The Collected Stories of Deborah Eisenberg (60 page)

There was something anatomical about the Center’s great concrete sweeps and protuberances. Like all Arts Centers and Performing Arts Complexes and National Centers for the Performing Arts, though futuristic in design, it had a look of ancient decay, being left over from a period when leisure time and economic abundance were considered an imminent menace. How quaint a notion that now seemed! Shapiro almost laughed to think there had been a period, the period in which he’d grown up, no less, when it had been feared that wealth would soon cause humanity to devolve into a grunting mass sprawled in front of blood-drenched TV screens. But, no—
Art
(whatever that was), encouraged to flourish in its Centers, would prevent people from becoming intractable, illiterate, fat! And all the while poverty was accomplishing the devolution by itself.

“I see you’re enjoying the, ah, prospect,” Penwad said.

Shapiro became aware that he was staring down over toothy crenellations into a city cleaved by deep ravines and encircled by mountains.

“Those tall buildings are the downtown area, of course,” Penwad said. “And to the right and left, obviously, are residential sectors. Our place is over there—that’s pretty much where the whole English-speaking community has…put down its little roots. And up there on the slopes is what we call the Gold Zone.”

Shapiro, shading his eyes, noticed that the ravines below were encrusted with fuming slums. “My God,” he said.

“Incredible, isn’t it,” Penwad said, “what an earthquake can do? You can really see the damage from up here. You probably noticed the floor of your hotel. The Center survived intact, though. We’re very proud of the Center. The architect was truly successful, we feel, the way he…Yes, actually. You might be interested. A fellow named Santiago Méndez. He’s done most of the better hotels in town, and our museum. There was a lecture last year. One of our events. It was explained. The way Méndez—Well, this was some time ago, of course—Joan would be better able to…But…the…combined influences.” He gestured toward several concrete mounds. “The modernistic, the indigenous…well,
motifs.
A cross-fertilization, as Joan says.”

Shapiro hesitated. A bunting-like stupefaction had enveloped him. “Of…what?” he asked.

“Of…? What of what?” Penwad asked. “Of…” Shapiro had lost the thread of his own question.

“Of what…does
Joan
…say ‘cross-fertilization’?”

“Joan
says
it…” Penwad glared at him. “She says it of…
motifs.
”

The orchestra was from a small, nearby dictatorship, and the musicians had a startled appearance, as though a huge claw had snatched them from their beds and plonked them into their chairs. The conductor, a delicate and intelligent-looking man, welcomed Shapiro with reassuring collegiality, but when he brought down his baton Shapiro almost cried out; the sound was so peculiar that he feared he was suffering from some neurological damage.

How had the conductor come to find himself in his profession, Shapiro wondered. The man’s waving arms seemed to be signalling for help rather than leading an orchestra. The poor musicians clutched their instruments, staring wildly at their sheet music as they played. But then it was Shapiro’s entrance; notes began to leap froggily from his own fingers, and he understood: clearly the hall was demonic.

How to outwit these acoustics? As if this concerto were not difficult enough under the best of circumstances, with all its flash and bombast! But, of course, there was always something. Even in the loftiest, the most competently administered concert, catastrophes invented themselves from the far reaches of possibility. The piano bench would fall into splinters at seven forty-five, or the other musicians turned out to have a new version of the score, three measures shorter than one’s own, or there was a bank holiday and it was impossible to retrieve one’s tuxedo from the cleaner’s—catastrophes far beneath the considerations of music, and yet!

How synthetic the concerto sounded in this inhospitable hall! Shapiro was surprised to find himself disliking it so. He had never tremendously admired it, exactly, but he’d always enjoyed playing it: he’d enjoyed the athletic challenge of its surface complexities; he’d enjoyed the response of the audience. It was
affirming
, people said upon hearing it, and their faces had the shining, decisive expressions of people who feel their worth to be recognized.
Affirming
, Shapiro thought, as sound sloshed and bulged, gummed up in clumps, liquefied, as though the air were full of whirling blades.

The interview that had been arranged for Shapiro was with an English journalist named Beale. An interview: implied interest on the part of someone. There would be clippings, at least, and, perhaps, therefore some shadowy retention of his name in the minds of those people—“we”—who put these festivals together.

Shapiro located Beale in a restaurant of the hotel, much larger than his own, where they’d been scheduled to meet. “Are you tired of it?” Beale inquired anxiously. “I was hoping not. In my opinion it’s the best food in town, and the station will reimburse if it’s an interview.”

Beale’s head was an interesting spaceship shape. Colorless and sensitive-looking filaments sprouted from it, and his ears looked like receiving devices. Sensors, transmitters, Shapiro thought, noting Beale’s other large, responsive-looking features and his nervous, hesitant fingers. Beale’s suit was faintly mottled by traces of stains; his shirt, from the evidence of his wrists, was short-sleeved, and he wore, incredibly, a tie that appeared to be made of rope.

“I’m not tired of it yet,” Shapiro said. “I’ve never been here.”

Beale squinted distrustfully at Shapiro. “They didn’t put you here? They put a lot of guests here…”

Shapiro glanced around. So this was where they’d put an
important
musician. It was ugly and grandiose, with slippery-looking walls—the very air seemed soaked with a venal, melting luxe. “Santiago Méndez?” he said.

“Oh, you’re good,” Beale said with delight. “Seriously. If they bring you down again, insist. Nice, isn’t it? They all speak English, and the furniture doesn’t just”—he lunged toward Shapiro in illustration—“loom up at you. Now, will you drink something?”

Shapiro saw that two glasses already sat in front of Beale, one emptied and the other containing hardly more than a gold film. “Just water, thanks,” Shapiro said.

“Oh, you can, here,” Beale said. “Rest assured. Ice and all. I, on the other hand,” he informed a waiter, “will have a whiskey, why not.”

“And perhaps we could order,” Shapiro added. Well, at least someone had seen fit to arrange a party for him.

Beale studied the menu worriedly, running his finger along the print. He had quantities of advice for Shapiro about it but seemed unable to make up his own mind. “A nice chop, perhaps,” Beale said. “You know, this is the one place where it’s perfectly safe to eat pork. That is if you—” His eyes blinked and reset themselves furiously, like lights on an overtaxed instrument panel.

While Beale entrusted his order to the waiter, Shapiro’s attention wandered to posters on the wall. Plenty of charm here, too: more lakes, more volcanoes, more smiling Indians…Beale dove abruptly beneath the table, resurfacing with a tape recorder as primitive-looking as a trilobite. “I hope you don’t mind if I…There are several publications that are reasonably, well…friendly to me, but mostly I do radio.”

“Radio,” Shapiro agreed politely. “And this would be for…the English-speaking community, I presume.”

Beale looked at him blankly. “Not really. There are telephones for that sort of thing. Oh! No.” His voice became gluey with attempted modesty. “No, this is a show back home in England, you see. They often ask me for a little story.”

England. So, this was a bit more promising. “A show…about the arts,” Shapiro suggested.

“The arts?” Beale said. “Well, there’s not really too much scope for that sort of thing here. This country isn’t just churning out the artists, you know. Not a very…well, ‘favorable climate’ I suppose is the expression. Actually, it’s a show about just whatever happens to come up. I was glad when your Embassy called and put me on to this one, because there’s not really a fantastic amount. You can file only just so often about dead students before people get sick of it. Still, don’t think I’m complaining—I’m lucky to be here at all. When I was young, I was simply frantic to get to this part of the world. Astonishing place. Have you had much chance to get around? See the sights, meet the people?”

“I got in last night,” Shapiro said.

“Ah,” Beale said. “Oh, yes. Well, it is truly staggering. Very beautiful, as I’m sure you know. And the highlands—when I first came it was like the dawn of the earth up there, really. Oh, if I could only…” He sighed. “You know, the Indians here had simply everything at one time. A calendar. A written language—centuries, centuries,
centuries
before the Spanish came. And all sorts of other magnificent, um—appurtenances. While
we
were still running around in—” He cast a veiled glance at Shapiro. “Yes. Well, and the Spanish actually destroyed it all. But you know that. Burned their books, herded them into villages with Spanish overseers. Isn’t it amazing? The written language was actually
destroyed
, do you see. The calendar, the architecture, the books…And so, I mean, we’re slaughtering these people and so forth, but we don’t really know anything about them. And if they know anything about themselves they’re not letting on. Who
are
they? That is, who are
we
? I mean,
they’re
here,
we’re
here…It’s just terribly
strange.
” He smiled a misty, wondering smile, then frowned. “Oh dear.
Anyhow
, I tried and tried to get people to send me here. They said, ‘But
why
? Where
is
it? Nothing
happens
there.’ Then, fortunately, there were all these insurrections and repressions and whatnot, and that created demand, and so now I’ve been here over fifteen years!”

Shapiro opened his mouth; a blob of sound came out.

“I tried to reach García-Gutiérrez yesterday,” Beale said. “But I gathered he hadn’t arrived yet. He lives in Europe a lot of the time now, you know. They told me he’d be in today, but I thought I’d talk to you instead. I’m sure he’s a wonderful composer. They say he is. But, to tell you the truth, the man gives me the shivers. I’ve seen him around, at parties here, and I just don’t like his sort. You know what I mean—well-fed, a bit of a dandy.
Suave.
Eye always on the main chance. A big smile for every colonel. Ladies all love him. Government always showing him off like a big, stuffed…” Beale brooded at his drink, then waved over a new one. “Anyhow,” he said unhappily, “I’ve got you.”

Shapiro took a sip of water. He would have liked a drink, too, but alcohol affected him unpredictably. Even Beale’s alcohol seemed to be making Shapiro mentally peculiar. “Let me ask you,” he said. “It isn’t actually dangerous here, I suppose.”

“Dangerous?” Beale said. “Why? What do you mean? Not for
you
, it isn’t. You know”—he sat back and looked at Shapiro with drunken coldness—“I find it
most
comical. How Americans come down here, and they talk about danger. And they talk about
this
, and they talk about
that.
Well, I don’t endorse slavery and torture myself, but who are you, may I ask, to talk? Dare I mention who kicked off all this ha-ha ‘counterinsurgency’ business here in the first place? Dare I mention whose country it was that killed
all
their Indians?”

“Now, look—” Shapiro began.

“A thousand apologies,” Beale said. “How true. You’re no more responsible for your country than I am for mine. But all this simply jerks my chain, I’m afraid. It simply does. And I mean
dangerous
! I mean this place is hardly in the league of—I mean, one’s forever reading, isn’t one? How some poor tourist? Who’s saved his pennies for years and years and years. Who then
goes
to New York, to see a show on your great Broad
way
, and virtually the instant he arrives gets stabbed in the…” He took a violent gulp of his drink. “The—”

“Liver,” Shapiro said.

“
Sub
way,” Beale said. “Yes.” He beamed at Shapiro in surprise. “I don’t know why that’s so difficult to…Oh, look,” he exclaimed, as the waiter set down their plates. “Oh, my darling! That
is
nice.” He extracted a pair of glasses from his pocket, put them on to peer at his plate, then removed them to clean them on his ropy tie.

Shapiro took a bite of his meal, but Beale’s grubbiness had damaged his appetite.

“Of course the highlands are another story,” Beale said. “The highlands, the whole countryside, really—still sheer carnage. But here in the city it’s just sporadic violence. Of a whatsit sort. Really, about the worst that can happen to you here is Protestants. Random. Of a random sort.”

“Protestants?” Shapiro said.

“Evangelicals,” Beale said. “So bloody noisy. Haranguing in the streets, massive convocations every which place, speaking in tongues—
YAGABAGABAGAGABAGAGA
.” He sighed. “Now, don’t think I’m prejudiced, please. I’m Protestant myself. But that’s the point, isn’t it? That one can slag off one’s own group, though one would never—That is, I, for instance, would never, oh, say, call…a Jew, for example, a
‘kike’
—that’s
your
prerogative. But all that shouting is simply not the point of speech. I mean, the point of speech is—Well, that is just very simply not the point. And it can be terribly, just terribly annoying when you’re trying to conduct an interview or what have you, as you and I are here today.”