‘Guys and Dolls is OK, I guess,’ said Bill. ‘But you ought to read Sartre. Dirty Hands. You’ll get more what jazz is all about if you read Sartre.’
‘Why’s that?’ said Henry, a little annoyed.
‘Well, it’s about fundamental things. Just like real jazz. Not Dixieland. You know, you have to choose between one thing and another. You’re faced with a choice where several paths could be the right one, and you feel worried that right now you might not be able to tell which path to take. What seems right today might seem wrong tomorrow, and there you stand like an idiot, just staring. Provided you don’t believe in God, of course.’
‘I’ve got a stomach-ache,’ said Eva. ‘I’ve got such a damn stomach-ache.’
‘It’s just the cold,’ said Bill, stuffing his hand inside her duffel coat. ‘Give me Paris any day.’
Eva’s flat was cold and old-fashioned. They immediately lit a fire in the stove, using empty sugar boxes. Bill started leafing through a bunch of books by Dostoyevsky, and Henry looked through the records. He instantly felt at home.
The girl named Maud brought in a tray with tea cups and biscuits and set it in front of the fire. ‘What do you do when you’re not playing?’ she asked Henry.
‘I’m still at school,’ said Henry, drawing himself up.
‘How old are you?’ she asked, sounding surprised.
‘I’ll be eighteen in June.’
‘A youngster!’ shouted Bill. ‘You’ve got your whole life ahead of you!’
‘So how old are all of you?’
‘That’s not something you should ask a lady,’ said Maud.
‘These old girls are twenty-five,’ said Bill. ‘They’re past their prime.’
Maud smiled and went out to the kitchen to tell Eva something. Henry assumed that it had to do with him, because they both started laughing out there. He definitely felt like a youngster in this crowd. But he felt at home.
After that, Bill put on a hot new record with, as he said, a fucking powerful tenor-sax player named John Coltrane. It was ‘My Favourite Things’, and it sounded like nothing else. All four of them lay down on the floor in front of the fire blazing in the stove and just listened, closing their eyes and digging this new John Coltrane, who blew as cool and smoky as it was possible to blow at that time of the morning. And Bill said that it sounded just like in Paris. Henry was almost asleep. He felt a hand running through his hair, but he didn’t feel like finding out whose hand it was. He was peering into the landscape created by the embers inside the stove. It was a dark, glowing lava landscape, constantly pulsating and changing. And the air from Coltrane’s horn fanned the coals into that white heat which makes the embers turn into nothing, into ashes.
________
Dawn had already come and gone and Henry would have kept on sleeping if it hadn’t been so damn cold. He was wakened by the chattering of his own teeth because it was draughty on the floor. Someone had put a blanket over him, but it wasn’t enough.
He was lying on the floor alone. Bill and Eva had taken the bed. Bill was the only jazz musician that Henry would ever meet who wore longjohns.
Henry set about adjusting his tie. He hauled himself up off the floor, closed the damper on the stove and went out to the kitchen. For breakfast he drank some milk from a bottle in the pantry, then found his coat and left. Down on the street he ran into people on their way to work. The city was starting to huff and puff in the cold. Steamy clouds of breath were mingling above the pavements, and Henry felt full of life. A bit stiff in the back, but comfortably drowsy and tired.
He stuffed his hands in his coat pockets and started walking back towards Gamla Stan. In one pocket he suddenly felt a piece of paper that didn’t belong there. He pulled out the paper and read: ‘Rendez-Vous today at 1 p.m. Maud. P.S. You can keep wearing the tie, as far as I’m concerned.’
Henry had almost forgotten about Maud; he’d paid even less attention to when she left the flat. He had dozed off and slept soundly on the floor. Maybe she was the one who had put the blanket over him. It made him happy, at any rate, and he headed off for school at a brisk pace. He wondered where the Rendez-Vous was located and what sort of place it was. It sounded like a restaurant, and he didn’t have much money. But no doubt he’d figure something out. ‘Master is my name, though poverty oppresses me, said the beggar’, as Henry’s mother used to say. And that’s what Henry said too.
________
Henry was not the punctual type, but for once he was determined to show up on time. He leapt out of the tram near Norrmalmstorg, walked down Biblioteksgatan to the corner of Lästmakargatan, and turned up the hill towards the Rendez-Vous. He had found the address in the phone book at school.
Maud looked nothing like he had imagined her. It took him a while before he even recognised her. Last night she had looked like a teenage girl, but now she was wearing a brown suit with a pleated skirt. Her lips were painted a dark red, and her hair wasn’t black at all; it was also quite straight. She was smoking a lot. There were already three cigarette butts in the ashtray, red from her lipstick.
Maud actually looked the way you might imagine a tough woman in luxury packaging would look, as a song might have described her. When Henry caught sight of her, she was holding a little round mirror and painting her lips as bright red as a tough woman in luxury packaging would do it.
Henry hadn’t a clue where this meeting was going to lead. He hadn’t a clue about most things in life; he wasn’t the analytical type, like his precocious brother. Events happened to him the way they happened to a true defeatist – he merely had to accept the situation as a sentence without a trial.
But at least he was given a hint. Maud sat there, as absorbed as a narcissist staring into a pocket pond, and Henry had an inkling that this woman was totally concerned with physical appearances and not achievements. She might talk about Sartre and Art, but she wanted to turn great ideas and deeds into physical qualities instead of actions. Physical qualities were replaceable, just like a lipstick, or a scarf that according to a certain fashion trend, was supposed to stay fastened to the strap of a handbag.
‘You’re right on time,’ she said, pushing out a chair with her foot.
‘You’re so dressed up!’ Henry couldn’t help saying.
‘Dressed up?’ said Maud.
‘You didn’t look like this last night.’
‘I should think that’s my own business,’ said Maud curtly.
‘Sure,’ said Henry. ‘But I just thought that …’
‘You can order whatever you want. It’s my treat,’ said Maud, handing him a menu.
Henry had very definite ideas about how a gentleman should behave at a lunch with a lady, and he tried to insist on paying, even though he barely had enough money even for his own lunch. Maud pretended not to hear what he was saying, out of pure tactfulness, and Henry gave in without further argument.
Maud had thick, chestnut-coloured hair with a parting down the middle, cut quite short at the back, and with two points dangling down her cheeks. Sometimes she sucked on them when she was thinking. Otherwise she sucked on a cigarette. She smoked more than Henry did, and that was saying a lot. He had a hard time focusing on the menu choices; he was completely bewitched by this creature Maud. He mostly just sat and wondered if that beauty spot on her right cheek was real or had been painted on. He didn’t dare ask.
That’s how the whole lunch proceeded, under the astrological sign of Henry the amateur and his sense of awe. He was incapable of telling a single story about himself – not even about boxing, though Maud was incredibly fascinated – without stopping in the middle of a sentence to stare at her. Then he’d have to pick up the thread again. He didn’t know whether this was some sort of love, hitherto unknown to him. But he tried to keep things together as best he could, until Maud placed her hand on his and said, ‘Henry, you seem a little nervous.’
‘I guess I’m just tired,’ he said. ‘I shouldn’t have had wine with lunch. I didn’t get enough
sleep last night.’
‘So I’m not making you nervous?’
‘You’re not the same as I pictured you.’
‘Are you disappointed?’
‘On the contrary.’
‘Don’t worry about it right now. Everything has its purpose.’
‘So what should we do now?’
‘We can go over to my place, if you like. I live nearby.’
Maud paid for everything, and then they sauntered over to Birger Jarlsgatan, where she slipped into Augusta Jansson’s shop, as was her custom, to buy a bag of sweets for two kronor fifty. She loved salty liquorice. Henry thought she was marvellously childish.
Maud lived in one of the red brick buildings in Lärkstan, in a sparsely furnished two-room flat right under the eaves, with a view of Engelbrektskyrka.
‘Put on a record,’ she said. ‘I’ll get us something to drink.’
Henry hung his coat and cap on a coat-rack with four pegs. It almost tipped over, and ended up tilting against the wall. It always did that, as he would learn.
He went into the living room, which had mullioned windows and was furnished with a low sofa, a couple of armchairs, a TV and a small stereo bench with a turntable and records. The floor was covered with a wall-to-wall carpet, and this was the first time that Henry had ever set foot on a wall-to-wall carpet. It lent a special atmosphere to the room, a certain intimate and familiar atmosphere, seemingly relaxed and exciting at the same time, as a contemporary-furniture catalogue might express it.
There was a lot of modern jazz in the stack of records. MJQ, Miles Davis, Thelonious Monk, Duke Ellington, Charles Mingus, Arne Domnérus, Lars Gullin and Bengt Hallberg. At the very bottom were a couple of albums with Elvis the Pelvis. About half of the records were classical music, and Henry put on Sibelius. He didn’t know much about Sibelius, except that the Finn had boozed a lot and died the year before his own father passed away. What more did he really need to know?
Maud came in from the kitchen carrying a tray with whisky, ice cubes, soda, gin and Grappo. He could choose whatever he wanted. Henry chose whisky.
________
‘Now I want to hear this one,’ said Maud, getting up from the sofa. She had been lying with her head on Henry’s lap, and they had listened to Sibelius, both of them almost falling asleep. Henry was feeling drowsy from the whisky, and he had forgotten to worry about his hands. When Maud lay down in his lap, he didn’t really know what to do with his hands. Should he run them through her hair, pat her on the cheek or let them lie quietly on her breasts? But then he had dozed off, sinking into the music and feeling very peaceful.
‘This is my favourite tune,’ said Maud, and she put on ‘Spin My World’, by Jan Malmsjö. The song was already a hit, but it had never really turned Henry on; for that matter he’d never been to any cabarets or theatres where this sort of French singer performed. Those places were mostly frequently by intellectuals talking about Paris and Sartre, like Maud and Eva and Bill in the Bear Quartet.
Maud knew all the words by heart, and she sang along softly, looking at Henry without blinking. He lit a cigarette and thought the song was OK.
________
This time it was not dawn but twilight. They had fallen asleep in the bed, and Henry awoke as twilight set in. He cautiously pulled himself free from Maud, who was lying on his arm, lit a cigarette and looked out of the window.
It must have been about five in the afternoon. People were on their way home from work. Maud and Henry had eaten lunch, gone home, had a couple of drinks, listened to music and talked a little about skipping school. Then they had made love. All of this had taken less than four hours. That must be a record for me, thought Henry.
He blew smoke at the ceiling, feeling more antisocial than ever. He had skipped school plenty of times in his day, but that was in order to work extra hours, to box, or to rehearse with the school band. He had never in his life slept with a woman in the middle of the day, and it felt quite bohemian.
The beauty spot on Maud’s right cheek was not genuine. Henry had kissed it right off.
________
‘You have to leave,’ said Maud as soon as she awoke and got up to put on a bathrobe.
‘Leave?’
‘Yes, leave,’ she said curtly. ‘Don’t ask any questions right now. I’ll explain later. You have to leave. It’s already late.’
Henry had no idea what this was all about. He thought she was being awfully quick about changing moods. LEAVE! That sounded like an order. LEAVE! With a big exclamation mark. ‘Are you married?’ he asked as he pulled on his trousers.
Maud started to laugh. It wasn’t a nervous or malicious sort of laugh; it sounded happy and warm. ‘I didn’t notice before,’ she said as she kept on laughing. ‘I didn’t notice that you have a button fly!’
Henry chuckled along with her and started fumbling more than necessary with his fly.
‘No, my young man,’ said Maud, ‘I’m not married.’ She held up her left hand to show him that she wasn’t wearing a ring. She had on several other beautiful rings, but no wedding band. ‘I’m not married,’ she went on, ‘and I’m not going to get married either, not for a good long time.’
Henry sat down on the edge of the bed and pulled on his vest and shirt, buttoning it up more slowly than necessary.
‘Are you disappointed?’ asked Maud.
He looked at her back as she sat at the dressing table, brushing her hair. Her posture was erect, making her look like a straight-backed horsewoman in one of the paintings in his grandfather’s flat on Hornsgatan.
‘Of course I am,’ said Henry. ‘I don’t like being thrown out.’
‘You’re not being thrown out, Henry. But you have to leave.’
‘Can’t you tell me why?’
‘Not now. You wouldn’t understand. Later. Some other time.’
‘OK,’ said Henry glumly. ‘I’ll leave, but …’
‘But?’
‘But I’m not coming back ever again.’
‘Don’t be silly!’ said Maud, not sounding the least bit worried. The threat didn’t work because Henry couldn’t make it sound convincing, since he wasn’t convinced himself.
‘All right, that was stupid,’ he admitted.
When he started knotting his tie, she turned around from her position in front of the mirror at the dressing table. ‘That tie …’ she began. ‘I can give you a new one, if you like.’
‘You have ties in your flat? And you’re not married? You really are an eccentric, aren’t you!’
Maud laughed again, that carefree laugh of hers. ‘Look in that box,’ she said, pointing to a box on the window seat facing the church. Henry discovered that the box was filled with ties, exclusive ties from Morris & Silvander, as well as from England and France. Expensive ties without the creases and wrinkles from knots that had stayed in place for several days.
‘He must change his tie every day, at least,’ said Henry. ‘And he has excellent taste. A good salary, travels a lot, about one eighty in his stockinged feet.’
‘Perry Mason was never jealous,’ said Maud.
‘I’m not either. I’m just curious, from a professional standpoint.’
He was curious, from a professional standpoint; he was also a notorious liar. Of course Henry was jealous, but he didn’t feel that sharp pang in his chest that he had felt before. This time it was different. Maud was a full- grown woman, twenty-five years old, even though at any time she could make herself look like a teenager with a couple of well-chosen and carefully calculated lines with a brush, a few dabs with a lipstick and the right clothes. She could also behave like a little lady and a childish chick at the very same time. Henry couldn’t make her out, nor could he understand how he felt about her. Love was hatred and jealousy, but he’d never been able to mobilise blind passion until they were both lying in her bed and she was writhing under him and he was watching her, as astonished as a child. Now all that was left was the taste in his mouth. She had abruptly changed
again, into a very practical, rational and unsentimental creature.
‘Well?’ she said. ‘Do you want a tie or not?’
Henry had sunk into a sort of pragmatic composure and insisted that he wasn’t interested.
‘I don’t want any tie. My own is good enough. I don’t want to go around wearing someone else’s clothes. Especially his!’
‘But your shirt is all ragged,’ said Maud. ‘Just look at that cuff!’
Henry studied the cuff above his wristwatch. It was undeniably worn. ‘So what?’ he said sullenly.
‘Here!’ said Maud, handing him a freshly ironed, nice-smelling shirt from the wardrobe. ‘Take this one!’
It was an elegant, heavy cotton shirt with stripes, and Henry couldn’t resist. He had always liked freshly ironed shirts, and in this instance the shirt seemed less personal than the ties. A tie is like a signature, a badge against the shirt. A tie says more about the owner than even the shirt front. Henry didn’t notice that the initials W.S. were under the shirt collar, or that it was made in England and very exclusive.
‘OK,’ he said when he was fully dressed. ‘I’m leaving now.’
Maud came out of the bathroom to give him a hug that was much too light and fleeting. He started nibbling on the back of her neck, but she pulled herself free from his arms.
‘Can you come back on Sunday?’
‘Will he be gone by then?’
‘Let’s not have any of that nonsense right now,’ she said, annoyed. ‘Don’t think about him.’
‘Sunday morning, then. Early.’
‘Early,’ Maud repeated. ‘Wake me up and we’ll have breakfast together.’
Out in the stairwell Henry quickly discovered something in one of his pockets. He pulled out a slim, oval cigarette case made of silver. It was filled with long cigarettes. The initials W. S. were engraved on the lid. She has a real thing about putting objects in people’s pockets, thought Henry, lighting a tax-free Pall Mall. It tasted excellent.
Gentlemen (Klas Ostergren) (FO8) Page 17
