Guilty: The Lost Classic Novel Page 9

  But this is disconnected from the boy I was at the time, whose thoughts and feelings were still partially childish. I couldn’t help thinking now and again what bad luck my father had had in returning from his long search for peace just in time for the most frightful war we’d ever experienced. If the thought of my own responsibility were anywhere in the background (as, after Jaggers’s remarks, it seems that it must have been), my consciousness carefully censored it. There was no time for brooding over personal feelings, as everyone was immediately conscripted for some work useful to the community, in which I, as a prefect and member of the sixth, was expected to take a leading part. At first, the junior boys, and some seniors who should have known better, were in an excited state, apt to look upon this divergence from the norm as a sort of prolonged picnic. Such jobs as digging potatoes and even indoor chores seemed a pleasant change from ordinary classwork, especially as time off was allowed for games and swimming and resting from the hot sun. But, under our stern supervision, the febrile excitement which infected the youngsters, often making them obstreperous and hard to control, gradually subsided, and even they began to get some inkling of the seriousness of what was going on and to share the anxiety of their elders, many of whom were moody or depressed, disguising fears for their families under an assumed toughness.

  Of course, I suffered like other people from these emotional disturbances, for which the heat seemed such a perfect breeding ground. I had no worries over my parents’ safety, knowing our isolated cottage to be far outside any possible target area. But the old story of my father’s switch to pacifism – which everyone else had most likely forgotten – revived in my memory and made me extremely touchy, imagining people suspected me of cowardice in consequence and only refrained from saying so because of the Head’s words all that time ago. And I was impelled to disprove the unmade accusation by demonstrating my courage and militancy in various extreme ways.

  For instance, I was the first to volunteer for the boundary patrols, which soon came under my leadership altogether. And my repeated requests led to the issue of rifles from the Cadet Corps and to our being authorized to use them in case of need. Our instructions were, as long as ammunition was plentiful, to fire one preliminary warning shot, but if supplies dwindled this was to be dispensed with. Fortunately it never came to this; we never had to fire twice. But, whenever I handled a rifle, I felt guilty, wondering what my father would think if he knew I was quite ready to shoot to kill – and defenceless, starving people of my own country at that, whose only crime was their sufferings – and had persuaded or forced other boys to bear arms with the same object.

  On the sixth day after the first bomb fell, rumours of an armistice became so strong that, though we were strictly forbidden to take any notice of such tales, one could hardly disregard them, especially since they didn’t expire in the usual way to be replaced by others but persisted and strengthened as time went on. People were always asking me, in my capacity as patrol leader and prefect, whether there was any truth in the story; and they obviously remained unconvinced when I replied that I knew no more than they did.

  All the next day the rumours went on. And the following day they were almost overwhelming, and all to the same effect. But I forgot them in my amazement at being sent for by the Headmaster, for the first time in the whole of my school career. On the way to his study, I was conceited enough to believe he might be going to congratulate me on my zealousness in patrolling the walls and maintaining discipline and morale, for I could imagine no other reason why he should want to see me.

  But it was obvious as soon as I entered that his hostility was unchanged. Barely glancing at me, he acknowledged my salute only with a curt nod, while he went on writing at his desk in front of the open window. Outside there, I could see the chessmen, at their most mocking, crowd one behind the other to peer in derisively at me, as though all the centuries-old malice, which should have been distributed over the whole human race, had been concentrated on me alone.

  It shows how far from normal our reactions were at this time that I should have thought the man at the desk could be in league with these trees and had deliberately planned to subject me to the barrage of their spectral contempt. Though I looked away from the window and forced myself to keep calm, I became increasingly conscious of the uncanny disparagement out of doors, which, against all natural laws, reached me from a different category of existence, and I felt a fine perspiration break out on my forehead, though it was cool in the room.

  Suddenly the Head looked up, fixed upon me an unrelenting gaze, without recognition, as if he’d never seen me before, and said in an icy voice, ‘Your protectors have seen fit to inform me that an armistice has been signed. I shall give out the news at lunchtime. I was instructed to tell you privately to expect a visit sometime during the day. That’s all. You may go.’

  To my disorganized brain, the sight of his implacable face seemed like a confirmation of the triumphant philosophy of hate, already paramount in the world, and, though it registered the meaning of what he’d said, this for the moment was put aside, as, without a word, I saluted again and left the room. My equilibrium slowly returned as the distance increased between me and the remorseless antagonism of the man, so much older and wiser than I, who, after so many years, could still look upon me as an enemy and a stranger with such assurance of rectitude; but, still unable to face the antique deriding presences of the chess-garden, which I identified with him, I walked a long way round to my study and remained there in a very queer frame of mind till the bell rang for lunch.

  The news of the armistice, as the Head gave it out, aroused very little excitement in his hearers, who had already, for the past week, been experiencing the maximum excitement of which they were capable. And, in any case, demonstrations of rejoicing, or even of relief, were forbidden. Our troubles, and those of our country, were far from over, he told us ominously; indeed, the worst might still be to come. There was to be no relaxation of the defensive measures we had adopted; so, when the time came, I went out with my rifle to patrol the wide boundary wall.

  A part of my daily duty was to assign new stations to everyone there, on the assumption that the eye, growing accustomed to a particular view, transmitted to the brain a sense of familiarity, resulting in a slackening of the protective mechanism. Remembering the visitors I’d been told to expect, I myself took a position commanding an extensive view of the road, from the point where it left the forest borders and crossed the flat cultivated ground to our gates. The post happened to be one I hadn’t occupied before; but the prolonged heat wave had given a depressing sameness to every vista, a barren brown lifelessness, the trees already autumnal, their leaves falling or turning yellow as if scorched by invisible flames. For the first time since the patrols began, I felt profoundly apprehensive; the appearance of a belligerent crowd, bent on vicious attack, wouldn’t have been half so alarming as the prospect of this coming encounter with people unknown to me but doubtless connected with the ‘authorities’ of the Head’s original oration. My recent interview with him, short as it had been, seemed to have resurrected and infused with new life obscure semi-superstitious fears of childhood I’d almost forgotten. Once more I felt vulnerable, lonely, outside the pale, as I’d done years ago; unfit to love or be loved, overshadowed by some obscure nightmare menace beyond my understanding. Deep within me, old remembered horrors opened their bleeding throats like wounds. The personality I’d built up through the years, the sixth-form prefect, confident and admired, on good terms with people, had been no more than a ghost, exorcized by a single glance. The Head’s inexorable expression, his cold look that had turned me into an enemy stranger, had also made me a stranger to myself and to this world of school in which I’d believed I was at home. I was an intruder here; I had never been accepted. And now, looking back, I seemed to remember seeing similar hostile distrustful looks on many faces beside his. I remembered silences when I’d entered a room, topics suddenly dropped, because the speakers could
not go on speaking freely before a stranger suspected of being a traitor.

  If, as I half believed, the Headmaster was in spiritual communication with the green monstrous shapes outside his window, he must have been highly amused by the torment they’d devised for me between them, reducing me to the victim of childish terrors I’d thought I had long outgrown, as I waited, in fear and trembling, for the nightmare visitors I couldn’t even imagine. Presently, shamed out of my abasement, I started to patrol the section of wall under my supervision, as each of us was supposed to do at least once while on duty; and the effort of keeping my balance exchanged occult fears for the more bearable fear of the laughter I should arouse by toppling into the currant bushes below or the nettles outside the wall. I had a few words with my next-door neighbour, who seemed gratifyingly friendly, and was feeling much more confident when I returned to my post.

  Could the war really be over so soon? I wondered. So little did we know then of its horrors that it was possible for me, with childish autism, to regret the return of peace, which to me then meant only going back to my parents and all the business of our proposed departure that war had providentially shelved. I was so far from realizing the chaos into which the whole world had been thrown that, though vaguely envisaging some delay, I quite expected ships to be carrying passengers about the globe as before.

  Noticing a change in the light, I looked up and saw that, as usual, the cloudless sky, out of which the sun had all day been blazing down, had grown overcast with the approach of evening. Very soon the sun would go down, which meant, as far as I was concerned, that it would soon be too late for visitors to arrive from the city. I started to feel relieved; then, to make sure nobody was in sight, carefully surveyed the stretch of country before me. Finding it empty, I again raised my eyes to the sky.

  Every evening the same thing happened. Once again the great anthracite-coloured clouds had piled stealthily in the west. But now a change was occurring: a few thin unexpected rays fanned out above and sprayed the vacant landscape with their expiring light, a weird radiance in which details emerged with a trick-like strangeness, as if flood-lit.

  Nothing about the view had as yet actually changed; the grey-black head of cloud still obscured the sky, wearing its rayed diadem; the drab stretch of country, the thinning trees, were just the same. Only the solid permanence of reality seemed to have gone and with it all that made sense to my understanding – the reliability of appearances on which sanity depends. It can’t be real, I thought blankly, staring at the approaching car like an hallucination. Already within our gates, it came in a cloud of yellowish dust along the road just below me at a speed that must have made it difficult for the occupants to distinguish between the young figures posted along the wall. On it came unhesitatingly, to stop directly beneath the spot where I stood.

  Simultaneously the descending sun reached a crack between cloud and horizon and through this narrow aperture, to my confusion, hurled its last light in a lurid flare, distorting everything, and falsifying proportions, so that for a moment I seemed to see the world through the eyes of a child on a bank, apprehensively looking down at the great black beetle-like car filling the narrow lane, a queer medicinal scent teasing my memory with its elusive association – before I could catch it, three people got out of the car now below me.

  This was certainly a mistake. There ought not to be three, I wished to protest. One of them I knew I should recognize; I did recognize Mr Spector, though he seemed different in some way, strange. Before I’d decided what was strange about him, his accustomed appearance reassembled itself, the two superfluous armed figures ceased to perplex me, I was dazzled no longer. Suddenly I saw my surroundings real, concrete again, in dun-coloured dusk; while, apparently dissociated from everything and instantly lost, the thought came to me that the child I’d once been wasn’t yet so completely forgotten that he could be considered dead.

  The sun had set now. All unreality and distortion ended, I once more stood on the wall in my proper self, looking down at my old friend and his armed escort.

  Of course it was Mr Spector, I thought, jumping down and hurrying through the currant bushes with outstretched hand. What a perfect fool I’d been to imagine anyone else could conceivably be the first to reach us with news from outside. My old belief in the man’s infallibility had returned, and I felt drawn most warmly towards him. My childish fears now seemed utterly ludicrous. I was so happy just to see him again that I found myself saying, ‘How splendid of you to come.’

  He didn’t seem surprised at this unusual display of boyish enthusiasm on my part, accepting it, as he accepted my hand, with a faint enigmatic smile. Yet I wasn’t disappointed: this was his most attractive, most benevolent self; there was no need for him to say anything; it was as if he exuded goodwill, convincing me, without a word or a sign, of his unchangeable friendliness.

  Though I’d drifted away from him during recent years, as I had from my mother, allowing the world of school to absorb my emotions as well as my interest, I’d always remained aware of his ultimate importance to me, which was, in changing circumstances, the one unalterable certainty. I knew now that the years between didn’t matter, our intimacy being established upon a plane unaffected by temporary ups and downs. Impulsively I started questioning him about the course of events, but he silenced me by a gesture, told one of his attendants to take my place on the wall and returned to the car, signing to me to follow. As I obeyed him, a faint sense of repetition touched me with the eerie proximity of long-forgotten events, as though the past was gathering around us in the dusk. Then, banishing all such imponderables, Mr Spector asked where we could talk without danger of interruption, and I directed him to drive on a little way to the enclosed rickyard, to which nobody ever came at this hour.

  His wish for privacy rather surprised me. But I felt no apprehension, looking at him with implicit trust, waiting for him to speak. It was years since I’d felt this particular sort of warm, confiding affection that made me eager to do whatever he asked, without question, to throw in my lot with him, without reservation of any kind. I’d almost forgotten that he could be so endearing at times, so that his goodwill seemed more valuable than anything in the world.

  Looking back from this distance of time, I’ve no doubt whatsoever that he knew exactly what I was feeling and quite likely had induced me to feel as I did, for he kept his eyes on me all the time, turning sideways to do it and leaning against the window, his arms lying across the wheel, his long legs stretched out across mine. It was getting darker each moment, but a lingering gleam of sunset was on his face, enabling me to distinguish the piercing brightness of his eyes and his fixed expression, which combined sadness with affection. To my surprise, his large, cool, powerful hand closed over my own, pressing it encouragingly for a second before he said, ‘I’ve brought you bad news, Mark, I’m afraid – the worst possible news.’

  His voice was melancholy, grave and sincere. I couldn’t doubt that he meant precisely what he’d just said. But the strength of my personal feeling for him – or, if you like, of his influence over me – transcended everything else. I was neither alarmed nor especially curious about his news. The simple fact of sitting here beside him was far more important, enclosing me in happy serenity and security, safe from all my former agitations and fears.

  I couldn’t bear to interrupt this peaceful happy intimate moment. It was one of those moments of conscious respite and relaxation, made more poignant by the knowledge of coming trials, that one longs instinctively to extend into infinity. However, I knew I must resist the temptation to abandon myself to it, and, returning with an unwilling effort to world affairs, asked naïvely, ‘Have we lost the war?’

  ‘That, too.’

  In strange contrast to my own almost indifferent question, the two words, heavily spoken with a dying fall, sounded so ominous that I was startled at last. They pointed clearly to some other disaster, concerning me more directly; but what catastrophe could have occurred grievous enough t
o merit that gloomy tone or to be mentioned in the same breath as a nation’s fall?

  ‘My father … ?’ Once my thoughts had turned in the direction of pacifism they began running away with me, imagining all sorts of disturbing eventualities. Perhaps he’d led hostile demonstrations against the authorities; perhaps he’d spoken in public against the war, trying to convert people to his own views; perhaps he’d engaged in subversive activities (whatever they were); perhaps he was to be put in gaol or even shot as a traitor …

  ‘He was caught on the first day, by the first bomb.’

  This quiet statement arrested my sensational guesses and covered me with confusion and shame. I was thankful there wasn’t enough light to reveal the flush I could feel on my cheeks as guilt and remorse overwhelmed me. How could I have been thinking these shameful thoughts about my father, who had suffered an experience so horrific I couldn’t even begin to imagine it? Suddenly it struck me that even now I wasn’t thinking of him but always of my own reactions and feelings. Such egotism really dismayed me; and, to escape from it, I asked quickly and without thinking what I was saying whether he had been injured.

  ‘Killed.’

  The shock of the single crude word hit me like a stone. Involuntarily I winced and shuddered, taking it as either a reproof or an accusation, assuming that Mr Spector was aware of my heartless thoughts. Immediately afterwards I found myself thinking: Of course; as though my father’s death were inevitable and I’d known for a long time that it would happen like this. Yet, at the same time, I knew I hadn’t grasped it so far as an actual fact, and the two conflicting ideas confused me. What was I supposed to do or say now? I was aware of having been silent too long already, but no suitable words came to me. I tried out one or two sentences in my head and rejected them as inadequate.