Iris Murdoch - The Sea, the Sea

‘I gather from Titus that one of your reasons for not taking her back, even if she wants to go-’

‘She doesn’t.’

‘Is that you fear that her husband may be violent to her.’

‘That’s one reason, there are about a hundred others.’

‘But supposing his violence depended on a misunderstanding, and supposing that that misunderstanding could be removed-’

‘James, don’t be a fool, you know perfectly well that there isn’t any explanation or any excuse for what I have done, whatever it may be. And I advise you to be careful what you say to me.’

‘Look,’ said James, ‘I’m saying two things. First, that if you are going to take her back it must be done intelligently. We should all go with you, as a show of force, but also to back up your statement. ’

‘My statement?!’

‘And secondly, that if fear of violence is one of your reasons for not returning her, and if that fear can be reduced, this could be relevant to what you decide to do.’

‘Do you see what he means?’ said Peregrine.

‘Yes! But as James admits, you cannot understand the situation! You speak of explaining or making statements-you might as well try to explain to a bison. In any case this whole argument is beside the point since there are not two possibilities. I do not admit her return to her husband as possible.’

‘Well, then let us consider the other course-’ said James.

‘We will consider nothing! I don’t want you lot tramping around over this problem. You are being impertinent, and I resent it extremely! But since the matter has come up I should like to ask Titus why he thinks I ought to let his mother go home.’

Titus, who had been staring at the ham (perhaps he was hungry) all this time, seemed reluctant to answer, blushed and would not look up. He said, ‘Well-you see-I feel I may be to blame-’

‘Why on earth?’

‘It’s so difficult, one has so many sort of-emotions, and sort of-prejudices, about fathers and mothers. I feel I may have made you think it was awfuller than it was, though it was awful. And she does exaggerate, she has fantasies and ideas in her head. I don’t know. Maybe she does prefer to be with him, and I’m against forcing people, I think they should be free. You’re in a hurry to fix it all at once. But if she wants to come to you she can come better later on when she’s had time to think it over.’

‘Well said, Titus,’ said James.

Titus gave James a look which stirred my ever-vigilant jealousy.

Peregrine said, ‘You don’t understand marriage, Charles, you’ve never been in it, it’s deep. You think a tiff means shipwreck, the end, it’s not so.’

I said, ‘To begin with, “free” doesn’t apply here, we’re dealing with a frightened person, a prisoner. She has to be pulled out, she’ll never walk. So it’s got to be fixed now. If she goes back she’ll never leave him, she’ll never escape.’

James said, ‘Well, isn’t that significant too? Isn’t that to admit that she ought to go back? That she’ll choose to stay there? Oftener than you might think what human beings actually do is what they want to do.’

‘She may stay. But “choose”? This isn’t a matter of a “tiff”, to use Perry’s ludicrous word which shows that he has no idea what this is all about. She’s a bullied terrorized woman who has never been happy with that man, she told me so herself.’

‘Her marriage may not have been happy, but it has survived a long time. You think too much about happiness, Charles. It’s not all that important.’

‘That’s what she said.’

‘There you are.’

‘Titus,’ I said, ‘is happiness important?’

‘Yes, of course it is,’ he said, and looked at me at last.

‘There you are,’ I said to James.

‘A young man’s reply,’ said James. ‘Now let me make a further point-’

‘Your trouble, Charles,’ said Peregrine, who was still drinking whisky, ‘as I said before, is that you despise women, you regard them as chattels. You regard this woman as a chattel-’

‘A further point. This drama has been developing very fast and it’s a whirling mass of emotions and ideas. You say you’ve kept this image of a pure first love beside you all these years. You may even have come to think of it as a supreme value, a standard by which all other loves have failed-’

‘Yes.’

‘But should you not criticize this guiding idea? I won’t call it a fiction. Let us call it a dream. Of course we live in dreams and by dreams, and even in a disciplined spiritual life, in some ways especially there, it is hard to distinguish dream from reality. In ordinary human affairs humble common sense comes to one’s aid. For most people common sense is moral sense. But you seem to have deliberately excluded this modest source of light. Ask yourself, what really happened between whom all those years ago? You’ve made it into a story, and stories are false.’

(At this point Titus, who could bear it no longer, surreptitiously seized a piece of ham and some bread.)

‘And you are using this thing from the far past as a guide to important and irrevocable moves which you propose to make in the future. You are making a dangerous induction, and induction is shaky at the best of times, consider Russell’s chicken-’

‘Russell’s chicken?’

‘The farmer’s wife comes out every day and feeds the chicken, but one day she comes out and wrings its neck.’

‘I don’t understand, let’s leave this chicken out.’

‘I mean, you are assuming on as far as I can see very insubstantial evidence, your memory of some idyllic times at school and so on, that if you were to carry her off you would be able to love her and make her happy, and she would be able to love you and make you happy. Such situations are in fact fairly rare and hard of achievement. Further, as a matter inseparable from the happiness you prize so much, you assume that it is morally right thus to rescue her, even in the apparent absence of her consent. Now should you not-’

‘James, please just stop insulting me with your pompous speculations will you? I wonder if you realize how insupportable you are? As you said, this business has developed fast and it’s a first-class muddle. And, all right, I made the muddle. But inside it there isn’t any perfect morality any more. That’s what ordinary human life is like. Perhaps cloistered soldiers don’t know about such things.’

James smiled. ‘I like “cloistered soldiers”. So you admit you aren’t sure that this rescue would be a good thing?’

‘I’m not sure, how can I be? But you’re trying to force me to have an argument which isn’t the argument of the situation. What you are saying is all at the side, it’s a sort of abstract commentary. You’re the one who’s “telling a story”. I’m in the place where the real things happen.’

‘Well, what is the argument of the situation?’

‘That I love her. She loves me. She says so. And love doesn’t rely on “evidence” and “induction”. Love knows. She’s been very unhappy and I’m not going to let her return to a bully who will henceforth be even more cruel to her. It will be worse. OK, I made it so, but the fact remains. For his cruelty we have a witness here, though the witness seems unwilling to testify.’

‘That’s not an argument,’ said James. ‘It’s a rather confused statement of intention.’

‘Well, it’s what I propose to act upon. I can’t think why I let myself be drawn into this perfectly ridiculous discussion at all.’

‘All right. What I personally think has probably emerged already, and of course needn’t be a matter of any interest to you. But I’d like to add this: that if you do decide, unwisely in my view, to take her away, we would all want to help you as much as we can. That’s so, isn’t it?’