The Book And The Brotherhood

been emotional but not effusive. They gripped each other's arms, turning quickly away without an embrace.

The Playroom was darkish except for two shaded lamps. one on the desk, the other perched on a pile of books mon one of the tables. The room was cold and smelt of paraffin. Jean looked thinner, looked tired, seemed to be wearing no make-up, was dressed in a dark blue woollen dress and a brown cardigan and had just taken off an apron. She looked well, however and beautiful, her dark hair more shaggy, long less neat, her dark eyes fierce. She had what Rose had once called her Jewish heroine look. Rose now felt, confronting her, almost afraid, at a loss, ready to cry, afraid too that Jean might suddenly weep angry ferocious savage tears. It had proved so far difficult to make conversation.

`I was at Boyars in the snowy weather. The meadow was frozen.'

`Did you skate?'

`Yes. Lily Boyne was there. She skates very well. I was surprised.'

`I don't see why you should be surprised.'

`No – I suppose not – I just didn't expect it.'

`How's Tamar?'

`Not well. She's eating very little and looks unhappy.’

`Can't you do anything?'

'I try. She came to see you, I believe.'

'I assume you arranged it.'

‘Well – would you like to see her again?

'No.’

'She's very fond of you. Doesn't he like you having visitors?'

‘Why did you come?' said Jean.

‘To see you. And to see if there was anying in the world I could do for you.'

' There is nothing.'

After a moment's silence Rose said, 'Will he come straight back after he leaves?'

‘Will who come straight back after he leaves where?'

‘Will Crimond come straight back here when he leaves Gerard?`

`Is he with Gerard?'

‘Yes! Didn't you know?'

‘He doesn't always say where he's going_. said Jean, 'I don't ask. I don't know whether he'll come strait back.'

‘You don't seem to know much about him.'

‘I don't know everything about him.'

Jean, her hands on her knees, sat starin^q at Rose, waiting for the next question, as in an interrogation.

'Does Crimond shoot at that target?'

'He used to.'

'I remember he was a marksman, he won some prize. I hope he’s not preparing for a revolution.'

‘I think he's amusing himself.'

‘What do you do?'

‘What do you mean?'

`l mean both of you, what do you do all day, do you stay here, do you travel, do you entertain, do you visit people, do you go to concerts, are you happy?'

‘We’re mostly here,' said Jean, 'we don't 'entertain', people sometimes come.'

‘Do you discuss his work?'

‘We discuss all sorts of things, but if you mean the book_., no, not that.’

‘The book really exists?'

`Of course. It's over there. You can look at it if you like.'

Rose looked toward the desk, where the lamp showed a pile of different-coloured notebooks, one open. She felt a superstitious aversion to looking at the book. 'No, thank you -'

`You imagine I'm unhappy, perhaps you hope I'm unhappy.'

`No,' said Rose, 'I just thought you might be bored.' She had begun to feel they were talking in their sleep, not communicating at all, wasting precious time. Now Jean frown and the atmosphere became tenser and more alert. Rose went on, in the new tension and sense of closeness, to say something which she had resolved to say, felt she must say, even rehearsed. 'Duncan loves you. He wants you back. We all love you, we miss you. I wish you'd come back.'

Jean seemed to reflect on these words but replied only. I’m sorry to disappoint you all, I'm not bored and I'm not unhappy. I have never been more completely happy in my life. If you want a message to carry back, there it is.'

`You left Crimond last time, there must have been reason. ‘

`I have a kind of happiness which I think you've never known or dreamt of.’

`Have you forgotten your love for Duncan? You did love him, surely you do love him?'

`Last time was different. I wasn't then able to conceive of a complete removal of my being, a complete change. I've groom into that ability in the time between. It's a meeting with an absolute. When you can see what is perfect, what is imperfect falls away, it withers. Now, it's face to face, not in a glass darkly. One cannot dispute, one cannot resist.'

`And apparently one cannot explain.'

`One cannot explain.'

`Forgive me,' said Rose, 'I wanted so much to talk to you, and there's so little time, I'm saying a lot of things very badly. I must go before Crimond comes back. Gerard said he'd give him an hour -'

, Give him an hour!'

`I don't know how long it will take him to get back, if he comes back at once – you see I'm trying to say what matters, what matters to me, God knows when I'll see you again. You know that I love you, we've been friends forever, I must say things. I think you're living inside an illusion. It's all so one-sided, so unfair. You don't know where he goes and what he does, you've given him over your whole life, you've given up your friends and your world, and you don't meet his friends or inhabit his world. He has not shared his things with you. You don't even share in the book. As far as I can see, you have no relationship now except with him, a sexual relation which is part of his life and all of yours! I'm sorry – if I'm saying crude emotional things it's because I'm angry on your behalf-'

'Oh don't be, don't be,' said Jean, who had listened to this wade with a weary air of absent indifference. She sighed and got up again and went behind her chair and tilted it a little towards her. 'Would you like some coffee? I'm afraid there's no alcohol in the house.'

, Of course I wouldn't like some coffee!' said Rose, exasperated. 'Oh Jean -'

'I don't deny our love,' said Jean, 'our love, I mean, between you and me, I have no doubt that it will survive forever, even if we were never to see each other again, which of course we will, it is something unique and uniquely durable. But you must take it that we inhabit two absolutely different worlds. You rely on continuity, you live by a certain quiet seamless order in your life, it suits you, you've lived and thrived on it, whereas it has gradually suffocated me.' She let the chair fall back with a jolt.

‘Oh well, if it's just desire for change – If you've chosen discontinuity that implies that you don't entirely believe in Crimond's love, you can't see your future together, you are insecure.'

' I am the only woman he has ever loved or could love. I believe in his love and our future is together whatever happens. But of course, unlike you, we can't foresee what will happen. There is insecurity, not in our love, but in the world. Crimond is brave and he has made me brave. You live in the old dreamy continuum where everyone is nice and dependable and good and every year has the same pattern. I have left that place, with him I am outside, in the dangerous contingent real world, love is dangerous, absolute and dangerous, one lives with death – and to live so is really to live. You don't understand what being deeply in love and being deeply loved is like, how it brims over one's whole existence and