Anthony Powell - The Acceptance World

Alternatively, the matter to be regulated might be the behaviour of some great lady, aware that St. John Clarke was a person of a certain limited eminence, but at the same time ignorant of his credentials to celebrity. Again, Members could put right a situation that had gone amiss. Lady Huntercombe must have been guilty of some such social dissonance at her own table (before a secretary had come into existence to adjust such matters by a subsequent word) because Members was fond of quoting a mot of his master’s to the effect that dinner at the Huntercombes’ possessed ‘only two dramatic features — the wine was a farce and the food a tragedy’.

In fact to get rid of a secretary who performed his often difficult functions so effectively was a rash step on the part of a man who liked to be steered painlessly through the shoals and shallows of social life. Indeed, looking back afterwards, the dismissal of Members might almost be regarded as a landmark in the general disintegration of society in its traditional form. It was an act of individual folly on the part of St. John Clarke; a piece of recklessness that well illustrates the mixture of self-assurance and ennui which together contributed so much to condition the state of mind of people like St. John Clarke at that time. Of course I did not recognise its broader aspects then. The duel between Members and Quiggin seemed merely an entertaining conflict to watch, rather than the significant crumbling of social foundations.

On that dank afternoon in the park Members had abandoned some of his accustomed coldness of manner. He seemed glad to talk to someone — probably to anyone — about his recent ejection. He began on the subject at once, drawing his tightly-waisted overcoat more closely round him, while he contracted his sharp, beady brown eyes. Separation from St. John Clarke, and association with the firm of Boggis & Stone, had for some reason renewed his former resemblance to an ingeniously constructed marionette or rag doll.

‘There had been a slight sense of strain for some months between St. J. and myself,’ he said. ‘An absolutely trivial matter about taking a girl out to dinner. Perhaps rather foolishly, I had told St. J. I was going to a lecture on the Little Entente. Howard Craggs — whom I am now working with — happened to be introducing the lecturer, and so of course within twenty-four hours he had managed to mention to St. J. the fact that I had not been present. It was awkward, naturally, but I did not think St. J. really minded.

‘But why did you want to know about the Little Entente?’

‘St. J. had begun to be rather keen on what he called “the European Situation”,’ said Members, brushing aside my surprise as almost impertinent. ‘I always liked to humour his whims.’

‘But I thought his great thing was the Ivory Tower?’

‘Of course, I found out later that Quiggin had put him up to “the European Situation”,’ admitted Members, grudgingly. ‘But after all, an artist has certain responsibilities. I expect you are a supporter of the League yourself, my dear Nicholas.’

He smiled as he uttered the last part of the sentence, though speaking as if he intended to administer a slight, if well deserved, rebuke. In doing this he involuntarily adopted a more personal rendering of Quiggin’s own nasal intonation, which rendered quite unnecessary the explanation that the idea had been Quiggin’s. Probably the very words he used were Quiggin’s, too.

‘But politics were just what you used to complain of in Quiggin.’

‘Perhaps Quiggin was right in that respect, if in no other,’ said Members, giving his tinny, bitter laugh.

‘And then?’

‘It turned out that St. J.’s feelings were rather hurt.’

Members paused, as if he did not know how best to set about explaining the situation further. He shook his head once or twice in his old, abstracted Scholar-Gypsy manner. Then he began, as it were, at a new place in his narrative.

‘As you probably know,’ he continued, ‘I can say without boasting that I have done a good deal to change — why should I not say it? — to improve St. J.’s attitude towards intellectual matters. Do you know, when I first came to him he thought Matisse was a plage — no, I mean it.’

He made no attempt to relax his features, nor join in audible amusement at such a state of affairs. Instead, he continued to record St. John Clarke’s shortcomings.

‘That much quoted remark of his: “Gorki is a Russian d’Annunzio”—he got it from me. I happened to say at tea one day that I thought if d’Annunzio had been born in Nijni Novgorod he would have had much the same career as Gorki. All St. J. did was to turn the words round and use them as his own.’

‘But you still see him from time to time?’

Members shied away his rather distinguished profile like a high-bred but displeased horse.

‘Yes — and no,’ he conceded. ‘It’s rather awkward. I don’t know how much Quiggin told you, nor if he spoke the truth.’

‘He said you came in occasionally to look after the books.’

‘Only once in a way. I’ve got to earn a living somehow. Besides, I am attached to St. J. — even after the way he has behaved. I need not tell you that he does not like parting with money. I scarcely get enough for my work on the books to cover my bus fares. It is a strain having to avoid that âme de boue, too, whenever I visit the flat. He is usually about somewhere, spying on everyone who crosses the threshold.’

‘And what about St. John Clarke’s conversion to Marxism?’

‘When I first persuaded St. J. to look at the world in a contemporary manner,’ said Members slowly, adopting the tone of one determined not to be hurried in his story by those whose interest in it was actuated only by vulgar curiosity—’When I first persuaded him to that, I took an early opportunity to show him Quiggin. After all, Quiggin was supposed to be my friend — and, whatever one may think of his behaviour as a friend, he has — or had — some talent.’

Members waited for my agreement before continuing, as if the thought of displacement by a talentless Quiggin would add additional horror to his own position. I concurred that Quiggin’s talent was only too apparent.

‘From the very beginning I feared the risk of things going wrong on account of St. J.’s squeamishness about people’s personal appearance. For example, I insisted that Quiggin should put on a clean shirt when he came to see St. J. I told him to attend to his nails. I even gave him an orange stick with which to do so.’

‘And these preparations were successful?’

‘They met once or twice. Quiggin was even asked to the flat. They got on better than I had expected. I admit that. All the same, I never felt that the meetings were really enjoyable. I was sorry about that, because I thought Quiggin’s ideas would be useful to St. J. I do not always agree with Quiggin’s approach to such things as the arts, for example, but he is keenly aware of present-day tendencies. However, I decided in the end to explain to Quiggin that I feared St. J. was not very much taken with him.’

‘Did Quiggin accept that?’

‘He did,’ said Members, again speaking with bitterness. ‘He accepted it without a murmur. That, in itself, should have put me on my guard. I know now that almost as soon as I introduced them, they began to see each other when I was not present.’

Members checked himself at this point, perhaps feeling that to push his indictment to such lengths bordered on absurdity.

‘Of course, there was no particular reason why they should not meet,’ he allowed. ‘It was just odd — and rather unfriendly — that neither of them should have mentioned their meetings to me. St. J. always loves new people. “Unmade friends are like unmade beds,” he has often said. “They should be attended to early in the morning.”‘