Shuttlecock

by Graham Swift

  I thought of Marian – Marian like a stranger in the same bed. All those nights seeking enlightenment.

  ‘Do you know what the hell I’m talking about?’ He gave a wry smile. ‘I said it was madness. I’m not absolutely lunatic, mind you.’

  One of the cats – perhaps the same one as before – drew near his seat again, and as it stood, uncertainly, about a yard away, he stared at it, then made a sudden jerking movement, as though to pounce on it, so that it gave a start and turned away. I thought: Quinn could be cruel to these cats.

  ‘Do you know what makes you different from Fletcher, Clarke and O’Brien, Prentis? They’re happily lacking in imagination.…’

  He toyed with his glass. For a long time he seemed to be bracing himself to speak.

  ‘You can’t get rid of knowledge. But I believed I could. At least, I believed I could get rid of knowledge on other people’s behalf – before it became their knowledge. I used to sit at that desk of mine and think of all those people who – were within my power. I started to take files from the shelves. I started little inquiries of my own – from the reverse end. I started to destroy information. I used to think: here is such and such an individual – just a name in a file – who will now never have to know some ruinous piece of information. He’ll never even know his benefactor. I used to think I was actually ridding the world of trouble. Good God. And the motive behind all this – was nothing but the desire for power.’

  He paused for a moment, removed his glasses, wiped them. He looked, for the first time, in my eyes, like a man without any power at all.

  ‘I warned you, Prentis. If you want me to stop, just say so.’

  I shook my head.

  ‘Very well.’ He took a sip of his drink, replaced his glasses. ‘The irony of it all – the absurdity of it all – was that in order to continue what I supposed was this benevolent scheme I had to put up a screen around myself so I wouldn’t be found out; and, to keep people at a distance, I found myself having to behave the very opposite of benevolently. I’m afraid I’ve been a bit of a tyrant.’

  ‘So, you mean – all your – ’

  ‘All my high-and-mighty bloody-mindedness?’

  ‘– was just a cover? But you must have known that sooner or later the missing files and so on would have been discovered.’

  ‘Yes, but I thought if I spread enough intimidation around nobody would dare do anything about it.’

  ‘And the mixed-up files – the inquiries that didn’t lead anywhere at all?’

  ‘Red herrings – to cloud the issue. You see, I thought that if you or one of the others got wind of something, then the more generally confusing I made things, the better. The fact is, by this time, I was beginning to work hard at this other role – not just a cover – baffling people, making people afraid of me. Suspiciously hard. Did it work? A good performance?’

  ‘It worked.’

  An anxious, almost desperate look had come into his face.

  ‘But only up to a point. Up to a point. Here, you’d better drink up, we’re getting to the difficult part.’

  We both drank. Everything in the garden was perfectly still. I thought of the patients on the terrace, with their tales of woe.

  ‘Do you know at what point my little bid for power – my little enterprise for the good of mankind – broke down? Can you guess? It was all right, you see, doing good turns for people who were only names in files. I didn’t have any qualms, then, that what I was doing was keeping from them the truth. I thought, they can do without the truth. But when it suddenly became a case of keeping the truth from someone I knew, then it was a different matter. I began to waver. Oh yes, I’ve always been a waverer – but I really began to waver. What do you do? Let the truth out, always, no matter how painful? I began to get conscience-stricken. You know who the person is I’m talking about, don’t you?’

  I looked at him. His bald head shone. I had forgotten he was my boss.

  ‘At first I thought there was an easy way out. When your father – became ill. When he ceased to speak. I thought, that puts a better seal on things than ever I could. It’s all right, Prentis, I’ll explain in a moment. No, but that was too easy. And it didn’t solve the real issue. Supposing your father – forgive me – were to speak again. And the evidence, in any case, was still traceable. So I started to sound you out. I thought the only fair basis on which to proceed, either way, was your own disposition. I started to test you, to find out if you were the sort of person who would always want the truth – regardless of the cost – or not. I already knew about that fertile imagination of yours. I began to lay down little clues, little hints, to see how you would react. They must have become rather transparent in the last few weeks. And when you seemed to be cottoning on, I’d get scared and come down hard on you. I’ve been blowing hot and cold, I know. It’s a funny thing, isn’t it, how you start off wanting to protect someone and then, for that very reason, you end up torturing them? And as I was conducting this little test on you I began to realize that I was testing you for quite another reason too. I knew my retirement would be on the cards this year. Another way out of the problem, if you like. But it’s not. I used to wonder, what will happen when I go? What will happen to my little half-baked scheme to save the world? All right – the sort of person they need in my job is the firm, inflexible – unimaginative type. But, between the two of us, I hope they never get him. You see, here I am, confessing away like a sinner, but the truth of the matter is – I’m going round in circles, I know – I’m not convinced that I’ve done wrong. Anyway, I put you to the test. And I found out firstly that you weren’t the sort of person who would stop at finding out the truth – you wanted to know; and, secondly – I hope this doesn’t shock you – I found out you were just a little bit like me. There were times when you almost came and had it out with me weren’t there? – and then you didn’t. You want your little bit of power as well, and you can’t entirely control your actions, and – forgive me for speaking like this – you really want to be rather better than you are.’

  So it was true. I had been spied on. I had been the subject of an investigation.

  ‘What I’m saying – I’m not being clear, I’m sorry – is that ultimately I can’t trust anything but my own instincts, and when I’ve left the department, I’d like to know that it’s being run, well, shall I just say – wait till you’ve heard everything – by someone who will – trust his own instincts too.’

  He turned to face me. Deep in his eyes again was that needle-like gleam.

  ‘Shall we get down to particulars? How much have you found out – you know what I mean – about C9?’

  I drew a long, shaky breath.

  ‘That Z was a friend of my father’s. That X may have been imprisoned by the Germans at the same time, and at the same place, as my father.’

  ‘No more? Enough. Look I want to say at the beginning that what we’re dealing with here isn’t necessarily the one hundred per cent proven truth. I’ve been talking just now about the truth. It’s hard enough withholding the truth when you’re sure it’s the truth you’re withholding. But it’s ten times worse when there’s even the shadow of a doubt that it might not be the truth at all. All your pangs of conscience for nothing. But if it’s a lie, Prentis, then maybe you have a right to know the lie as well. Now, do you want to know what was in File E?’

  I nodded. My voice had gone.

  ‘File E contained documents relating to X which came to light soon after X’s death while undergoing trial. These documents contained evidence which might have been grounds for further investigation or even further criminal charges, but because X was dead the case was closed. The Home Office concluded their own investigations and were satisfied that both Y and Z were innocent victims of a malicious attack. Amongst the documents in File E – I can let you see them, I haven’t destroyed them – yet – was a letter, or the copy of a letter, addressed to your father. Attached to this was another, long letter. clearly meant to be copied
and circulated, since it was accompanied by a list of addresses. These included two newspapers, your father’s publishers, a number of former members of special operations – and so on. There was another letter, addressed to Z, but I’ll come to that later. The letters involving your father were the set-up for a blackmail. The gist of the blackmail was this: that your father did not escape from the Germans – from the Château Martine. He succumbed under interrogation, betrayed several resistance units and the whereabouts and covers of three British agents operating in the extreme east of France; and in return for this the Germans “allowed him to escape”.’

  I looked at the dead-still garden. Before me was the vision of a naked man fleeing through a dark forest.

  ‘Do you want another drink? Let me tell you, Prentis, I’ve read your father’s book – more than once. When it came out – before I met you. I’ve admired what’s in it. Oh yes, I know I’m not the patriotic type, not the type to look for heroes. But I was around at the same time, I had my own little part in the war. And I can appreciate – this is the whole nub of it, Prentis – how a son might feel about such a father.’

  Something had collapsed around me; so I couldn’t help, in the middle of the ruins, this strange feeling of release. I had escaped; I was free.

  ‘Can I see the file?’

  ‘I’d wait a bit if I were you. Till we’ve talked it over. The letters put things rather more strongly than I do. They say your father was a coward and a traitor.…’

  ‘Were the letters sent?’

  ‘No evidence of it. The ones to the publishers and so forth, definitely not – but they were the back-up letters to the initial one to your father. Your father never came forward. Of course – forgive me – blackmail victims often don’t.’

  ‘Were they dated?’

  ‘No. The usual blackmailer’s precaution. But obviously they must date from before X’s death, and, as the back-up letters were never sent and as, to judge from the Y case, where Y was barely given time to make a pay-off before the allegations were made public (X tended to work fast, which supports the pure malice theory), they must date from a time shortly before X’s committal for trial. That’s to say, about two years ago.’

  ‘Two years ago was when Dad had his breakdown.’

  ‘Exactly. But don’t jump to conclusions. There’s no evidence for a connexion between the two things. And even supposing your father did receive the letter and his breakdown was a consequence, it may have been a reaction to a vicious, sudden, but still false allegation.’

  ‘No –’ Suddenly, I don’t know why, my voice became angry. ‘Dad wouldn’t have reacted like that. If it had been false, he would have faced it out, denied it, cleared himself.’

  Why was I speaking like this? I thought: or, if he’d broken once, he would have broken twice.

  ‘But, in any case,’ – I faltered – ‘maybe that doesn’t matter. Maybe that’s academic. There is still the fact of the allegation.’

  ‘Yes. I’m afraid it’s you who must bear the brunt of that. Your father may know nothing. At any rate – he’s silent on the matter.’

  The perfect defence: impenetrable silence.

  I peered into Quinn’s face – as if, now, he had become an easy target for me – for several seconds.

  ‘Do you think it was true?’

  Quinn threw up his hands. ‘My dear chap, that’s a question I can’t answer.’ His face looked pained. I thought: he is regretting he ever spoke – didn’t keep silent too. ‘I don’t know if it can ever be answered. I’ve weighed up the known facts. You must do the same. X was a British agent in ’44 and was a prisoner in the Château Martine at a time coinciding with, or close to the period of your father’s imprisonment. All that is established fact.’

  ‘So X would have known.’

  ‘He would have been in a position to know. But he would also have been in a position, several years later, to make a spiteful, unfounded attack which had an apparent historical basis. Come back for a moment to the present and the other cases in C9. Y and Z were cleared: that itself speaks in your father’s favour. All the evidence suggests that X was an embittered failure who wanted to get his own back on those who had fared better than himself. One of the charges he was up for before he died was fraud. Y and Z were successful civil servants on their way to the top. X’s own civil service career was a flop. X was a British agent like your father, but he didn’t come out of the war, like your father, a hero. The man felt neurotically inferior.’

  Quinn turned in his chair and the little sharp gleam flashed in his eyes just for a second. I thought: if I had known what I know now, and the circumstances were different – I might have blackmailed Quinn.

  ‘But if Dad did betray the other agents, isn’t there evidence to corroborate that?’

  Quinn bent forward in his chair and passed a hand over his face.

  ‘In mid-September ’44 three British agents were rounded up, almost simultaneously, by the Germans and shot, in Mulhouse. X mentions this in his letter – but it’s a genuine fact.’

  ‘So – ’

  ‘Wait. Don’t forget there are two ways of looking at it. X wants to incriminate your father. He searches round for facts, coincidences, that will apparently do this. His whole purpose is to suggest the wrong sort of deduction.’

  ‘But there are too many coincidences – X being at Château Martine, the shot spies, Dad’s breakdown at the time the letter might have been sent – ’

  Quinn passed his hand over his face again. I thought: he really believes Dad is guilty, but he is straining every nerve to protect me.

  ‘Was he a traitor?’ I blurted this out naïvely – as if Quinn were omniscient. The word ‘traitor’ sounded like something out of melodrama.

  ‘Perhaps that isn’t really the question. The question is, if he was, could you bear knowing it?’

  I thought of the day when I refused to go any more with Dad to the golf course.

  ‘There’s one thing – that seems to go against all this. His book – ’

  ‘Ah – ’

  ‘The last pages, where he describes the Château, and his escape.’

  ‘I’ve read them.’

  ‘They’re too convincing not to be real. He couldn’t have written those things, if they never happened.’

  ‘He knew the Château, and the region – and perhaps he had – like you – a strong imagination. If he wanted to invent an escape story he could have done so. I’m just pointing this out, not disagreeing with you.’

  ‘No, I don’t mean just that. The last chapters are more convincing than the other parts of the book, even though the other parts are about things nobody disputes are true. It’s not just the authentic detail – it’s the tone.’ I felt my voice running away with me. ‘In the rest of the book you hardly sense Dad’s feelings, you don’t sense Dad himself. But in the last paragraphs you – ’

  I looked at the pale, peppery hairs, visible on Quinn’s chest.

  … of all the humiliations … none was more demoralizing, more appalling …

  ‘If he didn’t actually escape, if it was all a deal with the Germans – why should he write a false story anyway? Why should he have written his book at all and put himself at risk. Shouldn’t he have just kept quiet?’

  ‘Because he had to justify how he got out of the Château. He couldn’t just say, They let me go. His war record up till then had been pretty remarkable – the grand finale had to live up to it. Of course, I’m speaking hypothetically. But to continue the hypothesis. Suppose that this brilliant record really was blotted by a final act of betrayal; suppose that his hero’s reputation rested ultimately upon a lie. Imagine the pressure, the burden of this – the fear of the truth coming out. Have you ever wondered why it was so long after the war before your father’s book appeared? 1957. He was approached before then by more than one publisher. Why? Because he hesitated over the final act of committing the lie to print, of becoming an out-and-out impostor. At least, he hesitated up to a
point. But then the mental pressure becomes too much. He starts to see the publication of his memoirs in a quite different light – as a means of rebutting once and for all the possibility of exposure, of presenting the hero-image in such a complete and thorough way that no one will dare challenge it. And think for a moment what happens when he actually does this. Why are the final chapters more convincing, more heartfelt than the rest? Because it’s here the real issue lies. The true exploits, all the brave and daring deeds, what do they matter? They can be treated almost like fiction, but the part of the book that’s really a lie – that’s where all the urgency is. It’s here that he’s trying to save himself. Why does it read like a real escape? Because it is an escape, a quite real escape, of a kind. Who knows if in writing it your father didn’t convince himself it was true? And why is it also the most thoughtful, the most sensitive, the most imaginative part of the book? Am I seeing too much in it? Because in writing it he is actually torn between the desire to construct this saving lie and an instinct not to falsify himself completely – to be, somehow, honest. So behind all the “authentication” of his prison experiences and of the escape, he puts down little hints, little clues, meant perhaps only for those nearest to him – for his own son – ’ Quinn grew excited ‘ – clues which say, in case they should ever inquire beyond the surface: See, I was only human. I had my limits, my failings.’

  Through the open door, that summer night, Dad’s sudden start – as if I’d caught him in some guilty act.

  I thought: who has the lurid imagination now?

  ‘My dear fellow – I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to say all this. I got carried away. Please – ’

  For a long time there was silence. I sensed Quinn’s apprehension. Then suddenly I said, ‘Did he break down?’ My voice was savage. ‘In the Château – did he break down?’