The Go-Between (11 page)

  It was like looking on at a dance, unable to join
in. I could not bear to watch them, and went round to the far side
of the sluice, where Denys and the other man were floating on their
backs in the deep water, sometimes kicking it into a foam,
sometimes staring at the sky, only their faces showing. While I
stood there admiring them, but not wishing to join them, I heard a
sound beneath me; it was Ted Burgess clinging to the post, hauling
himself out. His muscles bunched, his face tense with effort; he
did not see me, and I retreated almost in fear before that powerful
body, which spoke to me of something I did not know. I drew back
into the rushes and sat down, while he stretched himself on the
warm brickwork in the sun.

  His clothes were lying at his side; he hadn’t
bothered to seek the shelter of the rushes. Nor did he now.
Believing himself to be unseen by the other bathers, he gave
himself up to being alone with his body. He wriggled his toes,
breathed hard through his nose, twisted his brown moustache, where
some drops of water still clung, and looked himself critically all
over. The scrutiny seemed to satisfy him, as well it might. I,
whose only acquaintance was with bodies and minds developing, was
suddenly confronted by maturity in its most undeniable form; and I
wondered: “What must it feel like to be him, master of those limbs,
which have passed beyond the need of gym and playing field and
exist for their own strength and beauty? What can they do,” I
thought, “to be conscious of themselves?”

  Now he had a plantain stalk in his left hand and was
rubbing it gently along the hairs of his right forearm; they
glinted in the sun and were paler than his arms, which were
mahogany-coloured to above the elbow. Then he stretched both arms
high above his chest, which was so white it might have belonged to
another person, except below his neck where the sun had burned a
copper breastplate; and he smiled to himself, an intimate, pleased
smile that would have looked childish or imbecile on most people,
but on him had the effect of a feather on a tiger—it pointed a
contrast, and all to his advantage.

  I wondered whether I ought to be spying on him, but
I could not move without betraying myself and I had a feeling that
it would be dangerous to disturb him.

  The bathers had been quiet all this time, but
suddenly a cry came from the river: “Oh my hair! my hair! It’s come
down, it’s all wet! It’ll never get dry! What shall I do? What
shall I do? I’m coming out!”

  The farmer sprang up. He didn’t wait to dry himself.
He pulled his shirt over his head, and his corduroy trousers over
his wet bathing-drawers; stuffed his feet into thick grey socks,
and pulled his boots on. Coming after his previous quiescence, the
furious energy he put into these movements almost frightened me.
His leather belt gave him the most trouble; he swore as he was
fastening the buckle. Then he strode off across the sluice.

  A moment later Marian came by. She was holding the
long coil of her hair in front of her. It made two curves with
which I was familiar; they belonged to the Virgin of the Zodiac.
She saw me at once; she was half laughing and half angry. “Oh,
Leo,” she said, “you do look so smug sitting there, I should like
to throw you in the river.” I suppose I looked alarmed, for then
she said: “No, not really. Only you do look so dreadfully
dry
, and it will be ages before I am.” She looked round
and said: “Has that man gone?”

  “Yes,” I said, always glad to be able to answer any
question she asked me. “He went off in a hurry. His name is Ted
Burgess and he’s a farmer,” I volunteered. “Do you know him?”

  “I may have met him,” Marian said, “I don’t
remember. But you’re still here, that’s something.”

  I didn’t know what she meant, but it sounded like a
compliment. She went on into the hut. Soon the others came up out
of the river. Marcus joined me and began to tell me how ripping it
had been. I envied him his wet bathing-suit, which seemed shrunk to
half its size; my dry one was like a badge of failure. We had to
wait a long time for the ladies. At last Marian came out, holding
the coil of hair away from her. “Oh, I shall never get it dry,” she
wailed, “and it’s dripping on my dress!” It was funny to see her
helpless and despairing, she who always took things so lightly, and
all about a trifle like wet hair! Women were very odd. All at once
I had an idea. It pierced me with joy. “Here is my bathing-suit,” I
said. “It’s
quite
dry. If you fasten it round your neck,
so that it hangs down your back, then you can spread your hair on
it, and your hair will get dry and your dress won’t get wet.” I
stopped, breathless; it seemed to me the longest speech I had ever
made, and I was in terror that she wouldn’t listen to it:
children’s suggestions were so often brushed aside. Imploringly I
held the garment up, so that she could see for herself its fitness
for the purpose. “It might do,” she said doubtfully; “has anyone a
pin?” A pin was produced; the garment was draped round her neck; I
was congratulated on my ingenuity. “And now you must spread my hair
on it,” she said to me. “And take care not to pull it. Ooh!” I drew
back in alarm; how could I have hurt her? I had hardly touched her
hair, much as I wanted to. Then I saw that she was smiling and
returned to my task. A labour of love it truly was, the first I had
ever done.

  I walked back with her through the lengthening
shadows, anxious still to be “something” to her, though I didn’t
know what. Every now and then she asked me how her hair was, and
whenever I touched it to see, she pretended I had pulled it. She
was in a strange, exalted mood, and so was I; and I thought that
somehow our elations came from the same source. My thoughts
enveloped her, they entered into her: I was the bathing-suit on
which her hair was spread; I was her drying hair, I was the wind
that dried it. I had a tremendous sense of achievement for which I
couldn’t account. But when she gave me back my property, damp with
the dampness I had saved her from, and let me touch her hair once
more, dry with the dryness I had won for it, I felt my cup was
full.

  5

  BREAKFAST at Brandham Hall started with family
prayers at nine o’clock. These were read by Mr. Maudsley sitting at
the head of the table (all the dishes were on the sideboard). The
chairs were drawn back and ranged round the walls/ they were all
alike, I think, but I had my favourite chair, which I could
distinguish by certain signs, and I always tried to get it. After
the gong had gone, the servants filed in, headed by the butler
wearing his most solemn air. I always counted them but could never
make them more than ten, though there were said to be twelve in the
house. The family were less regular in attendance. Mrs. Maudsley
was always there; Marcus and I made it a point of honour; Denys
came from time to time and Marian, who was seldom there at the
opening, sometimes came in half-way through. On the whole, rather
more than half the guests used to attend. It was in no way
compulsory, Marcus told me; but most households that were not
“fast” had family prayers (I dared not tell him that ours hadn’t).
His father rather liked one to go, but would not be angry if one
didn’t.

  First we sat, then we turned round and knelt down.
While we were sitting, Mr. Maudsley read a lesson; while we were
kneeling he read prayers; he read in a secular voice without
inflections but not without reverence; his personality was so
subdued that it seemed to fit in with anything he did.

  While we were sitting was the best time to make
observations, to study the guests, or, which was easier, the
servants, for they sat opposite us. Marcus was to some extent in
their confidence; he knew, for instance, which of them had been
getting into trouble, and why. If one of them could be thought of
as looking red-eyed, it lent a touch of drama to the morning
ceremony. Afterwards, kneeling, one could press one’s knuckles into
one’s eyes to make the colours come, and one could observe
intensely over a very restricted field of vision. Covertly to
extend this, without incurring the charge of irreverence, was one
of the tasks one set oneself.

  This morning, my first Sunday morning at Brandham
Hall, Marcus did not come down with me. He said he didn’t feel
well. He did not, as I should have, debate with himself whether he
should get up or not or ask anyone’s leave to stay in bed; he just
stayed there. His pale cheeks were a little flushed and his eyes
bright. “Don’t worry about me,” he said. “Someone will come. Give
Trimingham my kind regards.”

  Secretly resolving to tell Mrs. Maudsley as soon as
prayers were over (for apart from real concern for his state I
fancied myself as a breaker of bad news), I waited for the last
stroke of the gong and presently found myself at the head of the
double staircase. I had no difficulty in remembering which track to
take.

  Trimingham, I thought as I went bumping down the
cataract. (I was a Red Indian this morning; shooting the rapids, I
had to be some kind of explorer.) Trimingham: the misterless
Trimingham whom her mother wanted Marian to marry. But supposing
she didn’t want to marry him. I hated to think of her wishes being
crossed or forced in any way. Trimingham was a weight on my
thoughts. Perhaps I could cast a spell on him. Thinking how to word
it, I reached my favourite chair and composed my features. The
other guests were coming in, and one of them sat down beside me. I
didn’t have to be told who it was, and in spite of having been
warned I started.

  On the side of his face turned to me was a
sickle-shaped scar that ran from his eye to the corner of his
mouth; it pulled the eye down, exposing a tract of glistening red
underlid, and the mouth up, so that you could see the gums above
his teeth. I didn’t think his eye could close, even in sleep, or
his mouth either. He had grown a moustache, so I afterwards
learned, to cover this, but it was a straggly affair and didn’t do
its job. His damaged eye watered a little; even as I was looking at
him he dabbed it with a handkerchief. His whole face was lop-sided,
the cheek with the scar on it being much shorter than the
other.

  I decided it would be impossible to like him, and
immediately liked him better. He was nothing to be afraid of, even
without the handicap of his ambiguous social position, which I
judged to be below that of a gentleman but above that of, well,
such a person as Ted Burgess. But why make all this fuss of him? It
must be because of his disfigurement. The Maud-sleys were, I
thought, a religious family: perhaps he was some sort of dependant
whom they didn’t want to lose sight of, and they were being kind to
him on Christian principles. So would I be, too, I thought, as I
listened with more attention than usual to the Collect.

  I didn’t get the opportunity to give him Marcus’s
message; he sat on the other side of the breakfast table, which was
full to capacity; several guests had arrived on Saturday while we
were bathing. Marian sat on one side of him, his good side; I soon
came to think of him as two-sided, like Janus. Together, they
looked like Beauty and the Beast. How nice of her, I thought, to
take such trouble with him! She opened her blue eyes for him as she
rarely did for anyone except, at times, for me.

  The men walked about to eat their porridge. This,
Marcus told me, was
de rigueur
; only cads ate their
porridge sitting down. I roamed about with mine, fearful of
spilling it. The ladies, however, remained seated. Mrs. Maudsley
seemed preoccupied. Her inscrutable, beeline glance rested several
times on Trimingham—it didn’t have to travel, it was
there
. But it never turned my way, and when at last I did
get her attention, the meal was over, we were leaving the table,
and she said: “Oh, isn’t Marcus here?” She hadn’t even noticed that
he wasn’t, though he was such a favourite with her. But she went
straight up to his room, where, after making sure the coast was
clear, I followed her. To my astonishment, I found an envelope with
“No Admittance” on it fixed with two drawing-pins to our door. This
was a challenge I at once took up; besides, it was my room as well
as Marcus’s, and no one had the right to keep me out. I opened the
door and put my head in.

  “What’s up? “I said.

  “It was decent of you to trickle along,” said Marcus
languidly from the bed, “but don’t come in. I have a headache and
some spots and Mama thinks it may be measles. She didn’t say so,
but I know.”

  “Hard cheese, old man,” I said. “But what about the
jolly old quarantine? “

  “Well, cases do develop when it’s over. But the
doctor’s coming, and he’ll know. What fun for you if you get it!
Perhaps we shall all get it, like at school. Then we shan’t be able
to have the cricket match or the ball or anything. Lord, I shall
laugh!”

  “Is there to be a cricket match? “

  “Yes, we have it every year. It helps to keep them
quiet.”

  “And a ball?” I asked, apprehensively. I didn’t feel
equal to a ball.

  “Yes, that’s for Marian, and Trimingham, and all the
neighbours. It’s to be on Saturday the 28th. Mama’s sent out the
invitations. Cripes! The place will be a hospital by then!”

  We both laughed like hyenas at the prospect, and
Marcus said: “You’d better not stay here breathing in my ruddy
germs.”

  “Oh God, perhaps you’re right. That reminds me, I
want my prayer-book.”

  “What, are you going to the jolly old kirk?”

  “Well, I thought I might.”

  “Pretty decent of you, but you needn’t, you
know.”

  “No, but I don’t want to let the side down. We do it
at home sometimes,” I told him, tolerantly. “Shall I slink across
the room and get my prayer-buggins?”