William Boyd - Sweet Caress

As a consequence, I became a bit dry with him, a bit clipped and cynical, as if to say: I’ve got your number, my friend — and it doesn’t appeal. But I don’t think he picked up the nuances — these kind of men don’t. It’s a variant version of pure ego — they’re never aware how others are judging them.

In any event, we did talk about Vietnam, vaguely. I said it had been so long since I was there that I didn’t think any observations I might make would be valid any more.

‘You got into a bit of trouble when you were out there, didn’t you?’ he said, casually, pouring us both another glass of wine.

‘How do you know that?’ I said, at my driest.

‘You know, that whole SAS thing.’

‘You haven’t answered my question: how do you know that?’

‘I read your file.’

‘What file?’

‘Everyone has a file somewhere — especially if they’ve led a life as interesting as yours.’ He smiled, and couldn’t keep his patronising manner concealed. ‘I’m in the diplomatic service, I get to see files.’

I took my time, drank a mouthful of the Bordeaux, and put my glass down, turning it on the tablecloth for a moment. Then I looked at him squarely.

‘It was a very difficult time, back in the late Sixties. Everybody was lying. Everything was falling apart.’

‘Well — all ancient history.’ And he smiled again and changed the subject.

I knew then at once that although he may ostensibly have been going to Saigon as a diplomat he was in fact working for the security services — a spy, or a handler of spies. That was why he wanted to meet me.

‘Do you still keep in touch with anyone out there, by the way?’ he asked, later, pouring the rest of the wine.

‘No,’ I said. ‘They’re all dead, now.’

THE STRANGE ASPECT ABOUT the affair I embarked on with Charbonneau was that it seemed almost immediately normal — as if we’d been lovers for years — the question in my mind being why had it taken us so long?

We had dined together two or three times, whenever Charbonneau could slip away from Washington and come to New York. I remember towards the end of the year he called me in a foul mood, saying he had to escape from the hell of DC and his ‘ foutue mission ’. What about dinner? Choose a new French restaurant — it had to be French — let’s test it, as we used to. I need some fun, he said. Come to the apartment and have a drink, first, I said. I’ll find somewhere interesting.

My new place was on 65th Street between 3rd Avenue and Park. I had the top floor of an old crumbling brownstone with my own entrance at the side. An ancient lady and her maid lived in the rest of the building but I rarely saw them. Once a whole two months went by without a glimpse.

Charbonneau arrived, took off his ill-fitting captain’s jacket and explored my rooms as I mixed two manhattans. I heard him opening cupboards and drawers, running taps in the bathroom as if he were a prospective tenant.

He wandered back into the sitting room and I handed him his drink.

‘Are you all right?’ I asked. ‘You seem a bit depressed.’

‘We are invading French Africa tomorrow,’ he said. ‘Morocco. Or rather you are. Americans and British fighting the French. C’est bien déprimant. ’

‘Fighting the bad French — you’re good French.’

‘It’s very complicated.’

‘Everything’s very complicated, Charbonneau. Life is complicated. It’s what you always tell me.’

‘It’s top secret. Don’t tell anyone.’

I raised my glass. ‘ Bon courage aux alliés. ’

‘Your accent is terrible but the sentiments I approve.’ He paused, thinking. ‘Approve of.’ He smiled ruefully. ‘At least we have twelve million Russians soldiers on our side. How can we lose, in the long run?’ He seemed uncomfortable, all of a sudden. ‘What is it, Amory? Why are you looking at me like this?’

‘I’m just looking at you. A cat may look at a king.’

‘Have you found us a restaurant?’

‘No.’

His exasperation was obvious.

‘All right. So we don’t eat. We call for a Chinese meal.’

‘Afterwards.’

He looked at me, understanding now what was going on. He closed his eyes and did a little shimmy on the spot, shuffling his feet, rolling his shoulders. He looked at me.

‘So?’

‘The answer is yes.’

I lay in the dark of my bedroom beside Charbonneau — who was sleeping the sleep of a satiated man — thinking about Cleve. Had I done this because of what I’d discovered about the other woman, whoever she was? Perhaps. Then I thought: maybe it’s more complicated, like everything, as Charbonneau said; maybe it was a way of showing myself that I was free.

In the morning I brought Charbonneau a cup of coffee as he lay in bed.

‘Is this “light” coffee or “dark” coffee?’ he asked.

‘I think it’s light. Lots of hot milk.’

‘Only in America.’

I sat down beside him.

‘I want you to know something,’ I said. ‘I told you I’d been very ill. One of the consequences is that I can’t have any children.’

He shrugged, put his coffee down and took my hand.

‘Well, you know, it could be worse. I have a child. I never see her.’

‘You have a daughter?’

‘From my first marriage. She’s called Séverine. She’s ten years old.’

‘I don’t know very much about you,’ I said.

‘And I don’t know very much about you,’ he countered and flipped back the sheet. ‘Shall we get to know each other better?’

*

THE BARRANDALE JOURNAL 1977

I suppose I should add, in the spirit of fair comparison with the other men whom I have made love with, that Charbonneau’s penis was quite small and stubby, though he had a surprisingly and disproportionately large and heavy scrotum. What shook me first, though, when he was naked, was his hairiness. He had a great pelt of black hair over his chest and belly and loins. Out of this thicket his small, darkly pigmented penis protruded. He had hair on his back also and of course on his arms and legs. I was initially in a state of some alarm — I’d never seen such a shaggy monster of a man — but as soon as he embraced me I realised that the hairs on his body were soft and yielding, like a fine expensive fur, and after a while I found his hirsute presence quite stimulating.

Today, I took out my old Leica and went down to the end of the bay where the rock pools are. It was sunny, with just a few speeding clouds going by and I wanted to take pictures of the rock pools with the sun bright and glaring overhead — spangling, dazzling. I intended, in other words, to take pictures of light in such a way that you would never know it was light reflected in rock pools. This was my new plan, my new obsession. Snapshots of light-effects were what I wanted to capture — luminescent starburst abstract moments that no painter could reproduce. Windows reflecting street lamps; close-ups of chrome bodywork in full sunshine; shallow puddles clustering dappled sunspots. Light stopped — light static. Only the automatic eye could do this. I had a new book in mind.

*

It seemed to me that, after my intermittent affair with Charbonneau had been going on for a few weeks, Cleve was beginning to sense something. He sensed a change in me — but it would be wrong to say that he was suspicious.

About two days after Charbonneau’s latest visit from Washington and his ‘ projet inutile ’ I received a telephone call from Cleve late at night. I was alarmed as he never called the apartment.

‘What’s happened?’

‘I want us to meet. But at the office. A proper meeting.’