Iris Murdoch - An Unofficial rose

It was tea-time. It seemed to be always tea-time at Emma's. The weather had changed and it was a bleak windy day, and tugged-at leaves and whirling branches knew that summer was defeated and departing. Outside the window the little evergreen garden tossed itself about in a tumultuous undulating mass of dark shapes. The wind came in sudden roars and whines. In the room a fan heater purred, mingling its faint rattle with the now perpetual noises inside Hugh's head. He had just made the tea and brought it in. Emma was sitting in her usual chair. She had a new dress on, or at any rate one which Hugh had not seen before, and looked singularly handsome. The dress was of a dark fine very light tweed with a thin green stripe, cut wide and long in the skirt like all her dresses. Leaning back, the silver-topped cane in its place, her frizzy grey hair more orderly than usual like a contrived and generous wig, she seemed something remote, something French, something vastly clever and timeless out of some courtly world of ceremony and sophistication. Tender, admiring, covetous, and unreasoningly pleased with himself, he took her good looks as an omen and as a tribute.

She looked at him with the air of resolute vagueness which he had come to know, and said, 'Would you pour out the tea, dear? I just don't feel strong enough. I'm sure you've made it beautifully.

Hugh poured out. 'Now don't put me off this time, Emma. Don't treat me as if I scarcely existed. Talk to me properly. I deserve some real speech.

'Real speech? she said. 'You're bullying me.

'Me bullying you, for God's sake, when you haven't seen me in weeks? And you know how much I want from you.

'Oh yes. You were the one who wanted, roughly; everything. The second time round. She laughed her shrill little laugh.

He edged his chair closer. 'Well, what about it, Emma?

She turned to stare at him, her eyes heavy with some sad extinguished light. 'I could never decide in the old days whether you were cliv'inely simple or just stupid.

'What do you think now?

'I don't know. Perhaps that you are divinely stupid and God loves fools. Perhaps God is a fool. Could you fetch me those tablets, please, from the desk.

He fetched them and stood fidgeting, aware of himself as stout and shambling before her. He was vaguely conscious of the room as looking different. 'Why must we always fight? Why can't we be at peace together at last? Why do you always try to confuse me?

'This isn't fighting, Hugh. I've been very gentle with you. I haven't struck you once, really to hurt. Though I could. As for the other, you are so adorably confusable. C' est plus fort que moi. She swallowed a tablet with a gulp of tea.

'Talk to me properly! He let his voice now entreat her shamelessly.

Emma was still looking up at him sadly. Then as if shaking herself into an effort, she said, 'You want some real speech, do you? All right I'll see what I can arrange. Do you notice anything different in this room?

He looked about him. There were many new things. The but too symbolically stripped look which the room had worn as a result of Lindsay's depredations had quite gone. There were new rugs, a new bookcase, a new writing-desk in the window, cushions, miniatures, Chinese vases, which had not been there before, and on every level surface were scattered little specks of treasure in gilt and silver and glass. The room had put on its attire again, it was adorned like a bride.

'Good heavens! said Hugh.

'You are an unobservant chap, you know.

'Is it — for me? he said. He was moved, and also sad that he had not thought himself to bring her armfuls of expensive knick-knacks to fill those empty spaces..

'No, it's not for you, said Emma. 'It's for Jocelyn.

'For who?

'For Jocelyn. Jocelyn Gaster. She's my new companion. Lindsay's successor.

'What? said Hugh. He glared down at her with anxiety and suspicion.

'Well, really, said Emma, 'your inability to think about anyone but yourself is really colossal. How do you think I can manage without a companion?

'But the whole point was —

'That you were to have the job? But that would never have done.

I need so much attention. And you're so unpractical, you know. Would you like to see a picture of her? She pointed to a thick envelope on a near-by table. Hugh brought it to her and she drew out a large photograph and put it in his hand.

Hugh saw a dark tousled boyish-looking girl with an arrogant ironical face. He laid the photo down. 'Well, I think you might —’

'I wanted. to be sure she'd come, said Emma, speaking quickly. 'I always ask them to send photos. She's handsome, isn't she? Such a clever face. And her dossier is good too. Second in Mods and a third in Greats. That seems all right, doesn't it? Somerville, of course. I like them to be well educated. r took Lindsay plutat pour ses beaux yeux. But Jocelyn is really cultivated as well, and awfully nice. She starts work next week.

Hugh stood before her looking down at the dog-mask of her face in which the eyes burned so sadly and anxiously. Did he see there pity or cruelty? He felt with a gloomy foreboding that he was near the truth with her. 'Emma, why clid you come to Grayhallock?

'Oh that, she said, with the same emphasis as if he were always mentioning the irrelevant. 'I had my reasons.

'What were your reasons?

'Is this real speech? All right, let us go on. I wanted to see Randall's wife'.

'Why?

'I just wanted to make sure it was all all right.

'What was all all right?»

'What was going to happen.

'And is it all all right?

'You mean Ann?

'I mean myself.

'Oh, you. I don't know. But Ann — I did develop a little plan for Ann that would have been nice —’

'A little plan?

'Yes. Did you have no ideas yourself, for Ann, no ideas at all? Hugh stared at her in complete puzzlement. 'Ideas? What sort of ideas?

'Never mind. They came to nothing. The girl is a goose. She's not the only one. And of course I was just curious.

'Look, said Hugh, 'I don't understand. You speak as if you arranged everything yourself. You're confusing me again. Please —

'Arranged? How crude you are. No, no. But I had another reason. I wanted to decide about the money.

'About what money?

'My money.

'Decide what?

'Who's to have it.

'But — why now? And why there?

'You see, she said, 'I had the beautiful idea of swindling my way into your family via your descendants! I thought it would be marvellously confusing. Perhaps confusing you is a way of loving you.

'I don't understand, he said, humbly now and encouraged by the gentleness of her teasing manner.

'I have selected my heir. Your grandchild.

'Miranda!

'No, not Miranda. I didn't like her. Young Penn. He's the lucky one. Isn't it a happy idea?

Hugh sat down heavily on a delicate petit-point stool which creaked violently under him. The wind moved and the bushes hurled themselves about outside like puppets and the fan heater clattered and the voices that argued inside his head continued their yapping polemic. He said, 'But why, why?

'Well, someone's got to have it! said Emma impatiently. 'And I have no family except for two cousins I detest, and I don't like my old college, so what can I do? And there's no point in leaving it to you.

'Anyway I'll be the first to go. But you astonish me.

'You won't be the first to go, said Emma. 'That's rather the point. She looked at him still with the holding gaze, sharper now and more anxious, as if trying to retain him in a difficult argument.

'You mean —?

'I'm ill, really ill. I've never told anyone, and I've let people think I just make an absurd fuss. But I've got a heart thing that could take me off at any time. Or of course I might live for years too. But that was why I hurried you about Grayhallock. One never knows how much time one has.