‘You thought it was a bar.’
‘But, Henry, what’s happened to the place? You mean they’ve actually begun to give you culture now? Shakespeare and all the rest of it?’
‘They give we, we give them. A two-way process, as old Blackwhite always saying. And they always saying how much they have to learn from us. I don’t know how the thing catch on so sudden. You see the place is like a little New York now. I imagine that’s why they like it. Everybody feel at home. Ice-cubes in the fridge, and at the same time they getting the exotic old culture. The old Coconut Grove even have a board of governors. I think, you know, the next thing is they going to ask me to run for the City Council. They already make me a MBE, you know.’
‘MBE?’
‘Member of the Order of the British Empire. Something they give singers and people in culture. Frankie, you don’t even care about the MBE. Forget the telephone. Forget Selma. Sometimes you want the world to end. You can’t go back and do things again. They begin just like that, they get good. The only thing is you never know they good until they finish. I wish the hurricane would come and blow away all this. I feel the world need this sort of thing every now and then. A clean break, a fresh start. But the damn world don’t end. And we don’t dead at the right time.’
‘What about Selma?’
‘You really want to know?’
‘Tell me.’
‘I hear she buy a mixmaster the other day.’
‘Now this is what I really call news.’
‘I don’t know what else to tell you. I went the other day to the Hilton. Barbecue night. I see Selma there, picking and choosing with the rest. Everybody moving with the times, Frankie. Only you and me moving backwards.’
Mrs Henry came into the room. She didn’t have to say that she didn’t like me. Henry cringed.
She said, ‘I don’t know, Henry. Leave you in charge in front for five minutes, and the place start going to pieces. I just had to sack the doorman. He didn’t have no tie or anything. And Mr White did ask you to take special care this evening.’
I fingered the doorman’s tie. When Mrs Henry left Henry sprayed the door with an imaginary tommy gun. I was aware of the room. We were among flowers. Hundreds of plastic blooms.
‘You looking,’ Henry said. ‘Is not my doing. I like a flowers, but I don’t like a flowers so bad.’
The back door was pushed open again. Henry cringed, lowered his voice. But it wasn’t Mrs Henry.
‘I is Pablo,’ an angry man said. ‘What that fat woman mean, telling we to come round by the back?’
‘That was no woman,’ Henry said. ‘That was my wife.’
Pablo was one of three angry men. Three men of the people: freshly washed hair, freshly oiled, freshly suited. They looked like triplets.
Pablo said, ‘Mr White sent for us specially. He send for me. He send for he.’ He pointed to one of his friends.
The friend said, ‘I is Sandro.’
‘He send for he.’
‘I is Pedro.’
‘Pablo, Sandro, Pedro,’ Henry said, ‘cool down.’
‘Mr White won’t like it,’ Pablo said.
‘Making guests and artisses come through the back,’ said Sandro.
‘When they get invite to a little supper,’ said Pedro.
Henry sized them up. ‘Guests and artisses. A lil supper. Well, all-you look all right, I suppose. Making, as they say, the best of a bad job. Go up. Mr White waiting for you.’
They left, mollified. Determination to deter further insult was in their walk. Henry, following them, seemed to sag.
I noticed an angry face behind the window. It was the sacked doorman. I could scarcely recognize him without his tie. He made threatening gestures; he seemed about to climb in. I straightened his tie around my collar and hurried after Henry into the main hall.
At the long table the little supper seemed about to begin. Blackwhite rose to meet Pablo, Sandro and Pedro. The three expensively-suited men with Blackwhite rose to be introduced. Leonard and Sinclair were hanging around uncertainly.
Blackwhite eyed Leonard. Leonard flinched. He saw me and ran over.
‘I don’t have the courage,’ he whispered.
‘I’ll introduce you.’
I led him to the table.
‘I’ll introduce you,’ I said again. ‘Blackwhite is an old friend.’
I pulled up two chairs from another table. I put one chair on Blackwhite’s right. For Leonard. One chair on Blackwhite’s left. For me. Astonishment on the faces of the foundation men; anxiety on Blackwhite’s; a mixture of assessment and sympathy on the faces of Pablo, Sandro and Pedro, uncomfortable among the crystal and linen, the flowers and the candles.
A waiter passed around menus. I tried to take one. He pulled it back. He looked at Blackwhite, questioning. Blackwhite looked at me. He looked down at Leonard. Leonard gave a little smile and a little wave and looked down at the table at a space between settings. He drew forks from his right and knives from his left.
‘Yes,’ Blackwhite said. ‘I suppose. Feed them.’
They hurried up with knives and forks and spoons.
Pablo and Sandro and Pedro were lip-reading the menus.
Pablo said, ‘Steak Chatto Brian for me.’
‘But, sir,’ the waiter said. ‘That’s for two.’
Pablo said, ‘You didn’t hear me? Chatto Brian.’
‘Chatto Brian,’ Sandro said.
‘Chatto Brian,’ Pedro said.
‘Oysters,’ I said. ‘Fifty. No, a hundred.’
‘As a starter?’
‘And ender.’
‘Prawns for me,’ Leonard said. ‘You know. Boiled. And with the shells. I like peeling them.’
‘He is a great admirer of yours, Blackwhite,’ I said. ‘His name is Leonard. He is a patron of the arts.’
‘Yes, indeed,’ Leonard said. ‘Mr White, this is a great pleasure. I think Hate is wonderful. It is — it is — a most endearing work.’
‘It was not meant to be an endearing work,’ Blackwhite said.
‘Goodness, I hope I haven’t said the wrong thing.’
‘You can’t, Leonard,’ I said. ‘Leonard has got some money to give away.’
Blackwhite adjusted the nature of his gaze. Pablo, Sandro and Pedro looked up. The men from the foundations stared.
‘Do you know him, Chippy?’
‘Can’t say I do. I’ll ask Bippy.’
‘I don’t know him, Tippy.’
‘Leonard,’ Chippy said. ‘I’ve never heard of that name in Foundationland.’
‘This is possible,’ Blackwhite said. ‘But Leonard has the right idea.’
‘Mr White,’ Bippy said, affronted.
‘We have never let you down,’ said Tippy.
‘You won’t want to run out on us now, will you, Mr White?’ Chippy asked.
‘What about you, Mr White?’ asked the waiter.
Blackwhite considered the menu. ‘I think I’ll start with the Avocado Lucullus.’
‘Avocado Lucullus.’ The waiter made an approving note.
‘What do you mean by the right idea, Mr White?’
‘Then I think I’ll try a sole. What’s the bonne femme like tonight? The right idea?’
The waiter brought his thumb and index finger together to make a circle.
‘Well, let’s say the sole bonne femme. With a little spinach. Gentlemen, I’ll tell you straight. The artist in the post-colonial era is in a position of peculiar difficulty.’
‘How would you like the spinach, Mr White?’
‘En branches. And the way you or anyone else can help him is with — money. There it is, gentlemen. The way you can help Pablo here—’
‘The wine list, Mr White.’
‘Go on. We are listening.’
‘The way to help Pablo — ah, sommelier. But let’s ask our hosts.’