A Word Child

  ‘What’s your name, Miss Mukerji?’ I did not expect her to tell me.

  She replied at once, ‘Alexandra Bissett.’

  ‘Alexandra Bissett? No, no, there are limits, you can’t look like that and be called Alexandra Bissett!’

  ‘My father was an English officer. My mother was a Brahmin.’

  ‘I see. That makes you some sort of princess, I think. Where were you born?’

  ‘In Benares.’

  ‘Well, Miss Bissett — ’

  ‘Please call me — ’

  ‘Alexandra?’

  ‘No, no one calls me that. They call me Biscuit.’

  ‘Biscuit?’

  ‘Yes. I was called Bissett. Then Chocolate Biscuit. Then just Biscuit.’

  ‘Who are “they”?’

  ‘Who they?’

  ‘You say they call you Biscuit. Who are they?’

  ‘My — friends — ’

  The voice, the manner, eluded classification. She did not seem quite like an educated person, there was a certain awkward simplicity. Yet she had a confident dignified directness which was itself a sign of culture, and there was none of the giggling forwardness of an amateur whore. She smiled, obviously amused at my puzzlement.

  ‘But Biscuit,’ I said. ‘Why me? Why me?’

  ‘I saw you on the tube train. Perhaps.’

  ‘Yes, perhaps. And perhaps I was wearing a placard round my neck with my name on it. And perhaps you decided at once that I was the most attractive man in London. I know I’m a big handsome chap — well big anyway. But no, that won’t do. Try again.’

  ‘I saw you in the bar at Sloane Square.’

  ‘Maybe you did. But why did you follow me home and how did you know my name? Biscuit — look — may I hold your hand?’ I took a cautious firm hold of her long delicate hand, so frail that it felt as if it might break in my grasp. And as I took her hand I felt a stirring of the old crude male desire which had been present before but diffused in wonderment.

  She laughed awkwardly. If I had still thought her a designing tart that laugh alone would have proved me wrong. She turned her head away, pressed my hand back with surprisingly strong fingers, and then withdrew her hand, moving a little away from me and standing up. ‘I must go now.’

  ‘Biscuit! You can’t go! You haven’t even called me Hilary!’

  ‘Should I?’

  ‘Yes, of course. If I call you Biscuit you must call me Hilary. That’s a rule.’

  ‘Hilary — ’

  ‘Good. And now you’re going to come along with me and have a drink and then some lunch and tell me what this mystery is all about.’

  ‘No, I must go. I have to be back.’

  ‘Back where? Why? Have you got to go to them?’

  ‘I don’t understand. I must go. Forgive me. Oh, yes, forgive me.’ She sounded a little foreign at last.

  ‘I won’t forgive you if you just go away. Where do you live? Where can I find you? When shall I sec you again? I will see you again, won’t I? Biscuit, please — ’

  ‘Yes. Again. Yes.’

  ‘Promise me. Swear to me. Swear by — by Big Ben.’

  She laughed. ‘I swear by Big Ben that I will see you again.’

  ‘Give me your address.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Let me give you something. Something to prove later that it wasn’t all a dream. Oh God — what — ’ Standing now, I leaned down and picked a stone off the wet pavement. It was a blackish smooth elliptical stone. I gave it to her.

  She displayed more emotion than at any previous moment. ‘Oh thank you, thank you, so much — ’

  ‘Actually I need the proof, not you. Let me see you to where you’re going.’

  ‘No. You must stay here. I shall go away.’

  ‘But how shall I ever find you? Will you come to me again, will you come to my flat?’

  ‘Yes, I will come.’

  ‘Because of Big Ben.’

  ‘Yes, yes.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘I must go. You stay here.’ She began to walk away from me, backwards at first, then looking back over her shoulder, as if riveting me to the spot with her glance. She walked away, holding the stone in her hand, holding it clear of the swinging skirt of her black mackintosh. She disappeared from view at last behind the stone pavilion at the head of the courtyard, vanishing in the direction of the Bayswater Road. As soon as she was gone I began to run. I darted round the corner, to the park gate. She must have started to run at the same moment. There was no sign of her among the people moving in both directions along the wet crowded pavements. I hurried up and down and searched and looked for some minutes, but there was no sign of her. She was gone.

  Saturday was my day for Crystal. I usually went there fairly early, about six-thirty. Once a month, Tommy, arriving separately (she was not allowed to arrive with me) came in for a brief drink, disappearing at my nod about ten past seven. So as not to miss any minutes of my valuable presence she invariably arrived first. She and Crystal were not designed by nature to understand or like each other, but they were good girls and they loved me so they had to get on. They were both possessive about me of course, but with deep tact they had sorted out their spheres of influence so that there was almost no conflict. The tact was mostly on Tommy’s part in fact. She occupied the junior position and she had the intelligence to appreciate the absolute nature of my relation to Crystal. Tommy knew that a foot wrong in that respect and she would be finished. She never put a foot wrong. I should say that I had told Tommy a little about my childhood but only in vague general terms and, so far as it was possible, without emotional colour. Of course Crystal and Tommy never had confidential chats. They would both have been far too frightened to do so. But as I say, they were good girls and they were kind to each other.

  I was in a strange mood. The baffling events of the morning had filled me with a kind of nervous exhilaration. Laura had said that I hated new things. This was not entirely true. I did not initiate change but I could still be refreshed by it. What a beautiful and strange visitation and what could it mean? Very occasionally in my life something, it might be almost anything, it could be something much more trivial than this, disturbed me with some sense of a possible salvation. Must every sign be sinister, every unexpected visitor be from the secret police? Were there no more bright innocent surprises to prick the weary and depraved hide? But perhaps, indeed it was most likely, the whole business would prove to be neither delightful nor menacing but just senseless. Perhaps I had already had the best of Biscuit. Perhaps I had already had all of her. And now, as I approached the North End Road that evening, a deep apprehension about Crystal began to absorb my mind and the strange image of the Indian girl faded away.

  Crystal’s room was quite big and could have been pleasant if she had had the faintest idea how to embellish it. There was a bright centre light and also a dim lamp with a parchment shade, portraying a scorched galleon, which was turned on for guests. There was the wooden table, which only had a cloth on on Saturdays, and a sideboard of shiny veneered wood with a row of ebony elephants upon it. There was Crystal’s little narrow bed with a green satin bedspread. There were two junk shop armchairs and three upright chairs and a thin dark trampled carpet which seemed to be growing upon the floor. The faded wallpaper had a design which it was hard to believe that any sentient, let alone rational, being could have invented. There was a wireless set but no television. I would not let Crystal have television. She might have picked up a few facts from it, but better decent ignorance than such a teacher. Also I connected television with the orphanage where I had become an addict, and deprivation of it had been a regular punishment far more effective than thrashing.

  As I came in the two women rose. Tommy looked very nervous and anxious until reassured by some ineffable feature of my manner. They could both read me as dogs read their master, probably noticing tiny traits of behaviour of which I was myself unconscious.

  ‘I told you not to come,’ I said to
Tommy. ‘You’ve got a cold.’

  ‘I haven’t got a cold,’ said Tommy bravely. ‘You’ve just got a silly phobia about colds, hasn’t he?’ She was perky and timidly uppish because she saw that I was sorry I had hurt her in the morning.

  ‘If Crystal gets that cold there’ll be trouble.’

  ‘I don’t think Tommy’s got a cold,’ said Crystal.

  They both smiled at me. I threw off my coat and sat down at the table which had been covered with a white lace cloth in my honour. I felt a bit better. Every occasion of entering Crystal’s presence was an access of brightness, a lightening of the load. They sat down too and Crystal poured out a third glass of sherry for me.

  ‘Is it still raining?’

  ‘Yes.’

  I knew that Tommy would have said nothing to Crystal about what had happened that morning at my flat, nothing about the way I had received her, nothing about my sudden departure, nothing about whatever had happened (whatever that had been, another subject for anxiety) after I had gone. I had trained Tommy well. Equally of course she would make no reference to such matters now. There were in fact so many subjects which the three of us could not discuss, and a fortiori which Tommy and Crystal could not discuss, that it might have seemed that conversation would languish. However we always chattered easily enough about trivialities, and I imagine Crystal and Tommy did the same when I was not there.

  ‘What’s the weather forecast?’

  ‘Rain, and colder.’

  ‘The shops are getting ready for Christmas already.’

  ‘They are beginning to put up the decorations in Regent Street.’

  I detested the subject of Christmas and steered off it. ‘Show me the stuff your new lady brought.’

  ‘Oh yes! I was just showing it to Tommy.’

  Crystal took the stuff from a box on the bed and spread it on the table. The design was a close relation of the wallpaper. ‘Isn’t it lovely?’

  ‘Lovely.’

  Crystal folded the stuff into the box and took it away into the little kitchen where she kept her materials in a trunk.

  Tommy was sitting next to me with her skirt hitched up displaying those long perfect legs. (Quite unconsciously. She was, apart from Crystal, the most uncoquettish woman I had ever met.) (Crystal’s legs were like tree stumps.) She now began to roll up the sleeve of her jersey, and looking at me meaningfully, displayed two large dark spotty bruises just above the elbow. I looked at the bruises and then at her face. She knew at once she had done wrong. Any surreptitious behaviour or hint of secrets was absolutely taboo. Also I was prepared to be sorry, but not to be grossly reminded of my fault. I frowned. Tommy hastily pulled down her sleeve. Crystal returned.

  ‘Well — ’ I said, and almost imperceptibly nodded, the sign for Tommy to go.

  She got up hastily, her face stiffened, on the verge of tears. ‘I must go now. Thank you so much, Crystal.’

  I watched Tommy put on her raincoat. She was struggling hard to repress the tears and succeeding. They would have constituted yet another serious crime.

  ‘Good-bye — ’ in a trembling voice.

  I let her make for the door. ‘Good night, Tommy dear.’

  Relief. Mercy had prevailed. ‘Good night — Hilary — see you next week — and I’ll write Monday as usual. Good night then.’

  Of course Crystal made no comment on the fact that I had sent Tommy away half an hour early.

  Crystal and I now faced each other.

  I should make it clear that there was nothing physical in my relation with Crystal. (Except in the sense, which I must leave to the reader to determine, that anything mental is physical.) I did not want to go to bed with her or kiss her or caress her or even touch her more than minimally. (Though if I had been told that I could never touch her I should have gone mad.) I did not ‘find her attractive’. I simply was her. I had to have her there, like God. And by ‘there’ I mean again, not necessarily in my presence. I needed to see her regularly but not very often. She just had to be always available in a place fixed and controlled by me. I had to know, at any moment, where she was. I needed her sequestered innocence, as a man might want his better self to be stored away separately in a pure deity. Did I want her to remain a virgin? Yes.

  None of all this however decided anything about Arthur. I wanted Crystal to go on forever being whatever it was she was to me, but I also wanted her to be happy, and had perhaps too long been content with the formula that her happiness was to make me happy, or as near to it as I could ever be, which was certainly not very near, since the Oxford smash up. Of course Crystal had not married because of me, though this too could be a little hazed over by the thought that she was the old maid type anyway and being no beauty would never have been likely to have suitors. There had been in fact one or two, a chap in the north and a Canadian in London, but I thought poorly of them and Crystal never really took them seriously at all. A few years ago I had actually been settling down to the comfortable feeling that the dangerous time was over and Crystal had passed the marrying age. Then somehow, as I explained earlier, I had begun to see a new picture. Two things had come up to change the world. One was that Crystal wanted a child. This surprised me, and how she had put it into my head I do not know. She never said so in plain words, but I was by now thoroughly aware of it. The other thing of course was Arthur.

  If Arthur had been either wonderful or impossible the situation would have been a good deal easier. As it was Arthur was not at all what I would have chosen (but then what would I have chosen, would I ever have chosen?), yet he was a possibility. He was not clever or impressive or rich (but then someone clever or impressive or rich would not have loved Crystal). Arthur was indeed something of a ‘wet’. He was not notably vertebrate and could hardly look after himself, so how could he look after Crystal? I was not so sunk in egoism that I could not see that Crystal’s life was dreary. In an abstract way I wanted her to go away and be saved and not to be damned with me, and yet of course I did not and could not want her to go away. If she could have been metamorphosed into a happy well-off wife and mother living in a big country house with a huge garden and six dogs (she wanted a dog, I never let her have one) I should have been, not pleased, but satisfied that this had to be and also somehow glad of a new happiness for her; at least, this was what I sometimes imagined when no such thing was in prospect. I had intended to transform her life, I had intended to transform her mind, but I had failed, and this was the fundamental and awful failure for which I should be damned. I had, I suppose, pulled her up a little way out of the Aunt Bill caravan world, but only a little way. I had never, as I once meant to, educated her. Crystal knew her Bible, but she did not know who Tolstoy was or whether Cromwell lived before or after Queen Elizabeth. In this respect Arthur was not exactly a foothold. Arthur’s rag-tag of junkies and criminals whom he ‘helped’ (or was victimized by) led straight back into the world I myself was about to enter when I was rescued by Mr Osmand. I felt a horror of that world and I did not want the smell of it to come near Crystal ever again. What was Arthur himself anyway? A poor clerk with no talents and no prospects. Would Arthur be strong enough to protect Crystal? Arthur was a muddler. He might even become some sort of drop-out. Would not a marriage with him mean some ultimate subsidence into confusion and poverty and thereby misery? Married life if not organized is hell. Neither of these two could organize themselves out of a wet paper bag. Although it might not be so thrilling, there was a kind of purity and cleanness about Crystal’s present position which I knew was a support to her; and protected by me she felt perfectly secure. Would she be strong enough to exist as Arthur’s wife, to become the (oh God) quite different person Arthur’s wife would be? On the other (to all this) hand, Arthur was thoroughly decent and he loved her and it had begun to look as if perhaps she could love him; only of course everything ultimately depended on me.

  My relations with Tommy had begun before Arthur became important on Crystal’s scene, and it was a cause of bitter pain
to me to think that that entanglement had possibly in some way encouraged the other. Unfortunately these dramas had proceeded at a different pace. I never deliberately isolated my sister, I introduced her to some few of my few friends, but it had never hitherto happened that any friend of mine had really become a friend of hers. Arthur, however, with some diffidence and caution I must admit (for he feared me) did begin to move in, and this was made easier by the fact that I was then so involved with Tommy and was seeing less of Crystal. Something which I could never measure was the fright which I had then perhaps given to Crystal by some seeming desertion of her. Had this fright created a space, a need? This question, from which my mind recoiled in horror, was by now perhaps of historical interest only. What was more crucial was this. I had been watching Crystal anxiously to see if she ever showed signs of getting married, and of course (though naturally she never breathed a word about it) Crystal was watching me anxiously to see if I ever showed signs of getting married. I had earlier on told Crystal in the most forthright terms that I would never marry. (I did not notice then, but did later, that she did not offer me a similar resolution.) And for a long time it seemed to me as if I was perfectly right about myself, and my bachelor existence had become a steady and established fact. Then I fell in love with Tommy. I was not of course ‘really’ (totally) in love, but I was physically in love in a way which I had not imagined ever again to be possible. And although this love had ceased its consequences remained. Crystal knew that I could love, and so could conceivably want to marry. She even now perhaps thought that I wanted to marry Tommy. She knew that Tommy and I had our difficulties and she had seen them on display before tonight. But I had never told her that I did not want to marry Tommy, and I had refrained from telling her for a good reason. Crystal was quite capable of sacrificing Arthur, even if she wanted desperately to become his wife, if she felt that I was opposed to the marriage. To say she was quite capable understates the matter. She would have no hesitation, it would be at the drop of a hat, the hat need not even begin to fall. And so of course I had done my best to conceal my thoughts, even if possible not to formulate them. Equally this state of mind in Crystal presupposed her knowledge of a similar state of mind in me where a possible marriage with Tommy was concerned. Crystal knew that her marriage with Arthur would facilitate my marriage with Tommy, assuming that I wanted to marry Tommy, just as my marriage with Tommy would facilitate hers with Arthur, assuming she wanted to marry Arthur. Now I had no intention of marrying Tommy, only I was not going to tell Crystal this, because I wanted Crystal to be able to make up her mind about Arthur without being crippled by anxieties about leaving me abandoned. The danger of the whole situation was of course this, that there was the possibility of a catastrophic altruistic error à deux! That is, we might each of us do what we did not want to do so as to help the other to do what he (she) did not want to do either.