‘Yer did yer level best ter make it work, Ivan.’ She is still beautiful, seated in her ancient armchair, all her memories piled around her. ‘It ain’t yore fault if ther effin’ world wosn’t up ter yer expectations. It’s the same wiv kids. Take it as it bloody comes, I say. One effin’ day at an effin’ time.’
She was a fantastic legend - yielding in my arms. I gasped. The joy was almost anguish. Esmé went by and her eye met mine. She smiled. I returned my gaze to Mrs Cornelius, holding her with all the passion of the years until the ‘Cut!’ I most dreaded and she was fanning herself with her feathers, pursing her perfect lips to blow air up into her face and calling enthusiastically for a beer. ‘Phew! This ain’t the wewer for ‘uggies and smarmies is it, Ive?’
Hardly able to breathe, let alone speak, I indicated that I agreed with her, but secretly I was nurturing the ambience. If Goldfish’s erratic temper permitted no other take, I had at least recorded the fulfilled ambition of those many years! Finally I had held the quintessence of all women (the woman who had been my wife) sober, in my arms for one infinitely thrilling moment! I think Esmé, strolling smoothly through her own part, sympathised, as women can, with my profound physical and intellectual pleasure; something she herself could never quite inspire. Though she satisfied my noblest longings and my every ideal of womanly perfection, though Esmé understood my soul, and my most primitive desires, only Mrs Cornelius really understood my heart.
‘OK shot! OK shot!’ Radonic, in vivid cotton, raised his thumb, his highest praise. Wiping his forehead, Wolf Seaman’s lugubrious features had an expression of faint astonishment. We all knew we had recorded a moment of screen magic.
It was later, as I vomited into the sand at the base of the Great Pyramid, that I realised with surprise that I had caught the sun.
* * * *
FIFTEEN
OUR STORY BEGAN to take shape at last and, recovering slowly from my mild sunstroke, I was euphorically self-assured, anticipating our movie play’s glorious resolution, which would echo the prologue and the central scene in the burial chamber (I was now sketching the clearly visualised final draft). A somewhat schematic writer, I possessed classical skills perfect for a romantic narrative needing a certain detachment lest it be plunged into bathos. Filming was going smoothly, with Sir Ranalf Steeton underwriting our expenses from his own pocket, and we were grateful for this display of confidence. On my birthday, the fourteenth of January 1926, in full Egyptian costume, I embraced Mrs Cornelius once more, but she was ill at ease in so little clothing and we looked forward to shooting the scene again later. It had become obvious even to our patron, Sir Ranalf, that we needed fresh locations. Memphis having proved less ruin than aura, and Sakkarah merely unimpressive, we jumped at Steeton’s suggestion that as soon as it could be arranged we take a steamboat up the Nile to Luxor and the famous monuments of Karnak, the centre of the great Theban Empire where we should at this time find fewer tourists and, as Malcolm Quelch said in an aside to me, far fewer distractions. ‘The land of the Hawk, my dear boy, where people can trace their ancestry back to the beginning of Time. Of course, you must be hugely imaginative to get anything from the place at all. Basically it is a ramshackle Arab settlement pitched upon the ruins of an earlier and superior civilisation like a fungus on a dying oak, hardly a town at all.’ Perhaps because he was now assured of regular wages and was consequently consuming morphine rather generously, he had grown more expansive. He was able to obtain both his own drug and mine in substantial quantities. Indeed, it soon became clear to me that he was discreetly supplying half the team. I did not blame him if he made a small profit, given that he risked up to a year in prison and a stiff fine if he was caught. I told him I was concerned only for him. He assured me it was almost impossible for the British police to conceive of a middle-class Englishman having anything to do with drugs and the Egyptian police had the sense or the greed to leave him well alone. ‘It’s only the dagos and the natives who get picked up, dear boy, and most of those with any influence or money are soon sent substitutes or bought free. As far as the good Russell Pasha is concerned the drag trade is a filthy native appanage.’ Bertrand Russell was at that time the Cairo police chief.
It gave me a rather dishonourable thrill to spend an evening in Major Nye’s company. I never mentioned this to Quelch, for fear of disturbing him. The major had asked me to be his go-between and I had a little reluctantly acted as message-bearer for both him and Mrs Cornelius.
He was not, it emerged, pursuing the drug traffic but following a lead British Intelligence had received concerning the arms trade. That was in the days when selling arms to Arabs was still not respectable and was called gun-running. I gathered he was working for the Government of India. ‘Through some loopholes in former treaties we can’t stop Muscat importing firearms. Muscat therefore is as flourishing a market for wholesale gun-merchants as Baghdad is for sweetmeat sellers and curio dealers! You can buy as many rifles and boxes of ammo as you can afford. The only problem you have then is getting it to your next destination. Once the stuff is across the Oman Gulf and reaches Persia it can’t legally be confiscated. The Indian government instituted a sea patrol out of Jashk on the Persian coast. Most of those guns are going into Afghanistan. Naturally, we want to stop ‘em.’ But he would not elaborate, although he spoke at another time of going by gunboat into the Gulf to board a native dhow. He had taken from the Jashk barracks half-a-dozen sepoys, in charge of a subahdar and a half-caste Baluchi as interpreter. By some accident of fate they had stopped not a gun-runner but a slaver. ‘Bodies packed like maggots in the hold. We let ‘em come up, but the stench was dreadful. Blacks mainly, and a couple of Asiatic women from God knows where.’
We had not heard from Goldfish in weeks, which somewhat surprised me since earlier he had managed to send an average of two cables a day. Eventually we taxed the head of our Egyptian office. Sir Ranalf was massively apologetic. He had wired several queries, he said, but Goldfish still seemed to be away. What was more, the missing actor had last been seen at Cherbourg on January 13, had not been found in Cyprus and there was some talk of his having fallen overboard. This news threatened to dissipate my sense of well-being, but I recovered as much of it as I could and was glad when early one morning the porter came to take me and my baggage to the quayside and the paddle-steamer Nil Atari, already sighing and gasping in a ladylike way as her boilers were fired. The old mahogany and time-polished brass, her sturdy hull, quivered as we made our way through the usual pleading rabble to the gangplank guarded by Nubian youths wearing dark blue and red uniforms in the local style. Sir Ranalf Steeton was waiting for us on the arrival deck. He wanted, he said, to tell us the news himself. When we had found our cabins we should assemble on the bar deck where he would make a little speech to the whole team.
Although small, our cabins were very solidly built from the best woods, with fittings of brass and chrome and mother-of-pearl and everything neatly stowable, under bunks, above cupboards, within mirrors. It was possible to secrete one’s treasures in a hundred unlikely crannies. The horsehair mattresses were first-class and a reassuring smell of Pine disinfectant permeated everything. A place is never clean to a Briton unless it smells of his native fir. I have observed this in some of the filthiest homes in the kingdom: the dirtier the floor, the more it reeks of the Scottish wilderness. So powerful was this resinous charm against infection in the British psyche that I still find myself deeply reassured by it, especially if ill. Mrs Cornelius, as she grew to count the years, paid less attention than most to what she called ‘fussy ‘ousekeepin’ ‘. The smell of damp and mildew (as well as the unfortunate problems of her drains and the sewer which never recovered from next-door’s Flying Bomb) grew to be unmanageable in the end. But for many years a good, strong whiff of Pine allowed me to take my tea with confidence.
The boat’s top deck lay under an awning like an outdoor ballroom, with a piano and a bar at the bow end, backing on to the wheelhouse and behind that the great
stirring blades of the paddles. It was here that Sir Ranalf addressed us, wringing his little hands as he waited for O.K. Radonic and Grace (reluctantly sharing a cabin) to join us.
Some of us leaned against the bar or the piano. Others had taken lounge-chairs or simply preferred to stand back against the railings as the ship rocked gently in the wake of a passing police launch and Old Cairo ululated from the far bank.
‘Fair ladies, gentle chevaliers all,’ began Sir Ranalf with that odd choice of forms which I understood was called Olde Worlde in England and, was now chiefly associated with followers of Shelley. There had never been much discussion of PreRaphaelite or Yellow Book tendencies in my own Pearson’s and Strands, which meant that for years I remained oddly innocent of references most English and Americans find excitingly or disgustingly obvious, depending upon their tastes and dispositions. ‘My dear colleagues,’ he continued. ‘My news from the United States is, like the News from Persifiloum in the Wheldrake poem, of a disappointing rather than a tragic nature. I must tell you at once, sweet mortals, that our mutual master, Mr Samuel “Gold-wynn”, has withdrawn all support from The Nile Remembers. He has washed his hands of you. He claims to know nothing of the Hope Dempsey.’ At our expressions of dismay he released his hands and chuckled. ‘However, I will not play cat-and-mouse with you, hearty lads and noble lasses, but inform you that nothing is lost! Nothing at all!’
It was my turn to consider Sir Ranalf s sanity and wonder if he were not after all one of those many English eccentrics whose instability goes unnoticed in Egypt or India where chaos is always barely held in check and the more bizarre expressions of the human beast’s lusty appetites are given full rein.
‘I have been in frequent communication with our “Tsar”, as they say, and he is emphatic. Without major players an epic on its own is no longer enough. Ben Hur, he says, has proved that much. Everyone’s doing epics now, don’t you know. He is “cutting his losses”, he says. I believe he is about to go into partnership with United Artists. So whether our “star” really did turn up or whether he never intended to leave Hollywood but lay low and relaxed at home, we shall never know.’
‘No word, then, of Barrymore?’ enquired an anxious Swede.
‘None. I think it is probably immaterial now. We can keep our fingers crossed, of course, and hope to tiddlypop that he has discovered our whereabouts and is on his way, but meanwhile time really is money in the kinema profession, as you know, so I think you should just carry on as you were - only this time, my courtly squires and lovely demoiselles, I am your new angel, your producer. You are now working for Cinema Anglo-Cosmopolitain. You’ll receive regular weekly salaries, the best in Egypt, and we shall produce only the most artistic films!’
He went on to explain how Egypt was the apex of the international film business. From here movie-plays were exported all over the world, even to America. Up to now Sir Ranalf had not been able to assemble a team to make the quality of pictures he demanded, but now, to our mutual profit, here was the golden opportunity!
I, for one, was particularly relieved. It seemed I again detected the hand of a benign god. Not only were our salaries saved but our integrity also. I turned to share my joy with Quelch. He was unimpressed, and Mrs Cornelius reflected his reaction. But the rest seemed moderately agreeable to see how the plan worked out.
‘I have already, don’t you know, had a word with Mr Seaman who will explain any details of our contract, but I think, under the circumstances, you’ll find it pretty decent, sweet fellows, fair ladies.’ And he leaned to chuck my Esmé under her little chin. ‘I wish you Godspeed for Luxor. You need not fear a lack of interest. As soon as you berth there I shall take the railway to join you. Meanwhile, this is your hotel! Every facility and servant is at your disposal. They are up-river Nubians, chiefly, and therefore good, docile, cheerful workers. You need fear nothing of thievery or any other form of banditry. You may leave your cabins unlocked, your valuables wherever you care to put them. It has been said before - and I repeat with approval - Islam has a rather more positive way with criminals than we in the West. Perhaps we could learn from their forms of discipline. Be that as it may you have, if it does not seem indelicate to suggest, only to mistrust each other.’ With that, he departed, our miniature Henry V, from the bar. Descending to the main deck by means of a carpeted stairway, Sir Ranalf strode with chubby dignity across the gangplank, up concrete steps to the quayside and into his noble Mercedes.
‘I can’t help feeling suspicious of an English chap who sports a Boche car.’ Malcolm Quelch scowled after the departing producer. Mrs Cornelius put her arm through his. ‘I noo yer ‘ad yer ‘ead screwed on right; prof. ‘E’s a tricky bugger. Did ya recognise ‘im from somewhere?’ A shy, flattered schoolboy, Quelch allowed her to lead him slowly to the rear of the deck to watch the casting-off procedures of our muscular ‘fellahs’.
The city still held some of her blue dawn haze, turning to pink-gold glaze where it met the sky, and, with her tall silhouetted trees and towers, her pale domes and glittering crenellations, possessed for a moment the air of fabulous romance the tourists so longed to find and which their agreeable guides so poorly understood. It was pleasant to enjoy the skyline’s beauty without having to block out Malcolm Quelch’s dampening realism. The noise of the surrounding paddle-wheelers and motor launches readying themselves for their work slowly drew my attention until I was watching with fascination the brown barefoot boys and men running back and forth through the morning air, shouting orders, slipping lines, pushing off, starting engines, and when I looked back at Old Cairo it was once again the same dusty, modern Europeanate city I had first seen from the railway station, its solid neo-Classical buildings proclaiming the latest followers of Alexander and the Ptolemys working to create stability out of this confusion of creeds and races. In those days there were many of us who still looked to the British Empire as a force for peace and order in the world. The Germans always admired the British. No one was more astonished than Hitler when they sided with the Bolsheviks and, achieving his ruin, achieved their own into the bargain! Who could have predicted such a will to self-destruction?
From a moored felucca, the white-sailed swan of the Nile, came the rhythm of a drum, the yodelling of a native violin and clarinet, as some ceremonial party stepped aboard, the men in dark European suits wearing garlands of pink flowers, the women in enough gold, blue and cerise to make an Odessa wedding look dowdy.
Esmé came back to me, seeming a little wan as she sipped from the glass of Vichy water a Nubian boy brought her. She had on her pale green silk. ‘What are they doing, Maxim?’ Her attitude towards me had changed radically now we again enjoyed the pleasures of man and wife. The mixture of terror and lust, which produces that adrenalin best released in urgent sexual activity, had momentarily taken us in its power and she had developed a peculiar clinging quality which I found flattering and perhaps a trifle alarming. I placed my arm around her little shoulders and told her I guessed they were celebrating a marriage, though it was unclear which particular day of the ceremony they had reached. As we stood together watching the boat, still shuddering and squealing with the sounds of Africa, I reflected that it was not the prospect of marriage I feared, but the threat of betrayal. I was sure Esmé would not betray me but feared that Fate might again conspire to take my darling from me. In the past days I had developed a creeping sense of dread which even Quelch’s comforting junk could not dispel. My attachment to Esmé was deep and enduring. Our mutual sexual satisfaction had peaked, I think, during those days of sublime equality. I could only enjoy such fearful pleasures if they were mutually demanded, when, as it were, the Yin and the Yang achieved their ultimate expression, when the fundamental male and quintessential female found total harmony. This power is only satisfying when it is mutually experienced. I believe it is wrong merely to use women for this particular release (though I must admit there is a certain type of female who almost demands it). After all, I say to Mrs Cornelius, women are th
e only other sentient creatures on earth! Mrs Cornelius had no brief for Suffragism on the basis that she did not want ‘ther right ter vote fer ther same bunch o’ wankers thass in orlready’. I say that women are half the population of the earth. It is as much man’s responsibility to protect women from the beast that lurks in all men, and which he controls in himself, as it is for women to take care and not arouse that beast. I have fifty per cent of the burden, I say to her, ‘and you have the other fifty per cent.’
Jerusalem Commands: Between the Wars Vol. 3 Page 28
