… And in that last delirium of lust
Your image glows. Love is a blinding rain,
Love crow all the cocks, love lays the dust
Of this cracked crying throat whose thirst is pain…
He wrote out a cheque for Mrs Meldrum, composed the curtest of farewells: "Thank you for your unwanted solicitude. Take a week's notice. Yours etc." To Mrs Bainbridge he wrote a courteous acknowledgement of her communications and regretted that, on maturer consideration, he found himself unable to find it in himself to meet the meagre poetic needs, if even these existed, of the readers of Fem. His compliments to Miss or Mrs Frobisher, if Mrs Bainbridge would be good enough to pass them on, and congratulations on possessing so tough-stomached a gang of followers of her culinary columns. He, Enderby, had, if it was of any interest to anyone, suffered greatly from her Spaghetti Fromaggio Surprise. He proposed to destroy the contract and distribute the copies of Fem to the poor. He was hers sincerely. P.S. He was moving from the above address forthwith, whither he knew not yet. No point in her replying. Calmer now, Enderby shaved and prepared to go out. He would be safe so long as that shouter Jack was still at work.
5
Arry, in grubby cook's white, complete with white necktie and white mushroom hat, stood at the bar of the Freemason's Arms, taking time off from his kitchens. He greeted Enderby with no enthusiasm but, without asking or being asked, ordered a double whisky for him. "That suit," he said, "were a right bloody mess. Ad to send it tert cleaner's." He drank off a good three-quarters of a pint of brown ale mixed with bitter.
"I'm sorry," said Enderby. "It won't happen again. I shan't have to borrow from you again. I'm leaving."
"Leavin'? Goin'? Not coomin' back 'ere naw mawr?"
"That's right."
Arry looked solemn, but that stiff crust of his expression seemed to be hiding a tiny feeling of relief; a whiff of relief escaped as through a steam-hole in the crust. He said:
"Where to?"
"I don't know," said Enderby. "Somewhere else along the coast. It doesn't matter where, really."
"Thee get as far aweeeeeh," advised Arry, prolonging his vowels, as in some primitive language, "far aweeeeeh," to emphasize the distance, "far aweeeeeh," by onomatopoeic suggestion, "as tha can bloody get. That's naht 'ere, naht for nobody. Coom back 'ere," he said, "never naw mawr." He looked with gloom at the lesbians in the corner-Gladys in glasses and leopard-skin pants sly-cuddling crosseyed Prudence-and then with compassion at Enderby.
"This is to say good-bye, really," said Enderby, "and to hope that your suit prospers."
"It'll be aw right when it cooms back fromt cleaner's."
"I meant the other suit," said Enderby, "the Arry to Thelma suit. I've brought one more poem for you, the very last of the cycle. If this doesn't do the job, nothing will." He took the folded sheet from his pocket.
Any shook his head. "Naht doin'," he said, "naht doin' at all. It were a bloody wester mah tahm."
"My time, too," said Enderby.
"Wan 'and int till," said Any, "and toother betwinner legs. No good to man nor flamin' beast that Thelma. Oo's tecken no notice er naht av doon forrer."
"Well," sighed Enderby, "that's how it is. Nobody wants poetry nowadays. All wasted." He prepared to rip up his final fiery offering.
"Weren't wested," said Arry. "Ot stooff, wan or two were. Ah lakhed 'em. Boot oo," he said, "didn't 'ave bloody intelligence." He put out a clean cook's hand to rescue Enderby's poem. He took the folded sheet and unfolded it with wan interest. He pretended to read it, then put it into his trouser-pocket. Enderby bought him a pint of brown ale and bitter. Enderby said:
"Since I've lived here you're the only one I've been in any way friendly with. That's why I wanted to shake hands with you before I go."
"All sheck 'ands wi' thee," said Arry, and did so. "When will yer be clearin' off?"
"I've got to pack," said Enderby. "And then I've got to decide where I'm going to. Tomorrow, I should think. While Jack's out at work."
"Oo's Jack?"
"Oh, yes, sorry. The chap who lives upstairs. He thinks I've been carrying on with the woman he lives with."
"Ah," said Arry, shaking his head, then looking at Enderby with renewed compassion. "Get away as soon as yer can," said Arry. "Shoove yer things in a bag and then get to Victoria Station. On Victoria Station there's nameser places stoock oop on indiketters. Teck thy choice, lad. There's plenty on 'em. You choose wanner them and go straight to it. All places is the same nowadays," he said. "The big thing to do is to kip movin'. And," he asked, "what will yer do when yeu've getten wherever yer goin'? Wilt kip on wi' same game?"
"It's all I can do," said Enderby. "Writing verse is all I'm cut out for."
Arry nodded and finished his pint, the fourth since Enderby's entrance. "Dawn't write too mooch abaht spaghetti, then," he said, frothily. "Leave spaghetti to them as knaws summat abaht it." He shook hands with Enderby once more. "Moost get back now," he said, "tert bloody job. Special loonch for Daughters of Temperance." He spaced out the words like a poster. "Luke after yerself," said Arry. He waved a white cook's arm from the door and then went out. Spaghetti coiled, puzzled, in Enderby's brain. Then a horrid thought struck him. He finished his whisky palpitating but then calmed down. He might have sent it to Mrs Meldrum. But no, he distinctly remembered pinning a cheque to a quarter-sheet of writing-paper. But that made no difference, did it? That might still have got into the wrong envelope. He'd better get out of here very, very quickly.
As he panted towards his packing down the esplanade, the gulls wheeled and wailed and climbed the blue wall of the marine winter day. For two days now he had forgotten to feed them. They planed, complained. Greedy beady eyes. Ungrateful birds. They mewed no farewell to Enderby; they would be there, waiting for his doles of bread, further up or down the coastline.
Chapter Five
1
Of what the world would call essentials, Enderby had few to pack. It was the bathful of verse that was the trouble. Kneeling in front of it, as though-and here he laughed sardonically-he worshipped his own work, he began to bundle it into the larger of his two suitcases, separating-with reasonable care-manuscripts from sandwich-crusts, cigarette-packets, and the cylinders of long-used toilet-rolls. But he found so many old poems which he had quite forgotten that he could not resist reading them through, open-mouthed, as afternoon ticked on towards dusk. He had modified drastically his original plan of departure, his aim now being to catch some evening train (Jack permitting) to Victoria, spend the night in a hotel, and then, about midday, follow some new spoke to the south coast. He had, he felt, to live near the sea, this being a great wet slobbering stepmother or green dogmatic Church which he could keep his eye on; nothing, at least, insidious about it.
It was amazing what things he had written, especially in his youth: pastiches of Whitman, Charles Doughty, an attempted translation of the Duino Elegies, limericks, even the beginning of a verse-play about Copernicus. There was one sonnet in sprung rhythm and Alexandrines which dated from the days of his love and envy of the proletariat. He read the sestet with horror and wonder:
When the violet air blooms about him, then at last he can wipe
His hands sheerfree of swink, monarch of hours ahead;
Hearty he eats and, full, he sits to pull at his pipe,
Warm at the kitchen glow. The courts- and sports-news read,
He argues, sups, in the Lion vault; to a plate of tripe
Or crisp chips home returns, then climbs to a dreamless bed.
Dead on this homecoming cue Jack came home, his hands sheerfree of salesman's swink, ready for Enderby. Enderby was aroused from the past by the gorilla two-fist beat on the door.
"Come on, Enderby, out of it. On the job, Enderby. Come and be bashed, you poetic bloody nuisance."
"Have you got my knife?" asked Enderby, standing now behind his punished door.
"Your knife, eh? That's been put in a refuse-bin, you dirty mess as you are,
you. There's going to be clean bashing only, you nasty deceitful thing. I'm giving you fair warning, Enderby. If you don't open up I'm going to get old Ma Meldrum's key. I'll say that you lost yours, lying like you lied, you nasty liar. Then I'll come in and do you. So open up like a sportsman and play the game and be bashed, you bugger, you."
Enderby shivered with rage and immediately began to roam the flat, trembling, looking for some weapon. Meanwhile Jack, who should, by rights, have been fatigued by his work, hammered at the door and execrated nastily. In the bathroom Enderby cast around and his eyes momentarily softened as they lighted on his old friend, the lavatory-seat. It had always been somewhat loose; it was not difficult to wrench it from the pin that had held it to the pedestal. "Coming," called Enderby. "Shan't be a minute." He apologized to the wooden O as he pulled it roughly away, promising that soon he would write it a small ode of reparation. Armed with it he went to the door, pulled the door open and saw Jack's thumb-protecting fists ready for a fierce double-bang at the empty air.
"That's not fair," he said, backing. "You're not playing the game, Enderby. All I ask is a fair apology for ill-treating me as regards my own property." ("Is that you back, Jack?" came the voice from above. "Don't hurt him too hard, love.")
"There's nothing to apologize for," said Enderby. "If you don't believe what I told you you must take the consequences of your disbelief. I'm going to clonk you on the head with this seat here."
"Not that," said Jack, trying, on dancing feet, to get in odd punches. "That's comic, that is, that's not decent. That's making a farce out of the whole thing." Enderby parried the weak blows, slamming Jack's wrists hard with his wooden weapon. He drove him down the hallway towards the front door of the house, past the two spotted pictures on the wall, both of Highland scenery in wretched weather. Enderby raised the seat high, intended to hit Jack's wiry head with its hard border. He misjudged somewhat, and the seat came down to encircle Jack's face, so that Jack was framed like a most animated portrait in a bottom-shaped ring. His hands clawed at it, forgetting to chop at Enderby's own, which tugged down and down, Enderby's obscure aim being to pull Jack to the floor and then stamp on him. "You bastard, you," cried Jack. "This isn't funny, this isn't, you sod." He tried to lift off the wooden lei of bottom-polished smoothness, but Enderby's weight pulled down and down. "All I ask," panted Jack, "is an apology for what you done, did. Give me that and I'll let you go." Enderby swung round, still clinging to Jack's round pillory, and saw Jack's woman at the foot of the stairs. She was dressed like Hamlet in black tights, a black sweater above, inside which her bubs danced still from her descent.
"You," sobbed Enderby, at his last gasp with all this effort, "started all this. Tell him the truth."
"He bashed me," she said, "and I did nothing wrong. Now it's only right that you get bashed."
"Tell him the truth," cried Enderby's dying voice.
"That won't make no difference to Jack," she said. "You've got to get done by Jack. Jack's like that, you see."
"I want him to apologize," cried Jack, still framed.
"There's nothing to apologize for," gurgled Enderby's fading ration of air.
"Apologize for what you're doing now, then."
"I'll stop it," said Enderby. He let go of the wooden seat, and Jack, now pulling at nothing, went hurtling back to the hallstand, crashing into it and sending it over, still horse-collared. The little inlaid mirror tinkled; from the glove-drawer, suddenly opened, there issued letters, unforwarded, for people long shadily departed, and also highly coloured coupons representing, each, a fivepence rebate off a packet of soap-powder.
"Call it," Enderby, bent double as though air were something to be sucked up from the floor, tried to say, "Call it," seeing Jack on the floor with lavatory collar still on lying beside, as a wooden mate, the crashed hall-stand, "a day."
"You come upstairs, love," said the woman to Jack. "You'll be tired after your hard day's work. I'll make you a nice cuppa."
Jack got up, removed the collar and, panting still, handed it to Enderby. "You got what was coming to you," he said. "I'm not one of those vindictive buggers, Enderby. Fair's fair's what I stand or fall by." He dusted himself down with the hall-stand brush, still in his overcoat which was of a dull plum colour. "Don't do it again, that's all I'm going to say now, and let it be a warning." The woman, soothing, put her arms about him and began to lead him upstairs. Enderby, exhausted, entered his own flat, holding the lavatory-seat like a victor's wreath. It was a long long time since he'd exerted himself so much. He lay down for at least an hour on the floor of the living-room, seeing how dirty the carpet was. Under the couch were walnuts and bits of paper. He lay until the town-hall clock struck, from from afar, over the chill evening air of late January, the hour of seven. There was now no hope of leaving tonight.
When he felt better he got up from the floor and went into the kitchen to examine his store-cupboard. There was little point in, and little room for, taking these half-empty jars and bits of lard in paper, potatoes, cut spaghetti-sticks, mustard. He took down Mrs Meldrum's largest saucepan and prepared a stew of meat-paste, Oxo cubes, spaghetti, olive oil, spuds in jackets with dirt and all, pickled onions, cheese-heels, bread-crusts, dripping, half a meat pie, Branston sweet pickle, margarine, celery salt, water. At the back of the fast-emptying cupboard he found a neglected chicken carcass, a gift from Airy, which would go well. He left the stew to bubble, thrifty Enderby, and went back to the sorting and packing of his papers.
2
Enderby, fagged out by fighting, packing, and the thin and over-savoury stew he had cooked, slept later the following morning than he had intended. The work of packing and clearing-up was not yet finished. Both suitcases were crammed, but there were still many manuscripts to bundle together and put safe somewhere. Enderby, yawning, creased, and with hair in sleepy spikes, made tea with the remaining half-packet of Typhoo and coffee with the last few spoons of Blue Mountain. Taking in the milk he left a note of farewell for the milkman, several empty bottles, and a cash cheque for five shillings and fourpence. He then drank one cup of tea and emptied the rest down the lavatory, feeling the sense of virtue he always felt when he knew he had used what another man might well have wasted. Then he heated up last night's stew and felt further virtue when the gas failed half-way through the process. No waste there either. He switched on all the electric fires in the flat, ate breakfast, drank coffee, smoked. Then, in shirt and underpants (last night's nightwear, his pyjamas having been packed) he emptied the rubbish out of its cardboard box into a small dustbin outside the backdoor. (Sunny, piercingly cold, gulls high-screaming.) He cleaned out this box with a copy of Fem, finding difficulty in dislodging corner-hugging mush of decayed peel and odd tea-leaf hieroglyphics, then lined it with two or three copies of the same magazine, collected handfuls of poems from the bath and packed them in tightly, covered with further Fems then tied the box about with a discarded pair of braces and a long knotty link he made out of odd pieces of string that were lying around. He washed all dishes in (necessarily) cold water and packed them on their shelves. Then he had a cold and excruciating shave, washed quickly, and dressed in his daily working garb with corduroy trousers and a tie. The time was eleven-thirty. He could, he thought, soon now be off. The keys, of course. He went out into the hallway of the house, found that someone, probably Jack, had righted the crashed hall-stand, and then he put the keys in the glove-compartment. On a letter addressed to a long-left Mrs Arthur Porceroy (postmark 8.VI-51) he wrote, in inkpencil, KEYS ENDERBY, and leaned this notice upright on the hallstand. While he was doing this the front door opened. A man looked in. He seemed to play an elaborate game of looking for someone everywhere except where someone was, his sad eyes roaming the entire hallway and then appearing at last to find Enderby. He nodded and smiled bleakly, as in modest self-congratulation on his success, and then said, "Would I be addressing one of the name of Enderby?" Enderby bowed. "Could I have the pleasure of a word with you?" the man asked. "A
question of poetry," he added. He had a thin Uriah Heep voice. He was of less than medium height, had a long face and a fluff of whitish hair, wore a raincoat, was about Enderby's age.
"Who are you from?" asked Enderby sharply.
"From?" repeated the man. "From nobody except me. Me being the name of Walpole. And coming to see you on a question of poetry. It's cold here in the hall," he said. Enderby led the way into the flat.
Walpole sniffed the warm dry air, the lingering sour stew-smell, the raised dust, and then noticed Enderby's packed bags. "Leaving, eh?" he said. "Well, I only just got you in time, didn't I?"
"I've got to catch a train," said Enderby, "any minute now. Would you -?"
"Oh, I'll be quick," said Walpole, "very quick. What I want to say is that I won't have you writing poetry to my wife."
Enderby saw rush and then fade a quite unreasonable possibility. Then he smiled and said, "I don't write poetry to anybody's wife."
Walpole drew from his raincoat pocket a carefully folded and smoothed sheaf of sheets. "This poetry," he said. "Look at it carefully and then tell me whether or not you wrote it."
Enderby looked at it quickly. His handwriting. The Thelma poems. "I wrote these, yes," he said, "but not on my own behalf. I wrote them at the request of another man. I suppose you could call him a client, really. You see, poetry is my profession."
"If it's a profession," said Walpole in all seriousness, "does it have what you might call rules of professional etty kwett? More important than that, in a way of speaking, does it have a union?"
Enderby suddenly saw that he had been made a party to a proposed bed-breach. He said that he saw, ignoring Walpole's questions, saying, "I see, I see. I'm really very sorry about all this. I knew nothing about it. I'm even more innocent than Arry. It just never crossed my mind-and I take it that it never crossed Arry's-that Thelma was a married woman."