‘No,’ said Gabriel. ‘I saw him in the street once. Brian met him, and of course George was his pupil.’
During the last exchange Brian had turned up the sound of the television considerably in order to demonstrate his displeasure.
‘What does Brian think of him?’ said the priest, raising his voice.
‘Better ask him,’ said Gabriel, raising hers and opening the door. ‘Brian! Father Bernard wants to know what you think about Professor Rozanov.’
Brian came in, walked across to the gas stove and peered into one of the saucepans, pulling its lid off and banging it on again. He stared at the priest who did not, however, at once repeat his question, but said instead, ‘Why is Professor Rozanov visiting us?’
‘He isn’t visiting me. I don’t know, arthritis, come to take the waters — ’
‘Do you know where he’ll be staying?’
‘No idea, Ennistone Royal Hotel.’ (Queen Victoria had visited Ennistone when Victoria Park was building, and went to the Institute where the Prince Consort praised the waters and spoke of Baden-Baden.)
‘He hasn’t been here since his mother died,’ said Gabriel, ‘but people say he’s coming back now for good, he’s going to retire here.’
‘What is he like?’ The television noise from the next room was almost drowning their voices.
‘Rozanov? He’s a charlatan. You know what a charlatan is, a fake, a trickster, an impostor, a busybody who pretends to be able — ’
‘Oh don’t shout,’ cried Gabriel as she ran to turn off the television.
The priest made his adieux.
Later in the evening Gabriel and Brian were still talking about George and Stella and Alex.
‘You must drop that Slipper House idea,’ said Brian, ‘Alex would never let us live there. Besides we’d hate it, right on top of her.’
‘We’d use the back gate — ’
‘Forget it.’
‘I want that house.’
‘You’re so acquisitive. And you think Alex is wasting our substance.’
‘She’s so extravagant — ’
‘You mustn’t think like that, it’s mean, it’s petty.’
‘I know!’
‘You shudder if Alex breaks a cup.’
‘She’s careless, and she will use the best stuff all the time.’
‘Why not, it isn’t your cup, it probably never will be. She’ll leave everything to George. You know we wouldn’t lift a finger.’
‘She might have consulted us before selling Maryville.’
Maryville was the seaside house.
‘It was nothing but trouble, that place; dry rot and then squatters — ’
‘Going to the sea isn’t the same after you’ve lived there; it’s made that lovely piece of coast seem all sad.’
‘There you go again, property, property, property!’
‘Alex doesn’t use the Slipper House. That time last summer I saw her painting stuff, it was just the same as it was years ago.’
‘Maybe she meditates there, it isn’t our business, try to imagine her life, for heaven’s sake. You don’t like this house.’
‘I do because it’s our house, but it’s so small.’
‘The trouble with you is you’ve never got used to being a poor Bowcock.’ Gabriel’s branch of the family had not, for some reason. shared in the ancestral money.
Gabriel laughed. ‘Maybe! But we need more room. If we have Stella here — ’
‘Do we have to have Stella here?’
‘I think so.’
‘She wouldn’t come.’
‘I talked to her again, very tactfully. I think she’s afraid to go back to George.’
‘Husbands and wives often understand each other better than well-meaning outsiders imagine.’
‘Anyway she wants an interval.’
‘You seem to want her to leave George.’
‘She goes on thinking she can cure him, she goes on looking for little signs that things are getting better — ’
‘That’s love.’
‘It’s an illusion.’
‘In a way,’ said Brian, ‘it can’t be an illusion.’
‘I think George really hates her.’
‘That’s something she will never believe.’
‘That’s the trouble. Think of the misery there must be in that house, and George involved with that other woman. I think Stella should have a quiet time to think it over. She’s still in a state of shock, she’s sort of prostrate.’
‘Stella prostrate? Never!’ Brian admired Stella.
‘Do you know, George hasn’t been to see her since the first day?’
‘George is demonic, like Alex,’ said Brian. ‘He would feel it stylish not to turn up, then it would seem inevitable.’
‘You keep saying he’s a dull dog.’
‘Yes, he’s commonplace, a thoroughly vulgar fellow, like Iago.’
‘Like - really! But Alex isn’t demonic, she’s become much quieter, a sort of recluse, I feel quite worried about her.’
‘You love worrying about people. Alex just doesn’t want to see how old and decrepit her friends are. She sees herself as a priestess, she goes on playing the femme fatale, she imagines men falling madly in love with her.’
‘I suppose they did. Wasn’t Robin Osmore madly in love with her?’
‘Dozens of them were. But that was a hundred years ago. And it wasn’t Robin Osmore, it was his father. Thai’s how old she is.’
‘She doesn’t look it.’
‘I keep longing for the time when Alex is just a poor old wreck, a pathetic confused old thing wanting to be looked after, but it never comes.’
‘You’ll hate it when it does.’
‘I shall dance.’
‘You won’t. You’re proud of her, you all are. There’s a sort of governessy grande dame aspect of Alex which supports you.’
‘OK, but that’s a metaphysical matter and strictly private. Just don’t ask me to love her.’
‘You should talk to her about George, it’s no good with me there. I really do think we should take some sort of collective responsibility for George.’
‘Women always want to rescue men, to save them from themselves, or help them to find themselves, or something.’
‘I said collective responsibility — ’
‘George needs electric shocks and some of his brain removing.’
‘I can’t think how he can live with himself.’
‘Stella ought to ship him out to Japan. He’d do well in Japan, they are all Georges there.’
‘He must be in hell.’
‘George in hell? Not a bit of it. He blames us.’
‘Well, we are to blame because we speak ill of him, we’ve turned against him and abandoned him.’
‘I mean he blames us, everybody, the world, everything except George. He has chronic hurt vanity, cosmic resentment, metaphysical envy. George has always behaved as if he were being outrageously cheated, something stolen, something lost.’
‘I suppose he has guilt feelings.’
‘It isn’t guilt, it’s shame, it’s loss of face. He’s probably more worried about losing his driving licence than about having nearly killed his wife. Anything wicked or evil in himself he immediately shifts on to the enemy, the others. He’s lost all sense of ordinary reality.’
‘He feels insecure.’
‘I daresay Hitler felt insecure!’
‘You’re exaggerating wildly. Everyone says how violent George is, but we don’t know the circumstances, it all builds up by hearsay. I think people are just against him because he’s unconventional and that frightens them. They’re afraid of him because he’s not polite!’
‘He’s certainly given up the niceties of human intercourse, but that’s just a symptom. George hates everybody. He makes one understand terrorists.’
‘Can’t you feel pity for him? Do you think a day or an hour passes when he doesn’t think about Rufus?’
‘Loss of child, loss of face.’
‘How can you — ’
‘He probably pitched the child down the stairs in a fit of rage and then convinced himself it was Stella’s fault.’