Robert Wilson - Instruments of Darkness

‘Yvette tells me they don’t believe in marriage in France,’ Charlie said as he sat down. ‘Says they have this thing concubinage instead.’ He strained his whisky through his moustache. ‘Sounds kind of interesting, you know, concubines and that. Sounds to me as if you could trade ‘em.’

‘Like pork bellies, you mean?’ I asked Charlie, wondering how they got to be talking about this kind of stuff.

‘I was thinking more onna lines with “1987 Concubine convertible. Low mileage, one previous owner, swap plus cash considered”.’

‘I think you’re over-romanticizing it, Charlie,’ I said.

‘No, no, Bruce, you gotta understand, marriage – that ol’ roman’ic institution – is old-fashioned. Strictly wartime only before you fly off to a certain death. That’s what the lady says.’

‘Don’t you think so, Bruce?’ Yvette dared me, having dug deep to pronounce my name.

‘I’ve heard there’s a very high success rate when the man dies immediately.’

‘Whose side you on?’ asked Charlie. I ignored him.

‘The woman is left with a memory of perfect love and consummation…’

‘Yeah,’ said Charlie, with no encouragement.

‘…and, if it’s really a perfect marriage, a load of money.’

‘Now here is a man who really understands,’ said Yvette, uncrossing her legs and leaning forward.

‘And the guy?’ said Charlie. ‘What the hell does the guy get out of this perfect marriage?’

‘The guy gets to die at the pinnacle of his achievement. Wedding night followed by heroic death.’

‘What more could a man want?’ asked Jasmin.

‘To do it again?’ asked Charlie.

‘It’s never as good the second time,’ said Jasmin, ‘and anyway, men are always looking for the ultimate thrill.’ She pecked at her cigarette. ‘Sex and death. In Japan they don’t always need the sex…I’ve seen them sit down to eat puffer fish knowing that if the chef’s carved it up wrong any one of them could get the chop.’

‘Raw fish,’ said Charlie, ‘is not my kind of thrill.’

‘Yes,’ said Jasmin smugging at her Gauloise. ‘I think the spider gets it right. She shows her mate a good time, gets herself pregnant and has a problem free dinner.’

‘I think I’m coming round to concubinage ,’ said Charlie. ‘I don’t wanna give you indigestion or anything.’

‘Don’t worry about us,’ said Yvette. ‘We have huge appetites. You must think of it as an act of kindness. We’re saving you from yourselves.’

‘Kindness was not the word I had in mind,’ said Charlie.

‘All this talk and now I’m hungry,’ said Yvette. ‘It’s time to eat.’

‘Will you be our guests?’ offered Charlie.

Yvette had stood up and looked Charlie over.

‘You look too tough for me. I like my meat very tender,’ she said baring her teeth.

‘The tender bits are inside,’ I said for Charlie.

Yvette raised an eyebrow. ‘Can I use a phone?’

Charlie pointed to the desk at the far end of the room behind our sofa. He saw Yvette hesitate. ‘Sorry, it’s the only one inna house. My rules. Somebody wants to use my phone, I wanna know what they’re saying. It’s business…’ he smiled, ‘something personal.’

She gave Charlie a look which left me charcoal broiled and I was only sitting next to him. She walked over to the phone and punched out some numbers.

‘Camilia?’ she asked and started speaking in Italian. Charlie nodded and drank some more and sneaked a look at Jasmin who had stood up and walked to the window to look at the dark.

Yvette put the phone down and walked back over. ‘I’m sorry…’ she said.

‘I heard,’ said Charlie.

‘You speak Italian?’ she asked.

‘I am Italian,’ he said. ‘Carlo Reggiani.’

Yvette and Jasmin slipped into their shoes. ‘We have to go. Tonight we are meeting someone for dinner who says they know somebody who probably knows lots of other somebodies who might be able to sell me something I want,’ explained Yvette.

‘That’s the only kind of business they have here,’ said Charlie.

‘African art, Bruce, is a terrible business. The worst,’ she said, smoothing her scarf inside the lapels of her jacket.

I put my drink on the table and we all walked out to the private parking area at the back of the house. There was a taxi with a powder blue furry dashboard waiting for them under a low palm tree. Charlie was kissed soundly on the cheek by Yvette, which might have disappointed him but he didn’t show it. The two women got into the car. The taxi took a while to get going and circled us before disappearing behind the paillote.

Charlie shivered.

‘She does something for me, that woman.’

‘Confuse you?’ I said.

‘There’s one thing I’m not confused about,’ he said, turning and putting his hand on my shoulder to steer me into the house.

‘They don’t make them like that any more,’ I said.

‘Right.’

‘Now that we’re all being genetically engineered.’

‘Something went wrong in my test tube,’ said Charlie, looking down at his big hairy body.

‘Not us, Charlie. You can still see the ape in us. In the future they’ll iron out all those blips and glitches that make someone extraordinary like Yvette and we’ll all look like leads from shampoo and shaving ads. We’ll be the bathroom people from planet Earth.’

‘You know, Bruce’ – he stopped and looked at me from under his eyebrows with his hand resting on the back of my neck – ‘you’re kinda weird, but you’re OK…I think, anyways.’

We went back into the house and sat opposite each other on the sofas with big tumblers of Scotch in our hands and a bottle and a bucket of ice on the table. We drank and refilled without speaking. I took Kershaw’s photograph out of my shirt pocket and flicked it across to Charlie.

‘I’m looking for this guy. His boss wants me to find him, says he hasn’t heard from him in a week. He describes him as missing.’

‘Steve Kershaw,’ said Charlie, rolling his glass across his forehead. ‘English. Buys sheanut in Cotonou.’ He spun the photo back at me across the table.

‘When did you last see him?’

‘He was in here about three days ago with a blonde girl, French I think, I didn’t know her. Nice looking though. Great legs, nice ass.’

‘Three days doesn’t sound like he’s very “missing” to me.’

‘You asked me a question,’ he shrugged.

‘Was he intimate with this French girl?’

‘Kind of,’ he patted his bald head with his hairy hand. ‘Sex rather than marriage type, I’d say.’ Charlie twisted his leg under himself and winced. ‘You know, this concubinage thing confuses me, Bruce. It sounds…financial.’

‘It’s like a common-law wife,’ I said, my eyes widening with the whisky on an empty stomach which was loosening off the gab more than I wanted it to. ‘I know you Americans are keen on marriage. Divorce, too. But in Europe now, marriage is out. People live together, they don’t need to tie the knot in front of God any more. It keeps the divorce rate down. I’ve met quite a few Americans who’ve had three or four wives, which to Europeans sounds like upgrading, like we do with computers. The Africans? Well, they have all four wives at once, it shows they’re making money. But then they say divorce is not a cheap option in the US. Is it a status symbol there yet, Charlie?’ He didn’t answer but stared at a bookcase with no books in it.

‘You been married before, Charlie?’

Charlie, who was sitting sideways on the sofa with his arm thrown over the back of it, gave me a sideways look as if I was trying to cheat off him in an exam. He held up two fingers and took a large slug of whisky from his glass, including a lump of ice which he crunched.