Fuel for the Flame

by Alec Waugh

  ‘O.K.,’ he said. ‘You do just that. I’ll be surprised if you don’t find Barbara as reluctant to come as I am to see her here.’

  It was said not as a challenge, but on a note of triumph. That’s funny, she thought, that’s very funny.

  Julia waited till half past three to call up Barbara.

  ‘I was wondering when you and Charles could come round to dinner with us.’

  ‘That’s very nice of you. Now let me think.’ There was a pause. ‘I’m afraid this week isn’t possible, and next week is full too, at the beginning anyhow.’

  It was the prelude Julia recognized to a half-refusal; anyhow to non-commitment. It was unlike Barbara.

  ‘If it’s possible I’d like to fix a definite date,’ said Julia. ‘We’re going away so soon.’

  ‘I know you are. Charles and I were talking it over. We want to give a good-bye party for you, but its hard to fix that until we know exactly when you’re leaving. Your transfer is supposed to be a secret, though I can’t think why.’

  ‘That’s exactly why we want you and Charles to come round to dinner very soon. We’ll have to give a good-bye party too.’

  ‘I suppose you will.’

  ‘All of it will be a last-minute rush. We did want to see you and Charles quietly before we left.’

  ‘I know, and that’s what we want too. Now let me see.’

  Again there was a pause. This time Julia allowed it to continue. She was not going to make it any easier for her friend.

  ‘I’ll have to see Charles,’ said Barbara. ‘It’ll involve rearranging a date or two. He’ll have to decide what I can shelve and what I can’t. I’ll ring you back. It’s sweet of you to want us.’

  And that means ‘No’ thought Julia. It was unlike Barbara, most unlike her. She did not want to come. How on earth had Basil been so sure that Barbara would not want to come? It was odd, it was very odd.

  2

  The Indian had arranged Tuesday’s meeting for half past twelve in the museum: a historical collection of books, pictures, photographs, reproductions of native life and customs that had been founded before the First World War, had been neglected since the Second, and was only visited by tourists and newcomers to the island during their first week of residence. There was no place in the island where you would be less likely to be observed by an acquaintance. The Indian was standing beside a glass case that explained the various stages of oil production. He smiled as Basil came towards him; a friendly, tired smile.

  ‘So I hear you are leaving us, Mr. Hallett?’

  Basil’s nerves had received a number of shocks during the last six months; this was one of the most violent.

  ‘How on earth do you know that?’ he asked.

  ‘It is my business to know things like that, and when I learned it I was not at all surprised. I was happy for your sake. This, I thought, will be a great relief to that nice Mr. Hallett with the so very charming wife, for whom I have always had such a very real regard, whom I have always been so anxious to help. It has been a real disappointment to me that circumstances have forced you to think of me as an enemy, not as a friend. How very differently you would have felt towards me if Potiphar had come in first, but Potiphar did not come in first, and though I have done my best to be of help to you … but do not let us go back over that; one cannot retrace the past. I know how you felt when you learnt that you were to be booked to another station. You chuckled to yourself, “How I have fooled that silly Indian. He will send me one of his chess problems and I shan’t be there to open it. It will not reach me till I am many miles away, well beyond his reach.” That was what you thought, now wasn’t it? Don’t you think it was very silly of you to have thought that?’

  He paused; his head was slightly tilted as he looked up at Basil. A half-smile lifted the right side of his mouth; his voice had been, as always, pitched on a low tone; it had a world-weary inflexion, coloured by a sense of deep, central indifference; it was a warm, a friendly tone, with its implied suggestion that the world was a very foolish place, but that a wise man could derive pleasure and profit from his passage through it.

  ‘Yes, it was foolish, wasn’t it, to have thought that Mr. Hallett? Surely you should have realized that it would be very easy for me to find out from London where you had been posted; and surely you should have guessed that I was most unlikely not to have a colleague in any spot where you were posted and that I should only have to send my dossier to him for you to find yourself in exactly the same situation in your new post as you are here. One does not escape as easily as you imagine from the kind of tangle in which you have placed yourself.’

  Basil made no reply; there was none that he could make. Despair had laid its hold on him. He was helpless, shackled. There was nothing he could do. He had read in books of this kind of thing happening to a man. Coming away from films in which a similar situation had been exploited, he had said to Julia, ‘It’s extraordinary isn’t it, how easily such a thing could happen to someone like oneself; a slip, a moment’s weakness, and one’s whole life’s imperilled.’ He had said it in the smug way one would say on a wet night in London, ‘Thank heavens one has a warm fire to go back to,’ thinking with a moment’s pity of the poor wretches sleeping under arches, never imagining for an instant that the day would come when one would not have a fire to go home to. One never believed the worst could happen to oneself.

  Speechless, overwhelmed, he stared at his tormentor.

  The Indian’s smile grew broader.

  ‘There is no need to look so despondent, Mr. Hallett. I am not saying that that will happen. I am only saying that it could happen. I was teasing. I have what I hope you will consider a nice surprise for you. I was heightening your appreciation of it. I am not a vindictive man, Mr. Hallett: very far from it. I bear you no ill-will. I want to do my best for you, as far as is compatible with my own interests, my own immediate interests; and it is not particularly in my interest to hand you over to somebody else’s care. Of course there is reciprocity in matters such as this—if I do a good turn to a colleague in Ceylon, he will eventually do a good turn to me. That is how an international organization functions, but that is taking a long view, and I favour the short view, pro vided of course that one does not lose sight altogether of what politicians call the ultimate objective. You will surely agree with me in that, Mr. Hallett.’

  ‘Yes, yes, of course.’ Would he never come to the point, thought Basil. Teasing, had he called it; it was torturing.

  ‘And in this present instance,’ the Indian was continuing, ‘I have an excellent opportunity of combining the short view, the ultimate objective and your own immediate interests in one single and simple operation. A very fortunate coincidence; I am sure you will agree on that, my dear Mr. Hallett.’

  Basil made no reply. If he were to, he would lose his temper; his patience had been strained to the snapping point.

  ‘I want us, Mr. Hallett, to part on friendly terms. I want to release you from the hold I have on you, in return for one last service. By that I mean if you perform this service I will return to you those cheques that bear your signature. You have nothing any more to fear once those cheques are in your own possession.’

  ‘What is the service that you want?’

  ‘Employment in your office for a friend of mine.’

  ‘What kind of work is he looking for?’

  ‘He has technical qualifications, but I believe he would be more useful as a secretary.’

  ‘Why do you want him in our office?’

  ‘That is a very foolish question, Mr. Hallett; you know I cannot answer that. I will reply obliquely. I need information about what goes on in Pearl, the kind of information that you have given me during the last six months. I need a replacement; that is how I shall put it Mr. Hallett. I need somebody to take your place.’

  ‘What is his name?’

  ‘Mara Sekaran.’

  ‘Of Indian origin?’

  ‘He has been here three years.’
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br />   ‘We have no vacancy in my office.’

  ‘I know; you will have to create a vacancy.’

  ‘That will not be easy.’

  ‘I am well aware of that; that is why I am making you such a very generous proposal.’

  ‘If I do this for you, what guarantee have I that you will give me back those cheques?’

  ‘You will have to trust me, Mr. Hallett. I am afraid that you have no alternative to trusting me.’

  3

  Two mornings later Mara Sekaran presented himself in Basil’s office. He was slim, small, neatly dressed. He seemed to be in the middle thirties. To Basil he was indistinguishable from two hundred other relatively well-to-do Indian immigrants. Basil subjected him to the usual questionnaire, his age, his provenance, his antecedents; how long he had been in Karak, why he had come here, had he friends or relatives; had he had an offer of work when he had left Calcutta? His answers were as standardized as the questions. His prospects had deteriorated since the British gave up control of India. His mother was an Anglo-Indian. His sister had married an Anglo-Indian. His links with the British had been always close. In Calcutta he was an object of suspicion and distrust. He had wanted to live in a country where the British were in actual, if not in nominal control. He spoke quietly, convincingly. There seemed no reason why he should not be sincere.

  ‘You have never been out of work since you arrived?’ asked Basil.

  ‘Never, sir.’

  ‘Why do you want to leave your present post?’

  ‘My wife’s health, sir. I think she would be in better health living in the country.’

  Basil watched him closely. But for the nature of his introduction, he would not have questioned his straightforwardness.

  ‘You have some references?’ he asked.

  He produced three letters. Basil took them from their envelopes; he read them to gain time as much as anything. References meant practically nothing. They were obtained so easily. Yet the names and the addresses were not unimpressive.

  ‘I shall have to check up on these.’

  ‘Of course, sir.’

  ‘It’ll take three or four days to get the answers.’

  ‘I suppose so, sir.’

  And when he had the answers, what would they really tell him. All this business of checking-up, references, visas, fingerprints were a nuisance for the law-abiding citizen, but the real bad hat always crossed a frontier, obtained a credit, eluded vigilance. If he refused this application, his successor would let in someone equally subversive. It might even be better to let in this man, so that he could watch him; when he left, he could drop a note to Forrester, putting him on his guard. What harm anyhow could this man do here; what real harm? Pass on a few pieces of trivial information? What had he himself been able to do for the Indian’s sponsors? This whole cloak and dagger business was a nursery game of pirates; who really believed here in the Communist bogy? Karak was a happy country. Why shouldn’t he profit by their childishness? It mattered so much to him. It could make so little difference to Pearl. If he didn’t let this fellow in, his successor would. No doubt of that, no doubt whatever.

  ‘I’ll let you know within a week,’ he said. ‘But I can make no promise.’

  Next evening Harry Pawling dined with the Halletts. They had not asked anyone to meet him.

  ‘If you want him to let down his hair, we’d better be just ourselves.’

  She said it with bad grace. She was still annoyed with Basil. There had been no real reconciliation. For that very reason, she had been at special pains over the dinner. She had ordered a bottle of vin rosé from the canteen, a dish of cocktail canapes from the guest-house; she had gone to market early in search of vegetables; she had returned with an armful of gladioli.

  Harry surveyed the result, wistfully. What a difference a woman made in a house, and it was not only what were called ‘the feminine touches’, the flowers, the way the canapes and glasses were set out. It was the presence of a woman in the house. The whole room, the pictures on the walls, the arrangement of the chairs and sofa, the matching colour schemes of cushions, rugs and window drapes were a background to Julia’s ragamuffin prettiness. The room would be nothing without her in it, or without the awareness that she would in a minute be coming down the staircase.

  He sighed as he settled into a chair. How good to be in the atmosphere of real home again.

  ‘Which would you like, a long drink or a Martini?’ Basil asked him.

  ‘A Martini, please.’

  He had had too many long drinks. He could not be bothered to mix Martinis for himself. He wanted to get the evening started quickly; he was in no mood for a slow thawing-out. Harry blinked at his first sip.

  ‘You certainly know how to mix these,’ he said. There was nothing like a dry Martini. He could not honestly say that he enjoyed its taste, but no medicine in the world could do so much to you so quickly. ‘This is so good,’ he said, ‘that I can forget the bad news from Manchester.’

  Harry was a Lancastrian, and the battle of the white rose and the red was going disastrously for him. Once again Surrey would be the champion county.

  They discussed cricket cosily, uncontentiously, with Julia every few minutes going into the kitchen to supervise an erratic cook. The first Martini was followed by a second, a second by a third. Julia looked at Basil interrogatively. Should she serve dinner in the next five minutes? He shook his head. Better after another cocktail. Then, after dinner, when Harry was in a mellow mood, he could bring up the crucial question. ‘Always better four than three,’ he said.

  ‘Better not to count,’ said Harry.

  ‘You’re very right. Far better not to count.’

  It was twenty minutes later that Julia finally insisted that they start their dinner before it was completely spoiled. ‘I’ll bet it will be far from spoiled,’ said Harry.

  ‘What did I tell you,’ he said ten minutes later.

  A curried vichysoisse, thinned and chilled had been followed by a coq-au-vin.

  ‘It’s a long time since I ate anything like this,’ he said.

  He paused, he looked from Julia to Basil, and then back to Julia.

  ‘It’s very good of you to ask me here. I nearly didn’t come, I felt I’d be a spoil sport. It was only because you said “Just ourselves” that I said “Yes”. I couldn’t have stood a party. I’ve too much on my mind; knowing that everyone is watching me, wondering how I’m making out; especially those whose own marriages aren’t too happy, who’d like to make a break if they knew how, but haven’t got the guts or don’t get the opportunity. They envy me, but they won’t admit it. If they did, there’d be an implied criticism of themselves; since they can’t envy me, they disapprove of me. I feel waves of disapproval every time I go into a room.’

  Julia shook her head. ‘You’re fancying that. That’s not the way it is at all. Everyone is full of sympathy; they are sorry there’s been a break-up. They are fond of Blanche and they are fond of you. They hope it’ll turn out for the best for both of you.’

  ‘Oh, no, no, no. It’s only because you are yourself so generous and warm that you say that; you’ve made a happy marriage. Everyone says that about you; you’re the happiest married couple in the camp; you have your fights but you can make them up. You’re a team, and because you are, you can be open-hearted with the world; not covering up, not on the defensive. What matters more in life than that? Is there a thing? I doubt it.’

  ‘But Harry, dear …’

  He would not let her speak. He had been alone so much, with nobody to talk to. He needed the release of the confessional.

  ‘That’s why it’s so good to be in your house,’ he said. ‘Your marriage is a fire at which your friends can warm their hands. It’s what we all want for ourselves, but so few get it. We don’t realize how much we need it till we’ve missed it. Why do we miss it? I don’t know. Some weakness, some deficiency in ourselves. Perhaps we don’t try enough, we leave too much to chance. Where did I go wrong
? Was I too old for Blanche? Maybe it was that. Fourteen years; that’s a big difference. Though it doesn’t seem much compared with Iris. Iris. What’s going to happen there? I can’t look ahead. Easier to look back; think of what went wrong with Blanche, then be on my guard with Iris. What went wrong with Blanche? Did I marry too late? Too much a bachelor; too set in my ways. That was the war’s fault, the war, coming after three years with Pearl in the Persian Gulf when I didn’t see a white woman. I’d told myself then that it was high time I married. On my next leave I’d go to Switzerland for winter sports. There were bound to be a lot of girls there. I’d click with one of them. That’s what I planned; but then the war came and the Middle East. No chance of an early marriage for old Pawling.’

  As his voice droned on, Basil thought, This is my chance. Afterwards, when Julia goes out to fix the coffee. What luck to have a wife who didn’t trust her cook.

  By the time they left the table, Harry was in a maudlin, self-pitying condition. He had talked himself into silence. Now, Basil told himself.

  ‘One shouldn’t talk shop here,’ he said, ‘but there is one thing I would like to ask you. It’s easier sometimes to ask things when one’s not in an office. It’s a question of the staff. We really need another man in the secretariat; someone who can type and take down shorthand, who can act as a filing clerk. I was interviewing a man today who’d applied for a job on the off-chance. He seemed a man whom we could use.’

  ‘Of course, of course.’

  Pawling seemed to be scarcely listening. He was absorbed by his own problems, his own mood.

  ‘He brought me references. I’ll have to check up on them, but if they are satisfactory, may I go ahead?’

  ‘Of course, dear boy, of course. I’ve complete confidence in you. You are the best judge. Do what you think right.’

  In the state he was in, Harry would have agreed to anything. Never had Basil despised himself so thoroughly. What a worm he was, what a pitiful, pitiable worm. Into what a contemptible morass he had allowed himself to stumble. Never again, he vowed. If he once got out of this, he would be on his guard. He would never gamble, never drink too much.