The Book of Illusions (32 page)

One afternoon, Martin and Claire are eating lunch in the kitchen. Martin is in the middle of telling her a story (
And then
I said to him, If you don’t believe me, I’ll show you. And then I
reached into my pocket and
—) when the telephone rings. Martin gets up to answer it, and as soon as he exits the frame, the camera reverses angle and dollies in on Claire. We see her expression change from one of joyful camaraderie to concern, perhaps even alarm. It is Hector, calling long-distance from Cuernavaca, and although we can’t hear his end of the conversation, Martin’s comments are clear enough for us to understand what Hector is saying. It seems that a cold front is headed toward the desert. The furnace has been on the blink, and if the temperatures drop as low as they are expected to, then Martin will need to have it checked out. If anything goes wrong, the man to call is Jim, Jim Fortunato of Fortunato Plumbing and Heat.

It’s no more than a mundane point of business, but Claire grows increasingly upset as she listens to the exchange. When Martin finally mentions her name to Hector (
I was just telling
Claire about that bet we made the last time I was here
), Claire stands up and rushes out of the room. Martin is surprised by her sudden departure, but that surprise is nothing compared to the one that follows an instant later.
What do you mean, Who’s
Claire?
he says to Hector.
Claire Martin, Frieda’s niece
. We don’t have to listen to Hector’s answer to know what he says. One look at Martin’s face and we understand that Hector has just told him that he’s never heard of her, that he has no idea who Claire is.

By then, Claire is already outside, running away from the house. In a series of rapid, pinpoint cuts, we see Martin burst through the door and chase after her. He calls out to Claire, but Claire keeps on running, and another ten seconds go by before he manages to catch up with her. Reaching out and grabbing her elbow from behind, he spins her around and forces her to stop. They are both out of breath. Chests heaving, lungs gasping for air, neither one of them able to talk.

At last Martin says: What’s going on, Claire? Tell me, what’s going on? When Claire doesn’t answer him, he leans forward and shouts in her face: You have to tell me!

I can hear you, Claire says, speaking in a calm voice. You don’t have to shout, Martin.

I’ve just been told that Frieda has one brother, Martin says. He has two children, and both of them happen to be boys. That makes two nephews, Claire, but no niece.

I didn’t know what else to do, Claire says. I had to find a way to make you trust me. After a day or two, I thought you’d figure it out on your own—and then it wouldn’t matter anymore.

Figure out what?

Until now, Claire has looked embarrassed, more or less contrite, not so much ashamed of her deception as disappointed that she’s been found out. Once Martin confesses to his ignorance, however, the look changes. She seems genuinely astonished. Don’t you get it, Martin? she says. We’ve been together for a week, and you’re telling me you still don’t get it?

It goes without saying that he doesn’t—and neither do we. The bright and beautiful Claire has turned into an enigma, and the more she says, the less we are able to follow her.

Who are you? Martin asks. What the hell are you doing here?

Oh Martin, Claire says, suddenly on the verge of tears. It doesn’t matter who I am.

Of course it does. It matters very much.

No, my darling, it doesn’t.

How can you say that?

It doesn’t matter because you love me. Because you want me.
That’s
what matters. All the rest is nothing.

The picture fades out on a close-up of Claire, and before another image succeeds it, we hear the faint sounds of Martin’s typewriter clicking away in the distance. A slow fade-in begins, and as the screen gradually brightens, the sounds of the typewriter seem to draw closer to us, as if we were moving from the outside to the inside of the house, walking up the stairs, and approaching the door of Martin’s room. When the new image settles into focus, the entire screen is filled with an immense, tightly framed shot of Martin’s eyes. The camera holds in that position for a couple of beats, and then, as the voice-over narration continues, it starts to pull back, revealing Martin’s face, Martin’s shoulders, Martin’s hands on the keys of the typewriter, and finally Martin sitting at his desk. With no halt in its backward progress, the camera leaves the room and begins traveling down the corridor.
Unfortunately
, Martin says,
Claire
was right. I did love her, and I did want her. But how can you
love someone you don’t trust?
The camera stops in front of Claire’s door. As if by telepathic command, the door swings open—and then we are inside, moving in on Claire as she sits in front of a dressing-table mirror applying makeup to her face. Her body is sheathed in a black satin slip, her hair is swept up in a loosely knotted chignon, the back of her neck is exposed.
Claire was like no other woman
, Martin says.
She was
stronger than everyone else, wilder than everyone else, smarter
than everyone else. I had been waiting to meet her all my life
,
and yet now that we were together, I was scared. What was she
hiding from me? What terrible secret was she refusing to tell?
A part of me thought I should get out of there—just pack up my
things and leave before it was too late. And another part of me
thought: she’s testing me. If I fail the test, I’ll lose her
.

Eyebrow pencil, mascara, cheek rouge, powder, lipstick. As Martin delivers his confused, soul-searching monologue, Claire goes on working in front of the mirror, transforming herself from one kind of woman into another. The impulsive tomboy disappears, and in her place emerges a glamorous, sophisticated, movie-star temptress. Claire stands up from the table and wriggles into a narrow black cocktail dress, slips her feet into a pair of three-inch heels, and we scarcely recognize her anymore. She cuts a ravishing figure: self-possessed, confident, the very picture of feminine power. With a faint smile on her lips, she checks herself in the mirror one last time and then walks out of the room.

Cut to the hallway. Claire knocks on Martin’s door and says: Dinner’s ready, Martin. I’ll be waiting for you downstairs.

Cut to the dining room. Claire is sitting at the table, waiting for Martin. She has already set out the appetizers; the wine has been uncorked; the candles have been lit. Martin enters the room in silence. Claire greets him with a warm, friendly smile, but Martin pays no attention to it. He seems wary, out of sorts, not at all sure of how he should act.

Eyeing Claire with suspicion, he walks over to the place that has been set for him, pulls out the chair, and begins to sit down. The chair appears to be solid, but no sooner does he lower his weight onto it than it splinters into a dozen pieces. Martin goes tumbling to the floor.

It is a hilarious, wholly unexpected turn of events. Claire bursts out laughing, but Martin is not at all amused. Sprawled out on his rear end, he smolders in a funk of injured pride and resentment, and the longer Claire goes on laughing at him (she can’t help herself; it’s simply too funny), the more ridiculous he is made to look. Without saying a word, Martin slowly climbs to his feet, kicks aside the bits of broken chair, and puts another chair in its place. He sits down cautiously this time, and when he is at last assured that the seat is strong enough to hold him, he turns his attention to the food. Looks good, he says. It is a desperate attempt to maintain his dignity, to swallow his embarrassment.

Claire seems inordinately pleased by his comment. With another smile brightening her face, she leans toward him and asks: How’s your story going, Martin?

By now, Martin is holding a lemon wedge in his left hand, about to squeeze it onto his asparagus. Instead of answering Claire’s question right away, he presses the lemon between his thumb and middle finger—and the juice squirts into his eye. Martin yelps in pain. Once again, Claire bursts out laughing, and once again our grumpy hero is not the least bit amused. He dips his napkin into his water glass and begins patting his eye, trying to get rid of the sting. He looks defeated, utterly humiliated by this fresh display of clumsiness. When he finally puts down the napkin, Claire repeats the question.

And so, Martin, she says, how’s your story going?

Martin can barely stand it anymore. Refusing to answer Claire’s question, he looks her straight in the eye and says: Who are you, Claire? What are you doing here?

Unruffled, Claire smiles back at him. No, she says, you answer my question first. How’s your story going?

Martin looks as if he’s about to snap. Maddened by her evasions, he just stares at her and says nothing.

Please, Martin, Claire says. It’s very important.

Struggling to control his temper, Martin mumbles a sarcastic aside—not addressing Claire so much as thinking out loud, talking to himself: You really want to know?

Yes, I really want to know.

All right … All right, I’ll tell you how it’s going. It’s … (he reflects for a moment) … it’s (continuing to think) … Actually, it’s going quite well.

Quite well … or vey well?

Um … (thinking) … very well. I’d say it’s going very well.

You see?

See what?

Oh, Martin. Of course you do.

No, Claire, I don’t. I don’t see anything. If you want to know the truth, I’m completely lost.

Poor Martin. You shouldn’t be so hard on yourself.

Martin gives her a lame smile. They have reached a kind of standoff, and for the moment there is nothing more to be said. Claire digs into her food. She eats with obvious enjoyment, savoring the taste of her concoction with small tentative bites. Mmm, she says. Not bad. What do you think, Martin?

Martin lifts his fork to take a bite, but just as he is about to put the food in his mouth, he glances over at Claire, distracted by the soft moans of pleasure emanating from her throat, and with his attention briefly diverted from the matter at hand, his wrist turns downward by a few degrees. As the fork continues its journey toward his mouth, a thin trail of salad dressing comes dripping off the utensil and slides down the front of his shirt. At first, Martin doesn’t notice, but as his mouth opens and his eyes return to the looming morsel of asparagus, he suddenly sees what is happening. He jumps back and lets go of the fork. Christ! he says. I’ve done it again!

The camera cuts to Claire (who bursts out laughing for the third time) and then dollies in on her for a close-up. The shot is similar to the one that ended the scene in the bedroom at the beginning of the film, but whereas Claire’s face was motionless as she watched Martin make his exit, now it is animated, brimming with delight, expressing what seems to be an almost transcendent joy.
She was so alive then
, Alma had said,
so vivid
. No moment in the story captures that sense of fullness and life better than this one. For a few seconds, Claire is turned into something indestructible, an embodiment of pure human radiance. Then the picture begins to dissolve, breaking apart against a background of solid blackness, and although Claire’s laughter goes on for several more beats, it begins to break apart as well—fading into a series of echoes, of disjointed breaths, of ever more distant reverberations.

A long stillness follows, and for the next twenty seconds the screen is dominated by a single nocturnal image: the moon in the sky. Clouds drift past, the wind rustles through the trees below, but essentially there is nothing before us but that moon. It is a stark and purposeful transition, and within moments we have forgotten the comic high jinks of the previous scene.
That
night
, Martin says,
I made one of the most important decisions
of my life. I decided that I wasn’t going to ask any more questions.
Claire was asking me to make a leap of faith, and rather
than go on pressing her, I decided to close my eyes and jump. I had no idea what was waiting for me at the bottom, but
that didn’t mean it wasn’t worth the risk. And so I kept on
falling … anda week later, just when I was beginning to think
that nothing could ever go wrong, Claire went out for a walk
.

Martin is sitting at the desk in his second-floor study. He turns from the typewriter to look out the window, and as the angle reverses to record his point of view, we see a long overhead shot of Claire walking alone in the garden. The cold front has apparently arrived. She is wearing a scarf and overcoat, her hands are in her pockets, and a light snowfall has dusted the ground. When the camera cuts back to Martin, he is still looking through the window, unable to tear his eyes away from her. Another reverse, and then another shot of Claire, alone in the garden. She takes a few more steps, and then, without warning, she collapses to the ground. It is a terrifyingly effective fall. No tottering or dizziness, no gradual buckling of the knees. Between one step and the next, Claire plunges into total unconsciousness, and from the sudden, merciless way her strength gives out on her, it looks as if she’s dead.

The camera zooms in from the window, bringing Claire’s inert body into the foreground. Martin enters the frame: running, out of breath, frantic. He falls to his knees and cradles her head in his hands, looking for a sign of life. We no longer know what to expect. The story has shifted into another register, and one minute after laughing our heads off, we find ourselves in the middle of a tense, melodramatic scene. Claire eventually opens her eyes, but enough time passes for us to know that it isn’t a recovery so much as a stay of execution, an augur of things to come. She looks up at Martin and smiles. It is a spiritual smile, somehow, an inward smile, the smile of someone who no longer believes in the future. Martin kisses her, and then he bends down, gathers Claire into his arms, and begins carrying her toward the house.
She seemed to be all right
, he says.
Just a little fainting spell, we thought. But the next
morning, Claire woke up with a high fever
.