Hemingway's Chair

by Michael Palin

  ‘Good to ’ave you on board, Sproale.’

  * * *

  Martin remained in shock for much of the subsequent meal. He hardly spoke a word, half the time listening to Marshall, the unquenchable enthusiast, and Devereux, the blunt layman, and the other half running his long fingers discreetly over the slim bulge in his jacket pocket.

  Slowly, as the wine took its effect, he began to recover his confidence. He and Devereux were the only ones drinking and a tacit intimacy had grown between them as the meal went on. By the time Geraldine went out to make coffee and Marshall to make another phone call, Devereux was regarding his lowly employee with mellow benevolence.

  He nodded towards the study from where the faint sound of a telephone conversation could be heard.

  ‘Genius, that lad,’ said Devereux. ‘Fucking bloody genius.’

  Martin, warmly full of relief and Tesco’s house claret, responded with vigorous agreement.

  ‘That’s why the buggers hated him,’ said Devereux.

  ‘Who hated him?’ asked Martin, not quite following.

  ‘The fucking Post Office.’ Devereux jabbed a finger in Marshall’s direction. ‘Just because he was a counter clerk they couldn’t believe he had a brain.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘I spotted him. I didn’t know Jack Shit about computers but if his system could deliver what he promised I could see it was a damn sight better than the one we were about to spend ten million on.’ He reached into a pocket and brought out a packet of Henry Winterman’s cigars. There was one left.

  ‘Gerry!’ he shouted towards the kitchen. ‘You got some matches?’ Geraldine appeared round the doorway and tossed a box of Swan Vestas hard and accurately into his lap. ‘Ta!’

  He looked across at Martin as he lit the stubby, unimpressive cigar. It clearly pained him to be seen putting something so small in his mouth. ‘Used to like ‘avanas, but they didn’t like me.’ He inhaled with a grimace of pleasure and jabbed his head back towards the low sound of Marshall’s voice in the back room.

  ‘In six months’ time, touch wood, fingers crossed, justice will have been seen to be done. And about bloody time.’ He sent a wreath of cigar smoke spinning towards Martin.

  Martin cleared his throat to avoid it looking as if he was coughing on the cigar smoke. It was time to make some contribution.

  ‘Exciting times,’ he said. It seemed to be enough. Devereux nodded thoughtfully.

  ‘And we want to make sure everyone sees it that way.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Martin, uncertainly.

  Another low blue cloud headed across the table.

  ‘And that’s where you come in, of course.’

  Devereux looked up as Marshall returned from the telephone, muttering, shaking his head and prodding at the buttons of a calculator.

  ‘Ah, Nick. I’m just filling Martin in on a little background.’

  Marshall shook his head, set the calculator aside and took a mandarin orange from a fruit bowl on the side. He sat across the coffee table from them. Devereux watched him for a moment, almost as a father might a son, then turned his attention back to Martin.

  ‘We see your role, Martin, as our man on the ground in Theston. The man who knows the territory. The ‘uman territory. You’re a local lad, Martin. People like you. People trust you. Very important that. You can keep your ear to the ground. People like me have to keep a professional distance.’

  ‘I understand,’ said Martin.

  They both watched Marshall for a moment. He took out a penknife and sliced into the mandarin orange with surgical precision.

  ‘It’s also very important to us, Martin, that we maintain the best possible relations with the Town Council and in particular with the Planning Committee.’

  Devereux paused. Marshall finished work on the orange and began popping the immaculately pith-stripped segments into his mouth.

  ‘The Chairman’s quite well known to you, I believe?’ Devereux asked.

  Martin looked uncertain.

  ‘Frank Rudge. You’re friendly with the family, I hear.’

  At this Marshall looked quickly up from his orange. Martin gave a non-committal nod of the head. ‘Yes. I know the family.’

  Devereux put his brandy glass down on the edge of the table and, leaning forward, tugged at his socks, pulling and straightening them elaborately. ‘Tell me, Martin, I’ve heard rumours to suggest that not everything Frank Rudge has done in his life has been altogether … on the level.’

  ‘Frank? He’s straight as a die.’

  Martin knew the talk about Frank, but Frank had been a good friend to his mother and as far as Martin was concerned the constant repetition of the rumours only irritated him.

  ‘Pleased to hear that,’ said Devereux, immediately suspicious. He took his glass again and cradled it. ‘Was it always so?’

  ‘There’s always rumours in a place the size of Theston.’

  ‘What sort of rumours?’

  ‘Well, a long time ago he had a fish processing plant that went of out business. People lost money. Him included. That’s all.’

  Devereux nodded. ‘Interesting. Very interesting.’ He reached for the ashtray. ‘You see, the people we get involved with have to be dead straight, Martin. If they’re not we have to know.’ He ground the remains of his cigar into a dark, wet little mess. ‘We have to know their weak points.’

  There was a silence.

  ‘Do you read me?’

  Martin nodded.

  ‘Good lad!’ Devereux struck the table top and grinned. ‘Sproale, if things go well your days behind the counter are definitely numbered.’

  ‘You’ll be able to buy a second bicycle,’ said Nick.

  ‘Be able to buy the fucking factory,’ said Devereux.

  * * *

  Geraldine drove Martin home. Forcefully. She raced down the narrow lanes and revved out of the corners and it sobered him up dramatically.

  ‘There might be something on the road,’ Martin said anxiously as a particularly dark and leafy corner raced towards them.

  ‘Did you know there’s a higher risk of hitting a hedgehog at thirty than at sixty?’ she shouted, as the corner unwound and the bypass loomed ahead.

  ‘I was thinking of cyclists.’

  ‘Shouldn’t be out at this time of night,’ she laughed, braking sharply and just early enough to avoid a southbound forty-foot trailer.

  When they reached Marsh Cottage she turned to him. ‘I’m sorry you had to go through all that.’

  Martin reassured her. ‘I’m all right. Not used to cars, that’s all.’

  ‘No, not the driving.’ She pushed the heater up a notch and pulled up the collar of her tweed overcoat. ‘The evening. It must have seemed pretty strange to you. I could see what you were going through. I could tell it wasn’t your cup of poison.’

  Martin had begun to open the door. Now he paused. For some reason he trusted Geraldine. ‘Did I do the right thing?’ he asked.

  Geraldine grinned. ‘Don’t ask me. I’m just the maid. I do as I’m told.’

  Martin nodded slowly. ‘Well I did ask you. Did I do the right thing?’

  ‘What do you think?’ She reached forward to the dashboard, pulled back the heavy sleeves of her overcoat and pressed in the automatic lighter.

  ‘How did you get involved with Nick?’ Martin asked.

  ‘Agency,’ she replied. ‘Employment, not dating. They advertised. I was,’ she smiled to herself, ‘between jobs, as we say in the theatre.’

  ‘Who’s they?’

  ‘Nick’s company. Shelflife. Nick and John Devereux are the directors. I’m the workforce.’

  She flicked open the glove compartment. ‘Want one of these?’

  ‘No, I don’t smoke.’

  ‘There’s not much tobacco in them.’

  Martin looked again.

  ‘Are they…?’

  ‘My life-savers,’ she said and chose the longest and thickest of half a dozen carefully prepared joints.
The dashboard lighter, having heated up, clicked out, and she took it and carefully applied the glowing filament to the loose paper. It smouldered and a piquant aroma filled the car. Geraldine took in the smoke unhurriedly. For a moment she was quite preoccupied. Then she let it drift slowly out again. She rolled the window open a crack. The smoke was snatched out by the cold night air.

  ‘Just so you know the game, Martin,’ she said matter-of-factly, ‘Nick, Devereux and me have our salaries paid through an offshore subsidiary of Nordkom. They pay bloody well. Whatever we get from the Post Office is a bonus.’

  ‘Oh my God,’ said Martin, not bitterly or even angrily.

  ‘Don’t feel bad,’ said Geraldine. ‘It’s the way things get done nowadays.’ She offered him the joint. ‘Welcome to the real world.’

  Twenty-one

  The sound of an alarm, emitted from a 1932 Ingersoll traveller’s clock, had been drilling into Martin’s consciousness for quite some time before he was awake enough to deal with it. He turned off the alarm and lay for a moment trying to think if there was any other man-made mechanism which was designed to be stopped as soon as it started working, when, quite suddenly, the extraordinary events of the night before flooded his memory like a wall of water from a newly breached dam.

  He sat up sharply in bed as if to anchor himself against the torrent of names and faces and places and plans and feelings. Though draughts of cold air were squeezing in from around the window he felt a sudden flush of nervous warmth.

  He thought he remembered where he’d put the money but when he looked over to the chair on which his jacket lay draped there was no sign of the buff envelope. He hadn’t imagined it, surely he hadn’t imagined it. Maybe it would be better if he had. He jumped out of bed and grabbed the jacket and went through every pocket. All were empty.

  Then he saw the door of the medicine cupboard was open and he remembered putting it in there, behind his most precious bottles, after a long talk with Papa.

  He took it out, turned it over in his hand, regarded it for a moment with fearful fascination and replaced it carefully. He locked the cupboard and, barely aware of the inhospitable darkness outside, began to dress.

  * * *

  He passed a restless day at work, left punctually at five and cycled furiously back to Marsh Cottage. Ten hours after he had left it he was back in his room changing swiftly and purposefully from his work clothes to his visiting clothes, which were exactly the same but newer. Van Heusen cotton shirt, Viyella sweater, creaseproof cotton and polyester trousers. When he’d finished he took the envelope in and out of the medical cabinet several times before finally removing five of the fifty-pound notes from it and replacing them behind the bottles.

  Hemingway’s chair had not been far from his thoughts all day long. Now the lightly bulging envelope he held in his hand began to take on a mystical significance. It was surely a sign that he had been predestined to have the chair. Could there be anyone else in the country who deserved it more than he did, who would look after it with more tender care?

  Possessing the chair would be enough. He would never ask for more.

  As he combed his hair he avoided Papa’s eye. Today, for the first time, he had seen something in the Master’s expression that he had not been aware of before. Rather than watching him, thanking him for being there, sharing the moment, there was, behind the big sad eyes, a look of pity. Well, thought Martin, if he were trying to give him some sort of moral lesson, this was not the time.

  Before he left the room Martin took out a bottle of grappa, wrapped it in a scarf and laid it carefully at the bottom of his bag. There was something to celebrate.

  * * *

  When Ruth opened the door of Everend Farm Cottage to find Martin standing there, his breath forming visible clouds in front of him, his nose reddened like a gnome’s in the bitter cold, she wisely, but with difficulty, kept from laughing.

  Martin smiled nervously. She held the door open and he moved quickly inside. Ruth watched him as he dropped his bag down on the sofa, felt in his pocket and carefully laid fifteen brand new fifty-pound notes on the table.

  Ruth was impressed. ‘Great-grandmother’s legacy? Bank raid?’

  Martin was biting his lip hard. ‘It’s all there. You can count it.’

  Ruth fingered the money. The new logs that Mr Wellbeing had cut for her hissed and spat from the fire.

  ‘You’re serious.’

  ‘I had more money in my account than I thought.’

  Martin began to hum as he pulled at the zip on his anorak. It was an odd, uneasy sound and Ruth had never heard it before. For the first time since she had met him, Ruth sensed that he might not be telling the truth and she was intrigued.

  ‘You mean you cashed in your life savings for a one-legged chair?’ Ruth did laugh then. ‘I think Papa would have appreciated that.’

  ‘Don’t mock.’

  ‘I wasn’t mocking, Martin. Hemingway had a sense of humour. You must know that.’

  ‘Not about himself. He didn’t like to be laughed at.’

  Ruth nodded uncomfortably. Martin’s face was solemn and tense.

  ‘He wouldn’t like you to have said that.’

  ‘No, well, look, how about a drink.’

  Martin didn’t move from the table. There was no trace of a smile on his face. ‘I think maybe you should apologise before we drink.’

  Ruth laughed nervously. ‘Look, I’m sorry for what I said, Martin. It was a light-hearted remark. No big deal.’

  ‘You goddamn well meant it though, didn’t you?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s what you think about me isn’t it? You think there’s something perverted about a man of thirty-six who keeps Hemingway in his room.’

  Ruth shrugged and laughed again. ‘Everyone’s entitled to live their life the way they want,’ she said.

  ‘But you want some of the action too, don’t you? You want the dirty, lousy pervert to help you to meet Mr Hemingway. That’s what you said. You want to get to know him. You want some of the dirt. Isn’t that right? Isn’t that what you want?’ Martin was advancing slowly towards her.

  ‘Come on Martin, let’s have a drink. I’ve made some –’

  ‘Well if you want to meet him you have to be a little careful of what you say, because he’s a difficult man sometimes. Especially with women.’

  Ruth edged towards the kitchen. Martin kept on coming. ‘So maybe you should apologise for being such a goddamn hypocrite.’

  Ruth tried to smile, but it was hard. She knew she must stay calm. Then he lunged at her, stopping only inches from her face, right fist raised and tightly clenched. ‘Okay … apologise…’

  ‘Martin!’

  ‘Apologise, you damn bitch!’

  ‘Martin, I’m sorry for what I said.’

  Martin stopped, beamed and pulled off his bobble-hat. ‘Pretty good eh?’

  ‘What are you doing?’

  Martin tossed his hat on to the table. ‘That was Ernest,’ he said simply, and his face broke into an engaging, almost schoolboyish smile.

  Ruth shook her head slowly. ‘God, you bastard. That was good. Look at me, for Christ’s sake. I’m shaking.’

  Martin removed his bicycle clips, pulled open the Velcro sealing on his anorak pocket and slipped them inside.

  ‘Don’t ever do that again.’

  ‘I thought that’s what you wanted.’ Martin pulled off the anorak and hung it behind the door.

  Ruth leaned back against the kitchen doorway. ‘Jesus, I need a drink.’

  * * *

  Later, when they had eaten, Ruth put the money away in a safe place and promised to ring her dealer friend in the morning. Martin remembered the grappa was at the bottom of his bag. He retrieved it and they sat beside the fire and clinked glasses. The first, sharp, eye-watering shock of the spirit took them by surprise, as usual. They sat and watched the fire until Ruth looked up.

  ‘I think we have to make some ground rules,’ she said.


  ‘For what?’

  ‘For the exchange of Hemingway information.’

  ‘You sound like a schoolteacher.’

  ‘Well, you forget, Mr Sproale, that I am a teacher. That’s my job.’

  ‘What? Pretending that Ernest Hemingway really wanted to be a woman?’

  ‘Teaching English to the people of New Jersey.’

  ‘Why don’t you just tell them to go and read his books? Why do they need to know how long he slept with his mother or how old he was when he stopped wearing dresses?’

  ‘We’re talking about his relationship with mothers and wives here, Martin. Aren’t you interested in what they were like too?’

  ‘No. I’m interested in him. He was special. They weren’t. They didn’t write A Farewell to Arms. They didn’t write The Old Man and the Sea or For Whom the Bell Tolls. They didn’t fight in wars or win the Nobel Prize.’

  Ruth shook her head angrily. ‘Do you think Hemingway would have written A Farewell to Arms if he hadn’t fallen in love with Agnes Kurowsky? Why did he dedicate For Whom the Bell Tolls to Martha Gellhorn? He shaped his life around women, Martin. You can’t have one without the other.’

  ‘Of course there were women in his life. They loved him. Women loved him. I’m not surprised. But they did what women do. They cooked for him and cleaned for him and gave him children and looked after his houses and his friends but they didn’t write a single word of his books.’

  ‘May I ask you a question as you, rather than him?’

  ‘It’s up to you. You’re the one who wants the rules.’

  ‘What do you think about women?’

  Martin stared into the fire. ‘I like women,’ he said, slowly. ‘But I could do without them.’ He paused. ‘I don’t think I could do without him.’

  Ruth didn’t reply immediately. She leaned over to the log basket and picked out the two remaining lengths of cherry wood. She laid them on the hot but dying fire and knelt to watch them burn.

  ‘May I suggest just one ground rule, Martin?’

  ‘All right. I’ll let you have one.’

  ‘That both of us accept the possibility that we may be wrong.’

  He chuckled. Then he held out his hand to her. ‘Okay, daughter. It’s a deal.’