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Twenty-five thousand pounds. What a laugh!
Yes, he said and sighed. Yes indeed. He lowered the picture very gently and carried it back to the window. He looked at me and smiled. You have good taste, he said.
I felt that in some way he and I understood each other. I thanked him and went out into Bond Street.
Chapter 3
I dont know much about writing things down not, I mean, in the way a proper writer would do. The bit about that picture I saw, for instance. It doesnt really have anything to do with anything. I mean, nothing came of it, it didnt lead to anything and yet I feel somehow that it is important, that it has a place somewhere. It was one of the things that happened to me that meant something. Just like Gipsys Acre meant something to me. Like Santonix meant something to me.
I havent really said much about him. He was an architect. Of course youll have gathered that. Architects are another thing Id never had much to do with, though I knew a few things about the building trade. I came across Santonix in the course of my wanderings. It was when I was working as a chauffeur, driving the rich around places. Once or twice I drove abroad, twice to Germany I knew a bit of German and once or twice to France I had a smattering of French too and once to Portugal. They were usually elderly people, who had money and bad health in about equal quantities.
When you drive people like that around, you begin to think that money isnt so hot after all[11]. What with incipient heart attacks, lots of bottles of little pills you have to take all the time, and losing your temper over the food or the service in hotels. Most of the rich people Ive known have been fairly miserable. Theyve got their worries, too. Taxation and investments. You hear them talking together or to friends. Worry! Thats whats killing half of them. And their sex lifes not so hot either. Theyve either got long-legged blonde sexy wives who are playing them up with boyfriends somewhere, or theyre married to the complaining kind of woman, hideous as hell, who keeps telling them where they get off. No. Id rather be myself. Michael Rogers, seeing the world, and getting off with good-looking girls when he feels like it!
Everything a bit hand-to-mouth[12], of course, but I put up with that. Life was good fun, and Id been content to go on with life being fun. But I suppose I would have in any case. That attitude goes with youth. When youth begins to pass fun isnt fun any longer.
Behind it, I think, was always the other thing wanting someone and something However, to go on with what I was saying, there was one old boy I used to drive down to the Riviera. Hed got a house being built there. He went down to look how it was getting on. Santonix was the architect. I dont really know what nationality Santonix was. English I thought at first, though it was a funny sort of name Id never heard before. But I dont think he was English. Scandinavian of some kind I guess. He was an ill man. I could see that at once. He was young and very fair and thin with an odd face, a face that was askew somehow. The two sides of it didnt match. He could be quite bad-tempered to his clients. Youd have thought as they were paying the money that theyd call the tune and do the bullying. That wasnt so. Santonix bullied them and he was always quite sure of himself although they werent.
This particular old boy of mine was frothing with rage, I remember, as soon as he arrived and had seen how things were going. I used to catch snatches here and there when I was standing by ready to assist in my chauffeurly and handyman way. It was always on the cards that Mr Constantine would have a heart attack or a stroke.
You have not done as I said, he half screamed. You have spent too much money. Much too much money. It is not as we agreed. It is going to cost me more than I thought.
Youre absolutely right, said Santonix. But the moneys got to be spent.
It shall not be spent! It shall not be spent. You have got to keep within the limits I laid down. You understand?
Then you wont get the kind of house you want, said Santonix. I know what you want. The house I build you will be the house you want. Im quite sure of that and youre quite sure of it, too. Dont give me any of your pettifogging middle-class economies[13]. You want a house of quality and youre going to get it, and youll boast about it to your friends and theyll envy you. I dont build a house for anyone, Ive told you that. Theres more to it than money. This house isnt going to be like other peoples houses!
It is going to be terrible. Terrible.
Oh no it isnt. The trouble with you is that you dont know what you want. Or at least so anyone might think. But you do know what you want really, only you cant bring it out into your mind. You cant see it clearly. But I know. Thats the one thing I always know. What people are after and what they want. Theres a feeling in you for quality. Im going to give you quality.
He used to say things like that. And Id stand by and listen. Somehow or other I could see for myself that this house that was being built there amongst pine trees looking over the sea, wasnt going to be the usual house. Half of it didnt look out towards the sea in a conventional way. It looked inland, up to a certain curve of mountains, up to a glimpse of sky between hills. It was odd and unusual and very exciting.
Santonix used to talk to me sometimes when I was off duty. He said:
I only build houses for people I want to build for.
Rich people, you mean?
They have to be rich or they couldnt pay for the houses. But its not the money Im going to make out of it I care about. My clients have to be rich because I want to make the kind of houses that cost money. The house only isnt enough, you see. It has to have the setting. Thats just as important. Its like a ruby or an emerald. А beautiful stone is only a beautiful stone. It doesnt lead you anywhere further. It doesnt mean anything, it has no form or significance until it has its setting. And the setting has to have a beautiful jewel to be worthy of it. I take the setting, you see, out of the landscape, where it exists only in its own right. It has no meaning until there is my house sitting proudly like a jewel within its grasp. He looked at me and laughed. You dont understand?
I suppose not, I said slowly, and yet in a way I think I do
That may be. He looked at me curiously.
We came down to the Riviera again later. By then the house was nearly finished. I wont describe it because I couldnt do it properly, but it was well something special and it was beautiful. I could see that. It was a house youd be proud of, proud to show to people, proud to look at yourself, proud to be in with the right person perhaps. And then suddenly one day Santonix said to me:
I could build a house for you, you know. Id know the kind of house youd want.
I shook my head.
I shouldnt know myself, I said, honestly.
Perhaps you wouldnt. Id know for you. Then he added, Its a thousand pities you havent got the money.
And never shall have, I said.