Whatever the case, I knew that I would receive a third photograph, and perhaps a fourth, and a fifth. Whoever was trying to get my attention had gotten it.
I determined to put an end to this by phoning Jean-Louis. I dialed the number. He answered on the eighth ring, by which point my nerves were completely on edge.
“Hi, Dad!” His voice was balm to my soul. “Sorry it took me so long to answer. I was in the shower. Just played two hours of tennis.”
And there I had been imagining the worst sort of catastrophes. All because he was taking a shower.
I asked him when he had started playing tennis again. About three weeks ago, he told me. That meant the photo had been taken recently. I had intended to tell him about the new picture but changed my mind. This time it would worry him. And for no reason, very likely.
After asking him some silly questions, designed purely to gauge what I could from the tone of his voice, or to glean some detail — something that might hint at trouble or the outline of a problem — I said good-bye and hung up, feeling calmer.
The reassurance was temporary. This business of the photos had put me in a foul mood. I found it difficult to concentrate on “European Estheticism Toward the End of the Seventeenth Century,” the tide of my next lecture. The situation was upsetting the smooth operation of my routines, leaving me feeling disorganized and edgy.
When I least expected them, dark thoughts would swirl in my mind, a noisy chaos of them. I don’t think now that I felt any specific fears of immediate danger. That was the problem. I couldn’t make the photographs fit into a frame; hence there was no way of figuring out the motives behind them.
The following day I had lunch with Luciano at the Savoy. We played chess and I lost. I unnecessarily and stupidly sacrificed my bishop for a knight. I never would have done that had I not been distracted.
The third photograph arrived a week later. I opened the envelope, my heart beating hard, my ears buzzing. Only later did I note the postmark indicating it had been mailed from Brussels.
The photo showed Jean-Louis reading on a balcony, presumably that of his Berkeley apartment. It had been taken from a distance, again with a telephoto lens. My son seemed unaware his picture was being taken.
I sat down and tried to think. I couldn’t even play my Haydn. Noise of any sort was disruptive. Clouds were darkening over me. A current of dread ran in my veins.
I struggled nonetheless to remain composed, for I knew that I needed to find some kind of design. I put a stray pencil back into its tray, refiled a folder lying on the desk, and plucked dead leaves off a geranium. Then I began examining the third photograph.
Instinctively, I sniffed it, hoping for the trace of an odor: a woman’s perfume, or tobacco, or a chemical, something that might set me on the right track, like a bloodhound given a scent and then taken off the leash.
I examined the photograph minutely, looking for a fingerprint, a lipstick trace, a smudge of nail polish, some varnish, a stain.
I lit a match and heated the back of the image to see if something might have been scrawled in invisible ink, or if it bore the impression of some writing. Please, I begged, give me a code. Anything.
Finally in desperation I lined up the three photos and tried to make some sense of them as a series. Perhaps I needed to find the right way of reading them, of finding their meaning in their order, as if each were parts of a single sentence, visual words.
Jean-Louis surfing … ocean, tide, wave, undertow, drown.
Jean-Louis playing tennis … court, serve, double fault, overhead, put away.
Jean-Louis reading on his balcony … height, vertigo, fall.
When you play this kind of game, danger lurks everywhere, even in the happiest of photos. Behind the tanned skier is the tree that can kill him. Beneath the foot of the young man hugging his girlfriend is the step waiting to give way. It was silly, regressive. Still…
In the corner of the beach in the first photo was a brown-haired woman. Was she meaningful? Was her look malevolent?
What about the flower bushes to the left of the tennis court in the second photo? Could they mean something malevolent, as they did in the tarot cards my grandmother used to read the future? One card had a bouquet of flowers in the corner, signifying, she told me solemnly, “I’ll luck to the man who strays from the straight path.” The simplest bouquet of flowers can foretell doom.
My grandmother had attempted to initiate me in the obscure arts of divination. I used to laugh, though now I think it had some influence on my choice of careers. My life revolved around the search for hidden meanings.
Symbols and signs are inscribed even in those paintings whose meanings seem self-evident. From the works of Cranach, Bellini, Piranesi, I had learned a thing or two about puzzles. Fm not talking about hidden figures, magic squares, crosses, skulls, or scales, all of which you can decipher with the help of a half-decent reference book. Fm talking about symbols that on first view don’t seem like symbols at all: a color, a chubby baby, a stone terrace, a bouquet of flowers.
The Allegory of Purgatory, which for many years was attributed to Giorgione, then to Bellini, is a veritable hotbed of clues that yield unending interpretative possibilities. Thousands of feverish imaginations have focused on the painting, trying to account for all the arcane references and multiple meanings. To say the painting deconstructs itself is too easy an excuse for giving up.
Observing Piranesi’s Prison or De Chirico’s abandoned cities, those factories of the uncanny, we learn that the only way they can be approached is through metaphor, in an association of ideas. You find the first word, which in turn gives you the second, and so on. By a sequence of decoding, the visual turns linguistic.
Even were my son not involved, I would have spent the day poring over the photographs. I do not like being kept in the dark. Having devoted my life to deciphering the seemingly indecipherable, I know that it is possible to find meaning. The problem this time was that my judgment was clouded. Behind these photos lurked some danger. Instinct was telling me to beware.
“Premonitions are like instinct,” my wife used to say. “They are infallible.”
Sophie’s intuitions had been infallible. She could tell if Jean-Louis was ill before the symptoms appeared. She sensed when he had a fever. She would run to Jean-Louis’s crib even before he awoke in tears from a bad dream.
Thinking of Sophie made me think I should ask for advice from someone, but I did not feel I had anyone to whom I could turn. I had always been a bit of a loner. It’s not that I’m misanthropic, for I’m not. I enjoy the company of good friends like Luciano and Sylvie.
But I relished solitude more. That is perhaps why I chose the line of work I did. I enjoyed being alone with a work of art, alone with its beauty — even if the work contained some wisdom I might share with my fellow man, its pleasure for me lay in the poetry of contemplation. In solitary communion with beauty one achieves the highest state of awareness.
The truth was I did not feel I could confide in anyone. Yes, there was my sister, and Sylvie, and Luciano, all of whom were above suspicion in that matter of these photographs. But I mistrusted the rest of the world. How can I confess to this? For a split second I even imagined my son was sending me these photos, as a ruse for extorting money.
That thought proved I was losing my sanity. At that instant I decided to go to Berkeley as soon as possible — the next day — and visit Jean-Louis. I had planned to return to San Francisco at some point anyway; I had an open invitation from the Young Museum to authenticate a work attributed to Le Nain.
I have said I was not a superstitious man. I was changing. That morning, on the way to the post office to mail in my article (entitled “The Play of Contrasts in Lorrain’s Landscapes”), a large cat with orange fur, a magnificent creature, stopped in front of me and stared unblinkingly with its phosphorescent green eyes. I couldn’t rid my mind of the image of those eyes the entire day.
I must have looked the way I felt, for th
e secretary and the security guard at the College both inquired after my health. I told them I was feeling fine, thank you, though the truth was that I had had to stop twice on the way to the office because my heart was beating so hard and my head felt coated in ice. I had gone into a café and ordered sugared tea. Next to me two men were talking.
One said to the other, “Anyway, I expected it. I had lived with the fear of it for so long I couldn’t breathe. Everything scared me. I knew I needed to prepare for the worst. But, you know, I just couldn’t face it. Every time I tried, I closed my eyes.”
“There’s your mistake,” the other replied. “If they’re threatening you, it’s because they’re the ones who feel threatened. Don’t you see? They’re afraid of you.”
I swallowed my tea and stopped in at the first travel agency I could find to buy my ticket.
“I’m very sorry,” an officious young girl behind a desk told me, “but the next two Air France flights to San Francisco are fully booked.”
“These planes are never fully booked. Look again, please, miss. There must be a free seat somewhere. In the middle, toward the back, I don’t care —”
“Sir, I’m telling you. They’re full. Not one seat is open.” I left the travel agency feeling that the world was in league against me. I decided to take matters into my own hands. Early the next morning I packed and went to the airport, where I bought a standby ticket for the first flight to San Francisco.
2
Of course there were empty seats on the first flight. There always are, especially in first class. Getting on the flight settled my nerves a bit. I had lots of legroom, and was comforted by the idea that I would be with Jean-Louis in a dozen hours. I had called from the airport to tell him I was coming. He told me he would come meet me.
The champagne was chilled, the flight attendants cordial. I dove into an article on seventeenth-century drawings and for a while lost track of time.
Then two Americans sitting in the row behind me began talking about recent earthquakes in the San Francisco area.
This brought back all my fear. I regretted that Jean-Louis had ever had the idea of getting his business degree at Berkeley. What was wrong with the University of Michigan, or Yale? Why did he have to choose a school located, as the whole world is well aware, equidistant between the San Andreas and Hayward Faults? I knew that only one quake in ten thousand was dangerous, and that there was a million times smaller chance of being killed in an earthquake than of winning the lottery. Reminding myself of this did little good.
I recalled one California guidebook cheerfully informing me that California was particularly susceptible to earthquakes in the autumn. Here it was, the beginning of autumn. How delightful.
Where my son was involved I had always imagined the worst. I would never forget the day when he said the words that caused my heart to fall into my shoes: “Dad, I want a motorcycle.”
Five little words, yet they had thrown me into total panic. Images instantly crowded my teeming brain — Jean-Louis in a coma, on a hospital bed, bleeding profusely in some gutter, broken in a thousand places. It had seemed like only yesterday he had cut himself above the eye falling off his tricycle.
And now he wanted a motorcycle! Good God. Those metal death traps that made that infernal racket. Never!
“No, Jean-Louis. Never.” I had said this as calmly as I could.
“But, Dad—”
“No.”
“But, Daddy.” He began his sweet-talking routine, and I’d had to shut my ears.
Eventually, of course, I relented. I allowed myself to be dragged down to the nearest motorcycle dealer, where Jean-Louis pointed out the one he had his heart set on. It was shiny and red. The color of blood.
I had never seen such a monstrous machine, and searched the salesman’s eyes for some shred of sympathy. Nothing but the sale was on his mind. In desperation I had asked Jean-Louis if he didn’t want a VCR instead, an electric organ, a drum set (to hell with the neighbors!) What about a trip to Canada? Iroquois still live in its primeval woods, you know!
All to no effect. He walked around the thing, stroking its smooth metal flanks. It was already his. That murderous salesman, who was his accomplice, sidled up to me.
“All boys want motorcycles. It’s natural,” he said.
The imbecile!
“All students want to study in California,” Jean-Louis’s professors had said years later. “It’s natural.”
And so off to California he had gone, putting seven thousand miles between us, a plane trip of over eleven hours. Here was the separation I had always expected and dreaded. Here was the reality: that I would wake up old, helpless, alone. I would become a pathetic old man, leading a joyless existence between phone calls from my son.
It has only been six weeks since he left, but I felt I’d already begun the long, slow journey toward death. A chill engulfed me. No more vacations together. No more evenings when I would come home with a surprise for him — a video game, a CD, an art book, fresh foie gras.
All the fun had gone out of my life. Now I was going to live with ceaseless worry and a thousand new things to fret about: earthquakes, mud slides, AIDS, drugs, religious cults, random violence. Worst was the distinct and very alarming possibility Jean-Louis would fall in love with some silly American girl and settle down with her in her native state — Arkansas, or Nevada.
In my calmer moments I understood perfectly Jean-Louis’s decision to study in California. He had always dreamed of living near golden beaches, pounding surf, sequoias, the land of Jack London and the Sierra Nevada. He was happy; so should I have been. Instead of bemoaning my loneliness I should have been celebrating his happiness. Berkeley was a world-class institution. I myself had taught there for a semester before Jean-Louis’s birth and I remembered well the sights and smells of California — the food and wines; the snowy tops of the Panamints; Zabriski Point, an infinite landscape whose desolation yields unexpected splendors; Badwater, near whose heated earth you could almost fry an egg; the wild roses of the Mojave.
Yes, I had sung the praises of California to Jean-Louis. I also knew that with an American business degree in hand, and then returning to France’s Ecole Nationale d’administration — breeding ground of the country’s leaders — Jean-Louis’s future was a bright one indeed.
Of course I’d relented. It was only to be for two years. I would count the days until his return, just as I was counting the hours until the plane touched down at San Francisco airport.
Following a stopover in Chicago to refuel, my excitement began to mount. In one hundred forty-two minutes I would see him. Already I felt his proximity to me, an encroaching feeling of happiness, a wave of warmth. How fragile and tender a thing is happiness. As light as the air beneath the engines of flight.
We got a new pilot in Chicago, an American. Alas, he was a chatty fellow who felt obliged to give us a running and very homespun commentary on every aspect of the flight. Each time the public address system came on I winced.
“Captain Jerry Carter here. Well, folks, well be cruising at an altitude of thirty thousand feet… heading right smack over Kansas City. We’ve got real clear skies today. If you look way over on the left side of the aircraft in ‘bout half an hour you’ll be able to take a gander at the Grand Canyon. That’s quite some sight, believe you me.” I felt as if I was stuck on a guided tour.
Eventually, thankfully, the plane landed in San Francisco, and with such deft lightness that I forgave the pilot all his chatter. I headed into the terminal with a radiant smile.
There he was, just on the other side of customs, waving his arms, looking the way he used to when I came home from a trip. I was the most adored father in the world.
In the time it took to get through customs, I already knew almost everything: Jean-Louis looked happy; he glowed with good health; he was tanned and fit. When I got to him I smothered him in an embrace.
We drove into the city, talking freely and merrily How far away my troubles
in Paris seemed!
We went straight to Berkeley and to Chez Panisse. I had promised Jean-Louis in a letter that one day we would visit this mecca of California cuisine. Not only had he made the reservation, he had booked the best table, on the first floor, near the fireplace. There were fresh flowers on the table.
Time felt suspended in its flight, and I savored the delights of the moment. Warm oysters served with endive from Chino Ranch — a strange and delicious combination Jean-Louis recommended. The boy had exquisite taste. I had made him a gourmet in my own image, weaning him on the finest and rarest of foods. Perhaps this was my way of compensating for the loss of his mother. I felt a deep obligation to teach him the art of living, and acuity of the senses, I believed firmly, was one of life’s essential arts.
We sipped a fine Pinot Noir from Napa Valley, and remarked how far California wines had truly come. Nothing could compete with Bordeaux, but I knew my chauvinism was tied to a memory of a trip Jean-Louis and I had made to that region. Pine, sand, the smell of grapes, fresh foie gras. Who could forget Bayonne, with its chive purée, its black bread, its beautiful cathedral, the Bonnat Museum, and those omelets. Royan, with its oysters, its butter, and its Pineau de Charentes. Mauléon, with its wood pigeons. All this did credit to Chez Panisse, which brought back other tastes and smells.
For an hour or two I was on a cloud. Jet lag, no doubt. When dessert arrived — croissant pudding, how creative these Californians! — I began to remember why I had come.
I began asking Jean-Louis some questions I’d been rehearsing, though without trying to give him the impression that his replies were of any great moment. Who was he seeing? What did he do in the evenings? Did he go out often? Who were his friends? Simple questions. The difficulty lay in interpreting his answers. One reply can mask another.
Then I started asking questions that were less general, more probing. “Which professor do you most admire?” “Have you met someone here you genuinely dislike?”
A Masterpiece of Revenge Page 3