He uttered a penetrating psssstttt and ordered lemonade for himself, a beer for Joe. ‘You ever see so many beautiful girls?’ he asked as a procession of especially attractive ones passed on the street above. ‘For a man, this town is paradise. The secret is this. Every girl you see has flown here on a special excursion rate. They have fifteen days in the sun, then back to the treadmill. Not much time to waste, so they don’t want to bother with involved introductions …’
‘You speak good English,’ Joe said.
‘Also German and Swedish and French.’
‘What do you dor
‘I look after things.’
‘How can a guy get a job?’
Over the rim of his lemonade glass the young man assessed Joe, and while he did so, Joe had an opportunity to study the second layer of Torremolinos, for interspersed among the beautiful girls was a less appealing stream of fugitives—the dead-enders, both male and female, who had sought refuge in this Spanish nirvana and were finding life dreary, if not impossible. They were a shabby lot, young people from all countries who had thought that because Spain was warm it had to be cheap. They wore their hair long and their clothes tattered. Some were incredibly dirty and all looked as if they had not bathed for weeks. A considerable number were glassy-eyed, and they passed along the street as if in a trance; they were the ones who had been eating hashish or popping heroin, and their shoulders sagged and they moved mechanically. Unusually effeminate young men walked hand in hand. And there were the unpretty girls, the ones who had flown south in the same great jets that had brought the beauties. You could almost tell what point in their fifteen-day vacations they had reached; during the first tour days they were hopeful that life in a swinging town like Torremolinos might be different from what it had been at home; on the ninth day they faced up to the fact that when so many girls concentrated on one place, even some really attractive girls would have trouble finding young men; and by the thirteenth day, knowing things weren’t going to be much different from what they had been at home, they surrendered to desperation and walked the streets heavy-shouldered, with disappointment showing in their faces.
And scattered through this variegated mob of Germans, Englishmen, Belgians and Swedes, there moved a few Spaniards—a very few. They were apt to be workmen on their way to fix abused plumbing systems, or entrepreneurs trying to peddle bits of property their uncles owned, or clerks from the various stores. You could spot them by the sardonic looks on their faces, by the uncomprehending glances they occasionally cast at particularly outrageous hippies. It was a foreign world, one they did not understand, nor did they care to, so long as it provided them with a living. They were surprised at times, when they stopped to reflect that all this was happening in Spain, but they no longer worried about it, secure in their belief that the government in Madrid must be aware of the strange things that were happening and would correct them if occasion demanded.
When the young man with the lemonade was satisfied that he understood Joe, he said, ‘With you I’d better be honest.’
Joe heard this frightening statement as if through a blanket of fog, for he was still lost in his review of the passers-by, wondering where in the procession he was going to fit. ‘What’d you say?’ he asked.
‘You can call me Jean-Victor,’ the young man said. ‘Not French. ‘I’ll let you guess what. But I’ve been studying you and I see that you’re capable. Quiet but capable. And I’ve decided that with you I’d better speak the truth about Torremolinos. If you were a young girl trying to make your living as a prostitute, I’d have to warn you that it couldn’t be done, because competition from the amateurs would drive you right out of town. But you being a handsome young man, with a certain physique, attractive hair … Do you speak any language other than English?’
‘Spanish.’
‘That doesn’t count.’
‘In Spain? It doesn’t count?’
‘We’re not in Spain. Now if you put on your tightest pair of trousers and wander down this main street until you find a bar called the Wilted Swan, and go inside and order a lemonade, within fifteen minutes you’ll find somebody who’ll take care of your expenses for as long as you care to stay in town.’
Joe said nothing. Rummaging through his wallet, he looked for a scrap of paper, found the name he wanted, and turned to Jean-Victor, asking, ‘Inside would I happen to find Paxton Fell?’
‘Oh, you know Paxton Fell!’ the young man cried ecstatically. ‘Splendid! Splendid!’ He insisted upon paying for the drinks and chaperoning Joe to meet Fell at the Wilted Swan. They had walked only a couple of short blocks when Joe saw one of the world’s great barroom signs, a heraldic shield painted in bright primary colors, in the center of which floated a swan whose neck and wings had wilted into a limp design, with a result so languid and degenerate that he had to stop and laugh.
‘That’s a great sign,’ he said admiringly. ‘I’ll bet it looks like Paxton Fell.’
At this the guide slapped his leg and cried, ‘Oh, I’ve got to tell Paxton what you said!’ He led Joe through the brass-studded Renaissance doors and into a dark room ornately decorated with objects of French and English origin. He peered carefully from corner to corner, then pointed to a table at which sat four men who appeared to be in their forties. They were obviously well-to-do, for they were dressed with that austere elegance which only money can sustain, and they spoke in low voices.
Jean-Victor approached the table deferentially, bowed and whispered to the man whose back was to the door. Slowly this gentleman rose, slim and imperious, and when he turned around, Joe saw that he was much more than forty. As if from a considerable height he studied Joe, apparently found him acceptable, and walked slowly toward him, extending a slim, be-ringed hand. ‘I am Paxton Fell,’ he said quietly. ‘And who might you be?’
‘Name’s Joe. I’m from California. The gang at Yale gave me your name.’
‘It must have been Professor Hartford,’ Fell said languidly. ‘He’s very helpful, I understand, when you fellows fall into trouble with the draft.’
Joe nodded and became aware that most of the habitués in the bar, including one table of oddly dressed women, were watching him. On the spur of the moment he extended his hand to Fell and said, ‘Professor Hartford sends his best wishes. I’ll probably see you around.’ And he walked to the door.
‘Just a minute!’ Fell cried. ‘Join us for a drink.’
‘Later,’ Joe said. ‘I’ve got to find a place to park this gear.’
‘We can always help you find a place to stay. Now if you …’
Joe looked at his watch, snapped his fingers and said, ‘Damn. I told the landlady I’d look at her room at five.’
On the sidewalk he grabbed Jean-Victor by the lapel and asked, ‘What the hell are you trying to peddle?’
‘You brought up his name. I naturally supposed …’
‘You let me do the supposing.’
‘When I first met you … I showed you the pretty girls and you didn’t even look.’
‘I was looking … in my own way.’
‘So I put you down for another American on the make. And when you popped up with Fell’s name, I was positive.’
‘You one of his boys?’
‘Me? I wouldn’t go near the place. For me it’s strictly girls.’
‘Then why peddle me?’
‘Simple! If I cooperate with Paxton Fell … he sees I get a little money.’ Since his manhood had been impugned he felt it necessary to establish his character, so he led Joe down into the oldest part of Torremolinos, a story-book fishing area that had kept out the luxury hotels and skyscrapers. He took Joe past a chain of attractive small bars, each with three or four charming girls waiting on stools, and Jean-Victor said, ‘In Torremolinos … three hundred bars … and they all need bar girls.’ They came finally to a row of very old fishing sheds that had been converted into slap-dash apartments, at whose doors the Mediterranean knocked with knuckles of sea foam.
‘This is the real Torremolinos,’ Jean-Victor said, and as he pushed open the door of his flat, Joe saw two large beds, one empty, the other containing a pair of most attractive girls. ‘Ingrid and Suzanne,’ Jean-Victor said offhandedly. ‘My girl is Sandra, from London, but she’s out shopping, I suppose.’
‘She went to get her hair done,’ Ingrid said in excellent English.
‘She’s always getting her hair done,’ Jean-Victor said resignedly. ‘Joe’s new in town. From California. No money, test him.’
‘Running away from the draft?’ Suzanne asked with a lilting French accent.
‘Yes.’
‘Any money?’
‘Flat broke.’
‘Who cares. Tonight we take you to dinner. We must all fight like hell for peace.’
‘You mustn’t waste your money,’ he protested.
The girls did not even bother to reply. In their crowd, if someone had a little bread he shared it; when Joe was in the chips they would expect him to do likewise. Jean-Victor went on to say, ‘You can make your bed on the floor. A German left his sleeping bag. It’s that tartan thing in the corner. He probably won’t be back.’
The girls did take Joe to dinner, at a fish restaurant where a solid meal cost less than a dollar. They told approximately the same stories: they had come to Torremolinos on fifteen-day excursions, had fallen in love with the place, had looked everywhere for jobs, and had finally met Jean-Victor, who allowed them to sleep in his extra bed. He had also found them work in one of the bars he frequented, and since he would accept no money, they bought the food. Ingrid thought she might have to return to Sweden at the end of the next month; she had been away a half-year and a young man with a good job in Stockholm wanted to marry her, but Suzanne said, ‘I’m staying. This place was meant for me. Tell you what, Joe! We’ll treat you to the Arc de Triomphe.’
They walked up the hill that led from the seafront to the center of Torremolinos, and there, on a side street, an old motion-picture hall had been converted into a ballroom consisting of a tiny raised floor, scores of small tables and much standing room. It was dark and lined with velvet so that the tremendous volume of sound which erupted from the electronic system came forth clean and hard, without reverbrating echoes. The lights were stroboscope, flashing on and off four times a second, but everything was subordinated to the marvelous beauty of the patrons. By the score, girls who had won honor grades at the Sorbonne and Uppsala and Wellesley came through the big doors, peered into the darkness, and were picked off by keen-minded young men who had won equal grades at Tokyo University and Heidelberg. At any table of six you might find four nationalities, languages flowed more freely than the Coca-Cola which most of the dancers were drinking, and always there was the incredible volume of sound, louder than a score of the bands that the parents of these young people had listened to in the 1940s.
‘I really dig this music,’ Joe said as the hurricane of sound enveloped him in its metallic cocoon. Regardless of which nation the young people had grown up in, they accepted this throbbing music as an integral part of their culture and were at home with it; to them the ear-shattering sounds were as essential as pipes and cymbals had been to the ancient Greeks when they were evolving the theory of aesthetics.
‘This is my home,’ Ingrid shouted above the noise as they elbowed their way to a table. There Suzanne closed her eyes, leaned her head back, and invited the sound to flow over her. They were scarcely seated before two German students who had met them at their bar approached and ordered some drinks. They spoke good French, which left Joe isolated, but after a while one of the Germans said in fluent English, ‘Are you having trouble with the draft?’ When Joe nodded, the German clapped him on the shoulder and said, ‘Very curious. One of my great-great-grandfathers ran away from Germany to the United States to escape his draft, and now you run away from the United States to Germany to escape yours.’ Joe was about to say that he wasn’t in Germany, but the young man interrupted, ‘Perhaps you know his family? Schweikert in Pennsylvania. One boy was all-American football at Illinois.’
‘Before my time,’ Joe said.
He walked back alone to Jean-Victor’s while the two girls reported to their bar, and he found Sandra waiting. Jean-Victor was out somewhere, but he had told her of the newcomer and she showed him how to spread the tartan sleeping bag. Joe watched her proficiency in handling things, and asked, ‘What did you do in London?’
‘Nothing. Father’s a banker and he’s always let me have a little bread. He was keen on camping and taught me how to cope.’
‘You been here long?’
‘Like the others. Came down for fifteen days. Wept when the airplane arrived to fly me back. Jean-Victor was at the airport and he said, “Why go back?” So I’ve been here for almost a year.’
‘Who is Jean-Victor?’
‘Parents are Italian. Lugano—the Italian city at the southern end of Switzerland. His real name’s Luigi or Fettucini or something. He finds the French name involves less explanation. Gets a little money from home … keeps his hand in many things down here. We’re not sure how he makes his bread. Probably selling marijuana. I know he has connections in Tangier. You care for a joint?’
‘I’m not big on grass.’
‘Neither are we. If there’s a good party we pass the stuff—to be sociable. If not, we forget it for weeks.’
Joe unrolled the German sleeping bag and watched as Sandra knowingly adjusted newspapers and old blankets under it to ensure a better bed. ‘I slept in this for three weeks before Jean-Victor allowed me in his bed,’ she said. ‘Of course, he was sleeping with a Belgian girl at the time and I had to wait my turn.’ Joe climbed in and almost immediately fell asleep, but he was vaguely aware that when Sandra went to bed she kissed him lightly on the forehead, as a mother might, and sometime toward dawn he was awakened by Ingrid and Suzanne returning from their work. They undressed casually, prepared for bed, and when they saw he was awake, paused to chat. ‘It’s good to have a man in the room,’ Suzanne said.
Joe pointed to where Jean-Victor slept, and she said, ‘He’s taken. You’re for us,’ and they knelt down to kiss him goodnight.
‘I’m going to like Torremolinos,’ he said drowsily.
‘We all do,’ Ingrid cried happily as she crept into bed. ‘My God, this is heaven.’
‘Today I’m going to find a job,’ Joe said.
II
BRITTA
The daughter of a lion is also a lion.
When the Germans invaded Norway, I was able to adjust to their occupation. When the British were defeated in our waters, I never doubted that they would someday return to rescue us. When food was cut off, we survived; when fuel was in short supply, we shivered and made do; and even when Germany seemed triumphant on all fronts, we masked our feelings and never lost hope for an eventual victory. But when Knut Hamsun, our great novelist who won the Nobel Prize, turned his back on all that Norway stood for and openly propagandized on behalf of Nazi Germany, we not only lost heart but experienced a lasting shame, as if one of our family had done this dreadful thing, for if you cannot trust the great writers, on whom you have lavished your highest rewards, who in God’s name can you trust?
The permanent temptation of life is to confuse dreams with reality. The permanent defeat of life comes when dreams are surrendered to reality.
What though the spicy breezes
Blow soft o’er Ceylon’s isle;
Though every prospect pleases
And only man is vile:
In vain with lavish kindness
The gifts of God are strown;
The heathen in his blindness
Bows down to wood and stone.
—Bishop Heber
For God’s sake, give me the young man who has brains enough to make a fool of himself.—Stevenson
The curtains of the First Act open on a wild and savage beach on the Island of Ceylon. To the right and left, some huts of plaited bamboo. In front, two or three palms ove
rshadowing giant cactus trees, twisted by the wind. Below, on a rock which overlooks the ocean, the ruins of an ancient Hindu pagoda. In the distance, the ocean, illuminated by a blazing sun.
The Pearl Fishers
Your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions.—Joel
The secret of being tiresome is to tell everything.—Voltaire
Ah, for some retreat
Deep in yonder shining Orient, where my life began to beat,…
Larger constellations burning, mellow moons and happy skies,
Breadths of tropic shade and palms in cluster knots of Paradise.
Never comes the trader, never floats an European flag, Slides the bird o’er lustrous woodland, swings the trailer from the crag;
Droops the heavy-blossom’d bower, hangs the heavy-fruited tree—
Summer isles of Eden lying in dark-purple spheres of sea.
—Tennyson
This Scandinavian flew down from Stockholm four times each year. No matter what the temperature, he dressed in his swim suit and went right out to lie on the sand, whether the sun was out or not. We asked him about this, and he said, ‘I paid a lot of money to get down here. I’m supposed to be here on the beach and the sun is supposed to be there in the sky and if it doesn’t know its job, that’s not my fault.’ And you know something? He always went home sunburned.
I hear as in a dream
Drifting among the flowers
Her soft and gentle voice
Evoking songs of birds.
The light of distant stars
Permits a view once more
Of those seductive veils
That shimmer in the breeze.
The Pearl Fishers
Everything I relate in this narrative I either saw for myself or heard about from those involved. For example, the flaxen-haired Norwegian girl of whom I now speak once spent several days enchanting me, like Scheherazade, with tales of her childhood in northern Norway.