To the Dark Tower by Francis King Read Free Book Online Page A

it."
    Carefully he places it in his wallet, smiling.
June 15th , 1937
    This evening Cauldwell has planned to leave. He is going to stay with some friends who run a boy’s club in the East End—his services in return for board, lodging, and a little leisure. I see now that I shall miss him. All through breakfast I have tried to persuade him to stay: and the last swimming lesson is a melancholy affair. "If only I had another week," I say ruefully, "I think I could teach you to dive."
    He, too, looks regretful. "I must go. Really I must. I can’t finish the book without a change of scene. I’ve got stack."
    His book puzzles me.
June 16th , 1937
    A strange, rather disturbing, thing happened yesterday evening before Cauldwell left. I had gone up to his room to talk to him while he packed, but found him out. He was evidently in the garden. The room was littered with old newspapers, dirty collars, bus tickets, letters—and on the table three notebooks, small, soiled, at least one of which he always keeps with him.
    Is a moment of curiosity I opened the first of the notebooks and read at earldom: ‘Ravaged face, superb physique. Something curbed, controlled—I don’t know what. Reticent, frigid, then suddenly voluble. Introspective? In some ways, in others, not. There is power, certainly, but of a kind which frightens me. The way that face vibrates with personality even in a bad newspaper photograph—but vibrates is not quite the word. Burns perhaps. Strong, tranquil, steadfast...’
    At that moment there are footsteps and I close the book.
    It is of me that he writes.
    After this discovery I find that my hands are trembling, my mouth goes dry. When I talk to him I stumble over my words. It is as if I were drunk. Why? I cannot explain it.
    "Write to me, sometime," I say when I see him off.
    "Do you mean that?"
    "Certainly I do. I shall be interested to hear about the novel."
    "Oh—the novel!" He laughs. I do not think he has any suspicions of my discovery.
    The train jerks and then slides forward. Hands wave. "Good-bye," he shouts. "Good-bye. Thank you so much. Thank you."
    "Good-bye."
    That horrible moment when one watches a train disappear. Everything flat, rather hostile. Things relaxing savagely.
    So I am a figure in his novel. So that’s it.
June 17th , 1937
    All to-day I have thought about Cauldwell—in spite of a letter which I must write to The Times , and two articles.
    Firstly: Will he ever be a good writer? It seems to me that he is too obsessed with the novelist’s rôle—with the outward manifestations. He loves to talk of how he creates: and this makes one feel that he is subtly imposing on one—and on himself. (As if to make up for some lack, some deficiency, he has to present himself as the typical artist—mildly eccentric, pacing his room at midnight, liable to sudden fits of inspiration. He is acting a part.)
    Secondly: Those words of his, "When I am faced with my subject... I try to depersonalise myself". Assuming from that entry in his notebook that I am a figure in the novel, does this explain that feeling I have of never being able to grasp the essential him ? Like water in sunlight there are sudden flashes: his confidences, the time I struck him—and then the whole thing goes blank.
    Thirdly: How will I appear in the book? Will it be as a caricature Blimp? Or introduced for a few pages of comedy?
    These thoughts keep me awake to-night. I am sorry that he has gone.
June 22nd , 1937
    I am in bed—in Croft’s flat. Last night I came here to dinner, feeling headachy and rather shivery. Then, during dessert, I suddenly felt the table rise up towards me; the light rocked; there was the sound of a plate breaking. I had fainted.
    An acute go of malaria. Croft insists on my staying here though I have suggested a nursing home. He is a wonderful nurse. I am too feverish to write more: my hand shakes.
    Yes. I should like to go with him to the Amazon.
June 23rd , 1937
    Much better to-day. I want to get