The Kindly Ones - Anthony Powell [28]
‘True enough, Trelawney, true enough.’
‘You are approaching the Sublime Threshold.’
‘Do you think so?’
‘You should make good your promise to spend a rhythmical month under instruction, General. We have a vacancy in the house. There is no time like the present. You would be subjected to none but probationary exercises at first. Disciplines of the Adept would not be expected of you in the early days.’
‘Look here, Trelawney,’ said General Conyers, ‘I’m a busy man at the moment. Besides, I have a strong conviction I should not commit myself too deeply for the rest of the year. Just one of those feelings you have in your bones. I want to be absolutely mobile at the moment.’
‘Such instincts should be obeyed. I have heard others say the same recently. The portents are unfavourable. There is no doubt of that.’
‘I will write to you one of these days. Nothing I’d like to see more than you and your people at work.’
‘At Play, General. Truth is Play.’
‘Give me a change of routine. Sort of thing I’m always meaning to do. Got very interested in such things in India. Bodhisattvas and such like, Mahasatipatthana and all that reflection. However, we shall have to wait. Sure I’m right to wait. Too much business on hand, anyway.’
‘Business?’ said Dr Trelawney. ‘I think you need meditation, General, more than business. You must free the mind from external influences. You must pursue Oneness – the Larger Life.’
‘Sure you’re right about that too,’ said the General. ‘Absolutely certain you are right. All the same, something tells me to let Oneness wait for the time being. That doesn’t mean I am not going to think Oneness over. Not in the least.’
‘Think it over, you must, General. We know we are right. But first you must gain Spiritual Mastery of the Body.’
How long this unusual conversation would have continued in front of the Stonehurst gate, if interruption had not taken place, is hard to say. It was brought to a close by a new arrival, wearing a straw hat and flannel suit, who pushed his way unceremoniously between a group of longhaired boys in short Grecian tunics, who were eyeing the car as if they would very much like to open the bonnet. This person had a small fair moustache. He carried a rolled umbrella and Gladstone bag. The strangeness of Dr Trelawney’s disciples clearly made no impression on him. He looked neither to the right nor to the left. The beings round him might just as well have been a herd of cows come to a stop in their amblings along the road. Instead of regarding them, he made straight for my parents, who at once offered signs of recognition. Here was Uncle Giles.
‘Hope you did not mind my inviting myself at such short notice,’ he said, as soon as he had greeted my mother. ‘I wanted to have a word with him about the Trust.’
‘You know we are always delighted to see you, Giles,’ she said, probably even believing that true at the moment of speaking, because she always felt warmly towards hopeless characters like Uncle Giles when they were in difficulties. ‘We live so far away from everything and everybody nowadays that it is quite an exception for you to have found Aylmer and Bertha Conyers lunching with us. They were driving away in their motor when—’
She pointed to the road, unable to put into words what was taking place.
‘I see Aylmer standing there,’ said Uncle Giles, who still found nothing at all unusual in the presence or costume of the Trelawney community. ‘I must have a word with him before he leaves. Got a bit of news that might interest him. He is always very keen on what is happening on the Continent. Interest you, too, I expect. I had quite a good journey here. Was lucky enough to catch the carrier. Took me almost to the foot of the hill. Bit of a climb, but here I am.’
He turned to my father.
‘How are you?’
Uncle Giles spoke as if he were surprised not to find my father in hospital, indeed, in his coffin.
‘Pretty well, Giles,’ said my father, with a certain rasp in his voice, ‘pretty well. How has the world been wagging with you, Giles?’
That was a phrase my father tended to