Cast in Doubt Page 10

  I lead her to her room, which is one floor below mine. A bouquet of flowers carefully arranged and placed in a locally made ceramic vase has been set on the white dresser. Nectaria put the flowers there, to welcome Gwen. I think Gwen is surprised and pleased. People who expect bad or poor treatment are usually overcome by kindness. I would never allow anyone but Gwen to call me Lulu.

  It’s so nourishing to talk with Gwen. We talk and talk. I embellish the stories about Alicia and Roger, and then offer my tale of Helen. Gwen listens, scrutinizing me, getting the story. Her lips caress and hold tight a Greek nonfiltered cigarette. Her dark eyes, which slant upward, are narrowed. When I’ve finished, she repeats, You’ve been out of the States too long, Lulu, you’re becoming one of those expatriates. She waves her hands in the air, indicating, I suppose, a dizzy expatriate, a confused one. A predictable expatriate, she explains. Then she adds, Horace, girls like Helen are a dime a dozen. Pish-posh! I exclaim, like a character out of Dickens.

  It’s been some time since I’ve seen Helen on her terrace, and she hasn’t come for dinner at Christos’ restaurant. One of the beauties of this place is that one can make oneself scarce, it’s true. One can disappear at will, for a time. Yet Helen may be angry with me. It is no fault of mine that John is living at Alicia’s house, surrounded by bougainvillea, and that he is cared for by such a lovely older woman, though to me she is a younger woman. Isn’t everyone younger than I? Helen may need to blame me, but I am blameless. Of this event, anyway. The last time we dined, in the condition I was, I may have blurted out something about suicide, about her having had a twin who died. Too much time has passed since then. A few days’ absence is normal. And though, prior to Gwen’s arrival, I was furiously at work on my crime book, I was unsettled and concerned about Helen. I thought about her and that evening, and then repressed it. I said to myself it is nothing; but then I dwelled on her and it again, and yet I did and have done nothing. Actually I have been waiting to hear from her. But now I think I will send her a note. I will also ask Yannis to go to the market and buy her some flowers to accompany the note. I don’t think this can be viewed by Helen as another one of Horace’s impositions.

  With Gwen here, my absence from home seems poignant. I’ve been here nearly as long as Helen’s been alive. I might become annoyed at Gwen’s harping on my being out of touch. No doubt I am, whatever that means. With the zeitgeist, with American life and day-to-day reality, whatever that may be, with the city, the polis. Politics were not why I left America. I’d lost my lover of many years. I had a publisher, a contract, books to do. I was tired of everyone and everything, just as I am now, come to think of it. I had a little money to play with, as I was and am privileged. I loathe people who hide their means of support, though I am no Marxist. I identified during the sixties with James Baldwin, especially when he fled to France, and though I’m not black, and he’s years younger, and I didn’t suffer the poverty and discrimination he did, I felt close to him. I still feel close to him because of these things and certain details like our bulging eyes and predilection for men. I always thought I’d meet him, but fate has not been kind to me in that respect. He’s a marvelous writer and much misunderstood. Gwen knew of my feelings for him, and she’s the only person I ever told. She’s met him. Gwen knows everyone. She is more than twenty years younger than I. I must ask her how Baldwin is these days. If anyone would know, she would.

  The sea is remarkably calm now and the only sounds one hears are small waves slapping gently against the harbor walls. It is quiet, peaceful. The States is a maelstrom. All those products, and people and clubs, and TV shows. I watched television once only. It gave me a headache. There is some noise here of course. On Sundays the army marches around the harbor. Gwen will watch the parade, laugh her sharp little laugh, and flick the ashes of her cigarette. I never would have marched in protest marches. I couldn’t, carrying a banner proclaiming, “U.S. Out Of Vietnam,” or “Women’s Bodies, Women’s Lives,” and not because I don’t believe in the truth of both, but because I abhor the idea of wearing a placard or button. I hate to think that a phrase could in any way even for an instant define me. That I could be summed up that way is appalling, absolutely terrifying. I immediately conjure a tombstone upon which my life is reduced to an engraved epitaph.

  I am more than a little ambivalent lately. Gwen has never marched, I’m sure of that. Were I to ask her she’d arch one eyebrow and shoot me a certain look, as if to reproach me for reading her so badly. She and I share ambivalence like a biscuit we might break in half for tea. She’s more angry than I, I believe, but her anger is carefully muted through sarcasm. This may or may not reveal some truth beneath. I’m sure she still fights, verbally, as she always has, especially when she’s tied one on. Gwen loves a wickedly good contest, one of wits, of course. For her there is almost no other contest, except perhaps for love. The love of a bad man, usually.

  Some fights must be fought—the Civil War, World War II. I would have liked to have been at Stonewall as a fly on the barroom wall. But I hate physical violence. I was not brave enough, when I was living in Boston, to go on a freedom ride to the South. I drank a toast to them in Gwen’s apartment in Cambridge; she drank and said nothing. I cried when King died; Gwen wrote me that she was so drunk that night she lay down in the gutter on Canal Street. But it was not at all clear whether her drinking was in relation to King’s death. She allowed that to remain ambiguous. About matters pertaining to civil rights or to the fact that she is black, she has, over the years’ said little, almost nothing. I am sure she carries all this within her where she nurses her secret self, the self that would not rest easy in the company of whites, not even men like myself whom she loves and trusts. But I don’t really think Gwen trusts anyone. Her cynicism is deeper than the sea out my window and beyond. I can’t bear to think about it. I wonder if Gwen’s script—Dark Angels—holds these secrets, these surprises, exposes the Gwen I am not privy to. I’ve often thought that, that her true self and outrage would find release in her personal writing. I wonder if on this trip she will show me any of it. But I know, in my heart, beaten but still beating, that she will not.

  Gwen is asleep in the room beneath me. Her proximity provides a homey comfort. That Gwen represents for me a kind of security and sense of rightful place is odd, as she is edgy, always on the edge, always about to fall over to the other side. I sigh audibly and look out again to the sea and to Helen’s terrace. It is empty. The sea is choppy.

  It is beautiful here. Gwen must or will surely recognize that. Truth must be beauty. Beauty its own truth. With a full heart I go to the typewriter and confront Stan Green as he studies and tracks the young rich boy, stalking him, stalking him, watching and waiting for him to return to the scene of the crime. Blasting with energy I type more than ten manuscript pages. I will make my deadline after all if I continue with such alacrity. Just a little more detective-like analysis and Stan Green will nail the young spoiled criminal to a cross of his own making. I think it will be in a diary he’s kept, a small book written in code. Green will crack it.

  The sky is darkening. Gwen is still asleep. Perhaps she took a pill. Suddenly it comes to me that the word analyst on Helen’s diary may apply as much to her father as to herself. That is, I had assumed she was in analysis, though I never inquired, and now, I remember quite distinctly, she told me her father was a shrink. Her psychological astuteness may indeed be an inherited trait, or one encouraged from birth. Perhaps placing analyst in block letters on her diary’s cover was an ironic gesture. She may have been one of those children who was sent to a psychiatrist at a young age. I don’t think Helen was a twin, after all. I cannot imagine that that fact, were it so, wouldn’t have risen to the surface in these past months. But I do think her sister died. There was some great family tragedy, I am certain.

  I know Gwen is going to disabuse me of this and upbraid me. She will most likely tell me that my fascination with Helen has to do with my being isolated, out of touch with my ba
se, or that it comes from alienation, loneliness, or that my desire for progeny can’t be fulfilled by Yannis. She’ll think of something, I’m sure. I do agree—there is something strange about my relationship to Helen. Her curtains are still drawn. Perhaps she is traveling or hiding. Helen may be spending time with the Gypsy.

  Gypsies pass through this way with some regularity, and some have settled not far outside of town. Thousands of Gypsies live in Greece and have for years. But I have always been suspicious of them. It’s a prejudice, yet I cannot shake it. I don’t understand their ways at all, and they have not yet come into my mind as individuals. Alicia has some sociological books on them. I think I’ll pay her a visit while Gwen sleeps. It’s still early for dinner. I’ll just leave Gwen a note and toddle off. See Alicia. And John, of course.

  Generally I like this time of day. Dusk elicits neither happiness nor sadness. It doesn’t demand a precise response. The boats are rocking gently on the water. The slight nip in the air is invigorating. I walk briskly up the hill to Alicia’s house. I knock boldly on the thick wooden door. John answers and lets me in. His neck is healed. He wears a small bandage on one part of it only, which I suppose is the place where most of the damage was done. I shudder to think more on it. His violet eyes, I detect, light up at the sight of me. How curious—he’s glad to see me.

  Just a short visit, I explain quickly, embarrassed. How’s Helen? John asks in a muffled voice. She’s well, I lie, since I most assuredly don’t know how she is. He makes his inquiry at the base of the stairs, out of Alicia’s sight and hearing. He dawdles, waiting for something more, some more meaty disclosure, and as he dawdles, he scratches his cheek lazily. His cheekbones are high, and today he reminds me of a foppish lad I went to school with. I want to offer other, better information and thus add portentously, She’s taken up with a Gypsy, John. A girl, woman. Yeah, John snorts, what is she going to do—live in a cave? I shouldn’t think so, John. I answer him with as much dignity as I can, more for Helen’s sake than my own. She’s much too urban for that, I insist.

  I follow him up the stairs. His tanned feet are bare and dirty, and I recall following my first lover up the stairs to his bedroom when his parents were away. His feet were very dirty too. He committed suicide many years later, I heard, which also reminds me of John and his recent botched attempt. When I knew my first beau, he was furtive and guilty but he possessed a mad sense of humor. In those days a practical joker was much prized, a wicked but wickedly appropriate spoof much appreciated. I once was served coffee in a porcelain bowl, not a cup; I spent several minutes searching for the piece that holds the index finger. My friends howled as I spun the bowl around, again and again, feeling but not looking for the handle. My friends knew I never looked at what was in front of me when I was engaged in conversation. It is the same today. Many things do not change, though we Americans expect everything to change all the time, which is why we are so easily disillusioned.

  Alicia is reclining on her Moroccan couch. She’s in blue, a violet blue. Her cheeks and nose blush pink and there’s something indefinable about her mood. Were I a vulgar man, I would imagine she’d just had an orgasm. An orgasmic flush had spread over her precious womanly body, that’s how our South African Don Juan, Wallace, might pen it. She’s lost weight, I think, though I’m not really able to imagine what Alicia’s body is like. She wears flowing robes and loose trousers and shirts. She waves her hands in the air grandly when making certain points. Her wrists are thin and delicate, her hands well-shaped, each finger pink and clean, her nails are covered in a clear polish. When quite still she seems active or about to be. One might call her intense. She moves with her mind. Your mind races ahead of you, Mother used to say to me.

  I’ve just been playing the piano for John, Alicia says, and touches her brow as if the heat of playing had overcome her. She sang for me, too, John declares, looking down. I hate opera, but when Alicia sings, it’s okay. How wonderful of Alicia to sing for you, John. You haven’t sung for me in ages, Alicia, I complain petulantly. She smiles patiently.

  Alicia is all pink and blue, like wallpaper in a baby’s nursery. She hasn’t sung for me in a long while. I used to cherish her private recitals, sung on nights that were gray and rainy, in November and December, when the mistral blows this way. She would clasp her hands under her breast, purse her full lips to contour sound, shaping it this way and that with ovals and circles; she emitted lovely bell-like tones and her voice transported me. I had assumed she’d given up singing, at least in company, and feel rather peeved that this scruff of a boy has become her audience.

  On the other hand, this scruff of a boy is immensely pretty. Alicia and I both look at him at the same time and then look at each other. Much passes in this glance. She offers us wine, my favorite, Demestica, which I cannot refuse. My curiosity about their relationship grows by leaps and bounds. How are you spending your time, John, and will you stay here long? I inquire. Alicia directs her attention to him with an interest as great as mine. Obviously she must also be in the dark about his future plans. He swallows his wine, wipes his mouth, and says he hasn’t decided, but he doesn’t think he’ll be here that long, because there’s no way he can do his music here. Also, he says he’s nearly out of money. Impulsively I respond that I need some carpentry done, if he does that kind of thing, bookcases and so on. He perks up, observing—inspecting?—me from under his long dark lashes. Those violet eyes. Alicia seems surprised or startled but not upset, I think. The question one always wants to ask of truly ravishing individuals like John is how well aware of it are they.

  The wine loosens John up; he becomes almost voluble. He likes Greek food and espouses reasonable sentiments about the people, all nuanced by a fashionable coolness and a studied inarticulateness. He seems a distrustful type, I think, but like most callow youth, betrays an enthusiasm for life—against his will, I should imagine. He discusses bouzoúki music and is apparently somewhat knowledgeable about musical instruments. He talks of modalities; I think of Joyce and modalities, the ineluctability of the visible, wasn’t it? What is ineluctable here? Alicia and I are ineluctable modalities, and John is rapturous dissonance. During the day, John tells me, he fishes down at the end of the pier in the harbor and catches enough for their dinner. He wiles away many hours with hook, line and sinker—and bait. A rock-and-roll Huck Finn, I suppose. The doctor cautioned him to be quiet, which is what he’s doing, and of course he’s not taken any drugs in weeks. Which drugs, I do not ask.

  I tell Alicia and John that I have a visitor; my best friend, Gwen, has arrived, I explain, and John asks, Gwen who? Gwen Duvanel, I answer, and he says, Wow, her. She’s cool, man, a scenemaker. Gwen? I say, surprised at the appellation, Gwen, a scenemaker? What a strange term, I announce, she’s much more than that…oh, I don’t mean that’s bad, man, you know, it’s a sixties word, scenemaker, and she’s kind of sixties, John says quickly, and, you know, she’s still on the scene, and for someone pretty old, she’s heavy, great.

  Pretty old, I repeat to myself. I know that Alicia is also repeating that to herself and that the phrase is reverberating within her, too, somewhere.

  Now I am sure they haven’t slept together but that Alicia lusts for him just a little, or maybe a great deal, perhaps in a Death in Venice way, which I too could easily fall prey to. This thought invades me, nearly an epiphany of the negative. It feels unpleasantly real, and might be ineluctable. That is, once I have placed all of us in this narrative, I might just be determined to see it through. I am a perverse creature. But, I remind myself, I don’t need John, as I have Yannis. But he doesn’t and cannot negate John. Fantasy is fantasy, literature is literature, destiny is destiny. And I, I live life for art’s sake.

  Overwhelmed almost by the sight of John now, having articulated this desire so brazenly to myself, my secret self, I tell them I must return to Gwen, who will probably be awake and hungry. John will come to my rooms tomorrow, he says, to see if he can do the work, man, as he refers to me. Man, I t
hink to myself, yes, that is surely what I am. I rush to the door, as if to escape fate.

  But the die is cast. I walk into the hallway, followed by Alicia; she is close beside me. I exclaim, Oh Alicia, the books. Which books? she asks. Yours. On Gypsies, may I borrow them? Of course, but I didn’t think you had any interest in Gypsies, dear. I do of late, I say, abashed. Yes, she answers, of late many things are different. Alicia takes my hand. Helen no longer comes for her piano lessons, she adds almost ruefully. Have you seen her? she asks. No, I haven’t. I think she is angry with me. You see, Horace, I was right to distrust her. Alicia, you distrust everyone. I was nasty to her. You were probably drunk, Horace, I worry so about you. Pish-posh, I sputter, I’m made of sterner stuff than you think.

  Standing there, holding Alicia’s soft hand, I think, rather suddenly, I’ll have a party. And instantly blurt out, Alicia, come for a party the end of next week—won’t you? And John. For Gwen. I’ll invite the whole crowd, Helen too. What do you think? Alicia responds thoughtfully, What I think is, I hope you know what you’re doing. She kisses me on the cheek. I look toward the living room and admonish waggishly, I hope you know what you’re doing, too.

  Alicia glides to the bookcase and gathers several books from the shelves. She hands them to me and looks steadily into my eyes, as if to unfrock me, then answers, much too wisely, I know as much as you do, dear. Alicia always has to have the last word.

  Chapter 9