Thus Bad Begins

by Javier Marías

  Then Van Vechten emerged from the bathroom for the first time since we had arrived; he was heavily stained with blood and his sleeves were soaked up to his shoulders, doctors quite often get totally filthy, they must need a very large wardrobe of clothes, that suit, for example, would have to be thrown away, even though he’d removed his jacket early on. It was he who answered my question, being more au fait with the situation:

  ‘Fortunately, there aren’t that many cuts and they’re not very deep, the pain must have been enough to frighten her, not enough for her to regret doing it, you understand, but to pull her up short, instinctively, involuntarily. And the water wasn’t particularly hot either. I think she probably did it about an hour ago. She’s not in any danger or won’t be once that damned ambulance finally gets here and we can give her a transfusion.’

  ‘It’s probably stuck in the damned traffic,’ I said – swear words are infectious.

  No sooner had I said this than we heard the siren, and the ambulance must have been travelling very fast for, an instant later, it was there outside the hotel. Van Vechten went over to the balcony to check that it was ours.

  ‘They’re here,’ he said.

  ‘Did Beatriz manage to find her veins? Did she actually cut them?’ I asked, one foot already out in the corridor, which I saw was still full of guests and commotion, held in check by the fat, hesitant, awkward manager. Yes, I was leaving, preferring not to have to see the stretcher-bearers and all that, and, besides, Muriel had urged me to go back to the apartment.

  ‘Of course she did,’ answered the Doctor, frowning. ‘What kind of a question is that?’

  It’s always a bad thing to have sudden gratitude thrust upon us, it makes us forget all previous affronts or abandon our plan of revenge, it numbs our rancour and blunts our desire for justice; we overlook offences and are prepared to ignore suspicions or to renounce curiosity and suspend our investigations, to shrug our shoulders and appease our feelings by resorting to false justifications for giving up: ‘What does it matter if I forget all about it, so many crimes go unpunished that no one’s going to notice one more, the world won’t be any different. What does it matter if no one remembers?’ It’s always a bad thing to feel indebted to someone who has hurt us or hurt others either close to us or unrelated, sometimes it makes no difference, someone who has behaved in an indecent manner or committed the unspeakable and the unforgivable, the lowest of the low, because that can all be abruptly cancelled out by the feeling that we owe them something really crucial, really important. Offenders sometimes resort to this consciously and deliberately and even calculatingly: ‘I can’t fight on every front, so I’m going to neutralize this particular person who loathes me and has a grievance against me by doing him an unexpected favour, getting him out of a real mess, flattering him and thus confusing him, lending him money when he most needs it, or sending it to him through a third party if he won’t take it from me (that third party will be sure to blab once the money’s spent and it’s too late to reject my gift, and then it’s in my power to increase the beneficiary’s gratitude still further by not asking for the money back), by ensuring that he keeps his job, which is hanging by a thread, by helping one of his children who has got himself into trouble and for whom he cares more than anything else in the world, or by saving the life of a suicidal wife.’

  This wasn’t the case with Van Vechten of course, because he didn’t even know about the resentment and suspicions harboured by his friend of so many years, still less that his friend had embarked on a secret and potentially hazardous investigation into possible facts about his past – as secret as it was erratic, as befits an amateur – using a young employee who had no idea what he was looking for and was, therefore, very much working in the dark. That night, he had helped spontaneously and disinterestedly, as would any doctor, and he would doubtless have done the same for anyone, even a complete stranger who had locked herself in a bathroom with a razor –Vic Damone’s Asian girlfriend, for example, had Van Vechten been at that party in 1961 – and, it goes without saying, the wife of a great friend of his, a wife whom he occasionally fucked, because, given what I’d seen at the Sanctuary of Darmstadt, that was the only correct verb to use, there was no lying with, no making love to, they weren’t even lovers, or so it seemed to me, or only technically speaking. Muriel knew nothing of all that, because, among other reasons, he didn’t care what Beatriz got up to, but what seemed so extraordinary was that he should care so much about losing her or saving her, for he had seemed genuinely anguished, distraught, at times looking as deathly pale or even more so than the hotel manager, Señor Gómez-Antigüedad, as if he couldn’t live without that woman who so infuriated him and whom he made so very unhappy, even haring like a mad thing down Calle Velázquez, he who never ran anywhere. And because of these new or renewed feelings of gratitude towards Van Vechten, he halted my investigation: the result of the Doctor’s perfectly routine intervention at the Hotel Wellington was that, two days later, when Beatriz was in hospital, still under observation and medical care, and during one of the brief periods when Muriel was not at her bedside and had come home to rest a little, his reward to the Doctor was to cancel all his previous orders to me, to cancel my mission, if that isn’t too grand a term for it.

  ‘Listen, young De Vere, I have something to say to you.’ He was once again lying full-length on the floor in the living room, and whenever he did this, I was more and more convinced that it was his way of avoiding having to look me straight in the eye, a way of preventing me from accurately reading the expression on his face, which is difficult when someone is not on the same level as you, that’s why kings always insist on having an elevated throne and why the same effect is still sought by the rich and powerful, many of whom wear lifts in their shoes or a wig. And although he opted to descend to a lower level, it provided him with a similar degree of opacity. ‘You saw how well the Doctor behaved a couple of nights ago. And that isn’t the first favour I owe him either, he’s done me a number of favours over the years; and although he couldn’t save the child, he did everything in his power to do so. He did save Beatriz, and it isn’t right that I should repay him with suspicions and machinations, by asking someone to spy on him. It doesn’t matter if what I was told is true. Even if it were, other things are more important, namely, our friendship and what he has done for me and my family in the past. I would be an ingrate, an avenger, a fanatic, if I were to withdraw my friendship over something that doesn’t even concern me, when he has done so many good things for the people who do concern me.’ – ‘Perhaps one of those good things is that he distracts you and occasionally rids you of Beatriz’s presence,’ I thought suddenly, ‘and you know all about it, Muriel, and may even have encouraged it’; in my thoughts I addressed him as tú, for the mind tends to be less formal than the tongue. – ‘What happened the night before last has forced me to remember and reflect. So just leave it be, forget all about it, ignore my orders, there’s no need for you to take him to any more nightclubs, still less to draw him out and observe him, just drop the whole thing. If he did once do something vile, that’s a matter for those he harmed, it’s not up to me to investigate or make some decision. It’s not even my business. I allowed myself to be carried away by a mere rumour.’ I had wanted to interrupt him several sentences ago, but realized this was not yet the right moment, that he had paused only in order to continue or to finish what he had to say. He again fixed his eye on the Casanova painting (on that possibly one-eyed horseman listening to his possible victims outside the painting, where the viewer was standing, all of them pleading: ‘Remember us’), although determining its exact trajectory belonged in the realm of divination. And he added: ‘In fact, anything you’re told, anything you didn’t personally witness, is pure rumour, however wrapped up in oaths it comes, all swearing the story to be true. And we can’t spend our lives listening to rumours, still less acting in accordance with their many fluctuations. When you give that up, when you give up trying to know
what you cannot know, perhaps, to paraphrase Shakespeare, perhaps that is when bad begins, but, on the other hand, worse remains behind.’

  It seemed to me now that he was about to fall silent and that I could finally ask him the question that was plaguing me. However, the mention of Shakespeare brought to mind one of the lines Rico had recited so theatrically, one arm outstretched: ‘Upon my tongues continual slanders ride, the which in every language I pronounce, stuffing the ears of men with false reports …’ Perhaps Muriel really had been listening to what the Professor was saying and had started there and then to ponder the injustice of believing what he had been told about the Doctor. If so, it hadn’t been enough to put a brake on his suspicions and his unease, for he had nevertheless decided to investigate or, rather, sound out the situation.

  ‘You said, “Although he couldn’t save the child”? What child? I don’t know what you’re talking about, Eduardo.’ That was the question that had been burning inside me ever since I heard Muriel’s passing comment, made as if he assumed I would know all about whatever it was. Then suddenly I twigged, almost at the same time as he – with a look of genuine surprise, not to say astonishment – pointed at the photo, on full view, of the young Beatriz holding a child of about two in her arms and looking not at him, but to her right: the boy in the little fur coat and the white balaclava with a large pompom on top, the boy with the delicate features who was also looking intently away, but to his left. There was the photo framed and on display and about which I had never asked. I’d asked very little in fact (despite my tendency to spy, I was basically a reasonably discreet young man), ever since Muriel had abruptly brushed aside my inquiry about the origin and reason for his eyepatch.

  ‘Who do you think? Javier, of course, our firstborn, the one who died. There he is. I thought you knew, indeed, how could you possibly not know? How long have you been working here now?’

  ‘I don’t know if I realized or not, Eduardo, but you hardly ever tell me anything. You told me off when I asked about your missing eye. And since you were determined not to tell me your suspicions about the Doctor, I’m completely in the dark about that too. I also have no idea what your wife did to cause you to be so unpleasant to her, because, you know, you don’t always hide your feelings in my presence. I’m not asking that question now, certainly not, it’s none of my business, but I don’t see why it should surprise you that I don’t know about everything else. No one has ever told me anything, and I only ask what is strictly necessary. Because of that, I still don’t even know why Beatriz tried to kill herself, and I was, after all, the one who saw her go into the hotel. I’m also aware that there might be no easy answer to that.’

  Muriel sat up a little and looked at me more directly, although he was still not on my level, propping himself up on his elbows.

  ‘You’re right, Juan. Sometimes I take it for granted that all the friends who come here know the basic facts of my life, those that are verifiable and public knowledge, I mean, that you’ve all been witness to them or that you discuss me among yourselves. Not, of course, that there’s any reason why you should talk about me, even though I am the common link. I’m sure the others know about the death of our child, some of them were there at the time, that is, they attended the funeral and tried to console us in the days that followed. I forget that you’re a recent addition and much younger too.’

  ‘What happened?’

  Muriel tucked his thumb under his armpit as he did sometimes, as if it were a tiny riding crop or a ridiculous little crutch, as if in search of a symbolic support on which to rest his whole body. Perhaps he did this whenever he was in low spirits, a state of mind that afflicts stomach and limbs and torso and head.

  ‘Well, I don’t much like to talk about it.’ And he said this somewhat haltingly, as if he were about to lose his voice or had a sudden need to clear his throat, a need that had not been there a second before. ‘We don’t really know. Jorge wasn’t sure, and there was no question of performing an autopsy on that poor little body. What would have been the point? He had died and, given the magnitude of that fact, it didn’t really matter why. And it wasn’t like it is now, when people are always looking for someone to blame, to see if they can squeeze some money out of their misfortunes. He fell ill one afternoon with a high fever. We didn’t think it was anything serious, a sore throat perhaps, children often run a temperature, but we called the Doctor anyway and he came rushing over, as he always did, always so ready to help. As I said, he did everything he could, none of us left Javier’s side for a moment and we saw how, that same night, he suddenly got worse. No, not suddenly. It was gradual, but somehow horribly fast. The truth is that at no point did it occur to us to fear for his life, and then he died and there was nothing we could do about it. As you can imagine, it was utterly incomprehensible. Beyond our understanding, I mean. I don’t think Beatriz has ever really taken it in. I’m not sure I have either.’

  ‘But did no one have even the vaguest idea of what caused his death?’

  ‘Jorge mentioned the possibility that it was meningococcal meningitis, which destroys the adrenal glands. It’s very rare apparently and, at the time, there was no treatment for it. It was impossible to diagnose quickly enough and impossible to treat. He assured us that no one could have saved him. Nothing and no one. I don’t know. We didn’t really try to find out and, in all these years, we never have. Why go delving any deeper, it would only have upset us even more. It happened, and now it can’t be undone.’ He had referred to the Doctor as ‘Jorge’ and called me ‘Juan’, as he had on the night of the suicide attempt; any truly serious matter restores our real names to us, it cannot tolerate affectionate or ironic nicknames. He again pointed at the photograph. ‘Beatriz insists on having him there on show, as if she were afraid we might forget. Or so that his brother and sisters are aware of his existence, even though they never knew him. Or perhaps she likes to see him whenever she passes by. It’s the most recent one we have of him, at Susana’s christening, Susana being almost two years his junior. As you can see, he was absolutely fine. He was until that final afternoon, and there was no warning of any kind.’ He stayed like that for a few seconds, leaning on one elbow, thinking or remembering, his finger still pointing. ‘Fortunately, I was here in Madrid. If I’d been away, I would never have believed it. But I was, and I saw what happened.’ Yes, he had been there, it wasn’t something someone had told him about, it wasn’t just a rumour, that’s what I understood him to mean. I repeated to myself the words he had said a little earlier. ‘Perhaps that is when bad begins, but, on the other hand, worse remains behind.’

  ‘Beatriz was there too,’ I said after a few seconds had passed, and once he was no longer pointing at the photo and had lowered his arm and was lying down again; before he did, though, he took the compass out of the back pocket of his trousers and began slowly rubbing it against his cheek (the little box, I mean), as if smoothing a non-existent but always incipient beard, which, one day, he would allow to grow. ‘And for women, for mothers, it tends to be an even greater tragedy. It’s much harder for them to recover, if they ever do. The child developed inside their womb and so they’ve known it for months before it’s even born, isn’t that right?’ I uttered these banalities because I didn’t really know what to say.

  ‘Yes, unless the mothers are completely stoical,’ he said. ‘Because such mothers do exist, you know, no legend is without its exceptions. But, yes, Javier’s death made her more fragile in a way, left her still more unbalanced. Although not more fragile or more fearful as regards the other children, not at all, rather the reverse: the worst that could happen had already happened and wouldn’t happen again. It almost had the effect of an inoculation, she was much more relaxed about the other children than she’d ever been about Javier. Perhaps because he was the first, perhaps because he was a boy and because we men are said to run more risks, and so she feared for him far more than for any other child. I sometimes wonder if it wasn’t those bad presentiments of her
s that brought it all about. Panic attracts misfortune and catastrophe. We do sometimes bring about what we most fear because the only way of freeing ourselves from that fear is for the bad thing actually to have happened, for it to be in the past and not in the future or in the realm of possibilities.’ – ‘For it to remain behind,’ I said to myself, those words from Shakespeare had made me think. – ‘However terrible and appalling the past may be, it always seems more innocuous than the future, or at least we’re better able to deal with it. I don’t know, maybe it was that or the realization of how defenceless we are, that there’s no point in taking precautions or protecting ourselves or anyone else, and that it’s therefore absurd to make yourself suffer beforehand; that, regardless of what preventative measures you take, the worst can still happen. It happens and it’s too late. It happens and that’s that. As you’ve seen, she takes her children pretty much for granted now, to the point of suddenly leaving them orphaned.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘but I don’t believe Beatriz’s fears could have made her son catch what you say is a very rare illness.’

  He didn’t even bother responding, his comment had clearly been literary, not literal, a superstitious explanation for the inexplicable, which is what literature does really, most of the time, more or less. He changed tack:

  ‘Anyway, now I’ve told you. Let’s see: what other complaints do you have, my poor “no-one-has-ever-told-me-anything” ’ – and he imitated my voice – ‘what else would you like to know? Ah, yes, about my eye. Well, there’s no great mystery, it’s just that I prefer not to talk about or remember it – it makes me sad and makes me seem older too. It was when I was a child, at the beginning of the Civil War. My brother and I were playing on the roof terrace of my parents’ house. A bullet fired by a paco ricocheted off a wall and hit me. I lost an eye, which, at the time, was a real drama. Anyway, I’ve been like this since 1936, and that’s what makes me seem older than I am, I mean, fancy having a war wound at my young age. But, then, saying that I lost an eye during the War does make it sound as if I was old enough to fight, doesn’t it? Anything else?’