by Alan Isler
The afternoon had waned. A chill wind, tinged with melancholy, blew in from the Atlantic. Kraven found himself more and more of late turning to memories of his childhood. Perhaps the phenomenon was a function of age. Approaching forty, he was himself becoming a figure of the past, towards which his thoughts quite naturally tended. He crossed Columbus Circle and began to walk up Broadway, stiffening his back and stepping out smartly.
* * *
KRAVEN REPLENISHED HIS DRINK at the makeshift bar and returned to the hubbub in the main room, the ‘salon,’ as Liz Papadakis called it. He had just spent a few ghastly minutes with Zinka Bleistift, the department’s most militant pacifist and most conspicuously publishing scholar. She had attached herself to him like a suckerfish. ‘Nickolino, hi! Haven’t seen you in simply eons! Not avoiding me, you sexy man? Tell me all about my new book, why don’t you.’ She was a tall dark creature already past the half-century mark, who possessed a huge nose that hung down limply over fleshy lips. Over her left nipple this evening she wore a brooch advising TRY GOD!, whether suggesting a new course of holy living or urging the indictment of the Almighty, Kraven was unsure. She had shaken him by the hand but had failed to let go, paddling his palm with her forefinger. ‘I’m a woman of profound moral convictions, whose strong sexual urges must be satisfied if I’m not to fall into looseness.’ With her other hand she had nervously picked shreds of nicotine from her tongue, the glowing tip of her cigarette almost burning her nose. ‘I rather think I feel a strong pulsation now! Yes, yes, that old black magic, Nick. Here.’ And she had conveyed his hand to her brooch, holding him clamped in place. ‘Tell me you feel it too.’
‘Ari’s looking for you. I think he went into the den.’
‘No kidding?’ She had released his hand immediately. ‘I think I’ll toddle off then.’ The rumours long circulating of hanky-panky in high departmental places were perhaps true after all.
The salon was filled with the usual Papadakis crowd, mostly ageing colleagues and their mates, shrill faculty wives or grunting husbands, accumulated in undiscriminating salad days and not now abandoned in the sere and yellow leaf. In a corner one of Papa Doc’s graduate students, alone, earnestly awkward among such luminaries, pretended interest in a gloomy gouache, petals on a wet black bough, the work, of Honoria, his hosts’ teenage daughter. Baxter Gosson, the department’s only living Emeritus, stood with his back to the fireplace, cocktail glass in hand, smiling vacantly and toasting whoever passed across his line of vision. Milo Thaler, resident poet, a young man who carried misery about with him like an open umbrella, hovered over Aubrey Lubert, music critic of a neighbourhood journal. Lubert was a regular at the ‘annual bash’, perhaps because he lived in the building. Dressed this evening in a dark-blue velvet tuxedo and bright red bow tie, he winked at Kraven and mouthed a tiny kiss.
Alone for the moment, Kraven sank gratefully into quality time, and while there he composed in his head a rhyme in that tight, short, complicated form called clerihew, the name of his cousin Marko’s college in London:
On again, off again,
A. Papadakis, the
Speedy Gonzalez of old Mosholu,
Fell on the floor atop
Lush Zinka Bleistift and,
Unzippered-trouseredly,
Started to screw.
The heat and the noise increased. People were still arriving. John Crowe Dillinger, the medievalist, was making his way to the bar. Now here was a man well worth cultivating. Without question the most incandescent of Mosholu’s luminaries, his appearance tonight was clearly something of a coup for the Papadakises. Dillinger was a meticulous scholar, a prolific author, who emerged from his study only to accept an award or to address some international symposium. The History Department did not require him to teach; it was enough that his name appeared in the catalogue and at the foot of a seemingly endless stream of first-rate publications. What on earth was Dillinger doing here?
Kraven, footing slow, followed the great man back to the bar.
‘Unexpected pleasure seeing you here, John.’
‘Eh?’ Dillinger eyed him suspiciously.
‘Kraven, English Department.’
‘Ah, of course, yes.’ He lowered his voice. ‘God, how I hate these faculty socials! Natter, natter, natter. No getting out of it this time, though. Diotima’s here, inside there somewhere. Our masters designated me her escort, and that was that. Jesus Christ! In any case, you’ll understand why I need this drink.’ He took a lusty swallow of scotch. His eyes narrowed. ‘She’s not, I take it, a particular friend of yours?’
‘Liz?’
‘Diotima, the Kraut, my date.’
‘I hardly know her.’ In fact, he knew her not at all.
‘Thought I might’ve put my foot in it.’
‘Never fear, your secret’s safe. Tell me, what’ve you been up to of late? Chipping away at some magnum opus, I’ll be bound – or rather, you will be.’ Kraven chortled.
‘Rather outside the limits of your interests, I imagine,’ said Dillinger coldly. ‘You’re a what’s-his-name man, aren’t you? The lunatic who sat around naked with his wife in the orchard?’
‘Blake? No, I’m a Shakespeare man, actually.’
‘Ah, yes, well. It’s possible, then, that you’ve heard of Geoffrey of Monmouth’s Historia Regum Britanniae?’
‘Lots of good stuff there.’
‘Precisely!’ He took Kraven’s arm in a sudden show of warmth. ‘I’ve been working on the Historia – and the Prophetae, of course.’ The great man winked and pulled at his ear. ‘Not so long ago, you know, Geoffrey’s writings were regarded as mere fabrication. Well, the tide’s turned – thanks in no small measure to yours truly, to put it modestly. It’s a matter of separating the wheat from the chaff. There’s a harvest to be garnered in Geoffrey. He’s a wily devil, though. You have to cross-check him, back and forth through the centuries. Gildas, Nennius …’
‘The Annales Cambriae?’
‘Why, yes,’ said Dillinger, delighted. ‘A bit late, of course, but frequently useful. I see you’re something of a medievalist yourself.’ Dillinger moved closer to Kraven and began to whisper, forcing him to bend over to hear his words. ‘Just between the two of us, tell me this: in your reading of Geoffrey did you ever get any sense that Merlin was … well, of the Hebraic persuasion?’
Kraven’s fingers, in the act of conveying a clutch of peanuts to his mouth, dropped their load into Dillinger’s scotch. His legs felt drained of their power to hold him up.
‘Feibelman!’
‘What? See here, Kraven, are you all right? You look as if you’ve seen Banquo’s ghost.’
Kraven rallied. ‘It’s nothing, the noise, the heat. I’m fine.’ He held on to Dillinger for momentary support. ‘The answer to your question, John, is yes. I’ll go further. I’ve not merely sensed he was Jewish, I’m convinced he was.’
‘Convinced? I don’t think I’d go that far – although I can make out a pretty good case.’
‘You know the Apologia pro vita Grylli, of course.’
‘Yes, but not as well as I probably should. What’s the Apologia to do with Merlin?’
‘It seems that Gryllus actually met a Myrddin.’
‘A common enough name in sixth-century Wales,’ said Dillinger doubtfully.
‘Ah, but he refers to this Myrddin as poeta, vates, magus. He tells us, moreover, that he was completely off the wall, bonkers.’
‘The Battle of White Chapel,’ Dillinger breathed.
‘Exactly. But here’s my point; Gryllus jots down one of Myrddin’s spells.’ Kraven paused. He had the great man now. ‘Making reasonable allowances for Gryllus’s faulty memory, John, for his mishearing, for his ignorance, Myrddin’s “spell” was without question the Hebrew blessing over wine!’
‘Jesus Christ!’
‘There it is. Go take a look.’
‘So I was right all along! D’you know what we have here? Can you understand? Jesus Christ, this is bigger than t
he Dead Sea Scrolls!’ Dillinger swallowed a half-tumbler of whisky in a gulp. Sweat beaded his brow. ‘We can’t sit on a thing like this. Look, the Royal Arthurian is meeting at Clerihew next month. London might be the place to go public.’
‘I had thought of a monograph…’ Kraven let his eyes grow wistful. ‘But no, too many irons in the fire, spreading myself too thin. It’s yours for what it’s worth.’ Here was true generosity of spirit; but here, too, was prudent foresight: Clerihew meant an almost certain encounter with Professor C.U.T. Quimby, an encounter he dared not chance. ‘Anyone who’d given half a thought to Merlin’s provenance might have stumbled on it. You yourself, after all.’
‘That’s very good of you, Kraven, very good. But the credit for the discovery’s yours, I’ll see to that. The hell with London, why wait that long? What about UCLA? I’m chairing the Arthurian section at the Institute of Med-Ren Studies, the seasonal chinwag. That’s sooner. You’re going, of course?’
‘Inadvertently I allowed my membership to lapse.’
‘The college will provide. I’ll speak to our masters, they owe me for tonight.’ He thumped Kraven heartily on the back. ‘Well, I’m off. There’s work to be done.’ He paused, frowning. ‘Damn Diotima! Look here, Kraven, you’ll take care of her for me, won’t you? Make my apologies, and so on? Remember, we’re off to Los Angeles. We’ll tell the world, my boy. My secretary’ll make all the arrangements, give you the precise dates and so forth; the Dean’ll speak to Papadakis. See you at JFK.’
Kraven beamed, his heart fluttering cheerily. An unexpected semester break on the West Coast, all expenses paid, had much to recommend it. Besides, a word passed from Dillinger to Pioggi to Papadakis would nicely boost his credit in the department. Of course, it might perhaps not be entirely cricket, actually to go to LA. An image of wheezing, sweating Feibelman presented itself to his inner eye. The old man had nudged Kraven towards the discovery, after all. He should not be entirely forgotten. Surely it would be possible to make some generous and offhand reference to a student of his who had clumsily and all-unwittingly stumbled on the truth.
Liz Papadakis bore down on him, cleaving through the press, drawing in her wake a rotund crone whose upper teeth preceded her as if gnawing out a passage. The crone wore an evening gown of moss green stained dark at the armpits, a gown like herself a relic of another era.
‘Professor Dillinger’s not leaving, I hope,’ said the crone.
‘You know, Diotima, don’t you, Nick?’ said Liz, ‘Diotima von Hoden?’
‘How d’you do,’ said Kraven.
‘You bet,’ said Diotima von Hoden. She closely resembled the late Eleanor Roosevelt.
‘Have you seen Ari?’ said Liz.
‘He’s probably with Zinka. She was looking for him too. Splendid party, Liz.’
‘Thanks.’ Her eyes misted rapidly. ‘Zinka, you said?’
‘Well, possibly.’
‘Look, if you see Ari, tell him from me to get his fat ass into the kitchen. We’ve got a fucking buffet to set up.’ And Liz, gamely swallowing, dashed off, blowzy, stringy hair falling in her plump face, one thumb attempting in vain to conceal a twisted brassiere strap beneath the shoulder of her tight dress.
Kraven was thus left with Diotima, who had him wedged with his back to a corner. There was no way he might gracefully escape. This was the woman the slippery Dillinger had relinquished to his care.
Diotima was eyeing him through narrowed lids, her head cocked to one side, as if she were guessing his weight. ‘We were not fully introduced, such charming American informality. But I am at a disadvantage, so unfair. Mrs Papadakis did not give me your final name.’
‘Poore-Moody,’ said Kraven, ‘Robert Poore-Moody. My friends call me Nobby.’ How easily – too easily! – the untruths nowadays slid off his tongue.
‘Ah, but why then did Mrs Papadakis say Nick?’
‘The Old Nick, an in-joke, too embarrassing to explain.’
‘I understand. We won’t talk of it.’
It was Kraven’s turn again. Diotima was looking at him eagerly. ‘What is it you do, if I may ask, Fräulein von Hoden? What, as Ari would say, is your area of special competence?’
‘Love.’
‘No, I meant academically.’
‘The European love lyric.’ Her laugh was surprisingly youthful. ‘I’m a guest of your Comparative Literature Department. They sponsor my visit here. The famous Dick-stein Lectures, you know. Five days in New York, three public addresses. Then for me it is off to Russell Square for a week of grinding at the British Library. Indeed, I hold a Dozentur at Heidelberg.’
‘Of course, I should have realized. Perhaps I know some of your work.’
‘Not much has been translated,’ said Diotima doubtfully. ‘But who knows? You read German?’
‘Aber natürlich.’
‘And speak it too. But the accent, so slight… Viennese? You’re not an American? No, of course not. Herr Robert Poore-Moody is a man of mystery. Let me see…’ Diotima put a wrinkled finger to a recessive chin, held her head to one side, and smiled flirtatiously. ‘Poore-Moody, Poore-Moody … hmmm. Poehr-Mutig? Of course, of course! The old duke, one sees it in the nose. Turn your face, so, a little more, yes, the profile. Wait, yes, and the Esterhazy chin. One does not expect to encounter the best of the old aristocratic blood here in the New World. You are appearing incognito, your nobility?’
‘Ahem.’
‘Fear not, your nobility, I am mum.’ She put a finger to her lips and then wagged it at him impishly. ‘But I must find out all about you. The spirit of scholarly inquiry demands it. From which side of the blanket did Childe Poore-Moody emerge? What will I find in the Alamanach de Gotha? It is certain that you have a past.’
Kraven created on his face an expression to suggest hidden sorrows, private griefs. This in his view was one of his better expressions. The thing was to create a formula, that is, to visualize with the mind’s eye a set of objects, a situation, a chain of events that evoked a particular emotion.
‘Jesus, Nick, you look rum, must be something you ate. I keep telling Liz she puts too much ipecac in the dip. For that matter, watch out for the meatballs when they finally reach the groaning board. Trust me, it will not groan alone. Tabasco, that’s the secret of the Elizabethan meatball. But don’t let on I told.’
Solidly ursine, Aristotle Papadakis lumbered up behind Diotima and dropped a pale hairy paw on to her shoulder. His face looked as if it had been crudely etched on a bag of damp putty, or perhaps as if there were within the head some independent yeasty matter that, swelling after its nature, had minimized the definition of the external features. At the moment he had on the side of his neck what appeared to be a large fresh hickey.
‘You’re a sly son of a gun, Nick. You’ve found the prettiest girl in the room, and you’re keeping her all to yourself.’ Diotima fluttered her eyelashes madly. ‘Missed your lecture today, Di, damn it. What was it again?’
‘The Imagery of Self-Abuse in the Poetry of German Romanticism.’
‘Right on!’ Papa Doc rather liked such expressions, his use of which placed him, he thought, at the barricades with the seekers after a better world. (Earlier that evening he had greeted Kraven at the door with a manic ‘Hey, man, what’s happening? Gimmee skin!’)
‘Ari, my dear chap,’ said Kraven, ‘a message from the fair Liz. She has present need of you. Tell him, she said, to get his fat ass into the kitchen. Those were her very words.’
‘Good fucking Christ! Can’t she even put together a goddam fucking buffet without me!’
Papa Doc had exploded into a general conversational lull. Heads turned in their direction from every part of the salon. Over by the window Gosson, the emeritus, dribbling, raised his glass to them. ‘Up yours,’ he said amiably. Talk picked up again.
Shocked at his outburst, Papa Doc strove to recreate his earlier bonhomie. The fire was leaving his cheeks and, but for the hickey, his neck. The old familiar pallor was reasserting itse
lf. ‘We kid each other a lot, Liz and I. Don’t want Di here to get the wrong idea. Hell, we’ve got more than twenty years under the bridge. A little kidding here and there, kinda keeps the juices flowing. Having a good time, Di? Right on! Say, better watch out for this guy.’ Papa Doc winked at Kraven and gave him a chummy nudge. He was rapidly recovering his buoyancy, the stuff of which successful chairmen are made. ‘Well, duty calls. I hate to leave you special people.’
‘Right on, Ari,’ said Diotima, a quick study. Papa Doc lumbered off. ‘A charming couple the Papadakises, so sym-patisch don’t you think?’
‘Absolutely,’ said Kraven. ‘They’re everybody’s favourites.’
The salon was less crowded now. People had begun drifting into the dining room; others were returning juggling paper plates piled high with food, plastic knives and forks, and styrofoam cups of wine. Liz, evidently unable or unwilling to wait any longer for Papa Doc’s fat ass, had launched the buffet on her own. It was after eleven. The salon was a wreck. Ashtrays were filled to overflowing; empty glasses and dishes, spilled drinks, crushed potato crisps, wayward globs of dip, soiled napkins cluttered the surfaces. The smoke hung at eye level.
‘Shall we get something to eat?’
‘Not for me, thank you. I’m watching my figure.’
‘I’ve been watching it all evening,’ said Kraven gallantly.
‘Ach, you naughty boy,’ said Diotima, delighted. ‘Now I must be on my way. I think, a pity, no? But the hour is so late; the jet makes a horrid lag, yes? Do you know where in the world is Professor Dillinger?’
‘Home with his books, I believe. A flash of inspiration that has cast the last decade of the sixth century into a strange new light.’