John Berger - G.

For a woman the state of being in love was a hallucinatory interregnum between two owners, her bridegroom taking the place of her father, or later, perhaps, a lover taking the place of her husband.

The surveyor-in-herself quickly became identified with the new owner. She would begin to watch herself as if she were him. What would Maurice say, she would ask, if his wife (that is me) did this? Look at me, she would address the mirror, see what Maurice’s wife is like. The surveyor-in-herself became the new owner’s agent. (A relationship which might well include as much deceit or chicanery as can be found between any proprietor and agent.)

The surveyed-within-herself became the creature of proprietor and agent, of whom both must be proud. She, the surveyed, became their social puppet and their sexual object. The surveyor made the puppet talk at dinner like a good wife. And when it seemed to her fit, she lay the surveyed down on a bed for her proprietor to enjoy. One might suppose that when a woman conceived and gave birth, surveyor and surveyed were temporarily reunited. Perhaps sometimes this happened. But childbirth was so surrounded with superstitution and horror that most women submitted to it, screaming, confused, or unconscious, as to a punishment for their intrinsic duplicity. When they emerged from their ordeal and held the child in their arms they found they were the agents of the loving mother of their husband’s child.

I hope the preceding few pages will throw some light on the story I am about to tell and in particular on G.’s insistence upon Camille being ‘solitary’ (i.e., unsurveyed by her own agency).

KARL MARX HAS BEEN RELEGATED TO THE ATTIC

Giolitti in 1911

Since his father’s death in 1908, this is the first time G. has returned to Italy. Lawyers in Livorno settled the problems of his inheritance; he owns three factories, two cargo vessels and fifteen houses near the centre of the city.

The evening haze over Lake Maggiore gives everything the look of a backdrop to a theatre set. The islands seem painted. On the hill rising up behind Stresa are the large villas of the rich. Most of them were built in the nineteenth century. Around their windows and doors are painted vine leaves and oranges and birds. At one of the largest villas with an imitation Renaissance watch-tower, Weymann and G. have been invited to dine.

Why did he crash?

Although there were hundreds of witnesses, accounts of what actually happened vary considerably, as do the explanations. Around the dinner table several theories are suggested.

Chavez was in complete control and was about to make a perfect landing. But unhappily, as a result of the strain of the flight and the buffeting of the wind, one of his wings folded a few seconds before his wheels touched the ground. This immediately forced the nose of the plane down and it dived, engine first, into the earth.

This theory is proposed and defended with authority by Monsieur Maurice Hennequin who, since he is an engineer working for Peugeot, was indeed the semi-official Peugeot representative at the competition, has to be listened to with respect. He has a habit of holding his listeners’ attention by suddenly stopping in the middle of a sentence to take in a mouthful of food. He gesticulates rigidly with his large hands, as if they were wooden doors opening and shutting to let his words out and to prevent anybody else’s ever entering into the home of his argument.

It would not have been a perfect landing. Chavez misjudged his speed. He was trying to land at about ninety kilometres an hour instead of sixty. What, however, caused the crash was not one but both wings folding, folding up like the wings of a butterfly when it alights.

This is the opinion of the Italian host, a director of the Pirelli rubber firm in Milan who has made generous donations to the Aero Club and believes, like Lord Northcliffe, that aviation has a great military and commercial future. His voice is habitually modulated to express the sweetness of reason itself. The position of his villa, its painted ceilings, the idea of dining beneath Chinese lanterns on the open platform of the imitation watch tower, the live flamingoes in the garden below, the new factory opened, all testify, he feels, to the reasonableness of his views. He believes in encouraging trade unions and offering incentives to his workers. How often has he quoted to his less successful and more belligerent business colleagues the words of the great Giolitti as Prime Minister:

‘The upward movement of the popular classes is accelerating day by day, and it is an invincible movement, because it is common to all civilized countries and is based upon the principle of the equality of all men. Let no one delude himself that he can prevent the popular classes from conquering their share of political and economic influence. It depends chiefly on us, on the attitude of the constitutional parties in their relations with the popular classes, whether the emergence of these shall be a new conservative force, a new element of prosperity and greatness, or whether instead it shall be a whirlwind that will be the ruin of our country’s fortunes.’

Only as a last resort would the host think in terms similar to those of his uncle: The cavalry! Don’t delay! Martial law and the cavalry! And then he would not shout such words in a Milan hotel; he would quietly pick up a telephone.

His wife asks whether it would not have been safer to land in the lake.

As the result of the cold experienced during the crossing, the pilot’s hands became so numb and frozen that he could no longer handle his controls properly.

This is the suggestion of the Contessa R., who is a great patron of the Milanese opera.

The Contessa raises her hand, its fingers supplely converging towards an apex. It is a dancer’s miming gesture for a flower about to open: it is also the gesture of a child trying to pick something out of a jar. Suddenly, on the word ‘frozen’, she shoots out fingers and thumb and holds them stiffly outstretched while she passes her other hand over the supposedly frozen one, indicating by tentative touches how icy its surface must be.

What intelligence! a man whispers to the young lady beside him, what intelligence behind those grey hairs! By Christmas, the young woman replies, she will have recovered from the loss of Gino, and her hair will be as black as five years ago.

Why does nobody consult Monsieur Chavez himself? The speaker is a woman of about thirty. Her voice is slightly rasping, as if it had once been ruined by a fit of inordinate demonic laughter. Are not most of the controls worked by the feet?

Could you please tell me her name?

Madame Hennequin. Surely you were introduced?

Her first name, I mean.

I do not know her maiden name.

Her prénom .

Ah. I am so sorry. Camille.

Geo remembers nothing after the Gondo gorges.

Poor Geo!

The hostess, wearing a golden bracelet made in the form of an ancient Etruscan one, extends her arm in beckoning invitation to Weymann. Monsieur Weymann, she says (Weymann is a friend of Maurice Hennequin — hence the invitation), you are the flyer and our guest of honour, tell us your opinion.

Weymann smiles but replies tersely in English: You can’t trust a plane like that. Do you know what its wings are made of? Cotton and wood.

Chavez was suffering from a kind of euphoria. He believed that he had succeeded in his venture and the worst was behind him; at the last moment he became reckless.

This is the theory of Harry Schuwey, a Belgian industrialist.

A woman who was just previously smiling at Camille Hennequin and sharing some joke with her says: I don’t find that very convincing, Harry. Her manner of address indicates that she is probably his mistress.