The Magus - John Fowles [74]
of construction rather than a source of chaos, and precisely because I had no other choice. It was certainly not a moment of new moral resolve, or anything like it; I suppose our accepting what we are must always inhibit our being what we ought to be; for all that, it felt like a step forward--and upward. He had finished, was watching me. "You make words seem shabby things." "Bach does." "And you." He grimaced, but I could see he was not unpleased, though he tried to hide it by marching me off to give his vegetables their evening watering. An hour later I was in the little bedroom again. I saw that I had new books by my bedside. There was first a very thin volume in French, a bound pamphlet, anonymous and privately printed, Paris, 1932; it was entitled _De la communication intermondiale_. I guessed the author easily enough. Then there was a folio: _Wild Life in Scandinavia_. As with _The Beauties of Nature_ of the week before, the "wild life" turned out to be all female--various Nordic-looking women lying, standing, running, embracing among the fir forests and fjords. There were lesbian nuances I didn't much like; perhaps because I was beginning to take against the facet in Conchis's polyhedral character that obviously enjoyed "curious" objects and literature. Of course I was not--at least I told myself I was not--a puritan. I was too young to know that the having to tell myself gave the game away; and that to be uninhibited about one's own sexual activities is not the same as being unshockable. I was English; ergo, puritan. I went twice through the pictures; they clashed unpleasantly with the still-echoing Bach. Finally there was another book in French--a sumptuously produced limited edition: _Le Masque Fran�s au Dix-hniti� Si�e_. This had a little white marker in. Remembering the anthology on the beach, I turned to the page, where there was a passage bracketed. It read: _Aux visiteurs qui p�traient dans l'enceinte des murs altiers de Saint-Martin s'offrait la vue delectable des bergers et berg�s qui, sur les verts gazons et parmi las bosquets, dansaient et chantaient entour�de leurs blancs troupeaux. Ils n'�ient pas toujours habill�des costumes de l'� qua. Quelquefois us �ient v�s a la romaine ou a la grecque, at ainsi r�isait-on des odes de Th�rite, des bucoliques de Virgile. On parlait m� d'�cations plus scandaleuses, de charmantes nymphes qui las nuits d'� fuyaient au clair de lune d'�anges silhouettes, moiti�omme, moiti�h�e_..." * [* "Visitors who went behind the high walls of Saint-Martin had the pleasure of seeing, across the green lawns and among the groves, shepherds and shepherdesses who danced and sang, surrounded by their white flocks. They were not always dressed in eighteenth-century clothes. Sometimes they wore costumes in the Roman and Greek styles; and in this way the odes of Theocritus and the bucolics of Virgil were brought to life. It was even said that there were more scandalous scenes--charming nymphs who on summer nights fled in the moonlight from strange dark shapes, half man, half goat..."] At last it began to seem plain. All that happened at Bourani was in the nature of a private masque; and no doubt the passage was a hint to me that I should, both out of politeness and for my own pleasure, not poke my nose behind the scenes. I felt ashamed of the questions I had asked at Agia Varvara. I washed and, in deference to the slight formality Conchis apparently liked in the evenings, changed into a white shirt and a summer suit. When I came out of my room to go downstairs the door of his bedroom was open. He called me in. "We will have our _ouzo_ up here this evening." He was sitting at his desk, reading a letter he had just written. I waited behind him a moment, looking at the Bonnards again while he addressed the envelope. The door of the little room at the end was ajar. I had a glimpse of clothes, of a press. It was simply a dressing room. By the open doors, Lily's photograph stared at me from its table. We went out onto the terrace. There were two tables there, one with the ouzo and glasses on, the