The Sea, The Sea - Iris Murdoch [104]
‘Who on earth was that boy?’
‘Ah that’s no boy, Charles dear, that’s my stepdaughter Angela, she’s sixteen.’
‘God. Last time I saw her she was a little thing with golden ringlets.’
‘She is no longer a little thing with golden ringlets. Do you know that she shaved her head last month? It’s just beginning to grow again. Her father has given her a motor bike. And when I say a motor bike I don’t mean a put-put-put on which you sit as on a chair, I mean a long thick brutal thing which you bestride like a charger and which makes a noise like AAAARRGRR. I remember when you were being sentimental about wanting a son I told you what hell it would be. I think a daughter is worse. Thank God I haven’t got any children of my own. Children—innocence—God! You should hear the language Angie uses, and she’s made herself so ugly, so grotesque—Pamela doesn’t care, she’s—well, you saw Pamela just now, didn’t you—she did come in, didn’t she or did I dream it? Angie, yes. She wears climbing boots and leather everything. And she drinks. They all do. Christ, Charles, you’re lucky. No family. The family, the seat of love. And to think that I not only persuaded myself I loved those two women, I really did love them—that is, if I’m capable of love. Am I? I don’t know. And I loved—oh—earlier—other women—other people—lost now, lost, gone forever—but it would have been no good—skunks and rotters and cads can’t be happy, so there’s some justice in the world after all.’
I had reached the stage where it was very difficult to leave, very difficult to do anything except go on and on drinking whisky; and I was beginning to be stupidly affected by Peregrine’s tears. ‘Perry, who was your first love?’
‘Don’t call me “Perry”, fuck you. Well, I’ll tell you—it’s not what you’d—it was my Uncle Peregrine—yes. Uncle Peregrine. God rest his dear soul, he was a good good man. And if there’s ever a Judgment Day all my fucking family will be kneeling down behind Uncle Peregrine and hoping that he’ll say the good word and save them from the fire. And I’ll be lying on the ground waiting for him to raise me up, and he will raise me up. He was a sweet man. I don’t know why I’m calling him good, what did I know about it, I was a child. He used to hold my hand and hold me on his knee. He loved me, the bugger. My parents never fondled me, they never hugged me and kissed me, I think honestly they didn’t like me much, they liked my bloody sister, not me. But Uncle Peregrine liked me. He used to hug me and kiss me. And do you know, I’ve never had better kisses from women, though it was only—it wasn’t like you think—it was so innocent and sweet—and he only did it when we were alone. That taught me something, I understood. And we talked about everything, as if we were the same age, and I longed for his company, as if he nourished me. Then one day—my parents must have seen, or maybe they decided there was something funny about Uncle Peregrine, and they just banished him. I never saw him again. Never.’
‘What happened to him?’
‘I don’t know. I heard much later on that he’d committed suicide. When I became an actor I took his name, partly out of piety, partly to spite my family. I was christened William. Well, that was my first love. What was yours?’
‘I forget. Thank you for telling me about your uncle. I liked hearing about him.’
‘I’m sorry I told you already. You’ll start making psychology. And psychology is bunk.’
‘I know psychology is bunk! I must go, Peregrine.’
‘Don’t go. I’ll tell you Freud’s favourite joke, if I can remember it. The king meets his double and says, “Did your mother work in the palace?” and the double says “No, but my father did.” Ha ha ha, that’s a good joke!’
‘I must go.’
‘Charles, you haven’t understood the joke. Listen, the king meets this chap who looks just like him and the king says—’
‘I have understood the joke.’
‘Charles, for Christ’s sake don’t go, there’s another bottle. “No, but my father did”!’
‘I really must