(no subject)
I got back to my little flat quite late last night. The Baron appeared as I was climbing the stairs and asked me to join him for a whisky or several.
Going down to his lounge for a drink is like disappearing into the Twilight Zone, in a comfortable way. “I'm reading the most incredible book right now,” I said by way of a conversation-starter, since his entire house is covered in books and he's clearly obsessed by them. “Have you read Black Lamb and Grey Falcon by Rebecca West?”
He looked at me, as they say, askance. “Good Lord,” he said, “is that what you're reading?”
“Yes.... What?”
“Well what an extraordinary coincidence. I knew Rebecca rather well, you see. She was a cherished correspondent and a wonderful person.”
I said something like, “!!” The Baron then proceeded to show me a first-edition copy of Black Lamb and Grey Falcon in the original two volumes, with a long inscription on the title page by Rebecca West herself, which read: To my dear N-, with affection:- thank you for the good food, good music and good books; I will always think of you as one of those people who promote pleasantness in this world. I said something like, “!!!”
It was a rather great comment, as no word better sums up the Baron than pleasantness. He is just an extremely pleasant person. Anyway, he went on to tell me that when he ran his own bookshop, Rebecca West had opened it for him. He pointed to a wooden plaque above a doorway, which sure enough read This bookshop was opened by Dame Rebecca West and named some date in the early 70s. “!!!!,” I commented.
There was more. Leading me out to the stairway, he drew my attention to a copy of Wyndham Lewis's portrait of Rebecca West which was hanging in the hallway, signed by her “with great affection”. It's rather good. The original of this was just sold to the National Gallery for some astronomical sum.
He sketched this in 1932; apparently Lewis was a close friend of hers. “!!!!!,” I noted, examining it. We then went next door and had a long and improbable conversation in which I heard much about the Baron's trips to London to visit Rebecca, and he used a lot of phrases like “She was rather close to Oscar Wilde's son Vyvian, you know”, and “of course she had an illegitimate child with HG Wells; the boy blighted her life”, and I tried hard to make some intelligent responses.
By the time I left, three hours and half a bottle later, I was in a bit of a daze. Once again the Baron has trumped himself.
The only remaining mystery to me is how he can have led such a cultured and well-connected life, and yet still drink Famous Grouse whisky. I had to have a healthy shot of Laphroaig when I got upstairs just to wash the taste out of my mouth.