Scoop-Evelyn-Waugh [13]
REPUBLIC OF ISHMAELIA LEGATION AND CONSULATE-GENERAL If away leave letters with tobacconist at No. 162b
William knocked and the door was opened by the Negro whom he had seen the evening before in Hyde Park. The features, to William's undiscriminating eye, were not much different from those of any other Negro, but the clothes were unforgettable. "Can I see the Ishmaelite Consul-General, please?" "Are you from the Press?" "Yes, I suppose in a way I am." "Come in. I'm him. As you see, we are a little understaffed at the moment." The Consul-General led him into what had once been the servants' hall. Photographs of Negroes in uniform and ceremonial European dress hung on the walls. Samples of tropical produce were disposed on the table and along the bookshelves. There was a map of Ishmaelia, an eight-piece office suite and a radio. William sat down. The Consul-General turned off the music and began to talk. "The patriotic cause in Ishmaelia," he said, "is the cause of the coloured man and of the proletariat throughout the world. The Ishmaelite worker is threatened by corrupt and foreign coalition of capitalistic exploiters, priests and imperialists. As that great Negro Karl Marx has so nobly written . .." He talked for about twenty minutes. The black-backed, pink-palmed, finlike hands beneath the violet cuffs flapped and slapped. "Who built the Pyramids?" he asked. "Who invented the circulation of the blood? ... Africa for the African worker, Europe for the African worker, Asia, Oceania, America, Arctic and Antarctic for the African worker." At length he paused and wiped the line of froth from his lips. "I came about a visa," said William diffidently. "Oh," said the Consul-General, turning on the radio once more. "There's fifty pounds deposit and a form to fill in." William declared that he had not been imprisoned, that he was not suffering from any contagious or outrageous disease, that he was not seeking employment in Ishmaelia or the overthrow of its political institutions; paid his deposit and was rewarded with a rubber stamp on the first page of his new passport. "I hope you have a pleasant trip," said the Consul-General. "I'm told it's very interesting country." "But aren't you an Ishmaelite?" "Me? Certainly not. I'm a graduate of the Baptist College of Antigua. But the cause of the Ishmaelite worker is the cause of the Negro worker of the world." "Yes," said William. "Yes. I suppose it is. Thank you very much." "Who discovered America?" demanded the Consul-General to his retreating back, in tones that rang high above the sound of the wireless concert. "Who won the Great War?"
The rival legation had more spacious quarters, in a hotel in South Kensington. A gold swastika on a white ground hung proudly from the window. The door of the suite was opened by a Negro clad in a white silk shirt, buckskin breeches and hunting boots, who clicked his spurs and gave William a Roman salute. "I've come for a visa." The pseudo-consul led him to the office. "I shall have to delay you for a few minutes. You see the Legation is only just open and we have not yet got our full equipment. We are expecting the rubber stamp any minute now. In the meantime let me explain the Ishmaelite situation to you. There are many misconceptions. For instance, the Jews of Geneva, subsidized by Russian gold, have spread the story that we are a black race. Such is the ignorance, credulity and prejudice of the tainted European states that the absurd story has been repeated in the press. I must ask you to deny it. As you will see for yourself, we are pure Aryans. In fact we were the first white colonizers of Central Africa. What Stanley and Livingstone did in the last century, our Ishmaelite ancestors did in the stone age. In the course of the years the tropical sun has given to some of us a healthy, in some cases almost a swarthy, tan. But all responsible anthropologists ..." William fingered his passport and became anxious about luncheon. It was already past one. ". .. The present so-called Government bent on the destruction of our great heritage ..." There was an interruption. The pseudo-consul went to the door. "From the stationer's," said a cockney voice. "Four and eight to pay." "Thank you, that is all." "Four and eight to pay or else I takes it away again." There was a pause. The pseudo-consul returned. "There is a fee of five shillings for the visa," he said. William paid. The pseudo-consul returned with the rubber stamp, jingling four pennies in his breeches pocket. "You will see the monuments of our glorious past in Ishmaelia," he said, taking the passport. "I envy you very much." "But are you not an Ishmaelite?" "Of course; by descent. My parents migrated some generations ago. I was brought up in Sierra Leone." Then he opened the passport.