Kingsley Amis - Lucky Jim (Penguin Classics)

'That's what I'd like to know.'

'How do you mean?'

'You know how I mean, Jim, unless you go about with your eyes shut. And you don't do that, do you? No, I'm sick and tired of being pushed around. I don't mind telling you this, because I know you. I do know you, don't I? In fact, I've got to tell someone, so I pick you. You don't mind?'

It was having to dance again, and so soon, that Dixon minded, not hearing what Carol wanted to say, which promised to be at least interesting. 'You go ahead,' he said encouragingly, looking round to see who was dancing near them. The floor seemed fuller than ever of jigging, lurching couples, who every few seconds lurched all one way together, bearing one another along like a crowd that knows a baton-charge is imminent. The noise was enormous; every time it rose to a maximum Dixon felt sweat start out on his chest as if it were being physically squeezed out of him. Above eye-level, the painted Pharaohs and Caesars seemed themselves to be twisting and toppling.

'He thinks he's only got to crook his bloody finger and I'll come running,' Carol announced in a shout. 'Well, he's mistaken.'

It was on the tip of Dixon's tongue to tell Carol not to think she was fooling anyone by talking and behaving so much more drunkenly than she was in fact feeling, but he didn't, guessing that she needed some sort of mask and knowing by experience that this was a much more efficient one than drunkenness itself. He only said: 'Bertrand?'

'That's the fellow; the painter, you know. The great painter. Of course, he knows he isn't great really, and that's what makes him behave like this. Great artists always have a lot of women, so if he can have a lot of women that makes him a great artist, never mind what his pictures are like. You're familiar with the argument. And with the fallacy too, no doubt. Undistributed how-d'you-call. Well, you can guess who the women are in this case. Me and the girl you've got your eye on.'

Dixon started insincerely; the charge was quite unfounded, but at the same time it managed in some unscrupulous way to be well-founded too.' What the hell are you talking about?'

'Don't waste time like this, Jim. What are you going to do about it, anyway?'

'About what?'

She dug her nails into the back of his hand. 'Stop doing that. What are you doing about Christine Callaghan?'

'Nothing, of course. What can I do?'

'If you don't know what to do I can't show you, as the actress said to the bishop. Worried about what dear Margaret would do?'

'Look, do cut it out, Carol. You're supposed to be telling me something, not cross-questioning me.'

'I thought so. And don't worry; it's all connected, all connected. No, you let dear Margaret stew in her own juice. I've met people like that before, old boy, and believe me, it's the only way, only thing to do. Throw her a lifebelt and she'll pull you under. Take it from me.' She nodded, her eyes half-dosed.

'What do you want to tell me, Carol? if anything.'

'Oh, I've got plenty to tell, plenty. You knew he was bringing me to this hop originally?'

'Yes, I had gathered that.'

'Dear Margaret again, no doubt. Well, then he ditches me so that he can bring his new piece and her uncle, and pairs me off with the uncle. Not that I minded that after a bit, because I think old Julius and I have got a lot in common. We started to, anyway, until dear Margaret decided she could make sweeter music with old Julius than I could. I'm using her vocabulary, you understand; not mine.'

'Yes, I understand very well, thanks.'

At this point they both heeled over sharply in the crowd, but he heard her say: 'None of your Galsworthy dialogue here, please, Jim. Can't we go and sit down for a bit? This is a bit too much like a C. and A. sale for me.'

'All right.'

They made their way effortfully towards the Carthaginians, under whom they found two vacant chairs against the wall. As soon as they were seated, Carol leaned vivaciously over to Dixon, so that their knees were touching. Her face was in shadow, and seen so it had a romantic bloom. 'I suppose you've guessed I've been sleeping with our friend the painter, haven't you?'

'No, I hadn't.' He began to feel frightened.

'That's good; I shouldn't like it to be generally known.'

'I won't tell anybody.'

'That's the spirit. Especially not dear Margaret, eh?'

'Of course not.'

'Good. Rather a surprise, isn't it?'

'Yes, it is.'

'You're a bit shocked, aren't you?'

'Well, no, not that exactly. Not in the ordinary way, that is. It's just that he seems such a queer fish for you to have gone for in that way.'

'Not so queer as all that. His determination's rather a good thing about him, you know. And he's very attractive in his way.'

'Is he?' Dixon's mouth tightened.

'And, well, old Cecil isn't much of a boy for that kind of business, as you can imagine. We've more or less packed it in, that side of things. The trouble is that I still quite like it.'

'And so does Bertrand, eh?'

'Of course, the thing's been dragging on for some time now. We'd been getting rather fed-up. Bertrand was always in London hopping into bed with people, the Loosmore girl chiefly, and I'd been getting sick of his line about being a great artist and so on. Then it flared up again the last time he was down. I think perhaps Christine wasn't coming up to scratch, or not quickly enough, possibly.'

'Oh, then you don't think they've?'

'Hard to say. I should think not, on the whole. She doesn't seem the type, really; at least, she doesn't talk or behave like it, though she does look it in a way. It depends how deep that prim, prissy look of hers goes. Still, the point is that he gets me all lined up for the Ball, with a hint of other things to follow, and then tells me he's not taking me after all in front of that mother of his, and in front of dear Margaret too. That's what annoyed me in the first place. Then he starts trying to conciliate me in front of Christine this evening. That got me down again. Then he takes me in here for a dance and tries to laugh the whole thing off by treating me man-to-man and telling me I know what little girls like Christine are like and how I'm not the sort of person he's always taken me for if I let that sort of thing interfere in a friendship note that between two adults note that too. Oh, I know I oughtn't to be taking it like this, but Honestly, Jim, it does get you down, the whole thing. I feel so fed-up with it all. I don't even want to bash his brains out any more.'

Dixon had been studying her face during this speech. The movements of her mouth were beautifully decisive, and her voice, abandoning its synthetic fuzziness, had returned to its usual clarity. These things helped to give her presence a solidity and emphasis that impressed him; he felt not so much her sexual attraction as the power of her femaleness. It was just as well that her married status put her beyond his ambition, since even their friendship demanded reserves of an attention, of a sort of mental and emotional integrity he wasn't sure he really possessed. After a short pause he said hurriedly: 'How have you managed to keep all this out of Cecil's way?'

'You don't think I haven't told him all about it, do you? I wouldn't dream of doing anything behind his back.'

Dixon fell silent again, reflecting, not for the first time, that he knew absolutely nothing whatsoever about other people or their lives. Then Carol's face moved out of the shadow. Though quick to detect a change in expression, he wasn't usually observant of the actual lineaments of people's faces, but this time he saw clearly that the outline of her lips was slightly blurred and there were two well-marked lines in her cheeks. When she spoke again he noticed something else: that the whiteness and regularity of her top teeth gave place to a black gap beyond the canines. He felt uncomfortable again.