Essay
VII. Short Stories.
Two Brothers.
|
|
THERE once were two brothers, both of a faith. One was
Christian and the other atheist. They each attempted to convert the other but neither
could succeed. The Christian believed in the ways of God, and the atheist
believed in the ways of men. The Christian saw mankind with hope unfulfilled,
the atheist saw religion with contempt unconcealed. Neither brother wished ill
on the other and each was experimentally courteous, but these large differences
inevitably caused debate in their discourses. The Christian would ask, 'But
what do you expect of death?' and the atheist would reply, 'Not that which I
expect of life. Why do you for your part indulge in notions which oblige you to
be almost dead in life, and to expect life in death? Surely, to embrace the one
in its time and the other in its time is more effective and reasonable?’
And the Christian
would say, 'I live as though to live ever after; not as though an irreversible
calamity hangs fatally and perpetually over my destiny. Why do you, my brother,
fear death? I only fear the objectionable, and all which is objectionable in my
life is righted by religion, and all which might be objectionable in death will
be also so righted.'
'You cannot know
that.'
'If I know anything
I know this. Religious truth absorbs the preponderance of experience, quite as
empirical assertions subsist entirely upon the very smallest particles of
observation. There are things the intellect experiences which cannot be
described, there are sensations not merely physical. Have you never felt the
strange and mystical cloud of déjà vu
fall upon you, without any apparent explanation, without the moment bearing any
conscious similarity to another time or place? Have you never wondered that men
born deaf, dumb, and blind, may think and feel? Would you as an empiricist deny
that such a soul thinks or feels at all? How can your scientific empiricism
account for anything but itself, for empiricism knows only itself, and even that it knows imperfectly. Once it speculates it
self-destructs.’
‘I see with my
eyes.’
‘You speak with your
teeth.’
‘You won’t listen.’
‘You mean I won’t
agree.’
‘It is the same
thing.’
‘It is not, although
your pride demands it should be; but far be it for me to throw water on a fat
fire. Let us cease.’
In such a vein they
would proceed.
Their father on his
deathbed beseeched goodwill of the two and gave them a final caution,
‘My sons, all is
simple and easy for me now. I must die. But you, both of you, you must live,
and that is the trouble, that is the place of complexity and hardship. Pray, heed me.
Live well. Treat your fellows kindly. Do not regard yourselves too highly. Be
decent. God bless you.’
He left them equal
shares of a not inconsiderable fortune. Now the Christian was a Christian in
deed as in name, and considered how, in God's Providence, he might best spend
his money. It struck him that he might buy a luxurious house with luxurious
things, and luxuriously live like luxurious kings. He was not impervious to the
easy temptation of so tantalising a prospect. He knew, however, that he was
already comfortable, that to be too comfortable is to be uncomfortable, that he
who considers himself foremost considers others least, and that he who
considers others least is least considered by others. Upon such worthy lines
did he ruminate and did not as yet, in his perplexity, spend any money.
The atheist brother
was in no such confusion. He was a hedonist because he was an atheist. His
father's will to leave him religion had failed, but he was glad that his
father's will to leave him money had succeeded. 'For,' thought the atheist, 'a
religion might be only as useful as it is truthful. If Christianity is true
then I am false, but if it is false then I am true and my brother is false.
Some think it true and some think it false. Thus the matter is questionable.
But the matter of money is undoubted. It is the universal key to the vaults of
pleasure. Every man wishes to spend it with only a lesser rapidity than he
acquires it. The more spent the better, the more acquired the more spent! First
I will enjoy myself, and then I will see if I cannot make more money and
consequently more pleasure.'
The two met shortly
after receiving each their share of the fortune, over scones and tea, with the
cream on first.
‘We have paid the penalty of grief.’
‘I suppose you think
we deserved all this after the Fall. Eve is to blame for our sorrows.’
‘Are you deluded
Sir?’
‘No more than is
usual for a man.’
‘I am not sure I
want be with you in this mood.’
‘You would prefer
your brethren at St. Michael’s I suppose?’
‘They are good
people.’
‘Yes, you like your
company as you like your meals, to be comprised of vegetables.’
‘Why must you behave
like something between Pontius Pilate and Bramwell Brontë? Let us enjoy our
tea.’ A moment’s silence passed.
‘How have you spent
your money so far then?’ the atheist asked.
‘I haven’t much
yet.’
‘Wrenched between
the chapel and the chamber? Well I have bought a new house in town and found a
new woman to occupy it.’ Silence again.
‘I didn’t think you’d
like my saying that. You think I am solely employed in ravishing the ravishing
I suppose?’
‘It is strange, my
brother, but I have not asked you about
any of these things, it is you who
volunteers the information.’
‘How else am I to
pass the time of day? More cream?’
‘Thank you, no.’
Eventually they
settled into two armchairs beside a log fire, and spoke of tedious but
necessary affairs. Once these were concluded however they began again a
discussion upon their money, and the atheist waxed lyrical about the yacht he
had his eye on, his new suits and furniture, his silverware and club
memberships, his vintage wines and superior cooks, which the Christian, having
at last lost his patience, called a wasteful expenditure devoid of all purpose.
This roused an angry eye from his brother who retorted in the following manner.
‘Purpose is a thing
which only exists in the mind. People only question the ‘purpose’ of things
when they have tired of their lives. Depression is due to laziness in not
pursuing sports, frivolities, cooking, working, and generally sweating to
acquire a thing. That is why common labourers are blithe. Therefore all description
of a universal ‘purpose’ is only an attempt to lay a kind of sedentary path to
contentment without pursuing things. For this reason religion is most cherished
by the fearful, the old, and the infirm.
Moreover the peace
and solace found in it is due entirely to the influence of the arts, that is,
music, painting, sculpture, architecture, and literature, and of the
disciplined conduct taught in it. The arts put together with discipline but
divested of their religious veneer would have the same effect on any
individual. The moral approval of it comes only from the teaching of ordinary
common sense. The intellectual approval comes only from reading the same
opinion, though perhaps differently worded, over and over again. The
philosophical approval for it is based solely on the imperfect and contradictory
nature of human reasoning; and I would like to tell you now that I am sick of
hearing your superior drawl and manner in condemning ordinary things which you
know you like as well as I. Ever since Mother died, before which you were as
frolicsome and happy as any, you have become a pompous deluded bore. Frankly I
am worried about the state of your mind and sorrowful for the faded years you
have wasted persuading yourself of such nonsense.’
Each word of this
tirade fell like a hammer blow upon the Christian’s head, for he knew that
there was force as well as malignance in what had been said. Yet he responded,
with a voice of unmistakeably repressed anger.
‘I often find such
bleak and desolate statements of disbelief very heartening, for they always
seem to me utterly unconvincing. There is nothing less convincing than
listening to a misanthrope addicted to disparagement. Most people will have met
some such in their acquaintance, people who walk into a room with drawn and
frustrated features, resolved to smut and blacken everything mentioned. If the
weather is thought lovely prepare to hear how it makes people silly, if the
food is thought good know it was better last year, if a baby is born be
reminded of the pain of life. The more such a one is heard the less his
opinions will be credited, for we see the spring of them is but a mean and
jealous impulse.
The contrary spirit,
however, we see originates in an impulse beyond selfishness, beyond earthly
things, even beyond time and finitude, it is a never ending but ever fulfilling
impulse, a wellspring of sympathy with the surroundings of God. The more one
hears of such a spirit the more one is convinced, not because it is a mere
reading over and brainwashing but because a joyful nature is more credible than
a wasteful and selfish nature.’
‘I am not the
misanthrope!’, the atheist retorted, ‘I am not the one who disdains a banquet
or a new yacht or a good time. Even were I not rich I would take as much
pleasure from eating a chop in dirty clothes, whereas you I am sure would be a
pale-mouthed prophet dreaming in every walk of life. Anaemic with thought,
obsessed with a lie.’
‘How can you call a
religion founded on the life of Christ a lie?’
‘It is only “a lie
with a circumstance” on which is superadded a hundred ridiculous worn out
dogmas like original sin. What could be more morbid? I have led a blameless
life, not without fault, but without causing great harm. No, I will not consent to be
told that I am at heart wicked, filthy, abominable, and only to be redeemed in
a true church by one holier than me.’
‘That is not my
understanding of a doctrine which is honest as to the nature of human beings.’
‘Then you do not
even understand the tenets of your own religion.’
An awkward silence
descended, but neither moved from his chair. The truth was that, opposites as
they were in opinion, different as they were by temperament, they both of them
too much enjoyed a debate to leave merely for the sake of pride. It was the
Christian who now broke the silence and ponderously expressed his thoughts.
‘When I talk to you,
my brother, and with others who are atheists and who seem ever to deride a
thing in inverse proportion to the little
they know of it, it strikes me that you live through life without even the
slightest idea of what it is. You are conscious of your own life indeed, but
not of life itself, or what it means of itself. Thus, it has often been
apparent to me that a Christian is usually more empathetic than an atheist
because he is become more aware of life itself, and life as it is manifested in
others, whereas the atheist often, it seems to me, is unconscious of the
substance of life though he is naturally conscious of the experience. I talk of
God to you and you are at once wearied; I talk of gold to you and you are at
once animated. Yet why do you value gold, and why do you not value God, when
the former is a relative grandeur and the latter an absolute grandeur?
It is the same as to
purpose, a thing you call non-existent without the remotest thought of what
such a pronouncement means. To me human life resembles a scene of mountain
climbers that of an afternoon had paused to eat and, over the meal, one
ventured to remark, “I certainly look forward to reaching the summit of this
mountain.” and another admonishingly retorts, “Stop talking about the summit! Why
aren’t you happy climbing like the rest of us? And why need there be a summit
anyway? No one really believes there is.” Were that indeed true the immediate
course to pursue would be first to throw one’s meal into the fire and then oneself
over the edge, for I am not so very fond of the cramping process of climbing
that I can be bothered to persist in it for its own sake.’
‘This I realise’,
the atheist replied, ‘and that is why I think you need to have a change or take
a cure, for most people are happy with the climb alone.’
‘Most people are not
at all happy, but it is astonishing the degree to which they can lose
themselves in their occupations and interests. No, no, I do not give up on the
summit. I do think there is purpose in little things, but only because I think
there is a purpose in the higher things. The reason I criticise you, my
brother, is because at the present moment you are almost wholly absorbed and
concerned in the pleasure of popping bubbles. I think you are going to waste
your money, which might be put to any number of good uses, on tiresome toys
which you will later sell for a third of the price you paid for them.’
‘That is my choice
and I make it with the view that life can offer me little better.’
‘I am sure you can
become reasonably happy doing so, if you can avoid making any particularly
woeful errors, but do not think that you will be forever able to avoid the
questions which suffering begs. They come to us all eventually.’
‘When they come to
me I shall not give them a hearing. At any rate I have an appointment at a
motorcar showroom in half an hour so I shall wend my merry way now. Perhaps I
will see you at Christmas?’
‘Certainly,
certainly. My good wishes to you brother.’
‘And mine to you. Amen.’
Thus the atheist
brother left the Christian to his thoughts. Their lives thereafter proceeded
rather predictably. The atheist spent a great deal of his money, but in justice
he a made as much back, for he had a good head on his shoulders. At times he
would meet with his Christian brother and they would still spar and debate. The
Christian brother purchased a small cottage for himself and kept a reasonable
living cleaning lavatories. The rest of his fortune he kept in savings for his
relations, for he felt that having himself inherited money it was not his right
to debar his relations from doing so as well. Modern charities he mistrusted
because they were too business-like, but he tried his best to show actual
charity in his treatment of his fellow men. He died long after his atheist
brother, who became corpulent and cantankerous in his fifties, in a state which
was not exactly happy but which was at least more patient and less regretful
than is typical.
The
Romantic Discussion;
A Comedy,
In
the Manner of Oliver Goldsmith.
‘Frankly speaking
madam, the beauty of your person arouses in me a desire which I cannot
reconcile with the principles of religion.’
‘That is very
frankly speaking.’
‘It is madam, and I
should not have so spoken had I not so just an appreciation of your
understanding, so accurate a knowledge of my nature, and so honest an esteem of
the truth.’
‘But is what you
speak grammatical? Firstly, do you desire me for nought, as any delicate female
on the street? Is this your carnality? I had hoped it was for the utmost
principle of love that you have found pleasure in my appearance, such as it is,
a thing that must fade. I had hoped this were an effect and not a cause.’
‘It is both; I
cannot conceal it. Your person is a hearth fire to my soul, my worst ills are
alleviated by the contemplation of you, even bodily pain is hardly so relieved
by narcotics as my real and eager love. But how can I deceive my love of the
other part, the vile fleshly part, a very murderer of sense and virtue? It is
the devil’s own vanguard against faith, and I cannot allow of any means to
strengthen it.’
She between times
smiled in merriment and pityingly gazed on this poor man’s too analytic a
confession. Eventually she realised the importance of the moment and spoke
accordingly.
‘Listen to me and
look at me as I have you. Where has come this notion of religion and love’s
opposition? You are in danger by breaking my heart of breaking your own; I will
not allow it. If you crush our love its nutrients will be the prey of every
termite, you will drink and smoke and I will descend into coquetry. You will
stagger about at night drunk and unshaven, and I will prance in the daytime
plastered with paint, we will scorn lovers to obscure our own disappointments.
We will become a plague for society instead of an example. Hush! I must speak.
You are distracting me.’ The gentleman had unwisely appealed in a look for a
moment’s hearing. She continued,
‘In everything of
which you have spoken to me, and which by your guidance I have privately learnt
of wisdom, it is shown that God has tempered things with assertive and
retreating properties. We must have hues and variations. We cannot lead a life
of utter denial, excuse me for saying so, it may be some are fitted thus by
nature, to be monuments of unimpassioned reason, set squares with only the
philosopher’s affections, yet surely such a majesty may be ours in time? With
age we may enjoy that peace which we cannot now find except in each other. Do
not unwisely treat God’s nature certainly, He has allowed us to love, and love
doubles its light, like a match, with another. Our love is not selfish, nor
will it be if we love wholeheartedly, bearing all, and turning outwards instead
of in. You must follow, I say, the straight path of love’s desire, if only so
that I may. For love’s desire is a
fire that warms, but desire’s love is a blaze which incinerates. Take the other
measure of virtue, the part which fosters with the part which purges! That is
enlightenment.’
She concluded this
remarkable soliloquy quite breathless with the earnestness of her meaning, and
also, let it be recorded to the credit of her character and sex, with the
anxiety to destroy the furrows on her lover’s brow. He replied, however, still
maudlin and abstracted,
‘Every light casts a
shade.’
She at once retorted, shouting in her exasperation, ‘A shade
but not a shadow! For shadow is a thing of visible darkness, shade is water,
balm, and respite! It is the covert when the sun is burning too hot to bear. Do
not so cowardly revoke our hopes for the fear of troubles: they will come, they
are here!’
She began to cry but
not to sob, and was much too magnificent to be soothed. Her literature was
becoming a too unwieldy weapon for her to employ, but she would not put it down
until he relented, in spite of the encroaching tears.
‘Troubles are
legion, they are tests of our fidelity. Love must be a very painful thing, like
all triumphs it demands years of dispiriting struggle. But it is the very
impulse of existence. All of life is a testament of love, and love, as life,
demands restraint for its own sake. Excess is the scourge which you fear, yet
excess is a very little thing. Only temperance nourishes flowers, which cannot
grow in the flood or swamp, a habitat where the toads live, mosquitoes, and
vermin, everything poisonous and decaying. But we will not be excessive, for we
are much too in love are we not?’
He took up her hands
with a violence which at once surprised and abashed him, and he hardly knew the
words he spoke.
‘I know I am, and my
taste is good, but if you are, my love, as I am, then your taste is poor
indeed! Come, I realise before such a sheer cliff-face of eloquence who is in
the wrong. I love you, and, as you say you love me, I pray before God that you
may be the means by which I may cure myself of all the wretchedness of my
condition.’
He fell on his
knees, an embarrassing figure certainly.
‘Will you marry me?
I have no engagement ring, nor I must confess money to buy one, nor a job to
make money, nor a talent to find a job, nor a horse, but I mean to find a
donkey.’
They laughed
appropriately at the excessive farce of the situation, and naturally she
refused him, as is meet and proper. Somehow, however, they were wedded in a
fortnight.
Wine-Women and Ale-Men.
PART THE FIRST.
This story occurred in 2018 but it might have occurred at any
time in any place. It is a story of three town ladies who thought a bank
holiday to the country would be amenable. One was slightly too plump, one was
slightly too gaunt, while the other was slightly different. To say she was just right would be inaccurate. She was
neither too plump nor too gaunt, neither pretty nor ugly, neither profound nor
dull, neither eloquent nor mute. Her hair was not quite a bun (though it hardly
fell like an autumn bower); her eyes were blue, yet not as the sea, but blue as
a forming bruise; her chin had a point, yet not like a pebble, but like a strong
hardy boot. Her name was Jill, and she was a teacher, and eminently qualified
as such.
The other two are
everywhere archetypal. The plump lady drinks too much of something alcoholic
that sparkles, but which is patently not champagne; the gaunt lady reads too
many books without grammar, spelling, or sense; and Jill combines something of
both in a most unholy alliance. Of course, each is a keen politician.
Now, they took the
Great Western on a most crowded Saturday morn, and their first worry was soon
overcome.
‘Do you mind if we
sit here, love?’ said Lady Dripping as she lowered herself into a seat,
complacent at the thought of an oncoming ‘no’.
The question was
addressed to a single man wearing clothes painted in the style called graffiti, who had elected to sit alone
at a table with four chairs—which was a most admirable proof of his foresight,
as he would otherwise have suffered the discomfort of the families huddled in
the aisle. Yet, before this tactician had e’en a moment to consider his move,
Lady Dripping’s Pr***cco bottle had already POPPED and
FIZZED
as though to say, ‘I shall be comfortable here young man.’
Her large posterior wriggled between the arm-rests in its accustomed effort to
fit. Jill and Lady Gaunt sat opposite. The flutes—the plastic flutes—were
produced.
It is a most
remarkable phenomenon which causes drunkenness through cork-popping, but it is
one too common to be denied. Immediately these three ladies, having heard the
fatal sound, began to cackle and halloo as though, for all the train knew, they
were on their final journey to Hades. The quiet passengers began to draw themselves
in. A man, who had lived too long in London, had been talking on the telephone
in his own loud and curious fashion for some time. ‘Hiy mayte... noy, umm, yeahh, yeahh, could you just, noy I’m on a train mayte. Gosh it’s crowyded! Anywyay mayte, could you just maybey
[here his voice deepened for business] send that e-mail mayte. Yeah...
yeah... yeah, yeah, yeah, mayte, just
ping it on can you? Yeah just ping it. Thanks. OK, ‘bye!’ These
telephone calls lasted most of the journey. But the many subsequent events on
the train, deeply distressing though they were, are not the especial concern of
this narrative.
The especial concern
of this narrative is a public house called the Beaten Barnet, located in ——,
slightly north of ——. This is a very forbidding establishment. The barmaids
themselves, who only stay there because work is scarce west of the bog, are
frightened of the locals. The smoking ban never came into force in the Beaten
Barnet, everything smaller than a cigar or pipe is frowned upon. There are no transparent
windows; the establishment is dark, damp, and tankard-like. Mining lamps hang
from the walls.
It was after their
Pr***cco picnic that Jill, Lady Gaunt and Lady Dripping, who had between them
eaten and packed the contents of their carrier
bag, first decided to visit a public house. Of course in London there are
restaurants they could visit. But here in the county of —— restaurants are
things visited abroad. The three ladies, for such it is said they are, had been
wandering about a dark secluded country lane when they saw the ivy-strewn hut
of this very Beaten Barnet. They, as one incorporated unit, made for the
creaking splintered door. It would not open at first but when Jill,
indisputably the cleverest of the three, pulled the small string dangling
through the doorway, the lock lifted, the door opened, and they stepped inside.
A large grey dog,
with teeth missing and a euphonium in his throat, growled a harsh welcome.
Every fat, gnarled, unshaven, and unfriendly, face turned to the intruders; the
bar was not a large one.
‘Can I help you?’
quavered the barmaid. A very loud cough flew behind.
‘Yeah, can we get,
uhm, uhm, do you sell wine?’ A second very mucus-filled cough sang through the
air.
‘Red or white?’
‘Do you have
sauvignon blanc?’
‘I thort she wonted
woine.’ murmured a local.
‘We’ve only got
house wine.’
‘Love,’ chimed the
sweaty Lady Dripping, ‘We’ll have white
wine with ice, ok? I never know the difference after a while—know what I mean!’
she turned, appealing to the men.
They stared; she turned back; the dog
growled again. One man blew on his foaming tankard. Another slurped
economically and muttered ‘woine’.
PART THE SECOND.
The ladies sat down. Lady Gaunt seemed particularly
uncomfortable. She seemed to know or to fear something of these men, for men
they were with no exception. Lady Dripping was flicking her hair as though she
had a wood pigeon nesting in it and tried to talk convincingly to Jill, despite
her eyes wandering to a pair of trousers or two.
‘I know, I know, I
know! Oh this wine IS lovely! Mm, smell it Jill go on, it’s the bo-kay. It’s
like peaches, isn’t it?’
‘Woine.’ muttered
Duncan, and slammed his tankard.
‘‘ow are ye Gouger?’
said he, kicking the dog.
‘Oi! Dunlop! Where’s
your pipe?’
‘Oi put it away.’
‘And wherefore?’
‘Wherefore do ye
think?’
Every man looked to
the women. The massive brown cloud of pipe smoke obscured their appearance, so
they seemed like three mastheads in a fog at sea, a sight every mariner knows.
The door flew open and a figure marched in.
‘Eh?’ roared a mixed
English and Australian accent, ‘Eh? How are we then, eh?’ the figure stopped
dead. ‘Eh?’ he cried, looking at the women.
‘’ullo Ron.’ It was
Ron Page.
‘What! Eh?’ he made
a futile attempt to lower his booming voice, ‘Are they? Eh?’
‘Straynjers.’
rumbled a voice.
‘Yeah-eah-eah-eah-eah? Eh?’
‘What?’ piped the
deep, husky, well-educated voice of Arthur Malkin.
‘Eh? Arthur!’
‘Hello.’ said
Arthur, still husky ‘What-what-what are you having?’
‘Eh? Will it - will
it - will it pass muster? Eh?’
Another man entered,
whose name was Bertie, a noted wag. ‘Hello Arthur, hello Ron, Duncan. Uh-oh,
skirts. As my old dad used to say, you’re talking —, and I’m talking about
eating it. Well it’s six of one and half a dozen of the other. Appearance and
reality, Arthur Koestler, category mistake, spoil the ship for an
halfpennyworth of tar. I lift up my finger and I say tweet tweet, shush shush,
now now, come come! I don’t have to linger when I say—’
‘As long as you’re here I’ll be there!’
‘It’s not his fault he has a conker for a plonker!’
‘No!’
‘Oi remembah when oi was sai’ing dan the River Volga-’
‘Where you acquired your manners.’
‘And
oi met a Shebah with one twinklin’ oiye...’
The
tale must end here, for the rest is kept under a super-injunction.
An Illness.
Alfred Wetherby looked distractedly at the palm of his small
and pale hand. Then, bringing it nearer his eyes so that it filled the greater
part of his vision, turned it to look at his knuckles. He had hoped that this
were a profound action which might yield a most profound wisdom; such things
are not uncommon. The animals might have the indifference of philosophers in
their sure regularities, but in the unnatural and unwieldy body of Society
practically nine-tenths of all deeds might be called ritualistic or
superstitious. Who does not worship a number and detest another? Who does not
reverence one cause and abhor a second? Who does not perform certain pirouettes
in the name of good fortune or to the honour of a great purpose? Thus Alfred
spent a half-minute examining his hand. Which completed, he shifted in his
seat, settled on a certain part of the wall to look on, and waited. His
restlessness forced certain poems and songs to repeat flavourlessly in his
head. At length a door opened and the stiff request for ‘Mr. Wetherby?’ rent
the anxious quiet. He rose, nodded to the unfamiliar doctor, and walked into a
sterile room of bright white light. The doctor following said, in an alarming
tone of forced condescension, ‘Please, take a seat.’
Mr. Wetherby was an
exact man and had acquired the habit of correcting people in his head. ‘He
means,’ he thought, ‘Please, sit down.’ Mr. Wetherby sat down, and now his
innards were revolting. He clutched his left hand with his right.
‘How do you feel?’
asked this doctor in a strange accent.
‘I feel unwell
generally. It has become a matter of daily existence, to wake and to suffer
till again I sleep. I know I am ill.’
‘Well, the test
results have come through and they do confirm the presence of cancer in the
blood. We must therefore discuss what treatment would be best for you to
receive, but first, if you have any questions at all I will do my very best to
answer them.’
With a quavering voice
Mr. Wetherby asked if his condition were terminal. He had, he said, decided
already that he should prefer to know.
‘The results show
that your condition is leukaemia, that is cancer of the blood, and has already
reached an advanced stage. The care we usually suggest in this phase is mostly
of a palliative nature.’
‘Is it possible to
know how long I may live?’
‘Although it is
always uncertain,’ recited the doctor with a studied care, ‘whether a patient
will live another day or another few years, the average prognosis of leukaemia
at this stage is six to twelve months.’
The rest of the
interview was of course unimportant. Mr. Wetherby accepted the prescriptions of
strong narcotics, declined the appointments of weak consolation, and walked unsteadily
back to his wife’s car. He was already hoping that he would be one of the
exceptional instances, that he might still live many years of comparative ease,
perhaps ten years, and fulfil an ambition, or complete a great work. On this
occasion however the reputation of medical science for inaccuracy was
disappointed, and six months later he was dead.
Another Illness.
Hampstead Heath, London, 6 January, 20—
My dear Godfrey,
Here is a letter
to inform that I will be away for some time, perhaps for all time, in order to
see something of the lands in which I was born. You know that I have fondly
entertained the idea for many years of gently walking about the counties, with
only an empty head and a wallet bursting with cash for luggage. I had hoped of
course to make the tour with Margaret but fate willed matters otherwise. I
myself have been told that my heart is not improving with the tablets. I asked
outright you know, with trembling hands and a boulder-rolling stomach, ‘How
long will I live?’ The sheer bravery of the question seemed itself to engender
courage and I held my stare upon the doctor, a young and careless creature
whose estimate of my life’s value seemed to be a point below nil (a judgement
of accuracy perhaps). He looked at his screen as though he had long since
prepared the answer to this most predictable of questions, gently tapped
something with an assurance which seemed to reply ‘Yes, I quite agree.’ and
then swivelling about he said, ‘It was decided by your pre-medical assessment
that an operation on the right ventricle would–ah–not be–ah–suitable to
your particular case.’
‘Yes, it was.’ I
replied, with an irony perhaps more imagined than manifest.
‘The prognosis then
is, if you continue with the increased dosage prescribed two weeks ago, between
one to two years.’
Then with much
awkward shifting, each of us trying to avoid one another’s eyes, me rising from
my seat and unfortunately breaking wind, his swivelling around and seeming
deeply involved in something, perhaps a game of draughts, my blinking back the
tears which I freely confess had started into my eyes, taking overlong to put
on my coat, dropping my scarf, and then resolving to say determinedly ‘Thank
you.’ for the death sentence I had received, but only squeaking out a pitiful
‘thanks’, I left the surgery. I screwed up my prescription and walked to the
antique bookshop nearby. The miserable and sarcastic woman who huffed her lungs
and rolled her eyes as I enquired whether she had any guides to the British
Isles, after many self-important remarks, eventually found me a guide book with
some good maps and pictures of the counties. I then paid the eighty-five pounds
she curtly demanded and left.
I carried the book with a feeling of exalted
importance; others must indeed have possessed this book, and perhaps even read
it, with vague flashes of interest or short daydreams of retirement, but to me
it would be my compass and weathercock. Returning home therefore and opening it
I was much struck by the variety and size of these famous, rugged, and various,
isles. Of course other nations are far larger in extent, but how many are so
continuously different as these isles which, commencing with the southernmost
Channel Islands then turning northwards to the Isles of Scilly, then onto the
mainland, sweeping across in horizontal lines through Cornwall, Devon, and
Dorset, Hampshire, Sussex, and Kent; and so repeating through the downs,
through Surrey, Berkshire, the Cotswolds, the Chilterns, the moors, the rivers, the mountains, the
beaches, the waters, the bays, the drowsy village squares, the rippling
streams, till through the Midlands, the North, through that region called
Scotland, Man, and that region called the Irelands, and so back to happy
Hampstead Heath to die. For I have lived all my life in the suburbs of London.
I do not believe I have ever left willingly or stayed long abroad. Let me only
live a little while or so, my God, to know my country, outside the massive
piles of London. When I am satisfied I will return to the same soul-stifling
city of my business-sunk life.
Goodbye
Godfrey,
Your Desmond.
A Play.
[Walking by a river.]
William. Have you noticed Alexander that a river is more refreshing than a sea? The contracted refreshment of the former somehow cools more generally than the vast breezes and sprays of the latter.
Alexander. Why do you talk of everything you see? Has it not occurred to you that most are content to observe the obvious without describing it?
William. Then I am sorry for speaking.
Alexander. Not so much as I am for listening. [A pause.]
William. This is friendship to you then? Silence? [A longer pause.]
William. When I went to university I thought there would be rather more debate and rather fewer hangovers.
Alexander. And I thought the reverse. Can’t we suffer together in peace?
William. You seem to forget Alexander that I am a water drinker now.
Alexander. William, if your water drinking is anything near as excessive as your beer drinking has lately been then you will develop water on the brain. Of all the people I know I think you could least afford to contract that particular malady.
William. We are not all of us cast-iron. I only developed my trembling because I was trying to match you beer to beer.
Alexander. Two to one you mean.
William. Well... the spirit of competition is hot in me. [A pause.]
William. I say! There’s a fine crumpet over there.
Alexander. Where?
William. There.
Alexander. Beyond you don’t you think?
William. Then you try. I can’t stand your monotony anymore. Look, she’s meandering gently by the river, like a swan without a help meet. Go to, and prove your looks by your courage.
Alexander. I will. Too much of your company is enough to incite the most absurd attempts.
Alexander. [Hailing her.] Excuse me, but I like your face and would like to walk with you.
Constance. Oh! Ha ha! How funny! [Exeunt both.]
William. All it requires is the correct quantity of guts, plastered to an ox’s body and a statue’s face. [Exeunt]
[Curtain falls.]
Oscar’s Wild Daydreaming.
Oscar I. I like to see a flower, but a host is tedious.
Oscar II. No sooner do we discover than we tire; as the life of the fox is the death of the lamb so the life of knowledge is the death of interest.
Oscar I. Your borrowed wit is not so monotonous in this garden as it is elsewhere. Speak freely, you will not mind if I maintain my attention with an equal liberality?
Oscar II. I am quite used to you doing so. Yet I wish to observe that borrowing wit is rather like borrowing joy than borrowing money; the lenders freely lend as the borrowers liberally borrow. Not by staring into depths is a man made quick but dumb. Shallowness makes for sprightliness.
Oscar I. Put a sock in it.
Extracts from a Journal.
(Undated.) This morning I saw a
very beautiful and hideous thing. As I painfully attempted, with shaking limbs
and cindered throat, to prepare the much needed lifeblood of corn flakes, milk,
and honey, I heard a terrible squealing. It sounded like a pig in distress, or
a dog being bitten. I rushed outside to see two delightful songbirds at my feet
with an attractive brown plumage, freckled with impressionist dabs of white and
black, wrestling ferociously with each other and setting up this screech for a
war cry. I interceded, shouting something comical such as ‘Oi! Get out of it!’,
and they both flew off in mutual fear, distracted from their conflict by an
alien threat. I went back inside and thought how illustrative the scene had been.
(Undated.) We perceive how much pain is indeed self-willed
when we wake up. Excepting nightmares, which may be explained as resulting due
to an abiding level of consciousness, sleep is the great analgesia. This is at
least a part proof that a great deal of ordinary pain and of ordinary problems
attributed to physical or mentally unalterable causes are in fact due to a
certain kind of manner, and that if one’s manner could only be altered many of
these pains and problems should cease.
(Undated.)
There is probably a measure of satire in every heart, there is at least in
mine, and thus this morning I felt inclined, I am not quite sure why, to taunt
Pippa (the dog). As I walked by her tail stirred and eyes of loyalty and love
turned up to mine; therefore I commenced the process of making some barking
noises, in an effort to discompose her. She reacted without definite
comprehension. There were some signs of a rising fear that I was unhappy with
her, but she would not react to my noises as though they were produced by
another dog. I was a thing altogether different and dearer than that. Thus from
this mood of slightly mischievous and unfeeling mockery I altered to one of
minor remorse and pensive calm. It occurred to me that this dog was simply
incapable of realising what the spirit of rather disdainful satire was.
Therefore, as I walked on, I thought of a fly last summer that had flown again
and again against a window without ever quite realising the difference between
a free space and mere transparency.
(Undated.) Yesterday
was another such a day in which I, verily I, my least preferred and most
frequented subject of thought, had been languishing uselessly and shamefully,
risen late and moving slow, unshaved, with throbbing temples and a stinging
sinus. The day was fair, most galling to the sour who seem to conceive every
hint of joy a peculiar satire against their own cherished woe, but I felt so
brittle and hollow, like a rotting acorn, that I remained indoors.
(Undated.) God
in Thy loving care and mercy, in Thy ever wise Providence and Power, Amen.
(Undated.)
The weather was cold in the morn and sun-littered in the day.
(The 18th day of March, 2021.) To-day
I finished one essay and ordered my rooms. It is raining now quite beautifully.
(The 23rd day of March, 2021.)
I had a marvellous long walk to the lovely meadow flowers near Bridge, and
really felt revived, thanks be to God. I sent some messages to people and mean
to do so more, it being a good way of diffusing love. The weather was crisp and
fine.
(The 24th day of March, 2021.) A
variable day for weather, and weather often proclaims the spirit.
(The 30th day of March, 2021.) A
warm day. I wrote somewhat.
(The 9th day of April, 2021.) The
great Duke of Edinburgh died.
(The 11th day of April, 2021.) Concluding
my new room arrangements.
(The 11th day of May, 2021.)
A good day for your servant involving sunshine, but not too much, tennis, a
salutary rearrangement of my rooms, readings of Edward FitzGerald, and a
decided feeling of gladness, thanks be to God.
(The 12th day of May, 2021.)
A quite good day of some accomplishment I think, only, I do feel so wearied of
things at times. Although there are joys and satisfactory pleasures of the day,
company, food, literature, fine weather, exercise, still, at the end I feel
always the same: why am I here? what should I be doing? Help me God.
(The 13th day of May, 2021.) I
feel quite heavy and sore this morning.
(The 18th day of May, 2021.) Not
a day of abiding use, but peaceful, full of pleasing rain. God willing I may
better strive to-morrow.
(The 26th day of May, 2021.) Arising
early in the morning, it is a fine day. Sunlight dappled in bowers, arching
upwards from its low morning source, trembles gently and delightfully through
the house. God willing I may write my essay to-day.
(The 3rd day of June, 2021.) A
day of heat and no small hardships, but also comforts and consolations.
(The 12th day of June, 2021.) A
truly terrible night of heat and restlessness explains but does not excuse the absence
of my morning reading to-day. I must be more Constant. Tennis and bat and ball
have kept me active. I enjoyed a quite good luncheon with Betty and Octavia.
(The 14th
day of June, 2021.) The day began with me parched for thirst
and heat, headaches threatening, and wood pigeons blaring forth with the sun
ready to burn like a furnace. I gradually arose and staggered me to a basin to
cool my hideous feet and wash my clammy face.
Once awake I
fashioned a bowl of corn flakes and attempted to talk with Fabian. That attempt
failing, due in large part to his being unwell, unrested, and compounding in a
room none the cooler for drawn curtains, I set slowly about the business of
finishing my packing.
This took several
hours. Once having bid goodbye to Betty, and first refusing then accepting a
battered straw hat, Hector, Mother, and I, seated ourselves in the car.
It was a hot day
indeed, with clouds in the sky which seemed to be breaking up like rubble for
the atmosphere’s intensity. There were but twenty remaining minutes and I,
being of a foregone demeanour, instantly declared we should be late for the
train to London.
Once on the train to
London, in good time and seated in a shaded nook by the lavatories, I attempted
to focus on Marlowe’s play Tamburlaine the Great. It is a good circumstance in
which to read blank verse in my opinion, for blank verse is a hazy thing to
construe at the best of times, and when the alert and defensive senses are
endlessly hailing the consciousness with such news as, ‘people are talking!
doors are opening! ought not inspectors to be coming? (they never do), the back
aches! blink! swallow! what will you do about this? &c. Blank verse’s odd
salient phrases simply mingle with the general chaos of thought.
The train was cool
and relatively comfortable however, and fast. By the end of the first act of
Tamburlaine we were at London. It was a heavy hand-scouring suitcase I had to
lug into the taxi-cab. There a man with a thick American accent opened the
portal into his private kingdom, decked in the symbols of a matriarchal
society: No Smoking. Fire Alarm.
Wheelchair Access. Before long I remarked it was unusual for an American to
be a black cab driver. He said he was the only one as far as he knew; there was
a Canadian of whom he heard tell, and there once was another Yankee in the
wilderness of past and buried years. He told us of his life, talked of the
English as ‘us’, but he was amiable and I think good-hearted.
When we reached
John’s flat all things seemed surreal. I think he and Hector felt so too. He
had no food to speak of so Hector and I acted like Ratty in Wind in the Willows where mole longs for
his hole, they reach it, there is no bread, ‘no cheese’ exclaims Moley, ‘No
champagne! No paté de fois gras!’ returns Ratty. ‘I say! Here’s a tin of
sardines! What a capital place this is!’ I cut up some egg and cress sandwiches
I had brought with me, apportioned the very poor crackers and cheese, set the
table, and we made the best of things. John brought some mandarins the size of
larger marbles. I attempted to peel one; it coughed up some dust. Then I made
some omelettes. Thus the afternoon passed in conversation.
We walked to the old
Bishop’s Park, now a general pleasure ground for that queer species ‘Londoner’.
They are fond of running without too much encumbrance in the way of clothes;
they enjoy cycling without too much encumbrance in the way of manners; they are
often too much groomed to be innocent of the charge of vanity. Old Father
Thames was high and cooling; the sky glowered slightly; a somewhat oppressive
humidity gathered. We returned and prepared for a restaurant we had been
recommended.
When we walked in
and I saw the bomb shelter walls and heard the bomb-like music I thought
‘Ho-hum! Diamonds can get in the rough.’ When the surly Italian brought the
menu on a stick and said something like ‘You read this or scan a code for
menu!’ I thought ‘Hey-ho! The food will redeem’. When the wine made John choke
and me wonder whether I had grown eyeball hair I knew it was not five star.
When the massive bowl of cold pasta arrived I knew it was not four star. When
Hector’s pudding arrived on a roof tile I knew it was three star. I told John I
must pay for this catastrophe but he nobly (and of course correctly) insisted
otherwise. We said nothing, we were craven. All I did was to tear the
insufferably impudent ‘loyalty card’ in half and leave it on the table.
When we returned we
were all perhaps unwell, but we rallied, toasted each other with sherry, and
conversed in fellowship’s vocabulary. I had booked the taxi earlier; the Indian
driver called; we left a tired John not without heavy hearts, and got into the
motorcar. The journey was surprisingly long but unhindered we arrived at a
deserted Paddington Station at half-past nine o’clock, wandered about, my hands
chafing on the case’s handle, made ourselves confused, eventually established
we were an hour early, entered into the ‘First Class Lounge’ (comprising
plastic chairs and a madwoman with a coffee machine). Here I took up
Tamburlaine again and here I end the account, for before long we were on this
sleeper train with a narrow bed, a fair carpet, a wash basin, a window (out of
which I have often looked writing this), mirrors, and little lights. I am to
have porridge at half-past six and it is now half-past twelve.
We have stopped at a station now, with all
its unnatural accoutrements of polished metal, smudged plastic, flashing
lights, and ungainly architecture. Yet, all in all, this day has not been
without pleasure nor interest. I look forward to a to-morrow in Cornwall. In
God’s Providence, Amen. (Note: Cornwall was miserable.)
.png)
No comments:
Post a Comment