Noble in Reason (25 page)

Indeed my whole point here is that this reclamation of the unconscious is a continual and continuing process, which should terminate only with life itself. The struggle is not over
after a single analysis. One often fails—from ignorance, from laziness, from lack of goodwill—but at least one must continually make the attempt to act reasonably, not ignoring or disregarding the id, but sublimating its desires and using its power to invigorate the ego.

A most useful exercise in the attempt to adjust myself into a living understanding with my fellow-men, is the habit of
translation
I mentioned previously. I had occasion to practise this a good deal with Robert, whose tastes at so many points were opposed to mine. Robert, I said to myself as I scanned his school reports, is as bored by history and literature as I was by loom mechanics. I did not throw overboard my view of the relative value of literature and loom mechanics, but I agreed that his feeling was as strong as mine and pained him as severely.

To say that one is captain of one's soul is an unfashionable mode of expression; though I think it desirable I would not for a moment venture to assert that I have achieved such complete sovereignty. But I think I might claim that I have established a working partnership, with my intelligence, my reason, as the senior partner. Let me repeat, however, that only by constant vigilance, constant self-examination, am I able to maintain this supremacy; at any moment it is liable to slip. To apply this vigilance, this self-examination, at the time of the action, when it could be fruitful, instead of years later, was henceforward my constant aim.

In the following two years I wrote a couple of novels,
The Brazen Rod
and
The Inadvertent Mind,
which reflected my preoccupation with the matter of awakening consciousness— their titles being taken from passages in Hardy's
Dynasts
where he appears to be discussing the problem on a cosmic level.

These two books represented a considerable advance on my earlier work. Although in them I was of course putting forward my own ideas about the universe and the nature of man, the main character was in neither case myself, nor was the atmosphere laden with the peevish and irritable resentment which had coloured my first fictions. Moreover, both these novels owned firm chains of causality, “plots” to use the old-fashioned word, their incidents selected from real Yorkshire happenings and composed into illustrations of my theme.

These two books were again, of course, financially un-lucrative, though not quite so devastatingly disappointing as the earlier pair. But what was of more importance, they were quite differently received. Instead of employing towards them the indulgent and condescending tone which one keeps for childish productions, the critics treated them as adult work and judged them by adult standards. Accordingly the reviews of
The Brazen Rod
appeared to an uninitiated eye much less favourable than my earlier notices. This very much vexed my father, who turned the cutting over in quite a pettish style
and glared up at me from angry blue eyes as he demanded to know what the critics meant by this behaviour.

“The reviews are worse but surely the book is better, Chris,” he said crossly. “There's quite a story in it. And it's not so silly. I mean, it's really quite interesting to read.”

Nowadays I was able to see the humour of such remarks, though not without an effort. I pointed out that to be reviewed at all by persons and journals of such eminence was a compliment; but my father was not familiar at that time with the notion of any difference in standing between, say,
The Times Literary Supplement
and some remote provincial town's evening gazette, and he listened to my explanations with an air of offended reserve, as if to an inferior's false excuses. However, at the mill next day he repeated my explanations word for word to John, who listened with an air of suspended judgment.

“Edie thinks the book's quite interesting,” he said—accenting the third syllable of this word in true West Riding style.

When the notices of
The Inadvertent Mind
reached us, even my family began to believe, though in a tentative and hesitant way, that there might be something in Chris's writing after all. The words
promising, interesting, assured, original, honest,
occurring in these notices, battered at their defences; my father was to be seen poring over the strips of print with a perplexed but beaming air, and now enquired carefully from me as to the relative importance of the various newspapers. Edie, to whom I had hitherto been
poor
Chris, an awkward liability of her husband's whom she accepted with cheerful kindness for his sake, told me one day in a tone of surprise that I was growing quite good-looking. (My physical health had, in fact, steadily improved since the day of the eclipse and my shoulders, arms and legs had now reached a more normal girth.) John surveyed me thoughtfully.

“Aye, Edie's right. You're a lot improved since you took
to writing, Chris. Pity there isn't more money in it,” he said.

This remark angered me—angered me more than I thought it should. I therefore investigated my own reactions, and found that I had in fact made little attempt to earn money in any of the legitimate sidelines of my profession—whether from diffidence or idleness I did not know, but probably the former. I was vexed with myself on this account, and therefore vexed when John laid his finger on the sore spot of my vexation. I set to work (being at the moment “between novels” as I liked to say) and spent the next few months in a search for paid journalism in the literary world. After a time I was in a moderate way successful; I found myself equipped with a small but regular reviewing job and the entry to some newspapers and journals for occasional articles. My interest thenceforward centred more and more in my typewriter and less and less in Hilbert Mills, so that going to the mill became an exasperating interruption—after the weekend particularly; for to have to leave a piece unfinished on which I had laboured all Sunday was legitimately annoying. There came at length a Monday morning when I rushed upstairs to make a correction I had just thought of while my father stamped angrily in the hall below and John, whose habit it was to call for us in his car, sounded the horn at the gate in a prolonged and irritable fashion.

“Chris! Chris!” shouted my father at the foot of the stairs.

I longed to tell them to go without me but dared not, so rushed downstairs in a bad temper, seething with resentment against them as tyrannous taskmasters.

But since my moment of illumination this kind of feeling was suspect to me and I had taught myself to examine it with care. As soon as my temper cooled that morning I turned upon my situation all the searchlights of reason I could command. If I wished to give all my time to writing, why did I
not do so? Did my acquiescence really proceed from a sense of duty? Could not my work at Hilbert Mills in fact be easily replaced? Yes, I told myself firmly; it was the merest routine. What then really prevented me from leaving Hilbert? Lack of faith in my work? A preference for material comfort? Of these I thought I could acquit myself. Cowardice, then? Yes, I reflected; that had always been my trouble; fear. But of what? Fear of stepping from the shelter of a cosy regular job into the harsh blasts of a competitive world? Hardly that, I thought, for my wants were simple; once Robert's maintenance was paid I could live on very little; the memory of my contrivances during the days of Mr. M's bookshop returned to me with genuine pleasure. Fear of failing in my family's eyes? Surely not—I was used to that, I thought sardonically. My fear was the simple physical (or deep-rooted biological) fear of confronting my father and my elder brother.

Once this was recognized, mere shame drove me on to the confrontation. That very afternoon, in the moment after the buzzer had sounded when the workpeople were streaming from the mill, while my father (his back turned to me, which I admitted was helpful) was taking down his coat from the office hatstand, I gathered all my courage and blurted out to him:

“Father, I want to give up working at Hilbert.”

My father turned and gave me a look, sharp and intent, which I was nevertheless at a loss to interpret. John, who had been locking up, now came into the office.

“Chris wants to leave Hilbert, John,” said my father.

John turned quickly and they both stared at me. Now that I saw their faces side by side the meaning of their expressions, thus duplicated, became clear to me. They showed relief.

The blood rushed strongly to my face and I recoiled, for the pang of humiliation was severe.

But it was my plan nowadays, I reminded myself, to admit
everything, to repress nothing. I struggled with my fears and my humiliation, and brought myself to utter, though in a somewhat choked and childish tone:

“I'm sorry my work's been so bad that you're glad to be rid of me.”

“It's not that, it's not that at all!” exclaimed John, stepping forward.

“Now, Chris!” my father admonished me. “You know it's not that, my boy.”

“What is it, then?” I demanded. In spite of all my efforts I could not keep out of my voice the note of hurt pride.

“Trade's very bad, Chris,” said my father.

“And going to get worse,” said John.

“If you can get hold of any money outside the textile trade, take it, Chris,” urged my father, beginning to pace up and down the room with an agitated step.

“We shall be glad not to have to find your salary, Chris, and that's a fact,” said John.

I was astonished, incredulous, ashamed and sardonically amused. So much for my vaunted perception! While I had feared to incur their displeasure by leaving them, they had wished me to go, and though all the statistics of the firm's dealings passed through my hands, I had not noticed a continuing drop in production. I remember now that there had been such a drop, which I had attributed to a seasonal slackening. In fact, I thought, recovering my confidence to some extent, I still so attributed it; I had heard too many grumbles about bad trade from West Riding manufacturers for too many years, to believe this one fully now. And the present elucidation was a triumph, after all, for my new mode of conduct. Rather ashamed all the same, I said quickly:

“I can keep an eye on the books at the weekend, without pay.”

“Better not, Chris,” said John. “It would only worry you.”

“In that case,” I said hotly, “I might as well go and live in London. I could pick up more jobs there.”

My father halted and looked at me with his head on one side.

“Why not?” said John.

It was as easy as that, I said to myself, incredulous; one struck but a single blow and one was free!

A week later I was in London.

At that time a certain song was the rage—one heard it on the wireless programme sung by the great-hearted Cicely Courtneidge, and in the streets whistled by errand boys and lorry drivers. Its tune had an irresistibly cheerful martial lilt; its title was
The Changing of the Guard.
The verse began like this:

Are you going to London?
If you go to London—
WHEN you go to London—

and went on to urge—I forget the exact words—that in London you must see the Changing of the Guard. Even today, nearly a quarter of a century later, I cannot hear those words or their tune without a tingling of the blood. At the time they thrilled me so that I could scarcely keep still; I laughed at this childish excitement and told myself ruefully that it was more suited to a lad of twenty than a man of thirty-five, but I could not help it; my eyes shone, my head jerked, my mouth opened in a beaming smile whenever I heard them. I was radiantly happy in my escape; the mere sight of a London bus roused in me a loving joy, so that I would gladly have patted its red sides; the roar of the traffic was a paean of joy celebrating my freedom. I had arranged to stay for a night or two at one of the large cheap bed-and-breakfast hotels while I looked for a more permanent lodging; I wanted to acquire an accommodation with a literary flavour if possible before calling on the editors
with whom I had had correspondence. But on the first morning after my arrival the fancy took me to walk down Charing Cross Road, eyeing the bookshops, and discover whether by any chance some copies of
The Inadvertent Mind
—though it was now a year old—lurked in their windows.

It was quite a severe shock to see the name of Merridew still above its accustomed window; somehow I had imagined that in the twenty years which had elapsed since I worked there, the place would have been swept away by the stream of time. The shock was not altogether one of pleasure, for it recalled poor Henry and the foolish young fledgling Christopher, of whom I was not particularly proud. Still, I had made progress since then; I had published four novels. Perhaps after all I had unconsciously intended to seek out Mr. M and ask his appreciation of his packing-boy turned novelist. I entered the shop.

A handsome lad, fair and tall, came forward to greet me. There was something in his face which made me say, regardless of ages and probabilities:

“Are you Mr. M's son?”

“Grandson,” he replied, smiling. “Nicholas Merridew.”

“Is Mr. Merridew—here?” I continued, not liking to ask whether he were dead, though it felt such aeons since I had known him that this seemed probable.

“Yes. You want to see him?”

“My name is Christopher Jarmayne. I worked here once,” I began.

“Oh! We have your books,” said Nicholas, smiling. “My grandfather has always taken an interest-”

He turned and indicated a shelf where, sure enough, in the corner stood my four novels. Their presence, and young Nicholas's knowledge of it, was a delicious compliment; I coloured with pleasure and could not forbear to take down
The Inadvertent Mind
from the shelf, turn it over, glance at
the title page and replace it, quite in the most foolish manner of the young writer. After this piece of conceit I looked at Nicholas with a sheepish grin; he laughed in sympathy, then stood back to allow his grandfather, who had emerged from a nearby bay of shelves, to approach.