Self Condemned (22 page)

It was in Johnsonian vein that he began with Professor René Harding.“I am a reader of yours, sir. I am very grateful to Robert Kerridge for affording me the opportunity of meeting you.” René, on his side, was greatly amused. He was his most urbane. He planned, by the extravagance of his language, to shame this local impersonator of Dr. Johnson out of his pose. He screwed up his mouth and its surroundings into a budding rosette of concentrated sweetness. His eyes directed upon the other a crackling glance (emitting something like a cloud of midges playing all over the person in front of it, in the last refinement of deferential gallantry).

“My brother-in-law and my sister, too, have told me so much about you. The privilege of meeting you is something, sir, I had never dared to hope for.”

The housemaster blinked a little at this but he accepted it as normal, and even managed an abbreviated eighteenth-century bow.

“The privilege, sir, is altogether on my side.” Then came the bow.

It was in this spirit that they all went in to dinner, with many courtesies on René’s part suggestive of the great social and academic importance of Dr. Grattan-Brock. And had it not been for the incitements of Kerridge it is probable that the dinner would have passed off with Dr. Grattan-Brock basking his way through an excellent meal (for her early home life had provided Helen with a feeling for good cooking), and have gone home thinking what a charming fellow Professor René Harding was. It was Kerridge who first moved the conversation into dangerous channels. In a pause after a number of scholarly exchanges he was heard to say, “By the way, Grattan-Brock, I was telling my brother-in-law that you had read his
Secret History of World War II
, and how much you had admired it.”

There was a disagreeable silence, all four suspending the meal and waiting. At last the housemaster shook himself and growled, “Oh (arhumm) yes, of course. Indeed, I did, read your book, (arhurnm). Are you writing another, sir?”

René laughed. “No, sir. Not for the moment.”

“My brother-in-law is going to Canada. He is sailing in a few months.” Kerridge beamed at René.

“Canada! Extraordinary place to go to. Well, sir, I hope you will have a good trip.”

That the Professor was not returning, that he had resigned his professorship, etc., etc. was, Kerridge saw to it, elicited. The housemaster began to be less ready to bask in the flatteries of this ex-professor; and although René attempted a diversion with the architectural beauties of Strasbourg, which he had recently visited, Kerridge soon drove him out of Strasbourg, though Dr. Grattan-Brock seemed inclined to linger there a little. The St. Estephe, which was now circulating, was all the more conducive to pottering about in a French city, and perhaps becoming acquainted with
La Maison Rouge
.

A little later Helen, returned from a somewhat lengthy visit to the kitchen, found, to her astonishment, that the atmosphere had so worsened as to be alarming. Her husband and the housemaster were both turned, with accusing eyes and irritably knitted brows, towards René, who was looking first at one, and then at the other, without speaking. It was Kerridge, evidently, who was the leading spirit.

“Very well; but the
Times
, René, described you as fascist-minded, didn’t it?”

“Did it?” René smiled. “I do not remember that. But quite likely it did, since many people have been called that recently, simply because they had made a remark of an unenthusiastic kind about communism. So many youngish reviewers are romantic about Russia. It is quite absurd. I do not have to love Russia because Hitler, Russia’s enemy, is so vile a man.”

“I do not think, René, that the critic of the
Times
would base a judgment on so stupid a reasoning as that.”

“No?” René looked around awaiting the next move.

“I must say, sir, that I myself have felt, at times, that you showed fascist tendencies,” Dr. Grattan-Brock began a little gruffly. “It was just an impression, to be sure, but you have used arguments, sir, which have (arhmmp) surprised me.”

Kerridge showed signs of annoyance at the feebleness of the housemaster’s co-operation. He leaned over and refilled his glass with wine, hoping that this might improve matters.

“I remember you pointing out to me, Grattan-Brock, a good illustration of what you mean. It was where Professor Harding made a comparison between Herr Hitler and St. Ignatius Loyola.”

“Yes, I
do
remember that. How, sir, you could compare that miserable gangster at present terrorizing Europe with the founder of the Society of Jesus I completely fail, sir, to understand.”

René shook his head. “You have got that wrong, sir. I was not suggesting that those two men personally resemble one another; what I said was that they had functioned much in the same way. Both were ‘military minded,’ both organized paramilitary organizations, both were reactionaries, both stood, or stand, for the old order in Europe, one had the Reformation (potentially), the other the Communist Revolution, to cope with.”

From the housemaster came a muffled snarl, from Kerridge a deep-toned bay of gentlemanly protest.

“But, sir, do you consider it seemly to speak in the same breath of this foul blackguard, this guttersnipe who has seized power in Germany with … with
anybody
?”

“Upon what plane, sir, are we discussing this? Upon the plane of contemporary political passion, or as History sees these things: not
subjectively
, sir, but
subspecie aeternitatis
.”

“
Subspecie aeternitatis
fiddlesticks! How can you bring eternity in to supply a monster like that with admission to a place where he can meet saints and heroes upon equal terms? I am ashamed, sir, to be sitting at a table …”

“No, Grattan-Brock, do not allow yourself …”

“It is quite clear now,” said René coldly, “upon what plane this discussion is to proceed: upon the plane, that is, of passion, not of reason.”

Helen’s voice rose full of an unexpected sharpness and firmness. “But what is all this about? Will you allow a mere woman to ask a few questions? I cannot quite see what my brother’s offence is. He is a historian, not a political writer. You, Robert, and you too, sir, I gather, are exclusively politically minded. You are talking at cross-purposes.”

“Classification is one of the historians’ tasks,” René said. “My only offence was, in the course of classification, to put the Iron Chancellor No. II (whose military obsessions I detest as much as you do), to put Herr Hitler in his right pigeon-hole. He has often been compared with Martin Luther. Quite apart from whether one admires or detests these two figures, as a historian, the comparison appears to me erroneous. The soldier-saint seemed to me a far better choice. Oh, gentlemen, please.” René half rose in his chair, holding up a hand. “This is not to say that the German Chancellor is a
saint
.”

Helen laughed. “You two seem to be taking up a most unreasonable attitude. This Führer (little beast though he is) has a certain place in history, which may be defined and measured. He has to be pigeonholed, however much we would wish he could be abolished. Just as he has to be shaved, and measured for suits.”

“I am afraid, my dear lady …”

“Most unfortunate illustrations. I do wish, Helen, you would not talk nonsense.” Kerridge bayed disgustedly his complaint.

“You can’t just slap down anything you don’t like,” René told him.

“I hope Robert will digest that,” Helen laughed.

“We are devoting too much attention to one point,” Kerridge began. “There are plenty of
other
things in
The Secret History of
World War II
.” Kerridge looked at Grattan-Brock. “Are there not, Doctor?”

“I was thinking just now, sir,” Dr. Grattan-Brock was addressing himself to René, “where classification is in question, that your
Secret History
, sir, can only be classified as a political work.You are as much a politician, sir, as we are politicians.”

René’s urbanity unimpaired, he turned towards the sour and quarrelsome pseudo-eighteenth-century personality at his side, and observed, “In finding myself classified, sir, as one of you, I suppose I should feel flattered. I am afraid I am unable to return the compliment and invite you over into my class. You belong irrevocably, sir, to the subjective order: I might add to those who, with shouts and brandished fists, throw any argument down on to a lower plane, out of reach of Reason’s arbitrament.”

“Order, order!” called Kerridge roughly. “Are you describing my guest as a brawler and a bully? If so, I must really ask you …”

René rose. “I will immediately comply. I will withdraw to my room.You have asked me to sit at this table in order to attack me: because I do not tamely submit, you ask me to leave it.” He looked the Wicked Giant in the eye. “It is extraordinary behaviour for a clergyman.” He moved round the table towards the door.

Kerridge sprang up, crying, “Now look here, René.
This
is extraordinary behaviour if you like! Do please be sensible and come back and sit down.”

René, standing with his band upon the handle of the door, answered quietly, “If you will allow me to make a few remarks, without interruption, I will return to my seat.”

A sound similar to the rumbling of the stomach came from the housemaster: at the same time Kerridge, who had resumed his seat, declared, “As many remarks as you like, my dear fellow. Why should anyone interrupt you? It is not every day that we have a famous author among us.”

René walked back to his place to the right of his sister, who gave his arm a quick squeeze as he sat down. Everyone looked at him with various expressions.“As I have been accorded permission to deliver a short lecture …”

“No lectures at dinner-table, not that,” sang rubberneck.

“Yes, I was going to say …!” came a Johnsonian rumble.

“All right then. It shall be table talk, it doesn’t make any difference, provided I have my two hundred words in silence.”

“Shoot!” His mouth bitterly twisted, all teeth showing, the clergyman sat back derisively.

“Herr Hitler’s air-fleet will doubtless smash up large areas of our capital. Our air-force is so inferior in strength (for some reason) that that seems inevitable. Why a few brigades of British and French troops did not march into Germany, at the time of the Rhineland coup, why Hitler was not made prisoner, and the whole Nazi movement forcibly liquidated no one knows, at least I do not. Let me say about this by now very powerful and menacing politician, the Führer, that my indictment of him is mainly on the ground of his insane militarism, and belief in force.This boils down to terrorism. Many people express a more or less insincere horror of the fact that he is a dictator. There is however one man who is at least ten times as complete a dictator as he: and there is much dictatorial power elsewhere. Myself, I object absolutely to political terrorism and philosophies of force. And war as well as other forms of organized violence belongs, for me, to the Dark Ages. I am not violent myself, because I am a civilized man. So far, so good. Now what I find is that those who are most juicily ferocious in their denunciation of the German leaders are themselves adherents, or part adherents, of a terroristic philosophy.This appears to me hypocritical. Hypocrisy is a thing for which I feel a great distaste.”

René stood up. “Now, I will retire to my room.” He stepped back and, without hurrying, left the room.

As he was leaving, Kerridge laughed bitterly, saying, “I am afraid that my brother-in-law has always been a man of violent gestures. The French blood, I suppose. Oh, I apologize, darling.”

“The man is a thug,” exploded the housemaster, whose glass had never stood empty, Kerridge had seen to that.

Helen now rose, exclaiming rather hotly, “Now I shall go to my room, too,” and moved off quickly in the wake of her brother, her husband shouting, “But, Helen darling; you simply cannot leave us like that, we have a guest. It is impossible for you to do this!”

He, in turn, moved towards the door, and so, in a few moments, there was no one in the room but the housemaster who, with a wheeze, grasped his wine glass fiercely, and emptied it at a gulp.

IX
HOW MUCH CAN WE
AFFORD TO JETTISON?

T
he next morning just after eleven o’clock the Reverend Robert Kerridge was exhibiting proudly his fine dental Christianity to a fair-sized congregation in Starbrook Church — about twenty-five or thirty women Christians, appreciative of his well-toothed and Oxford accent. About the same time René and his sister sat in a taxicab, chatting about Kerridge, on their way to Rugby station.

Almost as soon as the cab had started, Helen had asked her brother’s forgiveness for the disgusting scene of the night before. “It was perfectly awful, I have never seen or imagined anything so vile. And I just cannot understand it. I do hope, René, that you will try and think of us without thinking of that. It was utterly unlike Robert; I believe that he was temporarily out of his senses. He was abjectly apologetic this morning.”

René stopped her with a most hearty laugh. “No apology whatever is required of you — for you to apologize is absurd. I owe you my deepest gratitude for rescuing me from a dragon.”

“A dragon? I believe you are capable of dealing with any dragon.” And she glanced sideways in a complimentary way at the Preux.

René shook his head. “I am afraid not. There was a moment when I first caught sight of it, that I had that St. George-like feeling. But no — now I know better.”

“What is all this, brother, about mythological monsters?”

“Well, a dragon has made its appearance in this century. It is not a reptilian animal about fifty yards long which spits fire. It is a far bigger animal than that, and a far more subtle one. It is, if you like, a mental animal: one may identify it, almost see its fiery being in the minds of men. I have seen it, I have felt it. For a long time now I have known of its existence. I know why it is here, I am afraid of it. I recommend you very earnestly not to interfere with it, pretend you do not see it, and if you do so, you have nothing to fear from it. Sidestep if you can its tumults, its earthquakes, its thunderbolts.”