“I don’t think I’d do that, Gunilla,” said Darcourt.
“Nobody wants you to do it, Simon. I am doing it, and that’s enough. That is the curse of life—when people want everybody to do the same wise, stupid thing. Listen: Do you want to know what life is? I’ll tell you. Life is a drama.”
“Shakespeare was ahead of you, Gunilla,” said Darcourt. “ ‘All the world’s a stage,’ “ he declaimed.
“Shakespeare had the mind of a grocer,” said Gunilla. “A poet, yes, but the soul of a grocer. He wanted to please people.”
“That was his trade,” said Darcourt. “And it’s yours, too. Don’t you want this opera to please people?”
“Yes, I do. But that is not philosophy. Hoffmann was no philosopher. Now be quiet, everybody, and listen, because this is very important. Life is a drama. I know. I am a student of the divine Goethe, not that grocer Shakespeare. Life is a drama. But it is a drama we have never understood and most of us are very poor actors. That is why our lives seem to lack meaning and we look for meaning in toys—money, love, fame. Our lives seem to lack meaning but”—the Doctor raised a finger to emphasize her great revelation—”they don’t, you know.” She seemed to be having some difficulty in sitting upright, and her natural pallor had become ashen.
“You’re off the track, Nilla,” said Darcourt. “I think we all have a personal myth. Maybe not much of a myth, but anyhow a myth that has its shape and its pattern somewhere outside our daily world.”
“This is all too deep for me,” said Yerko. “I am glad I am a Gypsy and do not have to have a philosophy and an explanation for everything. Madame, are you not well?”
Too plainly the Doctor was not well. Yerko, an old hand at this kind of illness, lifted her to her feet and gently, but quickly, took her to the door—the door to the outside parking lot. There were terrible sounds of whooping, retching, gagging, and pitiful cries in a language which must have been Swedish. When at last he brought a greatly diminished Gunilla back to the feast, he thought it best to prop her, in a seated position, against the wall. At once she sank sideways to the floor.
“That sugar was really salt,” said Darcourt. “I knew it, but she wouldn’t listen. Her part in the great drama now seems to call for a long silence.”
“When she comes back to life I shall give her a shot of my personal plum brandy,” said Yerko. “Will you have one now, Priest Simon?”
“Thanks, Yerko, I don’t think I will. I shall have to get the great philosopher back to her home and her pupil.”
“Is that the girl who is doing the opera?” said Mamusia.
“The same. Present appearances to the contrary, I think the Doctor is doing her a lot of good.”
“Now she is out of the way, what about this baby?” said Mamusia.
“Well, what about it? It’s a fact.”
“Yes, but a queer fact. It’s not her husband’s.”
“If I may ask, how do you know that?”
“He can’t make babies. I could see it as soon as he came home from the hospital. There is a look. This actor who haunts their house made the baby.”
“How do you know?”
“Wally Crottel says so.”
“Mamusia, Wally Crottel is an enemy to Maria, and to Arthur, and you mustn’t trust him or listen to him. He wants to destroy them.”
“Oh, you don’t need to warn me against Wally. I have read his palm. A little good-for-nothing, but one can find out things from such people. Don’t worry about Wally. I saw an accident in his palm. Yerko is maybe taking care of the accident.”
“My God, Yerko! You’re not going to rub him out?”
“Priest Simon, that would be criminal! But if he is to have an accident, it had better be the right one. Leave it to me.”
“This baby,” said Mamusia. “Maria wants a baby more than anything. Deep down she is a real Gypsy girl and she wants a baby at the breast. Now she has a baby and she would be happy if Arthur would be happy too.”
“It’s rather a lot to expect, wouldn’t you say?”
“In these queer days people hire women to have babies when the wife can’t do it. Why not hire a father? Doesn’t this fellow Powell work for them?”
“I don’t suppose they thought he would work for them in quite this way.”
“That Powell is not an ordinary man. I think he is the Lover in the spread. You know how that card looks. A young man between two people and the one on the right is a woman, but who is that on the left? Some people say it is another woman, but is it? They say it is a woman because it has no beard, but what is a man without a beard? Not a man in every way, but still important enough to rule the beautiful woman. That figure wears a crown. A king, of course. Every spread is personal. Maybe in this spread that figure is King Arthur, and he looks as if he is pushing the young man toward the beautiful woman. And the beautiful woman is pointing to the lover as if she is saying, ‘Is it this one?’ And over their heads is the god of love and he is shooting an arrow right into the heart of the beautiful woman.”
“You make it sound very plausible.”
“Oh, the cards can be very wise. Also very tricky. So you know who the Little Man is? And you won’t tell?”
“Not yet.”
“Well, be careful. Maybe the Fool is tied up with the Little Man I had that hunch about. Father Simon, have you ever looked hard at that card of the Fool?”
“I think I remember it pretty clearly.”
“What is the dog doing?”
“I don’t remember the dog.”
“Yerko, get the cards. And maybe just a thimbleful of your plum brandy.”
While Yerko was busy, Darcourt looked at the prostrate Doctor. Her colour was better, and so far as a woman of her distinguished demeanour could do so, she was snoring.
“Look now. There he is. The Fool. You see he is going on a journey and he looks very happy. He is always going someplace, is the Fool. And he has a good fool’s dress, but see, the pants are torn at the back. Part of his arse is showing. And that is very true, because when the Fool comes into our life, we always show our arses a little bit. And what does the little dog do with the bare arse? He is maybe nipping at it. What is the dog, anyway? He is a thing of nature, isn’t he? Not learning, or thinking, but nature in a simple form, and the little dog is nipping at the Fool’s arse to make him go in a path that the mind would not think of. A better path. A natural path that Fate chooses. Maybe a path the mind would not approve of, because the mind can be a fool too—but not the great, the very fine Fool that takes the special journey. The little dog is nipping, but maybe he is also sniffing. Because you cannot nip without you also sniff. You know how dogs sniff everybody? The crotch? The arse? They have to be trained not to do it, but they forget because they have the great gift of scent, which wise, thinking Man has almost murdered. The nose speaks when the eyes are blind. Man, when he thinks he is civilized, pretends he does not smell, and if he is afraid he stinks he puts on some stuff to kill his stink. But the little dog knows that the arse and the smell are part of the real life and part of the Fool’s journey, and the natural things cannot be got rid of if you want to live with the real world and not in the half-world of stupid, contented people. The Fool is going just as fast as he can to something he thinks good. What do people say when somebody goes as hard as he can for something?”
“They say he goes for it bald-headed.”
“People I know say he goes for it bare-arsed,” said Yerko.
“You see, Father Simon? Somebody in all this destiny that is told in that spread of cards is going bare-arsed for something very important. Is it you?”
“You have amazed me, Mamusia, and in my amazement I shall speak the truth. Yes, I think it is me.”
“Good. I thought you were the Hermit, but now I am sure you are the Fool. You are going far, and instinct is nipping at your arse, and you will have to understand that instinct knows you better than you know yourself. Instinct knows the smell of your arse—your backside that you can never see.—Listen, how much does my son-in-law pay you for what you do?”