“That you are indeed,” said Melkior from his sudden solitude. What’s to be said now? Mankind? Well, that’s everybody. Including Enka. Including Freddie. Including Maestro. There are various mankinds. The Enka mankind, the Freddie mankind, the Mr. Kalisto mankind … don Fernando’s MANKIND? The word and the pathos. You can say anything in a solemn tone—“the Dardanelles,” for instance. So what do I care? Rot the Dardanelles.
“Did he smite you hard, good my friend?” he suddenly asked Ugo with ardent sarcasm. “Show me.”
“What? Oh, you mean last night, in the battles with Fredegarius? Who told you — Chicory? Yes, it was a nasty altercation, my good friend. Blood flowed in streams. And I got my share of the wounds — a bludgeon in the face. He swings a heavy punch, does that Roscius-Rostratus. I was being your outer wall, antemurale Melkioritatis! My physical person stopped the cabotin’s creative force, as shown by the upper lip enclosed herewith. Here, look at the left corner, that’s where the celebrated protagonist’s front hoof landed.”
Yes, that part of the lip was still swollen. Melkior eyed the wound with sympathy.
“But we won the war, pardieu! Fredegonde has been won and is standing firmly by us. No problems there.”
“Standing by you,” and a sigh uprooted itself from Melkior.
“No need to sigh, is there? By me, by you … Insomma, she’s with us! And for my sacrifices and bravery in combat, I took my slice of the spoils of war, you understand.”
“You were with her, afterward?”—bandaging his wound with a smile.
“Naturellement, mon petit!”
“At her place?”
“A studio flat, couch, (two couches!), bathroom, hot water. Et, ce qui est le plus important, elle m’aime.”
“What about you?”
“Fou d’amour!”
Peeking up her skirt while she wiped the blood from his snout — that was “amour”? No, he couldn’t take any more. Tension had reached a high point and suddenly he blew a synaptic fuse. Flash!
“You’re such an asshole!”—and then darkness … and peace.
“Oh?” Ugo was surprised. “And you’re some kind of hysteric, Eustachius the Most Pure? That’s what comes of abstinence. I practice sexual congress. Why not follow my example?”
Melkior chuckled inside. Enka. What was she doing now? He felt the tug of desire to call her. No, Coco was back from the clinic. They were now mourning his failure with the heart. Well, who ever had any success in matters of the heart, mon Coco?
“Date tonight?” he asked ingratiatingly, begging.
“No.” Ugo was being appreciative of his own importance.
“What, the brush so soon?”
“No — at ease. For today.” And Ugo smacked his lips, with gusto.
Suddenly he gripped Melkior’s shoulders and turned him so that they were face to face. He looked into Melkior’s face roguishly, derisively.
“Hurts you, Eustachius, doesn’t it?” and he burst into laughter. “Well, in that case none of it is true. Not a thing.” He gave Melkior a protective hug. “Not a thing, get me? She’s as pure as Ophelia. She can go to a nunnery if she likes. But … but perhaps she won’t, eh? The fair Fredegonde. Perhaps she prefers this sinful Giventakian life? Ha-haaa, my good prince!”
And I still don’t know her … Viviana’s … name. Now she’s Fredegonde on top of all else! Oh Lord, what is the matter with me?
You’re in a bad way all right, replied the Lord.
“Hey, Parampion, tell me,” he asked hesitatingly, “who is that woman?”
“A mystery woman!” said Ugo seriously. “Like any other. Perhaps even …” He did not want to finish. “Here comes my tram. Kalisto ringing for lunch. Tired. See you at the Give’nTake tonight,” he added from the tram step.
“Perhaps even” what? A mystery woman. He seems to have a way with these mystery women. All sorts of thing can lurk there. Various possibilities. Anything is possible. Nothing is ruled out. Not under the rules. Under rule. Under their rule. Like the fragrance of spring’s breath they pass by; that is how it all begins. Like a bolt of lightning they strike our nerves, batter us, roll us, cut us up, cook us, soften us. We spread ourselves docilely, mushlike, jamlike, over their whims. As long as the whims last. Then they get us unstuck, scrape us off, clean it all out, every last bit, so as not to leave behind a single crumb of “the past,” so as to consign all to utter and eternal oblivion.
They course through our veins like poison — a melancholy, moody flow. We yearn for an ending, any ending, for a finality, any finality, for somewhere to stop, to lie down peacefully, on our backs, to watch the branches sway with the wind, to help the ants in their small lives. We shamble like sick dogs along the fences of the happiness of other people, other people’s laughter. We give an occasional bark alone in the night. We watch warily, cross-eyed, both sides of life, we are careful. Poisoned. Crippled by missing the warmth of touch, the fragrance of flowers, by missing springtimes, mornings, awakenings, the meaning of walking, of motion …
Where to? Poisoned. Poisoned. Poisoned.
And then … we take them like a shot of cognac at the bar, hastily, in from the cold, strangers, aloof, accidental passengers through all those distant, random, other people’s lives. Indifferent. Locked. Cynical. That is the end.
Oh Maestro, you rhapsody of filth!
And yet he is making for the Café, hoping unconsciously … No! Hoping consciously, indeed aspiring, to meet her. To find out, somehow to read in her person “the night before” … and all the rest of love’s hieroglyphs inscribed on her by all the various pharaohs in all the nights of her dirty history. Damned Sphinx!
“Perhaps even …” Perhaps even a whore, is what he wanted to say? Ugo knows something about her, something nasty, something you don’t tell about the woman whom you … whom you … whom you … he kept repeating in his mind while his thoughts floundered elsewhere, enraged, mad. Is she … that kind of woman? Or did he mean something else? She doesn’t work for a living, what does she live on? Gentlemen friends? But if she’s not that kind of woman, if she isn’t a … Oh, Manon! Yet another name for her.
He was approaching the Café. There were guests on the terrace, loud, vivacious. Having preprandial cognacs. Journalists. Waiting for proofs of their papers. In one of the groups, Maestro, mind-blowingly drunk, reciting “I have been on a cloud o’er the sea …”
She’s not there. She’s not inside either. Now then … Now then, the thing to do is abandon my self. Leave it here in the Café to wait for her. While I go to … go to … Go where, miserable, alone, without my self? But I’ll find her! I’ve got to see her today, have to think of a way …
He realized he was singing nonsense in his head. What sorrow! To sing my sorrow. Or to have lunch? He felt hunger in his entire body. It was Enka’s doing. All your doing, baby, billing and cooing, baby. Maybe. Then, to his body: No way. You’re not getting anything to eat, not as long as the reason’s valid, and I want you to remember it. Be patient and … disintegrate, melt into air, into thin air. I let you have a sausage at Kurt’s last night, didn’t I? I’m speaking to you as if you were a dog. Forgive me, poor body. The fault is not thine. The fault is not mine. You know, bud, Pechárek’sh going to eat ush up if we gain weight. Off to the barracksh with you, he’ll shay. And den to Hishtory’zh cauldron where the fate of dish faderland izh being cooked.
Those words aroused reflexes in the stomach. It gave an angry rumble. Don’t be a fool, stomach, we’re in danger! What if someone heard you? They would say, Poor father, such a willful child! Did Pestalozzi live in vain? Moderation, moderation, as the Greeks taught. Epicurus, you say? He was not referring to food only! And you do get “the rest,” according to your just desserts. Be a Stoic. Renunciation, my boy, that’s the yardstick of true greatness. Dom Kuzma was a giant of a man, sobbed Melkior-the-body, and look at him now! What do you think you’re doing? Taking you to be weighed, that’s what I’m doing, you greedy bastard! You’ll be the death of me yet! replied Melkior-the-mind and resolutely led his beast to the invalid’s weighing machine.