Man Descending (24 page)

So our business concludes, though not quite satisfactorily. I cannot help thinking that Sam Waters would have handled it in a more efficient, more
masculine
manner.

It is only when I am safely at home knocking together my supper (peanut butter, banana and corn syrup sandwiches) on a kitchen counter frustratingly littered with dirty dishes that Benny’s treachery really begins to eat away at me.
How dare he counsel my wife not to talk to me!

Benny and I go some way back. As university students we shared quarters in a derelict old house on 14th Street. Now, however, we are barely on speaking terms. This is because the disloyal bastard agreed to represent my disloyal wife in divorce proceedings.

That is not to suggest that Benjamin and I saw eye to eye on everything even back then. But I can say I liked him a hell of a lot better in 1968 than I do today.
Tempus fugit
.

During the late sixties and early seventies Benny was a priapic, hairy activist who kept the bedsprings squealing and squeaking upstairs and the kitchen table circled by people full of dope arguing how to remodel the world so that there would be a chicken in every pot and a stereo in every living-room.

In those days Benny was a great nay-sayer and boycotter. When he bought groceries Benny packed two lists. One enumerated necessities. The other listed brands or articles that were
verboten
: Kraft products; grapes and lettuce picked by non-unionized workers; Angolan coffee, lifeblood of Portuguese imperialism; South African wine – all were comestibles which never passed his lips.

Benny walked around with a millennial light in his eyes. He intended to dedicate his life to eternal servitude in a legal-aid clinic. For my uncommitted ways he had nothing but contempt. My flesh was weak. I remember his discovering my contraband peanut butter, a proscribed brand, and righteously dashing it to the floor in a Calvinistic fury. God, I loved him for it. He was a kind of moral standard.

But that evangelistic Benny is no more. He’s dead. Affluence did him in. The hirsute, wild-eyed Benny is transmogrified. He is razor-cut and linen-suited. His ass cupped lovingly in the contoured leather seats of his
BMW
, he tools around town on the prowl for extra-marital snarf. You see, Benny knocked up money and then, in a rare interlude of common sense, married it.

The longer I think about Benny, the more I am bugged. He ought to be treated to a piece of my mind. It’s only a quarter to six; I may still catch him at the office if I phone now. In any case, I need to get Victoria’s new address from him. I’ve been after him for two weeks to reveal all, but he hasn’t budged. He’s not telling.

I phone. His secretary informs me it is impossible to speak with Mr. Kramer. He is with a client.

“Please tell him it’s his father-in-law,” I say, “and inform him it’s important.” I know this will beat him out of the bushes. Benny’s Daddy Warbucks bought him his partnership in this firm of shysters. The old man, I am convinced, still has his proprietary talons sunk deep in old Benny’s carcass. Benny will talk to Papa.

There is a fussy delay, lots of hum on the line and background thumps.

“Daddy? Benny here. What’s up?”

Daddy? Daddy?

“It’s Captain Ed calling Corporal Benny. Captain Ed calling Corporal Benny. Come in, Corporal Benny.”

There is a moment of hesitation at the other end of the line. Then Benny speaks to me in a tone usually reserved for converse with dolls and children.

“Now that you’ve finished with the collegiate humour, Ed, what can I do for you? I happen to be very busy right now. I think my secretary
may
have just mentioned that to you.” You’d think I’d just piddled on the carpet or something.

I ignore him. Squirm, you bastard. “I want to talk about this divorce, Benny. I don’t like what’s been happening. It is turning into a dirty, nasty business.”

“Only because you insist on regarding it as
personal,”
Benjamin replies smugly. That piece of idiocy is the just measure of the legal mind.

“You know,” I say, attempting to adopt a fey and whimsical tone, “if there were any real justice in God’s universe, he would have provided a cosmic hammer, preferably silver like Maxwell’s, to bang people on the head when they make idiotic statements. ‘I’m not getting any younger.’
Bong!
‘There is no such word as can’t.’
Bong!
‘Don’t take this personally.’
Bong!
You’d be a foot shorter right this minute, Benny. The point is, it
is
my divorce! Victoria
is
my wife! Jesus Christ, of course I take it
personally, you
ass-hole.”

“Same old Ed,” he says uncertainly, jollying the madman.

“No,” I say, “it’s not the same old Ed. Ed doesn’t sleep too well any more. He’s getting fat and cranky and he’s verging on vicious, Benny. This is a new Ed and he’s not going to be fucked over any more. Personal,
shit.”

“You know what I mean by personal. We’ve gone over this again and again,” Benny says impatiently. “I mean that you should get yourself a lawyer, a professional. You need someone to conduct your affairs in a civilized, businesslike way. We could put an end to this rancour and bad feeling if you’d just get a lawyer.”

“I don’t need a goddamn lawyer to tell you and my wife that I don’t
want
a divorce. No divorce. That’s it. As they say in your business, Benny, that’s the bottom line. No divorce.”

“What you want and what Victoria wants are two different things, Ed.”

There is an awkward pause. I jump in with both feet. “I get the feeling Victoria is being told what she
ought
to want by somebody else.”

“What is that supposed to mean?” Benny is beginning to sound irascible, dear boy.

“Excuse me if I say his name begins with a B and I wink in your direction.”

“Oh Christ. Now I’ve heard everything.”

“Then quit acting like a goddamn harem eunuch guarding the sultan’s favourite honey-pot. Give me Victoria’s address.”

“No.”

“I ran into her today. She told me that you told her not to talk to me. Is that right?”

“Not quite.”

“Where the hell do you get off telling her not to talk to me? I thought a divorce lawyer had the responsibility to aid in a reconciliation. How the hell can we be reconciled if you keep standing in our way? It’s your duty to give me her address, for chrissake.”

“My duty is to my client. To protect Victoria and her interests. Right now that means keeping her away from you. You have this talent for making people feel guilty. How, I can’t imagine.” This seems to genuinely bewilder him. Victoria’s sympathy for me seems as bizarre to him as mourning a dead rat.

“Victoria has a conscience, what can I say?” My heart leaps at the news of her … regrets? “I wish the same could be said of you.”

“I can’t afford one. I work for a living. I don’t live your sanctified existence.”

“Benny, you have cut me to the quick.” I pause ominously. “I am a man in love, Benny. I can’t afford the luxury of a conscience either.”

I sense Benny’s ears prick up at that. “Ed?”

“Yes.” I try to sound as dangerous as ever I can.

“What does that mean?”

“Give me Victoria’s address. I’m finished being a nice guy.”

“Are you threatening me, Ed? You better not be threatening me.”

“We lived together for a long time, Benny. You know old Ed. Hell hath no fury like a roomie scorned.”

“Out with it. Just what the hell are you trying to say?”

“I have a lot of free time on my hands, Benny. I could learn to be a real nuisance. You know how I get when I’m
thwarted.”
The word sounded positively hell-like on my tongue. “How would you like me trailing you around town, keeping tab on your extra-curricular activities? Rumour has it you’re still a ladies’ man. I could keep track on who you’re shagging, Benny. Just like a big-league scout. With reports to the manager, Mrs. Benny, and perhaps even your owner, the father-in-law.”

“You son of a bitch.”

“It’s a possibility, Benny. Don’t push me too far, I’m near the end of my tether. God knows what might pop into my head next. You always claimed I was erratic, remember?”

None of this makes me feel as rotten as I should. But all is fair in love and war and this is a bit of both. Sometimes I feel entirely disassociated from what I do. It’s a malady of the modern age. Since Victoria left me there has been entirely too much drift in my life. Sam Waters is the only firm point, but he can’t replace a wife.

“I suppose I have no choice, do I?”

“None.”

“Victoria has moved to 719 Tenth Street East. She’s in Apartment 23.” Benny clears his throat. “Ed,” he says sinisterly, “let me tell you how much I’m looking forward to seeing you in court.”

“Benny, Benny, nothing personal.”

“Fuck you.”

“One other thing, Benny. Is there anything else I should know?”

“Like what?”

“Oh, for instance,” I inquire with feigned merriment, “does Victoria have anything large, jealous and dangerous lounging around the house? Something sporting two hairy balls? A live-in friend?”

“You’re a goddamn degenerate. You make me sick.”

“We all grow up in our own surprising ways, Benny. Look at you, a
BMW
socialist. We make our way in the world however we can, don’t we?”

“Victoria has told me stuff about you, Ed, that I didn’t believe until now. And I’m going to make you admit to every humiliating detail in court. Every one of your pathetic tricks. Dressing up in a suit and tie every morning, walking out of the door and pretending to go to work for two months after you’d been fired. A moral coward,” he says disgustedly.

“Okay!” I shout. “You try it! Get me on the stand! If I can’t handle a two-bit shyster lawyer whose term papers I used to
write
, then I resign from the human race!”

“Proofread!”
he yells. “Proofread!” That got to him. Benny is very touchy about his intellectual abilities because deep down he suspects, quite correctly, that they are extremely limited. “It isn’t as easy as you think, smart-ass. You’ll find out.”

When I get Benny going I can drive him absolutely berserk. Get it in and really twist it, Ed. “Oh yeah,” I say. “That really tough lawyer stuff. Habeas corpus, juris dictionae fundandae causa, caveat emptor, annus mirabilis, hocus pocus.”

“I’m hanging up now,” says Benny. “But before I do, I have one question for you.”

“What?”

“When might we expect your novel?”

Click
.

I’m not sure any more that I want to face Benny in court. He appears to have mapped my soft underbelly and knows just where to slip the thin blade into my cuts.

The novel. Driving through the dusty haze of a soft summer evening to Victoria’s apartment building I reflect on my metamorphosis into an author.

I still regard the idea of the book as a master stroke. Not, mind you, the idea
for
the book, but the idea
of
the book. After being unemployed for a full twelve months I had to invent a plausible occupation. People were always asking me what I
did
. I didn’t
do
anything. I was simply unemployed, which doesn’t qualify as an activity but is, rather more accurately, a state of being. In the animal kingdom it has its metaphorical equivalent in the hibernation of the bear or the woodchuck, or in the pupal stage of various insects. Or so most people seem to think. Particularly employers who never want to hire anyone who isn’t already working for someone else.

So one day, in answer to the inevitable question as to what I did, I replied that I was a writer. It just popped into my head. I noted a cessation of embarrassing questions. The news circulated among Victoria’s friends and my acquaintances. Nobody questioned my sincerity. It appears they regarded this profession as socially unproductive enough to appeal to me.

The strangest thing was that this public confession got me writing. Sort of. I admit I have spent more time thinking about writing than actually writing, and even more time talking about writing than actually writing. But still, if one announces one’s membership in that illustrious company of joyous spirits, living and dead, who have judged the pen mightier than the sword, one had better evince loyalty to the side and scribble.

However, from experience I can testify that authorship is a trying, taxing business. It is particularly so in my case because I can’t seem to get interested in writing about what I ought to be writing about. I mean, after all, I was once a seriously considered candidate for a Canada Council grant, a genuine, copper-bottomed A-student with a double major in English Literature and Philosophy. I was going to ship out for England and write a dissertation.

Consequently, I am capable of bandying around the names of some pretty thoughtful people: Blaise Pascal, Soloviev, Ellul and even Simone Weil. I was even forced to read some of their books. In fact, at one time I had a very strong affection for Soren Kierkegaard, who, at least in the flesh, seemed to have much the same effect on people that I have. Like me, the gnarled little Dane didn’t mix well at parties, was inclined to goad people into a frenzy, and made too much of a love affair.

Because of my exposure to great thoughts I feel a vague obligation not to reflect too badly on my education. I feel I ought to at least take a shot at a Big Book. Somehow I can’t seem to manage it.

My first Big Book was to be about my generation, a revealing tale about what it was like being a Canadian university student during the Vietnam war. Let me tell you it wasn’t easy having to vicariously share the guilt and agony of
their
war like some poor cousin.

There was, of course, the question of Canadian complicity. But we lacked the necessary stage properties to put on a really top-notch performance. We had no draft cards to burn and there was the lingering suspicion that if we desecrated the new flag we might be taken as friends of the Canadian Legion. Back then, twelve or thirteen years ago, we didn’t even have our own black problem, though we did have plenty of relatively unmilitant and unfashionable Indians. So we imported Black Panthers from Detroit to address rallies and harangue us as motherfuckers. Somehow the home-grown product, cats like Lincoln Alexander, didn’t seem capable of that.