Rates of Exchange (29 page)

‘I think I do now recall it,’ says Plitplov, ‘An excellent piece, now I remember. Such a strange coincidence, that our paths cross again.’ ‘Yes, isn’t
it,’ says Miss Peel. ‘Of course you will not at all remember me,’ says Plitplov, ‘I was just one of so many listening to your words with admiration.’ ‘I believe
I do, actually,’ says Petworth, ‘Weren’t you working on Trollope?’ ‘Oh, my small chef d’oeuvre,’ says Plitplov, ‘Do you recollect it?’
‘Trollope,’ says Budgie, ‘Wasn’t he some kind of postman?’ ‘Your great novelist,’ says Plitplov, ‘More famous than a sausage.’ ‘I think
you know each other perfectly well,’ says Miss Peel, ‘I don’t see any need for concealment.’ ‘Well,’ says Plitplov, as if stirred to act, suddenly looking at
Petworth with his bird-like eyes, ‘Perhaps I do not wish to embarrass your guest.’ ‘How could you possibly embarrass him?’ asks Budgie, ‘He doesn’t look at all
embarrassed.’ ‘Oh, I think we don’t discuss such a thing,’ says Plitplov, ‘In front of the nice people enjoying their sausages. I think you make a saying in your
country: let the sleeping dogs lie?’ ‘I can’t imagine what you’re talking about,’ says Petworth. ‘It is just I recall a little problem between us that has made
me very discreet.’ ‘How utterly fascinating,’ says Budgie, ‘What little problem?’ ‘No, I go too far,’ says Plitplov, ‘Really I should not mention it.
Your wife would not please with me.’ ‘My wife?’ says Petworth.‘Her name is Lottie,’ says Plitplov. ‘I know her name is Lottie,’ says Petworth. ‘A
very amusing lady,’ says Plitplov, ‘She smokes the little cigars. She came to Cambridge and we made some very good walks together, also sometimes the shoppings. Well, on these occasions
sometimes certain confidences are made that should not be repeated. Now you see why I make a little concealment.’

‘You went for walks with my wife?’ asks Petworth. ‘Oh, you do not know this?’ asks Plitplov, ‘I am wrong to mention it, then. Really I do not mean it. But so many
glasses of whisky, and now this nice sausage, I am not so cautious as I should be.’ ‘This is fascinating,’ says Budgie. ‘What kind of confidences?’ asks Petworth.
‘I think I displayed her just a friendship that was necessary,’ says Plitplov, ‘Often the ladies need a person to talk to about their troubles.’ ‘This is true,’
says Budgie. ‘What troubles?’ asks Petworth. ‘Oh, you are angry, please do not blame me,’ says Plitplov, ‘You see how hard I try to conceal what has happened there
from these people. You know I am your good friend. Only if your wife is still with you, and you are happy again, please to remember I had just a little finger in that pie.’ ‘She wanted
to leave him?’ asks Budgie, ‘Oh, Angus, now we begin to see the secret of your gloom.’ ‘This is nonsense,’ says Petworth. ‘She did not ever explain you?’
asks Plitplov, ‘Well, it is natural. We cannot always tell our distresses to those who come closest to them. That is why a stranger is sometimes a good friend. Such a person may see what the
involved ones do not: that a person is sad, feels a neglect, has a distress.’ ‘And you performed this generous service for my wife?’ asks Petworth. ‘I was there when a
certain help was needed,’ says Plitplov, ‘You must remember, you are a famous scholar, everyone is admiring you. You are giving notable lectures on the Chomskyan linguistics and all are
spellbound. But for her life is not the same. She comes, but no one regards her. She walks alone in the streets. There are fulfilments she does not enjoy. It is natural she talks to someone who can
listen, even if that is a stranger from a faraway country where you cannot get even an English sausage.’

‘I recognize all those feelings,’ says Budgie Steadiman.‘What exactly did you do with my wife?’ asks Petworth.‘Please, it was just a little friendship,’ says
Plitplov, ‘All the time I am speaking very well of you. I tell her a fine scholar is a very valuable man, who needs very special understandings. I point out to her the high spots of your
work. Not every woman appreciates these achievements. I explain of course you are attractive to other women, of course your students fall a little sometimes in love with you, and you are flattered.
But this does not mean always that love is ended. Now you understand perhaps why I am curious about her condition. When one has been of such an assistance, one feels a devotion. Of course my
respect is for both of you. You know you helped me very well with my book. I have made due acknowledgement in the preface, which I will like to show you. But now you see why I do not like to
mention such acquaintances. It is better if such things are just a little secret. Like a sausage.’ ‘I think in matters of sex discretion is sometimes advisable,’ says Budgie
Steadiman, ‘I’m afraid we live in an age of excessive sexual confession. There are people nowadays who only go to bed with you to tell you long stories about all the other people
they’ve had, who, and when, and how often, where and why and which way up. Personally I find it quite distasteful. One gets quite enough of that sort of thing at the hairdresser.’
‘Please, Dr Petworth, remember,’ says Plitplov, his eyes glinting sharply across the table, ‘I am always your good friend. I like to make a nice toast to you for your tour, and
hope it will be always a success. Also I try to get to your lecture, because I hope our paths cross somewhere again.’ ‘How very nice,’ says Budgie.

But now Magda is with them again, putting on the table a cakey, flakey dessert. ‘Perhaps you could tell Dr Petworth a bit about these places he will visit,’ says Felix Steadiman from
the other end of the table. ‘I will make some advices if I can,’ says Plitplov, ‘But of course I do not know the places you visit.’ ‘Glit, Nogod and Provd,’ says
Petworth. ‘Oh, really?’ says Plitplov, ‘Well, these are cities out in the country. You will have nice times there, I know.’ ‘But what are they like?’ asks
Steadiman. ‘They are towns, like all towns,’ says Plitplov, ‘I do not know them so well. But I think you have a guideinterpreter. She of course will tell you where you are. You
know: in my country we have a saying.’ ‘I bet you do,’ says Mr Blenheim. ‘You cannot build a city with words only,’ says Plitplov, ‘Also: the future will come,
whether we speak of it or not. I am afraid my poor words would spoil these places for you.’ ‘But who will he meet?’ asks Budgie. ‘In Glit is Professor Vlic,’ says
Plitplov, ‘He has good assistants who will ask advanced Marxist questions. In Nogod, not so good perhaps, the professor is a lady, Personip. In Provd is not university, so I think you attend
congress, perhaps in a place that was once hunting lodge for the emperors. But I think you can explain all this, Mr Steadiman.’ ‘Well, no,’ says Steadiman, ‘These places are
in the yellow areas.’ ‘What is yellow areas?’ asks Plitplov ‘The areas marked yellow on the diplomatic map,’ says Steadiman, ‘Where we’re not allowed to
go.’ Plitplov’s face whitens:‘Then you should not ask me,’ he says, ‘Now I am indiscreet again. Tonight I say too many things.’

And Madga stands over them, taking away the last plates; under the table, Petworth feels Budgie Steadiman’s hands playing rhythmically across his knees. Across the table is the sharp,
glinting face of Plitplov, half malicious, half worried. The troubling conversation runs through his mind, fuddled and gloomy with the day’s drink. Down vague, complicated passages, he tries
to think back to his wife, that dark anima; sitting at a table with candles in Slaka, he tries to recover Cambridge, the brown river, the punts, the greenfly, but it seems very far away. The
glinting face opposite him looks across, in an expression that could be apologetic, or victorious; he has a moment’s glimpse of that face as it comes, late one night, to the room he and his
wife have shared somewhere high in the Cambridge college, bearing, civilly, some carved wooden object, which may have been an egg-holder or a pipestand, doubtless carved by some peasant in these
Slakan woods, and talking on into the night long after Petworth has retired exhausted to sleep. But is there more? He remembers the long hours in which his wife wandered, tries to recall whether
Plitplov was present or absent at those same times; it is too far away. He looks around at the table of exiles, and wonders why he is here; he recalls a domestic conversation: ‘He asked me if
you had great sexual energy; I told him so so.’ A sense of being implicated, complicated, in someone else’s plots comes over him, but he is too tired to understand them, too will-less,
too lonely, too personless, not enough the noun, too much the object. ‘Some brandy,’ says Steadiman, coming up with a bottle. ‘No, thank you,’ says Petworth, putting a
debilitated hand over his glass. ‘I see you make an excellent choice among our spiritous liquors,’ says Plitplov, smiling, ‘Just a small. But you enjoy it, I think, your
diplomatic life here?’

‘Talking of secrets,’ says Budgie Steadiman, putting her hand back on Petworth’s knee, ‘A story that illustrates the odd difficulties of the way we live here. About those
yellow areas. You know whenever we leave Slaka, we’re checked to find out where we’re going. We have to report at the control points on every route out of the city. One Friday night we
left in the car to go skiing for the weekend. The roads were dark, we had to go through the thick forest, and we must have missed our turn. We came to a small town and checked on the map, and it
was in one of the yellow areas. Felix tried get the car turned round, but there was a dance going on in the street, and the dancers came all round us, gipsies playing their violins through the
window, you know. We couldn’t move, so I made Felix get out and we joined in the dance.’ ‘I wanted to go, you remember,’ says Felix. ‘But I like dances,’ says
Budgie, ‘You know I have a wild and foreign nature. Well, we danced, then we were taken to a house to get warm, and these peasants all started pouring brandy down us, and I sang some songs.
Well, we went back to the car, and a huge tent had been built on top of it.’ ‘Who did it?’ asks Miss Peel. ‘The militia,’ says Budgie, ‘They weren’t
allowed to move it, you see, because we had diplomatic plates, but they weren’t going to let us move it either.’ ‘So what did you do?’ asks Miss Peel. ‘Oh, we slept in
it all night,’ says Budgie, ‘Then in the morning Felix said the only way to get out was to go to the militia and explain. Well, they held us there for two days. We asked them why; they
said we had seen things we were not allowed to see. But, I said to the colonel at the barracks, all we saw was a dance. Yes, said the colonel, but to see it is not permitted. So I told him not to
be silly and they put us in the car and we drove between two army trucks all the way back to Slaka. Then the Ambassador put on his raincoat and went and apologized and the incident was
closed.’

‘But you should not go there,’ says Plitplov, ‘You should not know that place.’ ‘You mean it’s a secret dance?’ asks Budgie. ‘Your secret is a
sausage,’ says Plitplov, ‘Why not ours a dance?’ ‘You know these things ex ex excite you, Budgie,’ says Steadiman at the other end of the table. ‘Excite
me?’ cries Budgie, ‘Who knows what excites me? Who in thirty-five years has ever succeeded in unlocking that particular door?’ ‘I think it’s getting late,’ says
Miss Peel. In a big black coat, carrying a plastic bag, Magda appears gloomily beside the table. ‘Yes, time to take Magda home,’ says Steadiman, rising, and going to look for his
windscreen wipers. ‘Dr Plitplov,’ says Budgie, seizing her visitor by the arm, ‘Do you perhaps understand, just a little, why in this country, in this world, I feel a confined
soul?’ ‘Of course,’ says Plitplov, ‘But really you must not depress.’ ‘Depress?’ cries Budgie, ‘I think I’m awfully gay.’ ‘Time for
bye-byes, I think,’ says Mr Blenheim, stretching his arms, ‘Look, I’ll see Miss Peel safely down the stairs and take her back to her apartment.’ ‘I think I make also a
quiet excuse me,’ says Plitplov, ‘My wife probably has a headache. Also I have said perhaps some things I do not mean.’ ‘Not at all,’ says Budgie, ‘I thought you
remarkably good value.’ ‘Yes, well, my friend,’ says Plitplov, rising and shaking hands with Petworth, ‘I hope so much we stay good colleagues. You know I do not like to
distress you. But, as you say, a man has to keep his end up. I hope please one day you come for a dinner to me. Of course I cannot promise you such a sausage. And remember always, when you call
your wife, to give her the love of Plitplov.’ ‘Going?’ asks Budgie, ‘Everyone going?’ ‘Mrs Steadiman,’ says Plitplov, kissing her hand, ‘A most
interesting evening, and my compliments to your menu. You know I have taken many risks to come, and perhaps it was worth it.’ ‘I must get back too,’ says Petworth, ‘Can I
call a taxi?’ ‘Of course I would take you,’ says Plitplov, ‘But I do not like to go in your direction.’

‘No, Angus, you stay here and help me with the washing up,’ says Budgie. ‘Oh, really, you should not do it,’ says Plitplov, putting on his coat, ‘You are the wife
of a diplomat.’ ‘How nice of you to offer,’ says Budgie. ‘Oh, I do not offer, I am guest,’ says Plitplov, ‘But you have a maid to do it.’ ‘I like a
maid to leave early,’ says Budgie, ‘A hostess needs a little privacy for her indiscretions. Angus, you’re not too proud to help me? And Felix will take you back when he returns
from dropping Magda.’ ‘Bye, Mr Petworth,’ cries Miss Peel from the door, ‘Told you it would be a stunning evening.’ ‘Take care, old chap,’ cries Blenheim.
Then Petworth looks round at a diplomatic room suddenly empty; drained glasses shine on the table, the Mexican dance-masks stare blankly off the wall. ‘Could you just take a few of those
things into the kitchen?’ says Budgie, ‘I must just discard a few jewels and make myself more comfortable.’ In the kitchen, it seems churlish not to put on rubber gloves and wash
a dish or two in the sink; it is in this domesticated condition that Budgie finds him when she comes in a few moments later, clad in a very diaphanous nightdress. ‘A sorry tale that funny
little man tells,’ she says, ‘I hope it hasn’t distressed you.’ ‘I don’t understand what he’s up to,’ says Petworth, scouring a saucepan. ‘When
two people are together in agony, Angus,’ says Budgie, drawing him away from the sink, ‘There is only one solution. You are not a young man, Angus. You have a certain sophistication and
expertise. This is the centre of the house. I always think it’s harder for telescopic sights to see in here. Do you prefer the kitchen table or the floor?’