The Traymore Rooms: A Novel in Five Parts

by Norm Sibum

  The tentative tone of her inquiry suggested there was something stuck in the corner of her eye. Moonface the girl could see it was an item to dread; the woman could but stammer.

  ‘There are standard operating procedures,’ I said, ‘but poetry and whiskey usually do it for me.’

  ‘And if those don’t work?’

  ‘Then you’re beyond help.’

  ‘Avuncular, Randall.’

  ‘Shoo. Go away.’

  Fuzzy and Buzzy

  The oneirocritical functions of my brain were playing me silly, so I surmised, as when I dreamed I must go and write about onions. I went to the library and read up on the subject, to wit, allium cepa—edible bulb. The green onion, the chive, the garlic, the leek, the scallion, the shallot. Did I not know my onions? Which is to say, of what had I any expertise? I feel all fuzzy and buzzy, said Baby Doll, Vacarro’s hand presumably on her knee. The leek was sacred to Apollo, the onion to Isis. I had enough of myself and my fuzziwuzziness in the library. The smile of the clerk at her check-out counter had all the politically correct healing properties of this week’s trendiest herb. In a certain phantasmagorical land, what is not gelded in life is neutered in death and deified on postage stamps. Such was the reflection I carried away with me from my pilgrimage to a temple of books, the maples still, sun glorious. And on a certain noble boulevard, I ran into Dubois. He was returning from his office, whereabouts unknown, just that I was beginning to suspect it was in the next district over of pricey boutiques and overrated restaurants. His smile said: ‘We have to stop meeting like this.’

  ‘Just back from the library,’ I said. ‘I was reading up on the noble onion.’

  Dubois reached for a rejoinder, but there was none immediately forthcoming. Then his smile brightened: ‘Ail des bois,’ punned Dubois at the expense of his name, ‘I’ve eaten it myself.’

  We stood useless in the street. We would meet later on our favourite terrasse.

  As it was at hand, I went and sat in the little park, the one shaped like the prow of a ship or an arrowhead. Pigeons, sparrows, crows. A thoughtful squirrel. Since when had I ever encountered a thoughtful squirrel? The shadows were still crisp of a late morning. One might lull oneself to sleep with thoughts of well-being, flowers bright and lively against granite and shadowed brick. The cast and crew of Baby Doll, in the year 1956, did not believe they had filmed anything untoward, though of course the sex as presented was pure erotic burbling, pungent, oily, sulfuric. Israelites fondly recalled the onions they had eaten in Egypt. It was here in this park I had last seen Echo, who was now, by all accounts, dulled, after a fashion, drug regimens making for vacancies in her round eyes. Miss Meow walked by in a heavy coat; she was on the arm of her newfound but smaller companion, a woman who had the look of an entity who had never known a dark moment. I supposed it was possible. Were they to pass through shadow and disappear among the dappled maple leaves, proto-angels, well, why not?—more power to them.

  I enjoyed all the sports when I was a boy. Football, baseball, basketball, tennis, to be sure. There were the games we invented from which stemmed epic contests, no quarter given. We observed, I have to say, a crazy, byzantine code of justice for whenever disputes arose, and it worked. And any girl who could handle a bat was, willy-nilly, on equal footing with any male would-be slugger. One way my father had of not completely alienating my affections was to keep me well-stocked with athletic gear, and in this, no matter the neighbourhood in which we happened to reside, my popularity was vouchsafed. When one had in one’s possession the toniest catcher’s mitt or first baseman’s trapper for blocks around, the shiniest and sleekest bats, one could count on the unfailing company of friends. From this state of affairs, though it was a gradual process, one expedited by the travails of high school, to state it briefly, I passed from ‘popular’ to ‘loner’. Somewhere along the way, poetry reared its ugly or lovely head, depending on one’s point of view. One assumed the making of it was as natural to the order of things as polishing the family car or roping calves or joining a thespian club just to be near some girl. One was shocked to discover it was not. One went on to assume that the practice of poetry was the one last, honest endeavour left to humankind. One was further shocked to discover it was not. Whither are you whirling me away, O Bacchus, to what sacred grove et cetera? Enough. Now and then, residence in the Traymore Rooms brought me back to my old place of esteem among fellow beings. Drinking on the Blue Danube terrasse was a kind of play; one brought to it one’s stock of conversation. Even so, though Eggy wished to see the bastards hang, to politics and metaphysics he preferred sex and his loopy memories of the same. How he ran afoul of the FBI. (Dubois was skeptical of this.) How he drank with Sophia Loren in Innsbruck. And then it was Ava Gardner or Lana Turner or that minx, what was her name, oh, Natalie Wood. One knew then that Eggy was making it all up. Even so, he was an unceasing fountain of verse committed to memory. I supposed ologists had an explanation for the miracle that, in old age, in regards to memory, one’s centre of gravity shifts. I, for one, believed that Eggy, were the conditions right, would recite such liturgy as was mouthed by King Numa, priestly office part of his résumé, crops, animals and marriage rites the mandate. It was Eggy who divulged to me the fact that Dubois got a kick out of my person. It was easy enough, I figured, to amuse an arch-materialist with one’s shabby superstitions. As for Eleanor, I had been replaced in my role as confidante by Marjerie Prentiss, and, on occasion by Phillip Dundarave. If she was a well-camouflaged deity, which herbs were sacred to her? Once again the question arose: just how much longer could Eleanor rely on such forbearance and patience as Dubois seemed to have in spades? Though they always maintained separate digs, there was much they had done together, including travel. And now? Dubois’s vanity was not the sort of vanity that fatally compromised relationships, but perhaps the man was sufficiently vain he would go about the world in his years of seniority as he did when he was boffo on campus. Moonface was not the beauty that Caroll Baker had been, but every now and then one got the look; that is to say, some power emanating from some remote fastness of her being ventured out and sampled the air, and it could turn one’s knees to jelly. No doubt, the celebratory cause of sex had been grossly cheapened—too much mindless celebrity, but even Moonface might muddle through, perhaps on the strength of Eggy’s traversals in the matter. Why else had she visited the old bugger nearly every morning, walking across the hall from her place to his in her pajamas and robe, to gossip and wink conspiratorially? Due to Champagne Sheridan, these visitations were now curtailed. But perhaps she had found a trail that had not long since gone cold and so, seen her way clear to a modicum of love and contentment as ought to satisfy any citizen of a phantasmagorical land. Then again, that she was in my room so recently; that she believed she had yet again found the love thing not quite as advertised—it was not the best of signs.

  Caligula’s excuse was that he was mad, bonkering mad; besides, he was vulnerable to every assassin’s knife. We had no such excuses, we in our suburban constellations so many self-empowering, self-enabling mall cashiers with a soft spot in our hearts for drive-in churches and the winks and nods of the Unitary Executive. And then, speaking of devils, here was Eggy, behind him Moonface. There was Dubois half a block away. And lo, there were, coming from the opposite direction, Eleanor and Marjerie on the arms of Phillip Dundarave, he a yesteryear Parisian dandy squiring his debs. Now was our noble boulevard a particle smasher. Eggy hove-to at the table I occupied and seated himself. Moonface continued on inside without a word of greeting.

  ‘My bell,’ thundered Eggy.

  Cassandra brought it, and it tinkled, I supposed, with undue respect for the thunderer.

  And Eggy thanked her. Dubois, however, at the sight of the threesome headed his way with every intention, apparently, of stopping by the café for drinks, stopped and consulted himself as to where he stood on the matter. It was a quick consultation; he was, after all, a gamer. He resumed his progress. As Moonface mig
ht, I rolled my eyes.

  And, at the next table over, the jovial threesome parked themselves.

  ‘Hail fellows, well-met and all that rot,’ Eleanor called out, feeling no pain, silly smile backlit, as it were, by her freshly gilded curls.

  ‘Hail yourself,’ Eggy responded, not in the least intimidated.

  Marjerie Prentiss said nothing, her eyes on Dubois, who now gained the terrasse, his eyes searching Eleanor, then Eggy and I. It was an embarrassment of riches: at which table should he park? It seemed to hit him then: he was going to be gamed, no matter which table he chose.

  ‘Effing hell, sit down, you twit,’ thundered Eggy, deciding for him.

  ‘Hey, Bob,’ said Eleanor, ‘didja know those who do it more live longer?’

  There was pain in her voice, and derision too. Pain and derision manifested in her now and then, like monsoon rains. There was in the eyes of Bob Dubois a sudden hunger for peace and quiet.

  Moonface stepped out to see what we wanted to drink. My eyes caught the promise of a breast sheathed in its cup. If she noticed, she did not let on. Otherwise, she was not in good humour. She collected our orders.

  ‘Did you see that?’ asked Eggy.

  ‘See what?’ said Dubois.

  ‘Her eyes. They’re all purple underneath.’

  ‘No sleep,’ I said.

  ‘Maybe her Sheridan beat her about,’ Eggy suggested.

  ‘You sure have an imagination,’ observed Dubois.

  ‘I do not. Effing hell.’

  Then to me, Eggy put this question: ‘Do you think she’s going to find herself?’

  ‘Who knows,’ I shrugged, ‘it’s not easy to tell about her. She’s a chameleon.’

  ‘You’re always saying that,’ said Eggy, ‘but I tell you what, it’s the rain in Spain. Bloody effing hell, no one pays me any mind.’

  And I did not think Phillip meant anything by it when he, perversely Anglo, remarked that for every by-law the English dreamed up, the other official half of the polity dreamed up three. Dubois seethed. It was an assault on the fact he had elected to live his life by enlightened rules. Eleanor laughed. Eleanor shook a pompadoured foot, one in solidarity, perhaps, with the wrong faction. From such a one as Eggy, Dubois might accept insults, but Eggy was the limit. The sight of Eleanor’s ankle erring on the side of a cheap shot might have vexed me as well, had I the pleasure of her intimacies as Dubois certainly had, and for once, I believed he loved her. His chin about to raise his chest, Eggy perked up his ears; even he could sense something was amiss with remarks that would have been, otherwise, so much barnyard noise. Marjerie studied Dubois, as did Phillip, realizing now, inadvertently or not, he had rung someone’s bell. Moonface brought beer and wine, and no, she had no sense of who might prevail in the American general election; in Canada, however, Current PM would hold his position. Sometimes, it was like this: she spoke as if she had authority on the subject at hand. Eleanor, I believed, had no idea with what incendiary material she was playing. Marjerie sat there, a woman quietly supreme among rivals, snipping at yet another sinew of Phillip’s self-respect. And by this or that gesture, she staged her charms to advantage, my sinews in no better shape than overused and brittle elastics. Dubois took a deep breath. His tone unusually pedantic, even for him, he began to patiently explain the weaknesses each of Harper and Dion, gladiatorial opponents in a possible snap election. Rotweiler versus unicorn. I said, more in hopes of forestalling hostilities than in advancing the cause of understanding: ‘But with the one, all one hears are the shutting tight of sphincters. The man’s what they call a control-freak. And what with his glass jaw, should anyone actually manage to deliver a hit, and no one’s managed it yet, he’ll shatter. Trudeau, Chrétien—they could shrug things off.’

  Dubois’s guffaw should have been more full-bodied; it came off as a squeal.

  Eggy, raising his finger, thundered: ‘Yes but—’

  He lost his train of thought. The cumulus above was impressive.

  ‘Yes but, well, Mulroney, you know, and, effing hell, have you ever seen Mila shop? I have.’

  And Eggy was grim with self-satisfaction, he who had had drinks with Sophia Loren or somebody in Innsbruck, and had seen the wife of an ex-prime minister buy herself shoes. What sort of homeopathies would have had favour at Caligula’s court?

  Quiet Night

  I left the Blue Danube, the wild west show of the terrasse, the Roman bacchanal, beer-tent aspect of it all; Dubois going on about Chrétien the knife fighter, Eggy the Balfour Declaration. I was drifting into virtue and self-righteousness—always dangerous, inwardly moping on account of the waning prospects for truth-telling in the U.S. of A., my alma mater, as it were; that the citizens there wanted change, but not so much change as would compromise their lines of credit. And I knew I was profligate, oh, not with money, perhaps, but with matters of the spirit; that I pursued the pleasures; that I was, even so, cenobitic; that I was half-infatuated, still, with Moonface, even as I could see she was lost, was awfully confused, and inappropriate; that I could see my failures in her eyes that now and then claimed me as their trophy. As for the future in a general sense, that one whose bones public intellectuals were already fighting over even as we spoke, it was as if I lacked the social skills for the forced marches out of bondage that were imminent. Eleanor, Marjerie and Phillip occupied an echo chamber of their own; relations had grown elaborate between them, this much was obvious, though I could not follow every turn of their talk. But it seemed Marjerie had had an abortion when she was not yet beyond her teens, and that Phillip, well, he had every intention of doing right by his daughter. Eleanor, I supposed, fulfilled the role of den mother, supplied cookies and lemonade for such intrepid scouts as made it home from each their rites of passage, merit badges in hand; and I was a little surprised and a trifle vexed when Eleanor appeared at my door, looking disconsolate. She was armed with amaretto; it was her peace offering though war was as yet undeclared, its objectives, in any case, ineffable. I should have done the good woman the courtesy of a show of compassion when she confessed that, yes, she had been behaving like a jerk. My silence in the matter caused shadows to gather in her eyes (and I could never get to the bottom of their true colour—gray, green, flecks of topaz?). She looked as summery as she had an hour ago, looked sumptuous in her blouse and denims; her allure, the guarantor of dreams now largely irrelevant, given what had shifted over the past years, less viable in the winner-take-all economies of desire. Eleanor commandeered the couch; I got us drinking glasses.

  ‘Yes,’ said Eleanor, ‘I’ve been a shit. Well, aren’t you going to say something?’

  ‘Don’t know what to say,’ I replied.

  ‘You’re always saying something—’

  ‘That doesn’t mean I’m saying anything—’

  If I was ridiculous and she sumptuous, we were both veering toward the absurd.

  ‘Bob loves you,’ I said.

  ‘So what that he loves me, he won’t marry me.’

  ‘Well, I’ve run out of grand things to say for love,’ I said, ‘just that, in the end, in spite of everything, we do come to care for each other. I don’t know how, I don’t know why, but it happens. Cynic that I am, I have to say it seems to me this fact sometimes defies all odds.’

  ‘You’re not a cynic. You’re a romantic, and a damn fool.’

  ‘Alright, Bob doesn’t love you, but he cares for you.’

  ‘What do you mean, he doesn’t love me?’

  I wished to believe in Moonface’s theatre of self-empowerment; that is to say, I wished to believe she was truly proud, and not just putting on a show for her various mentors. Boffo spoke, and he sounded more like some dreaded grief counsellor than a circus performer afflicted with a perpetual case of the giggles: ‘Your desire for marriage is a chimera. You want a prize, not a husband. True, the one addresses some need in you, but the other would—’

  ‘Calhoun, for God’s sake, you’ve gotten boring. Either kiss me, say something that ma
tters, or get off the proverbial pot.’

  ‘Why would I want to kiss you?’

  ‘Because you want to.’

  ‘What makes you say that?’

  ‘Because all men want to kiss me. Because I don’t mind that all men want to kiss me, only I don’t necessarily want to kiss all of them.’

  ‘What would you say if I said, no, I don’t want to kiss you, at least not now.’

  ‘I’d say it again: you’re a damn fool.’

  ‘I’d say I don’t want any trouble.’

  ‘That’s all men want from a woman: no trouble. That’s what Bob wants from me: no trouble.’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘Oh, perhaps to you, too.’

  ‘You don’t do me justice.’

  ‘You’re so, I don’t know what, so prissy, sometimes. Effing Quaker.’

  ‘Thanks for that.’

  ‘Alright, Randall, I’ll simmer down. Can’t hurt for a girl to try. It was Marjerie’s estimation, by the way, that you’re prissy.’

  ‘What does she know? She’s a piranha in a goldfish bowl. Everyone’s prissy to her. She thinks she’s the antidote to political correctness, liberal puritanism.’

  ‘You really don’t like her.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I suppose I love Bob. No, I do. He was a great travelling companion. We haven’t travelled in a while.’

  ‘He carried your luggage, did he?’

  ‘There he is, the real Randall, sarcastic to the bone, even if he is a dreamer.’

  ‘It’s the true condition of the poet.’

  ‘Poet schmoet.’

  We were almost managing it, pure dialogue, one untrammelled with the machinations of thought.

  ‘You can’t change the world, you know,’ so the good woman reminded me.

  ‘I never expected to. I’m still holding out for a little justice, though.’