The Man of Feeling (4 page)

A
ND
YET
I
FIND
MYSELF
RESISTING
telling you everything. A poor tenor who is afraid of his own story and of his own dreams, as if using words instead of lyrics, words that have not been dictated, invented phrases rather than repetitive written texts, learned, and memorized, had paralyzed his powerful voice, which up until now has only known the recitative style. I find it hard to speak without a libretto.

I was not an entirely free man then, and what I do not know and what I fear I will never know is why I lied about this to Dato that night in the hotel bar, when he enquired about my marital status. It wasn't one of his first questions, but it makes no difference: I could not have imagined then what he was going to propose without actually saying that he was proposing something. And if I had told the truth, he might not have proposed anything.

"Ah, so you're a singer. I should have guessed as much from that great chest of yours, and those shoulders, those pectorals, that virile appearance; you know, you look exactly as everyone imagines a singer should look. Now I don't know much about music, but I love it, all of it, I don't mind what it is, I can happily listen to music whatever I'm doing, really, anywhere, any time. Yours must be a fascinating life."

Up until the moment when I lied about my situation, I was telling him the truth, although, from the start, I found Dato's manner very hard to take and his comments utterly trivial, so much so that just as I was about to respond, I was seriously considering whether it was worth getting involved in a boring conversation of a kind I'd had thousands of times before and which was (as can be seen) tinged with the inevitable impertinence of the ignorant, and all for the sake of a little company in what had once been my own city. But, despite his manner and his opening remarks, the truth is there was something intriguing about the fellow (whom I no longer believed to be a traveling salesman: he was too relaxed, his voice and his gestures too languid, his clothes, on closer inspection, too expensive) and, at the same time, too, there was something about him that invited confidence. For all his worldly tone, his appearance and his expression still struck me as unreal or perhaps too real, like a Daumier caricature. He smiled constantly and easily, revealing those great, bulging gums that seemed about to burst at any moment, and gestured animatedly with his miniature hands.

"Well, I don't know about fascinating. It's varied and interesting, and all the moving around certainly keeps you on your toes. But, although it might not seem like it, it's a pretty hard, solitary existence. All that traveling is very unsettling." And I spoke to him briefly (though vehemently) about my sorrows and my discontents, about my partial or latent despair, and then asked him the obligatory question: "And what do you do?"

As I said earlier, by then, indeed as soon as I recognized him as being the same man who had been staring so intently out of the train window, I had rejected the idea of him being a traveling salesman, but apart from what I had thought at the time (without much conviction or insight, that he owned some medium-sized company), I had not stopped to think what he might do. Of course, I could never have guessed what his reply would be.

"I'm a companion. Now, don't look so surprised. That isn't what it says on my passport, and I suppose that isn't really my proper tide, perhaps private secretary, financial adviser, Manur & Co.'s Iberian representative, whichever you prefer. I was a stockbroker once and that marks you, oh, yes, it leaves a mark, but what can you expect? Basically, though, I'm a companion. At my age there's no point in trying to dress up the truth. And the truth is that I'm just a companion, albeit a well-paid one."

I was still trying to decide if I was interested in this conversation or not and so I did not reply at once, but in one gulp drank down my glass of milk which was still intact before me, and which gave rise to another of Dato's inappropriate remarks:

"I suppose you have to look after your throat and avoid cold drinks. Another whisky, please, barman."

"Yes," I said mechanically. "You must never let your throat get cold, that's absolutely fundamental. For example, I don't usually take my scarf off until well into June, and even then that very much depends on the weather."

"Really? And when do you put it on again?"

"Usually in early September. If you ever see a young man wearing a scarf around the end of June or the beginning of September, you can be sure that he's a singer. As I say, it's an unforgiving life, with a lot of obligations and duties. We can't even allow ourselves an ordinary cold, which, as you can imagine, would be a complete disaster, because although you might recover soon enough from the cold, it takes four or five weeks before your voice is in perfect condition again. And meanwhile we're in breach or semi-breach of our contract and we lose both money and reputation. But tell me," and I led the conversation back to the one thing that had really struck me: I was struck by the fact that, in the solitude of what had once been my own city, the person now keeping me company claimed to be a professional companion, "What exactly does a companion do? Whom do you accompany? How do you do it? Are you for hire?"

Dato smiled even more broadly than before (he was a nice man or at least that was his intention) and made a negative gesture with one of his delicate hands before picking up his fresh glass of whisky.

"No, you've misunderstood me. I'm not what people call a lady's companion, if that's what you're thinking: you know, one of those insipid, kindly, intransigent women you get in films, looking after some old duffer or an invalid. What I meant to say is that, despite my theoretical duties (as financial adviser, etc.) what I mostly do, my main function and use, is to keep my employers company. Didn't you see them? Didn't you notice? They were traveling with me on the train."

Of course I had seen them and studied them, and analyzed and even defined them: an exploiter and a depressive, a tycoon and a melancholic, a man of ambition and a neurotic. That is how they had seemed to me then, and I had in fact thought about them occasionally since. Yes, I dreamed that at that moment in my conversation with Dato I remembered, or admitted having given them a few fleeting thoughts during the first three days of my stay in Madrid, while I was beginning rehearsals at the Teatro de la Zarzuela for my role as Cassio in Verdi's
Otello.
Given her a few fleeting thoughts. Of course I had seen them, of course I had noticed, but, quite why, I don't really know—or perhaps now I do know—I pretended to think hard for a few seconds.

"Oh, yes, a couple, he seemed very imposing." I hadn't wanted to use the word "imposing," which is so often used when speaking of someone's physical appearance: I had wanted to use an adjective that would describe him morally, but at that moment I couldn't think of any word that would not also prove offensive.

"You've put your finger on it, that's him, imposing. Señor Manur is very imposing. She, on the other hand, is in a terrible state. Not the way she looks, of course, I mean she's very attractive and elegant, but she's a lost soul, really, a most unhappy woman. And she's the one, of course, whom I mainly accompany, both at home in Brussels (he's Belgian, you see, we live in Brussels) and on the occasional trips we make, like on this one now. Especially on the trips. You see, she's got nothing to look forward to and she gets bored. She suffers, she's never happy, and you can see her point really. I'm supposed to distract her, to try to keep her boredom and suffering to a minimum, so that she doesn't cause Señor Manur too many problems, so that she's not quite so unhappy, and focuses on the present and doesn't pine. I listen to her complaints and her confidences, I console her with reasoned arguments, I ask her to be patient for my sake and for Señor Manur's sake too, I try to make her see the pros and the cons; I take her to the movies, to an exhibition, to the theater, to the opera, to a concert; she's very fond of old books and old things in general, and so I consult or, rather, study huge catalogues from the most prestigious booksellers in Paris, London, and New York, and I order for her the most bizarre, most sought-after books, rare, expensive editions, anything that might interest her; and I go to auctions with her, where I do the bidding and raise my finger or make the agreed signal and where we buy not just paintings, but furniture, statuettes, vases, the occasional carpet, wall clocks, letter openers, little boxes, paperweights, engravings, frames, figurines, anything you can imagine, all of it first-rate, all of it very old and in the best possible taste. I do what I can, but, after all this time, I'm running out of ideas and, besides, I'm tired, very tired. I know all her ills, I know them by heart, and she knows by heart all my arguments, my remedies, all my persuasive techniques."

Dato paused to take a sip of his drink. Although he had just begun what appeared to be a litany of complaints, his voice, his gestures, his ingratiating smile had barely altered. It was as if he too were reciting something—a lamentation, the introduction to an aria. And there was not the slightest trace of mockery in his voice, nor even irony. He took that woman utterly seriously and felt no rancour either, perhaps because—or so I thought—she seemed to be his sole occupation in life, even if he would rather she were not.

"The only place in the world where she used to feel comfortable, where she didn't need anything, not even me (
volontiers
), the only place where she had independent memories that predated her disastrous marriage, was Madrid, where she comes from and from where she was uprooted some twelve or fifteen years ago and where, up until only a few months ago, her brother used to live. Whenever we came to Madrid (and since Manur & Co. has traditionally had many dealings here, we used to come here frequently), I could have a rest and devote myself to other things. Señor Manur, as he always is everywhere, would be busy with his many financial deals (he's a banker, you see), and Natalia, his wife (her name's Natalia, you see), would spend all day with her brother. That was the only time when she seemed happy, when she seemed almost to have forgotten her melancholy and seemed almost indifferent to Manur, indeed she was almost nice to Manur when their paths occasionally crossed in the hotel lobby or when they had to go out to some formal supper, to which her brother, Monte, would nearly always go along too. And now what? Monte is no longer in Madrid, he's gone to live in South America (South America of all places!), and for the three days we've been here, Natalia has been even more unhappy and depressed than ever; it's the first time she's been to Madrid without Monte being here, and she's even more bored and lethargic and miserable than she usually is (and for two reasons now), and just at a time when my reserves are at an all-time low, when I simply don't know how to distract her or even how to bring a smile to her face, least of all during those formal suppers. I simply don't know what to say to her any more. I can be quite resourceful when I put my mind to it, you know. I can be extremely resourceful, but she knows all my jokes, all my pithy sayings, the kind of remark I'm likely to come out with, she can even tell when I'm about to make some quip. She knows all my mechanisms and she knows the city, well, she was born here. I can't take her to the Prado or to the Plaza Mayor as if it were a novelty for her. And I haven't got anyone else to fall back on: she's lost contact with all the friends from her youth, because she left here when she was nineteen or twenty, and anyway everyone's always so busy; she hasn't written to or phoned anyone in years and you have to make an effort to keep in touch; all she knows is that in this city, her own city, she doesn't exist: she only used to exist (when she came here) through Monte. She knows the people her brother introduced her to, but they won't want to see her without her brother, you know what social conventions are like and how lacking in curiosity most people are. And I'm finding that here, where I used to have a break, a break from being a companion, I have to work and strain my imagination to the limit; I have to be with her almost all the time, especially during her interminable walks around areas she has probably seen thousands of times before and knows like the back of her hand. It wears me out I'm too old for all that walking. And besides, Madrid, when it wants to be, is a very hostile city, and here I am obliged to spend hours at a time walking through this hostile city; walking and stopping again and again (she's always looking at shop windows and buildings), which is the most tiring part of all. What was traditionally my rest period has become the worst time and the worst journey of the year."

Dato finished his second glass of whisky and asked for a single. The suppressed agitation with which he had been speaking seemed to have caused his voluminous, curly hair to fill out or rise. There was still no one else in the hotel bar, just him and me sitting before the invisible presence of the barman. Dato pointed towards the door with one of his small, eighteenth-century hands.

"In a few moments, she'll appear at that door and she won't let me go to bed or continue my conversation with you. No, she'll ask me or, rather, order me to go for a last walk around the block with her, because it's such a fine evening, or she'll want to have a drink with me somewhere so that she can tell me what a terrible time she's had over supper (tonight Señor Manur has taken her to a supper for wives and husbands, part business engagement, part formal supper). And meanwhile he, Señor Manur, will go off to bed so that he can rise refreshed in the morning and dedicate himself busily to his many tasks and occupations. And since I'm no use to him whatsoever (for that's the truth of the matter), he can manage perfectly well without my purely theoretical services; Manur can do everything without my help and I serve a far more useful purpose, a far more valuable role, keeping Natalia company and making sure she doesn't get bored and doesn't suffer and isn't entirely miserable. Do you understand? Do you see? I am a companion, nothing more, and both of them, Natalia and Manur, know that that is what I'm paid to do, and they make that quite clear. And I know it too. So you see, you complain about being too alone; I, on the other hand, complain about having too much company. You complain that your life is too scattered and diverse; I, on the other hand, complain that my life is too concentrated and monotonous. Keeping Natalia Manur company, that is what my life has been these last few years, that is the actual content of my present existence. She's a lovely person, of course, if somewhat on the melancholy side, but only a husband or a lover or possibly a brother can keep a woman company indefinitely and unconditionally, don't you think? And I am not her husband or her lover or her brother. Señor Manur is her husband and Monte is her brother, and she, incredible though it may seem, has no lovers. It's completely illogical in her situation, but that, alas, is how it is."