A Word Child

by Iris Murdoch

  The only constructive thing which I did during the day was to write a letter to Mr Osmand, care of the school. I also wrote to the Headmaster, saying I was trying to trace Mr Osmand. I knew that he had left years ago, but I trusted that they would have an address. My letter to Mr Osmand said that I was very sorry to have been in such a deplorable condition when he came, that the drug had been given to me as a joke, that I hoped soon to have an opportunity of seeing him again and talking about the old days. I assured him of my continuing gratitude to him for all that he had done for me, and expressed the hope that he was well and happily situated. The letter was stiff, a letter to an old schoolmaster. I was thoroughly distressed by the incident, but I could not really concentrate on what I was writing. As for my final ‘hope’, it seemed on reflection a vain one. How could things possibly be well with Mr Osmand? He must be well over sixty, doubtless alone. ‘Educational Consultant’: what did that mean? Something tragic no doubt. He was evidently no longer a schoolmaster and what else in the world could it give him pleasure to be? Had he retired, or had he at last been sacked for patting one boy too many on the head and stroking his arm after prep? I had probably been his best pupil and look what had become of me. Of course I had never explained to him why I gave up Oxford. I wonder what he thought?

  I left the office at half past four and went straight to Chelsea. I had suffered no ill effects from the drug. I had forced myself to eat some lunch. I felt weirdly clear-headed and vibrating with power. I felt as if I could have cleared the Thames in a leap. I tried hard not to think beyond my encounter with Kitty, and on the whole I succeeded. It was very possible that it would be our last meeting. Even if I were to see Gunnar again, tonight might be the last I saw of her. Or would she want a further conference after I had seen Gunnar, if I saw Gunnar? Should I even suggest this? These reflections did not get very far, burnt up as the day went on in the annihilating sense of her approach.

  At fifteen minutes to six, after I had passed the house about eight times, looking up at the line of golden light in the drawing-room windows, I could bear it no longer and went and rang the door bell. I noticed at the same moment that the door was ajar. I put one foot inside and listened.

  ‘Come on upstairs, you know the way.’ Kitty’s voice.

  I went on up, treading softly on the thick carpet, past a lot of glimmering things on brackets and an immense number of little pictures like glittering eyes, through the warm haze of new furnishing smells and Kitty’s perfume, and entered the room where I had talked with Gunnar. An exotic sight met my eyes.

  Kitty, with a towel round her shoulders, was sitting on a low satin chair near to the fireplace. A small fire was glowing in the grate. The innumerable discreet lamps were shedding their accumulation of diffused discreet light upon various trinkets on various tables. The yellow medallion on the carpet was glowing like a jewel. Kitty, wearing a long peacock-blue woollen evening dress with a pendant hood, was gazing at me. Standing behind her and holding a brush, with which she had evidently been brushing Kitty’s hair, was Biscuit. Biscuit was wearing a magnificent sari, a dark brown shot silk with golden borders. Biscuit’s black shining hair was unplaited and falling in a single straight torrent far down her back. As I stood there at the door, and after looking at me with expressionless attention, she began to pluck some hairs from the brush, twirl them into a little ball with her long thin fingers, and project them into the fire. Then she stood there, seemingly patient as an animal, gazing down towards the hem of Kitty’s dress. She touched the back of Kitty’s head very lightly with the brush, and stood there immobile waiting presumably, with lowered eyes, for Kitty’s order to depart or to continue brushing.

  Kitty with the dark tumble of hair brushed right back from her brow, and in the clear light of a lamp which was perched above her on the mantelpiece, presented me her most exposed face so far. Her brave audacious rash beautiful face. I could see the colour of her eyes, big, very dark slaty-blue, the large nose seemed more dominating, the mouth fuller, pouting with vitality and purpose and radiant animal self-satisfaction. I stared at that face, and the universe seemed to circle round quietly like a great bird and come to rest.

  ‘You’re early,’ said Kitty, not a bit discomposed. She lifted a hand behind her and thrust Biscuit’s poised brush away. With the same movement she pushed the towel off onto the floor. Biscuit picked it up and put it over her arm.

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘Biscuit — ’

  ‘No need to send Biscuit away,’ I said, ‘I’m not staying.’

  ‘Not staying?’

  ‘This is the place where I talk to your husband. The place where I talk to you is outside on the jetty.’

  ‘Biscuit, please — ’

  Biscuit, bearing brush and towel, moved to the door. I noticed that, beneath her sari, she was barefoot. I stood aside. A glittering strand of inky-black hair had fallen forward over her shoulder and as she twitched it back I saw the swing of long jewelled ear-rings. She passed me without a glance, with a faint frou-frou of silk, and I heard her almost inaudibly pad away, mounting the stairs behind me.

  ‘It’s very cold out there,’ said Kitty. ‘Has it started to snow?’ She had bundled her hair forward and was combing it with her fingers and vigorously massaging her scalp. The unselfconscious confidence of the gesture disconcerted me.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then wouldn’t it be more sensible to stay in here?’

  ‘Please yourself,’ I said. ‘I’m going outside.’ I left the room and went downstairs and out of the house closing the front door quietly behind me. I crossed the road and made my way towards the jetty.

  The place was deserted. The embankment traffic sizzled quietly along over a roadway slightly dusted with snow. The little flakes were falling sparsely but steadily. I was very cold and I was glad of my scarf and gloves. I had put my cap in my pocket. The tide was half in, a line of stone-strewn mud visible and gleaming in the dim light from the jetty. A darkened launch plopped gently, nuzzling the wood. I began to feel that I had been a perfect fool. The little scene with Biscuit had distressed me and I had been stupidly aggressive. Now if she did not come I would have to go tamely back to the house. But supposing she were offended, supposing she would not see me? I spent five minutes of knuckle-biting anguish. Then she came.

  She was wearing a black woollen cap, and a huge overcoat which, I realized with renewed chagrin, must belong to Gunnar. The long dress swirled beneath it. She came towards me, to where I had stationed myself at the end of the jetty, and I waited for her to come.

  ‘I say, it is cold, isn’t it?’

  ‘I’m sorry. I do hope you don’t mind coming out? You see, I really don’t want to be in your house without — without his knowing.’

  ‘I quite understand.’

  ‘He doesn’t know — anything — does he?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘And he’s not likely to — ’

  ‘No, no, he went off to Brussels this morning.’

  I was ready to bet Gunnar had not said anything to Kitty about Crystal. It seemed a moment to find out.

  ‘Where was he last night? I thought I saw him in Whitehall about eight.’

  ‘You might have done. He was dining with a friend at the House.’

  There was no doubting the sincerity of her tone. So Gunnar lied to his wife. So much the worse for Gunnar. I felt a sense of power which I knew to be pointless, useless, but it pleased me.

  ‘I’m glad you didn’t speak to him,’ she said. ‘I wanted to see you first.’

  ‘Am I to see him again then?’

  ‘Yes. Once more. You know, it’s odd, but this morning he seemed so much better, so much calmer.’

  Crystal’s doing. Who had been lecturing me about ‘simplicity’? Crystal had it. Gunnar had benefited.

  ‘Shall I write to him and suggest a meeting?’

  ‘No. He will write to you.’

  A silence. Was this all? We had walked to the end of the jetty
where in a total privacy of cold the few tiny snowflakes were coming down out of a very dark darkness. The snow had blanketed the stars, even the great glow of London; all was covered and we were alone. The white flakes diamonded Kitty’s black cap and her face glowed in the dim light, in the frosty air. I sought for words to detain her, another two minutes, another minute.

  ‘What should I do when I see him again? I mean, have you any special advice?’

  ‘I think you will know what to do. Tell me what was wrong with the last time.’

  ‘With my last meeting with him? But you heard it all.’

  ‘Yes, but I want you to tell me what was wrong.’

  ‘Everything was wrong. He was too cold, I was too defensive. He assumed it was a kind of technical problem. I let this idea shut my mouth. We never met as human beings.’

  ‘Exactly. And you must meet as human beings, mustn’t you?’

  ‘I’ll try. It’s not so easy to find the words — ’

  ‘If you will only begin, set him off as it were, the words will come rushing, like they rush when he talks to me. I promise I won’t listen this time.’

  ‘Good. I’d rather you didn’t. I meant to tell him I was sorry or something like that, only in the face of his huge sort of intellectual grasp of the whole business there seemed no place for anything so stupidly simple.’

  ‘Yes, yes, exactly, you are so right, but it’s just that intellectual grasp that you must somehow break. He’s thought about it so much, he’s discussed it so much with those psychologists, he’s made it into a sort of vast inflexible thing.’

  ‘I know. But if he’s willing to see me again that’s a good sign, isn’t it? And you said he seemed “better”. Of course I’ll try — I’ll try, if necessary, again and again.’ Spend my life trying, if only you want it, if only I can see you again.

  ‘That won’t be necessary,’ said Kitty. ‘I think one more meeting should be enough.’

  ‘Of course I was not envisaging anything in the nature of friendship between us, naturally that would be impossible.’

  Silence again. Snow. A kind of awkwardness which I felt in her, as if she were waiting for me to help her to terminate the interview. I desperately did not want to terminate it, but out of sheer mechanical nervousness I found myself saying, ‘Well, is that all?’

  ‘Yes, I think so. Gunnar will write to you. I’m so grateful.’

  ‘Not at all. I’m grateful.’

  We both stood still, motionless. I waited for her to move, to begin to go away. I felt it was my last chance in the world. I said, ‘Shall I see you again?’ It was impossible not to make the question sound desperate.

  She said nothing. As the silence lengthened and as she continued to stand there some divine ferocious thrilling power out of the centre of the earth began to reach me, to rise through me. For a moment I was intensely giddy, as if I might fall. Then I put a hand on her arm. I felt the rough cold snow-dusted surface of the coat sleeve and can feel its texture this moment as I write. We stood absolutely still, arresting, arrested.

  Then she made a little sound, it was a kind of sigh, a kind of groan, as if she were too choked to speak, the most wonderful communication in the world. She took a step as if to move away. I turned with her and took her in my arms and drew her body closely against mine. Her face was pressed against my shoulder and I heard the sigh again. We stood perfectly quiet.

  I released her. I was almost sobbing myself, each breath came in an audible gasp. My heart was rending me with its violence.

  ‘Oh Kitty, Kitty, I love you.’

  ‘Hilary — ’

  ‘I love you, I’m terribly sorry, forgive me, I can’t help it, I love you, I worship you — ’

  ‘Hilary — my dear — ’ She had come back to me. I put my arms round her shoulders and kissed her, first hastily, then slowly. It was impossible that this could really be happening. I kissed her, I opened my eyes, I saw her spangled cap, her dark creeping hair and beyond the snow now steadily falling. We moved apart again. With a distracted gesture she drew the cap off and tossed her head, then stood there gazing at me.

  ‘Kitty, I love you, listen, I love you. I thought I’d never be able to say it. I can. I love you. I don’t mind if I die now.’

  ‘Hilary, I am so sorry — ’

  ‘I know it’s hopeless, I know it’s mad, I know it’s wicked, I know you don’t care for me, how could you. But I’m so grateful to you, just for this, just for tonight, even if we never meet again you’ve made me happy to the end of my life. I’m so glad you’re there in the world, oh my God, oh Kitty, it’s so wonderful just to say your name, I feel as if I could faint and lie at your feet and die, if only I could die now, if only I could drown — ’

  ‘Hilary, please — ’

  ‘All right, I’ll stop, I’ll go, I know I don’t exist for you — ’

  ‘But you do, you do — ’

  ‘Oh Kitty — ’

  ‘Of course you do. I’ve felt so sorry for you. And I’ve been thinking about you for years and I thought I’d never meet you. And then suddenly you were there and you were so sort of complete and real, and I pitied you so much and you had thought so much about it too, about the past, and suffered so much, and you were so honest and so helpless and like a child, and I couldn’t help — ’

  ‘What couldn’t you help, Kitty?’

  ‘Caring about you and wanting to — Oh I so much don’t want to hurt you. I want to make things well for you, to take the nightmares away from you — ’

  ‘You do, you will. Oh Kitty, Kitty, thank you, you pitied me, thank you — ’

  We stood staring, arms hanging limply down, dazed by the suddenness and the strangeness of what happened. I was panting with anguish and with joy, pumping my steaming breath out into the cold air, feeling the snow now upon my hair, upon my eyebrows, upon my eyelashes.

  ‘I don’t know what it means,’ she said. ‘Forgive me — ’

  ‘Don’t say that — you’ve been so — so gracious — so kind — ’

  ‘I must leave you now. I shouldn’t have — Oh my dear dear Hilary — ’

  ‘But I’ll see you again, won’t I, I must see you. Just let me see you again — ’

  ‘I’ll write to you.’

  ‘You’re not angry with me? I’m so very sorry I — I couldn’t help myself — ’

  ‘I’m not angry. God bless you, God bless you — I must go — ’

  ‘But you will see me again?’

  ‘I’ll write — ’

  ‘Oh Kitty, I’m so happy — even if the world ends I’m happy — ’

  It mustn’t end,’ she said. ‘I mean, you must be all right, you must be. God bless you. Good night.’

  And she was gone. I stood for a while groaning aloud in an ecstasy of torment. Then I knelt down in the snow, covering my face.

  The time was now five minutes past eight, and I was at the Impiatts’ house as I always was at this time on a Thursday. I was in the drawing-room. Laura and Freddie were there. Also Christopher.

  I had no memory of leaving the Chelsea embankment. I found myself in the King’s Road, walking very fast, dodging people, my face blazing. There is a sense of one’s own face as stretched, as thinned, which goes with extreme joy. I felt as if my face were simply a stretched skin, the features vanished, the pure radiance blazing through. Of course it was terrible, of course it was agonizing, of course it was possible that we should never meet again. But I had kissed her. I had told her I loved her. I had heard her speak my name and say that she cared for me. Of course this was simply pity and the fanciful romanticism of an idle woman. But she had spoken so kindly and she had let me kiss her and she had not said that we must never meet again.

  I reached Sloane Square station and took a fivepenny ticket and went down onto the westbound platform and into the bar. I ordered a gin. I sat down. I felt that I had received, somehow, the truth itself, the touchstone itself, as if this were something simply and unconditionally handed over. Yet what I h
ad received was also impossible. I did not want to dwell upon the impossibility, I did not want yet to think, I wanted just to enjoy my new possession in a glorified untroubled present. And it occurred to me after a while, as the mechanical habitual part of my mind soberly reminded me that it was Thursday, that the best way to continue in a state of pure unexamined joy was to be with other people, and thus the obvious thing to do was to go along as usual to dinner at the Impiatts.