The Standing Water

by David Castleton

  Weirton goes on with his teetering walk, his teeth pinching his wrinkled lip, preparing – I suppose – for the next part of his diatribe.

  ‘Social structures are too precious and – though they may appear otherwise – too fragile to let too many smart-arsed individuals risk upsetting. Before we know it, the whole lot could come crashing down! Look at Darwin – a genius, no doubt, but look at the damage to the social fabric he’s caused. In little over a century, our religion’s withered – withered! What society has ever survived without the glue of religion to hold it together! What hope is there for us today with every Tom, Dick or Harry believing what he wants?’

  ‘There’s the small but important fact,’ I say, ‘that Darwin was right.’

  ‘Of course he was right! But why is that important? There’s truth and there’s truth! Maybe his ideas should have been circulated among a select elite. But, oh no, they had to be made available to the masses in the demented cause of progress! Progress! Why on earth should we want progress? Far better to use our energies in firming up the status quo! Progress is the disease of the modern world!’

  ‘The Japanese have a saying,’ Weirton goes on, ‘that one Einstein is a blessing, but two are a curse. Too many smarty-pants just cause a load of trouble! Look at that meddling Jew Freud – the dreadful things he’s unearthed in our minds! Look at the damnable ideas of Marx! Clever blokes, I’ll grant you, but look where their cleverness has got us. The Japanese have another proverb – the nail that stands out must be hammered down! And, by God boy, I hammered you lot! I beat you all till you were embedded in your correct places! Unfortunately, that damned fool Stone had to come along and undo some of my good work.’

  Weirton’s panting now, made tired by his hobbling marches. He again sits on his chair.

  ‘I’ll admit something,’ he says. ‘I lied to you in the pub.’

  ‘How do you mean?’ I peer into his puffing face.

  ‘I lied when I said I was disappointed about Jonathon. I’m actually glad he’s turned out the way he has! I was delighted to hear it! OK, it would be better if he didn’t wander around so much, if he settled down somewhere and raised a family – a family of drones just like himself. But I’m pleased he hasn’t done more with his life. Think of all the trouble an intellect like that could cause! He could have turned our understanding of the world upside-down! Jonathon was a nail that stuck out and – by God! – I made sure he was hammered right back into place!’

  ‘You bastard!’ I say.

  ‘I’m also glad you’re such a miserable failure in your chosen field. Why should a pleb like you get it into his head to write novels, be an artist? Your lack of success is God trying to tell you something. Give it up, boy! Give it up and save yourself and all of us a lot of grief! You’re not meant to do it! It’s like a pauper being crowned king, a fish swimming in the air or a bird breathing water! Be what you’re meant to be and just be satisfied! Be a dull drone like your father! I could see your talent at school – I just never thought you’d have the stupid idea to make a living from it. If I’d known, I’d have striven with every fibre of my being to knock it from you! How I wish I’d thrashed you a lot more!’

  I lunge forward; my fist hurtles, catches Weirton on the chin. A crack echoes out, the teacher flies backwards from his seat. Luckily for Weirton, he crashes into a pile of dirty laundry. The teacher blinks up at me. That crack was so tremendous I wonder if I might have broken his jaw, but – though his words are slurred – that jaw soon starts moving again.

  ‘You’re a leftie, aren’t you?’ Weirton murmurs. ‘I can tell just by looking at you. God knows how someone like you emerged from Emberfield, but somehow you did. And, like all lefties, you’re disgustingly hypocritical. You tell me …’

  Weirton’s eyes close for a moment. He seems to drift out of consciousness then float back in.

  ‘You tell me … you lefties believe in the collective, the common good, what’s best for all. But you’re also continually bleating about opportunities, about how people should be encouraged to fulfil their potential. You can’t have both, boy, can you? Either it’s the common good, with people forced to bow to society’s needs, or it’s anarchy and individual selfishness!’

  ‘We won’t make things better by strangling people’s talents!’ I say. ‘By forcing people to play small! The fulfilled individual can benefit society – by deepening our knowledge, making great art, contributing to the culture. But if you want a world of drones, that’s exactly what you’ll get! A world of mediocrity and stagnation, a world that will eventually start to rot and poison itself from within! Maybe it’s for those reasons’ – I thrust my arm towards the bookcase – ‘that your great civilisations crumbled!’

  ‘What you call mediocrity and stagnation I call tradition and identity!’ Weirton’s groaning, gasping, but seems determined to spit his words out. ‘It’s tradition that sustains us through the ages! Not fads and novelties that are here today, gone tomorrow. Yes, gone tomorrow, but each fad or fashion does its bit in nibbling away at our culture. You talk about art, about expanding knowledge … so what? What’s cutting-edge art today will be laughed at tomorrow … people in the future will look at the crap filling our galleries, the rubbish people like you write in books, and wonder what we were thinking! As for expanding knowledge, every breakthrough gets overturned in a few decades. People are already saying half Einstein’s theories are wrong. But tradition, if we keep tradition alive, it will sustain us through it all – it will be like a sturdy ship, an ark to keep us safe in the storms and raging seas of these dreadful modern times! An ark to keep safe our blessed culture! What’s wrong with that? And, of course, we all know that for any ship to function its crew must be subjected to the strictest discipline!’

  I just shake my head, let Weirton go on with his woozy waffle.

  ‘Three thousand years, Ancient Egypt survived for, three thousand years. All based on the strongest tradition, the most rigid hierarchy, each person knowing their place. Three thousand years – it really isn’t bad, is it? Look at our civilisation – with its fads and fashions, its new ideas and novelties, its opportunities and rights, its namby-pamby democracy. The mighty Empire’s already gone – crumbled, just in my lifetime: in less than one lifetime! I fear it’s this sad island that will crumble next.’

  ‘I didn’t come here to listen to your fascist mumblings,’ I say. ‘I’m getting tired of your drivel.’

  ‘Oh really –’ a smile flickers weakly on Weirton’s lips ‘– what did you come here for?’

  ‘At first I wasn’t sure, curiosity maybe. I must say I’m heartened by the fact your existence is far more miserable than I’d imagined. But now, after hearing all the filth that’s spewed from your gob, I’m tempted to beat you senseless. Beat and batter you maybe even beyond the borders of this world! I think it’s time for you to receive an almighty thrashing!’

  ‘Go on!’ Weirton mumbles. ‘Do it! I won’t resist! I’ve got nothing to live for! I tried to do myself in once. Couldn’t quite go through with it, but I knew there was no place for me in this blasted modern world then and I feel the same now. Kill me, I beg you! I’m no more use to this world, and if it means a piece of violent left-wing scum like you ends up in jail, so much the better! At least you wouldn’t be able to write another dreadful book!’

  My gaze has been fixed on Weirton, my feet and hands itching to batter him, to rid the world of his foul presence. But that last word he uttered – book – has jolted me out of my trance. Without my brain thinking, my legs carry me over to Weirton’s bookcase. My eyes scan over the books on Egypt and Mesopotamia, ancient China and Japan, on Greek and Celtic mythologies, Aztec and Inca religion. They scan down past the fishing manuals, the yellowing teaching guides till they come to the rows of diaries. I realise, as if a sun’s dawned in my mind after a black night, those diaries are what I need. I grab 1982, ’83, ’84 then also snatch 1985 for good measure. I wedge the weighty books under my arm and pace over to Weir
ton.

  ‘I won’t kill you,’ I say, ‘as much as part of me would love to do that! The thing you’d most hate would be for me to finish a damned good novel! I think these’ – I tap the diaries – ‘will help me a lot more than anything my feet or fists could do to you. And let’s just see, let’s see what endures if either of us live long enough – my art or your fascist notions of tradition and obedience!’

  Weirton groans, rolls a little on the floor, but I’m already getting out of there. I turn the key he’s left in the door, stride out into the night. I’ve no torch so I have to fumble my way to the car. I chuck the diaries on the backseat. My mind’s already working, wondering what more they might reveal about the teacher as I inch the vehicle down Weirton’s dirt track. Soon I’m driving along the loch’s shore, its dark, dark waters gleaming when touched by my headlights. Light flickering on the surface of the blackest depths. Light playing for just a moment, just a second, on the deep, deep standing water.