Alexandra Singer (11 page)

“What is it exactly you are trying to say?”

“The Historian likes to research people.”

“People?”

“Yes, he likes to test them.”

“Does he test you?” Maia was laughing now; in an attempt to cover up her feelings of discomfort.

“In the past, he did. Now he has no need to test me further.”

Maia was forming her next question as Armand walked over to them, accompanied by Mahmoud and the Historian. Together they passed the rest of the night as other clientele wandered aimlessly
around the bar. The Historian remained deep in conversation with Mahmoud, whilst Maia and Konstantin talked together quietly.

When he looked at her, his eyes were warm, and Maia sensed that Konstantin was able to get away with almost anything he wanted. Around them people exchanged their meaningless pleasantries. Maia
felt Armand’s cold eyes penetrating her, almost immediately she contemplated surrender. She curled up on her chair.

“I’m feeling very sleepy,” she said quietly to Armand. With a subtle smile she offered herself to him, and a silent and surreptitious look passed between them. The Historian
caught their glance, and smiled. They left Mahmoud with the Historian, and Armand walked her back to the riad.

In the room alone with him, it struck her how small and airless the space was. He placed his hand upon her thigh, and she looked away. She knew what was to come, and she didn’t mind. She
had resigned herself to its inevitability. The heat allowed her to relinquish all authority. He stood only a foot away from her, but she was unable to step towards him.

“I was watching you – ”

“I know.”

“I want to talk to you properly,” said Maia.

“What is the point of that?” smiled Armand.

“I need a friend here.”

“We will not be friends,” Armand said, pulling her closer. Later, she realised that would have been the moment to stop.

“Why not?” asked Maia, closing her eyes.

“Because all of the interactions between a man and a woman are sexual.”

“I do not believe that.” She opened her eyes, pulling away from him. “Why has the Historian never returned to Europe?”

“He has never wanted to. He likes it here.”

“Then why is he so bitter?”

“The Historian’s former colleagues were ungrateful.”

“Do you know what happened?”

Armand shrugged. “They did not get on. They were not cooperative. You should ask him.” He knew that she would not. The Historian was far too intimidating. “But you don’t
want me to be your friend. You want me to conform to the needs of your unhappy life,” he said.

Maia didn’t reply. What Armand didn’t know was that behind Maia’s passion, she believed that if she could be seen as the property of Armand, she could continue to visit the bar
at the Grand Tazi, liberated from Mahmoud’s advances.

He traced the lines of her face, her nose, the corners of her lips. He pulled her closer still, and there were his hands on her waist, the exploration of her breasts. She succumbed to him.

“I feel as if I’ve always lived in exile, never belonging.”

“You are very sentimental.”

“I can’t help it. That’s the way I am.”

Even to her own ears she sounded ridiculous. The truth was not so romantic; she always felt as if she were missing out, as if the party was somewhere else. Now she stood naked before him, and he
came towards her.

“What do you want, Maia?”

“I want to lose myself.”

“I can give you that,” he said.

There was a darkness and an expectation, and an exciting vulnerability, and then it came hot and stagnant, eyes closed and bodies enlaced. With his thighs pressing down upon her she dissolved
herself into a frenzied emptiness. She longed for annihilation, life without responsibility, and at some point she must have murmured this to him, for he raised his head to her and acknowledged it.
He thrilled her, with his uncertain past and unreadable emotions, and bonded by sweat she abandoned herself to their nocturnal pleasure.

She knew she had demeaned herself. That he wanted to leave as quickly as possible. That she disgusted him. There was silence in the room and a growing aliveness outside. She felt lightheaded,
the events of the night before unfolding like a dream. She followed him down to the front door of the riad. Ina was standing in the corridor leading to the courtyard, looking at Maia as she passed
her by.

“
Putain
.” For a moment Maia was uncertain if she had heard the whispered word, but when she turned round Ina was staring up at her maliciously.

Maia ignored her and returned back up the stairs to her room, where she lay discarded and silent upon the bed.

From their first night together, Armand knew that he had her hooked. The power he felt himself holding over her was delicious in its irresistibility; the memory of it made him
wince with desire. But Armand was the type of man who thinks that he loves women. He loved their shape, their warmth and their scent. But he despised the way they made him feel, their pull on him
and all their sordid manipulations. And even when they came to understand this, still they found him fascinating. He pitied them. For Armand, Maia was a woman to pursue, and nothing more.

If Maia had known Armand’s thoughts, they would have horrified her. But now as she looked herself over, she felt only repulsion for the person she had allowed herself to become. She washed
her face and wiped the sleep from her eyes, watching the transformation take place as she made herself become all that she showed to the outside world, whilst inside she was still able to remain
detached.

Nobody disturbed her as the day dragged on. In the afternoon the streets were empty, abandoned to indolence and heat. The sun climbed in the sky over the ochre hued city and then began to fall.
When she woke, covered in sweat, as the wailing muezzin called the faithful to prayer, it was to a silent house. The room was suffocating. She opened the door, padded out over the smooth stone
slabs and called to Ina. There was no reply, only the sound of water tinkling in the courtyard. She went to dress. In the tiny bathroom there was only cold water but she cared little and stood
under the cold trickle for a long time. She dressed in light jeans and a loose shirt and went on to the roof, to drink what was left of her bottled water and smoke the first cigarette of the day.
Somewhere she had read that these flat roofs had once been the preserve of women, from where they could watch the life on the streets yet remain invisible. She surveyed the homing pigeons on the
rooftops beside her and peered downwards into the endless, seething labyrinth of side streets. She sat there for hours, before a drumming sound awoke her from her daze, and she could see the men
making their way towards prayer.

The view from the roof let Maia peer into the ordinary lives of women engaged in their daily chores. She began to photograph them, and then having gathered the shots she needed, she could paint
them as she had wanted to from the start. She depicted the light at all times of the day, the varying shades, the sunset over the city, the women who are hidden behind its walls. She enjoyed the
noise she could hear rising up from the streets, the occasional shrieking of children, the playing of a strange, dirge like music, with wailing voices that stirred in her a vague, distant longing.
It was a very different city from the one in which she had arrived. In those days she rarely wanted to go down into the crowded lanes, dreading the attention, the suffocating heat and the stench of
the bodies in the crowds. But now, curiosity took her in its firm grip and she went down into the pink city streets.

For a time she believed she was content. She worked hard; and when she saw the Historian he sighed, “Well, I suppose you’ll get it all done eventually. Good work with the
library.”

Armand appeared with three drinks and placed them on a round table, which he pulled up to the pool. The evening was still early, when the sun had just gone down and the courtyard lamps were
being lit. The fig trees were stretching up to the darkening sky, their fruit, soft and bruised lay discarded around the tree trunks. He smiled at her, and Maia wondered what the Historian knew
about him.

Maia resolved not to give the Historian any further information; he could think what he liked of her. She told them that she had been exploring in the streets when Armand had found her, but the
Historian seemed disinterested and he got up and went into the hotel. Maia was curious to know what Armand’s business was in Morocco, She reasoned that what he did was really no concern of
hers. Instead they discussed the Historian, and his eccentric behaviour.

“He is so secretive. I have no idea where he goes or what he does. We haven’t even had a decent conversation, apart from the time when he showed me briefly around his riad. And I do
admire his work. That’s also why I’m here.”

“Really? It has nothing to do with living rent free in the centre of the medina?”

“I do all the work he asks me to do.”

Armand leaned towards her. “Don’t concern yourself with his business, Maia.”

She ought to have been irritated by his patronising tone, but somehow she didn’t mind at all. She was unreasonably delighted to hear her name on the tip of his tongue.

“I see.” Maia stared at his lips. She looked at him, recalling her past innocence, and the strong belief she had held that love was for once only. She had never before been open to
other possibilities of pleasure.

“How is your painting going?”

“Slow. I’ve been painting city scenes, that sort of thing.”

“No women then?” He was laughing at her.

“Not yet.” She was lying to him and continued talking to cover up her unease.

“There is a painting I saw a copy of in a book. I thought of you. It’s a close up of the genitals and abdomen of a naked woman, lying on a bed and spreading her legs.”

She laughed. “That is a little obscene. I’m not sure why you thought of me. But I do know the one you mean. It is
L’origine du Monde
. Courbet, oil-on-canvas. I think it
is beautiful.”

“It is quite obscene. So tell me, do you believe that the world originates from women?”

“In a way the world does originate from women. I don’t know why so many religions worship a male god. Who knows what changed. But I can tell you that during the nineteenth century,
art changed the way the nude body was displayed, and Courbet was one of those painters. He rejected academic painting and its smooth, idealised nudes. I like that.”

“Why do you admire his work so much?”

“He was a realist. He pushed the limits of what was considered presentable. And he didn’t depict the woman’s face; he had a certain admiration for women.”

“So you believe that the women are the origin of the world?” said the Historian, who had returned from the bar and, stood hovering over them with a drink and a smile playing upon his
lips. Armand nudged the Historian and to Maia’s surprise the Historian did not seem hostile to his overt friendliness. In fact he seemed almost pleased.

“So, you do indeed believe that women are the origin of the world?” said the Historian. “Was it the chicken, or the egg?”

He laughed slyly at what he imagined was his own witticism and Maia wondered which question she was supposed to answer first.

“What is your style of painting?” asked Armand.

“I’m not quite sure. I haven’t tried to define it. Perhaps it is most similar to Fauvism.”

“Surely that is an excuse for laziness,” said the Historian.

“You are entitled to your opinions,” she said.

“I’d like to see your paintings,” said Armand.

“I haven’t shown them to anybody since I’ve been here.”

“Then perhaps you will show them to me.”

Her whole body screamed against this. At that moment, there in the bar she experienced a terrible dislocation; an insight into the relationship between them. An awareness that despite his hold
over her, not only were they wholly incompatible, but neither did she trust him.

The bar was beginning to get busier now, and brass lanterns were lit around the edge of the pool. The Historian reappeared by the table; he was swaying slightly. Maia was surprised, originally
he had seemed so controlled.

“Stop bothering with the past Maia. It won’t do you any good. It hasn’t to me,” he said.

Maia was surprised, judging by the world in which he now consumed himself. “But you are the Historian!”

The Historian eyed Maia, and finally he said coldly, “I really don’t think you know what sacrifice is.” He turned his back on her, and Maia went cold. The snub was obvious; his
true feelings towards her were becoming impossible to ignore.

Every so often the Historian stretched his long neck back and laughed at something. Konstantin was nodding his small head approvingly as the Historian was exclaiming, “There are so many
lives to be lived, if only one doesn’t care about the opinion of mankind, money and material success.” He turned challengingly to Maia and his eyes were sharp. “Don’t you
agree?”

“I don’t know,” said Maia. “Doesn’t the opinion of others matter at all? It keeps many of us on the right path.”

The Historian glared at her. “What is the right path? Please, tell me. For I think I may have diverged from it long ago.” He held up his glass, and Konstantin smiled in
adulation.

The way that Konstantin looked at the Historian, Maia could not help but assume that he was the Historian’s very own acolyte.

“Don’t we have something to discuss?” Konstantin said to the Historian.

But the Historian brushed him off with annoyance, and he left with Armand to find Mahmoud.

Konstantin smiled. “Excuse me,” he said quietly. Slowly he moved off in the direction of a group of leather jacketed Arabs.

Since spending the night with Armand, Maia had not showed her face at the Grand Tazi. She had preferred to stay away for a while, concentrating on the use of perspective in her art and doing the
work that had been set for her by the Historian. She was not particularly keen to see Armand, despite not hearing from him. She felt that during their last night together she had suffered an
embarrassing loss of control. She was suffering from that most dreadful of afflictions: hope. Hope that he might begin to feel something for her too.