The American Ambassador (15 page)

Yet such a man would not want to turn his face to the wall, either, and if his life contained disloyalties, if there were the usual misunderstandings and contradictions, he would want to explain himself, not to justify or to atone—that was the trouble!—but simply to get the facts straight and in sequence, knowing that a life was not a narrative written by a single author but a miscellany. Such a man would think that at the end, all there was was memory and blind faith.

Carruthers was still talking but North's eyes were closed. Hartnett tapped him on the knee and he looked up, blinking. Then he closed his eyes again. Hartnett said, “Paul,” and they both stood. This session was at an end. Hartnett thought of the son, looking at the father. To Bill North, his son must seem an undiscovered part of himself, an unmapped, uncharted territory of his own continent. My God, he thought, something had gone terribly wrong. North was motionless, eyes closed, sitting in his chair, waiting for the doctor, waiting for them to leave. And waiting for his son, too; that was foregone. Such a man would abandon his fortified self, and move far afield. Such a man would make an excellent and large-minded amanuensis, but a terrible witness. He would not hesitate to testify against himself.

“Look, Bill,” Carruthers said. “They have something else, something new. I don't know where they got it, maybe from the West Germans. Maybe from your friend Kleust. Nobody's heard anything about him for two years, but now they're hearing things again, and they think he's coming up from underground.”

He heard the door close softly, and he opened his eyes. He was alone in the solarium, except their words were in the atmosphere. The light hurt his eyes, so he closed them; it was less painful in the dark. But he could hear the humming of the fluorescence. What did parents say to children? I have eyes in the back of my head, and I can see you wherever you are, and know what you are doing. You did, too, as a young father; a particular noise or, more usually, a particular silence and you'd put down the paper and cock your head.

Bill Jr., what are you
doing?

I'm not doing anything.

Yes, you are.

It was good enough propaganda while it lasted; not as durable as Santa Claus or the Tooth Fairy, but good for four or five years, a fragile cease-fire, administered by the eyes-in-the-back-of-the-head peace-keeping force.

Yes, and you could shut your eyes but the humming of the electricity remained. The trouble was, he felt that
he
was the one who was being watched. Everyone had a hidden pair of eyes, as each word seemed to have a hidden meaning. He had spent too long listening to Hartnett and Carruthers, and himself, too. He was tired ot the sound of his own voice, blah blah blah. There was too much pressure behind his words, too much left unsaid, too much that couldn't be said; and so much that wasn't known. Too much of the past in the present. He wished Kleust were there, with his bred-in-the-bone naturalness. His fatalism and his fables, and his paradoxical faith in the future; no future could be worse than the past, probably. Kleust reminded him of the African continent in its variety and density, and endurance, and restraint.

Africa had thickened them both. And coming so close to death there, at such a young age. For a time it gave them the feeling that they were invincible, capable of deeds beyond their wildest imaginings; the truth was, it made them romantic in their own eyes. They never spoke of it, for the truth was too ludicrous. Kleust no doubt saw himself as Lohengrin, the Knight of the Swan, Wagner's Shane, who arrives out of the forest as if by magic. It was not a comparison to be pressed too far, but it was irresistible. North did see himself as a Western gunfighter, Bat Masterson cleaning up the town; a pacific man, no stranger to irony, but a good man with a gun and brave as an eagle.
That Bill North, he's quiet, but a hard man when aroused.

The predictable union of Western movies, the Hardy Boys, and Ernest Hemingway's publicity. And it was also true that of those who died, they gave no thought at all: who they were, or the lives they had led, or what they believed in. They were just extras littering the landscape, earning a day's pay for a day's work with no billing whatsoever. It was all physical, the look of the land and the weather, the Land-Rover's terrible racket, the odor of the vegetation. They drove out of the watercourse and onto the road, scarcely more than a path. Huge anthills flanked them. In the distance was a herd of antelope, scampering in the opposite direction, away from the car's noise. Only a few hours more to the capital, through the savannah, purple now at dusk. The driver was muttering under his breath, Kleust nervous, looking left and right. From the rear seat he watched Kleust; there was too much noise to talk comfortably. It was hot and he began to doze, thinking of the report he would make, to the ambassador, and then, if the ambassador agreed, to Washington. In Washington they were anxious to do something, anything, to retrieve the situation. They were weary of negative publicity, do-nothing liberals. They wanted a recommendation but it had to be effective, something decisive, no more halfway measures, nothing amateurish; it had to succeed, the assistant secretary was most insistent on that point. He made the point again and again in his late-night conference calls to the ambassador. In Washington, they wanted guarantees. He would advise the ambassador that it was time to place bets, the wheel on its last circuit.
Rien ne va plus.
No doubt Kleust would make a report as well, though the Germans had no assets in the region and would not act. And perhaps Washington would not act either, though he doubted it; the administration wanted to play.

He opened his eyes when the car abruptly slowed, then accelerated when Kleust yelled. They were surrounded by armed men, and suddenly explosions were all around them. He had never heard gunfire, nor the sound of grenades, and for a moment he did not understand what was happening. He had the absurd feeling that he had wandered onto a skeet field. Then he was pushed forward, stunned, the air out of him; it was as if a great hot hand had cuffed him. The windshield splintered and the car careened to one side. The driver was there and then he wasn't; his vacant seat was wet with blood. The car came to rest.

An acrid, sour smell filled his nostrils. He was upended, his head in the front seat, his body in the rear; he could not move. Things flew around him but he heard nothing. Kleust wrestled him out of the car and into the ditch. He was on his back. The sky was violent, a brilliant African violent at twilight. Kleust was beside him, firing a pistol. He methodically pulled back the hammer, aimed, and fired. The driver's rifle was on the ground beside Kleust. It took him a moment to identify it, its use. He picked it up, balancing the barrel on the car's fender. The barrel chattered on the metal. It took him a moment to pull the trigger; he did not want to hurt anyone. But he Bred once, and again, after a hesitation. It was likely that this was all a terrible mistake. He and Kleust were diplomats, with diplomatic immunity. Kleust seemed to think it was for real, though. He pulled the trigger again and seemed to find a rhythm to it, pulling the trigger, and feeling the kick against his shoulder. It seemed so very slow and silent, almost languid. He heard nothing except music, unfamiliar modern music. Someone had a transistor radio. The music was monotonous.

When at last the scene in front of him organized, he noticed the driver on his back in the middle of the road. A flash behind him, a grenade. The stench was awful. Someone was bending over the driver. He aimed and fired and the man twitched and fell. This was simple enough to do, point the rifle and fire and the man you fired at was dead. His mind was working so slowly, all his movements in slow motion against the violent dusk, mares' tails across the enormous sky. He was humming to the music now, believing himself most clear-headed. These were not live human beings, though the moment itself was real enough. The blood on his hands and arms was real, and the music inside his head was real. The two men in the road were not real.

He saw another rise from behind a bush: khaki shorts, no shirt, and a lean black face. He thought this khaki-shorted man had the face of a musician, a bass player perhaps; he was heavy-bellied and thick-legged. His back was to the man lying in the road, and he looked to be running away. Wonderful, if true, but there was no amnesty for musicians. He fired, aimed, and missed. He had got things turned around. Aim, then fire. That was what he did, but he missed again. He said, Damn. His hearing was returning. He heard Kleust's pistol, the click of the hammer, and the report. Kleust was talking to himself. He aimed again and fired as the target was nearly out of reach. That was what he was, this musician; he was a target.

He lay back on the ground, exhausted. The ground was soft. He'd gotten that one. One dead bass player. He saw the musician's head come apart, a fragment of bone flying off into the bush. The musician's hand flew up, as if he were trying to catch the bone fragment. He had a big hand, long fingers, graceful as a musician's should be. Kleust was saying something to him. He was speaking German and grinning. He felt as if he were under water. He could not breathe, owing to the strangling weight on his chest. His hands were filthy and sticky with blood. The sudden silence was terrifying. Kleust was yelling at him in German.

His legs wouldn't work, though he struggled to rise. Overhead the sky was darkening, little pinpricks of light high up; perhaps they were stars, but he thought not. Things went in and out of focus, and he could not trust his eyes. He saw the thorny tops of trees. He was rising, Kleust's arms around his shoulders, dragging him out of the ditch.

Kleust repeated, You're all right.

He said, I'm not.

He did not know what in his life had led up to this. There had been no preparation, no way to forecast the awful sudden violence. He never saw it coming. He was unprepared, and mystified. What was he doing here, he and the German diplomat? Yet he had killed a man, perhaps more than one man; it had been nothing like what he had expected. That was the trouble, all of it was unexpected. In the slowness of things he had felt a great anticipation, the sense of momentous occasion. History twitched, his life would never be the same. This would be a memory against which all other memories would be measured. He had no doubt that he would live and Kleust, too. He felt a great exhilaration. The others were not real to him. He lay again on the hot brown earth, the grains scratching his cheek, each grain before his eyes. A thin line of ants communicated between black pools of blood.

They were in the dark. Kleust held his hand, as if they were teenagers on a date. “Bill,” he said.
“Kamerad, Kamerad.”

He said, “Are you hurt, Kurt?”

“No,” Kleust lied.

He began to laugh. Kurt's hurt. Hurt Kurt.

Kleust's face was fixed in a dark German anger. Presently the silence returned, thick and painful. Kleust continued to speak but he did not listen. Dusk was nearly complete. It was cold in the car. When he opened his eyes, everything moved in slow motion, helter-skelter. Kleust had given him something from the first aid kit, so the pain was not so bad now. It was located way inside, where he could feel it but not locate it. He was dizzy. So he kept his eyes closed, shutting out the lights. He saw the President and his family, all of them in blue. The President stretched out his hand, in a kind of salute. Accepting the good wishes of the President, he flashed a cocky smile, listening to the monotonous music that replayed itself in his head, a dirge. Then he saw Elinor's face, and heard her voice.

This was a moment fixed in his memory, the car speeding and lurching, and the President, and the music. He remembered not another thing until he woke up in the hospital, the doctor and Elinor standing by his bed, Kleust sitting in the chair near the window. He remembered her great smile as she bent down to kiss him, then brought him their son. The boy was so grave, for a moment he did not recognize him as his own. In any case, he did not have the strength to embrace him; and he was marvelously elated, and did not need sympathy. So she quickly took him back.

 

 

 

 

T
HERE WERE TIMES
when she thought her father a specter, part of the air, everywhere and nowhere. He came and went without warning. There was no pattern to his movements. He was not predictable. She would be sitting quietly by the window, deep into her memory, and she would hear a noise and there he'd be, massive in the doorway, filling it, blocking the light. Often he would approach her, to say something or to touch her hair or shoulder. She would hold herself motionless, waiting for him to leave. Her mind would commence to race, and the noise began. Her mind was like a rushing stream, tumbling downhill over rocks and boulders, eddying, bouncing, shifting direction. When next she looked up he would be gone and the words he had spoken vanished also, though if she listened hard she could discover them somewhere in the room. His words were as spectral as he was. And yet when she looked at him, always out of the corner of her eye, when he was preoccupied, she could see the resemblance. Their eyes were similar, being large, dark, and luminous. They were alike in no other way. Her father was large, barrel-chested and heavyarmed, dark hair thick on his arms and hands. That she was terrified of him went without saying.

Gert and her father did not have very much to do with each other. She missed her mother, who was dead; and he was gone so often. They met occasionally at breakfast and at the dinner table, rarely speaking. They exchanged no information, and she understood that she must never ask about his work; and should anyone ask her, she should ignore the question. He usually went out after dinner, offering no explanation; and she did not expect one. She spent her own evenings in her room, sketching and listening to music: Wagner, Bartók, the Rolling Stones. She sketched scenes from her early life, as she remembered her early life. She had no social life, because of the fear she carried with her always.