Fast and Louche

by Jeremy Scott

  Shut in by the storm, rain beating on the windows … it was a familiar condition; throughout childhood the weather had provided long hours in my room with a book. To pass all day there was considered sloth though, and in the afternoon I’d been driven out into the storm. Today after lunch I put on my brother’s oilskin coat and set out on a walk. I crossed the stone bridge over a canal. In childhood this was the way I’d come most mornings with my .22 rifle soon after first light to hunt rabbits, and once while crossing it I’d spotted a big sea trout beneath the bridge. It had taken three shots to hit it, for the bullets deflected in the water, but the family had dined well that night.

  A half-mile further was a small cove; going by it I saw, only fifty yards out in the bay, a colony of seals on a seaweed-covered reef exposed by the tide. A big bull sprawled on the rocks, keeping watch over his harem. They’d never come so close inshore when I was young. The road I was following ran through a grove of trees, taller and denser than I recalled, then passed by a saddle of land where once had stood a settlement of wretched crofts whose inhabitants were deported in the Clearances. A mile more and I reached the end of the road at a jetty, destroyed by a storm years before and never rebuilt. Here, just short of the headland, I looked on to the ocean. The weather had started to break up; ten miles out to sea the peaks of Rum were taking ghostly shape in the dissolving mist. The wind blew strongly from the west and the sun flared in gaps between the racing clouds.

  Standing on the pier’s shattered slabs I could see long Atlantic combers breaking on the headland, each wave slamming on to the rocks to fling up a cloud of spray. At the age of twelve, with a similar sea running, I’d tried to take my kayak around the point. Caught in the cross-waves the craft had swamped; clutching my rifle and losing my sneakers, I had to swim to shore.

  It was how Gino had died. His kayak was still on display at the Royal Geographical Society in London. He’d had the Eskimos build it for him; ‘Fitted him exactly as a pair of handmade shoes,’ Father said. ‘He could flip it over, roll it, make it get up and dance; he could handle it skilfully as they could.’

  Father had been staying with me at the mill when – unusually, for always he avoided the subject – he’d talked after dinner about the exploring they’d shared in youth. He said Gino had known it was his last expedition before he’d set sail for Greenland that final time. In Britain there had been the General Strike and hunger marches, America and Europe were in deep recession; no one and no institutions were disposed to fund further expeditions to the Arctic. For Gino, the end of this one meant London, a job, marriage, everyday reality … and the prospect was unbearable. ‘He never intended to return,’ said Father.

  And now I was facing my own end. Not necessarily from a coronary, but if you have no money to keep a roof over your head and buy food it follows that you do die. I didn’t want to, but I saw no way to change my situation.

  As I stood on the pier at Rhu, behind me the mountains were still dark with rain, but out to sea the storm had cleared. The islands of Eigg and Rum reared black in silhouette against the blaze of colour behind the clouds. The sun was sinking in the west and a path the exact colour of the molten lead I’d transmuted as a boy tracked across the waves to where they were breaking at my feet.

  In my beginning is my end … home is where one starts from. The end of every journey is to return to the beginning, and this stormy, savage wilderness had been that; this place had shaped my infant soul. Here I’d been entirely happy; sent away to get an education and make my fortune, I’d felt banished. I’d done neither. In the whole course of my life I’d committed to nothing, stayed with nothing. Looking back upon it now, I found it astonishing that, lacking intellect, education or talent, I’d enjoyed such an easy and entertaining ride and dipped into such varied milieus. I’d never felt a part of any of them, but only there on a visit. I’d never been a ‘player’ except in the gambler’s sense: one who takes a seat at the table for a spell, to leave it richer or poorer a while later. Here, at the end of my life, I’d achieved nothing, possessed nothing, and had nothing to pass on except the dubious testimony of an accidental witness to our time.

  Expelled from this enchanted spot at the end of childhood I’d believed myself exiled from Arcadia … but it would have been impossible to remain. Then, as now. Tomorrow Jamie and I must get into her car and head south. After that the rest was uncertain.

  I remained on the ruined jetty until the sun went down. The night before, in the manse’s library, I’d done something I dare to do rarely; the oracle may be consulted only in extremis. With eyes closed I reached to the bookshelves and blindly ran my fingers along the rows of spines. I stopped at one, took the book out, and looked to see: Chaucer. Setting it on the table, I opened it at random, spread the page and read where my eyes lighted on the text:

  That thee is sent, receive in buxomness;

  The wrestling for this world asketh a fall.

  Here is no home, here is but wilderness:

  Forth Pilgrim, forth! Forth Beast, out of thy stall!

  Know they countree, look up, thank God of all;

  Hold the high way, and let thy ghost thee lead,

  And truth shall thee deliver, it is no dread.

  31

  Where the Ghost Leads

  Though sparsely furnished, the small flat where I lived was comfortable and quiet. The block was in poor condition; the paintwork was flaking and the decrepit cage-lift often broke down between floors. Built the year I was born, the building was falling apart at the same rate as myself.

  It was spring 2000. The money I’d borrowed from Ernest was gone, but since Christmas I’d been receiving a state pension of £124 a month. I used this to pay for electricity and council tax, little went on food. For the last five weeks I’d been living on only boiled cabbage.

  I already owed £200,000, there was nowhere to borrow more. I’d ceased making social security and pension payments when I moved to France in the ’seventies, I qualified for no form of benefit. My rent was in long arrears, soon I would be evicted from this flat. Jamie, friends, or my brothers might be willing to put me up for a while, but without prospects, penniless, lacking even the means to move on, truly I would be the houseguest from the abyss. That was not an option. Brahmins believe hell is nothing less than a state of bondage to others; Marcus Aurelius says very much the same, but that truth I knew already.

  Jamie did not like what was going on, but she understood where I was and had come to accept my situation. But it can’t have been easy for her.

  ‘Conform to Nature’ was the founding principle of stoicism. And to them Nature and God were the same. ‘Accept. Accept the seasons and whatever comes. Death is but a part of Nature, seasonable and natural. So be ready and willing to leave all things when the day of your departure dawns.’

  But the Stoics say you may choose that day. Suicide is an honourable option and a number of them died from starvation. If plants and beasts receive no nourishment they conform to nature by departing life. Likewise a man. On hunger strike in Northern Ireland it had taken Bobby Sands sixty-six days. I’d already lost thirty-five pounds from a body-weight of eleven stone. From the day I ceased eating altogether I estimated it would take me two to three weeks.

  Surprisingly, the decision freed me of every trace of anxiety. Having taken it, I came to understand what I think Thomas à Kempis meant by ‘liberty of mind’. It is similar to the experience of a man who throws himself from a high window; though he is doubtless hurtling down to shatter into fragments on the ground below, to him it feels like flight. And, while it lasted, it was an extraordinarily exhilarating sensation.

  I lay on my bed reading. It was Easter, and in the last eight days I had eaten nothing except a single apple, and never once felt hungry. I’d drunk vast quantities of unsweetened tea, walked daily, and peed a lot.

  I was physically weak. If I walked for long I became faint and had to sit down and suck a barley sugar to recover. But my mind and all my senses were
acute, my awareness of everything felt heightened and intense. Observing the body language of strangers in the street I believed I knew how they were feeling, sometimes even what was in their mind.

  Four or five years before, when confronted by loss of the mill, homelessness and poverty, I’d felt I was drowning in chaos and dread. Now to my astonishment I slept well. I dreamt, I dreamt vividly, but my dreams were adventures, never nightmares. I woke calm. I felt physically and mentally light, lucid, detached and high. Once you have accepted the worst that can happen, you are in a manner free.

  Now, as I lay on my bed reading, the telephone rang, and unusually I picked it up. It was Fisher. I’d seen him a couple of weeks before; he’d asked why I was so thin and I’d told him. At once he pressed money on me and I’d explained that to live by continuing to borrow was no longer tenable. He accepted this after a while and we turned with relief to other subjects. But I’d had few to turn to. Ignorant of current events and having no gossip, I rabbited on far too much about stoicism and Marcus Aurelius. ‘No, it’s useful,’ he said. ‘The ground we all walk can give way beneath our feet – shit happens in people’s lives. This helps, you should give a talk about it.’ Not possibly, I’d told him.

  Now on the line on Easter Sunday he said, ‘I’ve booked a lecture room in ten days’ time. Are you up for it?’

  ‘Of course,’ I answered. The response was instinctive, spoken without reflection; but in the circumstances it would have been churlish to refuse.

  The rest is brief. I got up, had something to eat and started to make a few notes. I gave the talk to the thirty or forty people the Fishers had press-ganged into attending. It seemed to work, I talked again. And again, in the remorseless way ageing cranks tend to once they get a bee in their outmoded bonnet.

  One day Peter Mayle called. ‘So what are you up to?’ he enquired. I told him. ‘Hmm, might make a how-to book,’ he said.

  I put one together. Ernest Chapman telephoned. ‘There’s this publisher Franklin …’ he began. ‘What’s he like?’ I asked. ‘Harry Potter, doesn’t wear a tie, rides a bicycle,’ he answered. Ernest is economical with words.

  Franklin published Marcus Aurelius as a slim volume in a package with three others I assembled. One day while I was in his office he mused, ‘You seem to have led a rather … how shall I put it, varied life. Have you ever thought of writing a memoir …?’

  Ramage took Jamie and myself to the Dorchester to celebrate. In the high-ceilinged retro opulence of the swanky restaurant he treated us to a lunch of bélons, sole Véronique and Krug as I related to him the above tale and its denouement. ‘So what do you make of that, then?’ I asked, when I had finished.

  Ramage sipped, set down his wineglass and considered sagely. ‘I always think,’ he said after a long moment, ‘That you cannot ever entirely trust a man who rides a bicycle.’

  Index

  A

  Addams, Charles 116–7

  Anouilh, Jean 64

  Aspinall, John 269

  Aurelius, Marcus 314–5, 318, 320, 332–4

  B

  Baines, Mr 108, 242

  Barber, Noel 162

  Bardot, Brigitte 181

  Barton, The Venerable John 280–1, 299

  Beatty, Warren 297

  Beauclerc, Charles de Vere, Duke of St Albans 152–3, 156, 161

  Beerbohm, Edward 279–81, 308

  Beerbohm, Jenny 276, 278–81, 288, 293, 298, 308

  Beerbohm, Tony 276, 279

  Bell, Sir Tim 231

  Benchley, Robert 205

  Benson, Charles 266, 269

  Benson, Gayle 211

  Birbeck, Eddie 98–9, 103–4

  Bolitho, William 171–4, 203

  Bosanquet, Reggie 158, 160

  Braden, Bernard 155–6

  Bradish-Ellames, Simon 81–3

  Brahms, Penny (also Jamie) 247–9, 300, 316–20, 327, 330, 332, 334

  Brittain, Sergeant-Major 75, 77

  British Council 43, 64

  Broackes, Sir Nigel 50–1, 53, 56, 68–9, 71, 78, 97, 109, 155–6, 176, 185, 187–90, 258–62, 276–8, 299, 325–6

  Broackes, Lady Joyce 189, 258–61, 276–8

  Buchan, John 38

  Buckley, Family 113

  Buckley, Reid 117

  Buckley, William F. Jnr 115

  C

  Calvert, Brian 55–60

  Capote, Truman 128

  Capsis, John 181

  Cartland, Barbara 8

  Carvel, Tony 190–2

  Casson, Sir Hugh 290

  Carafy 192

  Central Office of Information 151–66

  Charlie, Bonnie Prince 15

  Chataway, Christopher 221

  Chaucer, Geoffrey 330

  Christian, Linda 176, 177–8

  Churchill, Sir Winston 9, 38, 75

  Coates, Trooper 84–5

  Colette 70, 242

  Costa 173–4

  Courtauld, Augustine 2–5, 124

  Crichton, Richard 163–6

  D

  Daily Mirror 158, 159, 163, 166

  Daily Telegraph 6, 64–5, 106–7, 219

  Daleg, Major 212

  Davenport, John 51, 110

  Davies, Aubrey 270–1

  Day, Barry 221

  de Mailly, Countess Héloïse 294

  de Maupassant, Guy 70

  Dempster, Nigel 270

  Dennis, Nanny 6–8, 10, 19–22, 28, 31–2, 39, 40–2, 44–57, 60, 62–3, 78, 105–8, 131–2, 138–9, 144–5, 148, 156, 188, 233, 242, 292–3, 295, 298, 305, 321–3

  de Sérigné, Madame 242

  Diana, Princess of Wales 323

  Donovan, Terence 226–9, 231, 302–3, 323

  Dors, Diana 176

  Douglas-Home, Sir Alec 154–5

  E

  Eckhart, Meister 319

  Eden, Sir Anthony 146

  Edye, Anthony 176–7

  Edye, Tania [also Tania Scott/Leaver] 176–7, 188–90, 194–7, 199–200, 203, 209–10, 266, 324

  Emerson, Ralph Waldo 319

  Evening Standard 145

  Express 162

  Express Newspapers 162, 259

  F

  Fairbairn, Captain ‘Murder-made-easy’ 12

  Faulkner, Mr 36–8

  Feisal, Prince, King of Iraq 156

  Feldman, Charlie 234

  Firbank, Ronald 38

  Fisher, Ben 95–6, 98, 182–6, 247, 266, 299–300, 304, 323–5, 327, 333

  Fisher, Bridget 305, 323–4

  Fitzgerald, F. Scott 128

  Flaubert, Gustave 242

  Forbes, Bryan 226

  Forster, E. M. 267

  Forsyth, Angus 35–6

  Franklin, Andrew 334

  Frost, Robert 128

  Fry, Christopher 63

  G

  Garrett, James 144, 180, 218–25

  Garrett and Partners Company 168, 170, 180, 199, 202, 205, 214, 220–2, 229–31, 241, 244, 306

  Gerring, Chief Inspector David 268–9, 272–3

  Geyer, Gary 204

  Gillard, Michael 270

  Gillies, Miss 14

  Giono, Jean 241

  Goethe 272

  Goldsmith, Sir James 266, 269–73

  Goncourt Journals 241

  Grant, Cary 297

  Grayson, Corporal of Horse 86

  Green, Miss 35–6

  Green, Mr 33, 40

  Green, Mrs 33

  Guggenheim, Hazel 120–5

  Guggenheim, Peggy 120

  H

  Haas, Old 127

  Haas, Robert 127, 135

  Hamilton, Gerald 51

  Hardy, Stephanie 322

  Harper, Marion 180

  Hazlitt, William 317

  Heath, Sir Edward 218–31, 257, 259

  Healey, Denis 259

  Hemingway, Ernest 128

  Henry, Whitepowder 299

  Heseltine, Michael 259

  Herbert, George 308

  Hope, Bob 175, 177

&nbs
p; Howard, Alex 51–2, 56, 78, 108–10, 176, 181, 247

  Howard, Arabella 277

  Howard, Margot 51–3, 109, 118, 259, 277, 325

  Howard, Rex 110–11

  Hoyös, Countess Felice 31

  Humphries, Dr 49

  I

  Ingrams, Richard 270

  Isherwood, Christopher 51

  J

  Jacobs, Peter 191

  K

  Kambannis, Steve 181–2

  Keeler, Christine 176–7

  Keel, Howard 136

  Keller, Helen 134–6

  Kelly, Gene 297

  Kempis, Thomas à 128, 319–21, 332

  Kennedy, Robert 212

  Kerkorian, Kirk 235

  Kent, Duke of 99

  Khashoggi, Adnam 235–9

  Khashoggi, Soraya 235–9

  King, Martin Luther 212

  L

  Leaver, Don 199, 324–5

  Le Marr 215–7

  Lennon, John 211

  Lester, Richard 170, 198–9, 211

  Lowe, Sir Frank 257–8, 261, 275

  Lucan, Lady Veronica 265–7

  Lucan, Lord 265–73

  Lynch, Detective Inspector 201

  Lyons, David 316

  M

  MacDonald, Mr 60

  Macleod, Iain 221

  Magda 233, 235, 237, 240–2, 245–7, 249, 250, 253–6, 259–62, 264, 275, 305, 310

  Mansell, Nigel 299

  Marnham, Patrick 270

  Maudling, Reginald 221

  Maxwell, Gavin 22

  Mayle, Jennie 254–6, 260–1, 275, 308–9

  Mayle, Peter 253–6, 260–1, 274–6, 281, 308–9, 326–7, 334

  Mazel, Judy 282–91

  McCabe, Ed 215–7

  McClean, Jenny 180, 200–1

  McCullers, Carson 128

  Meinertzhagen, Daniel 269

  Miller, Henry 55–7, 61, 186, 297

  Milton-the-Nark 134, 143

  Monsell, Graham Eyres 9, 66–7, 110