‘More brandy?’
‘Not just now, thanks. Afterwards perhaps – or a long whisky. But just now, if you’re going to talk, I’d like to keep my head clear for half-an-hour.’
‘Promise you’ll never tell anybody that you heard this from me. It might get back to my grandfather – and I’d hate that. Though don’t imagine I’m being treacherous and breaking any promises. I’ve never been told anything properly. I’m not in the secret, whatever it is. This is only what I’ve picked up, overheard when people thought I wasn’t listening or too dumb to understand. But first – Tim, please – take hold of my hand – and keep on holding it. That’s right. I feel better like this – it’ll seem more human.’
She was serious, not just making a move in the sex game, so I asked her what she meant.
‘You see, Tim, you’re making me think about things I try not to think about. And when I do, I begin to feel frightened. Don’t ask me what I’m frightened of, because I don’t know. I just feel it deep down.’ Her fingers went creeping between mine and then squeezed them hard. ‘There’s some kind of organisation – and of course my grandfather’s in it and so are the men who come to see him. I know it’s not some ordinary political thing – planning a revolution or anything like that – ’
‘And not Nazis – which has been suggested to me?’
‘No, I’m sure it’s not. But what it is – what it wants to do – I don’t know.’
‘I drew something and showed it to Mrs Candamo, and it startled her. Have you ever seen anything like it? It’s a wavy line with a figure eight above it.’
‘Grandfather has something like that. I’ve seen it. Made of gold and like a badge. Yes, an eight with a wavy line underneath. What does it mean?’
‘I don’t know – yet. But I intend to find out, ducky.’
She squeezed my fingers hard again. ‘I’ve never taken much interest in the Institute. I don’t understand about science. But my guess is, from what I’ve overheard, that several men there have had to go because they began to be curious and perhaps knew too much – ’
‘And my cousin’s husband, Joe Farne, was one of them. And he didn’t go where he wanted to go. They gave him the treatment – and then sent him off. And the last letter he managed to write came from Chile.’
‘If they were just sending him off to one of their other places,’ said Rosalia, ‘then it would be either to Chile or to Australia.’
‘Australia!’ I probably half shouted it, remembering the places on Joe’s list.
‘Yes, Australia. They’re like links on a chain, these places. I know that much from all the talk I’ve overheard. No, it’s not quite like that either. A lot of different little chains arrive at Uramba – oh – from Washington and New York and Moscow and London and Paris – ’
‘I don’t know about Paris,’ I said, breaking in impatiently, ‘but I met three – no, four – people in London who come into this somehow. And back there at Uramba, this very day, when Melnikov’s there, General Giddings suddenly turns up. Now – for God’s sake – will you tell me what your grandfather, Melnikov and Giddings are discussing?’
‘I don’t know – I tell you – I don’t know.’ Her reply was as impatient as my question. ‘All I do know is that they’re not there by accident – just visiting – any of them. The other thing I know are the two places that link on to Uramba. One’s in Australia – don’t ask me why, but it is – ’
‘Anything to do with Brisbane – or the Blue Mountains?’
‘No, it isn’t. It’s – ’
‘Let me guess, ducky. It’s called Charoke – and it’s in Victoria. Right?’
‘Yes. How did you know?’
‘It’s on a list that Joe Farne made out.’
‘But it’s the one in Chile you want, isn’t it?’ she cried eagerly. She’d released my hand and now she jumped up. ‘That’s the one you really have to know, because that’s where they must have taken him. And I’m not going to tell you yet, Tim Bedford.’
I got up, not sure what I was about to say or do. It was tricky. There was one indication of a place left on the list I’d memorised so carefully: Osparas and Emerald L. And if she was going into her childish petulant act again, and I blurted out the wrong name or the right name at the wrong moment, I wouldn’t be any the wiser. I could see myself with all Chile stretching out in front of me, from deserts like these down to somewhere near Cape Horn. What a hope! To gain time I poured out some brandy and swallowed it too quickly lighting up a torchlight procession down my gullet. Then she took the glass away from me, stood squarely in front of me, and lifted up her face. ‘Kiss me,’ she said.
Well of course I did, and though I wasn’t even sure I liked the girl, it was a surprisingly satisfying this-is-us kind of kiss. To make sure – and there she was, not saying anything, just waiting – I tried it again. The same again, only more so.
I grabbed my brandy and finished it. She just watched me, not saying a word. ‘Come on, girl,’ I said. ‘We’d better take these things inside. Lend me a hand, Miss Arnaldos.’
Much later, Rosalia was saying: ‘But it’s quite simple, you idiot. I want you.’
‘I’m supposed to say that,’ I said. ‘And it isn’t simple.’
It was now after eleven. We were in the Garlettas’ sitting-room or music room or whatever it was. It was a short flight of steps below ground level, and I felt all the time that I was sitting in a kind of super night club for two. It had a grand piano, a lot of stereo hi-fi equipment, a corner bar, and some wide and deep seating arrangements. At first there had been some fantastic lighting but now Rosalia had reduced it to a minimum of one standard lamp. We’d played some peculiar music that she said was highbrow Latin-American. We’d argued about painting. And for quite different reasons, I fancy, we’d done some fairly steady drinking. Neither of us was plastered but we’d both reached the stage where the truth comes out, if only because you feel too lazy-minded to keep on suppressing it. Also, Rosalia had worked it so that no light at all fell near her face, which I could hardly see. And now we’d arrived at the point of the evening, chiefly because I’d said something about being ready for bed. And I’d meant my own bed, all alone. I wasn’t the seducer in this scene. But it’s only fair to Rosalia to say that throughout this session we had, there was about her absolutely nothing silly and giggly, tarty and bitchy. She was dead serious, as solemn as a lawyer at a will reading. In spite of being already twenty-four and a Latin-American with a dash of Indian blood and an ex-art-student and the rest, she sounded and looked like a consecrated big-eyed chump of a young girl. And this of course made it all the more difficult for me.
‘I fixed it so that we could be here alone,’ she said, ‘because I wanted you to make love to me. It was part of the deal we made. I thought you’d understand that, without a lot of talk about it. I guess you didn’t because you’re English. You try to forget about sex.’
‘If you knew the English as they are now, you wouldn’t talk such rubbish. Half of ’em think about nothing else but sex. The country’s crammed with rundown nymphs and satyrs.’
Rosalia ignored these remarks and kept straight on expressing her simple girlish thoughts. ‘If I want you, then why don’t you want me? Don’t I attract you at all?’
‘You didn’t until I saw you standing by the pool.’ I told her what she’d made me feel then. I’ll swear her eyes shone like a cat’s. She took a deep breath and was about to jump up, probably to pounce on me, when I told her to stay where she was. ‘And don’t get any silly ideas again about there being something wrong with me. I’m all right in that department. I’m fine. I’m a normal, virile, lecherous male animal, weighing over a hundred and eighty-five pounds, mostly bone and muscle, and there’s nothing better going except in the expensive gorilla class.’
‘I know it, Tim darling,’ she said, with what might be described as grave enthusiasm. ‘I knew it when you were so mad at me in my studio, and you held me at arms’ length and just shook me g
ently – ’
‘And you swore at me in three languages – ’
‘Yes, I was good and mad too. But at the same time I felt it was wonderful. It was then I decided to bring you here.’
‘What – to make love to you?’
‘Of course. Otherwise, what’s the point?’
‘There could be a lot of points. Some girls – your friend Marina Nateby perhaps – could have enjoyed just being here with me – this swimming, the drinks on the terrace, having dinner together, talking under the stars, coming in here for more talk and music and drinks – ’
‘But I’ve adored it, every minute. You ought to know that.’
‘Then why are you talking like a nymphomaniac? I don’t like nymphomaniacs,’ I said severely. ‘And if you’re one, then I’m bitterly disappointed in you, Rosalia.’
‘Oh – don’t be stupid. Can’t you see I’m – well – I’m the opposite of one.’
‘No, I can’t. No – no – let me say what I have to say now. There’s been so much damned silly monkey talk about sex, most of you girls have been talked out of your sensible instincts. Women used to know by instinct that sex is part of a personal relationship. They went to bed with men, if they weren’t whores, because they loved ’em. Making love is a psychological act, not just a physical performance. I know that now, and if I’d known it earlier I’d have saved myself a lot of mess and grief. But now you girls have allowed yourselves to be talked into the male monkey house. And if you’re not one of them, then what’s the idea of bringing me here?’
‘I’ll tell you, Tim. I’m not afraid to confess.’
‘All right, tell me,’ I said as she hesitated.
‘I’ve lived in Paris and New York, alongside art students and artists. So of course I’m not a virgin, not technically anyhow. But it’s never been any good. Really a lot of mess and grief, as you say. I’m beginning to wonder what’s the matter with me. Sex and painting and everything – all no good. That’s why I’ve behaved so bitchily ever since I’ve been back at Uramba. Grandfather doesn’t understand of course. But I’m sure Mrs Candamo knows – I’ve seen it in her eye. Did she say anything to you?’
‘She told me just after I arrived that I’d probably find you difficult, that’s all. And she was right – I did.’
‘But that’s what happens when you feel you’re no use. You take it out of other people. But when I tried it on you, in my studio, you wouldn’t have it. And then when you took hold of me – and told me to stop being a rich bitch – I suddenly felt different. I wasn’t really angry, not deep down. It was wonderful. So I thought if you came here with me – and we made love – it might be quite different too – I wouldn’t feel a dreary disappointment – ’ And then she began crying, not gradually working herself into it, but suddenly and loudly, like a hurt child.
‘Now – now – Rosalia ducky – there’s nothing to cry about – ’ I got up, hardly knowing what to do or to say.
She hurled herself across and I caught her in my arms and held her close while she first buried her face in my coat. And then of course we were kissing, and half an hour later she was in my room, which had been selected from the first as the best location for the final sequence. (It’s my belief, though I’ve never been able to confirm it, that by some magic of feminine communication, she and Tina Garletta were able to decide which room was best, over the telephone. ‘Darling, I think he’d like the end room’ – that sort of thing.) What happened after that is very much our business and nobody else’s. All I need to add here, because there are good personal reasons why I can’t be too frank, and, after all, this is the story of how I found Joe Farne and ran up against the Wavy 8, is that a great deal of love was made that night, and that if there was any disappointment I didn’t feel it nor hear anything about it. I remember having a drink and a cigarette about two in the morning, and talking freely about myself as I like to do on these occasions, while Rosalia, smiling, rosy and dishevelled, looked partly like a wild loose woman and partly like a small girl staring in wonder at a gigantic new toy. Then, I think, she put an end to this waste of time smoking and drinking and boasting, and back I went, without any reluctance. The rest I don’t remember.
Then there was too much knocking and I had to shout something if only to stop it. Somebody came in, drew the curtains, and my eyes opened only to blink at a glare of sunlight. The room was empty, the door left open. Was this Rosalia? There was a vague tantalising scent of her in the room. Then came the smell of coffee, and close behind it the oldish smiling woman who had opened the door for us when we first arrived. She had brought my breakfast and with it a letter. She could speak a little English and she made me understand that the car from Lima was here and that was why she had wakened me, following the instructions of Señorita Arnaldos. To my surprise and then sudden sharp regret Rosalia had gone, but of course the letter on the breakfast tray was from her. While I was drinking my coffee and taking great bites of buttered roll, I stared at the rather stiff angular writing, so strangely different from the Rosalia my arms still remembered. And this is what she had written:
My darling Tim,
I hope you will be disappointed but not too unhappy because I have gone. It was all wonderful and now of course I know there is nothing wrong and I am happy. But now I understand what you meant when you said there must be a complete love relationship, and if I had stayed we might have begun to pretend, you especially. Or we might have started fighting, which I would have hated. So you must go on with your search and perhaps you will think about me and feel something deep, or perhaps you won’t. And I must go away and be by myself to think about you and find out what I feel. The place they have in Chile, where Farne may have been taken, is at Osparas on the Emerald Lake. It is in the South and I think you go either by airplane or train first to a place called Puerto Montt. See – I have kept my promise! Also, I have reserved a seat for you on the airplane to Santiago, Chile leaving at 1.30 and have ordered a car to take you to the airport. So I am not stupid and selfish all the time, you see, Tim! Please take care of yourself – if not for me then for some other girl!
Rosalia
P. S. – It is ridiculous but just now I am crazy about you! Perhaps it is because of last night and feeling a real woman now and everything!! We shall see!!!
I read this letter three times before I got dressed, then once in the car, twice at the airport. There was something about it that made me feel desolate without this girl. I decided that as soon as I’d found Joe Farne I’d come back here, to see her again.
As we started off through the heat and dust, making for Limatambo airport, I suddenly remembered that it was only a week since I’d gone riding out of New York, with Sam Harnberg and his friend Hirsh, to Mrs Tengleton’s free-for-all in Westchester. It seemed more like three months than a week. I thought I’d try to put together all the bits of new evidence I’d acquired, make a list in my mind of everything I’d discovered during these last few days. But in the car I still wasn’t sufficiently clear-headed to tackle the job, and out at the airport I kept dodging round the great hall in the hope that Rosalia had come to see me off, and in the plane, after a drink and a few sandwiches while the Pacific Ocean dropped away from us and turned into blue milk, I fell asleep.
9
My idea of climate is that it gets hot near the equator and cold near the poles. But somehow it doesn’t work out like that. Santiago, Chile, is about 1,500 miles farther away from the equator and nearer the South Pole than Lima, Peru, yet it was hotter still down there. The only hotel room I could find that Sunday night in Santiago had no air-conditioning, just a fan, and I spent more time in it tossing around and dozing than I did sleeping. Next morning I came out blinking into a city already baking in the sun. It was all strange, foreign, damnably noisy. It would have been a hell of a place if the people there had been as sharp-tempered or sour as so many people are these days in London or New York. But in spite of the heat and noise, the Chileans seemed extraordinarily good-temper
ed, amiably determined to enjoy life, and very soon the sight of them shamed me out of my grumpiness. In fact I began to feel a kind of cheerful recklessness.
I went along to the nearest bank to exchange some traveller’s cheques into pesos. It was a biggish place, with a long open counter where, as you waited, you could see all the clerks at work. They were amiable there too, but very leisurely. There were about ten of us waiting at the counter. Perhaps I made some sort of impatient noise.
‘You are in a hurry perhaps,’ said a man at my elbow. He was short but wide and fat, and he wore a crumpled tropical suit and an emerald green shirt that was a mistake with any suit. ‘Excuse me. But I think you are a stranger to Santiago, Chile. You have just arrived perhaps.’ His smile was equally wide and fat.
I told him I had just arrived but wasn’t really in a hurry.
He made a sweeping gesture over the counter, to call my attention to the clerks on the other side. ‘Many are poets. Here in Chile we have many poets. I am a poet myself. My name is Jones.’ I must have looked surprised, because he didn’t look or sound like any kind of Jones I’d ever known. ‘I am Chilean of course but my great-grandfather came from Wales. So I am Jones. Excuse me, but there might be information about Chile you require perhaps. I shall be glad to be of service.’
Before I could reply I was called to finish my banking business, but after I had crammed the peso notes into my pocket I found Mr Jones at my elbow again and heard myself inviting him to have a drink. Five minutes afterwards he was smiling at me, like a fat yellow cat, across a café table. It was cool and shady in there, after the bright oven of the streets, and I was determined not to be lured into sight-seeing, for I suspected that Mr Jones hadn’t had any business to transact in the bank and might be looking for a job as guide. On the other hand, I certainly needed plenty of information, and if he could give it to me inside this café, then I wouldn’t have to go sweating round to travel agencies.
Saturn Over the Water Page 13