Doctor Criminale (36 page)

The grim stone castle of Chillon, sad spot in the history of human misfortune, islanded in the lake, sat illuminated close to where our steamer had docked. The photographers were already
streaming off the boat, onto the promenade, and, in a noisy crowd, crossing the wooden bridge that led to its keep. Criminale was among them; I could see him in the crowd, brought to attention by
the bright orange dress of Miss Belli, who hung onto his arm. The person I could not see was Ildiko, and I went round the ship, looking everywhere for her. She was not on the open decks, not in the
saloons; she seemed to have acquired a gift for disappearance quite as expert as Criminale’s. My life these days seemed to be a quest not for one person, but two. The ship was almost empty
now, so I went ashore, and across the bridge to the castle of Chillon.

Here, in the courtyard, the congress members had gathered together. The Mayor of Montreux stood on a balcony and welcomed them, telling the story of poor old François Bonivard, who had
been chained six years to a rock below the waterline in a dungeon beneath, apparently for choosing the wrong philosophy on the wrong day. Thinking has never been easy to get right. I scanned the
crowd, but Ildiko was nowhere to be seen. Next we were ushered into the Great Hall, where modern chairs were laid out under modern lighting. A flamboyant chairwoman rose, and introduced the
congress’s guest of honour, and speaker for the evening. It was Criminale, of course, rising to give our keynote lecture, on the topic of ‘Photography and Desire’. I sat at the
back and looked carefully round the attentive audience. Ildiko was not in the room.

This rather distracted my attention from Criminale’s lecture, but it seemed to go well. The apocalyptic gloom he had shown at Barolo seemed to have gone, as had the signs of sexual boredom
he had displayed to me a few minutes before on the deck of the ship. He spoke in open praise of the erotic, celebrating desire, more than desire: frankness, shockability, outrage. He refused, he
said, to see the body as sign or symbol, like the modern philosophers. For him it was pure presence, flesh as flesh. The erotic self was a place of plenitude, the naked being was a place beyond
culture or disguise. He assaulted old-fashioned moralists, new-fashioned semioticians; he dismissed Lacan, told Foucault just where to go. Feminists hissed and abstractionists muttered, for he was
clearly going beyond the intellectual convention, the most conventional form of convention there is. But, tired by two days of theory, and keen to get to the wine to follow, the photographers
reacted warmly, greeting him with loud applause.

I could hear it even from a distance, for by now I had slipped away; I wandered round the grim stone castle, looking everywhere for Ildiko. At last, down in the dungeons, I found her, holding a
drink and talking warmly to Hans de Graef. ‘I’ve been looking for you everywhere,’ I said. ‘You know how I don’t like lectures,’ she said. There was a flash, and
I saw Hans de Graef taking our photographs. ‘Excuse me,’ he said, ‘Now I must go upstairs for the reception.’ ‘Ildiko, I’ve had enough of this,’ I said
when he had gone, ‘I think it’s time you told me just what’s going on with you and Criminale.’ ‘Nothing goes on,’ said Ildiko, ‘I don’t even see
him.’ ‘You came all the way from Budapest to see him,’ I said. ‘At least I am not suspicious,’ said Ildiko, ‘Do you know that nice young man is asking many
questions about you?’ ‘De Graef?’ I asked, ‘What kind of questions?’

‘About your work, your background,’ said Ildiko, ‘He says you are the first Russian he ever met who speaks no Russian at all. Maybe you should learn to be a bit more Hungarian,
like me.’ ‘What did you tell him?’ I asked. ‘Nothing,’ said Ildiko, ‘I said I hardly knew you at all. Isn’t it true?’ ‘I had a long talk with
Criminale,’ I said, ‘He told me how his life had been ruined by sex.’ ‘He talked about me?’ asked Ildiko. ‘No,’ I said, ‘And I told him nothing at
all.’ ‘Good,’ said Ildiko, ‘With matters of this kind it is best to be a bit discreet.’ ‘Matters of what kind?’ I asked, ‘What’s going
on?’ But just then a crowd of conferees, wearing their badges and carrying glasses in their hands, came down the steps to inspect the dungeon. ‘Go back there and do your mingle,’
said Ildiko, ‘We can talk on the ship. I like to look some more round this terrible place.’

So I returned to the Great Hall. The chairs had been cleared for a reception. There were drinks, drinks in plenty; there were photographs, and what photographs! After all, the greatest
photographers in the world were there, all photographing one another, and, of course, Bazlo Criminale. He was where he liked to be, the centre of attention: he was surrounded. I pressed a little
closer. ‘You gave such good lecture,’ a very attractive Romanian lady was saying to him, ‘Only five people fell asleep, very good. And you understand so well the erotic. I would
love so much to be nude photographed by you.’ ‘Let us arrange,’ said Criminale, ‘Tomorrow?’ ‘Bazlo, caro, time you go back to the boat,’ said Miss Belli,
pulling at his sleeve, ‘These people will tire you out.’ Ildiko was right, she sounded just like Sepulchra; maybe Criminale did this to people. ‘This lovely lady likes me to make
her photo,’ said Criminale. ‘Don’t forget you have to go to the bank tomorrow,’ said Belli. ‘We can go any time,’ he said, ‘Why is it always time to leave
when someone admires you?’ ‘Everyone blasted admires you,’ said Belli, sounding impatient; then she saw me. Recognition dawned; her eyes widened. She turned, and whispered
something to Bazlo Criminale. I began now to see the point of Ildiko’s policy of discretion, and slipped away to tour the castle.

Not till I got back to the ship did I see Ildiko again. A chill squally wind had blown up to accompany our return trip to Lausanne. Hunting through the now very jovial photographers, I found her
alone in the rear saloon, huddled against the cold in her/my ‘I
Lausanne’ sweater, and looking extremely unhappy. ‘Time to talk, I want to know what’s going
on,’ I said. ‘I too,’ said Ildiko, ‘Is Bazlo still with Belli?’ ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘He wants to take nude photographs and she wants to get him to the
bank.’ ‘When, tomorrow?’ asked Ildiko, sitting up. ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘You were right, she gets more like Sepulchra every minute.’ ‘That is how Bazlo is
like,’ said Ildiko, ‘He finds a nice new woman, then he loses interest. He finds he really loves the one he has lost. When he ran away with Sepulchra, he always said he loved Gertla the more.’ ‘So why did he run away with her?’ I asked. ‘Of course, because Gertla would have ruined him if
he stayed,’ said Ildiko.

I looked at her. ‘Ruined him how?’ I asked. ‘She was sleeping with someone,’ said Ildiko, ‘The chief of the secret police, someone like that.’ ‘Gertla
was sleeping with the chief of the security police?’ I asked, amazed, ‘I thought they were against the regime.’ ‘It is well to be on both sides with these things,’
said Ildiko, ‘Maybe she thought it helped him. There were arrangements like that in those days. But it was bad, it ruined his reputation with all his friends.’ ‘Yes, the wife of a
leading radical having an affair with the boss of state security,’ I said, ‘I can see it wouldn’t help.’ ‘He had affairs too,’ said Ildiko, ‘And then he
was still in love with Pia. You remember Pia, who you saw nude in Budapest?’ ‘I did?’ ‘You saw her nude, yes?’ asked Ildiko, ‘On the wall in Budapest. Pia, his
wife in Berlin, the one he always said he loved the best.’

‘Why did he leave her?’ I asked. ‘Oh, she knew far too much about him,’ said Ildiko, ‘I think about his contact with Ulbricht and the DDR regime. Those were strange
times for him.’ ‘So he kept on seeing her?’ I asked. ‘She died right after he left,’ said Ildiko, ‘But she was the one he talked of the most. You can tell from
the photos, the ones of Pia are the best. Except for the ones of Irini.’ ‘Irini?’ I asked. ‘That one he never married,’ said Ildiko, ‘About her I know really
nothing. He would not speak of her at all, about Pia all the time.’ ‘What happened to Irini?’ I asked. ‘How do I know?’ said Ildiko, ‘Except he nearly got into
some very bad trouble because of her. She died also, and it was a long time before I knew him, you understand.’

‘Let me get this straight,’ I said, ‘First there was Pia, yes, who knew too much about him. Then Gertla who slept with the security chief . . .’ ‘No, you forgot the
one in the middle, Irini,’ said Ildiko. ‘Oh yes, Irini who nearly got him into very bad trouble,’ I said, ‘And next?’ ‘Next Sepulchra, who was only able to
possess him by what she knew about him,’ said Ildiko, ‘I like a squash.’ ‘Wait a minute,’ I said, ‘What did she know about him?’ ‘About all the
others,’ she said, ‘Then about those things under the table I told you about. Maybe some other things too.’ ‘What other things?’ ‘You know she helped him write
his books,’ said Ildiko, ‘Some people say that more than half his work is really Sepulchra.’ ‘I thought she just took notes,’ I said. ‘Some say
Homeless
is really her story,’ said Ildiko. ‘Then why is he leaving her now?’ I asked. ‘Because he thinks the world has changed, you can leave everything behind,’ Ildiko said,
‘He is wrong. The past does not go away. You cannot escape what you have been. There is always someone who remembers. There, now you know everything.’

‘Not quite,’ I said, ‘There’s someone missing in all this.’ ‘Many, I think,’ said Ildiko, ‘Criminale loved many women. He is Hungarian.’
‘I mean you,’ I said. ‘Don’t let us talk about me,’ said Ildiko. ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘I want to know when you met him, when you had your affair.’
‘It is over, that is enough,’ she said, ‘A few years ago. He needed help with his books in the West. I told you this already.’ ‘So why did he leave you?’ I
asked, ‘Did you know too much about him too?’ ‘What I know is what I told you, on the train,’ said Ildiko, ‘We all knew too much about him. But now with these changes
he thinks he is free, he believes none of these things exist any more, nothing has to be corrected.’ ‘Why did you follow him here?’ I asked. ‘I came with you,’ said
Ildiko, ‘I liked to be with you. And now what do you do, bring me here, find me a bad hotel, leave me all the time alone.’ ‘I thought you came to see him,’ I said.
‘No, I don’t like now to see him at all,’ said Ildiko.

I stared at her. ‘I must say for a thinking man he seems to have led a very complicated sex life,’ I said. ‘You think just because he is a clever philosopher he can’t
make a mess of love just like everyone else?’ asked Ildiko. ‘His complicated sex life also seems to be a complicated political life,’ I said. ‘Yes, why not?’ asked
Ildiko, ‘He comes from Eastern Europe.’ ‘
And
a complicated money life,’ I said. ‘I told you, money, he likes it, but it is not so important to him at
all,’ said Ildiko. ‘And every single one of these women he was in love with had something on him,’ I said. ‘Of course, this is called marriage,’ said Ildiko,
‘Now he likes to run away from all of it. He does not know that at last you can never run away.’ ‘Can’t run away from what?’ I asked, ‘What are these things you
all know about him?’ ‘Please, I don’t like to talk any more about it,’ said Ildiko, getting up, ‘Tomorrow perhaps, another time.’ She turned and walked away
through the jovial crowd.

A little later I caught a glimpse of her, dancing with young Hans de Graef. As soon as the boat docked back at Ouchy, she was off before me, running ahead for the Hotel Zwingli. By the time I
reached the desk, she had collected her key from the grim receptionist and gone up to her room. Passing her door, I knocked; there was no reply. I went up two floors to my own room, and sat down on
the bed. Everything had changed. Ildiko had become distant, and with dismay I felt I was losing her. But Criminale, who had been a blank, was now an excess of signs – signs of thought and
sex, politics and money, fame and shame. Before I had had too little; now I felt I had almost too much. What I needed now was to find the heart of Criminale, if he really had one. Over the course
of the evening my suspicions had gone, and now returned. I tried joining facts to facts, names to dates. I wanted it all to make sense, but somehow I couldn’t make it make the sense I wanted
it to make.

I thought about Ildiko, and then all the women in his life. I tried to get them in order, understand where Ildiko came in. Pia and Irini, Gertla and Sepulchra, Ildiko and Belli – Criminale
said he liked women with a certain grip on power, but he had found a good many who had quite a grip on him. One knew too much about him and the Ulbricht regime. Another, still obscure to me, had
brought some very deep trouble to his life. Another shared a pillow with the security police, another helped write his books and possessed him with all she knew. Another was his new bid for freedom
from something, his chance of a new start. Another, the one I thought I knew best, had helped him publish his books and secure his bank balance, so that he needn’t worry about money at all.
Two of them were here, one not far away in Barolo. I began to understand his sexual dismay on the boat. I felt something of the same myself, but I was a journalist, and I also felt a
journalist’s excitement. Lavinia had been right: the life and loves of Criminale made a strange story after all. I pulled on my jacket, slipped downstairs, tiptoeing past Ildiko’s door,
and went to the lobby, wanting to call Vienna with the news.