Fascination (17 page)

I heard a tapping at my window this morning (I am on the third floor) and pulled back the curtains to be dazzled by an oblique winter sun. A bird, a blackbird, was pecking at the glass. I shooed it away. I realize now that it is the utter inadequacy of human contacts that makes us turn to art. I know why I became a novelist: only in fiction is everything about other people explained. Only in our fictions is everything sure and certain.

‘He could sometimes be seen walking in Hyde Park. A tall man in his seventies, a little portly. His hair, quite grey, was thinning and as he was self-conscious about his baldness he often wore a hat, an increasingly unfashionable accessory in this day and age. He had known considerable success as a novelist in the 1920s and ’30s but his reputation had declined. All his books were out of print but he managed to live comfortably enough on a small, carefully managed legacy that his mother, a Russian aristocrat, had left him on her death. He was regarded by those who encountered him as difficult and stand-offish, or else eccentric and scatterbrained. In actual fact he looked on the world and its denizens with a curious and not unkind eye. Most things he saw amused him.’

DATE
: Monday.

VENUE
: Le Truc Interessant, Lexington Street, Soho.

PRESENT
: Me, Gerald Vere, Melanie Swartz, Peter (somebody) from Svenska Bank, Barry Freeman, Diane Skinner (account exec. from S.L.L. & L.), Eddie Kroll (left before pudding).

MEAL
: Tabouleh chinois, roulade de foie de veau farcie, millefeuille de fruits d’hiver.

WINE
: Two Moet & Chandon non-vintage, two Sancerre, an ’83 Pichon Longueville, a big Provençal red called Mas Jullien. Port, brandy (eau de vie de prune for Diane S.).

BILL
: £878, service not included.

EXTRAS
: Romeo y Julietas for Vere and Freeman, t-shirt and condiments set for Melanie. Twenty Silk Cut for Diane S.

COMMENTS
: No piped music. Tabouleh chinois an orthodox tabouleh with sliced lychees mixed in. Unusual. Roulade de foie exquisite, served on a little purée of celeriac. Diane S. barely touched her food, ‘saving up for dessert’. Millefeuille – eight out of ten for the pastry. Fruits bland. Diane S. picked up tab. Taxied me back too. Thank you Swabold, Lang, Laing and Longmuir. Thank you very much.

DATE
: Tuesday.

VENUE
: Eurotel Palace, Heathrow Airport.

PRESENT
: Me, Diane S.

MEAL
: Insalata Tricolore, Dover sole, tarte aux pommes.

WINE
: G & T in bar, Merry Dale Chardonnay, House champagne with pud.

BILL
: £96 (service incl.).

EXTRAS
: Irish coffee served in our room. £5.50 each. Twenty Silk Cut.

COMMENTS
: Almost inaudible classical muzak. Rubbery mozzarella. When will the British stop serving ‘A selection of vegetables’? Tasteless carrots, watery broccoli, some kind of swede. Tarte aux pommes a simple apple pie, not flattered by translation. House champagne surprisingly good – small bubbles, buttery, cidery. Undrunk Irish coffee – waste.

DATE
: Wednesday.

VENUE
: Chairman’s dining ‘set’, sixth floor. Pale oak panelling. Silver. Good paintings – a small, perfect Sutherland, Alan Reynolds, two Craxtons.

PRESENT
: Me, Sir Torquil, Gerald Vere, Barry Freeman, Blake Ginsberg (new m.d.), some senior suit from Finance (introduced as ‘you know Lucy’ – can’t be his first name, surely? Very foreign looking).

MEAL
: Vegetable terrine, lamb chops with new potatoes, raspberries with crème fraiche. Stilton.

WINE
: Hipflask in loo downstairs, then Vodkatini (could have been colder), a perfectly good Chablis, followed by a ’78 Domaine de Chevalier (stunning). Port (Taylor’s, missed date).

BILL
: A heavy price to pay.

EXTRAS
: At least I saw the Sutherland.

COMMENTS
: Apart from the vegetable terrine (always a total waste
of time) this was superior corporate catering. Sensible. Lamb nicely pink. Superb wine. They had the grace to wait until the cheese. The condemned man had eaten a hearty meal. Fucking heartless cold fucking swine.

DATE
: Thursday.

VENUE
: La Casa del’ Luigi, Fulham Road.

PRESENT
: Me, Diane, (later) Jennifer.

MEAL
: Minestrone, spaghetti bolognese, tiramisu.

WINE
: G & Ts, Valpolicella, replaced by a Chianti Classico when spilt. Large grappa after Jennifer’s arrival and departure.

BILL
: £73 rounded up to £90. Scant gratitude.

EXTRAS
: Twenty Silk Cut. Three glasses, two plates. Dry cleaning to be notified.

COMMENTS
: Minestrone was tinned, I’d swear. Alfredo’s spag. bog. amazingly authentic as ever (why can’t one ever achieve this at home?). He refuses to divulge his secret, but I’m convinced it’s the chicken livers in the ragú. Which must simmer for days, also. Watery, ancient tiramisu. Big mistake to eat so close to home. HUGE mistake. Jennifer would have walked right past. What bastard waiter called her in?

DATE
: Friday.

VENUE
: Montrose Dining Club, Lincoln’s Inn. Basement, large overlit room, long central table. Staffed by very old ex-college porters and very young monoglot girls who appear to be from Eastern Europe.

PRESENT
: Me, Alisdair Lockhart.

MEAL
: Potted shrimps and toast, duck à l’orange, treacle tart (!).

WINE
: G & Ts, club claret, club brandy.

BILL
: £28. (I paid. Astonishing value. Alisdair said he could add it to his bill but I insisted.)

EXTRAS
: About £5000 if I know Alisdair.

COMMENTS
: Time travel. Back to school. This was English cuisine until quite recently, we have forgotten that this was how we all used to eat. Potted shrimps like consuming cold butter, limp toast. Duck cooked to extinction, repulsive cloying sauce. I ordered treacle tart for nostalgia’s sake. (Alisdair has appalling dandruff for a comparatively young man.) I said Jennifer was being very difficult, thus far. He was not sanguine. Asked if this had happened before so I told him of Jennifer’s ultimatum. Spoke briefly about custody of Toby. He left early as he had to get to court. Depressing. Drank whiskey in an Irish pub.

DATE
: Saturday.

PLACE
: My kitchen, Rostrevor Road, Fulham.

PRESENT
: Me and (intermittently) Birgitte, the au pair.

MEAL
: Raided fridge – cottage cheese and crispbread, remains of Thursday’s shepherd’s pie, some of Toby’s little yoghurt things, cheese triangles. Birgitte sent out for a pizza but I couldn’t be bothered waiting.

WINE
: ‘Three goes of gin, a lemon slice and a ten-ounce tonic…’ Who said that? Then two glasses of Pinot Grigio, before I went down to the basement and rooted out the Ducru-Beaucaillou. Fuck it. I gave some to Birgitte, who made a face. She preferred to drink her own beer. She gave me a can when I’d finished the Beaucaillou. Strong stuff. Slept in the afternoon.

BILL
: The Human Condition.

EXTRAS
: I miss Toby and Jennifer. I miss our usual Saturday lunch. Best lunch of the week.

COMMENTS
: Music – Brahms Horn Trio initially, but it made me want to weep. Birgitte played something rhythmic, ethnic. She gave me a tape of ocean waves breaking on a shore. ‘For calming’ she said. Big, big-hearted girl. Why would anybody eat cottage cheese? What, in terms of taste and texture, could possibly recommend it? Jennifer and her silly, perpetual diets. Perfectly slim, perfectly… The cheese triangles were unbelievably tasty, ate a whole wheel’s worth as I drank the Beaucaillou.

DATE
: Sunday. Cold, low, packed clouds, a flat, sullen light.

VENUE
: Somewhere in eastern England on the 11.45 to Norwich. Writing this in the bar. On my way to Mother and Sunday lunch.

PRESENT
: Me, three soldiers, a fat woman, and a thin, weaselly man with a mobile phone.

MEAL
: Started with a Jimmyburger on the station concourse, then a couple of Scotch eggs in the bar. On the train I had a bag of salt ’n’ vinegar crisps and an egg and cress sandwich from the steward with the trolley. In the buffet thus far I have had a pork pie, a sausage roll, something called a ‘Ploughman’s Bap’ and a Mars bar. There is a solitary mushroom and salami omelette wrapped in cellophane that they will do in a microwave. Why am I still hungry?

WINE
: Large vodka and orange in the station bar – vague, very temporary desire to keep my breath alcohol free. Two cans of gin and Italian vermouth in the train before I wandered buffetwards. Started drinking lager: ‘Speyhawk Special Strength’. Notice the squaddies are drinking the same. They do quarter bottles of wine in here, I see. I’ve now bought a couple, having ordered the omelette. It is labelled ‘Red Wine’. No country of origin. Tart,
pungent, raw. I worry it will stain my lips. Mother will serve, as usual, Moselle and call it hock.

BILL
: I refuse to spend more than £20.

EXTRAS
: A lot of cigarette smoke, everyone is smoking including, covertly, the steward behind the bar. Smoke seeps between the fingers of his loosely clenched fist resting on his buttocks. The fat woman is smoking. The man on the mobile phone is smoking as he mutters into his little plastic box. I have a metallic taste in my mouth, and am seized by a sudden, embittering image of Diane S. – naked, laughing.

COMMENTS
: The English countryside has never looked so drained and dead under this oppressive pewter sky. The barman beckons… Now I have my mushroom and salami omelette, a piebald yellow with brown patches, steaming suspiciously, a curious, gamey but undeniably foodlike smell seems suddenly to have pervaded the entire carriage, obliterating all other odours. Everyone is looking at me. I screw the top off my ‘Red Wine’ and fill my glass as we hurtle across Norfolk. Gastric juices squirt. I’m starving, how is this possible? My mother will have the archetype of an English Sunday lunch waiting for me. A roast, cooked grey, potatoes and two or three vegetables, a lake of gravy, cheese and biscuits, her special trifle. I look out of the window at the miles of sombre green. Rain is spitting on the glass and the soldiers have started to sing. Time for my omelette. I know what I am doing but it is a bad sign, this, the beginning of the end. I am deliberately setting out to ruin (because, let’s face it, you cannot, before lunch, lunch) lunch.

I am standing on the corner of Westwood and Wilshire, just down from the Mobilgas station, waiting. There is a coolish breeze just managing to blow from somewhere, and I am glad of it. Nine o’clock in the morning and it’s going to be another hot one, for sure. For the third or fourth time I needlessly go over and inspect the concrete foundation, note again that the powerlines have been properly installed and the extra bolts I have requested are duly there. Where is everybody? I look at my watch, light another cigarette and begin to grow vaguely worried: have I picked the wrong day? Has my accent confused Mr Koenig (he is always asking me to repeat myself)?…

A bright curtain – blues and ochres – boils and billows from an apartment window across the street. It sets a forgotten corner of my mind working – who had drapes like that, once? Who owned a skirt that was similar, or perhaps a tie? –

A claxon honks down Wilshire and I look up to see Spencer driving the crane, pulling slowly across two lanes of traffic and coming to a halt at the kerb.

He swings himself down from the cab and takes off his cap. His hair is getting longer, losing that army crop.

‘Sorry I’m late, Miss Velk, the depot was, you know, crazy, impossible.’

‘Doesn’t matter, it’s not here anyway.’

‘Yeah, right.’ Spencer moves over and crouches down at the concrete plinth checking the powerline connection, touching and jiggling the bolts and their brackets. He goes round the back of the crane and sets out the wooden ‘Men at Work’ signs, then reaches into his pocket and hands me a crumpled sheet of flimsy.

‘The permit,’ he explains. ‘We got ‘til noon.’

‘Even on a Sunday?’

‘Even on a Sunday. Even in Los Angeles.’ He shrugs. ‘Even in 1945. Don’t worry, Miss Velk. We got plenty of time.’

I turn away, a little exasperated. ‘As long as it gets here,’ I say with futile determination, as if I had the power to threaten. The drape streams out of the window suddenly, like a banner, and catches the sun. Then I remember: like the wall hanging Utta had done. The one that Jochen bought.

Spencer asks me if he should go phone the factory but I say give them an extra half hour. I am remembering another Sunday morning, sunny like this one, but not as hot, and half the world away, and I can see myself walking up Grillparzerstrasse, taking the shortcut from the station, my suitcase heavy in my hand, and hoping, wondering, now that I have managed to catch the early train from Sorau, if Jochen will be able to find some time to see me alone that afternoon…

Gudrun Velk walked slowly up Grillparzerstrasse, enjoying the sun, her body canted over to counterbalance the weight of her suitcase. She was wearing… (What was I wearing?) She was wearing baggy cotton trousers with the elasticated cuffs at the ankles, a sky blue blouse and the embroidered felt jacket with the motif of jousters and strutting chargers. Her fair hair was down and she wore no makeup; she was thinking about Jochen, and whether they might see each other that day, and whether they might make love. Thinking about Utta, if she would be up by now. Thinking about the two thick skeins of still damp blue wool in her suitcase, wool that she had dyed herself late the night before at the mill in Sorau and that she felt sure would finish her rug perfectly, and, most importantly, in a manner that would please Paul.