Sex & Genius

by Conrad Williams

  Chapter Two

  'Sit down. Make yourself comfortable.'

  'Thank you.'

  Michael reclined in an easy chair, squinting at a bright but overcast sky. He put on his sunglasses, but then removed and repocketed them. Eye contact was essential. He drew slow breath. The air was close and the long climb up to the author's villa had made him sticky under the arms.

  'Kronenbourg or Peroni?' The voice was light.

  'Peroni, please.'

  'Beer for you. Orangina for me.'

  He had a few seconds to get bearings, to calm down. He was sitting in the heart of a public figure's private world. He breathed deeply, put his hands on his lap.

  The first glimpse had been a shock. The face that had peered around the front door was blighted with wrinkles. Hilldyard's eyes were pink-rimmed, his expression almost ravaged. He looked as though he had just got out of bed, and stood for a moment frowning at the visitor on his doorstep. Michael introduced himself and the author licked his lips. 'Come in,' he said.

  There was something mole-like in his aspect, as if he had difficulty facing daylight, the outside world. He guided Michael through to the balcony, apologised for the untidiness of his living room, dithered a moment and then offered him a drink. Michael was directed to a group of wickerwork chairs whilst the old man shuffled off to his kitchen. When he came back, with a tray and glasses, he seemed slightly more with it, as though the need to be decently hospitable had begun to revive him. His haggard face, Michael realised, was the essential face of the artist; a face that displayed the wear and tear of an intensely felt life; and when the author regarded Michael, even glancingly, one saw in his gaze a certain resilience. He did not look well, but he saw clearly, and it was the fixity of that look that established a link in Michael's mind between the master novelist and the old man in front of him. However disorganised their opening chatter, Hilldyard's strength of perception was present in those fastening eyes.

  He placed the tray on the table and backed carefully into his seat. With a glance he gave Michael to understand that they had rather well accomplished stage one of the proceedings: introduction, drinks, seating. He squinted at the light, and then reached for his glass. 'Where are you staying?'

  Michael drew himself up.

  'I'm at the Montemara.'

  'I hope the beds are serviceable. She has three pregnant daughters!'

  'Oh . . . My one was fine.'

  Hilldyard cleared his throat, as if to say something important. 'You like it here?'

  Michael nodded with more fellow-feeling than certainty. He had barely noticed the town.

  'Don't worry about the weather. The Camora will intervene. Somebody will be bribed. Perhaps God. The sun will then shine.'

  Michael managed a smile. He was still uneasy, unsure of his voice. 'It's a great improvement on Soho.'

  'Especially the Maiori restaurant. Did you ever have the misfortune to go there?'

  'The one in Frith Street?'

  'Spam for antipasto. Spaghetti you could eat with your gums. My publisher's favourite haunt, sod's law!'

  Michael swallowed. 'Where's good to eat here?'

  'Virtually anywhere. La Cucina is excellent. To avoid Americans you might give Black's the slip. Unless you want to see the antipasto trolley camcorded by a Texan in a ten-gallon.'

  Michael laughed appreciatively, though the sound of his laughter was not quite normal. He was a few split-seconds behind spontaneity, and although the nerves were less attacking now, he was not himself, not in confident form. On the way up he had felt shaky, intellectually unprepared, his adrenalin drawing up nothing useful. It was almost as if the meeting were doomed to fail because he was not himself this morning.

  'You've been coming here for years?' he said.

  'A month every autumn. The town has a spell, and the steps are good for my heart. Sooner or later I'll expire with a bag of salami in the one hand and a bottle of beer in the other. Ideally, on the cusp of a keen appetite and a deep thirst.' Hilldyard smiled. 'But not just yet, if you please. Would you care for an olive?'

  'Oh . . . thank you.'

  The elderly man rose and went back into the villa.

  Michael took the opportunity to glance around at the potted plants, the side-table with periodicals, the view (framed by tapering cypresses) of a grey sea and hazy mountains.

  He had no sure sense of the author's frame of mind. He seemed straightforward, not overly impressed by his standing as a great novelist. If his face were more ruined by age than Michael had expected, his manner was solid, his address keen. He wasn't too old to be the subject of a documentary film.

  When he came back from the kitchen, his hand around a dish of olives, Michael said unaffectedly, 'I'm so grateful for the chance to meet you. I do hope it's not an intrusion.'

  'Of course not.'

  'It's a great privilege for me.'

  'I doubt it. I'm just an old gaffer, as you see.' He eased into the chair, holding on to his knee as he sat.

  'I don't know what Basil told you.'

  The old man stared at him. It was a look that both waited and evaluated.

  'He said that you wanted to make a programme about me.'

  'I do.' Michael nodded quickly. 'A seventy-fifth-birthday tribute. Half interview, half retrospective.'

  Hilldyard glanced anxiously into the light, took his glass of Orangina carefully.

  Michael could feel his heart beating hard. 'Is that something you'd be willing to consider?'

  Hilldyard leaned forward and cleared his throat. He seemed for a moment mildly distracted, as if absorbed by a physical sensation. 'Actually, I'm very keen not to be interviewed or filmed.'

  Michael started.

  'I'd prefer posterity to have all of the work and none of the life.' He blinked. 'When posterity comes, that is.'

  Michael felt himself losing colour and control. He held on to his glass of beer and struggled to think of a response.

  'I . . . I can imagine your misgivings.'

  The author looked at him with sudden severity. 'I doubt it.'

  'You see, I think it's important to get you on the screen.'

  'One doesn't need advertising.'

  'No, I mean . . .'

  'Seven novels in countless editions. Braille, large print, audio cassette. I'm not in short supply.'

  'And that should be celebrated.'

  'Go ahead. Have another beer.'

  Michael's mouth was dry; he was not feeling well. He could not accept that he had come all this way for nothing. 'I want to make a programme that conveys your idea of the . . .'

  'I've no message.' Hilldyard scowled.

  'Yes, but . . .'

  'And I'm hideous to look at. Grossly untelegenic.'

  Michael smiled nervously. 'No message, but you do have views.'

  The author was intrigued. 'What views?'

  He shook his head. It sounded trite, but it was only what he meant. 'On how you reckon your contribution to the novel.'

  'I'd have thought that pretty obvious.'

  Michael frowned and then spoke with some fervour. 'Nothing is obvious in an era of multi-channel television.'

  Hilldyard's eyes narrowed.

  'What about your idea that writing can't be left to the professionals?'

  'I've had second thoughts about that. I now think it can be.'

  He swallowed. 'Your doctrine of a duty to subject matter? An ethical imperative that disciplines literary imagination?'

  The author was consumed with impatience. 'I regard myself as an utter failure and I think it would show.'

  'A failure!'

  'A failure.'

  'You're a great novelist!'

  'I can't put myself before a camera and speak with authority on anything.'

  Michael's gesture of appeal froze. He was baffled.

  Hilldyard tapped his chest. 'I'm hollow inside and may have been for years.'

  'But . . .'

  'A documentary would be one long obituary. I
want to look forward, don't you see? Or, at the very least, sideways.'

  Michael was dumbfounded.

  'One needs to suffer,' said Hilldyard, with abject sincerity. 'Suffering is a writer's best friend. One regenerates through pain and I'm grimly familiar with that torturous process. But to lose fecundity at this stage . . . at a time when bones are aching and friends are dropping off . . . You can't imagine how dismal that is. I haven't published in fifteen years. I couldn't look a camera in the eye without feeling utterly bogus.' His eyebrows arched as if to apologise. He pulled a hanky from his trouser pocket and wiped his nose. 'I'm sorry. I can't do it. I won't do it. There's nothing more to say.'

  Michael was overcome and could not speak.

  'Nothing is hollower than the voice of the dead artist in a man. Your viewers would not be inspired.'

  Michael was aware of an out-of-body sensation, as though shock had displaced him. The documentary had been summarily dispatched, and he felt the termination of a cause that left no spectrum for his thoughts, nothing but the odd fact of his sitting here in the presence of the writer. He looked askance, sensing the breeze in his hair, the near smell of pelargonium leaves. He could not begin to understand why Hilldyard had agreed to see him.

  Hilldyard looked at the glassy brightness of the sea, his expression vacant.

  Energy drained from Michael. He knew where he stood and could think of nothing to say. From this moment on bankruptcy was inevitable. He was not embarrassed by the lengthening silence. His capacity for awkwardness was completely exhausted.

  'It's hard to be a literary institution,' said Hillyard slowly, 'when one's last novel is loathsome.'

  Michael looked up. His heart was beating hard. 'Loathsome?'

  'Rotten to the core.'

  He tried to react. His voice was tight. 'Has anybody read it?'

  'The opinions of others are of no use to me.'

  Michael wondered if this were the manuscript Curwen had mentioned.

  'When one has been a writer all one's life, it is impossible to believe that something as mysterious as your own creativity can be seen into by another person. It's not a neurosis that can be unravelled. More a process of necessary pain.'

  Michael received the old man's gaze directly.

  'You're wondering why I've asked you here.'

  'Well, I . . .'

  'Basil says you've read all my novels twice and know them better than I do.'

  He shrugged. 'I'm . . .'

  'I need a literary secretary.'

  There was a moment's silence. Michael stared at the old man.

  'Sounds like a non sequitur? Or perhaps not. When Basil told me all about your knowledge and appreciation of my work, it occurred to me that you might be intrigued by a different kind of relationship to the one you envisaged. I know you're a veritable homme d'affaires, and my notion will seem impractical and distinctly forward.'

  Michael's astonishment betrayed him. He coloured at the directness of the overture.

  'But I need the perspective of a stranger who likes my work and would be interested to help its creator . . . muddle through a few things. There'd be research, admin, correspondence. I have an omnibus edition of the novels to prepare, occasional pieces to compile; and there are a couple of ideas that I'd like to incubate in Positano, which might benefit from a well-disposed interlocution or two. I know it sounds mad. You get to my age and you just say these things because there is so little time. But that's what I need, you see. Not a television documentary.'

  Michael sat up awkwardly in his chair.

  'I've embarrassed you.'

  'No, I . . .'

  'You think I'm naive or senile. Both?'

  He found it difficult to take in what Hilldyard was proposing. A moment ago he had been turned down as a documentary maker. Now he was being offered a closer relationship with a man he had just met.

  'We hardly know each other!'

  'You know me very well. You've read my novels and liked them. And, of course, being a writer I'm very well disposed to like someone who likes my work.'

  'I'm not sure how . . .'

  'Neither am I.'

  Michael regarded the author with amused consternation. He had come all this way to secure Hilldyard's co-operation and now Hilldyard was soliciting his.

  'Well, I'm honoured to be asked.'

  'May we discuss it?'

  He shrugged. 'Of course!'

  'Over a bowl of pasta?'

  The old man stood up suddenly, so that Michael was also obliged to stand up and meet him directly. 'Let's nip down to the Cucina and have a drop of vino locale and a bowl of vongole and talk it through.'

  'OK.'

  'I'll get my wallet.'

  He stood in a trance of bewilderment, gazing at the view. He brought out his sunglasses and pushed them on to his nose. His fingers danced on the balcony rail as he re-examined the tinted town sinking down to the sea.

  'You'll need those,' said Hilldyard, referring to his shades, as he returned with his parasol, and Michael removed them as they went back through the villa; and when they came outside into the alley, and Hilldyard staked out the route with a directional thrust of his parasol, Michael followed him in a slipstream of light-headedness. They reached the top of a flight of steps and the author turned on him zestfully.

  'I could eat a horse!' he said.

  Chapter Three

  The weather was unsettled for two more days. Banks of cloud sat on the hills; vapour blurred the outlines of the town; a greyness and flatness and dullness oppressed visibility, and between the hours of sea mist rising from the horizon to a cloudy vault above Positano, downpours spent themselves in withering bursts. It was not until the third day that he saw Hilldyard's Positano, and by then he was at the beginning of something new, which needed little encouragement, but received an electrical jolt.

  He was lying in bed, in the shuttered gloom of his room. He had emerged from a bottomless sleep and had no idea of the time. Pale lines formed on the wall; eddies of light played on the ceiling. He rolled on one side, wondering if the weather had improved. An oval shape, projected through a crack in the shutters, flickered on the bedspread. A line of yellow intensified into a bar of gold. He flung the sheets back and sprang off the bed, opening the shutters and turning on a blaze that flooded the room, colouring in everything. He pulled a towel around his waist and went on to the balcony, where brilliance overwhelmed him. He looked up at the sky, but was hopelessly dazzled, his eyes tickling and watery; so he came back inside, tripping through a nebula of dots, to the bathroom, where he grasped the taps and set the day running.

  He later returned to the balcony, and found himself entering upon a vision: a coruscating prospect, in the middle of which the sun torched across the sea and unfurled on the white villas below a quivering radiance. Positano had been switched on; placed before him in its glory.

  Banked up ahead were the shoulders of the mountains, dropping into the horizontal glitter of the sea. In the middle distance hundreds of buildings staggered down the slope, a helter-skelter of balconies and arcades set off by pines and cypresses, and endless bougainvillaea. It was a breathtaking spectacle, and it made him succumb at last to the town's extraordinary beauty. He could almost believe he had departed the real world for a seaside Eden. Everywhere vine twined along wires and up railings; convolvulus blossomed over gutters; walls were embellished with Virginia creeper and arrows of ivy.

  On the morning of that third day he discovered something else. The Signora came to tell him at breakfast that she had been called on by a Signor Correggio, a local solicitor and friend of Hilldyard's, who had instructions to pay Michael's hotel bills on the author's behalf. Michael could stay for as long as he liked. She would even move him to a bigger room on the second floor, if he wished. She relayed all this with new femininity and warmth, as though he were now an important guest.

  Michael was greatly surprised. Hilldyard had said that he wanted to pay for his 'services', but after two days of agre
eable conversation, the logistics of employment were most unclear. He was still flummoxed by the old man's proposition, which seemed impractical and inappropriate. Hilldyard knew he was a producer, and producers do not really have time to be literary secretaries, or even to sit around discussing literature on wickerwork furniture; except that he of course did, and was inclined to; but that was a fluke. And what puzzled him even more was that Hilldyard took the fluke in his stride. There was something lordly in his view of practicalities, his attitude to time, his force majeure assumption of Michael's hotel bill, as if they were bound to work things out and get on famously.

  He did have time. Perhaps the rest of his life. There was certainly no point in going back immediately. He had to talk to his bank. He had to find a new solicitor and liquidate voluntarily; but there was nothing positive he could do. Nobody was going to lend him money. He had asked his father, who said no, and had already borrowed from his brother, who was a director of the company and, being a barrister, would blow up horribly if he knew the real situation. Three set-backs had turned a viable business into a chasm of debt – and there was nothing on the horizon. So he baulked at the Signora's announcement, but he would not protest. With Hilldyard's support he could stay on for a few more days; and if, back home, there were grim realities to face, it was all the more reason for submitting to the temporary accident of an Italian holiday.

  After breakfast, he strolled on to the veranda, sat down at a table and gazed across the lit ravine of the town. He was warmed by the gentle heat of the sun, and, as he sat there letting the colour and light come at him, he began to relax. The stress in his joints and eye-sockets eased. He looked at the curlicues on the table legs, at the tubs of myrtle and geranium, at the terracotta pots and mosaic tiles, and for the first time in ages felt open to pleasing sensations. He was suddenly tranquil, and when his second cappuccino arrived, and he began to settle in to the view, taking as much from its sparkling detail as possible, he realised how much he needed a break. In recent weeks he had been frantic, strung out, narrowly obsessed by worrying things. The chance to experience an emotion other than stress was enough of a reason not to rush back, in addition to the bonus, intriguing and bizarre, of being courted by Hilldyard.