Brian Aldiss - Life in the West

‘Well, you mustn’t let your silly old mother interrupt you. You talk nicely to Tom and I’m sure you can get back together again. Tom, your misdeeds are in the past, or so I hope, and I want you and Teresa to kiss and make up. Remember that you’re both my children. Let’s have an end to this silly, pointless quarrel, for the sake of family harmony. Your Uncle Willie would say the same if he were here.’

Deirdre appeared in the archway of the living room. She tucked a thumb under her ample chin. Grace also materialized, still bearing the tabby.

‘This meeting does promise to be a shining example of family harmony, I must say,’ Deirdre remarked. ‘Marsh, you’d do well to get us all a drink — the sooner we’re tanked up, the better. As for you, Grace, I think you’d better make yourself scarce.’

‘Oh, Mummy…’

‘Go on, go and bully your brothers. You know too much already.’

‘You do chase the poor girl,’ Mrs Davies said to Deirdre as Grace disappeared. ‘Of course, I know I’m only an old woman and it’s none of my business.’

‘Quite so,’ agreed Deirdre, blandly. ‘All the same, Grace can look after herself. She told me yesterday that she is going to be an aircraft designer, and I believe her. She has some fantastic ideas about airliner loos and galleys which could revolutionize aviation history.’

Kaye entered through the french doors from the back garden. ‘The drink trolley’s outside. I thought you’d like to take a drink on the terrace while the sun shines.’

As they trooped out, Grace reappeared in a crimson beach robe, and curtsied to them one by one, cat under her left arm. Mrs Davies came last, taking the opportunity to grasp Squire’s wrist.

‘I just wanted to say to you — you’re at a responsible age, Tom. I think that your Tess would come back to you gladly if you gave up that younger woman. She can’t be good for you.’

‘I have given her up, long ago. I believe it if nobody else does.’

‘Don’t be cross. What I mean is, you must understand Teresa. I think it is the idea of — well, of this sex business that scares her off. Your Uncle Willie and I wouldn’t have anything like that. We have discussed the subject, oh yes. At your age, Tom, you’re nearly fifty, it is disgusting. Undignified. Ernest and I gave up all that sort of thing on my fortieth birthday, and neither of us were any the worse for it. Funnily enough, we were talking about it in the spring of last year, just before he was killed — when you were away in California, or wherever it was.’

Abandoning the cat at last, Grace sidled up to them and let out squeals of suppressed laughter. ‘Grannie, that’s awful! I’d have thought that you and Willie would be a bit more swinging. After all, what’s the point of getting married unless… Well, anyhow, I think it’s just terrific that Uncle Tom is the age he is and is still able to mate. Bully for him! It’s wonderful.’

‘But not exactly unique in the annals of medical science, Grace,’ Squire said, laughing.

Mrs Davies looked reproachfully at Grace. ‘My nerves are all to pieces. I’ve had my say, now I’m going to have a cigarette. To hear you talking so brazenly about sex, my girl… We never mentioned it, or thought about it, when I was your age. I don’t know what the world’s coming to.’

Kaye poured them all drinks. ‘Your beer at last,’ he told Squire, handing over a full tankard.

He raised his glass cheerfully. ‘Here’s to us all. Good to be back home, good to see Madge and Teresa and Tom here. Let’s hope the family will be a little more stable now.’

‘That’s a bit optimistic,’ Grace said, sotto voce.

‘Quiet, child, it’s only a toast,’ Deirdre said.

‘The country’s been going to the dogs steadily while you’ve been doing your archaeological work in Greece,’ Mrs Davies reported. ‘The unemployment figures are still rising, and the inflation rate. It’s this terrible Labour government of ours.’

‘Don’t despair, Madge,’ Kaye said. ‘Deirdre and I see a different aspect of things, coming from abroad. After Athens, England seems remarkably stable, sensible, and prosperous.’

‘That’s because we’re having a heat wave, Pop, you nit,’ Grace said. ‘People only go on strike in winter, when it’s cold.’

A lull fell over the conversation. Everyone became preoccupied with their drinks, or looked at the sails glittering far across the wilderness of marsh.

‘So how did you enjoy your trip to this Greek island, where exactly was it, Marshall?’ asked Mrs Davies, in a palpable attempt to blanket the difficulties in the room with words. ‘I kept meaning to look it up in my atlas and then I never did so. It seems years since Ernest and I had our Greek cruise. It is years, alas… The weather was lovely but I didn’t care for Athens at all. So noisy, even then.’

Squire and Teresa were standing awkwardly apart. ‘Grantham always reminds me of Athens,’ he said, but she did not take up the small joke.

Marshall Kaye began to deliver an archaeological lecture, ostensibly to Mrs Davies. Tom and Douglas appeared, licking icecream cones, took the temperature of the terrace, and slipped rapidly away.

‘The great days of Milos ended when the Athenians, who were at war with Sparta, invaded the island in 416 BC. Eventually Milos had to surrender to the Athenians, who took all the women and children into slavery, and slaughtered all the men of military age.’

‘What a terrible way to behave!’ said Mrs Davies severely, as if some of the discredit reflected on Marshall Kaye.

‘Yes, and it still happens. It happened also before the days of Athens. We could learn lessons from the Athens-Milos encounter — except that lessons of history are never learnt. The

Athenians demanded that the Milians surrender, in which case they would not be destroyed. The Milians tried to get out of a difficult situation by offering friendship. That wasn’t good enough for Athens. They made a resounding speech to the Milians, which Thucydides reports, or possibly invents.

‘They said, “You’re weaker than we are, so you’d better give in. We have concluded from experience that it’s a law of nature to rule whatever one can. We didn’t make this law, nor were we the first to act on it. We found it in existence, and we shall leave it in existence for those who come after us. We are merely acting in accordance with it, and we know very well that if you had our power, then you’d act in the same way to us.”

‘And they also said that the standard of justice done depends on the equality of power to compel. “The strong act as they have the power to act, and the weak accept what they have to accept.” It is a lucid exposition of realpolitik, and often applies to situations in the world today. It’s also applicable to individuals.’

He looked round to address this final remark to Squire and Teresa.

‘And to Eurocommunists,’ Squire said. He took Teresa by the hand and led her upstairs to Deirdre and Marshall’s bedroom, where half-unpacked suitcases skirted the walls.

‘Let’s talk,’ he said. ‘Forget Marsh’s lectures. You’re looking summery.’

‘You needn’t flatter me.’ She looked as if she was going to say more, but nothing more emerged. In Squire’s eyes, she appeared smaller than before, perhaps because she was wearing flat seaside shoes. Her shoulders were vulnerable. Her face looked as if it had tanned unevenly, and her wrinkles showed. Her gaze had gone to the carpet under his anxious scrutiny; he saw the dark roots of her dyed hair.

‘At least you came alone,’ she said, almost in a whisper.

‘I’m living in London because I can’t bear to be in the Hall without you and the girls.’