The Chinese Room

by Vivian Connell

  At ten minutes past four, finally goaded by an Egyptian who insisted on speaking French, although Nicholas knew he could speak English, he told them to go to hell and elsewhere for the money. Miss Coleman had looked up in warning, but he ignored her. This made a consternation, as the delegation well knew the City would look askance at anything he had refused. The annoying Egyptian began to conciliate in English. Nicholas snapped: “If you had talked plain English all the time, instead of your puerile French, I might have listened to you. Now, the matter is closed.”

  Nicholas got up. They left hardly able to muster a farewell politeness.

  Miss Coleman gathered up her notes. She said: “I imagine we’ll have a telephone call from Dorman.”

  The call came half an hour later. Old Dorman sounded very puzzled. Nicholas said bluntly: “Your advisers are either fools or rogues. It’s your job to find out which and why. I’m done with it.”

  Although he knew he had done the right thing, Nicholas worked himself up into a nerve storm. Outside, the heat that seemed, like the glass, a solid leaned against the window, and he felt that his head was like a drum on which at any moment thoughts would begin to pound like hands. He looked about for something to occupy his mind, and then his eye fell on his private case which Muriel had sent in with Blake. As if he could not help himself, he opened it with the key which Muriel had sent in an envelope with a note asking him to ring if he were not coming home to dinner as usual. He noted that her writing had changed somewhat. It was more compact, tauter, and the points of the letters had sharpened. Nicholas had frequently noticed how any sharp development in character at once showed in a more economical handwriting. Yes, she had changed rapidly. Then he saw the file of anonymous letters, there was a gap in his pulse, and he knew that suddenly he was back again in the middle of it all.

  As if it had somehow to discharge itself, his mind at once began to project faces on the white pad, and his eye occupied itself with them. Underneath each face now was the image of Sarah Fuidge with that mildewed light on the skin. Suddenly the other faces began to jump up and down on her face in a staccato rhythm, and Nicholas shifted uneasily in his chair, clenched his hands on the arms, and tried to abolish these faces that shot out at him like the close-ups he had seen in Russian films. As if to get away from them, he jumped up from his chair and went and took a glass of water. He wondered if they would vanish if he pulled the blind down. He walked about the room, felt calmer, sat down again, and found that the faces now came and went more slowly and that watching them was a comfort to his mind. So long as he kept looking at them, he was able to forget about the letters...

  “Mr. Elder.”

  “Send him in,” said Nicholas, and closed the shutter.

  During the week, Mr. Elder had accumulated documents, and Nicholas groaned as he saw the file in Elder’s hand. He asked unreasonably: “Mr. Elder, must I go on all my life scratching my name on these damned documents that I know very well you’ve got in order?”

  Mr. Elder looked at the taut white face of his chief and said: “Well, Mr. Bude, you can depute it to Mr. Strood.”

  Nicholas looked up and tried to consider him. “But you don’t want that, Mr. Elder, because Mr. Strood will fuss like a damned hen over each one and then probably send it up to me because he can’t make up his own mind.”

  Mr. Elder looked at him with nothing in his eyes.

  “Miss Coleman often signs your letters for you. Perhaps...”

  “All right, I’ll do them this time, but the system here is going to be changed.” He looked sharply at Mr. Elder. “Mr. Elder, I want a quick answer. Who is the most competent person in this bank?”

  “Outside yourself, Miss Coleman.”

  Nicholas took up one of the pens Mr. Elder had brought him. Mr. Elder always brought his special pens and special inks for these transfers involving large sums. Nicholas signed his name again and again and got more and more irritated with the pointed nob that Mr. Elder brought for the interlineal signature that was a Bude Bank safeguard against forgery in foreign transactions. He blotched the last deed and swore. Mr. Elder forgot his own blotter and turned the documents hastily on the white blotting pad on the desk. Nicholas jumped in his chair and hit the desk and overturned the pot of red ink so that the whole pad was incarnadined.

  “Jesus Christ! You fool!”

  Mr. Elder was startled. He stared at Mr. Bude.

  Nicholas looked furiously at him, and said: “Don’t you know damned well I never use that blotting pad!”

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Bude. I forgot myself.” Mr. Elder w&s a little pale under the onslaught. “After all, Mr. Bude, it is a blotter, isn’t it?”

  How the hell could he tell Elder that he wanted the thing to see faces on and kept it there for that? He gripped the arms of the chair and tried to calm himself. “I’m sorry, Mr. Elder. I shouldn’t have lost my temper.” Nicholas knew he was sweating. “It’s this goddam thunder in the air, and—I got no sleep last night.”

  “It’s quite all right, Mr. Bude.”

  Mr. Elder got his own blotter and mopped the splashes from the desk and then saw that the letters in Mr. Bude’s private case were reddened by the ink and took them in his hand to blot them.

  “Leave those alone!”

  Mr. Elder looked in some alarm at Mr. Bude’s face.

  Nicholas had shouted at him. Mr. Elder dropped the letters and said: “I’m sorry. I simply wanted to dry them.”

  Nicholas was too confused to explain.

  “Mr. Bude, I hope you don’t think me impertinent, but if I were you, I’d have a holiday.”

  “Why?” Nicholas barked the question.

  “Well—you seem overworked, or worried, or something. I’m sorry. Perhaps I ought not to have spoken.”

  Nicholas looked at him in a way that made Mr. Elder flinch.

  “Mr. Elder, why did you ask me how many pages of that notepaper I took the night I went to your place?”

  Mr. Elder paused for some time, as if trying to understand what lay behind this question. “Mr. Bude, I don’t know why you asked me that question. Must I answer it?”

  “I would prefer if you did.”

  Mr. Elder seemed very uncomfortable. “I am afraid you will think it rather childish, Mr. Bude, but I have a certain number of pages of that paper, and each day I use one page, either for a letter, or sometimes for a kind of diary I keep, of my thoughts, and...”

  “Go on,” said Nicholas as Mr. Elder paused in some embarrassment.

  “Well, I know it is perhaps stupid, but I always have had the idea that I have just so many days of life left as there remain pages of that notepaper.” Something like a spot of color came into the old face. “So, I had the queer idea that you had taken five days of my life away.”

  Nicholas looked hard at him. He was feeling awkward under this disclosure and suddenly remembered the uncanny way in which Mr. Elder had arisen from his chair in the Chinese room to draw the curtains at the exact moment when the sun, behind his back, had touched the horizon.

  “Well, perhaps that is the truth, Mr. Elder.”

  Mr. Elder seemed to be all bone and skin suddenly, and his voice had got thin. “Mr. Bude, that is a very unpleasant thing to say. I do not see why you should expect me to tell you a lie. I do not understand why you asked that question, anyway.”

  “Well, it’s no dafter than the answer you gave, is it?”

  “No, perhaps not. I suppose my culture, such as I have, ought to protect me from a superstition of that kind, but...”

  “So, I suppose, you keep that notepaper counted?”

  “Yes.”

  Nicholas looked at the desk and asked: “If that is so, you would know if any pages were missing?”

  “Yes. At the end of each box. I can check them by the calendar.”

  “Have you missed any?”

  Mr. Elder was obviously startled. Nicholas looked full at him suddenly. There was a pause.

  “Extraordinary! Why do you ask me that?�
��

  “Never mind. I want the answer.”

  “1 have. Eighteen pages.”

  “You have no idea who took them?”

  “No. I have been puzzled. And annoyed.”

  “I see.”

  “Mr. Bude, I don’t understand how you could come to guess that I have missed this paper.”

  “I’m not a fool, Mr. Elder.”

  “I don’t think you are. But I still don’t...”

  “You say you write letters on this paper. To whom?”

  “Almost invariably to Professor Crampton.’

  “When you were ill, you wrote a note of apology on it to me.”

  “That is correct.”

  “Hum...”

  There was a pause.

  “Mr. Bude, what is all this mystery?”

  “That’s what I want to know from you.”

  “Well, I have answered some very personal questions, but you do not explain your reason for asking them. It’s all very queer.”

  “Very queer, Mr. Elder, with you living like a Chinese mandarin, and somebody else in the bank smoking opium, and...

  Mr. Elder looked as if he might faint. Nicholas had not meant to talk about Miss Coleman, but it had slipped his tongue. Mr. Elder was upset.

  “Has Miss Coleman told you?”

  “She has not. She doesn’t even know I was in your room—unless you told her.”

  “Of course I did not.” Mr. Elder paused. “Then how do you know it was her. You could not recognize her under that veil...” Mr. Elder was startled. “Good heavens...”

  “I hadn’t meant to say it, Mr. Elder.” Nicholas hesitated. “This conversation is private.”

  “I understand. Well, is there anything else you want to know?”

  Nicholas took up one of the anonymous letters. “Have you seen this envelope before?”

  “No.”

  “Do you use envelopes of that kind?”

  “No.”

  “That is all, Mr. Elder.”

  Mr. Elder now looked obstinate. “It is not all, Mr. Bude. I don’t understand all this. But I want to know how you knew I missed that paper.”

  “Very well. You see these letters?”

  “Yes.”

  “They are written on Elder Bank notepaper.”

  “But...”

  “They are anonymous letters.”

  Mr. Elder paused. “The ones you are writing yourself?”

  “I am not writing them.”

  “Good Lord! What do they say?”

  “Perhaps you already know, Mr. Elder?”

  “Mr. Bude, even if I am your employee, I cannot permit this.”

  Nicholas hit the desk. “I don’t care a goddam whether you permit it or not.” He suddenly stood up. “If you repeat a word of this conversation anywhere, by Christ, I’ll ..”

  Nicholas took up the blotting pad and tore it across. Somehow the ink looked like blood on his hands. He saw Mr. Elder looking at his hands, and swore.

  “Is there anything wrong with my hands, Mr, Elder?”

  “No.”

  “Are you sure you have never noticed anything wrong with my hands?”

  Mr. Elder looked in alarm at the sweating white face of Mr. Bude.

  “No, Mr. Bude, except...”

  “Except what?”

  “Well, you don’t always seem to be able to keep them under control.”

  Nicholas sat down as if exhausted. Mr. Elder got him a glass of water. The clock struck five with its almost noiseless chime. All the fight had gone out of Nicholas. He said: “I’ve got my Chinese room, too, Mr. Elder.”

  “Your car will be here, Mr. Bude.”

  “Very well. Send somebody up to clear up this bloody mess.”

  THIRTY-ONE

  Muriel felt angry when Nicholas got home after his confession to Mr. Elder. He looked so exhausted that one felt the blood could not move in his body, and he stumbled as he came up the steps. He was too fatigued to utter the curse on his lips. He mopped his gray, damp face and looked up at the incubating thunder in the sky.

  “My God, what a day.”

  Muriel, who had gone to much care to make herself look nice, realized that he did not notice her at all. He had that awful, absent-minded look on his face.

  “You look dead tired.”

  “I am. I got no sleep last night. I missed the train and got down somehow.” He paused. “I stayed for the funeral.”

  “When did he die?”

  “About an hour after they telephoned me on Tuesday.”

  “You’d better have some tea, and a bath.”

  “Yes.” He said in a polite, random way: “What have you been doing?”

  “Oh, I spent the last two nights in London. I came down early this morning. It’s like an oven up there with all this thunder about.”

  “Yes.”

  He was taking no interest in anything. She felt she could not bear this any longer and said: “I’m just taking the dogs for a walk. Margaret is bringing tea. I’ve had mine. Why not have a sleep until dinner?”

  “I might.”

  Muriel put on a new frock for dinner, but he hardly seemed aware of her coming into the room. She began to get annoyed. She had not been able to get him out of her mind since she had discovered that he almost certainly had affairs with Laura and Miss Coleman and maybe other women. Now, as he sat like an old man in his chair, in some world of his own, she felt the whole thing was hopeless. Oxinham brought in the sherry.

  “Bring in the cocktail things, Oxinham.”

  “Yes, madam.”

  When they came she made a very strong cocktail and said: “Better have this, if you are tired. What about some Château Yquem for dinner? I’ve told Oxinham.”

  “Yes.”

  She thought he seemed to move, as well as talk, in monosyllables. She took up the Evening Standard he had brought and gave up any attempt at conversation. He obviously was not inclined to talk about what had happened in Northumberland, or else was too fatigued to mention anything at all.

  After dinner he apologized for being tired. He opened the window and stood by it to get some air, and remarked that it was terribly stuffy. She knew that it was, and said, as if to make it easy for him, that it had got her down all day. Nicholas came back from the window and gave it up and sank into his chair. His eyes closed, and his face seemed to hang in dejection, and she wondered if he was turning that file of letters over and over in his mind.

  With the sunlight of the wine in his blood, and the glow of the fire in his eyes, Nicholas had felt tides of sleep submerging his mind, and he shut his lids and was like some medium into whose liquid glass pictures and memories glided like bright fish in a sunlighted room of the sea. He could see the blue peat smoke climbing into the sky from the chimney of his uncle’s cottage in Northumberland. He could see the widow in her cheap black clothes that looked urban and cold on her strong peasant body. He counted again with her the old shabby bank notes that she had taken from a cupboard, and calculated with her again if they could afford a name plate on the coffin. And there he had sat, in the kitchen with the stone floor, Nicholas Bude, the millionaire, a future member of the House of Lords, knowing that he dare not offer her as much as a one-pound note to help with the burial, lest he offend the ghost of the proud and humble man who now lay on the bed with his mouth forever closed upon whatever last word he had wanted to say to his nephew, the great London banker, and his clean, muscular, and bony hands clasped upon a Bible on his breast.

  Nicholas remembered how he had stood by Christian’s widow by the graveside and in some way had felt closer to her than he had ever been to anybody save his own father, although they had spoken few words, as if she understood that they inhabited different worlds and there could be no communication between them. And she had said nothing personal until the last moment before he left for the country station. Then she had looked out at him from her clear eyes and said: “I’m glad he was gone, before you came, for he would have known that y
ou had no happiness.” Then she had put her hands on his shoulders. “Kiss me, Nicholas. I’m thinking you are as lonely as I am, and my man dead.”

  Then the door of the car had banged behind him, as it banged now in his memory, and woke him up, and he saw Muriel, suddenly beautiful, and as distant as some golden girl in a technicolor film. The hot air of the room seemed to choke him, and he felt the pressure of the accumulating thunder outside, and he wanted to pull the clouds asunder in his hands and then bang them together and burst the rain out of them. He saw Muriel’s long lovely legs and under the silk could feel in his hands the live, beautiful breasts. And her mouth was the red meat of the rose and her flesh the golden meat of the honey. And now he knew that he was admiring her like a painting, and a vague surprise came into him that she was his own wife, and it seemed like some accident that had nothing to do with him, and all he wanted to do was to get away by himself and sleep. Somewhere filed away in his mind were the letters, and Sidonie lay asleep in a corner, with a blue veil of slumber hiding her, and Elder’s Chinese room was hidden inside that Chinese painting on the wall. He knew that for the first time for ages he had got into a peaceful mood and wondered if he could slip away inside it to bed.

  Suddenly light cracked in the room, and the flash was followed by a tremendous bang, and both were repeated almost simultaneously.

  “God, it’s burst right over here!”

  The lights, of course, went out. Nicholas knew from long experience that every shaft of lightning in the district aimed itself at the Barrington electric plant and got it the first time. Muriel got up in the light of a flash and closed the window. Oxinham brought in an oil lamp and blinked at the violent flashes.

  “For God’s sake, draw the curtains,” said Nicholas, “or this damned lightning will blind us.”

  When Oxinham went out, Nicholas felt the electricity shooting through his body and swore in anger.