All That Man Is

by David Szalay

The surge of the motorway is making him sleepy.

  The lush glow of everything. Outside, green slopes strive skywards, rich with evening sunlight, thickly gold.

  Les Chalets du Midi Apartments consists of twelve brand new apartments in one of the most lovely valleys in the French Alps. There is a wide variety of 1, 2, 3 and 4 bedroom apartments available from 252,000 euros ex VAT located in a central location in the lively and popular village of Samoëns. The village of Samoëns is a charming French village with many shops, restaurants and bars …

  How many years has he been doing this now?

  They leave the motorway at Cluses, and she pays a toll.

  Cluses is prosaic, a series of small roundabouts. Flower baskets hanging from street lights. Midget plane trees brutally pollarded in the French fashion. It is where she lives, she tells him. She leans forward over the wheel to look up at some window and, pointing with a lifted index finger, says, ‘That’s where I live.’

  ‘Okay,’ he says, pretending to be interested.

  Then they have left the town and are hairpinning up the side of the valley. On the other side, mountains soak up what is left of the sunlight.

  She lowers her window a little. The air smells of manure, wet grass. ‘Do you know the area?’ she asks.

  He says he doesn’t. ‘Mostly we do stuff a bit further south,’ he explains. ‘Cham. Val d’Isère.’

  She nods.

  ‘Courchevel.’

  She works for the developer, Noyer.

  ‘I cover part of Switzerland too,’ he tells her.

  ‘I see.’

  The hairpins are over. The road passes through villages, under trees, through massing shadow.

  ‘This is nice,’ he says politely.

  She nods again. ‘Yes, it’s nice, up here.’

  ‘Very. Has Monsieur Noyer got other plans?’ he asks, trying not to sound too interested. ‘After this.’

  ‘I think so. You can ask him, on Friday.’

  ‘I will.’ He wonders what Noyer is like, whether they’ll get on. What Noyer will make of his proposal. He isn’t even sure what his proposal will be yet. He needs to think about that.

  ‘It’s more and more popular, this area,’ she says.

  ‘I bet.’

  ‘It’s more typical,’ she says, ‘than the more established areas.’

  ‘Seems like it.’

  A village. They slow markedly – severe speed humps. Trees heavy with moss. Ski-hire shops – Location du ski – shuttered out of season. Signs advertising honey for sale.

  ‘We’re nearly there,’ she says, accelerating as they leave the village. ‘It’s the next one.’

  It is evening now, unambiguously. She has turned on the headlights. There is a long straight stretch with solemn tall pines. Then the road swings left, passes over the noise of hurrying water – he sees it fraying white over stones – and they are there. ‘Here we are,’ she says.

  A mass of signage meets them – signs for hotels, pizzerias, walking trails, ski lifts. Everyone trying to make some sort of living.

  And then the deeper gloom of a modest avenue of trees.

  On either side of the road, among the apartment buildings, a few old blackened barns still stand in unsold fields.

  Quickly, imprecisely, seeing them through the trees, he tries to work out what they might be worth, those fields.

  *

  He walks for a while, in the last light. It is still there, pink, on the peaks that hang over the village. One in particular hangs there, implacable. Fading pink. A fountain warbles somewhere. Ice-cold water. In the old village, past the petrol station, there are handsome stone houses. He feels sad.

  These trips to the Alps, alone. The empty evening hours.

  Now a strange blue light stretches itself over the rocky tops of the peaks. It is dark in the street.

  There is a decent amount going on after the lifts close in Samoëns with a good number of bars to keep you entertained and restaurants that offer a wide range of local specialties …

  No sign of that tonight.

  Instead, a solitary meal in the hotel dining room, peach-pink tablecloths and an inhibiting quiet. Table for one. While he waits for his food, he looks over the shiny brochures, his own prose – he can hear his voice in that stuff, his own voice saying it.

  There is a decent amount going on after the lifts close in Samoëns …

  A decent amount …

  Ugh.

  Not that he would know what goes on here. This is the first time he’s seen the place. Giles was out in the spring, and made the deal with Noyer – exclusive marketing deal. Since then, James, speaking to him on the phone in slick French, has had the sense that Noyer feels neglected. He feels unloved. It is a situation that struck James, not so long ago, waiting on the wet platform of Earlsfield station one morning, as an opportunity, perhaps.

  The fact is, for Giles this isn’t much. He himself hasn’t spoken to Noyer since that visit in the spring. Giles is now in Hong Kong – or Singapore, maybe, today – selling Alpine property to the Chinese. Selling whole developments. (What’s five per cent of twelve million euros? A nice day’s work.) Giles, Air Miles. ‘Air Miles in today?’ they say, James and the others, arriving at the office in Esher for another day of phoning and emailing.

  How much does Giles make? They talk about that over their Pret sandwiches at lunchtime.

  And how much is he worth?

  He started the firm in the late eighties. He was in on some of the early deals himself, had a stake in them, is what John says – John who’s been there since the start, and somehow doesn’t have much to show for it. He wasn’t in on some of the early deals himself.

  You don’t want to end up like John.

  Alone at a table in the hotel dining room he turns over the shiny brochures. Faint smell of fresh ink. Les Chalets du Midi Apartments. Nearly finished now, apparently. Will be done in time for the skiing season. Furnished, everything. Ten to sell in the next few months. Should be okay. Will be out here a few times. Will know this place, the Hôtel Savoie. He looks up, looks at the starched, peach-pink space. He already does know it. Yeah, he knows it. He has stayed in how many hotels like this? Half-empty on an early September evening. First week of September – summer season over, more or less.

  He wonders, finishing his flute of Alpine lager, what Noyer is like, whether they’ll get on.

  After eating, he walks over to the apartments. It is a five-minute walk from the hotel, out of the stone centre of the village, into a silent area where there are still some open fields in the moonlight.

  As well as mountain biking there are also a number of hiking trails with beautiful scenery. You can visit the vast natural parks in the region and see the extensive natural beauty the Alps have to offer. If you are feeling more adventurous you can go paragliding off the mountainside, rock climbing, or 4x4 driving off-road. Equally if you are feeling less adventurous there are much less strenuous activities to undertake …

  The new apartments stand in a lumpy wasteland. He stops on the moon-shiny tarmac in front, putting his hands in his pockets. There is a pleasant smell of young timber lingering in the dark air. Pretty low-end stuff, he sees immediately. A standard design with some superficial ‘chalet’ trim, thrown up in a hurry in one short summer.

  ‘Miri?’

  He is lying on the hotel bed, in his underwear. Neon light floods out of the open bathroom door.

  ‘It’s me.’

  His voice sounds noisy in the staid hush of the hotel room.

  ‘Everything was fine,’ he says. ‘No, that was fine.’

  Pine walls, waxed pine.

  ‘It’s, you know – Alpine. No, nice. Perfectly nice.’

  ‘Tomorrow I’ve got to spend the day with the punters,’ he says. ‘Do my thing. Wine them. Dine them. Show them a shop that sells nice cheese. You need a shop that sells nice cheese.’

  He laughs at something.

  ‘I’m told there is one, yeah.’

&n
bsp; ‘No,’ he says, ‘on Friday it’s the developer.’

  ‘How are you?’ he asks. ‘How are things there?’

  He says, ‘Yeah? Well, we expected that, didn’t we?’

  ‘I s’ppose,’ he says. ‘I don’t know. Why don’t you ask him?’

  ‘I wouldn’t worry about it,’ he says.

  He yawns and says, ‘Well, I wouldn’t worry about it.’

  ‘Do I?’ he asks.

  ‘I am, I s’ppose.’

  ‘Yeah,’ he says.

  There is a pause, and then he says, ‘Same here.’

  ‘Night,’ he says.

  ‘Okay. Night.’

  2

  She is waiting for him, unexpectedly, at the hotel in the morning. She is there in the large pine lobby, talking to the manager as if she knows him well.

  ‘Hello,’ James says, sailing up to them in a well-pressed open-necked shirt. She turns to him and he sees, as if for the first time, the scar on her lower lip. It is texturally distinct from the flesh of her lip – like a small drip of wax, almost. He tries not to look at it. ‘Are you here for me?’ he asks.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘That’s nice of you.’

  She introduces him to the manager, and they talk for a few minutes in French, and with a sort of exaggerated politeness, about the village, how it’s developing.

  Outside, among the postcards and mountain knick-knacks, she puts on Ray-Ban Wayfarers.

  Her little Peugeot is parked in front of a shop selling artisanal eaux-de-vie.

  They stroll towards it.

  How well he knows these Alpine villages. Spick and span. Flowers and flags everywhere. The mountains hanging there decoratively, harmlessly, looking like pictures of themselves. And in the streets, the atmosphere of a posh suburb. Not a leaf out of place. An oppressive tidiness. Still, there is something here – a vestigial sense of a place with a life of its own. A few little streets that are still unspoilt, he thinks. There is still scope, in other words, for some money to be made.

  She asks him, as she searches for her keys, hauling up handfuls of stuff from the depths of a large leather handbag, how he slept.

  He says, ‘Perfectly. Thank you.’

  ‘That’s good.’

  From his high forehead the hair, greying, hangs back in waves. He is getting craggy with the years – his sunglasses accentuate this. A sort of authority is growing in him too. He waits for her to find her keys.

  ‘And where,’ he asks, ‘will the new télécabine go from?’

  ‘Over there.’ She pushes her sunglasses up her nose and points past the petrol station, towards the entrance to the village where they arrived yesterday, the avenue of linden trees.

  ‘And when will it be finished?’ The question is important.

  ‘In time for the season,’ she says. She has found her keys, and is looking at some message on her phone.

  ‘Promise?’

  She looks up.

  He is smiling.

  ‘I promise,’ she says.

  It takes less than a minute to drive to Les Chalets du Midi Apartments. They look smaller in the sunlight than they did last night, and even less inspired. The wasteland around them looks scruffier too, full of weeds and muddy hollows where huge puddles were, after the latest storm to trundle thunderously down the valley.

  He stands there, looking at it, while she talks on her phone.

  It might be Noyer she is talking to and he tries to hear what she is saying.

  When she has finished, he half-turns his head to her and says, ‘That was the boss?’

  ‘It was.’

  ‘Everything okay?’

  ‘Everything,’ she says, ‘is okay.’

  ‘What’s he like?’

  The question seems to surprise her. ‘What’s he like?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘He’s …’ She takes a moment to think about it. ‘Fine.’

  ‘Does he know what he’s doing?’

  Again she seems surprised. She says, ‘I’m sure he does. Why?’

  ‘Just wondering.’

  Not only is her English perfect – she has, when she says some words, some vowels, an actual English accent, a sort of semi-posh London accent.

  ‘You must have lived in London at some point,’ he suggests, smiling at her in his sunglasses, not moving from where he is standing.

  She says, ‘I did.’

  ‘Thought so.’

  He is still looking at her. She is petite, a neat little figure. The dress she is wearing stops halfway down her thighs. Quite a stylish dress. He thinks – La belle plume fait le bel oiseau. The thought makes him smile again.

  ‘So – what do you think?’ she asks seriously, after a few seconds. Her finger finds the scar on her lip. She has a habit of touching it sometimes, of putting a finger to it for a moment.

  He turns his attention to the brown development, its dour little windows.

  There is nothing interesting about it whatsoever.

  ‘Nice,’ he says, finally. ‘Shall we?’

  For the layout of these spacious apartments, the architect strived to achieve the maximum use of the available space. As a result, these apartments have a very practical layout. The living room with open kitchen provides access to the spacious terrace of 8m2. The terrace is south facing and offers impressive views over the valley. Furthermore, these apartments offer a spacious bedroom …

  His own words, written without ever seeing the place. Off-plan prose.

  They stand in the show apartment.

  Even after the unpromising exterior, he is disappointed. The whole thing makes a naff impression. The laminate flooring, the sub-IKEA furniture, the shitty pictures on the walls. Expense has been spared – that hits him the moment he steps in the door. The spaces are too tight. It isn’t ‘spacious’ at all, not even in the estate-agent definition of the word. It feels pinched. There is definitely no wow factor, except slightly out on the terrace, with the mountains shoving up into the sunlight.

  Still, it won’t be an easy sell. Not at the list prices.

  Who was advising Noyer? he wonders, stepping back inside. All this tatty stuff is just a false economy. Unless he didn’t have the money. In which case other investors should have been found. No problem. James knows where to find them, where to find money for things like that. Once Giles took him along to an event at the Gherkin – the money was waiting for them there, suited, smiling, munching nibbles.

  Must be that Air Miles just wasn’t paying attention here. This is pretty small-time stuff. No oligarchs venture up this sleepy valley. Méribel it ain’t. Might as well do it properly, though. Squeeze everything you can out of it. Like this you’ll end up selling them for fifty thousand less. Why throw that money away? A few showy pieces of furniture, Smeg fridge, a touch of marble in the bathroom. Stuff like that makes the deal happen. These people fly in for a day. First impression is all they have.

  He opens and shuts something flimsy in the kitchen.

  Has to be some kind of wow factor.

  The curtains, he thinks, look like something from a youth hostel. Some kind of hideous floral print, for fuck’s sake.

  She sees he isn’t impressed.

  ‘You don’t like it?’

  ‘It’s fine,’ he tells her. ‘I mean,’ he says, ‘it’s economy, of course.’

  He smiles at her. Sees she knows what he means. Has had the same thought herself. ‘Who was advising Monsieur Noyer here?’ he asks. And then says, smiling at her again, ‘I know you weren’t.’ From the way she dresses, just that, he knows she wasn’t. He wonders whether to say it to her. Something like that.

  It’s too late, though. She is already saying, ‘No, I wasn’t. I don’t know.’

  ‘Madame Noyer, maybe?’ It’s a joke, sort of.

  She just says again, ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Is there a Madame Noyer?’ he asks.

  ‘There is.’

  ‘Let’s have a look at the others then,’ he says. />
  Unfurnished, the other apartments are more appealing. There is, at least, a sense of potential in their emptiness. They will all, though, be the same as the show apartment. Despite what she said, Noyer obviously does not know what he’s doing. He needs help. He needs someone to hold his hand. Which is exactly what James was hoping to find – someone in need of help.

  He wonders whether to even show them the show apartment. Might be better to show them these empty ones.

  He stands at a window in the ‘penthouse’ – four hundred and twenty-five thousand euros (excluding VAT) – a duplex at the top of the development, with views up and down the valley. The valley ends in a mass of overlapping peaks. A wall of them. The other way, the horizon is low.

  There is no flooring down here yet, just the screed under his feet as he walks around.

  ‘This one sleeps six, yeah?’ he asks.

  ‘Eight,’ she tells him.

  ‘Eight?’ He sounds sceptical, like a journalist interviewing a politician on TV.

  She says, ‘Including the sofa bed in the living room.’

  ‘Right. Okay.’

  He wanders over to one of the windows, larger here than in the other apartments.

  ‘Fireplaces would have been nice,’ he mentions.

  ‘There was an issue,’ she says. ‘About the insurance.’

  ‘Yeah?’ He stands at the window, looking out. ‘Still.’

  His hand is on the cold glass. On the other side, green slopes leap up, the sides of the valley, high pastures and stands of pine. The trees, from here, look like toys. Pointy toy trees. He is looking at them. So still, everything up there.

  ‘Nice, the double aspect here,’ he says.

  She is waiting near the door, on the other side of the room. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Is there a shop in the village that sells nice cheese?’ he asks.

  Again, the question seems to take her by surprise. She says, ‘Nice cheese?’

  ‘A posh cheese shop,’ he says, turning from the window. ‘Is there one?’

  ‘There’s a cheese shop,’ she says. ‘I don’t know what you mean by posh, exactly.’

  ‘I’m sure you do,’ he says with an encouraging smile. ‘I suppose you could call it posh.’

  ‘Lots of nice cheese?’

  ‘Yes,’ she says with a single emphatic nod.