The Kindly Ones - Anthony Powell [76]
‘She was at Peter’s Maidenhead house once when I went there.’
‘Nice girl, didn’t you think?’
‘Yes, I did.’
‘Reasonably attractive?’
‘I’d certainly have said so.’
‘Wouldn’t have any difficulty in getting hold of the right sort of chap?’
‘It wouldn’t be polite to express doubt on that point, since she married you.’
I did not manage to impart all the jocularity fittingly required to give lively savour to this comment. Duport, in any case, brushed it aside as irrelevant.
‘Leave me out of it by all means,’ he said. ‘Just speaking in general, would you think Jean would have any difficulty in getting hold of a decent sort of chap? Yes or no.’
‘No.’
‘Neither should I,’ said Duport. ‘But the fact remains that she slept with Jimmy Stripling.’
I made some suitable acknowledgment, tempered, I hoped, by polite surprise. I well remembered the frightful moment when Jean herself had first informed me, quite gratuitously, of having undergone the experience to which Duport referred. I could recall even now how painful that information had been at the time, as one might remember a physical accident long passed. The matter no longer worried me, primarily because I no longer loved Jean, also because the whole Stripling question had, so to speak, been resolved between Jean and myself at the time. All the same, the incident had been a disagreeable one. That had to be admitted. One does not want to dwell on some racking visit to the dentist, however many years have rolled on since that day. Perhaps I would have preferred to have remained even then unreminded of Jean and Stripling. However, present recital could in no way affect the past. That was history.
‘Can you beat it?’
I acknowledged inability to offer a parallel instance.
‘Well, I can,’ said Duport. ‘I don’t set up as behaving particularly well myself, but, when it comes to behaving badly, women can give you a point or two every time. I just tell you about Jimmy Stripling by the way. He is not the cream of the jest. As I mentioned before, I thought things would be easier if Jean and I joined up again. I found I was wrong.’
‘Why was that?’
‘Not surprisingly, Jean had been having a bit of a run around while we were living apart,’ said Duport. ‘I suppose that was to be expected.’
I began to feel decidedly uncomfortable. So far as I knew, neither Duport, nor anyone else, had the smallest reason to guess anything of what had passed between Jean and myself. All the same, his words suggested he was aware of more than I might suppose.
‘The point turned out to be this,’ said Duport. ‘Jean only wanted to link up with me again to make things easier for herself in carrying on one of her little affairs.’
‘But how could joining up with you possibly help? Surely things were much easier when she was on her own?’
Duport did not answer that question.
‘Guess who the chap was?’ he said.
‘How could I possibly?’
‘Somebody known to you.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Seen you and him at the same time.’
Duport grinned horribly. At least I guiltily thought his grin horrible, because I supposed him to be teasing me. It was unlikely, most unlikely, that Jean had told him about ourselves, although, since she had told both of us about Stripling, such a confession could not be regarded as out of the question. Perhaps someone else, unknown to us, had passed the story on to Duport. In either case, the situation was odious. I greatly regretted having agreed to come out drinking with him, even more of having encouraged him to speak of his own troubles. My curiosity had put me in this position. I had no one but myself to blame. It was just in Duport’s character, I felt, to discompose me in this manner. If he chose to make himself unpleasant about what had happened, I was in no position to object. Things