Page 15 of Fire Must Burn

‘Maurice Dobb is having a small get-together at his house. You should come.’

‘What’s the occasion? More economics?’

He smiled.

‘The next level,’ he said.

London, 1947

‘And that’s how I almost became a communist,’ said Iris.

She had decided in the morning to tell Gwen more about Tony during their walk to work, and her partner listened without interruption the entire time.

‘The get-together with this Dobb person was a recruitment?’ she asked at the end.

‘A recruitment disguised as a party,’ said Iris. ‘A Party party. A mix of dons and students. There were relatively few freshers, even fewer women, so I was flattered to be invited, and the subject of much attention, of course.’

‘Of course.’

‘Tony stayed by my side the entire time,’ Iris continued. ‘My gallant protector and sponsor.’

‘This was a secret society of some sort?’

‘Oh, not that party. I mean, there were plenty of secret societies about, and I daresay half the guests that night were members of the Apostles as well, but Cambridge back then – they said that one out of every five students was with the socialists, and one of every five socialists joined the communists, so there was nothing unusual about any of it.’

‘But you weren’t seduced. Politically, I mean.’

‘No. There had been an incident the year before that bothered me. A Russian physicist on the faculty had gone back for a visit to his family, and the Soviets wouldn’t let him leave. I couldn’t see affiliating myself with anything associated with them after that. So I chose after a few more exploratory meetings not to join the CP.’

‘How did Tony take that?’

‘He was disappointed, but we remained friends.’

‘Only friends, though? It never went any further?’

A quick flash of memory …

She sat at the head of the bed, her back against the headboard, her legs drawn to her chest, her arms wrapped around them.

‘Is something wrong?’ she asked softly.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said disconsolately. ‘I don’t seem to be able to manage it.’

‘We didn’t get that far,’ said Iris. ‘I thought we would, but we didn’t.’

‘Do you wish you had?’ asked Gwen.

‘Not now,’ she said. ‘Given how things went later, it’s a good thing that it didn’t.’

‘What happened later?’

Once again, she sat across from him in the Whim. Their last time together there, the end of 1936. She wouldn’t meet his eyes.

‘Come with me,’ he urged her.

‘You must be mad,’ she said.

‘Why not?’ he asked. ‘It isn’t about joining the Party, it’s about fighting against fascism. That’s something you and I both agree on. A bunch of us are going – Cornford, Julian Bell, Dave Guest, Bruce Cater, others. The crème de la crème, or maybe I should say la crema de la crema.’