by Alec Waugh
The music ceased on a rising scale. Somebody shouted: ‘The police: a raid.’ Another voice shouted ‘Let’s get out of here,’ but the doors were picketed. The three uniformed policemen who had forced their way through the door had been joined by three plain-clothes men from the floor, spies, presumably, who had given the police the tip off.
‘Now, now, quietly please, quietly, ladies and gentlemen; we won’t be here for long. Ten minutes and you’ll be back to your fun again. We only want to make sure of what you’ve got in all these glasses. And to take a name or two. We shan’t be long.’
He wasn’t. In two minutes he was at Raymond’s table. He raised a glass. ‘Now what would you have here?’
‘I wouldn’t know, Constable, it was sold to me and charged to me as champagne. But I suspect that it’s aerated hock.’
‘It’s alcoholic, though.’
‘Oh, definitely alcoholic’
‘In that case, sir, I’d like your name.’
He put down the glass and opened the notebook that he held in his other hand. He looked at Raymond closely.
‘I don’t think I need to ask you for your name, sir.’
‘Perhaps you don’t, Constable.’
‘The Hon. Raymond Peronne, if I’m not mistaken.’
‘You’re not mistaken, Constable.’
There was the flash of an electric bulb across the room. The constable swung round. ‘No more of that or there’ll be trouble.’ He turned back to Raymond with a grin. ‘I’m afraid that his Lordship may have a surprise when he opens his Daily Mail on Monday morning.’
‘He’s got a strong constitution; I think he’ll weather it.’
Within ten minutes the policemen had done their job. From the doorway the sergeant waved goodbye. ‘Back to your fun, now, ladies and gentlemen. Make the most of your good time while you can. It may not be for long.’
His prophecy was not to be fulfilled. It was not the first time that the 43 had been raided. Nor was it to prove the last. Even though the proprietor was to serve a period in gaol, the club was to operate until the second war.
The band struck up. Couples were back upon the floor, waiters hurried between the tables. But Raymond looked pensive. ‘Will that photograph in the papers trouble you ?’ I asked.
‘Not at home, my father couldn’t care less what I do, but it may at Oxford. I got special weekend leave to see my father. There’s no explanation for my being here when I should be there. Two raids within a week. I’ll begin to think that you’re in league with the police.’ He sat silent for a minute, then he shrugged. ‘Waiter,’ he called. ‘My bill.’
He put his wallet on the table, took an envelope from his pocket, moved some notes into it, I could not see how many nor of what denomination, and handed it across to Mabel.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘Please forgive me, but somehow that raid has upset my mood.’ He turned to me. ‘I’ve got my car here. I can drive you back.’
It was a cold but a clear night. There were few clouds in the sky and a waning moon was three quarters full. He sat at the wheel, still pensive. ‘Somehow I don’t feel like driving back to Oxford right away.’
‘I’m not too keen on another nightclub.’
‘That isn’t what I had in mind. Why don’t we look up Judy?’
‘At this time of night?’
‘She keeps late hours. She’s quite likely to be reading or playing the gramophone.’
‘Shall we ring her up?’
‘No, no, she may be asleep; we don’t want to wake her. She’d feel she had to ask us over, though she wouldn’t want to. Let’s drive round and see if she’s a light on.’
Her flat was visible from the road. If he knew that, he must have been round to see her, probably that afternoon. Perhaps they had quarrelled over dinner and he had gone to the 43 in pique.
We drove in silence through the deserted streets. I was surprised at his composure. He was six years younger than I, but he seemed six years older.
‘Here we are,’ he said. ‘Yes, there is a light on. You ring the bell. I’ll stand in the street and wave.’
As he had foreseen, at the sound of the bell a window sash was raised, a female head looked out. I would have not recognised who it was, but he, on the pavement, was unmistakable, with his height and his short, fur-collared coat. ‘Wait there a minute,’ she called down.
She reappeared with an envelope in her hand. ‘Catch,’ she called. She flung it out. Its weight carried it over the narrow garden, into the street: a bunch of keys was in it. ‘The yale key for the front door,’ she called.
She was wearing a flannel nightgown, a very nursery garment. I could see over her shoulder before the gas fire a couple of cushions, an open copy of the Shakespeare Press, blue paper-covered edition of Ulysses. She had been reading it, lying on her stomach. She had no make-up on. Her face glowed with happiness, with relieved happiness. She looked no older than fifteen. ‘What can I get you to drink?’ she asked.
‘Is the kettle still on?’
‘It is.’
‘Then some of that Russian tea.’
‘You, tea?’
‘If you’d known where I’ve been spending the last three hours, you’d know that that was the one beverage we could use.’
‘Where have you been spending the last three hours ?’
He told her. He made a good story of it. He had asked me not to let her know that he had been at the 43. But that was two hours ago, when he had been planning to spend the night with Mabel, two hours ago when he was in reaction against whatever it was that had gone wrong with his date with Judy. They were together now. There had been no episode with Mabel. He could dismiss the whole excursion as a joke.
‘I don’t know what I shall be seeing in Monday’s papers,’ he concluded, ‘but I’m feeling very grateful to those policemen. But for them I wouldn’t be here now.’
It was clearly time for me to be on my way. I had served my purpose. I left my Russian tea half-finished. ‘I’ve played football this afternoon, remember.’ No effort was made to make me stay. If it doesn’t come to a head tonight it never will, I thought.
It did.
The Times was laid every morning by my breakfast tray. There was no reference there to a police raid on the 43, But at that time I had a half-time employment in my father’s publishing house of Chapman & Hall. Monday was one of my office days, and at Earl’s Court Station I bought a copy of the Daily Mail. It was there all right. On the second page: ‘Peer’s son in Soho nightclub raid’. A good photograph too. Raymond unmistakably himself. He was highly photogenic. It was not surprising that the policeman had recognised him. I was in the photo too, but I might have been anybody. Perhaps that was a lucky trait. It is better for a novelist to pass unnoticed.
At half-past ten Judy was on the telephone. ‘Have you seen the Daily Mail?’
‘Yes.’
‘Isn’t it terrible?’
‘It’s what he expected.’
‘Yes, but we all say things like that before they happen. When they do happen...’ She was in the mood, clearly, for a long, long talk, but Monday was my busy morning. I interrupted her. ‘Are you doing anything tonight?’ I asked.
‘Nothing that I can’t cancel.’
‘Why not a quiet dinner, then?’
‘That wbuld be wonderful.’
She was round very early; soon after half-past six. She was looking radiant. She had so much to say that she could not get it all in order. She would jump from one aspect of the subject to another. ‘He’s wonderful,’ that was the main rhythm of it all, the thread that held it all together. She had not believed that anyone could be so wonderful. Thank heavens that she knew enough about other men to realise how special he was: and it wasn’t as though those others had been shoddy men. No, no, they hadn’t. It was simply that he was different. That was the main thread, the theme that she came back to always.
But there were other threads, innumerable other threads— the surprise, the mirac
le of it all. ‘The two of you turning up like that. The last thing I had expected. I was feeling so despondent. His sudden leaving after dinner. Everything had been going so well, at least I thought it had. We’d dined at the Isola Bella, one of my favourite places. I love those pictures on the wall. The old half-drunk man, with the monkey taking away his bottle, and the girl with her head tilted back and the butterfly hovering above her lips, so tantalising. We finished with zabaglioni and that yellow Italian liqueur, Strega. It was so warm, so cosy, I was saying to myself, “In an hour from now, we’ll be back in my flat.” He wouldn’t hurry, that I knew. But we would be going back there, I was sure of that; and then, without warning, he signalled to the waiter, he looked at his watch. “It’s later than I thought. I’ve got to be back by midnight.” It took my breath away. I couldn’t think of anything to say. I was silent the whole way back. He didn’t ask if he could come in. He didn’t kiss me goodnight. Not even a peck on the cheek. I was sunk, I couldn’t have gone to sleep. I sat in my chair, staring at the fire. What had gone wrong? What had I said? What had I done ? Had he realised suddenly that I wasn’t his kind of person? Had he thought my flat awful, cheap and tatty? Question after question. I can’t stand this, I told myself. I gave myself a bath, a steaming hot one; but that only made me more awake. If I had taken a drink I would have gone on drinking; but drink’s not my remedy. Drink makes me sullen. Yet I couldn’t sleep. I had to sleep. I had to take my mind off this. Ulysses was on my writing desk. It’d been there five weeks. I had got stuck quarter through. Ulysses, that was my solution. I’d break the back of it. That would need concentration. I put two cushions on the floor. I made myself some tea. “Now I’ll fight this,” I vowed, and I did fight it. Do you know how many pages I got through? Seventy-seven: and I understood them, too. I not only understood them, I enjoyed them. I was so delighted with myself that Raymond almost went out of my mind. No, I can’t say that. But I regained my confidence. I wasn’t a trivial nonentity who had been turned down by a second son. I was quite a person. I could not only understand Ulysses, I could enjoy it. To hell with Raymond. I was having myself a ball. And then suddenly that bell went; and he was down there on the pavement, and I forgot everything that I had thought about him. It was so wonderful.’ She paused. ‘It couldn’t have been more perfect. Even so,’ she paused again, ‘I wonder why he did go off.’
Later, quite a lot later, I was to ask him that.
He laughed. ‘You may not believe it, but I had a twinge of conscience. No, don’t look so astounded, I really did. It was all too easy; so much too easy. It couldn’t lead to anything. I might be bad for her. We weren’t committed yet. There’s a point in a love affair where you can back out. That point once passed, you can’t. We hadn’t passed it yet. If I didn’t get out now, I never would. That’s why I went to the 43, to find somebody like Mabel, to work it all out of my system. I looked round the room, Mabel was the most my type, and she would have been amusing; I could tell that from the way she danced. But when she came back to my table, and I remembered Judy sitting opposite me an hour earlier at that other table, I couldn’t go through with it; not yet, anyhow. It would need a lot of drink before I was ready for that. Heavens, but I was relieved when you all turned up. It gave me a respite. I put it off, and I put it off. Then those policemen came. What a relief they were. Now I had an excuse for dumping Mabel. I didn’t want to hurt her feelings. Those policemen, an intervention of providence, they made my mind up for me.’
‘Have you told Judy this ?’
‘Of course. She roared with laughter. It’s become one of those little intimate jokes that you build up with someone. If we’re dining out together and we’re feeling pretty close, you know the way it is, just waiting to get back to bed, and I’d say “about time we got our bill” she’ll say, “Let’s hurry, before the policemen come and throw you off your stroke.” It’s fun how during an affair you build up a code language for yourselves.’
‘Like Swann’s cattleyas.’
But that confidence was several weeks ahead. Now we sat before the fire in my flat, she in her first flush of enchantment. ‘It’s wonderful to have you here so that I can talk about him. Do you know what’s one of the most frustrating things for a woman in a love affair?’
‘You tell me.’
‘That she can’t tell a man how wonderful he is. It’s not the thing. She would embarrass him. But he, he can tell her everything about herself. Write sonnets to her eyebrows. Moon over her. But a woman can’t moon over a man. She’s got to have a confidant. Thank God for you.’
She mooned over him, right enough. But half the time she was worrying about that photograph in the Daily Mail. Oxford was bound to see it. Would there be a row? The proctor at that party and now this. She’d hate to have him get into a row on her account. She had, clearly, a strong maternal streak. What would his father say? Was he independent of his father? Would it damage his career? What was he planning to do ?
I told her that he was reading history. ‘But what’s that leading to ? He must have something definite in mind.’
The telephone rang. It was Raymond at the other end. ‘What luck finding you in. Are you alone ?’
‘Except for Judy.’
‘The very person that I was looking for. Can I come round? Right away? Within ten minutes. Fine.’
‘You know who that was,’ I said to Judy.
She nodded. ‘And he’s in London?’
‘Must be; within ten minutes.’
He was round in less, bright-eyed, breathing a little quickly, with a high colour to his cheeks.
‘A whisky, quick,’ he said. ‘A strong one, with very little soda.’
He drank it standing up, in a succession of gulps. ‘That’s better,’ he said after the first. ’I didn’t dare have one before. If there’d been a smash, “Peer’s son drunk in car”, no, that would have been too rugged: as it is it’s calamitous enough. I’ve been rusticated until October.’ He was obviously excited. He was not in the least depressed. He behaved as though he were a hero, the sole survivor from a wreck. He had scarcely greeted us: Judy had not shifted from the cushions. He had not bent to kiss her, just put his hand upon her neck, running his fingers through her short bobbed hair, then standing with his back against the fire. ‘I’m cold, cold, cold,’ he said, ‘an hour and a half to Charminster, then two hours on from there: only time to grab a sandwich and leave my things.’
‘What did your father say?’
‘He wasn’t there, up here in London, debating in the House. He’ll be back tomorrow. Relief, on the whole: not that he’d have minded. As long as I avoid what he calls a scandal, cheating: at cards, that kind of thing. Spending a night in London is normal for a young man, he’ll say. No, he won’t mind.’
I asked him if he wasn’t hungry. ‘No, no, I’m too excited to be hungry,’ but when I produced a cake, he welcomed it. He stood with his back to the fire; he wanted to talk, talk, talk.
I had been struck by, more than anything, his composure. And he was still composed in spite of his excitement. He gave the impression still of knowing exactly what he was about.
‘What did the Dean say?’I asked.
‘You’re a novelist. Imagine what you’d have a Dean say to someone like myself who had behaved as I have.’
‘Was he angry?’
‘Not particularly. It was a set speech. “You haven’t been working properly up here,” he said. “Let’s see if you’ll work better in your father’s house. When you come back here in October, I shall expect you to be as thoroughly up in your set subjects as if you’d been here.” When you come back in October, indeed. I wonder if I shall.’
‘But of course you will,’ said Judy.
He shook his head. ‘I’ve been doing a lot of thinking during those two long drives. I’ve been wondering what a University degree will do for me. I’m not a scholar. I’ll be lucky if I get a second. I’ve taken it for granted from the start that I should go up to Oxford and get as good a
degree as possible, because that’s the routine that’s laid down for every Public School boy. His after-life is determined by what he does at Oxford. He wants to make a mark for himself. And his Oxford career is his jumping-off point. But that isn’t my case after all. I’ve got a basic income. I’d be glad to have more money, who wouldn’t ? But I don’t need it. And as for a position in the world, well, even nowadays having a handle to one’s name does count for something. People know who I am.’
‘But surely,’ Judy expostulated, ‘you’re going to have a career of some kind? You aren’t going to live on the past, you’re going to be someone in your own right?’
‘Of course, but the question is, what? It sounds ridiculous, but I hadn’t begun to think about it till today. It’s something that I’ve got to decide about?’
‘Where will you stay until October?’ That was my interpolation.
‘I’m not sure yet. Certainly not all the time at Charminster. And that reminds me, I’ve got to find somewhere to put up tonight. Can I use your telephone? I’ll ring up my sister.’
‘Why don’t you come back with me ?’ That was Judy’s suggestion, and it seemed to take him off his guard. For all his composure, he was not yet twenty-one. But he knew enough to know that the fact you had spent one night with a girl did not mean that there would be a second. It was not until after the second night that you could be certain how the course would run. ‘That’s dear of you,’ he said. ‘I’d love to.’
His manner changed. He became less excited, less in the middle of a drama. He moved away from the fireplace, edged past me to the chair against which she was leaning; he put his glass and cake on a low small table, drew her head back against his knees; with his free hand he stroked her head, drawing his long fingers along her cheek. He lowered the pitch and pace of his voice.