Lawrence Durrell - The Alexandria Quartet

“Is this Quaite Naice?” and my books never seem to pass the test.’ SCOBIE’S COMMON USAGE Expressions noted from Scobie’s quaint conversation, his use of certain words, as: Vivid , meaning ‘angry’, ex.: ‘Don’t be so vivid, old man.’ Mauve , meaning ‘silly’, ex.: ‘He was just plain mauve when it came to, etc’ Spoof , meaning ‘trick’, ex.: ‘Don’t spoof me, old boy.’ Ritual , meaning ‘habit, form’, ex.: ‘We all wear them. It’s ritual for the police.’ Squalid , meaning ‘very elated’, ex.: ‘Toby was squalid with joy when the news came.’ Septic , meaning ‘unspeakable’, ex.: ‘What septic weather today!’ Saffron Walden , meaning ‘male brothel’, ex.: ‘He was caught in a Saffron Walden, old man, covered in jam.’ Cloud Cuckoo , meaning ‘male prostitute’, ex.: ‘Budgie says there’s not a cloud cuckoo in the whole of Horsham. He’s advertised.’ WORKPOINTS

‘How many lovers since Pygmalion have been able to build their beloved’s face out of flesh, as Amaril has?’ asked Clea. The great folio of noses so lovingly copied for him to choose from — Nefertiti to Cleopatra. The readings in a darkened room.

* * * Narouz always held in the back of his consciousness the memory of the moonlit room; his father sitting in the wheel—chair at the mirror, repeating the one phrase over and over again as he pointed the pistol at the looking-glass.

* * * Mountolive was swayed by the dangerous illusion that now at last he was free to conceive and act — the one misjudgement which decides the fate of a diplomat.

* * * Nessim said sadly: ‘All motive is mixed. You see, from the moment I married her, a Jewess, all their reservations disappeared and they ceased to suspect me. I do not say it was the only reason.

Love is a wonderfully luxuriant plant, but unclassifiable really, fading as it does into mysticism on the one side and naked cupidity on the other.’

* * * This now explained something to me which had hitherto puzzled me; namely that after his death Da Capo’s huge library was moved over to Smyrna, book by book. Balthazar did the packing and posting.

* Page 298 From Eugene Marais’s The Soul of The White Ant.

A CLAUDE

τ ὸ ὄνομα τοῦ ἄγαθοῦ διάμονος

NOTE All the characters and situations described in this book (a sibling to Justine and Balthazar and the third volume of a quartet) are purely imaginary.

I have exercised a novelist’s right in taking a few necessary liberties with modern Middle Eastern history and the staff-structure of the Diplomatic Service.

As a junior of exceptional promise, he had been sent to Egypt for a year in order to improve his Arabic and found himself attached to the High Commission as a sort of scribe to await his first diplomatic posting; but he was already conducting himself as a young secretary of legation, fully aware of the responsibilities of future office. Only somehow today it was rather more difficult than usual to be reserved, so exciting had the fish-drive become.

He had in fact quite forgotten about his once-crisp tennis flannels and college blazer and the fact that the wash of bilge rising through the floorboards had toe-capped his white plimsolls with a black stain. In Egypt one seemed to forget oneself continually like this. He blessed the chance letter of introduction which had brought him to the Hosnani lands, to the rambling oldfashioned house built upon a network of lakes and embankments near Alexandria. Yes.

The punt which now carried him, thrust by slow thrust across the turbid water, was turning slowly eastward to take up its position in the great semicircle of boats which was being gradually closed in upon a target-area marked out by the black reed spines of fish-pans. And as they closed in, stroke by stroke, the Egyptian night fell — the sudden reduction of all objects to bas-reliefs upon a screen of gold and violet. The land had become dense as tapestry in the lilac afterglow, quivering here and there with water mirages from the rising damps, expanding and contracting horizons, until one thought of the world as being mirrored in a soap-bubble trembling on the edge of disappearance. Voices too across the water sounded now loud, now soft and clear. His own cough fled across the lake in sudden wing-beats. Dusk, yet it was still hot; his shirt stuck to his back. The spokes of darkness which reached out to them only outlined the shapes of the reed-fringed islands, which punctuated the water like great pincushions, like paws, like hassocks.

Slowly, at the pace of prayer or meditation, the great arc of boats was forming and closing in, but with the land and the water liquefying at this rate he kept having the illusion that they were travelling across the sky rather than across the alluvial waters of Mareotis. And out of sight he could hear the splatter of geese, and in one corner water and sky split apart as a flight rose, trailing its webs across the estuary like seaplanes, honking crassly.

Mountolive sighed and stared down into the brown water, chin on his hands. He was unused to feeling so happy. Youth is the age of despairs.

Behind him he could hear the hare-lipped younger brother Narouz grunting at every thrust of the pole while the lurch of the boat echoed in his loins. The mud, thick as molasses, dripped back into the water with a slow flob flob , and the pole sucked lusciously. It was very beautiful, but it all stank so: yet to his surprise he found he rather enjoyed the rotting smells of the estuary. Draughts of wind from the far sealine ebbed around them from time to time, refreshing the mind. Choirs of gnats whizzed up there like silver rain in the eye of the dying sun. The cobweb of changing light fired his mind. ‘Narouz’ he said, ‘I am so happy’ as he listened to his own unhurried heartbeats. The youth gave his shy hissing laugh and said: ‘Good, good’ ducking his head. ‘But this is nothing. Wait. We are closing in.’ Mountolive smiled. ‘Egypt’ he said to himself as one might repeat the name of a woman. ‘Egypt.’

‘Over there’ said Narouz in his hoarse, melodious voice ‘the ducks are not ruses , do you know?’ (His English was imperfect and stilted.) ‘For the poaching of them, it is easy (you say ‘poaching’ don’t you?) You dive under them and take them by the legs.

Easier than shooting, eh? If you wish, tomorrow we will go.’ He grunted again at the pole and sighed.

‘What about snakes?’ said Mountolive. He had seen several large ones swimming about that afternoon.

Narouz squared his stout shoulders and chuckled. ‘No snakes’ he said and laughed once more.

Mountolive turned sideways to rest his cheek on the wood of the prow. Out of the corner of his eye he could see his companion standing up as he poled, and study the hairy arms and hands, the sturdy braced legs. ‘Shall I take a turn?’ he asked in Arabic. He had already noticed how much pleasure it gave his hosts when he spoke to them in their native tongue. Their answers, smilingly given, were a sort of embrace. ‘Shall I?’