I Am Radar

by Reif Larsen

  • • •

  THEY FINISHED THEIR FOOD, and the plates were cleared. The last of the cognac was savored and dispensed with. Fabien disappeared into his famous cellar and came out with a rifle and three bottles of a vintage Bordeaux, a bottle of Johnnie Walker Gold, and a metal canteen of some local gin that smelled and tasted of gasoline.

  “Mais pourquoi le fusil, Fabien?” implored Yvette.

  “Parce que je suis ton protecteur.”

  At some point, the piano player stopped playing familiar medleys and seemed to devolve into experimental free jazz. The poodle shifted positions. Captain Daneri told them a long story about an island off Argentina inhabited only by women who never aged. At one point a glass was thrown across the courtyard into the fountain for emphasis.

  Fabien waved it away.

  “I own this place. I can do what I want,” he said, and with that, he stood up and shot his rifle into the air. Roosting birds fluttered away. The shot echoed across the courtyard. Lights turned on. A woman stuck her head out the window.

  “Qu’est-ce qui se passe?”

  “Tout va bien. Retournez vous coucher! Allez, au lit!” shouted Fabien angrily.

  After his sixth or seventh drink, Radar began to lose the sensation in his fingertips. The night expanded, contracted. The courtyard became all courtyards that were, that would be.

  Sometime past midnight, Otik and Lars announced that they had to be getting back to the boat.

  “But why?” moaned Daneri. “Where else would you rather be than here?”

  “Tomorrow is another day,” said Lars. He turned to Fabien. “Merci pour la nourriture et les boissons.”

  “Merci pour les conneries.”

  “Professor Funes.” Lars bowed. “We’ll see you at the docks tomorrow. We sleep on the ship, so we’ll be ready whenever you are.”

  As if by magic, Horeb had materialized again from the shadows.

  Yvette turned to Radar. “Are you going with them?”

  Radar stood up, slamming his knee into the table. The multitude of glassware shuddered.

  “Sorry,” he said. “I probably should.”

  “Oh, don’t,” she said. “The morning’s still not for a long time.”

  Radar looked at Lars, who raised his hands and said, “It’s your choice. We’re going, though.”

  “If it’s all right, then, I think I’ll stay,” said Radar.

  “Of course you’ll stay,” said Daneri. “That’s a good lad.”

  “Whatever you want,” said Lars. “But when the truck leaves, we leave. We don’t wait.”

  “Don’t worry,” said Daneri. “We’ll get him back to you in one piece.”

  At some point, the last of the wine was finished. As if on cue, the man at the piano stopped playing abruptly in the middle of one of his long, spastic compositions. He dramatically threw a sheet over the topless piano and then nodded, formally. Daneri, and Daneri alone, stood up and gave him a long, loud standing ovation. The poodle followed the piano player as he exited stage left.

  “It’s all so bloody brilliant,” said Daneri, collapsing back into his chair.

  Radar was just beginning to wonder why he had not gone home with the others when a figure appeared in the courtyard. It was Ivan.

  “Ivan!” he cried, waving with both hands. “We’re over here.”

  Radar could not remember when he’d last been so glad to see someone.

  “Hello, Radar,” said Ivan.

  “Yvette, Yvette, Yvette,” Radar said. “This is Ivan. He can sing. You should hear him sing. He knows everything about the stars. He’s the most amazing person in the world.”

  “Quels compliments,” said Yvette. “Enchantée.”

  “Madame.” Ivan kissed her hand. “Nous nous sommes déjà rencontrés.”

  “Vraiment?”

  “Ca fait quelques années.”

  “And he speaks French,” said Radar. “So that’s true.”

  “How did your business go?” grunted Daneri.

  “What business?” said Radar. “What business, Ivan?”

  “Your friend has interests in town. Do you want to tell them, Ivan?”

  “This town is no good,” said Ivan. “It’s dying.”

  “Careful, Mr. Kovalyov. We’re with the locals.”

  “We’re not locals.” Fabien lit a cigarette. “You act surprised. This town has been dying a long time. It’s our hobby to die. We quite enjoy it.”

  “Fabien, don’t be rude,” said Yvette. “They will never come back.”

  “They’ll come back. They are vultures. They pick at the body. Why else would they be here?”

  “For a woman,” said Daneri.

  “We’re here to do a show with birds,” slurred Radar. He put his hand over his mouth, but it was already too late.

  “Yes, tell us more, my little Harpo,” said Yvette. “Your friends are so mysterious. What is this all for? And what’s this about puppets? What are you really doing here?”

  Radar gazed across the table at her.

  “All of us came here not by choice, you know,” she said. “No one comes here by choice.”

  “I come here by choice,” said Daneri.

  “Vanushka, get him to say something,” Yvette cooed to Ivan. “Tell him we want to know the truth.”

  Everyone was looking at Radar. His head was spinning.

  “Excuse me, please,” he said.

  He got up from the table and began to walk. He was not sure where he was going, but he knew he must leave. He slid through a pair of palm fronds and then up a staircase. There were voices behind him, but he did not stop. Soon he found himself in a long hallway of rooms. He walked past a door that had a little figure made of sticks hanging on it. He stopped, his skin bristling. He raised his hand to knock.

  “They haven’t been back in a long time,” a voice said. “They haven’t claimed their things.”

  It was the piano player and his dog. They were entering a room down the hall.

  “Who is it?” said Radar.

  “I never knew their names. A man and a woman. They left some time ago. Fabien won’t rent it out, though. He keeps it for them. Not that he could rent it out. No one comes here anymore.”

  Radar stood there, swaying.

  “I like your dog,” he said. “What’s his name?”

  “Pascal,” the man said, and disappeared into his room.

  Radar followed the hallway, running his palm along the walls. He found another staircase and went up and up until he came to a door. He assumed that the door would be locked, but when he tried the handle it opened, and he found himself in the cool open air of the rooftop. It reminded him of the deck of the ship. He looked out across the city and saw the Aleph lit up at the docks. Suddenly, he desperately wanted to be back there. The ship had become his home now. He could barely remember New Jersey.

  One half of the roof was taken up by a giant billboard, illuminated by two large fluorescent lights that buzzed into the night. Insects swirled and dived around the lights in a frenzy. Radar walked over to the front of the billboard and saw a giant smiling man in a tie, talking on a mobile phone. PARLEZ À L’AFRIQUE! PARLEZ AU MONDE! declared the sign to the citizens of Matadi. Radar stepped forward to the edge of the roof. Normally he was terrified of heights, but he felt very calm. He looked down to the street below. He thought he saw Horeb in his white tunic, waiting by his motorcycle.

  He placed his toe against the ledge, felt the spot where the building ended and the air began. He knew that if he jumped he would survive. This would not be the way he died—not here, not now, not in a mangled heap next to Horeb’s rickshaw. If he jumped, he knew he would get up and walk away from the fall.

  “Don’t go so close,” he heard a woman’s voice say behind him.

  He turned and saw Yvette st
anding on the roof. She looked unsteady in her heels. Behind her in the doorway, Ivan appeared. She took a step toward Radar.

  “Please, Harpo, mon chéri,” she said. “I don’t want you to fall.”

  Instinctively, he inched backwards. Ivan came up beside her.

  “Ho,” said Ivan. “Come back from the ledge, my friend.”

  “What’s your business here?” Radar said to Ivan.

  Ivan took a step forward, and Radar raised his arm by his side, as if he were about to jump.

  “Captain Daneri said you had business interests here. What do you do?”

  Ivan reached out. “Come back from the edge. You had too much to drink, my friend.”

  “Please,” breathed Yvette. “I don’t want you to fall. We only just met.”

  “What is it?” said Radar again, raising his arm threateningly. “What do you do, Ivan? What did you not tell me?” For an instant he felt himself lose his balance and thought he might actually fall. He flapped his arms, and both Ivan and Yvette flinched before Radar righted himself.

  Ivan sighed. He pursed his lips and then looked at the ground.

  “I have a child,” he said. “I have a little girl. Her mother lives here.”

  Radar blinked. “What?”

  “In one week she will be four,” he said. “Her name is Anna, like her grandmother.”

  Radar took this in. The lights from the billboard buzzed.

  “She does not call me her father. For her, she has no father,” he said. “I have not earned this, to be her father. It is very hard for me to see her and not to tell her. I can hold her, but I cannot give her what she needs.”

  No one moved. And then Yvette said quietly, “I had a child. He was taken from me.”

  She did not say more, and no one asked for more. Then Radar took several steps toward them, and Ivan and Yvette each seized one of his arms. She laughed nervously, and they stood on the roof in silence like this, the scent of burning still around them. The sparse lights of the town beneath, the ship, the river that swallows all rivers, the sky.

  Ivan pointed. “It’s difficult to see, but there is a star there.”

  “Where?” said Yvette.

  “There.” He took her shoulder and pointed. He was pointing with the hand that was missing a pinkie. The absence of the finger somehow made his pointing more precise.

  “Alpha Centauri,” he said. “It is brightest star in sky. You can only see it here, in the south. I did not see this star until I was eighteen. It was greatest night of my life. I had read about it, but I had never seen it with my own eyes. Seeing it with your eyes changes everything.”

  They huddled and looked.

  “There, do you see? It is brightest.”

  “Yes, I think so,” said Yvette.

  “It looks like one star, but it is actually two, Centauri A and Centauri B. And a little red dwarf named Proxima. All three form star. You can’t tell them apart with your eyes.”

  “Who is little red dwarf?” whispered Yvette, leaning into Radar. “Who is my Proxima? Is it you, Harpo?”

  “This is nearest star to us besides our sun,” said Ivan. “That light we see is only four years old.”

  “So young,” she murmured.

  Radar was staring at the immensity of the sky. “We are really alone, aren’t we?” he said.

  “Not so alone,” said Ivan.

  “Come down to my room,” said Yvette. “Both of you.”

  It was not a request. They descended back into the hotel. Yvette’s room was decorated with hanging tapestries and various wooden masks. Clothes were draped everywhere, drawers open. A smell of what he realized was her perfume.

  “How long have you been here?” asked Radar.

  “Long enough,” she said.

  She fished a record from the shelf and put it on. The vinyl was in bad shape. The dust and scratches could be heard, but the singer was French and sang so beautifully that the three of them sat there in a stunned silence, listening to the little miracles of heartbreak. Then Yvette got up and walked over to the table. She picked up a long tube.

  “You don’t want any, Vanush?” she said to Ivan.

  He shook his head. “I must see the stars.”

  “You can always see the stars, my love,” she said.

  All of a sudden, he began to sing. “Yvette, Yvette, she’s loveliest woman I’ve never met . . .”

  She smiled, clutching the tube to her chest. “Go on,” she said.

  “Have you two met before?” asked Radar.

  “Only once, I promise . . .” said Yvette.

  “Someday I’ll write song about all this,” said Ivan. He shook his head. “Tonight I will write song about this. Do you have guitar?”

  Yvette held out her hands. “Ma chambre est nue.”

  “Okay,” he said. “Okay. I will find.” He got up and left the room.

  Yvette came to Radar and held out her hand. “Come,” she said.

  “Where did he go?”

  “Come.”

  They parried open the mosquito nets and slinked into bed. She took off Radar’s hat and placed it on her head. Even in his drunken haze, he winced, thinking she would be repelled by his baldness, by his tuft, by his Radar-ness. But she only smiled, letting her hand drift down his face before unzipping his jacket and pulling off his undershirt. He was suddenly aware of his skin as a surface that could be touched. She shivered out of her frock and lit a candle by the bedside. He thought of Ana Cristina then. He wondered whether she would be mad or not. It was too late to be mad. It was too late to be anything.

  “Have you ever smoked before?” she said. She was wearing his hat and nothing else.

  He shook his head, staring into those eyes. What had those eyes seen?

  “The flame will bring the smoke to you. Don’t breathe too hard. Hold it in. And remember to smile.”

  She spat on her finger and moistened the tip of the pipe and then brought it to his lips. He shut his eyes and drank in the smoke until his lungs stopped working. When he exhaled, his whole body went up into the ceiling. The smell familiar and not familiar. He had been here before, in this bed, with this woman. He had been here before, but then, he had never been anywhere at all.

  “What happened to your husband?” A voice that sounded like his.

  Yvette was smoking the pipe. She exhaled, closed her eyes.

  “I killed him,” she said. She turned and looked at him. “No. It’s not true. He walked into the forest and never came back.”

  The pipe was offered again to Radar. He could barely lift a hand to decline, and so he took more, and the world began to fade.

  “I shouldn’t,” he whispered. “My epilepsy.”

  “My little Proxima,” he heard her say. “Have you ever been with a woman?”

  “Yes,” he said. Then: “No.”

  “Would you like to be with a woman?”

  He could feel himself sweating. The syrup of his gears.

  “There’s a girl back home.”

  “C’est une fille chanceuse.”

  She came close. He could feel her breath on his neck. He could feel her skin, or the dream of her skin. He opened his eyes briefly, and through the scrim of the mosquito net he saw Pascal, the piano player’s dog, watching them.

  8

  Radar awoke with a start. He blinked at the canopy of mosquito netting above him. A pile of dead insects had pooled in a low spot. The air was thick and damp. His head was pounding. He tried to remember where he was. This could not be New Jersey, could it? He turned and saw her bare shoulder and the night came flooding back.

  Shit!

  The truck. He was going to miss the truck. Shit!

  He jumped out of bed, naked, and tried to locate his tracksuit among the jumble of clothes on the floor. There was no sign of Ivan or hi
s guitar.

  Yvette stirred in the bed.

  “You’re leaving?” she murmured.

  “I hope,” he said. “They might’ve already left without me.”

  “They wouldn’t,” she said, stretching. “They admire you.”

  He laughed. “Yeah, right.”

  She wrapped the sheet around herself and put on his trucker’s hat.

  “Can I keep this?”

  He blinked, rubbing his head. “Okay,” he said.

  “Will you remember me?” she said.

  “Yes,” he said, jimmying his heel into his shoe. “I don’t think I can ever forget.”

  “Welcome to the Congo, my little Proxima.” She leaned in and kissed him. “I hope it’s better for you than it has been for me.”

  He ran through the lobby and out into the street. The rush of morning traffic. Motos and trucks crawling about. A wash of pedestrians, carrying things, selling things. Almost instantly, a crowd of people formed around him.

  “Monsieur, diamants? Diamants, monsieur?” The voice was assured, as if they had known each other forever.

  “Taxi, caïd? Boss, you need taxi?”

  “Croisière de fleuve, monsieur? Très belle, très belle.”

  “Besoin d’une ceinture?” A little boy held up a stick, from which hung several ratty belts. He was pushed away by another.

  “Des cigarettes! Des cigarettes américaines! Authentique!”

  “Carottes? Crevettes?” A pot of steaming prawns was thrust into his face.

  A gentle hand, pressing at his wrist. “Des femmes, monsieur? Ladies? Very beautiful . . .”

  Another hissed into his ear: “Du kif? De la cocaïne? Qu’est ce que vous voulez?”

  He was helpless in the face of their advances. Hands prodded and shoved him, urging him this way and that. Slowly, he was tugged down the street. He was sure he had already agreed to buy hundreds of diamonds, arranged for four taxis, and bought and sold a kilo of cocaine. In the short time he had been outside, he was already a major player in the Matadi import/export scene.

  He felt a firm hand on his shoulder and panicked. It was no doubt a police officer, arresting him for his substantial black market dealings. Or maybe it was a rival drug dealer, coming to shoot him for treading on his turf. He turned, fearing the worst.