Author: John Barth
Category: Fiction
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“How’s that, you rascal? The both of ’em! Small favor to the husband, to bless him with horns! What a villainy!”
“Ah, on the contrary, sir, if I may say so, ’twas a double boon I did him, for not only did I plough his field, which else had lain fallow, but seeded it as well, and from every sign ’twill be a bumper crop come fall. Look ye, sir, ere ye judge me a monster; the lad knew naught but toil and thankless drudgery before and took no pleasure in’t, save the satisfaction of drawing his wage. He came home to a wife who carped and quarreled for lack o’ love and was set to leave him for good, which would’ve been the death of him. Now he works harder than ever, proud as a peacock he’s got a son a-building, and his clerking and fiddling have changed from mere labor to royal sport. As for Betsy, that was wont to nag and bark at him before, she’s turned sweet as a sugar-tit and jumps to his every whim and fancy; she would not leave him for the Duke o’ York. Man and wife are both the happier for’t.”
“And thou’rt the richer by a mistress that costs you not a farthing to keep,” Ebenezer added, “and on whom you may get a household of bastards with impunity!”
Bertrand shrugged, adjusting his master’s cravat.
“As’t happens, yes,” he admitted, “though I hear’t said that virtue is its own reward.”
“Then ’twas this cuckold of a fiddler started the story?” demanded Ebenezer. “I’ll take the wretch to court!”
“Nay, ’twas but gossip he passed on to Betsy last night, who passed it on to me this morning. He had it from the drinkers at Locket’s, after all the toasting was done and you were gone.”
“Unconscionable envy and malice!” Ebenezer cried. “Do you believe it?”
“Marry, sir, ’tis no concern o’ mine what persuasion ye follow. I’ll confess I wondered, after Betsy told me, whether all thy hollowing and pitching last night was not a free-for-all ’twixt you and your conscience, or some strange Papish ceremony, for I know they’ve a bag of ’em for every time o’ day. B’m’faith, ’twere mere good business, methinks, to take his superstitious vows for him, if that’s the condition for the post. Soon or late, we all must strike our bargains with the world. Everything hath its price, and yours was no dear one, inasmuch as neither milord Baltimore nor any other Jesuit can see what’s in your heart. All ye need do is say him his hey-nonny-nonnies whenever he’s there to hear ’em; as for the rest of the world, ’tis none o’ their concern what office ye hold, or what it cost ye, or who got it for ye. Keep mum on’t, draw your pay, and let the Pope and the world go hang.”
“Lord, hear the cynic!” said Ebenezer. “My word on’t, Bertrand, I struck no bargain with Lord Baltimore, nor dickered and haggled any quid pro quos, I’m no more Papist this morning than I was last week, and as for salary, my office pays me not a shilling.”
“ ’Tis the soundest stand to take,” Bertrand nodded knowingly, “if any man questions ye.”
“ ’Tis the simple truth! And so far from keeping my appointment secret, I mean to declare it to all and sundry—within the bounds of modesty, of course.”
“Ah, ye’ll regret that!” Bertrand warned. “If ye declare the office, ’tis no use denying ye turned Papist to get it. The world believes what it pleases.”
“And doth it relish naught save slander and spite and fantastical allegation?”
“ ’Tis not so fantastic a story,” Bertrand said, “though mind ye, I don’t say ’tis true. More history’s made by secret handshakes than by battles, bills, and proclamations.”
“Nay!” Ebenezer protested. “Such libels are but the weapon of the mediocre against the talented. Those fops at Locket’s slander me to solace themselves! As for your cynical philosophy, that sees a plot in every preferment, methinks ’tis but mere wishful thinking, the mark of a domestical mind, which attributes to the world at large all the drama and dark excitement that it fails to find in its own activity.”
“ ’Tis all above me, this philosophy,” Bertrand said. “I know only what they say.”
“Popery indeed! Dear God, I am ill of London! Fetch my traveling wig, Bertrand; I shan’t abide another day in this place!”
“Where will ye go, sir?”
“To Plymouth, by the afternoon coach. See to’t my chests and trunks are packed and loaded, will you? ’Sheart, how shall I endure e’en another morning in this vicious city?”
“Plymouth so soon, sir?” asked Bertrand.
“The sooner the better. Have you found a place?”
“I fear not, sir. ’Tis a bad season to seek one, my Betsy says, and ’tis not every place I’d take.”
“Ah well, no great matter. These rooms are hired till April’s end, and thou’rt free to use ’em. Your wage is paid ahead, and I’ve another crown for you if my bags are on the Plymouth coach betimes.”
“I thank ye, sir. I would ye weren’t going, I swear’t, but ye may depend on’t your gear will be stowed on the coach. Marry, I’ll not soon find me a civiler master!”
“Thou’rt a good fellow, Bertrand,” Ebenezer smiled. “Were’t not for my niggard allowance, I’d freight thee to Maryland with me.”
“I’faith, I’ve no stomach for bears and salvages, sir! An’t please ye, I’ll stay behind and let my Betsy comfort me for losing ye.”
“Then good luck to you,” said Ebenezer as he left, “and may your son be a strapping fellow. I shan’t return here: I mean to waste the whole morning buying a notebook for my voyage. Haply I’ll see you at the posthouse.”
“Good day then, sir,” Bertrand said, “and fare thee well!”
Irksome as was his false friends’ slander, it slipped from Ebenezer’s mind once he was out of doors. The day was too fair, his spirits too high, for him to brood much over simple envy. “Leave small thoughts to small minds,” said he to himself, and so dismissed the matter.
Much more important was the business at hand: choosing and purchasing a notebook. Already his excellent trope of the day before, which he’d wanted to set down for future generations, was gone from his memory; how many others in years gone by had passed briefly through his mind, like lovely women through a room, and gone forever? It must happen no more. Let the poetaster and occasional dabbler-in-letters affect that careless fecundity which sneers at notes and commonplace books: the mature and dedicated artist knows better, hoards every gem he mines from the mother lode of fancy, and at his leisure sifts the diamonds from the lesser stones.
He went to the establishment of one Benjamin Bragg, at the Sign of the Raven in Paternoster Row—a printer, bookseller, and stationer whom he and many of his companions patronized. The shop was a clearinghouse for literary gossip; Bragg himself—a waspish, bright-eyed, honey-voiced little man in his forties of whom it was rumored that he was a Sodomite—knew virtually everyone of literary pretensions in the city, and though he was, after all, but a common tradesman, his favor was much sought after. Ebenezer had been uncomfortable in the place ever since his first introduction to the proprietor and clientele some years before. He had always, until the previous day, been of at least two minds about his own talent, as about everything else—confident on the one hand (From how many hackle-raising ecstasies! From how many transports of inspiration!) that he was blessed with the greatest gift since blind John Milton’s and destined to take literature singlehandedly by the breech and stand it upon its periwig; equally certain, on the other (From how many sloughs of gloom, hours of museless vacancy, downright immobilities!) that he was devoid even of talent, to say nothing of genius; a humbler, a stumbler, a witless poser like many another—and his visits to Bragg’s, whose poised habitues reduced him to mumbling ataxia in half an instant, never failed to convert him to the latter opinion, though in other circumstances he could explain away their cleverness to his advantage. In any case, he was in the habit of disguising his great uneasiness with the mask of diffidence, and Bragg rarely noticed him at all.
It was to his considerable satisfaction, therefore, that when this time he entered the establishmen
t and discreetly asked one of the apprentices to show him some notebooks, Bragg himself dismissed the boy and left the short, wigless customer with whom he’d been gossiping in order to serve him personally.
“Dear Mr. Cooke!” he cried. “You must accept my felicitations on your distinction!”
“What? Oh, indeed,” Ebenezer smiled modestly. “However did you hear of’t so soon?”
“So soon!” Bragg warbled. “ ’Tis the talk o’ London! I had it yesterday from dear Ben Oliver, and today from a score of others. Laureate of Maryland! Tell me,” he asked, with careful ingenuousness, “was’t by Lord Baltimore’s appointment, as some say, or by the King’s? Ben Oliver declares ’twas from Baltimore and vows he’ll turn Quaker and seek the same of William Penn for Pennsylvania!”
“ ’Twas Lord Baltimore honored me,” Ebenezer replied coolly, “who, though a Romanist, is as civil a gentleman as any I’ve met and hath a wondrous ear for verse.”
“I am certain of’t,” Bragg agreed, “though I’ve ne’er met the man. Prithee, sir, how came he to know your work? We’re all of us a-flutter to read you, yet search as I may I can’t find a poem of yours in print, nor hath anyone I’ve asked heard so much as a line of your verse. Marry, I’ll confess it: we scarce knew you wrote any!”
“A man may love his house and yet not ride on the ridgepole,” Ebenezer observed, “and a man may be no less a poet for not declaiming in every inn and ordinary or printing up his creatures to be peddled like chestnuts on London Bridge.”
“Well said!” Bragg chortled, clapped his hands, and bounced on his heels. “Oh, pungently put! ’Twill be repeated at every table in Locket’s for a fortnight! Ah, ‘slife, masterfully put!” He dabbed his eyes with his handkerchief. “Would you tell me, Mr. Cooke, if’t be not too prying a question, whether Lord Baltimore did you this honor in the form of a recommendation for King William and the Governor of Maryland to approve, or whether ’tis still in Baltimore’s power to make and fill official posts? There was some debate on the matter here last evening.”
“I daresay there was,” Ebenezer said. “ ’Tis my good fortune I missed it. Is’t your suggestion Lord Baltimore would willfully o’erstep his authority and exercise rights he hath no claim to?”
“Oh, Heav’n forbid!” cried Bragg, wide-eyed. “ ’Twas a mere civil question, b’m’faith! No slight intended!”
“So be’t. Let us have done with questions now, lest I miss the Plymouth coach. Will you show me some notebooks?”
“Indeed, sir, at once! What sort of notebook had you in mind?”
“What sort?” repeated Ebenezer. “Are there sorts of notebooks, then? I knew’t not. No matter—any sort will serve, I daresay. ’Tis but to take notes in.”
“Long notes, sir, or short ones?”
“How? What a question! How should I know? Both, I suppose!”
“Ah. And will you take these long and short notes at home, sir, or while traveling?”
“I’faith, what difference to you? Both, I should think. A mere silly notebook is all my craving.”
“Patience, sir; ’tis only to make certain I sell you naught but fits thy need. The man who knows what he needs, they say, gets what he wants; but he who knows not his mind is forever at sixes and sevens and blames the blameless world for’t.”
“Enough wisdom, I beg you,” Ebenezer said uncomfortably. “Sell me a notebook fit for long or short notes, both at home and abroad, and have done with’t.”
“Very well, sir,” Bragg said. “Only I must know another wee thing.”
“I’faith, ’tis a Cambridge examination! What is’t now?”
“Is’t thy wont to make these notes always at a desk, whether at home or abroad, or do you jot ’em down as they strike you, whether strolling, riding, or resting? And if the latter, do you yet ne’er pen ’em in the public view, or is’t public be damned, ye’ll write where’t please you? And if the latter, would you have ’em think you a man whose taste is evidenced by all he owns; who is, you might say, in love with the world? A Geoffrey Chaucer? A Will Shakespeare? Or would you rather they took you for a Stoical fellow, that cares not a fig for this vale of imperfections, but hath his eye fixed always on the Everlasting Beauties of the Spirit: a Plato, I mean, or a Don John Donne? ’Tis most necessary I should know.”
Ebenezer smote the counter with his fist. “Damn you, fellow, thou’rt pulling my leg for fair! Is’t some wager you’ve made with yonder gentleman, to have me act the fool for him? Marry, ’twas my retching hate of raillers and hypocrites that drove me here, to spend my final London morn sequestered among the implements of my craft, like a soldier in his armory or a mariner in the ship chandler’s; but I find no simple sanctuary even here. By Heav’n, I think not even Nero’s lions were allowed in the dungeons where the martyrs prayed and fortified themselves, but had to stay their hunger till the wretches were properly in the arena. Will you deny me that small solace ere I take ship for the wilderness?”
“Forbear, sir; do forbear,” Bragg pleaded, “and think no ill of yonder gentleman, who is a perfect stranger to me.”
“Very well. But explain yourself at once and sell me a common notebook such as a poet might find useful who is as much a Stoic as an Epicurean.”
“I crave no more than to do just that,” Bragg declared. “But I must know whether you’ll have the folio size or the quarto. The folio, I might say, is good for poets, inasmuch as an entire poem can of’t be set on facing pages, where you can see it whole.”
“Quite sound,” Ebenezer acknowledged. “Folio it is.”
“On the other hand, the quarto is more readily lugged about, particularly when thou’rt walking or on horseback.”
“True, true,” Ebenezer admitted.
“In the same way, a cardboard binding is cheap and hath a simple forthright air; but leather is hardier for traveling, more pleasing to behold, and more satisfying to own. What’s more, I can give ye unruled sheets, such as free the fancy from mundane restraints, accommodate any size of hand, and make a handsome page when writ; or ruled sheets, which save time, aid writing in carriages or aboard ships, and keep a page neat as a pin. Finally, ye may choose a thin book, easy to carry but soon filled, or a fat one, cumbersome to travel with but able to store years of thought ’twixt single covers. Which shall be the Laureate’s notebook?”
“ ‘Sbodikins! I am wholly fuddled! Eight species of common notebook?”
“Sixteen, sir; sixteen, if I may,” Bragg said proudly. “Ye may have
A thin plain cardboard folio,
A thin plain cardboard quarto,
A thin plain leather folio,
A thin ruled cardboard folio,
A fat plain cardboard folio,
A thin plain leather quarto,
A thin ruled cardboard quarto,
A fat plain cardboard quarto,
A thin ruled leather folio,
A fat ruled cardboard folio,
A fat plain leather folio,
A thin ruled leather quarto,
A fat ruled cardboard quarto,
A fat plain leather quarto,
A fat ruled leather folio, or
A fat ruled leather quarto.”
“Stop!” cried Ebenezer, shaking his head. “ ’Tis the Pit!”
“I may say also I’m expecting some lovely half-moroccos within the week, and if need be I can secure finer or cheaper grades of paper than what I stock.”
“Have at thee, Sodomite!” Ebenezer shouted, drawing his shortsword. “ ’Tis thy life or mine, for another of thy evil options and I am lost!”
“Peace! Peace!” the printer squealed, and ducked under his serving-counter.
“Peace Peace we’ll have do I reach thee,” Ebenezer threatened; “nor no mere pair of pieces, either, b’m’faith, but sixteen count!”
“Stay, Master Laureate,” urged the short, wigless customer; he came from across the shop, where he’d been listening with interest to the colloquy, and placed his hand on Ebenezer’s sword
arm. “Calm your wrath, ere’t lead ye to blight your office.”
“Eh? Ah, to be sure,” sighed Ebenezer, and sheathed his sword with some embarrassment. “ ’Tis the soldier’s task to fight battles, is’t not, and the poet’s to sing ’em. But marry, who dares call himself a man that will not fight to save his reason?”
“And who dares call himself reasonable,” returned the stranger, “that will so be swayed by’s passions as to take arms against a feckless shopkeeper? ’Tis thy quandary, do I see’t aright, that all these notebooks have their separate virtues, yet none is adequate, inasmuch as your purposes range ’twixt contradictories.”
“You have’t firmly,” Ebenezer admitted.
“Then ’tis by no means this poor knave’s fault, d’ye think, that he gives ye options? He’s more to be praised than braised for’t. Put by your anger, for Anger begins with folly and ends with repentance; it makes a rich man hated and a poor man scorned, and so far from solving problems, only multiplies ’em. Follow rather the sweet light of Reason, which like the polestar leads the wise helmsman safe to port through the unruly seas of passion.”
“You chasten me, friend,” said Ebenezer. “Out with you, Ben Bragg, and never fear: I’m my own man again.”
“ ’Sheart, thou’rt a spirited fellow for a poet!” Bragg exclaimed, reappearing from under the counter.
“Forgive me.”
“There’s a good fellow!” said the stranger. “Anger glances into wise men’s breasts, but rests only in the bosoms of fools. Heed no voice but Reason’s.”
“Good counsel, I grant thee,” Ebenezer said. “But I’ll own it passeth my understanding how Solomon himself could reconcile opposites and make a plain book elegant or a fat book thin. Not all the logic of Aquinas could contrive it!”