by Jay Parini
Now Grant told me about a novel he planned to write in the coming year. It would be set on Capri, mostly in the present, with excursions into various centuries. “The island is full of wonderful stories and characters,” he said. When I told him that I hoped to learn more about Tiberius, he lit up. “I’ve been asked to translate Lives of the Twelve Caesars. You read Latin, what? At Harvard?”
“Columbia. Yes, but my Latin is not wonderful.”
“No matter. Suetonius is straightforward.” He popped up again, finding a copy of Suetonius, which he put in my lap. “Translate the chapter on Tiberius. I’ve got a good Latin dictionary if you need one. Will do you some good, and help me. I’ll correct your prose.”
I was mildly put off by this expression. How would he “correct” my prose? But I said nothing, and would try, for a while, to keep with the program as laid out by him.
“Suetonius is unreliable, as history, but he’s fun,” Grant said. “Smutty in places, though he stops short of pornography. Knew how to keep a reader’s attention.” He finished the whiskey in a gulp and wiped his lips with the back of his rough hand. “The emperor trained small boys—pisciculi is the word he used, I believe—to frolic between his thighs when he went swimming. They would nibble at his cock. Eventually, he commandeered infants from local families—liked their sucking reflex. Rather disgusting, don’t you think?”
“Yes,” I said, unambiguously. He did not, I feared, consider the emperor’s behavior disgusting enough.
“Had a painting in his bedroom, old Tibby—Atalanta sucking off Meleager. Very sexy. Loved it, apparently.” He lapsed briefly into silence, staring blankly ahead—a habit of conversation that would become familiar but never comfortable. “It was pathetic, I suppose. Came to a bad end, Tibby—at least in the version of him put forward by Suetonius. Died cranky, unfulfilled, and much loathed. One dislikes lust in old men, don’t you think?”
“I’ve never thought about it.”
“You will,” he said. “Have you read St. Augustine’s Confessions?”
For once, I had. It had been required reading in a course I’d taken during my freshman year.
“Good boy. Think of Tiberius as Augustine without the conversion. Burning in lust. Horrid spectacle.” Grant went around to his desk, taking some pages from a brown folder. “Here’s your first official task, a little job of typing. Something I did for an American travel magazine,” he said. “I do prose for money. It’s like breeding dogs so that I can afford to keep a few cockatoos.” He contemplated this simile for a moment. “Poetry has no market value. That’s why I prefer it.” He handed me the pile. “See what you can make of this. Double spaced, please. Wide margins.”
I took the pages from him, seeing they would pose a challenge. Sentences were crossed out, rewritten above, then crossed out again, with arrows and balloons in every available margin. “When will you need this?”
“Two, three days. No hurry. We don’t hurry around here.”
Without knocking, an olive-skinned girl of about twenty in tight, faded jeans and a pink T-shirt walked in. She wore leather sandles that showed off her bright red toenails. That she was aware of her unusual beauty was evident from the way she swept her brown hair, casually, from her forehead. But there was also something dark and sulky about her, as though she had swallowed a purple thunderhead. She curled into his lap, draping an arm around his shoulders.
“Mind the tea,” Grant said.
She kissed his eyebrows, lightly. I didn’t know quite where to put my eyes. I had seen plenty of adolescent displays like this at Columbia, but usually after long, beery parties in darkened dormitory lounges.
“This is Marisa,” he said. “Surname, Lauro: Marisa Lauro. A poem in its own right.”
I nodded slightly in her direction.
“Marisa does research for me,” Grant said. “Very bright girl, this. She’s digging up stories for me about Capri, aren’t you, dear?”
I waited for Marisa to speak, but she didn’t. Her makeup was thick—the lipstick redder than red, and her eyes like water at the bottom of deep wells of eye shadow. She wore large gold earrings, and the smell of cologne permeated the room. Her jeans were way too tight.
Grant folded his hands around her narrow waist, and her head slumped onto his shoulder. She seemed in need of comfort, and I felt like an intruder. I stood to leave.
“You needn’t disappear, Lorenzo. We won’t fuck in front of you. Promise.”
I hoped that my face registered nothing. “I’ve made arrangements to meet a friend in the piazzetta,” I said.
“What? Already got a friend in the piazzetta?”
“I met him on the ferry. A student at the Sorbonne.”
“Is he French?”
“Yes.”
“Marvelous. Invite him to my party—tomorrow, at six, on the beach.”
“Really?”
“Why not? Is he beautiful or intelligent? Either will do.”
Marisa was finally aroused to speech. “What a silly man you are, Rupert,” she said, her English heavily accented. “Don’t say things like this. You embarrass him.”
“He’s a student of philosophy,” I said, riding over her remark.
“A beautiful philosopher,” Grant said, “how excellent. One always prefers beauty to intelligence in a philosopher, since philosophy is nonsense anyway, especially French philosophy. Tell him to join us. He needn’t dress.”
Even before I was gone, Grant had begun to kiss Marisa, pulling her toward him with his large hands. From the corner of my eye, I saw her knees lift as she swiveled to face him.
I closed the door and ran.
six
That night, in the dining room, I met Holly Hampton, Grant’s English assistant, for the first time. She was elegant in a distinctly English way (although her mother was from Philadelphia), with pure but understated features. Her blond hair was silky, parted in the middle, and cut just above her shoulders. She wore a simple white dress with a high neckline. Our eyes rarely met, but I found myself excited by her presence, and wishing I could study her face at leisure.
To welcome me, Vera had made one of her favorite dinners: tagliatelle al prosciutto for the first course, or primo, then salt cod alla romana, served with long green beans marinated in olive oil and garlic. This was followed by a cheese tart covered in pine nuts and raisins—crostata di ricotta. The wine, from Grant’s cellar, was Bianco del Vesuvio—“a whorish little vino,” he said, filling glasses around the table, “but suitable for us, I fear.” He obviously relished the position of arbiter bibendi.
Grant introduced me as “a Latin scholar fresh from the New World.”
“My brother is a Latinist,” said Holly. “At Balliol.”
“That’s an Oxford college, Lorenzo,” Grant said, when I didn’t respond at once.
“I know,” I said.
“Sorry, old boy. That ignorant look of yours rather deceived me.”
A grandfather clock stood against one wall, ticking loudly.
“Please, Rupert,” said Vera. “It’s his first night.”
“He’s a strong chap,” Grant said. “And we’re already friends, aren’t we?” His nostrils appeared to flare.
“Malefico,” said Marisa, clucking her tongue.
“Oh, do speak English, Marisa,” Grant told her. He turned to me. “She spent a year in Liverpool, and she’s perfectly fluent.”
“I hope you’ll like us when you get to know us,” said Vera, tentatively.
“For God’s sake, Vera, let it go,” said Grant, with a detectable slur in his phrasing. I guessed that he had been drinking since our meeting in his study.
“Rupert is drunk,” said Holly. “He’s not always so frightful.”
Maria Pia and a delicate-looking young man called Alfredo, a cousin of hers, were serving the first course. There was nothing elegant about their presentation as they dropped the plates before each person at the table with a clatter.
Grant leaped from his seat,
moving around the table, putting his arms on Holly’s shoulders. “She is my prize,” he said. “I believe she will be a fine novelist one day.”
I noticed that Marisa blanched, looking down.
Holly shook off Grant. “I’m writing my first novel, and so are a billion other people.”
“I’m a fairly reliable reader,” said Grant, “and I like what I see.” He kissed her on the back of the head.
“I must be not good,” said Marisa. “You have never told me anything of this kind, Rupert.”
“How could I, since I’ve read almost nothing of yours? Unlike most reviewers, I insist on reading a work before judging it.”
Vera quickly poured herself a second glass of wine, agitated by her husband’s performance.
“Our new friend, Lorenzo, is himself a poet,” Grant announced. “Why don’t you recite something? Acquaint us all with your work.” He folded his arms, as if waiting for my recital to begin.
I said, “I’m not much of a poet.”
“But you sent me poems. I rather liked them.”
“I don’t remember any,” I said.
“Dementia, what? Brain cells washed away by alcohol? I sympathize.”
“I just never bothered to memorize them,” I said. “They’re not good enough.”
“Oh, dear,” he said.
“Do sit down, Rupert,” Vera said, looking sternly at her husband.
“Shut up, Vera. You’re becoming a bore,” he said. I had never heard that word carry so much negative weight.
Walking slowly around the table, he glared at each of us in turn, eventually taking a seat. Munching a piece of bread, he told us that he’d heard from a producer at the BBC that morning that one of his novels, Siren Call, was being considered for a serial. “There will be money in it,” he said, “especially if I get to do the scripts.”
“These projects never pan out,” Vera said, dampening the flame of his enthusiasm. “Or they take decades to materialize.”
“You’re always so refreshing, Vera,” said Grant. “It’s no wonder I love you.”
“I fear Alex will get the wrong impression of us,” she said. “We don’t always carry on like this.”
“I have an idea,” said Grant.
“Shall I alert the press?” Vera quipped.
Grant ignored her. “There’s a marvelous game,” he said, “a way to introduce us properly to our new friend, Lorenzo d’America.” He wiped breadcrumbs from his mouth, as everyone waited. “Let’s assume it’s my turn. My dear wife must state the least likely thing that could be said about me. Go ahead, Vera. What would no rational person in the galaxy ever say about me?”
“Rupert Grant has no idea how clever he is,” she said, without hesitation.
“Bravo!” He clapped his hands, then turned to Holly.
“I’m not much for games,” she said.
“Do be a sport,” Vera said. “We used to play this game at school.”
Holly put a finger to her lips, thinking. “Rupert Grant,” she said deliberately, “always lays his cards on the table.”
“Very nice,” said Grant.
Marisa didn’t have to be prodded. “Mister Grant,” she intoned, “does not care too much what people says about him.”
“A dagger, dear girl, an absolute dagger,” he said. “I must work to correct this misapprehension on your part. You see, Alex, the game has many positive aspects. It’s better than psychotherapy.” He gestured toward Vera. “The focus will now shift to my wife of many years, and I shall go first.” He wrinkled his nose, in deep thought. “Vera Grant does not have a jealous bone in her body.”
“How ludicrous,” said Vera. “He’s reversing the game.”
“I stand corrected,” said Grant.
Holly did not wait a moment. “Vera Grant should employ a cook. The food at the Villa Clio is rubbish.”
Grant was expressionless. “You’re clever, Holly, but I detect a lack of wit in that response. It does not speak well of an Oxford graduate.”
“You take your games too seriously,” said Holly.
“Poetry is a game,” I said.
“A game of knowledge,” said Grant. “That’s Wystan’s formulation, I believe.”
“How literary we are,” said Vera. “I really should have invited the press.”
Marisa said, “Vera does not care what he makes, her husband.”
“I should hope not,” said Grant. “I do whatever I please.”
“Bollocks,” said Vera.
Grant sighed. “As you see, this is a game of knowledge, too. But humankind cannot bear very much reality.”
I recognized the last line as a quotation, but could not locate the source.
“Marisa Lauro is a serious journalist,” said Grant, portentously.
“Marisa Lauro doesn’t care what people say about her,” said Holly, glaring at Grant.
“Marisa Lauro paints her toenails only to please herself,” said Vera.
“Every girl is painting her toenails except Holly,” said Marisa. “I am not so intelligent as these,” she said to me. “I am sorry for my confession. But you will not tolerate me for long. I am going to bed.” She rose and left the room, her pasta course untouched.
No one spoke till she was gone.
“Tetchy girl,” said Grant, reaching for her glass of wine, which he gulped.
“She’s very sensitive, Rupert,” his wife said. “I wish you’d be more careful.”
“Life is too short for that,” he said. “Truth is all that matters.”
“I’d have voted for Beauty,” she said.
Grant turned to Holly. “It’s your turn, I suspect. We aren’t letting you off the hook.”
“I’m tired of this game,” Vera said.
“Come on, darling. Play up, play ball, and play the game,” said Grant.
This was, I supposed, another quotation.
“All right,” said Vera. “Holly Hampton is perfectly transparent. What you see is what you get.” A permanent-looking smirk formed on her lips.
“But one sees so little,” said Grant. “Or, perhaps, one sees so much. I’m not sure.”
“Let’s say that I’m a mystery,” said Holly, “even to my myself.”
“We like you as you are, my dear,” said Grant. “Make no adjustments for our sake.” He tapped his fingers on the table, formulating a line. “Holly Hampton is desperately in love with Rupert Grant,” he said, suppressing a grin.
“I do love you, Rupert,” she said, flatly. “Why else would I sleep with you?”
Vera’s smirk vanished.
“What about you, Lorenzo?” Grant wondered. “We don’t really know you, but if we did, what would we never say about you?”
I didn’t hesitate. “Alex Massolini is a hard sell,” I said.
Vera crinkled her brow. “You’re a pushover in a shoe shop, is that what you’re telling us?”
“He’s what Americans call a wimp,” said Holly.
“I see,” said Grant. “Lorenzo will be good fun for all of us, what? Gullibility an endearing flaw. But we shall do our best to correct it, I daresay.”
seven
I was late for Grant’s party, and could see from the cliff above the beach that tables had been laid end to end, and that a crowd had already gathered, most of them forming a circle around Grant.
Being shy, I admired those who were not. And Rupert Grant was blessed in this regard, having a robust outwardness that would have been trying had it not been modified by a Scots wryness and general British sense of cool. He stood with a drink in hand, in the midst of some amusing anecdote. His white hair, a Pentecostal flame, leaped above his head. Shoeless, he wore a long-sleeved, flowing, chalky blue shirt, in the style of a Russian mujik. The girls, as he called them, were at either side, his attendant muses, beautiful and subdued, while Vera wandered at the edge of the crowd, by herself. The scene made my stomach clench.
That her husband diverted himself with younger women right under her nose
could not have made her life easy. I had searched her face for signs of anxiety or resentment, expecting a great deal of repressed anger; but little presented itself, apart from the occasional sly or cutting remark. Looking back, I wonder how I managed to navigate this situation. Certainly I wanted to fit in, and suppressed any complicated feelings about the Grant marriage, accepting their arrangement as simply a fact of life. I told myself that worldly people didn’t trouble themselves with such things as conventional morality. Everything I’d been led to believe about love and marriage was put on hold as I strode forward into this brave old world.
Though Grant was close now, my attention was absorbed by Holly Hampton. She tossed her head back, laughing, reacting strongly to Grant’s witticisms. To me, she seemed entirely beautiful in a boyish way. Just the outline of her body intrigued me: the odd, quirky angle of her hips, the way her head cocked slightly to one side as she listened. Her wrists dangled, and she had a quick smile and distinctive laugh. I liked the deep part in her hair, which revealed a lovely white strip of scalp.
Occasionally one can tell a lot about someone on brief acquaintance, and this was true for me with Holly. It had not surprised me, for instance, when I learned that her mother was from Philadelphia’s Main Line. (You didn’t usually meet English girls called Holly.) But her education and upbringing had been wholly British. She was obviously the product an English public school, and her aloof manner had been perfected at Lady Margaret Hall, her Oxford college. Even the physical mannerisms were British and class-specific, as when she held her arms around herself as she stood back to listen with her head tilted to one side. There was an aura of composure and self-assurance that, at its worst, veered toward complacency. At its best, it was reassuring; Holly knew her place in the world, and the place of those around her.
“God, we’re surrounded by Yanks,” Grant said, having caught sight of me. He beckoned over a burly man of fifty with a salt-and-pepper beard, drawing me urgently toward him. “Dominick,” he said, “this is my new assistant, Lorenzo. He’s from New York.”