Hangover Square Read online

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘But you must, Netta. You must know something about what you want.’

  ‘No, I don’t,’ she said vaguely, looking at a passing waiter, and speaking as a mother, watching the screen at a cinema, might speak to her talkative child. ‘Do you know what you want?’

  ‘Yes. Of course I do. I know what I want’

  ‘What?’ she said, and looked at him.

  He paused a moment, reluctant to start anything. He knew it could lead nowhere, could do him no good. But why shouldn’t he make love to her once in a way, why shouldn’t he get something back for the money he was spending, a little of the luxury of telling her he loved her, of speaking his heart. He hadn’t opened his heart to her for months.

  ‘I want you, Netta,’ he said, looking into her eyes. ‘That’s all I want.’

  ‘All right,’ she said. ‘so what?’

  ‘What do you mean,’ he said, ‘so what?’

  ‘Just “So what”,’ said Netta, and she was again looking at people in the room behind him.

  ‘Tell me, Netta,’ he began again. ‘Don’t you ever feel you want to get away from this racket?’

  ‘What racket?’

  ‘Oh – just the racket generally. Boozing, doing nothing. It’s all such a waste. Don’t you ever want to cut it all out?’

  ‘Cut what out? Drinking?’

  ‘Yes. Drinking. I’d cut it out if I could only get my life straight – if only things made sense.’

  ‘This is a new departure, George,’ she said. ‘You as a temperance expert. How long have you been like this?’

  ‘Always. I hate drinking really.’

  ‘Yes. That’s the impression I got.’

  ‘No. Don’t be sarcastic. It’s the truth. It’s only because of this life one leads.-Don’t you ever feel the same? Don’t you ever wake up in the early hours of the morning and feel the same?’

  ‘Alcoholic remorse?’

  ‘No. Not alcoholic remorse. Just wanting to get things straight. You must know what I mean. You must feel something of what I feel. You can’t be content going on living the life you lead.’

  ‘Can’t I?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Do you mean,’ she said, after a pause in which she flicked the ash of her cigarette into her coffee saucer, ‘that I’ve got to go away and live on a chicken farm in Sussex with you, because you’ve given me that one before, and I don’t want to a bit.’

  He marvelled at her cruelty but he had known he was throwing himself open to the cuts.

  ‘No, Netta – not a chicken farm in Sussex…’ he said, momentarily beaten.

  ‘Oh, not a chicken farm in Sussex… That’s a definite relief… Go ahead.’

  ‘All right, you can laugh at me, Netta, but there’s something in what I’m saying. You must want something in life. You must want to be a success, or to be in love, or something. You must be human somewhere. Don’t you want to be in love?’

  ‘There’s nothing I’d like better.’

  ‘Oh, you would like to be in love?’

  ‘Certainly.’

  ‘Who with? What sort of a man?’

  She paused.

  ‘Oh… Boyer,’ she said, with a little smile which conveyed a world of wicked and selfish meaning, and she again flicked out her ash in the saucer and looked round the room.

  ‘I still think you’re wrong,’ he said, ‘and that one day you’ll come to want what I’ve been talking about.’

  ‘In other words the chicken farm at Haywards Heath?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said, defiantly. ‘The chicken farm at Haywards Heath, or something like it. Something with a shape to it. Something which makes sense. I’ve got to think that. I’ve got to hope it anyway. If I didn’t do that I wouldn’t go on hanging about you the way I do – would I?’

  ‘I don’t know, my dear George… Why ask me?’

  He had already noticed that her attention was distracted, and the next moment her face lit up into a smile, and she held up her hand.

  ‘Good night!’ she said.

  He heard a man’s voice saying ‘Good-bye’ and, looking round, he saw Eddie Carstairs going out with his two friends.

  There was a pause in which he looked at her. He had a sudden feeling of tiredness – a feeling that the evening was at an end. Her loveliness and inaccessibility came over him in a fresh wave of misery. He had been a fool to take her out. He had had too much to drink: he would feel awful in the morning: he had again beaten his head against the brick wall of her imperturbability. He had exhausted his nervous system, and it would take him days to get over it.

  ‘Oh, Netta,’ he said, ‘I do love you so. Can’t something be done about it?’

  She paused, and then, for answer, she put her hand on her bag.

  ‘Will you excuse me,’ she said, ‘if I go to the cloakroom.’

  And without waiting for him to answer, she pushed back the table a little, rose, and walked away.

  While she was gone he thought he might as well call the waiter and pay the bill. It came to two pounds thirteen and sevenpence. He put down three pound notes and said ‘That’s all right’ when the waiter brought back the change.

  She returned in six or seven minutes (she always took hours in a cloakroom), and sat down opposite him again. It was now twenty past nine. He had an idea of taking her to the pictures, and then of going on drinking down at Oddenino’s or at the Café Royal.

  ‘Well,’ he said, ‘where do we go now?’

  ‘We go home now,’ she said. ‘That is, when we’ve paid the bill.’ And she looked round for a waiter.

  ‘I’ve done that,’ he said. ‘But we don’t want to go home yet, do we? It’s only twenty past nine. We can’t go home yet.’

  ‘Well,’ she said, ‘I am. I don’t know about you.’

  ‘Very well,’ he said, abruptly springing to his feet. ‘Let’s go.’

  All at once he was in a fury. It took a lot to get him into a temper, but that cool, impersonal, indescribably insolent ‘I am’ had done the trick. She had just brought him here so that she could see a man, a bloody theatrical manager: she had taken his money, she had taxied, wined and dined at his expense: and now the man had gone, she was going too. ‘I am.’ He felt he could smack her face: he felt he could kill her.

  Chapter Five

  Seemingly not noticing his rage (though of course she noticed it because she noticed everything), she rose, and walked out of the room in front of him. As she walked down the stairs he had an insane desire to kick her from behind, to seize hold of and shake her, to make a scene in a public place, anything to humiliate her, to dislodge her from the throne of her effrontery, but instead ‘Taxi, sir?’ said the man at the door, and he murmured ‘Yes’ weakly…

  The taxi came at once. He was in such a temper with her, with the whole evening, with everything, that he didn’t give the man a tip for his hat and coat, and he didn’t give a tip to the man who opened the taxi door. Let them go to hell. He was hysterical with hatred. He shouted Netta’s address to the driver, and the taxi moved away.

  For the time being there was a certain joy in his hatred. Like a local anaesthetic around a tooth it numbed the pain around his heart – the heart, which, normally, ached with the pain of Netta continually. He could feel, for a moment, that he was through with her; that hatred had killed love; that her beauty and power over him had been rendered null, inoperative, by her loathsomeness of character. If only he could make his feeling last he would be through with her for good.

  But how could he make it last? Already he felt it slipping away. She sat silently in her corner as the taxi sped on – sped on home.

  In ten minutes’ time the evening would be over. How could he remain silent and sullen when there were only ten more minutes – when he would shortly be dismissed at her door? He couldn’t. She could. He could see that she knew he was in a temper and that she did not mean to utter a word until he spoke: she would leave him without even saying ‘Good nigh
t’ if necessary. Such was her advantage over him, and such was her strength of character. The lights of London whirling across the taxi lit up her wonderful face in bright whirling mauve… He looked at her and had to speak.

  ‘Oh, Netta,’ he said, ‘you are a beast! Why do you treat me like this?’

  And as soon as he had spoken, and felt the self-pity of his own tone, all the hardness, the anaesthetic around his heart, faded away and he was begging for her mercy.

  ‘You’ve got yourself into a state, haven’t you, George?’ she said, looking out of the window. ‘I’d shut up and go to bed if I were you.’

  ‘No, Netta,’ he said, ‘you are a beast. Even if you hate me I don’t see why you should treat me like this.’

  ‘I’m afraid I don’t follow you. Like what?’

  ‘Like this! If you’re going to come out with me I do think you might treat me decently! If you’re going to make use of me, you might give me something in return – a little kindness of some sort.’

  ‘How do you mean – make use of you?’ She spoke sharply, with a note of rising temper in her voice. He had gone too far. He saw that although she made use of him, she was ready to be extremely angry at any suggestion that she did so. If he cared to mention Eddie Carstairs now, if he let her know that he now knew perfectly well the objects she had in mind when she came out with him, he could probably make her lose her temper properly. But he wasn’t going to do that. His temper had gone and he could only beg for mercy.

  ‘But you do make use of me, Netta,’ he said. ‘After all I am taking you out, aren’t I? Can’t you be nice if I’m taking you out?’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ she said.

  ‘I don’t see how you can’t see,’ he said. ‘After all, I’m paying for everything, aren’t I? I know that sounds an extraordinary thing to say, but it’s true, isn’t it?’

  ‘Most extraordinary,’ she said. ‘In fact I’ve never actually heard anyone say a thing exactly like that before.’

  ‘No, Netta, listen.’ He put his hand on her arm and pleaded with her. ‘Do listen, for God’s sake. You must be human somewhere. I know I’m a fool. I know you don’t care a damn about me. But if you agree to come out with me, can’t you even be civil? You just treat me like dirt – as though I’d done something wrong. I haven’t done you any harm, Netta. The only harm I’ve done is being in love with you…’ His voice began to break, and tears came into his eyes as he went on… ‘What’s wrong with that? You’re civil to other people. Why can’t you be civil to me? Oh, Netta, do be kind to me. I can’t go on unless you’re kind to me. It’s all getting too much. Say something civil to me, Netta. Can’t you say something civil? I’m worn out. I’ve spent what I’ve got on you – I’ve tried to please you… Can’t you be civil? Can’t you look at me and say something civil?’

  There was a pause. He looked at her and she looked out of the window. He waited for her to speak but she did not. In the faint hope that his tears and eloquence were moving her, he went on:

  ‘What have you got against me, Netta – what harm have I done? If anyone else took you out, you’d be nice enough to them, but just because it’s me you treat me like dirt. You don’t treat the others like dirt – you wouldn’t treat Peter or Mickey like this. What have I done? – That’s all I want to know. I love you, Netta – but I don’t interfere with you. I only hang about. I’m harmless, aren’t I? Aren’t I harmless?’

  ‘No,’ she said, still looking out of the window. ‘You’re not at the moment – if you want the truth.’

  ‘What do you mean, Netta? What am I doing?’

  ‘You’re being a bloody, insufferable bore. And the more you go on the more boring you’re being. So won’t you shut up? I’m likely to be much more civil, as you put it, if you do.’

  There was another pause.

  ‘All right, Netta, I’ll shut up,’ he said, and he was silent.

  Well, that was that. The evening was over. He knew the rules. When she delivered the final snub, it was always recognizable as such, and it was no use going on.

  He hadn’t really expected anything else. He had known no good could ever come from taking her out. He supposed he had somehow hoped, in the back of his mind, to make love to her, to woo her, to have her for a few hours to himself and try to bring about a change in her heart towards him. But he ought to have known better than to have hoped for such a thing, even in the back of his mind.

  He had known that making love to her was tacitly but utterly forbidden – that he only remained tolerable to her so long as he remained silent about the passion which raged in him. He at any rate couldn’t accuse her of not making herself clear on that point. This wasn’t the first time he had taken her out and been told he was a bloody insufferable bore – though perhaps she had not before been quite so painfully direct in her speech.

  What now? Hadn’t he better give her up? Hadn’t he better make up his mind to give her up altogether? Hadn’t he better go from pub to pub, getting really drunk, and picking up a woman and going with her and deciding all the time to give Netta up? He had done that once or twice before. It hadn’t succeeded yet, as far as giving Netta up was concerned, but hadn’t he better try again? It might work this time, and he might as well complete the usual circle. And anyway it would be nice to get drunk and go with a woman. He had got five pounds left.

  Yes – that was the idea. Then why not start now – leave her in the taxi – let her get home by herself? That was it. Leave her now. It would give her a bird, to leave her stone cold for once. He would do it ever so politely. That would make it more of a bird. He would even offer to pay for the taxi.

  ‘Look here, Netta,’ he said, ‘do you mind if I get out here? I think I’d like to stay in the West End for a bit.’

  ‘No,’ she said, ‘not at all.’

  But he did not exactly hear her say this. Rather he saw her lips saying it. For before she spoke and while he was looking at her, there was a funny sound, like a click of a camera shutter in the middle of his head, and the world was not the same lively, audible, intelligible world which it had been a fraction of a second before.

  Chapter Six

  Click!…

  Here it was again! He was in London, in a taxi at night, and it had happened again!…

  ‘Click…’ That was the only way to describe it. It was like the click of a camera shutter. Shutter! That was the word. A shutter had come down over his brain: he had shut down: he was shut out from the world he had been in a moment before.

  The world he was in now was the same in shape, the same to look at, but ‘dead’, silent, mysterious, as though its scenes and activities were all taking place in the tank of an aquarium or even at the bottom of the ocean – a noiseless, intense, gliding, fishy world.

  It was as though he had suddenly gone deaf – mentally deaf. It was as though one had blown one’s nose too hard, and the outer world had become dim and dead. It was as though one had gone into a sound-proof telephone booth and shut the door tightly on oneself.

  There were a hundred and one ways of describing it. When it happened to him he always tried to describe it to himself – to analyse it – because it was such a funny feeling. He was not frightened by it, because he was used to it by now. But it was happening a good deal too often nowadays, and he wished it wouldn’t.

  It was such a weird feeling: it was always novel, and, in a way, interesting to him. It was as though the people around him, although they moved about, were not really alive: as though their existence had no motive or meaning, as though they were shadows – rabbits or butterflies or kangaroos – thrown on the wall by an amateur conjurer with a candle. And although they talked, and although he could understand what they said, it was not as though they had spoken in the ordinary way, and it was an effort to understand and to answer.

  Take Netta, for instance, who was rather oddly and inexplicably sitting beside him in this taxi. He knew it was Netta well enough – but it was a different Netta. Al
though he could see her she was remote, almost impalpable, miles away – like a voice over the telephone, or the mental construction of the owner of a voice one might make while phoning – a ghost, if you liked.

  She was saying something actually. She was saying ‘Well aren’t you getting out?’

  He could hear and understand the words, but for the moment he couldn’t gather what they meant. They seemed divorced from any context: or at any rate he didn’t know what the context was. So he didn’t answer. For the moment anyway, he was too interested in what had happened in his head.

  Then, gradually, and as usual, and without his being aware of it, the feeling of novelty and strangeness, his conscious knowledge of the transition, of the falling of the shutter, faded away. And the world he was in now, the world under the sea, was his proper world, the only one he knew.

  And in this world there was something to be done. There was something to be done which he had forgotten about. He had, he fancied, somewhat reprehensibly forgotten about it, and now he must remember it. He could never think of it all at once, but it would come. If he didn’t nag at it, but took things easily, it would come.

  The taxi sped on towards Kensington; the reflected lights whirled across the inside of the taxi: he looked at the taxi-man’s black bumping back, and he remained silent and waited for it to come. But now she was speaking to him again.

  ‘I am sorry,’ she was saying, ‘but didn’t I understand you to say you were getting out?’

  What did this mean? ‘Getting out?’ Getting out of what? The taxi? Or of some business or concern in which he was a partner with her? What was she talking about? It was a nuisance, her speaking to him like this. How could he remember what he had to remember, if she interrupted him all the time?

  ‘I don’t know,’ he said.

  He couldn’t say anything else, because he didn’t know what she was talking about. He hoped it would shut her up. He looked at the taxi-man’s back and tried to get back into a proper state of mind to remember…

  But she evidently was not going to leave him alone. ‘Oh Christ,’ he heard her saying, ‘you’re not going to throw one of your dumb moods now, are you?’