A Void (14 page)

days to go till that swan song of his which, sung in Urbino,

would link up, 20 springs on, with Anton Vowl's kidnapping

and Hassan Ibn Abbou's assassination . . .

To transform him into an apparition, into that ghoulish Com-

mandant who,
Uomo di sasso, Uomo bianco
, brings Mozart's

drammagiocoso
to its climax, Karl Bohm actually thought to wrap

Haig in a sculptor's mould with an iron collar, almost causing

him to swoon. A broad slit was cut through this mould, giving

his singing a rich bass intonation without in any way muffling

it. Bohm, happy with such an acoustical idiosyncrasy, told him,

"In fact, it's akin to having a rotting carcass posthumously cursing

us from within his coffin." Bohm was right; alas, nobody could

know just how right. For (and how such a thing could occur,

nobody would say), as a pallid Haig was put into his mould, and

it was shut tight, and laid on thick with stucco, totally confining

him, Bohm, aghast, saw that nobody had put slits in for him to

look through. But Bohm also saw no point in panicking, for it

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was just at that instant that Don Juan commands his flunky to

ask Haig (in his capacity, naturally, as Mozart's Commandant)

to lunch with him.

First, Haig was drawn up on a sling. So far, so good. From

that point on, though, bad luck would dog his path.

All of you know
Don Giovanni's
closing bars of music:

Giovanni sings: ". . .
Grido indiavolato . . ."

And his flunky (who, in this production, was sung by van

Dam): "
Ah sip/nor . . . Uuom di sasso . . . Uuomo bianco . . . Ah

padron . . . Tum-ti-tum . . ."

This was Haig's prompt and van Dam was waiting for him to

walk forward, coming into sight as Bohm had his violinists play

a closing, fading chord; and, advancing again to allow his public

to savour his imposing physical proportions, to launch into his

famous "Dow
Giovanni . . . m'invitasti".

But Haig was to wait an instant too long. On his approaching

Don Juan, van Dam haltingly sang
"Ah Padron . . . Siam tutti

morti
" . . . Haig, looking around him in confusion, as though

slowly going adrift, took fright, turning crazily this way and that,

spinning about as a robot or a mutant might run amok and loudly

crying out
"mi mi mi mi mi
" . . . At which point our basso lost

all control, stubbing his foot on a column, tripping up, swaying

and falling - falling as straight and stiff as a mast, as a baobab

adroidy cut in half. With his fall making a loud thud, its shock

so startling that, as though imitating Humpty Dumpty tumbling

off his wall, Haig's mould split from top to bottom, a cry of

horror shook that auditorium to its foundations, from its balcony

to its stalls, and from its gods to its royal box. A long furrow,

ashy in colour, zigzagging from his foot to his skull, ran through

that mould, that stucco trap in which poor Haig was caught,

Assuring it with tiny sharp cracks, through which, as in a crumb-

ling dam, purplish blood would start to spurt and spout till,

finally, stomach-turningly, gushing forth.

Using a blowtorch, a jack and an automatic drill, unhitching

him as you might pluck a rotting pit, say, from an inhuman fruit,

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Bohm's assistants got Haig out and saw, first of all, on his body,

a grisly, ashy furrow similar to that on his mould, also running

from top to bottom and zigzagging down his torso as a bolt of

lightning from Thor might flash across a lurid Nordic sky. And

though Haig's own doctor would insist on carrying out an

autopsy, nobody could work out any natural grounds for his

dying in this way . . .

Why, nobody could say, but Augustus B. Clifford was also at

Urbino's "Musical May". And, that night, following his son's

tragic mishap, Clifford slunk into a local hospital — in which

Haig's body was laid out - took it away with him by swaddling

it in a shroud and carrying it out by a back door, bought a

Hispano-Suiza sports car and, driving all night, all day and all

night again, as frantically as a madman, as fast and furious as a

champion at Indianapolis or Brands Hatch, got to Azincourt. A

local myth has it that Clifford actually had his son's body burnt;

probably, though, Haig is now lying in his coffin, possibly

in that shady nook of parkland on which, as it's also said,

grass grows in particularly thick clumps and in a particularly

intriguing form, almost as though a topiarist had had a hand in

shaping it: that of a harpoon with 3 prongs or a hand with 3

digits, Satan's diabolical sign such as might initial a Faustian

contract.

Augustus, whom many local townsfolk thought raving mad,

would go for months and months without quitting his mansion

at Azincourt and would hurl rocks at any infant straying into his

domain, any busybody hawking goods or any tramp asking for

alms at his door. A high wall was built around its grounds, which,

at night, it was said, would turn it into a prison, a sort of Spandau,

with its solitary, voluntary convict, who would now stay indoors

for good. You might, at most, find his maid in town buying a

ham or a pair of fatty lamb chops. But if you sought to chat up

this maid, who, of part-Iroquois origin, was known as "Squaw",

if you said, "So, Squaw, your boss, still off his nut?", Squaw

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would shout back at you, "Sonofabitch!" and "Scumbag!",

two traditional Iroquois oaths.

And, as Squaw was an old judo pro, it wasn't politic to

insist.

Occasionally, too, with an ugly gap-tooth grin, Squaw would

add: "If boss good to Jonah, boss good man."

For it was known that Augustus, conscious of his son's mission,

would approach his pond at noon sharp, murmuring "Jonah,

Jonah!" Though Jonah was grown-up now, it always swam

upwards at his call; and Augustus would throw crumbs at it that

it would gulp down with obvious satisfaction.

It took Olga six springs to track down Augustus, who had only

caught sight of his gracious in-law for an instant. On Olga's initial

arrival at Azincourt, Squaw had instructions not to unlock its

door to this prima donna for whom Augustus's son had had such

a strong passion. But as things would work out, Augustus, taking

pity on Olga and also itching to satisfy a natural curiosity, would

start to thaw and gradually warm to this fascinating woman who

told him about holy matrimony with a man as romantic as his son,

a union brought, alas, to a tragically swift and abrupt conclusion.

Augustus in his turn would talk of Haig in his childhood,

giving scraps to Jonah, climbing acacias and playing blind

man's buff.

Taking a fancy to Azincourt, finding in it a tranquillity missing

in Paris - in which it was work, work, work all day long! - Olga

was soon paying it four visits a month, going for long walks

through its grounds, drinking fruit cocktails in a formal drawing

room from which Augustus had dustcloths vanish in honour of

his charming visitor. Following a light lunch, consisting of cold

cuts, salad and fruit, Olga, slumping on to a ravishing mahogany

sofa (still giving off vibrations from a torrid affair that La Grisi

had had on it with a Boyar and for which a youthful Augustus

had paid a tidy sum at an auction), Olga, I say, would stitch a

dainty rustic motif on a patchwork quilt, whilst Augustus, sitting

9 1

upright at his grand piano, would play a sonata by Albinoni,

Haydn or Auric. Occasionally, too, Olga sang a song by Brahms

or Schumann that would float out into a starry night sky.

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10

Which will, I trust, gratify fanatics of Pindaric lyricism

Whilst, far off, a dog, an Alsatian or an Afghan hound, starts

howling mournfully, Amaury knocks at Olga's front door and

Clifford's maid soon unbolts it.

"Morning, Squaw," says a smiling Amaury, visibly savouring

such an unusual alias.

"Good day to you, Sir Amaury," says Squaw; "and good day

to you too, Sir Savorgnan."

Amaury, caught short, looks squintingly at Savorgnan.

"What's this? Do you also know Squaw?"

"Didn't it occur to you I might?"

"Why . . . no," admits Amaury.

"I told you, didn't I, and not all that long ago, whilst our train

was drawing into Arras, I told you that you'd soon know my

story in its totality. So now you know just how similar my
curricu-

lum
, so to say, is to yours: an unfailing aspiration uniting us

now as it always has and always will. Your information is my

information, your informants my informants, your companions

my companions - so it's not surprising, is it, that our paths should

finally cross as both of us scurry about on this cryptic pursuit of

ours..

"Similia similibus cumntur
," a witty Amaury sums up.

"Contmria contmriis cumntur
," a sardonic Savorgnan snaps

back.

Pointing indoors, Squaw buts in. "Lady Olga is waiting for

you."

9 3

Amaury and Savorgnan stroll into a stylish living room: two

nylon rugs of a lilyish purity, oval armchairs, a lamp (from China)

of such formal sophistication that, by comparison, Noguchi's

work would look almost naif, a divan as long as a bar in a

Hawaiian nightclub with big shiny vinyl cushions in Day-Glo

colours and, filling a wall from top to bottom, an Op Art church

window by Sartinuloc.

Olga is dozing in a hammock, a hand trailing daintily

floorwards. Amaury stoops to kiss it, and Savorgnan follows

suit.

"Cari amid"
murmurs Olga with a languorous yawn, "I

know I can always count on you, both of you. Augustus

wants to say a word or two. Sound that gong, Amaury, will

you."

Picking up a small aluminium gong, Amaury whacks it, pro-

ducing a sound which, if a bit "off", has an oddly long-drawn-out

vibration.

Abruptly, as though by magic, Augustus B. Clifford is standing

in his own doorway. Clifford, a frail old fossil, wrinkly of brow,

frosty of hair, and having to cup his hand to catch what is

said to him, plods up to Savorgnan and puts his arms around

him:

"Wilburg, old chap, how do you do?"

"How do you do?" says Savorgnan with typical urbanity.

"How was your trip?"

"Oh, it wasn't too bad."

"No, not bad at all," adds Amaury, who, as usual, has to put

in his two bits' worth.

"Good, good," says Clifford, rubbing his hands. "Now sit

down, sit down, both of you."

Olga hands round a tray of fruit and fruit cocktails and fruit

crystals: fruit, only fruit, which our visitors dutifully swallow

without a word. In fact, nobody says anything at all. Savorgnan

coughs. Olga sighs.

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"What all of you must do now," says Olga at last, "is pool

what you know about this quicksand that risks sucking us in as

though along a giant straw. It's my opinion, and yours too, I

know, that during this past month (which will finish today) just

too much damn bad luck - or, as Augustus would put it, a

disturbingly high ratio of affliction - has struck down two of our

companions. Now, apart from a handful of scraps, you still lack

information on Anton's abduction and Hassan's . . . passing

away." (Prim Olga was always loath to say that basic D-word

that for many in our civilisation is still a major taboo.) "But what

you do know, or think you know, is that at its crux is a con-

undrum worthy of a Sphinx and it is its signification that you

must try to grasp. Which is why, as I say, Augustus and I want

to join up with you by pooling our information and coordinating

our actions!"

"Your proposition is worth its avoirdupois in gold," says

Augustus.

"You can say that again!" says Savorgnan (no doubt in a malici-

ous allusion to Augustus's linguistic pomposity). "Probably you,

Olga, or you, Amaury, know a thing or two that I don't and

probably I know a thing or two that you don't and it's by closing

ranks that our horizons will roll back and a communal intuition

spring forth!"

Arthur Wilburg Savorgnan is a hard act to follow. Amaury

simply shouts, "Bravo!" And Squaw, approaching with a tray of

drinks, caps this with "Hip hip hooray!"

A toast.

Proposing to submit his contribution first, Amaury maintains

that it is,
a priori,
of particular import. This was a slighdy surpris-

ing tack for him to adopt, but it gains him his right to hold forth

first.

Amaury starts straight in without any banal small talk. "I'm

now familiar with most if not all of Anton Vowl's diary, in which

I found 5 or 6 allusions to a book, a work of fiction, which, it

claims, contains a solution to our conundrum. Anyway, I found

9 5

indications in it of why this book was so crucial for him, without

Anton actually giving anything away."

'That's right," says Savorgnan, "you might say our chum had