The Children's Book

by A. S. Byatt

  And at night—they slept out, on unrolled blankets and a waterproof—he talked about the stars. He knew them all, the planets and the constellations. Bright Venus, almost aligned with red Mars, Mercury faint on the horizon. The head of the Water-Snake, “just to the left of Canis Major” just below Gemini. The gibbous moon, waning.

  He did not talk about himself. He never said “I want…” or “I hope …” and only rarely “I think …” He did express an impersonal grief at the vanishing of certain predatory species, exterminated by gamekeepers, the hen harrier, the pine marten, the raven. He speculated about why the weasel, stoat and crow had proved more cunning and more pertinacious. Julian said

  “Perhaps you should be a naturalist? Study zoology and write books, or work in the Natural History Museum.”

  “I don’t think so,” said Tom. “I don’t write.”

  “What are you going to do? What do you want to do?”

  “Do you remember at the Midsummer party, they asked us all what we wanted to be? And Florian said, he wanted to be a fox in a foxhole?”

  “Well?”

  “I have some sympathy with that.”

  “And since you can’t be a fox in a foxhole?” said Julian lightly, lightly.

  “I don’t know,” said Tom. His face clouded. “They go on at me,” he said. “They want me to go to Cambridge. They make me sit exams. And so on.”

  “Cambridge isn’t bad. It’s beautiful. Full of interesting people.”

  “Cambridge is all right for you. You like people.”

  “And you don’t?”

  “I don’t know. I just don’t know what to do with people.”

  The next day was hot. They found a river, and Tom said they would swim in it. He put down his pack, stripped to his skin, folded his clothes neatly and put them on the top of his pack. Then he waded in, through the reeds on the bank of the river: Julian sat on the bank, amongst the buttercups, and watched him, entranced. He would never, he thought, forget the vision of Tom’s penis against his hairy thigh as he bent over his clothes. He would never forget the sight of those thighs, striding through brown-green water into something suddenly deeper, so that he vanished and rose again with floating duckweed scattered like confetti in his thick hair. Tom was not only sunny, he was sunburned. Everywhere exposed to the sun had been painted a ruddy-tanned colour, with paler hairs gleaming on it. The V of his shirt-neck, the bracelet of colour-change on his upper arms, various zebra-gradations of gold on his calves and thighs.

  “Come on in. What are you doing?”

  “Looking at you.”

  “Well, don’t. Come and feel the water, the delicious water. It’s hot on top, and cold and clammy under. I’ve got mud and tiddlers between my toes. Come on in.”

  Oh, and how I would like to come into him, Julian thought, undressing, patting down his own member with precautionary fingers. I can’t believe he knows as little as he appears to know. He ought to be a dreadful bore. He would be, if he wasn’t beautiful. No, that isn’t fair, he’s nice, he’s nice through and through, whatever that useless word means. A nice young man. But sad, I intuit, sad under. His own knees were going under, and then the embarrassing appendage. Tom splashed him—from a distance, always from a distance—with great rainbows of water, and then swam off, upriver, like a trout.

  “I’ll show you where the pike would hide themselves,” he said. “I know.” He said “This is good, this is good fun.”

  “Yes,” said Julian, enjoying the water as substitute sensation. “It is good fun.”

  Tom said, when they were sitting in the sun to dry themselves “What’s your favourite poem?”

  “Just one? I could say ten. Busy old fool, unruly sun. Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? ‘Ode on a Grecian Urn’? ‘Caliban upon Setebos’? What’s yours?”

  “What was he doing, the great god Pan

  Down in the reeds by the river?

  “I can say all of it. I often do.”

  “Say it.”

  “What was he doing, the great god Pan

  Down in the reeds by the river?

  Spreading ruin and scattering ban,

  Splashing and paddling with hoofs of a goat,

  And breaking the golden lilies afloat

  With the dragon-fly on the river…

  “He cut it short, did the great god Pan

  (How tall it stood in the river!),

  Then drew the pith, like the heart of a man,

  Steadily from the outside ring,

  And notched the poor dry empty thing

  In holes, as he sat by the river.

  “ ‘This is the way,’ laughed the great god Pan

  (Laughed while he sat by the river),

  ‘The only way, since gods began

  To make a sweet music, they could succeed.’

  Then dropping his mouth to a hole in the reed,

  He blew in power by the river…

  “Yet half a beast is the great god Pan

  To laugh as he sits by the river,

  Making a poet out of a man:

  The true gods sigh for the cost and pain,

  For the reed which grows nevermore again

  As a reed with the reeds in the river.”

  21

  At Purchase House, things deteriorated. Benedict Fludd had always had swings of mood—there were days when he worked beside Philip with furious energy, and times when he sat for days together, motionless in his chair, snarling if Philip asked him for information or money, sneering at Seraphita if he spoke to her at all. After Imogen left for London he immediately went into a black depression, sitting and glaring at his picture of Palissy, or hunched with his head in his hands, as though it hurt. When the period of slump was over, he did not now return to work, but shambled rapidly, and without warning, out of the house and into the marshes, hatless and jacketless even on wet, windy days. On one very bad day he swept a whole tray of newly glazed pots to the ground, muttering that they were ugly abortions.

  They were not, and Philip was almost angry at the waste of so much good work. But Philip was canny about what he could afford to feel, and he could not afford to feel angry with, or contemptuous of, his master.

  He did say to Elsie, it’s getting worse and worse. They both knew what “it” was. Elsie said she had tried to talk to Mrs. Fludd, but had got nowhere. Mrs. Fludd had said that her husband had things on his mind, and had a difficult temperament, and that Elsie already knew that.

  One day, at Dungeness, in mixed, squally weather, where achingly bright patches of light off the water were succeeded by whipping winds and draggled clouds streaming over the sun, Philip, on one of his solitary walks, collecting driftwood, shells, and odd stones, saw Fludd at the water’s edge, flailing his arms and roaring inaudibly at the sea. Philip thought he would give him a wide berth and hope not to be noticed. Then he saw that Fludd, in boots and cord trousers, was over his ankles in the rising tide. It is not easy to walk fast on sloping shingle. Philip changed direction and set off towards Fludd. The pebbles ground and whinged under his feet. Fludd shook his fist at the horizon, and took several steps forward, moving his arms like a windmill. He was now over his haunches in seawater, and splashing his hands in the blown crests of spray. Philip had never ventured into the water off this bank. He believed, without knowing why, that the steep slope continued, and plunged rapidly beyond a man’s depth, into treacherous currents. He began a blundering run down towards the potter, who took another two or three grinding steps forward, and was waist-deep. Philip could not swim. He began to calculate what would happen if he lunged at Fludd and fell over himself, into the sucking water. He scrambled down to where Fludd was, and howled into the wind “Come back, sir. Come back home now.”

  For a moment they stood there, the old man swaying in the tide, and slapping at the surface with his great hands, the young man calculating furiously about balance and grip, moving forward always with both feet stable.

  “Benedict Fludd—” he howled.<
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  Fludd did turn round, his mouth snarling amongst his draggled hair, his torso lurching.

  “Go home,” said Fludd, and fell sideways with a sluicing sound, onto the sea. He rose again, obviously on his knees on the shingle, and slipping down the slope of the beach, shouting at Philip that he was a pest and a fool. Philip walked forward, mincing safe step by step, and took hold of the sodden flannel shirt.

  “You’d best come out now. You’d best come home.”

  “Leave me be.”

  “How can I?” said Philip, betraying crossness. “I’ve got to get you home. Help me.”

  Benedict Fludd gave a kick—whether to help Philip, or free himself of him was unclear—and pebbles rolled thickly down under the water. Philip put his arms round the bulk of Fludd and pulled.

  “You’ve got to help me,” he said with furious reason. “You’ve got to help yourself. Come on, now.”

  And somehow they were scrambling together, and both on the dry land, which was not dry, but wet with the water that ran off them, and with the whipped water blown in the wind.

  “You should have let me go on,” said Fludd, mildly enough. “I had the idea of just walking on and down and in. You did wrong to stop me.”

  “Why?” said Philip. “Why are you like this? You are a great artist. You can do things most men can’t dream of.”

  “It leaves me. I can do nothing. I think, I shall be unable—unable—unable for the rest of my life. And then I think, why drag it out?”

  “That is just a mood. You’ve had it other times, the black mood. I’ve watched you. And then you’ve made amazing things. The sun and clouds pot, remember? And the one like flaming damask. Remember? Those pots wouldn’t be, if you’d drowned yourself.”

  “You care more about the pots than about me.”

  “And if I do, it’s because I’m like you. And this time, you nearly drowned both of us, which was unjust.”

  It did not strike Philip as odd that he had made no appeal to Fludd to save himself for the sake of his wife and daughters.

  Philip was glad to see Arthur Dobbin, one day when he was in Lydd, buying provisions. He told Dobbin that Fludd was “very depressed” and this appeared to be a result of the departure of Imogen for London. He asked if Frank Mallett might call. Dobbin cycled back to Puxty, and told Frank, who got on his own bicycle and went to Purchase House. Fludd was not in—he was out tramping in the Marsh again—so Frank was able to talk to Philip, who described Benedict Fludd’s frightening behaviour, and said that he was at his wits’ end, for he could not watch the potter all the time—that might drive him to further extravagances—and moreover, he needed to work, or the household would have no money. Philip said Fludd couldn’t abide to see a doctor—that was no good. Maybe Frank could talk to him. He added, on a sudden impulse, that Pomona was sleepwalking. “Mostly into my bedroom,” said Philip. “It’s embarrassing. I know what you think, but she is deep asleep, deep. Elsie won’t believe me, but you might.”

  “The family puzzles me,” said Frank Mallett. “You and Elsie have saved it, so to speak. Major Cain may well have saved Imogen, but he has deranged the others. How is Mrs. Fludd?”

  “I never know,” said Philip. He said “Sometimes I see her, when I’m trying to get Pomona back to bed. She comes down in a dressing-gown, with her hair down, and drinks brandy. She looks like a washboard.”

  “A washboard?”

  “Sort of crumpled and ridged. With no expression on her face.”

  “To be truthful, I am a little intimidated by Benedict Fludd. I shall speak to him, of course. I shall also write to Major Cain.”

  “I had hoped you might.” Philip frowned. “When he is working, he’s dangerous—pots are slow things, they need calm, they need ease—and he does everything at double pace. But he does it well at double pace, better than I ever shall, Mr. Mallett—he smashed a whole batch of good pots I’d made and painted—he swept it away.”

  “He makes you angry?”

  “No-o,” said Philip slowly. “I love him, in a way. But he puts the fear of God into me.”

  Benedict Fludd grinned evilly at Frank Mallett, and said he had no need of his ministrations—yet. “I am not long for this world, young man, and I shall need you to shrive me. But you may as well keep away till then. I did not ask you to come here. I require solitude.”

  “You are not alone in the house, Mr. Fludd.”

  “And what do you mean by that? It is my house.”

  “I came to visit Mrs. Fludd. And Philip Warren.”

  “Oh, get out, before I throw something at you. I am in an evil temper, and best avoided.”

  “It is hard on Philip.”

  “I know that.”

  When Prosper Cain received Frank Mallett’s letter, he was planning one of several visits to the Grande Exposition Universelle de Paris, which had opened, with many of its palaces and pavilions unfinished, in April. There was a political frost between England and France, owing to the Boer War. The Prince of Wales, who was president of the British section and had overseen the construction of the British Palace, had refused to set foot in Paris in 1900. Several loyal British exhibitors had withdrawn, but the Victoria and Albert Museum was in constant communication with the experts in the decorative arts in France, Germany, Austria, Belgium and other countries where the “new” art flourished and was on show. Prosper Cain was interested in the new jewellery, both the French work of René Lalique and the exquisite Austrian work of the new Wiener Werkstätte and Koloman Moser. He had travelled to the new Museum of Decorative Arts in Vienna, and was excited by Jugendstil there and in Munich. He was due to make an extended visit in June, and conceived the idea of taking Benedict Fludd with him, to see the new styles of ceramics, and to take him out of his marshy desolation for a time. Some of Fludd’s great bowls and slightly sinister vessels were on display in Edwin Lutyens’s British pavilion.

  Cain went to Purchase House and tempted Fludd with the sight of some of his “Paradise” ware, intricately covered with birds, beasts, fruit, angels, and naked humans, which he hadn’t seen for twenty years since they had been bought by a Belgian collector. He said Fludd would like to see Gallé’s work, and inspect the Art Nouveau. Fludd glared and grumbled, and said he hadn’t been to Paris for twenty years. It was a pother of a city which would be worse with the stinking crowds of garlic-eaters there would be. But a glint of interest appeared in his eye as he contemplated these horrors, and he agreed to come.

  Prosper decided he would also take his son, as he hoped he might follow him into his profession. He told Julian to bring a friend, and Julian said he should like to take Tom, if Tom would come, which he imagined he would not. Charles Wellwood, it turned out, was intending to go. Julian asked Charles if he would ask Tom.

  Charles walked over to Todefright to ask Tom in person. The Todefright Wellwoods were sitting in the garden, taking tea in the midsummer sun. Charles said Prosper Cain was getting up a party to go to the Great Exhibition, and Julian would like Tom to come. Tom opened his mouth to say without thinking that he’d rather not.

  Phyllis said “He won’t come. He never goes anywhere anymore.”

  Hedda said “Tom’s a recluse. Tom is growing odd, you know, Charles. I wish you’d asked me.”

  Tom closed his mouth, and his eyes. Then he opened them again, and said he would be delighted to go.

  He was becoming odd. He did not want to be odd. He wanted to be invisible.

  Charles said that Prosper Cain had persuaded Benedict Fludd to come with them. Tom said he supposed Philip Warren would be coming too—Philip needed to see all the new art.

  It turned out that nobody had thought of taking Philip. When they considered the idea, they saw it was good. Philip was exactly the person who would be inspired by the new world of arts, crafts, and social hope embodied in the Exhibition. So Fludd told Philip he was going to Paris, and Cain bought him a new suit to go in.

  On the deck of the packet-boat, midway across the Channel
, Philip realised, with sudden shock, that he had no idea what France, or Paris, or Europe was. He had seen the French shoreline, on clear days, white cliffs with a difference, or vague solids melting into mist, which fascinated him. He was always fascinated by transparent films and substances that half concealed, and half revealed, other, different objects. He saw the French coastline as an analogy of glazes. He had been out on the Channel waters, fishing for mackerel—mackerel skin, like mackerel skies, was another endlessly fascinating structure. He tried to calm himself, when he realised he needed calming, by looking at the transient, repeated blades and arrows in the water ploughed back by the prow. Bottle-greens, greens chock-full of silver air, what cream and white, what a darkness under. Fludd was standing next to him, his arms on the rail, staring equally intently into the water. Philip knew they were seeing the same thing. Behind them, the three young men chatted and laughed. Julian was telling a story which entailed mimicry of a Frenchman. Charles was laughing. Prosper Cain was reading what appeared to be a catalogue. Philip realised he was both excited and afraid. Another country, other people, other habits, strange food. He was the only member of the party who had never travelled.

  Julian had been to Paris several times before. He knew the museums and galleries: he had been in cafés, and ridden in a rowboat on the Seine. Charles had stayed in the best hotels, and ridden in the Bois de Boulogne. Tom had been on a family holiday, some time ago with Violet in charge, and had a vague recollection of Notre-Dame and aching feet. Fludd had spent time in attic lodgings in his misspent youth, drinking, smoking and exploring women.

  Only Prosper Cain was at all prepared for the effect of the Grande Exposition Universelle.

  The Exhibition could be seen as a series of paradoxes. It was gigantic and exorbitant, covering 1,500 acres and costing 120 million francs. It attracted 48 million paying visitors, took over four years to build, and included the elegant new Alexander III Bridge, arching over the Seine, the glass-roofed Grand Palais, and the pretty pink Petit Palais. But it had the idiosyncratic metaphysical charm of all meticulous human reconstructions of reality, a charm we associate with the miniature, toy theatres, puppet booths, doll’s houses, oilskin battlefields with miniature lead armies deployed around inch-high forests and hillocks. It had the recessive pleasing infinity of the biscuit tin painted on the biscuit tin. It was forward-looking, containing new machines and weapons, and images of craftsmen, clearly enjoying their work. It contained a reconstruction of mediaeval Paris, with troubadours and taverns, picturesque beggars, and ladies in bumrolls. There were new facilities—plentifully scattered different public conveniences, from the basic to the luxurious with running water and towels, telephone kiosks, moving staircases and a moving pavement, travelling at three different speeds. There was a palace of mirrors, and a complete fake Swiss village, complete with waterfall, peasants, mountains and cows. Along the left bank of the Seine were the palaces of the nations, some with mediaeval towers, some baroque or rococo. The USA provided telegrams, iced water and Stock Exchange prices for businessmen away from home. The Kaiser himself had supervised the napery, glassware, silver and china in the restaurant of the German pavilion. He had also sent a collection of the complete range of Prussian military uniforms. The Italians had reconstructed St. Mark’s Cathedral. The British had commissioned Edwin Lutyens to make a perfect replica of a Jacobean country house, which they then filled with paintings by Burne-Jones and Watts, and furniture and hangings by Morris & Co.