Anthony Powell - Temporary Kings

Farebrother smiled his charming smile. He settled back into his own chair. Then he looked at his watch.

‘Good gracious me, I must be getting home. Geraldine and I are not at all late birds.’

‘She is well, I hope.’

Farebrother snapped his fingers in the air to give some idea of his wife’s overflowing health and spirits. He was in his gayest mood. The Parliamentary Question had made his day. It provided something far better, in a different class, from the occasion when Widmerpool’s career had been threatened by nothing worse than the disapproval of General Liddament.

‘We’ve found a nice little flat, not too expensive, well appointed as you could wish. Geraldine has a wonderful instinct for the right sort of economies, so we don’t have to be thinking about the pennies all the time now. In fact we find we can run a country cottage too. Roses are my interest these days. I don’t mind telling you, Nicholas, I’m rather proud of my roses. You and your wife must look us up, if you’re ever passing. We can’t always manage luncheon. Tea certainly. Well, it’s been a most enjoyable evening. I heard Ivo Deanery was to be present as a guest — can’t remember if you know him, he’s a major-general now — and we settled some useful matters. Don’t forget that invitation — preferably when the roses are in bloom.’

He repeated the address of the cottage, waved one of his genial goodbyes, was gone. The following day, the Parliamentary Question was brought up again at another party, in very different circumstances. This occasion owed something to the diplomatic detente of which Bagshaw had spoken. The so-called ‘thaw’ had been reflected, in a minor manner, by the tour through some of the European capitals of a well-known Russian author, bestseller in his own country. To give a few of our own literary world opportunity to meet a confrere not in general encountered in the West, a luncheon, to which I found myself invited, was given at the Soviet Embassy.

At this gathering, a foreseen profusion of literary figures had been perceptibly infused with a sprinkling of MPs, other notabilities, official and semi-official, either with a view to imparting additional robustness of texture to the party, or, more probably, simply to work off individuals, whose names were listed for entertainment, sooner or later, on the ambassadorial roster. Including our hosts of the Embassy staff, a large number of whom were present, about forty or fifty persons were drinking vodka, sampling zakuski, sitting in small groups scattered about a long, austerely decorated drawing-room. There was a faint atmosphere of constraint, as if someone or something essential to the party had not yet been manifested, but that would happen in a moment, when, from then on, all would be well, much easier, more relaxed.

The invitation had not included wives of writers asked as guests, but both the Quiggins were there, Quiggin’s status as a publisher no doubt judged of sufficient eminence to be considered out of context, permitting accompaniment of his novelist consort. Alaric Kydd — to use a favourite phrase of Uncle Giles’s — was behaving as if he owned the place. Other writers included L. O. Salvidge, Bernard Shernmaker, Quentin Shuckerly, a lot more, men greatly predominating in numbers over women. Mark Members was absent, known to be ill; Len Pugsley, not important enough, or considered too closely ‘committed’ to be asked to a purely social party. Evadne Clapham had also been overlooked, more probably barred from acceptance by a too relentless social programme of her own. Dr Brightman, sprucely dressed in a fur cap and high fur collar, revealing a rather chilly manner to Ada Leintwardine, passed her with a smile, moving on to where L. O. Salvidge and I were chatting to one of the secretaries of embassy.

‘I hope you don’t think my clothes too voulu ?’

The secretary nodded, and laughed. He was a tall fair young man, of surface indistinguishable from any other member of London’s diplomatic corps of similar age and seniority. We discussed signs of spring in the London parks. The young secretary moved away for a moment to receive incoming guests. Salvidge caught my eye. His silent lips formed the words ‘KGB’. The secretary returned before any sort of secretly uttered return comment was possible. Dr Brightman shared none of Salvidge’s trepidation about our surroundings.

‘Have you seen anything of Russell Gwinnett? I’ve quite lost touch with him. He was staying at one moment with some people called Bagshaw. He wrote to me from their house. Rather a depressed letter. I hear he left after some sort of trouble. The most extraordinary story I was told.’

Salvidge must have thought this subject dangerously controversial, perhaps because Gwinnett was American. He showed disquiet. At the same time he did not want to appear excluded from the circles of which Dr Brightman spoke.

‘Gwinnett came to see me. We had a talk. A nice young man. Not very exciting. I was not sure he was up to tackling so picturesque a figure as Trapnel.’

Salvidge turned to the secretary to explain what he was talking about.

‘This is a young writer called Gwinnett — G-W-I-N-N-E-T-T — who is writing a book about a novelist, now dead, called Trapnel — T-R-A-P-N-E-L — a good writer. One of our best.’

‘Yes?’

Salvidge must have thought this the moment to change the subject, probably what he had been leading up to.

‘Dr Brightman here, you know, is writing a book about Boethius — B-O-E-no diphthong — ’

The secretary nodded politely, but cut Salvidge off.

‘See, we must go into luncheon.’

We were firmly shepherded into the dining-room. So far as Salvidge was concerned, not a moment too soon. Here again was a faint sense of austerity, an impression of off-white walls sparsely decorated with pictures, landscapes light in tone — the steppe — birch trees — sunset on snow — nothing in the least reminiscent of Tokenhouse and his school. My place at table was between another secretary, possibly counsellor, somewhat older than the first, equally trimmed to outward diplomatic convention; on the other side, a personage not encountered for years, Bill Truscott.

Tipped, as a young man, for at least a place in the Cabinet, even if by some mischance he failed to become Prime Minister, Truscott, after a promising start at Donners-Brebner, had come to rest in some governmental corporation, possibly the Coal Board. The Russian engaged with his other neighbour when I sat down, Truscott and I went through the process of recalling where we had last met. He still carried some of his old, rather distinguished style, a touch, too, of the old underlying toughness that had made people think he would forge ahead. Fresh from observing Farebrother as a professional charmer, one could not help feeling Truscott, at least ten years younger, had worn worse. His manner dated. If he had become the ‘great man’ predicted, no doubt it would have been perfectly serviceable. As he was, the demeanour was a trifle laboured, ponderous.

I thought of my undergraduate days, when Truscott had been not merely an imposing, but positively frightening figure, setting up, by his flow of talk, standards of sophistication never to be contemplated as attainable. This brilliance of exterior, again, had been of quite a different sort from Glober’s. Even in those days, Truscott had been far less lively. There could be no great difference in age, even if the advantage was slightly on Truscott’s side. Unlike Glober, he had remained a bachelor. I spoke of Sillery’s ninetieth birthday party. It appeared Truscott had not been invited. He showed a little bitterness about that. It was true he had been one of the staunchest vassals of Sillery’s court. He should not have been forgotten. He asked if I often found myself in this embassy.