All That Is (14 page)

Berggren himself did not possess that holy quality. He had the appearance almost of a banker, tall, reserved, with irregular teeth and blondish hair turned gray. He wore suits, often with a vest, and habitually took off his glasses to read. He had married three times, the first time to a woman with money and a house, an old house built a century before, with a tennis court and stone walks. She was conventional but very knowing and perhaps not wholly unaware when Berggren at a party managed to introduce her to his new mistress, to have her opinion, so to speak, since he trusted her judgment.

The mistress became his second wife—he regretted his divorce, he had loved his first wife, but life had turned a page. This second wife, Bibi, was stylish but also temperamental and demanding. The bills she ran up were always an unpleasant surprise, and she paid little attention to the cost of things like wine.

Berggren had been made for women. They were, for him, the chief reason for living or they represented it. He was not a man who was hard to live with, he was civilized and had manners though he could seem incommunicative at times. It was not a matter of being withdrawn, only that his thoughts were elsewhere. He generally avoided arguments although with Bibi it was not always possible. There was a hotel on Nackstromsgaten where he put up visiting writers, and he went there when things became too turbulent at home. The manager there knew him, and the desk clerk. The bargirl swirled cracked ice in a glass and then emptied it and poured in a Swiss wine, Sion, that he liked.

One afternoon he passed a shopwindow where a girl in her twenties in black fitted pants was arranging a dress dummy. She was aware of him standing there but she did not look at him. He stood there longer than he wished, he could not take his eyes from her. She, not the shopgirl but someone like her, became his third wife.

What the unseen part of their life was, who can say? Was she difficult or did she stand naked between his knees like the children of the patriarchs, her bare stomach, the swell of her hips? A certain unwanted coldness at his center kept him from real happiness, and though he married beautiful women, let us say possessed them, it was never complete and yet to live without them was unthinkable. The great hunger of the past was for food, there was never enough food and the majority of people were undernourished or starving, but the new hunger was for sex, there was the same specter of famine without it.

With Karen, Berggren did not feel young again but something better. Sex was more than a pleasure, at this age he felt joined to the myths. He had accidentally seen, a few years earlier, a wonderful thing, his mother dressing—her back was to him, she was seventy-two at the time, her buttocks were smooth and perfect, her waist firm. It was in his genes, then, he could perhaps go on and on, but one day he saw something else, perfectly innocent, Karen and a girlfriend she had known since school lying on the grass in their skimpy bathing suits tanning themselves, face down, side by side, talking to one another and occasionally the leg of one of them kicked idly up into the sun that was soothing their bare backs. He was sitting in his shirtsleeves on the stone terrace, reading a manuscript. He thought for a moment of going down to sit beside them, but he felt a certain awkwardness and the knowledge that whatever they were talking about, they would cease. He did not try to imagine what they were talking about, it was only their idle happiness in doing it while his own habits were less joyful and animated. He lit a cigarette and sat smoking calmly as he reread a few pages. They were standing up now and picking up their towels. On that day and other days he accepted the reality of what happened with women he loved, wives, principally, which was one of the things that led, despite his position and intelligence and the high regard in which he was held, to his suicide at the age of fifty-three, in the year that he and Karen parted.

Many of the guests had already arrived and others, with him, were on their way upstairs. The invitation had been offhanded, he was giving a costume party, Wiberg said, why don’t you come? Together with Juno in a gold and white mask and a silver Viking in a helmet with great horns, Bowman climbed the wide stairs. The door to the grand apartment was open and within was a crowd of another world, a Crusader in a tunic with a large red cross; some savages dressed in green, with long straw wigs; a few people in evening clothes wearing black masks; and Helen of Troy in a lavender gown with crossed straps in the Grecian way over a very bare back. Bowman’s costume, found at the last minute, was a hussar’s frogged jacket, red and green, over his own pants. Wiberg, in the traditional British idea of the exotic, was dressed as a pasha. On the landing a six-piece orchestra was playing.

It was difficult to move in the crowd. They were not literary people, at least not from their conversation. There were people from the embassies and society, movie people, and people using the night to advantage, a woman sticking her tongue in a man’s mouth and another—Bowman saw her only once—dressed as a carhop in very brief shorts, her legs shining in steel-colored hose, moving between several groups like a bee in clover. Wiberg talked to him only briefly. Bowman knew no one. The
music went on. Two angels stood near the orchestra, smoking cigarettes. At midnight, waiters in white jackets began serving supper, oysters and cold beef, sandwiches and pastries. There were figures in beautiful silks. An older woman with a nose as long as an index finger was eating greedily, and the man with her blew his nose in the linen napkin, a gentleman, then. There was also, but only if one knew, the upper-class harlot who’d been dropped from the guest list but had come despite that and as an act of insolence had fellated five of the male guests, one after another, in a bedroom.

Bowman, having run out of things to notice and places to stand, was looking at a collection of photographs in thick silver frames on a table, well-dressed couples or individuals standing in front of their houses or in gardens, some of them inscribed. A voice behind him said, “Bernard likes titles.”

“Yes, I was just looking at them.”

“He likes titles and people that have them.”

It was a woman in a black silk pants-dress with a kind of pirate’s bandanna and gold earrings to go with it. It was a halfhearted costume, it might easily have been her normal wear. She, too, had a long nose, but was beautiful. He was suddenly nervous and with the unmistakable feeling that he would say something foolish.

“Are you from the embassy?” she said.

“The embassy?”

“The American embassy.”

“No, no. Nothing like that. I’m an editor.”

“With Bernard?”

How did she know him? he wondered. But, of course, almost everyone there did.

“No, with an American house, Braden and Baum. You know,” he confessed, “you’re the first person I’ve talked to tonight.”

A waiter was near them.

“Would you like a drink?” he asked.

“No, thank you. I’ve had too much to drink already,” she said.

He could see that then, from her eyes and a certain hesitation in her movements.

“Are you here with someone?” he found himself asking.

“Yes. With my husband.”

“Your husband.”

“As he’s called. What did you say your name was?”

Her name was Enid Armour.

“Mrs.” he said. Mrs. Armour.”

“You keep saying that.”

“I don’t mean to.”

“It’s all right. Are you staying in London long?”

“No.”

“Another time,” she said.

“I hope so.”

She appeared to lose interest but pressed the edge of his hand as if in consolation as she moved away. He didn’t see her again in the crowd although there were other lustrous figures. She might have left. He found out her husband’s name from a list on a table near the door. At nearly three in the morning there were fantastic figures, a man dressed as an owl with shreds of cloth for feathers and a woman with a top hat and in black tights, sleeping or passed out on the couches. He went by them in his tunic like a lone figure surviving history.

His hotel was near Queen’s Gate and the room was plain. He lay there wondering if she would remember him. The night, he realized, had been glamorous. It would soon be four o’clock and he was tired. He fell into a profound sleep that ended with the sun coming full through the window and filling the room. Across the street the buildings were blazing in the light.

E. G. Armour was listed. Wanting to call but uncertain, Bowman tried to summon his nerve. He was aware it was a foolhardy thing to do and decided yes and no half a dozen times while dressing. Would it be she who answered? Finally he picked up the phone. He could hear it ringing, where, he did not know. After several rings a man’s voice said, hello.

“Mrs. Armour, please.”

He was sure the man could hear his heart.

“Yes, who is this?”

“Philip Bowman.”

The phone was put down and he heard her being called. His nervousness increased.

“Hallo,” a cool voice said.

“Enid?”

“Yes?”

“Uh, this is Philip Bowman.”

He began to explain who he was, where they had met.

“Yes, of course,” she said though it sounded matter-of-fact.

He asked, because he would not have forgiven himself if he hadn’t, if she could have lunch.

There was a pause.

“Today?” she said.

“Yes.”

“Well, it would have to be on the late side. After one.”

“Yes. Where should we meet?”

She suggested San Frediano on the Fulham Road, not far from where she lived. It was there that Bowman, who had been waiting, saw her enter and then move through the tables. She was wearing a gray pullover and a kind of suede jacket, an unapproachable woman who then saw him. He stood up a little clumsily.

She smiled.

“Hallo,” she said.

“Hello.”

It seemed his manhood had suddenly caught up with him, as if it had been waiting somewhere in the wings.

“I was afraid to call you,” he said.

“Really?”

“It was a superhuman act.”

“Why is that?” He didn’t answer.

“Did you finally speak to someone else last night?”

“Only you,” he said. “I don’t believe it.”

“It’s true.”

“You don’t seem that withdrawn.”

“I’m not. I just didn’t find anyone I felt I could talk to.”

“Yes, all those sultans and Cleopatras.”

“It was a fantastic evening.”

“I imagine it was,” she said. “Tell me about yourself.”

“I’m probably pretty much what you see. I’m thirty-four years old. And as you can probably tell, a bit in awe.”

“You’re married?” she asked casually.

“Yes.”

“As am I.”

“I know. I spoke to your husband, I think.”

“Yes. He’s on his way to Scotland. We’re not on very good terms. I’m afraid I didn’t quite understand the conditions of marriage.”

“What are they?”

“That he would be looking for another woman constantly and I would be trying to prevent it. It’s boring. Are you on good terms with your wife?”

“On a certain level.”

“Which one is that?”

“I don’t mean a particular level. I mean just down to a certain level.”

“I don’t think you ever really know anybody.”

She was originally from Cape Town, it turned out, born on the steps of the hospital there which were as far as her mother got that night, she could never leave a party. But she was completely English; they moved to London when she was a little child. She was damaged though she did not appear to be. Her beauty was unwary. Her husband, in fact, had another woman, a woman who might come into some money, but he was not ready to get a divorce. Wiberg had anyway advised her to not get a divorce, she had no income and was better off as she was, he said. He meant by this nicely situated, from his point of view, to all appearances well-off and very decorative.

“How do you know Wiberg?”

“He’s an amazing man,” she said. “He knows everyone. He’s been very nice to me.”

“How?”

“Oh, in a number of ways. He lets me dress up like a pirate, for example.”

“You mean last night.”

“Um.”

She smiled at him. He could not take his eyes from her, the way her
mouth moved when she spoke, the slight, careless gesture of a hand, her scent. She was like another language, nothing like his own.

“Men must be after you in droves.”

“Not in the way you’d like,” she said. “Do you want to know what happened? The most frightening thing.”

She’d been near Northampton and had an accident with the car. A bit shaken, she’d gone to this little hotel and ended up having dinner there and a glass of wine by the fire. She had taken a room and afterwards, at night, she heard two men talking in low voices outside the door as she got ready for bed. Then they tried to get into the room. She saw the door handle moving. Go away! she called. There was no telephone in the room, which they probably knew. They spoke through the door, they just wanted to talk to her, they said.

“Not tonight. I’m very tired,” she said. “Tomorrow.”

The door handle moved again, being tried. Just to talk, they assured her, they knew she would not be there tomorrow.

“Yes, yes. I’ll be here,” she promised.

After a while it was quiet. She listened at the door and then, in great fear, opened it slightly, saw no one and took her things and fled. She drove off in the car with things banging and slept in it through the night near some houses under construction.

“Well, you have luck, don’t you,” he said. He took her hand, which was slender. “Let me look at it,” he said. “This is your life line”—touching it with his finger. “According to this, you’re going to be around for a long time, I’d say into your eighties.”

“I can’t say I’m looking forward to that.”

“Well, you may change your mind. I see some children here, do you have children?”

“No, not yet.”

“I see two or three. It breaks up a little there, it’s hard to be certain.”

He sat holding her hand which for a moment closed affectionately around his. She smiled.

“Would you do me a favor?” she said. “Come with me for a few minutes after lunch, would you? There’s a shop just a few doors down that has a beautiful dress I’ve been looking at. If I tried it on, would you tell me yes or no?”