The Grand Tour: Four International Mysteries

by Michaela Thompson

  But what if Brian didn’t feel Jean-Pierre’s presence? How ridiculous they would look, the great lovers whose perfect harmony could be misled by a cheap costume! Jean-Pierre flushed. It couldn’t happen. He and Brian would know one another. Yet here was Jean-Pierre, only a few yards from Brian’s bright yellow back, and Brian obviously felt nothing and had no idea.

  Brian had been talking with Sally a long time. Wind tugged at Jean-Pierre’s umbrella, and he redoubled his hold. No doubt Sally, with the stubbornness her listless attitude masked, was refusing to go to Venice. Jean-Pierre hoped Brian wouldn’t convince her. He wouldn’t try very hard, surely? Squinting through the rain, Jean-Pierre caught his breath. Brian had crossed in front of the window and bent over. Jean-Pierre saw just the top of Sally’s head as Brian embraced her.

  The pain and nausea that swept over Jean-Pierre made his grip loosen on the umbrella, which immediately turned inside out. Cursing, his eyes stinging, he let go of the abominable thing and watched it fly down the street like a crazed, crippled bird and lodge itself at the base of a chestnut tree.

  His knees weak with shock, he leaned against the stone post at the entrance to the courtyard and raised his eyes again to the window. No one was visible.

  Brian had touched Sally. He had crossed the room specifically for that purpose. Had he actually kissed her? The thought made Jean-Pierre dizzy. He didn’t think Brian had kissed her. The whole thing hadn’t lasted long. A few seconds, at most.

  Yet, they could be kissing now. Lying together on the faded green couch in their shabby apartment, tasting each other, their hands exploring. They could be laughing, clinging, pressing close to one another, completely unaware that Jean-Pierre was out here in the rain, completely unaware that he existed at all.

  Standing with his eyes fixed on the window, Jean-Pierre knew he couldn’t bear this pain. He had to know. He would knock on the door. If they were naked, embarrassed, so be it. If Brian felt shame to see Jean-Pierre, to realize the hurt he had caused, so be it. Jean-Pierre was readying himself to march across the courtyard when Brian walked out of the building.

  Jean-Pierre was horrified. Brian mustn’t see him. He turned and hurried away down the street. When he reached the corner, he risked a quick glimpse back. There was Brian’s receding back, unmistakable in the poncho. Breathing heavily, Jean-Pierre clung to the metal pole that supported the streetlight. Brian was probably going back to Jean-Pierre’s apartment. Jean-Pierre would say nothing about what he had seen. In fact, what had he seen? He wasn’t sure. He had to think about it, to think about everything.

  Jean-Pierre’s raincoat was soaked, and his clothes felt clammy underneath. Brian would be surprised not to find him at home. Jean-Pierre would stop for a quick coffee, buy a newspaper. He would tell Brian he went out for a coffee and the newspaper, and his umbrella was destroyed, so he got soaked. They would laugh together at Jean-Pierre’s bedraggled appearance. Jean-Pierre started off in search of a café.

  TOM SPECULATES

  Tom poured himself another cup of coffee and stared out at the rain. God, Paris in January. He’d been through— he figured it up— twenty goddamn Januaries in this town, and every year it seemed to get worse. He knew when he and Olga were first married there had been clear, sunny winters. He remembered distinctly walking through the Tuileries with Olga on a clear, bright day, with Stefan in a stroller. No leaves on the trees, and Olga was wearing a red wool scarf she used to have, so it was winter, all right. Stefan in red, too. Hat and mittens. But the point was, the sun was shining. Bright. He shoved the spread-out newspapers aside and sat down at the table.

  He should work. He had an afternoon clear, for once. He’d drag out his notes, get organized. And then about the time he got going, Olga would be home from her job, so pleased that he was going at it again. Stefan wouldn’t believe a word of it, and would look at him with something Tom had begun to identify as contempt.

  It was a bitter irony that Tom, author of From the Barricades, should have a son like Stefan. At the age of fifteen, all Stefan cared about, literally all, was getting a good score on his baccalauréat exams in a couple of years so he could be accepted in one of the Grandes Écoles, the top schools. Other people’s children had ideas, protested, argued, wore strange clothes, and cut their hair in funny ways. Not Stefan. Tom would have loved to argue ideas with Stefan, but Stefan never had the time. Stefan was— well, in Tom’s day you would’ve called Stefan a grind. Stefan was a grind, and a French grind at that, despite the fact that his parents were American. Stefan spoke French better than he spoke English, played soccer when he played anything at all, and wouldn’t know an American football if one hit him in the head.

  Tom sighed. At least he had the group, and the trip to Venice. He had a focus now, as he’d had in ’68. He would observe, make notes, and at last write up his conclusions about—

  His conclusions about—

  He didn’t have to draw formal conclusions. He could write his observations, as he had in From the Barricades.

  The game would be revealing. Tom had no doubt he’d be able to identify the others. He pictured them in some Venetian trattoria afterward, laughing, unmasked. Rolf, the Man of Mystery, was in a black cape and black slouch hat. The conventional Jean-Pierre was a conventional Pierrot, the sad clown, with a black-and-white satin clown costume, a skullcap, a fat tear painted on his cheek. Brian was a Renaissance prince, ambiguously beautiful, in green velvet bound with gold braid. Sally— Sally was a barefoot hick, wearing overalls, a straw between her teeth. As for Francine— well, he couldn’t help thinking of Francine as an Earth Mother, even though she hadn’t liked the idea. He saw her full, luxuriant body in a semi-transparent white shift, garlanded about with leaves and flowers and fruit. She’d be wearing nothing underneath, so you’d see the outline of her thighs, the slightest tightness in her nipples.

  He shifted his position in the chair. She’d been scornful of the idea. Better think of something else for her.

  And for himself? The obvious thing, the first that had leapt to mind, was Socrates. Maybe it was too obvious. Socrates the teacher, leading his disciples to wisdom step by step. Socrates, willing to die for his beliefs. Socrates, with his unsympathetic, nagging wife— although, Tom had to admit, Olga wasn’t unsympathetic, really, and she didn’t nag. Tom didn’t have much in common with her anymore, that was all. Anyway, Socrates— the only thing was, Socrates was gay. If Tom himself dressed as Socrates, would it be taken as a declaration on that level as well? Because understanding as he was of Brian and Jean-Pierre, he would never— he didn’t have the slightest interest, ever.

  Except maybe with Brian. Just once, out of curiosity.

  He drank off his coffee, got up, and poured himself another cup.

  That was the problem when you had somebody around who was as handsome as Brian. You forgot sometimes that he was an ignorant, snot-nosed kid. The group had been completely off balance since the romance between Brian and Jean-Pierre started, and this was no time for the group to be off balance.

  Tom should work, but he felt a little shaky. If he went to the Café du Coin, somebody might be there, even though the weather was so rotten. He went to find his jacket and umbrella.

  AFTERNOON AT THE BISTRO

  Rolf took the plateful of picked-over bones from in front of the florid man in the gray suit. The bistro had been only half-full for lunch because of the weather. It had hardly been worth it for the owner to call Rolf to substitute for the regular lunch waiter.

  The only other customers were a young couple with a camera and a green Michelin guide. Americans, for sure. The woman looked dolorously out the window and made a remark to her husband. Cursing the weather. Why were you stupid enough to come to Paris in January, anyway? It isn’t the Bahamas, you know.

  The woman looked a little like Sally, but prettier. Brown hair, freckles across the nose, but where Sally’s hair hung past her shoulders with no particular style, this lady had a very chic cut. Sally was so plain, so prov
incial. She reminded him— she really reminded him a lot—

  Rolf raised his eyebrows in an inquiring expression and approached the gray-suited man. “Dessert? Café?”

  “Un esprèss,” the man grunted.

  In the kitchen, picking up the espresso, Rolf noticed that his hands were sweating. He’d had to leave America because of women like Sally. There were a lot of them there, those trusting, unsuspecting sorts of women. He had gotten annoyed sometimes because they were such idiots.

  The United States was very large, fortunately, and a young man of twenty, twenty-one, could go wherever he pleased. He could live in university towns, work at jobs like this one, find roommates to share some bug-infested garret, find women.

  The cup rattled in its saucer as he set it in front of the man.

  It hadn’t been good, after a while, not good at all, and Rolf had thought it best to come back to Europe, where things would be different. How odd that things were not very different at all. He was working as a waiter, hanging out with students, and— Sally was a lot like the others.

  The American couple had finished eating. As Rolf picked up the plates the husband said, “L’addition, s’il vous plaît.” Rolf nodded and glanced at the woman. She looked nervous. Probably wondering if her husband had pronounced everything right when he asked for the check. Come with me, baby. I’ll give you a visit to Paris you’ll never forget. He saw her naked, writhing, gasping.

  Somebody like Francine you could approach with all sorts of ideas and hell, not only did she go along with you, she contributed a few wrinkles of her own. When neither of them had anything better to do, Rolf and Francine got together and had a pleasant enough time. Yet the edge wasn’t there. The edge that came from adding shock and outrage and, to be honest about it, fear. It was tricky, though, because if a woman’s fear excited him, it was also likely to spark his anger. A situation like that was difficult to balance, and that’s why he’d come back to Europe.

  The Americans were already struggling into their raincoats, and the husband was glancing impatiently at Rolf. Rolf deliberately turned his back and, in leisurely fashion, began to add up their bill. The Venice trip would be diverting. He was thinking of going as the Devil. An attractive Devil, carrying a pitchfork that branched into penises. He was sure he’d have no trouble recognizing the others. Francine would be a whore in black net stockings; Brian, a naughty little boy in blue satin knickers and a starched white Peter Pan collar; Jean-Pierre, a big dog slavishly drooling over Brian; Tom, some witless, has-been revolutionary waving a tattered banner and shouting an outmoded slogan.

  Tom was ridiculous. Rolf had been interested at first, because he’d heard of Tom, and had even read Tom’s book. Now, he thought he should have checked out of Tom’s stupid entourage long ago. He didn’t know why he hadn’t.

  Sure he knew. He’d stayed because of Sally. When he first saw her, he got a jolt that made his mouth go dry. Which was all the more reason to get out. After Venice, he would for sure.

  Sally’s costume? Against his will, he saw Sally wearing a schoolgirl’s plaid skirt and a prim white blouse with a ruffle around the collar. He saw her eyes start to open very wide.

  “I don’t know what you have to do to get a check around here,” he heard the American man saying in a loud voice.

  Rolf finished adding the numbers, folded the paper and put it on a saucer. Blandly, he placed the saucer at the American man’s elbow. The woman was talking in a low, agitated tone. Rolf heard her say, “…don’t do things exactly the way we do at home, that’s no reason to—” before he moved off.

  It was midafternoon. The American pulled a credit card from his wallet. Rolf wandered to the window. It was still raining.

  FRANCINE’S HANDIWORK

  Francine, her tongue clamped between her teeth, spread paste-soaked newspaper over the roundish blob of papier-mâché in front of her. In this weather, it would take a long time to dry. She brushed hair from her forehead and sat back to study her work, looking from the blob to the photograph in the book beside her. The shape, the roundness, was good. She hadn’t gotten the nose right, though. And speaking of noses, she hadn’t solved the problem of how she was going to breathe.

  She’d worry about that later. First, get the shape.

  Finally, she thought she had it. Especially the profile. Sophie, the sixteen-year-old daughter of the family from whom Francine rented a top-floor maid’s room, was hanging around, bored because of the rain. Francine pointed to her handiwork and asked, “Who does that look like?”

  Sophie studied it gravely. “I don’t know.”

  “Come, Sophie. Look at it.”

  Sophie picked at her underlip and said, at last, “I don’t know. Really, it looks like a goblin.”

  “Sophie!” Francine picked up one of the small Indian-print pillows from her bed and hurled it at Sophie, who screamed with laughter and cried, “A goblin! A goblin!”

  “You’re an idiot!” Francine yelled, ducking the pillow that sailed back at her. “Don’t they teach you anything at your silly school?”

  “Not about goblins,” Sophie gasped, and laughed hysterically until Francine had to laugh, too. They were still giggling when Sophie’s mother called her. Sophie’s mother preferred that Sophie not spend a great deal of time with Francine.

  After Sophie left, Francine looked closely at her creation. It would be painted, of course, but it seemed to her obvious, despite Sophie, that this could be nothing but the head of Jean-Paul Sartre.

  She had already bought a man’s suit and tie at the flea market at the Porte de Ouen. She’d pad herself with pillows to achieve the correct body shape, carry a cigarette, and— there it was. Sartre, the symbol of her true self.

  Francine had known immediately that she would go to Carnival as Sartre. Since first reading Being and Nothingness she had felt a mystical connection with him. When others had said Being and Nothingness was dense or difficult, Francine had not agreed. Francine had felt that Sartre was speaking directly to her.

  Francine discovered Sartre when she came to Paris from the provinces to go to school. She had been confused, directionless, until she found him, or his spirit found her. It maddened Francine that Tom was so evasive about what Sartre had been like in person. Tom confined himself to the blandest generalities, when Francine wanted to know how the philosopher had smelled, the timbre of his voice, the texture of the skin on the back of his hand. Tom claimed to have forgotten. She would find a way, somehow, to force him to remember.

  Brian had laughed at her. He had once said that when it came to Sartre, she didn’t know her ass from first base, whatever “first base” might be. Francine could not let Brian take Sartre away from her. She could not let the purest thing in her life be sullied by unfeeling, unthinking, beautiful Brian.

  No. Let Brian laugh. Francine and Sartre could laugh, too. She saw Sartre’s eyes, goggly behind his glasses, light up with mirth.

  Francine smiled. To dress as Sartre, re-create herself in his physical image, was an idea that greatly excited her. Obviously, there was a parodic element in it, but she knew Sartre would understand that she meant it as an homage.

  She gazed at the profile, listening to the rain drumming on the roof. Having the papier-mâché head was almost, in an eerie way, like having Sartre himself with her.

  The others, she was sure, would not have costumes so perfectly matched to their inner lives. They would be completely transparent. Tom would be a dithering, frightened old woman; Rolf a sleazy thug in tight pants, picking his teeth with a knife. Jean-Pierre would be a fussy little priest, with a picture of Brian around his neck instead of a cross. Brian would be a shallow, stupid Narcissus, entranced by himself and his own image. Sally— Francine yawned, then chuckled. Sally was like the pool Brian— or Narcissus— looked at himself in. He tried and tried to get an admirable image from her, but she wouldn’t show him one. That’s why he couldn’t give her up. But how could Sally ever construct a costume to represent a reflecting poo
l?

  Francine turned her attention back to her head of Sartre. She could hardly wait for it to dry so she could paint it. After that, she and Sartre would be one.

  EMBARKATION

  Sally clutched her boarding pass. Brian sat gloomily beside her in his molded-plastic chair, a large box tied with string at his feet. The two of them were the only people in the departure lounge who weren’t chattering happily. The conversations around them, she guessed, were about how excited everyone was to be going to Carnival. Many of their fellow passengers carried hat boxes and bundles that probably contained pieces of their costumes. A man nearby had a Cavalier’s hat with a curling plume, and the woman next to him wore a black lace dress under her white fur coat, and she had roses in her hair.

  Sally had gotten a bit excited when she was putting together her costume, but now she dreaded the whole thing again. Brian didn’t seem to be anticipating it as eagerly as he had been, either. Something was wrong. Lately, Brian had been jumpy and somber, and over the past weeks Sally had watched pale blue circles deepen under his eyes.

  She thought he was bothered by the letters. He had received four of them, in little white envelopes with no return address. Brian’s name and address were written on the front in a hand she didn’t recognize. Sally always got the mail, because Brian was home so rarely. She put the first letter under the clock for him, and when he returned and opened it, she heard him draw in his breath. She didn’t ask what it was because she was sure he wouldn’t tell her. The other three he hadn’t opened in her presence.