What do you mean—can't afford?
Too hard on the ego. One doesn't fall in love as often now or as easily. I don't want to fall out of love, it would be disastrous. I don't say that she has to marry me, but I've got to know that she's there ... reachable. I can love her from a distance, if necessary.
I smiled. Funny, you saying a thing like that. I was touching on that very theme the other day, in the novel. Do you know what I concluded ?
Better to become a celibate, I suppose.
No, I came to the same conclusion that every jackass does ... that nothing matters except to keep on loving. Even if she were to marry some one else, you could keep on loving her. What do you make of that?
Easier said than done, Hen.
Precisely. It's your opportunity. Most men give up. Supposing she decided to live in Hong Kong? What has distance to do with it?
You're talking Christian Science, man. I'm not in love with a Virgin Mary. Why should I stand still and watch her drift away? You don't make sense.
That's what I'm trying to convince you of. That's why it's useless to bring me your problem, don't you see? We don't see eye to eye any more. We're old friends who haven't a thing in common.
Do you really think that, Hen? His tone was wistful rather than reproachful.
Listen, I said, once we were as close as peas in a pod, you, George Marshall and me. We were like brothers. That was a long, long time ago. Things happened. Somewhere the link snapped. George settled down, like a reformed crook. His wife won out...
And me?
You buried yourself in your law work, which you despise. One day you'll be a judge, mark my words. But it won't change your way of life. You've given up the ghost. Nothing interests you any more—unless it's a game of poker. And you think my way of life is cock-eyed. It is, I'll admit that. But not in the way you think.
His reply surprised me somewhat. You're not so far off the track, Hen. We have made a mess of it, George and myself. The others too, for that matter. (He was referring to the members of the Xerxes Society.) None of us has amounted to a damn. But what's all that got to do with friendship? Must we become important figures in the world to remain friends? Sounds like snobbery to me. We never pretended, George or I, that we were going to burn up the world. We're what we are. Isn't that good enough for you ?
Look, I replied, it wouldn't matter to me if you were nothing but a bum; you could still be my friend and I yours. You could make fun of everything I believed in, if you believed in something yourself. But you don't. You believe in nothing. To my way of thinking one's got to believe in what he's doing, else all's a farce. I'd be all for you if you wanted to be a bum and became a bum with all your heart and soul. But what are you? You're one of those meaningless souls who filled us with contempt when we were younger ... when we sat up the whole night long discussing such thinkers as Nietzsche, Shaw, Ibsen. Just names to you now. You weren't going to be like your old man, no sir! They weren't going to lasso you, tame you. But they did. Or you did. You put yourself in the strait- jacket. You took the easiest way. You surrendered before you had even begun to fight.
And you? he exclaimed, holding a hand aloft as if to say Hear, hear! Yeah, you, what have you accomplished that's so remarkable? Going on forty and nothing published yet. What's so great about that?
Nothing, I replied. It's deplorable, that's what.
And that entitles you to lecture me. Ho ho!
I had to hedge a bit. I wasn't lecturing you, I was explaining that we had nothing in common any more.
!From the looks of it we're both failures. That's what we have in common, if you'll face it squarely.
I never said I was a failure. Except to myself, perhaps. How can one be a failure if he's still struggling, still fighting? Maybe I won't make the grade. Maybe I'll end up being a trombone player. But whatever I do, whatever I take up, it'll be because I believe in it. I won't float with the tide. I'd rather go down fighting ... a failure, as you say. I loathe doing like every one else, falling in line, saying yes when you mean no.
He started to say something but I waved him down.
I don't mean senseless struggle, senseless resistance. One should make an effort to reach clear, still waters. One has to struggle to stop struggling. One has to find himself, that's what I mean.
Hen, he said, you talk well and you mean well, but you're all mixed up. You read too much, that's your trouble.
And you never stop to think, I rejoined. Nor will you accept your share of suffering. You think there's an answer to everything. It never occurs to you that maybe there isn't, that maybe the only answer is you yourself, how you regard your problems. You don't want to wrestle with problems, you want them eliminated for you. The easy way out, that's you. Take this girl of yours ... this life and death problem ... doesn't it mean something to you that she sees nothing in you? You ignore that, don't you? I want her! I've got to have her! That's all you've got to answer. Sure you'd change your ways, you'd make something of yourself ... if some one were kind enough to stand over you with a sledgehammer. You like to say—'Hen, I'm an ornery sort of bastard,’ but you won't raise a finger to make yourself a wee bit different. You want to be taken as you are, and if one doesn't like you the way you are, fuck him! Isn't that it?
He cocked his head to one side, like a judge weighing the testimony presented, then said: Maybe. Maybe you're right.
For a few moments we walked on in silence. Like a bird with a burr in his craw, he was digesting the evidence. Then, his lips spreading into an impish grin, he said: Sometimes you remind me of that bastard, Challacombe. God, how that guy could rile me I Always talking down from his pedestal. And you fell for all that crap of his. You believed in him ... in that Theosophical shit...
I certainly did! I answered with heat. If he had never mentioned anything more than the name Swanii Vivekananda I would have felt indebted to him the rest of my life. Crap, you say. To me it was the breath of life, I know he wasn't your idea of a friend. A little too lofty, too detached, for your taste. He was a teacher, and you couldn't see him as a teacher. Where did he get his credentials and all that? He had no schooling, no training, no nothing. But he knew what he was talking about. At least, I thought so. He made you wallow in your own vomit,
