Point Counter Point - Aldous Huxley [87]
Walter made a vague mumbling sound of deprecation. That little pat, he was thinking, was the signal for him to begin:
‘I am a tainted wether of the flock,
Meetest for slaughter.’
‘I wish for your sake,’ Burlap continued, ‘for mine too,’ he added, putting himself with a rueful little laugh in the same financial boat as Walter, ‘that the paper did make more money. If you wrote worse, it might.’ The compliment was graceful. Burlap emphasized it with another friendly pat and a smile. But the eyes expressed nothing. Meeting them for an instant, Walter had the strange impression that they were not looking at him at all, that they were not looking at anything. ‘The paper’s too good. It’s largely your fault. One cannot serve God and mammon.’
‘Of course not,’ Walter agreed; but he felt again that the big words had come too easily.
‘I wish one could.’ Burlap spoke like a jocular St. Francis pretending to make fun of his own principles.
Walter joined mirthlessly in the laughter. He was wishing that he had never mentioned the word ‘salary.’
‘I’ll go and talk to Mr. Chivers,’ said Burlap. Mr. Chivers was the business manager. Burlap made use of him, as the Roman statesman made use of oracles and augurs, to promote his own policy. His unpopular decisions could always be attributed to Mr. Chivers; and when he made a popular one, it was invariably made in the teeth of the business manager’s soulless tyranny. Mr. Chivers was a most convenient fiction. ‘I’ll go this morning.’
‘Don’t bother,’ said Walter.
‘If it’s humanly possible to scrape up anything more for you…’
‘No, please.’ Walter was positively begging not to be given more. ‘I know thd difficulties. Don’t think I want…’
‘But we’re sweating you, Walter, positively sweating you.’ The more Walter protested, the more generous Burlap became.’don’t think I’m not aware of it. I’ve been worrying about it for a long time.’
His magnanimity was infectious. Walter was determined not to take any more money, quite determined, even though he was sure the paper could afford to give it. ‘Really, Burlap,’ he almost begged, ‘I’d much rather you left things as they are.’ And then suddenly he thought of Marjorie. How unfairly he was treating her! Sacrificing her comfort to his. Because he found haggling distasteful, because he hated fighting on the one hand and accepting favours on the other, poor Marjorie would have to go without new clothes and a second maid.
But Burlap waved his objections aside. He insisted on being generous. ‘I’ll go and talk to Chivers at once. I think I can persuade him to let you have another twentyfive a year.’
Twentyfive. That was ten shillings a week. Nothing. Marjorie had said that he ought to stand out for at least another hundred. ‘Thank you,’ he said and despised himself for saying it.
‘It’s ridiculously little, I’m afraid. Quite ridiculously.’
That’s what I ought to have said, thought Walter.
‘One feels quite ashamed of offering it. But what can one do?’ ‘One’ could obviously do nothing, for the good reason that ‘one’ was impersonal and didn’t exist.
Walter mumbled something about being grateful. He felt humiliated and blamed Marjorie for it.
When Walter worked at the office, which was only three days a week, he sat with Beatrice. Burlap, in editorial isolation, sat alone. It was the day of Shorter Notices. Between them, on the table, stood the stacks of Tripe. They helped themselves. It was a Literary Feast—a feast of offal. Bad novels and worthless verses, imbecile systems of philosophy and platitudinous moralizings, insignificant biographies and boring books of travel, pietism so nauseating and children’s books so vulgar and so silly that to read them was to feel ashamed for the whole human race—the pile was high, and every week it grew higher. The ant-like industry of Beatrice, Walter’s quick discernment and facility were utterly inadequate to stem the rising flood. They settled down to their work ‘like vultures,’ said Walter,