When Muriel came in, her frock was opened at the throat, and suddenly as she was caught in the golden light Nicholas had an extraordinary feeling that she had come in with her body singing and somewhere in the hinterland of his mind he had a sense of a bird’s throat opened in song. The vision had only half formed and had gone so quickly that Nicholas felt it was like something in a dream. Her legs were bare, and when she sat down he noticed how very clean her knees were and how her calves cooled down to her ankles. Everything about her was coming sharply into his eye, but there was also something about her that came in a volume into his whole being. He remembered something like this when he had been courting her, but then it was a kind of vague horizon in his mind where now it had a clear outline in calf and ankle and knee and formal chin and the English syntax of her face that seemed so plain to the eye. And behind all that he felt a kind of expansion of her being into his blood as tangible as the round pressure of her breasts into her frock, and he knew that it was this tactile sense of a woman which really was the woman herself and contained her body and soul and whole being. So long as a woman kept this emphatic in her she could never become a piece of human furniture. And now amazing as the fact that she no longer seemed a piece of furniture was the wonder that for ten years she had been empty of all that quick and sensibility that now seemed so much alive in her dark, golden body. And he knew that it had been for something like this in her that he had married her and into which she had not ripened or grown. There was a silence as if she was subtle enough to give him time to absorb her into his thought before she spoke.
“I’ve never known a summer so hot in England.”
“You’re getting a marvelous color. Are you doing a lot of sun-bathing?”
“Yes. I go down to the Wood Pool every day and swim and soak myself in sun.”
“Oh, don’t you use the bathing pool?”
“No. I don’t like sun-bathing in a swim suit. I’m hidden away down there and can lie in the nude. I’m done all over.”
“Oh, I didn’t know.”
“No.”
Nicholas put his hands into his pockets. It was very clear why he had not discovered that all her body was golden. He could feel the remark ride off into nothingness in the air, and it left the usual empty feeling. He had an uneasy notion that behind that significant “No” was a sense of amusement mingled with contempt.
She looked at the dark-blue flannel suit with a cream flannel collar and Harrovian tie he had changed into when she said she wasn’t going to dress for dinner. “All this dressing-up is silly in this weather—like going into a room and pulling down the blinds and shutting out the sunlight.”
There was a good-humored smile on his face. “Well, damnit, you can’t talk! It is you who have always kept me in uniform, as your father might have put it. I hate this damn dinner-jacketing in the evening.”
“Well, maybe I’m getting sense.” She paused. “Anyway, I think it’s nonsense now.” She sighed. “I suppose I got it from Daddy. You know what he used to say—’It’s only the white shirt that keeps the Englishman from going black among the natives.’ Army, the dear old army. Can’t get it out of my system.”
“Well, you seem to be changing. I suppose it’s never too late.”
“Maybe not.”
He knew that this was covering a great deal more than the question of clothes. There was a pause, then he asked: “Well, what did you do yesterday?”
“Oh, I went over to Dorminster.”
“That’s the second Monday! You seem to be getting to like that churchgoers’ paradise. Don’t tell me you’re getting religion!”
“No. I’ve joined the Conservative Ladies’ Club there.”
“Good God, politics! That’s worse.”
“No, it isn’t that. But I feel I want something to do.”
“Oh...”
“I mean—well, just running this house is not a whole-time job, and...”
“Has Saluby talked you into politics?”
“No. But I just want something to do.”
“Do you mean—you are bored?”
“Perhaps. Anyway, I spent half an hour at the club there yesterday, and the women there were a change from those here. Not one of them said the summer was a damned nuisance because it interrupted fox hunting. I’d rather have a kind of social politics than tiresome village gossip and foxes and stable talk and women with faces like turnips. Most of the women there seemed to wear their own clothes, anyway. Here they seem to wear somebody else’s, judging by the way they look on them.”
“I suppose it’s a case of town bitches versus country bitches.”
She laughed.
“Well, you haven’t many women friends.”
“I don’t want them. The best thing about a club so far away is that you can see them there without getting involved in wretched dinner parties and family gossip. It’s just useful to drop in.”
“Well, if you want town life, why don’t we take a house in London?”
“I thought of that—for the winter. I don’t want to bake myself in the oven of London now. I’m enjoying it here. The sun is warming my blood—helping me to put off middle age.”
“If you ask me, there is less sign of middle age on you now than there was—well, when I married you.”
There was a long pause before she spoke. “I wonder if there isn’t always something damned old in the kind of people I came from, middle-class army. Somehow I don’t ever remember to have been young. Life, as far as I can see, in that crowd, is all spent in behaving properly and going to a lot of trouble to keep on being a gentleman—like making an artificial rose to imitate a real one. Keeping things up! That’s all Mummy ever seemed to do. The colonel’s wife! A thousand miles from the lower class, and a million miles from real society. Nice and safe in the middle of nowhere.”
“Good God, I didn’t know you thought all this!”
“Oh, I don’t want to talk about it. I thought it was all gone. But now I’m wondering if they didn’t play hell with me, and if I hadn’t got that paltry social servitude so much into my system that it just ruined me inside in a thousand ways I never suspected. I suppose that’s where I got the dinner-jacketing from—that, and some other things.” She paused. “And now I’m beginning to wonder if that’s all we do here, keep things up, keep a large house and a big place going so that you can sleep somewhere between banking hours. Is this place for us, or the bank? Mummy’s life was for the army. Perhaps we’re doing the same thing on a bigger scale. Are you shocked?”
“I am not. I’m interested. I don’t know why we haven’t had this out before.”
“There has never been very much communication between us, has there—of any kind?”
“No.”
There was another long, uncomfortable pause. “Well, there’s no use in talking about it. A town house in the winter might solve it all.”
“That suits me.” He paused. “Well, I’m glad you’re not going in for politics seriously. A woman only does that when...”
“When?”
“Oh, nothing. Yes, I suppose you must do something besides running this house, and...”
The door opened, and Oxinham came in, his face grave, and Nicholas saw Muriel frown. Nicholas disliked the butler, who had a kind of careworn pomp on his face, as if he had inherited it from service with Lord Barrington and just put up with the Budes because they had taken over the place.
“Yes, Oxinham?” Muriel asked.
“Mrs. Biddle again, ma’am. She has returned.”
“Yes?”
“In her usual condition, ma’am.”
“She brought a drunken sailor home with her, ma’am. Very drunk. The conduct in the kitchen, ma’am...”
“Well, put him out, Oxinham.”
“He has gone to sleep, ma’am.”
“Oh?”
“In Mrs. Biddle’s bed, ma’am.”
“I see. Well, Oxinham?”
“There is only one thing left to do with
Mrs. Biddle, ma’am. She may be a good cook, but she’s disorganizing the household, ma’am.”
“Very well, Oxinham.”
“I shall take the liberty to inform her...”
“Thank you, Oxinham.”
Oxinham made a slight bow and went out. Nicholas said: “I wondered why we had a cold supper.”
“I’m fond of Mrs. Biddle. I don’t want to sack her.”
“I don’t think you’ve got very much to do with it.”
“What do you mean?”
“You say you run this house. It seems to me Oxinham runs it and always has run it. You might be a guest here.”
“Sometimes I feel like that.” Angry blood was in her face. “So you think Oxinham runs it?”
“Well...”
Muriel got up and rang the bell twice. Oxinham came back.
“Yes, ma’am?”
“Oxinham, I have decided to do nothing about Mrs. Biddle for the moment. I shall talk to her tomorrow.”
“But, ma’am...”
“Yes?”
“It is impossible to tolerate Mrs. Biddle, ma’am.”
“Impossible for whom, Oxinham?”
“Well, ma’am, for any decent person.”
“Well, Mr. Bude and I are prepared to tolerate her and give her another chance.”
“I see, ma’am. You make my position very difficult, ma’am.”
“If you find it too difficult, Oxinham, I will give you a very good reference for another place.”
“I understand, ma’am.”
“Now, go down and tell Grierson to throw that sailor out.”
“Grierson may be unable to obey your orders, ma’am.”
Nicholas found his hands clenching. “Oxinham.”
“Sir?”
“What height is Grierson?”
“I should say six feet, sir.”
“And weight?”
“Possibly fourteen stone, sir.”
“Well, if Grierson can’t throw that sailor out, I’ll go down and throw the sailor out and Grierson after him. I don’t want a bloody weakling as a footman in my house.”
“Yes, sir.”
“When Grierson has thrown him out, send him up to me.”
“Yes, sir.”
When Oxinham had gone out Muriel laughed. “Well, now, Oxinham knows where he is—at last.” She paused grimly. “Perhaps in time I shall find out where the hell I am.” She got up and walked about. “Nick, why don’t you go in for something? I know you hate politics, and so do I, but surely banking doesn’t make a life.”
“Well, perhaps not, but...”
“I know. I suppose you are going into the Lords?”
“Doubtful. I do not care, and I certainly am not going to pay fourpence to any party fund for a seat.”
“That will hardly be necessary, after the India loan.”
“No, I suppose not.”
“Do you want a title?”
“No. Do you?”
“I might, if you had earned it.”
“What do you mean?”
“Try and think it out.”
“I think I know. You mean that Bude’s Bank was handed to me on a plate, that I just stepped into it out of Harrow and Oxford?”
“Exactly. It was just something your father left you.”
Nicholas got up and walked about. “Do you think I’m not bloody sick of it all?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, I am. I wish to Christ I just worked with my hands.”
“I suppose that must be a good feeling.”
“I’d like to try it anyway. After all, in the beginnings, my father earned Bude’s Bank with his hands. If he hadn’t swung a pick into the right ore, I wouldn’t have had Bude’s Bank. He left me everything but the chance to make my own life and career, the chance to swing a pick.”
“Hum, it seems to me that being left a lot of money is like being put into a prison with bars of gold.”
“You couldn’t put it better...Oh...”
When Grierson came in he had a marked eye and a red ear. Nicholas smiled.
“You wanted me, sir?”
“Is he out?”
“Yes, sir.” Grierson smiled. “Right out.”
“Bring in the whisky, Grierson. Glasses.”
“Yes, sir.”
When Grierson went out Nicholas said grimly: “You see! That’s the kind of thing I can’t do. Grierson’s had a whale of a time. What the hell is he doing as a footman?”
Grierson put down the decanter and the glasses. Nicholas in silence filled two large whiskies, added no water, handed one to Grierson.
“Here’s to the next fellow you sock, Grierson!”
“And to you, sir”
“Was it all right, Grierson?”
“Yes, sir. When he got awake he was fighting mad. When they sober up at last they’re worse than ever then, sir.”
“Why do you spend your time handing around dishes?”
“I don’t know, sir.” He paused. “Just a habit, I suppose. My father was a butler.”
“Waste of time. Think I’ll sack you—into a man’s job.”
“Well, sir—I like it here.”
“Well, if you want something else, tell me.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Nicholas put down his glass, spoke to Muriel. “I’m going out for a walk.”
When he went out, Muriel looked at the young footman. He had great bony features, fair hair, and whimsical grin. She smiled. “You’ll want some iodine, Grierson.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
She looked closely at his ear. There was still a thumping in his heart after the excitement. Her warm scent came up to him mingled with the salt odor of his own sweat. She said: “Oh, it’s not much.” She paused. “So you like it here, Grierson?”
“Yes, ma’am.” Grierson wondered if he could put down his excitement to the sailor. He said in a hasty way, “I think I’d better go now, ma’am, and get cleaned up. I’m kind of excited after the fight.”
“It’s no harm to be excited, Grierson.”
Grierson picked up the tray. He knew, and she knew, that if he had not picked up the tray, he would have caught hold of her and kissed her. For the first time in her life, Muriel was beginning to take an interest in the staff at Barrington Hall. She remembered the sadistic handling of Saluby yesterday and felt that love-making, to be healthy, must be something nearer to a fight than a five-finger exercise on the body.
TEN
“Bad enough to put the headlights on, sir!”
Blake had tapped on the window and then spoken through the tube when Nicholas took it up.
“Yes, Blake, terrible!”
Nicholas let down the window more, and the weighted air came in like a kind of hot gas. One could smell the scorched countryside. Nicholas remembered what old Fuidge said when he opened the gate—“Heat’s bouncin’ off the ground, sir!” Nicholas wiped his face. The sky was so black that Blake’s remark had scarcely been a joke. It was getting worse all the way up to London, and the grimed houses in the suburbs had a dark glint on them. A roof was polished black like a boot. It was like going through a tunnel under this diabolical sky.
When Nicholas got out in Pall Mall, Grover saluted him and said: “Bin saving up for this, sir.” He looked at the solid block of thunder in the sky. “Whole sky’ll go off like a gun in a minute, sir.”
Grover’s gold buttons had an ebony shine. Nicholas said to Blake: “Better get back before the whole thing cracks open.”
“Yes, sir.”
Miss Coleman looked white and exhausted as Nicholas passed through her office. Nicholas looked at her eyes and felt that he would like to go down and bury himself in a green sea from this awful heat. Nothing else seemed cool except her eyes. She followed him and put one Personal letter by him and laid down her tray of correspondence and took up the diary in silence. Nicholas got the things out of his case.
“There’s a lot for today,” she said. “Not a g
ood day for work.”
“For two pins,” said Nicholas, his eye caught on the Personal envelope like on a hook, “I’d,pitch the whole bloody day to hell and go and swim somewhere.” What he wanted to do, he knew, was to get away somewhere from that Personal envelope.
“Will you take the mail now, Mr. Bude?”
“Yes.”
He took up the letters and looked at them and pretended to bend close over one so that he could read the postmark on the Personal envelope. He saw that it was Manchester.
Always nearer.
Miss Coleman reminded him: “Mr. Symes, about the Guilfoyle.”
“Oh—say yes.”
She made a note, and he did not see the mild surprise on her face.
“A letter of thanks from Professor Crampton, Mr. Bude. He says...”
Nicholas jumped in his chair, shot down his hands below the desk.
“Good Christ! Must I be bothered with letters of thanks on a day like this! Answer the damn thing, if it wants an answer, and don’t pester me.”
“Yes, Mr. Bude.”
He looked at some more letters, mumbled some dictations that Miss Coleman would put into coherent English, peered down at a handwritten letter from the Treasury about the Indian loan. He wished to God old Dorman didn’t carry his courtesy so far as a letter in a script that seemed to be written by some inhabitant of Lilliput. Suddenly he swore.
“Good God, must the blinds be down on a day like this!”
He looked up at her, his nerves taut, and saw her eyes move to the windows. The blinds were up. The black cloud seemed to be sitting on top of the bank. “I’ll put the light on, Mr. Bude.”
“I wish the darn thing would burst and get it over.” He wiped the sweat off his face. “Is there anything else urgent, Miss Coleman?”
“No. I can manage the rest.” She looked at the clock. “Mr. Durrant is at ten-thirty, Lord Ambleside at eleven...”
“All right. Get the documents for Durrant, and tell Strood not to keep me waiting if I ask for anything.”
“Yes, Mr. Bude.”
All he wanted was to get out of the room. When she had gone out he opened the shutter of the cabinet telephone and heard her calling Mr. Law about the deeds. Then she clicked her shutter, and he heard no more and knew she would be busy for ten minutes. He took up the letter and opened it. As he expected, exactly the same as the other three. This from Manchester. Always posted on a Saturday so that they would arrive on Monday from any part of England...There was a buzz on the cabinet.
The Chinese Room Page 5