Stiff Upper Lip by Lawrence Durrell Page A

and slow, now hollow and resonant, now sharp and clear. Day and night the banging haunted us until at last the Professor appeared. We received him with tears of entreaty in our eyes.
    He took a look at Percy and nodded sagely. He knew, it appeared, all about these press-studs. He applied some olive-oil on a feather to the relevant joints, tapped twice with his pince-nez and Presto: Percy was free. It seemed almost too good to be true—all that silence. A united sigh went up from us all—a sigh such as I have never heard from dips before or since. Silence at last descended on us, the silence of a normal embassy oozing along at the normal cruising speed. No longer the goods’ yards at Swindon, no longer a branch of Bassett-Lowke, no longer a boiler-makers’ jamboree in Sheffield. No. Just H.M. Embassy as ever was, as ever would be in future, we hoped. But just to make assurance doubly sure Polk-Mowbray had the arms taken off the suit of armour and sent home. I can’t say it improved the appearance of “The White Knight”; but then it was questionable whether anything ever could.



8
    The Swami’s Secret
    I told you (said Antrobus) about the Naval Attaché and his definite leanings towards the occult? I thought I had. I don’t think, however, that I ever told you about the business of the Swami. Well, the whole of my first winter old Butch Benbow, as he was laughingly called, was working away like hell on reincarnation. Breathing exercises in this office, squinting at the tip of his tongue for hours at a time until his P.A. nearly went out of her mind. He even took to holding his breath during the duller staff conferences and letting it out with a swish. This wasn’t reassuring. His valet said that during the lunch interval he often sat cross-legged on the lawn with a begonia on his navel, frankly and openly meditating—but this may have been an exaggeration. Anyway, he had it bad, and he was nothing if not dogged. Indeed doggedness was clearly marked in his horoscope, he said. There was no mention of drunkenness or indecent exposure. Just the doggedness. Mind you, I myself doubted the wisdom of all this spiritual strain upon a nature which, I thought, was of a more spirituous cast, but … I held my peace. Even when he sprained a rib I said nothing.
    Then one morning he came into my office and I was staggered by the change in his appearance. He walked like an aged and broken man. He was ashen pale. At first I put this down to the fact that we had all dined at the Burmese Legation the night before where they had served venison so rare as almost to lift one off the ground. But I was wrong. “Antrobus,” he said, “I’m ruined, old man. Dished. My blasted swami is coming out by air.”
    â€œYour swami?” I echoed. He nodded and gulped.
    â€œI’ve been taking reincarnation lessons by post from an Indian swami. Up to now he’s simply been a Box Number in the Edgware Road, old man. Name of Anaconda Veranda. And jolly fruitful it’s been up to now. But I wasn’t prepared for a telegram saying that he was coming out to visit me and study my spiritual progress at first hand. He is arriving this afternoon.”
    â€œWell what’s wrong with that?” I said, looking for the Silver Lining. “I bet you are the first dip. to have a private swami. Everyone will be mad with envy in the Corps.” He groaned and moved from side to side, as if he were representing Colic in a charade. He said:
    â€œMy dear chap, surely you know that all swamis are little naked men in spectacles walking around with a goat on a string? What could I do with him here? I couldn’t take him to cocktails with the French. I should become the laughing-stock of the whole Corps if I were seen bowling about attached to a man in a loin-cloth. The press would certainly get hold of it. What would the Admiralty say if they saw a picture of me in the Navy Weekly? You