Cushing's Crusade

by Tim Jeal

  Chapter 16

  Although the shops were filled with turkeys, Father Christmases, and many seasonal gifts and greeting cards, Professor Elkin was unhappy. He sat at his table in the Institute on the Tuesday before Christmas and informed Derek with appropriate gloom that Alice Macdonald had died three days earlier in an Inverness nursing-home. At first Derek had been unable to think who Alice Macdonald was and why Elkin should have been telling him about her demise, but then he remembered. The professor was unhappy, not because he had any personal feelings about the late Mrs Macdonald, but because her death put Derek in the clear. It would now be impossible to determine whether the deceased had intended, during her lifetime, to deny readers of the Afro-Asian Institute a sight of the letters she had donated. On the credit side, Derek would keep his job; on the debit side, Elkin would have to see the letters. There would now be no point in trying to outdo the professor in a purely scholarly work on the same period of East African history.

  Some minutes later Derek became excited. He would write a popular book around five of the more dramatic protagonists: Stanley, Lugard, de Winton, MacKinnon and Johnston. Call it something like The Imperial Adventure or British, Christian and White. Away with the careful drudgery of a serious analysis of cultural differences, social, political and economic conditions in Europe and Africa and enter with flourish five men in a new continent. At once an introduction calculated to madden all his colleagues was forming in Derek’s brain. He would start with Marx’s famous statement: ‘History does nothing, it possesses no immense wealth, fights no battles. It is rather man, real living man who does everything, who possesses and fights.’ This book is an examination of the impact of a few men on a vast and little-known continent and an attempt to understand how they felt and why they acted as they did. I shall not insist on calling it history but will leave my readers to apply whatever label they like. Labels do not interest me much and I will waste no time in speculating about the degree to which individuals can be seen as distinct from groups or classes. Such distinctions on journeys of exploration become largely academic.

  The book should be lavishly illustrated and glossily produced. Possibly it would become a best-seller. Derek was still exultant and enthusiastic when he rang Diana later that morning to suggest a meeting over the holiday. Something he jokingly compared with the brief Christmas truce of 1914; jokingly, so that he would not be forced to take offence if she refused.

  ‘Why not both come over?’ he said. ‘If that’s no good, we could go out somewhere, or if you don’t want to come yourself, perhaps Giles could come on his own.’

  Silence on the line for a little and then Diana’s voice, flattened and depersonalized by the wires and the receiver, saying, ‘We’re going abroad. Turkey. Giles is looking forward to it.’ A pause while she waited for his objection; he made none. ‘I’m not being unreasonable. Now I’m working I can only get away at holiday time.’

  ‘Since he’s with you all the time, I thought he might come and be with me at Christmas.’

  ‘Wouldn’t the following weekend be as good?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It isn’t Christmas.’ No answer from Diana, although Derek could imagine her expression. ‘On the subject of Christmas,’ he went on, ‘what should I do with Christmas cards sent to both of us? I had thought of cutting them in half and sending you one of the bits. I suppose I could send every other card.’

  ‘I can understand how you feel, Derek, but you really ought to have said something earlier about wanting to have Giles with you. I’m not telepathic.’

  After a silence Derek said, ‘Are things all right?’

  ‘Yes. How about you?’

  ‘I’m going to have that operation for piles. In February. The hospital sent me a letter.’

  ‘I’ll come and see you.’

  ‘Not before that?’

  ‘I’d like to leave it a bit.’

  ‘That’s that, then,’ he replied emphatically.

  ‘You do understand how I feel?’ she asked gently.

  ‘No I don’t,’ he shouted. ‘I don’t understand at all,’ and he slammed down the receiver. Just a phone call, he told himself, but all his earlier exultation had gone. The time to have written a popular book would have been when she was still with him. Now the idea seemed trivial and useless. If he wanted to show historians like Elkin what he thought of them, there were easier and less time-consuming ways than writing a monumentally unprofessional book. Send them obscene letters, dance naked round the manuscript room on a crowded day on the pretext of re-creating a Papuan fertility ceremony; simple too to make an indecent suggestion to the young woman working on the Dutch East India Company. Let me fondle your folios, as the archivist said to the actress.

  Derek was still depressed when he met his father for tea in an ABC off the Bayswater Road. Gilbert was sitting on the far side of the room at a table by himself. Derek passed along the self-service counter and selected a packet of biscuits and a glass of milk. Coming up to his father’s table, he noticed that the old man was sitting next to a small Christmas tree; since it was resting on a chair and was without any decorations, Derek assumed that Gilbert had bought it. Before he could make sure of this, an elderly couple two tables away started shouting at each other. The man was well dressed and had a venerable white beard.

  ‘You’re coming home,’ the woman was bellowing.

  ‘I’m not. No, I’m not. I’m never coming home,’ he yelled back.

  The woman started poking at him with her blunt stumpy little umbrella but he stayed where he was, shouting, ‘Never, never, never.’

  Gilbert went on eating a sausage roll while he watched. The manageress came up and talked quietly to the old man, who stopped shouting. Then his wife—Derek thought she was his wife—told the manageress that the old fool couldn’t control his bladder.

  ‘Sometimes he does it in the street; goes out into the Fulham Road in his nightshirt and does it against trees like a dog.’

  A little later the man started moaning and allowed his wife to lead him out. Derek, who felt slightly sick, was surprised to see that his father was quite unaffected.

  ‘They ought to live in the country,’ Gilbert said unemotionally. ‘More trees and fewer passers-by.’

  ‘Talking about trees,’ said Derek, pointing at the Christmas tree next to Gilbert, ‘is that yours?’

  ‘It is.’

  ‘Why did you buy it?’ asked Derek quietly, opening his packet of biscuits. He imagined travelling home in die tube with his father; saw branches of the tree sticking in people’s eyes, getting caught in the doors, causing all manner of trouble.

  ‘I wanted it. Don’t you ever want things?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘It’s important to do things, however routine they may be. We couldn’t have ignored the time of year, sat in the flat refusing to admit that it’s Christmas because of how things are.’

  ‘We could have listened to the carols on the radio.’

  ‘Not the same at all.’ Gilbert paused to sip lukewarm tea. ‘A tree demands attention. I’ve bought bells and bobbles to hang on it. You can help me if you like.’

  Derek finished his milk and stared at the stained table-top. I shall never forget the simple pleasure he got out of that last Christmas; I can see him so clearly standing back with sparkling eyes to admire his finished work. Father and son together again for a family Christmas like Christmases of long ago. The happiness recaptured, the past living in the present in a way that brought tears to the eves. Over the turkev thev discuss the step-mother who brought them to blows and the unhappiness they caused each other. By the time the spry septuagenarian has placed a flaming helping of Christmas pudding before his son of nearly forty summers, they have arrived, via paper hats and crackers, at a deeper understanding of themselves and others, a greater compassion for mutual failings and a determination to bring to the coming year the fruits of their new awareness. The Christmas spirit has come to 3
6 Abercorn Mansions.

  Gilbert had opened a small box and taken out a silver bell which he held up between finger and thumb. He looked at Derek for some sign of approval and getting none replaced it with a sigh. Sour, ungenerous Derek, lifeless loveless Derek, sitting in an ABC eating biscuits and drinking milk.

  ‘Let’s look at them,’ he said, taking the box and pretending interest. That’s what should be done: the stubborn assertion of zest for life in the face of a wife’s desertion and a son’s forgetfulness. Why, on the way here I picked up a glove in the gutter and so great was my curiosity and interest that I was able to re-create the owner almost as though I knew her, age, sex, income, married or single. I do it the whole time in tubes and buses; observe people and lovingly note their little mannerisms and gestures. Just the same in the country; as I walk through fields my wide interest in birds, insects, grasses, herbs and trees makes each path and track a potential delight. Derek turned over a green ball in his hand, seeing the distorted reflection of the tea-room mirrored on its shining surface. He laid out other bells, bobbles and balls on the table.

  ‘They’ll look splendid. Splendid.’

  Gilbert seemed pleased; so pleased that he produced a carrier-bag and fished out a yellow sweater.

  ‘I bought you this. Not really a proper present, so you might as well have it now.’

  Derek took it and held it up against his chest. Then he took off his coat and jacket and put the sweater on.

  ‘Not a bad fit,’ said Gilbert.

  ‘Excellent,’ replied Derek, thinking of another Christmas nearly thirty years earlier; himself unwrapping a red Indian suit with an animal’s head on the chest; a pink flap of material for the tongue and sequins for the eyes. Derek with a feathered head-dress on, standing in front of a mirror, flipping the tongue up and down. Then running whooping from room to room. Sudden vision of Derek now, singing like a canary in his yellow sweater to the amazement of other tea-eaters. Other Christmases: ‘D. Cushing made the best Virgin Mary for years, although his halo was a little too large.’ Derek discovered by Margaret rifling his stocking the day before Father Christmas was due to deliver it. He must have jogged the table, because a moment later one of the bells fell on the floor and smashed.

  Back at the flat Gilbert looked for and failed to find a reel of cotton to tie on the decorations with. Later Derek went out for a walk.

  The shops were still open and the pavements were crowded with people returning from work. Derek passed the phone box where he had sweated so profusely while waiting for Diana to make a journey which she never made. He sat down on the bench where he had eaten his lunch on that same day. In spite of his yellow sweater he felt cold. Many lights shone warmly in Abercorn Mansions as Derek recalled returning from work on a multitude of similar winter evenings. With a conscious effort he stopped remembering and tried to think of the future, but the more he tried the less clearly he felt able to construct anything or even to imagine a time several months ahead. A summer holiday with his father? Another year in the Institute? His father’s question came back to him: Don’t you want anything? Without wishes there could be no future, no possibility of change.

  He got up and started walking, making deliberate efforts to avoid the cracks between the paving stones; that was an aim after all. If I avoid the cracks for a hundred yards my rectum will be cured spontaneously without the aid of surgery. A wish too, an expression of superstitious faith; faith of a sort. The same old game, rationalize everything and so deny that anything can touch one; defuse emotions and fears like dangerous bombs. Distance the world and it has no effect upon one; but distance the world and one has no impact on it either; and with no impact, no reality; reducing present and future to a dream without shape or content. Too much power politics, too much bureaucracy, too much psychology, too much passivity and bang goes will power; far easier to become grovelling worshippers of determinism.

  Avoiding the cracks between the paving-stones involved a careful scrutiny of the pavement, which in turn brought into focus discarded bus tickets, sweet papers, and a varied range of dog shit. A man wishing to avoid the cracks between paving stones views a street in a particular way, a man wishing to buy a shop in that same street sees it in quite another manner, a man shopping regards it differently again, so too anybody driving along it on their way home. Vision is just a matter of intention or preoccupation; change the intention, change the view, change, change.

  A man without immediate aims is like a watch without hands. A man without hope of change is like a day without night. Cushing’s Collected Clichés for the feeble-minded, bound in tooled leather and twenty-five copies signed by the author.

  Past a baker’s and a jeweller’s Derek came to an estate agent’s. He stopped and looked at photographs of houses for sale. Flats for sale too. Comprising nine rooms … in need of some modernization … bathroom 6 x 8 … small patio at rear … central heating … elderly sitting tenant. Derek pushed open the door.

  The secretary was putting on her coat. The man behind an adjacent desk was tidying and sorting papers; he had a flabby yellowish face and a roll of flesh under his chin, which moved as he said, ‘We’re closed.’

  Derek sat down and folded his arms.

  ‘I want to sell my flat.’ The man was flicking cigarette ash off his lapels. ‘36 Abercorn Mansions.’

  The man said, ‘Your name?’

  Derek watched him writing down details. Name, address, phone number. Another flat to be sold; one of many. Derek said casually, ‘I’m leaving London to start a market garden. Mushrooms and chrysanthemums.’

  The man expressed polite interest and looked at his watch. People left London every day, by road, rail and air, some by crematoriums.

  The man said, ‘Would Thursday morning be all right?’ Measurements and other details for a description of the flat, he explained. Yes, Thursday morning would be fine. The Institute shut four days before Christmas.

  On his way home Derek bought a reel of green cotton for his father. Aims were of the essence; aims immediate and distant. Derek decided to visit Angela and stay the night. He would take books out of the local library about market gardening. Discover in action what cannot be discovered in the head. Margaret saying: But, Derek, how can you say you don’t like artichokes when you won’t try them.

  In the hall of the flat Derek prepared to tell his father about his visit to the estate agent’s. As he walked towards Gilbert’s room, Derek heard the sound of gentle snoring; the old man was having a late afternoon sleep.

  Derek lay down on the sofa in the sitting-room and tried to imagine what he might say. Dear father, in a life too exclusively mental, without sufficient immediate contact with the earth from which all our nourishment is drawn, I have decided to make amends, to be precise I intend to begin a small market garden; this will mean selling this flat. I made the decision with the same ease, or difficulty, as I have when forcing myself to get out of a bath on a cold morning. I was unaware of the precise moment of choice and do not intend to make myself aware of it, just as I am never aware of making the decision to get out of the bath. I am not being flippant, or if I am, I consider it essential. I intend to construct a future for myself, since I have recently found it impossible to see one coming in the normal way. The ebb and flow of the seasons and the part played by them in vegetable production attract me, since in them quiescence is as important as growth. You will say that it is typical of me that, at a time when even the most unimaginative farm worker will do anything in his power to get into the nearest town on his day off, I should be thinking of going to live in the country. I shall not argue with you, nor will I do so if you say that my new venture is no more likely to succeed than my earlier attempt to become interested in stamp collecting. For my immediate purposes it is enough to have set in motion a series of events likely to change almost everything I do. By choosing one course, I am refusing others; and the rejections may be as important as the acceptance. Only a fool would consider East African history to be mor
e important than vegetables. But such comparisons, as I am sure you understand, are beside the point. Did you know that many explorers discovered that natives thought they had no feet? The reason was of course their boots, which being non-existent in most tribes, were hard to ‘see’. Having no foreknowledge of my vegetable life I will not attempt to form an idea of it with words and symbols from my past. The prosecution of such substantial change demands this caution.

  Over an hour later, Derek was aware that he had gone to sleep; aware because the room was dark and the bell was ringing.

  When Derek opened the door there was nobody outside. A moment later he heard a cat crying and looked down to see Kalulu’s basket on the landing. Kneeling, he could see the cat through the gaps in the cane-work. Then, a few feet in front of him, he saw Giles’s face rise slowly above the brown carpet as the lift clanked and juddered to a stop. The boy was holding a suitcase.

  ‘I thought you’d gone to Turkey,’ said Derek, feeling a strange weakness in his legs.

  ‘We weren’t going till tomorrow,’ replied Giles, picking up Kalulu’s basket and taking it into the flat.

  ‘Are you going to go?’ asked Derek, following his son and shutting the door behind them. Giles bent down and unfastened the straps of the basket.

  ‘No,’ he said after a pause.