Peter Carey - Collected Stories

I sat back deep in the couch and prepared to enjoy the journey of a lifetime.

4.

How to describe the afternoon? A long slow dream in which everything was as it should be. I perused my “Tickets” album and resisted the temptation to place my current ticket in it although I had brought hinges for just this purpose. I drank gin and tonic as planned and had a light lunch brought to my salon. The train left the city very quickly, edged slowly around Mount Speculation, and by three o’clock we were already entering that poor dry country which marks the edges of the Great Eastern Desert. Here and there I saw bands of prisoners working on some task, guarded by soldiers, and I was reminded, against my will, of the mission that awaited me two thousand miles hence. I will confess that I drank a little more than might be considered correct and by four o’clock I was sound asleep.

I woke at five thirty, feeling a little the worse for wear, showered, dressed, and, with nothing else planned, decided on an early visit to the dining car.

This was not the right thing to do. My impatience got the better of me. For had I not imagined this moment for so many years, the moment I would take my place beside my superiors at dinner. To remain sitting in my salon was thus beyond my power.

Yet, as I said, this was a mistake. The dining car was practically empty and I thought at first that I had mistaken the hour. However, I soon noticed, at the far end of the carriage, an old gentleman already eating. I thought to join him, to engage in travellers’ conversation, but the waiter, resplendent in red coat and black trousers, escorted me to an obscure corner behind the dessert trolley where, as he pointed out, I could enjoy some privacy.

Here is not perhaps the place to record the meal for it is all entered in the menu which I quietly slipped into my jacket. But I would wish to record that I drank a bottle of Château Smith Haut-Laffite which many consider one of the finest wines in the world, although it did have the unfortunate effect of drying my mouth and making my tongue a trifle furry.

I retired without enjoying a cigar and, feeling a little below par, decided to cancel the courtesan.

The wine cannot be held responsible for the violent sickness which beset me during the night. Doubtless it was due to over-excitement on my part. But here again, even in the midst of such upheaval, I appreciated the little luxuries the train provided, for the toilet was but a short step from my bed.

5.

The morning revealed the truth which our most experienced travellers have so often related: that there is a certain monotony in a long journey through the desert. I was pleased to find that my view coincided with that of my superiors.

We were well and truly in the desert now and even a cluster of poor rocks was welcomed as something new, eagerly awaited, studied on arrival, and reluctantly farewelled.

I strolled the corridors a little and, not feeling up to much conversation, merely nodded to those ladies and gentlemen I met. Their smiles were in no way condescending.

In the afternoon I composed my instructions to the courtesan which I took great care over, drafting them several times and, to be honest, feeling not a little aroused by the activities I described. She was to visit me before dinner. I had the money in an envelope marked “Courtesan”. I placed it under the pillow where I considered it would be easily reached when the time came.

6.

“And this is what you want?” she said. She was so beautiful I could barely look at her.

“Yes.”

“You have written it all by hand.”

“Yes.” I wore my dressing gown, explaining that I had just had a shower. And in fact I had wet my hair a little just to go along with the story. All this was as planned.

She wore a long blue dress, very low-cut at the front. Her skin was white, so very, very white, and she smelt like a garden of flowers. A little smile played around her full lips.

“You have very beautiful handwriting,” she said.

“Thank you.”

“Shall we start then?”

“Very well.”

“You want to start with,” she consulted the instructions, paused, smiled, “number one.”

“Yes.”

“Oh, master,” she began. And fell upon my ear, licking it furiously.

“Not ears,” I shouted, “not ears.”

She consulted the list again and soon realized her mistake. After that she seemed to become more familiar with my handwriting.

7.

At dinner I was strangely pleased to hear that the dining car had run out of ice. Yet I had enjoyed ice aplenty in the gin and tonic I had ordered in my salon just fifteen minutes before. The practice of tipping had brought me rewards and I felt immensely pleased with myself in every respect.

After dinner I took a constitutional, walking the complete length of the train several times, feeling very much at peace with the world. True, the nature of my mission sometimes clouded this perfect happiness but there were so many things to observe, so many small memorabilia to collect, that the clouds soon passed.

It was near car 33 that I passed a large storage compartment and, looking in, saw the steward, my steward from car 23. He was bent over a cabinet, or so I thought it, scooping ice into a silver bucket.

“Ah,” I thought, “the devil has his own supply.” And seeking to congratulate him on his initiative I stepped inside.

“Good evening,” I said, and smiled to see him jump with fright, for he had not noticed my presence.

My smile, alas, was short-lived. For as he turned I looked into the cabinet and found it to be not a cabinet at all, but rather a coffin of sorts. To my horror I saw a man’s naked corpse inside and, packed around his pale corpulence, great quantities of ice floating in water. So this was the ice the rascal had been giving me.

I said not a word, but turned on my heel.

As I hurried along the corridor I heard him coming after me. I went into my salon and locked the door. I did not answer when he knocked, and in fact was unable to, for I was in the toilet, my stomach rent with uncontrollable spasms.

8.

How can it be that our dreams are so vulnerable, so tender, so frail that the spasms of the body can serve to rip them apart in so short a time. For that is what occurred in the long night that followed. It was as if every cell in my body rebelled against the train, its motion, its food, its passengers, its wine, and most particularly my mission which floated before me, pale, bloated and surrounded by ice.

My stomach was emptied but my body produced a green poison in order that there should be something to expel. Near as the cabinet was it was not always possible to arrive in time. And what dreams, what visions came to assail me: wide staring eyes, matted hair, pale hands floating in cold water. The taste of gin, foul and perfumed, surrounded me. I prayed to God that the spasms would stop and wished for nothing more than to be home in my poor bed.

But my prayers were shunned and all night the blackness was sliced into sickening strips by the hiss of a guillotine.

9.

The train moved like a merciless juggernaut, dragging my dead weight from grey dawn to pale day. I did not welcome it. For now I could see only the price which I, in my madness, had agreed to pay for this journey.

I wanted the courtesan, dreamed of her for so many years, wanted her breasts in my mouth, her legs wrapped around me, but when it was done, it was done and I couldn’t wait to get her out of my salon. So too it was with the train: I had had it and wanted it no more. But now the price I had agreed to in passion and lust must be paid on this cold grey morning when my lust seemed ugly and the blindfold of desire had been ripped away.