The Light and the Dark (2 page)

“As you’ve just said,” I replied, “there’s nothing to be done. One has to go on, that’s all.”

“Just so,” said Roy. “Life’s very unfair. Why should this happen to you?”

Yet I felt he liked me more because it had happened.

I told him one other thing, which helped explain why I had taken a job in Cambridge at all. As he knew, I had been born poor. Through a mixture of good luck and good management, I had done well in the Bar examinations and in my period as a pupil. By the time I married, I was making a fair living at the Bar. But I was overstrained, my inner life racked me more after marriage than before, I wanted to rest a little. Some of my influential friends made enquiries, and soon Francis Getliffe told me there might be an opening in his college for an academic lawyer. At last, after a long delay, the offer was officially made: I accepted it, and was elected late in 1933, a few months before this talk with Roy. The college did not object to my keeping on a consultant’s job with an industrial firm, and I spent some days each week in London, where my wife was still living in our Chelsea house. I usually stayed in Cambridge from Thursday to Monday, and slept in my college rooms on those nights, as though I had been a bachelor fellow.

It was since I came to live so much in college that Roy began to call on me. I had met him once when he was a boy (his father was a very wealthy man in the provincial town where I was born), and occasionally in his undergraduate days. I knew he was a member of the college when Getliffe first approached me and I had heard several conflicting rumours about him – that he was drinking himself to death, spending all his nights with women, becoming an accomplished oriental scholar. But it was a coincidence that his rooms should be on the next staircase to mine, and that we should be waited on by the same servant. The first weekend I spent in college he ran up to see me, and since then it was very strange if I did not hear his light step on my stairs once or twice a day.

I had come to the end of what I could tell him: we stood under the trees in the bright sunshine; Roy said “just so” again to lead me further, but the clear light reedy voice died away without reply from me, for I had finished. He smiled because he felt I was less careworn, and took me to his rooms for tea.

They were a curious set of rooms, in a turret over the kitchen, right in the middle of the college. From a window on the staircase one could look out over the first court to the front gate, and his sitting-room window gave on to the palladian building in the second court and the high trees in the garden beyond. It was for strictly nepotic reasons that Roy was allowed to live there. He had ceased to be an undergraduate nearly three years before; he would normally have gone out of college then. He was a rich man, and it would have been easy for him to live in comfort anywhere in the town. But he was a favourite pupil of the Master’s and of Arthur Brown’s, the tutor who arranged about rooms: and they decided that it would be good for his researches if he stayed where he was.

The sitting-room itself struck oddly and brightly on the eye. There were all kinds of desks in a glazed and shining white – an upright one, at which he could work standing and read a manuscript against an opalescent screen, several for sitting at, one with three arms like a Greek pi, one curved like a horseshoe, and one very low which he could use by lying on cushions on the floor. For the rumours about him had a knack of containing a scrap of truth, and the one which to many of his acquaintances sounded the most fantastic was less extraordinary than the fact. He had already put a mass of original scholarship behind him; most days he worked in this room for seven or eight hours without a break, and he had struck a field where each day’s work meant a discovery both new and certain.

The whole room was full of gadgets for his work, most of which he had designed. There were holders for his manuscripts, lights to inspect them by, a small X-ray apparatus which he had learned to work, card indexes which stood up and could be used with one hand. Everything glistened in its dazzling white, except for some van Goghs on the walls, a rich russet carpet all over the floor, and a sofa and armchair by the fire.

A kitchen porter brought us a big tray wrapped in green baize; underneath stood a robust silver teapot, a plate of toast, a dish of mulberry jam, a bowl of thick cream.

Roy patted the shining silver.

“You deserve some tea,” he said. “Reward for interesting conversation.”

He gave a smile, intimate and kind. He knew now that he had helped bring me somewhere near a normal state. He was sure enough to laugh at me. As I spread jam and cream on a piece of toast and tasted the tart mulberry flavour through cream, butter, burned bread, I saw he had a mocking glint in his eyes.

“Well?” I said.

“I was only thinking.”

“What of?”

“Women.”

“Well?” I said again.

“Each to his métier,” said Roy. “You’d better leave them to me in future. You take them too seriously.”

In fact, he attracted much love. He had been sought after by women since he was a boy: and he enjoyed making love, and threw it lightly away.

Five o’clock struck, and Roy sprang from his chair. “Not much time,” he said. “We must be off. I need you. I need to buy some books.”

“What is it?” I asked, but he smiled demurely and secretively.

“You’ll know quite soon,” he said.

He led the way to the nearest bookshop. “Quick,” he said as I followed through the press of people on the narrow pavement. “We need to get through them all in half-an-hour.”

He was playing a trick, but there was nothing to worry about. He was cheerful, settled, enjoying himself. When we arrived at the shop, he stared round with an expression serious, eager, keenly anxious. Then he moved over to the shelf of theological works, and said with intensity: “There are still some here. We’re not too late.” He had taken hold of three copies of a thin volume. The dust cover carried a small cross and the words:
The Middle Period of Richard
Heppenstall
by Ralph Udal.

“Who in God’s name was Richard Heppenstall?” I asked.

“Seventeenth century clergyman,” Roy whispered. “Somewhat old-brandy, but very good.” Then in a loud clear voice he greeted the manager of the shop, who was coming to attend to him.

“I see I’ve just got here in time. How many have you sold?”

“None as far as I know, Mr Calvert. It’s only come in today–”

“That’s extremely odd,” said Roy.

“Is it a good book, Mr Calvert?”

“It’s a very remarkable book,” said Roy. “You must read it yourself. Promise me you will, and tell me what you think of it. But you need to buy some more. We shall have to take these three. I’m extremely sorry, but you’ll have to wait before you read it. I want one myself
urgently
tonight. I need to send one at once to Mr Despard-Smith. And of course Lord Boscastle needs one too. You’d better put that one down to Mr Lewis Eliot–” he walked the manager away from me, whispering confidentially, the manager responding by wise and knowing nods. I never learned for certain what he said; but for the rest of my time in Cambridge, the manager, and the whole of the staff of his shop, treated me with uneasy deference, as though, instead of being an ordinary law don, I might turn out to be a peer incognito.

I was half-ruffled, half-amused, when Roy rushed me away to another shop.

“I’m buying these books,” he said before I could protest. “Just lend me your name. I’ll settle tonight. Talking of names, Lord B. is staying at the Lodge tomorrow” (for Lord Boscastle was a real person, and his sister, Lady Muriel, was the Master’s wife).

Breathlessly we hurried from bookshop to bookshop, buying every copy of Udal’s book before half-past five. Roy sent them as presents, had them put down to my account, asked me to enquire for them myself.

As we left the last shop, Roy grinned.

“Well, that was quite a rush,” he said.

He insisted on paying three pounds for the books that had been put down to me – and, to tell the truth, I did not feel like stopping him.

“I suppose I’m right in thinking that Udal is a friend of yours?” I said.

Roy smiled.

On our way back to the college, he asked:: “Tell me, Lewis, are you extremely tired?”

“Not specially.”

“Nor am I. We need some nets. Let’s have some.”

We changed, and he drove me down to Fenner’s in the cold April evening. The freshman’s match was being played, and we watched the last overs of the day; then Roy bought a new ball in the pavilion, we went over to the nets, and I began to bowl to him. Precisely how good he was I found it difficult to be sure. He had a style, as in most things, of extreme elegance and ease; he seemed to need no practice at all, and the day after a journey abroad or a wild and sleepless night would play the first over with an eye as sure as if he had been batting all the summer. When he first came up, people had thought he might get into the university team, but he used to make beautiful twenties and thirties against first class bowling, and then carelessly give his wicket away.

He was fond of the game, and batted on this cold evening with a sleek lazy physical content. Given the new ball, I was just good enough a bowler to make him play. My best ball, which went away a little off the seam, he met with a back stroke from the top of his height, strong, watchful, leisurely and controlled. When I over-pitched them on the off, he drove with statuesque grace and measured power. He hit the ball very hard – but, when one watched him at the wicket, his strength was not so surprising as if one had only seen him upright and slender in a fashionable suit.

I bowled to him for half-an-hour, but my only success was to get one ball through and rap him on the pads.

“Promising,” said Roy.

Then we had a few minutes during which I batted and he bowled, but at that point the evening lost its decorum, for Roy suddenly ceased to be either graceful or competent when he ran up to bowl.

The ground was empty now, the light was going, chimes from the Catholic church rang out clearly in the quiet. We stopped to listen; it was the hour, it was seven o’clock. We walked across the ground and under the trees in the road outside. The night was turning colder still, and our breath formed clouds in the twilight air. But we were hot with exercise, and Roy did not put on his sweater, but knotted the sleeves under his chin. A few white petals fell on his shoulders on our way towards the car. His eyes were lit up as though he were smiling at my expense, and his face was at rest.

“At any rate, old boy,” he said, “you should be able to sleep tonight.”

The next morning, as I was going out of the college, I met the Master in the court.

“I was wanting to catch you, Eliot,” he said. “I tried to get you by telephone last night, but had no luck.”

He was a man of sixty, but his figure was well preserved, the skin of his cheeks fresh, rosy and unlined. He was continuously and excessively busy, yet his manner stayed brisk and cheerful; he complained sometimes of the books he had left unwritten or had still to write, but he was happier in committees, meetings, selection boards than in any other place. He was a profoundly humble man, and had no faith in anything original of his own. But he felt complete confidence in the middle of any society or piece of business; he went briskly about, cheerful and unaffected, indulging in familiar intimate whispers; he had never quite conquered his tongue, and if he was inspired by an amusing sarcasm he often was impelled to share it. He asked me to the Lodge for dinner the following night, in order to meet the Boscastles. “My wife’s note will follow, naturally, but I was anxious not to miss you.” It was clear that I was being invited to fill a gap, and the Master, whose manners were warm as well as good, wanted to make up for it.

“We’ve already asked young Calvert,” he went on, and dropped into his intimate whisper: “Between ourselves, my brother-in-law never has considered this was the state of life his sister was born to. I fancy she wants to present him with someone who might pass muster. It’s a very singular coincidence that we should possess a remarkably talented scholar who also cuts his hair. It’s much more than we could reasonably expect.”

I chuckled.

“Yes,” said the Master, “our young friend is distinctly presentable. Which is another strong reason for electing him, Eliot. The standard of our colleagues needs raising in that respect.”

I was left in no doubt that Roy had been invited to the original party, and that I was a reserve. The Master could not explain or apologise more, for, indiscreetly as he talked about fellows of the college, he was completely loyal to his wife. Yet it could not have escaped him that she was a formidable and grandiose snob. She was much else besides, she was a woman of character and power, but she was unquestionably a snob. I wondered if it surprised the Master as much as it did me, when I first noticed it. For he, the son of a Scottish lawyer, had not married Lady Muriel until he was middle-aged; he must have come strange to the Boscastles, and with some preconceptions about the aristocracy. In my turn, they were the first high and genuine aristocrats I had met; they were Bevills and the family had been solidly noble since the sixteenth century (which is a long time for a genuine descent); I had expected them to be less interested in social niceties than the middle classes were. I had not found it so. Nothing could be further from the truth. They did it on a grander scale, that was all.

On the night of the dinner party, I was the first guest to arrive, and the Master, Lady Muriel, and their daughter Joan were alone in the great drawing-room when I was announced.

“Good evening, Mr Eliot,” said Lady Muriel. “It is very good of you to come to see us at such short notice.”

I was slightly amused: that sounded like rubbing it in.

I was not allowed to chat; she had discovered that I had an interest in world affairs, and every time I set foot in the Lodge she began by cross-questioning me about the “latest trends”. She was a stiffly built heavy woman, her body seeming cylindrical in a black evening dress; she looked up at me with bold full tawny eyes, and did not let her gaze falter. Yet I had felt, from the first time I met her and she looked at me so, that there was something baffled about her, a hidden yearning to be liked – as though she were a little girl, aggressive and heavy among children smaller than herself, unable to understand why they did not love her.