The Clowns of God

by Morris West

  “And yet,” said Waldo Pearson quietly, “that isn’t what you write. What appears on the page is the talk of a confident child with a loving father.”

  “So which am I?” asked Jean Marie with an odd half-humorous pathos. “The equable Englishman, doubting Thomas, the deluded prophet, or the clown who is himself a child at heart?… Or, perhaps, I am none of these, but something quite different.”

  “What, for instance?”

  Jean Marie crumpled the last shreds of the reed in his fist, tossed them into the water and watched them bobbing in the wake of the regal swans. It was a long moment before he answered the question.

  “I set out to make myself a thinking reed, pliant to the wind of the Spirit; but a reed is also a hollow tube through which other men may pipe a music alien to me.”

  Waldo Pearson took his arm and guided him away from the lake towards an old-fashioned hothouse set against the weathered brick wall of the garden.

  “Our grapes are ripe. I’m very proud of them. I’d like you to try a bunch.”

  “Do you make your own wine?”

  “No. These are table grapes.” As casually as he had slid off the subject Pearson came back to it again. “It seems to me what you are trying to explain are the symptoms of an identity crisis. I understand that. I’ve been through it. After twelve years in the House, five of them in cabinet, I felt lost, disoriented, empty—and, I suppose, open to manipulation. It’s a little frightening; but I didn’t feel, as you seem to do, that it was a situation tainted with evil.”

  “Did I say that?” Jean Marie swung round to face him. He was puzzled and concerned. Pearson, however, did not retreat.

  “Not in so many words; but you seemed to imply it. You said ‘a music alien to me.’ ”

  “You’re right, I did. That’s the core of the matter. All apocalyptic literature refers to false prophets deceiving the elect. Can’t you feel the horror of the idea?… What if I were one of them?”

  “I don’t believe it for an instant,” said Waldo Pearson firmly. “Otherwise I would not publish your book.”

  “I don’t believe it either,” said Jean Marie. “But I do feel myself to be a battleground, still in dispute. I am drawn to a safe indifference. I am tempted to lose all faith in a loving deity. I am afraid that my new and very fragile identity may suddenly explode into fragments.”

  “I wonder,” said Waldo Pearson as he opened the glass door of the orangery. “I wonder if your so rigid obedience isn’t a mistake. Contention is healthy and necessary—even in the Church—and self-imposed silence can be very demoralizing. I found that in Cabinet. You had to speak up or be killed.”

  “There’s a difference.” Jean Marie relaxed into good humour again. “You didn’t have to deal with God in the Cabinet room.”

  “The hell we didn’t!” said Waldo Pearson. “He was sitting right there in the P.M.’s chair.”

  They both laughed. Pearson snipped a bunch of big black grapes, divided it and offered a handful to Jean Marie, who tasted them and nodded approval.

  “I’ve got a proposal to make to you.” Pearson was adept at swift changes of subject. “You need a forum and some access to the decision-makers in this country. I need a substitute speaker for dinner at the Carlton Club. I did have the Prime Minister but he has a summit meeting in Washington. I need someone with weight and interest. It’s three weeks from now. You’ll probably be finished with the Letters. It’s a closed function. Everything said is off the record—and the rules have never been broken.… The members all belong to what you call in France le Pouvoir—though they’re rather less drastic in its exercise. Please? You’d do me a favour; and you can certainly propagate the message.”

  “What should I talk about?”

  “Your abdication. The reasons and the aftermath. I want to see my colleagues’ faces when you tell them that God spoke to you! I’m not joking. They all invoke Him. But you’re the only man I know who claims a private revelation and has put his head on the block to give witness to it. They’ll be expecting some wild-eyed zealot! Tell me you’ll do it!”

  “Very well. If I’m to speak in English I’ll need to write a text. Will you check it for me?”

  “Of course! I can’t tell you how happy I am.… And are we agreed, the reason for your presence is that we are discussing plans for a book, possibly several books?”

  “Agreed.”

  “Splendid! Now let me tell you about these grapes. The vine was struck from cuttings taken from the Great Vine at Hampton Court.…”

  It was all so especially British and understated that Jean Marie missed the significance of the invitation. Because he was more interested in the folklore of Waldo Pearson’s estate, he forgot to tell Adrian Hennessy about the Carlton Club until they were halfway back to London. Hennessy was so startled that he almost slewed the car off the road.

  “My God! The innocence of the man! Don’t you understand what’s happened to you?”

  “I’ve been invited to speak at dinner in a gentlemen’s club,” said Jean Marie amiably. “I assure you I’ll cope with the occasion. It’s not nearly so formidable as a public audience in Saint Peter’s or a papal visit to Washington!”

  “But it can be a hell of a lot more important for you,” said Hennessy irritably. “Pearson’s a shrewd old fox. He invites you to the Carlton Club, the stronghold of Conservative politics. He sets you as substitute speaker for the Prime Minister at one of the three most important political dinners of the year. That’s as close as you’ll ever get to canonization by the English. If you make a good speech—and if you don’t fall down drunk or toss chicken bones at the chairman—you’re made! You can lift a telephone and talk to anyone anytime in Whitehall or Westminster—and you won’t be nearly as vulnerable as you are now! The word will be around the chanceries that in Britain you’re a protected species. That will have an immediate effect in France; because whatever happens in the Carlton Club is studied very carefully on the other side of the Channel. Petrov’s going to hear about it, too; and the Americans. The members of the Carlton bring the guests they want to educate.”

  “Hennessy, my friend, if ever I am re-elected, you’ll be my Cardinal Camerlengo!”

  “Not unless you change the rules on celibacy! I’d have done well in the Renaissance; but not in this day and age!… Which reminds me—What are you going to wear to the Carlton Club dinner?”

  The question took Jean Marie by surprise.

  “What am I going to wear?”

  “Precisely. All the other gentlemen will wear dinner jackets and black ties. How are you going to present yourself—as a cleric or a layman? If you go as a cleric, will you wear any sign of rank? A red stock, a pectoral cross? If you go as a layman, you certainly can’t go in hand-me-downs from a rental company. I see you laughing, Monseigneur; but the question’s important. French protocol is clear and trenchant: tictac and you know who’s who in the pecking order! But the English—God bless their cotton socks!—-do it differently. You can be elegant and despised, shabby and admired, eccentric and respected. If you’re a genius you can even wear last year’s soup on your lapels! They’ll be watching you like a hawk to see how you perform in costume drama!” He swung out to overtake a juggernaut trailer. “The fate of nations may hang on the cut of your smoking.”

  “Then let’s give it the attention it deserves,” said Jean Marie Barette cheerfully. “Can you find me a good Italian tailor? I need someone with a sense of theatre.”

  “The best,” said Hennessy. “Angelo Vittucci. He can make a fat Bacchus look like Mercury in tights! I’ll take you to see him tomorrow. You know, Monseigneur…” He pulled the car onto the motorway and pushed down hard on the accelerator. “I’m beginning to get very fond of you! For a man of God you’ve got a good worldly sense of humour!”

  “You know what Pascal said: ‘Diseur de bons mots—mauvais caractère!’”

  “Why?” asked Hennessy with enormous gravity. “Why do bad characters make good company?”r />
  “We’re the mustard on the meat!” said Jean Marie with a grin. “It would be a dull world if nothing needed mending and nobody needed saving! We’d both be out of a job!”

  “If you’ll pardon the expression”—Hennessy with a clear road ahead of him was prepared to enjoy himself—“you’re the one who’s out of a job! I’m trying to get you gainfully employed.… Now sit back and listen to this song again. I really believe it could be a hit!” He slipped a cassette into the tape deck and a moment later they were hearing Florent de Basil’s theme song “Johnny the Clown.” The tape was designed to demonstrate several different treatments of the song. It stood up solidly under all of them. The words were simple, the rhythm catchy; but the melody had an odd plangent quality that tugged at the heartstrings.

  “Big boots, floppy clothes,

  Painted face, button nose,

  That’s Johnny the Clown.

  “Johnny, Johnny, bounced and humbled,

  Johnny, Johnny, trounced and tumbled,

  Johnny kicked and Johnny clouted,

  Johnny chased and Johnny routed,

  Why says thanks for all the laughter,

  Gives you hugs and kisses after?

  Johnny, are you lonely too?

  “Comic smile, goggle eyes,

  Who knows if he laughs or cries?

  Just Johnny—Johnny the Clown!”

  When the song ended, Hennessy switched off the tape and asked, “Well, how does it sound this time?”

  “Still charming,” said Jean Marie. “Haunting, too. How do you propose to use it?”

  “We’re discussing a contract now with one of the biggest recording companies. They’ll do a special production with one of their singing stars and launch it just before the book is published. Then, if my guess is right, the song will be picked up by other singers and should go climbing up the charts. It will provide an immediate audio link with the visual publicity on the book.”

  “Our young friend Florent has a very attractive talent; perhaps instead of my speaking at the Carlton Club, we should send him to sing there.”

  “First lesson in show business,” Hennessy admonished him. “Never pass up a good booking. You may not get asked again!”

  Two days later, alerted by telephone to the change in Jean Marie’s circumstances, Brother Alain arrived in London. As usual he was full of irrelevant solicitudes. Was not Jean’s hotel a shade too modest? Should he not entertain some of the old Catholic nobility, like the Howards of Arundel and Norfolk? If it could be arranged for the French ambassador to be invited to the Carlton Club, the climate in Paris would change immediately.

  Jean Marie listened patiently and agreed to take these momentous matters under advisement. He was grieved to hear that Odette had been stricken with the grippe, delighted that one of his nieces would soon announce her engagement and that the other had taken up with a young man of excellent prospects who worked in the Ministry of Defense. It was not until they were halfway through dinner at Sophie’s—a small retreat in a cul-de-sac off Sloane Street—that Alain began to talk freely about his personal concerns.

  “… I tell you, Jean, the money markets have gone mad. There is a mountain of gold in Swiss vaults and the price has gone through the roof. We are covering commodity deals all round the globe—base metals, rare metals, mineral oils, vegetable oils, beet sugar, cane sugar, timber and coking coal.… There aren’t enough ships to carry the stuff; so we’re making loans on bottoms that should have rusted through years ago and the insurance companies are charging mad money to insure the vessels and the cargoes. Even so, how do you make the payments with currencies swinging ten percent in a day?… God should not hear the words I say, Jean; but we need a war, just to halt the nonsense.”

  “Never fear, little brother!” Jean Marie was in a winter of sadness. “We’re going to have one! Paris will be a priority target. Have you thought what you’re going to do about Odette and the girls?”

  Alain was shocked by the question. “Nothing! We conduct our normal lives.”

  “Bravo!” said Jean Marie. “I’m sure you’ll end with pure hearts and blank minds, still believing the blast that hit you was hot air from a hair dryer. Get out of Paris, for pity’s sake, even if you have to rent a hut in the Haute Savoie!”

  Alain was a picture of dignity affronted. “We can’t all join the panic of the Gadarene swine!”

  Once again, Jean Marie had to reproach himself for the old sibling rivalry. “I know! I know! But I love you, little brother, and I’m concerned for you and your family.”

  “Then you must try to understand where our concerns lie. Odette and I have had our bad years. At one stage we were seriously thinking of breaking up.”

  “I didn’t know that.”

  “I took care you didn’t! Somehow we both managed to hold on. We’re solid now. The girls are older and they’ve paired off with decent fellows. That’s a satisfaction, if not a triumph. So far as Odette and I are concerned, there isn’t too much to interest us in a refugee life in the mountains! We’d rather enjoy what we have and take our chances with the rest of Paris.”

  Jean Marie shrugged agreement. “It makes sense. I should not try to prescribe anyone else’s life.”

  “I think you ought to take an interest in Roberta’s.” He said it in so flat and peremptory a fashion that Jean Marie was startled.

  “What sort of interest?”

  “Compassion, for a start. Her father died three days ago in prison.”

  “I didn’t know. Why didn’t someone tell me?”

  “I didn’t know myself until a couple of hours before I left Paris. I didn’t want to throw it at you the moment I arrived. The terrible part is that he was murdered, stabbed by another inmate. The general belief is that the killing was organized from outside, probably by accomplices in the bank fraud.”

  “Dear God!… How is she taking it?”

  “According to her assistant, very badly. She’d built everything on the fact that she was paying off her father’s debts and giving him a chance of an honourable life later. I think you should call her and, if you can, persuade her to come to London for a few days.”

  “I hardly think that’s appropriate!”

  “To hell with appropriate!” Alain was angry. “You owe it to her! She took you into her house. She’s financing your project with her own money. She adores the ground you walk on!… If you can’t pick her off the floor, dry her tears and play Dutch uncle for a few days, then frankly, brother Jean, you’re a fraud! I’ve heard you say a hundred times, charity isn’t collective. It’s thou and I… one to one! And if you’re worried about some kind of sex scandal at sixty-five, then all I can say is you’re more fortunate than I am!”

  Jean Marie gaped at him for a moment in utter disbelief. Then, without a word, he got up and walked across to the cashier’s desk. He laid a ten-pound note on the counter and asked if he might make an urgent call to Paris. The girl handed him the phone. He tapped out Roberta’s number. A few moments later her manservant answered. He regretted most deeply that Madame was indisposed and was accepting no calls.

  “Please!” Jean Marie pleaded with him. “This is Monsieur Grégoire. I am calling from London. Will you beg her to speak with me?”

  There was a long, ominous silence and finally Roberta Saracini came on the line. Her greeting was pale and distant. He told her:

  “Alain is with me. He has just told me the news of your father.… I imagine your line may be tapped. I don’t care. I know how you must be feeling. I want you to come over to London.… Immediately! Tonight if you can make it. I’ll book you a room at my hotel.… Yes, the same address Hennessy gave you.… No, I do not agree! This is no time to be alone; and with me at least you don’t have to spell the words.… Good! I’ll wait up for you!… A tout à l’heure!”

  He put down the phone, then called his own hotel to reserve a room. The cashier gave him his change. He walked back to the table and answered Alain’s unspoken question.


  “She coming over tonight. I’ve booked her into my hotel.”

  “Good!” said Alain brusquely. “And don’t waste too much time over the obsequies! Show her the town. She loves pictures. There seems to be some good theatre.…”

  “Why not let me plan my own tour, little brother?”

  Alain Barette seemed suddenly to have turned into a wit. He raised his glass in an ironic salute. “Well, you’re not really used to going about unchaperoned, are you?”

  Jean Marie burst out laughing. “You and I have a lot to learn about each other!”

  “And not much time to do it.” Alain was moody again. “There’s something else. Petrov came to see me. He wants a talk with you. I told him you were out of the country and any meeting would have to be outside the frontiers. I offered to carry a message. This is what he told me. The project for your visit to Moscow is under consideration at the highest level. So far, reactions are favourable. Once a decision is made he will contact me and I will pass the message to you.”