by Iris Murdoch
He still felt jealousy; he still felt, in spite of everything, panic and frenzy at the thought of her taking another lover. That was another complication for which, beset as he was, he simply had not got time. It was mad. He kept Harriet (who never complained) short of holidays so as not to seem to Emily to be grossly unjust, and he could not help feeling that this was something else for which Emily ought to be grateful, only he did not dare to tell Emily this either, because he must not be seen deliberately to condone and continue a situation which of course they both knew he deliberately condoned and continued. He offered her enough provocation to violence as it was. It was crazy. And now Pinn, in her role as his needling mentor, was going to talk to him about Luca and to tell him that he -ought to go to the school. Luca had said nothing to Blaise for over two months, although Blaise had tried to talk to him and had bought him a woolly pig and a mechanical mouse, and a chemistry set. Emily said Luca chattered to Pinn. She had heard him telling Pinn about some ‘wriggly tadpoles’. Why would his son not talk to him about the wriggly tadpoles? Everything now was an accusation. Blaise stared at Pinn with fear and resentment.
‘Did you know that Luca has been over to your place?’
‘Been over – where?’
‘To your place. To Harriet’s place.’
‘What?’
‘Yes. He’s been over several times. Twice anyway.’
The sun was blotted out. Blaise saw in a rent and jagged darkness Pinn’s pert round-cheeked face ablaze with interested malice. ‘It’s impossible.’
‘Not at all. He certainly went’
‘But – no, no – it can’t be – how could he know where to go? How could he get there?’
‘He stowed away in the back of your car. The first time anyway. He hid under a rug.’
Blaise turned round, half expecting to see his son’s grave intent little face gazing at him from the back seat.
‘How do, you know this?’
‘He told me.’
‘How did he know it was my car?’
‘He’s known about the car for ages. I didn’t tell you as I thought it might bother you. He must have seen you arriving some time when he was coming back from school. Or he might have followed you out one morning. He’s very sly.’
‘It can’t be true, it simply can’t be true. Children invent the most fantastic things. It’s all an invention. What did he say exactly?’
‘He says he hid in the white car and went over to Daddy’s other house. He said it was a big house with long windows down below and little square windows up above, and he hid in the garden behind a big tall tree. I asked him about what else he did, and he said he saw a beautiful lady and a boy, a grownup boy he called him. I said "I wonder who they are", and he said, "I know." Then he said, "I went again on the evening of school sports day. I saved my dinner and took it to the dogs." He said there were a lot of dogs.’
‘Oh, my God. What else did he say?’
‘Nothing else. He started talking baby talk. And I thought I’d better just smile and keep quiet in case he started shouting about it.’
‘How can a child of that age have done that journey by himself?’
‘He’s very independent. All those children are. He’s travelled all round London on the underground. He plays truant from school and he often just disappears in the evenings and comes in late. Emily says he’s out at play, but really she has no idea where he is.’
‘She never told me this.’
‘There are plenty of things she doesn’t tell you because she’s afraid you’ll get angry. She likes to save them up and then spill them all at once when she’s in a rage herself.’
‘Yes, yes. Christ, does Emily know this, about Luca going over –?’
‘No. I said nothing of course, and he hasn’t told her. I’d know if he had, she’d be screaming the place down.’
Blaise looked ahead along the road. People were beginning to leave their houses to go to work, opening their front doors, closing them again, walking down their garden paths, unlatching their gates. The clear sun shone upon the well-mown lawns and the bright orange roses. The sheer quiet ordinariness of it all made Blaise want to gesticulate and shout. How could such quietness exist all about when in one soul there was such a tumult?
‘Don’t tell Emily,’ he said.
‘Of course not’
But he felt, this is the end, it must be. This is it. At the thought of Luca standing underneath the acacia tree he felt an emotion too confused and intense to be identified as either misery or fear. The inconceivable, the unimaginable, had happened, already it had entered his life, defeating logic, impossible, destructive. There. How could those two worlds meet? Their utter separateness was the guarantee itself of any intelligibility and order. Their separateness was the prerequisite of any thought, the presupposition of the world, it was what thought was about, what the world was about. Blaise had never feared mental breakdown. But at the idea of what Luca had so simply done, passing through a steel barrier as if it were paper, passing through the looking-glass, he glimpsed for a second the terrible underlying chaos of his own mind. Luca had gazed at Hood House, had seen Harriet and David, had fed the dogs.
Blaise’s face expressed nothing. He said to Pinn, ‘Well, thanks. I must go now.’
‘What are you going to do?’ said Pinn, as she got out of the car.
‘I don’t know.’ He drove away in the direction of Putney Bridge.
Pinn looked after the white car. The interest, the dramatic unpredictability of it all, had enlivened her plump face, making it almost beautiful. Out of a sheer momentary excitement she began to laugh.
Monty was looking out of his bedroom window into the garden which the grey light of the dawn was just revealing. He-had never noticed before that it was possible from here to see into the orchard. How huge the orchard looked in this light, almost like a forest, a multitude of tree trunks under its umbrella of gathered dark. As Monty stared at it he saw with a thrill of alarm that there seemed to be some people moving about under the trees. He peered, trying to discern the shadowy intruders. Three figures were now visible upon the lawn, clear of the trees, three figures in long black flowing robes. They are nuns, he thought with amazement What are three nuns doing in my garden in the dawn, shall I go down and speak to them, what shall I do? As he hesitated he saw that the nuns were hurrying down the long lawn towards the house, their dark habits flying. They were running. He realized: they are frightened, terrified. What are they running away from? Terrified himself he watched the fleeing figures approach the house: and then saw with sudden clarity the face of the leading nun. It was Sophie, her face contracted with fear and anguish. Why, she is an old woman now, he thought. And what is she so frightened of, what is she running away from? Yes, she is an old woman, quite old, her face is wrinkled and her hair is white. I thought she had died, but she has simply grown old. Perhaps death just is growing old, and nobody told me?
Monty awoke. He experienced the split-second interval, then the searing memory. He remembered Sophie’s face in the later stages of her illness, all wrinkled up, like a child’s, with fear and pain, tears constantly in her eyes. Death had so cruelly separated her, still living, from him.
It was five o’clock and the birds were singing with crazy joy. He rose and pulled back the curtains and looked out into the garden, smaller and brighter than in his dream, but still alienated and menacing and strange. A black shape moved round the corner from the orchard and then proceeded with deliberation across the lawn. It was Ajax. Near to the house the dog looked up, saw him and paused. Ill-omened animal, thought Monty, as he and the dog stared at each other in the early light.
‘How was poor Magnus?’ asked Harriet, brushing the crumbs off the red check tablecloth and conveying them in her hand to the kitchen sink.
‘As usual.’
‘What?’
‘As usual.’
‘Poor you, you are so tired,’ said Harriet ‘Can’t you put off this morning’s pa
tients? You can’t stay up talking nearly all night and then work properly the next day.’
‘I’ve got Dr Ainsley and Mrs Batwood coming. I have to see them.’
‘Well, tell them you’re exhausted and get rid of them quick. You look utterly worn out. I wonder if you’re getting the ’flu?’
‘I am perfectly all right!’ said Blaise, returning his coffee cup to his saucer with a crack which made Harriet wince.
She was silent for a moment, swilling some water around in an unwashed saucepan and watching her husband. He was very tired and edgy this morning.
‘Well, I wish Magnus would hurry up and get better. I see him as such a kind sweet man, but he’s so inconsiderate to you.’
‘He pays through the nose. That’s all that matters, isn’t it.’
‘What were you discussing with him?’
‘It is not a discussion.’
‘Talking about then. Had he had any good dreams? I think Magnus has quite the most original dreams of any of your patients.’
‘He dreamt he was an egg.’
‘An egg?’
‘He was a huge white egg floating in a sea of turquoise blue, and he was everything that there was.’
‘It sounds a nice dream.’
‘No dream is nice for Magnus. All dream experiences fill him with terror. He now feels that all his limbs are withdrawing inside his body and his face is flattening out and his features are disappearing. He keeps looking in the mirror to make sure his nose hasn’t vanished.’
‘But he doesn’t really think he’s turning into an egg?’
‘It’s not clear what "really" is with someone like Magnus. The fears are real.’
‘Did he cry a lot?’
‘He always does.’
‘Poor thing. What does the dream mean?’
‘Fear of castration.’
‘What a pity. It sounds so beautiful,’ said Harriet ‘It’s a painter’s dream.’ She pictured the great white egg, tinged a little with ivory, floating in the deeply saturated turquoise ocean. She saw it clearly in her mind, and the image soothed her.
‘It’s connected with his compulsive eating. Men who are failures often disguise their castration fears as a desire to engulf everything. When you’ve swallowed the world there’s nothing left to be frightened of. It’s the pattern of the failed artist.’
‘Did he say anything about the bishop with the wooden leg?’
‘He said he was catching up.’
‘Did he say anything about me?’
‘He said, "give my respects to the lady".’
‘I love the way he calls me the lady, it’s like something in a legend. I feel I very much exist for Magnus. I’m sure I could help him just by talking to him a bit.’
‘Magnus doesn’t need vague emotional female chit-chat. He probably needs electric shocks.’
‘You’ve always been against shock therapy.’
‘Someone like Magnus is better off dead anyway.’
‘You are cross today. He’s not suicidal, is he?’
‘Of course I’m against shock therapy. Anything serious and scientific would put me out of business.’
‘Darling, do have a rest before the doctor arrives.’
‘Is that fat friend of Monty’s coming in again? What’s his name?’
‘Edgar Demarnay. Yes. He wants to talk about Monty. He thinks he can help Monty. I want him to meet David, only they keep missing each other. You know he’s head of a —’
‘God, I’m so fed up with helping people. And all this sympathetic bloody hand-holding you go in for. You seem to be collecting men now like you collect bloody dogs.’
‘Darling B, if you’d rather —’
‘Oh go ahead, hold his hand. He’ll probably fall in love with you too.’
‘You know Monty isn’t in love with me.’
‘He soon will be if you go on playing the ministering angel. Monty needs electric shocks, he should just bloody pull himself together. Well, let them all come. I’ll turn my patients over to you and you can hold their hands.’
‘Darling – please – you’re just tired —’
‘Oh hell – Sorry, dear girl – Sorry, sorry –’ Blaise left the kitchen and pulled the door violently to behind him.
Harriet felt as if she might cry. She never quarrelled with her husband, because she simply never answered him back when he became angry. But these scenes, which happened rarely, though recently rather more often perhaps, hurt her deeply, although she knew that they were simply signs of tiredness and strain. He always uses such bad language when he’s been with Magnus, she thought. He gives himself so much to Magnus, he comes back drained. He is so absurdly generous to people who need him. She did not ever doubt her absolute connectedness with Blaise, but these momentary breaks of contact were simply very painful, and she suffered them like headaches without regarding them as deep signs. At such times she felt how stupid she was, she overheard her own remarks as those of a stupid woman, uneducated, insensitive, unable to say the right thing. No wonder Blaise got crosser and crosser. He must wish sometimes that he had a witty intellectual wife.
‘What did you do with Kiki last night?’ said Emily. ‘You were bloody late.’
‘We drank.’
‘Where?’
‘At the pub. Then in her car. We drove out into the country.’
‘So she climbed in again?’
‘Yes.’
‘That school’s a laugh.’
‘Well, she is eighteen. Or pretends to be.’
‘God, I wish I was eighteen again, I’d do a few things differently!’
‘How was Blaise?’
‘Bloody. He’s so spineless. I think he’s simply frightened of wifie. Well, he’s frightened of everything, frightened of scandal, frightened of having to make a decision. I put on the heat but it’s no good. He just wants to be let off and I let him off. Jesus wept!’
‘Men are terribly conventional about marriage,’ said Pinn. ‘They chase younger women, but they want their lovely virtuous home life as well. Blaise is conventional and timid. Naturally wifie wins in the end.’
‘When is the end?’ said Emily. They were sitting over their coffee after breakfast. Luca had gone to school. Gone anyway. The kitchen was hot and smelt of frying and an overflowing bin. Grease, which seemed to drift in through the window on the warm urban air, lightly covered everything. Any object touched showed fingerprints. Even the tablecloth did. The distant traffic snarled and screamed. ‘I wish I had the guts to kill myself.’
Pinn was picking her teeth with the orange stick which she had been using to press back the cuticle on her fingernails. She said, ‘You ought to get really tough with him.’
‘I’m always tough! It gets me bloody nowhere!’
‘You complain endlessly, but that’s just a form of weakness. You just feebly annoy him, and that gives him energy to resist you. You must use real force. Tell him he’s got to tell his wife or else you will.’
Emily was silent for a while. She was still wearing her pink quilted dressing-gown. It seemed hardly worth while getting dressed. Last night she had dreamt of a cat with a terrible deformed head. The cat had fallen down a drain and Emily had tried to pull it out. But there was nothing in the drain except black blobs of mud. The cat had disintegrated. ‘I’m timid too,’ she said. ‘I’m afraid of losing him. There’s Luca. And I just feel I can’t cope with life any more. At least as things are Blaise is loyal, and he’s as kind to me as I let him be. I’m the one who draws blood. I know he won’t abandon me. I just can’t face a bust-up, I can’t face it. If I wrecked things for him, he might go mad with anger. Anything might happen. God, I’m a coward.’
‘I agree,’ said Pinn. ‘You are a coward. I wouldn’t stand for it in your place. At least I’d have a jolly good try at smashing up his lousy marriage. Of course wifie has the edge when it’s all hunky-dory and conventional and peaceful and great Mr Man is having the best of both worlds. But if wifie knew that Mr Man wa
s a rotten liar and if she knew that he loved you like crazy and had been duping her for years, she’d have to change her tune. Home life wouldn’t look so nice and cosy then. After he’d heard her scream and sob for a change he might decide to leg it to you. As things are his lovely legitimate home is a bolt-hole. He can go back there and lick his wounds. Spoil it, smash it, and he’ll have to run somewhere. That’s your chance to catch him properly. Have you thought of that?’
‘Christ. I’ve thought of everything,’ said Emily. ‘I just feel I can’t be sure – what would happen – he would hate me – it’s all so absolutely – unpredictable.’
‘Maybe,’ said Pinn. ‘Still if I were in your place I should want to see her tears.’
My darling boy,
I am thinking of you with so much love, I see your dear face so vividly before me, I feel I could reach out and touch you. Do understand? Perhaps no man can conceive what a mother’s love is. Surely God should be thought of as a mother. But need I tell you my feelings, dear? We two have always vibrated in unison. We two, then and now and always. Such love is so great that it cannot but help in affliction. Nay, I know it does. I think about you all the time, though 1 am busy with my little village cares as usual. Today for instance you have been with me to the alms houses, to the rectory, to the antique shop, to the play group, to the Women’s Institute Committee. I carry you, dear child, as I did once when you were a babe. I will come to you soon. Meanwhile make no decisions about real estate ...
