Dadaoism (An Anthology)

by Oliver, Reggie

  That was then. You’ve convinced me there has to be.

  I’m not sure.

  I am. Trust me. I go to the police. There’s evidence he did it.

  Wha— There’s evidence—they find evidence he did it, if you’re right.

  If I get it right. What then? They’ll go to him. He’ll deny it! And there’s nothing I can do about it.

  “There must be something you can do; it’s fraud, embezzlement or something.” He starts. Is it what I said?

  It’s more that you said it—also what you said.

  It seems all right to me. It is embezzlement.

  It’s I didn’t expect it. I’d got used to the other way, which I didn’t expect either.

  You don’t know what I’m talking about (you do that too), and I expect you to know. If you don’t, who does? I shouldn’t expect anything. Take it as it comes, and it keeps on coming. Go on. It is embezzlement. What’s next?

  Of course he’ll deny it. Didn’t he deny it to you? Of course he didn’t; you haven’t found the evidence yet you’re sure’s there and I’ve to trust you is—not your word, you. What’s the difference?

  I should take the evidence I’ve found, once I’ve found it, to him? before I take it to the police?

  Wouldn’t the police expect you to have?

  He smiles. It’s a game to him. He smiles more. I suppose I should be happy he’s taking it so lightly. I’m happy. For him. I’m not happy; I feel very uneasy about this.

  You think I’m happy! Sorry.

  I’ve found the evidence. I take it to him. (Thank you.) He denies it.

  He might admit it.

  Admit? He laughs, that’d be too good to be true, unless he’s been doing it too, without me knowing!

  He has, without your knowing.

  Yes. (That’s for me.) But I’ve got to think about it from his side too. Too good. He’d deny it anyway. I have to take it he’d deny it. I take it to the police.

  You’re right.

  So why isn’t he? I’ve kept him at the glass entrance door and he never goes through it. I don’t think he ever will. What do I do? Keep on keeping him at it. “Whether after you’ve seen him or you haven’t, at some point you must go to the police,” I impress on him. He agrees;

  I might not have to...,

  and promptly back-slides. From the door too.

  If I don’t have to, it’s better. I’ve an idea.

  What? I want to know.

  Let me think. It’s difficult. It’s an idea you gave me, not one of yours, mine, I want to think through the way you do, to see if it’ll work. You’ve helped me, but...

  He needs to do something without my help. I understand.

  While he’s thinking, I’m thinking to think myself, to have something to do, but not knowing what his idea is I’ve nothing to work on. He got his idea from me but it isn’t mine. My idea was he should take reasons for suspecting Kenneth Roy to the police. His idea—no, it was also mine, wasn’t it?—was he should take his reasons for suspecting him first to Kenneth Roy, because the police’d expect him to have—my idea, definitely. His follows from that. What is it?

  He takes reasons for suspicion to Kenneth Roy, who denies it was him, but does see how he might be suspected and if it’s Robert taking grounds for suspicion of both of them to the police it’ll be him rather than Robert who’d go to prison for a crime he didn’t commit—or crime he did? Robert didn’t commit, Kenneth did? Isn’t that the same thing, and tautology? It only wouldn’t be if he, Kenneth, didn’t, and he, Robert, did. Whichever, whoever, he doesn’t want to go to prison for it.

  Robert did; that means he’s innocent.

  An innocent man wouldn’t want to go to prison! I’m presupposing even a guilty man wouldn’t; he’d want to get out of the consequences of his crime if he could, though he might think he should go to prison, in that sense want to: and he’d want to if he were innocent of the crime himself but responsible for not preventing somebody else do it, Robert’s that good.

  I’m not that good. I might want to prevent somebody’s going to prison for a crime he did I should’ve prevented him doing, but he did it. I might not want him to go to prison anyway, but I wouldn’t want him to get away with it either.

  Forget me! It’s because I believe Robert would let somebody away with a crime I’ve been trying to make sure he doesn’t. Guilty or innocent, Kenneth Roy wouldn’t want Robert’s taking grounds for suspicion to the police. Robert has the edge I’ve given him. He’s going to get away with it—not going to the police—or let him get away with it—the guilty one—Kenneth is—to avoid being suspected himself; and I’m responsible for it. I do feel like going to prison; an innocent man can want to. Robert could be innocent and want to.

  I’m become aware, barely able to make him out among the foliage and trees by the edge of the Avenue, below where it bends, there’s a man. There. Possibly the one I was thinking about—what are the chances of that! Mibby coming to as I am—too coincidingly to be coincidental (?): He’s been listening in! or I was—or we were thinking concurrently. It might be clearer what when he speaks. He’s not speaking. He’s waiting for me to. I’m not speaking first to a strange man. If I pass on up, he could cut me off, and if I go back the way I came he can catch up on me. My best bet is to run towards, surprising him, dodge past and away across the boggy field beyond, which’d slow him down more than me if I did, though I don't feel in any danger. I’ll speak.

  It’ll work. Here we are, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, plotting Duncan’s murder.

  ! In Bellahouston Academy? It could be any school. Why not in a school? Murder can be plotted anywhere, better in a school, in innocent surroundings, the better for dramatic contrast and cover; nobody’d think we were talking murder, and she’d be right, we’re not. It’s bound to be a woman; a man would think nothing of it.

  Which am I? He thinks because he played Macbeth, he is, because he plays the man, he is. Oh that’s not fair; Robert doesn’t play the man more than his appearance insists. Does he?

  I’m not plotting. Who’s Duncan?

  He’s not saying much.

  I’m listening. It’s fascinating.

  I’m also forgetting whatever hasn’t just occurred or isn’t about to, like walking on a very small sphere with a near-to horizon, except I’m not walking and the sphere’s not rotating beneath my feet—so much for that analogy—and the actual horizon, if I could see it, through buildings, is where I’d suppose it usually is if I were where I am—

  Where’s that?

  Was that you or him?—in the street, going to or from school; it’s hard to decide which.

  Your analogy’s good, as far as I can make out.

  Kenneth Roy!

  He made an odd rising, revelatory emphasis on ‘Roy’.

  See; I’ve forgotten where I was already.

  Wasn’t there a Scottish king called Kenneth?

  Why’s he asking me? He must think I know, being better educated than him. He wouldn’t think that—from his expression, as if he heard me—but I might be in history; he’d concede that. School. Near enough; we’re in the precincts, within the railings of the old school. It could be Parkshot. Richmond. He’s never been there. He’s been to Richmond. He hasn’t been... I could be imagining him there. I’m imagining this. All of it?

  Some.

  Part. Which part? There must be some criteria for distinguish­ing what’s imagined from what’s real. I am. I could be imagining the I (I’m imagining part of this with) without that I knowing or, of course not, able to imagine who’s imagining it, or being imagined with that capability—why not?—but not in my case, because I can’t imagine who’s imagining me, unless it’s him, who may be part of my imagining per se or that part I’m able to imagine who is really the I imagining me imagining I’m imagining him; or—to all before—he’s imagining me, I’m not real at all, there’s no alter ego behind me, I, the I I feel myself to be etc., is a figment not of his imagination but of his alter ego. ’
s.

  I couldn’t imagine you. I couldn’t imagine this, not in a million years.

  Could your alter ego—if you have one?

  No. The simplest answer’s no, but, for what it’s worth, it’s the background you imagine. You and I are real against it, in relationship one to the other, equally real.

  Real but not equal; you knew it’s the background I—not you?—imagine.

  I don’t see it.

  So how...?

  You tell me. All I see is the reality.

  Perhaps equal: I imagine; you know reality. I’m a history teacher! Was. Am—will be again—a teacher. I can know reality too. That’s not bad. I might be. If I am I should know. MacAlpin?

  Yes. That was about Macbeth’s time.

  Before. You can’t draw the analogy too far. Who’ve you murdered, Robert?

  Who am I about to!

  Duncan. I remembered; and that was from some time ago.

  Symbolically. Really Kenneth—not really. Symbolically there too.

  Can he murder someone before his time? He might symbolically. Who is he? I called him Robert. Kenneth’s not Duncan; he’s not Macbeth. Robert the Bruce? John the, John Bruce; that’s me, absolutely no connexion, a total irrelevance. Who’s Robert the Bruce? I know things I don’t know I know. I open my mouth and the right words come out, the words he takes as the right ones, so they might not be; it’s just he’s making them right, by his understanding of them. Or it is plotted, that’s why they’re the right words; I would say them, he would understand them aright or the way he does, he has to, we have to, but it isn’t us doing the plotting. It’s—Shakespeare! Let’s find out. I open my mouth: Your best production.

  Did you see it!

  You told me about it.

  You said you’re not plotting but you are helping me plot—there’s no other word for it—against somebody else.

  Screwing your resolution to the sticking point.

  Yes! That’s plotting, we’re plotting—you are.

  But not to do evil. I’m not plotting, you’re not, it’s not plotting if it’s not to do evil. If it’s for you to do good,

  You think what I’m going to do—you don’t know what I’m going to do, right enough, but you know enough to know it isn’t... If you think that’s good, what d’you think evil? Good? I think it’s evil. It is evil. And you’re helping me do what I wouldn’t if you hadn’t. That makes you—does that make you?—more evil than I am. It doesn’t make you good. I always thought you were good. Is it possible to be good yourself and help somebody else do evil?

  It must be, if what you’re doing is evil. Mibby it isn’t.

  It is. It is. And you’re helping me do it.

  If it is, don’t do it.

  I have to.

  It’s a necessary evil.

  To me, for the bad I did, not to you. Are you going to use the excuse because you don’t know what I’m going to do you’re not responsible for it? You’re not. I’ll let you. I think that’s why I haven’t told you.

  It’s evil. I don’t know it but do know you’ve done bad, and have made it possible for you to do an evil you wouldn’t otherwise do. It doesn’t look good.

  I can’t use that excuse. I can’t use an excuse. I don’t need one. I’m good. I do good. I can’t do evil, because I’m good, yet I’ve incited someone who isn’t good, who has done bad, to do evil, who is going to do evil. How can I do that without being evil, even more evil, myself?

  Thank you, Robert, for posing a most interesting, the most interesting, metaphysical question.

  Is that all it is to you! you are evil.

  That would be an answer, but not the answer.

  What’s the answer?

  I don’t know. You’ve just posed the question. I do need time to think.

  Why have you been helping me?

  You’re my friend

  Because I’m your friend, you’re helping me, though I’ve done wrong, am bad; and because I’m your friend you’ll help me do evil. That makes—

  No.

  But you’re helping me do evil, to another.

  No! He deserves it. It’s justice. It’d be evil if you let him off with it, if I let you off with letting him off with it. If you do, as I think you’re going to, though I shouldn’t be telling you that’s what I think, at least I’ll have done all I could do to stop you except for telling you what I think you’ll do.

  That’s not what I’m going to do.

  So telling you what I thought made no difference; you’d’ve done it anyway.

  I’ve not done it yet. I would—will? do it. Telling me what you think there makes no difference to that. Telling me what you thought, what I thought you were telling me, what you were thinking, though I’m not sure it is what you were thinking if what you’re thinking is I’ll let him off. It’s the opposite, isn’t it?—That thinking made all the difference.

  You’re not going to let him off? I was afraid you might. Telling you what I thought was to make as sure as I could you didn’t, and you’re not; I’ve succeeded.

  Let him off what? What’s he done? If you know something,... You don’t know him. You don’t know of him either. Have you heard something I should know about?

  You know about it. I heard it from you. He ran off with money.

  I can’t decide whether you’re a fool or an evil genius.

  I didn’t think anybody thought me a fool, though I recognize he might share Robert’s indecision—from the similarity of expression—so he might decide I’m a fool, and I don’t like his thinking that but better that than his thinking I’m an evil genius. Why evil? Couldn’t I be a genius without the evil? Best he doesn’t decide. But given the choice, fool or evil genius? Fool, he can’t decide is evil genius, because once he decides I am I’d better be the other. So, evil genius, he can’t decide is a fool unless he’s a fool, who lets out his evil genius on whom he decides is a fool without an evil genius of his own.

  You believe I didn’t do it!

  On his relief I believed him, amazement rather, I doubt. It isn’t doubt; it’s certainty he did it: a fissure opens in the pavement beneath my feet, of the road to school, or from, from, or to, the underground, not the school. From the school, to the underground, okay? This is no time to get pernickety, with fissures opening in pavements beneath one’s feet when one should be able to put one foot after the other or stand in trust fissures won’t or what is the world coming to? a world where nothing may be trusted except one’s own man to get one through it nimbly (as I’m talking, I watch me lose my footing, when I’m almost across—the road—fall, and, after waiting to make sure, don’t get up again, at the last step. Everybody falls at the last step, my man makes no exception for me) an exciting world, as in fact it is, though, now you mention it, the pavement hasn’t actually opened up and, now I look more closely, isn’t actually a pavement. What is it?

  A carpet. It’s the carpet.

  And the streets are paved with gold! Actually,..?

  Isn’t that London, not Glasgow? It’s the streets of Glasgow are paved with gold. That doesn’t sound right. It is London, where the streets aren’t, yet here I am in Glasgow and the streets are, are they? I should never have left. They paved them to show I shouldn’t. They should’ve paved them before. I’d’ve left anyway. I can always visit Glasgow’s golden streets before the greedy people they lure prise up the paving stones. It’s an excuse to increase the police force, to stop stealing, but really to control people. You’d better pay them well. However well, how long before the corrupt police burst in, from the outskirts, and sweep all this away? You’d be better off with concrete.

  It’s not practical.

  He’s actually considering it, when he believes it’s carpet. Boy, I’m good; I can make people believe anything. Almost.

  Actually it...? I can’t quite see it. It looks like a room. He wants me to accept it’s carpet. I wouldn’t take his word for anything. Nothing’s certain, except he did it: the ground’s falling from under
me, or floor—ground’s often called floor, though floor... I’m falling! I haven’t fallen. I’d felt I was. I’m standing opposite Robert in a room. Is this the reality? or the pavement before. Standing’s constant to both, but if one or the other isn’t real, standing in it might not be either. Now I can’t see anybody or anything—my eyes have shut. I’m blinking?—everything’s falling away from me; I’m lost. Fear, turbulence, hate—is it hate? Loathing, self-loathing—blackness, despair, evil—is it evil? It’s bad certainly—irrupts in or I into it. I’m drowning, except my head’s above what isn’t water. I’m too concerned with saving myself to dimly register Robert’s distant words,

  I told you. I practically told you. I did tell you.

  This is no time to be admonishing me. Why isn’t he helping, holding out a hand? I’d help him. He’s looking at me in belief I don’t need help, can help myself; or holding onto his compo­sure. What’s discomposing him? I’m the one in turmoil. Why am I? He can’t detect mine for his own. Why is he?