“You’re sure about the child…
“Completely sure,” he replied.
She got up, and very slowly walked across the room towards the window where the night sky still danced and flickered over the newly-born Israel. Her numbness had intoxicated her and had conveyed a kind of slow unsteadiness to her walk, which was the walk of drunkenness or pregnancy. She turned suddenly and looked across the room at Father Gaudier, who still watched her, head on one side like a diminutive spaniel.
“My God, how strange,” she said. “After so many years of longing and wondering, all I can feel now is an intense relief. Would you have expected that?”
“Yes,” said the priest.
“I feel so ashamed,” she said.
The priest stubbed out his cigarette and said in his level voice:
“You’ll begin to cry tomorrow — or the day after. Perhaps even next week. Or next year. Just now it is all over and you’re free from an incubus. Isn’t that so?”
“And yet a door has closed on everything I care about,” she said.
The priest stood up and flicked some ash off his soutane with his fingers.
“No door can shut,” he said, “without another opening somewhere. Life is beautifully arranged. Or perhaps I should say a devilishly well-organized affair.”
“Look,” said Grete… “I must know how it happened, where, when. I must.”
“Typhoid… Dachau,” said the little man.
22. Pulling Out
The ADC opened the side door and admitted Lawton to the gallery which ran around the reception rooms of Government House.
“H.E.’s out on the terrace,” he said.
Lawton followed him across the long room with its blazing chandeliers and heavy pile carpets. The long mirrors reflected back his lean form with its nervous long hands and preoccupied face.
“I think,” said the ADC, “H.E. is going to make honourable amends.”
“For what?” said Lawton in surprise.
“Well, for having disregarded all your political analyses of the last year. You’ll be able to say ‘I told you so’ with a vengeance. That will be pleasurable, no?”
“No pleasure at all,” said Lawton curtly.
H.E. was sitting on the terrace, staring thoughtfully at the firework display which still burst and scattered over Jerusalem. The aroma of his Juliet hung in the still night air.
“Ah, there you are,” he said pleasantly. “Come and sit down.”
He vaguely indicated a soda siphon and bottles on a side table and Lawton, according to long-established custom, crossed to make himself a drink, saying as he did so:
“I’m sorry about the rush, Sir. I didn’t expect to go on such short notice. The cable came through this afternoon and I’m to leave tomorrow.”
“So I understand,” said H.E. Then he added awkwardly, “I’m afraid you must think I’ve been rather a doubting Thomas… I mean, about your Intel reports.”
Lawton sat down and said equably:
“Political judgment is a queer thing. I could easily have been wrong, Sir, and you right.”
“Yes,” said H.E. handsomely, “but it’s my duty to be right, d’you see? And I was wrong.”
A note of vexation came into his voice.
“What do you see in store for us now?” he said. “You might as well give me the benefit of a parting word, eh?”
Lawton accepted a cigar from the inlaid sandalwood box.
“Well,” he said, “since my responsibility’s over, I suppose I can indulge in a bit of fortune telling. That’s about all it would be.”
“This time I’ll pay careful heed,” said H.E. “What do you predict?”
Lawton considered for a second and then said:
“Within three weeks, at the outside, we’ll all be pulled out of here to leave a vacuum into which eight Arab armies are going to get sucked.”
“And then?”
“War,” said Lawton laconically. “What I can’t tell you is whether the Jews or the Israelis, as they’re now called, can defend themselves. That will have to be seen. But none of us will be here to see it, unfortunately.”
H.E. got up and walked up and down the terrace slowly and ponderously, reflecting. His elegant and discontented face with its handsome head of grey hair was still part-turned towards Jerusalem. At this moment the ADC appeared in the lighted patch by the great French windows and said:
“Forgive me, Sir, London is on the wire. It’s the personal line. Secretary of State’s office.” Lawton finished his drink and rose.
“The Secretary of State?” said H.E. on a rising note.
The two men exchanged a quizzical and ironic glance.
“That’s probably our marching orders,” said H.E.
Extending his hand, he shook hands with unaccustomed warmth and added with unexpected generosity: “Good luck, Major. I wish we’d made better use of your brains.”
The words echoed pleasurably in Lawton’s mind as the duty car jogged him back to Jerusalem. Well, even a bloody fool can be a gentleman, he thought, and that was something. His thoughts reverted to Grete as he had last seen her, standing with an air of white-faced uncertainty while the little priest smiled at her from the sitting-room door of the flat. Perhaps this was the best way. After all, there was nothing left to say to her. He would leave without a word. It was idle to continue tormenting himself on her behalf, and of tantalizing himself by seeing her.
He climbed stiffly out of the car at the gate of his private villa and walked slowly up the path to the front door. Jenkins, his batman, had the evening off, so he was forced to use a latch key. The little villa smelled musty and his bedroom was full of mosquitoes. He hauled a couple of dusty suitcases out of the wardrobe and began to pack his few belongings. This did not take him long. Then he went to the telephone and asked the duty operator at the office to call him at four.
“I have a six o’clock flight from Lydda,” he explained.
Then he stood for a moment, irresolutely looking at the carpet and wondering whether he was tired enough to go to bed there and then.
Suddenly the phone rang. It was Grete. But her voice sounded changed. It had a queer note in it — he frowned as he tried to identify it. Was he wrong, or was there a suggestion of exultation, of relief, almost of triumph?
“What is it?” he said anxiously. “You sound so different.”
“I wanted to ask you if you were doing anything tonight,” she said. “I simply must go out. I can’t sit at home for the rest of the evening. Are you free?”
“Yes,” he said.
In fact, he cursed himself for his lack of resolution. He could easily have made some excuse; and then by morning he would have gone and a whole new cycle would have started. He was beginning to realize that, while he loved Grete, something in him also wanted to be rid of this encumbering, futile, rather sterile emotion which was doomed for lack of a response in her.
“By the way,” he said. “I’m off in the morning very early.”
The expression of her dismay seemed very pleasurable to him. “So soon?” she said in a hollow tone.
“I’ve been expecting it,” he replied. “We both have.”
“India is so far away,” she said.
He ignored the remark and said simply, “Where do we meet, and when?”
“Are you sure you’re not too tired?”
“Sure.”
“Then the Officers’ Club, in half an hour.”
He crossed the town on foot, noticing the tremendous animation mixed with uncertainty which pervaded everything. The fireworks still went on, and at the Officers’ Club they reflected themselves in the lily pond beside which the diners and dancers sat at tables glittering with white napery and shaded lamps. The grass was soft and green.