Stars and Bars: A Novel

  Here at least some sort of orthodoxy and normal scale prevailed: white tiles and chrome. He had half expected to be issued with a spade and instructed to go and dig a hole. He took his place at the urinal trough, unzipped and let fly. His gaze rested blankly on the white tiles in front of him.

  “Hi there,” came a voice from his left. He ignored it. People just didn’t talk to each other while they urinated—it wasn’t done.

  “Mr. Dores.”

  He looked around with genuine irritation. It was Sereno, in the next but one stall. To Henderson’s astonishment Sereno leaned sideways and extended a hand over the vacant space. Good Christ! Henderson gasped inwardly, he surely doesn’t expect me to shake hands while I’m peeing. This was intolerable. But Sereno’s hand remained. Henderson, swapping hands, shook Sereno’s briskly and briefly.

  “Hello,” he said stiffly, and returned his gaze to the tiles.

  “You remember my partner, Peter Gint?”

  Henderson looked around. Beyond Sereno was the pebble beach of Gint’s face. Why were they peeing together? Like girls at a discotheque?

  “Hi there,” Gint said softly, reaching around Sereno’s back. After a horrified pause, Henderson leaned over and shook his hand. I don’t believe I’m doing this, Henderson thought. Why don’t we hold each other’s tinkles?

  “Good to see you again,” Gint said.

  “Mng.”

  “Some hotel,” Sereno opined. “Eighth wonder of the world.”

  They all finished simultaneously. Henderson washed his hands with untypical thoroughness, lots of soap and hot water. Sereno combed his hair and moustache.

  “Please join us,” he said as they walked out. He indicated one of the nearer cocktail islands. Henderson saw Freeborn, Shanda and—to his surprise—Cora.

  “Really, thank you, but I’m meeting—”

  “Hey, Hendursin!” Shanda waved and called. He saw Cora’s shades snap around.

  “Come on,” said Sereno. He seemed annoyingly confident. Shouldn’t they, as rivals for the Gage collection, be warily circling each other?

  They made their way to the island, Henderson being extra careful with the stepping-stones.

  “Well, hello there,” Cora said. “Is your ‘colleague’ here yet?”

  “Expecting her any moment.”

  “Sit here,” Shanda ordered. She was clearly drunk. In front of her was an enormous beaker full of blue liquid and chunks of fruit. She dragged him down.

  Sereno spoke. “Would you and your colleague—what did you say her name was?”

  “Dr. Dubrovnik. Dr. Irene Dubrovnik.”

  “She’s Czechoslovakian,” Cora said.

  “—like to have dinner with us?”

  “I’m afraid duty calls. But thanks all the same.”

  “Did you say Czechoslovakian?” Shanda asked.

  “How’s her English?” Cora asked.

  “Excellent.” Henderson desperately scanned the open surface of the lake. He saw Irene being paddled across by a cowboy. She was looking about her with an expression of aghast incredulity. Henderson rose to his feet.

  “Well, good to see you,” he said. “Enjoy your dinner.”

  “Do bring your colleague over, we’d love to meet her,” Cora said disingenuously.

  “Oh. Right.” He picked his way back across the stepping-stones and strode around to the place the canoes berthed. Irene was being helped ashore.

  “My God, Henderson,” she said in a loud voice. “This hotel. I can’t believe it.” She leaned forward to kiss him.

  “No kissing!” Henderson said, trying not to move his lips. “Don’t kiss me!” He shook her formally by the hand.

  “What?”

  “We’re being watched.”

  “By who?”

  “The Gage family.” He took her elbow in one hand and her small case in the other and began to walk her around toward the cocktail island.

  “But so what? For Christ’s sake.”

  “Listen. You’re called Dr. Dubrovnik; you’re an art historian from Czechoslovakia.”

  Irene stopped. “Henderson, I’m warning you.” Her voice was stern. “I’m not playing any of your stupid games.”

  “Please, it’s vital. Just for a minute or two. I’ll explain later.” He felt a light sweat moist on his face. They made their way across the stepping-stones. He glanced at Irene. Her eyes were narrow.

  “Dr. Irene Dubrovnik,” Henderson announced, and introduced her to the other members of the family.

  “A pleasure to meet you at last,” Sereno said. “I’m familiar with your work.”

  “How. Do. You. Do?” Cora said slowly, as if talking to a peasant or simpleton. “Welcome. To. Our. Country.”

  “D’you miss Czecho, Czechlso, Miss Dubronick. Nick?” Shanda burped.

  “May we offer you a drink?” Sereno asked, all oleaginous charm, signaling an Indian maiden.

  “Yeah. I’ll have a large Scotch, straight up with a twist,” Irene said, looking at Henderson.

  They sat themselves down. More drinks were ordered. Some sort of tremor had established itself in Henderson’s left thigh and, mysteriously, his indigestion had returned. He felt a fire in his throat. To his alarm and dismay he found himself sitting between Sereno and Freeborn. Cora lit a cigarette and exhaled. Irene vigorously fanned the air.

  The drinks arrived. Henderson buried his head in the cool clump of celery frothing from the top of a new bloody mary. Please, God, he prayed into the leaves, let her play the game.

  “Dr. Dubrovnik,” Cora said. “Excuse me, Dr. Dubrovnik?”

  Irene refused to acknowledge the pseudonym.

  “Isn’t this hotel quite astonishing?” Henderson piped up. “I had quite a problem with my canoe, I must say.”

  “What’d he say?” Shanda asked Gint.

  “His canoe,” Gint said.

  “Mr. Dores,” Sereno breathed in his ear. His large moustache and glossy purple lips were close to his face. “We may be rivals, but I’m glad that we can behave in a civilized way.”

  Henderson stood up. “No rest for the wicked,” he said cheerfully. “We must leave you good people to your dinner.”

  “Wha’s he say?”

  “Thanks for the drink.” Irene drained hers in a gulp.

  “Goodbye, Dr. Dubrovnik,” Cora said.

  Irene ignored her.

  “Dr. Dubrovnik?”

  “Goodbye,” Henderson said, hauling Irene away by the arm.

  They walked off. Henderson waved farewell. Just made it, he thought, as nausea joined forces once more with indigestion.

  “Don’t ever land me in that kind of shit again,” Irene said coldly. “I don’t want to play in your fantasies.”

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “It was necessary. Things aren’t going so well …” He sensed this wasn’t the moment to tell her of the canceled trip. “That chap Sereno’s trying to buy the paintings too.”

  “Who’s that weird girl in the shades?”

  “Gage’s daughter, Cora.”

  “God, spooky.”

  They were in a scenic elevator. Irene looked out at the vista and laughed. “Jesus Christ, Henderson, only you would choose a place like this.” She leaned against him. He took in her appearance for the first time. She wore a dark-green jersey dress with buttons down the front, and flat-soled beige shoes. He ran his hand down the warm furrow of her spine. No bra.

  In the suite the champagne and sandwiches had been delivered. They had a glass of champagne. They kissed. He pulled her through into the bedroom and they fell onto the bed. Irene propped her head on a hand and looked down into his face.

  “Has it been a bad week? Really that bad?”

  “The worst ever.”

  “Poor Henderson.”

  “Let’s not talk about it.”

  “But I want to hear everything.”

  “Later.”

  “Well at least it’s all over now.”

  Henderson swallowed. Was this the moment
to tell her? But Irene ducked forward and kissed his forehead. He shut his eyes. Then he felt her lips on his left eyelid. Her dark mouth closed hot over the socket. The tense tip of her tongue massaged the eyeball through the lid. Technicolor photomatic explosions seemed to brighten the inside of his skull. His left side erupted in goose pimples.

  “Stop it, please,” he said weakly. She pulled back and he opened his eyes. Her face was blurry through warm pink tears.

  “What’s that?” he said. “Where did you learn that? It’s appalling.”

  “I like to feel your eyeball squirm beneath my tongue. It sort of throbs.”

  “But I can’t see anymore. It hurts.”

  “It’s designed to stimulate me, dummy.”

  He unbuttoned her dress at the neck and pushed it back to reveal one breast, pale and flat with its small immaculate nipple, milk-chocolate brown. He pressed his weeping eye against it. He felt his nausea and indigestion dissolve into relief. At last, he thought, at last.

  He got up and took off his tie and shirt. He kicked off his shoes with pantomimic abandon, removed his socks and trousers. Irene lay on the bed and watched him with a smile. He eased off his increasingly taut underpants.

  “Well, hello there,” Irene said.

  He slid onto the bed to join her. He found it pleasantly erotic to be naked while she was clothed. Methodically he undid more buttons to expose both breasts. He bent his head.

  “Let’s stay here tomorrow,” Irene murmured. “This hotel is fun.” She kissed his crown.

  Henderson sat up. “Ah,” he said slowly. “I was going to tell you. There’s been a hitch. I’ve got to go back.” Blankly, he watched himself detumesce—the organ showed uncanny prescience, he thought.

  “What? To New York?”

  “No. Luxora Beach.”

  “Bastard,” she said with chilling matter-of-factness, doing up her buttons. “But you needed a quick fuck, just the same.”

  “Listen, it wasn’t like that, honestly,” he pleaded. “I’ve only just found out. Everything has suddenly gone horribly wrong. Nothing but disasters.” He launched into a garbled desperate narrative about Gage, the picture, Beeby. The arrival of Sereno and Gint, Freeborn’s maneuverings, Gage’s second thoughts, Bryant’s shocking betrothal to Duane …”

  “And who the hell is Bryant?”

  “Oh, Christ.… Ah, she’s a girl.…”

  “You can’t help it, can you? You sad fuck.”

  “She’s only fourteen. She’s not a friend. Jesus.” He shut his eyes and pulled the coverlet around him.

  “So what are you doing with a fourteen-year-old girl?”

  “She’s the daughter of … Thomas Beeby. I promised him I’d—”

  “Bullshit, Henderson. You prick. You English prick.”

  Why, he thought wildly, should the adjective make the noun more pejorative?

  There was a knock at the door.

  “Bloody hell!” Henderson swore. He jumped off the bed and grabbed his dressing gown. But Irene had already gone to the door. He heard a voice. A woman’s voice.

  “Oh. I’m sorry. Is this … is this 35J?”

  Henderson fought furiously with an inside-out sleeve.

  “That’s what it says on the door.” Irene replied coldly.

  Then he heard a wail, a keening, distressed cry. Christ, who can it be? he thought. Bryant? Cora? Melissa? Shanda? Fearfully, he peered through the crack at the doorjamb. He saw Irene, her arms folded sternly across her chest, confronting a young blond woman in military uniform with corporal’s stripes on her sleeves. She was sobbing fiercely into her cupped hands. A WAF or WAC, he thought; what ghastly new nemesis is this? Then the woman looked up and screamed in his direction.

  “Alvin, you bastard! I never want to see you again!” She turned and ran down the corridor.

  Alvin? Just a moment. His spearing hand finally engaged the stubborn sleeve. He sprang to the door.

  “What fucking game is this, Alvin?” Irene demanded.

  Just at that moment the door opposite was thrown open and a harassed General Dunklebanger appeared, zipping up his fly. He looked disbelievingly down the long corridor at the fleeing WAC.

  “Mary?” he said looking piteously back at Henderson and Irene. “Was that Mary?”

  “I think there’s been—” Henderson began, but he was interrupted by a bellow of primeval grief from the general, who set off thundering down the passageway after his beloved. Henderson took a few futile paces after him. He saw the general arrive at the lift doors just as they closed in his face. He darted to and fro—there were three lifts serving the thirty-fifth floor—pressing buttons frantically. Eventually another lift arrived and he leaped in. Henderson shook his head in astonishment. A few other guests had emerged from their rooms to see what the fuss was. Henderson realized he was in his dressing gown. He returned to his own door. It was locked. Oh, Christ, no. He tapped softly on it with his fingertips.

  “Irene,” he whispered. “Open up. I can explain everything.” He looked over his shoulder and smiled reassuringly at the curious guests.

  “Irene,” he hissed. “For God’s sake open up!” He rapped again.

  He had to wait a full ten minutes. He passed the time whistling quietly to himself, pacing unconcernedly to and fro in a tight oval, affecting profound interest in the pattern and texture of the corridor carpet for minutes at a time. Finally the door opened and Irene stepped out. She had her case in her hand.

  “I’m getting out,” she said. “You stay in the madhouse with the crazies. Goodbye.”

  She walked purposefully away. Henderson dithered for a moment.

  “Irene, wait,” he called.

  Farther down the passage a man’s head popped out of a doorway.

  “For God’s sake, will you people please party in your rooms?” he demanded of Irene.

  She said something to him in reply that caused him to start back in shock.

  Henderson ran back inside and started to pull on his clothes. There was nothing to be gained by pursuing her in his dressing gown. He felt an ascending panic stirring within him. Irene’s tone had been so uncompromisingly final. She couldn’t leave, he told himself: she had to hear him out. Given his predicament, anyone would understand. She couldn’t abandon him like this. He clawed on his jacket and trousers. He pulled on his left sock and found his left shoe in a corner. He looked around the room for his other shoe and sock. He found the sock, but not the shoe, such had been the frivolity with which he had disrobed.

  “Oh, God, please,” he prayed out loud, peering under the bed. He saw it: at the back in the middle, flush against the skirting board. He tried to reach it but his fingers were inches short. He struggled mightily to shift the bed but, for some unknown reason, it appeared to be bolted in place. In his mind’s eye, he saw Irene being paddled across the atrium lake. There was nothing for it. He ran awkwardly out of the room and sprinted like a clubfooted athlete down the passage to the lifts. He pressed the descend button. Obligingly, one lift was already ascending rapidly to his floor. Thirty-three, thirty-four, thirty-five, bing!

  The door opened. For an instant he saw General Dunklebanger leaning despairingly against the lift side. Then, with a cry of pure rage, the general surged out, fingers closing around Henderson’s throat, and they fell grappling to the floor. The man was wiry and tough, but Henderson—strengthened by his own urgent needs and panic, and his body brimming with adrenaline—struggled free.

  The general was on his knees, panting hoarsely.

  “Leave me alone, you mad bugger!” Henderson shrieked. The lift doors were still open. The general got to his feet, adopting a shaky wrestler’s stance, and began to advance on him again.

  “She got the wrong room number, you bloody cretin!” Henderson yelled in frustration. “It’s not my fault!”

  The general paused, then folded to the floor in a heap, making childlike crying noises. Henderson jumped over him and into the lift. The doors slid to. Henderson punched button
number one.

  As he emerged high in the bright space of the atrium, he peered out hopefully at the scene below. There was Irene! Just getting into a canoe. The lift came to a halt and Henderson ran out. “Irene!” he called. “Wait!”

  The atrium floor was busy with people. Henderson dodged his way through the crowd to the canoe-embarking point. Some child shouted, “Look, Mom, that man’s only got one shoe!”

  A small queue had formed at the lakeside; all the canoes were in commission. Henderson pushed his way to the front.

  “Excuse me, sir, but would you wait in line? It’ll only be a couple of minutes.”

  Henderson saw Irene approaching the far bank.

  “Irene! Wait!” he bellowed plaintively across the water. Everybody looked around. Except Irene.

  “Give me a canoe!” he begged.

  “Sir, please! Two minutes.” The cowboy’s strong arms held him back.

  Henderson looked at the lake. He could see the bottom clearly through the dancing water. Eighteen inches down, two feet at the most, he calculated.

  He jumped in.

  He went in up to his waist, gasping at the shock of the cold water. Waist deep! he exclaimed with mad outrage. That’s dangerous. What about safety regulations? …

  He began to slosh his way heavily across to the far shore, arms above his head, a creaming bow wave at his waist, like a determined marine invading some Pacific island. There were shouts, laughs and a few screams from onlookers and hotel staff, but he was possessed with unfamiliar single-mindedness. He forged on through the water. Canoes took avoiding action. “Irene, wait!” he cried again. To his dismay he saw her get out of her canoe and march into the forest.

  “Stop that woman!” he bellowed hoarsely. “She’s sick. She’s forgotten her medicine.”

  Willing hands reached out to help him as he reached the far bank.

  “Life and death,” he gasped. “Matter of.” And stumbled into the trees.

  He broke out into the lobby and limped-ran—clunk-splat, clunk-splat—across to the main doors, leaving a trail of wetness like a slug. A taxi pulled away into the main street. Another rolled up promptly to take its place at the foot of the steps. The driver leaped out at the sight of the distraught and dripping Henderson.