‘Ask your doctor to give Mrs Jaraby a check-up. Explain to him your fears. He will soon evaporate them, and you can start with a clean slate. That is all I can say.’
‘My doctor is a raving fool. He doesn’t understand a word I say. He never listens.’
‘But, Mr Jaraby, you must not have a raving fool as a doctor. Change, go to someone else.’
Frustration again faced Mr Jaraby. He had told his wife that in his public life all was well. It was true. In shops or on the street, in trains and buses he felt as always. He felt in command, able to insist on the course he chose to walk along a crowded thoroughfare, able to check the change he was handed, to demand and receive the goods he preferred. His wishes were observed; his word was law. So, within the month, should it be on the committee. But what of Crimea Road? What of the house he owned and called his own? Must he accept that it was now an unreliable place, where anything could happen? The sitting-room and the garden, once havens of rest, were fearful places now; uneasy places, rich in defiance and chaos. He felt like furniture in the house, unnoticed by his son, played upon by his wife. He could no longer order the child his son had once been to obey him; he could not expect his will to be interpreted and acted upon. Had the change been gradual or had his will been stolen overnight? Mr Jaraby did not know. He could not see the picture clearly. The edges were blurred, the details haphazard. The mad and the wicked were in charge of his life in that house. They were triumphant, they mocked him.
Still, Mr Jaraby did not feel beaten. Other people had troublesome families: intractable wives, unprepossessing sons. Mr Jaraby would go on his way with dignity, relying on the outside world to give him strength. He would stand out, a martyr if need be, against the forces that attempted to destroy him. For he knew he could not be destroyed. It troubled him only that men like Dr Mudie and Dr Wiley, men from the world outside, men from his public life, betrayed him in his need. And then – perhaps for no reason at all, or perhaps because his line of thought continued – he remembered the woman who had pursued him from Woolworth’s to the teashop. For a moment he felt afraid, but in a minute the fear passed. There was some explanation for the woman. It could not be that the house spread its influence beyond its true domain. It could not be that he was no longer safe outside it. ‘I shall hold my head high,’ Mr Jaraby said to himself; and Dr Mudie, overhearing the statement, raised his eyebrows.
20
The idea that was running through Swingler’s mind was that both Mr Jaraby and Mr Nox interested him. Mr Nox had telephoned and been rude. He had said he did not wish Swingler to continue his surveillance of Mr Jaraby; he said it was no longer important, that he did not wish to give Swingler another Italian lesson even if Swingler paid; that in fact, to speak bluntly, he disliked the kind of man that Swingler was. In reply Swingler was polite and curious. Mr Nox had told him very little; most of the time he had spoken in riddles. Swingler did not know why, precisely, he had been asked to keep an eye on Mr Jaraby; he did not know why Mr Nox wished to place him in disrepute. Swingler, who was never above suspecting the worst, suspected it now: Nox wished to ‘have something’ on Jaraby in order to extract money from him. Swingler, who had often himself ‘had something’ on people for that very reason, saw that the situation was bristling with possibilities. From what Nox had told him about Jaraby he was persuaded that if Jaraby had guilt it was worth something. If Nox could extract money, why not Swingler? Nox had all the signs of an amateur; Swingler was an expert. From what he had seen of Jaraby, the man was in something of a state. He had seen him emerge from a doctor’s house and strike the brass plate with his stick. Now there was an odd thing to do. He had seen him fidget and lose composure when he sat in the Cadena with Angie. Yet Nox had said he was well used to such women. Jaraby was nervous and jumpy, and he looked as though he didn’t like being like that. Maybe Nox had already made the discovery he was after, on his own. If that was so, Swingler didn’t like it. ‘Share and share alike’ was Swingler’s motto, though occasionally he deviated from it.
Then there was Nox himself. Nox was behaving very oddly. Nox, as Swingler saw it, was up to little good, however you looked at it. Could it be that Jaraby had something on Nox and that Nox wanted something on Jaraby to balance it? In that case, there was something to be had on Nox as well.
It was pleasant weather for watching people, and Swingler had nothing else to do. It was difficult for him to keep an eye on Nox because Nox knew who he was, but there was nothing to be lost by continuing his observation of Nox’s enemy. He stepped out from behind a parked car in Crimea Road and followed Mr Jaraby to Mr Turtle’s funeral. He trailed far behind him, dawdling and humming to himself. He always relied on his intuition: drama, Swingler felt, would sooner or later break through.
Drama of a kind had, in fact, broken through that same morning at the Rimini; and when later they attended their friend’s funeral Mr Cridley and Mr Sole were the victims of shock, and still suffered considerable surprise.
‘Fruit jelly,’ Mr Cridley said at breakfast. ‘It was marked fruit jelly on the menu. Fruit, I ask you. Did you have it, Sole? It was turnip in that jelly. I was up all night.’
‘I made for the rice. Fruit jelly and fresh cream, it always says. And along it comes with custard. Rice is rice. A square chunk, cut from the dish.’
But it was not all this that worried them: they were well used to the shock of being served with custard when expecting cream, and of coming across orange-coloured lumps, beyond identification, in the jelly.
‘Sole, look at what has just entered.’
Miss Burdock stood at the door, differently dressed. It was, apparently, that one day of the year: she wore already, at half-past eight in the morning, the flowered dress.
‘Almighty God, attired like that for Turtle’s funeral!’
Miss Burdock took her place at her own small table, requesting of the maid, as she always did, fruit juice and cornflakes, tea and brown toast. The two men gossiped, glancing at her.
‘Lily.’ Mr Sole called the maid. ‘Lily, did Major Torrill leave a black tie behind?’
‘I cannot believe,’ exclaimed Mr Cridley, ‘that she intends to attend the funeral in that get-up. One day in the year the woman goes gay, and it’s for a funeral.’
‘I didn’t sleep a wink. Miss Edge in the corridor, someone flushing the lavatory, Turtle on my mind. I was in the sanatorium with him for a fortnight. He knew the name of every flower in the British Isles. In those days he had a phenomenal memory.’
‘Who inherits?’
‘Indeed. Not Burdock, please God. He spoke of his godson, Topham’s boy. And a niece in Wales.’
‘Is this it?’ Lily asked, handing Mr Sole a black tie. ‘There are hundreds there, striped and coloured. This was all there was in black.’
‘A dressy fellow, Torrill. Lovely. Thank you, Lily dear.’
‘Are we all set then?’ Mr Cridley queried. ‘Is there a collection at these affairs? Was there at your wife’s? I was too upset to remember.’
‘Good morning, gentlemen,’ cried Miss Burdock, pausing at their table. ‘Where are you off to, so smart you look?’
‘We are attending,’ answered Mr Sole stiffly, ‘our friend Turtle’s burial. No doubt we shall have the pleasure of your company in the church?’
‘My company? Dear me, I am not dressed for so solemn an occasion. I don’t feel a call to go; funerals are for families and old friends.’
‘Are you saying you are not going to his funeral?’
‘I could hardly intrude myself. After all, I scarcely knew Mr Turtle.’
‘Scarcely knew him? Do you call being about to marry the man scarcely knowing him?’
‘Who was about to marry him? Surely Mr Turtle was not arranging to marry again?’
‘But Miss Burdock, you and Turtle were to marry. We all know about it. Turtle did not keep it a secret.’
‘Did Mr Turtle say that? That he and I … ? Oh, Mr Sole! How sweet of Mr Turtle to wish for that. How v
ery sweet!’
‘He proposed, you accepted. That was what he said.’
‘You dear old people, what fantasies you weave! Mr Turtle and I only went to the pictures and had tea. I hoped he would come to the Rimini as a resident; his big house was far beyond him. Oh, it has made my day to think that kind Mr Turtle had longed to marry me. How good of you to tell me!’
‘I don’t know about longed,’ murmured Mr Cridley. ‘Perhaps he thought you were the good housekeeping kind.’ But Miss Burdock, her head turned, had gone on to her cubby-hole, where she would think about the news and might even have a weep.
‘She led him on. She wanted to get him here. I call it diabolical.’
Mr Sole nodded.
‘Motives, motives,’ cried Mr Cridley, banging the breakfast table. ‘You find them everywhere. Think of the awful Harp. How I hate these smart middle-aged people.’
A week ago, when Mr Turtle was alive, they would have rejoiced to hear that in his confusion he had mistaken the situation. Now they felt a little peeved that Miss Burdock had got off so lightly and was so pleased at the discovery of what had lurked in Mr Turtle’s imagination before his death. Had they not spoken, she would never have known. Grumpily they set off for the sun-lounge and the morning mail.
All those people standing around in the heat by an open grave, they gave Swingler the willies. He was nervous because Mr Nox was there; he kept his hat pulled down over his forehead and his hand over his mouth.
The coffin lowered into a pit, earth falling on it: it seemed archaic and, to Swingler, something of a savage rite. Cremation, he considered, was the tidier end. Brass on the coffin gleamed, the clergyman’s surplice was bright in the sunlight, the dry clay was caked and hardened into lumps.
Swingler saw Mr Nox standing alone, and Mr Jaraby with his big stick staring at him, as though about to set upon him. There was distrust and suspicion in the way Mr Jaraby was looking, and Swingler could see that Mr Nox was aware of it.
‘Vouchsafe, we beseech Thee,’ said the clergyman, ‘to bless and hallow this grave, that it may be a peaceful resting-place for the body of Thy servant …’
Swingler saw two similar men who stood together, murmuring. ‘I think she should have come anyway,’ said Mr Cridley, ‘and shown some respect.’
His friend agreed in hushed, though violent, tones. ‘Burdock has no respect for a creature on earth, let alone one just removed from it.’
Mrs Strap was not at the funeral either. She was in Oxford Street buying lilac-coloured underclothes and twelve-denier stockings.
Basil was writing to A. J. Hohenberg … psittacosis seems to be spreading. I have tried the tetracycline treatment you suggest but so far without avail. I would be glad of any further advice you can offer … Basil and Mr Hohenberg had never met, but their correspondence, maintained now for close on five years, was a source of considerable comfort to him.
Swingler, chewing a match, followed Mr Jaraby back to Crimea Road.
21
It was too warm to sleep. Far too warm, Mr Jaraby thought, moving his body about the bed. Absurd to be so warm in London in July: had he not in his time known real heat in Burma? Was he not by this time a judge of what was right for London in July? Did anyone think he did not know that it was not some ersatz commodity, arbitrarily or even deliberately created by the fumes of heavy traffic and the increasing ubiquity of those electric signs? He sneered at the city, seeing the huge flashing neons and the new buildings and grown men eating chocolate on the pavements. The sheet beneath him felt like a rope; his pyjamas were damp and uncomfortable. He rose, switched on the light and remade his bed.
He lay on his back. If he chanced to drop off to sleep in this position he would, he knew, have a nightmare. But it was easier to relax like this, and Mr Jaraby had a theory that just at the moment of sleep he could turn gently on his side without upsetting his carefully coaxed drowsiness. He had held that theory for many years without ever succeeding in executing it. He lay still; first with his eyes closed and then with them open. It wasn’t the heat at all, he thought: it was this damned business. God knows, it probably wasn’t any warmer than any other night. God knows, probably the sweat on his body was the sweat of worry. Once you started worrying you couldn’t stop. He accepted that he must put up with the condition of his wife; he was quite clear in his mind that she would continue to speak in her own particular way, and could no longer be relied upon to give him his due. At least the situation was as bad as it could become: nothing could be worse than Basil dropping cigarette ash all over the place and the chirruping of those birds. He would have a word or two with Basil and explain that it would be happier for all concerned if he thought about moving on; he would speak with subtlety and discretion. It was useless to consult doctors. The doctor of today couldn’t see what was under his nose. Anyway, Mr Jaraby had other things to think about. He resented having worried about his wife, because that worry had led directly to this one. You start with one worry, you settle it in your mind; and then there’s another. There was only a week to go before the committee meeting and he felt unprepared. He felt that he had not made sufficiently certain that nothing could go wrong. There was that extraordinary slander of Sanctuary’s on Old Boys’ Day. If Sanctuary was capable of such a ridiculous idea about Dowse, he was capable of anything: it didn’t exactly give you confidence in the man’s judgement. And Ponders was so weak, so likely to be swayed, and Nox was a trouble-maker. He went on thinking about them, seeing their faces, seeing their hands. Who would they have if they didn’t choose him? Who would they have if there was a single real objection to his election? Not Cridley, not Sole; both were beyond it. Nor Nox, who was unpopular. Sanctuary? Sanctuary wouldn’t be interested, though. Would they break the rule, which they were at liberty to break, and invite the new committee to choose its own President? Only once before had that been done, but it could be done and might be done. And if someone was fool enough to suggest Nox and Nox agreed, there was nothing he could do to prevent it; he could offer no real objection, no reason that was sound enough to be damaging.
An hour later a fresh thought struck Mr Jaraby and he rose again from his bed. His dressing-gown was twenty-three years old and had all the appearance of a well-worn garment. It served its purpose, though, and Mr Jaraby saw no sense in another purchase. That it was ragged and inadequate was a private affair, and inadequacy, he argued, was a question of degree. In the kitchen Mr Jaraby rooted in the waste-bin. There were potato peelings, a sodden paper-bag, tea-leaves, a soup tin and a tin that had contained peaches. It was this last that interested him. At supper he had noted the peaches, reminding himself that as soon as they were consumed he must question their origin with his wife. He had forgotten. Concerned with this other business, the thought had passed easily from his mind. He looked at the label and picked a tea-leaf from it. No need to question their origin now. Cling peaches in rich syrup. Fourteen ounces. Australian.
‘My God,’ said Mr Jaraby aloud.
The clock on the dresser ticked loudly. As he prepared to wake his wife he noticed with satisfaction that it registered twenty-five minutes past two.
‘Come on now,’ Mr Jaraby demanded in her bedroom. ‘Cast sleep aside, we have a matter to discuss.’
Mrs Jaraby lay curled on her side, a white hair-net covering her head. He twisted the bedside lamp so that its beam fell on her face, an aid to her waking. She opened both eyes at once, and, seeing him there, immediately sat up. She said, as people often do in the confusion of being snatched from deep sleep: ‘What is the time?’
‘The time is irrelevant. Do not side-track me. I have not risen from my bed to discuss the time.’
‘What then? Why do you wake me?’
‘What of those peaches? Whence came our suppertime peaches? Tell me the truth, do not prevaricate.’
‘Peaches?’
‘Was other fruit mentioned? Did we enjoy some medley of fruit at supper? Do I enquire of cherries and pears and pine-apple?’
; ‘Basil likes peaches. He has done so all his life.’
‘You are avoiding my question. Cannot you be honest with a straight reply?’
‘I do not understand you. I do not know why you are here, waking me and talking of peaches. Did the peaches injure you? Do you feel unwell?’
‘The peaches were Australian peaches. They are clearly marked as such on the tin. Did you ascertain as you bought them that that was not so? That the label lies? I hope you did. I hope you have an explanation. At this late hour, I await it.’
‘Good God above, are you mad? I bought the peaches in Lipton’s. I have no idea –’
‘You have no idea about anything. Tell me what you think you have no idea about, that I may set you straight.’
‘I was going to say: I know nothing more about the peaches except that I bought them cheaply at Lipton’s. The tin was damaged.’
‘They were Australian peaches. They came from the Antipodes.’
‘They could hardly be Australian and come from elsewhere.’
‘I will not have Australian produce in the house.’
‘So you say –’
‘Then why go against my wishes? Why since you know them do you continue in your ways?’
‘It is quite impossible to keep an eye on everything I buy. I have asked in the past about the butter and the bacon and the cheese. The people selling think me odd.’
‘They think you odd for other reasons.’
‘Maybe, maybe. I do not go into it with them. What is the time? I cannot help it if you dislike Australians and the place they come from. That is your own business, though what they have ever done to you I cannot imagine.’
‘I dislike the way they speak. I will not have the house filled with Australian stuff. Cheap and nasty, as the people are. God knows, the house is bad enough. Must you make it worse?’
The Old Boys Page 14
