Temporary Kings - Anthony Powell [91]
I thought of my undergraduate days, when Truscott had been not merely an imposing, but positively frightening figure, setting up, by his flow of talk, standards of sophistication never to be contemplated as attainable. This brilliance of exterior, again, had been of quite a different sort from Glober’s. Even in those days, Truscott had been far less lively. There could be no great difference in age, even if the advantage was slightly on Truscott’s side. Unlike Glober, he had remained a bachelor. I spoke of Sillery’s ninetieth birthday party. It appeared Truscott had not been invited. He showed a little bitterness about that. It was true he had been one of the staunchest vassals of Sillery’s court. He should not have been forgotten. He asked if I often found myself in this embassy.
‘My first visit – and you?’
‘I’m asked from time to time. I’m afraid I’m not at all conversant with the current work of the guest of honour. I never read novels nowadays …’
Possibly thinking that admission, for more than one reason, suggested a too headlong falling-off from what had once been an all embracing intellectual coverage, Truscott corrected himself. He gave one of his winning smiles.
‘That is, you understand, I don’t find much time, with so many things going on – as we all have – of course I fully intend … and naturally...’
I told him what I had heard about Stringham, once his fellow secretary. Truscott showed interest.
‘Very sad. Poor Charles. He was a pleasant companion. One of the nicer people round Donners.’
Thought of his days working for Sir Magnus must have brought Widmerpool to mind; more specifically, as agent of his own sacking from Donners-Brebner. He lowered his voice.
‘Hardly a subject for discussion here, but one cannot help being a little intrigued by the embarrassments, at the moment, of another protégé of Sir Magnus of that period.’
‘What’s going to happen to him?’
By that time, having read the morning paper, I saw what Farebrother meant by speaking of Widmerpool’s position as insecure. Truscott certainly thought the same. He coughed, in a semi-official manner.
‘I should expect various enquiries of a – well, not exactly public nature – not immediately public, I mean – likely to be set on foot.’
‘You think it pretty serious?’
‘That would certainly be …’
‘Might come to a trial?’
‘One cannot tell. I — ’
Massive middle-aged waitresses had been bustling about the room, snapping out a sharp commentary to each other in their own language, as they clattered with the plates. Now, one of them interposed a large dish of fish between Truscott and myself, severing our connexion. At the same moment, my Russian neighbour began a conversation. Soon, by natural processes, we were discussing Russian writers. After Lermontov and Pushkin, Gogol and Gontcharov, Tchekov and Tolstoy, Dostoevsky’s name cropped up. Pennistone – who would never allow intellectual standards to be lowered, just because he was in the army, a war on – had complained that, when he spoke of Dostoevsky’s Grand Inquisitor to General Lebedev, the Soviet military attaché (unconvincing as a regular soldier) had recommended Nekrasov’s truer picture of Russian life. In short, Dostoevsky, impossible to ignore, equally impossible to assimilate into Communist life, a monolithic embarrassment to his countrymen, was a tendentious subject for the present luncheon party, however unequivocally political the tradition of the Russian novel. Remembering Trapnel once speculated on the meaning of the surname ‘Karamazov’, I put the question.
‘Am I right in thinking “kara” has some implication of blackness? The former Serbian royal house, Karageorgevitch, was not that founded by Black George? But ‘‘mazov “? How would that be translated into English?’
My Russian neighbour laughed. He seemed very willing that a Dostoevskian commentary should move into etymological channels, away from potentially political ones. The idea of giving The Brothers an English surname pleased him.