A Perfect Vacuum (2 page)

Sergius N., sizing up his situation, does not meekly resign himself but determines to become a true Robinson, beginning with the voluntary assumption of that very name, which is rational, inasmuch as from his past, his existence till now, he will no longer be able to derive any advantage.

The castaway's life, in its sum total of hardship and vicissitude, is unpleasant enough already and needs no further ministration by the futile exertions of a memory nostalgic for what is lost. The world, exactly as it is found, must be put to rights, and in a civilized fashion; and so the former Sergius N. resolves to form both the island and himself—from zero. The New Robinson of Monsieur Coscat has no illusions; he knows that Defoe's hero was a fiction whose real-life model—the sailor Selkirk—turned out to be, when found accidentally years later by some brig, a creature grown so completely brutish as to be bereft of speech. Defoe's Robinson saved himself not thanks to Friday—Friday appeared too late—but because he scrupulously counted on the company—stern, perhaps, but the best possible for a Puritan—of the Lord God Himself. It was this Companion who imposed upon him the severe pedanticism of behavior, the obstinate industry, the examination of conscience, and especially that fastidious modesty which so exasperated the author of the Paris Olympia that the latter attacked it head on with the lowered horns of obscenity.

Sergius N., or the New Robinson, feeling within himself some measure of creative power, knows ahead of time that there is one thing he will definitely never produce: the Supreme Being is sure to be beyond him. He is a rationalist, and it is as a rationalist that he sets about his task. He wishes to consider everything, and therefore begins with the question of whether the most sensible thing might not be to do nothing at all. This, of a certainty, will lead to madness, but who knows if madness may not be an altogether convenient condition? Tush, if one could but select the type of insanity, like matching a tie to a shirt; hypomanic euphoria, with its constant joy, Robinson would be perfectly willing to develop in himself; but how can he be sure it will not drift into a depression that ends with suicide attempts? This thought repels him, particularly out of esthetic considerations, and besides, passivity does not lie in his nature. For either hanging himself or drowning he will always have time, and therefore he postpones such a variant ad acta.

The world of dream—he says to himself, in one of the first pages of the novel—is the Nowhere that can be absolutely perfect; it is a utopia, though weakened in clarity, being but feebly fleshed out, submerged in the nocturnal workings of the mind, the mind which does not at that time (at night) measure up to the requirements of reality. “In my sleep,” declares Robinson, “I am visited by various persons, and they put questions to me, to which I know not the answer till it falls from their lips. Is this to signify that these persons are fragments untying themselves from my being, that they are, as it were, its umbilical continuation? To speak thus is to fall into great error. Just as I do not know whether those grubs,
already
appetizing to me, those juicy little white worms, are to be found beneath this flat stone, here, which I begin gingerly to pry at with the big toe of my bare foot, so, too, I do not know what is hidden in the minds of the persons who come to me in my sleep. Thus in relation to my
I
these persons are as external as the grubs. The idea is not at all to erase the distinction between dream and reality—that is the way to madness!—but to create a new, a better order. What in a dream succeeds only now and then, with mixed results, in muddled fashion, waveringly and by chance, must be straightened, tightened, fitted together, and made secure; a dream, when moored in reality, when brought out into the light of reality
as a method,
and serving reality, and peopling reality, packing it with the very finest goods, ceases to be a dream, and reality, under the influence of such curative treatment, becomes both as clear as before and shaped as never before. Since I am alone, I need take no one into account; however, since at the same time the knowledge that I am alone is poison to me, I will therefore not be alone. The Lord God I cannot manage, it is true, but that does not mean I cannot manage Anyone!”

And our logical Robinson says further: “A man without Others is a fish without water, but just as most water is murky and turbid, so, too, my medium was a rubbish heap. My relatives, parents, superiors, teachers I did not choose myself; this applies even to my mistresses, for they came my way at random: throughout, I took (if it can be said I took at all) what chance provided. If, like any other mortal, I was condemned to the accidents of birth and family and friends, then there is nothing for which I need mourn. And therefore—let there resound the first words of Genesis: Away with this clutter!”

He speaks these words, we see, with a solemnity to match that of the Maker: “Let there be...” For in fact Robinson prepares to create himself a world from zero. It is not now merely through his liberation from people due to a fortuitous calamity that he embarks upon creation whole hog, but by design. And thus the logically perfect hero of Marcel Coscat outlines a plan that later will destroy and mock him—can it be, as the human world has done to
its
Creator?

Robinson does not know where to begin. Ought he to surround himself with ideal beings? Angels? Winged horses? (For a moment he has a yen for a centaur.) But, stripped of illusions, he understands that the presence of beings in any respect perfect will be difficult to stomach. Therefore, for a start, he supplies himself with one about whom before, till now, he could only dream: a loyal servant, a butler, valet, and footman in one person—the fat (no lean and hungry look!) Snibbins. In the course of this first Robinsonad our apprentice Demiurge reflects upon democracy, which, like any man (of this he is certain), he had put up with only out of necessity. When yet a boy, before dropping off to sleep, he imagined how lovely it would be to be born a mighty lord in some medieval time. Now at last that fantasy can be realized. Snibbins is properly stupid, for thereby he automatically elevates his master; nothing original ever enters his head, hence he will never give notice; he performs everything in a twinkling, even that which his master has not yet had time to ask.

The author does not at all explain whether—and how—Robinson does the work
for
Snibbins, because the story is told in the first (Robinson's) person; but even if Robinson (and how can it be otherwise?) does do everything himself on the sly and afterward attributes it to the servant's offices, he acts at that time totally without awareness, and thus only the results of those exertions are visible. Hardly has Robinson rubbed the sleep from his eyes in the morning when there at his bedside lie the carefully prepared little oysters of which he is so fond—salted lightly with sea water, seasoned to taste with the sour tang of sorrel herbs—and, for an appetizer, soft grubs, white as butter, on dainty saucer-stones; and behold, nearby are his shoes polished to a high shine with coconut fiber, and his clothes all laid out, pressed by a rock hot from the sun, and the trousers creased, and a fresh flower in the lapel of the jacket. But even so the master usually grumbles a little as he eats and dresses. For lunch he will have roast tern, for supper coconut milk, but well chilled. Snibbins, as befits a good butler, receives his orders—of course—in submissive silence.

The Master grumbles, the Servant listens; the Master orders, the Servant does as bid. It is a pleasant life, quiet, a little like a vacation in the country. Robinson goes for walks, pockets interesting pebbles, even builds up a collection of them; Snibbins, in the meantime, prepares the meals—but eats nothing at all himself: how easy on the budget and how convenient! But by and by in the relations of Master and Servant there appear the first sands of discord. The existence of Snibbins is beyond question: to doubt it is to doubt that the trees stand and the clouds float when no one is watching them. But the stiff formality of the footman, his meticulousness, obedience, submission, grow downright wearisome. The shoes are
always
waiting for Robinson polished, the oysters give off their smell each morning by his hard bed; Snibbins holds his tongue—and a good thing, too, the Master can't abide servants' ifs, ands, and buts—but from this it is evident that Snibbins
as a person
is not in any way present on the island. Robinson decides to add something that will make the situation—too simple, primitive really—more refined. To give Snibbins slothfulness, contrariness, an inclination to mischief, cannot be done: the way he is, is the way he is; he has by now too solidly established himself in existence. Robinson therefore engages, as a scullery boy and helper, the little Boomer. This is a filthy but good-looking urchin, foot-loose, you might say, somewhat of a loafer, but sharp-witted, full of shenanigans, and now it is not the Master but the Servant who begins to have more and more work—not in attendance on the Master, but to conceal from the Master's eye all the things that that young whippersnapper thinks up. The result is that Snibbins, because he is constantly occupied with thrashing Boomer, is absent to an even higher degree than before; from time to time Robinson can hear, inadvertently, the sounds of Snibbins's dressing-downs, carried in his direction by the ocean wind (the shrill voice of Snibbins is amazingly like the voice of the big gulls), but he is not about to involve himself in the bickering of servants! What, Boomer is pulling Snibbins away from the Master? Boomer will be dismissed—has already been sent packing, scattered to the winds. Had even helped himself to the oysters! The Master is willing to forget this little episode, but then Snibbins cannot, try as he might; he falls down on the job; scolding does not help; the servant maintains his silence, still waters run deep, and it's clear now that he's started thinking. The Master disdains to interrogate a servant or demand frankness—to whom is he to be confessor? ! Nothing goes smoothly, a sharp word has no effect—very well then, you too, old fool, out of my sight! Here's three months' wages—and to hell with you!

Robinson, haughty as any master, wastes an entire day in the throwing together of a raft, with it reaches the deck of the
Patricia,
which lies wrecked upon a reef: the money, fortunately, has not been carried off by the waves. Accounts squared, Snibbins vanishes—except that he has left behind the counted-out money. Robinson, insulted thus by the servant, does not know what to do. He feels that he has committed an error, though as yet feels this by intuition only. What has gone wrong?!

I am Master here, I can do anything!—he says to himself immediately, for courage, and takes on Wendy Mae. She is, we conjecture, an allusion to the paradigm of Man Friday. But this young, really rather simple girl might lead the Master into temptation. He might easily perish in her marvelous—since unattainable—embraces, he might lose himself in a fever of rut and lusting, go mad on the point of her pale, mysterious smile, her fleeting profile, her bare little feet bitter from the ashes of the campfire and reeking with the grease of barbecued mutton. Therefore, from the very first, in a moment of true inspiration, he makes Wendy Mae ... three-legged. In a more ordinary, that is, a tritely objective reality, he would not have been able to do this! But here he is Lord of Creation. He acts as one who, having a cask of methyl alcohol, poisonous yet inviting him to drink and be merry, plugs it up himself, against himself, for he will be living with a temptation he must never indulge; at the same time he will be kept on his toes, for his appetite will constantly be removing from the cask, lewdly, its hermetic bung. And thus Robinson will live, from now on, cheek by jowl with a three-legged maid, always able—of course—to imagine her
without
the middle leg, but that is all. He becomes wealthy in emotions unspent, in endearments unsquandered (for what point would there be in wasting them on such a person?). Little Wendy Mae, associated in his mind with both Wednesday and Wedding Day (note: Wednesday,
Mitt-woch,
the middle of the week—an obvious symbolization of sex; perhaps, too, Wendy—Wench—Window), and also with a poor orphan (“Wednesday's child is full of woe”), becomes his Beatrice. Did that silly little chit of a fourteen-year-old know anything whatever about Dante's infernal spasms of desire? Robinson is indeed pleased with himself. He created her and by that very act—her three-leggedness—barricaded her from himself. Nevertheless, before long the whole thing begins to come apart at the seams. While concentrating on a problem important in some respects, Robinson neglected so many other important facets of Wendy Mae!

It begins innocently enough. He would like, now and then, to take a peek at the little one but has pride enough to resist this urge. Later, however, various thoughts run through his brain. The girl does what formerly was Snibbins's job. Gathering the oysters—no problem there; but taking care of the Master's wardrobe, even his personal linen? Here already one can detect an element of ambiguity—no!—it is all too unambiguous! So he gets up surreptitiously, in the dead of night, when she is sure to be still sleeping, and washes his unmentionables in the bay. But since he has begun to rise so early, why couldn't he—just once—you know—for fun (but only his own, Master's, solitary fun)—wash
her
things? Didn't he give them to her? By himself, in spite of the sharks, he went out several times to penetrate the hull of the
Patricia
and found some ladies' frippery, shifts, pinafores, petticoats, panties. Yes, but when he washes them, won't he have to hang everything up on a line, between the trunks of two palms? A dangerous game! Particularly dangerous in that, though Snibbins is no longer on the island as a servant, he has not dropped completely out of the picture. Robinson can almost hear his heavy breathing, can guess what he is thinking: Your Lordship, begging your pardon, never washed anything for
me.
While he existed, Snibbins never would have dared utter words so audaciously insinuating, but, missing, he turns out to be devilishly loose of tongue! Snibbins is gone, that is true; but he has left his absence. He is not to be seen in any concrete place, but even when he served he modestly lay low, kept out of the Master's way and dared not show himself. Now, Snibbins haunts: his pathologically obsequious, goggle-eyed stare, his screechy voice, it all returns; the distant quarrels with Boomer shrill through the screams of the least gull; and now Snibbins bares his hairy chest among the ripe coconuts (to what leads the shamelessness of such hints?!), he bends to the curve of the scaled palm trunks and with fisheyes (the goggle!) looks at Robinson like a drowned man from beneath the waves. Where? There, over there, where that rock is, on the point—for he had his own little hobby, did Snibbins: he loved to sit on the promontory and hurl croaking curses at the aged and infirm whales, who loose their spouts sedately, within the confines of their families, on the bounding main.