The History Man (11 page)

How are they this year? Well, no longer do they look like an intellectual élite; indeed, what they resemble this autumn is rather the winter retreat of Napoleon's army from Moscow. For in the new parade of styles which undergoes subtle shifts year by year, like the campus itself, bits of military uniform, bedraggled scraps of garments, fur hats and forage caps and kepis, tank tops and denims and coats which have lost their buttons have become the norm; the crowds troop along raggedly, avoiding the paths which have been laid out for them, hairy human bundles fresh from some sinister experience. Like the faculty, the place itself, they look smaller and darker and more worn than they did ten years ago. There is little wonder; much anguish has visited the Kaakinen city. Plagues of boils have fallen upon it; the locusts have eaten at the old dream of a university life totally new, qualitatively fine. In the rain the buildings are black; the concrete has stained, the glass grown dirty, the services diminished. The graffiti experts have been at work, inscribing ‘Stop Police Brutality' and ‘IRA' and ‘Spengler Bootboys' on concrete and steel; there has been a small fire in the library; rapes and muggings occur occasionally in the darker corners of this good society. From time to time the radical passions overwhelm, then subside again; right reason and divine anger, Apollo and Dionysus, contend ceaselessly; suddenly frenzies arise, mouths cry, eyes glare, features distort. There is a student divorce problem, a statistically significant suicide rate. In the Students' Union voices cry: ‘Woe, woe, the great city.' As Howard says, the place has grown up. He stares from the window; he takes in its texture. But now, over the wet, futurist place, a strange sound arises. It is the silvery chime of the old stable clock at Watermouth Hall, an eighteenth-century perpetuum mobile marvel that will not be stopped, ringing out the hour of ten. The chimes foolishly chime; Howard turns; there is a knock at his door. ‘Yes?' shouts Howard, moving away from his windows, ‘Come on in.'

The door opens slowly; two students stand in the frame. They are girls, one neat and bra-less, the other fat and dressed in a long, Victorian-style dress. Howard has not taught them before, but they are both immediately recognizable as Watermouth types, bright and anxious looking, ringed under the eyes, entering rooms cautiously; Watermouth is notable for experimental forms of teaching that often resemble physical assault. ‘Dr Kirk,' says the braless girl. ‘We're minors,' says the fat girl. ‘We're yours,' says the bra-less one. ‘You're minors and you're mine,' says Howard. ‘That's it,' says the fat girl. ‘You want to do sociology,' says Howard. ‘Well, we
have
to do sociology,' says the bra-less girl, ‘to be frank.' ‘Don't you want to?' asks Howard. ‘Why do they make us?' asks the fat girl. Howard takes the girls across to the window; he shows them the glass and concrete view; he tells them about
Gemeinschaft
to
Gesellschaft;
he says, ‘How else could you know why the world has become what it is?' ‘Is that what it's about?' asks the bra-less girl. ‘That's right,' says Howard. ‘Well, that's everything, isn't it?' asks the bra-less girl. ‘Exactly,' says Howard. ‘Ooooo,' says the fat girl, standing on Howard's other side. ‘What's that?' asks Howard. ‘Over there,' says the fat girl, and she points her finger out over the gloomy campus, ‘I can see where I live.' ‘Where?' asks Howard. ‘I'm in Hegel,' says the girl, ‘but the roof leaks.' ‘Dr Kirk, who was Hegel?' asks the bra-less girl. ‘Ah,' says Howard, ‘You see, you do need to study sociology.' ‘Did he know a lot?' asks the bra-less girl. ‘He did,' says Howard, ‘but his roof leaks.' ‘You know more,' says the fat girl. Howard laughs; he steps back into the centre of his room, and arranges two of his plastic chairs, so that they form a triangle with his own desk chair. In the plastic chairs he puts the girls; in his desk chair he puts himself; he talks to them, he tells them about their work for the term, he sets them some reading, he advises them on the purchase of books, he asks the fat girl to write him an essay for next week. The girls get up, and go. ‘He didn't tell you who Hegel was,' says the fat girl, as they walk off down the corridor. ‘Hey,' shouts Howard, after them, ‘Come to a party, eight o'clock tonight at my house,' ‘Ooooo,' says the fat girl.

And so the morning passes. At home, domestic Barbara unwraps cheeses, and cuts sausages, and tidies the house; in his rectangular room Howard sees students, old ones and new ones, sets essays, recommends courses, sets reading, asks for essays, invites them to his party. The stable clock chimes; the rain falls. At twelve-thirty there is no knock on his door; he takes his leather coat from the peg, and descends, down the lift, into the complexities of the campus. The student hordes pass, to and fro, across the Piazza; Howard walks through them, a contemporary stylist himself, and makes his way to the Students' Union building. There are many services for a Howard to perform in a modern society; he has now another duty. The Revolutionary Student Front, that vague, contentious coalition of Marxists and Maoists and Marxist-Leninists and Revolutionary Socialists, has its inaugural meeting of the term; Howard, busy in the world as well as in the mind, has agreed to address it, to help it recruit. In more plastic chairs, in a tiny room in the Union, a group of students sits. The rain splashes on the windows; a pop group rehearses in the next room. A student called Peter Madden, who, if this uncertain consortium believed in having a leader, would be it, leads him to the front of the group. Madden wears denims and hostile, one-directional sunglasses; he stands and says a few words, explaining the purpose of the group, its relevance and its ire, to the newcomers. There are not many there, for it is early for issues and political discovery, and they are solemn, like a class. Howard stands up; the faces look. He leans with one hand on the arm of a chair; he glances out of the window at the futurist city; he begins to speak. He offers a calm analysis of the socio-political situation in which, he says, we find ourselves. We are in a world of late capitalism, and capitalism is an over-ripe plum, ready to fall. It is cracking, bursting, from its inner contradictions; but who, from its fall, will benefit? How can the new world come?

He speaks on; he generates images of violence. The faces stare, as he talks of armed struggle, the need for unity, the claims of blood and force. The dark portrait builds up, to the room's consent. He stops speaking; he invites discussion; the minds contemplate the techniques of bloodshed, the degree of warfare, the bright new reality at the end of it all. Afterwards they go quietly from the room; the pop group raises the decibels in the next room. In the cafeteria, over a salad plate, Howard says to Peter Madden: ‘Not too many there.' ‘You don't radicalize people by talk,' says Peter Madden, ‘you get them in by action.' ‘That's right,' says Howard. A girl called Beck Pott, in denim, her fair hair done up in twists, says: ‘Have you
got
some action?' ‘I don't know,' says Howard, ‘Moira Millikin told me this morning that Mangel might be coming here to speak.' ‘You have to be joking,' says Beck Pott, ‘everybody's so low-profile these days you can't get a fascist to perform a fascist action.' ‘Why don't they repress us the way they used to?' asks Peter Madden. ‘There's your problem,' says Howard, ‘so you have to go for the soft liberal underbelly. Find where they're tolerant and go for that. Mangel tempts them to tolerance.' ‘But what makes you think they'll invite him?' asks Beck Pott. ‘I expect they will,' says Howard. ‘Well, great,' says Beck Pott. ‘Buy me a beer, Howard. You've got more money than me.' ‘Give her the money,' says Peter Madden, ‘she can fetch it herself.' ‘I'll get it, I'm going,' says Howard. ‘Look, come to a party at my home tonight.' ‘Okay,' says Beck Pott.

‘Myra and I are looking forward very much to the party at your house tonight,' says Henry Beamish, a few minutes later, as they meet each other getting into the lift in the Social Science Building. ‘We always look forward to your parties.' ‘Well, good,' says Howard, ‘it should be a lively evening. We've asked everybody.' ‘You always do,' says Henry, standing inside the box, and pressing the wrong button; the lift begins to descend, irrevocably, into the basement of the building, where the rubbish is kept. ‘Yours are the most interesting parties we go to.' The lift doors open; they stare at dustbins. ‘How's Myra?' asks Howard, pressing the right button. ‘Oh, well, you know,' says Henry. ‘No,' says Howard, as they rise. ‘She's all right,' says Henry. ‘She's just bought a new Miele dishwasher. How's Barbara?' ‘Ah, Barbara,' says Howard, ‘she's fighting back.' ‘A good girl,' says Henry. ‘Ah, well, term again, thank the Lord, I don't have to do any more to my book.' ‘You're writing a book, Henry?' says Howard, as the lift stops. ‘That's good.' ‘I thought I'd do a book,' says Henry, ‘I've nothing to say, of course. Ah, here we are. Take care, old boy.' ‘I will,' says Howard. ‘Till tonight,' says Henry, disappearing down one of the corridors on the fifth floor. Howard walks along the facing corridor; he goes back to his room. And now there are more students to see, letters to write, memos to dictate to Miss Ho, who sits in the grey chair, and takes shorthand from him. After this he goes to the library; the computer issues him some books; he carries them back to his room, and packs his briefcase. Then, with a good start to the new term behind him, and the joy of the party ahead, he goes out to the car park. It is just before five o'clock, on the day that Flora, and so many others, have noted in their diaries, that he gets back to the house in the terrace, and walks through the cool hall into the kitchen at the back.

In the days when the Kirks had remodelled their house, they had worked with particular dedication at the kitchen, since they both had to spend so much time there. They did it out in pine and rush; the long table is scrubbed pine, the shelves on the walls are pine, there are pine cabinets, and pine and rush chairs, and rush matting on the floors. Barbara stands amid this, in front of a vinyl wallpaper celebrating the bulbous lines of onions and garlics; she is wearing a striped butcher's apron, and making pâté. The children are here too, filling bowls with nuts and pretzels. ‘I said come back about four,' says Barbara, as Howard kisses her lightly on the cheek. She wipes the cheek with the back of her hand; she looks at him. ‘I've had a busy day,' says Howard. ‘I'm sure,' says Barbara. ‘Don't tell me about it. It's clearly set you up in a big way, and I'm not interested in other people's happy times right now.' ‘You're late, Howard,' says Celia, ‘that was naughty.' ‘Well,' says Barbara, ‘there are the following things to do. Wipe the glasses. Open all the bottles of wine; there'll not be time for doing that later. I should pour out a few dozen glasses full. Put out ashtrays; I'm not having dirty rugs, and for some reason students have started throwing cigarette-ends on the floor.' ‘They always did,' says Howard, ‘we didn't care, once.' ‘Well, we do now,' says Barbara. ‘And then arrange the house the way you want it, sociologically speaking, for all that there interaction you're always talking about. You also need a bath and a change. Especially if you propose to be intimate with anyone other than myself. I've had a wearying, infuriating day, Howard, I think you should know. I've had Rosemary on the telephone twice; I'm sure she's going crazy. I think my period's starting, too, isn't that great? And Anne has left.' ‘She has?' asks Howard, wiping glasses with a cloth. ‘Before she washed the dishes from last night, not after,' says Barbara. ‘She's gone back to her flat.' ‘I thought she'd help out today,' says Howard. ‘Oh, you pushed her on her way this morning, didn't you?' asks Barbara. ‘Everyone exploits somebody.' Howard begins to take out a row of bottles from one of the cardboard cases, and put them on the long table. ‘No, not there, somewhere else,' says Barbara, ‘I'm occupying that space.' She puts some long French loaves on the table, and begins slicing them neatly, putting the cut pieces into a rush basket. Howard stands by the kitchen cabinets; he takes the corkscrew from the pine drawer, and begins expertly opening bottles, one after another. The children run over, and begin to lick the pulled corks; the Kirks' party begins to take its shape.

After a while, Howard leaves the kitchen and begins to go around the house. He is a solemn party-giver, the creator of a serious social theatre. Now he goes about, putting out ashtrays and dishes, cushions and chairs. He moves furniture, to produce good conversation areas, open significant action spaces, create corners of privacy. The children run around with him. ‘Who's coming, Howard?' asks Martin. ‘A whole crowd of people,' says Howard. ‘Who?' asks Martin. ‘He doesn't know,' says Celia. Now he goes upstairs, to pull beds against the walls, adjust lights, shade shades, pull blinds, open doors. It is an important rule to have as little forbidden ground as possible, to make the house itself the total stage. And so he designs it, retaining only a few tiny areas of sanctity; he blocks, with chairs, the short corridor that leads to the children's rooms, and the steps that lead down to his basement study. Everywhere else the code is one of possibility, not denial. Chairs and cushions and beds suggest multiple forms of companionship. Thresholds are abolished; room leads into room. There are speakers for music, special angles for lighting, rooms for dancing and talking and smoking and sexualizing. The aim is to let the party happen rather than to make it happen, so that what takes place occurs apparently without hostly intervention, or rather with the intervention of that higher sociological host who governs the transactions of human encounter. He goes into the bathroom, to check there; Barbara lies, big and naked, in the bath, in a plastic showercap, reading Cohn's
The Pursuit of the Millennium
. She says: ‘Howard, I want you to know this. I'm having my Biba weekend in London, Anne or no Anne. I know you'd like to fix that, but you won't.' ‘Fix it?' says Howard in innocence. ‘Of course you should go.' ‘Then find me someone to replace Anne,' says Barbara, ‘so I don't worry about the kids all the time.' ‘No, you mustn't do that,' says Howard. ‘But can I count on you? Will you really do it?' asks Barbara. ‘Yes,' says Howard. ‘I'm a fool,' says Barbara, ‘I should find someone myself. Rosemary would come.' ‘Magical Rosemary,' says Howard, ‘fresh from the shed down the garden.' ‘That's not funny,' says Barbara, heaving in the bath. ‘I just meant there are better choices,' says Howard. ‘I'll find someone.' ‘Not too pretty,' says Barbara. ‘Oh, no,' says Howard. ‘I want to enjoy myself,' says Barbara, ‘my God, after four weeks close to you, I need it. Mind, I want to come out now.' ‘Oh, you look good,' says Howard, as Barbara steps from the bath. ‘Don't touch,' says Barbara, ‘get on getting ready.'