Dark Palace

by Frank Moorhouse

Had Robert been the one who had left? Had Robert left her? Why did that send a tremor through her?

  Was she still not prepared to let go of him?

  Was he, for her, a touchstone of normality?

  She wanted desperately to go back up to Vittoz and ask him more.

  Gossip and the Hazard of Unwitting Collusion

  ‘Tell me what happened with Vittoz,’ Ambrose said, as they sat at their dinner table in the apartment, having one of their rare home-cooked meals.

  Ambrose had cooked. He’d insisted that she—they—stop their public life for a few days and think out what she was now to do. She was owed the usual three days off after the Assembly and had a few other days owing.

  They’d become homebodies, cleaning and fixing and rearranging the furniture, hanging two Tamara de Lempicka lithographs, Spring and The Young Ladies. What would Robert make of them? Advertisements for the Modern Woman? Decadent? Terribly advanced even for Geneva. Maybe two Lempickas in one room was too strong? They matched her lithograph of Les Deux Soeurs which was in her bedroom.

  And they talked about all manner of things.

  What had happened during her appointment with Vittoz?

  ‘Well?’ Ambrose said.

  ‘He was very clever. But isn’t it supposed to be all confidential—between a doctor and patient?’

  ‘I am your doctor, in some sense.’

  ‘The Good Doctor Ambrose? Yes dear, you are my doctor, in a sense. Well, he pronounced me sane. Or normal, but not average. Or at least, he thought my life was very unusual but normal. Something like that.’

  Like what?

  ‘That, we more or less knew.’

  ‘I pointed out to him that all the gossip about drink was happening because I was a woman. He seemed to agree.’

  ‘He “seemed to agree”?’ Ambrose sounded sceptical.

  ‘I know what you mean about our Doctor Vittoz. But, yes, I think he nodded.’

  ‘Nothing can be assumed with Vittoz. His silence should not be taken as agreement. Or comment. I sometimes think talking to him is like fortune-telling: we tend to remember anything that the fortune-teller says which is vaguely connected to our lives, usually something generalised such as mourning a loss. Everyone is mourning a loss of some kind. And we forget the rest. Then we remake it all in our heads to make it tell us what we want to hear. We wish to believe the fortune-teller. But we do the fortune-telling of ourselves. Although the home truths do get through with Vittoz.’

  ‘You hardly need to tell a Rationalist about fortune-telling. I’m now inclined to think that we might be placing too much importance on the whole thing.’

  ‘I don’t. With the gossips at the League I think we still have what I call unwitting connivance—an unintended conspiracy—an accidental conspiracy, if you like.’

  ‘Vittoz doesn’t believe in accidents.’

  ‘Gossip can unwittingly cause disasters. And it could well be that you have risen in the organisation to a point where you attract hostile gossip—that you’re a target now for resentment. You know that achievement gains you enemies as well as admirers.’

  ‘I thought the wisdom was that when you gain an enemy you also gain the enemy’s enemies as your allies.’

  ‘Perhaps not with gossip. The gossips are not enemies—they don’t intend you harm but will accidentally do you harm. They know not what they do.’

  ‘How do we erase this view of me from the minds of people—so that it doesn’t keep coming up when the haute direction are considering me for a position or a promotion or whatever?’

  ‘I think it can be done. During the last few days you’ve led me to a new position. You have identified things which I did not see. First, you are right, Edith. Drinking, as such, is not your problem. And yes, it is because you’re a woman.’

  ‘Regardless, I’m perceived to be a tippler,’ she said.

  ‘There are different kinds of drinker,’ Ambrose said, speculating as much to himself as to her. ‘Liverright is a drunkard. He’s so boozed by evening he’s not worth talking to. You’re a different drinker. But there is not much fine distinction in gossip. I’m inclined to think that you should become, formally, a non-drinker.’

  ‘I can’t see that happening.’

  ‘Hear me out. We have to change their conversation—by getting out of the gossip. And we, as you say, have to erase the image of you as a tippler that some might have.’

  ‘If I let it be known I am not drinking it will seem that I have had to give it up—that I have a difficulty with drink. And I rather like drinking.’

  ‘Drinking is not that important in your life, Edith—it is a very, very minor activity. And anyhow, drink should be your friend—not your colleague. And something else, Edith.’

  ‘What?’ she said tiredly.

  ‘The world needs you.’

  She looked over at him.

  ‘Edith, we don’t want a drift to a situation where you are forced to leave.’

  ‘You think that could happen?’ Edith could hardly believe his words.

  ‘Remember that they forced Dame Rachel out because of drinking. And there is your countrywoman, the legendary Jocelyn Horn, dismissed for “dancing too much”. And we pretty much can guess what that meant.’

  She felt disturbed.

  ‘You’ll find the first part of the plan the most unpalatable. I propose that you do not drink at work or where your colleagues will see you. Stay away from people such as Liverright who will urge you to drink at any given moment of the day. No drinking at official occasions.’

  ‘Ambrose! That’s the only thing which makes much of it bearable.’

  ‘The drinks afterwards in private will be all the sweeter.’

  She could see that what he said was the inevitable outcome of their discussions.

  She had some new thoughts. ‘About the medical document—I’ve changed my mind about it. I do not think that it is ever a good idea to inform people of medical conditions of the mind. I think that anything to do with a doctor such as Vittoz should not be mentioned at all—except perhaps to Sweetser who sees going to such a doctor as a progressive thing.’

  She felt embarrassed then as she realised that this lesson applied in some way to Ambrose who had left the League because of such a medical condition.

  She realised that his own wounding back then with his departure from the League played a part now in his fears for her. Perhaps he was driven by his own anxieties and was overstating the problem.

  She ploughed on. ‘I think Sweetser was looked at differently because of his having been treated in Vienna for mental problems. Because of that, I don’t think he’ll get promotion now.’

  ‘Agreed. And my nervous collapse, as you well know, forced me out and they still look at me sometimes as if I might still be a little daft. Of course there was the great Sixtus V and his use of the tactic of ill-health.’

  ‘I wish you’d stop reading about the popes. It worries me.’

  ‘He was a rather zealous and ruthless reformer—in the Franciscans, I think—and he was in many ways an obvious candidate for Pope. But he was penalised time and time again for excessive zeal. So he decided to pretend to be of poor health, no longer having the energy of a reformer. He became passive and this was seen as a kind of wisdom and serenity. They made him Pope. And lo and behold, once installed as Pope, he returned to his former self and became the ruthless reformer again.’

  ‘How does that apply to me?’

  ‘I don’t quite see how it does.’

  They laughed.

  ‘It does in one small way,’ Ambrose said. ‘You should perhaps “disappear”, as it were, from gossip. Quieten down. Become dull for a time. If you don’t wish to use Vittoz, go to see Weber-Bauler and say you are run down. And then I suggest you ask for leave. And then really disappear from the landscape of gossip for a time.’

  ‘What if Weber-Bauler says I’m unfit to hold my position? Sees me as a spent force?’

  ‘You’re not. And he won’
t. Just have a physical examination. Get him to diagnose that you’re just run down. This will be seen then as evidence of how hard you’ve been working—as you have been.’

  The League doctor was something of a friend.

  ‘And you have now to act your position—as a senior member of section.’

  ‘You really mean that I have to act my age? How ghastly.’

  ‘Edith, You’re no longer a wild young thing in your twenties. You must now become a sober administrator.’

  ‘What about the other Edith—Edith the madcap!?’

  ‘Edith, you are a sober administrator—that is the new you. Save your wildness for the Molly Club.’

  ‘The Molly Club?’ she said. ‘Are we to be confined now to the Molly Club?’

  It was slowly sinking in that she could be sacked. ‘I’m terrified. I see yet another key to the plan.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘I’ll go to Sweetser and ask Sweetser’s advice—make him an ally. With Bartou, I’ll simply seek his advice about my life and strain—but I won’t tell them about my seeing Vittoz. Bartou will pass on what I say to Walters.’

  He thought about it.

  ‘It’s a master stroke. Very good indeed. You get them on board as advisers—they become protectors. If you can pull it off it will be a coup d’éclat.’

  He laughed. ‘And, Edith, may I add one more thing. Two things.’

  ‘I listen,’ she said in the tone of the chastised schoolgirl.

  ‘You will improve your grooming.’

  She knew what he meant. She looked at her nails. ‘I know, I know—I’ve not had the time enough in a day, to attend to myself the way I should.’

  ‘While on leave and when you come back, you must make time for your hair, your nails, your waxing, your facial cleansing, you must … bloom! And you’ll buy a new wardrobe. Maybe when you’re on leave, go to Paris and buy new clothes.’

  ‘You just want my old clothes.’

  ‘I shouldn’t mind some hand-me-downs. It’s important not to let life coarsen us. Working long hours can coarsen one. When you return everyone should compliment you on your wholesomeness, your radiance, and then you must keep it that way.’

  ‘And the second thing?’ she asked.

  ‘You will get rid of that wretched drink flask.’

  She coloured. What did he remember about the flask?

  She said, ‘The flask will remain out of sight.’

  He stared at her, forcing her to say more.

  She hoped that it was not going to blow up as it had with Robert.

  ‘It’s something of a talisman. It’s from the trip we all made to Paris years ago,’ she said.

  ‘All I know is that you disappeared backstage with a black musician, that you didn’t have the flask when you left us, and that you had it when you came back. I suppose it to be a trophy of sorts.’

  ‘A trophy of audacity.’

  ‘Perhaps the circumstances surrounding the winning of that trophy are better left to my imagination.’

  ‘Given your rich imagination, yes.’

  So. He did not glimpse what was happening when he’d come looking for her back then in the Room Artiste.

  She left the table and went to his side and kissed his head.

  ‘It was all a long time ago. Sorry.’ She sighed. ‘The only good thing that I can see coming out of the plan is that I’ll never have to pretend to be sober when I’m not.’

  ‘I agree—pretending to sobriety is the most disagreeable of all the social demands.’

  ‘You are a wonderful nanny.’

  ‘A nanny who’s also a vamp.’

  ‘Yes. A vampish nanny. Should I continue with Vittoz?’

  ‘That’s up to you. Just do it for yourself if you think it interests you.’

  ‘I think it’ll be good for me to have some more appointments with him. During the period of the emergence of the New Edith. I’m curious about where he might lead me. You think I’m a bit barmy, don’t you?’

  ‘Strain is a sort of barminess, Edith.’

  ‘I don’t want to be seen as being a person who is unable to stay the distance.’

  ‘The Committee of Eighteen is in abeyance. You were successful in what you did.’

  ‘If I’d known that getting older was so much trouble I wouldn’t have bothered.’

  ‘Different ages: different pleasures.’

  ‘And different pains?’

  She went about implementing the plan.

  She first approached Bartou.

  She contemplated taking him to lunch, but the plan now excluded drinking in work circumstances and so instead she took him to afternoon tea.

  ‘We did all we could with the sanctions. We put all we could into it. I think we were successful as far as we went. Now is a good time for me to take a break,’ she told him.

  ‘Good. You have done your job with the Committee of Eighteen. You’ve earned your rest.’

  ‘The leave will give me back my old spirits.’

  ‘I know it will.’

  ‘Weber-Bauler gave me a medical examination and my health is good. Could you mention that I’m taking leave to Walters? Keep him informed—tell him that all is fine, that I’m not deserting the ship, not losing my nerve?’

  ‘Of course, we all appreciate you and your work. May I be impertinent and ask if the strain is in any way to do with Robert? It is perhaps no secret that many of us find your union with him … unusual. I take it that you consider it a marriage still?’

  She considered her answer. The arrangement no longer seemed unusual to her. Did that show how unusual she herself had become?

  Bartou was something of a father figure. What to tell him? ‘In many ways it has to do with Robert. All things are connected.’

  ‘Of course. Is the marriage … over?’

  She again considered her answer. She said. ‘We have not pronounced it over.’

  Auguste looked at his petits four as he thought about her answer. ‘You have made a personal treaty to cover your marriage? And the treaty holds?’

  ‘It hasn’t been negotiated in detail. It has evolved.’

  ‘And Ambrose Westwood is to continue as your escort?’

  Bartou had been a close witness of the collapse of Ambrose in the old days, and her connections with him back then.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I always liked Westwood. He fell from grace but he seems to be recovered. That you two are together again is a remarkable turn of events.’

  He didn’t pursue the matter of Ambrose. ‘You must take your home leave.’

  Home leave? She hadn’t thought of home leave.

  ‘I was thinking more of a break to London.’

  ‘Go home. Walters will be glad that you’re having a long break. You know we talked about this in the early days of the League—the need for officers to go home from time to time, the dangers of being cut off from one’s patrie—and the dangers of living here in the artificial atmosphere of Geneva and the League.’

  She wondered if Auguste and Walters, maybe others, had talked among themselves about her taking home leave?

  She enlisted Sweetser’s advice about her strain and confided in him her visits to Doctor Vittoz. He was complimented by her confidence in him and enthusiastic about any form of psycho-analysis.

  ‘You have my support, Edith. The analysis in Vienna saved me. And we should talk about a proposal I have. You can join me in it. An institute to study the psychological dimensions of political life.’

  ‘When I come back perhaps, Arthur—and when I know more about this psycho-analysis.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘You’ll keep this confidential?’

  ‘Naturally.’

  He stood up and came around to her and hugged her.

  She went to Nancy Williams in Personnel and asked about leave.

  Nancy took out her file and flicked through it. ‘I see that you’ve carried over much of your annual leave. You have rather a large slab of lea
ve owing.’

  ‘Dr Weber-Bauler says I’m run down, but in good general health. He feels I should take a break.’

  ‘You hardly need a doctor’s certificate to take leave, Edith. You are long overdue,’ Nancy said. ‘Go home to Australia, Edith—all expenses paid. Go.’

  As she left the office, she wondered if Nancy was in a plot to send her home.

  But her anxieties were melting away and she was beginning to feel that people were thinking of her and her welfare.

  She waited until they were together in bed before telling Ambrose of the new possibility that she should go to Australia on home leave.

  ‘That would be for three months?’

  ‘Three months yes, but with some additional leave and the time of the travel there and back tacked on, closer to six months. I have the feeling that Walters and the others want me to take a long break. Auguste seemed to have considered it before I talked with him. And it’s time. It’s time for me to go back. My father is alone and growing old. I missed seeing my mother before her death. I suffer remorse because of that. I must not miss seeing my father before he goes.’

  He took her hands. ‘Go. But I will miss you greatly.’

  ‘I’ll be back.’

  ‘What if you choose to stay?’

  ‘Why should I?’

  ‘Didn’t you say that Australia now had a Department of External Affairs—Australia is handling its own foreign policy? Maybe you’ll be offered a position?’

  It hadn’t crossed her mind.

  ‘You would be a jewel in their crown.’

  She wondered if that was how they’d view her? And what followed then?

  ‘But then I would have to live in Canberra. I hear that it is a couple of buildings in a paddock. I would be a jewel in a potato patch.’

  ‘What if they do offer?’

  ‘Then you can come to live in Australia.’

  He pulled a face. ‘Really? Barely imaginable.’

  ‘There are bohemian types there, you know. Even people of your bent, I dare say.’

  He was silent.

  She touched his face with her fingers, ‘No long faces. Come on, I wouldn’t desert you and I wouldn’t desert the League. I’m an internationalist, remember.’