Charles Snow - Time of Hope

Two days after his return, at last I seized the chance to talk.

‘I’ve not paid you my last quarter’s fees,’ I said. ‘But—’

‘All contributions thankfully received,’ said Getliffe.

‘I’d like to discuss my position,’ I said. ‘I’ve done some work for you, you know, and you said—’

Getliffe met my eyes with his straightforward gaze.

‘I’m going to let you pay that quarter, Eliot,’ he said. ‘I know what you’re going to say. I know you’ve done things for me, I know that better than you do. But I’m thinking of my future pupils, Eliot. I’ve tried to give you more experience than you’d have got in the Chambers of most of our learned friends. I make it a matter of principle to give my pupils experience, and I hope I always shall. But if I start letting them off their fees when they take advantage of their opportunities — well, I know myself too well, Eliot, I shall just stop putting things in their way. So I’m going to accept your cheque. Of course this next year we must have a business arrangement. This just wipes the slate clean.’

Before I could reply, he told me jollyingly that soon he would be inviting me to a party.

That party was dangled in front of me in many conversations afterwards. Now that my pupil’s year was over, I was not called so often into Getliffe’s room. For his minor devilling, he was using a new pupil called Parry. But for several cases he relied on me, for I was quick and had the knack of writing an opinion so that he could master its headings in the midst of his hurrying magpie-like raids among his papers. In return, I wanted to be paid — or better, recommended to a solicitor to take a brief for which Getliffe had no time. Some days promised one reward, some days another. When I was exigent, he said with his genial, humble smile that soon I should be receiving an invitation from his wife. ‘We want you to come to our party’ he said. ‘We’re both looking forward to it no end, L S’ (He was the only person alive who called me by my initials.)

It was nearly Christmas before at last I was asked to their house in Holland Park. I found my way through the Bayswater streets, vexed and rebellious. I was being used, I was being cheated shamelessly — no, not shamelessly, I thought with a glimmer of amusement, for each of Getliffe’s bits of sharp practice melted him into a blush of shame. But repentance never had the slightest effect on his actions. He grieved sincerely for what he had done, and then did it again. He was exploiting me, he was taking the maximum advantage of being my only conceivable patron. And now he fobbed me off with a treat like a schoolboy. Did he know the first thing about me? Was it all unconsidered, had he the faintest conception of the mood in which I was going to my treat?

Their drawing-room was large and bright and light. Getliffe himself looked out of place, dishevelled, boyishly noisy, his white tie not clean and a little bedraggled. He wife was elegantly dressed; she clung to my hand, fixed me with warm spaniel-like eyes, close to mine, and said: ‘It is nice to see you. Herbert has said such a lot about you. He’s always saying how much he wishes I had the chance of seeing you. I do wish I could see more of you all—’

Watching her later at the dinner table, I thought she was almost a lovely woman, if only she had another expression beside that of eager, cooing fidelity. She was quite young: Getliffe at that time was just over forty and she was a few years less. They were very happy. He had, as usual, done himself well. They talked enthusiastically about children’s books, Getliffe protruding his underlip and comparing Kenneth Grahame and A A Milne, his wife regarding him with an eager loving stare, their warmth for each other fanned by the baby talk.

Once Mrs Getliffe prattled: ‘Herbert always says you people do most of his work for him.’ We laughed together.

They talked of pantomimes: they had two children, to what show should they be taken? Getliffe remarked innocently how, when he was an undergraduate, he had schemed to take his half-brother Francis to the pantomime — not for young Francis’ enjoyment, but for his own.

That was the party. I said goodbye, in a long hand clasp with Mrs Getliffe. Getliffe took me into the hall. ‘I hope you’ve enjoyed yourself, L S,’ he said.

When I thanked him, he went on: ‘We may not be the best Chambers in London — but we do have fun!’

His face was merry. On the way home, grinning at my own expense, I could not be certain whether his eyes were innocent, or wore their brazen, defiant stare.

In that bitterly cold winter of 1928-9 I reached a depth of discontent. I ached for this suspense to end. In my memory it remained one of the periods I would least have chosen to live through again. And yet there must have been good times. I was being entertained by the Marches, I was making friends in a new society. Long afterwards Charles March told me that I seemed brimming with interest, and even he had not perceived how hungry and despondent I became. That is how I remembered the time, without relief — I remembered myself dark with my love for Sheila, fretting for a sign of recognition in my job, poor, seeing no sign of a break. It was worse because Charles himself, in that December, was given his first important case. It was nothing wonderful — it was marked at twenty-five guineas — but it was a chance to shine, and for such a chance just then I would have begged or stolen.

Charles was working in the Chambers of a relation by marriage, and the case was arranged through other connections of his family. Nothing could be more natural as a start for a favourably born young man. As he told me, I was devoured by envy. Sheer rancorous envy, the envy of the poor for the rich, the unlucky for the lucky, the wallflower for the courted. I tried to rejoice in his luck, and I felt nothing but envy.

I hated feeling so. I had been jealous in love, but this envy was more degrading. In jealousy there was at least the demand for another’s love, the sustenance of passion — while in such envy as I felt for Charles there was nothing but the sick mean stab. I hated that I should be so possessed. But I was hating the human condition. For as I saw more of men in society I thought in the jet-black moments that envy was the most powerful single force in human affairs — that, and the obstinate desire of the flesh to persist. Given just those two components to build with, one could construct too much of the human scene.

I tried to make conscious amends. I offered to help him on the brief; the case was a breach of contract, and I knew the subject well. Charles let me help, and I did a good share of the work. He was himself awkward and conscience-stricken. Once, as we were studying the case, he said ‘I’m just realizing how true it is — that it’s not so easy to forgive someone, when you’re taking a monstrously unfair advantage over him.’

The case was down to be heard in January. I sat by the side of Charles’ father and did not miss a word. The judge had only recently gone to the bench, and was very alert and sharp-witted, sitting alone against the red upholstery of the Lord Chief Justice’s court. Mr March and I placed ourselves for a day and a half near the door, so as not to catch Charles’ eye. Charles’ loud voice resounded in the narrow room; his face looked thinner under his new, immaculate wig. The case was a hopeless one from the start. Yet I thought that he was doing well. He impressed all in court by his cross-examination of an expert witness. In the end he lost the case, but the judge went out of his way to pay a compliment: the losing side might, the judge hoped, take consolation from the fact that their case could not have been more lucidly presented.

It was a handsome compliment. It should have been mine, I felt again. Men stood around Charles, congratulating him, taking his luck for granted. I went to join them, to add my own congratulations. Partly I meant them, partly I was pleased — but I would not have dared to look deep into my heart.