Absolute Truths (65 page)

‘
I dropped in at the Deanery,’ I said. ‘My sole desire was to make a polite request to sec some interim accounts for the West Front
Appeal. Malcolm and Nigel had convinced me that this was the
best way forward in our attempt to quash the rumours which are
currently circulating, and I’d planned to be non-abrasive, non-
intimidating and thoroughly friendly in every way.’

Aysgarth tried to speak but Jon raised a hand to forestall him.
‘Your turn will come later. Go on, Charles.’

‘
Almost from the start,’ I said, ‘he adopted a bellicose position quite inappropriate for a senior cleric, and eventually his refusal
to cooperate forced me to admit my fear that something
was financially amiss.
However, in an attempt to ease the situation — which
he had made extremely fraught — I offered, just as a bishop should,
to give him any help that might be necessary if he were in trouble.
He rejected this suggestion very
offensively
and from that point
the interview
became
not merely unpleasant but disastrous.’

Aysgarth again tried to speak and was again cut off. ‘Be
quiet,’
said
Jon, and although I expected Aysgarth to rebel against this
toughness I saw to my surprise that he respected it. Obediently
he clamped his mouth shut and waited.

‘
I happened to point out then in my distress,’ I said, trying not
to sound too glib, ‘that he had had problems as a dean in the past
and that I therefore couldn’t be blamed for wondering if he was
having problems again. But unfortunately this oblique reminder
of the events of 1%3 angered him so much that he made a series
of remarks which I can’t possibly repeat.’

‘Why not?’

‘
Well ...’ I took a deep breath, thought furiously and produced the dignified reply: ‘I feel it would be lacking in charity to repeat
them.’

‘
Let’s not argue about charity for the moment; let’s just concen
trate on giving birth to the truth. Charles, what on earth’s the
point of coming here to confide in me and then offering only a
censored version of the facts?’

‘
I want to spare him the embarrassment of hearing his appalling
behaviour described.’

‘You mean your own behaviour was irreproachable?’

‘
All right,’ I said, now very hot under the collar of my cheap shirt.
‘All right.
The rock-bottom truth is that we both lost our
tempers, and it’s hard for me to talk of what happened because
it’s so shameful.’

‘That’s better. Very well, let’s hear the worst.’

‘
He dragged up that scene which took place between him and
Lyle after Alex Jardine’s funeral. He made some disgusting allega
tions which I know —
I know —
were false. Then having told me —
with liberal use of blasphemous language — that I was self-righteous
and hypocritical, he proceeded to threaten me in the manner of
an East End gangster: he said that if I made a visitation he’d see
the
News of the World
heard that I’d been to bed with Harriet
March. (Of course I don’t have to
tell
you that this statement
about Mrs March was a complete and utter lie.) At that point I
informed him that he was unfit to be the dean of a cathedral and
that I’d do my best to get him removed. End of conversation. End
of scene. Now I’m sure you can understand why I’m so upset.
Having been verbally beaten up, slandered and blackmailed —’

‘
I can contain myself no longer,’ said Aysgarth. ‘Jon, if you don’t
allow me to speak immediately, I shall burst a blood-vessel.’

‘
Pray save us all from such a tiresome inconvenience,’ said Jon
dryly, and Aysgarth, forearms on the table, ugly hands interlocked,
at once embarked on a passionate speech in his own defence.

‘
He descends on me out of the blue,’ said Aysgarth, ‘without even
being courteous enough to phone to ask if his visit would be
convenient. Who does he think he is? Napoleon? Frederick the
Great? The Emperor Constantine? I thought a public-school edu
cation was supposed to teach a man how to behave in a civilised
manner, but no — all it teaches him is how to behave like an
upper-class thug! And to think Charles looks down on me just
because I didn’t go to that expensive dump where he idled away
his
time
in ridiculous rituals! I can’t stand this appallingly arrogant
snobbishness of his,
can’t stand it.
To me it symbolises all that’s
wrong with England — and with the Church — but thank God the
1960s are finally sweeping away all those old-fashioned attitudes,
thank God the 1960s are raising the curtain on a different world,
thank God the 1960s are —’

I said to Jon: ‘Do we really have to listen to this tasteless exercise
in rhetoric?’

‘
Neville merely wishes to stress how angry he was that you
should have descended on him in the manner of a secular tyrant,
but I agree he’s made his point. Go on, Neville, please. Charles,
you said, descended on you out of the blue —’

‘
He sweeps into my house,’ said Aysgarth, ‘and I note at once that to disguise the fact that he’s on the warpath he’s dressed in
his shabbiest clothes. I know the way his mind works! He’s
as
addicted to power-manoeuvring as a boardroom tycoon, and if he’d
been wearing his pectoral cross he would have chosen exactly the
right psychological moment to stroke it. He always does that when
ever he wants to put me in my place by reminding me that he’s
reached the bishops’ bench in the House of Lords and I haven’t —’

‘
But that’s nonsense — it’s never occurred to me to fidget with
my cross for that reason!’ I exclaimed. I was genuinely distressed
to think that this trivial nervous habit of mine should have been
given such a revoking interpretation.

‘
Can we forget about class for the moment, Neville?’ said Jon.
‘Can we try and keep this a straightforward narrative? Charles
arrived at the Deanery, you said —’

‘
— and within five minutes of being ushered into my study he’s
demanding to see the Appeal accounts and implying I’m a criminal.
Of course he then realises he’s gone too far and tries to backtrack; playing the father-in-God, he starts to ooze unctuously about how
happy he would be if I confided in him. What a nerve! He crashes
around like some tinpot dictator and then suggests that I’rn the
one in need of spiritual help! Naturally I’m driven to point out
that he has no business behaving as if he’s a detective from the
fraud squad, and naturally I assure him — and wouldn’t you think
the
word of a priest would be sufficient? — that I’m well in control
of the Appeal, but is he satisfied? Of course not! He’s quite unable
to
resist the temptation to play the proud prelate and tell me Tye
been a failure as a dean. All right, I admit I got in a dreadful mess
in 1963, but we all make mistakes and I’ve repented, T
^y
e reformed
and I’ve put that part of my past resolutely behind me in order to
serve God as well as I possibly can. So how dare Charles be so
unchristian as to fling the past in my face like that? Has he really
no idea how a bishop’s supposed to behave towards a sheep that’s
returned to the fold?’

‘This is sheer demagoguery,’ I said. °This is —’

‘
This is how the scene seemed to Neville,’ said Jon, ‘and I think
that if you wish to rebut his accusation of dictatorial behaviour,
you’d be wise to allow him freedom of speech.’

‘
Well, after he’d rubbed my nose in the mud and kicked me in
the teeth,’ said Aysgarth, ‘I couldn’t restrain myself, I’m sorry but
I just couldn’t. I felt I had to hit back at him with the truth —
which is, of course, that he’s had his knife into me ever since he
found out about that idiotic scene after Alex Jardine’s funeral.
Then
he
was the one who descended into blasphemous language
— how typically hypocritical that he should
accuse
me of the sin
he himself had committed before I did! — and he implied I’d tried
to force myself on his wife when she was unwilling. Well, that’s
an allegation of attempted rape, isn’t it? He was accusing me, a
devout Christian, a clergyman, an archdeacon (as I was then) of
a most repulsive criminal offence! I tell you., Jon, that was the last
straw. I said ... well, no, on second thoughts never mind exactly
what I said –’

‘
But I do mind,’ said Jon. ‘And are you really going to get cold feet now that you’re basking in the luxury of freedom of speech?’

‘
All right, you wily old conjuror, you cunning old pirate, I
implied that Lyle found me very far from unattractive and said
that I could have had her if I hadn’t been so plastered – and the next moment Charles was accusing me of being a permanently
impotent drunk. Well, what was I supposed to do next? Receive this gross slander with a smile? I know I’ve had periods of heavy
drinking in the past, but I’ve got all that under control now, and
as for the suggestion that I’m always too sodden to –’

‘
I hardly think the question of your sexual potency need detain
us here. Continue, please. Charles, you said, accused you of being
a permanently impotent drunk –’

‘
– and at that point I unleashed the weapon which I’d hoped I
wouldn’t be driven to use. Harriet March rang me this morning
to say that Charles had given her a lift home last night after a
dinner-party at the South Canonry, and she’d seduced him.’

‘
But that’s a lie!’ I shouted. ‘It’s preposterous! It’s utterly beyond
the realms of possibility!’

‘I still don’t believe you,’ said Aysgarth.

‘Why, you absolute –’

‘
No, don’t you dare call me a bastard! Go and talk to the mirror
if you want to spew out that kind of language!’

We both sprang to our feet in rage, but Jon rose too, and Jon,
drawing himself up majestically to his full height, was taller than
either of us. For a moment after that no one moved. Then Jon
made a sharp gesture in the direction of our chairs. We sank down
again but Jon remained standing, towering above us both and
looking at us with his most inscrutable expression.

At last when we were both utterly silent and utterly still he said:
‘I have but one comment to make on your behaviour and that’s
this: it all seems a very long way from Jesus of Nazareth.’ And
turning his back on us abruptly, he stalked away into his kitchen.

We stared after him. Then we stared at each other. Aysgarth looked
appalled but I doubt if he looked more appalled than I did. He
was the one who first recovered his power of speech. He bawled:
‘Jon, come back here this instant!’ but Jon shouted from the
kitchen: ‘Not while you’re behaving like a couple of infantile
pagans!’ and we remained on our own. He was still near us; the
kitchen was a mere galley nicked behind the main room. I pictured
him standing by the sink with his arms folded across his chest
while he waited to hear how we would respond to his challenge.

Aysgarth said urgently to me: ‘You try,’ and I called in my
mildest voice: ‘Jon, if you’d be good enough to return – we both
realise we can’t go on without your help –’

‘
I don’t spoonfeed. Be your age, remember your calling and get
out of this disgraceful impasse by yourselves.’

To Aysgarth I said: ‘There’s no shifting him.’

Then what on earth are we supposed to do?’

‘
Let’s be quiet for a moment. At least if we’re silent we can’t
quarrel.’

‘I don’t want to quarrel.’

‘Neither do I.’

Then why are we beating each other up like this?’

‘I don’t know.’

We stared at each other again. Eventually Aysgarth said with
fury: This is entirely his fault! If he hadn’t insisted on this mad
three-cornered conference –’

3ut weren’t we beating each other up long before we got here?
And talking of that scene at the Deanery, how can you possibly
have believed that rubbish from Harriet March?’

‘She made it sound like gospel truth.’

‘Obviously she’s certifiable.’

‘You mean it really isn’t true?’

‘
Of course it isn’t true! If it were true,
I’d
be certifiable!’

‘
But you did go to her studio.’

‘
Certainly I did – as I’ve already told you, I saw the sculpture
of your hands. But I give you my word of honour as a priest –
I’ll even swear on the Bible – that I never touched her.’

Aysgarth at last showed no sign that he disbelieved me. Baffled
he demanded: ‘But why should she lie to me like that?’

‘
She thinks I’m persecuting you. Obviously she wanted to offer
a lethal weapon for your defence.’

‘
But why on earth should she go to such extraordinary lengths
on my behalf?’

‘She appears to be rather fond of you.’

‘
Do you think so?’ said Aysgarth, much surprised. ‘How interest
ing! I’m fond of her, I admit, but I thought she just regarded
me as an amusing old buffer.’ Astonishment was eased aside by
gratification. ‘Well!’ he exclaimed, becoming cheery. ‘Fancy that!’
However, remembering the horrific consequences of Harriet’s
affection, he quickly added: ‘But it was quite scandalous that she
should lie to me like that, and I’m extremely sorry, Charles, that I was fool enough to believe her. Of course I can see now that
the very idea that you might behave in such a way is ridiculous.
You of all men would never go to bed with a woman within days
of your wife’s funeral.’

In the terrible pause that followed this revelation of my self-
righteousness and hypocrisy, I examined my episcopal ring
as
if I
had never seen it before and Jon finally emerged expressionless from the kitchen with his tabby-cat padding at his heels.