I take the stand.
I pick up the introductions. The Last Refuge has another regular. He has a seat of honor, in Modern Classics. He has a special place, in his mind. A truth is discovered in the silence of disdain: Not all society is civil.
The gang was still sitting round the counter. The candy had somehow disappeared. “I wish he was at the reading last night.” Nick gestured towards Literature, where the compact figure of its guardian kept a disrespectful distance. “You should make him a deal.” Our dignitary was mounted on his chair, out of earshot, but always in the eye. Cordelio Cortés, the full name appears on the cover, the first dropped in the flesh. “Señor would have put that guy in his place.”
“Señor would have made it all about himself.” Jill has little regard for the person, still less for the reputation. “Confabulations! Does anyone understand a word?”
A ruffling of feathers? Yes, it saddens me to confirm your suspicion. I have welcomed you into a rare retreat of books, which you would hope to find a model of peace, love, and understanding, but the model needs some repair. Jill’s bone of contention is our de facto writer in residence, regular source of our conversation, daily beneficiary of my largesse. But he never attends a reading, however often we hint. Beneath his dignity? My children, you know very well, the evening is too precious, I do my best work late. Nick joshes with Jill, politely listens to my learning, but hangs on Cortés’s every last word. Our peculiar institution represents the young scribe’s literary saint, a life dedicated to writing, given to gnomic pronouncement.
“Literature has no more faithful witness than Cortés.” I cast a guarded glance. “But the man goes too far. He has transcended the human condition, prefers the company of ancient writers to that of mortal flesh. He once told me that if a fire broke out in his building and he had to choose between saving his books or his lover, the written word would win. I think he was serious.”
“Seriously deluded. If we’re talking about his own work, I’d be tossing it into the flames.” Jill is normally even of temper.
“Ma’am, I have to disagree with you.” And Nick gets away with it. Whoever said life was fair? “Cortés gets a lot of respect. Unlike Michael Jackson, who I googled after the reading—”
“Young man, kindly keep your sexual fetishes to yourself. This is a family store.”
“Jackson has written a couple of novels himself, out of print. And the reviews I found were not flattering.”
“There you go, Nick. Sour grapes! Instead of complaining that readers have been duped, write a great book yourself, why don’t you?”
“He did go rather quiet when you brought up The Employment.”
“My book is entertaining, if I say so myself. I’ve never pretended a classic of world literature.”
I drew on the well. Nick aspires to the top shelf, writing his undergraduate thesis on the great American novel. His novel does sport a title. The Running Back opens on a hardscrabble Mississippi farm and records a football player’s steady fall as he ascends the ladder from high school celebrity through college to the Cowboys. The story should have wide appeal. Sex, violence, craven ambition, treachery, the ingredients are there, a recipe for Hollywood.
Jill has read the manuscript. We are not on the same page. She offered a generous opinion. Nick’s book has a lot of promise. I never refuse a gift. A lot of promise, like a ticket for the Titanic. Bada boom! Mean old Annie! Just because Nick is young and charming. Please, the author’s face would grace the cover, but mine portrays no grudge, whatever she supposes.
I know my birds. And I am familiar with the field guide. Ducks are colorful creatures, though differ in disposition: The wood duck, Aix sponsa, is a solitary specimen, the wigeon, Mareca americana, only seen in flocks. Our native birds, too, exhibit a varied nature. Cortés withdraws, though denies any sulk. What do I care about some small-minded review! Nick gives us the pleasure, but his company is a mixed blessing. Jill’s notion notwithstanding, I feel some fondness for the boy, yet my spirits drop when he pedals up with his pack. The problem? I will later provide some evidence. Right now, just take it from me, The Running Back drops the ball.
“Ahem, the bowl is empty.” The gentlemanly ways have one exception, Nick’s gluttony spares no sweet.
“The name of your next work?”
“No refills today, I’m afraid.” Jill’s look assigned the blame. “The cupboard is bare as well. Speaking of which, Annie, I ran into Chris—”
“No big surprise. The woman parades past the window every day, with her masseur.”
“Moshe teaches in her studio.”
“Oxford has a college down the street, now?”
“Doing very well. Quite a crowd, waiting at their door.”
“As she never tires of telling.”
“When did we last have a line outside?”
“Just a fad. When did you last break out that hula hoop?”
“Chris is a little worried about your drinking.”
“I had no choice. Mutual friends, the party was an obligation.”
“She wanted to say goodbye to you. Your car was outside, but you were nowhere to be found. A little concerning?”
“I took a little trip. Tell dear Christine I’m still alive when you just happen to run into her again. If anything, you should be worried for your friend. There’s a sadness in her eyes now.”
“Seems pretty happy to me.”
“Refill, señor?” The proprietor was plying the pot.
“Your mathematics selection is to be commended”—the scholar had a stack by his chair—“your coffee not. My stomach is ill-equipped for battery acid.”
“Ivan can be heavy handed. Doesn’t it make for an experience, though? Who knew that caffeine was hallucinogenic?”
“My imagination needs no further stimulation.” Cortés subjects his metabolism to meticulous monitor. The prize-winning psychosomatic selected a vial from the portable pharmacy of his shoulder bag, looking to brick his defenses against the onslaught of complimentary beverage. The Arabian Peninsula lies directly across the street, a hand-painted sign promising brews of distinction; he refuses to deploy his wallet to advantage. Our forbidding fixture shows up at noon, always makes for the same chair, never pays for lunch. And attempt no wit. The writer of a lauded short story collection honors The Last Refuge with his presence and will greet your dissident comedy with deserved contempt.
His work enjoys prominent display. The name is inscribed on the shelf, a benediction that fails to meet with unqualified managerial blessing, but makes the store his shrine. The person also enjoys his pride of place, in close company to the creation. A generous institution, we save the seat, no matter how unprofitable the favor. Should you possess the predilection, the author will condescend to sign the rare purchase after you make the hesitant identification from a youthful snapshot on the promotional poster. I will not flesh out the picture, but through no willful tease; the face fascinates only for the formlessness of feature. An amorphous globe sits on his shoulders, the writer saving all expression for the work. He once smuggled his dachshund past our interdiction and the seated pair made some impression, a face of fur the only personality.
The portrait is unflattering? Well, the painter is beyond reproach, as you know. I’m envious of the prizes, the critical acclaim? Absurd! I am happy for the recipient, honored by his residence, fully respect his retreat. If I have alluded to a negative review, I really pay him a compliment, if you think about it—does an easy A not cast suspicion on the class?
The very being is suspect? We’re expected to believe that a famous novelist frequents an infamous hovel! O ye of little faith! The joint has more juice than meets the jaundiced eye, so much more. Let’s put things in perspective. The owner is man of sympathy. I am prepared to flatter the Cortés conceit. For all you know, the ingrate has imposed himself on other havens of literature—to less happy effect. At least we put up with him. Most of us, that is.
The biography is similarly blank. Although he does share an esoteric fancy with the Argentine laureate and acknowledges your praise in unaccented English whose propriety could only issue from the long study of a non-native speaker. The flow has a facility of which you will have plentiful occasion. But your offer of flattering handshake puts him in a bind. Twisting the top off the amber bottle, the Confabulist shook another capsule onto a pallid palm.
“Order!” Cortés cleared his throat. A distinguished speaker expects undivided attention.
“Uh oh. Court is in session.” I had already taken a bench.
“A superior court.”
“Last week you sentenced Portnoy to purgatory.” I humor the conceit. “A little extreme, in my humble opinion.”
“The Last Refuge has the name. And suspicious characters take advantage.”
“Who’s in the dock today?”
“The defendant was about to face his justice. However, he died of coronary thrombosis, according to the editor’s note. He may have avoided the criminal trial, but cannot escape a reckoning.”
“Your honor, would you please repeat his name?”
“Humbert Humbert.”
“You’re a funny one!”
“The character has a reputation.”
“Jealous?”
“Silence in court! The judge will read the verdict. Lolita, or the Confession of a White Widowed Male, fails to impress. The depravity is well received, the words are sorely wanting.
“Cortés the contrarian! I find the writing unsurpassed. My personal pronouncement is . . . perjury!” Sometimes, you have to take a stand! “I don’t believe a thing.”
—Humbert Humbert. Nailer of nymphets, I’m sure! Did you even know a girl? If so, we are brothers in bewitchment, though fail of fraternity. You are an old-world peacock, lover of conceit; yours truly is a bird of plainer plumage, but much the better man. All right, you might seduce the reader, a wizard of words conjuring away contempt. A fellow fool is also baring himself, at risk of summary judgement? I trust my travails will temper the taunts. And unlike you, poet of reprobate lust, I stayed within the bounds. At least my love was legal! Though she pushed a law-abiding citizen to the limit . . . of his endurance, that is to say!—
“Court is adjourned!” The antagonist allows no appeal.
“I was just getting started!”
“So Cordelio, what is your pleasure today?” I had underwritten the reading material open on his lap. He hoisted the volume for my inspection; Kline’s Mathematical Thought from Ancient to Modern Times is very reasonably priced at $19.95, though the paying public steadfastly spurns the opportunity.
“I have reached the ‘Stagnation in Mathematics.’ Here is Augustine: ‘Whatever knowledge man has acquired outside of Holy Writ, if it be harmful it is there condemned.’”
“Jolly fellow. And so Christianity’s first millennium extinguishes the candle of learning, first lit by the Greeks. We thank the Arabs for keeping the flame.”
“My child, suppose they were not alone. We talk of the Dark Ages—has darkness not just fallen on the truth?” Cortés has eyes of Andean basalt. The lava of invention stirs, the volcano only dormant of face. “I penetrate that darkness. I see a clandestine academy, a hive of activity, a fount of invention, until some resentful second-rate thinker betrays his better to the clerics.”
“Unfortunate consequences?”
“Not only for the person. An unprecedented wealth of mathematics is consigned to the flames, irretrievably lost.”
“We would never know.”
“I will give him the memorial he deserves. For I see a monk, secreted in an abbey, leading a double life. The thinker discovers calculus, five hundred years before Newton. Received history only tells of a heretic, tortured and burned at the stake. I see him rushing to hide his scrolls, when he hears the sharp knock on his chambers—”
“Cortés, listen up, for once.” I took the stand, with some reluctance. “That reviewer said your stories lack female interest. Maybe she had a point?” I never look for trouble. “Your thinker could be an abbess.” I have an aversion to conflict. “Go for it.” Provocation is the last thing on my mind. “She would do you proud.” But sometimes a man of sensitivity cannot hold his tongue.
“Mathematics, Physics, Philosophy . . . ” He perused our perimeter. “And the women?”
“How much have we lost?!”
“Women! Spare me the sermon. Sentimentality is the death of literature. One of them calls herself your manager”—he directed his disdain at the counter—“has that woman ever opened a book?” Cortés’ low estimation fails the physical facts. The man looks up to the object of his scorn.
“Reading right now, is she not?”
“Some infantile genre, no doubt. Is she lost in fantasy, hanging in suspense, haunted by horror?”
“She has found romance.”
“I rest my case.”
“Cordelio, welcome to the modern world. Most novelists are women.”
“And most whores.”
“The manager is a master, degree in English.”
“So Silly Sally says.”
“Jill! As you well know. You hit her up for ten bucks only this morning.”
“Which she summarily denied. Shouldn’t such an impressive education command a more generous salary?”
“Maybe working in a distinguished bookstore is enough. The characters!”
“I wouldn’t be so sure!” His lids drooped. “An abbess!” His voice trailed off. I know the sign, made no protest. Like a city metro, his train of thought will disappear underground, to reveal itself down the line in one of his “peerless” Confabulations. He deflects personal inquiry about his writing, although gives the occasional guarded report in the safekeeping of club meetings.
“I leave you.” He flipped his silver pocket watch. Cortés’s work requires an unbending routine. I have never seen the inside of his residential hotel room, but he speaks of a typewriter and oak desk, where he must be seated every evening at six. Mathematical thought joined the medicinal contents of the leather bag. My merchandise regularly leaves the premises in that transport, though I have never made the offer, he is yet to return the loan. He found a pressed handkerchief, but the coughing that signaled his departure carried little conviction.
“I’m looking for Joseph Campbell.” A light brightened my day. The young woman was new to the store; I would have remembered a previous visit. Straight black hair, oval face, warm complexion and dark brown eyes—neither overly friendly nor entirely dismissive—orient the compass, but sometimes you can’t be sure. Entering the rarified world of books, the visitor regretted her superficial fashion statement. At least she should have.
“You just missed him. He was here a minute ago.” What a wag!
“Josef Campbell? Ve have good selection, miss. You find in Religion.” The Terrible’s notebook lost the battle. “You vant I help you?” He jumped up from the stool, his first discernible move of the day.
“Er, no thanks, I’ll be fine.” She escaped towards the back of the store. “If I can find the switch.” An ensemble of black tights, knee-length boots, and short skirt lays down a law. Perched behind the counter, two thirds of The Last Refuge’s salesforce monitored the bookcases in her direction until the vision made the turn and disappeared into the penumbra of mysticism.
“Josef Campbell, pfff.”
“Appearances can be deceptive. She might be quite the student.” I managed a chuckle, though my back was acting up again. Please, wipe your smirk of speculation! In reality I had not slept well the night before, should really get a new mattress.
“Back section, vot she vant.”
“We can but dream.”“
Scholarship imposes a regime. But proximity to female contour loosens Ivan’s tongue, the severity of his wardrobe belying a baroque imagination. His stunted English, seldom employed in legitimate customer service, imposes little handicap in verbally bending women shoppers over the reference shelves. I offer no encouragement, though must nod to the gusto of invention. But the play obscures a pity, one of the most woefully undersexed vitae since The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of the Mariner.
—Crusoe, trust me, I have nothing but respect. The very name of self-reliance, your surprizing adventures issue a challenge: How long could modern man survive without the trappings of civilization, endure the solitude? Although given the benighted bent of our literary studies, some obscure journal paper will have cast tedious aspersions on you and Man Friday. Don’t take offense; publish or perish, the sheep will say anything to find favor with the herd.—
Mother and son live in the same apartment. I see them at the supermarket, Ivan still clad in suit and tie. And I hear her distress. Such good boy, what will become? Mr. Anselm, you know American girl who not smoke the drug or have sex orgy?
Merrywood! . . . A little harmless fun . . . And the real object of ridicule?
Women! While we’re on the subject, I am a different story altogether. My worldly career may feed no tabloid frenzy, but is discretion not the better part? Ask Jill, I have ample opportunity; any number of prospects visit the store on my days of schedule. Magnolia, to name just one, owns the art gallery across the street, and has suggested dinner. She has her charms, can carry a conversation. If I have yet to make a more intimate acquaintance, the reservation has a reason. The artist possesses a laugh. And takes advantage of her license.
“Eeek.” A shriek shattered the silence. “Attack!” The news came from History. The young woman returned with some dispatch, but no purchase. The fashion boots flashed by the till. “Horrible!” The thrill was gone. “A mouse!” And my back pain also left, if you must know.
“Monty checking her out.” I heard the door expel another empty-handed customer.
“Must take break, boss.” The Terrible stashed his notebook and made haste for the bathroom.
The window continued the story. Our counter commands a view of street parking, where a distinguished automobile did the honors, the same model as mine. Our small nation has a camaraderie, I always wave. This beauty was convertible, permitting inspection of the driver, who showed no inclination to leave his seat. The worthy individual was my contemporary, favored the same straw hat and was studying our display, sharing my love of books. The good man caught my eye, we nodded in mutual respect. However, The Last Refuge would not enjoy his business at this juncture. The sitter stirred, and his sojourn explained itself as he left his seat to open the passenger door for our fleeing customer. A father would share her features, so he must be an older friend, or boss. Or a kindly member of her book club had offered her a ride? Yet again, given her looks, she might need an agent. In any case, the man did have some manners. Tipping his hat in my direction, he chaperoned his charge, civilly took her coat, carefully cleared her seat.
The story takes a twist. A gentleman shut his door; a rogue opened my eyes. The excitable young woman retreated to the safety, pointing an accusing finger at the scene of a bestial crime. Her middle-aged companion shrugged, reached for the ignition, and a throttle sped his face out of sight. Although a revelation remained, a mug of satisfaction. A grizzled hunter can bag his trophy, a fawn had planted her kiss.
—Humbert Humbert, the name of notoriety, redoubled. You too are a revelation? Well, you open a can of worms! Confession of a White Widowed Male, the proceedings are preposterous. We can only imagine the debacle driving the deceit. Solipsistic free-fall, libidinal famine, impotent panic . . . A dreadful breakdown sent me to the sanatorium. And signaled a final loss of sanity?—