Life in the West tsq-1 Read online

  ‘Not more than two per cent!’

  ‘Nope. That’s the fact at the root of all Greece’s problems. From the Peloponnesian wars onwards, the forests have been ruthlessly hacked down and the timber used for ships or fuel. Rain and wind soon does for naked topsoil. You never see a damned bird in Greece. A few mangey sparrows round the tourist spots. Ravens. Nothing else. It’s a dead place, killed by man, his lust for war, and his domestic animals — mainly goats.’

  He was silent, then he said, ‘Political stability is impossible until you get your agriculture right. I’d hate to calculate how many billions of dollars the US has pumped into Greece since World War II in order to keep it safe for democracy, without once worrying whether it was safe for corn.’

  They were off the beach now, moving inland, the boys still leading. They travelled in single file along the top of a dyke, water and rushes setting up their perpetual rustle on either side. Where the land rose from the marshes ahead, there stood Blakeney, distinct in a medley of whites and umbers, its church crowning the rise and dominating all other buildings.

  Squire rode at the rear of the file. Addressing his brother-in-law’s back, he said, ‘Considering its significance for the West, it would be a sad day if Greece became communist.’

  ‘But not necessarily fatal, to my mind.’ Kaye twisted in the saddle to add, ‘I’m slowly altering my opinions. The West has been reluctant to realize how nationalism remains a safeguard against the monolithic aspects of communism. Your experiences in Yugoslavia show how nationalism triumphed over ideology there. So it will elsewhere — China for example. Maybe Eurocommunism is a genuine new direction. The Eurocommunists in Bologna make noises like decent uncorrupt capitalists.’

  ‘Don’t weaken, Marsh. That way the rot sets in.’

  ‘Maybe. Maybe not. I like to talk, Tom, but I was always a dove, not a hawk. That’s why I quit the States during the sixties. More aggressive we get, the more trigger-happy the Russians become.’

  ‘That’s an attitude they want us to adopt, certainly.’

  After a pause, Kaye added, “I appreciate that Britain’s position is far more vulnerable than that of the States. We’re just as open to sudden armed strikes here as Western Germany. But I discover I have ceased to believe in the concept of sudden strikes.’

  They were moving among sailing craft lying on their sides on muddy banks patterned by bird feet.

  ‘Despite events in Czechoslovakia in ‘68?’

  ‘Of course, there are many people in the States, mainly of the older generation, who would feel about the collapse of the UK much as you would about the collapse of Greece.’

  Squire laughed. ‘Well, that’s a consolation.’

  The sun enveloped Squire’s body, bathing it in summer. He felt the heat on his sparsely protected head and the occasional runnel of sweat down his chest. That suited him well. Yet he felt uneasy, he did not know why.

  He was sorry to hear his brother-in-law speak as he did. The world was a dangerous place — that was the open secret a younger generation of Englishmen resolutely refused to learn; they believed that as long as everyone earned the same wages, all was well. Marshall’s generation of Americans knew better than that. But everyone, of whatever nationality, seemed to prefer to forget that certain ancient laws were not revoked simply by the setting up of trade unions and health services: predators were about. The world was a dangerous place: for the individual as well as the nation.

  The patient ponies carried them to the flat ground by the harbour.

  ‘We’re going to grab some ice creams, Dad,’ Douglas called.

  Squire and Kaye handed the ponies over to Old Man Hill’s daughter, a gnarled woman, who sat patiently by the artist’s van. The men looked in at the paintings displayed for sale inside the van, and were confronted with a conventional array of windmills, churches, cows, and willows. They strolled together towards Marsh House, which faced them from the other end of the quay. Along the quayside, they passed the hotel where Squire had dined with Tess, Grahame Ash, and the camera crew a year ago; it seemed a happier time in retrospect.

  ‘You gain a different perspective on the world when you’re engaged in a dig,’ Kaye said. ‘In a sense, you live in the past, the present becomes remote.’

  ‘Professionally, that must be a good thing… Your salary is still paid in 1978.’

  Kaye laughed.

  Without any change in tone, Squire said, ‘We’ll have a beer when we get in. But I see Teresa’s car parked outside your front door.’

  Kaye shot him a swift glance. ‘She must have driven over from Grantham to see you. Is that a hopeful sign?’

  ‘It depends what you mean by hope. I want us to be together again but, as time goes by, I inevitably want it less. As you with Eurocommunism, so I with separation: resignation masquerading as wisdom sets in.’

  They both laughed.

  ‘Deirdre and I are sorry you suffer all this trouble, Tom. I just hope you have something by way of consolation.’

  ‘If you mean Laura, no, I haven’t. We broke it up to satisfy Tess almost a year ago. Perhaps that was a mistake. Tess remains unsatisfied.’ Bitterness crept into his voice.

  As Kaye and Squire entered the gate of Marsh House, Teresa appeared at the front door and waved to her husband. Something misplaced inflated the gesture: it was designed for someone considerably more distant than Squire. He went up to Tess, took her hand and kissed her cheek.

  They regarded each other with reserve, like military commanders looking for ground cover. Teresa’s gaze held that elusive suggestion of a squint which sometimes lent even her serious moods a touch of mischief.

  His nostrils received a warm perfume from her.

  She wore a light dress suited to the weather, low-cut and showing the cleft between her breasts. She was tanned as far as the eye could see.

  ‘Tess, you’re looking well. How are Ann and Jane?’

  ‘That’s good, because I’m feeling rather terrible, having just been given a good going over by your sister. The girls are fine — at school today. They break up later than Doug and Tom.’

  She turned to speak to Kaye, who kissed her. They all moved into the house.

  ‘You drove over from Grantham just to see me?’ Squire asked.

  ‘I happened to ring Deirdre and she said you would be here for the weekend.’

  As they moved from the hall into the living room, Teresa’s mother appeared, and greeted Squire. Mrs Davies was wearing an uncharacteristic costume, a kaftan in orange and lemon, and dark glasses.

  ‘Tom, it’s charming to see you. So you’ve managed to tear yourself away from London? I was taking the sun in the back garden — we’ve only been here an hour, not more, have we, Teresa? And the traffic was so thick on the A17, is it?’

  ‘You’re looking very summery, Madge.’

  ‘Do you know, I’ve had this old kaftan for years, but haven’t dared to wear it. I hope I don’t look too much like chicken dressed as lamb, or whatever that phrase is. We’re driving over to Norwich to see Willie. He’s coming back with us to Grantham, to stay the weekend, as I expect Teresa told you.’

  ‘No, I didn’t, Mother,’ Teresa said, in some exasperation. ‘I’ve hardly said a word to Tom.’

  ‘Well, you mustn’t let your silly old mother interrupt you. You talk nicely to Tom and I’m sure you can get back together again. Tom, your misdeeds are in the past, or so I hope, and I want you and Teresa to kiss and make up. Remember that you’re both my children. Let’s have an end to this silly, pointless quarrel, for the sake of family harmony. Your Uncle Willie would say the same if he were here.’

  Deirdre appeared in the archway of the living room. She tucked a thumb under her ample chin. Grace also materialized, still bearing the tabby.

  ‘This meeting does promise to be a shining example of family harmony, I must say,’ Deirdre remarked. ‘Marsh, you’d do well to get us all a drink — the sooner we’re tanked up, the better. As for you, Grace, I think you�
�d better make yourself scarce.’

  ‘Oh, Mummy…’

  ‘Go on, go and bully your brothers. You know too much already.’

  ‘You do chase the poor girl,’ Mrs Davies said to Deirdre as Grace disappeared. ‘Of course, I know I’m only an old woman and it’s none of my business.’

  ‘Quite so,’ agreed Deirdre, blandly. ‘All the same, Grace can look after herself. She told me yesterday that she is going to be an aircraft designer, and I believe her. She has some fantastic ideas about airliner loos and galleys which could revolutionize aviation history.’

  Kaye entered through the french doors from the back garden. ‘The drink trolley’s outside. I thought you’d like to take a drink on the terrace while the sun shines.’

  As they trooped out, Grace reappeared in a crimson beach robe, and curtsied to them one by one, cat under her left arm. Mrs Davies came last, taking the opportunity to grasp Squire’s wrist.

  ‘I just wanted to say to you — you’re at a responsible age, Tom. I think that your Tess would come back to you gladly if you gave up that younger woman. She can’t be good for you.’

  ‘I have given her up, long ago. I believe it if nobody else does.’

  ‘Don’t be cross. What I mean is, you must understand Teresa. I think it is the idea of — well, of this sex business that scares her off. Your Uncle Willie and I wouldn’t have anything like that. We have discussed the subject, oh yes. At your age, Tom, you’re nearly fifty, it is disgusting. Undignified. Ernest and I gave up all that sort of thing on my fortieth birthday, and neither of us were any the worse for it. Funnily enough, we were talking about it in the spring of last year, just before he was killed — when you were away in California, or wherever it was.’

  Abandoning the cat at last, Grace sidled up to them and let out squeals of suppressed laughter. ‘Grannie, that’s awful! I’d have thought that you and Willie would be a bit more swinging. After all, what’s the point of getting married unless… Well, anyhow, I think it’s just terrific that Uncle Tom is the age he is and is still able to mate. Bully for him! It’s wonderful.’

  ‘But not exactly unique in the annals of medical science, Grace,’ Squire said, laughing.

  Mrs Davies looked reproachfully at Grace. ‘My nerves are all to pieces. I’ve had my say, now I’m going to have a cigarette. To hear you talking so brazenly about sex, my girl… We never mentioned it, or thought about it, when I was your age. I don’t know what the world’s coming to.’

  Kaye poured them all drinks. ‘Your beer at last,’ he told Squire, handing over a full tankard.

  He raised his glass cheerfully. ‘Here’s to us all. Good to be back home, good to see Madge and Teresa and Tom here. Let’s hope the family will be a little more stable now.’

  ‘That’s a bit optimistic,’ Grace said, sotto voce.

  ‘Quiet, child, it’s only a toast,’ Deirdre said.

  ‘The country’s been going to the dogs steadily while you’ve been doing your archaeological work in Greece,’ Mrs Davies reported. ‘The unemployment figures are still rising, and the inflation rate. It’s this terrible Labour government of ours.’

  ‘Don’t despair, Madge,’ Kaye said. ‘Deirdre and I see a different aspect of things, coming from abroad. After Athens, England seems remarkably stable, sensible, and prosperous.’

  ‘That’s because we’re having a heat wave, Pop, you nit,’ Grace said. ‘People only go on strike in winter, when it’s cold.’

  A lull fell over the conversation. Everyone became preoccupied with their drinks, or looked at the sails glittering far across the wilderness of marsh.

  ‘So how did you enjoy your trip to this Greek island, where exactly was it, Marshall?’ asked Mrs Davies, in a palpable attempt to blanket the difficulties in the room with words. ‘I kept meaning to look it up in my atlas and then I never did so. It seems years since Ernest and I had our Greek cruise. It is years, alas… The weather was lovely but I didn’t care for Athens at all. So noisy, even then.’

  Squire and Teresa were standing awkwardly apart. ‘Grantham always reminds me of Athens,’ he said, but she did not take up the small joke.

  Marshall Kaye began to deliver an archaeological lecture, ostensibly to Mrs Davies. Tom and Douglas appeared, licking icecream cones, took the temperature of the terrace, and slipped rapidly away.

  ‘The great days of Milos ended when the Athenians, who were at war with Sparta, invaded the island in 416 BC. Eventually Milos had to surrender to the Athenians, who took all the women and children into slavery, and slaughtered all the men of military age.’

  ‘What a terrible way to behave!’ said Mrs Davies severely, as if some of the discredit reflected on Marshall Kaye.

  ‘Yes, and it still happens. It happened also before the days of Athens. We could learn lessons from the Athens-Milos encounter — except that lessons of history are never learnt. The

  Athenians demanded that the Milians surrender, in which case they would not be destroyed. The Milians tried to get out of a difficult situation by offering friendship. That wasn’t good enough for Athens. They made a resounding speech to the Milians, which Thucydides reports, or possibly invents.

  ‘They said, “You’re weaker than we are, so you’d better give in. We have concluded from experience that it’s a law of nature to rule whatever one can. We didn’t make this law, nor were we the first to act on it. We found it in existence, and we shall leave it in existence for those who come after us. We are merely acting in accordance with it, and we know very well that if you had our power, then you’d act in the same way to us.”

  ‘And they also said that the standard of justice done depends on the equality of power to compel. “The strong act as they have the power to act, and the weak accept what they have to accept.” It is a lucid exposition of realpolitik, and often applies to situations in the world today. It’s also applicable to individuals.’

  He looked round to address this final remark to Squire and Teresa.

  ‘And to Eurocommunists,’ Squire said. He took Teresa by the hand and led her upstairs to Deirdre and Marshall’s bedroom, where half-unpacked suitcases skirted the walls.

  ‘Let’s talk,’ he said. ‘Forget Marsh’s lectures. You’re looking summery.’

  ‘You needn’t flatter me.’ She looked as if she was going to say more, but nothing more emerged. In Squire’s eyes, she appeared smaller than before, perhaps because she was wearing flat seaside shoes. Her shoulders were vulnerable. Her face looked as if it had tanned unevenly, and her wrinkles showed. Her gaze had gone to the carpet under his anxious scrutiny; he saw the dark roots of her dyed hair.

  ‘At least you came alone,’ she said, almost in a whisper.

  ‘I’m living in London because I can’t bear to be in the Hall without you and the girls.’

  She made a gesture, perhaps thinking he missed her point.

  ‘Matilda Rowlinson is looking in every day, to see it’s all shipshape… How’s Nellie?’

  Teresa smiled. ‘A bit of a nuisance in mother’s flat. The girls love her… Oh, I’m looking after the girls properly and feeding Nellie regularly, don’t worry, while you’re playing the great successful man. I shop at the corner supermarket and talk to mother and play cards with her and her friends and all that — not at all the life you imagine I’m leading, I’m sure, while you’re being feted as Guru Number One all over London.’

  ‘The English critics have been a bit hard on “Frankenstein Among the Arts”. Didn’t you read the reviews?’

  ‘You know I don’t read reviews.’

  ‘Teresa, you can’t be jealous of my limited success. It’ll all be over soon, forgotten. But it is a sort of culmination of my life. I’m uncertain myself of its value but I want to share it with you. I have been able to express and demonstrate elements of popular culture in perspective, in such a way that it gives pleasure and — well, perhaps hope to a lot of people.’

  ‘Ha! It hasn’t affected us that way, has it?’

 
‘As a nation we’ve become defeatist. I hope I have somehow made us that bit stronger. Let everyone see how much we have, things precious to our day, how much we have to lose — how we should value the beauty of which technology is capable, the richness of an expendable plastic cup or a match-box, the visual delight of a traffic jam at night…’

  She walked over to the door, looked out on the landing, and closed it. ‘Grace is such an eavesdropper. You don’t have to lecture me. You treat me as if I was stupid, do you realize that? Ever since we’ve been married, you’ve been telling me things, things I just don’t want to know, things about your damned family, about art, Pippet Hall…’

  He broke in. ‘Tess, dearest, please do not say that. We need a grand reconciliation — talk like that will reduce me to silence, utterly.’

  ‘I want your silence. I’m sick of your talk.’

  He stood and stared at her. ‘If I’ve talked to you…I don’t lecture you. I — of course I talk to you, I’ve always wanted to share everything. Isn’t that the purpose of marriage?’

  ‘All this talk about your book and your television series… It’s not my thing, any more than your farm is. You address me as if I was one of your viewers. Oh, I can see how you think the series in some way squares you in your father’s eyes, eases that chip on your shoulder, makes you famous, as you discourse so cleverly about things you imagine he would have enjoyed. Really, at your age, it’s pathetic!’

  ‘Why pathetic? My father remains a strong influence. Why be ashamed of that? He’d understand that there is idealism still today, waiting to be freed — ’

  ‘I’m sorry, I think that’s all rubbish. You see yourself as some sort of knight of old, a one-man crusader — ’

  ‘But that’s not true — ’

  ‘Tilting against nostalgia, or received values, or — I don’t know, and I didn’t want this conversation anyway. They’re always your bloody conversations, not mine. Damn and blast the art of today. God, if your father only knew… Your mother was lucky, she died just in time to escape the mess we’re in.’ She shook her head wildly, so that her hair flew. ‘It’s too late, Tom, it’s too late. I don’t know. You’ve hurt me, I do know that much.’