The Search (9 page)

Twelve

I
T OCCURRED TO
him the following day that perhaps the best thing he might do was to advertise for his brother and the most convenient way of doing that was to ask for an interview on the local radio. A few weeks before, he would not have done this, for he would have considered it too public and shameful an airing of his private affairs. Nor did he know how the other lecturers and professors would react to such a naked appeal. As soon as the idea occurred to him he picked up the phone and rang the local radio station, stating what he wanted. There was a long pause and then the girl at the other end said,

“I don't see why not. We are doing a programme on the theme of exile. There are many Irish and Scots in Australia. Your appeal would fit in nicely if you linked it in some way with that theme.”

“When could I do it?” Trevor asked impatiently.

“Let's see. There's actually no reason why you can't come down and record it any time. For that matter you can come this afternoon.”

“I'll do that.” It seemed to him that he was making a fair demand rather than asking for a favour. He put the phone down and stared round him at the sparsely furnished room, withdrawing more and more into his surroundings, fearing that his guilt was staining them irrevocably. He went to the cupboard and poured himself a whisky. After he had finished it he had another one. Then he glanced at the sheaves of notes which he had been assembling for his lecture on Robert Louis Stevenson but they seemed irrelevant and useless. He thought again of phoning Sheila but decided against it, nor did he write a letter or a postcard. After a while he lay down on the bed and stared up at the ceiling. He was angry at Douglas for continually lying to him and deceiving him but considered also that there was an exact inevitability about how events had turned out. Douglas however shouldn't have told him that his brother was dead without overwhelming proof. Such a statement was unforgivable, but on the other hand he thought he now understood Douglas's psychology. Having been embittered by his own life, he had tried to make a more successful man than himself miserable.

He didn't have any lunch and at two o'clock in the afternoon he was in the radio station. He was met by a girl and boy: the girl was small and dark-haired, and the boy had a tentative sprouting of hair on his chin. The two apologized for their sparse knowledge of technicalities and told him that they would prefer the interview to be done in one complete block so that they wouldn't have to splice tapes. He sat in a chair between them and stared at the microphone. He had no idea what he was going to say. Normally when he did radio programmes, though in fact he hadn't taken part in many, he liked to be well prepared, but he didn't care now whether he sounded witty or inane.

There was a brief and rather rambling discussion about the best way to handle the programme. He listened to himself taking part in the discussion but wasn't particularly interested; he was so naked and defenceless that he didn't care what anyone thought of him.

They suggested that they do a follow-up on what he had been saying about himself on the previous programme he had done with them.

“I don't mind,” he said.

As the green light flashed on, the boy said, “Recently we were talking to you about your interest in Scottish literature: and we noticed that some of the interview dealt with the theme of exile. Would you like to comment further on this?”

“Yes,” he said, and his mind felt extraordinarily clear and sure of itself. “At the time I was doing the interview I forgot to mention that I had a brother who came here about twenty years ago and who may be considered an exile.”

“Oh?” said the girl in an interested voice.

“Yes,” Trevor continued. “He left home at the age of twenty-one. I haven't seen him since. But recently I had an extraordinary experience. As a result of the last programme I did I had a phone call from a person who was at that time unknown to me and he told me that he knew my brother and had actually met him. He said he was probably an alcoholic.” The word came out quite easily for he no longer cared what he admitted.

“This man told me that my brother might also have been in prison or that he might even be dead. I went to Sydney and discovered that he wasn't dead and I came back here and got in touch with this man again.”

“So in fact you know very little about him,” said the boy who, Trevor thought, was looking at him with a new respect because of the frank way in which he talked about his brother. “Why did he leave Britain in the first place? Why did he come to Australia?”

“It's a long complicated story. Essentially, however, it goes like this. While he was doing his National Service — I don't think you have anything like that here, though I believe you had compulsory military service at the time of Vietnam — his girl friend and myself were thrown into each other's company. When he came home we told him about it. Incidentally we are now married. He left Scotland because there was nothing much for him there. That's one reason for exile,” he remarked ironically.

And then, “I suppose if I were a poet I could write a poem about it all, for that is what we do in art, explain the pain of others or our own.” The girl and the boy were now looking at him with deference and excitement as if they realized
they had an interesting human story on their hands. Trevor continued in the same dead, even voice, “I find now that art doesn't help in a situation like this. What I wish to do is get in touch with my brother: nothing else matters to me. The time comes when we see the inadequacy of literature.”

“And you think,” said the girl sympathetically, “that he is unemployed and perhaps an alcoholic?”

“I think that might be so. Almost certainly so.”

“And you have no idea where he is?”

The boy looked impatiently at the girl and said, to Trevor, “How does this connect with the theme of exile? You talk about art almost contemptuously.”

“Yes, I do. It's difficult to explain. What is it to be an exile? Is it not to arrive in another country and learn the language of its stones? Why is it that when you study the names of places in a new country so many of them are derived from the old? It is as if the exiles arrived here and wished to surround themselves with familiar names as a child surrounds itself with toys in the night. Before the darkness comes down. Why is it that when you look at your early poets you find so many of them were alcoholics or bitter failures? Think of Lawson, for instance. Is it not the case that they were trying to build art in a rootless land? I can imagine my brother being in the same position, though he is not an artist. I must say that he is an ordinary person, no, I take that back, no person is ordinary. But I imagine him as an exile who was destroyed by this land. For all I know he may be dead somewhere. What would my job be if I were an exile? It would be to write calmly and coolly about the fact of exile. But if I were a true exile I might not be able to write at all.”

“What exactly do you mean by that?” said the boy who was now leaning towards him.

“I mean that if you are a true exile, lost in a strange land, no art is possible, at least at the beginning. Art is the excess of comfort.” The words sounded hollow and bitter in the small, cramped studio. “Where the heart and mind are not concerned, at their very deepest, there may be no art. It takes a long time to colonize the stones. I have been leading a privileged life since I came here.”

“So what you want to do is get in touch with him?”

“Yes, that is what I want to do.”

“But surely the circumstances you have just outlined are not the only reason for exile,” said the boy insistently.

“No, they are not. Some, I suppose, exile themselves from a sense of adventure and a feeling of boredom. To arrive at a harmony with new surroundings is not easy. It requires that one day you see these familiar names as belonging really to the new country. One morning you wake up and find that the names are not ancient phantoms at all but real places. With real people. There will be some kind of revelation.”

“Have you felt any of this yourself since you came to Australia?”

“No. I don't know. I don't think so. I want to return to the familiar darkness where I was brought up. I suppose as far as an artist is concerned he is the laureate of his own stones or nothing. For myself, I have no language for Australia.”

“But you think a language may be possible?” said the boy.

“Of course. Some day it will happen. Some day the language will spring naturally from the stones. The words will be like the dew that one sees on the flowers and leaves of one's own land. At the moment one hears the laughter from the birds but later there will be harmony.”

He felt suddenly as if he was going to be sick from talking too much, and ended. “At the moment all I want is to find my brother.”

“Thank you,” said the girl, but the boy was staring at him as if he had wanted him to continue, to say more about language and exile.

“That was fine,” said the girl, “that will fit perfectly into our theme. It was very powerful.”

“Thank you,” said Trevor. “And now I'd like to go back to the college. Do you think the broadcast will help me to find him?”

“It might,” said the girl.

“Good God,” said Trevor suddenly. “We didn't even mention his name.”

“That's all right. We can put that in at the end. What was his name?” She sat at the desk, pen poised.

For a moment of blind terror Trevor couldn't remember his name and then he said, “His name was Norman. Norman Grierson.”

“We can add that at the end,” said the girl again. “No worries.”

“Thank you,” said Trevor and left the studio. He walked back to the college among the colourful leaves. He thought that he must do something about his lecture on Stevenson but felt lifeless and dull. Stevenson had certainly understood and seen his own land more clearly from the perspective of exile, but his brother was not Stevenson, nor was he himself.

When he got back he drank some more whisky while at the same time trying in a desultory manner to add to his notes on Stevenson. But when he looked out of the window at the trees and the cockatoos and the pond with the leisurely goldfish he couldn't abide where he was. He felt that he ought to move out of his sheltered room and find a
more exposed one, perhaps infested with fleas. He wished to be punished by all the exiles who were weighing him down with their sadness, their gaunt open mouths. He was troubled by the ghostly sorrow of the trees, by their whiteness, by their hanging fragments of bark.

He stared down at the garden on which the darkness was falling quickly as it always did in Australia. Restlessly he left the room and walking down-town wandered about the shut shops. As he stood at a crossing he saw a parade of people with shaven heads and white cloaks walking by, ringing bells and chanting in unison. They were smiling and happy as they swayed along, as if joyful to be the centre of attraction to an admiring crowd. He felt again as if aslant to the universe. What was he doing here? What did he have in common with these shaven, chanting men whose concerns were so unimaginably different from his own?

He turned away and as he did so he met a boy who said to him, “Could you give me a dollar? I haven't eaten all day.” For a moment it seemed to him that the boy had a Scottish accent. He put his hand in his pocket, fished out three dollars, and gave them to him. The boy thanked him profusely and then ran towards a café which was still open. After he had gone Trevor still stood there, listening to the alien chanting in the centre of the failing yellow light.

Thirteen

“I
LISTENED TO
your talk on the radio,” said Professor Hastie. “I thought it was a most interesting story.” Trevor looked at him in amazement: he had thought that the professor wouldn't mention the broadcast at all.

He felt light-headed, as he hadn't been sleeping very well. He liked this professor who was more youthful than the ones he had remembered from his own student days: indeed he liked all the people in the department except for one female lecturer who seemed cynical and embittered.

“That, I presume,” said Hastie, “is why you asked leave to go to Sydney?”

“Yes,” said Trevor.

The professor was a boyish-looking man who had taught originally in Cambridge and had just published a book about Hopkins. He seemed to be the sort of man who glowed with an easy success, and Trevor was angry when he compared him to his brother.

“I do hope you find him,” said the professor kindly. “Please excuse me. I have a seminar.”

And he glanced at his gold watch. “At eleven o'clock.”

Trevor picked up his notes and made his way to the lecture room. There were perhaps ten students there and he talked to them about “Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde” for an hour. It seemed to him that while he was talking he understood the story more clearly and that the figure of Hyde, murderous and unshaven, grew more and more sympathetic to him. When he had finished, all the students except one picked up their bags and books and left. He noticed that the one who remained behind was the one who had interviewed him on radio.

“My name's Thorn,” said the student. “We talked about your brother.”

“That's right,” said Trevor.

“We're having a meeting tonight,” said Thorn, “about Australia in general. I wondered if you would like to come along.”

“Where is it being held?” said Trevor, cramming his books and notes into an attaché case that Sheila had bought for him and which could be locked by means of a code.

“It's being held in the house of a friend of mine,” said Thorn. “He's unemployed. He thought you might be sympathetic.”

For the first time Trevor noticed that the boy stuttered a little, perhaps from nervousness.

“What's the point of holding a meeting about society?” he said.

“That's what we do,” said Thorn. “We're mostly students. We're not very experienced or organized.”

“I see,” said Trevor. He knew perfectly well what was happening. This boy considered that in the depths of his nature he was a protester and socialist, had sensed it to his own satisfaction.

“If you give me the address,” he said, “I will be there.” The boy eagerly handed him the address and departed. Trevor left the university and made his way down town. He selected a cool, dark bar, and ordered himself a whisky. Through the window he could see the bare-footed guitarist playing his energetic music.

He felt a profound change taking place in himself, as if he were a sea shifting in overwhelming freedom, and the world was tragically open to him. After he had finished his first whisky he bought another one. How perfectly mannered this city of academics and civil servants was. Professor Hastie had been so genuinely sincere and kind and yet at the same time had allowed himself to pour out a tiny, exquisite dose of friendship and sympathy and interest.

No answer had as yet come to his appeal on the radio, and he didn't really expect one. It was unlikely that Norman had ever been to Canberra, unlikely that he would be known by anyone there except Douglas, if indeed even he had known him. He passed along the arcade in a daze of confused anger. In a short while he would have to leave Australia and it appeared as if all his questions would remain unanswered. Sheila had gone to live with her mother while he was away. He didn't like her mother much and he didn't like any of her sisters. All of them would have been astounded and enraged that he had spoken so openly on the radio. But he didn't regret doing so. At last he was inspecting his life which stood like an abyss in front of him. He stared dully into his whisky glass.

When he returned to the college he lay on his bed listening to the music of the flute that wavered among the ivy-covered buildings. After a while it began to irritate him and he rose from the bed, on which he had been lying, and went in search of the musician. Eventually he found him in a room in a different block from his own. He was a young man, bearded and perplexed, who gazed apprehensively at him.

“Isn't it time you stopped practising that thing?” Trevor shouted at him. “You're getting on people's nerves.”

“I'm sorry, I didn't realize. I'm sorry,” said the young man.

“Well then,” said Trevor and walked away, feeling that he had done something decisive and important. In the old days he would never have done what he had just done. He thought that he could howl like a wolf. He looked down at his bare arms but they were as red as ever, showing no signs of losing their rawness. But in an odd sort of way he was proud of them, as if they were a guarantee of a more real world than the one he had hitherto inhabited, medals and ribbons from a war that he had successfully waged. When he woke up, after falling asleep on the bed, it was getting dark and he washed his face and prepared to go to the meeting. The towering blocks of the city rose into the sky, with
their red and green lights. He saw a plane descending toward the airfield and the moon was cold and white in the sky. He felt slightly dizzy as if from too much drink. He had to walk a long distance before he found the address which Thorn had given him. He knocked on the door and waited. At last a young man with a pony tail like a Red Indian came to the door and told him to come in.