The Heart Of The Matter

for matins. On the other side of Bond street, in the windows of the High School, sat the young negresses in dark-blue gym smocks engaged on, the

anion has moved to Stormy. Below him the black clerks moved churchward, but their wives in brilliant afternoon dresses of blue and cerise aroused no interest in Wilson. He was alone on the balcony except for one bearded Indian in a turban who had already tried to tell his fortune: this was n

rhyme: ‘Captain want jig jig, my sister pretty girl school-teacher, cap-tain want jig jig.’ The bearded Indian frowned over intricate calculations on the back of an envelope - a horoscope, the cost of living? When Wilson looked do

companied him wherever he went, but it was taken at night in small doses - a finger of Longfellow, Macaulay, Mangan: ‘Go on to tell how, with genius wasted, Betrayed in friendship, befooled in love ...’ His taste was romantic. For public exhibition he had his Wa

a voice said, ‘a

man in the inevitable khaki shorts

es, tha

oin you? My n

ighted, M

e new accountan

’s me. Hav

h if you don’t mind. Can’t dr

aps you would tell your friend, Mr Harris, of my talents. Perhaps he would like to read my letters o

it, you old scoun

ou know my name

a cable censor,’ Harris sai

fortune has chan-ged considerably. If you woul

at it, G

e bathroom?’

suppose it’s the only pri-vate room av

een her

teen blood

oing ho

hen I do get home you’ll never see me here again.’ He lowered his voice and said with venom over his lemon

boy seems

Indians and they rule the coast Clerks in the stores, city council, magistrates, law-yers - my God. It’s all right up in the Protectorate. I haven’t anything to say again

t attached to the squat grey-haired man walking alone up Bond Street. He couldn’t tell that this was one of those oc-casions a man never forgets: a small cicatrice had been made on the memory, a

much,’ Harris said,

at the poli

force. A lost thing will they

sun-drowned street. Scobie stopped and had a word with a black man in a w

ay of the Syrians too i

The Sy

dians, Africans, real Indians, Syrians, Englishmen, Scotsmen in th

do the Sy

stores up country and most of th

ose there’s

rmans pay a

t he got a

She’s the city intellectual. She likes art, poetry. Got up an exhibition of arts for the shipwrecked seamen. You know the kind of thi

nk I will,’

ents were sent home, yellow and nervy, and others took their place - Colonial Secretaries, Secretaries of Agriculture, Treasurers and Directors of Public Works. He watched their temperature charts every one - the first outbreak of unreasonable temp

the human being rattled in the corridors like a dry kernel. No one could have been adequate to so rhetorical a conception. But the idea in any case was only one room deep. In the dark narrow passage behind, in the charge-room and the cells, Scobie could always detect

than this. There had been a photograph of his wife, bright leather cushions from the market an easy-chair, a large coloured map of the port on the wall. The map had been bor-rowed by younger men: it was of no more use to him; he carried the whole coastline of the colony in his mind’s eye: from Kufa Bay to Medley was his beat. As for the cushions and the easy-chair, he had soon discovered how comfort of that kind down in the airless town meant heat. Where the body was touched or enclosed it sweated. Last of all his wife’s photograph had been made unnecessary by her presence. She had joined him the f

almost immediately his Mende sergeant c

ything t

ssioner want to

ng on the ch

men fight in t

ammy tr

‘Yes,

nything

ll her you was at church and she got to come back

Wilberforce is

, sah. She come fr

after the Commissioner.

ery goo

didn’t look twice: he caught only the vague impression of a young black African face, a bright cotton frock, and then she was

ad served in the colony. The Commissioner with twenty-two years’ service was the oldest man there, just as the

bie,’ the Commissioner

‘I

ppose ever

rd the men tal

econd man I’ve told. Do the

aid, ‘They kn

do noth-ing more than I have done, Scobie. You are a wond

think I’m as j

nding a man called Baker from Gambia. He’s younger than y

t to stay,’

wife won’

better, better climate, better pay, better position. She would have taken every opening for improvement: she would have steered agilely up the ladders and left the snakes alone. I’ve landed her her

eve you do.

in the evening,’ S

t story they are using agai

se I’m in the

ou steep with black girls. You know what it is, Scobie, you ough

ith a black girl Then they won’t

hered anyone. They thought up some-thing different for him. They said he drank secret

tant Colonial Secreta

all right’ The Commissioner laughed. ‘You’re

ere bare: they stood side by side like casts in a museum: they didn’t belon

‘Yes,

on’t live h

live in Shar

ubbers, a broken rosary - no pencil. ‘What’s the trouble, Miss Wilberforce?’ His eye caught a snapshot of a bathing party at Medley Beach: his wife, the Colonial Secre-tary’s wife, the Director

night She come in when it was dark, and she pull down all t

got plenty

nly thr

r or stolen from an employer, a bed made out of old packing-cases, and a hurricane lamp. The glass of these lamps did not long survive, and the little open flames were always ready to catch some spilt paraffin; they licked at the plywood partitions and caused innumerable fires. Sometimes a landlady would thrust

rl sharply, ‘she say you make plenty tro

sir. No la

alaver, eh? Y

‘No,

Why you not call Corpor

landlady’s b

he? Same fathe

sir. Sam

the partitions would go up again, nobody would hear any more about the chest, and se-veral policemen would be a shilling or two the richer. At the beginning of his service Scobie had flung himself into these investigations; he had found himself over and over again in the position of a partisan, supporting as he believed the poor and innocent tenant against the wealthy and guilty house-owner. But he soon discovered that the guilt and innocence were as relative as the wealth. The wronged tenant turned out to be also the wealthy capitalist, making a profit of five shillings a week on a single room, living rent free herself. A

eg for something he hadn’t the power to grant, or they would shriek and fight and abuse to get served in a store before their neighbour. He thought: how beautiful she is. It was strange to think that fifteen years ago he would not have noticed her beauty - the small high breasts, th

hank yo

t.’ He smiled. ‘Try t

ut of the dark office li

of reclaimed swamp which would return to swamp as soon as the nuns set in. From the windows he looked directly out to sea over a line of Creole houses; on the other side of the road lorries backed and churned in a military transport camp and vultures strolled like domestic turkeys in the regimental refuse. On the low ridge of hills be-h

a shed in the yard opposite the back door), yet it was his habit to cry her name, a habit he had formed in the days of anxiety and love. The less he needed Louise the more c

man in the curiously dated officer’s uniform of the last war: the Chief Justice’s wife whom for the moment she counted as her friend: their only child who had died at school in England three years ago - a little pious nine-year-old girl’s face in the white muslin of first communion: innumerable photographs of Louise herself, in groups with nursing sisters, with the Ad-miral’s party at Medley Beach, on a Yorkshire moor with Teddy Bromley and his wife. It was as if she were accumulat-ing evidence that she had friends like other people. He watch-ed her through the muslin net Her face had the ivory tinge of atabrine: her hair which had once been the colour of bot-tled honey was dark and stringy with sweat. These were the times of ugliness when he loved her, when pity a

ad ugly pleasant face of a Temne. His bare fe

ong with Missus

y humbug,’

oom reminding him of his responsibility. A fork fell on the floor and he watched Ali surreptitiously wipe it on his sleeve, watched him with affection. They had been together fifteen years - a year longer than his marriage - a long time to keep a servant He had been ‘small boy’ first then assistant steward in the days when one kept four servants, now he was plain s

d, and Scobie rose at once.

d the impression of a joint under a meat-cover. But pity trod on the heels

aid, ‘Mrs Cas

make anyone il

een telling m

f unhappiness for another time. Noth-ing was ever lost by delay. He had a dim idea that pe

ssioner’s retiring, and

nd talks too mu

Is it

t for weeks. It doesn’t

never be able to show my

d as that. These thi

resign, won’t

think I can

ys everyone’s talking about it and saying things. Dar

‘No,

the end. It’s so mean of them, Ticki. You can’t

weat started where their skins touched. He said, ‘I do think of you, dear. But I’ve been fifteen years in this place. I’d

e could

sion isn’t mu

ience,’ Louise said, gazing through the white muslin tent as far as her dressing-table: there another face in white

you. There haven’t been many sinkings that

to retire too. You used to count the

l, one chang

y, ‘You didn’t think you

st hers. ‘What nonsense you talk, dear.

e anyone, Ticki,

i. Of course I love him too. But not you,’ he ran on with worn

d Ali’s

he got a

ers, haven’t they? Why di

orning on duty, d

ed it. You haven’t got muc

for both of us, dear.

st became a Catholic to marry me. It

and eat a bit Then you want to take the car

he said, staring out of her net, ‘if you’d come home

ant harbour - the Vichy French just across the border - all this diamond smuggling fro

dn’t thoug

reason. You can’t blam

es spoil everyth

s the younger

’ll come down and just p

ithdrew his hand: it was dripp

shouted ‘Ali’ out

‘Ma

o places. Mi

he iron roof and down again in me yard next door. Scobie drew a deep breath; he felt ex-hausted and victorious: he had persuaded Louise to pick a little

flower-like pink. It was the hour of content. Men who had left the port for ever would sometimes remember on a grey wet London evening the bloo

d back. He was just too late. The flower had withered upwards from the town; the white

f anybody will b

o be. It’s l

’s so hot in the car. I’ll

‘Will

t went on for a month

m, he could disregard every signal except the ship’s symbol and the SOS. He could even work better while she talked than when she was silent for so long as his ear-drum registered those tranquil sounds - the gossip of the club, comments on the ser

g round that the refrigerat

y Police in the exam-ination of passports, the searching of the suspects’ cabins: all the hard and disagreeable work was done by the F.S.P., in the hold, sifting sacks of rice for commercial diamonds, or in the heat of the kitchen, plunging the hand into tins of lard, dis-embowelling the stuffed turkeys. To try to find a few dia-monds in a liner of fifteen thousand tons was absurd: no malign tyrant in a fairy-st

half the books a

‘Did

ited for Louise to move, but she just sat there with a clen-ched fist showing in the switchboard light ‘Well, dear, here we are,

‘Know

ou’ve been p

Look at all the generals who’ve been passed over since

, ‘But they d

en the blacks had slashed his tyres and written insults on his car. ‘Dear, how absurd you are. I’ve never known anyone with so m

‘ just waiting for me to walk in ... I never wa

ient powder lying like snow in the ridges of the knuckles. ‘Oh, Ticki, Ticki,’ she said, ‘you won’t leave me ever, will you? I haven’t got any

ct of conversation. ‘Goody, goody,’ Mrs Halifax called to them, ‘the new Clemence Dane’s arrived.’ She was the most inoffensive woman in the station; she had long untidy hair, and one found hairpins inside the library books where she had marked her

ing, ‘not a railway refreshment-room.’ Ever since Fellowes had snatched his house, Scobie had done his best to like the man - it was one of the rules by which he set his life, to be a good loser. But sometimes he found it very

the trouble?’

ad in his time been completely exclusive, who had in fact excluded from his solitary table in the Protectora

s so,’ sai

norary member. Sooner or later they would begin to bring in undesirables. I’m not a snob, but in a

’s the trouble

her day we had a private brought in. The army can be democratic if it likes, but not at our exp

’ Brigstock said, sw

w what it was all

n called Wilson, and this man Wilson wants to join the c

t’s wrong

He can join the club in Sharp Town. W

’s not function

range of the night. The fireflies signalled to and fro along the edge of the hill and the lamp of a patrol-boat m

s Wilson?’ Sc

The poor devil looks lonely.

and trickled like plaster. He had obviously bought his tropical suit from a shipper who had worked off on him an unwanted line:

that’s me,’

f Assistant Col. Sec. This is S

Scobie, in his whole attitude: he stood there waiting for people to be friendly or unfriendly - he didn’t seem to expec

e a drink

’t mind if

’ Scobie said. ‘Louis

about Mr Wilson already

obie said. ‘You’re a man from the town an

s doing anything wrong.

ust make an appoint-ment with Cooper. I

bout the library,’ Wilson sai

It was always a bit of a toss-up with Louise. Sometimes she could be the worst snob in the station, and it occurred to hi

is thin moustache, ‘well...’ It was as if he were gathe

ve stories?’

stories,’ Wilson said uneas

,’ Louise said,

from his moustache, and something in his dog-like look of gratitude and

poetry myself

ening was not spoilt: she would come home happy, go to bed happy. During one night a mood

o in. They were enjoying themselves, and they would not want a senior officer with them. ‘Infernal cheek,’ Tod was saying. They were probably talking about poor Wilson. Then befo

e. The fingers that wiped it free shook like a drunkard’s. He told himself: Be careful. This isn’t a climate for emotion. It’s a climate for meanness, malice, snobbery, but anything

he said to someone who l

bad, Scobie.

ry of the world padding up like wolves around her. They wouldn’t even let her enjoy her books, he thought, and his hand began to shake again. Approachin

n said. ‘Just ring us

nated others. Sometimes he longed to warn her - don’t wear that dress, don’t say that again, as a mother might teach a daugh-ter, but he had to remain silent, aching with the foreknow-ledge of her loss of friends. The worst was when he de

them and said, ‘My dear, I’v

‘Alre

‘I’m

dear. Mrs Halifax

h you’d com

the beats? It’s ag

they were happy. But nobody that mattered saw - Mrs Halifax was busy with the books, Reith had gone long ago, Brigstock was in the bar, Fellowes talked too busily to Mrs Castle to no-ti

home to the Bedford. I shan’t be late.’ He put a hand on Wilson’s shoulder and prayed silently: Don’t let her pat-ronize him too far:

very kind o

u’re not a policeman, Wilson

usef sleeping quietly in the back: the light from Scobie’s car lit up the large pasty face, the lick of his white hair falling over the forehead, and just touc

flashed instantaneously like a torch. If Fellowes drives by now, what a story, Scobie thought. The deputy-commissioner meeting

Yusef said, ‘a friend in

do anythin

ef said. ‘The cars have gone by, and I have t

pare oil to pour into

is very good. But if you would

nto the Morris, easing a lar

had better come

nly way he can get to bed.’ He folded his large fat hands over his knee and said, ‘

red and fifty,

d pay you fo

sale, Yusef. Where

, but maybe w

’m not

d that you were resi

‘

r so much - but all of i

ow’s bu

not bad.

made several fortunes since the w

it. My store in Macaulay Street - that does not bad because my sister is there. But my store? in Durban Street and Bond

keep all your stocks in al

me awake at night, Major Scobie. Unless I take a lot of whisky I k

shall I drop

ie. My house in Sharp Town, if you please.

. I’m on du

give me this lift. Would you let me show my g

at I wouldn’t

ard, all this gossip. Just be-cause

allit out of your way,

would be for my good, but it

of those fake diamonds

ne like that. Some of the poor Syrians suffered a great deal over those diam

by buying diamonds. Some of them even h

very ignorant

s ignorant as all t

it was Tallit. Otherwise, why does

in black bodies weaved like daddy-long-legs in the dimmed

uch about that as I

devils can’t get rice

n’t get their share of the free distribution

the car to avoid a dead pye-dog, do I love this place so much? Is it because here human nature hasn’t had time to disguise itself? Nobody here could ever talk about a heaven on earth. Heaven remained rigidly in its proper place on the other side of death, and on this side flourished the in-justices, the cruelties, the meanness

be friends together. That is what I sho

to light him in. ‘Major Scobie,’ Yusef said, ‘it would give me such pleasure to give y

tons against a Vichy invasion, isn’t it? T

an?a is in tomo

‘Prob

-man reports where you looked. You will sift all the sugar in the hold. You will search the lard in the kitchens because someone once told Captain Druce that a diamond can be heate

‘

don’t

tles. He stood quietly for a while breathing in the heavy smell of the sea. Within half a mile of him a whole convoy lay at anchor, but all he could detect were the long shadow of the depot ship and a scatter of small red light

em pigs and ate them roasted; the name helped to distinguish them from the wharf rats, who were a human breed. Walking

ything t

‘No,

n along t

sah, we just c

of sixteen or so, armed with razors or bits of broken bottle, they swarmed in groups around the warehouses, pilfering if they found an easily-opened case, settling like flies around any drunken sailor who stumbl

obie said, ‘we’ll

from one side to another, lighting the abandoned chassis of a car, an empty truck, the corner of a tarpaulin, a bottle standing at the corner of a warehouse with palm leaves stuffed in for a cork. Scobie said, ‘What’s that?’ One of his official nightmares was an incendiary bom

aid, but neither of the po

ne, sah,’ one of them sa

om the bottle moved him with nausea, and he felt his fingers polluted by the palm leaves. He threw the bottle over the wharf, and the hungry mouth of the water received it with a single belch, but the contents were scattered on the air, and the whole windless place smelt sour and ammoniac. The policemen were sile

s heel. He had not gone twenty yards before he heard the

sitting along the pavement taking a bit of air. Within the police sta-tion behind the black-out blinds the scent of a monke

ything t

isorderly, sah. I lock

nything

chmen, sah, wi

‘Bl

‘Yes,

re were t

Pitt Stre

about the launch? Is it running all right

raser he try to mend it, sah

does Mr Fraser

Seven,

o the Esperan?a. I’m going out myself. If th

‘Yes,

character: out of revenge grew forgiveness. He began to whistle, driving back through Km Town. He was almost happy: he only needed to be quite certain that noth

like a shabby man, when he thought of Fraser’s disappoint-ment in the morning - no Portuguese visit, no present for his best girl, only the hot humdrum office day. Feeling for the handle of the back door to avoid flashing his torch, he tore his right hand on a splinter. He came into the lighted roo

of water.’ Half-way upstairs he heard the voice resume. Louise said, ‘A lovely poem about a pylon.’ Scobie walked

le to do little with this room: the bath of scratched enamel with a single tap which always ceased to work before the end of the dry season: the tin bucket under the lavatory seat emptied once a day: the f

carried from house to house. It had been like this years ago in his first

xplained. He held his hand out over the washbasin, while Ali poured the water over the wound. The boy made gentle clucking sounds of commisera

an hour. ‘Again,’ he said, ‘pour it over,’ wincing at the sting. Down below out of the swing o

said, ‘no. Ba

go he had taught Ali to bandage: now h

li. Go to bed. I sh

ssus wan

ence would embarrass Wilson. A man couldn’t listen to a woman reading poetry in the presence of an outsider. ‘I had rather be a kitten and cry mew ...’ but that wasn’t really his attitude. He did not despise:

p the stairs, ‘are you all righ

n walk, Mr

‘Nons

Yes, r

said. ‘Does it hurt?’ She was not afraid of the clean white bandage: it was like a patient in a hospital with the sheets drawn tidily up to the chin. One c

ite all right

ly, sir. I

ou won’t walk. Co

ly. I can’t thank you enough.’ The words vibrated with sincerity: it gave them the sound of a foreign language - the sound of English spoken in England. He

s they drove down the Burnside road towards the

herever they touched - if it were only a finger lying against a finger -sweat started. Even when they were separated the heat trem-bled between them. The moonlight lay on

secret. Sick at heart, knowing what he would find, he moved his fingers down until they touched her lids. She was crying. He felt an enormous tiredn

se the idea oc-curred to him that it was two o’clock: this might go on for hours, and at six the day’s work be

right,’ she said

l Ticki.’ He hated the name she had given him, but it a

ht you were h

py because a U.A.C. clerk was nice t

t’s just the heat: it makes you

peated with despair and sh

lson’s a

with the dentist They’ll be laughing about him and me.

’ staring out through the net and through the w

til you have leave. Ticki, you’ll be retirin

nerves twitching and straining: he always prayed that death would come first He had prepared his life insurance in that hope: it was payable only on death. He thought of a home, a permanent ho

can’t bear it a

e to figure it

Africa, and the Collinses. We’v

rices a

Ticki. And, Ticki, you could economize here without me. You

doesn’t c

little hel

miss you

ed him by the range of her sad spasmodic understandin

k something out You know if it’s possi

the morning comfort, Ticki, i

red carrier who has slipped his load. She was asleep before he had finished his sentence, clutching one

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