the first charge you are cautioned. On the second, you are fined a bottle of port.’
Mahoney signalled to the waiter … At the next table a young man was standing and shouting:
‘Mr Senior, I have a most weighty complaint. This gentleman – and I use that in the loosest possible sense of the word – stole my bread roll!’
‘Goodnight, everybody,’ Mahoney whispered to the mess. He turned, bowed to Senior in Hall, and hurried out. He handed his gown back. As he emerged from the robing room, the beautiful woman was coming out of the hall.
‘Well done,’ he smiled at her sympathetically.
She rolled her lovely eyes. ‘Isn’t it a laugh-a-minute?’ He caught a trace of an Australian accent.
Mahoney hurried on through the courtyard, out into Holborn. He half regretted that he had not struck up a conversation with the tawny Australian. But what was the point?
He got into his car, and sat there a minute, not relishing what he had to do now.
The house was in Hampstead, but the consulting-room was small. ‘It’s very good of you to see me so late, Dr Jacobson,’ Mahoney said.
‘The name’s Fred.’ He was unsmiling. ‘I don’t know what you expect of this meeting. Every patient’s problem is confidential, so I can’t tell you what’s wrong with Shelagh – if anything. You’re not really consulting me as a patient, so’ – he looked at his watch – ‘the quickest will be if I ask you questions, like you do in court. I warn you, some of them may be painful.’
‘That doesn’t matter.’
‘Oh? O.K. Why’s your marriage on the rocks?’
Mahoney was taken aback. On the rocks! This expert thought it was that bad?
‘Shelagh hates living in England,’ he said.
‘Why? And what can you do about it?’
Mahoney sighed. ‘The weather. The people. She feels they’re narrow. The cost of living … Our house. My job.’
‘And?’
‘And’, Mahoney said, ‘she misses her job in African Education.’
‘The last thing you mention. Because you consider it unimportant? And why aren’t you living in Australia, like you promised?’
Mahoney had to control his irritation with the man.
‘Look, I couldn’t sell the Britannia, so I set up the cargo company as insurance and went to Australia and had a good look. And I decided against the place. They’re nice people but they’ve got nothing to worry about except keeping up with the Joneses.’
‘And why haven’t you re-qualified as a lawyer?’
‘Because’, Mahoney said wearily, ‘I’m in the airline business whether I like it or not. I have to make it work. Look, I’m pretty bright, but I had to go to aviation school to get my commercial pilot’s licence – as well as run the airline.’
‘It’s a big undertaking, to become a pilot.’
‘It’s not. There’re a lot of exams, but any fool can learn to fly; some people fly solo after eight hours! On the big ones you just got to remember which bloody buttons to press.’ He added, ‘I only fly as co-pilot anyway.’
‘To save a pilot’s salary. Away half the time. What kind of life is that for a woman?’
‘But most pilots’ wives survive. Look, I’m not flying for fun. They’re bloody dangerous machines. And boring.’
‘Why haven’t you sat any of the law exams yet? Shelagh says they’re easy.’
‘Shelagh’s not a lawyer, to my knowledge.’ He shifted. ‘No, they’re not hard, and I’m exempted a lot of the exams. But it’s still a pain and I’m tired out when I get home. Listen, I’ll re-qualify. But I’m not a steam-driven genius.’
‘How much did you earn in Rhodesia?’
Mahoney sighed. ‘Sixty thousand dollars a year. A hundred thousand, if I worked my ass off.’
‘And it’s all sitting in the bank back home?’
‘I spent most of it.’
‘What on?’
He shrugged. ‘The farm. A boat. I don’t know. Booze. Women. I was a bachelor.’
‘And now you only earn housekeeping money. Is that fair? Why don’t you at least take your family home to Rhodesia where you can earn a decent living?’
Mahoney sat forward. ‘Rhodesia is finished. The whites have lost their chance to make it a multi-racial society, there’s no point defending a doomed situation just to earn money which you can’t take out when the blacks turn the country into an intolerable mess.’
‘And you’re not a racist?’
Mahoney shook his head. ‘No, I am a realist. Is there one African country which isn’t misgoverned? That’s not prejudice, it’s fact. Look, Shelagh taught in the Department of African Education, so all she met were nice black children eager to learn. And she’s British, brought up here; she doesn’t know about the vast mass of primitive ignorance out in the bush. She thinks they’re noble savages who just need a bit of education and one-man-one-vote to turn them into western democrats. She thinks the Russians are sincere people, that we’re all the victims of American propaganda.’
‘You haven’t a high regard for her opinion. Do you think you qualify as her soulmate?’
Mahoney sighed.
‘I like to read, but I haven’t much time. But Shelagh? – she writes poetry. She’s into long walks in the woods when it’s pissing with rain. Women’s Lib. Now she’s into meditation. I simply haven’t got the time.’
‘No, you’re the breadwinner, the Victorian husband who says: “This is what we’re doing, here is where we’ll live, I’m the man in this house” …’
Mahoney stared at him. ‘You think I’m like that?’
‘I’m suggesting Shelagh sees you like that … So, you don’t like Australia, and Shelagh must accept your life here.’
Mahoney took a breath. ‘You may not appreciate this, but being a Rhodesian makes me British to the goddamn core. Rhodesians may be a bit slow off the mark making the reforms people like me wanted, but the Rhodesians – even including Ian Smith and most of his cowboys – the Rhodesians are the last of the British! The last custodians of the good old British values in Africa. Like hard work. Incorruptible public service. Good judges. Good police. Good health and education services. And’ – he held up a finger – ‘a Victorian civilizing mission.’
‘Victorian …’ the psychiatrist murmured.
Mahoney
