Iris Murdoch - The Sandcastle

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ said Tim carelessly. ‘These values are so artificial. Maybe five hundred guineas.’

The thought of Miss Carter flashed immediately into Mor’s mind. He had not thought of her all the evening. With extreme vividness there was present to him again the absurd scene of the previous day in Bledyard’s bedroom. The memory was disturbing. He wondered if he would tell Tim Burke about it, and decided not to. He also remembered that it was tomorrow that he was to have lunch with Mr Everard, in the company of Miss Carter and Bledyard. Mor felt interest at the thought of this meal, which was bound to offer some curious features. The mood of gloom and emptiness which had possessed him earlier in the evening seemed to be lifting. Once more he felt a sense of purpose and direction, a sense of the future.

He was about to speak to Tim Burke about the matter which was to be settled between them when Tim said, ‘I wish you’d take something for the wife. No, don’t take on, I’ll not offer you the diamonds! What about these ear-rings? She cared for them, I could see. She put them on herself this time, and last time too. And they become her. Why not take them? They’re but cheap things that I’ll never sell. I’ll wrap them up for you now.’

The ear-rings were blue, as far as Mor could see of lapis lazuli, and did not seem to him to be especially cheap. He checked Tim, who was producing tissue paper and a little box.

‘You’re too good to me. No, said Mor.

‘It’s your wife I want to be good to!’ said Tim.

‘Well, no, you mustn’t really,’ said Mor. ‘We’ve already taken one thing off you this evening. Another time, Tim. Now, listen, we must talk business.’

‘All right,’ said Tim, reluctantly replacing the ear-rings. ‘Is it yes or no?’

Mor sat forward stiffly in his chair. In the face of this rather fierce question he suddenly realized that he was, that he had been perhaps for some time, in the position of the coy maiden who has made up her mind but who puts up a show of resistance merely in order to be persuaded. Mor hated vain shows. He felt that his wishes had crystallized. He felt it with a certain surprise and with an intimation of joy. He said, ‘The answer is yes, of course. But there are a number of difficulties.’

Tim turned on him. ‘Yes, is it?’ he cried. ‘Holding out on us, were you? And I thought you would surely say no, and no again for the next months!’

‘You seem disappointed!’ said Mor, smiling faintly.

‘Disappointed! cried Tim. ’I could embrace you! Here, have some more whiskey, and if I could dissolve a pearl in it I would!‘

‘Not so fast,’ said Mor. ‘I want to carry out this plan, and I have now, I must say, absolutely no doubt but that I will carry it out. All the same, to throw up my job and be a parliamentary candidate at my time of life — it’s not all that simple. I suppose there’s no doubt I’d get in?’

‘None, me boy,’ said Tim Burke. ‘Ten thousand majority last time. Saint Francis wasn’t a surer candidate for heaven than you for Westminster.’

‘Well, then,’ said Mor, ‘there are a lot of financial considerations. I won’t bother you with these just now. And St Bride’s must be squared. I’m not giving them much notice. But that leaves the gravest thing of all, and that’s my wife. You know that Nan is very much opposed to the idea, she won’t even hear it spoken of.’

Tim looked grave. ‘I’d gathered,’ he said, ‘that she’s against it. But she’ll come round surely.’

‘I suppose she will,’ said Mor. ‘She’ll have to. But it won’t be easy. Why did you mention it tonight, by the way, you fathead? Nothing annoys Nan as much as the notion that people are making plans without consulting her. I’d hoped you might have some influence on her - only now she’ll think we’ve been plotting this for months. Do you think it would be any use if you talked to her alone?’

Tim looked down. ‘No,’ he said, ‘it would be no use. You must handle it. But, as you say, she will agree because she must. I’m glad to hear at last that courage in you. If you really will a thing, Mor, that thing will be. We shall all support you in every way possible. But this thing you must do for yourself alone.’

‘Well, it will be done,’ said Mor. He felt deeply encouraged by Tim Burke. ‘Only not a word about this to anyone for the moment. I shall have to discuss my resignation with Mr Everard. And I shall have to persuade Nan. When that’s done I’ll let you know and then you can tell the Party and the Press.’

‘Splendid!’ cried Tim Burke, his eyes shining, his glass held aloft. ‘When shall I see you?’

‘We’ll talk of it again, said Mor, ’when, now? What about the day of the House Match - you’re coming over then, aren’t you? It’s my house against Prewett’s this time.‘ Invited originally by Donald, Tim Burke usually came over to St Bride’s for the final summer House Match, which was also something of a social occasion. ’I hope I’ll be able to give you the all clear,‘ said Mor, ’and we can go ahead. But till then, not a word!‘

‘You must go for your train,’ said Tim Burke. ‘I’ll see you down the road.’

‘You know,’ said Mor, ‘perhaps after all I’ll take those ear-rings for Nan. Only you must let me pay something for them.’

‘I’ll not hear of it!’ said Tim. ‘You oblige me by taking them. Here, I’ll pack them up nicely, handy to give. Now please me, Mor, in this way too.’

Mor protested, smiled, and finally put the ear-rings in his pocket. They left the shop together.

Chapter Five

WHEN Mor awoke next morning he found, with his first W consciousness, that he felt extremely light-hearted. It was as if a good angel had passed in the night. For a while he lay marvelling vaguely at his condition. Then it came back to him that of course he had now at last decided. In the light of the actual decision the moves necessary to carry it out seemed very much easier. What was necessary was possible. Recalling the previous evening, and asking himself what exactly had happened, it seemed to Mor that Tim Burke had suddenly been able to communicate to him a new sort of confidence. He wondered why. His thoughts switched to Miss Carter, whom he would be seeing at lunch-time today; and then it seemed to him that in some strange way it was Miss Carter who had been responsible for his ability to decide, having given him, by her mere existence, a fresh sense of power and possibility. Mor mused for a while upon this mystery. Eccentric people, he concluded, were good for conventional people, simply because they made them able to conceive of everything being quite different. This gave them a sense of freedom. Nothing is more educational, in the end, than the mode of being of other people.

The morning passed quickly, and a little before one o‘clock Mor set out on his bicycle for Mr Everard’s luncheon party. In the bicycle basket he had placed a small packet which contained the complete works of Demoyte and which in accordance with his promise he was taking to Miss Carter. A cycle track, for the use of masters only, led down the hill through the wood towards the neglected garden of the Headmaster’s house. As Mor free-wheeled through the trees, his bicycle bumping about agreeably on the undulating track, he experienced a profound sense of well-being and general benevolence. The weather was still extremely sunny, but today there was a soft breeze which seemed to bring, from not so very far away in the south, the freshness of the sea.

Benevolently Mor thought about Mr Everard. There came back to him the remark which Miss Carter had made about his having no malice in him. It was true. Evvy had no malice. In some sense of the word Evvy was undoubtedly a good man. He was well-intentioned and unselfish; indeed he seemed utterly to lack the conception of getting anything for himself. Evvy’s life was not constructed, it seemed to Mor, in such a way as to leave any place in it where he could store things for himself. Most people’s lives had a sort of bulge or recess in which they piled up their selfish acquisitions, their goods, their fame, their power. Evvy had no such private place. He lived in the open, with simplicity, seeming to lack altogether the concepts of vanity or ambition, weaknesses which he was equally incapable of harbouring within himself or of recognizing in others. If he hurt people, it was through indecision or sheer obtuseness and not through any preference for having things his own way, since his own way was something which had never really developed.