that this document, whatever it was, had certainly not been disclosed to mere Keepers of Departments, and asked Deputy Security why he could not speak to Sir William himself. Deputy Security replied that he might look in later, but that with an estimated four thousand five hundred visitors on his hands he was very busy. The grotesque egoism of this left Hawthorne-Mannering speechless.
To reach Sir William’s den-like office he had to encounter the sour looks of Jones, just leaving with a tray of medicines and a brandy-bottle. Then, in the secretary’s room, he found that Dousha Vartarian had arrived. Dousha, curled in creamy splendour in her typing-chair, had the air of belonging completely, like a cat, to the space she occupied; this was in spite of the fact that her family were exiles from Azerbaijan. She was not at all like the Director’s secretary, Miss Rank. She nodded sleepily to indicate to Hawthorne-Mannering that he could pass on and go straight in, but when he did so, he found Sir William’s room empty.
The washroom door was open. He was evidently not there — only the usual thick haze of pipe smoke, for the old man smoked like a chimney. Hawthorne-Mannering had so very much not wanted to come that he felt unreasonably resentful. He glided to the window, and looked down two hundred feet to the slow mass of schoolchildren shuffling through the intense cold of the courtyard. At least one is warm, he reflected. An occasional icy wind stirred the posters so that they glinted like flecks of golden leaf. Through the glass the stream of information from the sound system could not be heard.
‘What are you standing there for?’ asked Sir William, suddenly appearing from a door marked OPEN IN EMERGENCIES ONLY. ‘Perhaps you thought you had something to say to me?’
‘I did, although I haven’t met with a very ready reception from — well, from your staff. That man Jones, for instance, appeared to look at me almost in a hostile manner …’
‘Jones, oh, yes, he will do that. You’ll have to get used to that, if you do much standing about here.’
‘He perhaps thinks he is protecting you, but I should point out that it is by no means safe for you to go out on to the emergency exit platform.’
‘It’s the only place where I can get a view of the new aluminium box which they’ve put up in place, as far as I can see, of the old Papyrus Room, as a kind of canteen or pot-house for which the unfortunate public are now queueing four abreast.’
‘It’s a temporary measure, as I think you know, Sir William, to accommodate the enormous numbers. They are not, after all, obliged to come to the Exhibition.’
‘They’re obliged to feel that it’s educational death if they don’t. These booklets, with Golden Toys on the cover, these schools talks on the BBC, planned units for the Open University, Golden coach tours — the whole country has been persecuted to come here. And now they’ve got to queue for seven hours to get in. What would you say a museum is for?’
The minutes were slipping by, and there was so much to arrange. Hawthorne-Mannering succeeded in controlling himself. But of patience, unlike hate, one only has a certain store.
‘The object of the museum is to acquire and preserve representative specimens, in the interests of the public,’ he said.
‘You say that,’ returned Sir William, with another winning smile, ‘and I say balls. The object of the Museum is to acquire power, not only at the expense of other museums, but absolutely. The art and treasures of the earth are gathered together so that the curators may crouch over them like the dynasts of old, showing now this, now that, as the fancy strikes them. Who knows what wealth exists in our own reserves, hidden far more securely than in the tombs of the Garamantes? There are acres of corridors in this Museum that no foot has ever trod, pigeons nesting in the cornices, wild cats, the descendants of the pets of Victorian curators, breeding unchecked in the basements, exhibits that are only looked at once a year, acquisitions of great value stacked away and forgotten. The wills of kings and merchant princes, who bequeathed their collections on condition they should always be on show to the public, are disregarded in death, and those sufferers trudging like peasants to the temporary canteen, to be filled with coconut cakes and to lift plastic containers to their lips — they pay for all, queue for all, are the excuse for all; I say, poor creatures!’
‘Perhaps I might explain what I have been asked to see you about,’ said Hawthorne-Mannering coldly.
‘Well, I know that it’s journalists’ day, and you want the old lunatic to talk to them,’ said Sir William, with a rather alarming change of tone. ‘Bring them in, by all means.’ Then, reverting to the language of his boyhood, he added, ‘I’m careful what I say to them bleeders.’
Hawthorne-Mannering adroitly took advantage of this opening to point out the necessity for strict security. But Sir William continued musingly.
‘Carnarvon died at five minutes to two on the morning of the 5th of April 1923. I knew him well, poor fellow! The public enjoys the idea of a curse, though. Why shouldn’t they get what they can for their money?’
‘But this is in no sense relevant, Sir William. I have no competency whatever to discuss the excavations of the Valley of the Kings, but I am sure that no responsible authority has ever attached any importance to the Curse of Tutankhamen, still less to the quite arbitrary invention by popular journalists in these past few weeks of the Curse of the Golden Child.’
‘Who put those yellow pamphlets about?’ asked Sir William. ‘Gold is Filth? 50p?’
‘I am afraid that is quite outside my —’
‘Have you ever been under a curse?’ asked Sir William.
‘I think not. Or if so, I was not aware of it.’
‘It’s a curious feeling. It has to be taken seriously. By the way, I’ve forgotten your name for the moment.’
‘The two journalists whom I am particularly recommending to you,’ said Hawthorne-Mannering, ignoring this, ‘will, of course, not wish to discuss the alleged Curse or anything of a popular nature. They are the accredited archaeological correspondents of The Times and the Guardian. One of them, Peter Gratsos, is a personal friend of mine from the University of Alexandria. Louis Sintram of The Times you of course know.’
Sir William showed no signs of doing so.
‘A chat, yes, about these trinkets, eh? There were deaths, you know, in 1913, though we never talked about them. Poor Pelissier was dead when we found him, with one of the Golden Toys in his hand. He was stiff as lead.’
‘You will recall that the interview is to take the form of a short talk by Tite-Live Rochegrosse-Bergson from the Sorbonne — the distinguished anthropologist, anti-structuralist, mythologist and paroemiographer. Then there is Professor Untermensch, at present I think at Heidelberg. He has been invited, at his own request, to sit in. You are to make a few comments, a summing up, call it what you will …’
Sir William discharged a volley of foul smoke from his pipe.
‘If you want me to say what I think about Rochegrosse-Bergson …’
‘Hardly about, Sir William, but to. The whole discussion is to be on the highest level …’
Hawthorne-Mannering looked as though he were about to cry.
There was a faint disturbance in the outer office as Dousha moved in her chair. She could be seen through the green glass like an ample underwater goddess, slightly dislodged. The
