by Iris Murdoch
Cato was appallingly touched. ‘Yes, yes. But the holiness—it doesn’t depend just on ordinary sinful folk like me—it is there, Joe, and it will be there, whatever I do and whatever I think—so you mustn’t—’
‘I know, I know, that’s believing in God. But I don’t believe in God, I believe in you.’
‘Heaven help you!’ said Cato.
The doorway darkened and somebody came swiftly into the kitchen, a tall girl with a ridiculously short dress and a stream of long brown hair.
Cato stared, blinked into the sunlight. ‘Colette!’
They rushed, laughing, exclaiming, into each other’s arms. Cato’s large black shoes and Colette’s flimsy sandals executed a dance upon the slippery greasy floor. The summer dress, the slim shoulders, were enveloped in the old musty cassock. There was a sudden whiff of apples, of flowers, of thin freshly laundered cotton.’
‘Oh my dear, my dear—’ The dance continued for a moment.
Joe had leapt up and was standing by the gas stove, smiling and gaping.
‘Joe, this is my sister.’
‘Come off it, Father!’
‘I am his sister!’ cried Colette. They were all laughing now.
‘May I introduce, Joseph Beckett, Colette Forbes.’
‘Hello, Joe.’ Colette advanced with a beaming face and extended her hand. Joe rather diffidently shook it.
‘He’s called Beautiful Joe.’
‘I can see why! I’m so glad to meet you. Oh isn’t it a lovely day! Oh Cato, I’m so glad to see you. I feel so happy all of a sudden, I just knew I had to see you, and—’
‘Have you had lunch?’
‘Oh I had some sandwiches at the station, I see you’ve had yours—Cato, what a mess, shall I wash up? Look, can I just have that bit of bread and some cheese? But oh dear, I’m interrupting you. I’m so sorry, shall I go for a walk?’
‘No, don’t go for a walk,’ said Cato, still laughing with pleasure. ‘I must just talk to Joe for a moment—could you go upstairs—’
‘No, it’s so nice, I’ll stroll about in the street, just give me a shout. Good-bye then, Joe. Don’t worry, I’ll take the bread with me.’ Colette seized a piece of bread and disappeared through the door into the yard. The gate banged.
Joe sat down again at the table. ‘I say, I say—!’
Cato pressed his hands to his head. Some quite alien spirit of hope and joy had flown into the room with Colette and touched him lightly, as a child touches another child in the game of ‘tig’. ‘Now where was I—Look, Joe, you’d better go now. But I really must talk to you. Come back tomorrow morning and we’ll—’
‘Do you know something, your sister is a beautiful girl.’
‘Is she? Yes, I suppose she is.’
‘I tell you she is. And she’s so—sort of different. No girl ever looked at me like that before, so sort of straight, and shaking hands like a man—All the birds I know just never stop wiggling and giggling—they’re so dumb they don’t know how to put their tights on—Father, do you think, would she come out with me?’
Cato stopped smiling. ‘My sister—come out with you—?’
There was a moment’s silence. Beautiful Joe rose. He picked up his tie from the table, shook it fastidiously, and began to put it on. ‘Father, you’re a bloody snob.’
Cato blushed. The blood rushed hotly to his cheeks, to his brow. Beautiful Joe moved towards the open door.
‘Stop,’ said Cato. He stepped quickly round the table and barred the way. They looked at each other.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Cato, suddenly stammering. ‘It’s—it’s not snobbery—you don’t understand—I don’t know you—’
Joe lowered his eyes. Cato moved aside and the boy stepped out into the sunshine.
‘Joe—please—come tomorrow—please—’
‘Oh—well—yes—’ He turned and sped away, running through the yard and through the gate.
Cato sat down.
Colette came in a moment later. ‘That boy went by me like a—are you all right?’
‘Yes, fine. Have some cheese.’
‘Cato, look at those beetles!’
‘They live here.’
‘This place smells. Can I clean it? I’ll go out and get some disinfectant. Can I stay here with you and help? I could be some use, couldn’t I? I could clean things.’
‘No,’ said Cato. ‘This is no place for you.’
‘You sound so prim and old-fashioned. I’m quite tough, you know. Even though Daddy does think I’m a sex object.’
‘Did he say that?’
‘Well, not exactly. But he’s very upset that I’ve left the college.’
‘So you did decide to?’
‘Yes. Like I wrote you. It was no good. I got home last night.’
‘He’s not really angry though?’
‘Not like he was with you. Perhaps he’s getting resigned to his awful children.’
‘You’re looking lovely,’ said Cato. He took her hand for a moment across the table.
Colette’s hair, dead straight and rather silky, was of a many-hued light brown, a colour of brown salty trees beside the sea, and reached almost to her waist. A number of shorter locks, falling straight and flat, framed her face with an effect like leaves. She had salient cheeks like her brother, but looked thinner and finer with a straight nose and a long mobile mouth which twisted when she smiled. Her eyes were a clear light questing brown. There was a slight gap between her two front teeth. Cato stared at her unmarked radiant face. She looked childishly young and healthy and chaste.
‘Why can’t I stay here, Cato?’
‘This place is closing. They’re going to pull the house down.’
‘Oh what a shame! I do wish I’d come here more. I was afraid to because of Daddy. I either had to lie or to make him cross. Now I don’t care.’
‘You won’t lie?’
‘No, I shall make him cross. When are you going?’
‘Tomorrow or—well, maybe the next day—or—I’m going to stay with Brendan Craddock.’
‘Give him my love, if he remembers me. Do you think I’ll ever become a Carmelite nun?’
‘I hope not!’ said Cato. ‘What are you going to do?’
‘I don’t know.’ She looked at him, with her pleased childish brown eyes. ‘I think I shall just—wait—for the gods—to tell me—what to do—next. Not God. The gods. Daddy wouldn’t understand, would he?’
‘Enjoy the springtime. Don’t be anxious about anything,’ said Cato. ‘It must be so beautiful down at Laxlinden now.’ He sighed. ‘Oh I tell you who turned up here the other day, Henry Marshalson. He’s back from America.’
‘Oh really?’ said Colette. ‘I say, can I have some of that beer? I suppose you haven’t got any wine here, have you, no.’
I wonder if Max ever saw that? Henry wondered to himself.
He was in the National Gallery, examining the most important acquisition made during his absence, Titian’s great Diana and Actaeon. The immortal goddess, with curving apple cheek, her bow uplifted, bounds with graceful ruthless indifference across the foreground, while further back, in an underworld of brooding light, the doll-like figure of Actaeon falls stiffly to the onslaught of the dogs. A stream flashes. A distant mysterious horseman passes. The woods, the air, are of a russet brown so intense and frightening as to persuade one that the tragedy is taking place in total silence. Henry felt such intense pleasure as he looked at the picture, he felt so purely happy that he wanted to howl aloud with delight. Smiling, he sat down nearby.
It was certainly dangerous to tangle with goddesses. Athena was a fearful authoritarian and very austere even with her favourites. Hera was thoroughly vindictive. Artemis and Aphrodite were killers. What poor thin semi-conscious beings mortal men were after all, so easily maddened, so readily destroyed by forces whose fearful strength remained forever beyond their powers of conception. Surely these forces were real, the human mind a mere shadow, a toy. Yet if this was so, why was he s
miling? At least those dolls could adumbrate, in homage, their own frailty. And the piercing joy which he felt now, and which he knew to be so momentary, was surely as real as the gods.
Henry sat quietly, his outer eyes now veiled, and saw another picture. Against an empty blue sky, an empty blue horizon, a masked helmsman takes a fisher king, his queen, his fair-haired child, away to sea, while an old divinity clutches the edge of the boat and an immense wise blue fish lies looking upwards. On either side of this great confident calm are scenes of torture. But Max didn’t get away, thought Henry. He stayed, and the Nazis came and he couldn’t get to America, his America came later. The ruthless gods looked after Max all right, undid him by two wars, made him forget all he ever knew, left him with nothing but a pencil. Years without colours taught him that fearful Gothic stare: Max and his masculine mysticism. Grünewald, Breughel, Van Gogh. Why do I love him so, wondered Henry, why do I feel I am him, when he is so unlike me and I hardly know how to judge him? Sex is everywhere in Max, well, sex is everywhere in art only usually they keep it secret. Max never bothered with secrets. Candles and catfish, lucky old Max: pure vision plus pure egoism, objective perfect happiness. The gods invented space, the fearful space that he spent his life cluttering, lest he should die, and which spreads out so enigmatic and empty and blue behind the masked helmsman and the fisher king. What a nervous crazy self-indulgent artist he was in a way, what a spawner of obese and dotty symbolism, and yet how happy, even the scenes of torture radiate a mysterious joy. And all those manly self portraits. Rembrandt-Beckmann, what it is to be a man. The hedonist, the prisoner, the clown. He was so wonderfully pleased with himself. Oh God, oh God, oh God if only I could paint. Henry’s joy left him abruptly and he began anxiously to think about himself.
He did not look at the Titian again, but scuttled blindly from the Gallery and came out into the bright open light of Trafalgar Square. The sun was shining and the air was full of pigeons. Some golden-white clouds were slowly moving downwards over Whitehall, and Big Ben, visible straight ahead, said eleven o’clock. Henry raced down the steps and hailed a taxi. He was going to investigate Sandy’s secret flat. He had of course said nothing to Gerda and Lucius, and by a few casual questions had confirmed their ignorance of Sandy’s London hide-out. Merriman equally knew nothing. Henry felt a small livid excitement at the thought of penetrating into Sandy’s secret life, though he did not in fact expect to find anything very extraordinary there. There was a sort of lucky dip interest, a prospect as of loot. Of course Sandy was a total Philistine, so there would be no interesting objets d’art. Henry chiefly feared that some trivial discovery might touch his heart.
The taxi took him to a small street at the Kensington end of Knightsbridge, which had progressed rapidly and a little uncertainly from dowdiness to smartness. There were a few shops, mostly selling antiques, small terrace houses painted different colours. The taxi halted and Henry paid. Somewhat to his dismay, the street number which he had hastily copied from Sandy’s lease denoted a large ugly block of flats which had been built at one end of the street, presumably in a gap created by Hitler. The main door stood open. Nervously, rather guiltily, Henry entered the hall. He felt alien, almost criminal, hoping that no one would notice him or speak to him. He stood there irresolutely. Clearly the place was a warren of small flats. How was he to find out which one was Sandy’s, since he had failed to note its number? Then suddenly catching his eye with a white flash, he saw a wooden board, a row of names. Flat 11. A. Marshalson. How strange, how touchingly lost and insignificant the name looked here, unowned and uncared for in the midst of London. Henry advanced to the lift.
The flat was on the third floor. The lift door opened automatically onto a carpeted corridor, windowless and lit by electric light. Henry’s heart had now begun to pound uncomfortably hard as he fumbled in his pocket for the bunch of keys. He reached number 11 and after glancing up and down the corridor, began trying the keys with a hand which was suddenly trembling violently. The third key fitted and turned, and the door opened, scraping a little on the carpet within, and a profound silence came out to greet Henry. He sidled in and closed the door softly. He was in a tiny hall with several doors opening from it. Quickly, before panic set in, he grabbed the nearest door handle. Clearly the sitting-room. He darted about opening doors. Sitting-room, two bedrooms, kitchen and bathroom. Silence. He returned to the sitting-room and looked out of the window. A view of the antique shops, some roofs, a tree or two, and more distantly the fungoid dome of Harrods. He stood still, calming himself down and looking about.
The flat was small and rather cramped. The yellowish carpet from the corridor continued underfoot. Some large dark pieces of furniture, a dominating wardrobe, a big square desk, created equally dark spaces into which nothing else could reasonably fit. A long brand new leather sofa, with the price tag still attached to one foot, stretched diagonally across the sitting-room. The rest of the furniture was shabby and looked as if it had been assembled from the maids’ rooms at the Hall. There were two wobbly bamboo tables with thick green glass ash trays upon them. Some varnished bookshelves were empty except for thrillers and a book about speedboats. All the furniture seemed to lean and push and lower, and Henry found himself instinctively veering and ducking. The atmosphere, stuffy with tobacco smell and with a sweetish odour which Henry could not diagnose, was oppressive, irritating rather than sinister. There were some random prettifying touches: an embroidered footstool, a pair of soapstone elephants, a watercolour of the Hall from a set at Laxlinden. There was also a comical-faced Chinese lion which Henry remembered from long ago. Averting his face from this little presence he hurriedly rifled the drawers of the desk finding theatre programmes, the menu of a club dinner, pamphlets about boats, nothing of interest. Most of the drawers were empty. What after all had he expected? The place was tidy. The beds made. Henry walked about breathing deeply and inhibiting emotion. What came nearest to making him gasp was the provisional almost juvenile nature of it all. Against what had Sandy fought this losing battle? Doubtless he would never know.
Suddenly overcome, Henry ran to the kitchen in search of a drink. He found a bottle of whisky in one cupboard, a glass in another. He automatically opened the refrigerator in search of ice. As he was trying to pull out the ice tray he became aware of some food in the fridge, tomatoes, cress, a jug of milk. He picked up the milk and smelt it. Fresh. Henry considered this. He extracted the ice and put it into the glass. He closed the fridge. Then he noticed a folded newspaper which was lying upon the dresser. He took up the newspaper and looked quickly at the date. Yesterday. With a shaking hand he poured the whisky over the ice and retreated to the sitting-room.
His first thought was that Sandy was not dead at all but living secretly in London. But this was insane. His next thought was that Sandy must have sold the flat. But if the flat had been sold would not the deeds have been passed on to the purchaser? A confused feeling of guilt and fright dimmed Henry’s mind. This was no empty derelict flat, it was someone’s flat. This now seemed obvious. He thought he could hear a clock ticking. He decided to leave at once. He gulped down the whisky and seized his hat. And at that moment he heard the soft tap and click of a key being inserted and turned, and heard the front door scraping across the carpet as it slowly opened.
The sitting-room door was ajar. Henry stood still, paralysed with fright, expecting something unspeakable and uncanny. He could not move or speak. The front door closed. He heard someone sigh. Then the sitting-room door was pushed open and a woman came in. When she saw Henry she gave a little cry.
For a moment neither moved. Henry was rigid, hat in hand. The woman, still with coat and hat on, stood with her hands at her throat in an attitude of terror. Henry, to drown the echo of that cry, relieved too that he was not confronted with his brother, willed himself to speak. ‘I am terribly sorry—I didn’t want to—I am so sorry—my name is Henry Marshalson.’
The woman very slowly moved, taking off her hat which she threw
onto the red sofa which stretched between her and Henry. Then she dropped her handbag onto the sofa and began mechanically to comb back her hair with her fingers, her mouth slightly open, still staring at him.
‘Please forgive me,’ said Henry. He was frightened of her fear. ‘I didn’t mean to alarm you—you see—I’m my brother’s heir—but there must be a mistake—perhaps this is your flat and—’
The woman came round the sofa and sat down upon it, one hand pressed to her heart. He could hear her breath. ‘Excuse me—being here—’ her words were almost inaudible.
‘No, please—it’s for me to—but—I mean—is this your flat?’
‘No—well—you see—he said—he would leave me the flat—in his will—but—’
Henry listened to this murmur, not understanding. He began again. ‘I’m very sorry—’
‘You see—I am—I was—his friend.’
This baffled Henry. He moved, dropped his hat on a chair. ‘I’m afraid I don’t quite understand. You knew Sandy?—’
‘Yes—I knew—Sandy—’
Henry understood at last. ‘I see—I do apologize—I’m being very slow—I quite understand—of course—you—you have been living here with my brother?’
‘He said—if anything happened—I was to have the flat—but of course I didn’t expect him to—and now that you—I’ll move out as soon as—’
‘You certainly won’t!’ said Henry. ‘You must stay here, you must have the flat, I wouldn’t dream of—after all you have a right, and Sandy must have wished—really I am so sorry—I mean about your—loss, your bereavement—How long had you—been with Sandy?’
‘Oh—a long time—it has been a terrible—’
‘Yes. I can understand. Do please feel—that if there is anything at all that I can do for you—’
‘Oh I’ll manage—I’ll be all right—you’re very kind—’
‘After all I feel—responsible—just as if—Oh please don’t cry!’