The Death of Picasso

by Guy Davenport

  —How blind I was.

  —I don’t think so, sir. The reason I’ve stopped by is to thank you for how kind you were to us. You knew I wasn’t a student.

  —I think I did, yes. I trusted Sergeant Rasmussen to know what he was doing.

  —That’s what I’m thanking you for.

  —But where did you go when you left? What did you do?

  —That’s too much to tell. Magnus said later that he felt that something awful would have happened if we’d stayed, that the relationships we’d gotten into were potential disasters. They were daring adventures depending on trust and comradeship, and were more accident than design. We were, as he said, too happy. We had, the next two years, a wonderful life together. Nobody could ever understand.

  —Where is he now, do you know?

  —Of course I know. He’s at the moment in Greenland, on one of my geodesic teams, looking for the awesome meteor that impacted last September. We couldn’t do without him. He lectures on geology every other term at the university. My wife understands that we are very special friends, and my two sons adore him. I sometimes think they like their Uncle Magnus better than their father. His book on sand and quartz was well reviewed. I told him on the phone the other evening that I was going to drop by. So we both thank you for your great kindness.

  —This is all quite startling, Major. Out of the blue, so to speak. An event from a past I thought I knew, but didn’t. It explains, I think, yet another mystery I’d forgotten. There was an English teacher here, Pol Eddeke, who came to me once with a lot of folderol about Sergeant Rasmussen corrupting the morals of a boy who, and he said he had evidence, slept with him. He said he’d seen the bed. I suppose that was you and Rasmussen?

  —It would have been, yes. Sound logic: two people, one bed. He came over one morning when Magnus and I were back from our summer vacation in Paris and on a Swedish island, no happier summer any two people in love with each other ever spent.

  —You have no regrets, then?

  —None.

  —Good. Eddeke, rather a sad case, persisted in dithering and making accusations, until one day the physical education master—what was his name?

  —Sten Solveg, Sir.

  —Solveg, yes. He came to my office, what a handsome fellow he was, too, he came to my office and said enigmatically that he had shut Eddeke up. I hadn’t a clue what he was talking about. But, sure enough, about an hour later Eddeke, pale as a sheet and trembling, came and resigned, saying he was leaving immediately. When I asked why, he said he’d rather not say. I had to take his English classes myself. I’ve always been fond of Milton and Wordsworth.

  —This would be after we left.

  —Yes. As soon I’d got somebody to take over Rasmussen’s classes, I had to take over Eddeke’s.

  —Good old Sten! Is he still here?

  —Went to America, I believe. Look, if you’ll put up with my hobbling along on my cane, we might take a turn around the grounds, for old times’ sake. Shall we?

  —I don’t think I can, sir. I would see a twelve-year-old in a red-checked shirt, wide yellow braces, and stone-washed jeans with a brass-button fly. I want to remember the quadrangle as he knew it. He was a very happy little boy.

  III

  Now I Yosef was walking and I walked not. And I looked up into the air and saw the air in amazement, for the clouds were standing still, a hawk was fixed in its flight, neither going forward nor falling, and the earth had stopped turning on its axle. And I looked about me and saw workmen at their dish, some with their spoons halfway to their mouths, motionless. And I saw sheep being driven but they were not and stood still, and their shepherd had raised his staff and it came not down. And at the river where his kids had gone to drink, their mouths were upon the water and they drank not. And the smoke from a fire under a pot in a yard rose not and was like a picture on the wall of a house of the Romans. A waft of dust that the wind had lifted hung in the air. Then of a sudden all things moved forward in their courses.

  IV

  —I tell you, Adam Rasmussen, it’s there.

  Sholto Tvemunding put a finger on the tip of Adam’s nose and pushed.

  —I saw you wandering off, a thing you do, to pee or get a better look at a butterfly, and you saw this house and said absolutely fucking nothing about it.

  —Right. Had all sorts of cool ideas. It couldn’t belong to anybody who’s been there in years. It’s all but invisible. Trees crowded up to the windows. Weeds up to our chins. It’s on a jut of the woods onto the lake, a peninsula. If it hadn’t been for the tin roof I’d have missed it. A straight line in trees. Then I made out the chimney. A windowpane catching the sun.

  —And inside, skeletons, grinning skeletons.

  —Two of ’em. They shot each other.

  —And nobody missed ’em.

  —They robbed a bank and had a fight over divvying up. The money’s still there. We turn off where we left this road with the troop, the big oak and the red cows looking over the fence.

  —You say it’s a house, not a cabin? Somebody’s summerhouse on the lake, abandoned and all, for years maybe?

  —What if it’s not there? A ghost of a house.

  —I wonder if you can see it from the other side of the lake? If not, it’s as good as invisible. Whether we can get in is another matter.

  —Housebreaking. But we’d only be borrowing it for a while. A house just sitting there that nobody’s using.

  The house was there. They pushed their bikes through the thick of tall weeds and bushes, saplings and convoluted briars to the front door, over which a vine, one of the wall climbers, had fastened itself on its way to the eaves, under which it had branched left and right. The back door was inside a screened porch. The windows were shuttered.

  Adam followed Sholto, neither speaking. After two circuits, Sholto, pushing aside branches, whistling softly to himself, found the lake shore.

  —We should have worn long pants, Adam said.

  —And brought an ax, a saw, a crowbar, and a glass cutter. Voices carry across water.

  They followed the outline of the short peninsula until they came back to their bicycles near the house’s front. Only then did Sholto turn to face Adam and stare at him.

  The coast of Greenland, if you straightened out the wiggles, is as long as the equator.

  —We haven’t tried all the shutters.

  —There’s a tree on an island in the Gulf of Aden that’s the only species of its genus. They’re fastened on the inside, the shutters.

  Sholto pushed Adam’s nose again, causing him to grin and close his eyes.

  —There’s not even a path from the road.

  —Not anymore. How long would you say it’s been since anybody was here?

  With three fingers Sholto pushed Adam’s nose and the corners of his mouth.

  —They’re still in there.

  —It’s fucking lovely out here. We’re like ants down in the grass with all these trees. Inside there’ll be clues as to whose house it is and if they’re ever coming back. So let’s look at the shutters again.

  —Back screen door. A small snip in the wire, a finger through, lift the latch, and we’re in.

  —As far as the backdoor.

  Sholto ran a finger down Adam’s nose.

  —Yucatan. We’ve landed our pontoon Piper Cub on the lake. The Mayan temple is tied up in lianas. Pumas and alligators are watching us from under leaves as big as ponchos.

  —Monkeys, parrots, boa constrictors.

  —Since when are heathen temples more interesting than other people’s houses?

  —You’re the one who’s Sholto Tvemunding.

  —But you’re Adam Rasmussen.

  They looked at each other smiling.

  —Backdoor.

  —Backdoor.

  With the bottle-cap opener on his scout knife Sholto pried away the lathing strip that secured the screen half its length, freeing a way for his fingers, found a sliding latch, and disengaged its bolt.
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  Adam, his chin on Sholto’s shoulder, blew softly in his ear. The door would not open until they had sliced holding vines. They went through together, shoulder to shoulder.

  —Hold your breath, Adam said, trying the knob of the backdoor.

  —Push.

  The door opened onto a musty dark kitchen. Beyond, through an open door, a room with furniture in dense shadow. Off to the right, another room, its door partly open. Adam kept a hand on Sholto’s shoulder, squeezing.

  —Housebreakers is what we are, Adam said.

  —Adam and Sholto is what we are. Let’s open shutters and windows. What does it smell like in here? Mildew, dust, woodsmoke, and something peculiar. How many skeletons do you count?

  —They’re in the other room.

  —If they are, they’re under the bed.

  Opened shutters showed a dusty, cobwebbed two rooms and kitchen.

  —Oxygen! Sholto said, unlatching and raising a window. Do the front door while I get the windows up. Bring in the bikes. Talk about scuzz. But it’s a homey place, you know?

  —I saw a broom in the kitchen, Adam said from outside.

  —Don’t talk so loud.

  —You can tell a grave by the wildflowers on it. Remember that film? How old are the trees closest to the windows?

  —Two years, five years. A yellow house with a red-tin roof. A bed, made, with sheets and blanket.

  They found plates and cups in a kitchen cabinet, a pair of jeans, a sweatshirt, towels, and a man’s bathing brief in the closet. Outside they found an outhouse even more hidden by weeds and vines, a one-seater and with a bag of quicklime on a shelf, petrified into a hard lump.

  —There’s a pail in the kitchen, Adam said. Let’s get the spider webs down, clear this room of the chair and settle or whatever you call that in front of the fireplace, this Finnish folk-art throw rug that ought to be whipped outside, and with everything out, slosh down the floor.

  —Better still, let’s shake the bed blanket outside first. Then we’ll have a place to put our clothes, so’s we can strip down for pitching pails of water and sweeping it out as mud.

  —Smarter still: sweep first, slosh afterwards.

  —Well then, let’s do all the rooms. Roll up the mattress on the bed.

  —What about putting it outside, over a bush, for sun and air?

  —Sheets, too, pillow and pillowcase. We’re not scouts for nothing. As big Hugo says, brains get more work done than arms and legs.

  —So. Togs off and over the bikes. Keep your underpants on for going to the lake, and your shoes.

  Sholto swept dust into rills, stirring up a mist of motes that spun sunlit in the air. Adam brought pail after pail of water, swirling it in a circle. They began in the bedroom, moved to the kitchen’s linoleum, and finished with their washing down in the big room, by which time they had muddy legs and dusty arms and faces. From time to time they halted to laugh, get their breath, and mouth mimic kisses.

  —Are you still feeling immoral? Adam asked.

  —I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t. Another three buckets ought to do it. I’ll bring ’em.

  —Shouldn’t we rinse it down?

  —Fresh as a lumberyard it’s beginning to smell. Us next, then, after the rinse.

  —And after whomping a bushel of dust out of the rug and blanket and pillow.

  —And after a dip in the lake, sammidges, apple, and coffee.

  —Way to live. Are we, by the way, spending the night here? Thought I’d ask.

  After splashing his third fetched pail across the floor in a leaping surge that drenched Adam’s knees, Sholto padded over to push Adam’s nose, dance fingers on his chin, and draw a circle around his navel.

  —Our folks know we’re camping out. I think they imagine it’s with the troop.

  —We’re on patrol.

  In the lake, which was cold, they took off their briefs, batted the water with them, and wrung them out.

  —Housecleaning, laundry, Sholto said. How moral can you get?

  —You’re beautiful, Sholto, wet and shiny. Put our wash on that bush there. One zigzag yellow green orange with white piping underpants, one blue micro. Mom bought the zigzag. She says boys ought to be dazzling.

  —I’m a year older. Shouldn’t I be the one to get fresh?

  —In friendly numbers the divisors of the one that add up to the other, and vice versa, are a new assembling of the other number’s components. Pythagoras. A friend is yourself in another person.

  —If you say so. Anyway, I like you. You’re scrumptious.

  —Our dicks are the same size.

  —Mine had better grow. The friend who’s another self is not just like you, that would be silly, but is different in ways that add up to a kind of sameness, so friends can be unlike each other in all sorts of ways and still get along just fine.

  —Lisbeth Holberg was at a girl party where some dumb bint explained that dicks hang down soft only on little boys and stand up stiff all the time on teenagers and fathers.

  —Don’t they?

  —Girls! What we did, Sholto Tvemunding, is transfer a houseful of dust and cobwebs to us, which we’ve now transferred to the lake, and we’re clean and the house is clean, and I’m hungry. Lunch is in my backpack, supper in yours.

  —Word has gone around among the butterflies that we’re here.

  —Who have told the mosquitoes and gnats.

  —It’s their place. We’re intruders.

  —No we’re not. We’re going to fit in. Everything’s a matter of learning how to belong. Two specks of brint and one of ilt join up to be water. And way up in the clouds goes in for being hexagonal crystals.

  —Snow, Sholto said. Or in the summer gets blown around when it means to be rain, but gets rolled up in balls and comes down as hail.

  —Can also be fog and dew, ice, steam, oceans, rivers.

  —Lakes and icebergs. A speck of kulstof married to two specks of ilt shoved into it gives us Perrier vand.

  —And Onkel Magnus says there’s no way an atom can be an accident, or a cell.

  —What are the sammidges? I see ham and Swiss. So how do we get atoms and cells? They’re sort of everything that is, aren’t they?

  —Slice ’m all on a diagonal, and we’ll have the same. Is that Pythagorean buddy numbers? Unscrew the thermos. Magnus thinks we never will know, except maybe to figure out that there’s no nothing, that the whole fucking clockworks is stuff, with the intervals between things a different kind of stuff that we poor ignoramuses call nothing. He says Walt Whitman understood this, and chose grass as his favorite example of atoms and cells. Cows eat grass and give milk, and horses eat grass and pulled buses and plows and wagons.

  —Also stitches topsoil together so that we don’t get buried under sand dunes. If Mr. Whitman had been a Dane his book would have been Red Clover instead of Grassblades. Magnus looks at me as if I were a candy bar.

  —You are. Neither Daddy nor Magnus say they can remember which of them lost their minds when they first saw each other. They’re hilarious. Magnus keeps his rank of sergeant even though he’s a lecturer at the Niels Bohr Institute so that Daddy can send him on geodesic surveys. A civilian would have to be appointed. They both use civilian as a cuss word.

  Sholto, chewing and grinning, pushed in Adam’s nose. Adam, grinning and chewing, pushed in Sholto’s nose.

  —Hugo would say that for heavy-breathing comradely immorality we’re in rompers sucking our thumbs.

  —We’re eating lunch.

  —We have a house. I don’t believe it. Look at all the windows. The trees have been trying to get in for years.

  —The floor’s dry enough to bring in that peasant runner rug. We don’t need to sit here in the damp on our bare bottoms.

  —The mattress back on the bed, too. Next week, window cleaner.

  Sholto brushed a crumb from Adam’s top lip. Adam brushed an imaginary crumb from Sholto’s lower lip. To see what would happen, Sholto circled Adam’s left nipple with
his middle finger. Adam punched Sholto’s right nipple.

  —Pushing buttons, Adam said.

  Navel, navel, laughing.

  —It’s not as if we haven’t shared a sleeping bag and a bed.

  —Henry, the little bugger, got into bed with us, expecting God knows what.

  —Leave Henry out of it. We’re brothers.

  Rubbed knee, rubbed knee. Spidery fingers inside thighs.

  —Let’s bring all the stuff on bushes in.

  —Our underpants won’t be dry. Lean in, like, so’s I can play with the back of your neck.

  —Fine by me. Tickles. Feels good. All this is going to my balls.

  —Napes are sexy. So are shoulder blades, the groove down the spine, butts.

  —Hair, tummies, legs, toes, peters.

  —Ears, noses, eyes.

  —Mom says she married Daddy for the fun of it, but mainly for his eyes.

  —I thought you and Henry were bastards.

  —Born bastards, like Daddy. Family tradition, he says. But when he made major and they had to go to dinners and things, they got married.

  —Our tans are pinking over. Check your shoulders. The pink seems to be under the tan, wouldn’t you say?

  Adam, staring over Sholto’s head, a tactic signaling a need to be forgiven, into his laughing eyes, and running spread fingers along his shins, said that the mattress was aired enough to be brought in, the sky was incredibly blue, the sunlight as good as Denmark ever gets, and that the island in the Gulf of Aden with the monotypic tree is Socotra.

  —Do we put the sheets back on the bed? Sunlight kills germs.

  —Whoever built this house hasn’t been here in years. We snapped enough dust out of the blanket to start a garden. How long do germs live?

  —No electricity, only a pump for running water. They must have brought a lantern, for nights.

  —The dinky little stove in the kitchen burns wood. I’m going to feel you, OK?

  —I’ll feel back. Girls practice kissing, as they call it, French kissing, hands in each other’s knickers and all. Asgar Vollmer, classmate of Henry’s, cute as a puppy and with all his hopes set on being a policeman, gets to act as a kissable boy, passed around like a rag doll. For hours. They keep him tractable by petting his peter. He says he hates it but that it’s sort of fun.