Paul Murray - The Mark and the Void

‘Hmm, I am not seeing either of them.’

Pushing Jurgen aside, I jump from my seat and hurry towards the corner. As I get closer it seems other figures flicker out of the darkness — the little Portuguese man who had haunted the Minister — and there, isn’t that Howie? And, and Walter ? But my way is blocked again and again, colleagues stepping in front of me to clasp me in beery embraces or take my picture with their phones, and by the time I reach the corner, neither Porter nor Miles nor any of the others is anywhere to be seen.

A trick of the light after all. Shoulders slumping, I come to a halt. Around me, fragments of conversations flurry, memories jousting with each other in loud, unhearing voices. Down the stairs men continue to come, surveying the scene with identical expressions of childlike avarice; the nymphs thread through them, bearing order pads and trays of drinks, pushed-up breasts and intoxicating smiles. A dark-haired dancer has come onstage, the girl who looks like Ariadne; I pause to watch her grind her crotch against the pole, a mechanical Siren delivering her one-note song.

It was a mistake to come here; the night has nothing more to offer. I decide to cut my losses, make my way to the exit.

And then I see someone indisputably real. So: at least one mystery has been solved tonight. I follow at a distance, watching the figure weave through the crowd, then come to rest in a niche close by the warren of private booths, where thinking herself unobserved she sighs, arches her back and rolls her head. Marching briskly up to her, I tap her on the shoulder. ‘No volleyball tonight?’

She spins around — and I recoil. An enormous contusion, a swollen rainbow of purples and greens, adorns one side of her face. ‘Vot are you doing here?’ The words come in a gasp. ‘Is he here too?’ She casts desperately about the room, her hands frenetically hopping up and down over her bare flesh, as if they could cover it up one piece at a time.

‘It’s just me,’ I assure her. ‘I’m here with my work colleagues.’

Her breathing eases; her eyes lift to scan mine. ‘So you do not go to festival,’ she says.

‘Festival?’

Clizia waits, puffed eye louring at me, then lightens sardonically as she sees the realization hit me. Of course: tonight is the first night of the Black & White Festival. William O’Hara is interviewing Bimal Banerjee as we speak, and Robert Dodson is waiting in the wings to discuss Paul’s book proposal …

‘Oh,’ I say. Trying to gauge from her expression what he told her, what I need to say here. ‘Yes, ah, I was going to go with him, but there has been a crisis at work …’

She flaps a hand at me dismissively. ‘Don’t bother, Frenchman.’

‘He could have gone by himself,’ I point out. ‘I’ve been too busy at work to get in touch with him. He told you he was going? To meet Dodson?’

‘Oh, he tells me lots of things. Wonderful things. This very morning, he says that tonight he does something big. A new plan that will change everything.’

‘Well then! That must be what he meant!’ I tell her I have not seen him for a little while, but that I know he’s been working hard on the proposal, and it must be nearly finished –

‘It will never be finished, Frenchman,’ she says, cutting me off. ‘There will never be a book. I have fooled myself with this hope a hundred times.’ She looks at me dully. ‘All this week he does not even look at his desk. Does not lift up a pen. Just drinks with that idiot Igor.’

‘But then why would he tell you … why …’

‘Because he’s a liar.’ The bitter smile drops, and it seems that her whole face is suffused with the shadow of the wounded eye. ‘That is what he does, Frenchman. He lies. If he wrote his lies down, he would have enough for fifty books. But he is too afraid to lift the pen.’ Her face becomes stone. ‘All of this time, I have been the fool who believes him. No more.’

Her tone is bleak, final; I cast about desperately for some means of defending him. ‘What about you?’ I say. ‘When is the last time you told him the truth?’

Clizia shrugs her beautiful shoulders. She has stopped looking at me, instead scans the crowd for customers, as the crowd, simultaneously, slows to appraise her. Most men recoil when they catch sight of her black eye — but not all of them do.

‘Where have you told him you are tonight?’

She doesn’t reply, directs a salacious smile at a corporate type who has paused at the edge of our conversation; he gulps, takes out his wallet, fingers through it, moves on. Her smile inverts, her brow becoming thunderous. She insinuates herself into the throng, with me bumbling after. ‘How long have you been working here?’

‘Leave me alone.’

‘Who did that to your face?’

‘It’s not important.’

‘Was it … ?’

‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

‘But he’s seen it? Doesn’t he know? Hasn’t he guessed?’

‘I believe his lies, so he believes mine.’ She turns and looks at me straight on. ‘That’s how it goes at the end of love.’

She walks away. I grab her elbow. Instantly a bouncer bristles mastiff-like from the shadows. At some imperceptible signal from Clizia, he withdraws again.

‘You are costing me money,’ she says coldly.

‘ Alors , how much?’ I reach into my pockets. ‘How much does it cost to be alone with you?’

‘Private dance fifty euro.’

I hand her a note; she takes it without comment. Jocelyn Lockhart and Gary McCrum spot me from the bar and cheer. My cheeks burn; I do my best not to look at her as she leads me back to the booths.

The room is small and cramped. A red light comes on as she closes the door. She backs me into an uncomfortable chair, stands over me like a robot Amazon. ‘Five minutes. Vot do you want me to do for you?’

‘Tell me the truth.’

‘Vot for?’

‘I want to help you.’

‘I don’t need your help.’

‘It looks like you do.’

‘This is just temporary.’

‘Who did that to you?’

‘Club boss.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I borrow money, then I don’t come to work.’

‘When Paul was writing his book proposal?’

‘You are wasting your fifty euro, Frenchman. The truth is the least interesting thing about me.’

‘Why did you come back to the club?’

‘You have seen how we live.’

‘You had a job.’

‘I lost it.’

‘But this — dancing — you hate it. He told me.’

‘Is commercial transaction. Very soon I have enough to leave.’

‘Leave the club?’

She smiles; she knows I know that is not what she means. My heart plunges in a spiral. ‘Where will you go?’

‘Home.’

‘With Remington?’

‘Of course.’

I prop my elbows on my knees, scrub my head with my hands. ‘I wish you’d told me about this before. I can help you. I have money. It’s the one thing I do have.’

‘Oh, Claude …’ She stops short, brings her slender fingers to her heart. ‘Would you really do that for me? You are special man, very special man.’ She draws closer, till her breasts are hovering inches from my nose. ‘Maybe I can think of special way to repay you,’ she whispers. ‘A secret, just between us two?’

‘Stop,’ I mutter.

She reels away, with a leer of barren triumph. ‘The hero with his shining wallet,’ she says. ‘This club is full of men who want to help me, Frenchman.’

Exasperated, I rise from the chair; she flinches back theatrically, as if I had moved against her. I sit back again, say carefully, ‘I know you have made many sacrifices. And I know your husband has failed you many times. But I am asking you to give him just one more chance. I’m sure that this time, with a little help, he can finish this book —’