The youngest and best-looking of the troupe, the one Dr Brightman had called the Soubrette, took a plate round for the collection. The rest burst en masse into Santa Lucia. The programme came to an end. Preparations began for moving on to another hotel. Before they got under way, the old singer, in participation with the Soubrette, surreptitiously examined the takings, both gesticulating a good deal, whether with satisfaction or irony at the extent of the offering was uncertain.
‘To sing Neapolitan songs in Venice is rather like a Scotch ballad in Bath,’ said Dr Brightman. ‘Naples is unique. Even her popular music doesn’t export as far north as this. A taste for Naples is one of the divisions between people. You love the place, or loathe it. The character of the traveller seems to have no bearing on the instinctive choice. Personally I am devoted to the Parthenopean shore, although once victim of a most unseemly episode at Pompeii when younger. It was outside the lupanar, from which in those days ladies were excluded. I should have been affronted far less within that haunt of archaic vice, where I later found little to shock the most demure, except the spartan hardness of the double-decker marble bunks. I chased the fellow away with my parasol, an action no doubt deplored in these more enlightened days, as risking irreparable damage to the responses of one of those all too frequent cases of organ inferiority.’
She briskly shook the crop of short white curls cut close to her head. They looked like a battery of coiled wire (like the Dark Lady’s) galvanizing an immensely powerful dynamo. The bearing of the anecdote brought Ferrand-Sénéschal’s name to mind again. I asked if she had ever met him.
‘Yes, I once was introduced to Ferrand-Sénéchal in the not very inviting flesh. He told me he despised “good writing”. I praised his French logic in that respect. As you doubtless know, his early books are ridiculously stilted, his later ones grossly slipshod. I was at once hustled away by his court of toadies. Certain persons require a court. Others prefer a harem. That is not quite the same thing.’
‘Some like both.’
‘Naturally the one can merge with the other—why, hullo, Russell.’
The young American who had come up to our table seemed to be the only one of his countrymen at the Conference. He was called Russell Gwinnett. We had sat next to each other at luncheon the day before. He had explained that he taught English at a well-known American college for women, where Dr Brightman herself had spent a year as exchange professor, so that they had known one another before meeting again at the Conference.
‘How are you making out, Russell? Have you met Mr Nicholas Jenkins? This is Mr Russell Gwinnett, an old friend from my transatlantic days. You have? Come and join us, Russell.’
The serious business of the Conference, intellectuals from all over the world addressing each other on their favourite topics, took place at morning and afternoon sessions on the island of San Giorgio Maggiore. To reanimate enthusiasms imperilled by prolonged exposure to the assiduities of congress life, extension of the syllabus to include an official luncheon or dinner was listed for almost every day of our stay. These banquets were usually linked with some national treasure, or place of historic interest, occasions to some extent justifying the promise of Members that we should ‘live like kings’. They gave at the same time opportunity to ‘get to know’ other members of the Conference. Through the medium of one of these jaunts, which took place at a villa on the Brenta, famous for its frescoes by Veronese, Gwinnett and I had met.
He was in his early thirties, slight in figure, with a small black moustache that showed a narrow strip of skin along the upper lip above and below its length. That he was American scarcely appeared on the surface at first, then something about the thin bone formations of arms and legs, the sallowness and texture of the skin, suggested the nationality. The movements of the body, supple, not without athletic promise, also implied an American, rather than European, nervous tension; an extreme one. He wore spectacles lightly tinted with blue. His air, in general unconformist, did not strongly indicate any recognizable alignment.
I had not sat next to him long the previous day before unorthodoxy was confirmed. Having invoked the name of Dr Brightman, Gwinnett (like herself) created the usually advantageous foundation of good understanding between writers—one by no means always available—by showing well-disposed knowledge of my own works. That was an excellent start. He turned out to hold another ace up his sleeve, but did not play that card at once. In showing control, he began as he went on. After the gratifying, if subjective, offering made in the direction of my own writing, he became less easy. In fact he was almost impossible to engage, drying up entirely, altogether lacking in that reserve of light, reasonably well-informed social equipment, on the whole more characteristic of American than British academic life. This lapse into a torpid, almost surly reluctance to cooperate conversationally suggested an American version of the least flexible type of British don, that quiet egotism, self-applauding narrowness of vision, sometimes less than acceptable, even when buttressed with verified references and forward-looking views. If Gwinnett showed signs almost of burlesquing a stock academic figure, he was himself not necessarily lacking in interest on that account, if only as a campus specimen hitherto unsampled; especially as he seemed oddly young to have developed such traits. Even at the outset I was prepared for this diagnosis to be wide of the mark. There was also something not at all self-satisfied about him, an impression of anxiety, a never ceasing awareness of impending disaster.
At table he had messed about the food on his plate, a common enough form of expressing maladjustment, though disconcerting, since the dishes happened to be notably good. He refused wine. It might be that he was a reprieved alcoholic. He had some of that sad, worn, preoccupied air that suggests unquiet memories of more uproarious days. Above all there was a sense of loneliness. I talked for a time with the Belgian writer on my other side. Then the Belgian became engaged with his neighbour beyond, leaving Gwinnett and myself back on each other’s hands. Before I could think of anything new to say, he put an unexpected question. This was towards the end of the meal, the first sign of loosening up.
‘How does the Veronese at Dogdene compare with the ones on the wall here?’
That was a surprise.
‘You mean the one Lord Sleaford’s just sold? I’ve never been to Dogdene, so I haven’t ever seen it in anything but reproduction. I only know the house itself from the Constable in the National Gallery.’
The Sleaford Veronese had recently realized at auction what was then regarded as a very large sum. The picture had always been a great preoccupation of Chips Lovell, who used often to grumble about his Sleaford relations never recognizing their luck in ownership of a work by so great a master. Lovell, who agreed with Smethyck (now head of a gallery), and with General Conyers, that the picture ought to be cleaned, was also in the habit of complaining that the public did not have sufficient opportunity to inspect its beauties. In those days admission to Dogdene was about three days a week throughout the summer. After the war, in common with many other mansions of its kind, the house was thrown open, at a charge, all the year round. Even so, the Veronese had to be sold to pay for the basic upkeep of the place. In spite of the publicity given at the time of the sale, I was impressed that Gwinnett had heard of it.
‘I’ve been told it’s not Veronese at his best—Iphigenia, isn’t it?’
That had been Lovell’s view in moods of denigration or humility. Gwinnett seemed more interested in the subject of the picture than whether or not Veronese had been on form.
‘That’s an intriguing story it depicts. The girl offering herself for sacrifice. The calm dignity with which she faces death. Tiepolo painted an Iphigenia too, more than once, though I’ve only seen the one at the Villa Valmarana. There’s at least one other that looks even finer in reproduction. It’s the inferential side of the myth that fascinates me.’
Gwinnett sounded oddly excited. His manner had altogether altered. The thought of Iphigenia must have strangely moved him.
Then he abruptly changed the subject. For some reason speaking of the Veronese had released something within himself, made it possible to introduce another, quite different motif, one, as it turned out, that had been on his mind ever since we met. This matter, once given expression, a little explained earlier lack of ease. At least it suggested that Gwinnett, when broaching topics that meant a lot to him, was not so much vain or unaccommodating, as nervous, paralysed, unsure of himself. That was the next impression, equally untrustworthy as a judgment.
‘You knew the English writer X. Trapnel, Mr Jenkins?’
‘Certainly.’
‘Pretty well, I believe?’
‘Yes, I was quite an authority on Trapnel at one moment.’
Ginnett sighed.
‘I’d give anything to have known Trapnel.’
‘There were ups and downs in being a friend.’
‘You thought him a good writer?’
‘A very good writer.’
‘I did too. That’s why I’d have loved to meet him. I could have done that when I was a student. I was over in London. I get mad at myself when I think of that. He was still alive. I hadn’t read his books then. I wouldn’t have known where to go and see him anyway.’
‘All you had to do was to have a drink at one of his pubs.’
‘I couldn’t just speak to him. He wouldn’t have liked that.’
‘If somebody had told you one or two of his haunts—The Hero of Acre or The Mortimer—you could hardly have avoided hearing Trapnel holding forth on books and writers. Then you might have stood him a drink. The job would have been done.’
‘Trapnel’s the subject of my dissertation—his life and works.’
‘So Trapnel’s going to have a biographer?’
‘Myself.’
‘Fine.’
‘You think it right?’
‘Quite right.’
Gwinnett nodded his head.
‘I ought to say I’d already planned to get in touch with you, Mr Jenkins—among others who’d known Trapnel—when I reached England after this Conference I’d never have expected to find you here.’
After the statement of Gwinnett’s Trapnel project relations might have been on the way to becoming easier. That did not happen; at least easing was by no means immediate. For a minute or two he seemed even to regret the headlong nature of the confession. Then he recovered some of the earlier more amenable manner.
‘You did not go on seeing Trapnel right up to his death, I guess?’
‘Not for about four or five years before that. It must be the best part of ten years now since I talked to him—though he once sent me a note asking the date when some book had been published, the actual month, I mean. He went completely underground latterly.’
‘What book was that—the one he wanted to know about?’
‘A collection of essays by L. O. Salvidge called Paper Wine. There had been some question of Trapnel reviewing it, but the notice never got written.’
‘Where was Trapnel living when he wrote you?’
‘He only gave an accommodation address. A newspaper shop in the Islington part of the world.
‘I want to see Mr Salvidge too when I get to London.’
‘As you know, he contributed an Introduction to a posthumous work of Trapnel’s called Dogs Have No Uncles.’
‘It’s good. Not as great as Camel Ride to the Tomb, but good. What a sense of doom that other title gives.’
In contrast with the passing of a prolific writer like Ferrand-Sénéschal, Trapnel’s end, in spite of aptness of circumstances, took place unnoticed by the press. That was not surprising. He had produced no ‘serious’ work during his latter days. Throughout his life he had been accustomed to ‘go underground’ intermittently, when things took an unfavourable turn; the underground state becoming permanent after the Pamela Widmerpool affair, her destruction of his manuscript, return to her husband. That was when Trapnel disappeared for good. I knew no one who continued to hobnob with him. He must have made business contacts from time to time. His name would occasionally appear in print, or on the air, in connexion with hack work of one kind or another. This was usually radio or television collaboration with a partner, a professional, safely established, to whom Trapnel had passed on a saleable idea he himself lacked energy or will to hammer out to the end. In these exchanges he must have inclined to avoid former friendly affiliations, reminders of ‘happier days’. It had to be admitted Trapnel had known ‘happier days’, even if of a rather special order.
Bagshaw was a case in point of Trapnel deliberately rejecting overtures from an old acquaintance. As he had himself planned after the liquidation of Fission, when such fiefs were comparatively easy to seize, Bagshaw had carved out for himself an obscure, but apparently fairly prosperous, little realm in the unruly world of television. Now he was known as ‘Lindsay Bagshaw’, the first name latent until this coming into his own. I never saw much of him after the magazine ceased publication, though we would run across each other occasionally. Once we met in the lift at Broadcasting House, and he began to speak of Trapnel. Even by then Bagshaw had become rather a changed man. Success, even moderate success, had left a mark.
‘I’d have liked Trappy to appear in one of my programmes. Quite impossible to run him to earth. I caught sight of him one day from the top of a 137 bus. It wasn’t so much the beard and the long black greatcoat, as that melancholy distinguished air Trappy always had. I couldn’t jump off in full flight. It was one of those misty evenings in Langham Place. The lights were shining from all the rows of windows in this building. Trappy was standing by that church with the pointed spire. He was looking up at those thousand windows of the BBC, all ablaze with light. Something about him made me feel very sad. I couldn’t help thinking of the Scholar Gypsy, and Christ-Church hall, and all that, even though I wasn’t at the university myself, and it wasn’t snowing. I thought it would have been a splendid shot in a film. I wondered if he’d agree to do a documentary about his own failure in life—comparative, I mean. About a month later, I ran into one of his understrappers in a pub. He was going to see Trappy later that evening. I sent a note, but it wasn’t any good. No answer.’
There was also the occasional Trapnel story or article to appear, nothing to be ashamed of, at the same time nothing comparable with the old Trapnel standard. This submerged period of Trapnel’s life could not have been enviable. He abandoned The Hero of Acre, all the other pubs where he had been accustomed to harangue an assemblage of chosen followers. The roving intelligentsia of the saloon bar—cultural nomads of a race never likely to penetrate the international steppe—professional topers, itinerant bores, near-criminals, knew him no more. They were thrown back on their own resources, had to keep themselves instructed and amused in other ways. Where Trapnel himself went, whom he saw, how he remained alive, were all hard to imagine. Probably there remained women to find him still passable enough even in decline; more or less devoted mistresses to maintain survival of a sort. As Trapnel himself might have insisted—one could hear his dry harsh voice speaking the words—a washed-up condition is not necessarily an unattractive one to a woman. That had also been one of Barnby’s themes: ‘Ladies like a man to rescue. A job that offers a challenge. They can annex the property at a cheap rate, and ruthlessly develop it.’
Trapnel may have been annexed by a woman, not much development feasible, minimum financial security about the best to be hoped. That in itself was after all something. Gwinnett agreed the plausible assumption, after the collapse of Trapnel’s hopes, was personal administration taken over by a relatively prudent wage-earning mistress; even a good-hearted landlady, whose commonsense regulated money matters, such as they were, warding off actual destitution. That is, Gwinnett had nothing else to offer. His accord was not enthusiastic. Comparative reluctance to accept that a woman might have kept Trapnel going, made me wonder whether Gwinnett were not homosexual. He might be a homosexual as well as a redeemed drunk; the former state, possibly repressed, see
king outlet in the latter. Then he brought back the subject of women himself.
‘I’d like to ask you about this girl—the castrating one.’
‘Pamela Widmerpool?’
‘I’ve been spun so many yarns about her.’
The stories he had been told were, on the whole, garbled in a manner to make the true circumstances of Trapnel’s life all but unrecognizable. It was in any case a field where accuracy was hard to come by. At the same time, if Gwinnett’s information had percolated through misinformed sources, he himself showed unexpected flashes of insight. Enormous simplifications were possibly necessary to carry a deeper truth than lay on the surface of a mass of unsorted detail. That was, after all, what happened when history was written; many, if not most, of the true facts discarded. Besides, what could be called unreservedly true when closely examined, especially about Trapnel? The stories told to Gwinnett became notably blurred in their inferences about Pamela Widmerpool. Trapnel’s relationship with her emerged as little more than a love affair that had gone wrong, something that might have happened to anybody. Naturally, in one sense, it was a love affair that had gone wrong, but subtlety was required to express the unusual nature of that love affair, its start, progress, termination. All these had been conveyed with such lack of finesse that no kind of justice was done to the exceptional nature of those concerned: Pamela: Widmerpool: Trapnel himself. For Gwinnett, too, there existed the seldom remittent difficulty of translating the personalities and doings of English material into American terms.
The impression these reports had left with him was of a man’s luck—Trapnel’s luck—having suddenly, meaninglessly, taken a turn for the worse. From being, in his way, a notable writer, a promising career ahead of him, Trapnel had been suddenly, inexorably, struck down by misfortune, although leading much the same sort of life as he had always led, with girls not so wholly different from Pamela, before he had linked himself to her. Sometimes Gwinnett hedged a little, but that main interpretation was the one he was prepared, even if unwillingly, to accept.
A Dance to the Music of Time: 2nd Movement Page 26
