The Only Problem

‘Yes, they gave me back my passport.’

‘Oh, they took it away?’

‘Yes, they took the stuff out of my pockets,’ Harvey said. ‘They gave it all back. I’m not leaving.’

‘Why?’

‘Well, all my books and things are here. I don’t see why I should run away. I intend to go on as usual. Besides, I’m anxious about Effie.’

‘Maybe Effie would move to another field of action if you weren’t in the Vosges,’ said Stewart. ‘You see, I don’t want you to become an unwilling accomplice.’

‘Effie follows the gang,’ said Harvey.

‘Doesn’t she lead it?’

‘Oh, I don’t know. I don’t even know for certain that she’s in it. It’s all mere allegation on the part of the police.’

Stewart walked about the little room, with his scarf wound round his neck. ‘It’s chilly,’ he said. He was looking at the books. ‘Does Anne-Marie cook for you?’ he said.

‘Yes, indifferently. She’s a police agent by profession.’

‘Oh, that doesn’t mean much,’ said Stewart, ‘when you know that she is.’

‘I used to love mealtimes with Effie,’ said Harvey. ‘I enjoyed the mealtimes more than the meals.’

‘Let’s go out somewhere for lunch,’ said Stewart.

‘We can go in to Nancy. Undoubtedly we’d be followed.’

‘That doesn’t mean much if you know you are being followed,’ said Stewart.

Harvey stood in the middle of the room watching with an irritated air while Stewart fingered his books.

‘There’s nothing of interest,’ said Harvey, ‘unless you’re interested in the subject.’

‘Well, you know I am. I still don’t see why you can’t write your essay elsewhere.’

‘I’ve got used to it here.’

‘Would you like to have Ruth back?’ said Stewart.

‘Not particularly. I would like to have Clara back.’

‘With Effie?’

‘No, Effie isn’t a motherly type.’

‘Ruth is a mother?’

‘She is a born children’s nurse.’

‘But you would like to have Effie back?’ Stewart said, and he made light of this, as of all his questions, by putting them simultaneously with a flicking-through of the pages of Harvey’s books.

‘Yes, I would; in theory,’ said Harvey. ‘That is the New English Bible. The translation is godforsaken.’

‘Then you’d be willing to take Ruth back if she brought Clara. But you’d prefer to have Effie to make love to?’

‘That is the unattainable ideal. The New English Bible’s version of Job makes no distinction between Behemoth and Leviathan. They translate the two as “the crocodile”, which has of course some possibility as a theory, but it simply doesn’t hold in the context.’

‘I thought Behemoth was the hippopotamus,’ said Stewart.

‘Well, that’s the general view, not necessarily correct. However, the author of Job turns God into a poet at that point, proclaiming wonderful hymns to his own creation, the buffalo, the ostrich, the wild ass, the horse, the eagle; then there’s the sparrow-hawk. And God says, Consider this, look at that, reflect on their ways, how they live and survive; I did it all; where were you when I did it? Finally come Behemoth and Leviathan. Well, if you are going to translate both Behemoth and Leviathan as the crocodile, it makes far too long a passage, it gives far more weight to the crocodile as one of God’s marvels than is obviously intended. As for the features of Behemoth, they fit in with the hippopotamus or some large and similar creature equally as well as with the crocodile. Why should God be so proud of his crocodile that he devotes thirty-eight verses to it, and to the horse only seven?’

‘There must be some good arguments in favour of Behemoth and Leviathan both being the crocodile, though,’ Stewart said.

‘Of course there are arguments. The scholars try to rationalise Job by rearranging the verses where there is obviously no sense in them. Sometimes, of course, the textual evidence irresistibly calls for a passage to be moved from the traditional place to another. But moving passages about for no other reason than that they are more logical is no good for the Book of Job. It doesn’t make it come clear. The Book of Job will never come clear. It doesn’t matter; it’s a poem. As for Leviathan and Behemoth, Leveque who is the best modern scholar on Job distinguishes between the two.’ Harvey was apparently back in his element. He seemed to have forgotten about the police outside his house, and that Effie was a criminal at large.

Stewart said, ‘You amaze me.

‘Why?’

‘Don’t you want to know the facts about Effie?’