A Void (27 page)

protagonist in
Don Giovanni
? And didn't you too go to Urbino

to watch it?"

"You know, Squaw has a point," sighs Savorgnan. "Anybody

at all, Augustus as much as Olga, Anton Vowl as much as a

woman, say, sitting in front of him, had an opportunity of throw-

ing Douglas off his guard with an untoward cry, thus provoking

that tragic fall of his. So how do you know, Olga, that it was in

fact Augustus who did it?"

"I was told all about it by Anton Vowl," says Olga calmly.

"Vowl saw it occur. And, talking about it, Vowl would actually

claim to know by intuition that, in that stucco mantrap of his,

Douglas was such a startling, such a disturbing, apparition that,

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r

as though in imitation of a dying lion or an albatross brought

down and slain by a drunk sailor, Augustus was bound to cry

out. As soon as Douglas was spodit, Vowl saw Augustus turn

livid, his lips shaking; actually saw a roar forming in his throat.

Vowl's plan was to jump up and try to stop him from airing it,

but Augustus's cry would halt him in his tracks, for it was a truly

inhuman cry, a cry of Astaroth, of a Sphinx flapping its wings

on a clifltop, a
jjrtdo indiavolato
roaring up from his lungs. Doug-

las lost his footing, collapsing as though struck down by a

tumultuous gust of wind. And all that confusion and commotion

that was naturally to follow, all that hubbub and din, would

drown out Augustus's initial cry."

I, too, said Olga (continuing this dramatic account) would almost

pass away as Douglas did. I was watching it a l l . . . As I saw him

fall, a long furrow zigzagging across his mould, I sank swooning

into a profound coma. I was put on a couch, on which I lay,

practically dying, for six days. At which point a doctor brought

to my nostrils a product with a strong odour of ammonia. Finally

coming to, I found Vowl sitting in my room, clasping my hand

in his. And it was by him that I was told, bit by bit, in dribs and

drabs, what was going on. Having snuck into a local hospital,

in which his son was laid out, Augustus took his body away

without obtaining any authority to do so. I just
had
to go to

Azincourt.

"No," I was told by Vowl, "you, too, can claim no authority

in this sordid affair. Augustus would kill you as quickly and as

unthinkingly as a wild animal, a jaguar, say - Augustus would

kill anybody of your family, for it is, in his opinion, a Mavrokhor-

datos who was his son's assassin!"

So I was told all about my family, all about that Damnation

with which its history is bound up. But, instandy contradicting

him, I said with a sob in my throat:

"It was Augustus who brought about his son's doom by giving

out such a horrifying cry. Thus will I now carry out that Dam-

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nation that I carry within my soul, for it was that man's fault,

and only his fault, that I am now a widow!"

For six springs, Anton would constandy tag along, faithfully

following in my trail. I didn't ask him to. I didn't want him to.

What I did want, in fact, was to catch a train to Azincourt and

kill Augustus by my own hand. But I was starting to find that

Anton had a curious aura about him - a sort of charisma,

you might say. I found I simply couldn't do without his kindly

disposition and his unfailing affability. I was about to lay

down my arms, capitulating unambiguously to his natural gift

for consolation. I found him awfully amusing and found, too,

in his company, that I wasn't now thinking so much of

Douglas's charms or, I must admit, of his killing. If, as would

occasionally occur, I was in a sorrowful mood, Anton always had

a comforting word. And if I abrupdy had that old craving to do

away with Augustus, Anton would know just how to calm my

ardour.

I had quit my vocation for good: I wouldn't sing for anybody.

All that capital (substantial capital, too) that I'd got from Anastasia

had grown annually, by compound accumulation, into

a bank account that would allow as gracious and luxurious a

living as anybody could wish for. Nor was Anton in what you

might call financial straits: as with a Larbaud, or should I say a

Barnabooth, his capital was almost without limit, hinging as

it did, so rumour had it, on a mining supply that just wouldn't

dry up, so profound was it, containing zinc, strontium, platinum

and cobalt.

Anton and I took lots of trips. With him I was to know how

oddly wistful is cruising on a transadantic ship, how chillingly

cold it is to camp out at night, how fascinating to stand in front

of an unknown vista, how afflicting to cut short a visit that's only

just starting . . .

At long last, during a ball, and whilst I was indulging my

passion for mazurkas, Anton was to admit to a passion of his

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own. I took him in my arms, giving way, informing him that I

too had a soft spot for him. I'd had a handful of ungainly suitors,

but Anton was a courtly kind of swain, gallant and good-looking,

making his play with charm and assiduity, buying diamonds for

my hand, diamonds for my wrist, a sparkling diamond collar for

my throat, all vying for my approval, and, at lunch, invariably

choosing such pricy tidbits as Scotch woodcock,
ortolans farcis

and Iranian caviar . . .

"Was that black or gray caviar?" asks Amaury, with his almost

pathological fixation on food.

"Oh, can't you think about anything but your stomach, you

big fat glutton!" a furious Savorgnan shouts at him.

Olga, continuing, anxiously scrunching a hanky up in a ball,

looks about to burst into sobs.

"I had Anton's staff, a maid, a groom and so forth, at my

disposal. Mornings, in my boudoir, I'd find a mountain of mim-

osas or orchids which Anton would grow in tropical conditions

- this was in mid-March - and instandy forward to my Paris flat

by air."

As our liaison was growing strong, though, as Douglas was

gradually turning into a fond but fading ghost from my past, as,

far from him, far from Urbino, far from Azincourt and Augustus,

I was starting to blossom into an ordinary happy young woman,

as if, having known so much crying and sobbing, an Adantic of

sobbing, I was finally coming into port, into dry dock, Anton

was, by contrast, growing proportionally downcast. I had no

notion why this was so, but, day by day, I found his conduct

most alarming - his constant, nail-biting agitation, as if falling

victim to an unknown pain or malignancy, his constandy grim-

acing and also, curiously, his constandy touching with his hand

a talisman bound around his right foot by an invisibly slim gold

cord. Chancing to catch sight of it - it was an ugly thing, clumsy-

looking, inartistic, a bit puny, calling to mind nothing so much

as a scrap of typography, a shaving off a compositor's floor - I

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was avid to know why Anton thought that such an unsighdy

brooch (if that's what in fact it was) might bring him luck. But

my darling abruptly lost his cool, boiling up with a fury that was

as stormy as it was without foundation, shouting foul, scathing

insults and unjust accusations and, as I thought, spoiling for a

fight. I ran away.

For four days I had no word from him - until, on a warm

autumn night, I was brought up short by a soft tapping at my

door and, in an instant, with nary a hint of an apology, I saw

him approaching and smiling but also saying things that I found

profoundly disturbing.

"It was just six autumns ago today," said Anton, "that you and

I took off on our world tour, roaming around this country and

that, visiting all sorts of famous landmarks, from St Paul's in

London to Agra's Taj Mahal. Now your mourning of Douglas

is past, it's had its day. You hardly think of your loathing for

Augustus. So what I say to you is that you must go to Azincourt

with a word of consolation for him. Having lost his son, allow

Augustus to gain an in-law!"

Controlling an instinct to cry, I said, "Augustus isn't important

— I totally wash my hands of him - but for you, Anton, my

passion grows daily. It's thanks to you, my darling, that I got

my sanity back. If you abandon your Olga now, I think I'll go

crazy again!"

"No," said Anton, coldly oblivious of my supplication. "It's

only at Azincourt that you can go on living calmly and happily,

in harmony with your soul. As for yours truly, I must go away,

far from this city and, in particular, far from you. For that Dam-

nation that struck Haig is now on my trail!"

"But why?"

"I'm just coming to that. Augustus was Haig's kin only by

adoption - on a tramp's instructions, a tramp known as Tryphiod-

orus. Douglas didn't know who his natural papa was; nor, in

fact, did Augustus. But I found out about six months ago, totally

haphazardly, that - wait for it! - it was actually Tryphiodorus!"

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"But what's that got to do with you?" I said, dumbstruck.

"This! I also found out, within four days of that information,

by a card which a man, I don't know who, was to slip into my

tux whilst I was at a nightclub in Albi watching Lolita Van

Paraboom — you know, that star of Paul Raymond's shows in

Soho - I found out, I say, that just as dark a shadow was cast

on my own origins as on Haig's. I had always thought that I was

a son of an Irish tycoon, who, dying of a coronary on my fifth

birthday, had a tutor control my upbringing, a tutor who, a

bit of a Catholic bigot, thought nothing of simply packing his

ward off to a Franciscan school for his indoctrination. Not a

bit of it - my natural papa, I was told, was also known as

Tryphiodorus!"

"What!!!"

"That's what I said!"

"But . . . but if what you say is so . . . !!!"

"Uh huh. You got it. Douglas was my sibling!"

Half-choking, Amaury Conson can hardly say a word.

"What? Douglas was Anton's sibling? What do you know

about that! It's . . . it's a gag!"

"You don't think Anton was having you on?" Squaw asks.

But Savorgnan, showing no sign of this story surprising him,

says "Shhhh . . ." adding, "Shut up, all of you, and allow Olga

to finish. And if I don't look too aghast, it's simply that I'm

afraid, I'm much afraid, that, from now until nightfall, I'm going

to find out many things just as astonishing, many facts just as

confusing, and many plot points just as paradoxical."

So it all starts again, notwithstanding that Olga's public, as you

might call it, lying flat out on a sofa, or lolling back in an arm-

chair, would occasionally almost nod off, for this discussion,

which had got going that morning, was proving long and tiring.

In addition, it was hard to work out what its implication was,

though nobody had any doubt at all that, at worst, chock-full of

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action, rising and falling, twisting and turning, it would follow

an old, old tradition, that of fiction not fact.

Now (says Olga), if this fact, that Anton was a sibling of

Douglas, was disturbing, if it was, to put it mildly, simply aston-

ishing, still, it didn't imply, ipso facto, that it was any kind of

nail in Anton's coffin. I had to ask what was prompting my

inamorato to abandon his Olga, and all Anton could talk about

was of living in constant panic of that Damnation that struck

down his sibling striking him down in his turn.

"Douglas was slain," was how Anton put it, "and now it's my

turn. If that law of 'an I for an I' that I found on Augustus's

billiard board at Azincourt contains any truth, if, similarly, I

should put any faith in your papa's abomination of us all - your

papa, Albin, a man with a gift not only for loathing humanity

but for acting on his misanthropy - if all of that is fact and not

fancy, my only option is to abandon you, to fly as far away from

you as I possibly can, splitting that chain of passion, that chain

of mutual fascination, uniting us."

"But, my darling, I didn't draw poor Douglas to his doom! It

was Augustus's cry, not my hand, that struck him down!"

"No!" said Anton. "As soon as Douglas got into that stucco

mould of his, his Damnation was all but automatic. You

can't say that any of us sought his doom. Douglas was simply

a victim of that law that's punishing us all. Augustus, though,

will guard you from harm; as for yours truly, an old hand

at this sort of conundrum, I plan to go just as far as I can,

to try and work out to my own satisfaction what's going on,

what's causing this shadowy malignancy to cling to our

family!"

So saying, softly kissing my hand, trying to calm a loud fit of

sobs that was shaking my bosom and again advising my instant

withdrawal to Azincourt, Anton took flight.

Anton would join a firm of solicitors in Aubusson, but nothing

was to run smoothly for him. I don't know why it was so, but I

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found out that it took him just four months to pack it in and