Flashback Hotel

by Ivan Vladislavic

  * * *

  —

  Naturally I now began to take a special interest in the books published in 1956, my peers. But close as I felt to them, there was one with which I acknowledged an even deeper rapport, and that was A Ghost in Monte Carlo.

  I examined the triangle formed by A Ghost in Monte Carlo, Helena and myself with profound disquiet. I had seen the Cartland clan huddled together in the shops, under signs that said exchange only, chattering away. It amazed me to think that a book of their persuasion might be the one that held the key to our impossible love story – especially when there was so much other good literature to choose from.

  A Ghost in Monte Carlo was Barbara Cartland’s 42nd Novel. She had also published one Political Novel, called Sleeping Swords, under the pen-name Barbara McCorquodale; a work of Philosophy, called Touch the Stars; and a work of Sociology, called You in the Home. This precocious fecundity notwithstanding, who could have foreseen then that another four hundred and seventy-five books would issue from her imagination?

  * * *

  —

  I neglected to mention, I think, that the photograph of Helena and her parents contained a priceless piece of information: leaning into the picture from the right, on a striped black and white pole, was a white sign with the words BUS HALTE painted on it in black, and below them the stencilled number 15. I hardly need to stress how important such a route number might prove to be in locating the house in which Helena grew up. But perhaps I could add a tangential comment: I believe that this bus-stop was for the exclusive use of whites. The sign for a black bus-stop would have included the words SECOND CLASS. The sign is beautifully painted. The question of whether the pole is white with black stripes or vice versa I leave to those with an interest in natural phenomena like the quagga.

  * * *

  —

  Mistral, awakening from a six-day swoon occasioned by her aunt’s death, finds that the Grand Duke has claimed her as his daughter and that her wardrobe has therefore been filled with clothes. “Never had she seen such an array of lovely clothes. There were gowns of every colour and description, and their hues rivalled the very colours of the flowers in the garden. There were dresses of blue, pink, green, rose and yellow. Mistral stared at them with wide eyes…The one thing she had noticed immediately was that there was nothing grey amongst them. There was not even a pair of shoes of that colour.”

  * * *

  —

  I came round, at last, to certainties. I took sensible steps. Enquiries at the Information Office on Van der Bijl Square revealed that bus route 15 went through Orange Grove. I was not surprised. Whether the route had remained unchanged since 1956 no one could say, but I was optimistic.

  One morning in May, at 9.45, I boarded a number 15 doubledecker outside the magistrates’ courts in Main Street. I sat at the top, in front, and had the entire upper deck to myself. As luck would have it we went up Rissik Street, and so I obtained unusual new perspectives on no fewer than three vanished bookshops. When the bus turned into 10th Street, Orange Grove, I alighted and began to walk. My plan was to follow the bus route through the suburb, paying special attention to corner houses in the vicinity of stops. If I did not locate the Sheins’ house in this way, I would start a more wide-ranging search in the neighbouring streets and, if necessary, the adjacent suburbs.

  I felt confident: considering my aptitude for finding books, turning up something as large as a house seemed relatively simple. Even so, it was laughably easy. I had not gone more than four or five blocks when I spotted one of the houses in the background of the photograph. The palm-tree louring over house and garden gave it away at once. I was almost disappointed.

  Helena’s house was exactly where it was supposed to be, although it had vanished behind an eight-foot wall. Where the twirly gate had been there was now a wooden door with a yellow and white striped awning and an intercom. There was a sign that said the property was protected by 24-hour armed response. Another sign gave the address of Mr Paving.

  I sat down on the bus-stop bench facing the door and opened A Ghost in Monte Carlo. I had been saving the final pages for this moment.

  * * *

  —

  Madame Boulanger tells Mistral that Sir Robert still loves her: he has called her name in a delirium. Mistral seeks him out at the Hotel Hermitage. “He held her closer to him, his lips against her hair. He knew then that this was what he had searched for all his life, that his search was at an end, his goal in sight. With a sense of urgency at the passing of time he sought her lips. ‘I love you,’ he whispered against her mouth and knew there was no need for words as she surrendered herself to the passion behind his kiss.”

  * * *

  —

  As I raised the book to my lips the door opened and Helena appeared. I gazed at her over the top of the book, while she doublelocked the door behind her and secured an enormous bunch of keys in a shiny blue handbag.

  She didn’t look a day older. She was wearing the skirt she wore in the photograph, but I was delighted to discover that it was a sunny yellow, and splashed with whorls of bright blue and green. A white poplin blouse set off her brown skin to perfection. There was a chill in the autumn air, but she didn’t feel it. She swung her bag over her shoulder and walked in the direction of Louis Botha Avenue.

  I stowed my book in the pocket of my blazer and followed, like a blind man, the tapping of her heels along the pavement. I floated in her fragrant wake, light-headed with the scent of orange blossom and patent leather. At every step the book in my pocket thumped like a heart against my chest. On the cool fabric of her blouse, between her sculpted shoulder-blades, I saw in English Times the legend: THE END – and I walked towards it.

  Alphabets for Surplus People

  I

  A Day in the Life of

  the Parper of the People

  The woman who designed Parper’s official residence came to breakfast.

  “I still think it needs a louvre here,” she said. “I can’t see my aperitif.” The last crowd lived in utter darkness.

  “You’re the Architect,” said Parper.

  This was a little joke: Parper is universally regarded as the Architect of our Freedom.

  * * *

  —

  “Last time I was called to the bar,” said Parper, “I had to use the tradesmen’s entrance. Same again?”

  Parper and the Architect were sipping Bloody Marmers (named for Parper’s ex). Secret ingredients: bile, Tabasco. The Architect drew a line on her glass with a pointy fingertip to show the Barman when. “I’m not a drinking man,” said Parper, the autocrat of the breakfast nook. “Affairs of state demand a sober mind and judgement. I’m certainly unused to liquor on an empty stomach. By Jove, this is the stiffest porridge I’ve ever eaten. Compliments to the Chef.”

  Baroque laughter.

  “Now if you’ll excuse me…”

  * * *

  —

  The Architect disappeared by perspectival increments.

  “Duty calls,” Parper sighed, and buzzed for his Driver.

  Who arrived, flourishing a dipstick like an épée, to report that the official limousine was broken. There were spare limousines for just such an emergency, but Marmer’s friends had borrowed them and forgotten to bring them back.

  * * *

  —

  Thank heavens for the moped collection. The collection had been founded by one of Parper’s predecessors after the Great War. Several of the specimens belonged in museums, it was said. The Equerry, whose task it was to service the mopeds – in the absence of horse-flesh – recommended that Parper take the antique Vespa.

  * * *

  —

  “Never ridden a scooter,” said Parper, “but I’ll soon get the hang of it.”

  * * *

  —

  The Fashion Co-ordinator fastened bicycle clips to Parpe
r’s shins, which made his trousers look uncannily like jodhpurs. She attached rose-tinted goggles (a gift from the people of Denmark) to Parper’s head. The Equerry patted the Vespa’s velvety rump.

  * * *

  —

  A pair of springbok horns had been grafted onto the handlebars. The Fashion Co-ordinator draped a scarf over them, and shuddered.

  “It’s ethnic, my sweet,” said the Gamekeeper, who had performed the transplant.

  In fact, the horns were a gift from a small-town butcher in appreciation of Parper’s support for game conservation.

  * * *

  —

  The Helicopter Pilot, happening to glance down from the heliport on the roof of the east wing, saw Parper mounting the scooter, and came abseiling down to offer his services.

  “Goodness, I’d forgotten all about you,” said Parper. And was whirled away to the seat of power, which is made of stinkwood.

  * * *

  —

  Parper settled down with tea and thirteen newspapers. But he was interrupted by the arrival of the Interpreter from the Spanish, the newest addition to the staff. A sporty young woman. Parper had her installed in a corner.

  “I’m not sure your services will be required, but one can’t be too careful.”

  * * *

  —

  The hour between tea and lunch was for ministerial consultations. It being the first Tuesday of the month, Parper received various Jims, Johns and Jacks: a Jim Crow, a Johnny-Come-Lately, the Convener of the Jack-of-All-Trades Committee.

  They had all been poets before becoming ministers, and enlivened proceedings with quotations from their works.

  * * *

  —

  The luncheon menu was transparent, multicultural, democratic: polony sliced so thin you could see through it, reconstructed soyamince in Parper’s favourite poppadoms, representative crosssections of Black Forest gâteau.

  An aide-de-camp was observed stuffing petits fours up his pullover. Parper, surmising that the fellow was a Kleptomaniac, tactfully turned a blind eye, saying:

  * * *

  —

  “Anyone have a telling tale?”

  The Swedish ambassador tried the one about the Irishman, the Texan and Van der Merwe. She never reached the punchline. First the Attorney-General fell asleep over his sorghum beer. Then a Lumberjack, late for his morning appointment, burst in with a basketful of sawdust he wanted blessed.

  * * *

  —

  And then Parper’s Minister without Substance came bowing and scraping with a lunchpail of breyani, all his own work, he said. He had even grown the ginger in his window-box in an effort to revive the spice trade.

  “Too little too late,” Parper said, and sent him packing. (Curries give Parper wind.)

  * * *

  —

  Noddy hour. There were so many Noddymen today that the security guards herded them into the courtyard, where Parper might address them from the balcony, and rain down upon them blessings and the leftovers of the Black Forest gâteau.

  Today’s inspirational message: “Be the best Noddyman you can be. Multiply yourself inoffensively.”

  * * *

  —

  A party of tourists making their way to the rose-garden were outraged to see one man administering electrical shocks to another in the vaults beneath the official residence. But the tourguide set their minds at ease: it was the Organ-grinder and his monkey rehearsing for the gala performance at the Venezuelan Embassy.

  * * *

  —

  Parper’s Pogonologist, no mere barber and not to be confused with the Little Barber of the Piece, restored the grey symmetry to Parper’s beard by a painstaking frosting of individual hairs. Then he stropped his cutthroat twenty-six times and discreetly severed the pricetag from Parper’s skullcap. Parper looked more distinguished than ever.

  * * *

  —

  “Who is known as the Parper of Venezuela?”

  “Bolívar.”

  “What is the unit of currency in Venezuela?”

  “Bolívar.”

  “What is the capital of Venezuela?”

  “Bolívar.”

  Parper tipped his Quizmaster six cents, the exact equivalent of one bolívar, wordlessly demonstrating that he knew more about Venezuela than that charlatan with all his encyclopedias.

  * * *

  —

  Twelve limousines, three buses, one armoured car. Parper declined the helicopter, because he wanted to see what was happening on the ground, and took the armoured car.

  Parper (as they trundled over the rockery): “I forgot to put out the cat!”

  Driver: “Not to worry. A Rotary Ann will see to it.”

  * * *

  —

  The road to the Venezuelan Embassy lay past the new public toilet on Freedom Square, and Parper decided to make a whirlwind tour. A Speech-writer riding in the seventh limousine (with the Quizmaster) rustled up a speech. Parper jogged on the spot for a minute to make water for baptizing the urinal.

  * * *

  —

  When the moccasins were buffed, an oil-stain came to light on one of Parper’s turn-ups. A Tailor travelling in the bus with the choirboys undertook the invisible mending in transit. Parper gratefully tried on a pair of the fellow’s revolutionary “Long Jims,” which are made of grass, and pronounced them “surprisingly comfortable.”

  * * *

  —

  The Venezuelan Embassy was also the work of Parper’s Architect. Style: post-hacienda.

  The Interpreter from the Spanish obliged at the buffet, but Parper preferred sign language to express his admiration for the sultry, cigar-coloured Under-Secretary. Whereupon the Ambassador donated her to Parper, to hold in trust for the people of the republic.

  * * *

  —

  “You are most generous, comrade amigo,” said Parper. “I have always wanted a Venezuelan.”

  (A white lie. Parper afterwards passed the unhappy woman on to Barber. She was supposed to improve his Spanish, but instead she taught him tennis – he fantasized that she was Gabriela Sabatini – and the love-songs of the Orinoco.)

  * * *

  —

  When it was time for the speeches, Parper was nowhere to be found. But there was a happy ending: he was in the kitchen talking to the staff.

  “I too have been a Waiter,” he declared. “I started below the salt and worked my way up to the head of the table.”

  * * *

  —

  The Gringos’ rumba rendition of the national anthem, with solo for Organ-grinder and Monkey, brought the house down. The Xylophonist played his instrument behind his head, with the help of two assistants. Parper sportingly joined in on maracas. Then Parper’s Foreign Minister had to spoil everything by cha-cha-ing sideways into a fish-pond.

  * * *

  —

  The Parpermobile, newly repaired, gleamed in the porte-cochère. Parper patted the Driver’s back. Then they rolled through quiet streets. Behind glass, darkly, Parper sipped a Virgin Marmer.

  People of God!

  No job no money no house

  Six hungry childrens

  Please give work money food

  read the cardboard sign of a stop-street Yahoo.

  * * *

  —

  Parper read two newspapers and brushed his teeth. He looked in at the nursery.

  Barber was in Spiderman pyjamas, watching CNN.

  “How’s Parper’s Little Zuluboy?” Parper said, chucking him under the chin. Goatee stubble…Parper disapproved.

  “Everyone’s got them,” said Barber tearfully.

  “Oh all right then,” said Parper, pulling a human face.

  II

  The Comings and Goings around the Marmer of
the Nation

  Marmer’s Acrobats go before her turning cartwheels, belabouring the ground with loofahs to drive out dust devils, drawing dotted lines with the sweat of their brows.

  * * *

  —

  Marmer’s Bodyguards karate the grand piano into occasional pieces, opuscules, skeleton keys, matchsticks, and build in the trampoline pit a lyrical fire to braai a goat.

  * * *

  —

  Marmer’s Counsellors wield a lemon slice, a sundae spoon, a jar of honey, and a stainless-steel funnel to ensure that their sweet, refreshing counsel never splashes.

  * * *

  —

  Marmer’s Dilators apply rods and cones of every description, animal, vegetable and mineral, to open therapeutically, like a flinging ajar of doors, her duly congested passages.