CHAPTER XXXI

 

September 6^th 1933

 

'Death,' said Mark Staithes.  'It's the only thing we haven't succeeded in completely vulgarizing.  Not from any lack of the desire to do so, of course.  We're like dogs on an acropolis.  Trotting round with inexhaustible bladders and only too anxious to lift a leg against every statue.  And mostly we succeed.  Art, religion, heroism, love – we've left our visiting-card on all of them.  But death – death remains out of reach.  We haven't been able to defile that statue.  Not yet, at any rate.  But progress is still progressing.'  He demonstrated the anatomy of smile.  'The larger hopes, the proliferating futures …’ The bony hands went out in a lavish gesture.  'One day, no doubt, some genius of the kennel will manage to climb up and deposit a well-aimed tribute bang in the middle of the statue's face.  But luckily progress hasn't yet got so far.  Death still remains.'

      'It remains,' Anthony repeated.  'But the smokescreen is pretty thick.  We manage to forget it most of the time.'

      'But not all the time.  It remains, unexorcizably. Intact.  Indeed,' Mark qualified, 'more than intact.  We have bigger and better smokescreens than our fathers had.  But behind the smoke the enemy is more formidable.  Death's grown, I should say, now that the consolations and hopes have been taken away.  Grown to be almost as large as it was when people seriously believed in hell.  Because, if you're a busy film-going, newspaper-reading, football-watching, chocolate-eating modern, then death is hell.  Every time the smokescreen thins out a bit, people catch a glimpse and are terrified.  I find that a very consoling thought.'  He smiled again.  'It makes up for a great deal.  Even for those busy little dogs on the acropolis.'  There was a silence.  Then, in another tone, 'It's a comfort,' he resumed, 'to think that death remains faithful.  Everything else may have gone; but death remains faithful,' he repeated.  'If we choose to risk our lives, we can risk them as completely as ever we did.'  He rose, took a turn or two about the room; then, coming to a halt in front of Anthony's chair, 'That's what I really came to see you about,' he said.

      'What?'

      'About this business of risking one's life.  I've been feeling as though I were stuck.  Bogged to the neck in civilized humanity.'  He made the grimace of one who encounters a foul smell.  'There seemed to be only one way out.  Taking risks again.  It would be like a whiff of fresh air.  I thought perhaps that you too …' He left the sentence unfinished.

      'I've never taken a risk,' said Anthony, after a pause.  'Only had one taken for me once,' he added, remembering the bumpkin with the hand-grenade.

      'Isn't that a reason for beginning.'

      'The trouble,' said Anthony, frowning to himself, 'the trouble is that I've always been a coward.  A moral one, certainly.  Perhaps also a physical one – I don't know.  I've never really had an opportunity of finding out.'

      'I should have thought that that was a still more cogent reason.'

      'Perhaps.'

      'If it's a case of changing the basis of one's life, wouldn't it be best to change it with a bang?'

      'Bang into a corpse?'

      'No, no.  Just a risk; not suicide.  It's merely dangerous, the business I'm thinking of.  No more.'  He sat down again.  'I had a letter the other day,' he began.  'From an old friend of mine in Mexico.  A man I worked with on the coffee finca.  Jorge Fuentes, by name.  A remarkable creature, in his way.'

      He outlined Don Jorge's history.  Besieged by the revolutionaries on his estate in the valley of Oaxaca.  Most of the other landowners had fled.  He was one of the only men who put up a resistance.  At first he had had his two brothers to help him.  But they were killed, one at long range, the other by machetes in an ambush among the cactuses.  He had carried on the fight single-handed.  Then, one day when he was out riding round the fields, a dozen of them managed to break into the house.  He had come home to find the bodies of his wife and their two little boys lying mangled in the courtyard.  After that, the place seemed no longer worth defending.  He stayed long enough to shoot three of the murderers, then abandoned his patrimony and went to work for other men.  It was during this period that Mark had known him.  Now he possessed his own house again and some land; acted as agent for most of the planters on the Pacific coast of Oaxaca state; recruited their labour for them in the mountain villages, and was the only man the Indians trusted, the only one who didn't try to swindle theme.  Recently, however, there had been trouble.  Don Jorge had gone into politics, become the leader of a party, made enemies and hardly less dangerous friends.  He was in opposition now; the state governor was persecuting him and his allies.  A bad man, according to Don Jorge; corrupt, unjust – unpopular too.  It shouldn't be difficult to get rid of him.  Some of the troops would certainly come over.  But before he started, Don Jorge wanted to know if there was any prospect of Mark's being in the neighbourhood of Oaxaca in the immediate future.

      'Poor old Jorge!  He had a most touching belief in the soundness of my judgement.'  Mark laughed.  Thus to understate Don Jorge's faith in him, thus to withhold the reasons of that faith, sent a glow of satisfaction running through his body.  He might have told Anthony of that occasion when the old ass had gone and let himself be caught by bandits, and of the way he had been rescued.  And good story, and creditable to himself.  But not to tell it gave him more pleasure than telling it would have done.  'True, it's better than his judgement,' Mark went on.  'But that isn't saying much.  Don Jorge's brave – brave as a lion; but foolhardly.  No sense of reality.  He'll make a mess of his coup d'état.'

      'Unless you are there to help him, I take it.  And do you propose to be there?'

      Mark nodded.  'I've written him that I'll start as soon as I can settle my affairs in England.  It occurred to me that you …' Again he left the sentence unfinished and looked enquiringly at Anthony.

      'Do you think it's a good cause?' Anthony asked at last.

      The other laughed.  'As good as any other Mexican politician's cause,' he answered.

      'Is that good enough?'

      'For my purpose.  And anyhow, what is a good cause?  Tyranny under commissars, tyranny under Gauleiters – it doesn't seem to make much difference.  A drill-sergeant is always a drill-sergeant, whatever the colour of his shirt.'

      'Revolution for revolution's sake, then?'

      'No, for mine.  For the sake of every man who takes part in the thing.  For every man can get as much fun out of it as I can.'

      'I expect it would be good for me,' Anthony brought out after a pause.'

      'I'm sure it would be.'

      'Though I'm devilishly frightened – even at this distance.'

      'That'll make it all the more interesting.'

      Anthony drew a deep breath.  'All right,' he said at last.  'I'll come with you.'  Then vehemently, 'It's the most stupid, senseless idea I've ever heard of,' he concluded.  'So, as I've always been so clever and sensible …' He broke off and, laughing, reached for his pipe and the tin of tobacco.