Consciences at rest

Patricia Highsmith, 1921–1995.

Ripley’s Game by Patricia Highsmith.
Vintage Books, 1999 (1974).

‘There’s no such thing as a perfect murder,’ Tom said to Reeves.

This third outing for the talented Tom Ripley, following the original 1955 novel and then Ripley Under Ground (1970), has our antihero still ensconced with his wife Heloïse at Belle Ombre in the village of Villeperce near Fontainebleau, south of Paris.

After receiving a verbal slight from Englishman Jonathan Trevanny, a picture framer who has heard of the sordid rumours surrounding Ripley, Tom’s ‘game’ is to cynically set Trevanny up as a potential hitman to murder a Mafia member in Munich; Tom hopes to play on the impecunious Trevanny’s fears of dying of leukemia and leaving his wife and son Georges almost destitute.

But conman Ripley has not reckoned on two things: first, that his conscience will prick him when he believes Trevanny won’t be up to any further Mafia assassinations; and second, he hasn’t allowed for the unwavering suspicions of Simone, Trevanny’s wife. If his plausibility and manner can’t win over Simone will the contract killings and Tom’s own security be in jeopardy?

Richly resonant

William Holman Hunt, ‘The Scapegoat’ (1856).

Kingdoms of the Wall
by Robert Silverberg.
Grafton, 1993.

This is the book of Poilar Crookleg, who has been to the roof of the World at the top of the Wall, who has seen the strange and bewildering gods that dwell there, who has grappled with them and returned rich with the knowledge of the mysteries of life and of death.

So begins this richly resonant novel, set on some distant planet — well, all planets are distant, aren’t they? — in a part of that world which is dominated by an inconceivably vast mountain called the Wall.

From a community which is made up of distinct villages surrounding the Wall forty youngsters are chosen periodically to attempt the scaling of the mountain. Despite the honour accruing to the chosen ones, few of them ever return, and those that do seem unable to give a coherent narrative. Poilar is determined to be the one who not only achieves the ascent but to return and give an account.

Despite the very first sentence providing the most monumental spoiler ever, Silverberg’s novel maintains a very palpable will-he-won’t-he tension throughout: Poilar’s nickname, Crookleg, is just one of the most obvious obstacles to him ever making his dream a reality.