No Laughing Matter (61 page)

She sneezed violently. On the tip of the nose of the young man on his other side hung a mucous stalactite; against Marcus’ ankles his trouser bottoms clung in cold, wet sogginess. The Chairman’s voice came through clouds of tobacco smoke and warm steam from the soaked clothing. What he said was difficult to hear, literally dampened, befogged, or else, Marcus thought, the fog was in his own head – no doubt the heavy beginnings of the pervasive head cold that threatened to bring a more complete unity to the meeting than anti-Fascist emotion. It was as though he was being compressed into the cheerless crowd like papier mâché, yet he had never felt more completely alone. He could see almost nothing in front of him except navy blue
raincoats
. The heroic flame that had burnt within him more fiercely each day since the Bermondsey battle flickered feebly in this watery world. All his desperate determination to fight approaching doom weakened into thoughts of evasion, into distaste for a last few months of peace spent in fruitless fumbling. It was all right for Jane Farquhar, her face set in militancy, for the stalactite young man, no doubt, but for….
He forced himself to listen and was rewarded with Margaret’s name (some clapping). Craning over the acres of wet wool and water he saw a dark haired, darkly anxious looking, befurred woman, conspicuously middle class in the setting, before he fully realized that it was Margaret. How middle-aged she looked, he thought; for all Douglas’s soothing and her steady stream of well received books she looked haggard, fidgety, as though something were biting her bottom. Now came Rupert’s name (some clapping) and he at once recognized that tall ageing (but it had been ageing in the nursery) blond splendour with an amused but affectionate admiration which only turned to
embarrassment
when he took in the awful stagey clothes – camel hair coat and suède shoes! No doubt he played Malvolio in the dressing gown he’d worn for
Private
Lives
in repertory.

‘Margaret’ll be quite good, I expect, but I can’t
think
what dear Rupert will say,’ he told Jane. Speaking of his family, he talked in his usual loud, drawing-room voice. Heads turned towards him. Jane whispered, scowling:

‘It doesn’t matter what they say. The arts are always hopeless politically, but it’s very important that they should show solidarity.’

He was quite familiar with these tactical considerations by now; but he had not until then associated them with Margaret’s arid honesty and Rupert’s talented blague. He would have found it easier to accept Jane’s ruling if he had not caught her looking around their neighbours to see how impressed they were by this familiarity with the platform. However, there was no mistaking the genuine delight of Jane, and of all, at Haldane’s name (clapping, calls and cheers). Beside this demonstration the applause for Matthias Birnbaum, though general, was formal. Nevertheless, unlike all the others, he rose from his chair – a lion surveying a group of Bank Holiday rubbernecks – tossed his mane and looked down his long, fleshy nose. A pride of lions, Marcus thought; and then, remembering a banker cousin of Jack’s, Jack’s physicist sister, he thought, and a disdain of Jews. How tiresome they could be! But now it was Q. J. Matthews and more barracking than applause. He could hardly glimpse Quentin at the other end of the platform, but something in his manner must have infuriated the audience – some pipe smoking smugness, no doubt – for there were cries of,’ Get off the platform!’ ‘Mosley’s man!’ ‘Trotskyite!’ and ‘Pouf!’

‘They’re quite wrong there,’ Marcus whispered to Jane, ‘He
couldn’t be more normal. ‘Jane glared at him.’ Oh, I don’t defend him,’ Marcus went on, ‘He’s always been a show off. He
would
be a Trotskyist.’ Emboldened by the weak protestations of the Chairman, he shouted, ‘Trotskyist!’ loudly.

Among the many protesting voices, he heard Margaret crying ‘Shame!’ and wondered if she were addressing him personally – she’d always taken Quentin at his own inflated estimate. Indeed the fuss and palaver on the platform was considerable as the barracking and counter protests from the audience grew. All that Marcus could see of Quentin were his crossed legs, but they appeared unperturbed,
perhaps
imperturbable. Now Reg Smalley was bending over Haldane in discussion and now Haldane passed a note down to a man who circulated it round the audience. A moment later the demonstration against Quentin was broken into by a small bald headed man in the body of the hall who shouted: ‘Free speech, comrades, free speech!’ ‘We may not all agree with Q. J. Matthews….’ Mr Smalley began, and from all parts of the hall came shouts of, ‘We don’t’ but here and there were cries of, ‘Free Speech. Let him have his say, comrades. Let him speak. Leave him alone. Unity, Unity,’ that in time subdued and at last drowned the cries of ‘Trotskyist P.O.U.M. Traitor.’ Marcus alone was left shouting abuse.

‘For God’s sake, shut up.’ Jane said.

He looked at her in surprise. ‘Why should I?’ he asked.

Impatience and annoyance made Jane speak plainly. ‘Because we’ve been told to.’

Again Marcus stared at her. ‘My God!’ he said, then he let out a shrill ‘Traitor’.

A tough red-faced Scotsman in front turned round menacingly. ‘Will you hush your noise, or will we have to throw you out?’ But before the man had made his rebuke Marcus was already gone.

*

Gladys had spent the morning first with her bank manager, then with an auctioneer, and now she set off for Herr Ahrendt’s determined to tell him the whole story. She could offer him
£
6,000 straightaway or within days; she would ask him to give her a month or two to meet the rest. For all the disquieting, shifting glance and clenched fist of their last meeting, Gladys thought of him coming to the door, his old Santa Claus self, the thin scholarly figure, the shy eyes, the courteous bow, the gentle smile. His difficulty would probably be to find a
means of accepting her offer that wouldn’t appear too abrupt – he was a great seeker for the right phrases, a genuinely sensitive old thing. She imagined them exchanging compliments on a chilly doorstep and smiled to herself. She would have to push him into acceptance of the scheme or they’d be all day salaaming at one another. Whatever happened she mustn’t let him realize that in order to pay she would be penniless, temporarily of course, until Alf – but she would not even think of Alf, his name
must
not get involved. If she didn’t choose her words carefully the old boy would urge her to take her time; if anyone were to be kind to her, she might break down. She decided to try a light touch; not, of course, to make light of her own stupid wickedness, but somehow not to alarm the old boy or to encourage his pity. ‘Look,’ she would say, ‘I’ve been an abominable idiot. The story’s not a pleasant one, but if you’ll give me a little time, I can do the decent thing.’

She had thought of the old pair as living poorly, but she was not prepared for such a collapsing house in such a mouldering terrace. Ever since she had emerged from the lift at Kilburn Station and walked up the hill towards West Hampstead the desolation, decay and squalor had made it hard for her to hold on to the image of Herr Ahrendt, the courteous, neat, civilized old gentleman. Indeed by the time she faced the broken bell-pull under which a grubby, ink smeared, card said ‘Ahrendt’, she had reinforced him with a dandyish yet scholarly touch – a neat little amber velvet smoking jacket, Turkey carpet slippers, a book (no, a pile of books) under his arm, and, could it be? a little old-fashioned tasselled smoking cap. No doubt his distinguished little brown head would look more soignée, more silky in his own home. Much care, much sleekness would be needed if it were to counter the scabrously peeling stucco front with its green mossy looking patches, the draped lace curtains like dirty dish cloths, the uneven steps and broken balustrade, the blistered door, the dog mess by the empty unwashed milk bottles. Their little rooms would have to be very neat and cosy to overcome the atmosphere of this house, not only the old boy but his wife…. Of course, there was Mrs Ahrendt. Gladys decided she would not intrude on the sick room, their privacy must be very dear to them. She would just call a greeting, and, conspiring with looks and finger on lips, agree with Herr Ahrendt to a little lie that would satisfy an invalid’s anxious fears.

Pointless to pull the rusty bell, best get down to banging on the
door straightaway, but then she thought that just because they weren’t English that didn’t mean this wasn’t their castle – the more to be treated so since they were old, poor and in exile. The bell when touched lightly clanged furiously, enough to waken any dead. It did, in fact, rouse a sharp featured harridan on the top floor to throw up her window and bawl as no dead could have done. After that window had banged down again Gladys could hear a shuffling coming towards her from behind the door. A slow shuffling – but at last the door opened and a drawn white face as wrinkled as a parrot’s peered at her. The eyes, too, were parrot’s eyes, hooded, small and suspicious. From the bent old body came a stale, sour smell that made her recoil.

‘I am Miss Matthews.’

As though presenting a note for teacher she found herself holding out the envelope in which she had put a cheque for the three thousand pounds immediately available.

‘Is that the money? You should have consulted us before you sold. I own that picture, you know. It belonged to my uncle. But never mind, Hermann has been foolish, but …’ The old creature had opened the letter by now. She held out the cheque, having peered at it angrily, ‘What is this? What does it mean?’

‘I wanted to explain to Mr Ahrendt …’

‘Explain to
me.
What does it mean?’

‘I can produce another three thousand pounds almost immediately. Look Mrs Ahrendt, you’ll catch your death of cold standing here. Let me come in. Anyway I want to see Mr Ahrendt.’

‘My husband is ill. You must give us all the money. I don’t know what it is. Three thousand pounds? That’s not very much. No, you cannot come in! Three thousand, that’s not so much.’

Gladys had to push with all her weight for an entry. She felt sure the old woman was mad. She
looked
mad, absolutely round the bend, standing in a filthy bare hall on ragged linoleum under the dismal light of one feeble, flyblown, naked bulb, casually dismissing
thousands
of pounds.

‘I must see your husband.’

‘No, no, you can’t see him. You have robbed him enough, you thief!’

But now at the top of the steep flight of stairs Gladys saw Mr Ahrendt, standing motionless, staring at her. He seemed to have cut his head, the forehead was swathed in a handkerchief. Under his old
overcoat a striped pyjama jacket was open at the top to show some tufts of wiry hair at the base of his neck.

‘Mr Ahrendt, please let me tell you …’

But she felt now that she couldn’t tell the story, explain her guilt.

‘Your picture is sold. It
was
by the artist Grünewald …’

‘I know,’ said Mr Ahrendt, ‘the Christie’s have told me so much. What did you get for it?’

‘Nearly ten thousand pounds. I’ve brought three thousand now. And the rest

‘The rest we want now, you thief!’

The old woman had taken her arm and was twisting it most
painfully
.

‘Don’t be absurd. I can’t produce money out of a hat on a Saturday. Can I, Mr Ahrendt?’

The old man spoke slowly – he sounded sad, but whether it was a trick of the light, Gladys could not afterwards decide, his teeth looked larger, wolfish, and his beard, far from neat, was as straggly as that awful old creature’s in the Dickens book.

‘I don’t think you can produce the money at all, Miss Matthews. I think you have robbed me. You thought, perhaps, he has been thrown out of his country, he is old and in the dustbin, the big sharks have bitten, now let the little sharks have their chance. But I know what wicked people are, Miss Matthews. What they have done to me and Käthe and to millions more. I must not accept injustice. No! I don’t want to hear any more. Bring me my money by tomorrow morning.’

He disappeared into the darkness on the landing.

Mrs Ahrendt said: ‘Get out, thief.’

She pushed Gladys out of the door.

*

This is enough of all this politics, Margaret thought, this standing up, emitting a lot of platitudes to people who despise the things I care for, or who, if they don’t, are never going to do more than sit at meetings and wish the world was free of evil. And to have involved Rupert was unforgiveable. To have made a person of talent and charm make a fool of himself – though, even with her knowledge of theatre people’s extraordinary feeble grasp of reality, she could hardly have guessed that he would have treated them to a sort of adolescent’s anthology – Shelley; ‘bliss it was in that dawn to be alive’; Milton on
freedom of the press; Abraham Lincoln; and something quite
inappropriate
from
Julius
Caesar.
Whoever had suggested it to him? Her cheeks flamed as she thought of it and she welcomed Aunt Alice, now perpetually in the wings, to take the centre stage. As the climax drew nearer – what should it be? murder? or more horribly, soiled nighties, or perhaps a holocaust of all Aunt A’s treasured souvenirs? Any rate, something Gothic she would permit herself at last – really the moment of Aunt A’s realization that they’d cut her off from the outside world. Once that was clear to her the ultimate outrages were infinite, and lay in her terrorized anticipation; but as this climax…. Oh, Lord, the awful Birnbaum was booming away, but Aunt Alice was more powerful … if she were to grant herself this Gothicism, it could turn out a dangerously melodramatic affair, and there were no means of tempering it with her well-known irony – for if the nieces had cut the old woman off from the world of chars and piano tuners she had effectually cut
herself
off in this novel from the readers who called her a new Miss Austen – yet there must be
some
tempering. Perhaps the pathos of Aunt A’s position, but, if softened by pathos, where was the mighty oak brought down? Should she go back and soften the old tyrant? No. O Lord, here she was back again at the failure of connexion – Aunt A, wicked and strong, Aunt A pathetic and…. Oh, damn that old bore’s pompous drone.