The Gale of the World (28 page)

“Were you on the bottle?” asked Nilsson.

The man did not reply at once. Then he said, “I’d had a nip or two. It was the strain of waiting by the wireless, sir. We was all standing by, to hear anything special.”

“Including Lady Cloudesley?”

“No, sir. Lady Ann was dead of a haemorrhage, at five o’clock that morning. And my gentleman come home just before dawn the next morning. It was then I saw the black greyhound, sir.”

“Tell me what else you saw, Corney. Have another drink first.”

“Not at the moment, thank you, sir. Well, sir, my lady’s old nurse, what was living with us, come down from upstairs and she was shaking so she could hardly hold the candlestick in her hand. She said her lady, what had died in childbirth that afternoon, and ’adn’t bin laid out then, was standin’ by the window, lookin’ at a big white star rising up over the hill.”

“The nurse said that?”

“Yes, sir. It was the morning star. I saw it myself. I was
shivering
with cold, so I went back by the coke boiler. Then Nanny, that was the old nurse, sir, was being called by little Hugh—he what is now his Lordship—and when she went into the
night-nursery
again the candles was burning blue in her Ladyship’s room as though in a draught, she said, but all the windows was closed.” He poured himself a drink. “If anyone ever saw ghosts, they were seen in our house that night.”

Laura shouted, “You’re not to say any more, Mr. Corney!” She turned to Nilsson. “You ought to know better than to pry into other people’s private worlds! Especially when you were told some time ago that ‘Buster’ is writing the biography of his father! I suppose
you
want to cash in first—everything is dollars with you Americans!”

“Hold your horses,” he replied, in a voice now lush. “In a democracy all news is for free.” He wagged a finger. “Don’t think I don’t know all about the plot to rescue Rudolf Hess from
Spandau prison outside Berlin! You won’t get away with it! The Commies will see to that!”

*

Nilsson remained at The Marksman until an hour after closing time, talking at the landlord, who gave a remarkable
impersonation
of a man listening while sleeping upright with eyes open. At last Mrs. Nilsson arrived in the taxicab which was hired
half-a-dozen
times a month to fetch her husband home from some inn or hotel. Paying off the taxi, she took Osgood home in his
prewar
sedan smelling of goats and journalism. He was clutching the photograph of his Osgood grandfather late of the Confederate Army in the war between the Deep South and the Yankee North.

*

The next evening Nilsson was in high feather in what he called the ‘Zymes Club’ as he sat apart from those around the bar—a sprinkling of doctors, solicitors, and business worthies, some of them ex-officers of the late war recently admitted to what, before 1939, had unofficially been known as the Gentlemen’s Club—landowners, retired regular officers of the two Services,
including
those originally seconded to the R.F.C. and later transferred to the R.A.F., together with parsons, doctors and solicitors who had, generally speaking, served their interests.

Nilsson was tolerated as a ‘character’ in his ‘Zymes Club’; he felt himself to be several cuts above them—he, a writer of
international
reputation: author of books on travel, in which were described his meetings with prominent politicians, writers, artists thrown in with a measure of international financiers and crooks and a king or two. In fact, the books were a rehash of ephemeral journalism spiced by fishing and shooting experiences (some in poached preserves) in various parts of the world.

In drink, Nilsson was ready to enlarge on those experiences and to give opinions on world topics; but this evening, among the bar habituées who foregathered there after the days’ work, Nilsson remained silent; an odd bird in lush plumage, preening himself that he was on to a good thing in his new series of articles. He considered: what had the son of the late Manfred Lord Cloudesley to be so reticent about? What family skeleton was he keeping hidden? Why hadn’t the family, long ago, permitted an official biography to be put out? Could it be for the same reason that no biography of Colonel Lawrence of Arabia had been allowed by the trustees of that mysterious ‘hero’?

The Club was in a little house off the High Street. When the
time approached for the steadier members to go home to dinner, Nilsson was still simmering happily alone, occasionally
addressing
, in his hammy voice, inconsequential, semi-inaudible remarks to one or another of the members gathered there to relax and hear the latest local gossip. To them, so far, old Osgood had
remained
comparatively quiet; but suddenly, throwing down the local paper with its announcement of Lynton’s forthcoming Festival of the Arts Week, when the Amateur Dramatic Society would produce
Yeomen
of
the
Guard
, he fired the first rocket of the evening.

“It was Shakespeare who said, ‘Pistol’s cock is up, and flashing fire will follow’. Don’t mistake me, you Zymes nattering away over there! I’m not referring to your bogus Major Piston, who’s got a little-end loose.”

“How d’you know that, Nilsson?” said one of the topers, an articled clerk who was hoping to become a solicitor. “Is your own little-end loose, or is it a big-end, old boy?”

“Your Amateur Dramatic Society couldn’t even get stuck into ‘The Thirteenth Chair’, let alone ‘Yeoman of the Guard’. Your country of Devon is known in the publishing world as ‘the
graveyard
’.”

“Since you’ve come here, you mean, Mr. Nilsson?” asked the articled clerk.

“Piss off” said Nilsson.

“Is that what your New York editor advised you to do?”

After these fatuities, heads returned to the bar; but turned round once more at a cry from Nilsson, “You there! You’re a no-good man! You haven’t got anyone like this in your family!” as he felt in his breast pocket.

“Now it’s coming” murmured the articled clerk. For they were by now familiar with the daguerrotype of Nilsson’s grandfather.

“Ha, your respected grandfather was an actor, I see, sir!” said the articled clerk. “He’s wearing one of the uniforms sent to us by a London theatrical costumier as you will have read in our local paper.”

“This rag,” cried Nilsson, picking up the paper in order to throw it down again, “is a permanent all-time low! It’s just about what it calls itself, ‘The Lynton Lantern’!” He picked it up once more. “See the splash on page one! Half a dozen old goats to be turned loose to replace a similar lot of upholstered old hat racks standing about in the Valley of Rocks until they were eaten by you peasants during the war! I quote:– ‘Colonel Peregrine
Bucentaur has graciously offered to present to the Devon County Council his famous Brockholes St. Boniface herd of wild white goats, whose pedigree is said to go back in direct line to
Caractacus
, the Welsh partisan in the fight against the Romans in the reign of the Emperor Claudius, 54 B.C.’ You call that bumph, news? It stinks, like the goats!”, and Nilsson tore up
The
Lynton
Lantern
.

Ignoring the tipsy American, the articled clerk, who had been born in Somerset, told his cronies at the bar how Colonel Bucentaur once had a private golf course in his park.

“The goats used to wait for the balls, and run off with them, sometimes chasing the crows who pinched them first! An old fox used to join in sometimes, playing with the crows and the goats! Honestly, I’m not making it up! There was a tennis court above a haha, to keep out deer, and later, cattle in the park, but the goats got up all the same. Some used to leap over the net! They were used to playing with the family children, you see. When the Abbey was sold, Flash Billy, the Plymouth circus proprietor, tried to buy the goats for his circus, but Colonel Bucentaur wouldn’t sell.”

“You’re a zyme!” called out Nilsson. “I’ll tell you somep’n! Your British Empire was founded by a lot of old goats glued together by cricket! I speak straight from the shoulder!”

“Your trouble is that there isn’t any shoulder,” retorted the aspirant solicitor. “All you can do is to emulate Balaam’s ass.”

This put Nilsson in a rage. He stood and pulled up the trouser of his left leg. “That’s what I got, fighting for you half-krauts!”

“Ah, Exhibit Number Two. We wondered when another
inquest
was due.”

“Right now, you bogus attorney, right now! You British like to keep your ‘heroes’ on ice, else they melt away to nothing if exposed to the light of day. Your ‘Lawrence of Arabia’ was one, and Manfred Lord Cloudesley was another. How did you manage to win both wars? Shall I tell you zymes? You fake history, it’s as simple as that. We Americans won both Kraut wars for you! We gave of our dollars and our blood, which is thicker than your beer. You want to know what Dwight Eisenhower said when he got his first taste of British beer? He said, ‘Put it back in the horse’.”

“That beer had been kept waiting for him three years, midear, that’s why it had gone flat!”

On that the zymes went home, leaving Nilsson addressing an impassive club steward behind the mahogany counter.

Piston was awaiting the guests to his mother’s séance. That
afternoon
Mrs. Nilsson had called to ask if her husband might attend ‘as an observer’. His mother had said yes. Piston was anxious, a little unnerved at the thought of Nilsson. However Phillip was coming. Piston felt safe with him now. Also ‘Buster’ and Laura were O.K. Of Brigadier Tarr he had a real fear. The Brig at any moment was liable to become bloody-minded. As for Nilsson—

A curious thing sometimes happened when he thought of Nilsson: he felt to be almost outside his body, seeing it just beside him: everything seemed a little unreal. Piston believed that Nilsson’s evil side was trying to take charge of him. And he feared a collapse.

Soon after the 1914–18 war Piston had been subject to
epileptic
fits. To fall down before others was to a him a wounding disgrace.

He began to walk about the room, to plead with Nilsson for understanding.

“Please don’t come, old boy. Honestly, the vibrations have to be right on the beam, otherwise no reception. It’s all part of the natural world, you know. You were damned unfair to Caspar Schwenkfelder, you know. He put me right with myself. He could put you right with yourself, if only you would give up your defences, otherwise blockages.”

No one was in the room with Piston. He was addressing the detachable and hurtful image of the American writer.

Those present that June evening at Shelley’s Cottage were Molly Bucentaur and her daughter Miranda, ‘Buster’ and Laura, Brigadier Tarr, Phillip, and surprisingly, an old acquaintance last seen many years ago—Archibald Plugge, a little fatter, curly hair greying and recessive, owl-eyes behind thick concave glasses
beaming
benevolently as in the old days of the B.B.C. at Savoy Hill.

“My dear Phil, how good to see you again, looking just the same as ever! Have you heard any news of Piers Tofield? The last time I saw him he was, well—not at his best,” he laughed. “He told me you were coming down this way.”

“He’s recovered, Archie. How are you?”

“My dear old boy, I can’t tell you how what you say delights me. Oh, I’m not so bad, old boy, not so bad at all. You probably know I’m public relations at Oldstone Castle?” His voice dropped. “I suppose you saw all the stuff in the papers? It’s the same story of the B.B.G. and the gramophone companies over again. You may remember how they objected to their records being played over 2 L.O., thinking it would ruin their sales?” He moved away from the others. “We are simply overwhelmed by volunteer
students
applying to attend our courses of Diaphany.”

“What exactly is Diaphany?”

“The literal meaning of the word is the power to transmit light. I’m not familiar with all the processes, but the idea, roughly, is that most people are self-frustrated by some concealed fear, or shame, which, if not cleared, that is released, causes depression and finally, serious illness.”

“There’s something in that. Does it cost very much to be a student?”

“Well, we aren’t out to make a profit; but at the same time food, light, housing and other services have to be paid for.”

“Students come for idealistic reasons, I suppose.”

“Yes. At the same time, the courses are pretty strenuous.”

“Do you apply electric treatment, or drugs?”

“No. We regard such practices as destructive, while not
removing
the causes of blockages.”

“Who started Diaphany?”

“Jesus Christ, Goethe, William Blake, D. H. Lawrence, Richard Jefferies, Father Teilhard de Chardin—the main object is to try to release the essence of poetry in people.”

“I’d like to meet your friend. Will he be coming tonight?”

“I’m afraid not. He’s in London, old boy, arranging details of the new centre in Hampshire, to take the overflow. We’ve got a friend of yours coming here shortly, by the way—Melissa
Watt-Wilby
. Now, before I forget, old boy, I can give you several whole-page advertisements for your
New
Horizon
, if you like. And an article, free, about our Founder. What’s your circulation?”

“Not much, I’m afraid. Half the five hundred subscribers wrote to cancel their subscriptions when Christie gave it up. And my
first number gave offence to others. Chiefly because I quoted some of Birkin’s post-war writings.”

“You did rather ram Birkin down their throats, old boy, didn’t you? But seriously, we could help you, if only you’d do the same thing for us. Not that we need publicity. But no prophet likes to be dishonoured. Would you like some backing? I fancy my boss would take to the idea of a quarterly house-journal. The name is in line with our teachings, too.”

“What does he teach—in a sentence if you can?”

“That we must go to the creative side of the mind, which when sick is the cause of all illness. Put the mind right and few will be ill. Psychiatry is superceded.” His voice fell to a whisper. “I hear you knew our host Piston in the first war? Was he in the Army?”

“Well, he’d just come out of July the First on the Somme, badly shaken.”

“People down here say he wasn’t in the war at all.”

“Of course he was! I saw him in the Casualty Clearing Station at Heilly, on July the First. He was as mad as a whirligig beetle waltzing about on a pond after a mate.”

Plugge laughed so much that his coffee spilled into the saucer.

Just before the séance began Mrs. Nilsson arrived alone. “You know how Osgood gets sometimes. Oh,” she said cheerfully to Mrs. Piston, “Don’t misunderstand me, my dear, it’s not his leg that’s worrying him this time, but his deadline for the New York paper.” Turning to Phillip. “Is your sister Elizabeth coming? I thought perhaps you might be bringing her,” she went on untruthfully, for Elizabeth had responded to her caller’s friendliness, and told her a surprising lot of things about her brother, about whom she obviously had a ‘thing’, Rosalie had told others.

“We had such an interesting talk, Phillip.”

He felt himself becoming feeble.

*

The french windows looked out upon the lawn, beyond which an aspen stood, its leaves shivering in the warm airs ascending. Beyond came the noises of rapid water in the Glen.

Piston now brought the two halves of the window together, almost closing them. He put on a gramophone record of Holst’s
Planet
Suite
; music flowed serenely, as from the deep calm of remote starry space. They sat round a table, curtains drawn across windows. Two candles on a sideboard. When the music ended Mrs. Piston, who had been an actress, asked them to hold hands, and rest them on the round table. Then, after a silence, she began
to recite, speaking in a soft voice that made the words seem to be floating through from beyond the french windows.

“‘The summer night waneth the morning light slips

Faint and grey twixt the leaves of the aspen, betwixt the cloud

bars.

Far out in the meadow above the young corn

The heavy elms wait.’”

She drew a deep breath and as though helplessly waved a hand before closed eyes. Through light-streaked edges of the curtains came the call of a cuckoo in the Glen, with intermittent rushing sounds of water deflected under the leaves of the aspen on the lawn, shivering, shivering.

The medium, her eyes still closed, continued with occasional shrill overtones.

“I see a comely young woman looking out over water. There are white houses at the edge of the sea. The sky is blue, but the waves look agitated. There has been a tempest, the sirocco has been blowing from North Africa to Italy … I see a mirage.” She stopped and sighed, bent her head, wiped her eyes with a small handkerchief. Drew a long breath, respired as slowly, went on in a tired voice,

“Paper boats, paper boats—rather than weep away the hours I see you sailing paper boats under the leaf-shadows of the Glen —you have come back, your hair is matted with salt water—you are forever seeking her whom you called Miranda.”

Molly Bucentaur’s fingers moved to cover her daughter’s hand, while the medium uttered a sound between sigh and groan, her hand passing several times over her face.

“I see a letter—it is being written by the woman who was
standing
on the shore—among the white houses—I see the words—the date is not clear but the month is July—the letter is borne on a little paper boat—the letter is the boat—it is folded—a message. The woman writes to the youth sailing paper boats, hour after hour, as he lies beside the waterfall in the Glen—she asks him why he is always talking of never enjoying moments like the past —she wonders if he has second sight—if he will shortly join his friend Plato—or does he expect her to do so soon—she signs her name—and then adds two words—
Buona
Notte
—then in English she says,
Good
night
.”

Plugge was staring at the tears falling down the old woman’s face. A genuine communication, he thought. Laura looked fixedly at Phillip. Her eyes narrowed. Phillip knew what she was
think
ing
,
and dreading an outburst, kept his gaze on the table. In a faint, strangled voice the medium whispered, “I see the face of Shelley—he is trying to come through—he is struggling in water —he is trying to speak to the young woman across water, on the sea-shore, by the white houses.” The medium spread her hands, moved them as though helplessly. “He is replying from another world—

The medium appeared to be fighting for breath. In a choking voice, thin and strained, she went on,

“Now know’st thou, that voice desolate

Mourning ruined joy’s estate

Reached thee through a closing gate.”

The voice became shrill.

“‘Go’st thou to Plato?’ Ah, girl no!

It is to Pluto that I go.”

“A most moving performance,” said ‘Buster’ to Archie Plugge, while they were having drinks at The Eyrie.

“I was most impressed, sir.”

“Bloody rubbish, if you ask me!” declared Brigadier Tarr.

Laura, who had been unusually silent after the séance, now turned to vent on Phillip her suppressed feelings.

“
You
wrote that poem! You emotional blackmailer! Playing now on that schoolgirl’s feelings! You fixed it all to deceive that poor old woman!”

“No,” said ‘Buster’. “The poem came by water. A drowned paper boat. Piston showed it to me some time ago. I must add that I did wonder if it were a practical joke on someone’s part to copy out Francis Thompson’s poem, and sail it down the Lyn. It was almost illegible, the writing, but I managed to decipher it for her. She really believes it was put there by Shelley’s ghost. Don’t disillusion her. She lives almost entirely on a spiritual plane, as did Phillip’s lady Aunt. The material means—what are they after all? The actor—is he only pretending? The painter with his box of colours, and jar of brushes, is part of the
evolutionary
impulse to create beauty out of what—chaos?—
spiritual
forces? They are of the unseen world all about us. Even Osgood Nilsson, with his debunking mind and manner, is only trying to get straight, or clear, with himself. At the same time, I’m not sorry he didn’t turn up tonight.”

“Dear ‘Buster’,” said Laura. “Dear, dear ‘Buster’.” She took Phillip’s hand and kissed it. “I’m sorry, darling, truly I’m sorry.”

“We’ll all meet again for the Midsummer Festival on
Old-stone
Down,” said Buster as the guests departed later that night.

The following week Osgood Nilsson told the story, with
trimmings
, in the Zymes Club, including in his account how Molly Bucentaur had to take her weeping daughter away from the Piston séance. A dark horse, indeed yes, Phillip Maddison he said,
beaming
blandly, his mouth loose and wet with the present
amiabilities
of whisky. He went on to recount all his wife had told him concerning Phillip: his seducing his fifteen-year-old cousin when he returned from running away during the battle of Messines in 1914; trying to join the Navvies Battalion to avoid going back to the front; pushing his baby sister in the fire when she was sixteen months old, and going to prison after the first war for arson, after failing to convince the police that the fire was started by his best friend, and not himself. Then his admiration for Hitler, having given his wife a baby two days before he gave one
to a girl-friend, and then trying to get the two registered as twins; and other stories which held the attention of the drinkers at the bar, who wondered how far he would go, being an American with apparently little knowledge of the British laws of slander and defamation.

“He’s a no-good man!” concluded Nilsson. “He’s a man of no family. His wife has the money. Look!”, and he pulled forth the photograph of the Confederate General—his talisman, his reassurance.

*

Oldstone Down between the lights of midsummer. The form of a motor-coach visible beside motorcars on heather growing beside the narrow coastal road. Far below, tidal currents of the Severn Sea were enscrollings of reflected sky. A lone gull called, spirit of blind ocean.