Friends in Low Places

by Simon Raven

  And now, he thought with a quick lift of the blood, it was time to visit Maisie. (He had considered economy here too, but without sincerity.) With hands that shook slightly he folded his review; he could post it on the way. But no; he must make sure it got there. He would deliver it to Strix himself. Since he was already pressed for time if he was to be punctual at Maisie’s, he took a taxi from the Cavalry Club to the far end of Gower Street and then round and down to Berkeley Square. Not really a very economic performance, he supposed; but after all, this was his debut as a professional literateur, an occasion unsuited to parsimony.

  “The Board of Strix assembled at half past two of the clock on the twenty-second day of April, 1959. Present were the Right Honourable the Lord Philby, Proprietor; Henry Arthur Dilkes, B.Sc., Secretary to the Institute of Political and Economic Studies; Robert Reculver Constable, M.A., Professor of Economics in the University of Salop and Provost Elect of Lancaster College, Cambridge; Carton Weir, M.A., Member of Parliament for Chirt and Wedderburn Regis; and Somerset Lloyd-James, M.A., Editor.

  “Lord Philby having taken the Chair, he proposed a motion of congratulation to Professor Constable on his recent election as Provost of Lancaster College. The motion was seconded by Mr. Dilkes and warmly received by all present.

  “Mr. Lloyd-James: May one ask, Professor, when you take up residence at Lancaster?

  “Professor Constable: In September, in time for the new academic year.

  “Mr. L-J: Your new appointment. ... It may perhaps affect your attendance at this Board?

  “Prof. C: Why should it?

  “Mr. L-J: I was wondering, among other things, whether the Council of Lancaster would approve of your association with a journal well known to be conservative in tone.

  “Prof. C: Since it has been my constant concern to make it less so, I have no reason for embarrassment before the Council of Lancaster.

  “Mr. Dilkes: Anyway, they’re not as red as all that. I’m told that several of the younger dons are starting a new fashion in Toryism. They’ll be delighted you’re on this Board.

  “Prof. C: Their approval is of no moment to me.

  “Mr. Weir: I wouldn’t be too sure of that. Take Jacquiz Helmut, the historian. You wouldn’t want him for an enemy. As rich as a money-lender - come to think of it, his father was a money-lender - friend of royalty, blue-eyed boy of the Billingsgate Press -

  “Prof. C: Inside Lancaster College, Mr. Helmut is Assistant Tutor and a member of the College Council. As such he has one vote, no less and no more.

  “Mr. W: Don’t you believe it. Half of them vote as he tells them because they hope he’ll get them asked to Buck House.

  “Lord Philby: All very interesting, gentlemen. But, with respect to the new Provost of Lancaster, we’re here to discuss the affairs of Strix.

  “Prof. C: I entirely concur.

  “Mr. L-J: So we were in a way. I was hoping Professor Constable would take the hint, but as it is I must now remind him that his place at this Board is ex officio, deriving from his position as Professor of Economics at Salop. Since his appointment to Lancaster will necessitate his resignation from the Professorship, it follows that he must also resign from the Board.

  SILENCE.

  “Mr. D: Surely not. I too might be described as an ex officio member of the Board, in as much as I was asked to join it because of my position at the Institute. But as I understand it, it was not part of our founder’s intention to displace sitting members. When, in the fullness of years, Professor Constable sees fit to withdraw his services from Strix, then of course his place here will revert to whoever is then Professor of Economics at Salop. But just because he himself is now honourably relinquishing that office -

  “Mr. W: - There is surely no need of speculation. Our founder, the first Lord Philby, will have made his intentions quite plain in the Articles of this journal.

  “Prof. C: I must say, I have always considered the matter in much the same light as Mr. Dilkes.

  “Mr. L-J: In the past, Professor, on several occasions you have insisted that we follow the Articles to the letter. I take it you are still of the same mind?

  “Prof. C: Er . . . yes, of course.

  “Mr. L-J: Then let me quote you the relevant clause . . . ‘Two seats at the Board shall be reserved, respectively, for the Secretary of the Institute of Political and Economic Studies, and for the incumbent of the Chair of Economics at the University of Salop.’

  “Mr.. D: Nothing about resigning.

  “Prof. C: But the meaning is clear. The clause refers to the ‘incumbent’ and can only mean the actual and present holder of the chair. Your point is taken, Mr. Lloyd-James, and I shall act accordingly.

  “Ld. P: We shall be sorry to lose your services.

  “Prof. C: Such as they are, sir, you will have the benefit of them for some months to come. My resignation from the Chair at Salop will not be effective until August first of this year. It follows that until that time I shall continue to do my duty at this Board . . .”

  “Neat work,” said Carton Weir to Somerset after the meeting. “It’ll be a relief when Professor Constable removes his dreary face from the table.”

  “It was only a question of following the Articles . . . which may not suit our book so well when it comes to filling the empty place.”

  ‘‘Automatic, surely. The next Professor of Economics at Salop.”

  “Suppose we wanted someone else?”

  “Have you anyone in mind?”

  “I had thought. . . perhaps Canteloupe.”

  “You were impressed by your meeting?”

  “With reservations, yes. I hope you’re seeing to it that he doesn’t drink too much.”

  “Hardly my job. He spends a lot of his time in White’s, of which I’m not a member,” said Carton Weir resentfully.

  “Do your best to keep him out of mischief. I’m giving him a bit of a build-up in this journal. These camping sites of his.”

  “Good on you.”

  “I might even do a second piece later on ... if he comes up with anything else.”

  “Don’t go overdoing him, Somerset.”

  “I told you. I have my reservations. But the image is dead right. Morality with profit.”

  “If he can hold on to it. . . . Change of subject, Somerset There’s something you ought to know. As far as I can make out, Edwin Turbot’s going to back Morrison for Bishop’s Cross. We all thought he’d be behind you, but now. . . .”

  So Tom’s been busy already, Somerset thought. Well, it was only to be expected. Aloud he said,

  “What can Turbot do? Will they listen to him at Bishop’s Cross?”

  “He’s a persuasive man.”

  “I dare say something will turn up. They tell me the Selection Committee at Bishop’s Cross won’t decide till late July. That leaves three months . . . for me to bustle in.”

  “And for others to bustle in.”

  “Morrison won’t bustle.”

  “There are those that’ll bustle for him.”

  “And for me,” said Somerset, scraping a blackhead out of his ear with a jagged finger-nail.

  6

  BUYERS AND SELLERS

  _____________________________________

  “I THOUGHT YOU’D like to know,” Captain Detterling said. Peter Morrison finished his coffee and said nothing. Helen Morrison put her head round the study door.

  “The boys are waiting for you,” she said. “It is Nickie’s last day before school . . . .”

  “Tell them we’ll be right out. You’re strong enough,” said Morrison to his guest, “to bowl a few overs at the nets?”

  “It’ll do me good. So Nickie’s off to school already?”

  “Eight and a half. I thought it’d be jollier for him to start in the summer.”

  “Yes, the summer was always the best . . . . That reminds me, Peter, though I can’t quite think why. Fielding Gray’s back.”

  “Back?”

  “Out of the Army.
You knew about the accident in Cyprus? What happened to his face?”

  “I’d heard. something. Poor Fielding. Nothing ever went right.”

  “I hope it will now. He’s been writing books, and I’ve got Gregory Stern to take an interest.”

  “Good,” said Peter non-committally, and rose to his feet. “What you were saying just now,” he said, “before Helen came in . . . . That’s all?”

  “All I can tell you so far. Edwin Turbot is now on your side. It’s thought that Tom Llewyllyn has been talking to him - as the future son of the house.”

  The two men walked through a door and on to the lawn, at the far end of which Nicholas Morrison stood ready in pads while Jeremy tended gloves like a squire at a tournament.

  “Tom,” said Morrison, “is like a poltergeist. A well meaning one, but apt to create confusion.”

  “I think you will find that he’s more discriminating these days. He’s certainly done a good job on Sir Edwin. But even so, Peter - ”

  “ - Come along, Daddy,” called Jeremy: “Nickie’s waiting.”

  “ - Even so,” persisted Detterling, “it’s time you took the field yourself.”

  “What could I do at this stage?”

  “Show yourself at Bishop’s Cross. Get to know the Selection Committee. And start keeping a very sharp eye on Somerset Lloyd-James.”

  “Come along, Daddy.”

  “I can’t compete with Somerset at his game. You know that.”

  “We want you back, Peter.”

  “Very nice of you, but you must let me get back in my own way.”

  “Daddy.”

  “Your way,” Detterling said, “is much too easy-going ... much too fair for these days.”

  “I don’t know,” said Morrison, and caught the ball which Jeremy had thrown him. “It is possible to bowl fairly according to the rules and yet to be deceitful and aggressive. Come along. We’ll try some elementary tricks on Nickie.”

  “I quite agree with you, dear,” said Jonathan Gamp to Mark Lewson. “You’re way out of your class. Way out of mine too, for the matter of that.”

  They were talking in the dainty drawing-room of Jonathan’s house in Hereford Square.

  “What do you suggest?” said Mark.

  “We’ll have to think, darling. The great thing is to keep the game going. Poor Max may be going off his rocker but he’s still good for lots of lovely lolly. So you must keep finding amusing things to tell him, mustn’t you?”

  “It’s a strain. I’d like to cash in and be done.”

  “Of course you would, darling, but it’s not that easy. People like you are always dreaming of lump sums, when in fact their best hope is to go on drawing small ones. Lazy and greedy, that’s your trouble; always butchering the poor goose because it won’t lay more than one golden eggie at a time.”

  “Well, what do you suggest?”

  “As for that letter, we’ll talk about it in a minute. A little frivolity first, dear. You did say you’d got Max interested in that ghastly Burke Lawrence and his trollop?”

  “If she is his trollop.”

  “Well then, dear.”

  Jonathan unlocked a drawer, produced a small tin and took out a cylindrical capsule with rounded ends and about an inch in length. This he snapped in two; then he held .the broken ends just under Mark’s nose.

  “Not very appetising.”

  “No?” Jonathan threw the remains of the capsule on to the fire. “But expensive. And in certain circumstances - believe me - effective. An oriental recipe for prolonging natural pleasures. Ever seen one of those Japanese pictures of a woman holding a saucer under a man’s nose? Well, that” - he gestured at the fire - “is what the man’s inhaling. And that is what Burke Lawrence is peddling round the place.”

  “Where does he get it?”

  “He’s not saying, dear. And those little jobs aren’t the only things he’s got for sale. He’s got goodies much more dangerous and more expensive - though I don’t touch them myself.”

  “I see . . . and Penelope?”

  “It’s only a guess, sweetie, but I’d say she was helping with transport. She still calls herself a model, right?”

  “Right.”

  “Well, models can haul trunk loads of kit round the place without making anyone suspicious.”

  “Someone’d jolly soon get suspicious if he opened one and found it full of little tins.”

  “Darling. . . . Pills and packets can be sown into dresses. Stuffed into hollow heels of shoes. An ordinary make-up case - all those pots and things - can conceal enough junk to keep half London high for a month. Though mind you, it’s only a guess.”

  “It would certainly explain why he was so polite to her in Venice.”

  “And it’ll make a nice little tale for Uncle Max.”

  “Indeed,” said Mark, “though it’s pity we don’t know where the stuff comes from . . . who’s behind it all.”

  “I think, dear, that that is one of the things it is better not to know. Anyway, you mustn’t be so demanding.”

  “Sorry. . . . Now, what about this letter?”

  “I think Max is right, dear. Approach Edwin Turbot through Isobel, let him see a copy, and then promise to suppress the jolly news for so much a month. On the other hand, you could do worse than try that old crook, Somerset Lloyd-James. It’s right up his street.”

  “He’d print it in Strix?”

  “Not him. Like Max said, sweetie, it’s far more valuable for threatening, and Somerset will love that.”

  “Which of them would pay best?”

  “Hard to tell, darling,” Jonathan said; “Sir Edwin will have more in the bankie, but Somerset’s very resourceful. So why not try a little chat with both parties, and see who’s most forthcoming? Your main trouble will be to get them to believe that the original letter’s authentic without actually letting them get hold of it. If you’re called upon to give a demonstration, you can’t reasonably refuse, but don’t let it out of your hot little hand for a moment.”

  “I’ll make no bones about it,” Gregory Stern said to Fielding Gray. ‘I'm interested in those two novels of yours, but they won’t quite do as they stand.”

  Gregory Stern was a tall, elegant man with a long lugubrious face. He had fussy hands which moved constantly over the buttons on his dark check suit, testing and re-testing for weaknesses and thereby affecting them. His voice, in contrast to his physiognomy, was light and girlish; his eyes candid and intelligent; his teeth much metalled and wired.

  “And another thing,” Stern went on. “Although I hope to publish these novels - provided we agree the alterations - I shall be doing so less for their own sake than for their promise. You see, they’re lacking something . . . something which you’ve deliberately withheld. Detterling here agrees with me on that.”

  He nodded towards Detterling, who was examining a bookcase which contained all Stern publications to date.

  “It is felt,” said Detterling, “that your work could do with more ... of yourself.”

  “These two novels you’ve read,” said Fielding: “there is no place in them for more of myself.”

  ‘I don’t question that,” Stern told him. “As far as they’re concerned, it’s just that they’re both a little too short and too compressed. Some of the technicalities need expansion.”

  “I’ll gladly provide it.”

  “Then you can have a contract this morning. But,” said Stern, his voice fluting slightly, “that contract will bind you to let us publish the next three books you write; and in these we shall look for more . . . well more. . .”

  “Of myself. In what respect?”

  “More emotion rooted in experience . . . which has affected your - well - psyche. These two” - his fingers slid nervously over the typescripts on his desk - “are merely theoretical. Like riders in geometry, which end in a pat solution but offer no . . . human . . . comment.”

  Fielding pointed to his single eye,

  “This?” he said.


  “If you like.”

  A telephone rang, Stern started angrily, tested the buttons on either cuff while he recovered himself, and lifted the receiver.

  “Send him up,” he said after listening briefly. “Tom Llewyllyn,” he announced to the room at large. And then quietly to Fielding, “You don’t mind him being in on this?”

  “I'll be glad to meet him again.”

  “Good. . . . The thing is this, Mr. . . . er . . . Major Gray. I like to publish good books which make money. I don’t expect all that much money and sometimes I’m prepared to make none at all, but in your case I think we’ve got the makings of a minor prestige novelist with a broader appeal than most such. Which means both cachet and cash.” He giggled rather wildly. “Forgive my little joke; I have an old-fashioned taste for puns. Well then ... I think you write good English in the traditional manner and I think, though you have yet to show it, that you have a highly individual approach to - er - the human predicament. The combination promises well ... if I am right. But where is the evidence for this individual approach? Not in these.” He fingered the typescripts. “And yet it is in these - in the strong feeling I get from them of deliberate omission. Now, have you written anything from which you have not omitted . . . what has been omitted . . . here?”

  He drummed on the typescripts, then sat back and clawed at his Old Etonian tie. Tom Llewyllyn entered without knocking, gestured to Stern to ignore him, and went straight on to join Detterling by the bookcase.