The Traymore Rooms: A Novel in Five Parts

by Norm Sibum

  ‘You know,’ I said to Moonface as she sat on the edge of my couch, cracking open a nut, ‘your life is going to take a turn, and this will prove to have been the last of it, our being able to pass the time like this.’

  ‘I know,’ she answered, her thin lips drawing tight against her incisors.

  The dear girl had come dangerously close to acknowledging that, between us, there was anything at all. She blushed anew. Were we not cowards to the extent that I, even if greatly her senior, had not truly ravished her while she, with all the arrogance and indifference of the young, had discounted my mentations as not rating much merit, being old hat? So much for Virgil. So much for the human cycle of gain and loss. So much for the corrupt and debased regime of Current President. She might, push come to shove, admit she was more afraid of her sexuality (and certainly, she feared her fits) than she was of thunder and lightning and old biddies of the church, but I supposed I could build a case that what she most feared was her intellect and its affinity with poetry; that she had gifts which she might end up wasting.

  ‘Reality trumped the gods,’ I said, ‘and we got poetry as a consolation prize, whether or no anyone cares to notice. Science in all its glory keeps rubbing salt in those old wounds, no matter how many physicists quote Dante. Poetry’s about the only thing we have to keep the house honest. That and love, even if it amounts to nothing more than a transience, a touch on the lips, and we’re briefly warmed, and then it’s gone and we’re cold. And then there’s logic. But that’s another can of worms and maybe I should just shut up.’

  Moonface gave me a look, she perhaps distressed. Damn it all. Damn the pedagogue. And Moonface said she had better be going. Busy day, including a doctor’s appointment. Yet another considered opinion on her epilepsy.

  ‘Randall,’ she said somewhat brightly in her best imitation of a worldly-wise woman, ‘you do go on. But I’m glad you do. No one else in my life does.’

  I went to the closet for her coat, I a silly man. She pulled on her seven leaguers, the magical boots. She put on her coat, jamming her hands into its pockets. A grin dimpled her face.

  ‘A kiss,’ she said, ‘you filthy beast.’

  A kiss, then—this at the door. She clambered down the Traymore stairs. In the corner of my eye, an unwanted presence. Marjerie Prentiss in a night shirt.

  ‘Expose Thyself to What Wretches Feel—’

  I stood at the window in the Traymore hall. Snow madly swirling off rooftops and sparrows at Mrs Petrova’s feeder were the spectacles of the moment. I was angry with myself, dipping into such mentations that were convinced most endeavours were futile. I had persisted in seeing in Emma MacReady aka Moonface what was not there—a young woman of special gifts. A typical liberal failing. I was silly with wanting to believe. Or perhaps it was even worse; that I wished her to recognize something in me that was her way through the inanities, and of course, she could not see it, seeing only a man past his prime, one who had failed all standard indicators of success. Now bare feet padded my way on a carpet. Can a bipedal creature, shark-like, smell blood? Now dead watery eyes said it all: Arabs were getting knocked about in Gaza. Marjerie Prentiss knew what was right and proper and who was civilized. That the weak got in the way of the strong. Her shoulders were hunched, the night shirt a faded blue. She rubbed the back of an ankle with a foot, her arms enclasping her chest. Her freckles almost danced. That is the way it was with her. No woman I had ever known could so simultaneously attract and repel.

  ‘Eleanor says you know everything,’ her dull voice boomed.

  ‘Eleanor is too kind,’ I said, ‘and anyway, I’m sure you’ve heard it: the more you know the less you know.’

  ‘No, I hadn’t heard it. And if I had I would’ve said it was a dumb thing to say.’

  Her eyes, for all they were watery, were burning through mine down to some core, and then beyond as we fell through space.

  ‘Care to escort me to my bed and play the groundskeeper?’

  ‘No.’

  Her grin declared I was in a state of untruth. But I was not just then telling an untruth.

  ‘Maybe another time,’ I said.

  ‘Why not now? It’s winter. The world’s cruel.’

  Her dull boom of a voice was falsely magnanimous.

  ‘Eleanor says you’re sweet.’

  ‘Hoo hoo. High level talks?’

  It was Eggy peering out his door.

  ‘Can I join in?’ he asked, ‘or shall I just get drunk?’

  ‘No,’ I said, sharply, ‘you may not join in, but, by all means, attend to your intake.’

  ‘Effing hell.’

  Then Eleanor. She of the gypsy skirt and pompadours. She who liked a circus. Dear old Eleanor.

  Dear old Eleanor took one look at the scene, at what was her pleasure to behold, and she tossed her gilded curls and laughed. It seemed to me Marjerie Prentiss looked a little chuffed at this, Eleanor’s laughter, perhaps, dismissive.

  ‘Expose thyself to what wretches feel,’ I quoted at Prentiss, now that there seemed an opening for the words.

  ‘King Lear,’ thundered Eggy, his finger raised, even if he had no effing idea what in effing hell was going on.

  Here was Dubois come up the stairs, his face radiant from the cold wind, his tuque very much the mark of a man of active life, as if he had just climbed Mt Everest and liked it.

  ‘You’ve all got mail,’ he noted, ‘checking my mailbox, I noticed.’

  ‘Well,’ he continued, ‘everybody seems to be having a good time.’

  ‘A great old time,’ said Marjerie, dull voice booming with menace.

  And Dubois, removing his gloves, looked at her with his glittering blue eyes like a connoisseur might, and he arrived at no particular conclusion. Either this particular woman was someone he could take in his stride at any hour of the day, or he was putting up a show. But either way …

  ‘Monsieur,’ said Eleanor, crooking her finger at him.

  Dubois grunted. The woman in the night shirt stole away like a ghost put to rout.

  Eggy beamed, for no rhyme or reason.

  ‘How’s the sidewalks?’ he put it to Dubois.

  ‘Passable,’ Dubois answered.

  Weather was everything.

  Ringing in the New Year

  It would have to have been richly comic, what transpired in the Traymore Rooms on New Year’s Eve. Or else the comedy was in Eggy’s depiction of the event, Dubois correcting the old sod’s errant grasp of details.

  ‘You’re always reminding me of my ignorance.’

  ‘No. But let’s be clear on the basics,’ said arch-materialist Dubois.

  ‘Roll me one of your ciggies,’ Eleanor commanded me.

  ‘Effing hell,’ thundered a homunculus.

  The heart of Traymorean society was in situ at the Blue Danube on the first day of the new year: Eggy, Dubois, Eleanor, and myself. Moonface was there as well in her capacity as a long-bellied waitress. Gregory was there, cappytan of the ship. Elias and Cassandra. Antonio was nursing his hangover.

  ‘Oh, let me kiss you,’ he breathed on Eggy’s pate.

  ‘Effing hell, eff off.’

  Moonface uncorked a fresh bottle of wine, her nails red again, the pop of the sprung cork ever so soft. Dubois: ‘That was the most delicate pop I’ve ever heard.’

  Eleanor: ‘Behave.’

  Eggy beamed. Dubois guffawed. I had missed the theatrics that featured nudity, coarse language, violence in the Traymore.

  ‘You know, she was starkers,’ said Eggy.

  ‘Starkers,’ said Dubois, unfamiliar with the import of the word.

  ‘Yes. In the all-together, you know.’

  ‘Well, Randall,’ Eggy continued, ‘you couldn’t know because you weren’t there. Because you went down the street to the Irish bar to drink with Moonface and Sheridan.’

  ‘Only because Gregory closed early last night,’ I pleaded.

  ‘That’s right, Gregory-Smegory, why did you close so early?’ Eggy t
hundered.

  Gregory smiled an apologetic and somewhat harassed smile, Cassandra tending to the ferns, Elias going about in circles, beyond the help of rhyme or reason.

  ‘That’s right,’ Eggy went on, ‘he closed early. So Bob and I go back to the Traymore. Eleanor was going to have us over—’

  ‘But I fell asleep,’ said Eleanor, ‘can you imagine that, me falling asleep on New Year’s Eve?’

  ‘So there she was, Marjerie, that is, there she was starkers except for that, what do you call it, that pink thing—’

  ‘Boa,’ said Eleanor, supplying a word.

  ‘Yes. There she was wearing nothing but that boa, packing a sidearm, walking up and down the hall. She was, hoo hoo, you know—’

  ‘She was kissing it—’

  ‘Yes, kissing it. Hoo hoo.’

  ‘She was kissing the gun?’ I asked.

  ‘Yes,’ replied Eggy, ‘she was, you know, intimate with it.’

  ‘So these are the unassailable facts,’ I said, a bit dubious.

  ‘Of course,’ thundered Eggy.

  ‘I have to say it’s what I saw,’ Dubois said, in support of a tiny sparrow of a man.

  ‘Well,’ I said, ‘then what?’

  Miss Meow and her companion were miaowing. The Whistler whistled and stomped. I had warned Eggy and Dubois not to go on about the recent business in Gaza because the sight of the man gloating might put me over the edge. It was bitter cold out. We, convened indoors, would make up, that afternoon, for what had been lacking the entire year previous: libations raised to the spectre of hope. For now was the year and now was the month Current President went his merry way to his legacy and President Elect would take office.

  ‘Well, now I’m not sure. What happened, Bob?’ Eggy asked.

  Dubois cleared his throat, his red cheeks florid, their hairline cracks emblematic of a man who, despite his recent travail, was vastly entertained.

  ‘It seems,’ he said, ‘that as I stood there, trying to get to the bottom of her intention or intentions, whatever they may have been, you hustled yourself into your apartment. Eleanor, like she said, was sleeping—’

  ‘It was a nice dream I was having,’ Eleanor confirmed.

  ‘And then I went into my apartment, debating whether or not to call the police. Or maybe I could bluff it out with her and get a hold of the gun. Then Ralph and Phillip showed up. And I thought, good, she’s their charge. That was going to be the end of it. She started to go back into her place. They couldn’t see she had a gun as her back was turned to them. So I had words with Ralph. “She’s got a gun. Do something about her.” Ralph’s face went white. Phillip just laughed. What a guy that guy is.’

  ‘And that’s when you came to wake me up and tell me,’ Eleanor now kicked in, ‘that she had an effing gun. So I got all the sleep out of my eyes and called the police. You can’t screw around with that. I didn’t want to see another corpse in the Traymore. One was enough. Then I thought, well, I should lock the door. Then we wondered, Bob and I, whom she meant to shoot. And then Bob said he thought Ralph could handle it. And I said I wasn’t so sure, and Phillip might be so drunk he just might cause something to get out of hand.’

  Dubois resumed the narrative: ‘So I went over there, which was kind of stupid. I was pretty nervous.’

  Dubois guffawed.

  ‘Our hero,’ Eggy beamed.

  ‘Hang on til I get back,’ Eleanor said, throwing on a coat to go out for a puff.

  ‘Me, too,’ I said.

  ‘Here, I’m getting to the nitty-gritty, and you’re going to have a smoke break—’

  Dubois was incredulous.

  ‘Effing hell. Where’s Moonface? Effing wench,’ Eggy thundered.

  We her only customers, Moonface had been in the restroom.

  ‘Settle down,’ said Dubois, mildly rebuking a god.

  ‘Good god,’ I said to Eleanor once we were outside.

  ‘Don’t we know,’ she answered, cupping the flame of my lighter with her hands, and inclining her head to it, ‘first the Lamonts, then Osgoode, now this.’

  I had nearly forgotten them, those previous tenants of the Traymore whose antics had incurred a police presence.

  ‘I just don’t get her, I really don’t,’ said Eleanor in respect to Prentiss.

  ‘Nor I,’ I agreed.

  ‘I’ll tell you what I think,’ said Eleanor, and crisply at that, ‘she didn’t want to shoot anybody. She wanted to scare someone, and I think she wanted to scare Bob. Because I followed him in, you know. Because, oh I don’t know, I couldn’t just let Bob … well … anyway, that’s what I did, I followed him in, and there was Ralph trying to talk her into giving him the gun. Phillip just stood there, swigging from a beer, smoking a cigarette. But he was watching her very closely. As soon as Bob shows up, the look she gave him. If looks could kill and all that. I mean, she pointed that thing right at him. For a minute there, I thought Bob was going to faint. I nearly did. “What in effing hell are you doing,” I yelled at her. She ignored me. Bob motioned me to shut up. Then Bob said the police had been called and they were coming. That’s when Marjerie gave Bob the gears about being French and thinking himself so clever when really, he was just full of himself, a know-it-all. Come on, let’s go back inside. I’m frozen through.’

  So back in we went, Eleanor and me. Evidently, Dubois and Eggy had now gotten Moonface up to speed.

  ‘You’re kidding,’ she was saying, rolling her eyes up and to the side, yes, in that way she has.

  How far away she had gotten from Traymorean life. Good for her, I supposed. Even so, I was not so sure.

  ‘Anyway,’ said Eleanor, ‘I got Randall up to the point where we were in Marjerie’s and she was aiming the gun at you.’

  ‘She wasn’t going to shoot me,’ Dubois avowed, and then was interrupted once more, as Moonface went to settle a customer’s bill, her hips swaying slightly.

  Dubois waited, and Eleanor studied his face. Perhaps it was a face she loved, though the universe was so vast nothing in it was certain.

  ‘But she was pointing the gun at you,’ Moonface burbled, returned now.

  ‘Yes she was, as a matter of fact,’ said Dubois, ‘so I tried to talk to her. I said I didn’t know what she had going on inside her head, but that she couldn’t be serious—’

  ‘And she said she was,’ Eleanor interjected, matter of fact.

  ‘Hoo hoo,’ said Eggy, ‘I’m sorry I missed that.’

  ‘No you’re not,’ Dubois replied, ‘and I’m sorry I didn’t miss it.’

  Moonface, to top up our glasses, poured. She and I exchanged glances.

  ‘So, what happened?’ I asked.

  ‘So I said, well, I didn’t know what to say. So I said the first thing that came into my head. I said, “What’s being French got to do with it?” And she said the French beat their wives. “Really,” I said, “my father didn’t. If anything, my mother beat him up. But they loved each other.” I guess she didn’t believe me. Then she just sort of started shaking and she lowered her arm, and Ralph stepped up and grabbed it, and anyway, the gun wasn’t loaded. That’s when I felt like slapping her one.’

  ‘I could’ve slapped her,’ Eleanor observed.

  ‘And then the police came,’ Dubois continued, ‘and then all the questions. And then, well, did we have to charge her? They thought I should. It’s a very serious matter, playing around with a firearm. I said I didn’t want to press any charges. They could do what they had to do. So they took her to the station, I guess, and Ralph and Phillip went along. And that’s all we know.’

  ‘Rot your socks,’ I said, raising my glass.

  ‘The rain in Spain. Always,’ said Eggy, tuckered out.

  A Letter

  Montreal, Qc., Canada

  The First Night of the New Year

  To: Evie Longoria