by Paul Bailey
‘Dollars?’
He stopped and turned round. A small, fat, white-haired man was standing in a doorway, grinning at him.
He asked the man, who was dabbing at his freshly shaven face with a cloth, ‘Do you buy? Do you sell?’ in English.
‘Dollars? Yankee doodles? Dollars?’
The grinning man put Virgil Florescu in mind of the wicked character known as Smooth-Face in the story of Harap Alb their mother had read to them as children, and with the reminder came the thought that this man might be as devious and cunning.
The man came over to him and touched his bag. ‘Dollars?’ He raised a hand, fingers separated. ‘Dollars?’ He raised both hands. ‘Dollars?’ The man produced notes from one trouser pocket, coins from the other. ‘Dollars?’
Virgil moved away from the man and opened his bag. He fumbled inside it and brought out a ten-dollar bill.
‘Yippee!’ shouted the man, thrusting all his notes, all his coins, at him, and ran into the house. A grinning woman emerged a moment later, and thanked the stranger with a gesture of prayer and a curtsey.
‘I hope you’re being sensible.’
‘Sensible, Daisy? How sensible should I be?’
‘With your health, silly. I hope you’re looking after yourself.’
‘Yes, I think I am.’
‘You can’t be too careful –’
Before Daisy could continue, Kitty finished the next part of the litany for her. ‘Not at my age.’
‘Exactly.’
In the ensuing silence Kitty wondered if her sister would now say, ‘We’re neither of us any younger.’
‘We’re neither of us any younger. Middle age is well and truly upon us. You at least won’t have to endure the menopause, which must be some consolation for you.’
‘Yes, I suppose it is.’
‘Are you still having those tired spells?’
‘No, not so much. Not at all, in fact, lately.’
‘Dare I ask if that’s the result of your taking my advice for once in your life? You’ve been eating plenty of fresh fruit, as I advised?’
‘Yes, Daisy,’ she said, adding Daisy’s expected: ‘All that natural sugar.’
‘Precisely.’
‘As distinct from unnatural,’ she muttered to herself as she went into the kitchen. ‘Follow me, sister dear.’
‘I hope you haven’t prepared anything fancy, Kitty. None of your complicated sauces.’
Kitty’s complicated sauces were Daisy’s invention and the phrase ‘None of your complicated sauces’ was invariably delivered, as it was now, with an expression suggestive of Daisy’s uncomplicated, and by inference superior, culinary skills.
‘No, Daisy, I haven’t prepared one of my sauces. I haven’t prepared a sauce of any kind.’
‘I’m pleased to hear it. You, of all people, ought to know that my tastes are plain and simple.’
‘I, of all people, Daisy, think I do.’
Kitty served the plain and simple meal of baked cod and boiled new potatoes, and Daisy, at Kitty’s invitation, talked about her husband, Cecil, and their children, Andrew and Janet.
‘Oh, Cesspit’s his usual solid old self, expanding gradually round the middle and thinning a bit on top, but not too drastically, thank the Lord. You know how it is with Cesspit – how he’s caught up in his share prices and his stocks and bonds. No, Kitty, I’ve no surprises to offer you on the Cesspit front. And no complaints, I’m afraid, either.’
And there were no complaints, no surprises, where Andrew and Janet were concerned. As usual – with Daisy, everything was as usual – her son and daughter, always referred to in the order of their births, were not doing exceptionally well at school, but they were not, thank the Lord, doing badly. Then Daisy used a Daisy phrase that touched her sister whenever she heard it: ‘They’re really quite splendidly average.’
It was that ‘splendidly’, spoken with such warmth, such glowing pride, that moved her. Daisy could not have been more fulsome were Andrew a musical prodigy or Janet a mathematical genius.
‘I think they’re splendid, anyway, and that’s what matters.’
‘Yes, Daisy.’
‘All things considered.’
‘I’m in love, Daisy.’
‘You are what?’
‘I am telling you that I am in love.’
‘No, Kitty, you can’t be. No, Kitty. No, Kitty, you’re not.’
‘I am.’
‘Is this another of your infatuations?’
‘I do not have infatuations.’
‘Yes, you do, silly. There was the kaftanned creature.’
‘Freddy belongs to my vanished youth, Daisy. I was young then. There has been no one since Freddy who has captivated me. Until Virgil.’
‘Who?’
‘Virgil.’
‘Whoever is he?’
‘He’s a Romanian.’
‘What sort of Romanian?’
‘The human sort, Daisy.’
‘No, silly, don’t be clever with me. What does he do? Is he important? Is he a diplomat?’
‘I find him important. No, he isn’t a diplomat. He isn’t smooth enough for diplomacy. He doesn’t possess the required charm.’
‘Then what does he have? What is his appeal, Kitty?’
‘I love him. I simply love him.’
‘That’s no answer. That tells me nothing. Where did you meet him? Give me some details.’
‘Where did I meet him?’ She stared across at her frowning twin and said, ‘I didn’t meet him properly to start with. I saw him. I saw him looking at me.’
‘Where did you see him?’
‘In hospital, Daisy. After the operation.’
‘When you were drugged. When the drugs hadn’t quite worn off. Is that when this meeting of the eyes took place?’
‘Yes.’
‘Your drugged eyes met his, and it was love – was it – at first sight?’
‘I do believe it was.’
‘You stagger me, Kitty, you stagger me. You’ve been out of hospital for almost a year and you haven’t once mentioned this great Romanian lover of yours. Not to me, anyway.’
She hadn’t mentioned him because she had been alone for ten months, not even thinking of the man she had seen in the ward. Then, a mere matter of weeks ago, he had called out to her in Green Park and she had recognised him, and the next thing was that she had written her address on a scrap of paper and he had visited her the following evening, and now they were lovers. Those were the bare, the very bare, details.
‘Make of them what you will, Daisy.’
‘I wish I could make sense of them, that’s for certain, you silly. I take it this Virgil is as handsome as sin?’
‘No, he isn’t. I can say, in truth, that he isn’t. My Virgil Florescu is not at all handsome.’
‘What age is he?’
‘Mine. Ours.’
‘I’ll bide my time,’ Daisy promised, ‘before I predict disaster.’
In a copse not far from the village he sat down and counted the money the smooth-faced man had thrust at him.
(‘The miracle of the dinars,’ Dinu Psatta would remark on learning of his friend’s morning encounter and its outcome. ‘A very minor miracle,’ he would add with a grin as they entered the church that had once been the Temple of Jupiter and an imperial palace. ‘Not a gigantic miracle, like the one that happened here.’ They would stand where it was said the Emperor Augustus had stood when the heavens opened and the Virgin appeared to him, robed in light, holding the unborn Saviour of the world in her arms. ‘Your modest miracles are small fry in comparison.’)
The extent of the man’s generosity or improvidence became clear to him later the same day when, with two of the twenty notes, he bought a shirt, some socks, a razor, a bar of soap, a tube of toothpaste and a bottle of mineral water. The woman at the cash desk glared at the insanely smiling customer who refused the change she was offering him.
There was a railway station in the
town and he headed towards it. The sudden furious barking of a Dobermann pinscher chained to a post outside an official building with boxes of red geraniums in each of its windows startled him out of his reverie.
The dog growled on seeing him and began to move backwards, easing the tension on the chain it had extended to the limit. ‘Good boy, good boy,’ he said softly, and the Dobermann cocked its ears. ‘Come, boy, come,’ he whispered, bending low and putting out his right hand, palm upwards. ‘Come to me.’
The Dobermann flopped to the ground. ‘Good boy,’ he repeated, stroking the shiny black-and-tan coat slowly and gently. The animal rolled over and he now rubbed its belly, and as he did so he thought of the three-headed beast that guards the entrance to the underworld. ‘You are just like Cerberus,’ he told the delighted, wriggling Dobermann. ‘It only needs a few honeyed words and you change character.’
The dog bared its teeth and resumed its furious barking as soon as he rose to go.
He spoke the poem he called ‘Cerberus’ to her while she sponged his back. The idea of the versatile three-headed dog with a single brain had come to him early in his travels, he explained when he finished, but the words were new and the last words were the newest, having arrived only the day before in Green Park.
‘My father, Constantin Florescu, is its inspiration, Kitty. He is the cunning dog with three heads.’
He invited his beautiful Muse-to-be, the Muse of sweetness and contentment, to join him in the water.
3
The Fisher of Perch
Daisy and Kitty Crozier, wearing the gingham dresses their mother had specially made for them, were driven to London by a uniformed chauffeur in the biggest car they had ever seen. They were gawped at throughout the journey – by pedestrians in the streets or waiting at traffic lights and by the occupants of other, much smaller, vehicles. They were whistled at and waved to, and frequently saluted.
‘You are very privileged young ladies. It’s not many little girls who get the treatment you’re getting today – riding along in luxury as if you were a couple of princesses.’
‘We aren’t little any more, Mr Jackson,’ Daisy corrected him. ‘We are ten now. Under ten is little.’
‘I sincerely beg your pardon. Which one are you?’
‘I wouldn’t like to have your money. Nelly’s already told you who I am. I am Daisy. I’m older than Kitty, even though we’re twins. I act older than she does.’
‘Is that so?’
‘Yes, it is. I’ve always acted older.’
‘Then you’ll be a mature woman, Daisy, before you know it. Has the cat run off with Kitty’s tongue?’
‘She lets me do the talking when we’re out together. She’s shy in company.’
‘You mustn’t be shy with me, Kitty. I love listening to children babble.’
‘Babble? What’s babble?’
‘Babble’s how boys and girls speak when they’re not on their best Sunday behaviour.’
‘Is babble babyish?’
‘It can be.’
‘We don’t babble, Mr Jackson.’
‘That’s a pity, Daisy. I’m really disappointed. I was hoping you would keep me amused. You are enjoying the ride, aren’t you?’
‘Yes, thank you, Mr Jackson,’ said Kitty. ‘I’m enjoying it.’
‘Are you both looking forward to your holiday with Mr and Mrs Crozier? Are you both excited?’
There was a silence.
‘Which of you is going to answer? Kitty? Daisy?’
‘We think he should have come for us this morning, not you.’
‘Your father’s a busy man, Daisy.’
‘Does this big silly car belong to him?’
‘Big it certainly is, but you’ll have to tell me why it’s silly.’
(The Daisy phrase ‘big silly car’ was coined that day in March 1956. The ‘big silly car’ would signify for Daisy Crozier and Daisy Hopkins something vulgar, ostentatious. The ‘big silly car’ was one of the more obvious trappings of vanity. It was in the ‘big silly car’ that her lasting hatred of Felix Crozier was first made manifest.)
‘I don’t have to, if I don’t want to.’
‘Of course you don’t, Daisy. Perhaps Kitty will tell me why instead.’
‘She can’t, because she’s not me. I’m the only person who can tell you and I don’t want to.’
‘I shall have to carry on in ignorance in that case. There was I, convinced that I was driving a smart motor car and now I learn from you it’s really a silly one. I must admit I’m baffled.’
‘It’s silly because it’s not necessary, Mr Jackson,’ Daisy pronounced, adding – so that Kitty alone could hear – ‘Like him.’
‘You’re a strong-minded young lady and no mistake.’
The admirer of Emily Dickinson called on Virgil Florescu a second time. ‘Good morning, Virgil.’
‘Good morning.’
‘Your pupils have been instructed to do further revision. We have another hour in which to talk.’
‘Very well.’
‘I have brought my thirst with me again.’
‘I will make tea.’
‘It is excessively cold in here.’
‘That is how it is for us,’ said Virgil Florescu without rancour. ‘The radiator seldom serves its purpose. Radu Sava and I regard it as a Dadaistic object. We should be stupefied if it were to run warm. And as for hot –’
‘You are almost voluble today, Virgil. You were more restrained in your speech during our previous meeting.’
‘You gave me no opportunity to extol the pointless qualities of the radiator then. You appeared to be preoccupied with poetry.’
‘I still am, Virgil. The condition of your radiator is of no interest or significance to me. I have come to chew the poetic cud with you. There are many, many topics I wish to raise for discussion.’
‘Are there?’
‘The affair of “Icon” not being one of them, you will be relieved to discover. Whatever there is to say has already been said, in the clearest possible terms. “Icon” is Virgil Florescu’s folly and that is that. I can offer no embellishments.’
‘I understand.’
‘Let us turn our attention to George Bacovia.’
‘Why? He is out of harm’s way.’
‘You are not coming to harm, Virgil. I am aware that Bacovia is dead. It is his influence on the young poets of our country I am considering.’
(‘You are learning the words of a pathetic drunkard,’ Constantin Florescu chastised his thirteen-year-old son. ‘The man was a weakling. A man who was kept alive by his wife is no man for you to look up to.’
‘I am not looking up to him, Father. I am memorising one of his poems.’
‘Yes, and what a poem it is. A boy of your age should be seeking excitement and adventure, not reading this graveyard stuff. Where is your spirit, Virgil?’
His spirit, he could not disclose, was with the pathetic drunkard’s words and rhymes, with the beguiling music they made. That was where his quiet spirit was and where he knew it was going to stay, somehow or other.
‘He was mad. He was sick. He was a hopeless case.’)
‘I am thinking in particular of his self-absorption and his morbidity.’
‘Are you?’
‘Yes, Virgil, I am. They are not attractive attributes. Certainly not attractive or healthy enough to be emulated.’
‘His despair was his own and so was his irony. They cannot be assumed by anyone else. Here is your tea.’
‘Thank you. This will warm me up. Perhaps I am inferring, Virgil, that Bacovia’s work belongs to the darker times he lived through. He died a quarter of a century ago. Things are different with us now. We shall soon have a palace here in Bucharest that will be bigger and grander than Versailles. There is new hope burgeoning in our country.’
Virgil Florescu stared pointedly at the radiator. As he was doing so, the young intellectual just as pointedly poured the hot tea on to the Oltenian carpet. ‘Th
at was clumsy of me, Virgil. My hand slipped.’
‘I will fetch a cloth.’
‘You seem extraordinarily calm. I realise how precious this carpet is and what memories it provokes.’
‘Yes.’
‘Yes?’
‘Yes.’
‘Is “yes” to be your only response?’
‘Yes.’
‘If I were you I would curse me for my clumsiness.’
‘But I am not you.’
The intellectual, whom Virgil Florescu refused to address or recognise with the name Corneliu, watched as the poet dabbed at the sodden carpet with a dry cloth. ‘I fear you are doing more harm than good. I shall take it with me and have it cleaned by a professional.’
‘There is no need.’
‘There is every need, my dear Virgil. An antique must be treated with care and reverence. The expert I have in mind will treat it with both.’
‘It needs no expert.’
‘I insist that it does. I shall curtail our interesting discussion and bear your treasure to the expert restorer without delay. You are trying not to look distressed, Virgil, and you are not succeeding. Shall I carry it rolled or folded?’
‘My darlings.’ Felix Crozier was standing at the top of the stairs, his arms outstretched in welcome. ‘Come and be cuddled by your long-lost daddy.’ He bent down and embraced his daughters, kissing each of them in turn. ‘You’re both so pretty, my little darlings.’
‘We aren’t little any more,’ said Daisy. ‘Your darlings.’
‘You look little to a tall chap like me. But, yes, you have grown since I last saw you. By leaps and bounds, Daisy. You are less little than you were. That is the long and short of it, you might say.’
‘We’re ten now. We were five when you left us.’
‘It isn’t healthy, Daisy, to dwell on the past. It’s best to live in the present. Muriel and I have made all sorts of plans to keep you happily occupied. You are going to have a simply wonderful holiday, I promise you.’
