The Good Apprentice (58 page)
Read The Good Apprentice Online
Authors: Iris Murdoch
‘Don’t be vile, don’t be so crude and boorish, you’re envious, you’re spiteful — you don’t understand, how can you — ’
‘All right, I can’t, I’m sorry and it’s no use trying to make me understand, I’m not involved at all and I mustn’t be.’
‘You’re afraid of your father.’
‘I don’t think so. I’m sorry I said just now it was wrong. The deception was wrong. It’s only when it’s all in the open that you will be able to see what’s been done and what to do next. It’s no use recounting it to me, that’s just for thrills, you just want a distraction, like going to the cinema to forget your troubles, it’s a fantasy.’
‘You call my telling you the whole truth about this business a fantasy?’
‘Yes. You can’t and wouldn’t. It’s with Thomas that the truth can emerge, not with me.
This
is just setting up an emotional atmosphere, some sort of disturbing pseudo-connection — ’
This
is just setting up an emotional atmosphere, some sort of disturbing pseudo-connection — ’
‘I see — what
you
are afraid of is an emotional relationship with me. Do you feel you are in danger?’
you
are afraid of is an emotional relationship with me. Do you feel you are in danger?’
‘No. I feel you are in danger.’
‘You flatter yourself. Do you think I might fall in love with you?’
‘No, of course not! I mean you could just become addicted to endlessly talking about yourself to somebody — anybody — ’
‘It sounds like analysis!’
‘In a way that would do you no good. It’s just continuing the dream, the untruth, and putting off what has to be done — ’
‘You think I might disturb you.’
‘No!’
‘You said it was “disturbing”.’
‘Please let’s not argue like this — ’
‘I’m not arguing, you are. I just want help. You set yourself up as something amazing — you’ve created this sort of — vacuum — all round you — you can’t complain if afflicted people rush into it. Is your idea of holiness driving everyone away? You ought to be on a pillar.’
‘It’s only — you — ’
‘I’m so special — perhaps a temptation!’
‘No. You know what I mean. Let’s stop this conversation, it’s such a mess — ’
‘You hate mess. Where there are people there’s mess.’
‘Look, this involves
my father
— I can’t discuss his — his — ’
my father
— I can’t discuss his — his — ’
‘Adventures.’
‘With you. It’s not seemly.’
‘I love your vocabulary.’
‘He would — rightly — dislike it. That’s one good enough reason for asking you to please go.’
‘It’s the other reasons I’d like to get at.’
‘You just want a nervous emotional scene, a plucking at the nerves, it’s no use — ’
‘If you’re so anxious about not hurting your father, why did you travel back with us in that car’
‘That was a mistake,’ said Stuart, ‘I regret it. I just wanted to get away.’
‘Mistakes have consequences. Oh Stuart, help me, just a little, any little thing could help me. Don’t be so cruel. I want something you can give — just give me something — like a sort of absolution — no, I mean some forgiving understanding, compassion,
feeling — ’
feeling — ’
‘I’m sorry for you — ’
‘That’s something.’
‘But I can’t help you. Please don’t ask for anything here, it’s the wrong place.’
‘So there is nothing you have to give to someone who is mad with grief?’
Stuart reflected. ‘In this context — nothing.’
‘Oh you — devil — you and your mistake — ’
‘I don’t want to make any more, here.’
‘It’s too late. You think a single slip might demoralise you. You’ve got to be perfect even if everyone else perishes. At least I’m beginning to know you better!’
They were sitting in Stuart’s little room, he on the bed, she on a chair. They spoke in low voices. Oblique watery sunshine entered through a spotty window which Stuart had closed when Midge arrived unexpectedly. The walls were a tear-stained pale green, the shiny new linoleum, which rose to obstruct the door, a more vivid green. There was a washbasin and a thin white towel. There were papers on a small table, pamphlets, forms to be filled in. Stuart’s broken-backed suitcase, half unpacked, the lid fallen back onto the floor, was visible in the fluff under the bed. The wainscots were lightly piled with dust. The room was cold and smelt of unwashed clothes and damp.
Stuart felt cold and awkward. He had been shaving. He had been vigorously dashing cold water onto his face, and his hair was wet. His shirt was undone. He had tried to button it up but the buttons felt wrong and he had not wanted to look down and check them, Midge had so immediately started her attack and he had had to concentrate. He looked at Midge with his amber animal eyes which he could make so cool and unexpressive.
Midge, who had tossed her coat onto the floor, was soberly dressed; she wore a brown skirt and a white blouse and very little make-up and no jewellery, but her neat leather belt and her shoes somehow, like a distinguished signature, guaranteed and illuminated the smart ensemble. She sat gracefully, turned a little sideways, her skirt unconsciously hitched. Her small hands, with darkly red-painted nails, wandered nervously as she talked, along the hem of her skirt, over her knees, up to her throat, to her hair, like two anxious harmless little animals. She was no longer slim, but she looked, now, well composed, elegantly caparisoned, young, alert like a young soldier in a spotless rig. She constantly drew back her thick mane of bright hair, tugging at it nervously.
‘Stuart, don’t you understand what I’m saying to you, what this scene is all about, what it
means
when you
have
to see someone, when you want more than anything in the world to talk to him, to be with him? I love you. I’ve fallen in love with you.’
means
when you
have
to see someone, when you want more than anything in the world to talk to him, to be with him? I love you. I’ve fallen in love with you.’
It was true. It had happened, Midge later realised, in the car coming back from Seegard, when she had so much felt that she did not want to touch Harry,
must not
touch him. Gradually she had felt her whole body change, first dreadfully chilled, then slowly warmed, by the rays which came from behind. She had sat stiff at first with mingled horrified fear, misery, anger, embarrassment, remorse. She wished Stuart away, dead, never to have existed, his dreadful consciousness, his
knowledge,
utterly extinguished. She apprehended his big white clumsy body, so close behind her, heavy in the back of the car, as a contaminated corpse, full of a fatal disease, disgusting, dangerous. Then after a while she began to feel simply tired, surrendered to a hopeless quiet sense of ‘it’s too much’. Then a physical warmth began to steal over her and somehow, without altering her posture, she relaxed and let herself be warmed. She was conscious of an aura of emotion, unfocused desire, new desire. How could that be? There was a physical effect, a happening, as if her whole body were being remade, as if by radiation, the atoms of it changed. She felt soothed, as if ready for sleep, yet was also intensely alert, alive. She was, had been as she later thought, aware that it was Stuart who was in some way affecting her, simply by his proximity doing something to her. What did it mean when something like that happened? But nothing like that had ever happened to her, this, like herself, her altered self, was entirely new. She was not tempted to turn round, to turn round would have been
impossible.
As she sat there staring ahead with wide open amazed eyes, conscious of Harry’s profile in the dark car and of his jerky angry movements as he drove, she breathed deeply and meditated upon what was so indubitably going on. It was as if this were something beyond personality, a cosmic chemical change wherein he was a pure force and she was a pure substance. So strong was her sense of the impersonality, the ineluctable objectivity of the happening, that it could not have occurred to her then to wonder if Stuart too were in any way conscious of it.
must not
touch him. Gradually she had felt her whole body change, first dreadfully chilled, then slowly warmed, by the rays which came from behind. She had sat stiff at first with mingled horrified fear, misery, anger, embarrassment, remorse. She wished Stuart away, dead, never to have existed, his dreadful consciousness, his
knowledge,
utterly extinguished. She apprehended his big white clumsy body, so close behind her, heavy in the back of the car, as a contaminated corpse, full of a fatal disease, disgusting, dangerous. Then after a while she began to feel simply tired, surrendered to a hopeless quiet sense of ‘it’s too much’. Then a physical warmth began to steal over her and somehow, without altering her posture, she relaxed and let herself be warmed. She was conscious of an aura of emotion, unfocused desire, new desire. How could that be? There was a physical effect, a happening, as if her whole body were being remade, as if by radiation, the atoms of it changed. She felt soothed, as if ready for sleep, yet was also intensely alert, alive. She was, had been as she later thought, aware that it was Stuart who was in some way affecting her, simply by his proximity doing something to her. What did it mean when something like that happened? But nothing like that had ever happened to her, this, like herself, her altered self, was entirely new. She was not tempted to turn round, to turn round would have been
impossible.
As she sat there staring ahead with wide open amazed eyes, conscious of Harry’s profile in the dark car and of his jerky angry movements as he drove, she breathed deeply and meditated upon what was so indubitably going on. It was as if this were something beyond personality, a cosmic chemical change wherein he was a pure force and she was a pure substance. So strong was her sense of the impersonality, the ineluctable objectivity of the happening, that it could not have occurred to her then to wonder if Stuart too were in any way conscious of it.
When, back in London, Thomas had taken her away to Quitterne, she was glad to go, to
rest,
to find out what had happened to her. Of course she would have to go to Stuart to tell him, but first simply to see him, to be in his presence. That was clear. But now she began to see everything else as well. Had the dangerous proximity, the
being
of Stuart, fatally damaged her love for Harry, that beautiful mutual desire which she had cherished so, which had filled her consciousness and glorified her body and dictated her meticulously organised timetable for nearly two years? It was surely impossible that she could have stopped loving Harry, of course she loved him, but was it now
different
? Dreamily, alone at Quitterne with her husband and her son, segregated in an absolute interval, she tried not to worry about that, or about what she would do, but simply to indulge and protect and strengthen her awareness of Stuart. It was as if Stuart had already been given to her, as a subject to be
thought through,
in its entirety. She summoned all her memories of him from earliest childhood, she meditated upon him, she collected him. She was relieved, though at the same time hurt, when, in London again, she had found Harry absent, not anxiously and lovingly waiting. She had not planned to see Stuart on that morning, she had not
envisaged
seeing him, but Harry’s absence had served as a signal. By now however Midge had begun to see what a terrible situation she was in. She had been agonisingly touched by Harry’s little flat, by his familiar beseeching, by the pressure upon her of his utter ignorance. Old deep habits of love and loyalty fought for life against the new revelation. How could she not still love Harry, how could he not be her absolute? She felt an agony of tenderness and pity, which came as a new intensity of her awareness of her lover, while at the same time, even as she talked to him, she was planning her next encounter with Stuart, wondering how soon and with what mien she was to go to him again. Letting Harry make love to her had been touching and strange, as if
he
were now young and to be looked after, and she fled from thought by falling asleep before the end. She promised to telephone Harry, to fix something, on the next day, but did not, and went to Stuart instead.
rest,
to find out what had happened to her. Of course she would have to go to Stuart to tell him, but first simply to see him, to be in his presence. That was clear. But now she began to see everything else as well. Had the dangerous proximity, the
being
of Stuart, fatally damaged her love for Harry, that beautiful mutual desire which she had cherished so, which had filled her consciousness and glorified her body and dictated her meticulously organised timetable for nearly two years? It was surely impossible that she could have stopped loving Harry, of course she loved him, but was it now
different
? Dreamily, alone at Quitterne with her husband and her son, segregated in an absolute interval, she tried not to worry about that, or about what she would do, but simply to indulge and protect and strengthen her awareness of Stuart. It was as if Stuart had already been given to her, as a subject to be
thought through,
in its entirety. She summoned all her memories of him from earliest childhood, she meditated upon him, she collected him. She was relieved, though at the same time hurt, when, in London again, she had found Harry absent, not anxiously and lovingly waiting. She had not planned to see Stuart on that morning, she had not
envisaged
seeing him, but Harry’s absence had served as a signal. By now however Midge had begun to see what a terrible situation she was in. She had been agonisingly touched by Harry’s little flat, by his familiar beseeching, by the pressure upon her of his utter ignorance. Old deep habits of love and loyalty fought for life against the new revelation. How could she not still love Harry, how could he not be her absolute? She felt an agony of tenderness and pity, which came as a new intensity of her awareness of her lover, while at the same time, even as she talked to him, she was planning her next encounter with Stuart, wondering how soon and with what mien she was to go to him again. Letting Harry make love to her had been touching and strange, as if
he
were now young and to be looked after, and she fled from thought by falling asleep before the end. She promised to telephone Harry, to fix something, on the next day, but did not, and went to Stuart instead.
‘Oh don’t be silly!’ said Stuart. ‘Go home.’
Midge rose and flew to the bed and sat beside him, and for an instant her skirted leg touched him and she felt the warmth of his thick body through his shirt. Stuart leapt up and retired to the window, jostling the table and knocking his papers to the floor.
‘Midge, don’t talk such absurd nonsense — ’
‘Stuart, listen, don’t say anything hasty, I know it sounds mad, I know it’s a surprise, but it’s something
real
— don’t just reject me,
think —
I know you want to live your special life and have no sex and never marry, I respect that, I
love
that, I only want to be with you sometimes, I only want you to
accept
my love, think of me as a friend or a servant, I could be useful to you. You want to do good things, good works, so do I, my life has been so idle, so useless, so full of vanity, that’s why you mean so much to me, if you understand
that
you must let me be with you — I could be your helper, your secretary, I’d cook for you, do anything, it’s not impossible, please just realise how
little
I ask, I only must be connected with you, not separated, not utterly sent away, I simply want to
give
you my love — ’
real
— don’t just reject me,
think —
I know you want to live your special life and have no sex and never marry, I respect that, I
love
that, I only want to be with you sometimes, I only want you to
accept
my love, think of me as a friend or a servant, I could be useful to you. You want to do good things, good works, so do I, my life has been so idle, so useless, so full of vanity, that’s why you mean so much to me, if you understand
that
you must let me be with you — I could be your helper, your secretary, I’d cook for you, do anything, it’s not impossible, please just realise how
little
I ask, I only must be connected with you, not separated, not utterly sent away, I simply want to
give
you my love — ’
‘Stop it,’ said Stuart. ‘You don’t really believe or feel any of this, you don’t even understand it, it’s just emotional babbling-you’ re having a nervous crisis, you’re suffering from shock, from finding me and Edward at that place — naturally you resent my having been there, and this is just a peculiar way of attacking me — you’ll see that tomorrow, you’ll feel different — of course I wish you well, I hope you’ll make the right decisions and be happy, but what you’ve been saying is simply senseless — you’re not yourself -go away and rest — go, please — I’m going to open the door now.’
Midge slithered off the bed and was at the door before him, keeping it closed. ‘You’ve killed my love for Harry. It’s over. Aren’t you glad? I’m alone now, I’m yours, you must take responsibility for me, you must
know
what I feel, you must recognise me and acknowledge me. I have to exist for you and be in your life, this
has
to happen. It’s your doing, you provoked it all, you have these feelings too, I can sense them. It all happened in the car, I could feel you drawing me, you must have been desiring me then, in the car.’
know
what I feel, you must recognise me and acknowledge me. I have to exist for you and be in your life, this
has
to happen. It’s your doing, you provoked it all, you have these feelings too, I can sense them. It all happened in the car, I could feel you drawing me, you must have been desiring me then, in the car.’
‘Sorry,’ said Stuart. ‘I did not desire you then or at any time, I have no such feeling. Please don’t delude yourself. Now go home and take an aspirin and go to bed. I can’t do anything for you. Even listening to you rave is doing you harm.’
‘You are moved, you are excited, you care about me. It
can’t
be all on my side, something so strong, so vast. Falling in love is a miracle, it’s a renewal of life — you must feel something — you made me love you — I shall have to tell them all — Harry, Thomas, Meredith — ’
can’t
be all on my side, something so strong, so vast. Falling in love is a miracle, it’s a renewal of life — you must feel something — you made me love you — I shall have to tell them all — Harry, Thomas, Meredith — ’
‘Midge, please, please, don’t tell more lies and hurt more people. All this stuff is false, what you speak of isn’t there,
I
am not there. If you want to change your life go back to Thomas, if you want a miracle and a renewal look for it there. If you just stop telling lies and go home you’ll find that you’re really happy at last, you can’t have been happy in a deception. I don’t believe what you just said about your love for my father, but if things are somehow changing that’s a good thing, you’ll feel free — ’
I
am not there. If you want to change your life go back to Thomas, if you want a miracle and a renewal look for it there. If you just stop telling lies and go home you’ll find that you’re really happy at last, you can’t have been happy in a deception. I don’t believe what you just said about your love for my father, but if things are somehow changing that’s a good thing, you’ll feel free — ’
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