John Banville - Nightspawn

I picked up a box from the table and began to twist it in my ringers. Andreas closed his eyes again. He said,

‘Have you ever wondered why people were willing to kill for that docu—’

‘Why this Aristotle freak was willing to kill for it; come on, let’s start putting names to these vague devils you hint at.’

He grinned, and went on imperturbably,

‘And have you ever wondered —’

I would not let him escape.

‘Listen, answer the question.’

‘What question?’

‘Was it Aristotle who killed Black?’

‘But Mr White, you were there.’

‘For Christ’s sake.’

He sighed.

‘You have a very simple mind, Mr White. You deal too much in … what would I call it? … Too much in absolutes. You see someone murdered, you discover that the murderer works for someone, ergo, that someone — all right, don’t shout again, Aristotle, there, I have named him. You decide that Aristotle must be the real force behind the killing. Is that logical?’

‘It’s not illogical. But all right, all right, tell me, why did Fang want to kill him?’

‘Who?’

‘Black.’

‘Him, ah. But again you have leapt to a conclusion. Did I say that Aristotle was not the one who ordered the killing?’

‘Jesus.’

‘But don’t worry about these things, my friend. Everything will be explained. You have one task, to wait; to be patient and to wait. That’s all we ask you to do.’

‘But —’

‘Well, here, think on this. Why is it that no one outside this island seems to have heard about the murder? You saw the newspapers. Not a word about the affair.’

‘Protecting the tourist industry. Look, I want facts, dates, figures. I want the truth. I can afford to make demands, and don’t forget it, friend.’

‘But Mr White, Mr White, what is the truth?’

I flung the box down on the bed and glared at him. He had such a tender, attentive smile, his eyes moist with concern.

‘I want an approximation of the truth,’ I snarled.

He shrugged, which action, with his shape, was impressive.

‘Ask Erik,’ he said. ‘He will tell you all you want to know … perhaps.’

‘Erik is too busy just now.’

‘Mr White, why do you dislike me?’

‘I think we had this conversation before.’

‘But you gave no answer then either.’

‘No, I suppose I didn’t.’

A web of frost laced the air between us. Then I laughed, and shook my head, and heard my voice repeat an echo.

‘Useless,’ I said. ‘Useless.’

Andreas leaned forward in the chair, considered the folded flower of his fists, and, suddenly brisk, he said,

‘The reason I came here, Mr White, was to apologize to you.’

‘Apologize for what?’

‘I called you a coward. I’m sorry. Also I wish to say goodbye. I leave tonight for Athens. Erik will be travelling with me. At least, that was his plan.’

I sniggered.

‘He won’t be leaving just yet, not if I know anything.’

‘Mr White, what do you know about such things?’

He left the chair and shuffled about the room, looking at this and that. By the table he halted and glanced at the jumble of papers lying there.

‘This is your book, yes?’ he asked. ‘What is it called?’

‘It’s called I Was Just The Gipsy In My Mother’s Soul.’

He nodded. What a sense of humour the man had. He bent closer to the table in an effort to decipher my scrawl. I looked at his hump and had a vision of him wooing a widow over the brand-new boards of a coffin.

‘It’s strange, isn’t it?’ I mused. ‘The rash of lechers with yachts there is about these days.’

He lurched away from the table, knocked against a chair, and went to the window where he stood with his back, that back, turned resolutely toward me. Twist that knife.

‘Of course, a colonel in the —’

‘Stop,’ he said.

I stopped, and wrenched at one of my fingers until it hurt. A turkey cackled somewhere, and was joined in song by a chorus of its mates. A girl laughed down in the street. From the kitchens below, a sniff of rancid fat slithered in through the window. Andreas said,

‘I first met him two years ago. He was to give a lecture at the university, on the role of journalism in politics. He arrived very drunk, and one hour late. We took him to the lecture room. He clung to the desk and looked at the students gathered before him, blinking one eye, just one, and grinning. “Gentlemen,” he said, “I have lost my spectacles.”’ Here Andreas did a fair impersonation of Erik’s peculiar voice. ‘“Some oily Greek stole them, I think. Without them my notes are useless. So I shall tell you a story. I once met Jean-Paul Sartre. M. Sartre, I said, I think I have heard of you. And he said to me …” We never discovered what it was that Sartre said to him, for the desk which he clutched so tightly overturned, and Erik fell down at our feet, shouting and swearing. We picked him up and carried him from the hall. In the corridor he ran away from us, and raced out of the building, scattering the leaves of his notebook behind him. I went to search for him, all over the city. I knew the places where he would be. They were my places also, you see. In every one there was news of him. Here, he pretended to be dumb, there, he sat at the bar without his shirt, singing Nazi war-songs and toasting the Greek army. Oh yes, Mr White, you do not know all the sides of him. I could not find him. I returned home. There were my books, my possessions. Something was missing. I searched for hours, not knowing what it was that I was searching for. There was a storm that night, it seemed to shake the ground. I stood by the window and watched the rain fall on the city. I heard my name called above the roofs. It was very strange. In the morning Erik came to apologize, but still I had not found that thing which was missing. I never found it.’

He turned to me.

‘There is no end to my story, you see, Mr White. Just as there was none to Erik’s. Now tell me if you know anything.’

I had a friend once who was afflicted with a hare-lip. To draw attention away from that wound, he wore a black patch over a perfectly sound eye. So Andreas had manufactured for himself a diffidence and calm of character, a whole fastidious and mysterious personality which would hide the cruel twist of his back. Now a cord had snapped, the mask had slipped. Some sense of human pain was communicated to me, but all I could do was turn away from him in pity and disgust. He left. I closed my ears to his clumsy step on the stairs.

I am tired of these, all these people, tired of them, what are they to me, this is my story, god damn it, mine.

The cripple had been gone not five minutes when there was a furtive tapping on my door. No, I moaned, no, holding my head in my hands. Again the knock.

‘All right all right, it’s open.’

Erik came sidling in, and cast a look back through a crack of the door before closing it. Then he turned to me, rubbing his jaw. Our eyes met and parted. He sat down by the table, his long legs coiled together, and drummed his fingers on the wood.

‘Have you seen —’

‘He just left,’ I said.

‘Oh.’

Another lapse into the awful silence. Erik tried again.

‘You must understand that Andreas —’

‘I understand Andreas, I understand.’

He frowned, and began to whistle softly. I flung myself from the bed and paced the length of the floor, once, twice, halfway, halt.

‘I’m thinking of starting a salon here,’ I said. ‘Or a lonely hearts club.’

‘A what?’

‘Never mind.’

I lit a cigarette. Erik was reading my manuscript, his nose almost touching the paper. Things repeat themselves. I went and slapped my hand down on the page. He continued to gaze at my splayed fingers before him as though they were transparent.