Temporary Kings - Anthony Powell [6]
‘I suppose some jolly-up may have taken place. The brothels are closed nowadays officially, but that wouldn’t make any difference to someone in the know. I’m not sure what Ferrand-Sénéschal is himself supposed to like – being chained to a crucifix, while a green light’s played on him – little girls – two-way mirrors – I’ve been told, but I can’t remember. He may have given Kenneth a few ideas. I shall develop sadistic tendencies myself, if that new secretary doesn’t improve. She’s muddled those proofs of the ads again. I say, Nicholas, we’ve still too much space to spare. Just cast your eye over these, and see if you’ve any suggestions. You’ll bring a fresh mind to the advertisement problem. It’s a blow too we’re not going to get any more Trapnel pieces. Editing this mag is driving me off my rocker.’
In the light of what I knew of Widmerpool, the tale of visiting a brothel with Ferrand-Sénéschal was to be accepted with caution, although true that he had more than once in the past adopted a rather gloating tone when speaking of tarts, an attitude dating back to our earliest London days. Moreland used to say, ‘Maclintick doesn’t like women, he likes tarts – indeed he once actually fell in love with a tart, who led him an awful dance.’ That taste could be true of Widmerpool too; perhaps a habit become so engrained as to develop into a preference, handicapping less circumscribed sexual intimacies. Such routines might go some way to explain the fiasco with Mrs Haycock, even the relationship – whatever that might be – with Pamela. That Ferrand-Sénéschal, as Bagshaw suggested, had been the medium for introduction, in middle-age, to hitherto unknown satisfactions, new, unusual forms of self-release, was not out of the question. By all accounts, far more unlikely things happened in the sphere of late sexual development. Bagshaw was, of course, prejudiced. By that time he had decided that Widmerpool was not only bent on ejecting him from the editorship of Fission, but was also a fellow-traveller.
‘He probably learnt a lot from Ferrand-Sénéschal politically, the latter being a much older hand at the game.’
‘But what has Widmerpool to gain from being a crypto?’
Bagshaw laughed loudly. He thought that a very silly question. Political standpoints of the extreme Left being where his heart lay, where, so to speak, he had lost his virginity, the enquiry was like asking Umfraville why he should be interested in one horse moving faster than another, a football fan the significance of kicking an inflated bladder between two posts. At first Bagshaw was unable to find words simple enough to enlighten so uninstructed a mind. Then a lively parallel occurred to him.
‘Apart from anything else, it’s one of those secret pleasures, like drawing a moustache on the face of a pretty girl on a poster, spitting over the stairs – you know, from a great height on to the people below. You see several heads, possibly a bald one. They don’t know where the saliva comes from. It gives an enormous sense of power. Like the days when I used to throw marbles under the hooves of mounted policemen’s horses. Think of the same sort of fun when you’re an MP, or respected civil servant, giving the whole show away on the quiet, when everybody thinks you’re a pillar of society.’
‘Isn’t that a rather frivolous view? What about deep convictions, all the complicated ideologies you’re always talking about?’
‘Not really frivolous. Such spitting itself is an active form of revolt – undermining society as we know it, spreading alarm and despondency among the bourgeoisie. Besides, spitting apart, you stand quite a good chance of coming to power yourself one day. Giving them all hell. The bourgeoisie, and everyone else. Being a member of a Communist apparat would suit our friend very well politically.’
‘But Widmerpool’s the greatest bourgeois who ever lived.’
‘Of course he is. That’s what makes it such fun for him. Besides, he isn’t a bourgeois in his own eyes. He’s a man in a life-and-death grapple with the