The Green Knight

by Iris Murdoch

  Harvey summoned the richly appointed well-lighted lift. He pressed Emil’s various keys into their various keyholes and entered Emil’s beautiful flat. He turned all the lights on. He sat down heavily upon one of Emil’s Chippendale chairs and looked at the Bohemian glass and the silver goblets and the alabaster Buddha and the eighteenth-century snuff-boxes and the Persian rugs and the Caillebotte and the Nolde and the Bonnard. He recalled the previous occasion when he had sat beside Tessa on her bed and their sleeves had touched and they had sat as silent as two statues. Had it started then? But what was it? Was it his idea or hers? And that sad remote angelic smile – was that because they were not in love? What on earth had she expected? Oh God, what a sickening mess he had made of it all! He got up and fetched Emil’s malt whisky from its cupboard and poured it into one of Emil’s Waterford glasses. He felt better. He decided to go to bed. He undressed and got into bed and switched off the light. At once a heavy dreamy peace descended on him. He lay on his back, floating, breathing deeply. He thought, I have slept with an angel, and it was nothing but good.

  ‘I have something to tell you – and something to ask you.’

  Clement was with Louise. It was the next day, the day after Peter Mir’s last ‘manifestation’, as Lucas called it. Clement had telephoned Louise in the morning and had asked if he could come round before lunch. He could not help sounding, as he heard himself speaking, rather pompous and mysterious. Now facing her, he felt even more so.

  It was Saturday and the house was full of the girls. He could hear Moy above moving rhythmically to and fro. (He wondered, is she dancing?) Downstairs in the kitchen Sefton was clattering the plates. Aleph was singing softly in the Aviary, occasionally touching the piano, producing a little note like that of a bird. He could not make out the song.

  Louise was looking smart and neat, her face, not always so tended, discreetly powdered. Clement was aware of the faint smell of the powder as they stood close to each other by her bedroom window. She was wearing a straight brown tweed skirt and a close-fitting light woollen brown jerkin, with a white blouse showing at the neck. She kept touching the collar of the blouse, now smoothing it down, now pulling it up. As she listened to Clement’s solemn statement it seemed to him that she blushed a little and her eyes widened. Was she expecting something from him, something perhaps very different from what he was going to say? As this suddenly occurred to him he felt himself blushing and staring. Then he thought, maybe she thinks it’s about Aleph! At that moment the words of Aleph’s song became clear: ‘When maiden loves she sits and sighs, she wanders to and fro.’ He thought, confused, but it is Moy who is wandering to and fro. And now I shall upset Louise and alienate her and it’s all crazy anyway – Luc is crazy, that terrible dead man is crazy!

  He settled his tie. He too had dressed up. He said, ‘Listen, Louise, this is something strange and odd, and you may not like it.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘It concerns Lucas.’

  Louise’s hand stayed at her collar, touching her throat, pressing it, then unconsciously undoing the top button of her blouse. She frowned and took a step back.

  Clement, aware that he was somehow blundering, went hastily on, assuming a chattering tone which he knew to be entirely unsuitable. ‘Well, there has been a surprise, you know that chap Lucas accidentally killed, well of course you know, well it turns out that he isn’t dead after all, he’s come back, he’s perfectly recovered and he came to see Lucas, isn’t that extraordinary?’

  ‘He’s not dead? Why did they say he was dead and cause all that trouble?’

  ‘He was very ill and – you know the way people seem to die – their heart stops and so on – honestly I haven’t got the details – he was just thought to be dead, or what they call clinically dead, and then somehow recovered.’

  ‘But when did this happen, why didn’t they tell Lucas, why didn’t the doctors tell him – poor thing, all that time thinking he had killed a man when he hadn’t – ’

  ‘I don’t know when it happened, but anyway Lucas went away at once, he vanished, you remember – I expect they tried to tell him but he wasn’t there – the first Lucas knew was the man turning up.’

  ‘Thank God!’ said Louise. She recovered her hand from her throat and made a gesture as of relief and thanksgiving. She pulled the window curtain across a little and sat down in a chair. She neatly adjusted her tweed skirt. She said, ‘Clement dear, thank you for telling me, I shall tell the others. How intensely relieved Lucas must be – and all of us – it’s wonderful! And the poor man, he’s recovered, how splendid! Thank you for coming – did Lucas ask you to come?’

  ‘Yes, but – ’

  ‘I will write him a letter. I’ll go to see him – in a little while – what a wonderful ending to this terrible time.’

  ‘Yes, isn’t it, but – ’

  ‘Of course the man wasn’t a mugger, was he, or a thief, or anything – ?’

  ‘No, of course not – he was perfectly innocent, all that was settled in court, the whole thing was a mistake.’

  ‘Why did you think I wouldn’t like what you had to tell me?’

  ‘I don’t know why I said that, I was stupid to say it – it’s nothing awful – it’s just that – well, he wants to meet you and the girls.’

  ‘Who, dear?’

  ‘The man, the chap Lucas hit.’

  ‘Why on earth should he want to meet us, how does he know we exist?’

  ‘It sounds silly, but when he came to look for Lucas, to reassure him, and Lucas wasn’t there, he went around to look at people he thought knew him, as he thought Lucas might be staying with – ’

  ‘But how did he know?’

  ‘He looked me up in the telephone book and then I suppose he followed me – ’

  ‘But didn’t he tell you?’

  ‘No, perhaps he was too shy, he wanted to wait for Lucas to come back.’

  ‘Of course, to give Lucas that lovely great surprise – I can understand that.’

  ‘Yes, yes, that was it – ’

  ‘So you mean he watched us – how odd – I think I saw him – a man in a trilby hat and a green umbrella – ’

  ‘That’s him.’

  ‘I was a bit frightened. So it was that man! How extraordinary! Yes, I can understand he was waiting for Lucas – it’s a bit weird all the same – and now he wants to meet us – but why?’

  ‘Oh, I think it’s a sort of a whim, he just got interested in you, he thinks you all look so nice, and so ordinary – ’

  ‘Ordinary?’

  ‘I mean, it’s home life, he sees you as home life, he has no family, he’s lonely, he just wants to say hello to you, it’s just to oblige him, I thought you wouldn’t mind seeing him, I know you’d be kind to him, he’s rather shy, a little awkward and slow – ’

  ‘Slow? You mean he’s a bit damaged? Was he mentally damaged by – ?’

  ‘No, no, he’s perfectly OK, he’s just sort of diffident.’

  ‘If it means simply saying hello just once – is it me or the girls too?’

  ‘Actually he wants to see everyone, all the people he was studying, getting interested in, while he was waiting for Lucas, he wants Harvey and Bellamy too, it’s like a sort of little celebration.’

  ‘You mean a party, all together, here? That’s a bit much – ’

  ‘Well, if you don’t object.‘

  ‘I’m not sure whether I object or not. He sounds rather eccentric, I hope he isn’t dotty – oh, all right, whenever you like, only let us know. There’s the bell, I’m expecting Harvey, he rang up and we’ve invited him to lunch. By the way, when are you taking the girls to the Magic Flute?’

  The kitchen was a large room, almost as large as the Aviary, benefiting from an extension made when the family first arrived in the house. It was also as a result of Sefton’s meticulous orderliness, probably the tidiest. Louise had been gradually, to use Sefton’s phrase, ‘phased put’ (in the kindest way of course) of kitchen operations. Sh
e was permitted to cook, or more usually put together from pre-cooked items, her high tea or early supper. Major cooking was done by Sefton and Moy. Breakfast, not cooked, was an unorganised scuffle. Lunch was a serious meal only at weekends. Tea, if it occurred, consisted of tea and available biscuits. Dinner was always (for the girls only) a serious meal. Louise occasionally, now more rarely, joined them, on invitation or by her own request. On weekdays Moy had lunch at school, Sefton and Aleph if out took sandwiches, if at home ate bread and cheese and apples. A long scrubbed table occupied the centre of the room and a long tall dresser with open shelves covered one wall. A table-cloth appeared only for guests. The enormous fridge had been painted blue and green by Moy. There was a washing machine and (in spite of stiff resistance by Moy) a washing-up machine. Moy (Art) maintained a certain feud with Sefton (Order) since Moy had favourites among the plates and cups and mugs which had always to be washed by hand. Knives and forks and spoons were also individuals. As a result (in spite of Art and Order) of persistent breakages, there were no complete sets of anything. Moy preferred this state of affairs, as favouring individualism, and held strong views about the stations, upon the open shelves of the dresser, of particular plates and bowls, and the order, upon their hooks, of the cups and mugs. These patterns, which inevitably varied, had to be learnt by heart by Sefton, who was severely chided if she got it wrong. Moy and Aleph had a habit of buying, if very cheap, pretty china at junk shops. These additions caused, sometimes, contentious alterations in the order of battle, occasioning the dismissal of one-time favourites into invisibility. Washing up or consignment to the machine occurred after every meal however scanty, everything, including the spotlessly clean saucepans, was put away onto shelves or into cupboards or into the capacious larder, and the emptied table was brushed and scrubbed. In these daily and hourly operations Aleph played a fleeting though reasonably regular role, appearing at intervals and inquiring, ‘Can I do anything?’

  On this day, warned of visitors, Sefton had put on the best table-cloth (a king-size sheet from Liberty’s sale), and placed a white cyclamen from the Aviary upon the dresser. She had brought in an extra chair from the hall and one from her bedroom. Clement and Harvey had the sturdiest and most comfortable chairs. Louise sat at one end of the table with Clement on her right and Harvey on her left. Aleph sat next to Clement and Moy next to Harvey, Sefton sat at the other end of the table, nearest to the stove. The main dish (Moy’s creation) was mozzarella and spinach pie with salad. Some cold tongue and salami had been hastily brought in for the carnivores. Then there was to be a treacle pudding and ice-cream (which was supposed to be for dinner.) Then Wensleydale cheese and (on sale at last) Cox’s Orange Pippins. There was no alcohol. Aleph suggested running out to buy some but nothing came of that. Louise kept some sherry for visitors, but confused and bothered by her two self-invited guests, she found no occasion to offer any. Clement’s news had been so extremely odd, she did not know what to think of it, and Harvey had arrived before she had been able to put together any further questions. She was upset by Clement and annoyed at the hasty way he had announced it all, assuming that Louise would agree to meet the mysterious survivor. Of course she felt curiosity, but she also felt anxiety and irritation. What was this gathering or encounter to be like, who would be there, would they want to eat and drink? Would Lucas and his ‘victim’ make speeches? If Bellamy came then Moy and Anax must be absent, unless they could leave Anax with the Adwardens’ housekeeper, and would Moy agree to that? She did not like the idea of this homeless stranger, she had enough troubles without him, he might want consolation, he might want money, he might hang around. Meanwhile, she was aware of Harvey being cross that Clement was present, he had evidently expected a private chat with Louise, and having forgotten it was Saturday was startled to find the girls at home and planning to entertain him. Clement was also on edge, not pleased to see Harvey, and in no mood for a jolly lunch party. The girls had already intuited some sort of chill, and it was already clear from certain arcane signals passing between Sefton and Moy that there would not be enough to go round. The kitchen looked out onto the small garden with its two trees, a birch tree and a cherry tree. Rain drops on the remaining leaves of the birch gleamed blue and orange in the cool clear light of the faintly veiled sun. Moy, who always opened windows, had opened a window. There was a soft noise of traffic and intermittent chirpings and fragments of song from the birds in the garden and in the many other tree-filled gardens. Heavy with rain-water, dark creepers hung upon the brick walls.

  When they had assembled Louise had felt a nervous hasty urge to forestall Clement by telling the news. She did not want Clement to be portentous and make a drama of it, she wanted to calm herself by letting it out quietly, as if she could then see how little it mattered. ‘You know, Clement has just been telling me that that man Lucas was supposed to have killed didn’t die after all, he got better, he’s been to visit Lucas, he’s being very nice about it, he even wants to visit us.’

  ‘Why us?’ said Sefton.

  ‘He recovered!’ said Aleph. ‘Lucas must be relieved.’

  ‘Did he really seem to be dead,’ said Moy, who was very carefully cutting the pie, ‘or was he really all right all along and they made a mistake?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Louise.

  ‘When Lucas was away he came round to look at my place,’ said Clement, ‘and he came round here once or twice and waited about in case Lucas was with you, of course he didn’t want to say anything until Lucas turned up, he’s very shy and modest, he’s really awfully nice.’

  ‘Why, I suppose he was that man we saw,’ said Sefton, ‘do you remember, Aleph?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Aleph, ‘how odd!’

  ‘What’s his name?’ said Moy.

  ‘Peter Mir,’ said Clement.

  ‘How do you spell “Mir”?’ said Sefton.

  ‘M – I – R.’

  ‘That means ‘world’ in Russian,’ said Sefton, ‘it also means peace.’

  ‘World peace,’ said Louise, then thought, that’s a silly thing to say!

  Moy shifted some of the tongue onto a plate and handed it to Clement. ‘Have some salad. There’s basil in the salad.’

  Clement said, ‘Oh good, so that’s the lovely smell.’ He was dying for a drink. There was silence as everyone looked at the various foods. It was evident that the news of ‘the man’ was not proving so sensational after all.

  Harvey felt surprise, but instantly returned to his own troubles, the burden of his leg, and now the terrible thing which had happened yesterday with Tessa, and which he himself had wantonly brought about. How had he been so crazy, so stupid, so depraved? And how could he last night have felt so peaceful and so calm and so good? That must have been the whisky. Now, when it was too late, he realised how valuable, how precious, his innocence, his naivety, his blessed lack of ‘experience’, had been – and what it had been: freedom! Now, he was suddenly the slave of another person. Of course that would never happen again, he would never see Tessa again. But Tessa had stolen a part of his being, or rather he had forced her to purloin it! She said there was now a bond between them – but a bond was the very last thing he wanted. How could she keep her mouth shut? It was not just disgrace, his disgrace, but ridicule, something which would occasion laughter and be passed around as a joke, told to anyone, told to his mother. And even if Tessa were silent – and how could she be – he himself would have to tell, was bound to, was compelled, fated to tell, perhaps with terrible consequences. He had become a deceiver, a liar, and would inevitably blurt out some garbled version of the truth to Aleph, to Louise, to Emil, to Bellamy, to Nicky Adwarden, and finally and catastrophically lose his dignity, and lose his honour. Tessa had made a little speech about love and friendship, and even he, last night, had dreamt about some higher chaster purer love. But what he had done was to destroy forever whatever bond of friendship he had had with that strange girl, and replace it by embarrassment, contempt, disgust, horror, lies, fea
r. And now as he looked around the table at all these amicable innocents he realised how much he had now become an outsider.

  Louise was saying to Clement, ‘Will Lucas come to introduce him? How are we to do it? It really is a lot to ask!’

  ‘Oh Lucas will come!’ said Clement confidently, though he had in fact no idea what Lucas was going to do.

  The girls, talking to one another, were now piling their plates high with salad.

  Harvey said to Sefton, ‘Would you like some of my salami?’

  ‘No, thanks.’

  ‘Oh, of course you – I just haven’t any appetite today.’

  ‘Anax would like some of the tongue. He doesn’t like salami.’

  There was a pause in the conversation. The silence was broken by Moy who said to Sefton, ‘Did you know that sharks have to keep moving or else they drown?’

  ‘Can fish drown?’ said Louise.

  ‘Sharks are not fish,’ said Moy, ‘they’re more like mammals.’

  ‘Why do they have to keep moving?’ said Sefton.

  ‘They have no swim-bladder. Fishes have a membrane which retains oxygen and gives them buoyancy. The shark has to get oxygen by continuous motion.’

  ‘How interesting,’ said Sefton, ‘in what respect do they resemble mammals?’

  ‘No wonder they are so bad-tempered,’ said Louise.

  ‘Moy will be a biologist,’ said Clement.

  Harvey rose abruptly and said, ‘I’m sorry, I must be getting along – ’ He had just thought, perhaps she does this all the time with young boys!

  ‘Won’t you stay for the pudding?’ said Louise.

  ‘No thanks.’ Harvey looked at Aleph.

  Aleph rose. ‘I’ll ring for a taxi for Harvey.’

  ‘Have you got enough money?’ said Louise.

  ‘Yes, thanks. Emil sent me some taxi money.’

  ‘How kind of Emil.’

  Out in the hall, the door closed and the taxi summoned, Harvey sat down on a chair. A livelier chatter was to be heard in the kitchen.