The Fabrications

by Baret Magarian

  Oscar felt a sudden desire to spend the night in the park, in a spirit of non-conformity. As he was thinking about this Webster returned, peering around nervously.

  ‘Webster, what about sleeping in the park? Wouldn’t that be wonderful?’

  ‘I’m not so sure, I’ve just had the ’flu.’

  ‘Don’t be such a baby. Where’s your sense of adventure? Stay and keep me company.’

  Webster sat down and muttered, ‘Well, maybe for a little while, but I have to pick something up later from Basildon. A Japanese vase. Basildon’s enough to piss off anyone. It’s 19th-century, you see. I mean the vase, not Basildon. I don’t know when Basildon dates from. Probably the dark ages. Still in them, if you ask me. What a royal bore. I’m in antiques; you know that, do you? Got a stall on Portobello. Drop in, you’ll find me at the Admiral Vernon arcade. Chinese exports, Arita porcelain.’

  Oscar ignored him and kept his gaze firmly fixed on the changing sky. The moon was visible, hanging sadly, a pallid disc growing gradually more distinct.

  ‘What line are you in? What do you do Oscar?’

  ‘Right now, not an awful lot. I’m hoping that might be about to change.’

  ‘Well, I wouldn’t count on it.’

  ‘You think? If there’s one thing that’s been consistent in my life lately, it’s change.’

  ‘I need a change. And a new boiler. That useless landlord. I can’t even have a shower, I’ve been having to shower at the gym.’

  ‘That can’t be so convenient.’

  ‘It’s okay. For some reason the clientele consists of fat men dangling their bits. From the way they carry on you’d think they had the bodies of athletes, not beer bellies and double chins. I wonder how their wives can bear to be touched by them. So they probably don’t. In which case, I expect they visit ladies of the night.’

  ‘And what do you feel about that?’

  ‘Not a lot. It’s not my cup of tea. I wouldn’t go near a trollop with a barge pole.’

  ‘Would you disapprove of a man who did?’

  ‘Don’t know. Don’t think so. Would you?’

  ‘I’m not sure.’

  ‘So would you ever go? To a brothel?’

  There was a pause.

  ‘Actually, I went to one the other day,’ said Oscar, looking directly at Webster, ‘though I’m not likely to go again.’

  ‘Where was this?’ Webster demanded in a slightly hoarse voice. He wasn’t sure what motives lay behind this question.

  ‘Greenwich.’

  ‘Were you on your own?’

  ‘No, I went with someone I’ve since decided to have nothing more to do with.’

  ‘Why’s that?’

  ‘Because he’s manipulative and nasty. But at the time I didn’t really know that. From the way he described this place I had to admit I was curious.’

  ‘What did he say to you?’

  ‘He told me it was like some fin-de-siecle bordello, the kind of place you could normally find only in Budapest or Cairo, and yet here it was in London, known only to a few experts and special clients, of which – he assured me – he was one.’

  ‘I see. Doesn’t sound that amazing.’

  ‘No, it wasn’t.’

  ‘So go on, then, tell me what happened. That’s if you don’t mind.’

  ‘Actually, I’ve been wanting to tell someone.’

  Beside him, from his supine position on the grass, Webster moved around restlessly, never quite managing to settle down. He could find problems, obstacles in everything.

  ‘I’m just getting comfortable. But you start.’

  Oscar cleared his throat, feeling slightly self-conscious.

  ‘All right. Well, we had to catch a train from Waterloo.

  ‘During the ride I was pretty nervous. Nicholas produced a flask of whiskey, so I guzzled on it. It’s amazing how alcohol can alter your perspective on things, don’t you find?’

  ‘I suppose so.’ Webster was now making inroads into his left ear, excitedly excavating the bolus of wax lodged inside. Later on he planned to pick at the dirt in his finger nails.

  ‘Is this boring you? Are you sure you want me to go on?’

  ‘Oh no, I mean yes. Just ignore me. I’ll settle down in a minute.’

  ‘If you say so,’ Oscar said with a certain exasperation. Now, as he told the story, his gaze drifted away from Webster until he was staring in front of him, addressing the open spaces of the park. He found it easier to look away, given the story’s delicate nature.

  ‘When we got to Greenwich we walked for about half a mile. The house was out of the way. It stood at the top of a hill, so we could look down on London, a mass of lights. I could see the line of the Thames, silvery with moonlight. It was very picturesque.

  ‘Nicholas rang the bell and after a while a doorman with the face of a bulldog materialized. Normally he would have made me nervous, but because the situation was so unusual, his pockmarked face struck me as appropriate. He looked like he wasn’t happy about my being there, but after Nicholas had had a few words with him he showed us in.

  ‘Inside it was like something from another time, as Nicholas said it would be, though nowhere near as spectacular as he’d made out. The wallpaper was covered in rococo patterns and there were shaded lamps hanging from the walls, casting a lot of red light. I could see lithographs of what looked like illustrations from the Kama Sutra. There was a rather flashy staircase in the corner and, up above, on the landing, I made out a line of statues. Nymphs, they seemed to be.

  ‘On the ground floor there weren’t any doors, just red drapes; we pushed past some and entered a kind of waiting room, filled to bursting point with cushions. There must have been about twenty candles burning. We planted ourselves down. Then I noticed, for the first time, a dwarf at the far end. He was puffing on a long thing like a pipe which coiled around into a bottle.’

  ‘That would be a hookah; I used to sell them,’ Webster interjected.

  ‘Yes, a hookah. The dwarf was staring at me – he didn’t seem interested in Nicholas. He had thick glasses and I could see his eyes magnified through the lenses. It was odd seeing this giant pair of eyes peering at me out of a tiny body.

  ‘Nicholas offered me a cigarette. I took one, not because I really wanted it, but because I wanted something to focus on, and the dwarf was making me nervous. He just wouldn’t give up. He could have outstared an eagle. He sat back on his cushion, puffed every now and then on his hookah and pinned me to the wall with his eyes. I wondered whether he was a regular client.

  ‘I asked Nicholas what we were waiting for. He told me to “look seasoned, like you’ve done this before.” “Done what?” I asked.

  ‘The drapes fluttered and a woman – in her fifties, I suppose – came in. She wore a red dress with a long slit in it, and I noticed she had varicose veins. She sidled up to Nicholas and they moved away, chatting for a few minutes about all sorts of subjects, including me, as I gathered from eavesdropping. Meanwhile the dwarf got up to receive one of the girls as she made her entrance. I felt incredibly relieved that I was shortly to see the back of him. She wore a very unusual outfit; I don’t really think you could call it a dress. Four or five black hoops were joined together in a vertical line down her body. There wasn’t any material in between the hoops, just thin bars of plastic keeping them together. The hoops hovered slightly whenever she moved. Other than that all she had on was a black bra, black leather boots, and black gloves up to her elbows. Her pubic hair had been trimmed into a heart shape and her belly button was pierced.’

  Oscar cleared his throat, then resumed.

  ‘Anyway, the dwarf stomped off with this girl and Nicholas introduced me to his friend, who turned out to be the madam. She wanted to know something about my taste in women so I muttered a few words about how they had to be tall. I could see I was revealing my inexperience and Nicholas shot me a nasty look. Then, out of the blue, I heard this really strange sound. Someone was moaning, but it had an edge to
it; it was impossible to say whether or not the person was in pain. Then there was a man’s voice speaking – in – I think – Chinese. The voice was absolutely bizarre...it sounded like the man was speaking out of a hole in his throat.

  ‘I said in a hurry, “Do you have any girls with red hair?” This seemed to please the madam and she replied, “I’ve just the thing; she’s very sensitive, like you. Come with me, darling.” My heart was pounding as she led me away. As I pushed through the drapes a woman in a toga brushed against me, headed, I supposed, for Nicholas. I was about to say goodbye to him but thought better of it.

  ‘We climbed the stairs and she showed me into a bedroom overflowing with the smell of menthol. The bed was massive and covered with green taffeta, with gigantic phalluses embroidered all over it. There was a mirror above the bed and more lithographs on the walls, more explicit than the ones I’d seen downstairs. I also recognized a print by Hokusai, which was very eerie: it showed an octopus making love to a fisherwoman; she was held down in its tentacles.

  ‘My hostess told me to make myself comfortable and that “Julie” would be along soon. I slumped onto the bed and tried taking some deep breaths. After a few minutes I decided a drink might help. I tiptoed into the corridor; there was no one around, just a set of closed doors, as in a hotel. I could hear moaning and words like “just there” and “harder, harder.” I crept over to one of the doors to listen. After that I didn’t hear anything.

  ‘Back in the room I fiddled around in the side-table and found a few packets of condoms and not much else. There was a knock at the door and a tall, big-boned woman with red hair came in. She wasn’t much to look at, it has to be said. I forgot to say there was a fireplace in the room, a large, open fireplace and as she came in I found myself staring into the dead coals and wishing they were lit. I had this strange idea that a fire would have made everything all right.

  ‘She was wearing a transparent satin shirt and her breasts showed quite clearly. She had jeans on, and they were cut so short that I could see the arcs of her buttocks. In fact, she gave me a little twirl just to make sure I didn’t miss this feature. Her stilettos had laces that climbed up her legs like ivy, and she wore a single black ribbon around her neck. Her hair was loose, and it looked like she’d just stepped out of the shower, because it was damp.

  ‘“What’s your name, then?” she asked, sitting down by me on the bed.

  ‘For some reason I told her my name was Max.

  ‘“I’m Julie, Max,” she said. She took my hand. I was surprised how light her touch was. Then, for the first time, I looked into her face directly. As I did she started talking – about nothing in particular. I think she’d sensed my nervousness and decided she’d try and make me feel at home by chatting for a little while. But when she spoke there wasn’t any expression to her voice, she just sounded dazed. Sometimes she trailed off into these giant pauses and looked at me, but then she managed to pick up again. Half the time she didn’t really make sense and kept on using the wrong word. Listening to her was like trying to read illegible handwriting.

  ‘Then I began to think she wasn’t really human, or that she was a copy of a human. It was something to do with her eyes, which were like the eyes of a doll. Dead. In fact her face, when I really thought about it, and I had a lot of time to as she droned on, was completely expressionless; it was like the face of someone on very strong tranquilizers. She was a void. It felt as if the thing that makes a face alive, that spark, had been blown out of her, that actually every speck of life had been crushed out of her. I knew I had to get out of there, that I wouldn’t be able to stand being with her for much longer. I thought that if she smiled everything would be different, that everything would suddenly make sense. But she didn’t, it was as though she wasn’t actually able to.

  ‘Then something happened. She asked me what I’d like to do first. I didn’t make any reply. There was a sound, another moaning sound. But it wasn’t made by a person. At first I thought it was coming from next door and I wondered whether some of the clients liked to use animals. Then I realized it was coming from the chimney. There was something trapped inside it, a pigeon or something. She noticed, stuck her head up the fireplace, turned back and said, “It’s just a crow; we get them all the time. It’ll clear off in a minute. Shall we get on with it?” Her voice was still dead, flat.

  ‘But this croaking wouldn’t stop and it really began to get on my nerves. Here was this woman who was dead and this crow which was stuck, making this sound.

  ‘I said, “Look, I’m sorry, but that’s really putting me off.” She told me it was nothing and that it was an old Victorian house, the kind crows liked. “Well, shouldn’t we try and get it out, free it? It sounds like it’s dying,” I insisted.

  ‘Then, angrily, she grabbed my hand and forced it down her blouse. I have to admit it was nice, feeling her breast against my palm. She was moving my hand around slowly in a circle, directing it for me. But I broke away and told her I couldn’t go through with it with that bird trapped in the chimney and that we had to go somewhere else.

  ‘“You’re worse than a woman,” she said. “You know this is costing you, don’t you?” For the first time some kind of emotion penetrated her voice.

  ‘I nodded. She’d see if she could get us another room. She went off.

  ‘I tiptoed out, and ran down the stairs. As I opened the door the footman sniffed around me like the bulldog that he was, sensing something was amiss. I tried to look composed, knowing that Julie might be down at any moment. He growled, in his thick voice, “I trust you obtained relief.” I told him I’d found the experience very gratifying, but you could see he didn’t believe me. I made as if to go but he grabbed my hand and leaned up to me, quite close and whispered, “There’s a girl in there; she’s my daughter. If you’ve upset her, I’ll make sure you never walk straight again.” I tried my best to reassure him that I’d upset no one. I was really frightened now. “She’s my own flesh and blood, she’s a bright girl; if you’ve done anything to upset her, I’ll stick you in a bath and chuck in a live toaster.” I shouted: “Look, I haven’t touched anyone, all right; I haven’t even done anything.” As he gazed at me with psychotic eyes, I tried to see if there was any physical resemblance between him and Julie. Then, suddenly, crazily, he started laughing, and then he barked, “You’re all right; now fuck off home before you get gonorrhea.” I broke into a run after I’d put some distance between me and the house, peering around every now and then to make sure he wasn’t chasing me. I was gulping air down quickly, like I was gulping down food. The streets of Greenwich looked wonderful. I don’t know if you know what I mean, but as I ran for the station, through the night, I felt incredibly excited just to be able to hear sounds, just to pass by the houses with their lights on. Wherever I looked there seemed to be something I could celebrate, the twigs from trees, plastic bags floating in the wind.

  ‘As I slowed down I took to thinking about her...but I just couldn’t deal with that blankness...I couldn’t have slept with her; it would have been too weird. I don’t know; maybe I’m using that as an excuse but –’

  Oscar stopped abruptly. He turned to look at Webster.

  He was snoring. It sounded like the noise made by the final swirls of water as they are sucked down a drain.

  ‘Oh well,’ he said.

  It was dark now.

  The park gates were locked. A few stars were scattered here and there and the moon was shining brilliantly. Everything was profoundly still and – aside from Webster’s periodic snoring – silent. The trees were visible as filmy outlines and silhouettes. In the distance clusters of bushes stood out like the outlines of strange animals in the moonlight.

  He thought of his story. He was glad he had had the chance to tell it; it amounted to a kind of confession. But why confess to Webster, whom he hardly knew, and who was not exactly noted for his sensitivity or intelligence?

  His thoughts drifted aimlessly for a while until at last they led him
toward Najette. He visualized her face, matter-of-factly beautiful, and her transforming smile, offering an antidote against anxiety. He wished she was with him now. And then he was re-living once more their kiss in the cafe. It seemed to him that as they kissed her beauty had miraculously blossomed, grown supernatural, and his center of gravity had shifted until he was falling, falling through great chasms of pleasure, leaving the detritus and boredom of life far behind...

  As he stretched out on the grass these thoughts plugged him straight into sleep.

  10

  After Webster and Oscar had left, Bloch climbed back into bed. But as soon as the covers were over him, he jumped up. He was determined to tidy the flat. He picked up the pieces of the broken ashtray and threw them in the waste bin in the study, the floor of which was littered with books, ashtrays, cups of congealed coffee, newspaper cuttings, fax rolls. It was only by a massive effort of will that he was able to pick up the cups and ashtrays and put them in the kitchen sink. A vase full of dead roses sat in the corner, its water foul. He pulled one of the stems out gently and examined it. Its petals were sunken and dry, and a grey-green sepal hovered above the petals like a small jellyfish uprooted from its home and frozen. He placed the stem back in the vase, shuffled back to the study, collected a mound of dirty clothes which had piled up in the corner, went back to the kitchen and shoved the clothes inside his washing machine. He didn’t see the scraps of paper with ideas scribbled on them – since they were lodged between the clothes – so they also journeyed into the steel barrel. He took a deep breath, feeling very sick, but a little buoyed up by the space that these random maneuvers had created.

  He closed the bedroom windows, blocking out the corrosive sounds of the street, climbed back into bed and – under the covers – tore off his clothes and the pyjamas underneath. When the buzzer sounded minutes later, he thrashed around with his clothes once more, as if locked in combat with them, until he was dressed. By the time he reached the hallway he was drenched in sweat. He mopped his brow on his shirt-sleeve, opened his front door and waited, listening keenly to the slow footsteps which – he noted – were abnormally loud and resonant.