Casanova's Chinese Restaurant (4 page)

I listened to what was being said without feeling – as I came to feel later – that I was, in one sense, part and parcel of the same community; that when people gossiped about matters like Carolo and his girl, one was listening to a morsel, if only an infinitesimal morsel, of one’s own life. However, I heard no more about Carolo at that moment, because Barnby could now be seen standing in the doorway of the saloon bar, slowly apprising himself of the company present, the problem each individual might pose. By that hour the Mortimer had begun to fill. A man with a yellowish beard and black hat was buying drinks for two girls drawn from that indeterminate territory eternally disputed between tarts and art students; three pimply young men were arguing about economics; a couple of taxi-drivers conferred with the barmaid. For several seconds Barnby stared about him, viewing the people in the Mortimer with apparent disapproval. Then, thickset, his topcoat turned up to his ears, he moved slowly forward, at the same time casting an expert, all-embracing glance at the barmaid and the two art girls. Reaching the table at last by these easy stages, he nodded to the rest of us, but did not sit down. Instead, he regarded the party closely. Such evolutions were fairly typical of Barnby’s behaviour in public; demeanour effective with most strangers, on whom he seemed ultimately to force friendliness by at first withholding himself. Later he would unfreeze. With women, that apparently negative method almost always achieved good results. It was impossible to say whether this manner of Barnby’s was unconscious or deliberate. Moreland, for example, saw in Barnby a consummate actor.

‘Ralph is the Garrick of our day,’ Moreland used to say, ‘or at least the Tree or Irving. Barnby never misses a gesture with women, not an inflection of the voice.’

The two of them, never close friends, used to see each other fairly often in those days. Moreland liked painting and held stronger views about pictures than most musicians.

‘I can see Ralph has talent,’ he said of Barnby, ‘but why use combinations of colour that make you think he is a Frenchman or a Catalan?’

‘I know nothing of music,’ Barnby had, in turn, once remarked, ‘but Hugh Moreland’s accompaniment to that film sounded to me like a lot of owls quarrelling in a bicycle factory.’

All the same, in spite of mutual criticism, they were in general pretty well disposed to one another.

‘Buy us a drink, Ralph,’ said Moreland, as Barnby stood moodily contemplating us.

‘I’m not sure I can afford that,’ said Barnby. ‘I’ll have to think about it.’

‘Take a generous view,’ said Moreland, who liked being stood plenty of drinks.

After a minute or two’s meditation Barnby drew some money from his pocket, glanced at the coins in the palm of his hand, and laid some of them on the bar. Then he brought the glasses across to the table.

‘Had a look at the London Group this afternoon,’ he said.

Barnby sat down. He and Moreland began to talk of English painting. The subject evidently bored Maclintick, who seemed to like Barnby as little as he cared for Mr Deacon. Conversation moved on to painting in Paris. Finally, the idea of going to a film was abandoned. It was getting late in the evening. The programme would be too far advanced. Instead, we agreed to dine together. Maclintick went off upstairs to telephone to his wife and tell her he would not be home until later.

‘There will be a row about that,’ said Moreland, after Maclintick had disappeared.

‘Do they quarrel?’

‘Just a bit.’

‘Where shall we dine?’ said Barnby. ‘Foppa’s?’

‘No, I lunched at Foppa’s,’ Moreland said. ‘I can’t stand Foppa’s twice in a day. It would be like going back to one’s old school. Do you know Casanova’s Chinese Restaurant? It hasn’t been open long. Let’s eat there.’

‘I am not sure my stomach is up to Chinese food,’ said Barnby. ‘I didn’t get to bed until three this morning.’

‘You can have eggs or something like that.’

‘Won’t the eggs be several hundred years old? Still, we will go there if you insist. Anything to save a restaurant argument. Where is the place?’

Maclintick returned from telephoning. He bought himself a final Irish whiskey and drank it off. Conversation with his wife had been, as Moreland predicted, acrimonious. When told our destination was Casanova’s Chinese Restaurant Maclintick made a face; but he failed to establish any rival claim in favour of somewhere he would prefer to eat, so the decision was confirmed. I asked how such a recklessly hybrid name had ever been invented.

‘There used to be the New Casanova,’ said Moreland, ‘where the cooking was Italian and the decoration French eighteenth century – some way, some considerable way, after Watteau. Further up the street was the Amoy, called by some Sam’s Chinese Restaurant. The New Casanova went into liquidation. Sam’s bought it up and moved over their pots and pans and chopsticks, so now you can eat eight treasure rice, or bamboo shoots fried with pork ribbons, under panels depicting scenes from the career of the Great Lover.’

‘What are prices like?’ asked Barnby.

‘One might almost say cheap. On Sunday there is an orchestra of three and dainty afternoon tea is served. You can even dance. Maclintick has been there, haven’t you, Maclintick?’

‘Must it be Chinese food tonight?’ said Maclintick peevishly. ‘I’ve a touch of enteritis as it is.’

‘Remember some of the waitresses are rather attractive,’ said Moreland persuasively.

‘Chinese?’ I asked.

‘No,’ said Moreland, ‘English.’

He laughed a little self-consciously.

‘Bet you’ve got your eye on one,’ said Barnby.

I think Barnby made this remark as a matter of routine, either without bothering to consider the matter at all carefully, or on the safe assumption that no one would take the trouble to mention the fact that any given group of girls was above the average in looks without having singled out at least one of them for himself. That would unquestionably have been Barnby’s own procedure. Alternatively, Moreland may have spoken of Casanova’s on an earlier occasion, thereby giving Barnby reason to suspect there must be something special that attracted Moreland personally to the place. In any case, the imputation was not surprising, although Barnby’s own uninterrupted interest in the subject always made him perceptive where the question of a woman, or women, was concerned. However, Moreland went red at the enquiry. He was in one sense, easily embarrassed about any matter that touched him intimately; although, at the same time, his own mind moved too quickly for him to be placed long at a disadvantage by those who hoped to tease. In such situations he was pretty adept at turning the tables.

‘I had my eye on a girl there formerly,’ he said, ‘I admit that. It wasn’t entirely the excellent pig’s trotter soup that brought me back to Casanova’s. However, I can visit that restaurant now without a tremor – not a concupiscent thought. My pleasure in the place has become purely that of gourmet of Cathay. A triumph of self-mastery. I will point the girl out to you, Ralph.’

‘What happened?’ asked Barnby. ‘Did she leave you for the man who played the trombone?’

‘One just wasn’t a success,’ said Moreland, reddening again. ‘Anyway, I will show you the problem as it stood – no doubt as it stands. Nothing altered, so far as I know, except my own point of view. But let’s be moving. I’m famished.’

The name Casanova’s Chinese Restaurant offered one of those unequivocal blendings of disparate elements of the imagination which suggest a whole new state of mind or way of life. The idea of Casanova giving his name to a Chinese restaurant linked not only the East with the West, the present with the past, but also, more parochially, suggested by its own incongruity an immensely suitable place for all of us to have dinner that night. We arrived in two large rooms, in which most of the tables were filled. The clientele, predominantly male and Asiatic, had a backbone of Chinese businessmen and Indian students. A few negroes sat with very blonde white girls; a sprinkling of diners belonged to those ethnically indefinable races which colonise Soho and interbreed there. Along the walls frescoes tinted in pastel shades, executed with infinite feebleness of design, appealed to Heaven knows what nadir of æsthetic degradation. Almost as soon as we found a table, I marked down Moreland’s waitress. She was tall, very thin, fair-haired and blue-eyed, at that moment carrying a lot of glasses on a tray. The girl was certainly noticeable in her white lace cap and small frilled white apron above a black dress and black cotton stockings, the severity of this uniform, her own pale colouring, lending a curious exoticism to her appearance in these pseudo-oriental surroundings. There was an air of childlike innocence about her that could easily be deceptive. Indeed, when more closely observed, she had some of the look of a very expensive, rather wicked little doll. Moreland’s answer to Barnby’s almost immediate request to have ‘the girl we have come to see’ pointed out to him, confirmed the correctness of this guess. Barnby took one of his lingering, professional stares.

‘Rather an old man’s piece, isn’t she?’ he said. ‘Still, I see your point. Poorish legs, though.’

‘You mustn’t concentrate on legs if your interest is in waitresses,’ said Moreland. ‘The same is true of ballet dancers, I’m afraid.’

‘She looks as if she might well be a nymphomaniac,’ said Maclintick, ‘those very fair, innocent-looking girls often are. I think I mentioned that to Moreland when he brought me here before.’

Maclintick had hardly spoken since we left the Mortimer. Now he uttered these words in a tone of deep pessimism, as if, so far, he had resented every moment of the evening. He greatly disapproved of Barnby, whose inclination for women was as irksome to him as Mr Deacon’s so downright repudiation of the opposite sex. Maclintick possibly thought Barnby had a bad influence on Moreland.

‘She showed no sign of being a nympho,’ Moreland said. ‘On the contrary. I could have done with a little nymphomania – anyway at the start.’

‘What are we going to eat?’ said Barnby. ‘I can’t make head or tail of this menu.’

Maclintick and Barnby ordered something unadventurous from the dishes available; under Moreland’s guidance, I embarked upon one of the specialities of the house. Moreland’s waitress came to take our order for drinks. Although a restaurant of some size, Casanova’s had no licence, so that a member of the staff collected beer from the pub opposite, or wine from the shop round the corner. When she came up to the table the waitress gave Moreland a cold, formal smile of recognition, which freely acknowledged him as a regular customer, but suggested no more affectionate relationship. Close up, she looked, I thought, as hard as nails; I did not feel at all tempted to enter into competition. Barnby eyed her. She took no notice of him whatever, noting our orders in silence and disappearing.

‘Too thin for my taste,’ said Barnby. ‘I like a good armful.’

‘This lascivious conversation is very appropriate to the memory of the distinguished Venetian gentleman after whom the restaurant is named,’ said Maclintick harshly. ‘What a bore he must have been.’

He leant across the table, and, like an angry woodpecker, began to tap out his pipe against the side of a large Schweppes ashtray.

‘Do you suppose one would have known Casanova?’ I said.

‘Oh, but of course,’ said Moreland. ‘In early life, Casanova played the violin – like Carolo. Casanova played in a band – I doubt if he would have been up to a solo performance. I can just imagine what he would have been like to deal with if one had been the conductor. Besides, he much fancied himself as a figure at the opera and musical parties. One would certainly have met him. At least I am sure I should.’

‘Think of having to listen to interminable stories about his girls,’ said Maclintick. ‘I could never get through Casanova’s Memoirs. Why should he be considered a great man just because he had a lot of women? Most men would have ended by being bored to death.’

‘That is why he was a great man,’ said Moreland. ‘It wasn’t the number of women he had, it was the fact that he didn’t get bored. But there are endless good things there apart from the women. Do you remember when in London he overhears someone remark: “Tommy has committed suicide and he did quite right” – to which another person replies: “On the contrary, he did a very foolish thing, for I am one of his creditors and know that he need not have made away with himself for six months”.’

Barnby and I laughed at this anecdote. Maclintick did not smile. At the same time he seemed struck by the story. He was silent for some moments. When he spoke again it was in a manner at once more serious, more friendly, than any tone he had previously employed that evening.

‘I see nothing particularly funny in their conversation,’ he said. ‘That is how I propose to behave myself when the time comes. But I agree that Tommy was a fool to misjudge his term of days. I shall not do that. I give myself at least five more years at the present rate. That should allow me time to finish my book.’

‘Still,’ said Moreland, ‘however bent one may be on the idea of eventual suicide oneself, you must admit, Maclintick, that such sentiments must have sounded odd to a man of Casanova’s
joie de vivre.
Anyway, professional seducers never commit suicide. They haven’t time.’

‘The notable thing about professional seducers,’ said Maclintick, now returning to his former carping tone of voice, ‘is the rot they talk when they are doing their seducing. There is not a single cliché they leave unsaid.’

‘Although by definition the most egotistical of men,’ said Moreland, ‘they naturally have to develop a certain anonymity of style to make themselves acceptable to all women. It is the case of the lowest common factor – or is it the highest common denominator? If you hope to rise to the top class in seducing, you must appeal to the majority. As the majority are not very intelligent, you must conceal your own intelligence – if you have the misfortune to possess such a thing – in order not to frighten the girls off. There is inevitably something critical, something alarming to personal vanity, in the very suggestion of intelligence in another. That is almost equally true of dealing with men, so don’t think I hold it against women. All I say is, that someone like myself ought to restrict themselves to intelligent girls who see my own good points. Unfortunately, they are rarely the sort of girls I like.’