A Garden of Trees Read online

  “Do they?” I said.

  “Yes.”

  “But why?”

  “Well,” he said, “it’s the fashion. It’s what people want. The extraordinary thing about this country is that people always seem to get what they want.”

  “But they don’t seem to want anything.”

  “No,” he said. “That’s another extraordinary thing.”

  We walked down the darkening street. He did not seem to be sarcastic. He talked in an offhand way, rather distant.

  “But they want things for themselves,” I said.

  “Yes,” he said.

  “Comfortable things, crazy things.”

  “Yes.”

  “It all seems rather a mess to me.”

  “Yes,” he said.

  Such a strange man, with his agreements. I was sure he wasn’t being sarcastic. At that time (I was still quite young) I thought that I could always get to know people by talking to them, by saying the things that would please them, and as a rule I had been successful with those I had wanted to know. At least, I thought that I had known them. But I had no idea what to say to Marius. I felt, rather foolishly, that when I spoke to him not only were my words wrong, but my whole tone of voice, my expression too. It was almost as if on my old formula I was incapable of knowing anybody. So I kept quiet.

  “So,” he said, “I expect that they even want you to think them a mess!” He peered at me amicably.

  We were getting back towards the crowd. I could see the bus parked in a side street, like a whale washed up in a dockyard. The horses were gone. A line of policemen on foot was pushing the crowd back, advancing wearily upon them, causing grumbles. The crowd retreated, keeping clear of the police, not wanting to touch them. Then suddenly a man detached himself from his neighbours, wrapped his raincoat around himself, scraped his feet along the ground once or twice like a boxer in his corner, and charged the policemen. He ran like a man approaching the long jump, leapt, and was bounced back deftly by restraining arms. It seemed a quite dispassionate performance. He tried it once again, a little more wildly this time, burrowing his head slightly, almost diving. The police took little notice of him. He bounced comfortably. Then he rejoined his friends. It was as if he had to make some purely ritualistic effort to assert himself, to ensure his self-respect; as if it were some animal instinct within him to make him hurl himself thus; like a monkey that hurls itself against the bars of its cage, catches itself, and then returns to its corner to scratch. He was a tough, rotund little man—one of the balloons. There was certainly nothing purposeful about him.

  “There,” I said to Marius. “That’s what I mean.”

  “That?” he said. “Yes.”

  We went up a side street. We were on the inside of the police cordon, alone. The street at first was empty, with doors closed, giving the impression of enormous events elsewhere. Then, at the far end, some men appeared, running, looking over their shoulders like fugitives. When they were clear into the street they stopped, hopping sideways, and tried to appear at ease. A number collected, forming a column. They were demonstrators who, having evaded the police, were about to demonstrate. They huddled into their column and came marching down the street in a thin line, wispily, all bedraggled and out of step. They trilled some chant about killing. A schoolboy crocodile on the trail of its schoolboy prey.

  “Perhaps you’ll see something else,” Marius said.

  Along the other side of the street came a girl and boy, carrying newspapers. The crocodile saw them, paused, seemed to shiver along its reptile length and then broke, setting upon them. The boy and girl went down, crumpling, and then were out of sight. They were buried beneath the reptile bodies. There were some youths jumping up and down on the edge of the crowd trying to get a look, to be in on it, their hands rested friendlily on their companion’s shoulders. It was all quite quiet—just the whispering of feet, the feet of the insects, the scurry of cockroaches towards their hole, their refuge; and their refuge was this, the beating up of the girl and the boy. Marius was walking towards them steadily, his hands coming out of his pockets, I following him; and when he reached them he made a way dispassionately through the crowd until he came to the girl and boy, the flailing arms and the plunging movement of fists fading down before him, the youths stepping back, tossing their hair, wondering; then he was above the two crouching figures on the pavement and the boy had his arms wrapped round his head and the girl was gripping the railings as if she were chained. But they were unhurt, unscratched even—after the fists and the kicks they were not even so greatly perturbed—for the boy, seeing Marius above him, stood up quickly and ran, and then waited about twenty yards off: and the girl, pulling herself up by the railings and shaking herself seemed more concerned with the state of her stockings than with any bodily harm. She pulled at her clothes angrily, and then turned to the crowd, shouting something unintelligible at them, but as she marched off proudly to join the boy they did nothing to stop her except follow her with jeers, and at the end, when she was almost past them, snatch her papers from her and hurl them into the air from which they fell, rather damply, upon a neighbouring doorstep. The boy ran to pick them up, and the crowd lurched threateningly; but he got them, and tidied them, and the two of them proceeded on their way down the street. So it was all a game after all, I thought; they are only children and these are only children’s tears. And then a brick hit Marius.

  It hit him on the temple, obliquely, so that his head jerked round and he staggered rather, then felt for his forehead with the back of his hand and was examining the blood on it while the echo of the brick still clattered against the stones. He dabbed at his forehead again, cautiously, and he was reaching for his handkerchief while I was advancing futilely upon the crowd trying to alarm them with my fear; and then they left us. They reformed their column. Someone grated an order. They wandered off like prisoners into the dusk. Marius was carefully folding his handkerchief into a pad.

  “Are you all right?” I said.

  “Yes,” he said.

  “I should like to murder the lot of them,” I said.

  “I should like a brandy,” he said.

  We went to find a pub. Marius looked as he always looked, but then he never looked quite as if he belonged to himself. I wondered why he had been the only person to get hurt. Perhaps they had felt that he was more than a child and a gamesplayer, and had resented him. They had certainly left him quickly enough when he had been standing dabbing his forehead at the side of the street.

  We got through the police cordons. The crowds were now spasmodic, wandering in groups. It was cold, heavy evening, full of damp.

  “What time is it?” he said.

  “Six o’clock,” I said.

  “Then I must ring up.”

  That was all he said. His head had stopped bleeding. We walked into a pub and he went through to the telephone.

  The bar was tough, crowded, frightening. I ordered two brandies. The others were all drinking beer. They were old men mostly, hard grizzled men, quiet in their authority. The pubs were probably the only places in London where their authority still prevailed. Outside it was the rule of youths on the pavements, middle age in the offices, women in the homes. The old men left the rackets to the outsiders. In the pub they were patriarchal like priests; and even some of the racketeers, intruders at the bar, seemed aware of their own vulgarity. For the old men were tough. Seeing me and my two double brandies one of them said to me, “There’s a door marked gentlemen for the likes of you.”

  “What?” I said.

  “I said there’s a door marked gentlemen for the likes of you.”

  “Oh,” I said. I was nervous and did not know what he meant. I was thinking that he must be a nice old man to be talking to me so.

  “And do you know what there is when you get through it,” he said. He was smiling slily into his beer.

  “Oh yes,” I said.

  I eventually understood what he meant. I stood gripping my two double b
randies at the bar, unable to retreat and unable to reply. I wanted to answer him, to win him round, to expose this gentlemen rubbish; but I knew that if I opened my mouth I should sound either querulous or superior. I felt that this failure was somehow Marius’s fault, and I wanted Marius to return to deal with it. Meanwhile I could feel them all grinning at me, all being drawn into the joke, all waiting happily for the hopelessly one-sided skirmish between the cockney and the toff. It was all according to form. I must be easy with them, I thought, and then they will accept me. I grinned stupidly at the old man and his beer. But it was no use; I was only doing it through cowardice, so that they should accept me. The old man was winking to his companions, they were gathering round; I was twirling my brandy glasses for the hundredth time and trying to force my face to assume a less ridiculous expression; and then Marius returned.

  The old man looked Marius up and down. “I was saying there’s a door marked gentlemen for the likes of you,” he repeated. I found myself hating him. I wanted Marius to rub him in the dirt. I hated his glib complacent repetitions.

  “What?” Marius echoed.

  The old man repeated his statement yet again, and I wanted to sneer at him.

  “For me?” Marius said. “But I don’t want it.” He was looking round vacantly for the door marked gentlemen.

  “It’s all the likes of you are fit for,” the old man said. He was still winking and grinning and one of the intruders began to copy Marius’s voice in the unbearable music-hall version of the Oxford accent.

  “Well I’m drinking brandy and you’re drinking beer,” Marius said, “and I expect you’ll have to use it before me.” He drank his brandy and the intruders giggled.

  “There’s some would like to be drinking brandy but can’t,” the old man said.

  “Well I’ll get you a brandy,” Marius said. “And then you’ll be happy, because you won’t have to go through the door marked gentlemen.”

  He ordered three more brandies and the old man accepted his silently. Now I did not hate the old man, I loved him, and I wanted him to love Marius. His companions were making faces rather desperately; they were losing their grip.

  Marius looked genial and unconcerned. “Why all this talk about lavatories?” he said.

  “You’re all right,” the old man said.

  Marius laughed.

  “Yes,” Marius said.

  “And I know what I’m talking about,” the old man said he was swaying slightly with his elbow on the bar and his eyes watery.

  “You are lucky,” Marius said.

  “I know what I’m talking about,” he repeated.

  Those who had seemed to be intruders at the bar were giggling. The old man advanced on them suddenly and swore at them with effortless ferocity. They protested, alarmed. Then the old man flung back his arm, clearing a space around him, and waited.

  “I think we’d better all have a brandy,” Marius said.

  “No,” the old man said, “beer.” He leant across the bar and made signs at the barman like a tic-tac man.

  “This is mine,” I said.

  He looked at me. “All right,” he said. “But beer will do.”

  We all drank. The intruders were silent. They let their glasses stand for a moment and then they lifted them ceremoniously and drank in unison. I did not know how Marius had done it. After the sneers and the antagonism it was as if we were all suddenly in love.

  “Hooray!” the old man said.

  “Yes,” Marius said. The old man swayed forwards and touched him on the arm.

  “What do you think will happen?” he said.

  “Perhaps something like this,” Marius said.

  “Out there? In the streets?” The old man looked round for somewhere to spit.

  “Every now and then,” Marius said.

  “Not in my lifetime,” the old man said.

  “Sometimes.”

  “Ah, you’re still young.”

  “It makes no difference,” Marius said.

  We were gathered round Marius as if he were a prophet. The old man still had hold of his arm and I could see his fingers move as if he were stroking him.

  “You watch out then,” the old man said. “You watch out it doesn’t work the other way.”

  “On me?” Marius said.

  “Yes. They’ll hate you. I’m telling you. You’ll see.”

  “Well . . . ” Marius said. He seemed to think for a moment and then put his glass down and turned to me. “When you say it’s a mess,” he said, “I know what you mean and it is: but you don’t see that none of this matters. Nothing now matters except the way in which you and the mess affect each other. You don’t like your point of view because it doesn’t really give you a view at all. And if it’s a view that you’re looking for then you want to reach a point from which the view will not be your own. I think that is what matters.” And when he had finished he laughed and took up his glass again and the old man was already making tic-tac signs for more beer.

  I do not remember him saying much more than this. I do not remember any of us knowing him or understanding him. The intruders were watching their manners and the old man was drunk and I was knowing nothing except some quite impersonal feeling of elation; yet between the time that he had rung up and the time that the girl arrived we were all in some way giving him our worship.

  When the girl came in she came through the door like a ghost, like a thing that goes through solid objects. I saw her in the mirror at the back of the bar, and one second it was Marius and the next second it was her, and she was coming up to us quick and direct and I could see the alarm of her eyes where they stretched like an animal. I do not remember what she wore, except that it was something bright and plain, and I don’t remember what she carried: I do not remember if at that moment I thought her beautiful, but I know that she was frightened and that she smiled and that she came into the room not as a girl or a person but a ghost.

  “I say,” she said. “Have you seen that bus with all those policemen?”

  “I was afraid you might have trouble getting through,” Marius said.

  “But are they going anywhere?” she said. “I mean is there a conductor or anything to start them and stop them?”

  “Have a drink,” Marius said.

  “What would you like?” I said.

  “Water please. But do you suppose they have any tickets?”

  She was a medium sized ghost with medium hair and everything else about her quite exceptional and then, standing close to me, she became flesh and blood—a tough straight flesh like a tulip and blood which gave her the nervousness of an animal. She had a wide mouth and soft brown eyes and when she spoke she spoke with the whole of her body as if there were some violence within her to make her dance. It was as if she would respond to a touch or even a presence. She took the glass of water from me, and when it was in her hand I half expected it to bubble over and spill.

  All the people in the pub were watching her. I supposed people always watched her. The barman was wiping the bar and lifting up the glasses to get at the underneath of them, and as he leaned forwards with the cloth he was watching her and Marius out of the tops of his eyes. Everyone was silent. And then suddenly she laughed, and some of the water did spill, and this time I did expect the glass to fly out of her hand in some uncontrollable spasm of amusement.

  “But how did you get up here?” she said.

  “I’ve been hit on the head by a brick,” Marius said.

  “Oh dear,” she said.

  “A small one,” Marius said.

  “Your poor head,” she said.

  The old man solemnly raised his glass to her. She responded to him, quickly, as if he had touched her. They drank.

  “I knew a man once who was hit by a brick,” she said. “But I think it was on his elbow. So I supposed that’s different.”

  “Yes, that’s different,” Marius said.

  “It’s dreadful,” she said. “I never can tell a story.”

 
“That story was all right,” the old man said. “I’m telling you. Never you mind it being a bad story.”

  “I think it’s because my mouth gets so full of dribble,” she said.

  I could not think of anything to say. I had never met such people. I began to be afraid that without such people I had never met anyone at all.

  “I’ve been trying to buy a musical box,” she said.

  “Oh,” I said.

  “It’s for a wedding present. Do you think a musical box is a good wedding present?”

  “Yes,” I said. Again I could think of nothing else.

  She turned to Marius. “There,” she said, “he thinks it’s a good wedding present.” Marius was drinking. Her voice and her body moved back to me. “Thank you,” she said. The corners of her eyes were wrinkled like flowers. “Were you hit on the head by a brick?”

  “No,” I said.

  Outside in the street there were some children playing. I could hear the noise of them each time the door opened to let someone in. They were playing soldiers, playing war behind the dustbins. They were banging old tins and shouting, and then one of them put his head round the door and pointed a stick at Marius and made a sound like a gun going off. He was a small boy with an old army cap on his head, and he stood there grinning. The barman shouted at him and he swung his stick backwards and forwards like a machine-gun and then he ran off back into the street. He had surprised us.

  “Them kids,” the barman said. “You’d have thought we’d had enough of it without them kids going round playing soldiers.”

  “Yes,” Marius said.

  “And what’s going to happen to them?” the old man said. “What’s going to happen to the kids in the streets?”

  “I suppose they’ll continue,” Marius said, “until it kills them.”

  “It’s a dirty game,” the old man said. “It’s a dirty rotten game to be out in the streets chucking bricks around and chucking bombs around when you get too big for bricks.”

  “How are you going to stop it?” Marius said.

  “I don’t know. I’ll be out of it before the next one comes. I’ve had enough of it. It’s you who’ll have to do the stopping.”