The Fly in the Ointment by VS Pritchett. Part 2.
Watch on KineScope.
Well, there it is. I’ve made it. Have a cup?”
“No, thanks,” said the son, listening patiently to his father. “I have had my tea.”
“You’ve had your tea? Go on. Why not have another?”
“No really, thanks,” said the son. “You drink it.”
“Well,” said the father, pouring out the tea and lifting the cup to his soft rosy face and blinking his eyes as he drank, “I feel badly about this. This is terrible. I feel really awful drinking this tea and you standing there watching me, but you say you’ve had yours – well, how are things with you? How are you? And how is Alice? Is she better? And the children? You know I’ve been thinking about you – you look worried. Haven’t lost sixpence and found a shilling have you, because I wouldn’t mind doing that?”
“I’m all right,” the son said, smiling to hide his irritation. “I’m not worried about anything, I’m just worried about you. This –” he nodded with embarrassment to the dismantled showroom, the office from which even the calendars and wastepaper basket had gone – “this –” what was the most tactful and sympathetic word to use? – “this is bad luck,” he said.
“Bad luck?” said the old man sternly.
“I mean,” stammered his son, “I heard about the creditors’ meeting. I knew it was your last day – I thought I’d come along, I… to see how you were.”
“Very sweet of you, old boy,” said the old man with zest. “Very sweet. We’ve cleared everything up. They got most of the machines out today. I’m just locking up and handing over. Locking up is quite a business. There are so many keys. It’s tiring, really. How many keys do you think there are to a place like this? You wouldn’t believe it, if I told you.”
“It must have been worrying,” the son said.
“Worrying? You keep on using that word. I’m not worrying. Things are fine,” said the old man smiling aggressively. “I feel they’re fine. I know they’re fine.”
“Well, you always were an optimist,” smiled his son.
“Listen to me a moment. I want you to get this idea,” said his father, his warm voice going dead and rancorous and his nostrils fidgeting. His eyes went hard, too. A different man was speaking, and even a different face; the son noticed for the first time that like all big-faced men his father had two faces. There was the outer face like a soft warm and careless daub of innocent sealing wax and inside it, as if thumbed there by a seal, was a much smaller one, babyish, shrewd, scared and hard. Now this little inner face had gone greenish and pale and dozens of little veins were broken on the nose and cheeks. The small, drained, purplish lips of this little face were speaking. The son leaned back instinctively to get just another inch away from this little face.
“Listen to this,” the father said and leaned forward on the table as his son leaned back, holding his right fist up as if he had a hammer in his hand and was auctioning his life. “I am 65. I don’t know how long I shall live, but let me make this clear: if I were not an optimist I wouldn’t be here. I wouldn’t stay another minute.” He paused, fixing his son’s half averted eyes to let the full meaning of his words bite home. “I’ve worked hard,” the father went on. “For thirty years I built up this business from nothing. You wouldn’t know it, you were a child, but many’s the time coming down from the North, I’ve slept in this office to be on the job early the next morning.” He looked decided and experienced like a man of forty, but now he softened to sixty again. The ring in the hard voice began to soften into a faint whine and his thick nose sniffed. “I don’t say I’ve always done right,” he said. “You can’t live your life from A to Z like that. And now I haven’t a penny in the world. Not a cent. It’s not easy at my time of life to begin again. What do you think I’ve got to live for? There’s nothing holding me back. My boy, if I wasn’t an optimist I’d go right out. I’d finish it.”
Suddenly the father smiled and the little face was drowned in a warm flood of triumphant smiles from the bigger face. He rested his hands on his waistcoat and that seemed to be smiling too, his easy coat smiling, his legs smiling and even winks of light on his shining shoes. Then he frowned.