Peter Carey - Bliss

'Yes.'

'Have some more Scotch, Harry.'

'Thank you, Alex. The question is,' Harry dropped a fist full of ice into his glass, 'the question is who are the Captives and how can they be freed?'

'Harry,' Alex said, 'it is good to see you. It is nice to talk to you. We haven't talked like this since the Old Days. Remem-ber how we used to sit around till all hours and talk?' Alex stuffed tobacco into his little bent pipe and lit it. When he had it glowing he leant back in his chair. 'You old bastard,' he said. 'It's so nice to talk to you.'

'Let me ask you a question,' Harry said. 'An opinion… '

'Yes,' Alex settled down comfortably.

'The relative merits of Goodness and Originality… what do you reckon?'

'Harry,' he shook his head, 'you're amazing. I don't believe it.'

The two men smiled at each other proudly.

'Originality, without Goodness,' Alex said at last, 'is nothing, of no worth.'

'That's what I was thinking,' Harry said. 'Originality, by itself, is nothing?'

'Not a pinch of shit.'

'But with Goodness?'

'Dynamite.'

'I think we should fire Krappe Chemicals,' Harry said.

'I think that's the place to start.'

'Yes… ' Alex said cautiously.

'How much are they billing?'

'Just under two million.'

Alex began to feel that there was something in the conver-sation he had not heard, as if he had dozed off and missed some vital piece of information. He sat for a while puffing on his pipe and looking at the hockey match in the park across the way. Harry fished a piece of ice out of the bucket and crunched it up.

'Why?' Alex said at last.

'Why what?'

'Why fire Krappe Chemicals?'

Harry looked at him in astonishment, 'So you don't have to write your extra conference reports. I'm damned if I'm going to be punished for ever. Do you want to be punished for ever?'

Alex took the pipe out of his mouth. 'No,' he said, and held the pipe about three inches from his mouth, where smoke issued forth from both ends. 'Still,' he said, 'it's a lot of money… ' And, when Harry didn't comment: 'It might seem a little inconsistent... '

'How inconsistent?' said Harry through another mouthful of crunching ice.

'To suddenly, after all these years, fire them.'

, Ah, but they weren't doing it before.'

'Doing what?'

'Making you unhappy.'

Alex blinked. 'Harry, I've been doing these for ten years.'

'Mmmm,' said Harry Joy vaguely and poured himself a Scotch. 'Here's to us,' he said, 'we're going to be good.'

At night, lying in bed, Alex read Rousseau and Pascal, Bertrand Russell and Hegel, Marx and Plato, but now looking at Harry Joy, whom he had worked with for fifteen years, he was frightened that he had understood him.

'You mean Good, don't you? Capital G?'

'Capital G,' grinned Harry and wet his moustache in the Scotch.

'You mean GOOD.'

'Bet your arse.'

As a dream, as a possibility, this would have made Alex smile. Reading at night while his wife snored beside him he would have luxuriated in the ridiculous possibility of Harry Joy deciding to be Good. But now, facing the possibility of it in this stuffy Saturday office, he was filled with fear.

'You're really serious?'

'Sure. Why not.'

'You'll go broke.'

'Who cares.' Harry felt as if he had opened the windows in a locked-up house. He could smell fresh-mown grass.

Alex smiled a hurt ironical smile. 'Well I might. I need a job.!

Harry stood up and put both his hands on Alex's soft shoulders. 'You'll have a job. I'll make sure you have a job. We don't need a lot of money.'

Alex had always been given strength by Harry's enthusiasms but they had always promised him safety, not danger. And besides, there was something in him that was irritated by Harry's new discovery of morality and punishment, as if he were moving in on a territory that didn't belong to him, a territory where he, Alex, was much more familiar with the nuances of right and wrong, the details of the crimes of their clients, the exact nature of their own criminal compliance. It was Alex's field and he resented Harry's crude enthusiasm and his childish determination to be Good. A year ago, three months ago, Harry had had no interest in anything but a successful business and now he was acting as if he had sole proprietorship of the moral dilemmas of life. He had ignored Alex when he nervously, tentatively, suggested there was something wrong with various Krappe Chemicals products.

Now he, Harry Joy, was taking control.

'Still,' said Alex, 'it's good to see you, you old bastard.' But his smile was uncertain.

'Don't worry about the money, Alex. I'll make sure you don't go out on the street.'

'Sure,' said Alex and Harry decided not to hear the sarcasm in his voice. Instead they sat and talked about who were Captives and who were Actors and as afternoon came on and the bottle of Scotch gave up its last drinks, they composed a list, based on Alex's information.

Outside the streets were flooding and cars were stalling and being abandoned. But when the list was complete Harry Joy rolled up his trousers and went out to find a taxi.

Alex stayed in his office trying to open his filing cabinet with a screw-driver, cursing Harry Joy who now had the key.

It was one of those hot still mornings that come in the begin-ning of the wet season: the sky a brilliant cobalt blue, and beneath it legions of green all freshly washed or newly born and only the rustling dry leaves hanging like giant dried fish from the banana trees might suggest death, and then only to someone hunting eagerly for its signs. The air that blew through the open windows of the old wooden house was sweet and warm, and honeysuckle and frangipani lent their aromatic veils, which billowed like invisible curtains in the high-ceilinged rooms.

Harry Joy whistled and spread the old newspapers across the kitchen table and set up the boot polish (dark tan, light tan, black and neutral) and the matching brushes and the polishing cloths. He brought to his goodness the slightly obsessive concern with method which is the hallmark of the amateur. He picked up the first pair of shoes and was pleased to see them muddy. He took an old knife and scraped them carefully; then a slightly damp cloth to wipe them; then the brush and polish; now the cloth. Then considering he had rushed the job and perhaps done it badly, he removed the laces and began again.

In the hour before eight o'clock he had cleaned the whole family’s shoes, and none of them had so much as stirred. He allowed himself the luxury of a cup of tea and while the kettle boiled he watched a family of honey-eaters attack the last of the previous season's pawpaws on the tree outside the kitchen window. He tried to memorize the form and colours of the birds but he knew he had no talent for it. In three minutes' time the honey-eaters would be a crude blurr in his memory and all he would know was that they had a yellow marking near the eye.

When he had finished his tea he began to clean the win-dows, beginning in the kitchen where a fine layer of grease lay across the surface of the glass. He was engaged in rubbing this dry with old newspaper when David, already dressed with his wet hair combed neatly, came into the kitchen.

'Morning,' said Harry.

David took in the shoes which were now lined up on the back doorstep, the clean window, and Harry Joy resplendent in bare scarred chest and Balinese sarong, his taut body glis-tening with sweat, his yellowed teeth biting his lower lip in concentration. He didn't know what to be indignant about first.

He picked up his shoes. 'Did you do this?'

'Yes.'

'Dad, please, you mustn't.'

'It's O.K., it gave me pleasure.'

It was true. He couldn't remember ever having had so nice a time as this morning, alone with his family’s shoes. He had enjoyed everything about it.