by Simon Raven
'And you think like a eunuch. Why not kill him and be done?'
'Eunuchs ruled Byzantium rather effectively for nearly a thousand years, Savidis. Do try to remember your own history.'
'I live in the present.'
'Like all peasants,' Earle Restarick passed his fingers over the delicately embroidered Maltese Cross on his scarf. 'Well,' he said, 'you have your uses, I suppose. You can demonstrate your efficacy in the present, my dear Savidis, by going into Kyrenia forthwith and discreetly making the following arrangements for the entertainment of Madame Tuck ...'
6: Revivals
'Maise,' said Somerset Lloyd-James. 'We'll get her.'
'Who's Maisie?' said Lord Canteloupe.
'An old friend ...'
'I still don't understand.'
'Then have some more of this nice claret and listen carefully.'
They were lunching at the Ritz. largely because this was about the only place left in London where the tables were still far enough apart for the occupants to converse unheard. Although Canteloupe was paying for the lunch, Somerset was ordering and organising it. Nor did Canteloupe object; for Somerset knew a lot about food and somehow hypnotised waiters into absolute compliance, like a snake.
'The Director of Features says,' Somerset intoned, 'that while there are no specific provisions in Tom's contract as to moral respectability, there is a clause which requires that he should be resident in the United Kingdom during the period of his appointment and that he should retain "the necessary capacity to fulfil his obligations to the Corporation". Obviously, if Tom went mad or broke his neck the BBC would be entitled to terminate the agreement.'
'So where does this Maisie come in? Is she going to drive him potty or break his neck with a poker?'
'Maisie,' said Somerset, 'is a whore. A very accomplished whore.'
'Lead me to her.'
'I'll certainly give you an introduction, but that must come later. The point, here and now, is that Maisie of all people is qualified to make such a disastrous fool out of Tom that the BBC would have no alternative but to declare him thenceforth unfit "to fulfil his obligations".'
'Tom Llewyllyn,' said Canteloupe, 'is not an easy man to make a fool of.'
'Tom Llewyllyn,' said Somerset, 'used to be very, very partial to whores. In fact, Canteloupe, whores were all that he was partial to—though God knows he had enough opportunities elsewhere.'
'You mean ... he liked paying for it?' I mean he only liked it when he was paying for it'
'But since he's been married?'
Somerset shrugged.
'He'll have missed paying for it.'
'However much he's missed it, that's no reason why he should let this baggage make a fool of him. Not to the extent that you seem to count on.'
'You don't know Maisie,' Somerset said. 'She really is rather special. She's nothing much to look at, you understand, but she has a genius for her work.'
While Somerset Lloyd-James was lunching with Lord Canteloupe, Tom Llewyllyn was lunching down in Cambridge, with Robert Reculver Constable, the Provost of Lancaster College.
'The programmes,' Tom explained, 'will be monthly. We are starting at the end of May with an analysis, conducted by Hugh Trevor-Roper, of resurgent Nazism in Western Germany.'
'Very salutary,' said Constable. 'It's high time that cat was let properly out of the bag.'
'I hope to let out a lot of cats—even fiercer ones,' Tom said. 'I am particularly keen to emphasise the random nature of historical events. To show that we have very little control over anything that happens and that even when we think we know what we are doing we are usually doing something quite different.'
'Hmm,' grunted Constable, who was a good socialist and believed very firmly in planning. 'Concrete instance, please.'
'Cyprus,' said Tom. 'We thought we were dealing with a spontaneous demand for self-determination, In fact, however, the Cypriots were being unconsciously pressured into demanding something which they didn't want and then into using means they detested to get it. We weren't quarrelling with the Cypriots at all, really, we were fighting an American secret service conspiracy to humiliate and dispossess us. A perfect example of history making fools out of us all, since neither of the apparent protagonists—Britain and Cyprus—had the slightest control over anything that happened.'
'But not exactly a random affair, even on your theory. At least the Americans knew what they were doing.'
'Very few of them knew about it at all. And the only motive of those that did was atavistic jealousy of the British.'
'Still not entirely random.'
'Not far off it. There was no policy, only whim.'
'Very well,' Constable said; 'and what evidence can you produce?'
Tom outlined what he hoped to be able to prove.
'If all goes well,' he concluded, 'I want to make this the subject of our programme at the end of June.'
'And why are you telling me about it?'
'Gray himself.' said Tom, 'is too badly disfigured to appear on television. He will probably speak the narrative, which he himself will write, over the film sequences which we shall construct to illustrate it, but he cannot address the audience in person. In any case, I need someone more authoritative to do that: someone of prestige and known impartiality, who will summarise and endorse the proofs presented. In one word, Provost Constable, I need you.'
'I'm an economist, not an historian.'
'You are a figure,' said Tom, 'of the utmost academic repute. You are known as a man who will accept nothing without flawless evidence. That is what I need.'
'That's as may be,' said Constable, flattered despite himself: 'but what makes you think that Gray's evidence will be flawless?'
'I can't guarantee that, of course. But if I give you immediate access to it when Gray returns, will you agree to assess it?'
'I don't see why not.'
'And if you find it sound, will you appear on the programme and say so?'
'I don't much care for arc lamps and glamour.'
'I wouldn't want you if you did. I want you to be bleak, even boring, and totally undramatic. I want you to sum up as precisely and as prosaically as the most scrupulous judge in the kingdom.'
Constable rapped his coffee spoon on the table. First a few isolated beats, then a swift and continuous tattoo.
'I may write my own summary?' he asked.
'Of course.'
'And I may examine the film sequences you propose to use to make sure that these do not distort fact or give rise to false emphasis?'
'Certainly. When they are ready.'
'Very well,' said Constable, 'I'll do it. But if I were you, I shouldn't rely too much on this man Gray. Years ago, when I was tutor here, I had to refuse him admission to this college.'
'So I've heard.'
'But did you hear why? It was because he was found to have deceived. To have deceived and betrayed people who loved him for the sake of his own squalid pleasure.'
'I think you'll find that he's changed, Provost. Besides,' Tom said, 'if he tries to deceive us, no one will be quicker to find him out than you.'
'He very nearly wasn't found out before,' said Constable. 'He might never have been if he hadn't lost his head. First he deceived, and then, at a critical moment, he gave himself away because he lost his head. Unreliable either way, you see.'
'I think you're being rather hard, Provost. Years ago, when he was very young. Fielding Gray was pitiably exposed and then fully punished for all that he had done. Why not leave it at that?'
'I'll be glad to,' said Constable; 'but can he leave it at that?'
As soon as he arrived in Athens. Fielding had sat himself down in the Grande Bretagne Hotel and written to General Grivas in the terms already rehearsed with Leonard Percival. His experience of some years back, he wrote, while he was fighting against EOKA in Cyprus, had given him an immense respect for the General personally, and an abiding interest in the General's military techniques. However, since he h
ad been engaged by the BBC to investigate Cypriot affairs, certain people (he was not entirely sure who they were) seemed to have misconceived his motives as hostile to the present interests of Cyprus and to the good name of those who had taken part in her liberation. If the General would grant him the privilege of an interview, he would undertake to remove these misapprehensions; and having done so, he would be greatly honoured if the General would condescend to answer certain questions about the strategies and conceptions involved in the Cyprus campaign. The information would be used to prepare a responsible television programme, and it was also hoped to produce a detailed study in the form of a book by the writer of the present letter ... who was, my dear General, yours sincerely Fielding Gray, sometime Major and Officer Commanding the 10th Sabre Squadron of the 49th Earl Hamilton's Light Dragoons (Cyprus 1956-8).
The next day. Fielding made an expedition by taxi to Delphi and did not return until late in the evening. Since he had been feeling more and more doubtful as the day went on about the reply (if any) which his letter to Grivas would elicit, he was surprised to find that an envelope had been delivered by messenger that afternoon and that it contained a very courteous note written (like Fielding's) in literary Greek. The General regretted that he must be absent from Athens for the next seven days, but would be delighted to entertain Major Gray to luncheon at one o'clock on the afternoon following his return. The General was conscious of the honour of receiving an officer from so distinguished a regiment as Earl Hamilton's Light Dragoons, whose bearing and dexterity he had much admired.
So that's it, Fielding thought. Nothing to do now but wait. He composed a brief despatch to Leonard Percival. c/o The American Express, Roma, and another to Tom at the BBC; then he settled down to prepare an elaborate schedule of sight-seeing and related reading to fill in the next week.
Angela Tuck, having finished Fielding's novels, had nothing much to do with herself, and was therefore not at all pleased when Max rang up the next morning to say that he must now spend a third day and a third night away in Famagusta, where he had found a building suitable to house a casino and also several allies who were well placed to help him obtain the good will of the Administration.
After receiving this telephone call. Angela fretted and fiddled the morning away, ate a large English-style lunch, slept through the afternoon, awoke cross and sour-mouthed at six o'clock, and contrived to spend the next two hours bathing and dressing. During these two hours she drank several large whiskies, and by the time she had put down a pint of red wine with what little she could swallow of her English-style dinner and then poured two neat brandies on top of the whole mixture, she was positively twitching for action. Max, she remembered, had spoken of a wine-shop called Clito's, where the drink was supposed to be good and the company various; so thither, having with some difficulty obtained directions from a disapproving hall porter, she took her crepuscular way.
Some years before, Clito's shop had been only a dank cave filled with barrels and his clientele largely masculine and indigenous. However, the praise which several bibulous men of letters had bestowed on his wines and his tolerance had made Clito famous and enabled him to move into more commodious premises, in which he was now (to the fury of the men of letters) operating as a considerable tourist attraction, with prices to match. The arrival of an unaccompanied female, which in the era of the dank cave would have caused grave displeasure, was nothing out of the way these days; and though survivors of the original clientele frowned into their glasses, a new and younger class of Cypriot customer perked up, looked knowing, and dragged on its trouser legs to reveal large sections of bare calf, which were then laid out on available chairs for Angela's inspection.
There was only one firm rule of the house—that no native might make a direct approach to a foreigner or overtly solicit a drink. Smiles and displays of calf were as far as the young jackals of Kyrenia might go, and to these Angela remained indifferent. Or so it seemed. In fact, she was quietly employing a calculus of her own from which, having first made rough appraisals of shoulders, biceps and hips, she was able to arrive at a computation of the probable priapic capacities of all present. Only when she had done this, and added in certain other factors, such as facial appeal, skin textures and colouring, would she arrive at her final selection; and being a woman of great experience, she took her time. Meanwhile, she tried a bottle of Cypriot rosé, changed to a coarse local brandy and soda, changed again to a more refined local brandy without soda, reflected that she was too old to risk inferior liquor, and grievously offended Clito, who retained a fierce pride in the vines of his island, by making him bring out the bottle of Remy Martin which he reluctantly kept in reserve for faddy drinkers.
After about three-quarters of an hour, Angela decided on a boy with thin, hairy legs and smooth, pretty face. The contrast between the effeminacy above and the hirsute exhibition below titillated the perverse streak in her and also promised, when she consulted her mental records of this type, a graceful and not ungenerous sexual physique. So she called for another glass, raised the bottle of Remy Martin, waggled it like a pendulum, and beckoned to the goat-legged youth.
The youth rose, snorting and libidinous. Hardly had he reached her table, however, when a tall and bland-faced man, dressed in a beautiful suit of fawn gaberdine, took him by the shoulder, turned him smartly round, and pushed him back towards his friends. The boy turned at the man with a swift and saurian flick of the head, but as soon as he could see the interloper properly he nodded gravely and withdrew. The man sat down at Angela's table without speaking,waved at Clito, who was already bringing him a carafe of white wine, and then smiled at Angela, who had been about to issue a shrill protest, in a way that somehow seemed to offer untold riches in this world or even the next, to offer the Forbidden City, at the least, or the Golden Apples of the Sun.
'Mrs Tuck?' said the man.
What a come-down after that smile, she thought: a smile such as a jinn out of the lamp might give to a princess of Araby—and then the two words as bare and flat as floorboards.
'Mrs Tuck,' she said. 'And you?'
Clito poured the stranger some white wine from the carafe and then, giving Angela a look in which distaste was now mingled with new respect, tilled her glass with Remy Martin from the bottle on the table. Plainly, she thought, this man is someone; merely by sitting at my table he has raised my status.
'What do you want?' she said briskly. 'And what do I call you?'
'Earle... with an e.'
'Well, Mr Earle—'
'—Just Earle. I must apologise,' he said in an American accent which was all but entirely anglicised, 'for changing your plans for the evening. But I don't think you'll regret it.'
Again the smile, promising undreamed of pleasures and enchanted islands in which to enjoy them. A pure con, thought Angela, and nerved herself to resist.
'You haven't changed anything yet,' she said. 'You've merely interfered and delayed.'
'If you offered those boys a hundred pounds,' he said, 'not one of them would come near you now without my permission.'
'Bloody conceit.' Angela said.
She beckoned once more to the pretty face with the goat-legs. The boy stared straight back over her head and didn't move a muscle.
'You see?'
Then I'll make do with my own company.' She turned to Clito, who was hovering behind his counter. 'My bill, please.' she said.
Clito shrugged, shook his head, and spread his arms wide.
'He won't take your money.'
'Then he can go without it.'
Angela rose, walked steadily to the door and out into the empty street. As she went, the stranger said something in conversational tones and demotic Greek. There was a scurrying and a clattering behind her, and within five seconds she found that she was surrounded by the boys and youths from inside. They did not impede her; they merely formed a circle round her and walked along at the same pace as she did. Then the stranger, Earle, was beside her.
'We'll go to the harbour.' he said, and took her arm.
The circular cortege turned down a side street, and then down another. From this it emerged on to a short quay, the far end of which sloped down, like a ramp, on to a beach of shingle.
'Where are you taking me?'
'A little al fresco celebration. Mrs Tuck. Believe me, you'll enjoy it.'
They tramped across the shingle, away from the sea. Somewhere up on Angela's left the fort was hanging in the darkness, while ahead was a mass of large rocks. One of the boys led the way to a gap between two of these; Earle followed him through the gap, gently pulling Angela along behind him; and the rest of the boys, some eight or nine of them, came in single file after Angela. The gap led into a rather wider passage, so that now she was able to come up with Earle and walk by his side.
'Intriguing, isn't it?' he said.
The boy in front led on for perhaps twenty yards, after which the passage narrowed once more and then immediately widened again to turn itself into an egg-shaped arena, closed off at the far end, of fifteen yards in length by some six or seven where the oval was widest.
'Nothing to be frightened of,' said Earle in a soothing voice.
'I'm not frightened.'
Nor was she. For one thing, she had had a great deal to drink, and for another she was now pretty certain what was in train. Here was a rich American who was paying these boys to mount some sort of spectacle. For whatever reason, her own presence, or participation, was going to give him an additional thrill. So be it. If only he had come out with this proposition straight away in Clito's, instead of annoying her by putting on such a silly and pretentious act, Angela would have agreed to join in from the word go and would even have offered to share expenses. She liked a daisy chain from time to time, and the American himself, if too conventionally cut altogether to suit her tastes, was undeniably appetising. By and large, then, she was fully prepared to assist in anything which might be toward, and she looked with pleasure round the little grotto which had been selected. Her only regrets were that the floor was still of shingle, not sand, and that it would be too dark to appreciate the nuances of the entertainment.
