William Boyd - The New Confessions

One man spoke and the other two nodded. Thompson stared expressionlessly at his steepled fingers poised on the table in front of him.

“We were very impressed with your … your ‘film’ proposal. All of us, I think.” Nods, grunts of accord. “You will understand, Mr. Todd, that the ‘cinema’ industry is not one in which the bank normally invests.” I nodded. This man had a deep superpolite Scottish accent. He pronounced “bank,” benk . “But I’m glad to say that in your case it was felt that this was an area which was well worth entering.”

I felt relief ooze through me, warm and comfortable, almost as if I had wet myself.

The senior man (I think his name was McIndoe) consulted his notes. “Consequently the Investment Division has decided to advance your company fifteen hundred pounds at current rates of interest. But at your brother’s insistence — and he, ha ha, put the case most eloquently — we have raised the loan to twenty-five hundred.”

McIndoe stood and stretched his hand across the table.

“Delighted to be doing business with you, Mr. Todd.”

I managed — how, I will never know — I managed to control myself. I produced some sort of smile and shook Thompson’s hand as he escorted me to the main door.

“It’s not as much as you hoped, I know,” Thompson said. “But it’s a start.” He smiled. “You can have no idea how heretical it seems to the board — some members of our board — to lend money to a film company.” He chuckled. “It wasn’t exactly a unanimous decision, I can tell you — in confidence, of course — cries of nepotism and all that.”

“I’m very grateful to you.”

“Remember, John, great oaks and little acorns …”He clapped me on the shoulder. “Good Lord, is that the rain on again?”

I think it was my impotence that really distressed me. I was not quite able to rage and shout against injustice. I could hardly berate Thompson for not standing up for me, either. I honestly think I would have been happier if they had got their flunkies to throw me out on the street. What earthly good was twenty-five hundred pounds? What film studio was going to be convinced by this munificence? I had to get out of Thompson’s house at once. It was bad enough with Heather’s frozen good manners, but Thompson was so pleased with himself. His sunny pleasure in his good deed was intolerable. I think he had always felt guilty about me and somehow this loan canceled out all his childhood indifference. He was really upset when I said I had to go. I moved temporarily back in with my father, which proved a ghastly error. He was there to witness the final indignity.

I was sitting in his drawing room half-reading The Scotsman . Father was in his study across the hall. It must have been four or five days after my meeting at the bank. I had an account there now, credited with twenty-five hundred pounds. From time to time I wondered what to do with it. I was coming to the conclusion that I should just give it back — I was not sure I could manage to pay the interest for more than a couple of months.

I heard the doorbell. Jean, my father’s housekeeper, answered it. Some conversation ensued, then I heard my father emerge from his study. More chat. I paid it no further attention until my father came into the room.

“John, there’s a gentleman here to see you.”

Ian Orr entered. He wore his old shiny suit and carried his hat in his hand, hollow crown facing me so I could see clearly the effect of years of Orr sweat and brilliantine on the lining. I stood up. What could the man want?

“Hello, Orr. What can I do for you?”

“Are you John James Todd?”

I looked closely at him. Was he mad? He seemed slightly embarrassed. His face was as badly shaved as ever, red and sore looking. He had sticking plaster on an earlobe.

“What are you talking about?” I said.

“Yes, of course he is,” my father said eagerly.

Orr gave me a buff envelope. I opened it. “Dreadful sorry about this, Mr. Todd. I wish I could have said no. But there you are.”

It was a writ. Leo Druce was suing me for defamation of character.

My father took it from my hand.

“Could I have a wee look? Thanks, John.”

Three days later in London my solicitor explained the problem to me. He was a pale young man with long wrists, or at least that was the curious effect his hands gave as they extended from his starched cuffs. He was called Cordwainer and was a partner in the firm of Devize, Broome and Cordwainer. I had phoned Sonia to see if Devize would represent me. He declined but passed me on to Cordwainer.

Cordwainer’s white clean hands needlessly smoothed the blotless blotting paper in the pad on his desk as I considered the news he had just given me. My crucial error did not lie in the fact that I had accused Druce of fabricating his role in the attack on Frezenburg Ridge. It was the allegation that he wore medals to which he was not entitled that had provoked litigation. I felt suddenly helpless. My brain emptied. All I was aware of was noises: distant traffic, someone talking down the corridor, the dry susurration of Cordwainer’s white hands on his blotter.

“Can you prove,” he asked softly, “that Druce ever wore medals to which he was not entitled?”

“Well, morally he’s … No,” I said.

“We have no choice then,” he continued. “You must pay for a printed advertisement in the Herald retracting the statements in your letter and apologizing.”

“Jesus Christ.…”

“And Mr. Druce’s lawyer informs me that an out-of-court settlement of two thousand guineas will be acceptable.”

“ Two thousand guineas! ”

“That’s correct.”

“But, God Almighty, I just don’t have … that … kind … of money.…”

So Thompson’s loan placated Leo Druce. Once I had paid for the advertisement (as loaded with ambiguity as I could make it), my legal fees — Devize charitably arranged a 10 percent discount — I was left with some 325 pounds. I felt with powerful certainty that the only course of action available to me was to flee the country. But where could I go?

VILLA LUXE, June 25, 1972

Something odd is happening to Emilia. Today she came to work wearing a new dress, scarlet with white polka dots, and strappy shoes with wedge-shaped cork heels. Her broad horny feet looked most inappropriate in them. She’s being very friendly and solicitous.

I compliment her on her dress. A terrible mistake. She simpers like an ingenue. The horrible suspicion strengthens: she is responding to what she sees as my own carnal interest in her.… But then, I rebuke myself. Her life isn’t circumscribed by her domestic duties at the Villa Luxe. God alone knows what she gets up to when she’s left this place.

As she serves lunch she says, “Oh, yes. My friend told me a man was looking for you in town.”

“In town? Not the village?”

“No, in town. You know my friend who works at the post office. This man was asking there.”

I drank some water. My throat was suddenly parched.

“What was he like?”

“She didn’t say. She just said a man. An American.”

“Did she tell him anything?”

“Of course not. This information is confidential. You want some more melon?”

“No thanks.”

“I brought it specially for you.”

“No, no. I’m not hungry, thank you,”

I felt the Past again, like a fog creeping in from the sea, curling round the house, seeping through its rooms. A damp, old, saline smell.

* I discovered in 1955, on the publication of Boswell’s diaries, that Boswell and Thérèse had taken this opportunity to have a brief affair. According to Boswell’s log in his journal, they fucked fourteen times in three days. Thérèse was insatiable and the young Scot utterly exhausted. The revelation came as a genuine shock to me. To this day I cannot forgive Boswell his vile betrayal of Jean Jacques.