The Lovers

by Morris West

  ‘Tomorrow we are in Ischia. Molloy will be back on board. How do you feel about that?’

  ‘I feel fine. I’ll be handing him a clean ship and, I hope, a happy crew . . . Which reminds me, Chef, I’ll need the rest of your accounts. I have to finish writing up the books.’

  ‘To hell with the books! Tell me the rest of it. How are things with you and Giulia?’

  ‘They’re fine.’

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean. “They’re fine.” That’s nothing talk!’

  ‘What do you want me to say? It’s ended, or nearly ended. Tomorrow we rule a line under it and forget it ever happened. That’s what we agreed.’

  ‘Rule the line, by all means! You have to do that; but you’ll never erase what’s written.’

  ‘I know; but why should we erase anything?’

  ‘Why indeed, if you can read the tale without bitterness.’

  ‘I’m just beginning to believe we can.’

  ‘I’ve watched Giulia.’ The Chef was musing now. ‘She’s been very careful of you, like a mother weaning a baby off the breast.’

  ‘Jesus, Chef!’ Cavanagh spluttered over his coffee. ‘That’s a hell of a thing to say! Look what you’ve made me do! This bloody shirt is ruined!’

  ‘Why do you make such a fuss about a simple statement? It’s true.’ There was a gleam of cheerful malice in his eyes. ‘And you’re a good, strong baby, Cavanagh, you’re weaning well! I have respect for you – much more than I had at the beginning.’

  ‘Grazie infinite!’ In spite of himself Cavanagh laughed. ‘You don’t give an inch, do you, you old bastard.’

  ‘What’s to give? What’s to take? We’re stuck with what is. I keep asking myself how Molloy will be when he comes back?’

  Cavanagh dismissed the question with a gesture.

  ‘The Molloys of this world never change, Chef. They’re hard-heads. They take all, give nothing and they can charm the birds out of the trees when they put their minds to it. Dangle a profit or a pretty rump in front of Molloy and he’ll be head down and charging like a bull at a matador’s cape.’

  The Chef stood back, folded his arms and surveyed him like a particularly noisome specimen in a glass jar.

  ‘So! What have we here? A Solomon sitting in judgment! Who gave you the right to stick a label like that on Lou Molloy?’

  ‘It’s true.’

  ‘Maybe; but it’s not the whole truth.’

  ‘Who knows the whole truth about anyone, Chef?’

  ‘Then let me say, I think you still have quite a few surprises coming from Lou Molloy!’

  The first surprise came late that same afternoon while they were coasting slowly up to the port of Salerno to take on water and fuel and replenish their stocks of fresh food before making their last short run to Ischia, where stores would be double the price in the high season. Molloy called up on the regular Portishead channel. No, he did not want to talk to anyone else, only to Cavanagh. What time did he expect to be in Ischia? Anytime Mr Molloy desired. Ten in the morning, then. Aye, aye, sir. Was Mr Hadjidakis’ gear packed? All of it sir, in Hadjidakis’ own sea chest. Now a message for Farnese. Galeazzi was with Molloy on Ischia. Molloy had booked accommodation for all his guests at the Regina Isabella hotel. They should be ready to leave the ship with all their baggage and expect to stay a few days before going on to Rome. The vessel and the crew would remain in port pending further instructions. Was all that clear? Yes, sir, and how was Mr Molloy himself? Mr Molloy refused to broadcast the state of his health to the whole wide world. They would talk at length in Ischia. End of a forty-year-old dialogue . . .

  The stewardess was tapping him gently on the shoulder. When he lifted his eyeshades, she handed him a hot towel, informed him that they were just passing over the Maritime Alps en route to Rome and asked would he prefer an American breakfast or coffee and croissants.

  Awake, shaved and modestly refreshed, he sipped coffee and toyed with the tasteless croissants and looked down upon the changes that forty years had wrought along the Mediterranean littoral. The shoreline was an uninterrupted ribbon of urban sprawl. The hinterland was dotted ever more closely with ugly townlets where once the serried vineyards had marched, with the green pike-men of the cypresses towering over them.

  The sea, once sapphire and emerald and full of fish, was now a foetid lake of sewage from which the fish had retreated to the darkest ravines, while the sea grasses were covered with saponified slime, and human hordes disported themselves at daily peril of gasto-enteritis, typhoid and hepatitis. Alas and alas, the fleeting years!

  It had all been different on that early summer’s morning when they slipped out of Salerno harbour, coasted past Amalfi and Capri and headed across the Gulf of Naples to Ischia. Giulia and he had spent the night together, in the big double bed in her cabin. They had made love. They had talked disjointedly about his future and hers. They had wept together. They had made love again; but this time the passion was almost spent and they surrendered to the elegiac languors of the last mating and the last farewell that had any meaning for either of them. The rest would be postscript, dispensable, a formality.

  By the time he manoeuvred the Salamandra d’Oro into her berth in the small harbour basin, the passengers’ luggage was stacked on deck, the boys were ready with the gangway and Molloy was standing on the dock, a gaunt, commanding figure in his dress whites, ready to take the lines, as Cavanagh himself had done that first day in Antibes. Behind him the van from the Regina Isabella was waiting to pick up the luggage and there was a trio of horse-drawn carriages for the Farnese party.

  The moment the gangway was down, Molloy came on board at a run and swept Giulia into a passionate embrace that drew a low chorus of approval from the watchers on the dock. He embraced the Countess, kissed Miss Aurora Lambert’s hand, shook hands with the males of the crew, pecked Lenore lightly on the cheek, then turned his attention to Cavanagh, who had just come down from the bridge and was waiting to offer his own formal greeting.

  ‘Welcome back, sir!’

  Molloy stared at him for a long moment, measuring him as he had done at their first meeting; then his face lit up with a smile. He clapped his hands on Cavanagh’s shoulders and drew him, too, into a long, Latin embrace. Then he held him at arm’s length and proclaimed:

  ‘Well! Well! Well! The cub’s a tiger now, I hear! Did you have a good trip?’

  ‘It had its moments, sir, yes. And how was yours?’

  ‘That had its moments too; but we’ll talk about those another time. I want to get our friends installed in the hotel. We have urgent business with Count Galeazzi. I’ll visit with you sometime tomorrow, probably before lunch. Meantime, see if you can plug into a telephone circuit, clean ship and get the laundry done, then give the crew some shore leave. How are you off for money?’

  ‘We’re still in funds, sir. We don’t need anything yet.’

  ‘Good! Then say your goodbyes and we’ll be off.’

  The farewells were as brief as politeness permitted: a baciamano for the women, a cool handshake for Farnese, a brief expression of thanks for the pleasure of their company, a hope that soon they would meet again, a courteous but cool refusal of the envelope which Farnese handed him as ‘a small thanks for your service and that of the crew’.

  When Leo and Jackie complained afterwards that he had deprived them of their rightful earnings, he burst out:

  ‘Rightful, be damned! You know the rules! Molloy pays, not the guests! You missed the point. He was trying to put me down with a Judas payment!’

  ‘It was perhaps a natural mistake,’ said Chef blandly.

  ‘How natural?’

  ‘Well, he saw you and Molloy embracing. That must have looked very much like a Judas kiss to him. It certainly did to me!’

  ‘Oh, go to hell!’

  The memory of that little exchange, forty years ago, still made him feel uncomfortable. In all truth, it had been a Judas moment. All of them had been party to the betrayal of Declan Alo
ysius Molloy. However, there was no way one could embellish the metaphor, because Molloy was certainly not Jesus Christ, not even an innocent victim. He was a rough, tough politico, a ruthless money-maker, a recorded killer, a man who, as the Irish used to say, would poke a hole in a wall. Even so, the Farnese had eaten his salt and would soon be eating his money, Giulia was committing him to a loveless marriage, and Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh had made him a cuckold even before the wedding night, put horns on him before all his crew.

  The memory somehow matched the polluted seas and the defaced landscape below him, and it was a dangerous ulcer for a sixty-five-year-old lawyer to be carrying on an already well-scarred conscience. But that wasn’t the last of it. There was still one more part of the jigsaw to complete and he put it together while the aircraft was hung up for half an hour in a holding pattern over Lake Bracciano . . .

  Molloy came to the ship at eleven-thirty the next morning. He came alone. Cavanagh was alone too, sitting on the afterdeck, watching the ebb and flow of life around the dock. Once upon a time he would have had to be out there, mingling, making talk with anyone who would give him the time of day, smiling at the girls, offering them coffee and cognac for companionship. Today was different. He was different: empty inside, bruised all over. The only way he could take the crowd was to let it spread itself upon him like a healing salve. So even Molloy’s visit was a welcome diversion.

  They walked over the ship together, Molloy nodding a laconic approval of what he saw. They went through the ship’s accounts. Molloy approved those too, and handed Cavanagh a large wad of dollar bills by way of a new impressment. Cavanagh protested:

  ‘That’s far too much, sir. It’s five months’ funding. It’s risky to carry that much cash on board.’

  ‘There’s a reason. I want you to take the ship back to Antibes, pay out the crew contracts – with a month’s bonus all round – then hand her over to Glémot for gardienage pending further instructions.’

  ‘May I know the reason, sir?’

  ‘Sure! There’s no secret. Giulia and I will be married as soon as we get to Rome. I’m taking her to the United States for our honeymoon. Then Galeazzi and Farnese are coming over to meet with the Wall Street financiers. So there won’t be any more time for cruising, not this season anyway.’

  ‘With respect, sir, wouldn’t it be a good idea to work the ship, let Glémot find some charters for you?’

  ‘And let people I know nothing about kick the guts out of my beauty. No way!’

  ‘It needn’t be like that, sir. This is a good crew. We’d look after her for you.’

  ‘I know you would, Cavanagh; but . . .’ He hesitated a moment then let the words out with a rush. ‘Hell! What’s the use of beating around the bush! Without Giorgios Hadjidakis, I’ve got no heart for her any more. I’m going to sell her. I’ll give you a letter to Glémot with the appropriate instructions.’

  ‘She’s your vessel of course; but it seems such a shame.’

  ‘It is a shame, Cavanagh, but there it is. There’s a curse on her now. She’ll never be a happy ship again. Not for me, anyway.’

  Since that was a subject he had no wish to explore, Cavanagh asked:

  ‘What do you want me to do with Hadjidakis’ gear?’

  Molloy fished in his pocket and brought out a business card with an address written on the back of it.

  ‘Use these people, Salviati, they’re international shippers. They do a lot of work for foreign residents and embassies. They have an agent on the island. The address of Hadjidakis’ wife is written on the back.’

  ‘How is Mrs Hadjidakis holding up?’

  ‘Well, as always. She’s an iron lady that one. She married a wanderer; but she knew it when she got him. I never heard her utter a word of complaint. His kids adored him. I set up a money plan for them years ago. So they’ll be doing fine. The hole in their life isn’t so big as if Giorgios had been around all the while . . .’

  ‘That reminds me, sir. There’s something I have to give you. It belongs to Hadjidakis. I wasn’t quite sure how to deal with it. Wait here a moment please.’

  He was back in two minutes with Hadjidakis’ diary. He opened it at the title page and laid it in front of Molloy, who leafed through it quickly.

  ‘What is this?’

  ‘It’s Hadjidakis’ journal. I found it lying on his bedside table when I took over his cabin.’

  ‘Have you read it?’

  ‘Enough to know what’s in it.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘The title describes it accurately: “The True Chronicle of the Voyages of G and L”, that’s Giorgios and Lou.’

  Molloy’s first reaction was a belly laugh.

  ‘Well, I’ll be damned! The old bastard was always promising he’d do something like this. I never believed him. Go on, read me some of it.’

  ‘You may not like what you hear.’

  ‘That’s for me to judge. Go on man, read it!’

  Cavanagh picked two entries, one a particularly brutal description of an exhibitionist brothel in Martinique and an orgy in which both Hadjidakis and Molloy had taken part. The other was the account of the duel in Havana.

  Molloy was silent for a long time afterwards. Cavanagh closed the book and pushed it across the table to him.

  ‘I thought you should dispose of it yourself. It’s not the sort of thing you’d want his wife or his children to read.’

  ‘Nor anyone else for that matter. Who else has seen this?’

  ‘I have no idea. It was lying in full view on the table beside Hadjidakis’ bunk. Anyone could have seen it; but so far as I know I’m the only one on board who reads Greek.’

  ‘Have you talked about it or read it to anyone else?’

  ‘No.’ What else could he say without involving Giulia. ‘I kept it locked in the safe.’

  ‘But you must realise you’ve taken an awful risk by showing it to me.’

  ‘I understand the risk. I have done for quite a while now. In the games you’re playing people do get killed. There are three dead already. Hadjidakis, Benetti and his mate . . . I’m sure there have been and will be others. I could be one of them. There were moments when I thought of holding on to the book or at least making a certified photographic copy just to protect myself.’

  ‘That would have been the smart thing to do.’

  ‘It could also have turned me into a sort of blackmailer – a species I’d rather prosecute than promote. You have your book. If you want to do me harm, you’ll do it anyway. For the rest, if you’re agreeable, I’ll leave tomorrow morning. We can do the trip in two days.’

  ‘That’s fine. But I’d prefer you to stay at sea for the whole run.’

  ‘We have to drop Rodolfo off in Elba. That’s his home port.’

  ‘Stay the hell away from Elba. Put the lad ashore in Livorno or Piombino and give him his fare home. I know Carl Jordan thinks he’s cleared out the rats’ nest. I’m not so sure. The more I see of this Intelligence underworld, the less I like it. They run their own kind of blackmail. Do you have anything more for me?’

  ‘No, sir, that just about wraps it up.’

  ‘Then pour us a couple of whiskies and bring ’em out on the afterdeck. We can watch the fillies parade while we talk.’

  The talk was a confession, an apologia pro vita sua, by Declan Aloysius Molloy. He took a big swallow of whisky and then launched straight into the narrative.

  ‘. . . I need to talk about this, Cavanagh; and I’m talking to you because you’re the one who understands this whole Irish-Catholic rigmarole of sin and guilt and repentance and wanting to make a new start and never being able to because there’s an enormous great millstone hung round your neck and you can never lift your head high enough to see a single star. Now that Hadjidakis is dead, the guilts are blacker and the weight of the millstone is twice as heavy.

  ‘I wanted to talk to Spelly about it in New York; but he ducked it. He said we had so many outside things going he’d rather not meddle
in my private conscience. Which I understood, because I think Spelly’s a little screwed up himself in the sex department and he’s also keeping some very odd political company with Joe McCarthy and that little prick of a Roy Cohn. He said he’d be happy to recommend me to an understanding confessor, but hell, that’s the worst kind of blind date . . .

  ‘So, I’ve been stewing ever since, because I really do want to make a clean start with Giulia and found a family that can have some respect for its old man. Now you hit me with this – Hadjidakis’ book, which I can’t read and daren’t get translated, so I’ll never know what my heart’s true friend thought of me.’ He emptied his glass at a gulp and thrust it at Cavanagh. ‘You’re forgetting your party manners, boyo. I’m out of liquor! . . .’

  Cavanagh refilled his glass and put only a half measure in his own, but Molloy was quick to protest:

  ‘Oh no you don’t! If I have to be drunk to tell it, you’ll need a decent drink to make the tale tolerable. By the way Giulia showed me the little tear-vial you gave us for a wedding present. I liked the thought and I thank you for it. It showed you have some grace about you – as my old history teacher used to say. And it’s history now I’m talking about: Giorgios Hadjidakis and Declan Aloysius Molloy! We made some history! The plan was that we’d go on making it. Now he’s dropped off the planet. That’s why the bastards who killed him had to die too. That was the deal I made with Dulles. Those were Carl Jordan’s orders, which you nearly fouled up. But that was my fault, because I didn’t take you into my confidence. I’m doing it now, but it’s a long time too late.

  ‘I told you, didn’t I, Hadjidakis and I were kids together and our relationship never changed. He was the contriver, the one who set up the plots and dares. I was the doer, the sucker who had to carry them out. It wasn’t that he lacked courage. Never! He was there, raging like a lion every time. But he needed a leader. He was the perfect number two and he never wanted to be anything else. I needed a teacher. My old man was hard as nails and my mother was born to lace curtains. Between them they closed the doors and held them closed against anything or anyone that might threaten our safe and sacred world. So who was there to teach me how the world wagged beyond our front porch?