The Magus - John Fowles [10]
to gain... and at the same time a physical common ground, the same appetites, the same tastes, the same freedom from inhibition. She was teaching me other things, besides the art of love; but that is how I thought of it at the time. I remember one day when we were standing in one of the rooms at the Tate. Alison was leaning slightly against me, holding my hand, looking in her childish sweet-sucking way at a Renoir. I suddenly had a feeling that we were one body, one person, even there; that if she had disappeared it would have been as if I had lost half of myself. A terrible deathlike feeling, which anyone less cerebral and self-absorbed than I was then would have realised was simply love. I thought it was desire. I drove her straight home and tore her clothes off. Another day, in Jermyn Street, we ran into Billy Whyte, an Old Etonian I had known quite well at Magdalen; he'd been one of the Hommes R�lt� He was pleasant enough, not in the least snobbish--Etonians very seldom are--but he carried with him, perhaps in spite of himself, an unsloughable air of high caste, of constant contact with the nicest best people, of impeccable upper-class taste in facial exPression, clothes, vocabulary. We went off to an oyster bar; he'd just heard the first Colchesters of the season were in. Alison said very little, but I was embarrassed by her, by her accent, by the difference between her and one or two debs who were sitting near us. She left us for a moment when Billy poured the last of the Muscadet. "Nice girl, dear boy." "Oh..." I shrugged. "You know." "Most attractive." "Cheaper than central heating." "I'm sure." But I knew what he was thinking. Alison was very silent after we left him. We were driving up to Hampstead to see a film. I glanced at her sullen face. "What's wrong?" "Sometimes you sound so mean, you upper-class Poms." "I'm not upper-class. I'm middle-class." "Upper, middle--God, who cares." I drove some way before she spoke again. "You treated me as if I didn't really belong to you." "Don't be silly." "As if I'm a bloody abo." "Rubbish." "In case my pants fell down or something." "It's so difficult to explain." "Not to me, sport. Not to me." One day she said, "I've got to go for my interview tomorrow." "Do you want to go?" "Do you want me to go?" "It doesn't mean anything. You haven't got to make up your mind." "It'll do me good if I get accepted. Just to know I'm accepted." She changed the subject; and I could have refused to change the subject. But I didn't. Then, the very next day, I too had a letter about an interview. Alison's took place--she thought she had done well. Three days later she got a letter saying that she had been accepted for training, to start in October. I had my interview, with a board of urbane culture-organizers. She met me outside and we went and had an awkward meal, like two strangers, in an Italian restaurant. She had a grey, tired face, and her cheeks looked baggy. I asked her what she'd been doing while I was away. "Writing a letter." "To them?" "Yes." "Saying?" "What do you think I said?" "You accepted." There was a difficult pause. I knew what she wanted me to say, but I couldn't say it. I felt as a sleepwalker must feel when he wakes up at the end of the roof parapet. I wasn't ready for marriage, for settling down. I wasn't psychologically close enough to her; something I couldn't define, obscure, monstrous, lay between us, and this obscure monstrous thing emanated from her, not from me. "Some of their flights go via Athens. If you're in Greece we can meet. Maybe you'll be in London. Anyway." We began to plan how we would live if I didn't get the job in Greece. But I did. A letter came, saying my name had been selected to be forwarded to the School Board in Athens. This was "virtually a formality." I should be expected in Greece about the beginning of October. I showed Alison the letter as soon as I had climbed the stairs back to the fiat, and watched her read it. I was looking for regret, but I couldn't see it. She kissed me. "I told you." "I know." "Let's celebrate. Let's go out in the