Troubles - James Gordon Farrell [186]
He knew that it was futile. After all, he was not a complete fool. He knew that now there was really no further hope on earth of a successful union with Sarah. Apart from everything else, he now bore her a considerable resentment. Even if they met, this resentment would prevent him (probably against his will) from being friendly. Doubtless one day it would fade into indifference and allow him to be friendly again; but it would only disappear on one condition: namely, that he was no longer in love with her. Thus, his only hope of success depended on his not wanting to succeed! An appalling but not uncommon situation in the game of which the Major was so painfully learning the rules.
Meanwhile, although he did his best to put her out of his mind by concentrating on the other manifold troubles at large under the roof of the Majestic, she continued to emerge in random but painful thoughts that sprang sharp-clawed out of the hidden lair in his mind to which they had been banished.
“What sort of gentleman would ‘knock a girl cold’?” he found himself wondering with amazement, even while he was examining a truly alarming crack which he had discovered in the wall of the writing-room behind the faded tapestry. But for all he knew this crack might have been there for years! And then, what sort of girl would allow herself to be repeatedly “knocked cold”? It was all quite beyond him, both the man and the girl (and, come to that, the crack in the wall). He simply did not understand. He tried to imagine himself knocking a girl cold; but it was easier to imagine himself flying up into a tree and singing like a blackbird.
Then, later on, while he was standing, hands thrust gloomily into the pockets of his jacket, by the gatepost at the end of the drive and looking up at the notice posted by Edward: TRESPASSERS FOUND TAMPERING WITH THE STATUE OF QUEEN VICTORIA WILL BE SHOT ON SIGHT. BY ORDER and thinking: “But he’s gone clean out of his wits! He’s trying to provoke them!”—while staring up at this defiant and reckless object, he found himself thinking instead: “But how often does she ‘look at other men’? How often is she ‘knocked cold’? Is it likely to damage her brain?” And his thoughts would meander away, low in vitality, convalescent, as if he had really been sick (and perhaps he really was sick), round and round like tired animals in a circus ring...to arrive at last at the exit (which looked strangely similar to the entrance), concluding that it certainly couldn’t be very good for one to be continually knocked senseless.
But no, it wasn’t that at all...It was the intimacy which distressed him. Sarah felled in a restaurant for fluttering her eyelashes at a head-waiter; Sarah felled among the teacups at a Viceregal garden party for a lingering glance at some young officer; Sarah felled in Jury’s Hotel for looking out of the window...His mind, tired and dutiful, furnished him with any amount of these images. And they were always together, Bolton and Sarah, and he was always excluded (attempts to imagine himself stepping forward to correct Bolton with a classic uppercut proved hopeless). Bolton and Sarah...
Late in the evening, while listening patiently to Miss Bagley complaining that a maid had taken up residence in the room next to hers and the cook in the room opposite, it occurred to him that now, at this very moment, it was quite likely that Sarah and Bolton were preparing to get into bed together. His vitality dropped a few points lower and the muscles of his face became numb with despair; the moustache on his upper lip felt as heavy as antlers. He explained carefully, nevertheless, to the indignant Miss Bagley that the servants’ wing was uninhabitable: the roof had been taken off as cleanly as the top off a boiled egg.
On returning from the