The Ends of the Earth

by Lucius Shepard

  The bar—Café Pluto—was set in the lee of a rocky point: a thatched hut with a sand floor and picnic-style tables, lit with black lights that emitted an evil purple radiance and made all the gringos glow like sunburned corpses. Reggae from a jukebox at the rear was barely audible above the racket of the generator. I had several drinks in rapid succession and ended up out front of the bar beside a toppled palm trunk, drinking rum straight from the bottle and sharing a joint with Odille and a young blond Australian named Ryan, who was writing a novel and whose mode of dress—slacks, shirt, and loosened tie—struck an oddly formal note. I was giddy with the dope, with the wildness of the night, the vast blue-dark sky and its trillion watts of stars, silver glitters that appeared to be slipping around like sequins on a dancer’s gown. Behind us the Café Pluto had the look of an eerie cave lit by seams of gleaming purple ore.

  I asked Ryan what his novel was about, and with affected diffidence he said, “Nothing much. Saturday night in a working-class bar in Sydney.” He took a hit of the joint, passed it to Odille. “It wasn’t going too well, so I thought I’d set it aside and do something poetic. Run away to the ends of the earth.” He had a look around, a look that in its casual sweep included the sea and sky and shore. “This is the ends of the earth, isn’t it?”

  I was caught by the poignancy of the image, thinking that he had inadvertently captured the essence of place and moment. I pictured the globe spinning and spinning, trailing dark frays of its own essential stuff, upon one of which was situated this slice of night and stars and expatriate woe, tatters with no real place in human affairs…Wind veiled Odille’s face with a drift of hair. I pushed it back, and she smiled, letting her eyelids droop. I wanted to take her back to the house and fuck her until I forgot all the maudlin bullshit that had been fucking me over the past three years.

  “I hear you’re doing some writing, too,” said Ryan in a tone that managed to be both defiant and disinterested.

  “Just some stories,” I said, surprised that he would know this.

  “‘Just some stories.’” He gave a morose laugh and said to the sky, “He’s modest…I love it.” Then, turning a blank gaze on me: “No need to hide your light, man. We all know you’re famous.”

  “Famous? Not hardly.”

  “Sure you are!” In a stentorian voice he quoted a blurb on my last book. “‘Raymond Kingsley, a mainstay of American fiction.’”

  “Uh-huh, right.”

  “Even the Master of Time and Space thinks you’re great,” said Ryan. “And believe me, he’s sparing with his praise.”

  “Who’re you talking about?”

  Ryan pointed behind me. “Him.”

  Carl Konwicki was coming down the beach. He ambled up, dropped onto the fallen palm trunk, and looked out to sea. Odille and Ryan seemed to be waiting for him to speak. Irritated by this obeisance, I belched. Konwicki let his eyes swing toward me, and I winked.

  “How’s she going?” I took a man-sized slug of rum, wiped my mouth with the back of my hand, and fixed him with a mean stare. He clucked his tongue against his teeth and said, “I’m fine, thank you.”

  “Glad to hear it.” Drunk, I hated him, my hate fueled by the frustration that had driven me out of the house. Hate was chemical between us, the confrontational lines as sharply etched as the shadows on the sand. I gestured at his skullcap. “You lived in Morocco?”

  “Some.”

  “What part?”

  “You know…around.” The wind bent a palm frond low, and for an instant, Konwicki’s swarthy face was edged by a saw-toothed shadow.

  “That’s not very forthcoming,” I said. “Do questions bother you?”

  “Not ones that have a purpose.”

  “How about light conversation…that a worthwhile purpose?”

  “Is that your purpose?”

  “What else would it be?”

  “Wow!” said Ryan. “This is like intense…like a big moment.”

  Odille giggled.

  “I got it,” I said. “What would you like to talk about? How about the translation you’re doing…what is it?”

  “The Popol Vuh,” said Konwicki distractedly.

  “Gee,” I said. “That’s already been translated, hasn’t it?”

  “Not correctly.”

  “Oh, I see. And you’re going to do it right.” I had another pull on the rum bottle. “Hope you’re not wasting your time.”

  “Time.” Konwicki smiled, apparently amused by the concept; he refitted his gaze to the toiling sea.

  “Yeah,” I said, injecting a wealth of sarcasm into my voice. “It’s pretty damn mind-bending, isn’t it?”

  The surf thundered; Konwicki met my eyes, imperturbable. “I’ve been looking forward to meeting you.”

  “Me, too,” I said. “I hear you sell great dope.” I clapped a hand to my brow as if recognizing that I had made a social blunder. “Pardon me…I didn’t intend that to sound disparaging.”

  Konwicki gave me one of his distant smiles. “You’re obviously upset about something,” he said. “You should try to calm down.”

  I sat close beside him on the palm trunk, close enough to cause him to shift away, and was about to bait him further, but he stood, said, “Ta ra,” and walked into the bar.

  “I’d score that round even,” said Ryan. “Mr. Kingsley dominating the first half, the Master coming on late.”

  Odille was gazing after Konwicki, wrapping a curl of hair around one forefinger. She gave me a wave, said, “I’ll be back, okay?” and headed for the bar. I watched her out of sight, tracking the oiled roll of her hips beneath her cutoffs, and when I turned back to Ryan, he was smiling at me.

  “What is it with them?” I asked.

  “With Odille and the Master? Just a little now-and-then thing.” He gave me a sly look. “Why? You interested?”

  I snorted, had a hit of rum.

  “You can win the lady,” said Ryan. “If you’ve a stout heart.”

  I looked at him over the top of the bottle, but offered no encouragement.

  “You see, Ray,” said Ryan, affecting the manner of a lecturer, “Odille’s a wounded bird. The poor thing had a disappointment in love back in Paris. She sought solace in distant lands and had the misfortune of meeting the Master. It’s not much of a misfortune, you understand. The Master’s not much of a Master, so he can’t offer a great deal in the way of good or ill. But he confused Odille, made her believe he could show her how to escape pain through his brand of enlightenment. And that involved a bit of sack time.”

  Given this similarity in history between Odille and myself, I imagined fate had taken a hand by bringing us together. “So what can I do?”

  “Things a bit hazy, are they, Ray?” Ryan chuckled. “Odille’s grown disillusioned with the Master. She’s looking for someone to burst his bubble, to free her.” He reached for the bottle, had a swig and gagged. “God, that’s awful!” He slumped against the toppled palm trunk, screwed the bottle into the sand so that it stood upright. The surf boomed; the wildfire whiteness of the combers imprinted afterimages on my eyes.

  “Anyway,” Ryan went on, “she’s definitely looking for emotional rescue. But you can’t go about it with déclassé confrontation. You’ll have to beat the Master on his own terms, his own ground.”

  Perhaps it was the rum that let me believe that Ryan had a clear view of our situation. “What are his terms?” I asked.

  “Games,” he said. “Whatever game he chooses.” He had another pull off the bottle. “He’s afraid of you, you know. He’s worried that you’re into disciples, and all his children will abandon him for the famous writer. He realizes he can’t befuddle you with his usual quasi-erudite crap. So he’ll come up with something new for you. I have no idea what. But he’ll play some game with you. He’s got to…it’s his nature.”

  “How’s he befuddled you? You seem to have a handle on him.”

  “He’s got no need,” said Ryan. “I’m his fool, and a fool can know the
king’s secrets and make fun of them with impunity.”

  I started to ask another question, but let it rest. The wind pulled the soft crush of the surf into a breathy vowel; the moon had lowered behind the hills above the village, its afterglow fanning up into the heavens; the top of the sky had deepened to indigo, and the stars blazed, so dense and intricate in their array that I thought I might—if I were to try—be able to read there all scripture and truth in sparkling sentences. And it was not only in the sky that clarity ruled. What Ryan had said made sense. Odille was testing me…perhaps unconsciously, but testing me nonetheless, unwilling to abandon Konwicki until she was sure of me. I didn’t resent this—it was a tactic often used in establishing relationships. But I was struck by how clear its uses seemed on the beach at Livingston. Not merely the social implications, but its elemental ones: the wounded lovers, the shabby Mephistophelian figure of Konwicki with his sacred books and petty need to exercise power. Man, woman, and Devil entangled in a sexual knot.

  “Did I ever tell you my theory of the Visible?” I asked Ryan.

  “We only just met,” he reminded me.

  “God, you’re right. And here I’ve been under the illusion we’re old pals.”

  “It’s the sea air. Affects everyone dele…” Ryan hiccuped. “Deleteriously.”

  “Well, anyway.” I plucked the rum bottle from the sand and drank. “In places like this, I’ve always thought it was possible to see how things really are between people. To discern relationships that are obscured by the clutter of urban life. The old relationships, the archetypes.”

  He stared blearily up at me. “Sounds bloody profound, Ray.”

  “Yeah, I suppose it is,” I said, and then added: “Profundity’s my business. Or maybe it’s bullshit…one or the other.”

  “So,” he said, “are you going to play?”

  “I think so…yeah.”

  “Beautiful,” said Ryan. “That’s really beautiful.”

  A few moments later Konwicki and Odille came out of the bar and walked toward us, deep in conversation.

  Ryan laughed and laughed. “Let the games begin,” he said.

  We talked on the beach for another hour, smoking Konwicki’s dope, which smoothed out the rough edges of my drunk, seeming to isolate me behind a thick transparency. I withdrew from the conversation, watching Konwicki. I wasn’t gauging his strengths and weaknesses; despite my exchange with Ryan, I had not formalized the idea that there was to be a contest between us. I was merely observing, intrigued by his conversational strategy. By sidestepping questions, claiming to know nothing about a subject, he managed to intimate that the subject was not worth knowing and that he possessed knowledge in a sphere of far greater relevance to the scheme of things. Odille hung on his every word for a while, but soon began to lose interest, casting glances and smiles at me; it appeared she was trying to maintain a connection with Konwicki, but was losing energy in that regard.

  For the most part, Konwicki avoided looking at me; but at one point, he cut his eyes toward me and locked on. We stared at each other for a long moment, then he turned away with acknowledgment. During that moment, however, the skin on my face went cold, my muscles tensed, and a smile stretched my lips. A feral smile funded by a remorseless hatred quite different from the impassioned, drunken loathing I originally had felt. This emotion, like the smile, seemed something visited upon me and not an intensification of my emotions, and along with it came a sudden increase in my body temperature. A sweat broke on my forehead, on my chest and arms; my vision reddened, and I had a peculiar sense of doubled perceptions, as if I were looking through two different pairs of eyes, one of which was capable of seeing a wider spectrum. I decided to slack off on the rum.

  At length Konwicki suggested we get out of the wind, which was blowing stronger, and go over to his place to listen to music. I was of two minds about the proposal; while I wasn’t ready to give up on Odille, neither was I eager to mix it with Konwicki, and I was certain that if I went with them there would be some bad result. The dope had taken the edge off my enthusiasm. But Odille took my hand, nudged the softness of her breast into my arm.

  “You are coming, aren’t you?” she said.

  “Sure,” I said, as if a thought to the contrary had never occurred.

  We walked together along the beach, trailing Konwicki and Ryan, and Odille talked about taking a trip to Esquipulas someday soon to see the Black Christ in the cathedral there.

  “Women come from all over Central America to be blessed,” she said. “They stand in line for days. Huge fat women in white turbans from Belize. Crippled old island ladies from Roatán. Beautiful slim girls from Panama. All waiting to spend a few seconds kneeling in the shadow of a black statue. When I first heard about it, I thought it sounded primitive. Now it seems strangely modern. The New Primitivism. I keep imagining all those female shadows in the bright sun, radios playing, vendors selling cold drinks.” She gave her hair a toss. “I could use that sort of blessing.”

  “Is it only for women?”

  She held my eyes for a second, then turned away. “Sometimes men wait with them.”

  I asked if what Ryan had told me about her love affair in Paris was the truth. I had no hesitancy in asking this—intimacies were the flavor of the night. A flicker of displeasure crossed her face. “Ryan’s an idiot.”

  “I doubt he’d argue the point.”

  Odille went a few steps in silence. “It was nothing. A fling, that’s all.”

  Her glum tone seemed to belie this.

  “Yeah, I had a fling myself right before I came down here. Like to have killed me, that fling.”

  She glanced up at me, still registering displeasure, but then she smiled. “Perhaps with us it’s a matter of…” She made a frustrated gesture, unable to find the right words.

  “Victims recognizing the symptoms?” I suggested.

  “I suppose.” She threw back her head and looked up into the sky as if seeking guidance there. “Yes, I had a bad experience, but I’m over it.”

  “Completely?”

  She shook her head. “No…never completely. And you?”

  “Hey, I’m fine,” I said. “It’s like it never happened.”

  She laughed, cast an appraising look my way. “Who was she?”

  “This married woman back in New York.”

  “Oh!” Odille put a hand on my arm in sympathy. “That’s the worst, isn’t it? Married, I mean.”

  “The worst? I don’t know. It was pretty goddamn bad.”

  “What was she like?”

  “Frightened. She got married because she had a run of bad luck…at least, that’s what she told me. Things started going bad around her. Her parents got divorced, her dog ran away, and that seemed a sign something worse might happen. I guess she thought marriage would protect her.” I walked faster. “She’s a fucking mess.”

  “How so?”

  “She doesn’t know what the hell she wants. Whenever she doubts something, she’ll broadcast an opinion pro or con until the contrary opinion has been shouted down in her own mind.” I kicked at the sand. “The last time we talked, she explained how she was happy in her marriage for the same reasons that she’d once claimed to be miserable. The vices of this guy whom she’d ridiculed…she told everyone how much he bored her, how childish he was. All those vices had been transformed into solid virtues. She told me she knew that she couldn’t have the kind of relationship with Barry—that’s her husband—that we’d had, but you had to make trade-offs. Barry at least always wore a neatly pressed suit and could be counted on not to embarrass—though never to scintillate—at business functions.” I sniffed. “As a husband he made the perfect accessory for evening wear.”

  “You sound bitter.”

  “I can’t deny it. She put me through hell. Of course I bought into it, so I’ve got no one to blame but myself.”

  “She was beautiful, of course?”

  “She didn’t think so.” I changed the subject. “Was
yours married?”

  “No, just a shit.” Her expression became distant, and I knew that for a moment she was back in Paris with the Shit. “For a long time afterward I threw myself into other relationships. I thought that would help, but it was a mistake…I can see that now.”

  “Everything seems like a mistake afterward,” I said.

  “Not everything,” she said coyly.

  I wasn’t sure how to take that, and it wasn’t just that her meaning was vague; it was also that I was put off by her coyness. Before I could frame a response, she said, “Talking to Carl has helped me a great deal.”

  “Oh, I see.” I tried to disguise my disappointment, believing this to be a sign that her connection with Konwicki was still vital.

  “No, you don’t. Just having someone to talk to was helpful. Carl’s a fraud, of course. Nothing he says is without guile. But he does listen, and it’s hard to find a good listener. That’s basically all there was between us. I helped him with his work, and…there was more. But it wasn’t important.”

  I wondered if she was playing with me, making me guess at her availability, and was briefly angered by the possibility; but then, recalling how uncertain my own motivations and responses had been, I decided that if I couldn’t forgive her, I couldn’t forgive myself.

  “What are you thinking about?” Odille asked.

  Her features, refined by the moonlight, looked delicate, etched, as if a kind of lucidity had been revealed in them, and I believed that I could see down beneath the games and the layers of false construction, beneath all those defenses, to who she most was, to the woman, no longer an innocent in the accepted sense of the word, but innocent all the same, still hopeful in spite of pain and disillusionment.

  “Konwicki,” I lied. “You helped him translate the Popol Vuh?”