This was Martha’s first experience of it. Last time there had been a change, she had changed with it. Four years before, the present ‘politically conscious’ Martha had been born, out of – that’s what it amounted to – The Battle of Stalingrad. How odd that ‘a busybody who ran around all the time’ (Anton had said it again only last night) could be born out of a great battle thousands of miles away. Which was a ridiculous thought: Martha found herself sitting with a smile on her face, when the speaker on the platform was in the middle of a sentence about people starving to death in Europe.
But the hall was half full, and the audience were restless, not because they were bored, far from it, but because they were angry with the speaker. Martha ought to be making up with her appreciation for their lack of it. The chair she sat in had a hard edge which cut across the back of her thighs. It was very hot. When she stood up, her pink dress would be marked by a wet line, unless she – she wriggled forward on her seat, and Anton gave her a look – do be still!
This winter, Professor Dickinson was saying, millions of people in Europe would be without enough to eat; the children would be marked for life by what happened to them; thousands would die. Yet international capitalism was quite prepared to … A man shouted: ‘Cut out the gramophone record and let’s have facts.’
‘Yes, yes,’ shouted several people.
It was the most extraordinary thing, being part of this audience. Everything was suddenly different. At the beginning of this same year, 1945, the war still gripped half the world, and when people said: It will soon be over, they did not really believe it. One had only to mention the Soviet Union to create a feeling of warm participation with a mighty strength used for the good and the true. Germany was a sub-human nation so brutalized, so sadistic in its very essence, that it could only expect ‘to work its passage back to membership of the civilized world’ by long, slow degrees. Japan was not far behind in villainy. All these were major axioms. A minor change: six months ago the Tories had governed Britain and, it seemed, always would. But Labour had won the election after all. As for this country, this enormous tract of land nevertheless made unimportant by the fewness of the people it supported – well, its long prosperity, because of the war, was threatened. Its own soldiers returned from various battlefronts, mostly in small numbers, while the RAF left daily in thousands. But if to be in this country was to feel like being churned in a whirlpool, it was no more than what happened everywhere: all over the world human beings were shifting in great masses from one country, one continent, to another: myriads of tiny black seeds trickled from side to side of a piece of paper shifted about in the casually curious hand.
As for ‘the group’, that ridiculous little organism, it did not exist – which was proved by the fact that most of its former members were here tonight, friendly enough, if wary, towards each other.
This was ‘a big meeting’ and therefore everyone had turned out, responsible to the end towards something they had begun and which now was ending. They sat along the back of the Brazen Hall, which was even scruffier and dingier than before, a dozen or so people. There were present Anton Hesse and his wife, Piet du Preez and Marie, Athen from Greece, Thomas Stern from Poland, Solly Cohen, Marjorie and Colin Black, Boris Krueger and his wife, young Tommy Brown, and Johnny Lindsay who looked very ill, but was being supported by Flora.
As for the dozens of others, comrades, friends, lovers, who everyone thought about tonight, because of their sense of an occasion which marked an end, they were all over the world – in England, and Scotland, in America and in Israel. Nearer home, Joss had settled ‘up North’; and Jasmine was living ‘down South’ in Johannesburg.
Coming into the hall, Marjorie had said: ‘Isn’t it awful, when you think …’ And big Piet had said: ‘Man, it gives me the skriks, I can tell you that!’ And Solly had said: ‘O?, so I’m a traitor – but how about closing the ranks just for tonight!’
What could more sharply epitomize the general change than that ‘a big meeting’ should be taking place here, in this dirty little hall, even though the speaker was the famous Professor Dickinson from Johannesburg? Only six months before, it would have been enough to ask the authorities for the big State Hall, to be given it. But permission had been mysteriously delayed until Mrs Van, asking for the reason in person, had been give the verbal explanation that ‘it was not considered desirable that the State Hall should be used for such purposes.’ The letter of refusal had of course been bland: the hall was booked for all the nights they had asked for it. Acting on the sound old principle that ‘they should never be allowed to get away with anything’, Marjorie Black had written in offering the authorities twenty more dates supplied by the obliging Professor. But this letter had earned an exact repetition of the first; the hall was booked for all the mentioned dates. Again Mrs Van, respected Town Councillor, enquired ‘off the record’. And off the record she was told that ‘the Reds’ need not think they would ever get the State Hall again – a decision had been taken and was written into the minutes. And how, Mrs Van had demanded to know, was ‘a Red’ defined these days? Anyone who was a member of the following organizations, she was told.
And what, she asked, had happened to make these organizations unsafe which for at least four years had been respectable? A decision had been taken by whom?
At this tempers had been lost, and voices raised. A chill wind blew – that was all. The atmosphere had changed. ‘Public opinion had changed.’ What people were afraid of – that is what had changed. Fear had shifted its quarters.
Another difference: Mrs Van had said that obviously Thomas Stern could not be chairman. Now during the war, or at least since the end of ‘the phoney war’, the atmosphere had been such that of course a corporal from the Health Corps could chair a public meeting, of course a twenty-year-old aircraftsman could address five hundred solid citizens on revolutionary poetry – one needed no other credentials than one’s enthusiasm.
But Mrs Van had put Mr Playfair into the chair – he who had once been reserved for the most tricky of ‘respectable’ meetings. She had said to Marjorie Black: ‘Really, dear, now that everything’s changed, you must have more sense.’
The hall was less than half full. The faces were all familiar, of course. These were the public who had made so many activities possible, had raised money, given it, bought pamphlets, and applauded every variety of left-wing sentiment. And here they sat, their faces for the most part stiff and hostile. And where were the others?
Well, public opinion had changed, that was all.
Professor Dickinson was a lively, handsome little man, even more vigorous than usual tonight because he thrived on opposition. What he was saying was no more than what had been said up and down these platforms for four years. The Soviet Union had been allowed a truce by the capitalist powers for the duration of the war, since it was taking the brunt of the war against Hitler (who of course had been if not created, at least supported, by the said capitalist powers as an anti-communist insurance) but that now the Soviet Union was exhausted, bled white, had lost its usefulness, the capitalist powers would revert to type and do everything to destroy the socialist country, taking up where they had left off in 1940. The war need never have taken place if Britain had responded to the Soviet Union’s invitation to make a pact against Hitler: the war had suited certain financial interests extremely well, millions of people had died because finance capital was more interested in making profits than in …
This thesis, which until a few months ago would have been greeted by everybody with the over-loud, over-quick laugh of public approval which greets sentiments that have been, or might again be, dangerous, and then with storms of clapping and cries of Yes! Yes! – was now being listened to in sullen silence.
The Professor was saying that within two or three years, Germany the outcast, Germany the fascist beast, Germany the murderer would be the bastion of the capitalist defences in Europe against the Soviet Union, just as Hitler had been during the Thirties. The proof? Already the capitalists, particularly American, poured money into German industry. Why? Out of compassion for the starving Germans? No, because it was necessary that Germany was the strongest country in Europe, divided or not, and he would even go as far as to predict that within five years German troops and American troops and British troops would be marching under the same banners … but he could get no further. The whole audience had risen and were shouting at him ‘Red! Communist! Go back to Moscow!’ Mrs Van der Bylt rose from her place beside Mr Playfair, and since he was not doing more than smile earnestly at the angry audience he was supposed to be controlling, she banged authoritatively on the table with an empty glass.
But no one took any notice.
‘Just like the good old days,’ said Solly, with a loud laugh, and people turned sharply to stare at the group of ‘Reds’ who looked back, with incredulous half-embarrassed smiles. In spite of everything, they could not believe that these people, who had been to all their meetings, who were positively old friends, could now be standing there gazing at them with such uneasy, hostile, frightened faces.
But they had to believe it.
They were beginning to understand what they were in for.
It was during those few minutes while the hall seethed with angry shouting people that ‘the group’ finally realized how little they had achieved during their years of hard work.
For one thing, where were the Africans? There was not a black face in the hall – not even a brown one. The Africans, the Coloured people, the Indians – none were here. Yet when ‘the group’ started work, it was axiomatic that it was on behalf of the Africans above all that they would run their study groups and their meetings.
Tonight the mysterious Mr Zlentli, the nationalist leader about whom the white people fearfully gossiped, was running a study group for his associates. So Clive de Wet had told Athen earlier in the afternoon, when Athen had suggested that since the white audience was likely to be unappreciative of the famous Professor from Johannesburg, it might be a good thing if the other groups came. But Clive de Wet had said he did not see the point of their risking their jobs and homes for the sake of communism and the Russians.
So in fact their work had been done for the white people; hundreds of white citizens had been pleased to play with ‘the left’ while the war lasted, and now it was all over. And what had happened? The Zambesia News had changed the tone and style of its editorials, that was all. Or at least, there were no other influences ostensibly at work.
The meeting was breaking up. People streamed from both exits, not looking at the platform, where the Professor and Mrs Van der Bylt and Mr Playfair sat smiling philosophically.
Solly shouted: ‘That’s right, go quickly, got to be careful now, haven’t you?’
‘That’s right,’ said Marjorie fiercely: ‘The heat’s turned on, so back they scuttle to their little holes, out of harm’s way.’
Athen said seriously: ‘But comrades, this means a new policy must be made – I suggest we go to the office to discuss it.’
For the moment silence; then people laughed, uncomfortably, for who were ‘the comrades’ now?
‘Yes,’ said Athen, ‘but that is not good, it is not enough that we just go home. We have a responsibility.’
They stood, looking at the fierce little man who was gazing into their faces one after another, insisting that they should agree, become welded together, forget all their old differences. But of course it was not possible.
Piet said: ‘Oh no thanks, I couldn’t face all that all over again.’ He went off, and his wife followed him, having sent back a friendly, no-hard-feelings smile. Tommy Brown went after the de Preez couple. Marjorie, who was grasping Athen’s hands, in passionate approval of what he said, found her husband Colin at her side. ‘Yes, dear,’ said Colin, ‘I’m sure you’re right, but don’t forget we’ve got a babysitter waiting.’ ‘Isn’t it just typical!’ exclaimed Marjorie – but she went off with her husband. Johnny Lindsay was taken home by Flora and by Mrs Van and by the Professor, an old friend.
The lights went out in the hall, and by the time they reached the pavement, there remained Anton, Martha, Thomas Stern, and Athen.
Athen stood smiling bitterly as the others went into the Old Vienna Tea Rooms. Then he turned and said to the three friends: ‘Well, shall I make a speech just for us here?’
‘Why not?’ said Anton.
‘Ah,’ said Athen, in a low passionate tone, his face twisted with self-dislike, or so it seemed – pale with what he felt: ‘It is time I was at home. Every morning I wake up and I find myself here, and I ask myself, how long must I be away from my people?’
‘And how do you think I feel?’ said Anton. He sounded gruff, brusque, with how he felt. Yet such was the Greek’s power to impose an idea of pure, burning emotion that Anton seemed feeble beside him. Meanwhile, Thomas from Poland stood quietly by, watching. There they stood on the dark pavement. It was a hot night. A blue gum moved its long leaves dryly together over their heads. The air was scented with dust and with eucalyptus.
‘Look, Athen,’ said Martha, ‘why don’t you just come back and – I’ll make everyone bacon and eggs.’ She felt she had earned Athen’s reply: ‘Thank you, Martha, but no, I will not. Suddenly tonight I feel far from you all. And what will you all do now? You will sit and watch how the poor people of this country suffer, and you will do nothing? No, it is not possible.’
Thomas observed: ‘Athen, we’ll just have to cut our losses. That’s all there is to it.’
And now it was Thomas’s turn to appear inadequate – even ridiculous. Athen looked quietly at them all, one after another. Then he shrugged and walked off.
They stood, silent. Then Thomas said: ‘I’ll fix him, don’t worry.’ He ran after Athen. The two men stood in low-voiced gesticulating argument a few paces off, then Thomas led Athen back.
‘Athen has something to say,’ Thomas announced. He then stood back beside Martha and Anton, leaving Athen to face them. An audience of three waited for the speaker to begin. Presumably this is what Thomas intended to convey? Was he trying to make fun of Athen? Martha could not make out from Thomas’s serious listening face what he meant, then he nodded at her, feeling her inspection of him, that she must listen to Athen, who stood, his eyes burning, his fists raised, his dark face darker for the pale gleam of his elegant suit.
He was reminding them of the evening the Labour Party won the elections. The little office in Founders’ Street had been stocked with beer, and for hours people, mainly RAF, had streamed in, to sit on the floor, and outside in the corridor, and down the stairs. They were drinking beer, singing the Red Flag, finally dancing in the street. Athen had been there. Towards morning he had got up from where he had been sitting, very quiet, observing them all – the communists were celebrating with the others – from the bench under the window. He had said: ‘Good night, comrades. I hope that by the time the sun rises you will have remembered that you are Marxists.’
‘Is it possible that we are so far from each other – yet we all call ourselves communists? I do not understand you. Is it that you have forgotten what it means to be a socialist now? Yet when your Labour Party got into power, you were all as pleased as little children that night. I sometimes think of you all – just like little children. Such thoughts, they are understandable from the men in the RAF and in the army. They are poor men without real politics. When they are happy their Labour Party gets into power, then I am happy for them. But we know, as Marxists, that …’
It was grotesque, of course. This was a speech, they understood, that Athen had thought over, worked out, made part of himself. He had planned to deliver it – when and where? Certainly not on a dusty pavement after a public meeting that was almost a riot. Certainly not to Anton and Martha and Thomas. It was one of the statements, or manifestos, that we all work out, or rather are written for us on the urgent pressure of our heart’s blood, or so it feels, and always at three o’clock in the morning. When we finally deliver these burning, correct, true, just words, how differently will people feel our situation – and of course! theirs. But, alas, it is just these statements that never get made. Or if they do …
The three of them looked at Athen, embarrassed rather than not, and all of them wished to stop him.
‘… is it true that you really believe that Britain will now be socialist and all men free? And tonight, do we have to be told by a Professor from Johannesburg that now the war is over, America and Britain will again try to harm the Soviet Union? Is not America now, as we stand here, pouring out her millions to destroy the communist armies in China? Yes, it has been easy for you to say, in the last years, that you are socialists. But we have been allowed to say it only because the Soviet Union has been crippling herself to kill fascism. And now it will be death and imprisonment again, just as it was before …’
