“Like children,” said Jasper Gwyn.
The old man nodded in agreement. Like all artisans he spoke only as he worked, and in his case this meant holding in his fingers some small bulbs, as if they were eggs, and immersing them in an opaque solution that looked vaguely like a distillate. The purpose of the operation was openly inscrutable. Then he dried them with a hair dryer as old as he was.
They wasted a lot of time digressing on the nature of light bulbs, and Jasper Gwyn ended up discovering a universe whose existence he had never even suspected. He particularly liked learning that the shapes of light bulbs are infinite, but there are sixteen principal ones, and for each there is a name. In an elegant convention, they are all names of queens or princesses. Jasper Gwyn chose the Catherine de Médicis, because it looked like a teardrop that had escaped from a chandelier.
“Thirty-two days?” the old man asked when he decided that this man deserved his work.
“That’s the idea.”
“I’d have to know how many times you turn them off and on.”
“Once,” Jasper Gwyn answered, impeccable.
“How do you know?”
“I know.”
The old man stopped and looked up at Jasper Gwyn. He stared at him, so to speak, in the filament of his eyes. He looked for something that he couldn’t find. A crack. Then he lowered his gaze back to his work and his hands started up again.
“It will take a lot of care to transport them and mount them,” he said. “Do you know how to hold a bulb in your hand?”
“I’ve never wondered,” Jasper Gwyn answered.
The old man handed him one. It was an Elizabeth Romanov. Jasper Gwyn held it cautiously in the palm of his hand. The old man grimaced.
“Use your fingers. Like that you’ll kill it.”
Jasper Gwyn obeyed.
“Bayonet joint,” the old man stated, shaking his head. “If I give you the ones with screws you might do me in before they’re lighted.” He took back his Elizabeth Romanov.
They agreed that nine days later the old man would deliver to Jasper Gwyn eighteen Catherine de Médicis destined to go out in an arc of time that would vary between 760 hours and 830 hours. They would go out without gasping, in vain flashes, silently. They would do so one by one, in an order that no one could predict.
“We forgot to talk about the type of light,” said Jasper Gwyn as he was about to leave.
“What do you want?”
“Childlike.”
“All right.” They shook hands goodbye, and Jasper Gwyn realized that he had done so cautiously, just as, many years earlier, he had been accustomed to do with pianists.
22
Nice, said the woman in the rain scarf. She began to dry her umbrella on a radiator, and walked around examining the details from close up. The shoe rack, the warm colors of the carpets, the stains of dampness on the walls, of oil on the floor. She made sure that the bed was not too soft, and tried the armchairs. Nice, she said.
Standing in a corner of his new studio, his coat still on, Jasper Gwyn looked at what he had assembled in a month and a half, out of nothing, pursuing a foolish idea. He found no mistakes, and thought that everything had been done with attention and balance, in the same way a copyist could have arranged paper and pen on the table, put on the cloth oversleeves, chosen the ink, sure of recognizing the most appropriate shade of blue. He thought that he wasn’t wrong: it was a magnificent profession. For a moment the idea of a rusting iron nameplate on the door crossed his mind. JASPER GWYN. COPYIST.
“It’s surprising how pointless it all is in the absence of a model,” observed the woman in the rain scarf. “Or did I not see it?” she added, looking around with the air of one who is looking for the sauce aisle in the supermarket.
“No, no model, for now,” said Jasper Gwyn.
“I imagine there’s not exactly a line out the door.”
“Not yet.”
“Do you have an idea of how to resolve it, or are you going to put it off until the lease expires?”
Every so often the old woman’s tones reverted to those of a schoolmistress. That gruff way of caring about something.
“No, I have a plan,” answered Jasper Gwyn.
“Let’s hear it.”
Jasper Gwyn had thought about it at length. It was evident that he would have to hire someone, the first time, to test himself. But he would have to choose carefully, because a model who was too difficult would discourage him pointlessly, and one too easy wouldn’t push him to find what he was looking for. Nor was it easy to imagine what might be the right degree of acquaintance for that first experiment. A friend, so to speak, would make the job much easier, but would falsify the experiment, because he would already know too many things about him, and it wouldn’t be possible to look at him as at an unfamiliar landscape. On the other hand, to choose a perfect stranger, as logic would suggest, implied a whole series of embarrassments that Jasper Gwyn would prefer to spare himself, at least that first time. Apart from the difficulty of explaining the thing, of understanding the type of work they were to do together, there was that question of nudity—awkward. Instinctively, Jasper Gwyn felt that nudity was an indisputable condition. He imagined it as a kind of necessary goad. It would move everything beyond a certain limit, and without that uncomfortable dislocation he felt that no field would open up, no infinite prospect. So he had to resign himself. The model had to be nude. But Jasper Gwyn was a reserved man, and appreciated shyness. He had no familiarity with bodies and in his life had worked only with sounds and thoughts. The mechanism of a piano was the most physical thing he had had the opportunity to master. If he thought of a nude model, before him, what he felt was only a profound embarrassment and an inevitable bewilderment. So the choice of the first model was delicate, and the idea of choosing a perfect stranger imprudent.
Finally, just to simplify things somewhat, Jasper Gwyn had decided to exclude the idea of a man. He couldn’t do it. It was a matter not of homophobia but of simply being unused to it. There was no need to complicate life too much, in that first experiment: to learn to look at a male body was something that, for the moment, he preferred to put off. A woman would definitely be better, he wouldn’t be starting from zero. The choice of a woman, however, had implications that Jasper Gwyn was perfectly aware of. He added the variable of desire. He would like to start with a body that would be beautiful to discover, look at, spy on. But it was clear that making a portrait was an act that had to be sheltered from pure and simple desire, or that, at most, might start off from desire and then would let it, in some way, wane. Making a portrait had to be a matter of distant intimacies. And so too much beauty would have been out of place. Too little, on the other hand, would be a pointless affliction. What Jasper Gwyn sought was a woman who would be beautiful to look at but not so beautiful that he would end up wanting her.
“Let’s get to the point, did you find her?” asked the woman in the rain scarf as she unwrapped a citrus-flavored candy.
“Yes, I think so.”
“And so?”
“I have to find a way of asking her. It’s not that easy.”
“It’s a job, Mr. Gwyn, you’re not asking her to go to bed.”
“I know, but it’s a strange job.”
“If you explain it to her, she’ll understand. And if she doesn’t understand, a generous compensation will help her clarify her ideas. Because you’ve provided for a generous compensation, right?”
“I don’t exactly know.”
“What’s the matter, you’re becoming a skinflint?”
“No, it’s not that, come on, it’s that I don’t want to offend. Ultimately, it’s money in exchange for a naked body.”
“Of course, if you put it like that…”
“It is like that.”
“Not true. Only a puritan full of complexes like you could imagine describing the thing in those terms.”
“Do you have a better idea?”
“Of course.”
“Let’s hear it.”
“‘Miss, in exchange for five thousand pounds, would you allow me to look at you for around thirty days, just the time to transcribe your secret?’ It’s not a sentence that’s difficult to utter. Practice in front of the mirror, it helps.”
“Five thousand is a lot.”
“What are you doing, starting that again?”
Jasper Gwyn looked at her, smiling, and loved her dearly. For a moment he thought that it would have been simple with her, it would have been a perfect way to begin, with that woman.
“Forget it, I’m too old. You shouldn’t start with an old person, too difficult.”
“You’re not old. You’re dead.”
The woman shrugged. “Dying is only a particularly exact way of getting old.”
When he got home, Jasper Gwyn practiced a little in front of the mirror. Then he telephoned Tom Bruce Shepperd. It was two in the morning.
23
“Shit, Jasper, it’s 2 a.m. I’m in bed!”
“Were you sleeping?”
“Sleeping isn’t the only thing you can do in a bed.”
“Ah.”
“Lottie says hello.”
In the background he heard Lottie’s voice that, with no rancor, was saying Hi, Jasper. She was good-natured.
“I’m sorry, Tom.”
“Forget it. What is it, are you lost again? Should I send Rebecca to get you?”
“No, no, I’m not lost anymore. But, in fact… to tell you the truth, I wanted to talk to you about her.”
“About Rebecca?”
What Jasper Gwyn thought was that that girl was perfect. He had in mind how the unquestionable beauty of her face provoked a desire that her body then denied, with its slow, placid manner: perfect. She was poison and antidote—in a sweet and enigmatic way. Jasper Gwyn hadn’t met her a single time without feeling a childlike desire to touch her, just slightly: but as he would have liked to put his fingers on a shiny insect, or a steamed-up window. In addition, he knew her, but he didn’t know her; she seemed to be at the right distance, in that intermediate zone where any further intimacy would have been a slow but not impossible conquest. He knew that he could look at her for a long time without feeling uneasy, without desire, and without ever getting bored.
“Rebecca, yes, the intern.”
Tom burst out laughing.
“Hey, Jasper, we’ve got a weakness for fat girls?”
He turned to Lottie.
“Listen to this, Jasper likes Rebecca.”
In the background he heard Lottie’s sleepy voice saying Rebecca who?
“Jasper, big brother, you never stop surprising me.”
“Will you cut out the vulgar remarks and listen to me?”
“Okay.”
“It’s serious.”
“You’re in love?”
“It’s serious in the sense that it’s about work.”
Tom put on his glasses. Under the circumstances it was his way of opening the office.
“She persuaded you to do scenes from books that you’ll never write? I told you she was a smart girl.”
“No, Tom, it’s not about that. I need her for my work. But not that.”
“Take her. Provided you go back to writing, it’s fine with me.”
“It’s not so simple.”
“Why?”
“I want to make her my first portrait. You know, the thing about the portraits?”
Tom remembered it very well. “I’m not mad about that idea, you know, Jasper.”
“I know, but now it’s a different problem. I need Rebecca to come to my studio to pose for around thirty days. I’ll pay her. But she’ll tell me she doesn’t want to lose her job with you.”
“To pose?”
“I want to try it.”
“You’re crazy.”
“Maybe. But now I need that favor. Let her work for me for a month or so, and then you’ll take her back.”
They went on talking for a while, and it was a wonderful phone call, because they ended up discussing the profession of writing and things they both loved. Jasper Gwyn explained that the circumstances of the portrait appealed to him because they compelled him to force his talent into an uncomfortable position. He realized that the premises were ridiculous, but that was precisely what appealed to him, in the suspicion that if you removed from writing the natural possibility of the novel, it would do something to survive, a movement, something. He also said that the something would be what people would then buy and take home. He added that it would be the unpredictable product of a domestic and private rite, not intended to return to the surface of the world, and thus removed from the sufferings that afflicted the profession of writer. In fact, he concluded, we’re talking about a different profession. A possible name was: copyist.
Tom listened. He tried to understand.
“I don’t see how you will be able to get around the white arm resting softly on the hip or the gaze as luminous as an eastern dawn,” he said at one point. “And for that kind of thing, hard to imagine doing better than a Dickens or a Hardy.”
“Yes, of course, if I stop there defeat is certain.”
“You’re sure there’s something beyond?”
“Sure, no. I have to try, I told you.”
“Then let’s say this: I hand over my intern and don’t get in your way, but you promise me that if at the end of the experiment you really haven’t found something, you’ll go back to writing. Books, I mean.”
“What’s that, blackmail?”
“A pact. If you don’t succeed, you’ll do as I say. Start with the scenes from books you’ll never write, or whatever you want. But you give the studio back to John Septimus Hill and sign a nice new contract.”
“I could find someone else to come and pose.”
“But you want Rebecca.”
“Yes.”
“So?”
Jasper Gwyn thought that all in all he didn’t mind the little game. The idea that failure would take him back to the horror of the fifty-two things he never wanted to do again suddenly seemed to him galvanizing. In the end he agreed. It was almost three in the morning, and he agreed. Tom thought he was about to recover one of the few writers he represented whom he could truly consider a friend.
“Tomorrow I’ll send you Rebecca. In the Laundromat, as usual?”
“Maybe a somewhat quieter place would be better.”
“The bar of the Stafford Hotel, then. At five?”
“All right.”
“Don’t stand her up.”
“No.”
“Did I already tell you I love you?”
“Not tonight.”
“Strange.”
They spent another ten minutes talking nonsense. A couple of sixteen-year-olds.
24
The next day, at five, Jasper Gwyn appeared at the Stafford Hotel, but only out of courtesy, because in the meantime he had decided to forget about it, having reached the conclusion that the idea of talking to that girl was completely outside his ability. Still, when Rebecca arrived, he chose a quiet table, right against a window that looked onto the street, and the first remarks—about the weather and the traffic that at that hour made everything impossible—weren’t difficult. Eager to order a whiskey, he ordered an apple juice with ice instead and remembered some little pastries they did very well there. “For me, coffee,” said Rebecca. Like all truly fat people, she didn’t touch pastries. She was radiant, in her aimless beauty.
First they talked about things that had nothing to do with it, just to take the measure of things, as one does. Rebecca said that elegant hotels intimidated her somewhat, but Jasper Gwyn pointed out how there are few things in the world as nice as hotel lobbies.
“The people who come and go,” he said. “And all those secrets.”
Then he let out a confession, something he didn’t usually do, and said that in another life he would like to be a hotel lobby.
“You mean work in a lobby?”
“No, no, be a lobby, physically. Even in a three-star hotel, it doesn’t matter.”
Then Rebecca laughed, and when Jasper Gwyn asked her what she thought she’d like to be in the next life, she said, “An anorexic rock star,” and she seemed to have had the answer ready forever.
So after a while everything was simpler, and Jasper Gwyn thought he could try it, say what he had in mind. He took a slightly roundabout route, but that was, in any case, his way of doing things.
“May I ask if you trust me, Rebecca? I mean, are you sure that you’re sitting across from a well-brought-up person who would never put you in situations that are, let’s say, disagreeable?”
“Yes, of course.”
“Because I’d like to ask you something rather strange.”
“Go ahead.”
Jasper Gwyn chose a pastry, he was searching for the right words.
“You see, I recently decided to try to make portraits.”
The girl bowed her head almost imperceptibly.
“Naturally I don’t know how to paint, and in fact what I have in mind is to write portraits. I don’t even know myself exactly what that means, but I intend to try it, and I had the idea that I would like to start by making a portrait of you.”
The girl remained impassive.
“So what I would like to ask you, Rebecca, is if you would be willing to pose for me, in my studio, pose for a portrait. To get an idea, you could think of what would happen with a painter, or a photographer, it wouldn’t be very different, that’s the situation, if you can imagine it.”
He paused.
“Shall I continue, or would you prefer to stop here?”
The girl leaned slightly toward the table and picked up the coffee cup. But she didn’t bring it to her mouth right away.
“Continue,” she said.
So Jasper Gwyn explained to her.
“I’ve taken a studio, behind Marylebone High Street, an enormous, peaceful room. I’ve put a bed in it, two chairs, not much else. A wooden floor, old walls—a nice place. What I would like is for you to come there, four hours a day for thirty days, from four in the afternoon till eight in the evening. Without skipping a day, not even Sunday. I would like you to arrive punctually and, whatever happens, stay for four hours, posing, which for me means, simply, being looked at. You won’t have to stay in a position that I choose, just be in that room, wherever you’d like, walking or lying down, sitting where you feel like. You won’t have to answer questions or talk, and I won’t ever ask you to do something particular. Shall I keep going?”
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