Table of Contents

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  ALAN JUDD

  The Devil’s Own Work

  First published in 1991

  Winner of that year’s Guardian Fiction Award

  CHAPTER 1

  I had it, you see, from Edward himself; though not all at once and never, I am sure, all of it. I don’t suppose anyone could tell it all, except perhaps Eudoxie, and she was - is - part of the problem. The origins pre-date my marriage and Edward’s fame. I now regard that time as our first youth but it seemed to us then, fresh from university and in London, the time of entry into full estate. Nothing was impossible and nothing unimagined, except failure. In my case you could say that I was merely wrong but Edward’s is more complicated. He had every success an ambitious man could wish; it was the cost that got him.

  Of course, when he purchased that particular ticket he had no idea - which of us could have? - of what compound interest can mean, over a lifetime. I don’t suppose it even felt like a transaction, more another gift from a kindly Providence to add to his health, his looks, his charm, his winning disposition, his talent - his genius, it came to be called, but I at least am more cautious now. Everyone liked, even loved him, or perhaps I should say that no one disliked him and everyone felt drawn to him. I think I loved him, though what it was in him that I loved I am only now beginning to grapple with. I also envied and for a while hated him but my knowledge of the price he paid makes it impossible for those feelings to last. And there is a coldness that slows my blood at the thought that he might still be paying it.

  He had a flat in a Victorian house in Kennington, down one of those dirty Lambeth streets that for decades were described as ‘coming up’ but which never quite seemed to arrive. I shared a flat with two other teachers in a modern block not far away. Edward was not a teacher, of course; from the start, he was to be a great writer. He never actually said as much but the knowledge of it somehow spread around him like a personal aura so that no one ever thought of him as anything else. Perhaps we assumed that you became a great writer simply by being intent on it and by keeping at it until your greatness became apparent. Perhaps even Edward assumed it. After all, the intellectual world is credulous enough to take many of us at our own evaluations and people can become very successful just by believing in themselves and so persuading everyone else. I think Edward did believe in himself.

  He was lucky in that he had money from his father, so that while working on his first novel he didn’t have to get a regular job but could do freelance reviewing, which was as useful for getting his name known as for what it earned. In those days there was nothing to distinguish him from the shoals of Eng. Lit. graduates who feed off the scraps of London publishing and journalism. The more fortunate and determined grow into big enough fish to join the literati and become editors, columnists, presenters and, usually in a small way, writers. They think that being literary is a preliminary to writing good books, until time finds them out. But, after awhile, it became evident that there was some difference between Edward and the others. He did not seem to seek precisely what they sought, or as they sought. He was not a great attender of literary parties, did little to cultivate influential people, and once turned down the chance to write a trial television script, an act of apparent self-neglect that scandalized his acquaintances. Without actually saying so, he gave the impression of an integrity that needed preserving, of having higher aims in view, though I see now that it might simply have been higher strategy. He began to be spoken of as someone rather special, as if he were already an authority, though no one asked on what.

  Appearances helped, as nearly always. He was on the short side, well proportioned and with wavy blonde hair that marked him out from one end of a, street to the other. He had the regular good looks of the sort of male model who does summer casuals in open-top cars, usually by the sea or mountain lochs. There was a suggestion of ruggedness about him, almost of something soldier-like, but it was kept from crudity by the hint of contrivance. He had the posed nonchalance of the war correspondent rather than the matter-of-factness of the soldier. This selfconsciousness added to his charm because you had the feeling that what was on offer was something he had made himself, especially for you. It was his mouth and eyes, however, that really captivated. His feminine lips were beautifully shaped, his smile small and almost shy, and his eyes startlingly blue. They spoke of seas and skies, of friendship, of layers and depths, while all the time giving the appearance of being fascinated by whoever engaged him. Such eyes are a great advantage because dark eyes are less suggestive of shades of meaning. A dark gaze always seems to have a more inward intensity, self-focused or sometimes simply dazzling, rather than one that steps out to meet you and makes you feel special. When I first knew Edward I used to practice before a mirror, trying to get my own brown eyes to step out and respond as his did. But whereas his seemed to project his whole being upon you, mine showed only a baffled striving.

  I confess I played no part in Edward’s literary world and I probably had an exaggerated idea of his own place in it at that time. I taught English in a comprehensive school, an activity far removed from literary matters, and it pleased me to be able to say that I knew an author even if few had then heard of him. Apart from articles and reviews, he had at that time published nothing, though he had had a one-act play put on in the upstairs room of a pub. He worked away on his first novel but it seemed more likely that he would take the direct path into the literary establishment by seeking to become a literary editor on one of the major papers. These are the people with the widest powers of patronage, who sit on prize committees, decide how much review coverage a book gets, how much publicity its author is worth, get paid to talk on radio and television and become literary ‘figures’. It helps to be known to be working on a book but its appearance should ideally be delayed for some years until the name is well enough known to ensure good sales. These are the people who decide, in part, what becomes literary fashion and what is merely stuff to fill the British Library.

  I always thought Edward would become one of them, despite his seeming unwillingness to push himself. He was an incisive, quotable reviewer, personable, not short of ideas and looked right. Why he kept in touch with me while other university friends went adrift in his wake, I don’t know. We had never been particularly close. Perhaps it was out of habit formed through our proximity in Kennington; perhaps he liked now and again to talk to someone from outside his new world, or perhaps he wanted a disciple.

  Because I was certainly that. I was convinced he was on the threshold of great things and I felt privileged to know him. I dare say there was in the back of my mind some idea of myself as one of those who in later life are sought out by biographers and television interviewers. It didn’t matter to me that it was a pretty one-sided friendship; that was just the way of it. Every three weeks or so I would ring him. He rarely rang me and only once, I think, came to my flat, which was when he wanted to borrow my car. I would go round to his place for coffee, whisky and talk. Occasionally we would go out for a curry or a pizza. Edward was a careless eater, indifferent to what he ate, a scavenger who didn’t bother if he wasn’t hungry and when he was would eat anything, anywhere, at any time. The fridge in his flat was almost always empty apart from a carton of milk for his tea and coffee, a few pieces of sliced bread still in their wrapper and a scrap of New Zealand butter that stayed exactly as it was, I believe, throughout his years alone. He scavenged for his food. I remember his saying once that he was a scavenger of ideas, too, but I don’t recall whether that was before it all started.

  Yet he was very tidy and the flat was almost eerily clean. It was in a tall terraced house with a forbidding exterior and gloomy, unkempt common parts. He was on the ground floor and his main room overlooked the street. He had his desk facing the window, which he claimed not to find distracting because so little went on in the quiet street. I used to wonder whether it was really so that he could save on electricity, which is what the reason would have been in my case. The room itself was not at all how I had expected a writer’s room to be. Where one gets these ideas, I don’t know, but I remember expecting to find it littered with old books and pipes - though Edward did not then smoke - and furnished with worn leather armchairs, a large old desk, an open fire, an old-fashioned standard-lamp and some bit of exotica such as a skull or a parrot. Instead of which, the room was clinically white with a fitted beige carpet and adjustable metal bookshelves filled with new books. It was furnished with one metal-framed upright armchair, a desk and chair of the modern office sort, a small filing cabinet, a flexible table-lamp and two radiators. The fireplace was covered and there were no paintings. I never knew Edward to show any interest in music - except during a brief late period but that was not for the sake of the music - nor in painting, and he was never in the least discomforted by lack of decoration. I like to clutter a room. I fill space wherever I see it but he either didn’t notice or used positively to relish the emptiness. No doubt that added to the impression it gave of being a cold room. It was a cold that had nothing to do with temperature. A kind of patient, calculated waiting.

  It was in that room that it started, at least as far as I was concerned, although the origins were far away. I have tried to remember whether Edward gave any sign of having an inkling, whether he was, in fact, waiting; but I can recall nothing except one remark he made and that may have been coincidental. It was after he had turned down the television script and I had taxed him with neglect of his career. He swivelled in his typist’s chair to face me and smiled his small smile. The light was behind him and half his face was in shadow.

  ‘I don’t think my career is something I need pursue,’ he said. ‘It’s more a question of patience and recognition, of seizing the moment. Then it will pursue me.’

  That remained in my mind but it was only much later that I discovered I had remembered it. Edward had the reputation of being a brilliant talker yet he was far from voluble and I remember little of what he actually said. Others, I know, have found the same and it contributes to the increasingly unreal impression left by his career and reputation, an impression that affects even me. Conversely, I can always recall the exact timbre of his voice, the quiet and precise enunciation that lent such gravity to what he said that even when he used the same words as someone else they seemed to mean more. I don’t know that he really was wittier than other people but the way he spoke made it seem so. It was as if he put his words in inverted commas and so detached himself from them, reserving his position. I would tell others of Edward’s humour, yet I rarely laughed in his company, and he almost never in mine.

  His remark about his career I interpreted as meaning: hat it was a question of seeing and seizing the moment in. artistic terms. He published his first novel soon afterwards. and I remember he spoke about it as the time drew near. Normally he adhered to the wise practice of never discussing work in progress but one evening he was more unbuttoned:.-an usual and he described what he had tried and failed to do in the book. He was more self-critical than most writers and talked more of his failures; when, later, praise and prizes were bestowed upon him he would make only the odd remark such as, ‘It’s not as good as they say,’ or, ‘It’s not all it seems.’ But he talked at some length about that first book. He had, he said, tried to write a conscience-free novel; all novels involved the operation of conscience in one way or another and he had thought it ought to be possible to write one in which it played no part. Now, with the book about to be published, he had to admit that he had failed. He smiled as he said this and his smile had the curious effect of making the book seem immune to his own criticism, as if that particular failure were of little consequence. Conscience was implicit, he said, even in its lack, and that was why a conscience-free novel was as impossible as a conscience-free life. But he thought that other aspects of the book, notably its setting and story, were sufficiently strong for the real aim and failure to pass unnoticed. He was right. When it came out it was well reviewed and sales were above the norm for a first novel.

  It was on that same night that he gave me a signed pre-publication copy. I was delighted, but I would have found literature in a street atlas if Edward had written it. In fact, it is a good book and has stood the test of time. It is fresh, tells a story, has a balanced perspective and an intelligent voice; in my opinion, it is also strengthened by the very lack of that style for which Edward was to become so famous. He used to say then that the best style is the least noticeable because it so directs the reader’s attention to what is being written about that he is unaware of how the trick was done, or that there was a trick. I still believe that.

  Anyway, the book was more than good enough for me.

  I did not then read contemporary novels with the searching thoroughness that I do now but I think it compared pretty well with its peers. I was also flattered that he talked to me about his work at such length and it made me feel for him an affection he would not often permit, no matter how ready I might have been to give it. But there was something else. After he had handed me the book I sat in the tubular chair, turning the pages, while he remained at his desk, half facing me, the light still behind him. It was probably for only a few seconds that neither of us spoke, but quite suddenly the silence became oppressive. It changed with the rapidity of focus in a film and the effect on me was like one of those terrifying dreams from which you cannot free yourself; you lie, conscious and impotent, beneath a great weight of fear, your soul - if that’s what it is - fluttering like a stricken bird. I tried to speak and it seemed that for a long time I couldn’t, though it may have been almost no time at all. Finally I said how quiet it was, and felt my heart thumping in my chest as if I had escaped something.

  Edward replied without moving, ‘It’s why I live here.

  I can work only in silence.’

  That was all. There was nothing to it. There still isn’t, but I had cause to remember it later.

  I did not go to Edward’s publication party, though I was invited, because of Chantal. She was about the only reason in the world at that time that could have prevented me. She was the new French assistante at school and this was our first dinner. In fact, it was theatre followed by dinner. The play was one of those forgettable political message-bearers so beloved of the National Theatre at that time but it didn’t matter because it gave us something neutral through which we could show off ourselves and explore each other over dinner. Naturally, I found a way of mentioning Edward’s book and the publication party, not saying in so many words that I had turned it down for her but trying to let her know.

  I daresay I overdid it because I was still speaking when she smiled and said, ‘You should have gone. We could have had dinner another night.’

  I had thought of that but having plotted for weeks to ask her out, then having screwed up the courage to do it and finally having been so surprised by her easy assent that I was stumped for what to say next, I did not want to hazard it all by changing now. I had fallen for her as I had never fallen for anyone else. She had fair hair and freckles - which she thought a blemish - and a smile which softened her features nearly to the point of blurring them. When she listened to someone talking her smile never quite left her. She had also the charm of difference; French women mayor may not be intrinsically better-looking than British women but they see themselves differently, and so they often are. Probably something similar could be said about the men: their pride may often be comical but it gives them an alertness and an eagerness to please that makes them more attractive.

  Chantal and I became engaged shortly before Edward published his fateful review of O. M. Tyrrel’s last novel. If no longer at the height of his powers, Oliver Tyrrel was still riding the crest of his reputation. He was, of course, known to admirers and enemies alike as Old Man Tyrrel, or simply as the Old Man, and by his recent rejection of the Booker Prize he had demonstrated that his flair for publicity was undimmed by his eighty-five years. His marriages - which until the age of forty had outnumbered his novels - had become the subjects of books by embittered or greedy former spouses and he featured regularly in the colour supplements. His novels were translated into more than twenty languages and sold hugely. He lived in impenetrable privacy at Villefranche, between Antibes and Monte Carlo, and his domestic arrangements, involving a woman over half a century younger than himself, were often the subject of press interest. Headlines were sometimes made by his forays into politics, usually because of the bizarre or contradictory causes he chose, and it was hard not to suspect that that was why he chose them. He had opposed almost everything at one time or another and had thereby acquired in the eyes of many, including nervous governments, a surprising moral authority, as though his really was a standpoint of untouchable objectivity. Others regarded him as credulous, interfering and posturing.

  What no one had publicly questioned, until Edward’s review, was Tyrrel’s literary reputation. He was the doyen of English letters. For decades he had squatted like a toad upon the summit of literary fashion, not suppressing new movements so much as rising with them, always on top. It was as if they could not be properly established until straddled by Tyrrel and this had gone on for so long that it seemed the natural order of things.

  At the time of Edward’s review it was not of course known that this book was to be Tyrrel’s last, though there were signs that he was nearing the end. It was a tired book, possibly a re-working of old material, a book in which the driving idea was not sufficiently bodied forth in character and action and so showed through like the ribs of an old ship. The Old Man no longer had the energy or imagination to endow it with independent life, yet it remained of interest because in both theme and treatment it was similar to the novels of his youth, before he had become famous. His first book had been a very traditional novel about a man haunted by an act of betrayal committed many years before, and now in his last Tyrrel attempted a modern version of the Faust theme. But it was done too nakedly, and too late, in a way.

 

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