Cyclops (The Margellos World Republic of Letters) (45 page)

There begins
The Great Recapitulation
, but the entire sense of shame clenches itself spasmodically and makes the leap into the present day. Once here, it latches onto Viviana. He notices it latching onto her, notices, too, the phrase
onto her
with which he has zeroed in on his thought, and feels a tickling current down his back. He pounces upon her vengefully (to hell with hesitation!) and falls mindlessly to embracing her (at last!), pawing and kissing her, pressing impatient hands up and down her dress, undressing her … preparing her, in the rough masculine way, for “surrender.” She puts up a “demure” resistance to the onslaught (oh, what are you doing? Whatever will you think of me?), being refined (for greater triumph), resourcefully fanning his lust. But just at that moment Dom Kuzma enters the field of vision: he is crossing the street; he is headed for the invalid’s machine, his black hat pushed way down (to make the ears less conspicuous), his lips moving—talking to himself. And Viviana’s marvelous body falls apart, melts into defeated anguish. All that remains is a virginally empty skirt and arms embracing ruined desire. And Dom Kuzma’s lackluster eye, full of life’s bitter pain, leans paternally over the broken wave of yearning and speaks in a moralizing way in despair: that’s right, son, that’s right.
To have is not victory. To renounce
is victory. “Sour grapes!” shouts Melkior into Dom Kuzma’s large ear, “Sour grapes!” and the Ear falls to caressing his face compassionately, panting with deathbed breath: haughty is the fox, haughty. Let the birds of the air peck the grapes that ripen on high, let them carry the grapes back to their nests; they sow not, nor do they reap … so be it! And the son of man … let him travel through the vale of gloom that is this earthly existence—continues Melkior in poetic anguish—over thorns and stones, driven from pillar to post … And when tears come to his eyes he lets them run down his cheeks and lets the poet’s whispered words weep on their own from within:

… and Melkior the son of man holds his head in both hands and shakes it vigorously like an enraged Demiurge shaking the skies in his fury. Galaxies shake, scattering stars and setting up a new order in the universe. But Melkior creates no new order with the shaking: all he does is to bring about a crazy whirl of circles around his weary eyes and a dull ache in his bent head. And when somebody knocks at his door the pain in his temples wakes in a muted throb.

The knocking came again as the voice of inanimate things in the hungover dawning of wakefulness and the word, fully awake by now, found itself in Melkior’s mouth.
The Police.
Down beneath his feet he felt the palmist’s foul existence (he had himself, for a joke, dubbed him
ATMAN
the Great Spirit) and some dull indifference set him moving toward the door. He unlocked and opened it without fear, giving himself totally over to his lassitude.

Swaying at the door was Four Eyes. First there issued from him a cellarlike breath, a whiff of barrel and mingled smells, and then the herald spoke, gesturing hurriedly.

“Things have taken an interesting turn
over yonder
… that, if I’m not mistaken, is what I was told to say
over here.”

“Who … ? Over where?” asked Melkior, upset by the inklings. He thought of his guest and quaked.

“At the Corner is where things have taken this turn,” said Four Eyes with his foul breath; the words were barely audible, “and the message is from Parabrion, is that it? I can remember names even more difficult—Periplectomenos, Batrachomyomachy—from high school. They really force-fed us with the drivel. Your immediate presence is required, everything’s up for grabs. May I go back reassured?”

“Yes, you may.” Melkior was relieved—it was only Ugo “doing his thing.” He leaned against the doorframe in exhaustion.

Four Eyes was still swaying in the doorway.

“All right, what is it?” asked Melkior tiredly.

“What shall I take back
over yonder
as your reply? Because things have taken … like I said.”

“Tell them I’m coming. I’m coming,” said Melkior impatiently.

“Straight away, isn’t it? Coming straight away, coming straight away,” and Four Eyes went hopping down the stairs with idiotic glee.

the drunkard, was saying, gesturing tragically. He went into the Cozy Corner with his recitation still ongoing, but shortly he came back out—or rather flew out back first and sat down on the pavement. Behind this piece of action were Kurt’s strong arms. Melkior saw his silhouette against the yellow curtain: immobile, sleeves rolled back, at the ready.

“As I said, out of here, on his ear … correction, on his bum. Well, who cares, it’s still the same old fun.” The drunkard was not getting up from the pavement or speaking to anyone in particular: he was now explaining an important and very complex point under his nose, using small, myopic gestures like someone doing lacework.

Inside, things seemed to have got out of hand. One of Ugo’s favorites,
Spare the Horses, Driver
, could be heard, a number from
The Russian Balalaika;
Ugo’s solo passages alternating with a ragged chorus (of the sergeants, probably), destroying the song with drunken disorder.

Out in the street Melkior laughed at Kurt’s silhouette, standing at attention guarding unwavering sobriety amid the crazed orgy of Russian song. And when Melkior, after hesitating for quite a while, was finally driven by his sensitive conscience to enter the Cozy Corner, Kurt took this as a ray of sunshine. He immediately abandoned his post at the door and all but licked Melkior’s hand, wagging an invisible tail.

“Ach, Herr Professor, Herr Professor! Would you just look at what’s going on—this is sheer Bolshevism,” whispered Kurt confidentially, as one sober man to another. “Nevertheless I didn’t call the police. We got word from you. I was sure you would come …”

Ugo was standing on the table among overturned glasses and waving an unsheathed saber like a leader of the insurgents, and the sergeants around him were screeching, insolently, in a mutinous mood,
“iamshchik, ne goni
…” a Russian song. Four Eyes was kneeling piously on a bench at Ugo’s feet and following, with marveling fear, the swish of the saber above his defenseless head. Else had retreated to her mother behind the bar and the two of them were counting the broken glasses in strictest secrecy.

“Caliban, you sluggish fish, can’t you see who’s here?” said Ugo to Four Eyes, interrupting his singing for an instant.

“I’m swimming, my Lord and Master, swimming,” and Four Eyes swam, his fingers splayed at his hips in imitation of fins.

“Bow low, hideous son of Mistress Barrel, and pour a wassail for my friend Eustachius. Eustachius the Magnanimous, I leave you in the charge of my cup-bearer.”

“But there’s nothing to pour, oh Lord and Master,” whined Four Eyes, holding the bottles up to the light, “the wellsprings have gone dry. Mother’s corked the barrel!”

“Crawl, you turtle, over to Mama Cork and knock your useless head on the stone floor until you’ve softened her heart,” said Ugo, sovereign, and was swept up in a fresh song with the sergeants:
Chubchik, chubchik, chubchik kucheriavyi
…

“There, you see, Herr Professor,” lamented Kurt in a lowered voice. “He’s quite mad. He’s driven our regulars away and brought in this guttersnipe instead. They’ve broken a lot of glasses, too. … I’m very sorry, Herr Professor, but the bill is going to be rather steep.” Kurt noticed Melkior’s baffled face and hastened to explain:

“He said it was all to go on your account. Otherwise we wouldn’t have served him. I’m sorry, Herr Professor. I hope there won’t be a fine to pay as well. We haven’t got an entertainment license you see.”

“I told him only to have a drink for himself …”

“… and he went and started ordering drinks for everyone, as you can see.
And
breaking things! Tsk-tsk-tsk …” said Kurt in dismay at the appalling display.

Melkior watched Ugo savor his madness. God, the sheer amount of energy this madman blows off—into the air, into the smoke of the night! He tried to imagine him old, tired, spent, slouching in a café and playing a one-handed game of dominoes, coughing slightly every now and then. The row of dominoes progressed, but instead of Ugo he found himself, his own shriveled hands, lining up the tiles. And he chuckled at his imagination’s deception. He’ll die
as he is:
he’ll be stupidly, accidentally killed in the drunken euphoria of a night like this … or take his own life. The animal setting this force in motion will not be able to languish in the cage of old age.

“Gentlemen centurions,” Ugo addressed the sergeants, the saber whistling playfully over their heads, “gentlemen centurions of the 35th Legion, may I now request a song for Fraülein Else of Germany. Enough of the Russian steppe and swirling snow. A song for the Fraülein now, as befits your military dignity. If you please!” and Ugo, dipping the saber in a formal way, launched into song:
Adieu, mein kleiner Gardeoffizier
… But the song was unfamiliar to the sergeants and Ugo sang it through on his own, ceremonially facing Else with Junker-like dignity.

Four Eyes was ranging about happily like a drunken dog under the table, where he had been lapping spilt wine off the linoleum and making clicking noises with his tongue in derisive rhythmic accompaniment.

And when the sergeants saw the honorary smile on Else’s face (for manners and female vanity required it, let Kurt say what he liked) they, too, unsheathed their sabers and, at the final
adieu, adieu
, crossed them above Ugo’s head in an operetta-style apotheosis.

The tableau with the sabers (there
was
some military order to it after all!) managed to move even the angry Kurt: “That was a very good display the rascals made, wasn’t it, Herr Professor?” and he gave an admiring smile. But his sober gravity returned presently and his sober worries got hold of him again: “Well, this, I take it, concludes the show. Well done, gentlemen, bravo!” and he applauded artfully.

“And now it’s time, gentlemen, please, we’re closing, that’s it for tonight, gentlemen, if you would be so kind …”

How wrong Kurt was. Now was in fact the time to begin the crowning mad revelry in which Ugo was expecting a reward from the Corner owner in the form of further drinks on the house. If only for the sake of the establishment’s reputation, sir.

“Sir,” he addressed Kurt with the haughtiness of a celebrated virtuoso, “I do not remember when I last visited your highly esteemed establishment. Your name is Kurt, but there is no courtesy in your arrogant nature, sir. We have already performed, bona fide, a part of tonight’s show which promises much enjoyment to follow (Caliban, stop smacking your chops like a ravenous beast!) but where, Oh Mr. Kurt, is the due
courtage
for this worthy artistic body, not forgetting our household cur that is in this critical moment sniffing the ground vainly for bones and gnawing at a table leg in desperation? (Four Eyes gave a consensual growl under the table.—“Hush, Caliban!”) Very well, take no notice of the cur, or indeed of my humble self, but do take notice, sir, of these intrepid men who may all too soon lay down their lives on the altar of their country. Is that not so, gentlemen centurions of the 35th Legion?”

“So right!” the sergeants shouted in unison, genuinely aroused by Ugo’s pathos.

“Indeed I’m right. Fraülein Else, Ophelia had a brother, a nobleman who was killed defending her honor. Your brother would be capable of getting killed defending only the cork of his barrel. …”

Kurt had all the while watched him with the patience of a wise yet suffering individual, but now a baleful look flashed in his eye at the insult. Ugo proclaimed the situation to be “highly critical.”

“The
coward does it with a kiss, the brave man with a sword!”
he declaimed with insolent pathos and, in a show of silly threat, pointed the saber at Kurt’s chest. Kurt did not flinch. On the contrary, he thrust his chest out valiantly, ready to die. The women screamed. But Ugo, with a peace-loving gesture and a cry of “Farewell to arms!” flung away the saber, which speared the floorboards with pleasure. He then leaped off the table and hugged Kurt so hard that Kurt could not help but hug him back.

“There, gentlemen warriors, that is how to settle differences! Pass this on up high to your generals!” and Ugo planted a smooch on each of Kurt’s perplexed cheeks while winking slyly at the sergeants. “You, Mr. Kurt, are as brave and ungrateful as Cinna, let me shake your hand, let us be friends!”

Kurt was taking it all in good spirits, with nobility. Like a man he took Ugo’s hand and shook it vigorously, as one hero to another.

“Right, gentlemen, peace is signed. Now all that’s left is to drink to it …” Ugo winked at the sergeants, who took it up with the wile of drunkards: “That’s right, this calls for a drink.” And Kurt indeed signaled Else to bring a bottle of wine, on the house.

After Mother retired there appeared a second bottle, a third, several bottles, and the glass-clinking brought Kurt’s drunken declaration that he would go out of the Cozy Corner and into the street on all fours if they would not believe that he was
sincere
and that he
genuinely
loved all of them, his friends. Twice he went down on the floor and started to crawl toward the door; they had to force him up and pledge their trust. Four Eyes alone (pulling his leg) “disbelieved” him and Kurt started crawling again to reassure him. Kurt kept hugging and kissing Ugo, while Ugo, in full abandon as he was, kissed back brother and sister—particularly the sister, who made no effort to conceal her pleasure. Aroused by the wine and the kisses, Else danced with Ugo to a tune played by Four Eyes on his grimy pocket comb. And the sergeant who aspired to Else’s love twice grabbed Ugo by the ears and shook him jealously.—Are you a man? —Yes I am, Ugo grinned his fillings bare.—All right then, carry on, selflessly shouted the sergeant, at great pains to conceal his feeling of being ignored.