“It’s somewhere, I suppose.”
“Dear boy, don’t talk like that! Now look, Frankie; you always liked my rosary, and it’s a fine one. I want you to have it—no, no, I have others—and I want you to take it with you everywhere, and use it. Promise, Frank!”
“Aunt, how can I promise?”
“By doing so now. A solemn promise, made in love. A promise made to me. Because you know, I’m sure, that at least in part you are my child, and the only one I’ll ever have.”
So, after some further weak demurrers, Frank took the rosary, and gave the promise, and the next morning he left Blairlogie, as he then thought, forever.
So that poor wretch the Looner was the outcome of a chance meeting between the romantic Mary-Jacobine and the destroyed soldier Zadok? said the Lesser Zadkiel.
–If you wish to talk of Chance, said the Daimon Maimas. But you and I know how deceptive the concept of Chance—the wholly random, inexplicable happening—is as a final explanation of anything.
–Of course. But I am keeping in mind how dear the notion of Chance is to the people on Earth. Theirs is the short view. Rob them of Chance and you strike at their cherished idea of Free Will. They are not granted the time to see that Chance may have its limitations, just as Free Will has its limitations. Odd, isn’t it, that they are glad enough to have their scientists show them evidence of pattern in the rest of Nature, but they don’t want to recognize themselves as part of Nature. They seem persuaded that they, alone of all Creation, so far as they know it, are uninfluenced by the Anima Mundi.
–Well, we see that they have some choice within the pattern, but the pattern is strong, and now and then it shows itself nakedly. Then something like this happens: Mary-Jacobine chooses Zadok—against probability, but because she has a crush on an actor; Zadok begets a child, in a single coupling with a virgin—again against probability, but because he is a compassionate, unhappy man. Do we call that chance? But then, she does not recognize her chance lover when he appears and he does not recognize her because they are in a world they think of as the New World. Then—Marie-Louise destroys a child in the womb, which is very probable considering who and what she was. Zadok does not know his own son—how would he? Just Chance and Likelihood in their old familiar muddle, said the Daimon.
–I suppose they would call it coincidence.
–A useful, dismissive word for people who cannot bear the idea of pattern shaping their own lives.
–Coincidence is what they call pattern in which they cannot discern something they are prepared to accept as meaning, said the Lesser Zadkiel.
–But we see the meaning, do we not, brother? Of course we do. The Looner brought love back into the life of Zadok, for only love can explain his behaviour toward him. The Looner brought motherhood into the life of Victoria Cameron, who did not choose—probably feared—to seek it in the usual way.
–And for your man Francis, my dear colleague?
–Ah—for Francis the Looner was a lifelong reminder of the inadmissible primitive in the most cultivated life, a lifelong adjuration to pity, a sign that disorder and abjection stand less than a hair’s breadth away from every human creature. A continual counsel to make the best of whatever fortune had given him.
–But surely, also, a constant pointer to humility? said the Angel.
–Very much so. And I think that although I had nothing to do with the begetting of the Looner, I made good use of him in the shaping of Francis. So the Looner did not live in vain.
–Yes, you did well there, brother. And where is the helm set for now?
–For Oxford.
–Oxford certainly won’t strengthen the Blairlogie strain, said the Angel.
–Oxford will strengthen whatever is bred in the bone. And I have already made sure that the Looner, in every aspect, is bred in the bone of Francis. Francis will need all his wits and all his pity at Oxford, said the Daimon.
Part Four
What would not Out of the Flesh?
“Everybody agrees that your first year at Oxford was a triumph,” said Basil Buys-Bozzaris.
“That’s very kind of everybody,” said Francis. He was being patronized by the fat slob Buys-Bozzaris and he was beginning to wonder how much longer he would put up with it.
“Now, now; let’s have no false modesty. You have made a nice little name as a speaker in the Union; you have gained a place on the committee of the O.U.D.S.; your sketches of Oxford Notables in the Isis are admitted to be the best things of their kind since Max Beerbohm. You are known as one of the aesthetes, but you are not a posturing fool. You must admit that’s very good.”
“Those are pastimes; I came to Oxford to work.”
“Why?”
“Well, there’s a widely accepted notion that one comes here to learn.”
“To learn what?”
“The foundation for whatever one means to do with one’s life.”
“Which is—?”
“I haven’t really decided.”
“Oh, God be praised! For a few moments I feared you might be one of those earnest Americans with a career before you. Too middle-class! But Roskalns says you told him you meant to be a painter.”
Roskalns? Who was he? Oh yes; that grubby chap who hung about the edges of the O.U.D.S. and was a private coach in modern languages. Had Francis confided in him? Possibly he had said something to somebody else when Roskalns was listening—as Roskalns always seemed to be doing. Francis decided he had had quite enough of Buys-Bozzaris.
“I think I’d better be going,” he said. “Thanks for the tea.”
“Don’t hurry. I’d like to talk a little more. I know some people you might like to meet. You’re fond of cards, I hear.”
“I play a little.”
“For pretty high stakes?”
“Enough to make it interesting.”
“And you win pretty consistently?”
“About enough to come out even.”
“Oh, better than that. Your modesty is charming.”
“I really must go.”
“Of course. But just one moment; I know some people who play regularly—really good players—and I thought you might care to join us. We don’t play for pennies.”
“Are you asking me to join some sort of club?”
“Nothing so formal. And we don’t just play; we talk, as well. I hear you like to talk.”
“What do you talk about?”
“Oh, politics. World affairs. These are lively times.”
“Several people have gone to Spain, to see what they can do there. Even more say they would be in Spain in a moment, if they could see their way clear. Is that the sort of talk?”
“No, that is youthful romanticism. We are much more serious.”
“Perhaps I could look in once or twice?”
“Of course.”
“Tonight?”
“Admirable. Any time after nine.”
A few days later Francis wrote one of his letters to Colonel Copplestone:
Dear Uncle Jack:
Second year at Oxford is a great improvement. One knows where the things are that one is likely to want and where the people are one is certain not to want. The nice thing about being at Corpus is that it is so small. But that means that only first-year men and a few specials can live in college, so I am in digs, and have secured a very nice set of rooms virtually on the college doorstep. Canterbury House the place is called, because it’s by the Canterbury Gate of Christ Church. I have the top floor; big living room and small bedroom; superb view down Merton Street, which must be the prettiest street in Oxford, and the only drawback is that when Great Tom gets off his 101 peal at 9 P.M. it is almost as if he were in my bedroom. I am thinking of writing to the Dean and suggesting that this ancient custom be discontinued. Do you suppose he would listen?
Have met a few new people. The ground-floor set of rooms here—most expensive, worst view—is occupied by a man called Basil Buys-Bozzaris, which is a name to conjure with, don’t you think? He conjures a bit; a few days ago as I was running up the stairs beside his door he popped his head out and said, “A Virgo; I know him by his tread!” which was arresting enough to make me stop and chat, and he waffled a bit about astrology; rather interestingly, as a matter of fact. I don’t go for astrology by any means, but I have found that sometimes it provides useful broad clues about people. Anyhow, he wanted me to come to tea with him, and yesterday I did.