Any Human Heart

by William Boyd

  All these worlds interact to a certain degree – most obviously at Government House receptions (though the only blacks are serving canapés). I’m a regular at these functions and I watch the crowd carefully and discreetly glean information – people are very forthcoming. I have to say the Duke and Duchess move through their guests serenely and smilingly, as if there were nowhere else on earth that they would rather be, and in no other company. The acting is flawless.

  They are away at the moment in Miami. McStay is begging to be allowed to put out to sea. The 1122 is the smartest, cleanest, most polished boat in Nassau harbour.

  Sunday, 20 December

  We ride at anchor off a small island in the Exuma chain. On deck the men fish and swim. The sun beats down out of a washed-out blue sky. We seem very far from the war. Freya writes to say we have retaken Benghazi and Soviet forces have encircled the German army at Stalingrad. The unhappiest man in the world is Crawford McStay.

  1943

  Friday, 1 January

  Last night I went to a New Year’s party at Cable Beach given by a young widow called Dorothy Bookbinder (American). There was a band and champagne from 8.00 till midnight and beyond. Dorothy – in her forties, blowzy, a drunk, I suppose – is living with the ‘Marquis’ de Saussay – of French extraction, I would say, rather than French. Dorothy has a daughter (Nineteen? Twenty-two?) called Lulu who made a beeline for me as the clock struck twelve and planted a long wet kiss on my lips. I shook her off and went down to the beach and looked at the stars and thought about Freya. Lulu found me and candidly propositioned me: ‘Why won’t you fuck me, Logan?’ ‘Because I don’t fucking want to,’ I said. Then she fell over, dead drunk. So I carried her back and laid her on a cane sofa on the terrace and slipped away.

  News from Government House is that the Duchess is unwell – exhausted, tormented by her ulcer. I think I’ll let McStay take the 1122 off to the Out Islands for a few days. Nassau is beginning to get to me as well.

  Thursday, 14 January

  I wrote up my third report for NID and took it out to Oakes Field and gave it to [Squadron Leader] Snow (he flies it to Miami and someone takes it to New York and from there it reaches NID). Snow says the Duke will be offered the governorship of Australia as a sop. I felt my heart lighten at the prospect. I’ve only been here a few weeks and already I feel I’m rotting. I’m putting on weight, drinking heavily, I spend too much time in the bar of the Prince George Hotel talking to nobodies. My intellectual life is nonexistent: I read and write nothing (except letters from and to home). I begin to understand what the Duchess meant by ‘this moron paradise’.

  My report was a diligent account of the latest rumours. I have been told, in confidence, by de Saussay that Sir Harry Oakes15 has advanced the Duke two million dollars and Wenner-Gren is using this to speculate on the currency markets through his bank, the Banco Comercial16 in Mexico City – all profits to go to the Duke. No doubt NID can see if this can be confirmed or denied: it would certainly explain where the money came from. I can’t really believe the Duke would take such a risk, however: too many people in London, New York, the Bahamas could trace the money if he suddenly starts making payments to Oakes or some subsidiary.

  Saturday, 27 February

  Thirty-seven years old. I celebrated with a morning masturbate. Visions of Freya, naked, on top – her round, slightly pendulous breasts juddering as she rode me. I’ve coped with absence and abstinence before in this endless war but something about this scurrilous town seems to have increased my sex-drive. An RAF wife touched my cock under the table at dinner last night – I can’t even remember her name.

  Threatened to report McStay on a charge of insubordination. He practically called me a coward in front of [Petty Officer] Dignam. The men make no complaint about their posting: they recognize a cushy number when they see one. Only McStay’s martial instincts are frustrated. Perhaps I’ll let him drop a depth charge tomorrow.

  Monday, 22 March

  Intense pangs of loneliness: missing Freya and Stella so much it is like an ache in the gut. I suppose this is the soldier-on-active-service’s lot – and the world must be full of millions of men missing their loved ones. Such collective yearning is almost impossible to imagine. Still, I feel slightly fraudulent: a pseudo-sailor spying on an exiled duke in a tropical island resort… Would I feel better if I were in a trench in the North African desert?

  Feeling sorry for myself, I telephoned McStay and offered him dinner at the Prince George. I could practically hear his astonished mind working. Eventually he managed to say yes and we agreed to meet there at 8.00.

  The season is ending here in Nassau – the rich American tourists are closing their villas and beach cabanas and returning home. Walking from the hotel down Bay Street to the Prince George, you could sense the island returning to its normal comatose self – the shops empty, the horse carriages standing idle, only the occasional large car cruising along looking for some indication of fun to be had.

  McStay was stiff and overly formal at first (maybe he thought this was a prelude to him being sent home?), but as I called for more drink he began to unwind somewhat. I have to remember he is only twenty-three – he must look on me as an irritating older man who has stepped in to bugger up his promising career. He comes from Fife, his father is a farmer. McStay has one of those ‘carved’ faces – not an ounce of flesh on him – which is not so much handsome as noteworthy, as some statues or gargoyles are. He might suit a beard.

  Towards the end of the meal, a little tight, he leant forward and said, ‘I mean, Logan, what the flick’re we doing here? It’s been nearly five months.’ I suppose I shouldn’t even have dropped the smallest hint but I thought I owed it to him. ‘Who’s the most important Englishman this side of the Atlantic?’ I said. He knew, of course, who I was talking about. ‘Let’s just say we’re keeping a close eye on him,’ and I tapped the side of my nose, as one does. He nodded, his face serious. I think he’ll be more relieved to know there is a purpose, a mission – but probably no less frustrated.

  As we left, de Saussay came in with some of his chums and two really incredibly beautiful girls I’d not seen before. They seemed to know McStay, and de Saussay convinced us to join them for more drinks. I found myself talking to a tall, handsome, foreign-looking man who let it be known early in the conversation that he was Harry Oakes’s son-in-law. He invited me to lunch at his house on Sunday. I asked McStay how he knew these people. ‘Sailing,’ he said. ‘I’ve got nothing to do, so I go sailing with them.’

  Saturday, 10 April

  Golf with the Duke at the country club. Just the two of us – and his detective stayed at the club house. It was humid, hot and quiet – all the tourists gone. The Duke seemed troubled until he sunk a 25-foot putt at the third to win the hole and then visibly brightened. I let him win the fifth and eighth, which put him three up at the turn and in a much better mood. He became very chatty.

  Things we talked about:

  His desperation to leave Nassau – ranting on about ‘this lousy little island’. He’d asked Churchill for a job in America – he has no interest in any other governorships, however grand. He’s proud of what he’s achieved here – ‘the worst posting in the British Empire’.

  The familiar antagonism directed at the court. Finds the King and Queen unbelievably petty and vindictive. I think what irks him more than anything is their denying the Duchess her HRH appellation (shades of his servant Fletcher problem). ‘A wife takes her husband’s rank,’ he kept insisting. ‘Regardless of anything.’ I sense much of the blame directed at the Queen (easier than blaming his brother, I suppose). ‘She can’t bear Wallis.’

  Finds the House of Assembly difficult and selfishly obstructive, filled with ‘grasping, common little men.’

  Says he likes Churchill but no longer counts him as a staunch ally. ‘Winston knows who butters his bread.’

  On the seventeenth he chipped in from a bunker and spontaneously invited me back to GH for supper. I
handed over his winnings and he went to tell the detective to call ahead. So I had to pay for his caddie as well as mine. He does not like spending his money, our esteemed governor, however paltry the sum.

  Back at GH we were served drinks at the pool cabana. The Duchess looked well, her dark hair caught up in a kind of silk turban. She bemoaned the coming hot season, saying to me, ‘You’ve no idea how hard it is to get permission to go to the States. All the to-ing and fro-ing, the bowing and scraping: “Please Mr Churchill ask the King if we can go to Miami for the weekend.” ‘The Duke looked thoughtful, pulling on his pipe and fussing with one of his cairn terriers. Then to my astonishment the Duchess asked me a question about myself – about what I’d done before the war – and I told her I was a writer. They both flashed a glance at each other and the Duke asked me if I knew Philip Guedalla,17 a friend of his. I said I’d met him once or twice and they relaxed: it was a little moment of caution and alarm that soon passed.

  When it grew dark we went into the dining room and had chilled soup and scrambled eggs to follow. They have a French chef, a butler and the Duke has his valet and the Duchess her maid – plus innumerable Bahamian staff. We reminisced about Biarritz and Lisbon. It was as relaxed and intimate as I’ve ever been with them, the Duchess calling me Logan, the Duke rising from his chair to show me the special stance he’d adopt to fade a long iron into a green. Inevitably the court came up again, the King and Queen and their tedious vendetta. The Duchess, laughing, said, ‘Oh, they can’t stand me. But it’s David they’re really worried about. She has to keep him as far away from Bertie as possible.’

  The Duke remonstrated vaguely, but I could see that the line the conversation had taken was not displeasing.

  ‘No, no,’ said the Duchess. They couldn’t have you in England. Bertie’d be ignored, forgotten, if you were there. All eyes would be on you, darling.’ Who knows, she may be right? I sensed the Duke wanted to rush across the room at that moment and take her in his arms.

  ‘At least we still have friends, powerful friends who won’t desert you. Even Winston will do his best for you, darling, you know he will. We can always call on them if it’s a real emergency.’ There was something in her eyes as she said this that rang true: the power and influence of even an ex-king must be substantial, must reach into the very heart of the establishment. I sensed her ruthless, her absolute determination.

  As we left the Duchess drew me aside and, putting her face close to mine, said, ‘Logan, we would like you to think of yourself as un ami de la maison.’ Some kind of honour, I suppose. She does exude a strange sexual attraction, given that she’s not physically beautiful or alluring: the ideal dominatrix – if one were that way inclined.

  Monday, 17 May

  The Duke and Duchess are away in the USA, due back in June sometime, and a kind of lethargy has settled on the colony that is highly contagious. I cabled to NID asking for a recall but was told it was out of the question. Even my letters to Freya are becoming boring, I sense, as very little changes the rhythms of my life. Once a week I report on all the gossip and innuendo (Does someone find this useful? Who, exactly, wants to know all this tittle-tattle?). I golf with Snow and other acquaintances from the base; I go to moderately interesting dinner parties; twice a week McStay and I take the 1122 out on a run and McStay puts the men through their paces. Meanwhile, round the world, the war staggers on day by day.

  Thursday, 27 May

  Yesterday was one of our days out in the 1122. It was unseasonably clear and there was almost a sense of crispness in the air at first light. I enjoy these brief voyages more and more – maybe there is something intrinsically naval in me after all. We chug slowly out of the harbour – I stand on the bridge with McStay – and all the dockworkers and idlers stop to watch us pass by. The 1122 does look exemplary, flags and pennants cracking in the breeze, the men on deck in their tropical whites. Everyone instinctively waves at us. And then as we reach the harbour mouth McStay gives the order to increase speed and beneath your feet you feel the latent power of the twin engines thrum into life. The angle of the boat tilts as the stern goes down, the screws biting, and we grab the handrail around the bridge. Suddenly there’s a spumy white bow wave and we surge into the blue Atlantic, cheers from the quayside echoing distantly.

  Sometimes we go up to Grand Bahama, sometimes to Andros or Abaco, but our favourite run is down the chain of the Exumas – tiny, scrubby, low-lying islands with small bays and crescent beaches of pure white sand. We know there are no submarines but we pretend to look for them. At midday we anchor off some islet and have lunch. The men swim or sunbathe. Occasionally we let off a depth charge or fire the Lewis guns at an empty oil drum we set floating, just to remind ourselves that there’s a war on and that we are a small component in the struggle to defeat Nazi Germany.

  Yesterday, because it was so still and clear, I decided to have a swim after our lunch. I stripped off and dived in from the prow and swam the 150 yards from the 1122 to the small island. The water was cool and astonishingly translucent. I waded ashore and wandered along the small beach, picking up the odd shell or piece of driftwood, pleasurably conscious of my nakedness on this uninhabited island, thinking – as one inevitably does – of castaways, Robinson Crusoe, unaccommodated man.

  The highest part of this island couldn’t have been more than ten feet above sea level and the vegetation that covered it was a form of succulent scrub, low gnarled bushes with fat olive green leaves, a few cacti here and there and some patches of blond marram grass.

  Then I became aware of a commotion on the 1122 and looked round to see men running about the deck and heard the grating, clunking sound of the anchor being weighed. ‘Hoy!’ I shouted. ‘What’s going on?’ But no notice was taken of me. I waded into the water and was waist high, about to start swimming back, when, with a roar of diesel engine and a puff of exhaust smoke, the launch surged off and within seconds was lost to sight around a headland.

  I waded back on shore, cursing, wondering what the emergency was, what signal had been received and what the hell McStay was playing at, forgetting I was no longer on board. I wasn’t worried: I knew I would be missed eventually and at some stage they’d be back for me. Mind you, I thought, it depended what the urgency was. It might be some hours… And then I heard a rustling, a small commotion in the bushes a few yards from me and slowly, hesitantly, a lizard, an iguana about three feet long waddled on to the beach and, tongue flicking, headed towards me. Within seconds, it was joined by four or five others. I moved down the beach away from them, instinctively and stupidly cupping my hand over my genitals. The afternoon sun felt hot on my salty shoulders. I threw some shells and pebbles at the advancing lizards and they stopped. As soon as I showed no sign of aggression they began to plod towards me again. Then some more iguanas appeared at the other end of the beach. I charged at these, shouting, and they backed off clumsily, in some disarray, before regrouping and advancing again.

  Within a few minutes there were twenty or thirty iguanas on the beach, tongues flicking, looking at me with their dead eyes, as if they expected something of me. I stood there, a stick in each hand, wondering what I would do if I wasn’t rescued by nightfall. They weren’t frightening; they seemed no real threat; this was merely a form of temporary enforced coexistence. Naked man and three dozen primeval lizards on a deserted island. How were we going to get along?

  And then the 1122 roared back into the little bay and I felt my heart lift. She chugged in as close as she could and a small ladder was let down the side. I waded out and swam the few strokes necessary to reach it, leaving my non-swimming friends behind. McStay helped me aboard, trying to keep the grin off his face, and handed me a towel.

  ‘Very funny, McStay,’ I said.

  ‘It’s great you have a sense of humour, sir.’

  We headed back to Nassau, everyone in good spirits, including me. I wasn’t in the least put out by McStay’s prank. Images of myself alone on the island with the iguanas dominated my mi
nd (and what will I dream about tonight, I wonder?). It was one of those moments that you recognize, after the event, as epiphanic – charged, numinous in some way. I think McStay was bemused at how easygoing and benign I was about it all.

  Monday, 28 June

  Real, humid, enervating heat. A day of prickly irritability. McStay put in for a posting in the morning, I accepted, and he withdrew the request in the afternoon. I cabled NID: ‘See nothing to gain from my staying on. Banking problems non-existent. Please advise future course of action.’ The reply came: ‘Most useful your presence there. Carry on.’

  Tuesday, 6 July

  The D&D are back. Govt House reception tonight for some Foreign Office grandee touring the Caribbean. Even the Duke couldn’t disguise his low spirits, which is unusual for him – no one ‘puts on a face’ better. The Duchess said that he’d been very cast down by a meeting with Churchill in Washington DC. They want us to rot out here for the duration,’ she said with some bitterness. ‘We had some hope that after three years… David tried everything. They won’t budge.’

  Thursday, 8 July

  I went down to the harbour at about 10.00 this morning and McStay said at once, ‘Sir Harry Oakes has been murdered.’ My God, I thought, alarm bells ringing. But who would want to kill Sir Harry? McStay didn’t need to be asked. ‘Everyone says it was Harold Christie.’ I suppose McStay must have got this from his sailing chums. I only know Christie by reputation: big in real estate, here in the House of Assembly, an unattractive blunt-looking man, reputedly an ex-bootlegger. A political power and a close friend of Sir Harry. In a Bahamian context, Christie murdering Sir Harry is akin to Lord Halifax [Foreign Secretary] murdering Bendor [the Duke of Westminster].