The Go-Between (31 page)

  Even when she was everything I most admired, even
when to hear her voice speaking my name with its ironic, intimate
inflexion had brought me as much happiness as a human relationship
could give me, I had always been a little frightened of her, and
fearful of falling below her standard. What that consisted in I
don’t quite know, for it was not only her beauty. I don’t think I
ever heard her say a clever thing, though I shouldn’t have
recognized it if I had. No, it was her air of good-humoured
impatience with things and people—her getting to a point before
they did, and leaving it while they were still fumbling with it,
her disturbing faculty of guessing what they were going to say
before they said it, that made her seem superior to them. She
arrived while they plodded; her short cuts made them seem
heavy-footed and prosy. She wasn’t superior in the sense of being
patronizing; she took a great interest in people, and never spoke
to any of us as if he or she was someone else. But she had her own
angle on us, and it was generally a slightly disconcerting one: she
saw us not as we saw ourselves or as other people saw us. To me her
vision of me as the Green Huntsman had always been intoxicating, a
mirror in which I never tired of seeing myself: it was like a
rebirth. And only she could perform the miracle; it was no good my
saying to myself: “This is how Marian sees me.” The portrait
wouldn’t come to life unless she held the mirror.

  And now the mirror was cracked. Only I knew how much
calculation underlay her apparent inconsequence, and all my
thoughts of her were steeped in green and poisoned; I could hardly
bear to look at my green suit. No use to tell myself now that she
had given it me before I took to letter-carrying, because she had
always thought of me as green; Marcus had told me so, and it didn’t
occur to me he might have lied.

  So I was relieved at her absence; relieved from the
strain of having to keep up with her, of being what I thought she
wanted me to be at every minute, a psychological exercise that had
lost its magic; and relieved from the threat of an emotional
show-down, involving perhaps further recriminations and unkind
words, the desire for which I had read in her eyes, I thought, the
day before.

  It is I, the elder, the old Leo, who am making this
postmortem; at the time I didn’t analyse my feelings much: I was
content to feel the pressure of circumstances relax, and myself
slipping into my humdrum, pre-Brandham state of mind, with nobody’s
standards to live up to except my own.

  Four of the week-end visitors had taken the early
train with Marian, so we were a small party, only seven: Mr.
Maudsley, Lord Trimingham, Denys, Marcus and myself, and an elderly
Mr. and Mrs. Laurent, of whom I remember nothing except that they
were quite unformidable. Even the table had shrunk and was now
hardly longer than our dining-table at home, which I should see so
soon. The cats were away; a wonderful feeling of
détente
prevailed. Denys took advantage of it to give us a long harangue on
the best way of combating poachers. “But you forget, Papa,” he said
more than once, “that this park is an
exposed
park. Anyone
can get into it, anyone, anywhere, and we be none the wiser.” He
rambled on, working himself up, arguing with himself when no
opposition offered. He would not have dared to with his mother
there; but Mr. Maudsley never snubbed him in my hearing, except
that once, on the cricket field.

  Presently our host rose, and we rose with him. “Have
a cigar?” he abruptly inquired, his sunken eyes scanning face after
face, including mine. He often asked this question at times of day
which even I knew to be inappropriate; it was when he suddenly
remembered his duties as host that he proffered this pistol-shot
hospitality. We all smiled and shook our heads, and left the
dining-room to the servants. No orderly-room, no plans for the day,
no messages to take, no problems. We were free!

  As I was going out, Marcus said: “Come with me, I
want to tell you something.” Agreeably titillated, and wondering
what it could be, I followed him into Mrs. Maudsley’s
sitting-room—the blue boudoir, it was called. I should never have
dared to venture into it, but Marcus was a privileged person where
she was concerned.

  He shut the door and said, rather
self-consciously:

  “Have you heard this one?”

  “No,” I said instinctively, without waiting to
hear.

  “It’s very funny and rather rude.”

  I was all ears.

  Marcus composed his face into solemn lines and said:
“The awe-inspirers have gone away.”

  I rolled my eyes in agonized conjecture, hoping that
somewhere on the confines of sight I might see this as very funny
and rather rude, but I couldn’t, and finally had to say so.

  Marcus frowned and put his finger to his cheek. Then
he shook himself in exasperation and said:

  “Oh, I’ve got it wrong. I remember now. Be sure to
laugh: it’s frightfully funny.”

  I composed myself to guffaw.

  “It’s: ‘The awe-
mongers
have gone away.’
“

  I tittered slightly from nervous reaction, not from
having seen the joke. Marcus, realizing this, was vexed.

  “You needn’t laugh if you don’t want to,” he said
loftily, “but it
is very
funny.”

  “I’m sure it is,” I said, for I knew how ill-advised
as well as ill-mannered it is, not to appreciate a joke when it is
told one. Worse still, it laid one open to the charge of being a
thickhead.

  “A man who is a prefect at a public school told a
friend of mine, and he
locked
with laughter,” Marcus said.
“It was after some ushers had been sacked for spooning or something
like that. They had been frightfully strict in form, cursing
everybody and punishing them with extra assignments, which made it
all the funnier. Can’t you see it now?”

  “Not quite,” I confessed.

  “Well,
monger
—you can have an ironmonger,
or a fishmonger, or a cheesemonger or a costermonger, but have you
ever heard of an awe-monger before?”

  “I can’t say I have.”

  “Well, isn’t it funny?”

  “Yes, I suppose it is,” I said doubtfully. Then, as
I realized the ingenious use of the words, I began to laugh quite
heartily. “But why is it rude?”

  “Because ‘awe’ is a rude word, you dolt.”

  “Is it?” I said, feeling as small as only someone
can who has been caught out in ignorance of salacious matters. “Why
is it rude?”

  For answer Marcus laughed and laughed. He shut his
eyes, wagged his round head from side to side, and shook all over.
At last he said:

  “You’re the best joke of all.”

  I joined in the laugh, for fear of not seeming
sporting, and then when he had laughed his fill I asked a second
time, though it cost me a great sacrifice of pride to say it:

  “But why is ‘awe’ a rude word? Please tell me.”

  But he wouldn’t enlighten me and it’s my belief he
couldn’t.

  That day and the next were two of the happiest I
spent at Brandham Hall. They did not compare with Saturday and
Sunday morning; I did not feel, to use Ted’s phrase, “on top of the
world.” Those were days of buoyant emotional health, of positive
well-being such as I had never known. These were days of
convalescence: I felt as if I was slowly picking up after a long
illness; or as if in the middle of a tournament I had suddenly been
whisked out of the field and put down among the spectators.

  No one paid us a visit, nor did we pay any; for the
first time at Brandham Hall it was like family life, not like a
party. The strain of entertaining and being entertained was over:
there was no obligation to talk or listen, we could be as
uncommunicative as we liked. Denys took the opportunity to talk a
great deal, but the rest of us put in a word when we felt like it.
Many things in and about the house (though never its south-west
prospect) became visible to me which hadn’t been visible before, so
busy were we keeping the ball of sociability rolling. The weather
grew more settled as well as hotter; on Monday the temperature was
82.9, on Tuesday it was 88.2: the climax in the 100’s that I hoped
for seemed to be again approaching.

  “Marian will be boiled in London,” Lord Trimingham
said; “there’s nothing so hot as shopping.” I saw her in a crowded
bicycle shop, oil melting in all directions. “Oh dear, it’s got
onto my skirt, what shall I do?—and this is a new one I’ve just
bought for my engagement.” But she wouldn’t have said that; she
would have laughed and said something to make the salesman laugh; I
remembered how it had been at Norwich. Out she comes, her oily
dress sweeping the pavement, gathering up the dust; and behind her,
in my mind’s eye, is a small green bicycle, a boy’s bicycle,
complete with all the latest devices, including a brake front and
rear, made like a horseshoe, not one of those outmoded models
working on the tire of the front wheel such as Marcus had, which
wore thin and wouldn’t hold you. Whenever she came into my
thoughts, the bicycle followed her like a familiar, going by
itself, keeping very close to her, dogging her footsteps.

  A green bicycle! How difficult it is to keep out of
one’s mind a painful thought that attaches itself, leech-like, to a
thought one welcomes! If Marcus had not given me that unkind
explanation of the bicycle’s colour, I might not have posted my
letter to Mother.

  Upon the certainty of her swift response my
happiness reposed. I hoped she would not think it too extravagant
to send a second telegram,-1 rather dreaded having to show Mrs.
Maudsley mine: it might give her a fit, or something.

  On Tuesday morning I found a letter by my plate. The
handwriting was unknown to me; the postmark was Brand-ham Rising, a
near-by village. I couldn’t think whom it could be from, for only
two people wrote letters to me, my mother and my aunt. I was so
consumed with curiosity that I could hardly listen to what anybody
said, but I couldn’t satisfy it because I hated to read my letters
in public. As soon as the signal for departure—now so casual and
informal—was given, I ran up to my room. To my intense annoyance,
the house-maids were occupying it, as they so often were when I
wanted it to myself; and I had to curb my impatience till they were
gone.

  BLACK FARM

  SUNDAY

  Dear Master Colston,

  I am writing straight off to say how sorry I am I
sent you off like that. It has quite upset me that I sent you off
like that. I didn’t mean to, it wasn’t on purpose, but at the last
minute I jibed at telling you something. Perhaps when you are older
you will understand how it was and forgive me. It was quite natural
you should want to know being a boy of your age but the fact is I
didn’t feel like telling you at the moment. But I oughtn’t to have
taken on so specially after telling me your Dad was dead—only I got
my rag out as I do sometimes, that’s how it was.

  I ran after you and called to you to come back but I
expect you thought I was chasing you.

  I don’t expect you’ll want to come again in a hurry
but if you would like to come next Sunday at the same time I will
try and tell you what you asked, and have some shooting and stay to
tea. It was a shame you missed your tea, I hope they kept some for
you at the Hall.

  Please believe I am sincerly sorry if I was rather
rough, and don’t have hard feelings about me.

  Yours faithfully

  [this was crossed out]

  Your faithfull friend

  TED

  PS. You oiled my bat a treat.

  I read the letter over several times and was nearly
convinced of its sincerity. But a part of me still suspected that
it was a ruse to make me take more notes. I had been taken in so
often, I had been so green! And I thought, perhaps with justice,
that it was all very well for Ted to be ashamed of telling me
something that he hadn’t been ashamed of using as a bait. I didn’t
guess—what I now think may have been the case— that he was
apologizing for the one as for the other.

  In any case the letter made no difference. If the
prospect of a pleasant Sunday afternoon with Ted learning the facts
of life had its attractions, I put it away from me, knowing I
should be the other side of England.

  My mother believed in the logic of the emotions; she
did not think they should be tested, still less regulated, by the
lessons of experience. If I had been nice to her ten times running
and nasty to her the eleventh, it would upset her just as much as
if the ten times hadn’t existed; and if (for the sake of argument;
I hope I never was) I had been nasty to her ten times running and
nice the eleventh, she would have in the same way discounted the
other ten. She relied on the feeling of the moment, and would have
thought it “rather wrong” to do otherwise. Unconsciously I had
taken after her and accepted her example as a law of life. But now
I couldn’t: my emotions had become circumspect and
self-protective.

  An older person would have seen that the letter
needed an answer. It didn’t occur to me to answer it—I was too
prone to regard a letter as a present. But there was a phrase in it
that puzzled me, so I thought I would seek out Lord Trimingham and
ask for enlightenment (to my mind he was still Viscount though my
tongue had learned to call him Lord).

  At this hour he generally repaired to the
smoking-room to read the newspaper and discuss “deep affairs of
state” (as Mother used to say when my father was closeted with his
friends). Thinking he might be thus engaged, I softly pushed the
door ajar and peeped in, ready to take flight, but seeing him
alone, went in.

  “Hullo,” he said, “have you taken to smoking?”

  I wriggled and tried to find a suitable answer. Not
finding one, I circled about in front of his chair.