Dead Man Leading

by V. S. Pritchett

  ‘Come on,’ said Calcott. ‘Speak up, Silver.’

  He was always a little nervous of addressing the spirits himself. So Silva asked the question in his most polite manner.

  ‘One knock for yes,’ he reminded them. ‘Two for no.’

  The table made two clear movements.

  ‘Mucking about with us, eh?’ said Calcott.

  They all began to get restless. Their arms ached. Their wrists relaxed on to the table. Calcott was the first to take his hands away.

  ‘They are sleeping just as I said,’ Silva smiled confidingly.

  Johnson smiled at Silva’s remark and Silva smiled back as if a wick had been lit and turned up in his head, a smoky smile. All peoples regard the man who is foreign to them as mysterious, a creature of inexplicable ways and occult sympathies. Silva perceived by a certain restraint, nervousness and deference in Calcott’s attitude to Johnson that the latter was, in some way, more privileged. The peculiar mystery which the English understood was the mystery of going into strange lands and making money. Johnson’s father had been a missionary, for example; missionaries always had money, English money. Silva’s ingenuous interest was roused. Dreamily he looked at the young Englishman, who was clever enough to pretend like himself that Calcott’s spirits were real, and thought of the probable gold mines that were hidden in the country to which the expedition was going. To Silva, one had only to follow an Englishman and, where at last he stopped, there would be gold. Or if not gold some valuable equivalent. While they sat round the table and Calcott talked of the utterances and sprightly behaviour of the spirit, Hamlet, Silva gazed at Johnson’s shaggy black hair and finely lidded eyes, and thought about this.

  And Johnson’s thoughts about Silva ran on similar lines. Calcott was a joke, his seances were a pathetic parlour game. Johnson had met many lonely and uprooted Englishmen of the Calcott type who between their cups sank into fanatical and moody obsessions about the end of the world, the abominations of the Pope, the literal interpretations of the scriptures or the prophecies on the Pyramids. But the same obsessions transferred to a Portuguese were another matter. They were still quaint but translated into another tongue they had a hint of mystery. When Silva said, ‘They are sleeping,’ the words seemed to Johnson fanciful and, still, in their fanciful way, haunting. Since he was essentially a practical man, it was the humour of the words that haunted him. The way they established themselves in his mind was a joke to be remembered.

  The shutters had been opened again and they were all sitting in the light. Calcott was talking. He was boasting to Silva of the old days and how he had met Johnson’s father and showed off in front of Johnson by speculating about his father’s fate.

  ‘This,’ he repeated the story, ‘was the last room he stayed in.’

  The dramatic significance which Calcott’s Cockney imagination saw in this fact, was lost on Silva, but his quick curiosity noted that it seemed to mean something to the mysteriously privileged race of gold-knowing people called Englishmen.

  ‘What d’you say to another try?’ said Calcott with embarrassment after a while. ‘They were there all right.’ He looked in a baffled way into the middle air of the room. ‘There was a bloke mucking us about. Might have been Hamlet. What do you say?’

  Johnson asked to be left out of it this time. And Calcott approved of this. Silva agreed with Johnson. The shutters were closed by Johnson and, putting down the stumps of their cigars, the two men began the rite again.

  It was evident that now the experts were unhampered there would be results.

  ‘See that,’ murmured Calcott significantly.

  ‘Hell,’ came the deep, respectful voice of Silva.

  The table began to sway and tremble under their fingers.

  ‘Is there anyone there wishes to speak? If so give one knock for “yes,” two for “no,”’ Calcott said, raising his eyes to the ceiling, and before he finished the table gave a strong affirmative movement. ‘Who are you?’ The table leapt again into action. Calcott clutched it as if it were running away from him.

  ‘L,’ cried Calcott, head on one side as if listening to an actual voice. ‘E.S.L.I.E. Leslie, yes! My brother!’ exclaimed Calcott. ‘I was telling you about him the other day.’

  ‘Ask him something,’ said Silva.

  ‘Is mother there?’ asked Calcott.

  ‘Yes,’ the table answered.

  ‘Bring her along.’

  ‘She’s busy.’

  ‘What’s she doing?’

  ‘Too much work.’

  The table laboured at its replies.

  ‘I’d like to speak to her.’

  ‘Shut up.’

  ‘That’s not the way to speak, Leslie,’ said Calcott in an injured voice.

  ‘I’ve got Mr Silver and Mr Johnson here.’

  ‘Bovril,’ replied the spirit.

  ‘Hell,’ said Mr Silva.

  ‘Hungry,’ said Johnson.

  ‘Are you hungry, Leslie?’ asked Calcott, distracted by Johnson’s amusement and Silva’s comment.

  The spirit reverted to an old theme of these meetings. ‘Hamlet’s drunk.’

  But no, the spirit said, Hamlet was not there. How did he know then Hamlet was drunk? Answer: always drunk. Father’s ghost.

  ‘But Hamlet’s a ghost too. It oughtn’t to worry him now,’ said Johnson, interrupting. ‘Ghost doesn’t worry ghost.’

  The table paused while the three discussed this point. Calcott was very struck by it. ‘Can a ghost see a ghost, you mean?’ said Calcott.

  ‘He wouldn’t know it was a ghost, would he?’ pursued Johnson, now thoroughly enjoying himself.

  ‘That’s right,’ said Calcott. ‘What do you say, Silver, ol’ man?’

  ‘I think everything is possible in the world of spirits,’ said Silva very gravely in his deep voice.

  ‘Leslie,’ called Calcott, ‘are you telling lies?’

  The table leapt and hit Calcott hard in the stomach twice.

  ‘You see,’ said Silva.

  ‘Al right,’ said Calcott. ‘We only wanted to make sure because Mr Johnson is here.’

  ‘No,’ replied the spirit.

  ‘Oh yes, I am,’ called Johnson from the chair.

  ‘No, no, no,’ persisted the spirit.

  ‘Funny,’ said Calcott. The table was rocking swiftly in action.

  Back and forwards it went between the two. Calcott’s shirtsleeve came down and he rolled it up. The two men began to sweat under the energy of the table.

  ‘He is not here,’ the spirit said.

  ‘Of course I’m not,’ mocked Johnson. Calcott glared at him.

  ‘Leave this to me,’ Calcott said.

  ‘Perhaps,’ said Silva, with a mild detached delicacy, ‘he is speaking about the other Mr Johnson. The father,’ he said, ‘of our friend.’

  A sudden embarrassment overcame Calcott. He had had this at the back of his mind when he proposed the seance in the first place; that, in some way, they should honour and impress young Johnson by putting him in touch with his dead father. The deference Calcott felt to the young man made him hesitate in openly saying this and he had not known how to broach the matter, and the confusion of the seance so far had not helped him. But now Silva had done the task for him Calcott broke into a sweat of relief; in the semi-darkness of the room he drew hard on his cigar stump.

  ‘That’s funny you say that,’ Calcott said in a blatantly unnatural voice. ‘I was thinking the same myself. Do you think we ought to find out, Silver? That’s what he’s up to all the time, trying to get through to our friend.’

  ‘It depends on what Mr Johnson thinks.’

  ‘Me?’ said young Johnson. His amusement had stopped. He was embarrassed at being the centre of interest and he had no wish to involve himself in what seemed to him a bad joke once it brought his father into it. The idea of a faked communication with his dead father irritated him. But, he was above all a tolerant man, and moreover he was honest enough to note a curious, mor
bid interest in what would happen.

  ‘All right,’ he said.

  Calcott made a dramatic gesture.

  ‘You never know,’ apologised Calcott. ‘He might be some help in your job.’ But a sudden alarm seemed to seize Calcott, for he presently asked Silva to speak. ‘Silva’s better than me,’ said Calcott humbly. ‘He’s an educated man like your father was.’

  The English class system survives to the very brink of the next world.

  So Silva, in his most ceremonious manner, asked the spirit if he would have the delicacy to explain for the benefit of their great friend the significance of his words.

  ‘One knock for yes. Two for no,’ interpolated Calcott, not quite able to keep out of this crucial drama.

  The spirit repeated, ‘Johnson not here.’

  ‘Ask him where he is.’

  ‘Would you have the kindness to tell us where he is?’

  There was no coherent reply to this. The social approaches having been made, Calcott recovered his old peremptoriness.

  ‘Can you see him?’ he called into the air.

  ‘Gold mines,’ repeated the spirit.

  ‘Can you see him!!’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Is he anywhere there?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Is he alive?’ Calcott’s voice went high on the question.

  ‘Gold mines.’

  ‘Ask him what gold mines,’ said Silva.

  ‘What gold mines?’

  ‘Yes,’ said the spirit.

  ‘You mean that Mr Johnson’s father is not dead but has found a gold mine in the forest,’ said Silva in a dispassionate voice.

  ‘Wash out,’ said the spirit.

  A shout of laughter went up from Johnson and one of his rare frowns of cold annoyance, the contempt of the insulted artist, passed over Silva’s invisible face. Johnson was on his feet saying ironically:

  ‘Well, I’m glad he’s not dead and that he’s struck gold. But he’s been keeping pretty quiet about it.’

  He opened the shutters and stared out into the courtyard and the black sky where the big stars hung like white fruit. He had no idea that he was trying to break up the meeting. And when he saw the stars and heard the women singing in the kitchen, his genial thoughts vanished and with a feeling of cold revolt he thought of Lucy again. He saw her head and her shoulders in the darkness.

  Calcott said, from his chair:

  ‘I don’t believe your father is dead. No one’s ever seen him. I’ve always said to Silver, “That man’s as alive as you and me, Silver,” haven’t I? The message is that your father is alive.’

  Calcott stood up, feeling the dark wings of the drama he had created standing tall and ever growing beside him.

  ‘Oh yes,’ Silva replied. ‘Maybe he’s alive.’

  ‘He is alive,’ declared Calcott. ‘Mark my words. I wouldn’t mind betting anything I’ve got on it. You don’t believe it, I know. But why should he say he was alive if he wasn’t? Wouldn’t do him no good.’

  Calcott was inclined to resent Johnson’s ingratitude for this immense effort of research which he and Silva had staged. He suspected at once that Johnson’s attitude was due to class feeling. He felt snubbed. That night he showed Johnson his feeling by a score of sneers at ‘Oxford and Cambridge men’ who came out to ‘this country and think they can swank through it like the Bois de Bolong.’

  ‘What is education?’ he said in a more friendly tone. ‘You’re educated. Your father was educated. Silva’s educated. Well, what of it? Eh?’

  Calcott could not leave Johnson alone. He was completely fascinated by the fact that Johnson was the son of his father, whom he (Calcott) had known. He drove his own children out of the way, shouting and screaming at them for a lot of filthy niggers, saying, ‘I’ve made a mess of my life, I have. Women have been the ruin of me. Keep clear of women. They get you if you’re not careful. Take my advice and never marry a dago. All women are dagoes.’

  Silva took his leave very late and walked away like a small cat. He went in and out of half a dozen bars, standing against the counter in the smoke, entering without formality into every argument that occurred, improving it and speaking so that soon the conversation was his. He could assume possession, in his peculiar disinterested way, of any conversation. Unobtrusively he spread the rumour that the Englishmen were going up the river for gold.

  Chapter Seven

  They were away and his strength was returning. Harry walked into the town. He sat watching the Indians sailing their canoes in the morning squalls. On the bank the flies came in clouds and pestered, but on the river there would be no flies. He had no mind now, it seemed; his mind had been poured away in his sickness. He had only a body that could be moved about from place to place, enjoy the lick of the air upon its skin and suffer the bites of the flies.

  When he got back to the house he went to look at his canoe. He unpacked it and put it together. They were going to try out this canvas canoe on the river. It was a special fancy of his to try this boat because it would be swift and would draw little when they went up drying streams in the forests. At the rapids it would be portable. He had pictured himself going out from the camp in the evenings to shoot game on one of those lagoons that were left behind in the forest when the waters fell in the dry season. He was deeply engaged when Silva appeared in the shed.

  ‘You want me to help you take it to the river?’ said Silva.

  ‘No,’ said Harry. Then he looked up and said, ‘Perhaps later on.’

  Silva stood watching. Presently he began to say one or two things about the country. Johnson grunted.

  ‘I know the place you’re going,’ Silva said. ‘Oh, do you?’ said Harry, not believing him.

  ‘Yes, I know. I have been there,’ he said.

  ‘When?’ Johnson asked, now interested.

  ‘Long time ago,’ said Silva, ‘before I came here.’

  Harry looked at this figure. He could not imagine this fat little man on any expedition.

  ‘It must have been,’ he said.

  ‘I went with Mr Wright,’ Silva said.

  Johnson put down his knife and looked at Silva. He tested him with a few names.

  ‘Yes, I’ve been there,’ Silva said mildly. ‘Mr Wright was sent back sick—like you—he quarrelled.’

  Johnson had heard this story of Wright’s quarrel. It was Wright’s earlier expedition. He had joined a party of gold prospectors—or so they called themselves—but after weeks in the forest they began to fall out about direction. The man who had put up most of the money could not stand the hardships and wanted to go back. Wright had stayed, but a few weeks later himself was brought back ill. He had had a poisoned foot. But he had seen at that time country to which he burned to return. Silva repeated the story.

  ‘I want to come with you,’ Silva said simply.

  ‘You had better ask Wright about that,’ Johnson said.

  ‘You introduce me to him,’ Silva said.

  ‘But you know him. Haven’t you spoken to him?’

  ‘Yes, I know him—but you introduce me to him.’

  He paused and added modestly:

  ‘I know all this country.’

  ‘So,’ laughed Johnson, ‘that’s why you talked about gold last night.’

  ‘I talked?’

  ‘Well, the spirits.’

  ‘Oh, the spirits.’ Silva made a disparaging gesture. ‘You don’t believe in the spirits, you don’t believe they talked about your father?’

  ‘Of course not. Do you?’

  ‘Oh no,’ said Silva.

  ‘But Mr Calcott believes.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Silva, still in his simple way. ‘Mr Calcott is very lonely.’

  ‘Gold or no gold, you will take me?’ Silva said after a while.

  He spoke with an eagerness shadowed by a world of resignation and nonchalance. He dug the toe of an old cracked shoe in the dust making artless circles.

  This was a bad place, Silva said, for a man like him.
There were too many women. He adored women but not too many—not every night. There were the spirits two nights a week at Calcott’s house and then the rest—women. It was too much.

  ‘And I am tired of this place,’ he said. ‘I would like to help you with the boat.’

  Wright and Phillips were to return in the evening. Harry pushed the fact from his mind.

  Before noon a launch from the coast arrived with the mail and Calcott collected the Englishmen’s letters. He had them in his hand when he met Johnson in the street.

  ‘Here you are,’ said Calcott.

  One by one, avidly reading the addresses of English correspondence—for he had not had a letter from England for years—he handed over the letters. Johnson took them and stood in the street going through them. His heart was beating loudly. Now he would know. But he had gone past knowing. It seemed to him that the whole question had become past, an academic matter concerning another man—one who had tramped the streets of Rio in agony and had sat in the slow suffocation of oncoming sickness before the unrevealing forest screen.

  There was a letter from his mother. There were letters from his brothers. There were several letters in unknown hands to Phillips, one from a newspaper. (Yes, what was Gilbert going to write in the papers? Were he and Wright going to be in it?) There were letters for Wright, two from Mrs Wright to her husband. But there was nothing from Lucy. Nothing at all. Unless there were letters from her enclosed in Mrs Wright’s envelopes. He looked at them again and felt them.

  Slowly he stuffed them in his pocket and walked in silence up the street with Calcott. It was deserted at this hour. The shutters closed, nothing but hens and one or two broken-down cars blistering in the sun. The vultures clapped their wings on the roof, and beyond the roofs was the river flashing like ground glass in the middle, and grave with the shadows of the trees at the banks.

  A smell of wood smoke and charcoal and rotting oranges came out of yards and the funnel of a launch smoked deserted at the quay—almost the only sign of life. Calcott looked hungrily at Johnson’s pocket as they walked up.

  It was certain; he had been right. But she could have written. He felt slighted. He craved for her. He craved for her to come there and tell him with her own lips.