Tangier (11 page)

"Oh, puff—" Kelly blew a smoke ring, then stubbed out his cigarette in a cold cream jar. "I say let's take a vote. TP's democratic, right?"

"Of course TP's democratic, but you don't vote between the acts. I chose the play. I directed it. It's got to be done my way."

"Listen, dear old hack—"

"Don't you dare call me hack, you
swine
!"

Derik Law bobbed in again. "One minute. Everyone in the wings."

"All right. Now stop it, both of you." It was Jill Packwood waving her arms. "We can't settle this now. I'm for a compromise. I say let each actor make his choice. Those who want to do it Larry's way, fine, go ahead. And the ones who want can follow Joe."

"I'll go along with that, sweetheart." Kelly turned and started toward the stage.

"But that won't work," Laurence yelled. "It won't work, I tell you. You can't compromise on acting style."

Jack Whyte turned, came to him, patted him on the back. "Oh, come on, Larry. Get off your high horse. The audience loves it. Who the hell really cares?"

Through the second half he burned with humiliation, quivered with impotence and rage. The whole cast set out to ridicule the play, and at one point, when Kelly turned to the audience and said "Ridiculous, isn't it?" after his most moving speech, Laurence withdrew to the lobby in a fit of coughing and despair. Even there he couldn't escape—the ruined lines came to him only slightly muffled by the walls, and the titters of the audience, the occasional roars, left him unconsoled.

He left before the end, but even outside in the cool, windless night the thunderous final applause only amplified his shame. Drawn by instinct, he went back for the curtain calls and was shocked by the truth of what Whyte had said: Tangier
did
love it,
did
prefer the farce. It was sickening, but there it was. When the applause began to die and the curtains were drawn, Peter Barclay rose to his feet and began another round. The rest of the house followed him, the way the town always did, and so the clapping went on and on.

Finally, when the people streamed out, Laurence listened to their gaiety and suffered even more. Robin Scott gave him a pleasant nod—the review, he was saying, would be good. And Barclay, about to enter Camilla Weltonwhist's Rolls, caught his eye for a moment and smiled. Ouazzani's girlfriend wandered off, followed at a distance by Peter Zvegintzov. Then everyone else drove off, to the consulates or apartments in the town.

Usually on an opening night Laurence would head over to Heidi's Bar to receive congratulations and a few free drinks from friends. But he had no taste for that tonight, couldn't imagine what he'd say. Though the production had been successful, the success did not belong to him. So he left, making his way by the sulfurous street lamps, down the road that led through Dradeb.

He walked everywhere, didn't own a car, couldn't have afforded the petrol if he did. Every day he walked to town to shop and take his daily shower at the flat of Derik Law. People were kind—if they passed him on the road they'd pull over and offer him a lift. But this night the Mountain crowd had rushed off to Barclay's house, and the others went home a different way.

At seventy-five he was still strong, though at times he could feel his energy fade. The drama of the night, all the tension and despair, had suddenly made him feel old. As he walked slowly, watching out for mad stray dogs, he began to dread the coming summer and its heat. How much longer would he be able to make this walk, which was taking so much out of him tonight? Trouble was there was no alternative—he couldn't take taxis, could barely live on his income as it was. He had an inheritance from an aunt, twelve hundred a year, but prices were going up, and the pound seemed to fall lower every day.

He was the only Englishman to live in Dradeb, though he felt no shame about that. Over the years he'd learned Arabic, enough to get him by, and now he had friendships with his neighbors and Moroccans all over town. That was more than anyone on the Mountain could claim—those people didn't know they were in Morocco half the time. He, at least, had some contact with the world, knew Moroccans, shared their struggle to survive.

Better that, he thought, than the easy life, though now he wished he owned more than TP.
Why?
Why had they turned on him? How could they have been so cruel? They had stood there, supposedly his friends, simply stood there, nodded at Kelly, and acquiesced. He'd been insulted to his face, and not one of them had come to his defense. Were they all so false—Jack Whyte, Jill Packwood, the Drears? Was it true, as Derik had told him, that the Calloways made fun of him behind his back? He couldn't bear the thought—it hurt too much—that his decade in Tangier had added finally up to that.

He was in the middle of Dradeb, lost in the odor of the slum, when suddenly something hit him in the back. The pain was sharp, quick, and instinctively he cried out. Some men sitting in a café
 
looked up. He heard laughter and obscene Arabic words. He turned to see a gang of boys, stones in their hands, poised to throw at him again. One of the men said something, there was some shouting back and forth, and then the boys threw down their stones and ran up an alley out of sight.

They had hit him in the shoulder; he could feel the bruise. The man who'd stopped them came over and shook his head. He was old, bearded, a gold tooth in the center of his mouth. Did the foreign gentleman need assistance? Did he need help in getting home?

Laurence thanked him, shook his head, and continued on his way. At least, he thought, the older generation still is decent, though not the Moroccan young. What had just happened would have been unthinkable a year or so before, but now for some strange reason all the young Moroccans were turning mean. It was all those Kung Fu films, he was sure—in Dradeb, often, he saw boys practicing chops and kicks. What did it mean, this anger? Why this hostility toward foreigners when tourism was the bread and butter of the town? Now, lately, more and more he felt this violence in the poorer sections, a vague and generalized rage.

He turned up an alley and entered his house, past the smell of the septic that oozed always near the door. The building wasn't so bad, on the edge of the slum, away from the worst sections, in a quarter that was vaguely middle class. He had two small rooms on the first floor, separated by an archway, ventilated by a window on the street. No hot water, of course, but a clean well around the back; no central heating, not even a fireplace, but he had a butane heater and in winter piled blankets on his bed. There was a toilet, Moroccan style—two cement footprints set into the floor. He didn't mind. And there was electricity, at least, which was a blessing since he liked to read.

He went to his bedroom, hung up his jacket, took off his shirt, inspected his wound. He wasn't cut, though the bruise was tender to the touch. He lay down on the bed that had been a gift from Musica Codd, thought over the evening, and wished that he could sob. But there were no tears left—too many parts lost, too many lovers gone, too many failures, too many disappointments had used them up. Well, it was done, the play was ruined. He would have to discipline Kelly, of course, ban him from the club. But he couldn't do that without a vote, and then the issue would become himself.

What would become of him if he lost TP? Surely his health would begin to fail. It was keeping him alive, the excitement of the club; without it he would hardly have a life. He imagined himself falling with a stroke. How many hours would he lie writhing on the cold cement? They'd find him eventually—people would notice he hadn't been around—and then they'd carry him up to Achar's clinic, or maybe to Dr. Radcliffe's in town. Would the ones who'd turned on him feel sorry then? Would they take up a collection, buy his medicines, bring him books? Or would he die alone, a ruined old actor, come to grief in a slum in Tangier?

It was all too depressing and, he knew, unwise to fall into the self-pity trap. After a few minutes of concentrated misery he made a firm resolve: he would fight Kelly and all he stood for with everything he had, would fight him to save TP, would fight him to save his life.

H
e opened his eyes, blinked at the sunlight that burst through the slats and striped the room. "Good morning, darling," he moaned, though there was no one else in the bed.

He didn't know why he said it. Out of habit, he supposed. And sometimes there would be someone beside him—some primitive, well-built fellow named Mohammed or Mustapha who would think the greeting was for him. It wasn't; it was something he said only to himself. He'd slept, dreamed, awakened unscathed, and for that a sensuous "Good morning" was the very least that he deserved.

He deserved a lot more, evidently. "A good thrashing" that horrid little note had said. Who could have written the foul thing? Who could have had the nerve?

He rang for his coffee and pondered the problem. Why did the note bother him so? He'd been called worse things in his life—"snob," "poseur"—but "hypocrite," never! The charge simply wasn't true. Others might go to church to see and be seen, but he went only to worship God. It was lonely being pasha of the Mountain, with the whole town scheming to be invited to his house. It amused him to see them jump, but he was human too, and church was one place he could leave the burden of his pashadom outside. God, fortunately, was not fooled like everybody else. When he prayed, Peter Barclay was sincere.
In fact
, he thought,
that may be the only time I am
.

Then there was the business about his sleeping with the boys—something the Philistines always brought out. They hated the vice, for it resided also in them; they reproached him for it because they feared it in themselves. Well—he didn't care, didn't give a damn. He wasn't going to slink around like some poor old Oscar Wilde type. Not for him "the love that dares not speak its name."

In Tangier he could be anything he liked, pasha of the Mountain, king of Tangier queens. But he didn't flaunt it, stayed clear of people's sons, didn't mince or lisp or bitch. The boys he slept with, from the Moroccan working class, were simple lads with tantalizing skins. Street whores mostly—he liked them the best, the darker the better, though it pleased him to make Eton boys out of them if he could. Yes, he could lust after a European boy but resist taking him to bed. He much preferred Moroccan trash, and everybody knew that too.

What was it, then, that had hurt? How had he generated so much rage? He couldn't understand it, was mystified. He'd never meant anybody harm. Of course he'd hurt people. One couldn't live without doing that. If he snubbed someone, or dropped him because he was a bore, it was not to give deliberate injury but to simplify his life. People had no idea how difficult his position was. Everyone was after him; he had no time to suffer fools. The point was to stick to quality—people who were beautiful or rich. The author of the note had proved the point by showing he had no quality at all.

It didn't matter. Nothing people said ever did.
He was Tangier
—everyone knew that; as far as society went he was the top. Others might have more money—people like Patrick Wax with his palace and unlimited stocks of foie gras and champagne—but when word went out that Peter Barclay was giving a party everyone prayed that he'd be asked. His was still the best table, the best house in Tangier. And he didn't go after people—they all came running to him.

His coffee came, he drank it, then washed and dressed and shaved. He walked downstairs, past mirror after mirror, nibbling a croissant as he went. People said that Patrick Wax had more mirrors, but Wax had more wall space and his things were mostly fakes. Peter's mirrors were genuine antiques salvaged from his family's ducal home.

Power! Ha!
He had so little really—if people only knew. In London he'd be nothing; the place was filled with cousins to dukes. But here in Tangier it was a different world. Here he could be—
a king
.

He'd come down, settled in, built up his garden, made his myth, and now some poor beggar who felt abused was trying to evoke God to frighten him out. He'd have none of it. Life was much too sweet. He had an evening free on the following Tuesday, and he'd give a little dinner to fill it up. A circle of his confidants and closest friends, and a few powerful personalities as well. An intimate sixteen, seated around his big table, to whom he'd hold forth with such a barbed wit that his aphorisms would be repeated for days, even to the amusement of the ones they hurt.

He went to his desk to consult his address book, but there were so many names it was a bore to keep them straight. Better to ring up Camilla Weltonwhist and get her views—she was probably frantic now, waiting for his call.

"Camilla,
darling
," he crooned. "You must drop everything and help me out. I'm giving a dinner next Tuesday—you're invited, of course, but I need you to help me with the list."

"Tuesday? Tuesday?" Camilla seemed stunned. "Maybe another night would be better, Peter. I think Françoise is giving a party then."

"Well, she didn't invite
me
, darling."

"Or me either,
yet
. But I know she called Percy and Vanessa. A couple of days ago at least."

"If it was a couple of days ago, darling, then we're not going to be asked."

"I suppose not. Do you think she's offended? What could we possibly have done?"