Read Online Amsterdam by Ian McEwan - Free Book Online Page B

still in his view. He said, “So you’re fighting to keep them out of the paper.”
    It was part tease, part mischief, as well as a wish to delay voicing his thoughts.
    Vernon was staring at him, amazed. “Are you mad? This is the enemy. I just told you, we’ve got the injunction lifted.”
    “Of course. Sorry. I wasn’t quite with it.”
    “My idea is to publish next week. What do you think?”
    Clive tilted back on his chair and clasped his hands behind his head. “I think,” he said carefully, “your staff is right. It’s a really terrible idea.”
    “Meaning?”
    “It’ll ruin him.”
    “Dead right it will.”
    “I mean, personally.”
    “Yup.”
    There was a stalled silence. So many objections came crowding in on Clive that they seemed to cancel each other out.
    Vernon pushed his empty glass across the table, and as it was filled he said, “I don’t get it. He’s pure poison. You’ve said so yourself many times.”
    “He’s vile,” Clive agreed.
    “The word is he’ll be mounting a leadership challenge in November. It would be terrible for the country if he was prime minister.”
    “I think so too,” Clive said.
    Vernon spread his hands. “So?”
    There was another pause while Clive stared up at the cracks in the ceiling, shaping his thoughts. At last he said, “Tell me this. Do you think it’s wrong in principle for men to dress up in women’s clothes?”
    Vernon groaned. He was beginning to behave like a drunk. He must have had a few before arriving. “Oh, Clive!”
    Clive kept on. “You yourself were once an apologist for the sexual revolution. You stood up for gays.”
    “I don’t believe I’m hearing this.”
    “You stood up for plays and films that people wanted to ban. Only last year you spoke up for thosecretins who were in court for hammering nails through their balls.”
    Vernon winced. “Penis, actually.”
    “Isn’t this the kind of sexual expression you’re so keen to defend? What exactly is Garmony’s crime that needs to be exposed?”
    “His hypocrisy, Clive. This is the hanger and flogger, the family values man, the scourge of immigrants, asylum seekers, travelers, marginal people.”
    “Irrelevant,” Clive said.
    “Of course it’s relevant. Don’t talk crap.”
    “If it’s okay to be a transvestite, then it’s okay for a racist to be one. What’s not okay is to be a racist.”
    Vernon sighed in fake pity. “Listen to me—”
    But Clive had found his trope. “If it’s okay to be a transvestite, then it’s okay for a family man to be one too. In private, of course. If it’s okay to—”
    “Clive! Listen to me. You’re in your studio all day dreaming of symphonies. You’ve no idea what’s at stake. If Garmony’s not stopped now, if he gets to be prime minister in November, they’ve got a good chance of winning the election next year. Another five years. There’ll be even more people living below the poverty line, more people in prison, more homeless, more crime, more riots like last year. He’s been speaking in favor of national service. The environment will suffer, because he’d rather please his business friends than sign the accords on global warming. He wants to take us outof Europe. Economic catastrophe! It’s all very well for you”—here Vernon gestured around at the enormous kitchen—“but for most people …”
    “Careful,” Clive growled. “When you’re drinking my wine.” He reached for the Richebourg and filled Vernon’s glass. “A hundred and five pounds a bottle.”
    Vernon downed half the glass. “My point precisely. You’re not becoming comfortable and right-wing in your middle age, are you?”
    Clive answered the taunt with one of his own. “You know what this is really about? You’re doing George’s work. He’s setting you on. You’re being used, Vernon, and I’m surprised you can’t see through it. He hates Garmony for his affair with Molly. If he had something on me or you, he’d use that too.”