Time and Time Again (17 page)

The dinner was indeed good, though Havelock assured him it was just the ordinary club meal. 'But I'm glad I brought you here, Charles. I hope to put you up for membership one of these days, so it's appropriate we should choose it for our celebration. Incidentally, I believe this is the first time we've ever dined out together.' It was, not counting train dinners and times when they had both been guests of neighbours around Beeching. 'You may not realize it, Charles, but a father finds it hard to get to know his son, and therefore easy to postpone the effort. I hope we shall make that effort jointly--from now on.' He waited for some response, but Charles could not think of any. 'I'd like this to be the beginning of confidence between us. Don't think I shall be unsympathetic-- even about Lily.'

Charles flushed, resenting Havelock's use of the first name, as if there were in it some intolerable assertion of intimacy. Yet he could not help probing the matter by answering: 'Yes, you met her, didn't you?'

'I did, and thought her charming--though of course utterly unsuited to you, apart from her age.'

'You mean her Cockney accent--all that?'

'Well, it would be no help, though she might manage to unlearn it-- others have. Much more important is a lack in her of something you need, Charles--you especially. Even at her age one can tell she hasn't got it--a drive, a dynamism--a woman who will push you ahead, not just freewheel along in any mood you set for her.'

Charles was surprised by his father's assessment of Lily; he had expected the class angle to count much more. He said: 'How about being happy? Doesn't that come into the scheme of what you think I need?'

'No one should put happiness first, Charles. One doesn't die without it. From my own experience I can assure you of that.'

'But wouldn't you have PREFERRED to be happy?'

'Yes--if it could have come from achievement--from triumph. But not from mere BEING. Not just bliss. The Orientals believe in bliss--and look at them. Whereas, to take an opposite example, the Americans PURSUE happiness--it's the pursuit they stress, not the happiness itself. The phrase is even written into their Declaration of Independence--and look at THEM. They count.'

'Because they've pursued happiness without finding it?'

'Yes--rather than finding it and languishing with it.'

'I don't much care for pursuing things. I suppose that's why I'm no good at games.'

'But you haven't the blood in you to languish. Or if you have, I don't know where it comes from.'

'From my mother, perhaps. I hope so.'

'You mean you wish you were not my son?'

'I don't think that follows . . . but haven't you wished it too-- sometimes?'

They faced each other, as near to the core of some central issue as they had ever been, and aware of it. At that moment, if the message in Havelock's eyes had persisted, Charles might have decided to leave Beeching and his father and never see either again. But it changed, and Havelock further eased the tension by a slow smile. 'I don't see any reason to bicker, Charles. I just wanted you to know I liked Lily.'

'That's fine. I liked her too. In fact I still like her. And if I had the chance, now that I'm of age, I'd marry her. But you've seen to it that I haven't the chance.'

'You can still have it if you want it enough.'

'What do you mean?'

'Didn't Mansfield tell you ANYTHING?'

'He said nothing about . . .' Then Charles saw he had fallen into the oldest trap in the cross-examiner's repertoire. 'Oh, well,' he added, transferring some of his anger to himself, 'you evidently know it all, so what's the difference? Mansfield told me nothing except that he'd given you his word, he'd given you his word--he repeated that like a litany.'

'Then he kept his word too. Quite a fellow.' Havelock paused. 'Share another bottle of claret? . . . No? . . . Just the ordinary claret they have here, but not bad, I think. . . . Sure you won't? . . . Charles, let me be frank about all this. No father nowadays can put a final veto on a son's marriage--and that's as it should be. But when the girl's still so young-- younger than you ever thought she was, younger than she told you she was . . . surely there's a case for delay--or at least no need for any special hurry? Mansfield and I agreed that if, at the end of a year, you and Lily both wished, you could begin meeting again . . . and later still--say in eighteen months or two years-- and she'd only be nineteen then, remember--'

'And in the meantime?'

'No meetings--no letters, communications of any kind--for a year-- on either side.'

'And what did SHE say to that?'

'Very little, as I remember. She didn't make a scene, though. Bless her.'

'But she agreed to the separation?'

'In all fairness, Charles, I must point out there was nothing else she could do. After all, a father does have some control over a seventeen-year-old--'

'Did she know it was only to be for a year?'

'We didn't go into that with her. I didn't intend to with you, either, but I was tempted just now--I wanted to make your birthday a more cheerful one. Don't be distressed. If, after a year, as I said--'

'I know what YOU said--what I want to know is what SHE said. What were the words she used? How did she take it? I can't believe--'

'As I told you before, she was perfectly charming--both to her father and me. Other girls might have been sulky or hysterical or hostile--instead of which--well, I couldn't help admiring her attitude. And perhaps in her heart she felt the reasonableness of ours.'

'Damn the reasonableness.'

'A year isn't much, Charles. You once said that yourself.'

Charles remembered and it made him bitter. 'Yes, I suppose as a test of true love it's romantic as well as reasonable.'

'I've weakened it, though, by letting you know it exists. I've given you that much advantage.'

'Like throwing a dog a small bone.'

'No . . . like revising--slightly--the handicap in a race.'

'To make it more exciting for the spectator.'

Havelock chuckled. 'Your brain works rather well when you're excited.'

'I'm not excited--not in the way you are, anyhow. And whether it's a week or a month or a year, as far as I'm concerned, I promise nothing, I've agreed to nothing. Let's end the argument on that.'

'Yes--gladly. I was equally glad to end my argument with Mansfield, in which--I think you tend to overlook this--I really succeeded in getting you out of serious trouble. . . . Tell me, incidentally--this isn't arguing, I'm just curious--what would be your rating of Mansfield?'

'Rating? I don't know that I rate people at all. I thought him decent and honest, simple and--and--in a sort of way--sweet. Like a good apple. I'd trust him. He'd keep his word--even if he ought never to have given it.'

'So it puzzles you a little--why he did give it?'

'Not when I think of you in action against him. You have a persuasive manner.'

'And you think that was all? I'm really flattered, Charles.' Havelock poured himself more claret and again Charles saw, as in his dreams, the pose of one about to strike, even at the risk of unwisdom; grim glee infesting the eyes, a euphoria that ran riot in the bloodstream, so that the cheeks reddened and shone with what, in an athlete, would have suited the moment of passing the tape or vaulting the bar. 'Charles, my experience in the courts taught me many things. One of them is the meaning of the word "corruptible". It means "more corruptible than the person using the word". Take plain bribery, for instance. With some people--those we call honest--a bribe has first to be explained as something else-- something reasonable and fair and legitimate. Then cupidity must be aroused--a universal attribute--after which the payment offered must be large enough to administer a slight shock, so that the honest payee will wonder if it IS a bribe, and--out of a mixture of doubt and guilt and gratitude--will wish to treat the payer with the utmost fidelity. It's a very interesting process.'

He paused, aware that he was losing Charles's attention, then retrieved it by a fast grab. 'How do the Mansfields come into all this? I'll tell you. They're quite hard pressed financially-- buying their house through a building society and a radio- gramophone on the instalment plan--all that sort of thing. He has steady employment, but poorly paid--only about five pounds a week, so the three girls and the boy have to help to support the family from their own small earnings. Clearly, then, Lily couldn't give up her job and live in the country for a year at their expense . . . so the fair thing to do was quite obvious. But--and this really IS the point at last--how much do you think it costs a girl to live with her relatives in the country for a year?'

Havelock took out his wallet and pushed a folded paper across the table to Charles. It was a cancelled cheque made out to and endorsed by Frederick Mansfield for two thousand pounds.

* * * * *

Charles felt rather sick. 'All right . . . so you pulled it off. You've been clever, I admit that. It's an odd thing to prove to me on the day I'm supposed to become a man--that life's full of wormholes and that you know how to find them . . . never mind, though, I'll admit that also. But now I've got a disillusionment for you. This career of mine you talk of--this career--this-- this . . .'

His eyes were riveted by something else on the table before him. It was a telegram, addressed to Charles at Beeching, from his college tutor.

HEARTIEST CONGRATULATIONS ON OBTAINING NOT ONLY FIRST IN TRIPOS BUT YOUR THESIS ALSO CONSIDERED SO GOOD STRONGLY RECOMMEND SUBMISSION FOR THE COURTENAY PRIZE. . . .

Thirty-one years later Charles could sum up his early life as 'nothing to complain of without really wondering whether it had been or hadn't. He was much too pleased by his son's remark that he didn't look anything like his age; and for a second he glanced in a mirror on the wall of the Cheval Noir that showed him trim and distingué in his dark suit. 'Do you really think, Gerald,' he asked, fishing for another compliment, 'I could safely allow a photograph of the author to be used as a frontispiece for my book?' He laughed, of course, so that his son should know it was partly a joke.

'You bet you could,' Gerald answered, loyally. 'You're really very handsome. You look a bit like Ronald Colman.'

'And WHO is Ronald Colman?'

'Oh, come now, dad, you must know that.'

'I will admit I do, but I find that a great impression can be made nowadays by claiming never to have heard of somebody.'

Gerald grinned. 'You're pretty smart too.'

'Am I--away from dinner parties and agreeable company? Sometimes lately I've begun to doubt it.' At a remark like that Palan stepped into Charles's mind like an unwanted guest who finds the door left open, and because he would otherwise have had to quell an almost unconquerable preoccupation Charles began to talk about Palan to Gerald, though of course without mentioning the name. 'You know, Gerald, this job I have isn't the kind of thing it used to be. You may think me snobbish--it's so easy to be thought that nowadays--but when I first started in diplomacy one could always assume that whatever the sort of fellow one was up against there'd be at least some things in common--a professional training, for instance, and a minimum code of manners. Your opponent might trick you, he might be dishonest or corrupt--my father used to say that everyone was corrupt to some extent--but you could count on him not yelling across the room like an auctioneer or belching after a heavy lunch . . . But I mustn't bore you--here's Henri, wondering what we're going to eat. Anything special you fancy, my boy? This is an occasion, remember.'

Henri presented the menu, which Gerald studied for a moment before replying: 'My French isn't equal to it--maybe you'd better do the choosing.'

Charles smiled. He had been prepared for this. 'How about soup to begin with? May I suggest tortue claire?'

'Fine, whatever it is.'

'Just turtle soup. And then perhaps sole Véronique--that's sole cooked in wine and served with a very delicate cream sauce and fresh grapes--and after that I can recommend Henri's way with a small chicken--poulet en casserole ŕ la maison--'

Gerald put down the menu and tried to catch Henri's eye with a knowing wink, but of course Henri did not respond. 'I wonder if I could just have a good thick steak after the soup.'

'Certainly, M'sieu'.'

Charles continued to smile; he had been prepared for this too. All he said was: 'One thing you never have to specify here, Gerald-- everything always IS good . . . I think then a tournedos garni for Gerald, Henri, with those little potatoes and champignons. I'll have the sole.'

Henri bowed. After he had left them Gerald said, still looking amused: 'What first made you so interested in food, dad?'

'To that question, Gerald, I had better quote an answer made by a titled Englishwoman to the Duchess of Marlborough--who, as perhaps you know, was a titled American. The Duchess was informed that considering it is the only pleasure one can count on having three times a day every day of one's life, a well ordered meal is of prime importance . . . Ben trovato, possibly.' Henri had approached with the wine list. 'A Chablis, Henri . . . Try a small glass, Gerald, after the soup.'

'Okay.'

'It's a very simple wine.'

'I thought one ordered wines by the year.'

Charles smiled again; it was a matter he liked to have brought up. 'Your millionaire junk merchant ALWAYS does--he learns a few words and dates like Liebfraumilch Forty-Seven and thinks it makes him a connoisseur. I myself would GENERALLY know the best years for a Burgundy or a champagne or a claret, but with a Chablis I leave everything to Henri, who was born quite close to the town of Chablis . . . isn't that so, Henri?'

'At Auxerre, M'sieu',' said Henri, beaming.

'Oh yes?' Gerald suddenly spoke up. 'I think I know of it.' He was evidently at pains to demonstrate that he wasn't an ignoramus in every field of knowledge. 'Didn't Clovis capture Auxerre from the Romans in the fifth century?'