by Iris Murdoch
‘You told me long ago to draw in my horns. But I can’t. My horns are permanently out and my eyes are staring forward into the dark.’
‘It’s hard to stare into the dark. Very few people do it.’
‘Do you think so poorly of my mind?’
‘No.’
‘So you do encourage me?’
‘No, I mean I don’t care a fig about your mind.’
‘My mind is full of such strange trash. Jingles and - spells - I can’t explain. Do you think I’m mad?’
‘No.’
‘You said it’s not philosophy unless it makes you tremble. You are an incurable teacher. I am trembling now. Teach me.’
‘Why do you go on worrying about philosophy? It doesn’t matter.’
‘So you admit that at last, after all those dull years!’
‘I mean think your own thoughts. Why do you want to think mine?’
‘You know why. The guards in the concentration camps realized with joy that they didnt care. They had been afraid that they would care. But they found they didn’t, they were free! Isn’t that worth thinking about?’
‘You are not thinking,’ said John Robert. ‘You are simply suffering from a nervous craving of the will. Now let us close this ridiculous conversation.’
‘You don’t want it to end. You want to go on tormenting me. I am approaching the limit. It’s strange out there. Something terrible could happen.’
‘Go and buy yourself some Nazi badges.’
‘You think I’m playing at it?’
‘Yes. You’re a fake, a faux mauvais, pretending to be wicked because you’re unhappy. You’re not mad or satanic, you’re just a fool suffering from hurt vanity. You lack imagination. What made you bad at philosophy makes you bad at being bad. It’s a game. You’re a dull dog, George, an ordinary dull mediocre egoist, you will never be anything else.’
‘Don’t try me too much.’
‘You never tried to kill your wife, you dropped the Roman glass because you were drunk, you’re just a clown. Now go away unless you want me to start feeling sorry for you.’
George moved in the room. He opened the wardrobe door and looked inside and touched John Robert’s overcoat which was hanging up. He opened the door of the bathroom and looked into the steamy pit of the bath. He closed the door again. He said:
‘What’s the matter with you? Where’s all the power you used to have? You care for no one, you are alone. I doubt if you’ve ever had a woman. You had a daughter, but who was her father? You hated her and she hated you. Who’s supposed to feel sorry for whom, I wonder? You’re old and toothless and you smell. It’s the end, you’re losing your mind, it’s vanishing day by day and you haven’t anything else. You’ve seen through philosophy, you’re vindictive and drained dry, and you are alone. No one loves you, you love no one. Isn’t all that true?’
‘Just shut up, please, and go.’
‘Don’t you care what I think about you?’
‘As far as I’m concerned you don’t exist.’
‘I existed for you once. When did I cease to exist and why? Tell me, I’ve got to know.’
‘This is a pseudo question. You remember enough philosophy to know what that is. Ask, why is the question posed? Only ask yourself, not me.’
‘Have you no advice for me?’
‘Yes, stop drinking.’
‘John Robert, I know I was very rude to you in California, and I’ve been rude to you today, I know I haven’t been what I ought to be - Christ, now I’m crawling again - but you’ve banished me long enough and punished me long enough, let it be over now.’
‘These emotive words imply a state of affairs which simply does not exist between us. Nothing exists between us.’
‘You say you think I’m — ’
‘Oh never mind what I said! I don’t think anything about you. There isn’t any structure here for communication.’
‘There is structure! How can you deny it? There is! We are human beings! You taught me philosophy and I love you.’
‘George, listen, you want me to be angry with you and even to hate you, but I can’t. Take this as a kind word and please go.’
‘Oh damn you, damn you, damn you!’
‘Get out!’ said John Robert. He stood up.
The loud hum of the sealed-off water had covered the sound of Father Bernard knocking timidly on the door. He knocked twice and then entered. He saw, and at once partly understood, the end of George’s battle with Rozanov.
Rozanov said again, but quietly, ‘Get out, go.’
George was wearing a black mackintosh, like his alter ego. The collar was still turned up as it had been when, coming in out of the slight rain, he had arrived. His uncombed hair was standing jaggedly up on end, his untidy open shirt collar and dirty vest were visible at the neck of his mackintosh. He stood, his hands in his pockets, looking with burning eyes towards the philosopher who had risen, hunched and glaring, like a huge cruel-beaked bird behind the desk.
Father Bernard had been peacefully meditating to the sound of Scott Joplin when Rozanov’s letter had arrived that morning, simply summoning him to the Rooms. None too soon for the priest had the letter come, for he had heard nothing from Rozanov since their conversational walk upon the Common. A yearning had come upon Father Bernard, a need, an obsessive desire to be with the philosopher again, to be in his presence; and with this a fear that Rozanov had, after their conversation, found him wanting in the qualities necessary for a chosen companion. Father Bernard had thought of writing to Rozanov, but after being told to wait till he was summoned, did not yet dare to. He had composed many letters in his mind, some of them polemical.
Now, seeing George in defeat, so evidently rejected, and intuiting the appeal which must have been made to so ambiguous a power, Father Bernard felt himself in danger. But he recognized too a ‘high moment’, a moment of grace such as sometimes came upon him quite suddenly, and he felt elation. He hesitated only a moment before going forward and kissing George upon the cheek. It was an odd action. It was some time since the priest had kissed anybody. Hand-holding was different.
George was evidently startled, as if unaware whether he had received a kiss or a light slap. He stepped back. Then with vague eyes and without looking the priest in the face, he circled round him and went out of the door, leaving it open. Father Bernard closed the door.
John Robert was annoyed. He was annoyed with himself, with George, and now with Father Bernard. He took the kiss as an affront to himself, even a criticism, certainly an intrusion, the striking of a deliberate false note. The incident filled him with disgust. He was cross with himself for having at the end, and possibly in a muted way earlier in the conversation, exhibited emotion. He was not as indifferent as he had feigned to be to some of George’s taunts. He found hurt feelings of that kind extremely unbecoming. He was annoyed now because he thought that Father Bernard, who stood with downcast gaze, had already intuited his whole complex of feelings.
John Robert sat down noisily, fiddling with his books and papers, and motioned the priest to a seat. The priest put two of the sofa cushions on the chintz chair and sat down, looking now at John Robert with his glowing brown eyes which could not help admitting understanding and asking for pardon.
‘I’m sorry,’ Father Bernard actually said.
‘What for?’
‘Oh - interrupting.’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ said John Robert. He seemed to be at a loss.
Father Bernard, his high moment still upon him, said, ‘You could help George so much. Just a little gentleness. You have so much power.’
‘Are you telling me what to do?’
‘Yes.’
‘I asked you not to speak of him.’
‘Forgive me. I would not have done so without — ’
‘Without the impression you have just received.’
‘Precisely.’
‘And what is that impression?’
Father Bernard was silent a mo
ment, and then said, ‘You ought to be kind to him. Just - quietly. It wouldn’t take up much of your time. Anything would do, any signal of kindness. Then he would be docile, he might even leave you alone!’
‘You know nothing about it.’ John Robert felt immediate contempt for himself for saying anything so banal and so patently untrue. He had so many and so pressing things to think about which had nothing whatsoever to do with George. To be put in the wrong by the priest and urged to examine himself in this matter was really too much. For a moment he felt such intense loathing for his visitor, he was tempted to tell him to go. He glared at Father Bernard. ‘Are you familiar with Dante?’
‘Yes.’
‘Guarda e passa.’
‘No,’ said the priest, ‘no.’
Father Bernard tossed his finely combed hair (he had combed it down in the corridor before entering), his nostrils dilated and his cheeks burned. He raised a defensive hand and made as if to snap his fingers, but he said nothing and continued to stare at the philosopher.
Rozanov said, ‘Let us not talk of that. I called you here because I want to ask you a favour. I won’t keep you long.’
‘Oh?’ Father Bernard felt disappointment. He had assumed that another philosophical conversation would ensue, and had already planned to tell Rozanov that he disliked having to think when he was walking. He had enjoyed playing the young man to John Robert’s Socrates. He had hoped that a routine was being established.
‘I shall be going back to America rather sooner than I expected.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry — ’
‘You perhaps know, or perhaps you do not, that my granddaughter Harriet Meynell is coming to live in Ennistone.’
‘Yes?’ This was the first that Father Bernard had heard of the existence of a grandchild.
‘I would like you to keep a helpful eye upon her.’
Father Bernard felt instant alarm. He pictured a toddler. In any case, tasks, trouble, danger. ‘How old is she?’
‘Seventeen, I think. Perhaps eighteen. She has been at boarding school.’
‘What do you want me to do?’ Father Bernard now pictured a noisy American teenager. He must keep his head and say no quickly.
‘Just see her, know what she’s doing.’
‘Just that?’
‘I should say that she will have her chaperone with her.’
‘Her chaperone?’
‘A maidservant. They will be living in the Slipper House. That is the folly, or whatever one may call it, in the garden at Belmont, Mrs McCaffrey’s house.’
Father Bernard nodded. Everyone knew about the Slipper House. He was still alarmed. ‘What will she be doing?’
‘How do you mean?’
‘How will she be employing her time? Will she be working, finding a job, studying or —?’
‘I want her to proceed to an English university but she may need a - supervisor, a sort of tutor - could you do that?’
‘No!’ said Father Bernard wildly. ‘I mean what is her subject?’
‘I don’t know exactly. Some arts subject. Perhaps you could discuss it with her?’
‘But shouldn’t you discuss it with her?’ said the priest.
‘Oh, I shall talk to her, but I imagine - probably nothing will be decided. She is still young. There would be things to be found out - I mean about her capacities and wishes - and about - entrance requirements and - could you do that?’
‘No, I don’t think so,’ said the priest. ‘Well, I suppose I could.’
‘Just see that she’s reading something, and not wasting her time. I would pay you of course.’
Father Bernard stared at the big bony face of the philosopher and his large power-hungry nose and his moist pendant mouth and yellow bloodshot eyes. With his shock of stout stiff slightly curly grey hair and flat head he looked like a very old general, a Russian general. It was impossible to suspect him of impertinence. These ideas emerged with a kind of mad solipsism, a massive lack of connection with the world. Father Bernard said, ‘I don’t want to be paid. I have a salary and I have duties which I may or may not perform. I am prepared to add this child to my list of duties, that’s all. I will talk to her and see what she can do and if necessary find someone to coach her, I suppose - but don’t expect too much of me, I can’t be responsible - if I write you letters, will you answer them?’
‘About the girl, yes.’
Here Father Bernard almost stamped with exasperation. ‘But will you —?’
‘In emergency you can telephone me collect, that means reversing the charges.’
‘But — ’
‘I shall feel better if someone here is keeping an eye on her. I saw you as that - as a sort of pedagogue - but if you can just - I leave it to you. I’m most grateful. I will let you know when she arrives.’
Father Bernard fell back helplessly in his chair. It had by now occurred to him that the young girl might constitute a permanent link between him and the philosopher. Did he really want such a link? Evidently he did. But what a responsibility, what a time-consuming possibly irritating burden, and … a girl of seventeen … suppose something went awfully wrong …
‘Yes, all right,’ he said.
‘That’s settled then.’ Rozanov began to rearrange his desk, a clear indication that the interview was over. He added, ‘If you ever do have to telephone me, which I hope won’t be necessary, do remember to check the American time first.’
Father Bernard stood up. He said, ‘I’d like to talk to you again.’
‘What about?’
‘About anything. Like we did up on the Common. Or were you just testing me for the post of tutor?’
‘I - no - that had nothing to do with it.’
There was a silence during which Father Bernard felt an almost overwhelming impulse to say something more about George.
Rozanov said, ‘I feel sure you should consider leaving the priesthood.’
‘Oh. Why?’
‘Wouldn’t it be more honest? With your beliefs you must feel you are in a false position, living a lie. You must have taken vows. Aren’t you breaking them?’
‘Well, nowadays people are fairly relaxed about — ’
‘But didn’t you swear something or other?’
‘I swore that I assented to the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion.’
‘But that’s old-fashioned realistic theism! You don’t believe that?’
‘No.’
‘What else did you swear?’
‘To obey the bishop.’
‘And do you?’
‘No.’
‘What then does it mean to you to be in Holy Orders?’ The phrase came oddly and pompously and impressively out of John Robert’s mouth. ‘How can you go on?’
Father Bernard felt suddenly sick, he was going to be sick with rage, a black vomit of sudden positive hatred of Rozanov was going to spill out of his mouth on to the carpet. He swallowed and said, ‘I just can, that’s all. Well, good day.’
He marched to the door and jerked it open. Vast clouds of smoke and heat rolled out at him together with a sudden roaring noise, and for a moment he thought the place was on fire. Then he realized that the element was water not fire. He had opened the door of the bathroom by mistake.
He banged the door shut and made for the other door and got out into the carpeted corridor which belonged neither to a hospital nor to a hotel. Here he was again aware of the sound of water. He wondered, should I go back and apologize. Then he thought, am I mad? Apologize to that maniac? Whatever for? And he realized with horror that now and henceforth John Robert Rozanov was there inside his mind, like a virus, something that could not be cured. He had a new disease. Rozanovism.
Hattie and Pearl were in the Slipper House. They were as happy as two little mice in a doll’s house. They had never had a house before.
The effect upon them both was extraordinary, far beyond anything which they could have expected, even though they had looked forward to their unexpected new habitat with c
onsiderable excitement. They laughed and ran about like mad things. They were drunk with pleasure, although they could not at all coherently have said what it was that pleased and amused them so much.
Perhaps the poor neglected misunderstood Slipper House had stored up a lot of vague sweet innocent ownerless happiness from its past, the past when Alex and her brother Desmond were young, and when Geoffrey and Rosemary Stillowen invented games and parties for scores of beautiful young people, Quakers and Methodists, for whom sex was a future mystery and a present romance, and whose lives were still unshadowed in a world where nobody believed that there would ever be another war.
That may have been so. But also of course the two girls, at a moment when both of them were anxiously and silently feeling the cold turning band of time entering a new phase, had received a curious reprieve. Suddenly everything was fun, everything flowered into a kind of dotty youthfulness together which they had never really had before. Now suddenly Hattie was older and suddenly Pearl was younger. The strict old-fashioned upbringing which John Robert had distantly decreed for Hattie had not at all prepared her for this shock of gleeful joy. She and Pearl were ‘gay young things’, imprisoned perhaps and perhaps doomed (there were ideas which they sometimes glimpsed, as it were, over their shoulders) but for the moment compelled to have no other occupation but to inhabit the present, and carry on, in that exquisitely artificial little house, what felt like a delightful charade.
Pearl had arrived first with suitcases. The taxi had deposited her in the twilit evening at the back gate where she had found Ruby waiting. Before that, letters had been flying to and fro, letters which were more like army instructions than works of epistolary art. John Robert had written to Pearl to say that he wanted her and Hattie to ‘abide’ (his use of the word ‘abide’ was the only point of stylistic interest in his letter) during the summer at the Garden House (‘Slipper House’ was a nickname of course), Belmont, Tasker Road, Ennistone, by courtesy of Mrs McCaffrey, whom they were not to bother, but to use the back gate in Forum Way. He wrote in similar terms to Hattie. His letter to Pearl began ‘Dear Pearl!’ and ended ‘Yours sincerely, J. R. Rozanov.’ His letter to Hattie began ‘My dear Hattie’ and ended ‘Yours J R R’ (scrawled). He had never established himself as ‘granddad’ or ‘grandpapa’ or any such. Hattie had no name for him and called him by no name. Alex had written to John Robert with marked coldness that she ‘noted his arrangement’. He had not replied. Pearl had written to Ruby saying when she would arrive. (Ruby did not show the letter to Alex but took it to the gipsies to be read.) Neither Pearl nor Hattie had written to Alex since Pearl did not feel it was their place to do so. Alex did not write to Hattie because she did not know her address and felt affronted. Ruby casually informed Alex of Pearl’s arrival date.
