Lambert saw no reason to save Spanton embarrassment by inventing excuses for him. Moreover he thought that Arbor should know better at his age than to give away his discomposure in public. ‘He went off with Cowley.’
A look of — it was scarcely ridiculous to call it agony — crossed Arbor’s face. He straightened himself, smiled jauntily and said,
‘Ah, I’m glad he’s met Cowley. Dear boy, he needs as many friends as we can get for him…. You do forgive me for coming at this hour, don’t you? Penny, you look wonderful. Good night, good night.’
Why can’t I sleep? Lambert groaned. What’s the matter with me? The feeling that had invaded him during the evening, of dissatisfaction — worse than dissatisfaction — disorder, demoralisation, returned. He had a sour taste in his mouth. It had nothing, he thought, to do with their guests, not even the detestable Cowley…. He was vexed with himself. But why, why? In some way, at some point, he had let himself down, lost himself, lost his way. How had it come about that years and years of hard work had only brought him to this moment when nothing he possessed, nothing he was doing, no acquaintance, no friend, was worth the trouble of crossing a room? Had it always been like this? That young man who came to London in 1927 and worked so desperately to get on — was he ever happy? Looking back over the years when he was busy, alert, running about, sitting on committees, meeting new people, all he could see was a succession of humiliations. Over and over again, the same thing happened to him. He got to know, on one of the committees perhaps, an influential man, a Cecil Cowley, and laid himself out to be pleasant, praised, as a friend certainly ought to, the fellow’s work — but did any of them repay him by praising his? Never. His stillborn novels rose in their grave-clothes and mocked him. Not one friendly nor even patronising hand had reached down to save them from quick oblivion. All my dear clever friends, he thought savagely, kept mum, as if the least said about my feeble efforts the better. But let me dare to criticise one of them — and why shouldn’t I?, I’m no fool — and — crack! — as though I could be endured only if I held my tongue or used it to lick boots, the fellow accused me of treachery and slyness, and dropped me cold. And it was too damned easy to make me look silly. I’m ugly, I have no charm…. The ghastly episode of Mrs. Benham-Smith came back into his mind in all its ridiculous horror…. How they must have laughed at me behind my back — and not only over that….
The flood of bitterness welling in him rose as high as his thoughts of his wife and her ambition, remorselessly worked for, to be a power in the literary world. Her voice as she held forth at the dinner-table about the Motts rang a cracked bell in his ear. As furtively as though he were whispering, he thought: She’s as third-rate as the others. For all her shrewdness, her good sense, her acute mind, her voracious reading, she has exactly the same greeds as I have; she wants the sort of successes you can count and finger: in fact she’s what poor Marjorie Benham-Smith would have been if she hadn’t been witless and a figure of fun — and without the Benham-Smith’s generosity.
He had shocked himself. A feeling of giddiness and nausea seized him. Another inch and I shall be over the edge, he thought…. As well go out and jump into the canal, and let its dark discoloured water close over him.
He had a physical sense of withdrawal, almost, he was so alarmed, of desperate headlong flight.
No, he thought sharply, no, there is no way back. And I’m making a fool of myself…. After all, I haven’t done so badly. I’m not finished yet, not on your sweet life…. In the darkness his face hardened into a smile. Come now, come now, he thought, Deputy-Director of Rutley, with a say in the spending of millions — which of them, for all their celebrity, can say as much?
He turned away, and went back to his bedroom. In his absence, his wife had rolled over on her back; her mouth, that small pink mouth, was open, and her breathing had taken on a quite extraordinary sound, something between the note of a whistling kettle and a choked growl. Very gently he turned her on to her side, tucking the sheet round her shoulders. He listened for a moment to her now normal breathing, then got into bed. In less than a minute he was asleep.
Chapter Nine
Ten days later, a Monday, he was working in Gregory’s room in Rutley House, trying to reduce to order a mass of letters and documents to do with the Congress. Gregory was not in the office: it was one of his days of feeling unfit to come — which, his friend knew, was nothing more or less than reluctance to give up working on his novel and bore himself with administrative problems.
Bonnifet came in. Without looking up, Lambert said, ‘What do you want? I thought I told you not to bother me.’
‘Yes,’ said Bonnifet coolly, ‘you did. But a Miss Verity is here, asking to see Mr. Mott, and I thought—’
Lambert cut him short. ‘I don’t care what the devil you thought. Who is she, and why didn’t you tell her that Mr. Mott isn’t here?’
‘Do you know when he will be here, sir?’
‘No. I don’t.’
Bonnifet seemed to hesitate. He went away. Half a minute later he was back. ‘I’m sorry, sir, but the young woman is… insistent. If she can’t see Mr. Mott now, she would like to know when she can.’
Exasperated by yet another proof of Bonnifet’s incompetence, he said, ‘Are you out of your mind? Get rid of her.’
Bonnifet did not move. ‘I’m sorry. I can’t get her out of the place without trouble.’
Lambert stared. ‘My good man, if you’ve got a loony out there, send for the police.’ Only a month since, a woman who said she had messages for the Institute from Abraham Lincoln had got as far as the outer office, and given a great deal of trouble.
His face so without expression as to be insolent, Bonnifet said, ’She’s not in a state to use force on. You’d better see her.’
‘What the devil d’you mean?’
‘I mean, sir, that she can’t just be thrown out.’
I’ll get rid of you if it’s the last thing I do, Lambert thought. ‘All right. Tell her that the Director will see her.’
‘The Director? Yes, sir.’
Lambert bent over his papers again. Between Bonnifet’s impudence and the annoyance of being interrupted in the middle of a tiresome job, he was in a bad temper, and prepared to be extremely short with the visitor. She came in. He let her walk up to the desk before he lifted his head. His irritation dropped as soon as he set eyes on her. He understood what Bonnifet had felt. She was very young, and pregnant: if he knew anything about it, very pregnant. He jumped up, and pulled a chair out for her.
‘Sit down, sit down. Have I your name?’
‘Miss Verity.’ She had a thin voice, not the voice of an educated person. She took no notice of the chair. ‘I thought… It was Mr. Mott I wanted to see. Mr. Gregory Mott. Isn’t he…’
She stopped, and turned to go away, but swayed and caught at the back of the chair. All its colour drained from her face. Lambert thought she was going to faint.
‘No, no, sit down,’ he said gently. ‘Here. I’ll get you a glass of water. You’ll be all right. Just put your head forward. Tha-at’s it. You feel better now, don’t you? Sit still.’
He poured her a drink of water from the decanter on the desk, and helped her to sip it. A sourish smell rose from her body when he bent over it, as though it or her clothes were in need of an airing. He felt sorry for her. What a rotten deal women get, he thought. She’s surely very young for it, too?… He wondered about bringing Diana in to help her, and decided against it…. I’m a better mother than that bold piece will ever be, he thought drily.
Pushing the glass away, the young woman made an effort to stand up.
‘No, don’t rush it,’ he said. ‘Just rest here quietly for a few minutes, then I’ll get you a cab. You’re not in the way, you know.’
‘You’re being very kind.’
‘Not at all.’
‘I… Could you tell me when I can see Mr. Mott?’
Until this moment Lambert had been too concerned by her st
ate to think of her as anything else than a young woman needing to be kindly and sensibly handled. The queerness of the affair struck him suddenly. What in heaven’s name was she doing here, and who was she? The yawning gulf between Gregory and a pregnant young woman, lower middle-class and unattractive, baffled him — his mind declined to make any connection between them. He was really at sea. At the same time his nose picked up something, he couldn’t have said what. Some exciting and unpleasant smell. He didn’t want to upset her, but he had to get to the bottom of it, he had to find out what was going on. I must for Gregory’s sake, he thought: we can’t have young women in this state asking to see him and fainting in his room. He said very gently,
‘It’s quite uncertain when he’ll come back, I’m afraid. Can’t you give me a message for him?’
‘Oh, no. No, no, no. I’m sorry. I’ll go.’ She did not move.
‘My dear, you wouldn’t have come here — ‘ he suppressed the words: in your state — ‘if you weren’t worried. What is it? What’s the matter?’
‘I — I can’t tell you.’
‘You don’t know me. My name is Corry, Lambert Corry. I’m Gregory’s oldest friend, I’ve known him since we were both boys. You can tell me anything, I shan’t give you away, and if Gregory ought to know about it I’ll certainly tell him.’
The young woman looked him in the face for the first time. ‘No. No, I can’t.’
She was shaking violently. Mustn’t upset the poor creature, he thought; she’s on the edge of bursting into tears, and this isn’t one of the times when a good cry does no harm. If she were my daughter I’d pack her off to bed for a week…. He felt really sorry for her. At the same time he did not want to let her go off without getting something from her. Do her good to talk, he told himself: get it off her heart, as they say.
‘Now look here, my dear, I don’t suppose you can tell me anything I don’t know, but—’
The blood ran to her face. ‘He — he told you?’
‘Let’s say he told me something’ Lambert said, smiling at her. ‘But now you tell me your story, and then I shall know how to help you. I want to help you, y’know.’
That was true. He was intensely curious — not for a fortune would he have allowed her to get away now — but it was not only curiosity that possessed him. Nor was it only that anything that involved Gregory was, at least partly, his friend’s business. He had a real wish to help the poor girl: the idea of turning her out, in the despair she must be in, revolted him.
‘Since you know,’ she said under her breath. ‘Did he tell you that it was Nice where I met him?’
‘No. He didn’t tell me that.’
‘It was Nice. I was sitting in a café… he was very kind, he helped me. It was the waiter — I didn’t understand what he wanted, and Mr. Mott came over and explained.’
‘So then you made friends,’ Lambert said gently.
‘Yes. Kind of.’
‘Did he—’ he took care to speak in an easy reassuring voice — ‘ did he tell you his name?’
‘He said to call him by his Christian name. But he said it was Graham.’
‘And did you know who he was?’
She hesitated. ‘No. Not then.’
‘When did you know?’
‘Later.’
‘How did you find out?’
She was silent.
In the gentlest of voices, Lambert asked, ‘You’re quite sure it’s Mr. Mott you ought to see?’
‘Yes.’
He was holding back the excitement that had seized him — partly excitement, partly a confused sense of triumph. Without knowing what he meant, he thought: I’ve got it, by God, I’ve got it!… As much to avoid looking at her as for any other reason, he stood up and walked about the room for a minute. When he came back to the desk, she looked at him as though she thought he might be going to punish her in some way, a look half wretched, half sly, which struck him as truly pitiful. ‘My dear, you’d better tell me the rest,’ he said. ‘But take your time.’
‘He… he took me to dinner.’
‘Where? Where did he take you?’
‘A hotel. I forget the name — a foreign name.’
It was like getting information out of a child or a very old woman. ‘And then?’
She did not answer; her face seemed to shrivel. Lambert said kindly, ‘I can’t help you unless you tell me the whole thing.’
‘He went back with me to the house. He said… he came upstairs to my room, he . . we… he was with me, you know.’ Her voice rose, its flatness, a northern flatness, became marked. ‘I don’t know what came over me — I’m not like that. Perhaps you won’t believe me, but it’s true, it’s true.’
In a soothing voice he said, ‘Oh, I believe you, my poor girl.’
She hung her head, staring down at her hands gripped together in her lap. Lambert seized the chance to look closely at her — from her thin ankles and knees over her swollen body to her white neck and face; it gave him the strangest pleasure to scrutinise her in this way, and he felt an itch to touch her. I was wrong about her, he thought; she’s not unattractive; it’s a queer sort of good looks, but she has them…. His nose twitched.
Suddenly she got up. I must go. Why did you… oh, I must go. You won’t say anything to get him into trouble, will you? I — I don’t want that.’
‘Of course not. Don’t fret yourself — no one is going to get into trouble,’ he said quickly. The idea that she might slip through his fingers exasperated him to such a point that he lost control of himself and seized her arm. With a cry she pulled herself free. Vexed with himself, he thought: For all you know, she’s a liar; the whole thing may be nonsense. ‘Have you seen him since?’ he asked.
‘No, no, I must go,’ she said.
The note of panic in her voice steadied him. She’d better go, he thought. A fit of hysterics here… no, no, on no account.
‘Very well,’ he said quietly. ‘I’ll come down with you. But you haven’t given me your address, you know. I must have that.’
‘Oh, must I tell you?’ She widened her eyes in the way a cat does, with the same effect of brightness and fixity.
He smiled at her. ‘Well, unless we know where to find you it’s going to be difficult, don’t you think?’
‘Yes, yes, of course.’ In an uncertain voice she gave him the name of a street and the house number. It was across the river — somewhere off the Brixton Road, he gathered.
‘Don’t worry about anything,’ he said. ‘I’ll see to it for you.’
‘Thank you.’
He took her downstairs and insisted on putting her in a cab. She tried to refuse, but when she saw that he was going to pay for it she gave way, obviously thankful not to have to take a bus. He helped her in, feeling as he did it so sorry for her and her burdened movements that it was all he could do not to put his arm round her.
In his room, he sent for Bonnifet, and told him, ‘ I’ll speak to the Director myself about Miss Verity’s visit.’
The young man stared at him with a sort of politeness he found extremely disagreeable. ‘Very good, sir.’
‘And don’t talk about it to anyone. You understand?’
‘I had no intention of talking about it.’
‘All right, all right,’ Lambert said irritably, ‘that’ll do.’
The man I’ve been holding up to myself as a paragon of decency, purity, rectitude, he thought drily. It takes a lot to shock me, but by God I’m shocked…. For a long minute, forcing his excitement back, he struggled to think coldly about the discovery he had made. Of all breeds of hypocrite, he thought, the sexual is the meanest and least bearable. The savagery of his revulsion against his friend surprised and almost discomfited him, and for less than a moment he caught himself thinking that, unpleasant as it all was, there was no need to exaggerate Gregory’s sinfulness. But his anger smothered this weak voice. A hypocrite, he repeated hotly, a tuppeny-ha’penny seducer of — what is she? a housemaid? a typist? — posin
g as a high-minded Christian gentleman. And giving a fake name — pretty good proof that he knew damn well what he was doing, it wasn’t the first time…. Without warning, he was swept by an atrocious feeling of jealousy. That the man who had always had everything — success, praise, reputation, authority, a rich wife, money to travel, buy valuable things, live a soft easy life — had all the time been indulging himself with women — no, by God, it was more than he could stomach. He felt that he was suffocating, and then, astonishingly, he felt a relief that spread through his whole body, as though an abscess had broken in him harmlessly.
It was as pleasurable a sensation as he had ever had in his life: he felt cleansed — and calm and filled with new strength, able to deal with anything. I mustn’t make a mistake, he thought: I must go slow, I must think. Shall I tell Penny? No. Not yet. No — it would be a mistake.
He made no attempt to explain to himself why he was reluctant to hand Gregory over to Penny. He was reluctant, and he knew very well, too, that she would want to make his mind up for him, she would tell him what he ought to do and how to do it. The last thing he wanted.
He decided to see Gregory.
Chapter Ten
I’ve written myself out, Gregory thought lightly. The fatigue in his muscles and the nerves of his brain was thoroughly satisfying and pleasant. A good day’s work. It was six o’clock. Pouring himself a glass of sherry he sauntered with it to a window.
In the evening sun of early April the washed-out greys and pinks and yellows of the buildings in Park Lane were a memory in the mind of Canaletto: behind them the sky reflected from the opposite quarter of the horizon the colours of a sunset he could not see: dove, pink, blue, green, all a little faded, and, higher up, a drift of slate-grey clouds moving before the north wind, slowly, turning livid as they lost the sunlight. The angle of the light, its clearness — cleared by the wind — sharpened every line and colour of the houses to an extreme purity; the buses moving up and down Park Lane shouted their red and the grass of the Park shouted its new green. A bronzed saffron spread from the unseen west to the sky on the southern edge of the Park and darkened into the bronze-green vapour of trees: fumes of white smoke from the Battersea power station lay across it. Immediately under his eyes the trees had buds and a few narrow leaves of a clear, burningly clear, green without any stain of bronze. Far in the distance a column of rain marched.
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