Arthur & George

by Julian Barnes

  “I’m sorry, Dr. Butter, without sounding like counsel again, surely it was later than that?”

  “Later? Certainly not. I know what time the parcel arrived. I remember complaining. They insisted on putting the parcel into my hands that day. I told them I could not possibly stay till after nine. I had my watch out when it arrived. Nine o’clock.”

  “The mistake is entirely mine. I thought you meant nine o’clock in the morning.”

  Now it is the surgeon’s turn to look surprised. “Sir Arthur, the police are, in my experience, both competent and industrious. Also honest. But they are not miracle-workers.”

  Sir Arthur agreed, and the two men parted on friendly terms. But afterwards he found himself thinking exactly that: the police are miracle-workers. They are able to make twenty-nine horse hairs pass from one sealed package to another merely by the power of thought. Perhaps he should write them up for the Society of Psychical Research.

  Yes, he might compare them to apport mediums, who were supposedly able to dematerialize objects and then rematerialize them, making showers of ancient coins fall upon the seance table, not to mention small Assyrian tablets and semi-precious stones. This was one branch of spiritism about which Arthur remained deeply sceptical; indeed, the most amateur detective was usually able to trace the ancient coins to the nearest numismatist’s. As for the fellows who dealt in snakes and tortoises and live birds: Arthur thought they belonged more in the circus or the conjuror’s booth. Or the Staffordshire Constabulary.

  He was getting skittish. But that was just exhilaration. Twelve hours—therein lay his answer. The police had the evidence in their possession for twelve hours before delivering it to Dr. Butter. Where had it been, who had charge of it, how had it been handled? Was there casual contamination, or a particular act done with the specific intention of incriminating George Edalji? Almost certainly, they would never find out, not without a deathbed confession—and Arthur had always been dubious of deathbed confessions.

  His exhilaration mounted further when Dr. Lindsay Johnson’s report arrived at Undershaw. It was backed by two notebooks full of Johnson’s detailed graphological analysis. The top man in Europe judged that none of the letters submitted to him, whether penned by malevolent schemer, religious maniac or degenerate boy, had any significant consonance with genuine documents written by George Edalji. In certain examples there was a kind of specious resemblance; but this was no more than you would expect from a forger who admitted trying to counterfeit another’s handwriting. You would expect him capable of achieving occasionally a plausible facsimile; yet there were always giveaway signs to prove that George had—literally—no hand in it.

  The first part of Arthur’s list was now more than half ticked off: Yelverton—Hairs—Letters—Eyesight. Then there was Green—still work to do on him—and Anson. He would beard the Chief Constable directly. “I shall be much interested to note what Sherlock Holmes has to say about a case in real life . . .” had been Anson’s sarcastic response. Well, then, Arthur would take him at his word; he would write up his findings so far, send them off to Anson, and invite his comments.

  As he sat down at his desk to begin his draft, he felt, for the first time since Touie’s death, a sense of the properness of things. After the depression and guilt and lethargy, after the challenge and the call to action, he was where he belonged: a man at a desk with a pen in his hand, eager to tell a story and to make people see things differently; while out there, up in London, waiting for him—although not for too much longer—was the woman who, from now on, would be his first reader and the first witness of his life. He felt charged with energy; the material teemed in his head; and his purpose was clear. He began with a sentence he had been working on in trains and hotels and taxicabs, something both dramatic and declaratory:

  The first sight which I ever had of Mr. George Edalji was enough in itself both to convince me of the extreme improbability of his being guilty of the crime for which he was condemned, and to suggest some at least of the reasons which had led to his being suspected.

  And from there the narrative sped out of him, like a great unrolling chain, its links as hard-forged as he could make them. In two days he wrote fifteen thousand words. There might still be things to add, when the additional reports came in from oculists and handwriting experts. He also dealt lightly with what he took to be Anson’s role in the affair: no point expecting a useful response from a fellow if you went hard at him before you had even met him. Then Wood typed up the report, and a copy was sent by registered post to the Chief Constable.

  Two days later a reply arrived from Green Hall, Stafford, inviting Sir Arthur to dine with Captain and Mrs. Anson on any day of the following week. He would, naturally, be welcome to stay overnight. There was no comment at all on Arthur’s report, only a whimsical postscript: “You may bring Mr. Sherlock Holmes with you if you wish. Mrs. Anson would be delighted to meet him. Let me know if he too requires accommodation.”

  Sir Arthur handed the letter to his secretary. “Keeping his powder dry by the looks of it.”

  Wood nodded in agreement, and knew not to comment on the P.S.

  “I suppose, Woodie, you don’t fancy coming as Holmes?”

  “I shall accompany you if you wish, Sir Arthur, but you know my thoughts on dressing up.” He also felt that, having already been cast as Watson, playing Holmes as well would be beyond his dramatic elasticity. “I may be more use to you practising my billiards.”

  “Quite right, Alfred. You hold the fort. And don’t neglect your double-baulks. I’ll see what Anson’s made of.”

  While Arthur is planning his trip to Staffordshire, Jean is thinking further ahead. It is time to address her transition from waiting girl to non-waiting wife. It is now the month of January. Touie died the previous July; clearly, Arthur cannot marry within the twelvemonth. They have not yet talked about a date, but an autumn wedding is not an impossible thought. Fifteen months—few could be shocked by such an interval. The sentimental prefer a spring wedding; but the autumn suits a second marriage, in Jean’s opinion. And then a Continental honeymoon. Italy, of course, and, well, she has always felt a yen for Constantinople.

  A wedding means bridesmaids, but this has long been settled: Leslie Rose and Lily Loder-Symonds are marked for the task. But a wedding also means a church, and a church means religion. The Mam brought Arthur up a Catholic, but both have since deserted the faith: the Mam for Anglicanism, Arthur for Sunday golf. Arthur has even become covert about his middle name, Ignatius. There is little chance then, that she, a Catholic from the cradle, will marry as one. This may distress her parents, especially her mother; but if that is the price, Jean will pay it.

  Might there be a further price? If she is going to be at Arthur’s side in all things, then she must face what up till now she has run from. On the few occasions that Arthur has mentioned his interest in psychical matters, she has turned away. Inwardly, she has shuddered at the vulgarity and stupidity of that world: at silly old men pretending to go into trances, at old crones in frightful wigs gazing into crystal balls, at people holding hands in the darkness and making one another jump. And it has nothing to do with religion, which means morality. And the notion that this . . . mumbo-jumbo appeals to her beloved Arthur is both upsetting and barely credible. How can someone like Arthur, whose reasoning power is second to none, allow himself to associate with such people?

  It is true that her great friend Lily Loder-Symonds is an enthusiast for table-turning, but Jean regards this as a whimsicality. She discourages talk of seances, even though Lily assures her they are full of respectable people. Perhaps she should talk the matter through with Lily first, as a way of conquering her distaste. No, that would be pusillanimous. She is marrying Arthur, after all, not Lily.

  So when he arrives on his way north, she sits him down, listens dutifully to news of the investigation, and then says, to his evident surprise, “I should very much like to meet this young man of yours.”

  “Would
you, my darling? He is a very decent fellow, horribly traduced. I am sure he would be honoured and delighted.”

  “He is a Parsee, I think you said?”

  “Well, not exactly. His father—”

  “What do Parsees believe, Arthur? Are they Hindoos?”

  “No, they are Zoroastrians.” Arthur enjoys requests like this. The fundamental mystery of women can, he thinks, be encompassed and held at bay as long as he is allowed to explain things to them. He describes, with settled confidence, the historical origins of the Parsees, their characteristic appearance, their headgear, their liberal attitude to women, their tradition of being born on the ground floor of the house. He passes over the ceremony of purification, since this involves ablution with cow urine; but is expatiating upon the central position of astrology in Parsee life, and heading towards the towers of silence and the posthumous attention of vultures, when Jean raises her hand to stop him. She realizes that this is not the way to do things. The history of Zoroastrianism is not helping make the smooth transition she has somehow hoped for. Also, it feels dishonest, against her view of herself.

  “Arthur, my dear,” she interrupts. “There is something I wish to talk about.”

  He looks surprised, and slightly alarmed. If he has always valued her directness, there is a residual suspicion within him that whenever a woman says something must be talked about, it is rarely something to a man’s comfort or advantage.

  “I want you to explain to me your involvement in . . . do you call it spiritism or spiritualism?”

  “Spiritism is the term I prefer, but it seems to be losing currency. However, I thought you disliked the entire subject.” He means more than this: that she fears and despises the whole subject—and, a fortiori, its adherents.

  “Arthur, I could not dislike anything you are interested in.” She means less than this: that she hopes she cannot dislike anything he is interested in.

  And so he begins to explain his involvement, from experiments in thought-transference with the future architect of Undershaw to conversations inside Buckingham Palace with Sir Oliver Lodge. At all points he stresses the scientific origins and procedures of psychical research. He goes very carefully, making it sound as respectable and unthreatening as he can. His tone as much as his words begins to reassure her a little.

  “It is true, Arthur, that Lily has talked to me a little about table-turning, but I suppose I have always considered it against Church teaching. Is it not heresy?”

  “It goes against Church institutions, that is true. Not least because it cuts out the middleman.”

  “Arthur! That is hardly a proper way to speak about the clergy.”

  “But it is what, historically, they have been. Middlemen, intermediaries. Conveyors of the truth at first, but increasingly controllers of the truth, obfuscators, politicians. The Cathars were on the right line, that of direct access to God untrammelled by layers of hierarchy. Naturally they were wiped out by Rome.”

  “So your—do I call them beliefs or not?—make you hostile to my Church?” And therefore, she means, to all its members. To one specific member.

  “No, my dearest. And I would never seek to dissuade you from going to your Church. But we are moving beyond all religions. Soon—very soon in historical terms—they will be things of the past. Look at it this way. Is religion the only domain of thought which is non-progressive? Wouldn’t that be a strange thing? Are we forever to be referred to a standard set two thousand years ago? Cannot people see that as the human brain evolves, it must take a wider outlook? A half-formed brain makes a half-formed God, and who shall say our brains are even half-formed yet?”

  Jean is silent. She thinks that the standards set two thousand years ago are true ones which should be obeyed; and that while the brain might develop, and produce all sorts of scientific advances, the soul, which is the spark of the divine, is something quite separate and immutable, and not subject to evolution.

  “Do you remember when I judged the Strong Man competition? At the Albert Hall? He was called Murray, the winner. I followed him out into the night. He had a gold statue under his arm, he was the strongest man in Britain. Yet he was lost in the fog . . .”

  No, metaphor was the wrong approach. Metaphors were for the institutional religions. Metaphors paltered.

  “What we are doing, Jean, is a simple thing. We are taking the essence of the great religions, which is the life of the spirit, and rendering it more visible and thus more understandable.”

  These sound like tempter’s words to her, and her tone is crisp. “By seances and table-turning?”

  “Which look strange to the outsider, I freely admit. As the ceremonies of your Church would look strange to a visiting Zoroastrian. The body and blood of Christ on a plate and in a cup—he might think that was sheer hocus-pocus. Religions—all religions—have become mired in ritual and despotism. We do not say, Come and pray in our church and follow our instructions and perhaps one day you will be rewarded in the afterlife. That is like the bargaining of carpet salesmen. Rather, we will show you now, as you live, the reality of certain psychic phenomena, which will prove to you the physical abolition of death.”

  “So you do not believe in the resurrection of the body?”

  “That we go into the ground and rot, then at some future time are put back together whole? No. The body is a mere husk, a container which we shed. It is true that some souls wander in darkness for a while after death, but that is only because they are unprepared for the transition to the farther side. A true spiritist who understands the process will pass easily and without anguish. And will also be able to communicate more quickly with the world he has left behind.”

  “You have witnessed this?”

  “Oh yes. And hope to do so more frequently as I understand more.”

  A sudden chill goes through Jean. “You are not, I hope, going to become a medium, dear Arthur.” She has a picture of her beloved husband as an aged huckster going into trances and talking in funny voices. And of the new Lady Doyle being known as a huckster’s wife.

  “Oh no, I have no such powers. True mediums are very, very rare. They are often simple, humble people. Like Jesus Christ, for instance.”

  Jean ignores this comparison. “And what about morality, Arthur?”

  “Morality is unchanged. True morality, that is—which comes from the individual conscience and the love of God.”

  “I do not mean for you, Arthur. You know what I mean. If people—ordinary people—do not have the Church to tell them how to behave, then they will relapse into brutish squalor and self-interest.”

  “I do not see that as the alternative. Spiritists, true spiritists, are men and women of high moral calibre. I could name you several. And their morality is the higher because they are closer to an understanding of spiritual truth. If the ordinary person to whom you allude were to see proof of the spirit world at first hand, if he were to realize how close it is to us at all times, then brutishness and self-interest will lose their appeal. Make the truth apparent, and morality will take care of itself.”

  “Arthur, you are going too fast for me.” More to the point, Jean feels a headache coming on; indeed, she fears, a migraine.

  “Of course. We have all our lives ahead of us. And then all of eternity together.”

  Jean smiles. She wonders what Touie will be doing for all of the eternity she and Arthur have together. Though of course the same problem will present itself, whether her Church turns out to be telling the truth, or those low-born mediums who so impress her husband-to-be.

  Arthur himself is far from getting a headache. Life is on the move again: first the Edalji case, and now Jean’s sudden interest in the things beneath that truly matter. He will soon be back to full gusto. On the doorstep he embraces his waiting girl and, for the first time since Touie’s death, finds himself reacting like a prospective bridegroom.

  Anson

  Arthur told the cabby to drop him at the old lock-up next to the White Lion Hotel. The in
n lay directly opposite the gates of Green Hall. It was an instinctive tactic, to arrive on foot. Overnight bag in hand, he followed the gently rising drive from the Lichfield Road, trying to make his shoeleather discreet on the gravel. As the house, slantingly lit by the frail late-afternoon sun, became plain before him, he stopped in a tree’s shade. Why should the methods of Dr. Joseph Bell not persuade architecture to yield secrets, just as physiology did? So: 1820s, he guessed; white stucco; a pseudo-Greek façade; a solid portico with two pairs of unfluted Ionic columns; three windows on either side. Three storeys—and yet to his enquiring eye there was something suspicious about the third. Yes, he would bet Wood a forty-point start that there was not a single attic room behind that row of seven windows: a mere architectural trick to make the house taller and more impressive. Not that this fakery could be blamed on the current occupant. Peering beyond the house, across to the right, Doyle could make out a sunken rose garden, a tennis ground, a summer house flanked by a pair of young grafted hornbeams.

  What story did it all tell? One of money, breeding, taste, history, power. The family’s name had been made in the eighteenth century by Anson the circumnavigator, who had also laid down its first fortune—prize money from the capture of a Spanish galleon. His nephew had been raised to the viscountcy in 1806; promotion to the earldom followed in 1831. If this was the second son’s residence, and his elder brother held Shugborough, then the Ansons knew how to foster their inheritance.

  A few feet back from a second-floor window, Captain Anson called softly to his wife.

  “Blanche, the Great Detective is almost upon us. He is studying the driveway for the footprints of an enormous hound.” Mrs. Anson had rarely heard him so skittish. “Now, when he arrives, you are not to burble about his books.”