The Sea, the Sea by Iris Murdoch
‘The windscreen bugged me,’ said Peregrine, ‘but it was mainly symbolic. Thank you, waiter.’
‘Let me open it,’ cried Rosina. ‘I love opening bottles of champagne. ’ The cork flew, the golden stuff foamed. ‘Charles!’
‘Thank you. Your health, Mr and Mrs Arbelow.’
‘We can hardly believe it, actually,’ said Rosina. ‘We’re happy. At least I’m happy. Are you happy, Peregrine?’
‘This unfamiliar sensation I identify unerringly as happiness. Charles, the best to you. Is your macabre military cousin still around?’
‘No, he’s gone.’
‘So you languish with the ever-faithful Liz?’
‘No, she’s gone too.’
‘All alone?’ said Rosina. ‘What about the bearded lady?’
‘Oh, they’re going away. Anyhow I’ve given up the Quest of the Bearded Lady. It was a brief mental aberration.’
‘That was the general view,’ said Peregrine. ‘We congratulate you.’
‘Are you going back to London?’
‘Tomorrow. Though it’s lovely here and the food is excellent. I’ve got a TV thing. May we drive you?’
‘No, thanks. And are you really joining forces again?’
‘Yes,’ said Rosina. ‘Everything has sprung back into place. We never got over each other and now we shall never have to. It’s as simple as that. But do you know, Charles, what made me suddenly see the truth?’
‘What?’
‘Peregrine murdering you!’
‘Well, trying to,’ said Peregrine. ‘I must be modest.’
‘Why was that so endearing?’ I asked.
‘Oh I don’t know, it was splendid. After all, you deserved to be murdered. For what you did to us, if for nothing else.’
‘Let’s not talk of that,’ I said.
‘Oh, don’t worry, we won’t list your sins, we’re feeling far too cheerful. But it was so sort of sporting and splendid of Peregrine to push you into that hole. I always hated the idea that he’d forgiven you. I only wish you’d drowned, it would have been more aesthetic.’
‘I can’t think why you didn’t,’ said Perry.
‘It was a piece of thoroughly picturesque and proper violence. I like a violent man really, a man who’s a bit of a brute in a decent straightforward way. You are an awful crook, Charles, but basically you’re soft. I can’t imagine why I got so attached to you. I think it was your own illusions of power that fascinated people, not personal magnetism. We were just duped by your conceit. As a man, you’re a softie, I can see that now.’
‘I like being nice and soft, like a squashy toy. But are you actually going to marry again? Surely you won’t go that far? I thought you said marriage was hell, Peregrine, you said it was brainwashing. ’
‘Not when you marry the same person for the second time. Everyone should do it.’
‘But what about Pamela?’
‘Oh, haven’t you heard? Pam’s gone off with Marcus Henty. You know he’s become a gentleman farmer. The manor house life should suit Pam down to the ground.’
‘So I thought I’d better grab Peregrine before he started making passes at Angie!’
‘God!’ said Peregrine. They laughed crazily, Perry’s big wrinkled face red with the sun and the champagne. Rosina as usual was perched, now on the arm of Peregrine’s chair, swinging long bare legs, her white dress hitched up. She leaned over him, brushing his hair with her nose. They both twinkled at me, then regarded each other solemnly and went off into another fit.
‘I hope there’s a part for Peregrine in Fritzie’s Odyssey,’ I said. ‘Perhaps he could enact the old dog.’
‘Oh, that’s off,’ said Rosina.
‘Fritzie’s changed his mind?’
‘No, I’ve changed mine.’
‘We’re going to Ireland,’ said Peregrine.
‘To Ireland?’
‘Yes, to Londonderry. We’ve had enough of West End show business. We’re going to bring theatre to the people.’
‘Oh my God!’
‘Don’t you mock, Charles. This is going to be the beginning of something great—’
‘So you’re giving up the Calypso part, Rosina?’
‘Yes,’ she said.
I said, ‘You’ve impressed me, at last.’
‘The beginning of something great,’ said Peregrine. ‘We’re going to write the plays ourselves and get local people to act them. The Irish are natural actors, and there’s a darling little theatre that’s only a bit bombed—’
‘I’m not mocking,’ I said. ‘I think you’re brave, both of you, I wish you the best of luck. No, no more champagne, thanks, it’s made me drunk already.’
‘Charles never had a head for drink,’ said Peregrine, pouring himself some more.
‘I’m not a monster in your mind any more, I hope?’ I said to him.
‘No,’ he said. ‘I killed the monster when I pushed you into the sea. I’m glad you survived, really. All’s well that ends well.’
‘Ah, but when is the end? I must be off. Thanks for the champers.’
‘I’ll see you to the door,’ said Rosina. She skipped out, and I saluted Peregrine and followed.
Rosina’s white dress turned out to be a sort of shapeless prophetess’s robe made of some very light fabric which practically floated on the air all round her. She held out her arms and flapped it, then drew it closely about her. We came out and stood a moment in the sun on the stony verge of the road. Rosina’s feet were bare.
‘So you think this’ll work, I mean you and Peregrine?’
‘I don’t see why not,’ she said. ‘There was never anything the matter between us except jealousy.’
‘A big matter. And ubiquitous.’
‘Well, it’s a sign of love. Peregrine was simply obsessed about you, then he married that Pam simply to annoy me. And, you know, I couldn’t bear Peregrine being so passive about your stealing me away, I always wanted him to fight for me.’
‘The Helen of Troy complex. It’s fairly common.’
‘And when I heard he’d killed you . . .’
‘He boasted of it?’
‘Naturally—’
‘Well, good luck to you. Tell me, Rosina, that day when you went off and said you were going to see Ben, did you go?’
Rosina peered up at me with her intense crossing eyes. She chuckled and hugged the white robe more closely around her. ‘Yes.’
‘And what happened?’
‘Oh nothing happened. We had a tremendous talk.’
‘I would call that a happening. What about?’
‘Charles, you ask too many questions,’ said Rosina, ‘and you want something for nothing, you always did. But I can assure you of one thing—your bearded lady is a lucky woman. That man is extremely attractive.’
‘Oh—!’ I turned away with a wave. I would have given a lot for a tape-recording of that ‘tremendous talk’—if it really took place. It then occurred to me for the first time to wonder, had Ben and Hartley come together through sexual attraction?
‘Charles!’ Rosina had run a little way after me, padding on the grass verge with her bare feet, her white robe fluttering free.
I waited.
‘Charles, darling, tell me, I must know. When you came here today were you going to offer yourself to me?’
‘You ask too many questions,’ I said.
I could hear her laughing merrily as I walked on. Her having given up that film part, that had the hard touch of reality all right.
That evening the clouds gathered, the sun vanished, and it began to rain. The madcap English weather which had been putting on a passable imitation of June now decided to play March. A cold wind blew from the sea and brought the rain in aggressive irregular patterings, like flung pebbles against the back windows. The house was full of odd sounds of straining and creaking and the bead curtain kept up an irregular prattle of sudden flurried clicks. I looked for the Irish jersey and finally found it among the bedclothes and cushion
The next morning it was still raining a little but the wind had dropped and it was less cold. A thick clammy pearly-grey mist surrounded the house, it was impossible to see the end of the causeway. I carried the dustbins, which had not been cleared for some time, out to the road, and stood there for a while listening. The invisible countryside was a vast silence. I came in again, wet with fog and drizzle, and treated myself to a long breakfast of porridge with tinned cream and brown sugar, poached eggs, biscuits and honey (I had run out of bread) and several pots of hot tea. Sitting afterwards with a rug over my knees, my hand encountered in my pocket an object which my fingers were unable to ‘read’. I drew it forth and it turned out to be Hartley’s slide, which I had pocketed on the night when she ‘ran to me’. I stared at the almost senseless little thing and tried to grasp it as an omen, but it just looked pathetic and filled me with sadness and I put it away in a drawer in the red room.
I resumed my rug and began to review the situation.
One consoling and clarifying thought which kept returning to me as I tried to imagine Hartley’s state of mind, was that she might decide to wait until the last moment before making a dash for it. Let Ben go to Australia. It was certainly his wish, his idea, not hers. She could perhaps actually brush him off forever by slipping away just as he was about to sail. Then she would leap, like Lord Jim, down into my boat. Ben’s impetus would be greatest when he was all set to go, and he might then very well say: to hell with her. This view of the matter was ingenious and plausible. But could I rely on it sufficiently to remain inactive, and could I and dare I endure that much inactivity without a firm assurance from Hartley?
I decided I could afford to allow a span of two or three days more for Hartley to reflect upon the letter which I had left with her. I was glad she had that letter and I imagined it working upon her on my behalf like a little resident imp. I recalled too that I had the wit to give her my telephone number. Doubtless by now the woodwork class would know Ben no more, but he would surely have to leave the house sometimes to go somewhere, to pick up tickets, visas, money; and even though he might take Hartley with him he could not supervise her every move. Surely she could get away to a telephone and ring me up. Very few words would be necessary: Wait, I will come. Imagining those words carried me over one or two bad patches. And the constant possibility of the telephone call made endurable the short period of sheer waiting which I had decreed for myself.
But supposing nothing happened . . . and nothing happened . . . ? Then of course I must contrive to see Hartley, by some method yet to be invented, and even if it were to involve some sort of ‘showdown’ with Ben. There must be no more charades. The prospect of this perhaps decisive showdown filled me with a mixture of fear and pleasurable excitement, as I saw this as the final barrier beyond which I could, if I knocked it down, see my prize secure. The ‘knocking down’ image was not altogether a reassuring one however. At the very least I must be prepared to use force in self-defence. Ben was a more violent man by nature, which was psychologically a considerable advantage. He probably liked hitting people. He was younger than me, a burly strong fellow, but now getting fat and a little out of condition, whereas I was fit and agile. The theatre demands physical fitness and I had always responded to this demand with the scrupulous keenness of an athlete.
With a view to self-defence I searched Shruff End for a suitable blunt instrument. At any moment I might, after all, receive a visit not from Hartley but from Ben. The idea of killing Ben had not entirely left my mind. It was as if, contrary to reason and more calm reflection, a deep trace had been left in my mind, like a memory trace, only this was concerned with the future. It was a sort of ‘intention trace’, or like what might exist in the mind of someone who could ‘remember’ the future as we remember the past. I am aware that this scarcely makes sense, but what I felt here was neither a rational intention nor a premonition nor even a prediction. It was just a sort of mental scar which I had received and had to reckon with. I refrained, as yet, from planning. I vaguely envisaged the moment of ‘battering through’ as a scene of legitimate self-defence. And I searched for a blunt instrument.
It was now late in the evening of the day following my meeting with Perry and Rosina. A bit earlier I had felt a distinct temptation to walk along to the Raven Hotel and follow Peregrine’s example of drowning my sorrows in the bar. I felt a need simply to see a few ordinary human beings who were living ordinary human lives, having holidays, honeymoons, quarrels, trouble with their motor cars, trouble with their mortgages. However I feared to discover the Arbelows still there and I felt I could now do with a long interval before encountering that pair again. Perhaps I would go one day to visit the darling little theatre in Londonderry, but I thought it more likely that I would not. I did not want to go to the Black Lion because of the painful proximity to Hartley and because of the inquisitive dangerous hostility of the clientele and because I might run into Freddie Arkwright. Besides I had to stay near the telephone. Looking for a weapon was at least an occupation.
Mrs Chorney had left various things behind in the attics, which I had searched by daylight and in vain. I had found, lying behind the bath, a long piece of metal, perhaps for use as a crowbar, but it was too heavy and too large to be carried in, as I envisaged the matter, a mackintosh pocket. I had of course reviewed my own tools, but these were ridiculously scanty: screwdrivers but no chisel, and only a sort of little ‘lady’s hammer’. Now in the dark late twilight, I was searching with the help of a candle a space I had discovered under the sink which seemed to be a hiding place of various items. Probing, amidst damp rotting wood and a colony of woodlice, I found a thick heavy piece of metal which turned out to be a hammer head. The shank or handle, or whatever the wooden shaft is called that propels the head, was lying separately and I placed both items on the table.
It was now almost dark outside, the mist, more like a cloud descended, obscuring whatever light the twilit sky might still have offered. A small rain was falling, and although the wind was not strong the house seemed to be moving, shaking itself and twitching, jerking and creaking and stretching like a wooden ship. I could hear the window frames shifting, the bead curtain clicking, the front door rattling, and a little very high tinny vibration which I had, after some search, detected as coming from the front door bell which hung in the kitchen. I was also startled by a sound coming from outside, from across the sea, a prolonged repeated booming, not unlike a ship’s foghorn. I had never heard a foghorn before upon our strangely unfrequented sea; perhaps it was a ship that had lost its way and would, after an interval of silence, suddenly crunch upon my rocks with a most unimaginable din? The foghorn noise, if it was one, had ceased for a time; but now there was another sound, the peculiar regular slapping boom which was produced by the water racing into Minn’s cauldron and being abruptly forced out again. I put the candle on the table between the hammer head and the wooden handle which looked, oddly separated from each other, like ritual instruments belonging to some unfamiliar cult. I listened to the loud hollow regular noise from the cauldron and the force of it seemed to enter my body, it began to seem like a strong beating heart, like a strong beating of my own heart, and then like the menacing accelerating sound of the wooden clappers used in the Japanese theatre.
I felt suddenly very uneasy and decided to lock the door onto the lawn. As I moved to it, with my back to the candle, I could see the scene outside dimly through the window. I stopped with a sharp pang of fright, seeing a dark figure standing near to the door, between the house and the rocks. Then the next second I somehow realized that it was James. We looked at each other through the glass. Instead of opening the door I turned back, picked up the candle, and went out into the hall to find one of the oil lamps. I lit the lam
‘You don’t mind my turning up?’
‘No.’
I sat down and started fiddling with the hammer. James rose, took off his jacket which was spotted with rain, shook it, hung it over the back of his chair, folded back his shirt cuffs, and sat down again with his elbows on the table and watched me.
‘What are you doing?’
‘Mending this hammer.’ The problem was that the head fitted onto the handle all right, but loosely, so that it would come off in use.
‘The head’s loose,’ said James.
‘I have noticed that!’
‘You need a wedge.’
‘A wedge?’
‘Put a chip of wood in to keep it tight.’
I found a chip of wood (the house was littered with chips of wood for some reason), balanced it inside the metal hole and drove the shaft in, keeping the chip in place. I swung the hammer. The head held firmly.
‘What do you want it for?’ said James.
‘To crush a black-beetle.’
‘You like black-beetles, at least you did when we were young.’
I got up and found a litre bottle of Spanish red wine, opened it and put it on the table with two glasses. The room was cold so I lit the calor gas stove.
‘What larks we had,’ said James.
‘When?’
‘When we were young.’
I could not recall any larks I had had with James. I poured out the wine and we sat in silence.
James, not looking at me, was making patterns on the table with his finger. Possibly he was embarrassed; and at the idea that he might feel himself for once in the position of a suppliant I felt embarrassed too. However I was in no mood to help him out. The silence continued. This was getting like a Quaker meeting.