changing-places-david-lodge

by Unknown

  together the information that the year's nominee for the Actually, Gordon Masters had decided to back Philip for Exchange scheme had withdrawn at the last moment be-the Euphoria Exchange because he wanted to give a Senior cause he had been offered a Chair in Australia. It appeared Lectureship to a considerably younger member of the that the Committee concerned was looking rather urgently Department, a very prolific linguistician who was being for a replacement and that Masters (who was Chairman) tempted by offers from the new universities, and it would be was prepared to work it for Philip if he was interested.

  less embarrassing to do so while Philip was absent. Philip

  'Mmmmmmmnnnerink about it,' he concluded.

  was not to know this of course, though a less innocent poli-Philip did think about it. All day. With studied casualness tician might have suspected it.

  he mentioned it to Hilary while they were washing up after

  'You're sure you don't mind?' he asked Hilary, and was dinner.

  to ask at least once a day until his departure. He was still at

  'You ought to take it,' she said, after a moment's reflec-it when she saw him off at Rummidge station. 'You're tion. 'You need a break, a change. You're getting stale quite sure you don't mind ?'

  here.'

  'Darling, how many more times? Of course we shall all Philip couldn't deny it. 'What about the children, miss you . . . And you'll miss us, I hope?' she teased him though? What about Robert's eleven-plus?' he said, mildly.

  holding a dripping plate like hope in his hands.

  'Oh, yes, of course.'

  Hilary took a longer pause for thought. 'You go on your But that was the source of his guilt. He didn't honestly own,' she said at last.' I'll stay here with the children.'

  think he would miss them. He bore his children no ill-will, but

  'No, it wouldn't be fair,' he protested. 'I wouldn't dream he thought he could manage quite nicely without them, thank you, for six months. And as for Hilary, well, he found ofit.'

  it difficult after all these years to think of her as ontologically

  'I'll manage,' she said, taking the plate. 'Anyway, it's distinct from her offspring. She existed, in his field of vision, quite out of the question for us all to go at such short notice.

  mainly as a transmitter of information, warnings, requests What would we do about the house, for one thing? You and obligations with regard to Amanda, Robert and can't leave this place empty in the winter. And there's the Matthew. If she had been going to America, and himself fares...'

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  25

  left at home minding the children, he would have missed her his shoulder. Films and television conveyed the same all right. But if there were no children in the picture he message: that other people were having sex more often and couldn't readily put his finger on any reason why he should more variously than he was.

  be in need of a wife.

  Or were they? There had always been, notoriously, more There was sex, of course, but in recent years this had adulteries in fiction than in fact, and no doubt the same played a steadily diminishing role in the Swallow marriage.

  applied to orgasms. Looking around at the faces of his It had never been quite the same (had anything?) after colleagues in the Senior Common Room he felt reassured: their extended American honeymoon. In America, for not a Lineament of Gratified Desire to be seen. There were, instance, Hilary had tended to emit a high-pitched cry at of course, the students - everyone knew they had lots of sex.

  the moment of climax which Philip found deeply exciting; As a tutor he saw mostly the disadvantages: it tired them but on their first night in Rummidge, as they were making out, distracted them from their work; they got pregnant up their bed in the flat they had rented in a clumsily and missed their examinations, or they went on the Pill and converted old house, some unknown person had coughed suffered side-effects. But he envied them the world of lightly but very audibly in the adjoining room, and from thrilling possibility in which they moved, a world of ex-that time onwards, though they moved in due course to posed limbs, sex manuals on railway bookstalls, erotic music better-insulated accommodation, Hilary's orgasms (if such and frontal nudity on stage and screen. His own adolescence they were) were marked by nothing more dramatic than a seemed a poor cramped thing in comparison, limited, as far hissing sigh, rather like the sound of air escaping from a Li-as satisfying curiosity and desire went, to the more risque1

  Penguin Classics and the last waltz at College Hops when lo.

  they dimmed the lights and you might hold your partner, In the course of their married life in Rummidge Hilary encased in yards of slippery taffeta, close enough to feel the had never refused his advances, but she never positively bas-relief of her suspenders against your thighs.

  invited them either. She accepted his embrace with the same That was something he did envy the young - their style of calm, slightly preoccupied amiability with which she pre-dancing, though he never betrayed the fact to a soul.

  pared his breakfasts and ironed his shirts. Gradually, over Under the pretence of indulging his children, and with an the years, Philip's own interest in the physical side of expression carefully adjusted to express amused contempt, marriage declined, but he persuaded himself that this was he watched Top of the Pops and similar TV programmes with only normal.

  a painful mingling of pleasure and regret. How enchanting, The sudden eruption of the Sexual Revolution in the mid-those flashing thighs and twitching buttocks, lolling heads sixties had, it is true, unsettled him a little. The Sunday and bouncing breasts; how deliciously mindless, liberating, paper he had taken since first going up to the University, an it all was! And how infinitely sad the dancing of his own earnest, closely printed journal bursting with book reviews youth appeared in retrospect, those stiff-jointed, robot-like and excerpts from statesmen's memoirs, broke out abruptly fox-trots and quicksteps, at which he had been so inept.

  in a rash of nipples and coloured photographs of apres-sex This new dancing looked easy: no fear of making a mistake, leisurewear; his girl tutees suddenly began to dress like of stepping on your partner's feet or steering her like a prostitutes, with skirts so short that he was able to distinguish dodgem car into another robot-couple. It must be easy, he them, when their names escaped him, by the colour of their felt in his bones he could do it, but of course it was too late knickers; it became uncomfortable to read contemporary now, just as it was too late to comb his hair forward or wear novels at home in case one of the children should glance over 27

  26

  Paisley shirts or persuade Hilary to experiment with new front of the tourist compartment a stewardess is fiddling sexual postures.

  with a piece of tubular apparatus. How delightful, they In short, if Philip Swallow felt sensually underprivileged, are going to have a film, or rather, movie. There is an extra it was in a strictly elegaic spirit. It never occurred to him charge: Philip pays it gladly. A withered old lady across the that there was still time to rush into the Dionysian horde. It aisle shows him how to plug in his headphones which are, never occurred to him to be unfaithful to Hilary with one of he discovers, already providing aural entertainment on the nubile young women who swarmed in the corridors of three channels: Bartok, Muzak and some children's the Rummidge English Department. Such ideas, that is, twaddle. Culturally conditioned to choose the Bartok, he never occurred to his conscious, English self. His unconscious switches, after a few minutes, to the Muzak, a cool, rippling may have been otherwise occupied; and perhaps, deep, rendition of, what is it, 'These Foolish T h i n g s ' . . . ?

  deep down, there is, at the root of his present jubilation, the anticipation of sexual adventure. If this is the case, however, Meanwhile, back in the other Boeing, Morris Zapp has no rumour of it has reached Philip's ego. At this moment just discovered what it is that's bugging him about his the most licentious project he has in mind is to spend his flight. The realization is a delayed consequence of walking very next Sunday in
bed, smoking, reading the newspapers the length of the aircraft to the toilet, and strikes him, like a and watching television.

  slow-burn gag in a movie-comedy, just as he is concluding Bliss! No need to get up for the family breakfast, wash the his business there. On his way back he verifies his suspicion, car, mow the lawn and perform the other duties of the covertly scrutinizing every row of seats until he reaches his secular British Sabbath. No need, above all, to go for a walk own at the front of the aircraft. He sinks down heavily and, on Sunday afternoon. No need to rouse himself, heavy with as is his wont when thinking hard, crosses his legs and plays a Sunday lunch, from his armchair, to help Hilary collect and complex percussion solo with his fingernails on the sole of dress their querulous children, to try and find some new, his right shoe.

  pointless destination for a drive or to trudge out to one of the Every passenger on the plane except himself is a woman.

  local parks, where other little knots of people wander What is he supposed to make of that? The odds against listlessly, like lost souls in hell, blown by the gritty wind such a ratio turning up by chance must be astronomical.

  amid whirlpools of litter and dead leaves, past creaking Improvidence at work again. What kind of a chance is he swings and deserted football pitches, stagnant ponds and going to stand if there's an emergency, women and children artificial lakes where rowing boats are chained up, by first, himself a hundred and fifty-sixth in the line for the Sabbatarian decree, as if to emphasize the impossibility of lifeboats ?

  escape. La nause*, Rummidge-style. Well, no more of that for

  • Pardon me.'

  six months.

  It's the bespectacled blonde in the next seat. She holds a Philip stubs out his cigarette, and lights another. Pipes magazine open on her lap, index finger pressed to the page are not permitted in the aircraft.

  as if marking her place.

  He checks his watch. Less than halfway to go now. There

  ' May I ask your opinion on a question of etiquette?'

  is a communal stirring in the cabin. He looks round at-He grins, squinting at the magazine. 'Don't tell me tentively, anxious not to miss a cue. People are putting on Ramparts is running an etiquette column ?'

  the little plastic headphones that were lying, in transparent

  ' If a lady sees a man with his fly open, should she tell him ?'

  envelopes, on each seat when they boarded the plane. At the

  'Definitely.'

  s8

  29

  'Your fly's open, mister,' says the girl, and recommences

  'What has Stratford-upon-Avon got to do with it, for reading her copy of Ramparts^ holding it up to screen her face Chrissake?'

  as Morris hastily adjusts his dress.

  ' It's supposed to give you a lift afterwards. You get to see

  'Say,' he continues conversationally (for Morris Zapp a play.'

  does not believe in allowing socially disadvantageous

  'All's Well That Ends Well?' he snaps back, quick as a situations to cool and set), 'Say, have you noticed anything flash. But the jest conceals a deep unease. Of course he has funny about this plane?'

  heard of these package tours operating from States where legal abortions are difficult to obtain, and taking advantage

  'Funny?'

  of Britain's permissive new law. In casual conversation he

  'About the passengers.'

  would have shrugged it off as a simple instance of the law of The magazine is lowered, the swollen spectacles turned supply and demand, perhaps with a quip about the limeys slowly in his direction.' Only you, I guess.'

  finally licking their balance of payments problem. No prude,

  'You figured it out too!' he exclaims. 'It only just struck no reactionary, Morris Zapp. He has gone down on many a me. Right between the eyes. While I was in the John . . .

  poll as favouring the repeal of Euphoria's abortion laws That's why . . . Thanks for telling me, by the way.' He (likewise its laws against fornication, masturbation, adul-gestures towards his crotch.

  tery, sodomy, fellatio, cunnilingus and sexual congress in

  'Be my guest/ says the girl. 'How come you're on this which the female adopts the superior position: Euphoria charter anyway ?'

  had been first settled by a peculiarly narrow-minded

  ' One of my students sold me her ticket.'

  Puritanical sect whose taboos retained a fossilized existence

  ' Now all is clear,' says the girl.' I figured you couldn't be in the State legal code, one that rigorously enforced would needing an abortion.'

  have entailed the incarceration of ninety per cent of its present citizens). But it is a different matter to find oneself BOINNNNNNNNGGGGGGGGGG! The penny drops

  trapped in an airplane with a hundred and fifty-five women thunderously inside Morris Zapp's head. He steals a glance actually drawing the wages of sin. The thought of their one over the back of his seat. A hundred and fifty-five women hundred and fifty-five doomed stowaways sends cold shivers ranked in various attitudes - some sleeping, some knitting, roller-coasting down his curved spine, and a sudden vibra-some staring out of the windows, all (it strikes him now) un-tion in the aircraft, as it runs into the turbulence recently naturally silent, self-absorbed, depressed. Some eyes meet experienced by Philip Swallow, leaves him quaking with fear.

  his, and he flinches from their murderous glint. He turns For Morris Zapp is a twentieth-century counterpart of back queasily to the blonde, gestures weakly over his Swift's Nominal Christian - the Nominal Atheist. Under-shoulder with his thumb, whispers hoarsely: 'You mean all neath that tough exterior of the free-thinking Jew (exactly those women . . . ?'

  the kind T. S. Eliot thought an organic community could She nods.

  well do without) there is a core of old-fashioned Judaeo-

  'Holy mackerel!' (Zapp, his stock of blasphemy and Christian fear-of-the-Lord. If the Apollo astronauts had obscenity threadbare from everyday use, tends to fall back reported finding a message carved in gigantic letters on the on such quaintly genteel oaths in moments of great stress.) backside of the moon, 'Reports of My death are greatly exag-

  'Pardon my asking,' says the blonde, 'but I'm curious.

  gerated,' it would not have surprised Morris Zapp unduly, Did you buy the whole package - round trip, surgeon's fee, merely confirmed his deepest misgivings. At this moment he five days* nursing with private room and excursion to Stratford-upon-Avon ?'

  3'

  feels painfully vulnerable to divine retribution. He can't troubled. Morris Zapp experiences a rush of missionary zeal believe that Improvidence, old Nobodaddy, is going to sit to the head. He will do a good deed, instruct this innocent in placidly in the sky while abortion shuttle-services buzz right the difference between good and evil, talk her out of her under his nose, polluting the stratosphere and giving the wicked intent. One brand plucked from the burning should Recording Angel writer's cramp, no sir, one of these days he be enough to assure him of a happy landing. He leans is going to swat one of those planes right out the sky, and forward earnestly.

  why not this one?

  'Listen, kid, let me give some fatherly advice. Don't do it.

  Zapp succumbs to self-pity. Why should he suffer with all You'll never forgive yourself. Have the baby. Get it adopted these careless callous women ? He has knocked up a girl only

  - no sweat, the adoption agencies are screaming for new once in his life, and he made an honest woman of her (she stock. Maybe the father will want to marry you when he sees divorced him three years later, but that's another story, one the kid - they often do, you know.'

  indictment at a time, please). It's a frame-up. All the doing

  •He can't.'

  of the little bitch who had sold him her ticket, less than half-

  'Married already, h u h ? ' Morris Zapp shakes his head price, he couldn't resist the bargain but wondered at the over the depravity of his sex.

  time at her
generosity since only a week before he'd refused

  'No, he's a priest.'

  to raise her course-grade from a C to a B. She must have Zapp bows his head, buries his face in his hands.

  missed her period, rushed to book a seat on the Abortion

  •You feeling all right?'

  Express, had a negative pregnancy test and thought to her-

  •Just a twinge of morning-sickness,* he mumbles through self, I know what I'll do, Professor Zapp is going to Europe, his fingers. He looks up. 'This priest, is he paying for your I'll sell him my ticket, then the plane might be struck by a trip out of parish funds? Did he take a special collection or thunderbolt. A fine reward for trying to preserve academic something?'

  standards.

  • He doesn't know anything about it.'

  He becomes aware that the girl in the next seat is studying

  •You haven't told him you're pregnant?'

  him with interest.' You're a college teacher ?' she asks.

  'I don't want him to have to choose between me and his

  •Yeah, Euphoric State.'

  vows.'

  'Really! What d'you teach ? I'm majoring in Anthropolo-

  ' Has he any vuws left ?'

  gy at Euphoria College.'

  ' Poverty, chastity and obedience,' says the girl thoughtfully. ' Well, I guess he's still poor.'

  'Euphoria College? Isn't that the Catholic school in

  ' So who is paying for this trip ? *

  Esseph?'

  'I work nights on South Strand.'

  ' R i g h t '

  'One of those topless places ?'

  'Then what are you doing on this plane?' he hisses, all

  'No, record store. As a matter of fact I worked my first his roused moral indignation and superstitious fear focused year through college as a topless dancer. But then I realized on this kooky blonde. If even the Catholics are jumping on now exploitative it was, so I quit.'

  to the abortion bandwagon, what hope is there for the

  ' They charge a lot in those joints, huh ?'

  human race ?

  'I mean exploiting me, not the customers,' the girl replies,