Cloud Atlas (61 page)

ZEDELGHEM
21ST—X—1931

Sixsmith,

Ayrs should be up on his feet tomorrow after a bed-bound fortnight. Wouldn’t wish syphilis on my worst enemies. Only one or two, anyway. The syphilitic decays in increments, like fruit rotting in orchard verges. Dr. Egret calls by every other day, but there’s not much left to prescribe except ever-bigger doses of morphine. V.A. loathes using it because it clouds his music.

J. prone to bouts of despondency. Some nights, she just clings to me as if I’m her life belt and she’s drowning. Feel sorry for the woman, but I’m interested in her body, not her problems. Was.

Spent the fortnight gone in the music room, reworking my year’s fragments into a “sextet for overlapping soloists”: piano, clarinet, ‘cello, flute, oboe, and violin, each in its own language of key, scale, and color. In the first set, each solo is interrupted by its successor: in the second, each interruption is recontinued, in order. Revolutionary or gimmicky? Shan’t know until it’s finished, and by then it’ll be too late, but it’s the first thing I think of when I wake, and the last thing I think of before I fall asleep, even if J. is in my bed. She should understand, the artist lives in two worlds.

Next day

Had the devil of a spat with V.A. He dictated a toccata-like étude during this morning’s compositional, it seemed deuced familiar, then I recognized the refrain from my own “Angel of Mons”! If Ayrs hoped I’d not notice he was v. much mistaken. I told him straight—this was my music. He changed his tune: “What d’you mean,
your
music? Frobisher, when you grow up, you’ll find that all composers draw inspiration from their environments. You’re one of many elements in mine, receiving a fair salary, I might add, enjoying daily master classes in composition and mingling with the greatest musical minds of the age. If you’re unhappy with these terms, Hendrick will drive you to the station.” Well, a v. different man from the one I’d wheeled down to the lodge house a few weeks ago, when he’d pleaded with me to stay on until next spring. I asked whom he had in mind to replace me. Mrs. Willems? The gardener? Eva? Nefertiti? “Oh, I’m sure Sir Trevor Mackerras could lay his hands on a suitable boy for me. Yes, I shall advertise. You’re not as singular as you like to think. Now. Do you want your job or not?”

Couldn’t find a way to win back lost ground so I walked out, complaining of agony in my big toe. V.A. fired this warning at my flank: “If your toe isn’t better by the morning, Frobisher, get it fixed in London and don’t come back.” Sometimes I want to build a bloody great bonfire and toss the old sod into its roaring heart.

Some days later

Still here, J. visited later, spun me a line about Ayrs’s pride, how much he values my work, artistic tempers etc., but please stay, for her sake if not for his. Accepted this proxy fig leaf cum olive branch, and our lovemaking that night was almost affectionate. Winter coming on, and I’m not up to adventuring around Europe on my modest nest egg. Would need to meet a stupid, wealthy heiress rather smartish if I left now. Anyone spring to mind? Will send another package for Jansch, to boost my emergency fund. If Ayrs won’t cut me in for my ideas that went into “Todtenvogel”— enjoying its twentieth public outing since Warsaw—I’ll just have to reimburse myself. Resolve to be much more cautious before showing V.A. my own compositions again. You know, having the roof over one’s head dependent upon the good offices of an employer is a
loathsome
way to live. Christ only knows how the serving classes stand it. Are the Frobishery domestics forever biting
their
tongues as I must? one wonders. Eva back from her summer in Switzerland. Well, this young woman
says
she’s Eva, and the resemblance is certainly striking, but that snotty duckling who left Zedelghem three months ago has returned a most graceful swan. She supports her mother, bathes her father’s eyelids with cotton wool dipped in cold water and reads him Flaubert for hours on end, she’s courteous to the servants, and she even asks me about my sextet’s progress. Was sure it was some new strategy to oust me, but seven days on I’m beginning to suspect E. the stinker just might be dead and buried. V. well, there
is
more to E.’s & my pax than meets the eye, but must first provide some background. Since my arrival in Neerbeke, Eva’s “landlady” in Bruges, Mme. van de Velde, had been on at both E. & J. for me to visit their house so her five daughters—E.’s schoolfellows—can practice their English on a genuine English gentleman. M. van de Velde, you’ll remember, is the alleged rake of Minnewater Park who turned out to be a manufacturer of munitions and respected civic pillar etc. Mme. van de Velde is one of those tiresome, persistent women whose ambitions won’t be thwarted by “He’s v. busy at the moment.” Actually, one suspects J. of fixing the fait accompli out of spite—as her daughter grows swanlike, the mother is turning into a nasty old rook.

Today was the day appointed for me to dine at the van d. V.s—five evenly spaced daughters plus Mater and Pater. Needed a new set of strings for the ‘cello, and it does Ayrs no harm to see how helpless he is without me, so I put on my brave face and hoped the v.d.V.s employ a chef commensurate to a factory owner’s income. So at eleven o’clock the van de Velde car—a silver Mercedes-Benz, thank you very much—arrived at Zedelghem, and their driver, a perspiring snowman with no neck and no French, drove E. and me back to Bruges. In the past we would have ridden in stony silence, but found myself telling E. a little about my Cambridge days. E. warned me that the eldest van de Velde, Marie-Louise, had decided to marry an Englishman at any cost, so I should have to guard my chastity with the utmost care.

How do you like
that?

At the van de Veldes’ town house, the girls were arranged on the stairway to greet me in ascending order of age—half-expected ’em to burst into song, and stone the crows, Sixsmith, that’s what they did. “Greensleeves,” in English. Syrupy as humbugs. Then Mme. v.d.V. pinched my cheek as if I were a homecoming runaway and said, owlishly, “How do you
do-ooo?”
Was ushered into “the salon”—a nursery—and seated on “the question chair,” a toy box. The v.d.V. daughters, a hydra of heads named Marie-Louise, Stephanie, Zenobe, Alphonsine, and I forget the last, ranged from nine years of age to said Marie-Louise, one year Eva’s senior. All girls possess a thoroughly unjustified self-confidence. A v. long sofa sagged beneath this family of porkers. The maid brought lemonade while Mme. began the questions. “Eva tells us your family are v. well connected in Cambridge, Mr. Frobisher?” Glanced Eva-wards; she pulled a mock-fascinated face. Hid my smile and admitted my family are in the Domesday Book and that Pater is an eminent churchman. All attempts to turn the topic away from my eligibility were yorkered, and after a quarter of an hour the bug-eyed Marie-Louise had sensed her mater’s approval and settled I would be her Prince Charming. She asked this: “Mr. Frobisher, are you well acquainted with Sherlock Holmes of Baker Street?” Well, thought I, the day might not be a complete wreck. A girl with a taste for irony must conceal some depths. But Marie-Louise was serious! A congenital dunce. No, I replied, I didn’t know Mr. Holmes personally, but he and David Copperfield could be seen playing billiards at my club every Wednesday. Luncheon was served on fine Dresden crocks in a dining room with a large reproduction of
The Last Supper
over floral wallpaper. Food a disappointment. Dry trout, greens steamed to a sludge, gâteau simply vulgar; thought I was back dining in London. The girls tittered
glissando
at my trivial missteps in French—yet their frightful English rasps on one’s ear unbearably. Mme. v.d.V., who also summered in Switzerland, gave laborious accounts of how Marie-Louise had been eulogized in Berne as “the Flower of the Alps” by Countess Slãck-Jawski or the Duchess of Sümdümpstädt. Couldn’t even force out a civil “Comme c’est charmant!” M. v.d.V. arrived from his office. Asked a hundred questions on cricket to amuse his daughters with this quaint English ritual of “Ins that are Out” and “Outs that are In.” A pi-jawed ass of kingly proportions, so busy planning his next boorish interruption that he never listens properly. Pays himself unveiled compliments, beginning “Call me old-fashioned but …” or “Some consider me a snob but …” Eva sent me a wry look. It said, “And to think you honestly thought
this
oaf was a threat to my reputation!”

After luncheon, the sun came out, and Mme. v.d.V. announced we would all go for a walk to show the honored visitor the sights of Bruges. Tried to say I’d already impinged on their hospitality enough, but wasn’t to get away so lightly. The Great Patriarch excused himself—had a pile of chits to sign as high as the Matterhorn. May he die in an avalanche. After the maids had hatted and gloved the girls, the carriage was summoned and I was carted around one church after another. As dear old Kilvert notes, nothing is more tiresome than being told what to admire, and having things pointed at with a stick. Can scarcely recall the name of a single sight. By the itinerary’s finale, the great clock tower, my jaw was hurting from all the yawns I’d suppressed. Mme. van de Velde gave the pinnacle one squint and announced that she would let us young things scramble up there by ourselves and wait in the patisserie across the piazza. Marie-Louise, who outweighs her mother, remarked that it wouldn’t be ladylike to allow Maman to wait alone. Brainbox couldn’t go because of her asthma, and if Brainbox wasn’t going etc. & etc., until in the end only Eva and I bought tickets to go up. I paid, to show I wasn’t blaming her personally for the hideous waste of a day. Went first. The stairway was an evernarrower spiral. A rope ran at hand height through iron rings set into the wall. Feet had to feel their own way. Only source of light was occasional narrow windows. Only sounds were our feet and E.’s feminine breathing, reminding me of my nocturnes with her mother. The van de Veldes are six never-ending, ill-tuned harpsichord
allegretti
, and my ears rang with gratitude to be free of ’em. Had forgotten to count the steps, I thought aloud. My voice sounded locked in a closet of blankets. Eva gave me a lazy
“Oui …”

Emerged into an airy chamber housing the cartwheel-size cogs of the clock mechanism. Ropes and cables disappeared into the ceiling. A dogsbody snoozed in his deck chair. He was supposed to inspect our tickets—on the Continent one must forever be producing a ticket—but we slipped by him up a final flight of wooden stairs to the viewing belvedere. Tricolor Bruges spread out, far below: roof-tile orange; masonry gray; canal brown. Horses, automobiles, cyclists, a crocodile of choirboys, witch-hat roofs, washing on lines across side streets. Looked for Ostend, found it. Sunlit strip of North Sea turned Polynesian ultramarine. Seagulls wheeled in currents, I got giddy following ’em and thought of Ewing’s mollyhawk. Eva declared she had spotted the van de Veldes. Assumed this was a comment on their ampleness but looked where she said and, sure enough, six little blobs in pastels around a café table. E. folded her ticket into a paper dart and flung it over the parapet. Wind carried it off until the sun burned it up. What would she do if Dogsbody woke and demanded her ticket? “I’ll cry and say the horrible English boy stole it.” So I folded my ticket into a paper dart, too, told E. she had no evidence, and launched it. Instead of soaring high, my dart fell out of sight in a moment. E.’s character depends on which angle you’re looking from, a quality of superior opals. “You know, I can’t remember seeing Papa so content and alive as he is now,” she said.

The awful v.d.V.s had created a camaraderie. Asked her straight what had happened in Switzerland. Had she fallen in love, worked in an orphanage, had a mystical encounter in a snowy grotto?

She began to say something several times. In the end, she said (blushing!), “I was missing a certain young man I met this June.”

You’re surprised? Imagine
my
feelings! Yet I was every inch the gentleman you know me for. Instead of flirting back, I said, “And your first impression of this young man? Was it not wholly negative?”

“Partly negative.” I observed her beads of perspiration from the climb, her lips, and the fine, fine hairs on her upper lip.

“He’s a tall, dark, handsome, musical foreigner?”

She snorted. “He
is …
tall, yes; dark, quite; handsome, not so much as he thinks, but let us say he can catch the eye; musical, prodigiously; a foreigner, to his core. Remarkable that you know so much about him! Are you spying on him too, as he passes through Minnewater Park?” I had to laugh. So did she. “Robert, I sense …” She gazed at me shyly. “You’re experienced. May I call you Robert, by the way?”

I said it was about time she did.

“My words are not … entirely appropriate. Are you angry?”

No, I said, no. Surprised, flattered, but angry, not at all.

“I behaved so spitefully to you. But I’m hoping we can start again.”

Answered, of course, I’d like that too. “Since my childhood,” E. said, looking away, “I’ve thought of this balcony as my own belvedere, from
A Thousand and One Nights
. I often come up here at this hour, after school. I’m the empress of Bruges, you see. Its citizens are my subjects. The van de Veldes are my jesters. I shall chop off their heads.” A beguiling creature, she really is. My blood was hot, and I was seized by an impulse to give the empress of Bruges a lingering kiss.

Got no further; a party of infernal American tourists swarmed up through the narrow doorway. Fool that I am, I pretended not to be with Eva. Took in view from other side, trying to wind in all unraveled strings of myself. When Dogsbody announced that the viewing balcony was closing shortly, Eva was no longer there, like a cat. How true to form. Once again forgot to count the steps going down.

At the cake shop Eva was helping littlest v.d.V. at pussy’s cradle. Mme. van de Velde fanned herself with a menu and ate
boule de l’Yser
with Marie-Louise as they dissected the fashions of passersby. Eva avoided my eye. Spell was broken. Marie-Louise sought my eye, the spoony-eyed little heifer. Ambled back to the v.d.V.s’ house where, hallelujah, Hendrick was waiting with the Cowley. Eva bade me
au revoir
in the doorway—glanced back to see her smile. Bliss! The evening was golden and warm. All the way to Neerbeke, saw Eva’s face, strand or two of hair across her face, left there by the wind. Don’t be hatefully jealous, Sixsmith. You know how it is.