In the Time of Greenbloom

by Gabriel Fielding

  Rachel and Kate Holly were seated uneasily by one of the low black tables in the farthest corner of the lounge, and in all save their patent relief at the arrival of Greenbloom and Michael, presented a sharp contrast to one another.

  Rachel was small and expensive-looking with film-star teeth and finely plucked eyebrows over dark-blue eyes, whereas Kate Holly was a big-boned manly girl, curiously untidy in every detail of her person and manner. She smiled carelessly, talked and laughed generously, and had little bits of bedroom-fluff and loose golden hairs clinging to the shoulders of her cherry-coloured twin-set. John warmed to her at once; she was obviously common, the sort of north-country girl to whom he was accustomed, the sort of girl Michael had always liked. He did not in the least blame him for wanting to go out with her though he thought it a little unfair of him to get her into a place like the Luxor with a girl like Rachel and a man as sophisticated as Greenbloom.

  Greenbloom himself did not seem in the least surprised by her appearance. The fact that she was quite differently dressed from everybody in the hotel, that she and Rachel had obviously found very little to say to one another in their twenty minutes of waiting, and that she had a broad though indefinable country accent of some sort, weighed not at all with him. He shook her hand hurriedly gave her a deep smile and asked her what she would drink, all in a matter of seconds, and then without even glancing at Rachel fixed his impatient gaze on a passing waiter and ordered a bottle of champagne and a plate of lobster pâtés. This done he at last turned to Rachel and said:

  “Well, what did you book for?”

  From the security of the fur coat draped over the back of her chair, Rachel smiled up at him and then at the others.

  “Iss-n’t he a man?” she asked softly.

  “He rings up at five o’clock, tells me to collect a woman—a complete stranger—change my clothes, and then book the best seats for the bess-t show in town, all in the same evening.” Beneath Kate Holly’s chin she extended a wrist flashing with a tiny diamond-encrusted watch, and then continued, “Not only that, but he arrives twenty minutes late, makes no introductions of any ss-ort whatsoever, and then as arrogantly as a prince, he wants to know what I’ve booked for.”

  Greenbloom snatched at the extended hand and glanced greedily at the watch.

  “Like it?” he asked.

  “Oh, yes, Horab, I do! It was lovely of you. Don’t you think it’s ni-c-ce, Michael?” She lisped and prolonged the word just a fraction. “Don’t you think he’s sweet and that I ought to forgive him when he gives me press-ents like this?”

  Holding the scented hand in his own, Michael examined the watch a little gingerly. “Beautiful, Rachel.” He turned to Kate. “Beautiful, isn’t it, Kate? and just right for a wrist like Rachel’s. Have a look at it, John.”

  John stepped forward, wanting desperately to say something impressive so that he might be rewarded by one of her soft sentences.

  “I’ve never seen anything so small and so—so dainty.”

  She smiled up at him. “Small and dainty—like me?”

  “Yes,” he said, “that’s what I meant.”

  Her fingers tapped a little tattoo on the back of his hand, and then she withdrew the wrist, the diamonds and the fingers.

  “Who is he?” she asked. “He’s very young.”

  “Mick’s brother,” said Greenbloom, “but you are not to talk to him. He wants to be left alone.” He sat down on the arm of her chair. “Well, what did you book for?”

  “She’s booked for the play at the Haymarket. That actor with the nose,” said Kate Holly. “What’s name of it, Michael?”

  “You must mean Gielgud. I can’t remember what he’s playing in at the moment. Are you sure it was the Haymarket?”

  “Of course I am.”

  “Good heavens, it’s not Musical Chairs? You haven’t booked seats for that surely, have you Rachel?”

  “And why not, Michael dear? It’s the only play worth seeing. And I know that Horab will like it.”

  “Is it hot?” asked Greenbloom. “Plenty of sex and luxuriance and no bedrooms?”

  “Well,” she confessed, “it has got one. But you don’t see it, really you don’t, Horab.”

  “Oh,” Greenbloom refilled his glass. “Drink up, everyone! Drink up! we’re going to be late. You had better order a taxi, Mick. The Bentley’s difficult to park, and the London police do not seem to like it.”

  “You know, Horab, I don’t honestly think we ought to take John to see Musical Chairs,” said Michael, “he’s far too young and I am responsible for him.”

  “You’re not,” said Greenbloom. “I’ve already told you that John is my idea, my guest. Only I am responsible, and perhaps in a minor degree, Rachel too, eh Rachel?”

  “Yes, Horab, I like him.” She gave him another smile. “He’s sweet, and he’s going to be so good-looking, and he’s sso sad.”

  “And you heard her?—there’s a bedroom.” Greenbloom spat the word out. “Where there’s a bedroom there is no sex, none at all: all serious love-making is done elsewhere. So order the taxi, Mick, and stop worrying.”

  Michael swallowed the remainder of his lobster pâté.

  “The little lad can come with me,” he said. “We must show him the ropes. Now, come on John, I’ll show you how it’s done.”

  As soon as they were out of earshot of the others, Michael took his arm and steered him down a long discreetly lighted corridor which led off at right angles from the entrance hall of the hotel.

  “I thought we were going to get a taxi,” John said.

  “We are. But first of all I want to talk to you, in the Gentleman’s if we can find it.”

  They turned another corner passed a number of closed doors and, unsuccessful in their search, were about to retrace their steps when they saw two business men emerge from the last door on the right. They looked clean and pleased with themselves.

  “That must be it; they’ve got it written all over them.” Michael smiled for the first time. “That’s what I hate about Horab’s taste in hotels; they’re always so respectable. Myself, I like a nice little pub with the word ‘Gentlemen’ written up where everyone can see it.”

  They pushed open the door, only to find themselves in a narrow tiled passage which ended in another door in which was set a square glass panel. Through it they saw a glowing interior in which one or two black and ponderous figures glided slowly about their business like fish in an aquarium. Michael paused.

  “Confound it! I believe this must be the hairdressing saloon.”

  John peered through the glass.

  “No,” he said, “I don’t think so. There’s a chap having his shoes cleaned.”

  Michael pushed open the door and there came to them the mingled odour of pine and camphor and the busy sound of running water.

  “Ah!” said Michael as he hurried ahead. “We’re on the track.”

  They crossed the outer sanctum or foyer where a shoeblack was hard at work on the feet of another business man, traversed an archway, and reached a long amber-lighted room almost completely filled with hand-basins and looking-glasses. At the far end of it were two closed swing doors bright with chromium and glass. With a final gesture of impatience Michael rushed across the intervening space and dived between the doors. John followed him as he made straight for the nearest of a group of glazed white stand-ups.

  They were beautiful and it struck him that people were very dull to take them so much for granted. No one ever mentioned them in essays or poems and he supposed that nobody ever would, though Rupert Brooke had come the nearest to it when he talked about the “keen impassioned beauty of a great machine”. These were a great machine, they seemed to stretch in all directions as though they had been designed to accommodate an army. Each was equipped with a shining copper pipe a transparent reservoir of disinfectant and a brass nozzle which at regular intervals sprayed perfumed water down its flawless face. At the bottom was a smooth slopping gutter spanned by precise metal
bridges and guarded in front by a frosted glass plate set at an angle so that it might protect the shoes of patrons from any least spot of moisture from above. The atmosphere was religious and John found himself thinking in whispers as he took up his position beside Michael.

  “I must say they do these things well at the big pubs,” Michael said. “I should imagine you could get anything done here from a manicure to a Turkish bath.”

  “That’s just what I was thinking. It’s got a sort of holy atmosphere like a cathedral.”

  Michael looked shocked. “Scarcely that, laddie, we mustn’t mix our metaphors! If anything, it’s more in the pagan tradition, like the Roman vomitoria; and quite right too, when one considers that it is intended to serve a function inseparable from that of the Bacchic.”

  “Does that mean drinking?”

  “Yes, but it was merely an observation, and there isn’t time to discuss it now.” Michael moved away in the direction of the chromium-plated doors. “Horab may follow us at any minute; for some reason of his own he seems bent on separating us. Look here, how much money did you say you’d brought with you?”

  “I told you,” said John defensively. “I haven’t brought any—I’ve got none.”

  Michael extracted a ten-shilling note from his breast pocket and handed it to him.

  “Here! it’s a nuisance, but you’d better take this. You can pay me back in the holidays.”

  John took the note suspiciously. “What’s it for?”

  “It’s to get you back to Oxford.” Against the background of the glass Michael regarded him very seriously. “Don’t worry about paying me back for the moment, because really this is Horab’s money and he doesn’t like people badgering him about debts.”

  “You mean about credits?”

  “No! no! you’ve misunderstood me, but don’t let’s waste time. The important thing is for you to get into the first possible train and report to your housemaster.”

  “But I don’t want to! I want to go to the theatre. Horab’s booked for me and everything, and besides I’ve got a late pass—nearly three hours yet—and so far we seem to have done nothing except visit pubs and lavatories.” He felt absurdly near to tears again, and as if to emphasise his mood the automatic flusher began to operate throughout the length and breadth of the room; with a short premonitory hiss like a soda syphon, water and disinfectant began to flow copiously down the glistening surfaces which surrounded them.

  The sound galvanised Michael; followed by John he pushed open the doors and hurried across to a hand-basin.

  “Now be sensible old chap! It’s just seven-forty-five, and the earliest train you could catch from Paddington would be the eight-fifteen. Allowing half an hour between here and the station, and even that would be cutting it fine, you would only just reach Oxford in time to get out to Beowulf’s before your pass expires.”

  “Yes, but—”

  “But quite apart from that,” his voice was as remorseless and measured as the flushing apparatus sweeping away impurities next door, “quite apart from that the whole situation is unsuitable.”

  “Unsuitable? You mean the play we’re going to see?”

  “That is the least of my worries.” He was washing his hands very carefully.

  “Oh dear,” said John. “What else is worrying you?”

  “If only you would be your age, Laddie. I know that you’ll probably counter with Horab’s remarks about your lost youth—he’s inclined to dramatise, but one ignores that and really you should be able to see that your being here this evening is as embarrassing to Rachel and Kate, and probably to Horab himself as it is to me. They don’t see an awful lot of each other, one can’t when one’s in the thick of exams and so forth, and naturally after the show they’ll want to say goodnight to one another and enjoy a little—intimacy. In addition, as Rachel herself pointed out—”

  “You mean that I’m too young,” said John angrily. “Is that it?”

  “Frankly yes; but not primarily. You see old chap, whatever Horab likes to say, you are my responsibility both from the point of view of the School and, more important, from the parental angle.”

  He let the water out of the basin and gazed at himself earnestly in the looking-glass as though he were appealing to a judicious and favourable friend. “I mean an evening like this wouldn’t make awfully good reading at home, would it? You can’t really imagine Mother and Father feeling that all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds when they hear that you’ve been dashing about London in the middle of the term with people like Horab and Rachel can you?”

  “I suppose not, but I don’t see who’s going to tell them about it. And anyway what will Horab say if you shunt me off back to Oxford without saying anything to him? He seems to like me and to want me to be with him, and in a queer way I rather like him.”

  Michael tapped his shoulder affectionately. “I don’t want to hurt you Johnny! you must have had enough of that lately; but at the risk of repeating myself I must emphasise that Horab happens to be my friend and consequently I have a good deal more insight into his motives than you’re likely to have. Horab likes to appear to run things, all Jews do, but the moment he’s presented with a fait accompli he accepts it at once. He’s fickle you know, capricious, and you must take it from me that it was only a flutter—a lubie, the sudden whim of an enfant gaté which made him insist on bringing you along tonight; and if you must know he only thought of it this afternoon.”

  “I thought you said he’d invited me yesterday.”

  Michael sighed. “You’re forcing me to it,” he said indulgently, “you seem to want me to hurt you—I never knew such a chap for arguing, you’re worse than Uncle Felix. To be brutally truthful it’s the publicity that’s taken Horab’s fancy, he admitted it to me this evening. His rather unpleasant way of putting it was to suggest that publicity is a racial weakness with the Jews—he cited the New Testament as an example—and he made it perfectly clear that if no one had ever heard of you he’d find the whole situation as much of a bore as any other undergraduate saddled with a teenager in London; but as things are and through no fault of your own you’ve got a sort of notoriety which makes Horab think he’s sorry for you.” He paused and John interrupted quickly:

  “He is sorry for me. He’s much sorrier for me than you are because he’s not sorry for me, he’s sorry with me. And he’s doing something about it! He wants to take me away somewhere—he mentioned Paris—or write about me.”

  Michael groaned. “Oh Lord! I suppose he’s been telling you about his aeroplane, has he? or was it the book?”

  “No, he only mentioned the book once and that was when you were there, something about Wittgenstein. Who was Wittgenstein?”

  “Who is Wittgenstein, you mean; he’s still alive, I can’t tell you anything about him except that he’s one of a vast variety of people and concepts that Horab is going to touch on in a book he intends to write. Another of his obsessions is the scapegoat idea and quite obviously he looks upon you as a recent example and that’s why he’s making such a confounded nuisance of himself over this evening. Don’t you see?”

  “You mean he doesn’t really sympathise with me at all? He’s just using me because I fit in with some idea of his?”

  “I’m afraid so, but there’s something else as well; I’m quite certain that if you happened to be Jewish Horab would not be taking the least notice of you despite the tragedy.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I’m pretty sure he’s not, in any sense, sorry for us; he’s simply exulting in our humiliation as Christians. Now do you understand?”

  “Yes I think so,” said John slowly. “But why do you let him?”

  “There isn’t time to explain now, but briefly I’m trying to help him. He’s a man completely without Faith, and it flatters his vanity to let him think for the present that I a Gentile, a Christian Gentile, am allowing him to dominate me. It’s the only hope I have of influencing him and of winning him round.” He br
oke off. “I’m afraid we can’t go into it any further at the moment, John; and really you know it’s nothing with which you need concern yourself, is it?”

  “It’s not my fault Greenbloom’s taking an interest in me, and I don’t see why you should have all the fun while I just go back to the beastly school when I’m supposed to be having half-term with you. And what about the doctor? Greenbloom said he was sure his doctor would be able to sort me out and get rid of this feeling I’m always having that I’m separated from everybody. He seems to understand.”

  “Look old chap you’ve only got twenty-five minutes to catch that train.” With a studied, indulgent, reluctance Michael put his hand into his pocket. “Here’s another half-crown for you, it’ll do for the taxi; take it and run.”

  They swung round as the doors opened and Greenbloom hurled himself towards them.

  “For God’s sake! We’re going to miss the whole of the first scene, what on earth have you been doing? I sent you to order that taxi ten minutes ago and you know that I object to being kept waiting.”

  “It’s John,” said Michael. “He’s thought better of it. He doesn’t feel he ought to come and I’ve decided to let him catch the eight-fifteen and get back to Beowulf’s before his pass expires.”

  Greenbloom straightened his tie and wriggled his head a little higher over the top of his white collar.

  “The taxi,” he said, “it is obstructing the entrance.”

  Like an Old Testament prophet he drove them before him down the length of the corridors past the uniformed commissionaire and into the attendant taxi.

  Once inside it there was no further discussion and Michael behaved as though there had never at any time been any conflict of views between himself and anybody else. It struck John then that Greenbloom shared with Mother a capacity for such intense self-interest that lesser people and their smaller desires simply ceased to exist when he chose to exercise his power to the full. It was not that either of them necessarily fought down opposition to their aims, it was only that they themselves were so totally engrossed in their private vision of a situation that their view ultimately prevailed over that of others to such an extent that even the memory of difference was expunged and forgotten. Michael now was bland, almost gay, and carried on a cheerful and bantering conversation with Rachel and Kate all the way to the theatre.