Complete Works, Volume IV (11 page)

He pours champagne.

Hirst enters, wearing a suit, followed by Briggs.

HIRST
Charles. How nice of you to drop in.

He shakes Spooner's hand.

Have they been looking after you all right? Denson, let's have some coffee.

Briggs leaves the room.

You're looking remarkably well. Haven't changed a bit. It's the squash, I expect. Keeps you up to the mark. You were quite a dab hand at Oxford, as I remember. Still at it? Wise man. Sensible chap. My goodness, it's years. When did we last meet? I have a suspicion we last dined together in ‘38, at the club. Does that accord with your recollection? Croxley was there, yes, Wyatt, it all comes back to me, Burston-Smith. What a bunch. What a night, as I recall. All dead now, of course. No, no! I'm a fool. I'm an idiot. Our last encounter—I remember it well. Pavilion at Lord's in ‘39, against the West Indies, Hutton and Compton batting superbly, Constantine bowling, war looming. Surely I'm right? We shared a particularly fine bottle of port. You look as fit now as you did then. Did you have a good war?

Briggs comes in with coffee, places it on table.

Oh thank you, Denson. Leave it there, will you? That will do.

Briggs leaves the room.

How's Emily? What a woman.
(
Pouring.
) Black? Here you are. What a woman. Have to tell you I fell in love with her once upon a time. Have to confess it to you. Took her out to tea, in Dorchester. Told her of my yearning. Decided to take the bull by the horns. Proposed that she betray you. Admitted you were a damn fine chap, but pointed out I would be taking nothing that belonged to you, simply that portion of herself all women keep in reserve, for a rainy day. Had an infernal job persuading her. Said she adored you, her life would be meaningless were she to be false. Plied her with buttered scones, Wiltshire cream, crumpets and strawberries. Eventually she succumbed. Don't suppose you ever knew about it, what? Oh, we're too old now for it to matter, don't you agree?

He sits, with coffee.

I rented a little cottage for the summer. She used to motor to me twice or thrice a week. I was an integral part of her shopping expeditions. You were both living on the farm then. That's right. Her father's farm. She would come to me at tea-time, or at coffee-time, the innocent hours. That summer she was mine, while you imagined her to be solely yours.

He sips the coffee.

She loved the cottage. She loved the flowers. As did I. Narcissi, crocus, dog's tooth violets, fuchsia, jonquils, pinks, verbena.

Pause.

Her delicate hands.

Pause.

I'll never forget her way with jonquils.

Pause.

Do you remember once, was it in ‘37, you took her to France? I was on the same boat. Kept to my cabin. While you were doing
your exercises she came to me. Her ardour was, in my experience, unparalleled. Ah well.

Pause.

You were always preoccupied with your physical . . . condition . . . weren't you? Don't blame you. Damn fine figure of a chap. Natural athlete. Medals, scrolls, your name inscribed in gold. Once a man has breasted the tape, alone, he is breasting the tape forever. His golden moment can never be tarnished. Do you run still? Why was it we saw so little of each other, after we came down from Oxford? I mean, you had another string to your bow, did you not? You were a literary man. As was I. Yes, yes, I know we shared the occasional picnic, with Tubby Wells and all that crowd, we shared the occasional whisky and soda at the club, but we were never close, were we? I wonder why. Of course I was successful awfully early.

Pause.

You did say you had a good war, didn't you?

SPOONER
A rather good one, yes.

HIRST
How splendid. The RAF?

SPOONER
The Navy.

HIRST
How splendid. Destroyers?

SPOONER
Torpedo boats.

HIRST
First rate. Kill any Germans?

SPOONER
One or two.

HIRST
Well done.

SPOONER
And you?

HIRST
I was in Military Intelligence.

SPOONER
Ah.

Pause.

HIRST
You pursued your literary career, after the war?

SPOONER
Oh yes.

HIRST
So did I.

SPOONER
I believe you've done rather well.

HIRST
Oh quite well, yes. Past my best now.

SPOONER
Do you ever see Stella?

Pause.

HIRST
Stella?

SPOONER
You can't have forgotten.

HIRST
Stella who?

SPOONER
Stella Winstanley.

HIRST
Winstanley?

SPOONER
Bunty Winstanley's sister.

HIRST
Oh, Bunty. No, I never see her.

SPOONER
You were rather taken with her.

HIRST
Was I, old chap? How did you know?

SPOONER
I was terribly fond of Bunty. He was most dreadfully annoyed with you. Wanted to punch you on the nose.

HIRST
What for?

SPOONER
For seducing his sister.

HIRST
What business was it of his?

SPOONER
He was her brother.

HIRST
That's my point.

Pause.

What on earth are you driving at?

SPOONER
Bunty introduced Rupert to Stella. He was very fond of Rupert. He gave the bride away. He and Rupert were terribly old friends. He threatened to horsewhip you.

HIRST
Who did?

SPOONER
Bunty.

HIRST
He never had the guts to speak to me himself.

SPOONER
Stella begged him not to. She implored him to stay his hand. She implored him not to tell Rupert.

HIRST
I see. But who told Bunty?

SPOONER
I told Bunty. I was frightfully fond of Bunty. I was also frightfully fond of Stella.

Pause.

HIRST
You appear to have been a close friend of the family.

SPOONER
Mainly of Arabella's. We used to ride together.

HIRST
Arabella Hinscott?

SPOONER
Yes.

HIRST
I knew her at Oxford.

SPOONER
So did I.

HIRST
I was very fond of Arabella.

SPOONER
Arabella was very fond of me. Bunty was never sure of precisely how fond she was of me, nor of what form her fondness took.

HIRST
What in God's name do you mean?

SPOONER
Bunty trusted me. I was best man at their wedding. He also trusted Arabella.

HIRST
I should warn you that I was always extremely fond of Arabella. Her father was my tutor. I used to stay at their house.

SPOONER
I knew her father well. He took a great interest in me.

HIRST
Arabella was a girl of the most refined and organised sensibilities.

SPOONER
I agree.

Pause.

HIRST
Are you trying to tell me that you had an affair with Arabella?

SPOONER
A form of an affair. She had no wish for full consummation. She was content with her particular predilection. Consuming the male member.

Hirst stands.

HIRST
I'm beginning to believe you're a scoundrel. How dare you speak of Arabella Hinscott in such a fashion? I'll have you blackballed from the club!

SPOONER
Oh my dear sir, may I remind you that you betrayed Stella Winstanley with Emily Spooner, my own wife, throughout a long and soiled summer, a fact known at the time throughout the Home Counties? May I further remind you that Muriel Blackwood and Doreen Busby have never recovered from your insane and corrosive sexual absolutism? May I further remind you that your friendship with and corruption of Geoffrey Ramsden at Oxford was the talk of Balliol and Christchurch Cathedral?

HIRST
This is scandalous! How dare you? I'll have you horsewhipped!

SPOONER
It is you, sir, who have behaved scandalously. To the fairest of sexes, of which my wife was the fairest representative.
It is you who have behaved unnaturally and scandalously, to the woman who was joined to me in God.

HIRST
I, sir? Unnaturally? Scandalously?

SPOONER
Scandalously. She told me all.

HIRST
You listen to the drivellings of a farmer's wife?

SPOONER
Since I was the farmer, yes.

HIRST
You were no farmer, sir. A weekend wanker.

SPOONER
I wrote my Homage to Wessex in the summerhouse at West Upfield.

HIRST
I have never had the good fortune to read it.

SPOONER
It is written in terza rima, a form which, if you will forgive my saying so, you have never been able to master.

HIRST
This is outrageous! Who are you? What are you doing in my house?

He goes to the door and calls.

Denson! A whisky and soda!

He walks about the room.

You are clearly a lout. The Charles Wetherby I knew was a gentleman. I see a figure reduced. I am sorry for you. Where is the moral ardour that sustained you once? Gone down the hatch.

Briggs enters, pours whisky and soda, gives it to Hirst. Hirst looks at it.

Down the hatch. Right down the hatch.
(
He drinks.
) I do not understand . . . I do not understand . . . and I see it all about me . . . continually . . . how the most sensitive and cultivated of men can so easily change, almost overnight, into the bully, the cutpurse, the brigand. In my day nobody changed. A man was. Only religion could alter him, and that at least was a glorious misery.

He drinks, and sits in his chair.

We are not banditti here. I am prepared to be patient. I shall be kind to you. I shall show you my library. I might even show you my study. I might even show you my pen, and my blottingpad. I might even show you my footstool.

He holds out his glass.

Another.

Briggs takes glass, fills it, returns it.

I might even show you my photograph album. You might even see a face in it which might remind you of your own, of what you once were. You might see faces of others, in shadow, or cheeks of others, turning, or jaws, or backs of necks, or eyes, dark under hats, which might remind you of others, whom once you knew, whom you thought long dead, but from whom you will still receive a sidelong glance, if you can face the good ghost. Allow the love of the good ghost. They possess all that emotion . . . trapped. Bow to it. It will assuredly never release them, but who knows . . . what relief . . . it may give to them . . . who knows how they may quicken . . . in their chains, in their glass jars. You think it cruel . . . to quicken them, when they are fixed, imprisoned? No . . . no. Deeply, deeply, they wish to respond to your touch, to your look, and when you smile, their joy . . . is unbounded. And so I say to you, tender the dead, as you would yourself be tendered, now, in what you would describe as your life.

He drinks.

BRIGGS
They're blank, mate, blank. The blank dead.

Silence.

HIRST
Nonsense.

Pause.

Pass the bottle.

BRIGGS
No.

HIRST
What?

BRIGGS
I said no.

HIRST
No pranks. No mischief. Give me the bottle.

Pause.

BRIGGS
I've refused.

HIRST
Refusal can lead to dismissal.

BRIGGS
You can't dismiss me.

HIRST
Why not?

BRIGGS
Because I won't go.

HIRST
If I tell you to go, you will go. Give me the bottle.

Silence.

Hirst turns to Spooner.

HIRST
Bring me the bottle.

Spooner goes to cabinet. Briggs does not move. Spooner picks up whisky bottle, takes it to Hirst. Hirst pours and places bottle at his side.

BRIGGS
I'll have one myself.

Briggs takes a glass to the bottle, pours and drinks.

HIRST
What impertinence. Well, it doesn't matter. He was always a scallywag. Is it raining? It so often rains, in August, in England. Do you ever examine the gullies of the English countryside? Under the twigs, under the dead leaves, you'll find tennis balls, blackened. Girls threw them for their dogs, or children, for each other, they rolled into the gully. They are lost there, given up for dead, centuries old.