Paul Murray - The Mark and the Void

‘I think you will find that I can do a lot less than that.’

‘Oh, well, that’s lovely, Claude, after all I’ve done for you.’

‘What, exactly, have you done for me? Apart from the incessant lying.’

He goggles at me furiously. ‘You know. The, the …’

‘The attempted robbery? The non-existent book?’

‘The advice!’ he snaps. ‘The advice!’

‘It seems to me that your “advice”, like your business ideas generally, amounts to little more than a vicarious attempt to sleep with waitresses.’

‘Well, let’s just drop the subject, shall we?’ Paul flashes me a deliberately synthetic smile, and swabs his plate with a hunk of bread. ‘Let’s just drop it, and concentrate on enjoying this overpriced, pointless meal.’

‘An excellent idea,’ I respond in kind. ‘Let us leave the heavy topics for another time, and simply take pleasure in our long-standing friendship.’

The ensuing silence continues until the waiter returns to relieve us of our plates, when I take the opportunity to add a side of potato dauphinoise to my main course. ‘And … how are the petits pois today?’

‘Delicious, sir. Fresh from our own farm.’

I see Paul glare at me hatefully from the far side of table. ‘Perhaps I will have a side of those as well,’ I say.

The waiter departs, the silence resumes. Then a machinating smile breaks across his face, and Paul says, ‘I meant to tell you — I saw a film last night, reminded me of you.’

‘Oh yes?’

‘Yeah, it was called Anal Analyst . What was the strapline … “We’ve all been fucked in the ass by banks … but here comes the biggest dick of all!” ’

The couple beside us look at each other in alarm. ‘Ah, superb,’ I say, as the mains arrive.

‘What it is, Rod McMaster is this banking analyst, okay? And in his office there are these two hot girls with really big asses …’

He proceeds to give me a lengthy and extremely graphic description of the banking analyst and his associates’ adventures at an asset management conference in Luxembourg. If he thinks he is going to embarrass me out of my meal, however, he is wrong.

‘On the subject of culture,’ I say, when there is a break in the narrative, ‘Bimal Banerjee is reading in Dublin tonight.’

Paul recoils violently, as if I had thrown acid in his face.

‘They say he will win the Raytheon again this year,’ I muse. ‘I hope so. Ararat Rat Rap is a staggering achievement.’

This time he does not react, other than to continue chewing and then, evidently with some difficulty, swallow.

‘You should come,’ I suggest. ‘It will be exciting to see a real writer, how do you say, in the flesh.’

‘I’d like to, Claude,’ Paul says, recovering his composure. ‘I’m always interested to see what feat of mediocrity the bourgeoisie have canonized now. Unfortunately I can’t manage to put out of my head what a vile excrescence that vile excrescence is. So for me, it’s like every word is written in pus, you know?’

This impressively unambiguous image brings the exchange to a close, and with it any further desire to eat; I push away my plate. The waiter comes over to clear the table. ‘Will that be all, gentlemen?’ he asks hopefully.

I have a meeting in less than an hour; nevertheless, out of bloody-mindedness, I order a digestif , which Paul watches me drink with unconcealed malevolence.

‘Had enough?’ he asks sourly.

I give the question some thought. His eyes widen fearfully. I decide to be merciful. Paul motions to the waiter for the bill.

‘They always insist on hiding it inside these stupid leather books,’ he grumbles when it comes. ‘Like maybe you’ll mistake it for some magical fairy tale.’

Clearly on this occasion the fairy tale does not have a happy ending. His face turns ashen; he rubs his eyes, and scans the bill again. ‘How can this be?’ he whispers.

‘Let me see,’ I say, and take the leather book out of his limp, unresisting hand. Everything appears to be in order. ‘Service is not included,’ I say, and pass it back to him.

‘And Ludmila wasn’t even here!’ Paul laments.

I sit back and fold my hands peaceably over my stomach.

He thrums his fingers on the tablecloth, then glances up at me. ‘Full disclosure. I only have twenty euro on me.’

‘Do you,’ I say.

‘Yeah,’ he says.

‘How did you intend to pay for the meal?’

‘I really hadn’t thought that far ahead,’ he says. ‘I suppose I figured that if I got you to invest right now, in cash, I could pay for it out of that.’

‘I see. That is unfortunate, because I left my wallet in the office.’

‘You did?’

‘Yes.’

‘Right.’ He looks troubled. The waiter, who is not eager for us to stay, glides close, glances at the still-unaddressed bill, glides on. Paul shoots me an up-from-under look and says in a low voice, ‘What if I told you I had a foolproof way for us to walk right out of the restaurant without us paying them a penny?’

I roll my eyes.

‘I’m serious. We walk out of here — walk, not run, with our heads held high — and it doesn’t cost us a thing.’

‘Look, just let me pay,’ I say, and reach for the bill.

‘I thought you didn’t have your wallet.’

‘Obviously I have my wallet. I will pay, and put it on expenses.’

‘No!’ Paul whips it away. ‘There’s a principle at stake here. These fuckers are totally scamming us.’

‘How are they scamming us? We have just eaten an enormous meal.’

‘They said Ludmila would be here and she wasn’t. I’m not letting them get away with it. All we have to do —’

‘I don’t want to hear your plan.’

‘Listen, it’s simple — all we do is, we pretend to have an argument. We have this big flaming row, then I storm out, and then you chase after me, trying to get me back, see? And when we hit the street, that’s when we run for it.’

‘We run for it, with our heads held high.’

‘It works, Claude. I’ve tried it before, in Turkey?’

‘I don’t care, I am not doing it.’

‘Although that was with Clizia — the thing is, it’s probably a bit more convincing if it’s a lovers’ tiff. That way, people are more reluctant to intervene.’

‘I am simply going to put the meal on my card. Excuse me!’ I call to the waiter.

‘Oh, you like the look of him, do you?’ Paul declares, yanking his chair back from the table.

‘What?’

‘All through the meal you were staring at him — devouring him, with your eyes!’

‘Excuse me, waiter —’

‘A boy, Claude! A mere boy! And you flirt with him right in front of me — like I’m not even here!’

‘I have no idea what you are talking about,’ I say. At the neighbouring tables the conversation has petered out, and patrons glance over with that combination of embarrassment and glee characteristic of eavesdropping on an argument.

‘Don’t play innocent!’ Paul exclaims. ‘You wish you were rid of me, don’t you! That’s the kind of person you are, you just use people up and toss them aside!’

‘Waiter!’ My credit card sits conspicuously on top of the leather book, but the staff are now giving us a very wide berth.

‘I was once a pretty boy like him,’ Paul notes sorrowfully. ‘Is it my fault I’ve got old?’

‘Please!’ waving my wallet in the air.

‘You can’t stop yourself, can you? Even now, you can’t stop yourself! Well, you can have him! You can have him, you heartless monster!’ He jumps to his feet and thrusts on his jacket. I realize that he is going to go through with this, and I will be left here with the whole restaurant staring at me.