John Christopher - The Death of Grass

“Yes,” Ann said, “it could have been us instead. Isn’t that what you mean? We had forgotten them again. And probably in another five minutes we shall have found some other excuse for forgetting them.”

David crumpled the grass in his hand, and threw it into the river. It sped away on the swiftly flowing Lepe.

“Nothing else we can do,” he said.

Ann, who was dummy {26} 26 dummy: in bridge, the hand of a dealer or dealer’s partner, turned up and played by the declarer , switched the wireless on for the nine o’clock news. John had landed in a three no-trumps contract which they could not possibly make, chiefly to shut out Roger and Olivia, who only wanted thirty for game and rubber {27} 27 rubber: three successive games (or two games won by the same side) between sides or persons in bridge . John frowned over his cards.

Roger Buckley said boisterously: “Come on, old boy! What about finessing {28} 28 finessing: playing the lower card with the hope of winning the trick (though still holding a higher card) that nine?”

Roger was the only one of John’s old Army friends with whom he had kept in close touch. Ann had not cared for him on first acquaintance, and longer experience had not moved her towards anything more than tolerance. She disliked his general air of schoolboyish high spirits almost as much as his rarer moments of savage depression, and she disliked still more what she saw as the essential hardness that stood behind both aspects of his outward personality.

She was reasonably sure that he knew what her feelings were, and discounted them—as he did so many things—as unimportant. In the past, this had added further to her dislike, and but for one thing she would have weaned John away from the friendship.

The one thing was Olivia. When Roger, fairly soon after her first meeting with him, had brought along this rather large, placid, shy girl, introducing her as his fiancée, Ann had been surprised, but confident that this engagement—the latest of several by John’s report—would never end in marriage. She had been wrong in that. She had befriended Olivia in the first place in anticipation that Roger would leave her stranded, and subsequently so that she could be in a position to protect her when, after marriage, Roger showed his true colours {29} 29 true colours: real characteristics or thoughts . She had been humiliated to find, by degrees, not only that Olivia continued to enjoy what seemed to be an entirely happy marriage, but also that she herself had come to depend a great deal on Olivia’s warm quiet understanding in her own minor crises. Without liking Roger any more, she was more willing to put up with him on account of Olivia.

John led a small diamond towards King—Jack in dummy. Olivia placidly set down an eight. John hesitated, and then brought down the Jack. With a triumphant chuckle, Roger dropped the Queen on top of it.

From the radio, a voice said, in B.B.C. accents:

“The United Nations {30} 30 United Nations: formed from the nations who defeated Italy, Germany and Japan in World War II (1939–45). Emergency Committee on China, in its interim report published today, has stated that the lowest possible figure for deaths in the China famine must be set at two hundred million people…”

Roger said: “Dummy looks a bit weak in hearts. I think we might try them out.”

Ann said: “Two hundred million! It’s unbelievable.”

“What’s two hundred million?” Roger asked. “There’s an awful lot of Chinks in China. They’ll breed ’em back again in a couple of generations.”

Ann had encountered Roger’s cynicism in argument before, and preferred not to do so at this moment. Her mind was engaged with the horrors of her own imagination.

“A further item of the report,” the announcer’s voice continued, “reveals that field tests {31} 31 field tests: practical demonstrations with Isotope {32} 32 isotope: one or more forms (of an element) with the same atomic number, same chemical properties etc., but differing in atomic weight and in nuclear properties such as radioactivity 717 have shown an almost complete control of the Chung-Li virus. The spraying of all rice fields with this isotope is to be carried out as an urgent operation by the newly constituted United Nations Air Relief Wing. Supplies of the isotope are expected to be adequate to cover all the rice fields immediately threatened within a few days, and the remainder within a month.”

“Thank God for that,” John said.

“When you’ve finished the Magnificat {33} 33 Magnificat: Hymn of the Virgin Mary (Luke 1:46-55) ,” Roger said, “you might cover that little heart.”

In mild protest, Olivia said: “Roger!”

“Two hundred million,” John said. “A sizeable monument to human pride and stubbornness. If they’d let our people work on the virus six months earlier they would have been alive now.”

“Talking of sizeable monuments to human pride,” Roger said, “and since you insist on stalling before you bring that Ace of hearts out, how’s your own little Taj Mahal {34} 34 Taj Mahal: the massive, splendid mausoleum at Agra, India, built in the 17th century by the Mogul Emperor Shah Jahan in memory of his favourite wife going? I hear rumours of labour troubles.”

“Is there anything you don’t hear?”

Roger was Public Relations Officer to the Ministry of Production. He lived in a world of gossip and whitewash {35} 35 whitewash: concealment of faults or errors that fostered, Ann thought, his natural inhumanity.

“Nothing of importance,” Roger said. “Do you think you’ll get it finished on time?”

“Tell your Minister,” John said, “to tell his colleague that he need have no fears. His plush-lined suite will be ready for him right on the dot.”

“The question,” Roger commented, “is whether the colleague will be ready for it.”

“Another rumour?”

“I wouldn’t call it a rumour. Of course, he might turn out to have an axe-proof neck. It will be interesting to see.”

“Roger,” Ann asked, “do you get a great deal of pleasure out of the contemplation of human misfortune?”

She was sorry, as soon as she had said it, that she had let herself be provoked into reacting. Roger fixed her with an amused eye; he had a deceptively mild face with a chin that, from some angles, appeared to recede, and large brown eyes.

“I’m the little boy who never grew up,” he said. “When you were my age, you probably laughed too at fat men sliding on banana skins. Now you think of them breaking their necks and leaving behind despairing wives and a horde of under-nourished children. You must let me go on enjoying my toys as best I can.”

Olivia said: “He’s hopeless. You mustn’t mind him, Ann.”

She spoke with the amused tolerance an indulgent mother might show towards a naughty child. But what was suitable in relation to a child, Ann thought with irritation, was not therefore to be regarded as an adequate way of dealing with a morally backward adult.

Still watching Ann, Roger continued: “The thing all you adult, sensitive people must bear in mind is that things are on your side at present—you live in a world where everything’s in favour of being sensitive and civilized. But it’s a precarious business. Look at the years China’s been civilized, and look what’s just happened out there. When the belly starts rumbling, the belly-laugh comes into its own again.”

“I’m inclined to agree,” John said. “You’re a throwback {36} 36 throwback: living in the past , Roger.”