Graham Swift: Shuttlecock

‘Exactly. But don’t jump to conclusions. There’s no evidence for a connexion between the two things. And even supposing your father did receive the letter and his breakdown was a consequence, it may have been a reaction to a vicious, sudden, but still false allegation.’

‘No —’ Suddenly, I don’t know why, my voice became angry. ‘Dad wouldn’t have reacted like that. If it had been false, he would have faced it out, denied it, cleared himself.’

Why was I speaking like this? I thought: or, if he’d broken once, he would have broken twice.

‘But, in any case,’ — I faltered — ‘maybe that doesn’t matter. Maybe that’s academic. There is still the fact of the allegation.’

‘Yes. I’m afraid it’s you who must bear the brunt of that. Your father may know nothing. At any rate — he’s silent on the matter.’

The perfect defence: impenetrable silence.

I peered into Quinn’s face — as if, now, he had become an easy target for me — for several seconds.

‘Do you think it was true?’

Quinn threw up his hands. ‘My dear chap, that’s a question I can’t answer.’ His face looked pained. I thought: he is regretting he ever spoke — didn’t keep silent too. ‘I don’t know if it can ever be answered. I’ve weighed up the known facts. You must do the same. X was a British agent in ’44 and was a prisoner in the Château Martine at a time coinciding with, or close to the period of your father’s imprisonment. All that is established fact.’

‘So X would have known.’

‘He would have been in a position to know. But he would also have been in a position, several years later, to make a spiteful, unfounded attack which had an apparent historical basis. Come back for a moment to the present and the other cases in C9. Y and Z were cleared: that itself speaks in your father’s favour. All the evidence suggests that X was an embittered failure who wanted to get his own back on those who had fared better than himself. One of the charges he was up for before he died was fraud . Y and Z were successful civil servants on their way to the top. X’s own civil service career was a flop. X was a British agent like your father, but he didn’t come out of the war, like your father, a hero. The man felt neurotically inferior.’

Quinn turned in his chair and the little sharp gleam flashed in his eyes just for a second. I thought: if I had known what I know now, and the circumstances were different — I might have blackmailed Quinn.

‘But if Dad did betray the other agents, isn’t there evidence to corroborate that?’

Quinn bent forward in his chair and passed a hand over his face.

‘In mid-September ’44 three British agents were rounded up, almost simultaneously, by the Germans and shot, in Mulhouse. X mentions this in his letter — but it’s a genuine fact.’

‘So — ’

‘Wait. Don’t forget there are two ways of looking at it. X wants to incriminate your father. He searches round for facts, coincidences, that will apparently do this. His whole purpose is to suggest the wrong sort of deduction.’

‘But there are too many coincidences — X being at Château Martine, the shot spies, Dad’s breakdown at the time the letter might have been sent — ’

Quinn passed his hand over his face again. I thought: he really believes Dad is guilty, but he is straining every nerve to protect me.

‘Was he a traitor?’ I blurted this out naïvely — as if Quinn were omniscient. The word ‘traitor’ sounded like something out of melodrama.

‘Perhaps that isn’t really the question. The question is, if he was, could you bear knowing it?’

I thought of the day when I refused to go any more with Dad to the golf course.

‘There’s one thing — that seems to go against all this. His book — ’

‘Ah — ’

‘The last pages, where he describes the Château, and his escape.’

‘I’ve read them.’

‘They’re too convincing not to be real. He couldn’t have written those things, if they never happened.’

‘He knew the Château, and the region — and perhaps he had — like you — a strong imagination. If he wanted to invent an escape story he could have done so. I’m just pointing this out, not disagreeing with you.’

‘No, I don’t mean just that. The last chapters are more convincing than the other parts of the book, even though the other parts are about things nobody disputes are true. It’s not just the authentic detail — it’s the tone.’ I felt my voice running away with me. ‘In the rest of the book you hardly sense Dad’s feelings, you don’t sense Dad himself. But in the last paragraphs you — ’

I looked at the pale, peppery hairs, visible on Quinn’s chest.

… of all the humiliations … none was more demoralizing, more appalling …

‘If he didn’t actually escape, if it was all a deal with the Germans — why should he write a false story anyway? Why should he have written his book at all and put himself at risk. Shouldn’t he have just kept quiet?’

‘Because he had to justify how he got out of the Château. He couldn’t just say, They let me go. His war record up till then had been pretty remarkable — the grand finale had to live up to it. Of course, I’m speaking hypothetically. But to continue the hypothesis. Suppose that this brilliant record really was blotted by a final act of betrayal; suppose that his hero’s reputation rested ultimately upon a lie. Imagine the pressure, the burden of this — the fear of the truth coming out. Have you ever wondered why it was so long after the war before your father’s book appeared? 1957. He was approached before then by more than one publisher. Why? Because he hesitated over the final act of committing the lie to print, of becoming an out-and-out impostor. At least, he hesitated up to a point. But then the mental pressure becomes too much. He starts to see the publication of his memoirs in a quite different light — as a means of rebutting once and for all the possibility of exposure, of presenting the hero-image in such a complete and thorough way that no one will dare challenge it. And think for a moment what happens when he actually does this. Why are the final chapters more convincing, more heartfelt than the rest? Because it’s here the real issue lies. The true exploits, all the brave and daring deeds, what do they matter? They can be treated almost like fiction, but the part of the book that’s really a lie — that’s where all the urgency is. It’s here that he’s trying to save himself. Why does it read like a real escape? Because it is an escape, a quite real escape, of a kind. Who knows if in writing it your father didn’t convince himself it was true? And why is it also the most thoughtful, the most sensitive, the most imaginative part of the book? Am I seeing too much in it? Because in writing it he is actually torn between the desire to construct this saving lie and an instinct not to falsify himself completely — to be, somehow, honest. So behind all the “authentication” of his prison experiences and of the escape, he puts down little hints, little clues, meant perhaps only for those nearest to him — for his own son — ’ Quinn grew excited ‘ — clues which say, in case they should ever inquire beyond the surface: See, I was only human. I had my limits, my failings.’

Through the open door, that summer night, Dad’s sudden start — as if I’d caught him in some guilty act.

I thought: who has the lurid imagination now?

‘My dear fellow — I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to say all this. I got carried away. Please — ’

For a long time there was silence. I sensed Quinn’s apprehension. Then suddenly I said, ‘Did he break down?’ My voice was savage. ‘In the Château — did he break down?’