Iris Murdoch - The Book And The Brotherhood

`Oh – no -'

`At least, well, perhaps he hasn't, I'm not sure, he may have done, and I can't go round myself-'

`I'll go – when did he -?'

`Crimond asked him to go at eleven, I've just found the note – if you go at once you might arrive first – but oh hell you haven't got a car – and ours – I've just remembered it's at the garage, or I could drive you round, oh hell -'

`Don't worry, I can get a taxi, I can usually get one on Goldhawk Road and there's a taxi rank on the Green. Have you told Gerard?'

`He's not in. Oh Jenkin, I'm so sorry to trouble you, it may be nothing, now I come to think of it Duncan probably didn't go at all – he may have answered the note and – but please go at once, I feel if you're there nothing bad can happen. You know where Crimond lives, don't you, and the downstairs room -'

`Yes, yes. I'll go at once, don't worry -'

`And you'll ring me.'

`Yes – I'll fly now.' Jenkin dropped the telephone and ran for his overcoat. He said to Tamar, 'I'm sorry, my dear, there's an emergency and I have to leave you for a while. Would you like to stay here till I come back?'

`Yes – yes, please – I'd like to stay.'

`I don't know how long I'll be, just stay and keep warm, I'd like to think you were here. There's lots to eat in the larder and you can rest on m ybed – turn on the electric fire – I'm sorry I haven't made up the other bed.'

`I'll be all right, Jenkin, dear Jenkin.' She had risen and now threw her arms round his neck.

He kissed her. 'Stay here till I come back.'

Jenkin hurried along toward Shepherd's Bush Green. There were no taxis. He waited at the taxi rank.

As soon as Jean put down the telephone she thought, perhaps I ought to tell the police? Why didn't I think of that at once? Then she hesitated. Perhaps Duncan had decided not to go, perhaps he had replied suggesting another meeting place. This now seemed possible, even likely. She telephoned Duncan's office again. He was not there. She telephoned Gerard, and then Rose – no answer. Should she tell the police? If she did, whatever happened she would have to explain everything, it would all get into the papers. Even if it was a farce of some kind, Duncan might get into serious trouble and would be furious with her for interfering. And the police might be glad to have an excuse for picking on Crimond, and she might have to give evidence and this would involve her horribly with Crimond again just when she was trying to think that he did not exist. It then occurred to her that this sort of false frightening blackmail must be a part, perhaps only the beginning, of Crimond's revenge upon her. Unable to decide what to do she sat and wept. Duncan had of course left Crimond's letter behind on purpose. If anything 'happened', if for instance Crimond were to do him some damage, he would like to have in a safe place, and not removed from his pocket by his assailant, the evidence that Crimond had, in an aggressive style, asked him to, come. This could be important if'Crimond were to plead self-defence against a hostile intruder`. If Crimond did, Crimond must pay. Equally, if' Duncan were to damage Crimond, it would be helpful to prove that Crimond had been asking for trouble. The idea thatJean might find the 'challenge' did not enter his head for a moment. Jean was not a searcher in desks, and he knew that she believed him when he had said there had been `no one around' during her absence. This indeed was true, apart from the little incident with Tamar, which he would perhaps tell Jean about one day.

Since their car was being serviced Duncan took a taxi which put him down near his destination. His anxiety brought hint there too early, and he had to walk about for some time round squares of little streets trying to keep warm. An appalled misery overwhelmed Duncan's heart. What on earth was he doing here walking about in these bleak squalid streets, with a hammer in his overcoat pocket? The hammer was heavy and jarred against his thigh. His hands inside his gloves were freezing. The cold made him feel weak and strengthless. He could not imagine holding, let alone using, any weapon. Why had he felt it impossible not to come when it would have been perfectly easy to ignore Crimond's ridiculous letter? It would have been better, it would have been right. Of course having said he would come, he had now to come. Yet why was that, what stopped him from going back to the office at once, where he ought to be, where important matters awaited his attention and decent ordinary work was to be done? Why was lie walking about intending to kill somebody, if that was what he was doing – or gratuitously running the risk of being killed oi, maimed himself? And Jean – would she ever forgive him if he let Crimond wound him? Or – suppose he were to hurt Crimond, to hurt him badly? Would not this awaken Jean’s sympathy, even perhaps reawaken her love? He was in a situation where he couldn't win, and had wantonly put himself there. Was there still a way out? He thought, I must keep my head, I'm imagining all sorts of improbable horrors. I'll be frank with bloody Crimond, I'll tell him I came to tell him there was no point in this farcical business, and that he could go to hell, I wouldn't co-operate with his play-acting, and he would keep out of my wa yand not communicate with me gain. Surely nothing could stop him saying this and walking out, without letting Crimond start on whatever welcome he had contrived. This idea, with a rehearsal of its angry authoritative tone, cheered Duncan a little.

At eleven o'clock precisely Duncan mounted the steps to the door of Crimond's house. He pushed a bell which did not ring. He waited a moment. Then Crimond, who had evidently been waiting in the hall, opened the door.

It was not until that moment that it occurred to Duncan that, apart from what he had seen at the summer ball, he had not set eyes on Crimond since the meeting in the tower so many years ago. Yet oddly what shook him when he saw Crimond standing before him was how young he looked, and how like the quite different, far more distant person he had known at Oxford; and for an instant Duncan thought we can't fight – what on earth put the idea of a fight into my head at all! I'm mad. We are to talk, that's what this meeting is about. Perhaps it will end in reconciliation after all. And a glow of confidence and strength entered into him. Talking, conference, diplomacy, that was his subject. He would talk Crimond down.

Crimond was dressed in an old black corduroy jacket and trousers, and had obscured the neck of'his shirt with a dark reen knotted scarf. He looked at first sight dandyish, almost raffish. His hair was quite long, longer than at the dance, and, perhaps recently washed, a little fluffy. He was very thin and his pale eyes stared out of a face which seemed inordinately lengthened as in a caricature. His complexion, which in the summer had glowed with freckles, was sallow, and the skin strained over the bones as if'ready to split. The only colour in his face was the extremely red, damp, rims round his eyes, and a red area at the end of his long nose. His eyes in the staring face seemed alien, dry, like blanched stones. Duncan's second impression was that he was confronting a mad person. The sense of Crimond's youth had come from the slim figure, the corduroy, the scarf, the hair. Now he looked like a wraith.

Crimond said nothing, but moved his head to indicate that Duncan was to follow him. Duncan followed, closing the door behind him, across the icy hall and down some dark stairs into the long large basement room. This room was faintly warmer and smelt of a paraffin stove which was lurking somewhere at the far end. It was dark, very little light coming from outside, and only one lamp alight which was placed on the floor at the far end. The middle of the room was taken up by two long tables, placed longways opposite to each other, one at each end. There was a bed near the door, a great many books piled against the walls, two chairs, an open cupboard, a desk pushed into a corner near the lamp, no sign of activity upon it, the top swept clean. Otherwise the room was bare. As Duncan's eyes became accustomed to the dim light he saw the target. A contest of that sort? The lighting did not suggest target practice of any kind.