Desmond Bagley.
The Vivero Letter (1968).
I would like to thank Captain T. A. Hampton of the British Underwater Centre, Dartmouth, for detailed information about diving techniques.
My thanks also go to Gerard L'E. Turner, Assistant Curator of the Museum of the History of Science, Oxford, for information on certain bronze mirrors, Amida's Mirror in particular.
Theirs the credit for accuracy; mine the fault for inaccuracy.
One
I made good time on the way to the West Country; the road was clear and there was only an occasional car coming in the other direction to blind me with headlights. Outside Honiton I pulled off the road, killed the engine and lit a cigarette. I didn't want to arrive at the farm at an indecently early hour, and besides, I had things to think about.
They say that eavesdroppers never hear good of themselves. It's a dubious proposition from the logical standpoint, but I certainly hadn't disproved it empirically. Not that I had intended to eavesdrop -- it was one of those accidental things you get yourself into with no graceful exit -- so I just stood and listened and heard things said about myself that I would rather not have heard.
It had happened the day before at a party, one of the usual semi-impromptu lash-ups which happen in swinging London. Sheila knew a man who knew the man who was organizing it and wanted to go, so we went. The house was in that part of Golders Green which prefers to be called Hampstead and our host was a with-it whiz kid who worked for a record company and did a bit of motor racing on the side. His conversation was divided about fifty-fifty between Marshal MacLuhan waffle and Brand's Hatchery, all very wearing on the eardrums. I didn't know him personally and neither did Sheila -- it was that kind of party.
One left one's coat in the usual bedroom and then drifted into the chatter, desperately trying to make human contact while clutching a glass of warm whisky. Most of the people were complete strangers, although they seemed to know each other, which made it difficult for the lone intruder. I tried to make sense of the elliptical verbal shorthand which passes for conversation on these occasions, and pretty soon got bored. Sheila seemed to be doing all right, though, and I could see this was going to be a long session, so I sighed and got myself another drink.
Halfway through the evening I ran out of cigarettes and remembered that I had a packet in my coat so I went up to the bedroom to get it. Someone had moved the coats from the bed and I found them dumped on the floor behind a large avant-garde screen. I was rooting about trying to find mine when someone else came into the room. A female voice said. That man you're with is pretty dim, isn't he?'
I recognized the voice as belonging to Helen Someone-or-other, a blonde who was being squired by a life- and-soul-of-the-party type. I dug into my coat pocket and found me cigarettes, then paused as I heard Sheila say, 'Yes, he is.'
Helen said, 'I don't know why you bother with him.'
'I don't know, either,' said Sheila. She laughed. 'But he's a male body, handy to have about. A girl needs someone to take her around.'
'You could have chosen someone more lively,' said Helen. This one's a zombie. What does he do?'
'Oh, he's some kind of an accountant. He doesn't talk about it much. A grey little man in a grey little job -- I'll drop him when I find someone more interesting.'
I stayed very still in a ridiculous half crouch behind that screen. I certainly couldn't walk out into full view after hearing that. There was a subdued clatter from the dressing-table as the girls primped themselves. They chattered about hair styles for a couple of minutes, then Helen said, 'What happened to Jimmy What's-his- name?'
Sheila giggled. ''Oh, he was too wolfish -- not at all safe to be with. Exciting, really, but his firm sent him abroad last month.'
'I shouldn't think you find this one too exciting.'
'Oh, Jemmy's all right,' said Sheila casually. 'I don't have to worry about my virtue with him. It's very restful for a change.'
'He's not a queer, is he?' asked Helen.
'I don't think so,' said Sheila. Her voice was doubtful. 'He's never appeared to be that way.'
'You never can tell; a lot of them are good at disguise. That's a nice shade of lipstick -- what is it?'
They tailed off into feminine inconsequentialities while I sweated behind the screen. It seemed to be an hour before they left, although it probably wasn't more than five minutes, and when I heard the door bang I stood up cautiously and came out from under cover and went downstairs to rejoin the party.
I stuck it out until Sheila decided to call it a night and then took her home. I was in half a mind to demonstrate to her in the only possible way that I wasn't a queer, but I tossed the idea away. Rape isn't my way of having a good time. I dropped her at the fiat she shared with two other girls and bade her a cordial good night. I would have to be very hard up for company before I saw her again, A grey little man in a grey little job.
Was that how I really appeared to others? I had never thought about it much. As long as there are figures used in business there'll be accountants to shuffle them around, and it had never struck me as being a particularly grey job, especially after computers came in, I didn't talk about my work because it really isn't the subject for light conversation wife a girl. Chit-chat about the relative merits of computer languages such as COBOL and ALGOL doesn't have the glamour of what John Lennon said at the last recording session.
So much for the job, but what about me? Was I dowdy and subfusc? Grey and uninteresting?
It could very well be that I was -- to other people. I had never been one for wearing my heart on my sleeve, and maybe, judging by the peculiar mores of our times, I was a square. I didn't particularly like the 'swinging' aspect of mid-sixties England; it was cheap, frenetic and sometimes downright nasty, and I could do without it. Perhaps I was Johnny-out-of-step.
