WELCOME STRANGER

by MARY HOCKING

  Business was becoming brisk and several of the tables were occupied. There were sober-suited men who might be civil servants or policemen, a brick-faced, rakish individual who was Jacov’s idea of a journalist, an ambulance driver, two girls surrounded by suitcases festooned with foreign sucker labels, and a particularly malodorous tramp. Jacov sat at an empty table near the two girls.

  One of the girls was saying, ‘There’s going to be a ban on foreign travel, did you see? It’s lucky we didn’t wait any longer.’

  Her companion said, ‘I wonder what Mario and Guiseppe are doing now.’

  ‘Same routine with two other girls, I expect.’

  ‘I don’t think Mario was like that.’

  ‘My brother says you can never trust an Italian. He was quite shocked we went. He said they were worse than the Germans. You knew where you were with the Germans.’

  ‘I don’t think Mario and Guiseppe would ever do anything . . . you know, really nasty . . . do you?’

  ‘You never know, do you? What about those English fellows at Amalfi? Talk about letting yourself go when you get on foreign soil!’

  The baked beans were tasty and Jacov was considering a further helping when a shadow fell across his table.

  ‘Jacov Vaseyelin, isn’t it?’

  Jacov looked at the dark, distinguished man whom he certainly should not have forgotten. ‘I saw you recently at the Criterion. Otherwise I might not have remembered you, either. I’m Angus Drummond.’

  ‘How extraordinary!’ Jacov, delighted to have company, cleared a space on the table. ‘I was thinking of your sister only this morning.’

  ‘Daphne, I assume.’

  The girls at the next table were making plans for future summer holidays. ‘It’s ever so cheap in Austria. A friend of mine stayed in a hotel where King Farouk stays, and it only cost her a few pounds a week.’

  ‘But they are all blubbery and pink. I don’t like pink men.’

  ‘They’re not pink – not nearly as pink as Englishmen!’

  ‘Well, there you are, then. I go abroad to get away from Englishmen.’

  Angus said to Jacov, ‘Do you ever think of going back?’

  Jacov looked perplexed. ‘How could I? The house was bombed. And, anyway, I don’t like Shepherd’s Bush.’

  ‘I meant to Russia.’

  ‘Russia!’ Jacov responded to this theatrically and several people turned to look at him. ‘I was only four when I left Russia. All I can remember of it is snow coming down outside a window. I remember more than that about Lithuania.’ His voice had dwindled as he spoke but one person at a table near by continued to take an interest in the conversation.

  ‘You don’t think it’s important to go back to your roots?’

  ‘I haven’t got roots in Russia or Lithuania,’

  ‘So, I suppose you would say, you’ve put down roots here. That’s interesting.’

  ‘No, I don’t think I would say that.’ Jacov, used to speaking other people’s lines, was uncharacteristically disobliging on this occasion. ‘I don’t really know what people mean when they talk about putting down roots.’ He pointed to a glass of water on the ambulance man’s table. ‘You know there are some plants which will grow, just in water? Well, I suppose I’m like that.’ The idea pleased him. ‘A lotus, perhaps.’

  The ambulance man peered suspiciously into the glass.

  ‘But you have made a life for yourself here, roots or no roots. I admire people who can fit into a new country, adopt a different culture . . .’

  ‘Did you enjoy the play? I thought it was rather gloomy myself.’

  ‘The play? Oh, yes. I thought you were very good, especially in the last act.’

  ‘Oh, that last act!’ Jacov clutched his temples, attracting general attention once again. ‘One of the critics wrote “Mr Vaseyelin is a superb communicator. He plays the final scene as if it is a matter of life and death that we should understand the motives of this tormented man.” And I had no idea, not a glimmering, of what it was all about!’

  ‘So, how do you manage?’

  ‘You must tell yourself before you go on stage – this is so, because I say it is so. You must will it. What you do must be unquestionable, because you are doing it. If you really believe that, most of the audience will believe it, too. At least while they are in their seats!’

  Angus sat, elbows on table, cupped hands folded like protective leaves around his face. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I can understand that.’

  ‘I really am very hungry this morning. Can I get you something? I’m going to have more baked beans.’

  ‘I think I might manage another round of toast.’

  Angus watched Jacov walk to the service counter. In spite of what seemed a remarkably good appetite, he was thin as a modern sculpture – no more than a coil of vibrating wire topped by a tangled mop. The face eluded the kind of delineation the camera excels at. One could understand why he had not made more films. His would always be the face which gave memory the slip; one would search the cast list and say ‘of course!’ and then forget. And yet, this indeterminate man who could not be associated with any one place, or identified with a particular culture, this irrational, imprecise man, incapable of exact definition, could, by a sheer act of will, become conqueror in his own kingdom. Surely a proof that once the will is engaged, circumstances can be made to work for it.

  When Jacov returned, Angus said, ‘It was a happy chance our meeting. I may have to go abroad for a little while – one of those confidential trips.’ He could see that Jacov was not really taking this in; he had been right to think that he would show little curiosity. ‘It will be Irene’s birthday while I’m out of the country – Irene Kimberley, you remember her?’

  Jacov, busy cutting the toasted beans into neat squares, nodded his head. ‘She and Alice came to see me when I was playing at the Q Theatre. Very perceptive, I thought. She . . .’

  Angus intervened quickly, ‘I have a small present for her. Something I don’t want to trust to the post. Would it be too much to ask you to deliver it to her on the appointed day? I could give it to Alice, of course; but women are such talkers, and this is to be a surprise.’

  ‘I should be delighted.’

  ‘It’s not until October. I’ll let you have it before I go.’

  Jacov said, ‘I will put a ring round the day on the calendar.’ It was to be hoped he studied the calendar.

  ‘I don’t know when I shall be going. It could be quite soon.’ It was surprising, the need to talk to someone, not for advice, of course, but because the excitement demanded a voice. ‘It all depends on how quickly a man who gained certain information will be able to market it. It is the assessment of his character and ability which will be the telling factor, rather than the information itself. And he gives the appearance of being rather stupid – and a busybody. An unfortunate combination. Few people have patience with the stupid and fewer still can tolerate the busybody, especially if he is telling them something they should have discovered for themselves.’

  ‘What is he trying to market?’

  The question startled Angus. Jacov Vaseyelin was not stupid and although he had at first not been particularly interested in what Angus was saying, his brain had had no difficulty in deciding what was crucial to this issue. Angus said, ‘A few facts and quite a lot of theory. Nothing important.’

  ‘But important enough to be the deciding factor in your leaving the country.’

  Angus realised in dismay that he had played this game with the wrong man. Jacov Vaseyelin, with his background, was probably instinctively suspicious. He would know that during the war Angus had been involved with the Resistance movement; from this he might well deduce continued involvement with the intelligence service. To find himself cast for a part, however peripheral, in a transaction with such a man, and at a time when that man was talking of leaving the country, might well throw Jacov into a blind panic.

  Angus said, ‘You mustn’t take me seriously. I am given to maki
ng cryptic remarks. My sister Daphne says I enjoy devising puzzles because I can’t tolerate the commonplace.’

  But it was too late. Jacov had pushed his plate to one side; his appetite for food had gone, and also, it seemed, for company, since he was obviously preparing to leave. He said to Angus, ‘I think your best course would be to deliver your present to Irene when you return. I am sure she would accept your apologies for any delay.’

  And yet, Angus thought, I have said so little! But enough, I suppose, to touch a chord in someone who most of his life has been morbidly afraid of spies. As he watched Jacov’s precipitate exit, he thought grimly that if anyone had been observing this ridiculously over-dramatised exchange, they might have found stronger grounds for suspicion than any Sergeant Fletcher could provide.

  Angus finished his toast and had another cup of coffee; he did not think he was being watched, but the pretence of appearing unruffled was instinctive. In fact, he was very ruffled indeed. It was true that he enjoyed being cryptic; and when he had made oblique references to Sergeant Fletcher as a man with information which he might, or might not, be able to market, he had not given much weight to what he was saying. But Jacov had deciphered these coded messages with which Angus hoped to fool himself as well as others. He had said with commendable clarity, ‘But important enough to be the deciding factor in your leaving the country.’ The situation had been more real to Jacov, the hazards more clearly perceived, than to Angus Drummond, the person actually involved.

  Angus had always known that a point must be reached where there was no going back. What he had not realised was that this point could be reached and passed without his ever noticing. Now, he saw that it was a long time past. A very senior man in his branch of the intelligence service had connived in Angus’s exploits; but this man would not continue to do this once there was a risk that suspicion might fall on him. Angus had had a lot of luck, more than he could have expected, certainly more than he deserved. But that, too, was in the past. He was near the end now.

  ‘You can’t sit here all morning. You’ll have to shift yourself when we get really busy,’ the woman with the trolley said to the tramp.

  ‘I shall have one more coffee.’ The tramp spoke in a hoarse but not uneducated voice. He delved into his rags and produced a few coins, counting them to make sure he could make good his promise.

  ‘Well, make it quick,’ she said, good-natured but firm. ‘It’s getting hot in here and you’re more savoury than the baked beans.’

  It occurred to Angus, looking at the tramp, that he found the man quite as distasteful as his father would have done. Not that his father was squeamish, but he could not tolerate failure. The tramp was the epitome of failure – always assuming that the aim in life is to be acceptable in one’s own society, and that the tramp was aware of this and had tried conscientiously but found he could not measure up to the requirements. But supposing he had made a deliberate decision? One day, looking at himself in the mirror, he had not liked what he saw and had simply walked away from it. In that case, it was the tramp who denounced the failure of society, disassociating himself from its values, rejecting its received truths. Why couldn’t I have done that? Angus thought. Then, from time to time, I would meet my father and, stealing up behind him, look over his shoulder – like Lear’s fool! How strange, that I can contemplate what I suppose people will call a betrayal of my inheritance, yet find this rejection too difficult, too wholesale. The tramp is strong enough to stand alone, while I can only change sides.

  He went out into the street. It was a morning that seemed to hold a lot of promise. There had been other such mornings in his life. I can’t always stand on the edge of the day, he thought: thresholds are for crossing.

  Ben sat on the tow-path, making notes. It was just before seven in the morning and a mist came up from the river, which was low, the tide still going out. The river smell mingled with that of the Brentford gas works. All this Ben noted. He had been having a bad time lately. The doctor had suggested he should see a psychiatrist. ‘But I’m not ill,’ Ben had pointed out. ‘I just don’t feel well.’ When it became apparent that he was not to be shifted from this diagnosis, the doctor had made one or two suggestions. Chief among them was that Ben should make a practice of going for a walk each day and note in detail exactly what he saw. As a therapy it seemed to work rather well, concentrating his mind on his particular surroundings instead of the abstract terrors with which it preferred to concern itself. ‘The river moves sluggishly carrying a tin of Spam down to the sea,’ Ben wrote. ‘Mud, wrinkled and whorled like melting toffee . . .’ Or toffee in the making? No, no, no! This was just what he was not supposed to do. He scribbled hastily, ‘piece of paper fluttering from half-closed dustbin, one woollen glove on end of post – hopefully waiting to be claimed?’ Now, how did I know that? Well, it wouldn’t have put itself on the end of the post, would it? ‘Willows, all present and correct, lined up on parade, just as yesterday.’ No, not true. Misty today, blurred with moisture, all the leaves running into one another.

  One good thing about this little exercise was that it disposed of the notion of the sameness of days. Each day had its individual fingerprint. Each day was a gift. He had made a vow to remember that when he left the jungle behind. Mustn’t think about the jungle, or Geoffrey and the others . . . Water is still now. That Spam tin isn’t going to make Barnes bridge, let alone the sea! And that church across the bank is quite definitely made of stone, not cotton wool; the mist is beginning to clear. Nothing lasts forever, not even the monsoon rains . . . A police launch coming up from Hammersmith, very neat and trim. I wave, but they don’t respond. I am odd, but not odd enough to merit their taking an interest. A woman coming along the tow-path wearing something long and shapeless in faded cotton. Her straw hat has seen as much service as the one I wore in the jungle. She carries an easel and has a satchel hitched over one shoulder. She is also bare-footed, but from choice, not necessity – her feet press into the soil like roots as she studies the river and its banks as though they had been arranged for her purpose. Now, I must go. The woman has disturbed me. I can see Geoffrey hunched under a tree, drawing that other river . . .

  More traffic about now. When I reach the road the windows of the pub are open and someone is playing a radio as they clean out the bar. The sun is breaking through and I am sweating already; it is going to be a scorcher. I shan’t go back to my lodgings. If I go back, I shall be unable to get myself out again. It isn’t staying away from the office that I mind, it is going back and facing that look they will give me which says that there is nothing physically wrong with me. How odd, that after all that has happened, the thing that really puts me in a lather is going into the office after I have had a day away sick. So, I will catch the train at Chiswick Park, and get something to eat at that stall outside Waterloo station. And my landlady, Mrs Milbrook, will get in a panic because I haven’t returned and she will tell the police and . . . The doctor is quite right. As soon as I allow my mind any sort of freedom it constructs some minor disaster! And anyway, Mrs Milbrook enjoys calamity.

  Not a bad train journey, too early for the crowds. And at the stall outside the station no one takes much notice of me. All sorts of strange people here, nothing excites the stallholder. When I stand here, eating a cheese roll, I have a sense of real freedom and I think I may manage after all. A positive thought! Follow it quickly with another. There is something remarkably satisfying about a cheese roll. It will carry me through the morning very well.

  Alice played tennis in the park with a friend from her office. The girl wanted to join a tennis club which had a high standard, because her boy friend was a member, I need a lot of practice before I play myself in there,’ she said to Alice. ‘Otherwise, I shall play myself out!’ So Alice practised with her daily. When the weather was fine, they played early in the morning before going to the office. This was the time which Alice liked best. When the day was pearly and fresh, and the town was only just coming to life, she had the
feeling she had had on night duty of being in a territory of her own, as though time was also place. It was surprising how few people had yet discovered the existence of seven o’clock in the park, this place of escape, where other people had not yet thought of you, let alone had hopes for you or formulated demands. Fellow explorers, walking dogs or feeding squirrels, passed by absolved of any need to make acknowledgements, safe in their solitude.

  It was over two months since she had seen Ivor. As she hit the ball hard and flat across the net, Alice felt it was conceivable that she might get over his loss; and when she angled her smash deep into the corner, there was such exhilaration that it could not be disputed that other excitements might one day present themselves. The friend collected balls, and stood thinking about her service. Alice, well within the baseline, thought where she was going to put her return. The service was weak and the server stayed back; Alice popped the ball gently over the net. They changed ends. In a café opposite the park a man pulled down a faded green awning and then began to arrange a few chairs around a table. For the first time in many weeks, Alice realised that she was not merely hungry, but ravenous.

  When the game was over, she put on a dirndl skirt and slipped off her tennis shorts; then she changed into white sandals and was dressed for the office. She was not returning to Holland Park, nor was she eating with her office friend. She was doing something much more interesting.

  At a small hotel in Pimlico she breakfasted with Jeannie Clinton Hobbs. They had last met in Alexandria, when Alice was a coder and Jeannie the Commander’s writer. Alice had wondered whether Jeannie could possibly be so radiant under more temperate skies. In fact, there being less in the way of competition, the effect was even more overwhelming. Her presence seemed to fill the small dining-room, and not only because she talked rather loudly. Later, Alice wrote that Jeannie’s hair tumbled like a golden cataract about her shoulders; then she crossed out the word ‘tumbled’; Nature had had too much assistance from artifice for there to be any suggestion that even one curl did not know its place. Eyes and eyebrows owed their definition to the discreet use of mascara. A fellow coder, Madeleine Flint, who had not liked Jeannie, had once pointed out that she was a very sandy person who practised alchemy. In the morning light, Jeannie’s face glowed from its immersion in cold water followed by a few brisk slaps on the cheeks. She wore a low-necked dress in buttercup yellow and the man sitting at the table opposite was bent on discovering to what regions the golden tan extended.