Evelyn Waugh - A Handful Of Dust

“You never tell me anything,” repeated Mrs. Beaver. “And there are so many rumours going round. Is there going to be a divorce?”

“I don't know.”

Mrs. Beaver sighed. “Well I must get back to work. Where are you lunching?”

“Brat's.”

“Poor John. By the way, I thought you were joining Brown's.”

“I haven't heard anything from them. I don't know whether they've had an election yet.”

“Your father was a member.”

“I've an idea I shan't get in … anyway I couldn't really afford it.”

“I'm not happy about you, John. I'm not sure that things are working out as well as I hoped about Christmas time.”

“There's my telephone. Perhaps it's Margot. She hasn't asked me to anything for weeks.”

But it was only Brenda.

“I'm afraid mother's got nothing for you at the shop,” he said.

“Oh well. I expect something will turn up. I could do with a little good luck just at the moment.”

“So could I. Have you asked Allan about Brown's?”

“Yes, I did. He says they elected about ten chaps last week.”

“Oh, does that mean I've been black balled?”

“I shouldn't know. Gentlemen are so odd about their clubs.”

“I thought that you were going to make Allan and Reggie support me.”

“I asked them. What does it matter anyway? D'you want to come to Veronica's for the week-end?”

“I'm not sure that I do.”

“I'd like it.”

“It's a beastly little house — and I don't think Veronica likes me. Who'll be there?”

“I shall be.”

“Yes … well, I'll let you know.”

“Am I seeing you this evening?”

“I'll let you know.”

“Oh dear,” said Brenda as she rang off. “Now he's taken against me. It isn't my fault he can't get in to Brown's. As a matter of fact I believe Reggie did try to help.”

Jenny Abdul Akbar was in the room with her. She came across every morning now in her dressing gown and they read the newspaper together. The dressing gown was of striped Berber silk.

“Let's go and have a cosy lunch at the Ritz,” she said.

“The Ritz isn't cosy at lunch time and it costs eight and six. I daren't cash a cheque for three weeks, Jenny. The lawyers are so disagreeable. I've never been like this before.”

“What wouldn't I do to Tony? Leaving you stranded like this.”

“Oh, what's the good of knocking Tony? I don't suppose he's having a packet of fun himself in Brazil or wherever it is.”

“I hear they are putting in bathrooms at Hetton — while you are practically starving. And he hasn't even gone to Mrs. Beaver for them.”

“Yes, I do think that was mean.”

Presently Jenny went back to dress. Brenda telephoned to a delicatessen store round the corner for some sandwiches. She would spend that day in bed, as she spent two or three days a week at this time. Perhaps, if Allan was making a speech somewhere, as he usually was, Marjorie would have her to dinner. The Helm-Hubbards had a supper party that night but Beaver had not been asked. “If I went there without him it would be a major bust-up … Come to think of it, Marjorie's probably going. Well I can always have sandwiches for dinner here. They make all kinds. Thank God for the little shop round the corner.” She was reading a biography of Thiers that had lately appeared; it was very long and would keep her going well into the night.

At one o'clock Jenny came in to say goodbye (she had a latch key of Brenda's) dressed for a cosy lunch. “I got Polly and Souki,” she said. “We're going to Daisy's joint. I wish you were coming.”

“Me? Oh, I'm all right,” said Brenda and she thought, `It might occur to her to sock a girl a meal once in a way.'

They walked for a fortnight, averaging about fifteen miles a day. Sometimes they would do much more and sometimes much less; the Indian who went in front decided the camping places; they depended on water and evil spirits.

Dr. Messinger made a compass traverse of their route. It gave him something to think about. He took readings every hour from an aneroid. In the evening, if they had halted early enough, he employed the last hours of daylight in elaborating a chart. ` Dry water course, three deserted huts, stony ground … '

“We are now in the Amazon system of rivers,” he announced with satisfaction one day. “You see, the water is running South.” But almost immediately they crossed a stream flowing in the opposite direction. “Very curious,” said Dr. Messinger. “A discovery of genuine scientific value.”

Next day they waded through four streams at intervals of two miles, running alternately North and South. The chart began to have a mythical appearance.

“Is there a name for any of these streams,” he asked Rosa.

“Macushi people called him Waurupang.”

“No, not river where we first camped: These rivers .”

“Yes, Waurupang.”

“ This river here .”

“Macushi people call him all Waurupang.”

“It's hopeless,” said Dr. Messinger.

“Don't you think that possibly we have struck the upper waters of the Waurupang?” suggested Tony, “and have crossed and recrossed the stream as it winds down the valley.”

“It is a hypothesis,” said Dr. Messinger.

When they were near water they forced their way through blind bush; the trail there was grown over and barred by timber; only Indian eyes and Indian memory could trace its course; sometimes they crossed little patches of dry savannah, dun grass growing in tufts from the baked earth; thousands of lizards scampered and darted before their feet and the grass rustled like newspaper; it was burning hot in these enclosed spaces. Sometimes they climbed up into the wind, over loose red pebbles that bruised their feet; after these painful ascents they would lie in the wind till their wet clothes grew cold against their bodies; from these low eminences they could see other hill tops and the belts of bush through which they had travelled, and the file of porters trailing behind them. As each man and woman arrived he sank on to the dry grass and rested against his load; when the last of them came up with the party Dr. Messinger would give the word and they would start off again, descending into the green heart of the forest before them.

Tony and Dr. Messinger seldom spoke to one another, either when they were marching or at the halts for they were constantly strained and exhausted. In the evenings after they had washed and changed into clean shirts and flannel trousers, they talked a little, mostly about the number of miles they had done that day, their probable position and the state of their feet. They drank rum and water after their bath; for supper there was usually bully beef stewed with rice and flour dumplings. The Indians ate farine, smoked hog and occasional delicacies picked up by the way — armadillo, iguana, fat white grubs from the palm trees. The women had some dried fish with them that lasted for eight days; the smell grew stronger every day until the stuff was eaten, then it still hung about them and the stores but grew fainter until it merged into the general indefinable smell of the camp.

There were no Indians living in this country. In the last five days of the march they suffered from lack of water. They had left the Waurupang behind and the streams they came to were mostly dry; they had to reconnoitre up and down their beds in search of tepid, stagnant puddles. But after two weeks they came to a river once more, flowing deep and swift to the Southeast. This was the border of the Pie-wie country and Dr. Messinger marked the place where they stopped, Second Base Camp. The cabouri fly infested this stream in clouds.

“John, I think it's time you had a holiday.”