George Passant (22 page)

For a time I could not find the street in which Jack lived. He had given up his flat, George said; he had returned to his parents’ house. I had never been there in the past. When I first knew him, it was one of his mysteries to mention that he could not invite us to his house – and then, after his self-revelation that night in the park years ago, I had not expected to be asked.

Now, when at last I discovered it, I smiled, in spite of my errand. For the street, as I made my way down the faces of the houses, peering at the numbers in the diffused lamplight, seemed the perfect jumping-off place for daydreams of magniloquence: and, on the rebound, when he repented of those, just as good a place to let him imagine himself among the oppressed and squalid.

The houses were a neat row from the beginning of the century. Their front doors gave onto the street and the paint on most smelt fresh as I went close; it was a row of houses such as artisans lived in by thousands throughout the town; it was a frontier line of society, the representative street of the highest of the working class and the lowest of the middle. Few windows were lighted at this time of night.

I came to Jack’s number. There was a light in the window, shining thin slats of gold between the Venetian blinds. I knocked softly on the door; a movement came from inside. The door opened slowly. A voice, light, querulous, said: ‘Who’s there?’

I answered, and he flung the door open.

‘What on earth are you doing here?’

‘I’m afraid I’ve come to worry you,’ I said. ‘I expect you’ve had enough for one day.’

‘I was just going to bed.’

‘I’m sorry, Jack. I’d better come in.’

Then my eyes, dazzled after the darkness, gradually took in a room full of furniture. A tablecloth, carrying some used plates and a dish, lay half over the table. A saucepan of milk was boiling on the hob.

‘I have to live here occasionally. It gives them a bit of pleasure.’ Jack pointed upstairs. He was wearing a new, well-cut suit. His eyes were excessively bright. I nodded, then threw my overcoat on a chair, and sat down by the fire.

‘And so you’re after my blood as well.’ A smile, mischievous and wistful, shot through his sullenness. As I replied, telling him I had been with George, it was replaced by an injured frown.

‘He must have told you everything,’ said Jack. ‘It’s no use me going over it all again.’

‘It may be the greatest use.’

‘Then you’ll have to wait. I’m tired to death.’ He poured out the boiling milk into a tumbler. This, ignoring me, he placed on the hearth. I remembered once laughing at him at the farm, when he went through this ritual of drinking milk last thing at night; he had produced pseudoscientific reasons for it. He had always shown intense concern for his health. It was strange to see it now.

I pressed him to talk, but for a long time he was obstinate. I told him that I should be George’s lawyer, if it came to a trial – and his, if he would have me. He accepted that, but still would not describe his interview in the afternoon. I said once again: ‘Look, Jack. I tell you we’ve got to be ready.’

‘There’s plenty of time.’

‘As I say, they’ll be making inquiries while we do nothing.’

Suddenly he looked up.

‘Will they have gone to Olive yet?’

‘Probably,’ I said.

‘She was visiting a cousin. She won’t get back to the town today. I suppose I ought to see her before they do. Clearly,’ said Jack.

Then, for the first time, he was willing to talk of their businesses. He did it sketchily, without George’s command. He finished up: ‘I can’t imagine why they expect to find anything shady. It’s – it’s quite unreasonable.’ Then he said: ‘Incidentally, I told the chap this afternoon, and I don’t mind telling you, that if you search any business you’ll find something that’s perfectly legal but doesn’t look too sweet. He took the point.’ Jack looked at me. ‘I’ll show you what I mean, sometime, Lewis. It’s all legal, but you’d expect me to try a piece of sharp practice occasionally, wouldn’t you? I’ve never been able to resist it, you know. And it’s never worth the trouble. One’s always jumpy when one’s doing it, and it never comes to anything worthwhile.’

I was certain that the ‘sharp practice’ had nothing to do with the suspicions: I did not follow it up. We were both silent for a moment: Jack pulled out a case and offered me a cigarette. I thought I recognised the case, and Jack said, with his first smile since I tried to question him: ‘Yes. It’s the famous present.’ His smile stayed as he ran a finger along the initials. ‘I like having something permanent to remind me exactly who I am. It gives me a sort of solidity that I’ve always lacked.’

We both laughed. Then Jack said quietly: ‘I simply cannot understand what these people expect to find. It’s simply unreasonable for them to think they might pull out a piece of dishonesty. Why, if there’d been anything of the kind, I could have covered it up ten times over. If I’d had to meet every penny a month ago, I could have covered it completely. I happened to have an extra offer of money to tide me over any difficulty just about that time.’

‘Who from?’

‘Arthur Morcom.’

I exclaimed.

‘Why ever not? Oh, you were thinking of his keeping away because of Olive. I don’t see why he should.’ He hesitated. ‘As a matter of fact,’ he said, ‘he made the same offer this afternoon.’

‘It’s not useful now,’ I said.

‘It might be extremely useful,’ said Jack. Then he took back the words, and said: ‘Of course you’re right. I can’t use money until they give up these inquiries.’ He broke off: ‘You know’ – he showed, instead of the fear and resentment I had seen so often in his face that night, a frank, surprised and completely candid look – ‘these inquiries seem fantastic. They ask me about something I’ve said years ago – what I told people about the profits of the agency and so on. I just can’t believe that what I said then might ruin everything now. Even if I’d done the dishonest things they believe I’ve done – which I’ve not – I’m certain that I still couldn’t believe it. All those actions of mine they ask about – they’re so remote.’

Yes, that was honest. On a different occasion, I had been through the same myself.

When I left, I walked straight to Morcom’s. It was after one o’clock, but I had to speak to him that night. As it happened, he was still up. From the first word, his manner was constrained. He asked me to have a drink without any welcome or smile. I said straight away: ‘I’ve just come from Jack’s. He tells me that you offered him money this afternoon.’

‘Yes.’

‘Don’t you see it might be dangerous?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘If Jack skips now, they’ll take George for certain. For him, it’s inevitable disaster. If you make it possible for Jack to go – and, well, it’s crossed his mind. He’s no hero.’

‘That is true,’ said Morcom, still in a cold, disinterested tone.

‘I had to warn you tonight,’ I said.

‘Yes.’

After a silence, I said: ‘I’m not too happy about them.’

‘I’m not surprised,’ said Morcom. ‘I told you this was likely to happen. I thought you wouldn’t be able to stop it. I might as well say, though, that I rather resent you considered it necessary to tell people that I was paralysed with worry. I dislike being made to look like a nervous busybody. Even when it turns out to be justified.’

‘I said nothing.’

‘Jack said that he heard I was very worried. I mentioned it to no one but you.’

Casting back in my mind, I was beginning to reassure myself: then, suddenly I remembered asking Roy to send word at any sign of trouble – because of Morcom’s anxiety.

Morcom said: ‘You know?’

‘I’m sorry,’ I said, ‘I mentioned it to Roy Calvert. It was my last chance of getting the whole truth. I made it clear–’

‘I told you in confidence,’ said Morcom.

I took refuge in being angry with Roy. I knew that he was subtle and astute about human feelings – yet he had been so clumsily indiscreet. But I ought to have known that he, like many others, was in fact, subtle, astute – and indiscreet. The same sensitiveness which made him subtle, which gave him antennae to reach another’s feelings, also caused this outburst of indiscretion. For it was from the desire to please in another’s company, Jack’s or George’s, that he produced the news of Morcom’s concern – from the same desire to share an emotion with another which is the root of all the deepest subtlety, the subtlety, which, whatever it is used for ultimately, arises from a spontaneous realisation and knowledge of another.

Just as, ironically, Morcom himself had once broken into a graver indiscretion in Eden’s drawing-room.

It is one of the myths of character that subtlety and astuteness and discretion go hand in hand by nature – without bleak experience and the caution of age, which takes the edge both from one’s sensitiveness and the blunders one used to make. The truth is, if one is impelled to share people’s hearts, the person to whom one is speaking, must seem, must be, more vivid for the moment than anyone in the world. And so, even if he is irrelevant to one’s serious purpose, if indeed he is the enemy against whom one is working, one still has the temptation to be in a moment’s conspiracy with him, for his happiness and one’s own against the rest. It is a temptation which would have seemed, even if he troubled to understand it, a frivolous instability to George Passant. But, for many, it is a cause of the petty treasons to which they cannot look back without shame.

Morcom was speaking with a restrained distress. Some of it I should have expected, whatever the circumstances, if he heard that he was being discussed in a way he felt ‘undignified’. But tonight that was only the excuse for his anger. He was suffering as obviously as George. His cold manner was held by an effort of self-control; he was trying to shelve the anxiety in a justified outburst. Yet his anxiety was physically patent. With a mannerism that I had never seen him use before, he kept stroking his forehead as though the skin were tight.

We talked over the inquiries. Information must have been laid, I said, a week or two ago. I went on: ‘Jack told me that he could easily have raised money just before that time. If there had been any call. He said you made your first offer then – is that true, by the way?’

‘I ought to have done it in the summer,’ said Morcom. ‘I suppose it came too late. But I couldn’t resist doing it at last. I’ve always had a soft spot for Cotery, you know.’

That was true: it had been true in the days of his bitterest jealousy. It was true now. He was filled with remorse for not having tried to help them until too late.

In a moment he asked me: ‘What are the chances in this case?’

‘It’s impossible to say. We don’t even know they’ve got enough to prosecute on.’

‘What’s your opinion?’

I paused: ‘I think they’ll prosecute.’

‘And then?’

‘Again I don’t know.’

‘I’d like to have your view.’

‘Well,’ I said, ‘if you remember it’s worth very little at this stage – I think the chances are against us.’

‘Look,’ he said, ‘I can’t do anything in the open. I’ve got to tell you that again. I insist that nothing I’ve said shall be repeated to anyone else. For any reason whatever. That’s got to be respected.’

‘Yes.’

‘But if I can help in private–’ he said. ‘You’ve got to ask. Whatever it is. Remember, whatever it is. You aren’t to be prevented by any sort of delicacy about dragging up my past.’

He had spoken very fast. I answered: ‘I shall ask. If there’s any possible thing you can do.’

‘Good.’

‘There may be – practical things. We shall probably want money.’

‘I should like to give it.’

WHEN I arrived at George’s lodgings the next afternoon, I found his father just on the point of leaving. Mr Passant said, with the old mixture of warmth and hesitation: ‘It’s not – Lewis?’ He had aged more than anyone I knew. His breathing was very heavy.

‘I’m glad you’re helping us, Lewis,’ he said. He began to talk hurriedly, about the inquiries. His eyes were full of puzzled indignation against the people who had instigated them. ‘You’ll help us deal with them,’ he said. ‘They’ve got to learn that they suffer if they let their spite run away with them.’ It was not that he did not know’ of the danger of a prosecution. George had been utterly frank. But injured as he was, Mr Passant was driven to attack.

‘At the end, when it’s the proper time, you’ll be able to go for compensation against them,’ he said. ‘The law must provide for that.’

During these outbursts, George was quiet, once augmenting his father’s with an indignation of his own. For a moment they looked at each other, on the same side, the outer anxiety pressing them close. But when Mr Passant said, tired with his anger: ‘It’s a great pity they were ever given the excuse, Lewis–’

George said: ‘We’ve had all this out before.’

‘After it’s over,’ said Mr Passant, ‘I still want to think of you yourself.’

George replied: ‘I can’t alter anything I’ve already said.’

Both their faces were strained as they parted. Without a word upon his father’s visit, George came to the table and brought out his papers. He sat by me through the afternoon and evening, helping me arrange the facts.

The extraordinary precision of his memory might have been laughable in another context. But now I heard his voice on the edge of shouting, when from time to time he burst out: ‘It’s ludicrous for them to try to manufacture a case like this. We’ve got an answer for every single point the swine bring up. Do they think I decided to take over Martineau’s paraphernalia simply for the pleasure of cooking the figures? When it was perfectly easy for him to check them? A man who’d been used to figures all his life. The suggestion’s simply monstrous. If I’d wished to swindle in that particularly fatuous way, I should have chosen someone else–’

‘He’d gone away, though, before you took over–’

‘Nonsense. That is simply untrue. We bought Exell out in November ’28’ – he gave the exact date – ‘Martineau had been in the town all July. He came back for a couple of weeks continuously the next January. Settling up his house and his other affairs. He could have investigated at any time. Do they think that a man in his senses – whatever else I may be, I suppose they’d give me credit for that – would take a risk of that kind?’