An Indecent Obsession

‘To do that, it would have to start on the outside and work in. I mean that what’s on the inside has to have a chance to work its way out.’

Neil shivered. ‘What if there’s nothing there?’

And the old man had shrugged, smiled a small indifferent smile. ‘Then isn’t it better to know that there’s nothing there?’ he asked.

Not one word had been said about his learning the family businesses; Neil had known any such discussion to be superfluous. In a way he felt his father wasn’t worried about the businesses; what happened to them after his own hands relinquished control did not concern him. Longland Parkinson was as detached from generational empire building as he was from wife and son. He didn’t demand that his son prove himself, felt no animosity toward a son who didn’t measure up; it wasn’t necessary for him to fuel his ego by demanding that his son be what he was himself, or achieve what he had achieved. No doubt when he married Neil’s mother he had known what sort of progeny she was likely to throw, and not cared; in marrying her he was thumbing his nose at the very society he aspired to enter by marrying her. In this as in everything, Longland Parkinson acted to please himself, fulfill himself.

Yet as he sat watching his father, Neil had seen a fondness there, and a pity which had wounded to the heart. The old man simply didn’t think Neil had it in him, and the old man was a very good judge of character.

So Neil had gone into the army, commissioned rank of course. On the outbreak of war he had been posted to an A.I.F. battalion and shipped out to North Africa, which he enjoyed immensely, feeling more at home there than he had in his native country, picking up Arabic with extreme ease and generally making himself useful. He became a very capable and conscientious soldier, and turned out to have a streak of extraordinary braveness; his men liked him, his superiors liked him, and for the first time in his life he began to like himself. There is a bit of the old man in me after all, he told himself exultantly, looking forward to the end of the war, seeing himself returned home seasoned, honed by his experiences to a fine sharp ruthlessness which he felt his father would instantly recognize and admire. More than anything else in life, he wanted those bird-of-prey eyes to look on him as an equal.

Then came New Guinea, and after that the Islands, a kind of war far less to his taste than North Africa. It taught him that even while he had assumed his maturing process to be complete, he had really only been playing games. The jungle closed in on his soul the way the desert had freed it, drained him of exhilaration. But it strengthened him too, brought out a stubborn endurance he had not known he owned. He ceased finally to act a part, to care how he looked to others, too busy reaching into himself for the resources which would ensure survival for himself and his men.

In a fruitless, extremely bloody minor campaign early in 1945 it had all come to an end. He made a mistake, and his men paid for it. All the precious hoard of confidence crumbled immediately, disastrously. If they had only held it against him, only reviled him for it, he could have borne it better, he told himself; but everyone from the surviving men in his company to his superior officers forgave him! The more they told him it wasn’t his fault, that no one was perfect, everyone made a blue sometimes, the more depressed he became. Having nothing to fight against, he faltered, broke down, and stopped.

In May of 1945 he was admitted to ward X. On his arrival he was weeping, so immersed in his despair that he neither knew nor cared where they put him. For several days he had been permitted to do as he pleased, and all he pleased to do was huddle inside himself, shake, weep, grieve. Then the person who had hovered greyly in the background began to intrude upon his misery, make an irritating nuisance of herself. She stuck herself onto him, bullied and even forced him to eat, refused to admit there was anything different or special about his plight, made him sit with the other patients when all he wanted to do was to shut himself inside his cubicle, gave him jobs to do, needled and poked him into talking, first about anything, then about himself, which he infinitely preferred.

Returning awareness stirred sluggishly at first, then seemed to leap. Things not directly concerning himself impinged upon him; he began to see his fellow patients, and to notice his surroundings. He started to be interested in the phenomenon of ward X, and in Sister Honour Langtry.

She had acquired a name and an identity within his mind. Not that he always liked her at first; she was too matter-of-fact and unimpressed by his uniqueness. But just as he had decided she was a typical army nurse, she began to thaw, to reveal a softness and a tenderness so alien to most of the experiences of the last few years that he would have drowned in it had she let him. She never, never did. Only when he deemed himself cured did he begin to understand how subtly she had chivvied him along.

He had not needed to be shipped to Australia for further treatment. But he wasn’t shipped back to his unit, either. Apparently his CO preferred that he remain where he was; the division had been laid off active duty for the moment, so he wasn’t needed.

In many ways his continued enforced rest in ward X delighted him, since it kept him near Sister Langtry, who these days treated him more as colleague than as patient, and with whom he was establishing the foundations of a relationship having nothing to do with ward X. But from the time when he considered himself cured and ready to resume duty, doubt had begun to gnaw at him. Why didn’t they want him back? He found the answer for himself— because he couldn’t be trusted any more, because if for some reason the war flared up again, he would not prove equal to command, more men would die.

Though everyone denied it, Neil knew that was the real reason why after almost five months he still remained a prisoner of ward X. What he couldn’t yet understand was that his neurosis lingered on, showing itself chiefly as an extreme self-doubt. Had the war flared up again, he would probably have been returned on probation to duty, and would probably have done very well. Neil’s tragedy was that the war really had ended, and there was no more active duty.

He leaned across to read the name on the papers lying on Sister Langtry’s desk, and grimaced. ‘A bit of a slap in the eye, isn’t it, getting him at this late date?’

‘A shock, yes. A slap in the eye remains to be seen. Though he doesn’t strike me as the troublesome type.’

‘There we agree. Very bland. He reminds me a bit of a cliché-ridden parrot.’

Startled, she turned from the window to look at him; Neil wasn’t usually so obtuse about men, nor so critical.

‘I think he’s quite a man,’ she said.

An unexpected and inexplicable irritation rushed up and out, surprising him as much as it did her. ‘Why, Sister Langtry!’ he exclaimed. ‘Are you attracted, then? I wouldn’t have said he was your type at all!’

Her frown became a laugh. ‘Not on me, Neil! It’s unworthy of you, my dear friend. You sound exactly like Luce, and that isn’t a compliment. Why be so hard on the poor chap?’

‘I’m just jealous,’ he said flippantly, and drew his cigarette case out of his pocket. It was plain heavy gold, expensive-looking, and bore his initials in one corner. No one else in the ward smoked tailor-mades, but at the moment no one else in the ward was an officer.

He flipped the case open and offered its contents to her, lighter ready in his other hand.

She sighed, but took a cigarette and held it while he lit it. ‘I should never, never have let you talk me into sneaking a smoke with you while I’m on duty,’ she said. ‘Matron would hang, draw and quarter me. Besides, I’m going to have to throw you out in a tick. I’ve got to plough through Michael’s papers before Colonel Chinstrap arrives.’