The Furnished Room (14 page)

Her interest had sagged. She gazed vaguely round again.

He said impatiently: ‘What are you looking for?'

‘The Ladies. Will you excuse me?'

‘Surely.' He watched her walk away, swinging her white handbag. When she had been gone a few minutes he got up, with the intention of waiting for her by the café exit. It was then that he saw Jacko, sitting at a table behind theirs.

Beckett made an angry movement towards him, and Jacko cringed back in his chair. Jacko's eyes were mocking, a parody of servility.

Beckett checked his movement, and merely asked: ‘What are you doing here?'

‘That's better. Wouldn't do for you to assault me again, would it? Not with all these witnesses. Besides, I've come up in the world a bit...' Jacko indicated the pile of cakes on his plate. ‘I can afford to pay for my own food now. Cream cakes. I like them.'

‘Never mind that. What are you doing here?'

‘It's a free country, isn't it? Or so I was always told; pardon me if I'm wrong. I've got as much right to sit here as you have.'

Beckett hesitated, and realized that he was being unfair and unpleasant. He said: ‘Yes, you're quite right. Look, I'm sorry about that incident the other day. But I get moods of being unsociable, when I don't want to talk to anybody. I expect you get those sort of moods yourself from time to time, don't you? Anyway, I'm sorry.'`

‘Still feel unsociable today?'

‘No, no, it isn't that. But we're just going, anyway.'

‘Going, eh? Why? Afraid your lady friend wouldn't like the look of me?' Jacko flicked a speck of dust from his lapel with fierce, shabby pride.

‘It's impossible to say anything to you if you take offence so easily.'

‘I understand you very well. You'd rather keep me hidden away like a shameful secret, like a secret vice, wouldn't you?'

‘You're being ridiculous.'

‘No, I'm not. I may be a bad habit, but all the same you need me, see? Why don't you take me with you, then I wouldn't have to follow you. I only follow you because you won't take me with you openly.'

Beckett realized he was dealing with a near-lunatic. He didn't know what to say. Embarrassment made him laugh.

Jacko's face went white with hatred. ‘All right,' he said. ‘All right. You think I'm funny, do you? Well, if you want to know, I wouldn't come with you even if you begged me on bended knees. I hope you rot, Mister Joe Beckett. I hope you bleeding well rot.'

‘Oh, I'm bound to, eventually.' He saw Georgia emerging from the privet-lined path, and went to meet her.

She preceded him out of the café enclosure. ‘Who was that you were talking to, Joe?'

‘Nobody. An acquaintance.' He felt shaken. Losing his temper always had a bad effect on him. It left him feeling jarred and off-balance. The encounter with Jacko had disturbed him. The memory of the twisted, insinuating face cut with the coldness of a premonition between himself and the sunshine.

She asked: ‘Were you going to do anything particular this evening?'

‘Well, I'd arranged to visit a friend of mine.'

‘Oh, I see.' She sounded disappointed. ‘What a pity. I was going to invite you to have a meal at my flat. I live quite close, really.'

‘That's very kind of you.'

‘It wouldn't be any trouble. There's ham in the fridge.'

It would have been churlish to refuse. He said: ‘Thanks, Georgia, I'd like to.' Leaving the park, he explained: ‘This friend of mine, and his wife, have a house in Gulliver Road. They let rooms cheaply to students, including coloured students who find it difficult to get lodgings on account of race prejudice. The house is run on community lines. He's a left-wing writer. Reg Wainwright. You might have heard of him.'

‘No, I'm afraid not. I'm not very well educated.'

Reaching Gulliver Road, Beckett pointed to a spiral of smoke which rose from a front garden. ‘That's him, burning the place down.'

‘Not really, I hope,' Georgia said.

Wainwright was standing beside his bonfire, holding a can of paraffin. He wore old corduroy trousers and was naked from the waist up. His face and neck were sunburnt ruddy; his powerful shoulders looked white and gleaming by contrast. He watched his bonfire with an expression of pride and absorption. Above him danced the dizzy heat of the flames. He wiped his brow with the back of his hand.

Beckett and Georgia also watched in silence. Wainwright picked up a long straggling weed and threw it on top of the others. It struck sparks when it hit the fire. Then he saw them. ‘Joe! Good to see you! How long have you been standing there like a deaf mute?'

Beckett opened the gate and they went in. ‘You should be a countryman, with a smallholding.'

‘Yes, it's a private ambition of mine. I enjoy making something out of the earth.'

Beckett introduced Georgia. Wainwright smiled into her eyes in his firm, honest way. ‘I'm glad to meet you, Georgia. Excuse me for not shaking hands but I'm covered in paraffin.' Then he turned to Beckett. ‘Yes, I'd like to have a plot of land. Or maybe retire into the country to write books.' He led the way up the path, rubbing his paraffin-smeared hands on his chest to clean them. ‘But it won't be yet awhile. I belong here, among people. I won't be one of those ivory-tower writers who see nothing but their own four walls. Besides, I've got too many commitments here in London. Apart from this house, I've just taken on the editorship of
The Humanist Quarterly
; did I tell you?'

‘No, you didn't. Congratulations.'

‘Oh, it's a thankless task. But I'm pleased about it.'

There was a romp of children and dogs round the house. Beckett could not tell how many of each. Wainwright conducted them into the living-room, and shouted in a booming voice: ‘Marion! ...'

The answering call came: ‘Busy...'

‘My wife,' Wainwright explained. ‘She won't be long. Would you people like some beer?'

Georgia said: ‘Not for me, thank you.'

‘Joe will. I know him of old. Excuse me while I find some glasses in the kitchen.'

When Wainwright had gone, Georgia sat down on the edge of a chair. She folded her hands on her handbag on her lap, and giggled at Beckett.

He grinned back, then looked round the room. The furniture was pushed back against the walls, giving the effect of a Youth Hostel common-room. There was a large table, covered by a blanket, on which was Wainwright's typewriter, a bottle of glue, a bottle of milk, back numbers of
The Humanist Quarterly
, and a screwdriver. The noticeboard on the wall displayed newspaper-cuttings, a notice for a lecture on Ethical Thought, another for a meeting for Colonial Freedom, and a typed washing-up rota.

Georgia, who had been following his gaze, giggled again. ‘They're very organized here, aren't they?'

‘Yes.'

‘I like Reg Wainwright. He's nice, isn't he?'

‘Yes.'

‘Are all those children his?'

‘I think only two are. The others probably belong to the neighbours. Marion seems to provide half the kids in the district with buns and home-made lemonade.' Wainwright returned with a quart bottle of light ale and the glasses. He had put on a shirt. He asked Beckett: ‘Well, what did you think of the meeting the other day?'

‘Nothing much happened after you left. The crowd cheered in obedience to the cheer-leaders.'

‘Idiots.'

Beckett asked: ‘Are you writing anything at the moment?'

‘Ah yes, a historical novel set in the Middle Ages.'

Wainwright poured the beer and handed a glass to Beckett. ‘Cheers! Yes, I find a lot to occupy my mind in that period of history.' He began to expound on the corruption of the Church, touching on its preoccupation with wealth and power, politics, the breeding of hatred, superstition, and heresy hunts, and the Church deliberately keeping the people in ignorance. He explained that religion was nothing but a ruling-class institution to keep the underdogs under.

Beckett did not disagree with Wainwright's remarks, but he thought them shallow. He said: ‘Of course the Church was corrupt and immoral. But any organization, religious or political, must be corrupt and immoral if it wants to impose its concept of order on humanity. It's an evil inherent in order.' He realized that he was more or less repeating Father Dominic's words. He had an ambiguous love-hate feeling for the Church. When talking to a Catholic, he attacked the Church, but when talking to a materialist he defended it ‘And, anyway, force and threats of hell-fire couldn't enforce religion by themselves. Religion couldn't persist if it didn't have very real roots in human nature, and if it wasn't psychologically satisfying.'

‘It isn't a question of psychologically satisfying. It's a question of true or false.'

‘Oh, nonsense. Nothing is true. People make their own truths; they invent something that works for them. You do it yourself. You campaign against petty politicians, but you must know that men have less freedom than they think, and that the petty politicians are formed by their contexts.' Looking at the bottle against the light, Beckett saw that there was quite a lot left, which made him feel happy. ‘Don't you ever have sensations of unreality when you attack people?'

‘No. I can't say I do.'

‘I suppose the leader, or dictator figure, has more freedom than most. He is thrown up by the waves of his time, but he precipitates and directs the flood. And the masses flock round him because he has the qualities they admire secretly but lack themselves. He's got a powerful personality and the courage to stand alone. He's an idealist, and mows down ordinary morality because it would obstruct his path. He takes the responsibility for the means that secure the end, and thus becomes the conscience of his nation. However, he fails eventually, because immoral means infect the end. Also because he inhabits a world of petty men who lack free will and who are moved by circumstances, and their rot eventually poisons his cause. I should say the leader does more harm than good in the world. His virtue is that he is dynamic; the dynamic force by which history bounds forward into change.'

Marion Wainwright came in. She was about thirty-five, with a faded prettiness. She was pregnant, and wore a maternity smock over her skirt. She wore sandals and a pair of her husband's grey socks.

Georgia, who had been gazing at the two men in turn with an expression of admiring vacuity, now inspected Marion to make sure that she was not more attractive than herself. Seeing that Marion's pregnancy removed her from the competitive field, Georgia beamed at her in a friendly manner.

Wainwright provided his wife with a chair and a glass of beer, then resumed his discussion with Beckett. ‘Do you admire such a man?'

‘I can admire the driving willpower of a Hitler or a Napoleon while deploring the lives lost in their wars.'

‘No. You cannot separate them from the evil they caused.'

‘Yes, I can. Men are always drawn to the heroic. They admire the heroic even while condemning the harm their heroes have done. Heroes seem to have the inner logic they lack themselves, and a man with inner logic can aspire. Isn't it aspiration that distinguishes man from the animals?'

Wainwright said: ‘You're a terrible fascist, Joe.'

‘I don't think so. I deplore the fact that there is something in the nature of man which makes it almost impossible for his heroes to take the form of saints instead of bloodstained tyrants.'

Marion picked up her knitting. At the same time she followed the argument with an intent frown.

From outside, a child's voice shouted: ‘Goal! …'

Beckett said: ‘I'm only pointing out facts. I'm saying that men can, and do, simultaneously deplore wars and admire the man who caused the war.' He leaned forward, gesturing with his beer glass. ‘Oh, for Christ sake! Look at the cinema queues for a film about any ruthless and determined man, — from Napoleon to Al Capone. People uphold the laws against gangsters in real life but nevertheless they flock to admire, and identify themselves with, Al Capone on the screen. I know it's a contradiction, but it's a contradiction in human nature, not a flaw in my argument.'

Georgia asked Marion: ‘What are you knitting?'

‘A pullover for Stephen, our eldest.'

‘Oh, how nice. Can I see the pattern?'

Marion handed it over.

‘Oh, how nice.'

Marion said: ‘I'm probably the most undomesticated wife in the world. It takes me ages to finish knitting anything, so I have to make it several sizes too big.'

‘Well, he'll soon grow into it. How old is he?'

‘And out of it. Children's clothes are hell. My two are always outgrowing their things.'

‘Oh yes,' Georgia agreed eagerly. ‘My little girl's just the same. I'm always buying her frocks, and then in next to no time she's complaining they're too small. I think it's just an excuse to get a new one; she loves going to a big store and trying things on.'

‘Yes.'

‘She won't wear anything that's too short for her. She's very clothes-conscious, really, for her age. A real little girl.'

‘Mine just scruff around in T-shirts and jeans.'

‘Oh, I do like a little girl to be dressed up to look pretty.'

‘I prefer rough clothes, so it doesn't matter if they climb trees or roll on the ground.'

‘Yes, don't children get grubby quickly?' Georgia said complacently. ‘My little girl has to have a clean frock every day.'

‘Eleven.' Marion answered an earlier question. ‘Stephen's eleven.'

‘Teresa's six. The awkward age.'

Marion said humorously: ‘Aren't they
always
at awkward ages?'