Her Lover (48 page)

'But the prime mover in his mania is the hope that he will fail, that one of them will'at last resist him. Alas, he never fails. He thirsts for God, yet each of his sorry victories confirms that the chances of God's existing are small. One after the other, none of these noble and pure women can wait to fall flat on their backs. Yesterday they wore the face of the Madonna. Today, their tongues are in his mouth, proving yet again that there is no absolute of virtue and that therefore the God he longs for steadfastly refuses to exist, and there is nothing I can do to change that. But I'm going to have to ring off now, Adrien. I have to seduce the woman who is here listening to me, hating me. But never fear, mine she will be! Caught in my snares will she be! For fate decreed that I should be born Solal XIV of the Solals, a man with no first name, for no first-born of the older branch of the Solals is ever named, truly caught in my snares will she be, for by what name will she call me in the heat of passion? Oh yes, Deume, with the avenging glee of sorrow shall I seduce her, and on wings of love shall she and I, this very night, fly to a luxuriant isle while you slumber peacefully in your sleeper. Goodbye, and forgive me.'

He hung up and sat without moving. If no tattooer available in Geneva, try Marseilles. He could get the address of one in any bar on the Vieux-Port. The important thing in life was to be guaranteed a quick and sudden death. He turned and faced her.

'Your husband's a very lucky man, you know. He belongs. He has a country he can call his own, he has friends, kindred spirits, beliefs and a God. But me, I'm always alone, a stranger, eternally watching my step. Sometimes I grow weary of having no one to depend on but myself, of having to rely on my sole ally: my intellijewishness. Sometimes I long to be a nobody, a nobody who belongs, who feels he is part of things, someone ordinary whose passage from cradle to grave is eased by social ties which make him a member of the community. It's crazy, but I wish I were a village postman, a road-mender, a policeman, somebody everyone knows and says hello to and likes, the sort who spends his evenings in the cafe playing cards with his friends. But I am always alone, I have only women to love me, and I wear their love like a badge of shame.

'The shame of owing their love to my handsome face, my sickening handsome face which sets the eyes of my darlings aflutter, my despicable handsome face whose praises they have been shrilling since I was sixteen. They'll be well and truly had when I'm old and my nose drips or, better still, when I'm six feet under consorting with roots and silent slithery worms, green and desiccated in a coffin split by damp earth, oh no they won't find me such a juicy proposition then, and it'll serve them right, I rejoice at the prospect. Handsome. It means such and such a length of meat, such and such a weight of meat, a full set of mouth ossicles, thirty-two of them, you can check them out later with a little mirror like the ones they have at the dentist's, so that the merchandise is fully guaranteed, before we set off, off bur heads off to the sea.

'If I possess the appropriate length and weight and ossicles, she will be an angel, a cloistered nun of love, a saint. But if I do not, then I'd better look out! I can be a fount of goodness, a genius. I can worship the ground she walks on. But unless I can offer her a hundred and fifty centimetres of meat, her immortal soul will be unmoved. She will never love me with all her immortal soul, nor will she ever be an angel for me, a heroine ready to undertake any sacrifice.

'Look in the personal columns of the newspapers and you'll see how much importance young, yearning women attach to the centimetres of the man of their dreams. "Look here," say the adverts, "what we want is meat at least a hundred and seventy centimetres long, and it's got to come complete with tan!" And if whoever answers can only produce a shorter length, they spit in his eye. Suppose all I can offer is a poor hundred and fifty centimetres - make that centimedfres -but nevertheless try to tell her I love her to distraction. Her heart will turn to stone, she'll look down her nose at my shortfall before turning it up in disgust!

'Oh yes, if I'm thirty-five centimeatres short she won't give a damn about my soul, nor will she ever fling her arms round my neck to protect me from a gangster's bullet. Ditto if I'm a genius but deficient in ossicles! They long for the union of souls but are awfully keen on those little bones! They pine for unseen spiritual realms, but those ossicles have got to be highly visible!' he exclaimed gleefully, though there was sadness in his eye.

'And they insist on quantity! At the very least, all front teeth have to be present and correct! If there are two or three missing, those sweet angelic creatures will be quite incapable of appreciating my spiritual qualities and their souls will remain unmoved! If I don't have those two or three little bones a few millimetres wide, there's no hope for me, I'm doomed to be alone and loveless! If I dare speak to her of love, she will throw a tooth-glass in my face in the hope of knocking out an eye! "What," she'll say, "no little bones in your mouth? And you have the impertinence to love me? Get out, you wretch, and here's a kick to help you on your way!" Conclusion: don't be good, don't be clever - pretend will do - but weigh the requisite number of kilos and have a full complement of grinders and cutters!

'So I ask you, what value should I attach to a sentiment which is entirely determined by half a dozen little bones, the longest of them no more than a centimetre or two? Ah! you're thinking: oh, the blasphemer! Well, would Juliet have loved Romeo if Romeo had had four incisors missing and a great black gap in the middle of his mouth? Of course not! And yet his soul would have been the same soul and his character the same character! So why are they forever telling me that what really count are soul and character?

'But I am naive to go on about these things! They know it all. What they want is that it should never be brought out into the open, they want false coin, they want to hear those fine and noble words which I regard as personal enemies. Instead of one hundred and eighty centimeatres and ossicles, they'd much rather have honeyed talk of nobility and manliness and winning smiles! So away with their carping! A fig for their scorn! And let them not whisper that I am base and self-interested! If anyone is self-interested, it's not me!

'Absolutely nothing escapes the notice of the pretty little creatures! When you meet them for the first time, their lips speak of Fioretti and St Francis of Assisi but their eyes list your assets and judge. Without appearing to, they notice everything, including the number and quality of your little toothbones, and if you've got one or two missing, all is lost! Yes, quite lost. But if, on the other hand, you look the least palatable, they know at a glance that you have eyes which are brown with just a hint of green and a few flecks of gold, though you yourself were never aware of the fact. They are the world's best scrutineers.

'But that's not all. They don't stop at your face! They want the ' whole package! At your first meeting, with those big, blue, angel eyes of theirs, they've already undressed you. You don't know it and they don't realize it either, because they won't even admit their X-ray probings to themselves. They all go in for this instant undressing, even the virgins. They are specialists, and they know at a glance what you are worth in meat under your clothes, if you have big enough muscles, a large chest, flat stomach, narrow hips, how much fat on your bones. For if you've got any fat on you, even the teeniest hint of flab, the game's up! An innocent couple of pounds of excess fat on your belly and you're written off, they don't want to know!

'On top of which, they go for you, tenacious as the counsel for the prosecution, and they will not commit themselves unless they're absolutely sure of their facts. Which is why, in the course of a genteel conversation in which nature and little birds feature prominendy, they manage in the most casual way to quiz and prod, find out if you are the physically vigorous sort, if you like being out in the fresh air, if you're keen on sport. In the same way, the female of the tiny insect known as the empis will not plight her troth unless the male can demonstrate his athletic prowess! The poor devil must be able to carry on his back a little ball of something or other three times his own size! It's a fact! And if they find out that you ride or climb mountains or water-ski, they've got their guarantee and they proceed to think the sun shines out of you, safe in the knowledge that you are good for fighting and breeding. But naturally, since they are above such things and proper and middle-class, they never think base thoughts. They cover them with noble words, and, instead of talking about slim waists and good breeders, they say how charming you are. Nobility is a matter of the words you use.

'It's despicable. For what is this handsomeness which they all pursue with their fluttering eyes, what is this male beauty which means being tall, having hard muscles and teeth that bite, what is it if not the outward sign of youth and rude good health, that is of physical strength, that is of the ability to fight and to do violence to others which is the real test of strength, of which the ultimate expression, sanction and deepest root is the power to kill, the ancient power of the caveman? It is this power which draws the unconscious minds of these sweet, God-fearing, oh-so-spiritual women! That's why they'll chase anything that wears a uniform. In other words, before they can fall in love, they have to sense the potential killer in me, believe that I am someone who is capable of protecting them. You want to say something? You have my permission.'

'If you're right, then why don't you go and find yourself some humpbacked old hag and tell her you love her?'

'Aha! Clever are we? All right, I'll tell you why. Because I am a miserable male! I accept that hairy men are carnivorous creatures! But not women! I cannot accept that of Woman, in whom I believe! Not my pure angels! To be constantly reminded of the fact that women, with their melting looks and noble gestures and modest blushes, require me to be handsome before they give me their love, the only divine sentiment we know on earth, that is my torment and my despair! I cannot accept it because I cannot stop respecting them! Such is my nature, eternally born of woman. And I feel ashamed for them when they look at me and size me up and weigh me in their balance, when they use those eyes of theirs, yes their eyes, to sniff at the scales of my scaliness! Ashamed when I see their eyes acquire a sudden serious glint of interest, when their eyes fill with respect for my meat! Ashamed for them when I see them captivated by my smile, the one small part of my skeleton which is already visible!

'And as to admiring the beauty of women, who shall demur? For it is the promise of tenderness, a kind and loving heart, and motherhood. Those nice girls who want nothing more than to care for the sick and rush off to the front to be nurses when there's a war on warm the heart, and I am morally entitled to love their meat. But I cannot stomach the horrible attraction women feel for male beauty which signifies physical strength, courage and aggression, in other words man's animal qualities! That is what makes them unforgivable!

'Oh I know, this is a pathetic prelude to a seduction. It's quite absurd of me to expatiate at such length on standards of male physique and the power to kill, and I'm not done with these things yet. It would be much cleverer of me to talk to you about Bach and God and then ask you, virtuously, if we could be friends. Who knows, you might say yes nobly, with eyes demurely lowered, and you would fall pure into the trap at the end of which there is always a bedroom. But I cannot, I will not seduce the way they want! I have done with such ignoble games!'

He sat down and coughed once to make her look up at him, but her head remained bowed, which annoyed him. He whistled under his breath and wondered if his diatribe against women who adored gorillas had not been prompted by anger because he knew that the shameless creatures could be attracted by other men. For, in plain terms, he wanted all women for himself. He shrugged, undid his Commander's tie, played with it listlessly, and raised his eyes to heaven to take God as his witness that the wicked woman sitting there was not looking at him on purpose. To comfort himself, he lifted the lid of a small box, opening it just wide enough to insert two fingers. Just like a sultan stealing into the harem unannounced, she thought. Absently, he took the first cigarette he touched and she thought: the sultan has chosen his favourite for the night, without looking, because he likes surprises. He struck a match, forgot to light his cigarette, burnt his fingers, and dropped both the match and the cigarette in disgust. She checked a nervous laugh. The favourite has been spurned, she thought.

'Ashamed too that I owe her future love to my exalted but despicable job, which I got by ruse and the ruthless elimination of the competition. Ex-minister, Under-Clown-General, a Commander of some order or other, I don't recall which, or rather, I do remember, I just said that for the effect. A bit of an actor,' he smiled sweetly. 'Yes, that's me! Solal, fourteenth of the line of the Solals, slumming it as Under-Secretary-General of the League of Nations, an abject big buzz in the humming, honeyless hive alive with bumble-bees, Under-Bumble-Bee-General, and Under-Fly-on-the-Wall-General. Tell me, what on earth am I doing standing elbow to elbow with all those tailor's dummies, the politicians, the ministers, the ambassadors? They haven't a soul between them. They are all stupid and cunning, dynamic and sterile, so many bobbing corks swept along by the current which they think they command, always so chatty and affable in the corridors and lobbies, backslapping, always an arm round the shoulders of the dear friend they.heartily detest, but all busily doing each other down and setting out their own stalls with a view to rising up the ladder of influence from which they will soon topple and fall into the waiting hole below, silenced at last in their wooden coffins, but in the meantime putting up smokescreens, soberly discussing the Locarno Protocol and the Kellogg Pact, treating all the passing inanities with the profoundest gravity, giving their most serious attention to great political issues which are invariably either sordid family intrigues or shabby parochial squabbles, but these cretins take it all so seriously because they take themselves seriously, pompous-eyed, hands in their trouser pockets, the rosette of some honour or other in their buttonhole, and a white handkerchief peeping out of the breast-pocket of their jackets. And every day I take part in this farce, every day I pretend I'm a part of it, I too discuss gravely, I spout unadulterated twaddle, and I too strut with my hands in my trouser pockets and that political, international look in my eye. I despise the whole merry-go-round but I hide my contempt because I've sold my soul for a suite at the Ritz, silk shirts, a Rolls, three baths a day and my despair. But enough of that.'