on; dirty dishes sat in the chairs.

  ‘I’ve brought you a little present,’ said Treece. He handed it over and prowled around the flat inquisitively. ‘Are you alone or do you share?’ he asked, opening the broom closet and looking in.

  ‘Alone,’ said Emma. ‘I say, this is lovely.’ She pulled out the dress and put it in front of her. ‘But you shouldn’t have done it. I told you, didn’t I?’

  ‘I know, but I wanted to,’ said Treece.

  ‘I’ll go and try it on and you can see how it looks,’ said Emma.

  ‘Lovely,’ said Treece.

  ‘You’ll find something to read in the bookcase,’ said Emma, and went into the bedroom. She could hear Treece prowling noisily about in the other room.

  ‘This is fantastic,’ said Emma, coming out again with the dress on. ‘How did you do it? It fits perfectly.’

  ‘Well, I just went in the shop and asked for a dress for a girl that came up to here.’ He put his hand to the end of his nose.

  ‘But the bust size and everything’s right!’

  ‘Well, I looked at all the assistants until I saw one with a bust like yours. I’m glad it suits you so well.’

  ‘I didn’t know you’d observed me so carefully,’ said Emma.

  ‘Oh, I like looking at women,’ said Treece. ‘How’s Mr Eborbelosa?’

  ‘I haven’t seen him for ages,’ said Emma.

  ‘That was all rather a mess, wasn’t it?’ asked Treece with a smile. ‘I’m afraid people like us are too reasonable to be true. Personal relationships, civilized human contacts – how splendid it all sounds, doesn’t it, like some intellectual Fabian club, you know, full of goodwill and rather spinsterly. Poor Mr Eborebelosa! What does he want to get mixed up with people like us for? We’re much too dried-up for him. I suppose it’s something that cultural boundaries conceal.’

  If Treece hadn’t been smiling at her so sweetly she would have supposed he was insulting her: that was what it sounded like. ‘You mean that if I had been interested in him the advantage might have been for me, not him?’ asked Emma interestedly.

  ‘Possibly,’ said Treece. ‘It’s a funny age, isn’t it? There are so many literatures, so many religions, so many cultures, so many philosophies, one doesn’t know where to turn. Do you remember the thirties?’

  ‘I’m not that old,’ said Emma. ‘I remember the forties, after the war. There were lots of grants for everybody and people used
to sew leather patches on the elbows of perfectly new Harris tweed sports jackets.’

  ‘I am that old,’ said Treece. ‘My goodness me, talking to you, I feel it. But the thing about the thirties was you knew you were a socialist – there was nothing else to be – and there were all these socialist clubs, with people doing things about human quandaries. There were quandaries too. I think that really, however pessimistic we were about the state of the world, we had a kind of Rousseauesque belief in the perfectibility of man. It’s such a paradoxical belief, of course; the evidence of ordinary experience is against it, and as Rousseau himself admitted, wickedness is a source of considerable embarrassment. But we did think there was something to be done about the social order; that the human condition could be mended; that there was so much further to go. Now one doesn’t. Do you have any hope for the future?’

  ‘No,’ said Emma. ‘I don’t.’

  ‘And I don’t, none at all. If I see the future as anything other than an explosion, then I think of it as the present, only worse. But in those days . . . take adult education. In those days it seemed really important work. One was evolving the new man. If you had in your class one of those old-style working-class intellectuals who started in the mines and finished in Parliament, you felt really a part of the world’s process. One was of the English scene. Now the classes are for middle-class ladies whose families are grown up, and there they come, a little lost, improving themselves and using the place as a kind of knitting bee. Don’t misunderstand me, I’m not contemptuous . . .’

  ‘No, I know,’ said Emma; Treece was never contemptuous of anything.

  ‘But their prejudices are formed, and one teaches them nothing except facts. Not how to improve the world. All this is why someone like Louis Bates interests me. You know him, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes; he’s Eborebelosa all over again,’ said Emma.

  ‘He’s told you, has he? I knew, you know. And really, when one thinks of him, one can’t help feeling sorry for him. Are you going to marry him? All he needs is some simple human understanding.’

  ‘No, damn it . . . excuse me, Professor Treece, but I am not. It’s the other thing all over again. It’s exactly the same dilemma.’

  ‘Well, not quite, is it?’ said Treece. ‘I mean, Bates is a marginal man like ourselves. Admittedly he has more vigour . . .’

  ‘You’re very cruel to us both, you know,’ said Emma. ‘You seem to despair of us.’ What made Emma uneasy was that he did define her own doubts; she was the sort of person, she feared, to whom nothing happened, who set no worlds on fire and who, because there were so many identities to choose from, had none at all. Treece’s plain assumption that she, along with him, was not in the ripeness-is-all faction, not among the livers and doers, disturbed her. How did he know?

  ‘Ah, we poor Platonists, this just isn’t our world,’ said Treece. ‘Well, let’s have some tea.’

  Emma had a small gas ring in one corner of the room. She went and put on the kettle. Treece had a picture of Emma’s life here, that of a quiet, intellectual soul working studiously amid the fuss and furore of this slightly depressed area, over which train-smoke billowed and fog collected.

  ‘So’, said Treece, ‘you think that Mr Bates is a Yahoo?’

  Downstairs the front door bell rang and rang again, soulfully, yearningly, passionately.

  ‘I didn’t say that,’ said Emma.

  ‘Oh,’ said Treece. Heavy footsteps sounded on the stairs.

  ‘You are strange, you know,’ said Emma, looking up from her sandwich-making. ‘You seem almost as though you’re trying to marry me off. First it was the other one; then you produce this one. Really, you know, I want to marry someone who’s good for me. You seem to think that I’m in heaven and all I need do is pull other people over the threshold. Believe me, I’m outside and I’m looking for someone to pull me in. I’m not a human sacrifice.’

  ‘I know,’ said Treece, adding speculatively, ‘I understand all that, but what worries me is, if you don’t marry him, nobody will. No one will ever recognize him . . .’

  He flung open the door, the subject under discussion, and they recognized him quickly enough. ‘Ah, Mr Treece,’ he shouted. ‘Who invited you here?’

  ‘Be careful, Bates,’ said Treece, standing up and looking dreadfully alarmed.

  ‘I’ve caught you, haven’t I?’ cried Louis. ‘Wait until everyone hears about this.’

  ‘Louis,’ said Emma, ‘Professor Treece happens to be my invited guest. You aren’t. I asked him to tea. He brought me this dress.’

  ‘Take it off, this instant,’ cried Louis.

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ said Emma.

  ‘I think I’d better go,’ said Treece.

  ‘I agree,’ said Louis.

  ‘You stay where you are,’ cried Emma. ‘You’re not leaving this room until Louis has learned to behave himself.’

  ‘I’ll pull his ears off,’ said Louis.

  ‘It’s Louis who has to leave,’ said Emma. ‘You’re my guest. I didn’t invite him.’

  ‘Why are you lying?’ shouted Louis. ‘You did. I’m taking you to Mirabelle’s party tonight. You’d forgotten, hadn’t you?’

  ‘You didn’t even say when it was,’ said Emma. ‘In any case, if it’s tonight, I can’t go.’

  ‘You have to go,’ said Louis. ‘I’ve bought a bottle of wine.’

  ‘Drink it yourself,’ said Emma.

  ‘I can’t afford to buy wine to drink myself,’ said Louis. He looked spitefully, meanly, nastily at Treece, and only succeeded in presenting himself as infinitely ridiculous and pathetic. The only person who could take him seriously, even in a crisis of this sort, was Louis Bates himself, but his offering in that direction practically made up for everyone else’s. You could not be too angry with him; after all he was a sensitive and intelligent creature, in his own way, and situations always turned sour on him. ‘You can’t win against competition like that, can you?’ he said, looking at Treece.

  ‘I’m not competition like that,’ said Treece. ‘You have much more right to Miss Fielding than I do, and . . .’

  ‘He certainly does not,’ said Emma indignantly.

  ‘Look, let’s sit down; this is getting like a Restoration comedy,’ said Treece. They poised themselves on the edge of chairs.

  ‘Is it still raining?’ asked Treece.

  ‘Yes,’ said Louis curtly.

  This concession to social law having been made, Treece rose from his chair. ‘Well, I don’t want to trespass on your evening, Miss Fielding. Many thanks for the pleasant tea.’

  ‘You haven’t had any yet,’ said Emma, ‘and you came to trespass and trespass you shall.’

  ‘I thought you wished to go to a party?’

  ‘I should never forgive myself if I allowed people to come in and break up a tea party in this way. We’re civilized people, aren’t we? At least, I know I am. I’m not going to the party.’

  ‘You mustn’t let me stop you,’ said Treece.

  Louis took out a bottle of wine from his pocket and waved it about. ‘We’ve got to go,’ he said.

  ‘Well,’ said Emma graciously, ‘if we go, Professor Treece comes as well.’

  ‘Oh, I can’t go,’ said Treece. ‘I should ruin the occasion.’

  ‘And think how I should look, bringing him,’ said Louis.

  ‘I absolutely insist,’ said Emma implacably.

  ‘Oh, all right, then,’ said Louis.

  ‘You must tell me what you think of these cakes, Professor Treece,’ said Emma.

  ‘They’re very nice,’ said Louis.

  ‘I’m not really interested in your valuation,’ said Emma. ‘Who established you as a judge of cakes? Now, Professor Treece, what are they like?’

  ‘They’re very nice,’ said Treece.

  ‘Good. I shall go there again,’ said Emma.

  ‘I should,’ said Louis.

  ‘People are always trying to interfere in one’s business, have you noticed?
’ said Emma to Treece. ‘As if one can’t do one’s shopping on one’s own.’

  ‘Look, really, I ought to . . .’ said Treece.

  ‘You’re not going. I shan’t let you,’ said Emma, conscious that she had never behaved as badly as this in her life before, and enjoying every minute of it. ‘Your evening’s already booked.’

  ‘Why don’t you leave him alone?’ said Louis.

  ‘If he goes, so do you,’ said Emma. ‘Well, since you’re so conversational now, Mr Bates, tell me what you really think of this dress?’

  ‘I think it’s terrible,’ said Louis frankly, ‘and it amazes me that you accept gifts like that. You’re a cruel woman. Don’t you think so, Professor Treece?’

  ‘Oh, that’s hardly fair, is it?’ cried Treece.

  ‘I’m surprised at you too,’ said Bates. ‘I told you that this was the one I was after.’

  ‘But this was simply a friendly visit . . .’

  ‘I’m not naïve, you know,’ said Bates. ‘I worked in a paperbag factory once. I know what friendly visits are.’

  ‘You have a horrible mind,’ said Emma Fielding.

  V

  Treece knew that it was very naughty of him to go to Mirabelle’s party. But then the mood of the evening seemed permissive: Louis had been naughty and threatened to pull Treece’s ears off, Emma had been naughty and had practically pinned him down in his chair so that he shouldn’t escape, at the same time teasing Louis Bates to fury; the conventional moulds seemed well and truly broken, and the trouble with feeling in this spirit is that the rest of the world, not sharing the initiatory experience, looks on in amazement. Moreover, all his life Treece had been doing things that he did not exactly want to do, journeying off on holidays he had no intention of taking, watching plays he did not wish to see, playing sports he detested, simply because someone had gone to the trouble to persuade him, simply because he felt they cared, simply . . . well, simply because he could not say no. He always thought what a hard time of it he would have had if he had been a woman; he would have been pregnant all the time. In addition to the fact that he lacked the positive sense of what his life ought to be doing at that moment, he possessed, equally, a simple faith in the unexpected – in the capacity of Fate for coming up with something new and interesting. He liked being nudged around.