Saturn Over the Water by J. B. Priestley, J.B. Priestley Page B

said you didn’t believe me,’ I said. ‘That means you think I’m lying. Well then, there’s no point in our going on with this conversation. However, I’ll have one more try. I know an art dealer in New York called Sam Harnberg – I was staying with him this last week-end – and he wrote to Mr Arnaldos telling him I was coming to Peru. So your grandfather asked me to stay here for a few days.’
    ‘If that’s true, I still don’t understand it,’ she said, not glowering but looking at me very doubtfully. ‘Why did you accept his invitation? Did you think you could sell him some pictures?’
    ‘I can always do with some money,’ I said, trying not to lose my temper, ‘but I haven’t started hawking my pictures yet. Not many reputable painters do, y’know. You could have found that out in Paris and New York – ’
    ‘Oh – stop being sarcastic. It’s so boring – and old .’
    ‘I’ll bet. Well, you go on just being exciting and young. And please could I make myself another martini?’
    ‘Yes – and make me one too.’ It wasn’t a request, it was an order. I looked at her, and if my look didn’t tell her I thought she was a sulky spoilt rich girl, then it wasn’t doing its work. She frowned, then turned away. By the time I had poured out the martinis for us, Arnaldos had arrived with his other guest.
    ‘I am sorry if we have kept you waiting,’ the old man said. ‘Mr Bedford – Dr Steglitz.’
    I don’t think I actually jumped at the sound of the fourth name on the list. Probably I just stared like an idiot. But perhaps Dr Steglitz was used to it. He looked like the original of all eggheads. He was Humpty-Dumpty after being out in the sun a long time. He had an enormous brown bald head, a body both long and fat, and short bowed legs. His English was very fluent but it had an odd accent that didn’t seem to have come from anywhere I’d been. Rosalia was polite to him, making an effort for her grandfather’s sake, but it was obvious she disliked him even more than she disliked me.
    ‘So this is how it is,’ Steglitz began, after we’d sat down to dinner. It was his favourite phrase. ‘Mr Bedford, you are an artist – a painter – like our pretty Rosalia here.’ She looked at him in disgust. ‘And so you paint for us your inner world. But what do you show us? Ah – yes, this excellent fish you have here – I have not forgotten it, you see, Mr Arnaldos.’ He took what seemed to me more than his share. Then he turned his attention to me again. ‘I say, what do you show us? Disaster and disintegration, fear and horror. You offer us in paint what the poets and novelists and dramatists offer us in words. No faith, no hope, the end of our species. So this is how it is. You agree, Mr Arnaldos? But of course you do. We live in a world, Mr Bedford, where everything is being adulterated, watered down, falsified, to please the foolish masses – and the few who do not belong to these masses – the artists – can only show us the terror and despair of their inner world, which has already faced destruction, the ruin of all mankind’s belief and hope. So there we are, Mr Bedford – and you too, Rosalia, if you are not tired of hearing me talk – and what can you offer us – to bring us even a little satisfaction, a glimpse of beauty and joy, new insight? Very little, I am afraid. And that is how it is.’ He emptied his glass of white wine. Arnaldos looked at him with almost affectionate approval. When I turned my head I saw that Rosalia was looking at me, as if she expected me to say something.
    ‘I know what you mean, Dr Steglitz,’ I said, ‘though I don’t have to agree with you. Obviously you don’t know my work – why should you? – so I must ask you to believe me when I say it isn’t quite like that. I try to make it a kind of bridge between what I see outside and what I feel inside. And what’s inside isn’t always screaming with horror.’ I didn’t look at her but I