Leper Tango

by David MacKinnon

  “She gave me a call the other day. Dry as a prune.

  Over the phone anyways.”

  “In her leisure hours, Franck, she works at a battered women’s shelter. Not likely to be sympathetic to your cause. She’s also a dyke. A dyke with a good reason for being a dyke, if you catch my drift.”

  “What has she got on me?”

  “What’s that got to do with it, Franck? You personify everything she is fighting.”

  “Unfair editorial comment, Hervé. You’re the woman beater. Remember, the aller-retour? I recall you were the one who defined it for me. You sound short of breath, Hervé. You inhaling or exhaling?”

  “Franck, you’re more than out of the loop in the City.

  You’re right up there with urea formaldehyde, my friend. Christ, even conversing with you might make me some kind of accessory after the fact. Listen, Franck, I’m a few deviations from the norm. We all are. We’re judged behind our backs, in our sleep, or before the courts. But you’re getting involved in something different. Criminals — and here, I refer to the criminal classes, and not some poor bugger who sods off his wife because he lost his job — operate differently. Type that kills you because of the way you look at him. Or because he hasn’t been laid in a week. You’ve cross-examined these sub-humans, Franck! Come on! You can still come back.”

  “No, this is home now, Hervé. Where the heart lies.” “I always thought of you as a convenience man, Franck. But you are something else. For what it’s worth, you’re signing your death warrant.”

  “You’re a good man, Hervé, but you’re wrong. Everybody is toast sooner or later. Or, in my case, everybody is croque monsieur.”

  “Go ahead, Franck. But, I can’t communicate with you anymore. Nothing personal, but I’ve never been a fall guy.”

  “I know the rules of engagement, Hervé. Quit worrying so much. How are things back home?”

  “I’m selling the property. Too much to tend in old age. Not that this would concern you, but the taxes are too high.”

  “True enough, definitely not on my radar screen.”

  “In the long run, you can live with taxes, Franck.”

  I hung up the phone.

  “What did he say?”

  “He said we’d better talk to Dmitri.”

  Dmitri’s twin diesel yacht, the First In, First Out, was moored on the Jetée Nord at the Club Nautique d ’Antibes.

  The upper saloon of First In, First Out was lizard lounge all the way, minus the strippers, but overloaded with plasma screens, DVD home cinema, cellphones, TV sat systems, and antique sextants, compasses and maps of the world, circa 16th century, with the entry Terra Incognita over large parts of the New World. In the far end of the Upper Saloon, a wall covered with pictures of young models, posing.

  Dmitri’s look was 1950s film noir star, which suited his broken nose, hooded eyelids and mallet head. The way he held his whisky looked precious for a man with his face, until you noticed that he was missing three fingers on his right hand.

  “I wondered where you’d gone, Sheba,” he said as he lined up three whisky tumblers, a bucket of ice and a bottle of J&B on the oval teak table of the stateroom. “You disappeared for a while.”

  He poured out the whisky, still wasn’t looking at me. He poured out doubles, on ice. I went into drift, started running a mental list of 1950s film noir stars. Definitely not Delon. Remnants of Belmondo. Jean Gabin? Close, but no. Lino Ventura. That was it. The Slavonic Lino Ventura.

  “I don’t like something about it. But I said I would help you,” says Dmitri. “So, I’ ll help you What’s this somebody’s name bothering your friend here?”

  Dmitri pulled a thread from between his teeth as if it were the remains of the last somebody who had bothered one of his friends.

  “Spike,” I intervened, “Spike Nussbaum.”

  He poured himself another J& B. Nodded towards

  my glass.

  “Another finger?”

  “No, I’ve got enough on my hands.”

  Dmitri frowned, like he was noticing me for the first time, or was taking a stab at calculating two to the third power, or found himself in front of a traffic light which stayed red for three minutes running. Then, he grinned and shook his head.

  “I am from Russia. Siberia.”

  “Nice. What’s a one-way on the Trans-Siberian set you back in rubles these days?”

  “Even today, there are cannibals in Siberia.”

  For a moment, I even forgot Spike. The Riviera.

  Hideout for Arctic cannibals.

  “On second thought, give me a finger. Of J&B.”

  “Tell me, Robinson. How come everybody got short names in America?”

  “What’s short about Robinson?”

  “No, like Bill, Bob, Gus, Sam.”

  “We have bad memories.”

  “We have no memories in Russia. Vodka.”

  “But you have long names.”

  “Not everybody. Joe Stalin is short.”

  “Funny. He looks tall in the pictures.”

  “So, what is the problem with this Spike somebody?”

  “Money.”

  “And you got no money.”

  “I have money. But none for Spike.”

  “Just tell this Spike somebody, no worries, Spike, you want the money, you come by and pick up the money.

  Then you tell him you’re waiting for him here.”

  Dmitri passed me a business card pressed between his thumb and forefinger. Hotel del Monte. Villecroze.

  Diner-Spectacle. PMU. Cuisine Provençale.

  “Just like that.”

  “Just like that.”

  “Then what?”

  “That’s simple. Then, I take care of things.”

  “What’s your end?” Dmitri looked at Sheba.

  “You said he wanted my help, Sheba, know what I mean? So, he wants my help, or he don’t want my help?”

  Right at that moment, I was thinking, you can write your own rule book and escape unscathed for a long time. Until society’s various bounty hunters, the Spikes and the Margaret Tillmans, put the squeeze on you, money, the great lubricator, dulls the critical mind.

  Everything is equal and everybody’s your friend. That was my little ozone layer until now. Lovemaking in the morning, pétanque in the afternoon, drinks and the casinos in the evening. It seemed like it could go on forever. Sooner or later, I had to pick my friends. Even if I had to pay for them.

  “All right, Dmitri, fair enough, I’ll invite Spike over.

  You do your thing, and then we’ll discuss terms after the event. Sort of a commission deal.”

  “Sure. A commission deal. Don’t worr y about it.

  Know what I mean?”

  VI

  We were listening to an old Argentinian soul music number from Astor Piazzolla titled Oblivion. She wore ruffled, white satin panties, white bra, white pumps. She was combing her hair, looking in the mirror, talking casually. She reminded me of a dragonfly when she performed her monologues while beautifying herself. She dabbed some foundation around her right eye to mask a bruise which had appeared there. I had just finished whipping her backside with my belt, opening up the now thick scars criss-crossing her buttocks and calves, which were partially covered with gauze to stop up the thick suppurating flow of ooze coming from her wounds, giving an effect of venetian blinds. “Franck, I don’t want you to be afraid. No matter how much I kick up a fuss, I invite you to be brutal. If you do it carefully, increase it by degrees, then I can take it. But the worst thing you could do is stop, Franck. I would never forgive you for that. Beauty doesn’t last forever, Franck. I would prefer to kill it off myself than have time do it for me.” She stopped applying some mascara, looked into the mirror at me, verifying something.

  “Can’t you see, Franck? I am no better than an animal. But, while we are acting this thing out, I prefer not to have to stop and give you instructions. You can understand that it defeats the whole purpose. Oh, I a
lmost forgot, there is something I want to show you.”

  She walked out of the room, and returned with several bound packages, of var ying thickness, each tied around with lace, and a label with the first name of a man. Henri. Cédric. Jack. She pulled out the first stack, unlaced it and began reading.

  “Even now, from Ward K ...” She glanced at me.

  “Non, mais tu te rends compte, Franck? Ward K. I cannot believe they still use letters. It makes it sound just like a prison.”

  She continued reading aloud. The first letter ended with a promise of suicide.

  “ You see what these buildings can inspire? Scandaleux, Franck.”

  She continued reading, then moved onto the next sequence of letters, addressed by a certain Cédric.

  “A pilot. For les grandes lignes.”

  Cédric’s letters alternated between effusive confessions of love, pleading for her return, and threats of police action.

  “Cédric was less than a man. And he betrayed me.

  So, I seduced his brother. He was no better. A defective genetic code. I believe the scientists study these things in Iceland. And Tonga ... yes, Tonga.”

  She read from another letter. It was a long, rambling diatribe, at times pathetic, at other times coldly analytical. Someone who clearly hated himself for having become involved with her. The letter concluded with a servile, obsequious request to have a large sum of money returned.

  “Vincent was Dutch. W hen I met him, I owed a rather large sum of money to someone, in the Var, and the person needed the sum immediately. You know what the Var people are like, Franck. Codes of honour. Vincent turned it into a moral issue. Insisted he pay the debt. But, later, I received a letter from a woman, in a truly execrable French, insisting that as his vrouw, she was entitled to ask that the sum be returned illico presto, or else the police would become involved.”

  She held her finger out, as if drawing a picture, and traced a rectangle in the air, then smiled.

  “Could she have meant the Dutch police? I have never understood how the Dutch have survived. They are not like us.”

  The next letter was from Vincent’s grandmother. She asked for clemency as Vincent had been a good boy, and needed the money for his next campaign to become a school board trustee. His one chance to make good.

  “Clemency! Nul. Then she had the nerve to ask for the money in guilders. How could I possibly calculate that? You know how much I detest les maths. I told her I might arrange for payment in Euros.”

  That might have ended the exercise, had it not provoked a recollection.

  “Tell me about your past, Franck.” “Nothing to tell.”

  “There were other women ... you are brutal with me. Brutality comes from experience. Were you married?”

  “Sure. I was married.”

  “Tell me about your ex, Franck.”

  “Which one?”

  “The one you loved.”

  “What about her?” “Why did you leave her?” “Problems.”

  “Were the problems vertical ou horizontal ?”

  She held her index stiffly upwards, then laid her hand flat, as if lowering a corpse into a tomb.

  “There was no problem horizontal, there was no nothing horizontal.”

  “How big were her breasts?”

  “What difference?”

  “I saw a picture of her in your wallet, Franck. It was disgusting, dégueulasse. I don’t understand. Were you looking for a cow to milk, Frank? Haven’t you heard of the risks of mad cow’s disease? How old was she? Oh, god, Franck, sometimes you really lean towards the lowgrade. Promise me, Franck, that you will never leave me for another woman unless she is younger and more beautiful. Promis, juré, Franck?”

  I lit a cigarette. We watched each other in silence for a moment. We were seeing each other in a new way.

  Sizing each other up, maybe for the first time. Like a couple of sparring partners about to go at it for the nth time, then suddenly realizing that only one would survive. Although, that wasn’t quite so clear at the time.

  She had wound a transparent Indian sari around her torso like a funereal shroud. She appeared ephemeral in it, as if she could fade away and become part of the firmament at any given second. A faint smile appeared on her face. She had a way of making the smile appear, as if emerging from the depths of a translucent forest mist.

  “Call your wife, Franck. I want you to kill her. I must have this proof of your undying love for me. Kill this cud-chewing ruminant. A mercy killing.”

  Her stare was limpid, her skin transparent. Her mind nuclear. “You, I might consider killing.” I mused aloud. “Why were you drawn to me, Franck? What was it?

  No man has ever answered this question properly. Do you remember Père Lachaise, Franck?”

  “Yeah, I remember.”

  “When you took me, in the mausoleum, what did I look like?”

  “Like a silhouette. A corpse.”

  “That’s it, Franck. It is our wish to destroy ourselves that brings us together.”

  “Self-destruction is a solo flight, Sheba. It’s not a dance.”

  She wasn’t listening. Or she was desperate. I tried to recall what was novel about her.

  “The difference between us and the others, Franck, is we know we won’t get another chance.”

  “Actually, that’s not it at all, Sheba.”

  “What is it, then?”

  “ We’re just not concerned with what is going on around us.”

  “I see it another way, Franck. I think we are precursors of something yet to come. I have these visions.

  Everything fire and ashes. Everything destroyed. Not just you and me.”

  She was marking me. I was marking her. She had used the lines a hundred times before. I didn’t buy into the lines; the content was superfluous. It was the delivery and the sonority that made considerations like truth secondary. The delivery and that ass of hers. And something else, but at the time I didn’t admit it to myself.

  “We are anti-celebrities, Franck. No one will ever know who we are. But at least we are voluntarily choosing our fate. Franck, let’s kill someone. Why don’t we make a sacrifice to the gods, Franck? Let’s sacrifice your ex-wife.” Sheba was now leaning back against the tiled wall of the square shower-bath stall, had removed her lingerie, but not her pumps, and was spraying her cunt with the coiled metal shower head she held in her left hand as if it were a flowerbox of pansies. She had smeared her body in coconut oil, which enveloped her in a larval cocoon. She ran her finger up and down her thigh, prying open her cunt, spraying her clitoris with the nozzle end, scrutinizing me, then retreated into her silence, but the silences were losing their mystery. Like the intimidating glare of a boxer with a losing record. Statistics stronger than anything the soul can muster.

  “We were supposed to be like this, Franck.”

  This was illustrated by her holding up her index and forefinger, side by side like two sentries standing face to face during the changing of the guard on the Pall Mall.

  “Who could possibly be more like this?” I inquired, holding up two of my own fingers, and jamming a Marboro between the two of them. Then lighting it.

  “No, no we are not like this. We can never be like this, as long as you insist on not being transparent, Franck. You can’t keep hanging on to your jardin secret, Franck. Why are you looking at me like that, Franck?

  What’s the matter, Franck? You don’t love me anymore?”

  I walked across to the kitchenette bar counter.

  Reached for some whisky. Poured several ounces into a glass. Drank it down. Looked through the two portals and, at the end of the tunnel of vision, her, washing that cunt. As if it could never be too clean. She looked calm, which was a bad sign. I was getting used to it. You can get used to anything. I reached for a steak knife, slid the saw-toothed blade between my thumb and forefinger.

  Laid it down again. Premature. “Franck, I was just thinking that today might be a good day for you to call that salo
pe, and tell her exactly what you really think of her. And prove, once and for all, that you love me, Franck. Or at least, that you have cojones. But that is a question you’ve never really answered, isn’t it, Franck?”

  Her tone was still even, controlled, but the cadence had slowed to an inquisitorial crawl. Her right eye darkening into ebony translucence. Maybe it was her lenses. “Sometimes, I wonder whether it isn’t you that caused everything.”

  Her hand dangling the shower head against her cunt, the eyes retreating, the rising crest of a wave ready to lash onto shore.

  “Everything Franck, is everything that has created this storm in my head that is lashing against the wave breakers and dykes of my very mind, Franck, and everything that has given me bad dreams and causes me to do these things I do to other people.

  “I am starting to wonder whether I wasn’t mistaken in letting you fuck me, and sodomize me and stick that cock of yours into my mouth. Why am I wondering this, right now, Franck? Why?”

  During one of those whys, her left hand had inched its way downwards and shut off the cold water. She swung the nozzle towards me, spraying the scalding hot water into my face, then lunged at me. I side-stepped her, and she slipped, falling to the floor. I wrenched her wrist hard, pushed my shoe into her neck, pressing her face harder into the tile floor. I held it there until I was pretty sure she had calmed down a bit.

  “You going to behave?”

  “Bien sûr.” I removed my foot, allowed her to rise. She walked out of the bathroom at an easy pace, into the living room, up to the wall telephone.

  She wrenched the jacks out of the wall.

  “Late t wentieth centur y telephone. Ringard,” she decreed. She crossed towards the coffee table, picked up a multi-coloured lamp, rotated it in front of her for me to see.

  “Rococo. Very kitsch. Personally, I am a minimalist.”

  She allowed the lamp to slide through her fingers.

  The porcelain shattered into pieces across the tiles of the bar area.

  “Franck, you know, one of the arts never mastered by Americans is letter-writing. Here, if something is even typed, it is considered to be an insult. So, you can only imagine what I think of you ruining the harmony of my life with this.”

  I think this was a Ricoh, or at least was a Ricoh until the machine smashed onto the ground. She held t wo crystal champagne flutes in her hand.