by Iris Murdoch
George was sitting with his hands squarely on his knees, with vague unfocused eyes, his lips parted, frowning with puzzlement.
Alex said, ‘Go, Tom, go, dear, I’m not angry with you.’
Tom went out, closing the door. He went down the stairs. The front door stood open where the Brian McCaffreys, in their disordered retreat, had failed to shut it. Tom turned toward the back door. He emerged into the garden and ran across the grass to the Slipper House. Like Hattie, he rang the bell, tried the doors, peered through the windows. No one.
It was beginning to rain. Tom ran on along the slippery mossy path under the trees and out of the back gate. He closed the back gate. He stood in the street with the rain quietly soaking his long hair and running down his face like tears, and he held his head firmly between his two hands, trying to think.
As the door closed after Tom, Alex said to Ruby, who was still sitting on the chair near the door:
‘How dare you sit in my presence and how dare you come into the drawing-room and listen to our family talk! Go away at once, please.’
As Ruby rose, George said, ‘Ruby love, be a dear and bring us some sandwiches, would you? You know the ones I like, tomato and cucumber, and cress and cream cheese.’
Ruby vanished.
‘I’m frightened of her,’ said Alex. ‘She’s become different, as if there were an evil spirit in her. She’s even become larger, like a sort of big robot.’
‘She’s practically one of the family,’ said George, ‘and she’s old now. She knows all about us. It’s her one interest in life.’
‘Yes, and she tells everybody! She gossips spitefully about us at the Institute. I’m sure she told someone about your looking at that girl through the glasses. She saw from the garden. She’s everywhere.’
‘Oh never mind,’ said George. ‘It doesn’t matter.’ He sneezed.
‘You’ve got a cold.’
‘Yes, I got it from Tom.’
‘I think that Gabriel is the silliest wettest human-being I’ve ever met. And she’s in love with you.’
‘Yes. That doesn’t matter either.’
‘Sit down,’ said Alex. ‘Why did you come now?’
‘Because of Bill the Lizard.’
‘I thought so.’
She sat down near to George and looked at him quietly. It was a long time since she had done that. George looked older and almost strange to her in a way she could not measure. Perhaps some general idea which she had had of his face was now suddenly seen to be out of date. His hair had grown a little longer than usual (he had not been to the barber) and showed daubs of grey at the temples. There were new discoloured wrinkles round his eyes. He was again looking worried. The charming boyish look was in abeyance. Now the older face appeared, George as he would be when he was sixty or seventy, less plump, more gaunt, more lined. The lines were already faintly sketched on the brow which had been smooth so long. Alex looked, feeling the pain of her love for him. She thought, I have somehow relied on George being invulnerable, untouchable, youthful, somehow like myself, a guarantor of myself. But now he looks just like an ordinary worried muddled mediocre shop-soiled man. She saw his shabby suit, his dirty shirt, his need of a shave.
Meanwhile George was looking at Alex and thinking, how old and stiff and sort of ailing she has become, and she stoops and her skin has become brown and loose and dry, dirty-looking, and her mouth droops into those long gloomy furrows and her eyelids are stained and puffy, and why must she still paint them so. She looks pathetic and touching, and I’ve never seen her look like that before.
George smiled and wrinkled up his short nose rather like Zed and showed his short square wide-apart teeth and looked young again.
‘Nice to see you, Alex.’
‘Nice to see you, George.’
‘Bill was somebody. I might have talked to Bill.’
‘I wish you had.’
‘It doesn’t matter, but it’s sad. His death touched old things, things before it all began.’
‘What is “it”?’ she asked, but he did not answer that.
‘You know, I feel changed. Perhaps Gabriel was right. What did she say? “Saved”, “Come back.”’
‘Changed? How?’
Ruby came in with the sandwiches then withdrew.
‘I’m peckish. You have some?’
‘No, thanks,’ said Alex.
George began to eat the sandwiches voraciously. He had not eaten since noon on the previous day. He said, ‘We’re going to Spain.’
‘We?’
‘Me and Diane Sedleigh. We’re going to live in Spain on my pension.’
‘Where in Spain?’ said Alex, watching him intently with her narrow-eyed cat-look.
‘I don’t know yet. Somewhere cheap. We’ll have to look at the map, get advice. I’ve got some money saved, and quite a decent pension. It’ll go further in Spain. We’ll live near the sea and eat cheaply, olives and fruit and fish. It’s suddenly occurred to me that I might be able to be happy at last, it’s not too late, it’s not impossible, have what I want. We’ll be different people. We’ll forget this place ever existed.’
‘Can I come too?’ said Alex.
George stopped munching. ‘Would you like to?’
‘Yes, very much. I wouldn’t be in your way. I’d live somewhere not terribly far off and invite you to lunch. We could go swimming together sometimes.’
‘And Diane?’
‘I’d like Diane, why not.’
‘Even if she wants to be Diane McCaffrey? She does, you know.’
‘Yes. I feel I’m changing too. Some revolution is accomplished.’
‘Perhaps it’s something to do with William, some bit of his soul that’s flown into us. Except that it’s been coming … I now see … for a long time…’
‘Could I come? I’ve got plenty of money. We could build two houses. I’d pay for a car.’
‘Alex,’ said George, ‘we’re inspired, we’ve become gods!’
And he looked at her with his radiant bland mad face, in which, at that moment, Alex saw the reflection of her own. They stared at each other. George said, ‘I must go.’
‘I’ll think of you with Diane, looking at that map.’
George murmured, ‘Don’t worry. There’s a place beyond.’
‘Beyond Spain?’
‘No - just beyond - beyond. It’s not like I thought, with a great heave of the will, or by great excessive things, at all - when all is permitted one doesn’t want to, you see - it’s so easy, just a matter of relaxing - and simply letting go - of all that — ’
‘All what?’
‘Never mind. Dear, dear Alex. Kiss me as if we were … anybody … nobody … as of course … we are …’
They both rose, and kissed. Lips only touching, they hung together as if suspended in space. They remained so for a long moment.
‘Goodbye, Alex. Soon, soon, you know. I’ll take the rest of the sandwiches.’
‘Where are you going?’
‘To the cinema.’
However George did not go to the cinema. It was raining when he left Belmont, and he decided to go home to Druidsdale rather than walk to the Odeon in the High Street, which was farther away. George hated rain, he hated getting his hair wet, his feet wet, his clothes wet. He had no umbrella. He felt vaguely unwell and feverish. And he wanted to eat the rest of the sandwiches in peace. He wanted an interval in his existence, his life which had for some time been such intensely hard work. He felt, for the first time for months, that he might be able to rest, to do something which had seemed forever impossible, to lie down on his back and close his eyes and feel quiet and drowsy and unafraid and at peace. At the same time he felt excited and confused and odd. Something had snapped, had given way, and that was (was it not?) better. He did not want to examine the new state at all closely, he felt he would never want to examine anything closely again. He wanted to spend the rest of his life in peace, with people who did not examine things closely.
He reached Druidsdale and got the key into the lock. His hand trembled. He opened the door and entered the darkish hall. He stopped. There was something wrong. There was something there. Something terrible. He peered. Stella was sitting on the stairs.
‘Hello, George.’
‘Oh God.’ George sat down on one of the chairs in the hall.
‘I’m sorry to come suddenly.’
‘Why have you come at all? Why now, oh Christ, why now?’
‘Well, it had to be sometime. I’m sorry it wasn’t sooner.’
‘You cold - cold - beast.’
‘I can’t talk otherwise. You know how I talk. I can only say what’s the case. I feel very upset, very emotional, not cold.’
‘Other people have emotions. You say it’s the case that you feel emotional.’
‘I’m sorry I went away. I can’t explain my conduct. Though there is an explanation. I just mean it would take some time, if you ever wanted to hear. Nothing dramatic, nothing interesting.’
‘Where have you been?’
‘With N, with Mrs Blackett.’
‘N, that impotent voyeur, I thought so.’
‘Why?’
‘I saw his sly old face in the street, he’s always after me.’
‘Don’t be angry about that.’
‘Oh I’m not. Were you afraid to come back?’
‘Yes, I suppose so — ’
‘Afraid I’d kill you?’
‘No - just afraid of you - you’re like a dog that bites - one is afraid. I don’t like unpredictable things.’
‘Why have you come back then?’
‘I had to decide whether I wanted to go on being married to you. That was another reason why I didn’t come back. I felt it wouldn’t be fair to you.’
‘What wouldn’t be fair?’
‘To come back and leave again.’
‘And you decided —?’
‘I decided I did want to go on being married to you.’
‘Why?’
‘You know why. Because I love you. Because I think - this between us is - absolute.’
‘Absolute, what a word. You always were an absolutist. You talk of love, you who have no tenderness, no gentleness, no forgiveness.’
‘I have these things, but you just kill the expression of them, the way I would express them, you reject all my language, all my — ’
‘Always my fault.’
‘No.’
‘You have never forgiven me anything. You remember every fault. You might as well be the recording angel. You are a sort of angel, a frightful one.’
‘Let’s not talk about forgiving, I think it’s a weak idea, usually false — ’
‘You’re like Cordelia, the most overrated heroine in literature.’
‘The question is, do you want to go on being married to me?’
‘What a charmingly blunt question. No.’
‘Are you sure?’
George was silent for a moment. Then he said, ‘That night - when the car went into the canal - can you remember it clearly?’
‘Yes.’
‘What happened exactly?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Was it an accident, or did I deliberately make it happen?’
‘You mean you don’t remember?’
‘No.’
Stella paused. ‘It was an accident.’
‘It was an accident?’
‘Yes, of course.’ She added, ‘You like to think of yourself as a fierce violent person, but you’re harmless really. Just a bad-tempered dog.’
‘And you claim to love this animal.’
‘Yes, I do.’
‘You humiliate me in order to love me. That’s not love. It’s like torturing your pet. The sort of thing that interests N.’
They sat silently in the darkish hallway, Stella on the stairs, George sitting near the door on a chair against the wall, not facing Stella but facing an old ornate Victorian hallstand which they had bought in an auction sale when they were engaged.
Stella said, ‘See, I brought the netsuke back.’
George saw on the hallstand the little array of pale ivory figures. He said, ‘Yes, I went looking for them one day.’
‘I thought you would.’
‘Isn’t it rather sentimental of you to bring them back? The sort of thing a real woman might do. Am I supposed to be touched and softened?’
Stella was silent. She began to fumble in her handbag.
George said, ‘Oh you aren’t crying are you? Can you cry now? Congratulations. You never used to.’ He added, ‘I’ve got a cold.’
‘Want an aspirin?’
‘No. To answer your earlier question, yes, I am sure I don’t want to go on being married to you.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I’m going to go and live in Spain with Diane Sedleigh.’
Stella was silent again. She blew her nose. She said, ‘All right.’
‘What. No scene?’
‘You know me.’
‘Yes I do. Diane is a woman. I like women. I get on with her. She makes me feel happy and calm. Which you have never done.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘I admired you. That was the trouble. A rotten basis for marriage.’
‘I daresay.’
‘Maybe you shouldn’t have gone away, I mean if you really wanted it to go on. I had time to see the point.’
‘I wanted you to have time. And I needed a holiday from you too.’
‘Well, the holiday can continue. What will you do with it?’
‘I don’t know. I’ll travel. I’ll go to Tokyo to see my father, go to California to see Rozanov.’
‘You’ll - what?’
‘Well, I might. I’d like to see him. I only kept away because of you. Or is he still here?’
George leapt to his feet.’ You’ll talk to him about me…’
‘It might be difficult to avoid mentioning your name, but I won’t discuss you. You know how fastidious I am in such matters.’
‘Fastidious, that’s one of your words. How I loathe your vocabulary! It’s power, power, contempt, contempt, everything about you. Oh God, why did you have to come back now, you devil, just when I was feeling better, you don’t know what you’ve done, you’ve spoilt everything, you’ve destroyed it all, you did it on purpose, you heard I was with Diane at the funeral. Didn’t you, didn’t you?’
‘Yes. But that’s not the reason.’
‘It is - it’s common mean spite and jealousy - you can lie too, you foul vixen - I could kill you for spoiling things so - you want to destroy me - and you killed Rufus, you killed Rufus, you killed Rufus…’
Father Bernard was sitting in his study in the St Paul’s Clergy House meditating to the sound of Scott Joplin’s Sugar Cane. He sat as usual, four-square, relaxed, his hands on his knees. He used to kneel once, but found the posture uncomfortable and fraught with irrelevant emotion. The unlined curtains put up by his predecessor were drawn and displayed, penetrated by the lurid rainy light of Saturday evening, a design of huge chrysanthemums. The room was filled with a subdued yellowish glow. In a corner of the room a dim electric lamp illumined a calm radiant icon of the baptism of Jesus. (Father Bernard did not care for the more tormented images.) Opposite to him, Father Bernard’s Gandhara Buddha (a reproduction) meditated with drooped eyelids and delicate slightly pursed lips. His exquisitely beautiful austere face combined the calm of the East with a thoughtful Hellenic sadness. Father Bernard loved him because he was and was not a judge. He paid no attention to the priest and did not require to be addressed as ‘thou’. But Father Bernard, who did not always meditate with lowered eyelids, paid a great deal of attention to him.
Some teachers of meditation exhort us to empty our minds. Others permit the quiet circling of random thoughts, increasingly to be set at a distance and sensed as unreal. Father Bernard followed both rules, but more usually the latter which was easier because more ambiguous. He let his worldly thoughts accompany him sometim
es to the extent that a detached observer of them (God, for instance) might have found little difference between the priest’s holy reverie and the unregenerate day-dreaming of one of his flock.
On this Saturday evening Father Bernard’s thoughts, somewhat tidied up for purposes of communication, might be rendered as follows. John Robert, what a monster, how attractive that frightful face is, I want so much to see him again, I’m quite in love with him, dear me. If only my life could change completely, be utterly renewed and changed. Lord, let me amend my life. If I could only reach a place beyond personal vanity, sometimes it seems so close, an inch away. Miss Dunbury said she saw Christ waiting on the other side, could she be right? Lord have mercy upon me, Christ have mercy upon me, Lord have mercy upon me. How moving simple faith is, Lord let me have a simple faith if it be thy will. Quaerens me sedisti lassus. I ought to go and see Hattie, I must see her before I see Rozanov, I was supposed to see her last Saturday, oh my God, last Saturday. Hattie, that milky-white flesh, like angel cake, no. What a nasty anonymous letter I had this morning about kissing prostitutes in church, there are spies everywhere. And on that bench with Bobbie, oh dear me. I like that bit in the music, it’s such melancholy music, mechanical and yet jaunty, like life. Tom McCaffrey, his tumbling hair. Dans l’onde toi devenue ta jubilation nue. Yes, I spend my life wanting the impossible. But I never reach out my hand for what I want. Isn’t that religion, not reaching out? O Lord Buddha, have mercy upon me, a sinner. George McCaffrey, may he be protected from evil and may he do no harm to anyone. Will he come to me? Non ragioniam di lor, ma guarda e passa. What a dreadful thing to say, how cruel Dante was and yet he was granted a vision of paradise. Pretty boring place, actually. But oh the desire for God, the desire, the desire. Agnus dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, miserere nobis. If I had walked across the bridge when George was miming the accident he would have killed me, exciting, what nonsense. Dear little Diane squatting down behind the elder tree. I’ll have to go one day, the bishop’s letter will come, Mount Athos, I’ll live in retreat at last. John Robert said I was false, a false priest, broken my vows. I suppose so. Not that anybody cares what a priest believes these days, but I do. Have to come to it at last. At last. I wonder if Diane would come with me to Greece, she wouldn’t mind what I did, what a crazy idea. Bobbie’s coming tonight, I hope he’s got rid of that cold, thank God I don’t seem to have caught it, a pity he’s so unattractive. Have a nice talk, wine, oh blast I forgot to buy that cheap Valpolicella. I shall lie in the earth. Every year I pass the anniversary of my death. Where will I lie? In Greece? In America? Perhaps I shall follow Rozanov, I suppose he’ll go back there. An impossible man. How sad the yellow light is in this room, and a fly on the window. How beautiful he is, the Lord Buddha, so austere, so stern, so sad. George and Rozanov. Oh God, help them, help us all, help the planet. The lonely circling planet moving into night. God rest all souls. I am tense, I must relax, forgive. Not think about Rozanov, Tom, Mount Athos. Oh the desire. Oh God, if only I could be at peace. Lord, I prostrate myself, I ask for forgiveness, for guidance, for faith. My Lord and my God. Tomorrow’s Sunday, damn.
