Eating Air

by Pauline Melville

  *

  A week after the party Sursok’s titanic sleeplessness had reached a pitch where he did not even attempt to go to bed. Insomnia drove him to the kitchen. He raided the fridge and ate crystallized ginger in ice cream.

  Something which the sociometrist revealed had appalled him and kept his eyes from shutting all night long. When the soundtrack was added to the visual recordings Sursok suffered two destabilising shocks. Firstly, he heard several people laughing about an email they had received from Caspers pointing out the similarity of Sursok’s house to parts of Brixton prison. Sursok had padded in his slippers through his empty house that night and looked up aghast at the high window set in the wall and the wire netting between the stone galleries as he gradually understood what he was seeing. Secondly, he heard Butterfield telling Hetty how he was so much in love with her that he couldn’t concentrate on work and that Johnny Caspers had promised to keep an eye on the Sursok shipping deals while he showed her Amsterdam and Paris.

  By the next night, after listening to the audio tapes again, Sursok’s mood had swollen to one of grim hatred. The following morning he made a thorough check on the state of his business affairs. He was horrified by what he found. He had undertaken enormous acquisitions in the ship-building industry. This involved acquiring companies at a good price from both private concerns and national governments. Contracts and loans had been negotiated from Japan to Holland. He had reckoned on owning twelve per cent of the industry worldwide. His new company was registered in Holland for tax reasons. Butterfield had been in charge but it was Caspers who was ultimately responsible for the operation. On checking, Sursok discovered that contracts had not been properly negotiated. Had the contracts been completed before the global financial crash his fortune would be intact but shares in shipping had plummeted with fears of reduced trading capacity during the recession. The bank was heavily involved at every level. Interest on the loans had soared and there were clear implications of fraud and malpractice. His financial empire was in jeopardy.

  Sursok wandered around the kitchen. There was a choice to be made. He could report the whole matter to the Financial Services Authority. The fraud squad would then become involved. That would almost certainly mean that Caspers would be investigated and charged with negligence or fraud. It would be the end of Caspers. He spooned some ice cream into his mouth and chewed on the fragments of ginger. But if he did that the fragility of his shipping deals would be exposed. Shares in the bank would be in free-fall and it was one of the few banking concerns that had so far escaped nationalisation. Most of his enormous fortune was invested there. Sursok brooded. He could not sell his shares too suddenly. It would look like insider dealing. He sank down in a kitchen chair under the weight of his thoughts.

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  Butterfield was euphoric and oblivious to the drizzling rain as he shepherded Hetty Moran along the Prinzengracht in Amsterdam. He pointed out his favourite buildings. His eagerness and enthusiasm irritated her. She found Amsterdam dreary and dirty. In the afternoon he hailed a taxi and showed her his official flat, a five-bedroom luxury apartment near to the HCB bank complex where he worked. After she had looked around the flat he took her to the bank itself. Hetty stood in the vast lobby:

  ‘Wow.’ She rolled her eyes in surprise.

  The bank was designed to channel ‘forward-thinking energy for the future’. It was a feng-shui bank. Opposite each lift was a marble mosaic. Butterfield showed Hetty the water statue carved in Carrara marble. He took her for lunch at the Salvador Dali Restaurant on the second floor. The building consisted of ten multi-storey towers each one connected by a three-hundred-and-fifty-foot walkway. Every tower boasted a glass-roofed stairwell. At the back there were streams and rills, gardens with red-bricked paths and pergola-covered walkways where the staff could relax in their lunch hour. The bank was a city in itself.

  That evening Butterfield took Hetty first class by train to Paris. They went to Montparnasse for a light meal. Hetty sat on the crimson velvet banquette under one of the hanging lamps with a gold-fringed shade. Her curls gleamed in the lamplight. A slim white-jacketed African waiter took their order. While Hetty was ordering her meal Butterfield reached into his briefcase and took out a scroll of papers. Once the waiter had gone he raised his eyebrows in anticipation of her happiness and handed her the documents across the table:

  ‘I’m giving you the flat in Amsterdam. I had it made out by the bank’s legal department. I will be there with you most of the time when I’m not travelling.’ He leaned across the table. His face was coated with a fine film of sweat.

  ‘You have transformed my life. I thought I would never be happy again. Do you want champagne?’ His lip was trembling.

  Hetty stared at the document in her hands:

  ‘I don’t know what to say. I can’t.’ She handed the documents back. ‘Honey this is not what we’re about.’

  Butterfield gave a delighted laugh without taking his eyes off hers:

  ‘I knew you’d say that. It’s the sort of person you are. But I want to be generous to my Aphrodite – she of the beautiful buttocks.’ He laughed again and an expression of lascivious and gleeful expectation passed over his face.

  Later on she picked up the scroll again:

  ‘It’s so cute the way they do all that legal stuff, don’t you think? The red ribbon and the seals and everything.’

  Butterfield’s happiness was such that he felt as if he were filled with helium and might float off the ground altogether.

  *

  At six o’clock the next morning Hetty Moran awoke from a deep sleep. She lifted the alpine drift of white linen sheets and slid silently out of bed leaving Stephen Butterfield asleep. He had chosen the Hotel les Citronniers in Rue Jacob because he thought it the most romantic place in the world. The hotel kept to its old-fashioned style, the walls lined with faded damask patterns of red and yellow; a wooden galleon of a bed; black oak beams jutting from the yellow plastered ceiling. A single lift with a rattling iron lattice gate lumbered from floor to floor. There were no electronic cards to open the rooms, just a solid metal key on a brass tag.

  She looked at the humped figure lying under the sheet. Butterfield’s flabby cheek was squashed against the square white pillow, pulling his mouth open in a harmless snarl. With each exhalation there was a whistling sound from his nostrils and an accompanying tremor of his upper lip.

  Hetty experienced a flash of incandescent fury. Her pattern was always the same. After each seduction she would fall into the sleep of the dead then wake and want to escape in order to be reborn all over again as a seductress. She did not want to be the object of Butterfield’s enjoyment. She wanted to be the object of his desire and the best way to remain desired was to postpone his satisfaction. The memory of Butterfield’s epileptic thrusting and humping on top of her the night before filled her with rage. She determined to snatch back the joyfulness he had stolen from her.

  She trod carefully towards the bathroom lest the floorboards creaked. The door clicked lightly behind her as it shut. The bright light on the white tiles made her wince. She examined herself in the mirror – the pretty, featureless face, the blonde curls, the round eyes. She raked a hand through her hair and then smoothed the frown lines on her forehead with the tips of her fingers. The only way to recreate herself as a figure of allure, both in her own mind and his, was to put as much distance between them as quickly as possible. She threw some water over her face, dried herself and dressed. Then she sat on the edge of the bath for a few minutes.

  Back in the bedroom she tiptoed towards the dresser. Scattered on the glass top were an elegant leather wallet which contained his credit cards; his asthma inhaler, spectacles and her pearl stud earrings. She took her earrings and left everything behind except the legal documents stating she was owner of the flat. These she put in her handbag. Then she gathered her overnight bag, stepped out into the cramped corridor and closed the door quietly behind her.

  The fron
t door of the hotel opened onto a small paved courtyard lined with lemon trees which led through a stone arch onto the Rue Jacob. As soon as she walked out into the yard Hetty’s spirits lifted. The first tabac had already opened. A man with malicious black eyes and a wine-drinker’s crimson cheeks swept the pavement in front of his shop. His black hair sat on his head like a dead spider, dense in the middle with crooked strands affixed to his forehead.

  ‘Bonjour, monsieur,’ she said cheerfully, throwing him a bright smile as she passed.

  He straightened up from his broom and wiped his hand on his long white apron as he watched her heading towards the taxi rank. As if knowing she was being observed she suddenly turned and gave him a flirtatious wave.

  *

  Four hours later Stephen Butterfield left the hotel puzzled and distressed. He walked past the tabac which still smelled of disinfectant from the freshly mopped floor. There was little morning traffic in the secluded Place de Furstemberg. He tried Hetty’s mobile number again. It was switched off. Could she have been taken ill? He sat down on one of the wooden benches. They were supposed to be returning to Amsterdam by train. Perhaps she had slipped off early to buy something. Perhaps she had gone on ahead to prepare some sort of treat for him. His plump fingers trembled a little as he lit a cigar. Perhaps he should alert the police.

  Opposite him he noticed a motorcyclist in a leather jacket leaning his bike against one of the trees. Butterfield watched the motorcyclist take a bag of crumbs from his pocket and begin to feed the pigeons. The pigeons fanned out elegantly, heads down, like police looking for a murder weapon.

  A thin elderly woman walking with a cane came into the square leading an excited brown and black whippet on a leash. While the dog rushed around the small square from tree to tree, the woman sat erect on a bench near Stephen, her hands immobile in her lap like a dead bird’s claws.

  A shadow of pain passed over Stephen’s face as he remembered Margaret, his wife. She had gone off on a sailing holiday to Portugal with friends who were besotted with boats. A squall blew up. The boat overturned. He thought of her death in the rolling blue waters of the Atlantic. It would have suited her, a leisurely athletic death with her limbs executing their own dance in the waves, her body continuing its play-acting at life in the billows.

  For a moment he stared down at the patterned perforations on the toes of his black shoes. Something caught his attention. At first he thought it was a brown leaf. He bent to look more closely and saw that it was like one of those dried brown pods of a Chinese lantern plant. There was something odd about it. The thing was rocking steadily from side to side as if it had a life of its own. Gradually the rocking built up speed and as Butterfield watched, the muddy dragonish larva split wide open and a shimmering nuptial insect arose and staggered from it. The gleaming wet creature dragged itself off towards some bush to dry out in safety.

  Butterfield stood up and took a last puff on his cigar before throwing the stub into some bushes. He remained unaware that the man in the red and black helmet pushing his motorbike was following him. When Butterfield finally hailed a taxi to the station Mark Scobie followed behind on his motorbike.

  *

  Hetty leaned back in her seat on the Eurostar train to London. Opposite her sat a young student. He had laid out sheaves of handwritten notes on the table and was studying them. She pushed them aside a little to make room for her coffee carton. In response he raised his head and flung his arms in an extravagant stretching yawn and gave her a warm smile:

  ‘My thesis.’ He slapped his hand down on his notes. ‘Finished! I’ve been at the Sorbonne doing the last bit of research. I had to do it by hand ’cos I had my laptop stolen. It’s taken five years but it’s over.’ He gave a loud whoop of delight which made her laugh.

  ‘Is it about Nietzsche?’ she asked. He was wearing a T-shirt with ‘God is dead. Nietzsche’ written on it.

  ‘No. It’s about a French philosopher Jean Bodin. Are you American?’

  ‘Sure am.’ A look of sadness crossed her face as she briefly considered launching into the story of her narrow escape from the Twin Towers, but then couldn’t be bothered.

  He gathered the notes together and put them in a folder. They fell into conversation about his travel plans. After a while the conversation petered out and the student fell asleep. The train passed through brown raked fields. Hetty shut her eyes. By the time she opened them again the train was pulling in to St Pancras station in London and the student was wrestling his backpack down from the overhead rack.

  ‘Bye then,’ he said. She watched him push his way down the aisle towards the doors. Only when she stood up did she see the folder of notes he had left behind on the seat. She waved and shouted after him but he had already disappeared into the crowd. She put the bulky folder in her shoulder-bag and manoeuvred herself out into the aisle. A minute or so later she saw him pushing his way back along the platform through the disembarking passengers in a panic. He waved his arms and shouted across at her:

  ‘I’ve left my thesis on the train.’

  ‘Oh no.’ She pulled a face of commiseration as he darted past through the throng of people.

  She took the escalator to the main part of the station. On the concourse she walked quickly over to a large litter bin, took out the folder of notes and thrust it down amid the rubbish, covering it with some used cartons. Without looking round she walked towards the entrance to the underground station.

  *

  Back in the Javastraat flat Mark ran his hands through his hair in exasperation as he reported to the others the unpredictability of the target and his liaison with a blonde woman. The pattern of his movements was erratic. When Mark phoned Butterfield’s office in Amsterdam the next day on some pretext or other he learned that Butterfield had unexpectedly gone back to England and would be away for two or three days. After heated discussions it was decided that Mark should follow Butterfield to England in case his irregular comings and goings were to affect their plans.

  Chapter Fifty-Seven

  The next Tuesday Ella made her way to Covent Garden. Caspers had made arrangements for Felix to meet her at the stage door and give her the costume but she deliberately arrived early to have a look round on her own. It was over thirty years since she had set foot in the building.

  When she arrived the scene dock was wide open for the stagehands to change sets and so it was possible to glimpse right through to the stage from the street. Two long trucks were parked outside with their back doors gaping open. Ella decided to slip in that way rather than go through the stage door. She stepped inside, tiptoed over the tangle of wiring and cables gaffer-taped to the floor and made her way through to the darkness of the wings. Behind her the open scene dock let in the bleak light of day, making the painted scenic flats look garish. Men were shouting and calling out to each other. Up in the flies other stagehands carefully lowered sections of a painted house down to the ground.

  She crossed the stage and looked out at the familiar horseshoe shape of the dimly lit auditorium, now refurbished with gilt paint and plush velvet. The pass-door with its intimidating signs demanding silence allowed her through to the corridors and dressing rooms at the back. Immediately she was lost. The whole building had been redesigned and renovated. She could not recognise the backstage corridor where dancers had rushed headlong to examine the cast lists for the new ballets and where the offices used to be. Eventually she located the dressing rooms. She tried a few doors out of curiosity but they were all locked. A female wardrobe assistant scurried past carrying an enormous pile of white petticoats. She decided that the rehearsal room at the top of the building must still be the same. It was a vast room constructed to be exactly the same size and proportions as the main stage below. Ella made her way up three flights of stairs to the top floor.

  She pushed open the door. Standing on his own in the middle of the empty rehearsal room was a beautiful young man in an expensive camel-hair coat. He stood facing her, completely composed, doing
nothing. The coat collar was turned up at the back framing his head. Ella was struck by the smooth peach bloom of his complexion. It must be make-up, she thought. His gaze was steady but he seemed to be both aware of her and in some sort of self-absorbed dream. There were traces of eye-liner on his eyes and some smudged violet eye-shadow on the lids. He held a dog-lead in his hand.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘Are you working?’

  ‘No. I’m not.’

  Suddenly, she noticed a small Yorkshire terrier at the side of the room sniffing at her Brazilian costume which lay over the side of a trunk.

  The man snapped a command at the dog which came to heel.

  ‘Oh that’s my costume.’ She turned to look at him. ‘You’re not the pilot, by any chance?’ she enquired.

  ‘I am the pilot. I’m Felix Caspers. How do you do?’

  ‘I’m Ella de Vries.’ She held out her hand. ‘I thought we were going to meet at the stage door.’

  ‘I just wanted to have a little look around.’

  With calm assurance he assumed control of the situation. Ella was reminded of a schoolmistress showing a new girl the ropes.

  ‘Now then could you check that everything is here and correct?’

  They walked over to the chest. Ella took out the costume. She handed each item to him as she brought it out. He took each one like an experienced assistant in a ladies haberdashery shop waiting on a customer.

  ‘There should be a white shawl,’ said Ella.