Thomas Mcguane - Something to Be Desired

“I’d say — let me look at this now — I’d say you’re either going to have to sell it or just view it as an ongoing money machine, which won’t change and which — I know you — won’t be that exciting as a business qua life passion.”

“You’re wrong about that. It’s very exciting. I’m happier than you think.”

“So long as you emphasize your losses, losses are valuable things. Sell them to yourself before they are captured by someone less worthy. Everyone is trying to buy losses. These days it’s the sizzle, not the steak.”

A short time later Janoff gathered his paperwork to his chest and went out. When Lucien heard his BMW grind off through the deep gravel, he got up, thinking what a nice place he had created for himself and for others. It would be hard to give up. He got to his feet and walked out into the evening air, feeling a warm inversion come down the mountain and across his face.

But then, by force of will, Lucien behaved as usual for his dinner guests. Scrubbed and cologned, he made his way through the dining room, circled the old spring twice, made thoughtful moues to his concessionaires and returned to his office with its pictures of his parents and his child. He worked there and fell asleep at the desk on purpose. Some hours later, awakened by his alarm watch, Lucien rose and made his rounds of the spring. He went over the books in front and the bar receipts when the last celebrant had gone to his room. He’d usually exchange a few convivial words with the night watchman, light a cigar and stroll the flagstone shore of the spring. But tonight, late tonight, with the prospect of Kelsey emerging again and again, he sat down beside the empty spring and watched the phantoms drift toward the skylights and walls. He remembered when he and his father had first seen the spring under a mantle of circling crows. But he remembered too being there with Emily. And he felt his throat ache. He didn’t know if it was from remembering his father, from remembering Emily, or because the spring had become a bit of a madhouse. If it was the latter, he’d get over it; for, despite his adoration of the natural world, he despised the quiet life. It was better for the spring to draw the successful, those in need, the hungry, the full, the kings and queens of boogie, the mindless and desperate, than just lie there. Lucien was not ashamed; he just wasn’t sure why he was so blue.

Wick called Lucien at the spring. Lucien was out at pool-side fielding complaints. One man demanded to go “downstairs” and adjust the mixing valve, as it was too hot in the pool. Lucien explained that it came straight out of the ground at one hundred fifteen degrees. “And after you adjust the mixing valve,” the man replied, “add chlorine.” Lucien advised him that it was considered a marvel that the state found the water so clean that additives were not required. “The chlorine’ll get after those bugs,” the man said conclusively and left.

“Saw Suzanne,” said Wick.

“And?”

“I strongly advise you to throw yourself at her feet and beg for another chance.”

“She’s something, isn’t she.”

“Why don’t you stop by my Chinese restaurant and share a quiet litchi. I can go over the QED on that topic and spare you from endlessly shooting yourself in the foot.”

“Fuck you, I’m a millionaire.”

“Today I’m having tea-smoked duck and some nice Mexican welterweights via the satellite dish to help pass the time. Too, there is a pleasant view of the Deadrock skyline and the music of our nearby switching yard.”

“I can’t make it. I’m going to try to pick up on stuff here.”

“Incidentally, by way of deepening your debt to me, I handled your Kelsey problem. I donated him to a college in North Dakota. I had him tagged and shipped. I’m going to let the college deal directly with the family on any complications there might be involved, and I billed them for the freight, the embalming and that snazzy container. The wife called and got snarky with me. So if there’s any problem on collecting, I’ll garnishee their damn television set. I know how to hate too.”

“I can’t thank you enough for handling that. I never thought I’d see the last of him. Not that he wasn’t a nice guy. However, this thing went on and on.”

“But remember, if you ever need a liver transplant or anything, we’ve got an inside line at the college.”

“Goodbye, Wick.”

Life and death, thought Lucien. That’s all I have to say. One minute you’re shipping a body, the next you’re beating your brains out trying to get into some housewife’s shorts. During Lucien’s bad winter he had pulled his friend Dee into the unlocked foyer, a kind of anteroom in front of the locked plate-glass doors, of the Deadrock First Security Bank; whereupon like two rumpled suits they made long and boisterous love. The next day the large staff of the bank reviewed the activity on their video surveillance system. The time ran on the right-hand side of the screen, grimly factoring Lucien’s performance. Once again, Lucien’s dick had dragged him someplace the rest of him would never have gone alone, and caused him shame.

At two the mayor, Donald Deems, came in with his secretary and tossed down a hollow-sounding briefcase. His secretary was lean and large-boned as Don Quixote, and she worked hyperkinetically in her steno book and stared out of the window to the hot spring. There were three or four local schoolteachers in the pool, bobbing and chatting amiably. Sometimes Lucien’s former math teacher, Mrs. Hunt, came and glowered in the shallow end, looking for her old victims. I ought to pound that geek, thought Lucien.

“What’ve you got going today, Donald?”

“We’ve got the sister-city deal, Lucien. You remember.”

“I do remember but I don’t know what to do different. We’re ready for them. It’s what, half a dozen people?”

“No, more than that. I don’t even know what country they’re from, but it’s Deadrock’s sister city. Someplace out in the Pacific with one syllable. Zook, Plock, something, I don’t know. Don’t write that down, for Christ’s sakes!” he said to the scribbling secretary. He fingered the skip-stitching in his lapel.

“Do they speak any English?”

“I don’t know, Lucien. Foreign aid and papaya is their main deal, I guess.”

“Well, we’ll sure try to make them feel at home. If we only knew what home was—”

“I just thought, you being in the State Department …”

“Do you know what letter it starts with?”

“I’ll find out, I’ll find out.”

“Maybe you could go through some back issues of the National Geographic .”

The mayor bobbed his chin and looked off pensively. “I know it’s somewheres out there in the Pacific somewheres.”

Suzanne appeared briefly in the window, her brown eyes bright against a new tan. She gave Lucien a small wave in which he was more than a little suspicious there was flirting. He raised his arm toward the mayor in a kind of stiff-arm gesture and darted for the door. By the time he got out to the pool, Suzanne had gone past the far end, wearing a cotton wrap over her bathing suit. By now she was strolling with a tall young man, a college student possibly; and the two of them turned into the open bar. Lucien would have raced after them and spoken to her, but he knew he had almost no chance of appearing self-possessed; and he had perfect capability for imagining himself looking very awkward indeed in front of … the two of them. He went back into the office.

“Is something the matter?” the mayor asked, his secretary standing by to write down the answer.

“No, someone I know.”

“You look sick.”

Lucien cut through this. “Where were we?” he asked.