Lights Out in Wonderland

by DBC Pierre

  “I know two or three of them, sure.”

  “A fat man in black, who wears a hat?”

  “Hm—that must be Herr Pietsch, yes.”

  “Because that man has been spending his day at the wagon asking questions. And not purely innocent questions—he’s a man who knows what to ask, if you get my drift. We’re a little concerned. One of our people also saw him underground yesterday, so we know he has clearance into the complex.”

  Thomas sits back, watching me while this settles in. I try another sip of champagne but soon abandon it, trying not to squirm.

  “So in your position as pursuivant,” Thomas goes on, “which will keep you around the entrance to the venue, you could perform a valuable task in managing this man, and any others who might happen past. Yes?”

  “I’ll give it some thought. See what we hear from Smuts.”

  At this we sit watching each other for a moment. Then Thomas steers the talk to informal matters, and the meeting ends.

  I exit through the jungle of foods feeling tired and confused. On top of this the absence of intoxicants brings another flood of feelings and thoughts. As well as a ravenous hunger, I now yearn for some kind of home.

  And feel a pressing need to escape exquisiteness.

  My room at the Adlon doesn’t quite satisfy the latter, but still I repair to my bed to let my mind comb through the options now crowding the point of this cone. First comes the question of whether to trust the Basque and Thomas. One thing I’ve learned about the Master Limbo of modern markets is that you’re never off the hook—just when you think you’re home and dry, a situation fails and the Limbo offers a next solution. That is happening here. First the promise of a venue was enough for Smuts’s release. That situation collapsed, to be replaced by a condition where the keys to a venue would secure his release. And as that situation proved false, another condition now seems to be offered, which is to decoy Gottfried from the goings-on.

  All the Master Limbo’s fees are being paid while none of ours are. This is the basic equation, take note—this is how the Master works. It keeps us in hock while promising release upon payment of a next condition down the line.

  But are the Basque and Thomas part of the limbo itself? Or are they merely pirates, surfing its edge for the sake of adventure?

  This is the crux of my position: if I can trust the pair, I should attend the banquet in good faith, for Smuts’s sake. And if I don’t trust them, I should find a lake this evening.

  My mind wanders from this to the nature of these worlds I stand between, and will soon leave behind. An overworld and an underworld were my estates, though I proved pointless in them both. On evidence gathered throughout this odyssey I think I can say the underworld is my world. I spend a few moments paying it mental homage. I suppose every creature should die knowing where its heart once lay.

  The idea makes me think of Anna, Gottfried, and Gerd.

  Recall Anna’s empty face, my friend, unmoved by any challenge or surprise. I wish I’d mastered the poker face before death. When a strong reaction isn’t called for, there’s no reaction at all, and I feel this more honestly reflects life’s workload. A sense grows in me that these aren’t dour people, but that they hold themselves in reserve. I think of my ex-girlfriend Sarah. She doesn’t really like her friends, but they fit the template of who she should like and have the right accessories, so she pretends to like them. She has taken this to be a duty of friendship. I think of myself, pretending to like them for her sake, and them probably pretending to like us, because we seem to like them so much. I think of everyone I know just pretending. It brings this revelation: it’s dishonest to expect life’s base condition to be happiness; and in maintaining that lie, another lie is needed, then another and another. How could such a detour have arisen in our thinking? Who benefits from the idea that anything less than happiness must be a treatable condition?

  Only the markets. Only the Master.

  I’m blasted from this reverie by the phone.

  “Gabriel,” says Smuts. “What’s the game? I’m just calling to say don’t give those boys the venue, looks like they boned us.”

  “What? I’ve just come from the Basque—he assures me everything’s well in hand.”

  “Mate: what’s in hand is his dick. Satou’s entering a guilty plea first thing Monday. Says it’ll go easier than arguing about fish.”

  “Eh? Surely we have a business day left?”

  “Oh, yeah? What business day’s that?”

  “Tomorrow—today’s only Thursday.”

  There’s a dull silence, and then: “Putain—it might be Thursday there. But it’s already tomorrow in Japan. Wish me luck.”

  22

  An October sky like a pane of frosted glass sits over Kreuzberg. I make my way to the airport to say goodbye. The end-play only pointed to one thing—the end.

  I catch sight of myself passing a shop window. My skin is yellow, my hair as stiff as hay. Just look at me, will you? My clothes hang off me like a tramp’s. This is the wages of limbo. I buy a half liter of chocolate milk at a Turkish Imbiss, and with this august sustenance limp away up the street. It’s a fact worth noting that a derelict person can attract suspicion and fear from passersby, but not if he carries chocolate milk. The passing eye always looks for alcohol or drugs on a derelict, and so is pleasantly disarmed by chocolate milk. With this urban white flag, then, I continue up Mehringdamm to the Flughafen.

  Approaching the kitchen wagon, I see another two trailers parked beside it. One is fully enclosed, with mirror glass. Gottfried’s hat is nowhere to be seen, so I make my way toward the terminal. As I reach the steps Anna hurries out in her coat:

  “Gerd’s missing,” she says. “I’ll check Piratenburg—can you go and find Gottfried?”

  “What? Of course—what’s happening?”

  “Gerd lost the fight for his party. Now he owes four hundred euros to a lawyer and his car is missing. He wasn’t looking good when I saw him, I’m afraid he might do something stupid. He’s taking things way too hard.”

  “Hm—sorry. And where will I find Gottfried?”

  “Have you been to his place? The little bicycle workshop around the corner from Piratenburg. See what he knows and meet me at Gerd’s, I’ll use the phone there.”

  “And where’s Gerd’s? Are you able to get in?”

  “Grossbeerenstrasse, just past Piratenburg, third floor. Of course I can get in, it’s where I’m staying until I leave for the Galápagos.”

  I find Gottfried’s shop in the basement of an old apartment block. Bicycle parts languish behind a dusty window. The shop looks closed, but a few moments after I ring I see Gottfried’s shape stir inside. He doesn’t open the door but cracks it an inch, peering around his feet. Then he reaches down with a grunt, hoisting up a ginger kitten:

  “Come in—she has more spirit than wisdom.”

  He strokes it with a chubby finger and shows me inside. Dozens of beer bottles line the wall nearest the door. On a table at the back I spy an empty Marius bottle, a souvenir from Gerd’s party. And I’m struck by a smell of chain oil and unwashed laundry. Still, Gottfried is shiny, his hair’s combed, he wears a checked flannel shirt. He shuffles around muttering to himself under his breath, stroking the kitten. “Where’s the thing?” he tuts. “Here it is—no, no, it’s the other one,” and during this time certain shapes begin to emerge from the clutter. Contraptions here and there, his inventions. Among the bicycle parts I see a rotating shoe tree made from a wheel, and through a door I see a small device beside his bed combining a cigar and a traveling clock.

  He spots me looking. “You like it? Cigar alarm—wakes me with a lit cigar every morning. Anyway, today we’re watching out for Specht, in case you wonder. He has a hard life at the moment, and no real friends. So he needs a drink—but not too much of a drink, if you kno
w what I mean.” He steps to a cabinet in the darkest corner and scrapes open a drawer, pulling out a beer wrapped in cloth. I watch him unwrap it, handling it as one handles the tools of a busy youth gone by. “Here,” he says. “Let’s walk with it and check the Flughafen.”

  “You’ve refrigerated the wardrobe drawer?”

  “Ah.” He winks. “Come, just bring the beer.”

  We wander past Victoria Park to Mehringdamm and at a certain point, for no visible reason, he says: “Did you get the girl?”

  “Which girl?”

  “Don’t be coy.”

  “Anna? You’re joking.”

  “I never joke.” Gottfried swigs from the beer. “From the questions she asks me I give you a fair chance. Her mind is looking for ways to explain you.” He sees fit to stop at this juncture and stare into my face. “All men have madness inside them. And some have much more than others. I know it too well. A man without a strong woman is a ship broken off its anchor in the night. Things can turn dangerous.”

  “Hm—well, it’s good of you to mention, of course. But really I think she’s disgusted with me. I hardly know her, and she already told me as much.”

  “And I hardly know you. But perhaps she might be disgusted with what you do to yourself. Which is a different matter. If, let’s say, her father had been a fine East German writer who had a strong romance with alcohol—and as a consequence left the world too young, and left her alone—hm? The picture suddenly changes.”

  Whoosh: a beam of new light hits the arena, new depths appear that make me hush on the walk up the hill. How curious, I muse, for life still to be throwing revelations, still flicking lights and opening doors. The picture changes indeed.

  With this significant exchange, which I sense is as unusual for Gottfried as for me, born in the shimmering vapor of unexpected change that every so often rises between chapters in life—he relaxes back into himself, growing still in the face, reverting to the eye mechanisms of a crocodile; and we enter the airport’s lobby. Gottfried seems unhurried to find Gerd. In fact, I wonder if the mysterious hubbub around the airport somehow invigorates him, if he finds the vapor of change attractive and rejuvenating—because after a while, he suggests we promenade outdoors. Strolling through the parking lot toward the wagon, I note that he now holds himself taller, thrusts himself out that bit more. And twice now I’ve found him scrubbed and fragrant, his clothes crisp and clean. Something in vaporous limbo favors Gottfried.

  Something in adventure is good for him.

  Before reaching the wagon we spy an open service door. A painted creature takes our attention from the gloom, and we move in to have a look. There a horse-tailed satyr glances wickedly off a large wooden flat, maybe a section of sideshow hoarding. It’s not badly painted, rendered in oils, sunlit, in throes of high merriment against woodland depths, with boughs and leaves and fruit in a fringe at the top. Other creatures run off the edge of the flat, and I pull it forward to reveal more panels behind. There’s Pan with his pipes, head thrown back in ecstatic abandon, and beside him a Medusa whose serpents coil and tangle, baring their fangs through branches above her head.

  “Nineteenth century,” says Gottfried. “Maybe an old freak show.”

  The last flat is the headboard, a mayhem of nymphs and sprites exploding from trees, tearing bites from ripe fruits, scaring birds from the boughs, while grand sideshow lettering ominously reads: “Launen des Schicksals”—“Quirks of Fate.”

  As I turn from the flats I see Gottfried watching me. He doesn’t move or blink. After a long silence he simply narrows his gaze and asks: “Are you unwell?”

  “Hm—I’ve felt better.” I sense him measuring my vital functions.

  “Because I see you here quite pale.” He pronounces the words softly, in a whisper whose stronger notes also growl: “With uneven breathing. So your heart is diverting blood under stress. Here, looking through the cargo door, at the paintings. What is it in that action, I wonder, that makes your body divert blood under stress?”

  I try to meet his gaze, but only last a moment.

  “Is it,” he says, “that these freak-show paintings attach to a situation that is known to you? Could they be for a mysterious ‘production’ which may or may not center around the mobile kiosk over there? Some questions have arisen to ask.”

  Only now do I start to feel my blood diverting under stress.

  “Has the time come for us to share a secret?” He continues to stare. “Because another little story is running here, isn’t it, underneath this one? Sudden mysterious English boy comes to Gerd. Sudden mysterious film production. A game of chess has opened up underneath. And I know that you are aware of that game—because you are one of its players. I know that to you, in fact—it’s probably the main game.”

  I look around without answering. No blood remains to divert.

  “We live in peaceful times,” he says more casually, “hopefully we’re dealing with youthful exploits, not threats to civil order. And I don’t mind some adventure. I don’t mind a game now and then, believe me. But there is a viewpoint from which you may have deceived and manipulated everyone within kilometers of this cargo door. People who’ve done you no harm. There is a viewpoint from which you may have set loose a decadence on our peaceful place. From which you may have unleashed real pain, even against your will, on people you actually like. And all with a selfish plan that somehow attaches to these paintings, to that wagon, to all these new people.”

  My gaze has fallen. The only heat left to feel is from his stare.

  “Our talk makes you uncomfortable. I don’t like to discomfort a friend. Whereas”—he sets off walking again—“the Frenchman wouldn’t think twice.”

  I have to shake my head: “How do you know of a Frenchman?”

  “It was a bluff.” He glances sideways. “You’ve just given me another piece of the story. Though the French are always in there somewhere.”

  There’s nothing I can say to Gottfried, and as I walk I feel my plans crash and burn around my feet. He slows after a moment’s quiet, saying:

  “The reason I chose to speak to you is that I’m familiar with many human situations. Even extreme situations. Each has its scent, its feel. And they each have satellites, other people or situations attaching to them. Very often you can judge a situation’s nature by looking at the relative position and quality of its satellites.”

  My head stays down but his sails up, musing skyward.

  “And one of your satellites is my friend Gerd Specht. Which indicates two things—one, as he’s quite fond of you, that you must be of sound basic character. And two, that he stands to get hurt as your satellite. So then, looking into your situation, into this unfolding scenario at the airport, and putting it all together, I formed the judgment that you’re a bright and sensitive man, perhaps a little too ardent, often ambivalent due to a complicated worldview, slightly dissolute—who has set in motion a series of events which now spirals out of control.” Gottfried pauses, searching my face. “Spirals to such an extent—that you now even feel disposed to kill yourself.”

  He gives this time to sink in, which it does with the sound of his wheeze growing louder and starting to echo. But still there’s more:

  “You’re not a brutal man, I can see that. You wouldn’t contemplate any violence. In fact, you’re a romantic, a dreamer, and I rather think you would walk into the sea. In which case it’s a good thing we’re not near a beach.”

  A pause follows which is an invitation to answer, and I look up, struggling to form a denial—but before I can even open my mouth, Gottfried has reached into his coat and pulled out my notepad, opening it to the first page:

  “ ‘There’s no name for my situation,’ ” he reads, handing me the pad. “You should take more care of notes like this.”

  My veins melt to water. Gottfried takes me by the shoul
der and walks me away from the airport, speaking softly: “Life is a strange animal, with none of the boundaries we think are there. Situations can turn at any time. Of course things will spiral out of control, in fact they’re meant to—look how many industries depend on the spiral. So what I say to you is—you have comrades. I’ve worked out most of what’s going on, though your precise connection is slightly vague, the game is missing a piece somewhere. But that’s not important. We both know that a finale takes place here tomorrow. And I think we should talk before then. Things don’t have to go the way they seem. We’re a new force in the game—and we’re the one with the most power, do you know why?”

  Gottfried’s face seems to grow.

  “Because we’re the only unseen force.” And at this, after a pause, he softens: “Go check on the girl, she must be worried.”

  “And what about Gerd? If he’s not around here—”

  “Don’t be too concerned. I’ve known him a long time, he’s not an inventive man. That’s the beauty of Gerd Specht.”

  Gottfried sends me to find Anna, and I walk to Grossbeerenstrasse shattered by his speech, struggling to gather fragments of my world as I knew it. Past the Piratenburg bar I enter a dark old building with frayed rush matting up the stairs, and on the third floor Anna answers the door to Gerd’s apartment.

  “No sign of him at the airport,” I mutter.

  “Well. Who knows, then? You get one credit of good character.”

  “Thanks. How many to reach average?”

  “Ten thousand,” she says.

  No smile accompanies the comment, so I quietly step into the apartment, entering as all people enter strange places—tentatively—and gaze through the windows onto the street, absorbing smells of dish cloths, dust, and old cooking. It’s a sparsely cluttered place, recalling that ilk of older people who collect souvenir spoons. On one wall is a color photocopy in a wood-effect frame of Gerd in his sailor’s suit, smiling out. On a dresser sits a wedding picture with exactly the same smile. I muse how much pathos there is in seeing different pictures of someone in the same pose, with the same wooden smile. In the garden, on the beach, looking this way or that—they’ve decided over the years that a frozen grimace is their best feature. Pathos and quite some human beauty live in that portrait of the blind and fragile self.