But now you will begin to understand the nature of the task that lies
before me. If I am to do any justice to the cryptic George Boon, if
indeed I am to publish anything at all about him, I must set myself to
edit and convey these books whose only publication was in fact by word
of mouth in his garden arbours, using these few fragments as the
merest accessories to that. I have hesitated, I have collected
unfavourable advice, but at last I have resolved to make at least one
experimental volume of Boon's remains. After all, whatever we have of
Aristotle and Socrates and all that we most value of Johnson comes
through the testimony of hearers. And though I cannot venture to
compare myself with Boswell....
I know the dangers I shall run in this attempt to save my friend from
the devastating expurgations of his written ostensible career. I
confess I cannot conceal from myself that, for example, I must needs
show Boon, by the standards of every day, a little treacherous.
When I thrust an arm into one or other of the scores of densely packed
bins of press cuttings that cumber the attics of his castellated
mansion and extract a sample clutch, I find almost invariably praise,
not judicious or intelligent praise perhaps, but slab and generous
praise, paragraphs, advice, photographs, notices, notes, allusions and
comparisons, praise of the unparalleled gloss on his style by Doctor
Tomlinson Keyhole under the pseudonym of "Simon up to Snuff," praise
of the healthiness of the tone by Doctor Tomlinson Keyhole under the
pseudonym of "The Silver Fish," inspired announcements of some
forthcoming venture made by Doctor Tomlinson Keyhole under the
pseudonym of "The True-Born Englishman," and interesting and exalting
speculations as to the precise figure of Boon's income over Dr.
Tomlinson Keyhole's own signature; I find chatty, if a little
incoherent, notices by Braybourne of the most friendly and helpful
sort, and interviews of the most flattering description by this
well-known litterateur and that. And I reflect that while all this was
going on, there was Boon on the other side of Miss Bathwick's rampart
mind, not only not taking them and himself seriously, not only not
controlling his disrespectful internal commentary on these excellent
men, but positively writing it down, regaling himself with the
imagined murder of this leader of thought and the forcible abduction
to sinister and melancholy surroundings of that!
And yet I find it hard to do even this measure of justice to my
friend. He was treacherous, it must be written, and yet he was, one
must confess, a singularly attractive man. There was a certain quality
in his life--it was pleasant. When I think of doing him justice I am
at once dashed and consoled by the thought of how little he cared how
I judged him. And I recall him very vividly as I came upon him on one
occasion.
He is seated on a garden roller--an implement which makes a faultless
outdoor seat when the handle is adjusted at a suitable angle against a
tree, and one has taken the precaution to skid the apparatus with a
piece of rockery or other convenient object. His back is against the
handle, his legs lie in a boneless curve over the roller, and an inch
or so of native buff shows between the corduroy trousers and the
claret-coloured socks. He appears to be engaged partly in the
degustation of an unappetizing lead pencil, and partly in the
contemplation of a half-quire of notepaper. The expression of his
rubicund face is distinctly a happy one. At the sound of my approach
he looks up. "I've been drawing old Keyhole again!" he says like a
schoolboy.
[Illustration]
Nevertheless, if critics of standing are to be drawn like this by
authors of position, then it seems to me that there is nothing before
us but to say Good-bye for ever to the Dignity of Letters.