Voice of our Shadow

by Jonathan Carroll

  "That one's not from my childhood, Joe. Paul has this crazy thing he does sometimes –"

  "Shh, India, don't say a word! Maybe we'll introduce the two of them sometime, huh?"

  Her face lit up like a candle. She loved the idea. She laughed and laughed, but neither of them made any attempt to clue me in. Later she said she had painted the picture for Paul as an anniversary present. I had noticed there was an inscription in the lower-left-hand corner: To Mister from Missus – Promises to Keep.

  They had lucked into a great big apartment in the Ninth District not far from the Danube Canal. But they spent little time there. Both of them said they felt compelled to be out and on the move as much as possible. Consequently, they were almost never home when I called.

  "I don't understand why the two of you are always out. Your apartment is so nice and warm."

  India shot Paul an intimate, secret smile that fled as soon as she looked back at me. "I guess we're afraid there will be something out there we'll miss if we stay home."

  We met the first week in July, when they had been in town for over a month. They had seen the usual sights, but now I eagerly appointed myself their special guide and gave them every bit of Vienna I had accumulated (and hoarded) in the years I had lived there.

  Those dreamy, warm days passed in a delightful blur. I would finish my writing as early as I could and then two or three times a week would meet them somewhere for lunch. Paul was on vacation until the end of July, so we moved slowly and sensually through those days as if they were a great meal we never wanted to finish. At least that's how I felt, and I could sometimes sense their happiness was growing too.

  I began to feel as if I had been fueled with some fabulous high-octane gasoline. I wrote and did research like a mad machine in the morning, played with the Tates in the afternoon, and went home to bed at night feeling that my life couldn't possibly be much fuller than it was right at that moment. I had found the friends I'd been looking for all along.

  On my twenty-fifth birthday, they put the cherry on top of the cake.

  I was sitting at my desk on August 19, working on an interview I was doing on spec for a Swiss magazine. It was my birthday, and because birthdays almost always depressed the hell out of me, I was trying hard to work my way through this one with as few distractions as possible. I had had an early dinner at a neighborhood gasthaus, and instead of going to a cafй and reading for an hour, as I usually did, I raced home and restlessly pushed the sheets of typescript around my desk in a vain attempt to forget that no one in the world had tipped me a nod on my Day of Days.

  When the doorbell rang, I was frowning at the minuscule pile of pages I had done. I was wearing an old sweatshirt and a pair of blue jeans.

  An old man in a seedy but still-elegant chauffeur's outfit was standing there with his cap in his hand. He wore black leather gloves that looked very expensive. He looked me over as if I were last week's lettuce and said in a nice hoch-deutsch accent that "the car" was downstairs and the lady and gentleman were waiting. Was I ready?

  I smiled and asked what he was talking about.

  "You are Mr. Lennox?"

  "Yes."

  "Then I have been told to come for you, sir."

  "Who, uh, who sent you?"

  "The lady and gentleman in the car, sir. I assume they hired the limousine."

  "Limousine?" I squinted suspiciously and pushed him a little to one side so I could peek out the door into the hall. Paul liked to play tricks, and I was dubious of anything he had his finger in. No one was out there. "They're down in the car?"

  "Yes, sir." He sighed and pulled one of the gloves farther up onto his hand.

  I asked him to describe them, and he described Paul and India Tate in evening clothes.

  "Evening? You mean formal? A tuxedo?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "Oh, God! Look, uh, look, you tell them I'll be down in ten minutes. Ten minutes, okay?"

  "Yes, sir, ten minutes." He gave me one last tired look and marched off.

  No shower. Rip the tuxedo off the hanger way in the back of the closet. I hadn't worn it in months, and it was full of creases. So what? Seconds of trouble buttoning the silk buttons with shaky, happy hands. What were those two up to? How great! Fabulous! They had known it was my birthday. They had even double-checked the date a few days before. Why had they hired a limousine? I took a fat glug of mouthwash and spat it loudly in the sink as I was turning out the light and heading for the door. At the last second I remembered to take my keys.

  A silver Mercedes-Benz 450 was purring majestically in front of my apartment house. Inside I could see the chauffeur (with his cap on now – all business) lit by the calm yellow of the dashboard lights. I stepped over to look in the back seat and there they were, champagne glasses in hand, the bottle sticking out of a silver bucket on the darkly carpeted floor.

  The window on my side zizzed down, and India's wonderful face peeped out of that rich inner gloom.

  "What's up, Birthday Boy? Wanna go for a ride?"

  "Hi! What are you doing here? What's with this silver chariot?"

  "Joe Lennox, for once in your measly little life, don't ask any questions and get in the damned car!" Paul's voice rumbled out.

  When I got in, India slid over so I could sit between them. Paul handed me a chilled glass of champagne and gave my knee a short, friendly squeeze.

  "Happy birthday, Joey! Have we got some big plans for you tonight!"

  "And how!" India clinked her glass to mine and kissed my cheek.

  "Like what?"

  "Like sit back and you'll see. You wanna spoil the surprise?"

  India told the driver to go to the first place on their list.

  The champagne lasted until the end of the ride, which turned out to be Schloss Greifenstein, a huge and wonderfully forbidding castle about half an hour out of Vienna. It is perched high on a hill overlooking a bend in the Danube. There's a splendid restaurant up there, and that's where we had my birthday dinner. When it was over, I really had to work hard to keep from crying. What special people. I had never had a surprise like that in my whole life.

  "This . . . this is some night for me."

  "Joey, you're our boy. Do you know how much you helped us when we first got here? There's no way in the world we'd let you get away without a party tonight!"

  India took my hand and held it. "Now, don't get all worked up about it. We've been planning to do it forever. Paul thought up the idea of coming here for dinner, but that's nothing. Wait till you see what I –"

  "Pipe down, India, don't tell him! We'll just go."

  They were already standing, and I hadn't even seen anyone pay the bill.

  "What's going on? You mean there's more?"

  "Damned right, buddy. This here's just the first course. Let's go – our big silver bullet's waiting."

  More turned out to be three chocolate sundaes at McDonald's on Mariahilferstrasse, with the Mercedes waiting for us outside. India bought the driver a sundae, too. That was followed by a long coffee at the Cafй Museum across from the Opera, and then adjoining rooms for the night at the Imperial Hotel on the Ringstrasse. If you haven't been to Vienna, the Imperial is the place where the likes of Henry Kissinger stay when they're in town for a conference. The price of rooms begins at a hundred and forty dollars.

  When we were properly installed (and the bellboy had given us all an angry, insulted look because we had no baggage), and we'd bounced on each of the beds, Paul opened the door and paraded into my room with a Monopoly game he said he'd bought fresh for the occasion. We finished the night playing Monopoly on the floor and eating a terrific sacher torte ordered from room service. At four in the morning Paul said he had to go to work that day and had to get at least a little sleep.

  We were all ruffled, frazzled, and giddy as hell from no sleep, being silly, and laughter. I hugged the two of them when they went off to bed with a force I hoped told them how much the night and their friendship meant to me.

&nbs
p; 3

  "What was your brother like? Like you?"

  India and I were sitting on a bench in the Stadtpark, waiting for Paul to join us. The leaves had just begun to turn color, and the sharp, smoky smell of real autumn was in the air.

  "No, we were incredibly different."

  "In what way?" She had a brown paper cone of warm chestnuts in her lap, and she peeled the shell off each with the utmost care. I liked watching her do it. The chestnut surgeon.

  "He was clever and cagey and sneaky. He would have made the world's greatest diplomat if he hadn't had such a bad temper." A pigeon walked over and snatched up a cigarette butt at our feet.

  "How did you feel about him after he died?"

  I wondered if I would ever be close enough to her to tell the real story. I wondered if I wanted to tell anyone the real story. What would it accomplish? Would it truly make things better? Would I feel less guilty after I'd given someone else the truth to hold with me? I looked hard at India and decided to test some of that truth on her.

  "Do you want to know something? I felt worse when my mother was committed to the insane asylum. My brother, Ross, was bad, India. By the time he died he'd done so many mean things to me I felt like a punching bag. Sometimes I don't think he cared if he was my brother or not. He was that cruel, or sadistic, or whatever you want to call it. So in my heart of hearts I was glad I wasn't going to get hit anymore."

  "What's so bad about that? It sounds right." She offered me a fat chestnut.

  "What do you mean?"

  "I mean just what I said – it sounds right. Joe, kids are little shits, I don't care what anyone says about how cute and sweet they are. They're greedy and egotistical and don't understand anything outside their own needs. You didn't feel bad when your brother died because he wasn't going to hit you anymore. It makes total sense. What's the problem? Were you a masochist?"

  "No, but it also makes me sound terrible." I was half indignant.

  "Hey, don't get me wrong – you were terrible. We were all terrible when we were little. Did you ever see how vicious and monstrous kids are to one another? And I'm not just talking about in the sandbox either, where they bang each other over the head with their trucks! Teenagers . . . God, teach them for a while if you want to learn about mean. There is nothing in the world as small and malicious and self-centered as a fifteen-year-old. No, Joey, don't crucify yourself over it. People don't become human until they're around twenty-two years old, and then they're just beginning. Don't laugh, I'm completely serious."

  "Okay, but I'm only twenty-five!"

  "Who said you were human?" She ate the last chestnut and threw the shell at me.

  An editor who was interested in my idea for the war book was coming over to the Frankfurt Book Fair and asked if I'd come up so we could talk about it. I readily agreed because it gave me a good excuse to take a train ride (which I love) and to meet some New York book people. I mentioned the trip to Paul only because the subject of train travel came up in conversation one day when we were having lunch together. We went on to reminisce about the great train trips we'd taken on the Super Chief, the Transalpin, the Blue Train from Paris to the Riviera . . .

  This was at the beginning of October, when the Tates were busy going to a month-long adventure-film festival at the Albertina museum in town. The night I left, I knew they were due to see a double feature they'd been talking about for weeks – North by Northwest and The Thirty-nine Steps. We had coffee together at the Landtmann in the late afternoon and said we would rendezvous somewhere as soon as I got back to town. Fine, see you then. When we separated, I stopped, turned, and watched them walk away. India was talking excitedly to Paul, as if she'd just met him after a long separation and had many new things to tell him. I smiled and thought of how quickly our relationship had blossomed. I smiled even more when I thought how great it was to have both Vienna and them to return to.

  I've never been lonely in either an airport or a train station. The sounds and smells of travelers, dust, and huge metal; people rushing around in every direction; arrivals, departures, and expectations in their veins instead of blood. If I am ever traveling somewhere, I try to be in the station at least an hour before departure so I can sit somewhere and enjoy the bustle. You can always go to a train station and sit there and enjoy it, but it's better if you're on your way someplace or expecting someone.

  The original Vienna Westbahnhof was destroyed in the war, and the building that replaced it is one of those modern boxy things with no character at all. What saves it in the end is that about eighty percent of the place is glass – windows everywhere – and no matter where you are, you have a panoramic view of that part of the city. It's wonderful to go in the afternoon and watch the sun drift through the windows and over everything. At night, climb the wide middle staircase, and once at the top, turn around quickly: the Cafй Westend across the street is full and bright, trams stream by in every direction, and the neon ads on the sides of the buildings splatter the dark with words and catch phrases that remind you that you're in a far country. Car insurance is Interunfall Versicherung, cars are Puch and Lada, Mercedes. Coca-Cola as well, only here Coke macht mehr draus!

  I had a cup of coffee at one of the stand-up buffets and then started the long hike down the endless platform to the car with my reserved couchette. The lights in the train were off when I passed through the departure gate, but they suddenly clicked on all at once; street lamps at the end of dusk. A workman and a baggage porter, both dressed in different shades of blue, were leaning against a metal support post, talking and smoking. Since we were the only ones there, long appraising looks passed back and forth. This was their land until train time – what was I doing out there so early, trespassing? The porter looked at his watch, scowled, and flicked his cigarette away. The two of them separated without another word, and the workman walked over to the other side of the platform and climbed into a darkened first-class coach that said on a white and black sign that sometime deep in the night it would be going to Ostend, and then on to London.

  Far up the tracks a single black engine scooted shrilly away and out of sight. I hefted my overnight bag and kept looking at the numbers on the sides of the cars. I wanted to be in my compartment. I wanted to be in my seat, eating the jumbo hero sandwich I'd made at home for dinner and watching the other people arrive.

  The light was out in one compartment of my car. Climbing up the steep metal stairs, I made a silent bet with myself that it would be the light in mine. It would be broken, and if I wanted to do any reading before I went to sleep, I would have to walk ten cars back to find an empty seat. The light in the corridor was on, but sure enough, the dark one had my berth number on the door. The blue curtains were drawn across both windows. The Inner Sanctum. I reached down and pulled the door handle, but it didn't move. I put my bag down and pulled with both hands. Nothing happened. I looked up and down the corridor for anyone who could help, but it was empty. Cursing, I snatched at the damned thing again and pulled with all my might. Not an inch. I gave the door a kick.

  Immediately the curtains began to slide aside. I took a startled step backward. A theme from Scheherezade came on faintly. A match flared and broke the inner dark. It moved slowly left and right, then stopped. It went out, and a dull yellow flashlight beam came on in its place.

  Outside, I heard the chunk of railroad cars being coupled together. The lemony light held, motionless; then it moved over a white-gloved hand that held a black top hat. A second white hand joined it on the other side of the shiny brim, and for a moment the hat moved in time to the sultry music.

  "Surprise!" The light blasted on, and India Tate stood with a bottle of champagne in her hand. Behind her, Paul had the top hat on his head at a rakish slant and was opening another bottle with his clown-white gloves. I remembered the painting on the wall of their apartment. So this was Little Boy.

  "Jesus Christ, you guys!"

  The door slid open, and she yanked me into the little hot room.

&n
bsp; "Where're the cups, Paul?"

  "What are you doing here? What happened to your movies?"

  "Be quiet and take a glass of this. Don't you want any of your going-away champagne?"

  I did, and she slopped so much into my cup that it foamed up and over the edge and onto the dirty floor.

  "I hope you like this stuff, Joey. I think it's Albanian." Paul still had his gloves on when he held his cup out to be filled.

  "But what's going on? Aren't you missing North by Northwest?"

  "Yup, but we decided you deserved a proper send-off. So drink up and don't say anything else about it. Believe it or not, Lennox, we love you more than Gary Grant."

  "Baloney."

  "You're absolutely right – almost as much as Gary Grant. I would now like to propose a toast to the three of us. Comrades in arms." A man walked past in the narrow corridor behind me. I heard his footsteps. India held her cup up to him and said, "Prosit, pardner!" He kept walking. "Anyway, to get back to what I was saying, I would like to propose that we all drink to a truly wonderful life."

  Paul echoed her words and nodded in total agreement. They turned to me and held their Dixie cups up to be toasted. I was afraid my heart would break.

  Sometimes the mail in Austria is very slow; it can take three days for a letter to get from one side of Vienna to the other. I wasn't surprised when I received a Tate postcard from the town of Drosendorf in the Waldviertel section of the country a week after I'd returned from Frankfurt. That night on the train during our party they'd said they were going up there for a few days of rest and relaxation.

  The card was written in India's extremely neat, almost too-tight, up-and-down script. Every time I saw it I was reminded of the sample of Frederick Rolfe's handwriting in A. J. A. Symons's fascinating biography, The Quest for Corvo. Rolfe, who called himself Baron Corvo and wrote Hadrian VII, was nutty as a fruitcake. As soon as I knew her well enough to be able to kid her, I'd made a point of pressing the book on India and instantly turning to the page to show her the amazingly similar scrawl. She was not thrilled by the comparison, although Paul said I had her dead to rights.