The Sea, The Sea - Iris Murdoch [227]
‘Perhaps it was a mistake to tell you in this way,’ said James. He seemed to be getting annoyed though he was also very upset. ‘Of course you were bound to hate it whenever it emerged, we never underestimated that. I hope and believe that you will appreciate later that the thing concealed was trivial, though the fact of the concealment was not. I realize that all this has been an affront to your dignity—’
‘Dignity? My dignity?’
‘Well, an affront. I am heartily sorry for it. But given the mistake, the fault, you can hardly have wished it to continue. This truth-telling is something painful which we do for your sake. Lizzie felt that she could not be as she wished for you with the lie unconfessed. She wanted there to be, especially now, no barrier of untruth between you.’
‘Why “especially now”? What’s special about now?’
‘Please,’ began Lizzie, ‘please—’
‘Don’t worry, I’m not excited, I’m not even angry, this isn’t anger.’ I had not raised my voice at all.
‘Then it’s all right,’ she said. ‘It’s all all right?’
‘What you say in your devalued words may even be true, as true as such words can make it—’
‘Then it’s all right—Charles darling—?’
‘It’s just that it’s brought this to an end.’
‘Brought what to an end?’ said James.
‘I want you both to go now. I want you to take Lizzie back to London.’
‘I was proposing to go and leave Lizzie here,’ said James. ‘Now I’ve told you surely I can go and leave her. That was the point of telling you. That was what I waited for.’
‘You thought I might blame you and let her off because I needed her so much? I don’t need her all that much, I can tell you!’
‘Charles, don’t destroy yourself,’ said James. ‘Why are you always so intent on breaking everything that surrounds and supports you?’
‘Go please. Go together.’
I suddenly seized Lizzie’s hand, and for a moment it clasped mine, then it became dead. I seized James’s hand and I forced their two hands together. The hands struggled in mine like small captive animals trying to escape.
James wrenched himself away and went into the book room. I could hear him throwing things into his suitcase.
I said to Lizzie, ‘Go and pack,’ and she reached out towards me, then turned away with a sob.
I went out onto the causeway and walked on until I reached James’s Bentley. It was big and black and expectant, a little dusty, in the lazy afternoon sunshine. I opened the door. The interior had an opulent quietness like the interior of a grand mansion or a rich silent shrine. The polished wood glowed, the brown leather gave off a fresh rare smell. The gear nestled in a soft crumpled skin. The carpet was thick, spotless. The silence, the intimacy of the car invited a privileged habitation. And in this sacred interior I was about to enclose James and Lizzie and despatch them forever, just as surely as if I were shutting them in a sealed casket and drowning them in the sea.
As I turned back towards the house I looked automatically at the stone dog kennel, where Gilbert had so carefully installed the basket to keep the mail out of the rainwater. I saw there was a letter in the basket. I went and picked it up. It was from Hartley. I put it in my pocket.
Lizzie came out first, carrying her handbag and crying. She started to say something to me but I held the car door open and ushered her into the passenger seat and closed the door on her with a soft final sound.
James came out, carrying his case and Lizzie