by Mark Lawson
At seventy-one (this age specified), his academic career over, the widowed Silk – blaming the death of his wife, Iris, on the stress caused by the ruin of his reputation – has spent two years writing a memoir of his fall, called Spooks, and is involved in an intensely sexual affair with Faunia Farley, a thirty-four-yearold uneducated woman who works as a cleaner at Athena College and the local post office. She is estranged from her husband, Les, a psychotic Vietnam veteran who is taken to Asian restaurants under supervision as part of therapy for his hatred of people who remind him of the region in which he fought.
Yet neither the academic scandal nor the sexual folly are Silk’s biggest humbling. His life coming to resemble one of the Greek tragedies he taught – the final section, the fifth act, begins with the tolling words ‘Two funerals’ – it is revealed that the professor ruined by an accusation of racism was himself born black but, being light-skinned, was among those who, in the pre-Civil Rights era, were able to pass as white.
Reader Review: The Human Stain was not quite Tom’s favourite among the novels of Philip Roth, the American writer he most admired – that was The Counterlife, with its unnerving reversals of perspective – and its status had been further lowered by the poor movie version in which the casting of Sir Anthony Hopkins as Silk turned it into the story of a Welsh academic who had pretended to be Jewish in order to prevent anyone knowing that he had once been a young black actor who looked nothing like him. He had always, though, considered it Roth’s cleverest title, the stain referring both to the pigmentation of skin and the mess left on Monica Lewinsky’s dress by the President.
But re-reading the novel during the summer of his own suspension from teaching was a lesson to Tom in how experience changes perspective. When he had read this hardback copy in 1998 – mainly on a beach in Sicily, he thought, a suspicion confirmed by a trickle of sand when he opened the pages – he had seen it as a story about race relations.
Now he was struck by the extent to which Roth details the departmental infighting. Because of old career grievances – his appointment to a job others wanted or his position on the opposing side of a departmental debate – faculty colleagues refuse to support Silk over the allegations. And, in a logic that Tom now entirely recognized from the Traill report, one of the complainants, challenged over his failure to attend any of Silk’s classes, explains that he was too frightened of the possibility of suffering racism from the professor to turn up. Though it reduced the resale value of a still fairly pristine English first edition, Tom scored three exclamation marks in the margin.
Tom had always been dismissive of members of Helen’s and Emma’s book-group who judged fiction purely by the extent to which the central characters matched – or did not – their own experience and values. But now he had no doubt that, although Tom had personally never pretended to be anything except white, Coleman Silk was, otherwise, him.
What most surprised him was that his clear memory was of Silk being sacked by the obtuse campus yes-woman Dean Roux. In fact, he resigns, wrong-footing many colleagues who had merely been using the ‘incident’ as an excuse publicly to adopt liberal positions but had not been seeking his expulsion. Although he would almost certainly have won his case, Silk could no longer tolerate a place that could question his integrity with such malevolence and incompetence.
Tom came to a decision. Once he had been cleared, he would leave and find a job elsewhere. If his life subsequently continued to mirror Coleman Silk’s, there would at least be the consolation of a torrid affair with an illiterate erotomaniac half his age. But then, admittedly, the drawback of violent death and the revelation that his entire life had been a lie.
The Upside of Ruin
While comparing symptoms of trauma and stress or medical treatments for them, Ned and Tom also swapped anecdotes of kindly interventions. A revered broadcaster, whom Ned had met only occasionally at the BAFTAs or in BBC ‘talent’ boxes at Wimbledon and the Proms, sent a handwritten note offering to ‘help out’ with legal costs needed to resist this ‘persecution’, leading Ned to wonder, from the malicious questioning that had become his mental default, if the man himself was concerned about, or had even already suffered, the Millpond knock.
Then, so soon after many of the same people had bought lavish birthday presents for him, there were the gifts delivered almost daily, by van or hand, to a front door that Ned no longer dared open himself: bouquets (most, because of his allergies, immediately redirected to a nearby hospice), wicker baskets of mini muffins, ribboned presentation boxes from chocolatiers, several half-crates of his preferred Riojas, and, most imaginatively or perhaps egotistically, Amazon gift-wrapped box sets of little-known shows about deputy mayors of Seattle that wellwishers had enjoyed themselves. But, although the wine and the DVDs were the most practical and pleasurable offerings, they also alarmed Ned because they defined him as a man with no work: free to spend hours watching TV, with a hangover if necessary.
Tom, who moved in less high-earning circles, received a bounty more modest in content but not volume. Ciara Harrison, Professor of Irish History, possibly influenced by her troublesome subject to become a source of conciliation and kindness in the warring department, sent a box of wine from a website, followed by regular e-mails enquiring about his wellbeing, often attaching amusing photographs of her dog, Tess. A pile of recommended reading was sent by the other three – apart from Ned, who had no need for a formal gesture of support – of the Modern History Friday five-a-side football team, with Ben Loxley, who boycotted Amazon, driving over to deliver his gift by hand. All of his Ph.D. students sent messages of bewilderment at the claims. The colleagues who did not contact him – Daggers, Horny, Savlon, Quatermass – he took as proving that they were among Traill’s complainants.
If the conflagration of their reputations showed the cruelties of which human communities were capable, a contrasting kindness had been demonstrated by the belief and concern of so many who knew them.
‘As JFK didn’t quite say,’ Tom proposed a soft-drink toast to Ned. ‘In order that the many might do good, it is necessary for the few to do evil.’
Non-Drinking Buddies
Reaching across to pour Ned another glass of the Elderflower Cordial he had brought – because of their chemically-coshed sobriety – instead of his usual bottle of Spanish red, Tom noticed on his friend’s desk a stack of paperbacks. Having poured the drinks, he examined the titles sideways.
‘Kafka, Ibsen … and the one with the B, how do you … ?’
‘I say it to rhyme with troll. I’ve never known how to pronounce the dots above the … never did German.’
‘Despite being the Hitler guy. Weird.’
‘Fuck off.’
‘Bit of a pronunciation crash course. That South African bloke – how do you?’
‘Like a lady’s knees meeting the Queen, I’ve always said it. But I’ve heard cots-ay-ah on the radio.’
‘Disgrace, The Lost Honour Of … oh, and The Crucible. Nice bit of escapism, Nod.’
‘Well, that’s sort of the idea. Hair of the dog.’
‘I’ve just re-read the Roth. Mainly, I use this guy with a voice like velvet who whispers in my ear that I mustn’t worry if my mind starts to wander. But the thing it keeps wandering to is whether he actually fucking talks like that the whole time. When I ask you to pass the marmalade, is it possible that what I’m actually saying is …’
‘Is it doing any good?’
‘This is the thing. As I say to Dr Rafi, we don’t know what we’d be like without it. Well, we could come off it all and find out, but Rafi doesn’t want to do that, presumably in case we top ourselves.’
‘Have you thought about that?’
The hardest question. Tom gave the answer he always gave to Rafi and Helen. ‘No.’ Then: ‘You?’
Ned broke eye contact. ‘As I think I said in the sad cafe, I’ve thought about thinking about it.’ Looking back again. ‘But I have whole moments now when I’m convinced I’m going t
o be cleared.’
Whatever cleared means, Tom thought. He waited with an expectant expression and, when nothing came, said: ‘In the etiquette between defendants, I think this is where you say you’re sure I’ll get off as well.’
As if in apology, Ned refilled Tom’s glass. ‘Well, that goes without saying. I mean yours is just Special getting his truss in a twist. Once he tells the Executive Dean he’s got all the children playing nicely, he can get back to looking at supersize trouser sites.’
An effect of the Sertraline, Tom had found, was a generalized feeling of benevolence so the rising of his temper felt as surprising as an erection in church. ‘Jesus! I suppose it must be like this in jail – as you may be about to find out …’
The entry of enmity into friendship produced a physical whiplash reaction from Ned. ‘Tom, why have you suddenly gone all Daggers on me … ?’
‘This fucking convicts’ oneupmanship: I’m in more trouble than you are. From here, it really doesn’t feel …’
‘Mate, I’m not diminishing the shit you’re in but I’d rather have yours than mine.’
Tom tried to remember the bit from the Mindfulness CD about forcing out your bad feelings through your left big toe, or whatever it was that you were supposed to do, but, without the purring commentary in his ear, the mechanics eluded him. He tried the old-fashioned talk-down strategy of three breaths. ‘Sorry, Nod. I think it’s the lack of booze talking. I do know what you mean. Legally, it’s better for me: no cops, no court, whatever the outcome. But, at the moment, it doesn’t feel much different. We may neither of us work again or dare put our names into a search engine; we’re both on pills to trick our minds that it isn’t as bad as we think. And at least your nemeses have got names. I’m being ruined by people hiding behind trunk roads and postal districts.’
‘Exactly. Which is one of the reasons I find it hard to take the whole thing seriously. At some point, someone’s going to step in and send Special back to drawing the squares for the timetable.’
‘I don’t know. I feel like someone with a very rare disease. Because it’s so unlikely, it feels as if it must have been meant to get me. Even the things that seem mad in what they call their “process” make sense from a certain angle. The documentation stage is crazy because how could someone ever work again with those people? But perhaps it doesn’t matter because the aim is to make him unable to work with them?’
‘I can see why you think that. But …’
After briefly wondering if this was going too far, Tom interrupted: ‘In fact, to be honest, Nod, the reason it feels personal is that, if it were more general, then surely you’d be in the dock yourself.’
‘Well, steady on. I never did anything.’
‘Excuse me. Neither did I.’
‘Er, no, no, I know. But – this isn’t a criticism – you have always had a rather more abrasive relationship with – I’m not denying they’re tricky – but with members of the department …’
‘Well, maybe I paid the price for standing up for standards when some other people were playing Billy All-Mates. And at least I’ve never traded grades for gash.’
Was Ned flinching at the language or the allegation? His workroom was converted from a cellar – he believed that he wrote more in a windowless room – with a thickly bricked ceiling to which he gestured and said: ‘Sshhh! Anyway, the Eighties was the Eighties but since then …’
‘Yeah? Professor Marriott is in error on his dates’ – the posh snotty voice in which they parodied THES reviews – ‘if we believe the departmental rumours.’
‘Yes, well, I thought we weren’t believing them, Tom.’
They sipped their soft drink as attentively as if it were a thirty-year-old wine. Tom considered it a credit to his personality that Ned’s celebrity and wealth had never fractured their friendship. But now, an equal experience had caused a gulf.
Eventually, Ned said: ‘We’re letting the stress get to us. We’ve each got enough enemies without making one of each other. I’m sorry about today and I’m totally behind you.’
Tom let him wait as long as he dared before saying: ‘Same. Same.’ Then he asked: ‘Do you mind if I … ?’ He angled his phone and took a picture of the spines of Ned’s pile of books.
The Saint File
Of the two main reasons that Ned now left the house, he at first looked forward more to meetings with Claire than those with Dr Rafi. But it soon became apparent that medicine and law had significant similarities for clients. With his solicitor, as with his GP, there was a risk that each meeting would contain the revelation that something newly ominous had been found or was being sought. And, once he had been convinced that the symptoms of shock and stress were unlikely to kill him, he felt more at risk of a terminal diagnosis at the legal practice, terrified of what shadow or recurrence of an old problem might be found.
His lawyer, however, was reliably smiling and optimistic and, in the middle of one of their meetings, when Ned was despondently totting up what the half hour so far had cost, said: ‘I think it might be an idea to build a saint file.’ In response to his mouth-twist of doubt, she explained: ‘A set of character statements about how you’re rarely seen out without a halo. The idea is to make the police and the CPS think about them being read out in court if it got there. And, if it did get there, then we’d put as many of your attending angels as possible on the stand.’
‘Okay. But to take an example from my own area: the fact that Henry VIII didn’t kill all of his wives doesn’t mean he didn’t kill any.’
‘Absolutely. The other side will always try to argue that the experiences of C to Z don’t negate what A and B say happened. But, in stuff like this, with only narrative evidence and no forensics, it comes down to whether you’re the sort of guy who might have. The aim is to make the pattern of good behaviour bigger than the pattern of alleged bad behaviour. I know this sounds yucky but the golden ticket in this sort of thing is people you’ve slept with saying that you always folded your socks and said please and thank-you.’
‘And then they’re online forever for Emma and my children to read or to be told about?’
‘No. Because, if they work, the only readers will be the people who decide that it’s too big a risk to go to court. I hesitate to ask but your divorce didn’t happen to be one of those no-fault jobbies, did it?’
‘I’m afraid not. Certainly not at first. But we’re on talking terms now.’
‘And so she might not want you thrown in jail?’
At any mention of this prospect – even in connection with a tactic to avoid it – Ned saw imprisonment as a sequence of vivid scenes: none involving showering, so common a stereotype that he hoped any such danger would by now have been removed, but rather images of being confined to the hospital wing due to physical collapse and threats from other prisoners; eating putrid food; waiting at a visitors’ table once a week to find out how many of his friends and family remained loyal.
Unsure how to interpret his pause, Claire asked: ‘Could you ask her or ask one of your daughters to raise it?’
‘I could ask one of them, yes.’
Ex Certificate
Nervous of being late, which might be reported negatively back to Dee, Ned had allowed half an hour for the fifteen-minute walk. Jenny, visibly miffed at arriving second, tilted her cheek while he inclined his head, casual movements that could be passed off as everyday twitches if the other person ducked the kiss.
The sexless embrace had been perfected by his children and their friends – who seemed easily to exchange full-length hugs with casual acquaintances of both genders – but older generations were still experimenting with manners between former lovers. Ned’s dread about his daughters marrying – except, now, the expense – was the awkward moment when the photographer (they were presumably tipped off about blended families) would position him and Jenny at opposite ends of the smile line alongside their new partners, with a buffer of aunts and uncles between them. He had been to too many wed
dings where the divorced loomed as a warning, like a corpse in the corner of a hospital ward.
Reluctant to name The Best Cafe in an e-mail – in case Jenny Googled it and panicked that he was reduced to ruin – Ned had arranged to meet her by the Pilates gym on the opposite corner.
‘I assumed it was a landmark rather than an invitation,’ she said. ‘I haven’t brought my kit.’
The laugh he gave was louder than the joke deserved. But Ned, who had always taken pride in being something near to himself on TV, was conscious, since coming under suspicion, of behaving in public in a way that exaggerated the better aspects of his personality. He felt himself to be always playing a man who was warm, generous and, above all, unthreatening.
‘No. There’s a coffee shop nearby that I write in.’
Jenny nodded across the road, to where the dots of stick-on steam cloud above the bright green cup of tea were curling off like abandoned Christmas decorations.
‘I hope it’s not that one.’
‘You know, it actually is.’
‘Ned, are you okay?’
‘Yes, of course I am. History should be written among the people.’
Without ever declaring it a formal policy even to himself, Ned now made sure he was never left alone with any woman except those he totally trusted: Emma, Claire, Phee. He would have extended the same confidence to his other daughter, but the opportunity was unlikely to arise.
Thrown by Jenny’s order for herbal tea, which wasn’t among the dozens of possibilities on the white boards, the stern server eventually found a faded sachet of Moroccan Peppermint in the back of a cupboard. At the corner table he now regarded as his, Ned brushed can against tea cup, a substitute for their aborted earlier kiss.
‘Cheers,’ she said. A sip of the tea, recoil from its heat and then: ‘So are you shagging your solicitor?’
