Man Who Was Late (8 page)
Authors: Louis Begley
Viewed from my monogamous Upper East Side perspective, this last aspect of Ben’s situation did not seem too depressing. But I promised to direct to him any appetizing friends who might be traveling to Paris and then asked if there weren’t suitable replacements to be found among the circle of the Decazes’ friends and nieces. Véronique had written
to me about the favor I had done Paul by introducing them to Ben. That is how I knew that the Oklahoma clients had, in fact, retained Paul, that Paul had invited Ben to lunch, and that Ben’s bank was becoming an important source of business for Paul. Ben replied that he had been glad to help Paul—especially as the work was done right. He would keep my advice in mind, but he had not yet been able to accept any of their invitations (very cordial, very tempting) in Paris or in their place in the country.
We rose from the table. His next visit would be a short one, in early April, to attend a meeting of a board of directors. We made a date for Thursday the ninth to lunch again at my club.
Notaben 273 (written on Air France stationery and dated February 1970):
On the difference between a
mujtahed
and a shithead.
A
mujtahed
is an
ulama
(Islamic scholar) recognized officially by other scholars as qualified to engage in independent reasoning on legal (therefore religious) issues. The process of such independent reasoning is
ijtihad
—one supposes the highest possible form of intellectual activity. Sometime in the XIIIth c. of our era most—perhaps all—Sunni scholars decided that the gates of
ijtihad
had been closed forever, that everything capable of being grasped by the effort of human understanding had been so perfectly set down
for the generations to follow that all that remained was to apply precedents. That process is
taqlid
, the opposite of
ijtihad
. Since there was no possibility—in fact, no need for—further independent thought, no
mujtahed
would again come into being.
Possibly because they are awaiting the coming of the lost Imam and therefore must bet on the future, Shiites have never believed in such closing of the gates; for them, in every generation there has to be at least one
mujtahed
, so that among them the delicious process of
ijtihad
has continued unabated. On this issue, the best
ulama
among the Sunni have now rallied to the Shiite position.
This information comes from Dr. Bensalem. He swears it is accurate, his uncle having been a great shari’a scholar.
A shithead, on the other hand, is someone whose head is full of shit. I have that on the authority of the Cockney, whom I interrogated exhaustively before giving up my initial understanding of the word. Pre-Cockney, I understood it to denote a more superficial condition, that of one’s pate or possibly hair having been smeared with excrement.
Why go into this? Disgust at what I have become, fear that my head is just so packed with ignoble desires, envy, thoughts rooted in nothing and leading nowhere. When I traded in my chance for a life of something like
ijtihad
, I should have picked
taqlid
. Why not? Isn’t that what they practiced so joyously
in every heder in Lithuania and Poland? Only I could have done it at a fancy law firm. As it is, I read
Business Week
instead and claim that if I am paid enough I can also interpret the
Mene, Tekel, Upharsin
on the wall.
Before Christmas, I was in Venice with the Cockney. One walks down the frozen nave of the Frari, through the arch of the choir, and suddenly perceives the Virgin ascending, her young peasant girl’s feet hidden in a small, playful cloud, just out of the reach of the uplifted arms of the Apostles, who, until a moment ago, thought she was among them. Surrounding her is a crescent of cherubim, some standing or sitting on the same playful cloud, others supporting it. Above, like a flying saucer, soars the Father, propelled by two more grown-up angels; His dark-hued face is bearded and virile, resembling the vaporetto captain whose vessel I seem to board so often.
I told the Cockney I felt so “exalted and humbled” that while we were there I managed to forget about being a shithead. She paid no attention whatsoever. Perhaps she thinks I’m talking to myself. The day before, when we visited Santa Maria Formosa, I showed her the tombstone inscription near the altar that bears Hermann Wilhelm’s name and mentioned that it is believed Rilke had been inspired by it. Then I launched into a discourse about Rilke’s preference for Angels, lovers, animals, and trees that, as an analogy, might serve to explain my fondness for her.
Resolved: I will spend more time on sex and think less about food, clothes, and money.
Notaben 274, dated 15/3/70:
I have prepared the following notice that might, when I have had it suitably engraved, be presented by Gianni (when that invaluable man returns) on a little silver tray (naturally in a closed envelope) to all lady visitors:
How to Get the Most out of Monsieur Ben
While you are here, Monsieur will be as ardent as circumstances permit. Please respect his illusions and refrain from being more ardent than he!
Montherlant says somewhere that more marriages have been spoiled by bad breath than by infidelity. I live in terror of sour-smelling mouths, my own and those of others. Children of both sexes, young girls, and young cats can be approached without guile: no need to offer them mint candy, cigars, or garlic to mask the fetor of tired gums.
The whole of Montherlant’s oeuvre validates, with Old Testament sternness, my forthcoming notice to lovelorn visitors. The only question is: Have I made my meaning plain? In a later, improved edition I may try a formula. Sexual interest of
B
in
X
(which we shall call
I
) is reduced in proportion to the amount by which the sexual interest of
X
in
B
exceeds the value of
I
. In my case it is not only sexual interest
(and performance) that are so affected—the blight spreads over all of my affection for
X
. I cannot bear to receive more than I am able to give. Is this just my own starved and stingy heart, or are all males so constructed? (Montherlant is no help here; in his pages there is no love.)
W
E MET AS AGREED
on the second Thursday in April. I was jubilant about Carswell’s defeat the day before and told Ben about how people we both knew had gone to Washington to lobby senators, for the first time in their lives, to bring about that result.
Carswell is so much worse than Haynsworth that we are lucky Nixon for once didn’t get his revenge. Perhaps I should ask to be replaced in Paris and become a political agitator in New York like all my old friends. Do you think I’ve become respectable enough to fit in? It might suit me to get away from Pompidou and the agitators in France. I am tired of protesting shopkeepers!
Ben’s suggesting, even in jest, that he might wish to return to New York was unexpected. I asked what was wrong. Had he failed to renew his sexual zoo?
Yes and no, he answered, I don’t really know. I haven’t paid very much attention.
He went on to explain that this was a dreary time for him. He had finished the work for the Oklahomans and now missed his bargaining sessions in Rabat with the president of the Moroccan company and the brilliant little Dr. Bensalem—exchanges at once intricate, tense, and suffused with friendship. For instance, he said, take the black bean soup and
chefs salad they serve at your club. They’re all right. But one look is enough to make me long for boiled mutton, chickpeas, couscous, and
harissa
, followed by a glass of mint tea. And for Moroccan waiters who start grinning as soon as you appear, shake your hand, and call you Chef. What I am working on in Paris is dull stuff: the sale of a family-owned French perfume manufacturer to the owners of an American cosmetics firm who are even richer. Their money is new. The deal is limping along in a setting worthy of a Buñuel. Our meetings are at the house of the matriarch of the tribe on avenue Foch. It has small sitting rooms that are perfect cubes, each with its own Impressionist masterpieces, where one can caucus between rounds of negotiations. Her butler passes stuffed eggs and whiskey and soda. Then we go in to lunch. The other week, I managed to extract from the old lady a piece of new information: Yes, now that I had reminded her, she thinks the family in fact owns—through “formalities”—those Swiss companies one has never heard of before that have recently turned up receiving most of the proceeds from the sale of their perfumes. Naturally, it’s they and not the French company that have the rights to license the perfumes. No, the Swiss companies’ books of account can’t be revealed, let alone audited; a banker surely understands how important discretion and trust are in a family business. No, the family will not guarantee what those accounts might turn out to be; there are too many cousins to be consulted, the tax consequences might be unpleasant, she is no longer a young woman, one has to think of the worst.
How did this end? I asked him.
It hasn’t. It can’t. I have advised my clients to wait. As
soon as Madame Mère has her next attack of angina, which can’t fail to come, the whole gang, including the family
notaire
, will be in such a funk over the French tax audit of the estate that they will agree to anything we ask, provided they receive ready funds that can end up in their numbered Swiss accounts.
In fact since early March, well before that visit, domestic arrangements no longer gave him comfort. Gianni’s mother in Marseille was sick, probably dying. Ben told him to go there at once and look after her as long as was necessary; Madame Hamelin, the concierge, could bring the morning croissants and oranges and newspapers, make his bed, and do the laundry; he didn’t want a temporary replacement, even if it was Gianni’s best friend who had once worked for the Count de Vogüé. In the evenings, when he didn’t have a dinner to go to—it seemed to him he was invited less than in the past, except, of course, to business affairs—often he did not get home until after the great charcuterie at the corner of the boulevard du Montparnasse had closed. But even if it was open, a paralyzing anguish he was not proud of stopped him from buying
oeufs en gelée
, pâté, and pickles, gripping a baguette of bread under his arm, and, so equipped, proceeding to a comfortable and solitary meal at the small table near the window from which he had a view on the garden. Was it that he did not want the amiable woman with rapid gestures who dispensed those items to rank him with the other men, so sour and careful, also waiting to buy their lonely supper? The days were becoming longer: he disliked thinking of the figure he might cut carrying a
filet
of provisions as he walked back toward the rue Férou.
The same disabling embarrassment made him shun restaurants where he was known and the grating solicitude of the headwaiters’ inquiries: Will Monsieur dine alone or will “Madame”—which one, he wondered—be joining Monsieur later? The Coupole became his refuge; he could go there late, seek out the maître d’hôtel, who was his friend, mumble something about not having liked the play or having come directly from the airport, and order a full bottle of burgundy and grilled
andouille
—Ben liked, even in the worst of times, to eat always, in each restaurant he frequented, the one dish in which he believed it excelled. After a while, the roar of conversations surrounding him and the wine he had drunk induced a sense of tolerant detachment. When he saw an acquaintance pacing the aisles of the huge room in search of a table about to be vacated, usually someone who was not, like Ben, accustomed to being seated at once, he lowered his eyes to avoid recognition and comments on being alone. The waiter brought him a brandy and then another. The maître d’hôtel sometimes stopped by to complain about the pain in his feet. It would be well past midnight. Gently, the suppressed hope for an impending miracle—the woman with an expert mouth, painted the color of the plush banquette she leaned against, might fix him with her eyes and send a note suggesting they leave the restaurant together, or, like deus ex machina, a nearly forgotten college friend might suddenly hail him, a chic woman on each arm—turned into tipsy indifference.
Ben would walk back toward the rue du Cherche-Midi, past the middle-aged whores leaning against parked automobiles.
Across the boulevard glittered rue Vavin; within its short span, the devastating, cold solitude of the hotels where one could take them. In the other direction lay New Jimmy’s. What was the point? It was like dining with the Cockney: revulsion at watching her eat followed by revulsion brought on by repetitious exertions in bed and the new question their encounters were posing. Would she again give him crabs? The first onset of itching had puzzled him, as did the immobile colorless dots among his pubic hairs. He borrowed tweezers from Gianni and removed one of them for examination under a bright light; the sight of the energetic, curled little legs revived memories of lectures on this and related subjects during basic training at Quantico. A pomade he acquired from a scholarly pharmacist near the Madeleine—Ben thought the neighborhood was appropriate for this sort of purchase—proved highly effective. In the end, Ben decided that the best policy was to repeat the treatments when necessary and let the Cockney cling to the belief that her own puzzling itch, which she mentioned with satisfaction, was but a natural manifestation of her desire for Ben and the expanding group of men producing the same effect. Discussing the affliction, eventually sharing the pomade with her, seemed risky: it could be taken either as an invitation to greater familiarity or as a humiliating reproof, like the boorish effort he had once made to correct her table manners. On the other hand, if he asked that she shave, like her friend Marianne, he risked adding flame to her already excessive fervor. Was he an udder attached to a garrulous milking machine?
At home, he watched over his supply of Black Label scotch,
ordering it from the Nicolas at the rue de Sèvres by the half case. He believed he shouldn’t go to the Coupole too often. What would the waiters imagine? Would the way he dressed, his neatly barbered appearance, the generous tips he left, and his choice of good wine save him from demotion, or would he become one of the regulars—men and women found at the Coupole and the Lipp evening after evening, behind the same little table, glasses automatically set before them and refilled, reading
Le Monde
or staring blankly, dining off Baltic herring? It was the charcuterie dilemma posed in slightly different terms.