‘Forgive me, Mr Lom, but at this point, what the friend we’re talking about said was somewhat ambiguous and complicated, and it would be best if I gave Mr Muriel the actual Spanish.’
Herbert Lom waved his handkerchief in the air in a gesture of largesse and generosity, so extravagantly in fact that it touched my nose, making me sneeze, not once but three times.
‘No, of course, go ahead,’ he said, adroitly avoiding these explosions and waiting until I had stopped. ‘It’s all very interesting, I must say. But, please, Juan, feel free.’
He had caught my name first time. I felt very honoured and, given his cinematographic antecedents, rather troubled too. I had seen him treat people he was planning to kill with equal deference.
Muriel looked concerned, or possibly discouraged or disappointed, when he heard the words his old friend had spoken. As if he would have preferred me to come back to him empty-handed, having made no progress, or to be able to reject what I had to say, which seemed, however, to affect him quite deeply.
‘Did he really say that?’ he asked in a gruff voice, seeking some opening for his incredulity. ‘He actually said, “Nothing gives one more satisfaction than when a girl doesn’t want to do it, but can’t say No”? Are you sure, Juan?’ Out of respect for Lom he was still speaking in English and translated those words more precisely than I had when I gave him my version.
‘Yes, I’m sure, Don Eduardo, I mean, Eduardo.’ The great actor’s presence prompted me to add the ‘Don’, which I hadn’t for a long time. I didn’t want him to think I was being overfamiliar with my employer. ‘I have a very good memory. Give or take a word, that’s exactly what he said. Does that clarify or illuminate anything as far as you’re concerned?’
‘Possibly. And what did you say? Did you try to draw him out? That’s what I told you to do, to encourage him to talk. That was obviously the perfect opportunity.’
‘Yes, of course. I told him I didn’t quite understand, I asked him what he meant by “resentment”. I asked him to explain.’
‘And?’
‘And nothing. He burst out laughing and didn’t answer. And just then a niece of García Lorca’s joined us — she often goes to that same disco — and the conversation took a different direction. She’s half-American and has worked as a dancer in New York. She’s very pretty, a few years older than me. The Doctor couldn’t keep his eyes off her legs and he had a go at chatting her up, but I very much doubt he’ll get anywhere. She has a partner, a painter. And, to be honest, I didn’t want to return to the subject later in case it looked like I was being too nosey. Perhaps I should have persisted. But I think he’ll be more prepared to talk on another occasion if I don’t insist too much.’
‘All right, that’s enough,’ said Muriel somewhat dismissively, or perhaps he was merely distracted, weighed down by his own thoughts.
Then I told him what I found most bewildering: how did Van Vechten manage to get anywhere with Maru or with my other girlfriends if he didn’t pay them or offer anything in exchange? This was a mystery to me. Muriel said nothing, as if he too were asking himself that same question. Or perhaps he was thinking about the past, perhaps his thoughts were focused on that.
Seeing us both sunk in joint meditative silence, Herbert Lom intervened, with an elegant wave of his large handkerchief. This time it flicked my eye, and for a while I had to keep that eye closed, as if I had a speck of dust in it or, worse, some fierce insect. Or as if Muriel’s hard eyepatch had been placed over it.
‘Insofar as I have grasped the nature of the matter in hand,’ he said in his fine, deep voice, his eyes as sharp as nails, just as they were on the screen, ‘if this friend of yours, this Dutch doctor, neither pays for nor offers anything in exchange; if he neither promises nor tempts, then he must demand. There is, in principle, no other option.’
Muriel and I looked at each other in surprise, we had assumed he wasn’t much interested in our conversation, even though we were, contra natura, speaking in English (my spoken English was only average at the time, though it improved subsequently). But he had, it seemed, quickly grasped the situation. A bright, intelligent man, perhaps as fearsome as his characters, who had possibly been created simply so that he would play them.
Muriel was about to speak, but I got in before him:
‘What do you mean, Mr Lom? Demand what?’ I don’t know how I dared question him so directly. He may have been short, but I still found him quite intimidating.
‘It’s obvious,’ replied this Lord of the B-movie, as if it went without saying. He threw his handkerchief in the air and caught it on his forearm, like a falconer receiving his returning falcon. It missed me this time, but I was beginning to grow weary of that android-green piece of cloth, or perhaps it was Nile green, which was fashionable that season, I had seen Professor Rico sporting ties and (rather smaller) handkerchiefs in that same colour, his handkerchief protruding from his top jacket pocket. ‘If someone wants something that the other person denies him, and he’s not prepared to offer anything or to pay for it, then he’s in a position to demand it. If that doesn’t work, then his one bargaining chip is silence.’
I wasn’t following. Muriel, it seemed, was, because he asked:
‘So what the Doctor will have given in exchange is a promise not to do or say something that could prove detrimental to those women’s reputations. Is that what you mean, Herbert?’
Lom had now tucked his silk handkerchief up his sleeve. Most of it, however, remained hanging out, like a waiter’s serviette, but at least he wouldn’t be able to unleash it on me again. He then made a sweeping gesture meaning Voilà, his floating handkerchief underlining the flourish. Kuchačevič ze Schluderpacheru was clearly a man of the world. And then he did actually say Voilà, as if he were quoting a piece of dialogue.
‘Voilà. If you give me what I want, I will say nothing and do nothing, and I will not harm you with what I could do or say.’ It had never occurred to me that this might be Van Vechten’s weapon or attitude, and I couldn’t imagine what he could possibly remain silent about with any of my female friends and acquaintances. Muriel, however, could, because he nodded sadly or perhaps resignedly. But then he knew what he was trying to find out about the Doctor, and I as yet did not.
‘This may, I fear, be the case here,’ he muttered. He appeared not to wish to say anything more.
Herbert Lom, on the other hand, had perked up.
‘Whatever it is,’ he added, ‘and if he is a friend, let’s hope he isn’t mixed up with any activities such as those that caused our dear producer so many problems with the FBI. That’s all over now, of course, but, as you know,’ and he turned to Muriel this time, ‘it meant that he couldn’t visit America for twenty years. Or, rather, he avoided doing so, I assume because he would have been sent straight to jail if he’d so much as set foot there. These matters always end badly.’