“I can’t make head or tail of this play, Margaret. What theatrical purpose is served by all those characters coming to the door?”
“I think we’re being asked to compare the moral corruption going on inside with the innocent world outside.”
“Ah, yes, I see.” Obviously there are levels of subtlety here that are beyond the simple workings of my mind.
Margaret studies one of the protesters, a stout woman in checked slacks whose face is aflame with makeup. “Do I look as silly as that when I’m off on one of my campaigns?”
Hardly. In fact, she looks incredibly beautiful at this moment. The sun is in her hair. Her lines have softened; there is something erotic about her stance, her hand on her hip, one leg thrust sideways.
“Your Kimberley is pretty sexy.”
“She gets quite well into her role.”
“Chris was into amateur theatre, did you know that?”
I light my pipe.
The last act is even more banal than the first, relieved only by the sight of Kimberley Martin in the full flower of her twenty-three years jumping naked from the hot tub, grabbing a towel, and running to answer yet another chiming of the door. This time it’s the nosy neighbour.
Near the end, some suggestive moments occur in the hot tub that cause a matronly lady in the seat next to us to wriggle with what I assume is discomfort.
Our charter whisks us quickly back to Garibaldi, and I have Margaret at her doorstep at six p.m., as the shadows of evening are growing long. From behind her house come the squawk and baying of hungry animals. “I have to feed them. Would you like to come in and wait? We could have a coffee. . or are you exhausted?”
I would like to come in and wait. But she is hinting I ought not to. She has many duties. She is giving Uncle Arthur an out. I must tell her I’m exhausted.
“It’s been a full day.”
“Oh. Well. . I enjoyed myself a lot.”
“As did I.”
“Please come for dinner this weekend.”
“I’d be most delighted.”
I tell my feet that it is time to go. She smiles. I smile. She hugs me. We kiss clumsily, lips slightly misaligned, hers partly imbedded in my beard, but I taste the softness, the moistness of them, and suddenly I am overcome by unreasoning fear.
I run from her like a frantic cat.
In the morning, George Rimbold comes unannounced. He has observed I am pale, gaunt, distracted. It is time to go fishing. It is time to talk: There is a soul to be saved.
After we anchor out, I tell him the story of my swollen, captive heart. I tell him I am suffering a severe case of amor proximi: love of one’s neighbour.
He smokes a joint. He keeps a straight face until I finish my soggy confessions.
“Please help me understand. You escorted the divine St. Margaret to a play so raunchy the authorities talk of closing it down. Clearly she was sexually stimulated by this play. Indeed, you poor man, she was dropping hints like they were going out of style. She invited you in to share her hearth and later — I have no doubt — her bed.”
“George, it would hardly have gone that far.”
“Nonsense, her kiss was a formal invitation to acts of passion. You have rejected the woman who has your heart in her clutches. You are possessed of the devil, my son. Repent at once.”
“I was in fear, George. I am obsessed with failure.”
“Oh, by all the saints. . How do you know you’ll fail if you don’t try it? Arthur, you poor miserable creature, I really think you have simply persuaded yourself you’re impotent. All those years of married depression, who can blame you for not getting it up? Maybe you learned to expect failure: fear of criticism, fear of desertion — and doesn’t it all keep getting reinforced?”
“I have felt some urges, I must admit.”
“At all events, do you think Margaret would not understand? We all take pleasure in the weakness in others, and women particularly enjoy weakness in men. They see it as a challenge. They cherish their role as healers.”
“Three’s a crowd, George. Chris Blake stands between us like some kind of … duenna.”
“Oh, but can’t you tell what she’s doing? She’s letting him go. She speaks of him only to purge pain pent up too long, to get rid of it finally, so she can make room for you.”
I am heartened by this. But I tell him about my dreams, the recurring theme of bondage.
“Your dreams are what you fear; they are not what you are.” I think I am also in love with George, in that other, brotherly way. Suddenly I am disgusted with myself. I am snivelling about my self-centred heart to a friend who has deeper troubles, who yearns to fill the emptiness of his soul. I suddenly hunger to make communion with this priest.
“Maybe I should have a smoke of that.”
“I’ll roll you a fresh one.”
But the pot affects me adversely. I become groggy, and we end our fishing trip early.
Later, however, resting on a hammock, I am enveloped in a fuzzy but not unpleasant fog. I read from Paradise Lost and find new and lovely meanings. I listen to the Mozart clarinet concerto as if for the first time. I make up speeches to the jury, none of which make sense. I do tai chi: Dance Like a Rainbow. Then I fall asleep in the late afternoon and dream of Margaret Blake climbing naked from a hot tub, running to the door to greet me, and Chris Blake is sitting in the tub, smiling.
Again, later, I have a faded memory of my phallus engorged while I slept, in full, tumescent pride.
Dear Arthur,
I’ve just got back from the Slocan and am scratching this out by hand so I can get it Priority Post to you ASAP. I’ve given the original tape to my secretary to transcribe, but meanwhile I’m enclosing a copy fresh off my portable stereo. Make of Dominique Lander what you will.
Her studio is actually an old Bluebird bus beside her funky handbuilt-type-house on the Slocan River. She has a male partner who is a bit of an old-fashioned hippie, a lute-maker. It’s very 1960s out there in the Slocan. Or something. Spooky, in a way.
Dominique is definitely into her own dark trip: a tendency to slinky black clothing, like she stepped right out of a Charles Addams cartoon, and predictably she paints with great gobs of depressing colours. She’s very beautiful, in her witchy way. Pale. Doesn’t go out in the sun a lot. She was really almost over-cooperative. At first.
But I have to finish setting the scene, Arthur. Over in the corner there was a stool, and some leather straps and kneepads on it, and a thin cane leaning against it. A little distracting, right? It put me off my form. I forgot to turn the tape on right away, but you won’t miss much.
More, later, on Professor O’Donnell’s reaction. Okay, play the tape and get back to this letter.
No, I don’t mind at all. You can even plug it in if you like.
It has fresh batteries.
I want to help Jonathan. But I will not compromise the truth.
I won’t ask you to. Okay, to go back — this detective’s name was Mr. Sierra.
A nice little man with an accent. I think he comes from one of those Central American countries that are always at war.
And did he say whom he represented?
Well, as I told you, I assumed he was working for you. For the defence.
Did he say that?
He told me he was sworn to silence. But he. . well, he was being very friendly. I’m sorry. I just thought he was there on Jonathan’s behalf. I’m truly sorry about this.
And what did you tell him?
Well, he told me the case against Jonathan looked pretty bad, especially the business about tying up his student. He said it would be useful if the B and D could be explained somehow. He used that expression — “B and D,” bondage and discipline — and I assumed he’d got it from Jonathan. And I thought about it. And I realized, yes, I should explain that Jonathan actually had a relationship where we did that regularly as part of our fucking. I thought it would be a good defence for him, proving what he did was a form of ritual play, that he wasn’t actually attacking her. But now that you tell me it’s only her word against his, I feel terrible. I wouldn’t have lied — I could never lie — but I guess I could have said nothing.