He ended by saying:
“As to Surrealism, what would it tell you about Blake if you called him a Surrealist? Or Fuseli, for that matter. But possibly the word is a useful label nowadays for the pseudo-artists who produce mechanised Freudian nightmares.”
He discussed Surrealism at length, then asked if I knew a definition of art which had the smallest value.
“I don’t say it has the smallest value but, for me, art is the conquest of chaos. Every creative act is the conquest of chaos. As to what you said about nudes, Marcel Bon held that a nude must be a woman who has never known clothes—not one who has taken them off.”
“Would you add anything to that?”
“Well—romantically expressed—I’d say that a nude should awake Eden-like innocence in the spectator. Or, if he is incapable of that—and he almost certainly would be—then a nude should evoke Eden-like memories of lost innocence.”
We talked for another hour. When I rose to go, Singleton seemed reluctant to let me leave. I felt that he wanted to speak intimately, but was restrained by his habitual reserve. Whether or not this reserve had been created by pride or loneliness—or both, in icy partnership—Singleton had become incapable of revealing himself to any one. His wound bled inwardly. During the whole of his life he had found only one woman and one man with whom he had known companionship. Now, night after night, he sat alone in a panelled room—with their photographs on the walls.
Every capital has its unique peculiarity—and London is the city of coincidence.
When I found myself in the dark snow-bound streets, after leaving Singleton, I had no doubt whatever that I should have to grope my way to Chelsea. Everything had stopped running long ago: I passed no one and heard nothing. Then, just as I reached Piccadilly Circus, I found a stationary taxi—the driver of which informed me that he was going home and could take me to Chelsea, but only to Chelsea.
On arrival, and while I was fumbling for the flat key, I realised how totally Mervyn had revolutionised my life. Before he came, I had shared the flat with solitude, but, now, to open the front door was often to encounter adventure.
Mervyn frequently gave a night’s lodging to some man or woman whom he had picked up on his nocturnal rambles. Owing to overcrowding, all sorts of people found themselves stranded—especially men and women in the forces—and therefore were glad enough of a roof for the night. Mervyn’s hospitality was not elaborate: he put a mattress and a number of blankets in a corner of his room, then wished his guest good night. Already, a colonel, a commando, and a woman sergeant had gladly accepted this accommodation. To each, Mervyn had explained that he could not possibly give up his sofa-bed. He told the sergeant that he would not give up his sofa-bed to the Queen of Sheba—he would not even share it with the Queen of Sheba—such was his solicitude for the springs.
It is not surprising therefore that I wondered what would confront me when I went into the sitting-room.
I found Mervyn in pyjamas and dressing-gown, but, ranged on the sofa, were his thickest underwear, a pair of heavy corduroy trousers, three or four pullovers, and a pair of fur-lined gloves.
“What on earth are you doing, Mervyn?”
“I’ll tell you in a minute. You’re late. Where have you been?”
“Singleton asked me to his flat for a drink.”
“Alone?”
“Yes. Why?”
“Terrifying person! He’s one of those people who won’t forgive Goa. I admit it’s not easy—but it must be done.”
He took off his dressing-gown and pyjamas—thereby revealing an enormous, but well-proportioned very white body—then said as he pulled on a thick vest:
“Yes, my dear Max, you must forgive God. No matter what horrors you have endured—you must forgive Him. Against ail the evidence, you must assume that the King of the Universe is your friend. I saw that quoted somewhere. But Singleton won’t forgive. He’s turned himself into an icicle—and defies God to thaw him.”
Pause.
“It’s lucky I’ve got those pants. Actually, they’re not mine. They belong to a colonel of about my build. I had one of his vests, but some blackguard stole it.”
I watched him for some moments, then asked:
“What did you do this evening?”
“Went back to the Mirage Club. By the way, it used to be called the New World Club, but they decided that the Mirage Club is now more appropriate. Anyhow, I’m certain the murderer will be found there. I’m quite certain—and quite serious.”
After he had put on a pre-war flannel shirt, I asked:
“You’re still interested in Carol, then?”
“Interested! I’m in love with her! She is to me what the Lady of Thoughts was to the troubadours. I am a romantic. I need unappeasable desires—and perpetual suffering in the search for the unattainable. I am a Tristan who has found a dead Iseult. I have drunk the love-potion over her grave.”
Pause.
“The more I look at Enigma, the more things I remember from far away and long ago. Such jolly things! October avenues of falling leaves . . . Chestnuts, roasting on the nursery fire . . . the smell of seaweed on a briny beach. It’s marvellous! And there’s no possibility of disillusionment. Believe me, Max, the rapture of frustration is much more exciting than the routine of fulfilment. Of course, absence makes the heart grow fonder! Absence is a spring-board for imagination, whereas, too often, presence poleaxes imagination.”
Mervyn put on the colonel’s pants, surveyed himself in a mirror with evident satisfaction, then went on:
“Being in love makes me symbolic. Isn’t that odd? I am beginning to see Carol as a symbolic figure.”
“In what way—exactly?”
“My dear Max, one cannot be symbolic and exact! It seems to me that Carol represented emotional life. And she lived in a cul-de-sac. That’s superb symbolism, because the emotions have long been banished to a cul-de-sac. All sorts of lonely people visited her. That’s good symbolism, because modern people—deadly weary of an inhuman world—sometimes get nostalgic, and visit their emotions.”
He pulled on the corduroy trousers, then said:
“Very fortunate I’ve got these. Humphrey Cruikshank stayed with me the week-end war was declared—and left them behind. Nice fellow. Fine figure of a man. Ever since the Fight for Freedom started, he’s been in Brixton Gaol—under 18 B.”
He knotted a green tie, then studied it with a dubious expression. As I watched him, it seemed unbelievable that he had a wife and three children.
Suddenly I asked:
“Any news of Drina?”
“I say, Max! You really are a most uncanny person!”
“Why?”
“It’s about the tenth time it’s happened! I’m thinking about someone—and you suddenly gate-crash my thoughts. It’s rather frightening. No, I’ve no news of Drina.”
“Does your wife ever write?”
“That question shows that I have not given you an adequate idea of Ella. She is mean to a degree that scares misers of international reputation. Since the postage became tuppence-ha’penny in this sceptred island, Ella has not written a single letter. If you write and enclose a stamped addressed envelope, she steams the stamp off. So that doesn’t get you anywhere. But I must tell you that I do not regard Ella as a separate individual. She’s an extension of my mother. She’s a wing built on to a prison.”
Pause.
He picked up a black pullover, gazed at it reminiscently, then said: