Norman Manea - The Lair

“But this isn’t Ga par’s work, it’s by the artist Aet, eleven years old. Your friend attached a page with the history of the work and the artist. He insisted that the gift was an extravagance, not an insult. Many scholarly details, to convince me that it’s a serious thing, worthy of respect. Have you heard of the great Cambodian chef at Pierre’s? A superexpensive restaurant where Kissinger and Sharon Stone and Norman Mailer and Wall Street suits eat. Monsieur Gerard. Gerard Fun, the Cambodian nobleman who studied in Paris while his country was being devastated by the Communists. He became a famous chef in New York, at Pierre’s. That was how he met Beatrice.”

“Beatrice? What Beatrice? Dante wasn’t resurrected, was he?”

“He wasn’t and I’m not disappointed.”

“Beatrice, Ga par’s friend. Larry Five, that was what he’d called her. At the start I didn’t understand, Ga par raves sometimes. Larry Five, Larry Five, until I understood Larry Five is a woman. A wealthy widow. Ga par’s former colleague in the New York University doctorate program that he never finished.”

“Yes, I know about that. And the elephants?”

“Monsieur Gerard introduced Beatrice to two exiled Cambodian painters, poor and talented. She was very impressed, she agreed to back the project, ‘Painting Elephants.’ An art school for elephants that are becoming less useful. Looking after them costs money, as well as their medical care. I read that each one receives, at birth, a young male caretaker who will look after them until death. Asian elephants. The African ones are a different story. Ga par bought the drawing at a Christie’s auction. Beatrice steered him there. I don’t think that your friend will come back for a consultation. He got fed up with my telling him that he’s immense, like an elephant. Maybe he got as far as Thailand.”

“Did he suggest something to that effect?”

“No, but he didn’t ask after Lu. He entered the office like a meteor, dropped off the tube and was gone. Forever.”

Gora was silent. Koch, too. The show was over.

“You were wonderful, Izy, you were fantastic. I forgot all about the angioplasty, the stents, the panic.”

Izy was looking at him and smiling.

“I’m glad. There’s something else, while we’re here … Ga par left a letter, too. He wanted to inform me that he’s not supporting the Republican Party, and that the prophet Mohammed was born in the Year of the Elephant. He told me not to forget this! Forty years before the birth of Islam. And when the Abyssinian king, the tyrant Abraha, attacked Mecca, he didn’t use just one huge new weapon but many elephants. Ga par wanted very badly to improve my education before leaving.”

Now Gora smiled, as well, looking at his friend.

“And there’s still another strange allusion. He said to ask you if you have a code name. He’s referring to the secret police, isn’t he?”

“I assume so. He’s asking if I was an informant. There were many. Stalkers and stalked, that was the game. Sometimes the role was cumulative.”

“I knew what I was doing when I ran. I’d be interested to talk about this. You and I can talk about anything, right? Nothing will ever change between us?”

“Of course.”

Izy was convinced that a long conversation would follow. Gusti didn’t seem inclined.

“Yes, it’s interesting. We’ll talk some other time. I’m tired, and it’s late. You were wonderful, Izy, fantastic. I forgot about the angio — plasty, the stents, the panic.”

The two old classmates embraced fraternally, as they used to many years ago.

Izy remained pensive in the doorway. Surprised not by Gora’s refusal but by the way in which he interrupted the questions. He’d thanked him with the same words, repeated mechanically, identically, twice. Once home, Gora fell asleep instantly. The following morning he seemed perfectly recovered.

Recovered, he rushed to the small screen.

The Thai National Institute for Elephants was giving away extraordinary gifts for lovers of animals and art. Original paintings, executed by elephants with or without the guiding hands and minds of people. There were no forgeries in this extraordinary collection of abstract creativity — that was the name of the collection, Abstract Creativity.

The paper was handmade, especially for the collection, out of 100 percent recycled materials and free of bacteria, according to the needs of the medium, the acrylics were of the highest quality, imported from England and France.

The elephants had succeeded in forgetting their immense bodies, the patient concluded, encouraged. Each one had, from birth till death, his or her own caretaker and instructor, who knew his or her pedigree and history perfectly. The instructors were trained for the Great Project through special courses: how to prepare the brushes and paints, when to give the signal to start, and particularly, to finish. The opportune stopping of the creative exercise was essential. Elephants don’t know when to stop, they would keep going forever.

The celebrated Lampang Conservation Center fought against the disappearance of Asian elephants, reduced by half from the hundred thousand that lived in Thailand only ten years before. The funds obtained by the Lampang Center served for maintenance and for raising public awareness about the dramatic fate of these creatures.

It wasn’t a matter only of Thailand or South Africa, but also of Colorado Springs, where the drawings of the celebrated artist Lucky were being sold in a solo exhibition, held at the municipal airport. Born in 1980, Lucky had arrived at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in 1981, after she’d been orphaned in Kruger National Park in South Africa. She lives here with her friend Kimba, also from South Africa. In spite of her spectacular dimensions and weight, Lucky adapted to the courses in just a few weeks. Attentive to details, she works only with the brushes that she likes. “Elephants have over a hundred thousand muscles,” the computer was telling Professor Gora, who was following the forty — eighth birthday celebration of the African elephant Hydari, in the Philadelphia Zoo. Hydari, nicknamed Dari, was the oldest of his kind. Then Gora found himself in the Toledo Zoo, where little Louie received birthday presents, a festive cake and gifts to his tastes, for his fifth birthday. In the Oakland Zoo, the public observed the diet and caretaking of the elephants, in Los Angeles they were celebrating the one — year anniversary of the enchanting Ruby’s retreat, at seven years old, from an acting career in the Performing Welfare Society.

“The image trumps the word! The planetary transmission has no competition in the library!”

Was it Ga par’s voice? The question had burst victoriously through the fog of his thoughts.

“Is there another more insane and formidable country than this one? Idealistic, pragmatic, cynical, and religious. For — mi — dab — le! And that’s final! The online commercial agency Novica represents fifteen academies of elephant art. Elephantine art, is that right? That’s right and it’s formidable. For — mi — dab — le, that’s all.”