Temporary Kings - Anthony Powell [84]
‘He might be in deep water. Hard to say, at this stage.’
Gwinnett hesitated, seeming, as he sometimes did, uncertain of the exact ground he wanted to occupy.
‘Lady Widmerpool – Pamela – I wouldn’t be in her husband’s shoes, if she’s left to decide his fate.’
‘She’s got it in for him?’
‘That’s how it looks.’
‘You’re avoiding her for the time being?’
That was a reasonable question in the circumstances. Gwinnett did not answer it. At the same time he accepted its inferences.
‘Just to duck back to Pauline for a spell – she had dealings with Lord Widmerpool.’
‘Professional ones, you mean?’
‘Sure.’
‘He picked her up somewhere? Answered an ad?’
‘When his wife was living with Trapnel, Widmerpool had her shadowed. As a former girl friend of Trapnel’s, whom he saw once in a while, Pauline’s name was given to Widmerpool.’
‘And he went to see her?’
‘They met somehow.’
‘Continued to meet?’
‘It seems arrangements were made satisfactory to both sides. Pauline later figured at several parties attended by Widmerpool – and the Frenchman, too, who died all that sudden, when Pamela was around.’
‘Pauline told you that?’
Gwinnett nodded. He had a way with him when he sought information. At least information was what he acquired.
‘Was Pamela herself included in these Pauline jaunts?’
‘I don’t know for certain. I don’t believe so.’
Thought of Pamela seemed to depress Gwinnett He fell into one of his glooms. Their relationship was an enigma. Perhaps he was in love with her, in spite of everything. We parted on good terms, the best. Gwinnett spoke as if we were likely to talk together again as a matter of course, do that quite soon. At the same time he parried any suggestion of coming to see us; even arranging another meeting in London. This determination that initiative should remain in his hands was a reminder of Trapnel methods. Possibly it was one of the ways in which Gwinnett was growing to resemble Trapnel.
During the next month or so, Gwinnett’s problems receded in my mind as a matter of immediate interest, Widmerpool’s too. Fresh information about the second of those came from two rather unexpected sources. These followed each other in quick succession, although quite unconnected.
For several years after the war, I had attended reunion dinners of one of the branches of the army in which I had served, usually deciding to do so at the last moment, even then never quite knowing what brought me there. Friends made in a military connexion were, on the whole, to be seen more conveniently, infinitely more agreeably, in settings of a less deliberate character, where former brother officers, now restored to civilian life in multitudinous shapes, had often passed into spheres with which it was hard to make conversational contact. Intermittent transaction in the past of forgotten military business provided only a frail link. All the same, when something momentous like a war has taken place, all existence turned upside down, personal life discarded, every relationship reorganized, there is a temptation, after all is over, to return to what remains of the machine, examine such paraphernalia as came one’s way, pick about among the bent and rusting composite parts, assess merits and defects. Reunion dinners, to the point of morbidity, gave the chance of indulging in such reminiscent scrutinies. Not far from a vice, like most vices they began sooner or later to pall. Even the first revealed the gap, instantaneously come into being on demobilization, between what was; what, only a moment before, had been. On each subsequent occasion that hiatus widened perceptibly, moving in the direction of an all but impassable abyss.
There were, of course, windfalls. One evening, at such an assemblage, my former Divisional Commander, General Liddament (by then promoted to the Army Council) turned up as guest of honour, making a lively speech about the country’s military commitments ‘round the map’, ending with a recommendation that everyone present should read Trollope. That was an exceptional piece of luck. In the same way, an old colleague would sometimes appear; Hewetson, who had looked after the Belgians, now senior partner in a firm of solicitors: Slade, Pennistone