The End of the Affair

by Graham Greene

hats and coats and I took somebody else’s umbrella by accident—the man on the second floor had friends in. Then I closed the stained-glass door behind me and made my way carefully down the steps that had been blasted in 1944 and never repaired. I had reason to remember the occasion and how

stranger

his liking

I knew so much already, that one mo...

fight if only because there might have been a chance, however small, that through some

trust her absolutely not to read it though she comes in here a dozen times a day. I don’t even put it away in a drawer. And yet I can’t trust … she’s out for a walk now. A walk, Bendrix.’ The rain had penetrated his guard also and he held the edge of his sleeve towards the gas fire. ‘I’m sorry.’ ‘You were always a special friend of hers, Bendrix. They always say, don’t they, that a husband is the last person really to know the kind of woman … I thought tonight,

letter.’ He sat there with his damp arm extended, looking away from me. I had never felt less like laughing, and yet I would

overnight, that this day I was going to visit Mr

The reviewers said it was the work of a craftsman: that was all that was left me of what had been a passion. I thought perhaps with the next novel the passion would

that, and I wasn’t interested?’ ‘It’s kind of you to suggest it, sir, but you have to look at this all round. I don’t say I wouldn’t do it even to my boy, but what’s he going to think if he ever comes across you—in the course of the investigation?’ ‘That’s not necessary.’ ‘But it might well happen, sir.’ ‘Why not leave him at home

Doyle, Charles Garvice, Stanley Weyman, Nat Gould, with an occasional more illustrious and familiar face: the living you can count on the fingers of one hand. I have always felt at home in the club because there is so little likelihood of meeting a fellow writer. I remember Henry chose a Vienna steak—it was a mark of his innocence. I really believe that he had no idea what he was ordering and expected something like a Wiener Schnitzel. Playing as he was away from the home ground, he was too

the whole point, for how many promises I’ve made and broken in a lifetime. Why did this promise stay, like an ugly vase a friend has given and one waits for a maid to break it and year after year she breaks the things

believe. But I don’t want to.’ ‘Tell me,’ he said and because he forgot the beauty of his own hands and turned towards me his ugly cheek, forgetting himself in the desire to help, I found myself talking—about that night and the bomb falling and the stupid vow. ‘And you really believe,’ he said, ‘that perhaps …’ ‘Yes.’ ‘Think of the thousands of people all over the world praying now, and their prayers aren’t answered.’ ‘There were thousands of people dying in Palestine when Lazarus …’ ‘We don’t believe that story, do we, you and I?’ he said with a kind of complicity. ‘Of course not, but millions of people have. They must have thought

the philosophical arguments and the historical evidence.’ I suppose I must have made some evasive reply for he went on, ‘It’s really important. We mustn’t despise our enemies. They have a case.’ ‘They have?’ ‘It’s not a sound one, except superficially. It’s specious.’ He watched me with anxiety. I think he was wondering whether I was

reasonable.’ ‘You seem to have a very strange set of values, Mr Bendrix.’ ‘But surely you don’t believe cremation affects the resurrection of the body, father?’ ‘Of course I don’t. I’ve told you my reasons already. If they don’t seem strong enough to Mr Miles, there’s no more to be said.’ He got up from his chair, and what an ugly man he was. Sitting down he had at least the appearance of power, but his legs were too short for his body, and he rose,

sometimes he had left the house before I came down, but this morning his plate had not been touched and I heard the front door close softly before he appeared.

she wasn’t.’ ‘I wasn’t her only lover—’ ‘Stop it,’ Henry said. ‘You’ve no right …’ ‘Let him alone,’ Father Crompton said. ‘Let the poor man rave.’ ‘Don’t give me your professional pity, father. Keep it for your penitents.’ ‘You can’t dictate to me whom I’m to pity, Mr Bendrix. ‘Any man could have her.’ I longed to believe