The Heart of the Matter - Graham Greene [116]
Wilson put his hand on Louise’s shoulder and said, ‘You can trust me, Louise. I love you.’
‘I really believe you do.’ They didn’t kiss; it was too soon for that, but they sat in the hollow room, holding hands, listening to the vultures clambering on the iron roof.
‘So that’s his diary,’ Wilson said.
‘He was writing in it when he died - oh nothing interesting, just the temperatures He always kept the temperatures. He wasn’t romantic. God knows what she saw in him to make it worth while.’
‘Would you mind if I looked at it?’
‘If you want to,’ she said, ‘poor Ticki, he hasn’t any secrets left.’
‘His secrets were never very secret.’ He turned a page and read and turned a page. He said, ‘Had he suffered from sleeplessness very long?’
‘I always thought that he slept like a log whatever happened.’
Wilson said, ‘Have you noticed that he’s written in pieces about sleeplessness - afterwards?’
‘How do you know?’
‘You’ve only to compare the colour of the ink. And all these records of taking his Evipan - it’s very studied, very careful. But above all the colour of the ink.’ He said, ‘It makes one think.’
She interrupted him with horror, ‘Oh no, he couldn’t have done that. After all, in spite of everything, he was a Catholic.’
2
‘Just let me come in for one little drink,’ Bagster pleaded.
‘We had four at the beach.’
‘Just one little one more.’
‘All right,’ Helen said. There seemed to be no reason so far as she could see to deny anyone anything any more for ever.
Bagster said, ‘You know it’s the first time you’ve let me come in. Charming little place you’ve made of it. Who’d have thought a Nissen hut could be so homey?’ Flushed and smelling of pink gin, both of us, we are a pair, she thought. Bagster kissed her wetly on her upper lip and looked around again. ‘Ha ha,’ he said, ‘the good old bottle.’ When they had drunk one more gin he took off his uniform jacket and hung it carefully on a chair. He said, ‘Let’s take our back hair down and talk of love.’
‘Need we?’ Helen said. ‘Yet?’
‘Lighting up time,’ Bagster said. ‘The dusk. So well let George take over the controls ...’
‘Who’s George?’
‘The automatic pilot, of course. You’ve got a lot to learn.’
‘For God’s sake teach me some other time.’
‘There’s no time like the present for a prang,’ Bagster said, moving her firmly towards the bed. Why not? she thought, why not ... if he wants it? Bagster is as good as anyone else. There’s nobody in the world I love, and out of it doesn’t count, so why not let them have their prangs (it was Bagster’s phrase) if they want them enough. She lay back mutely on the bed and shut her eyes and was aware in the darkness of nothing at all. I’m alone, she thought without self-pity, stating it as a fact, as an explorer might after his companions have died from exposure.
‘By God, you aren’t enthusiastic,’ Bagster said. ‘Don’t you love me a bit, Helen?’ and his ginny breath fanned through her darkness.
‘No.’ she said, ‘I don’t love anyone.’
He said furiously, ‘You loved Scobie,’ and added quickly, ‘Sorry. Rotten thing to say.’
‘I don’t love anyone,’ she repeated. ‘You can’t love the dead, can you? They don’t exist, do they? It would be like loving the dodo, wouldn’t it?’ questioning him as if she expected an answer, even from Bagster. She kept her eyes shut because in the dark she felt nearer to death, the death which had absorbed him. The bed trembled a little as Bagster shuffled his weight from off it, and the chair creaked as he took away his jacket He said, I’m not all that of a bastard, Helen. You aren’t in the mood. See you tomorrow?’
‘I expect so.’ There was no reason to deny anyone anything, but she felt an immense relief because nothing after all had been required.
‘Good night, old girl,’ Bagster said, ‘I’ll be seeing you.’
She opened her eyes and saw a stranger in dusty blue pottering round the door. One can say anything to a stranger -they pass on and forget like beings from another world. She asked, ‘Do you believe in a God?’
‘Oh well, I suppose so,’ Bagster said, feeling at his moustache.
‘I wish I did,’ she said,