When he got back to England, Speke blew his brains out. This biographical detail I spared Lily. By genius I mean somebody like Plato or Einstein. Light itself was all Einstein needed. What could be more common?
“There was a fellow around named Romilayu, and we became friends, though at first he was scared of me. I asked him to show me uncivilized parts of Africa. There are very few of these left. There are modern governments springing up and educated classes. I myself have met such educated African royalty and am the guest right now of a king who is almost an M.D. Nevertheless, I am off the beaten track, without question, and I have Romilayu (he is a wonderful guy) and Charlie himself, indirectly, to thank for that. To a certain extent it has been terrible, and continues to be. A few times I could have given up my soul as easily as a fish lets out a bubble. You know, Charlie is not a bad egg, at heart. But I shouldn’t have come along on a honeymoon trip. I was a fifth wheel. She is one of those Madison Avenue dollies who have their back teeth pulled to produce a fashionable look (sunken cheeks).”
But on further recollection I see that the bride could never in the world forgive me for my behavior at the wedding. I was best man, and it was a formal occasion, and it wasn’t only that I didn’t kiss her, but that I was somehow alone in the cab with her instead of Charlie on the way down to Gemignano’s restaurant after the ceremony. In my inside pocket, rolled up, was a sheet of music-Mozart’s “Turkish Rondo” for two violins. I was drunk; how did I get through a violin lesson? At Gemignano’s I was very obnoxious. I said, Is this Parmesan cheese or is it Rinso? I spat it out on the tablecloth, and after this I blew my nose in my foulard. Curse my memory for being so complete!
“Did you send a wedding present for me or not? We must send a present. Get some steak knives, for God’s sake. I want to tell you that I owe Charlie a lot. Without him I might have gone to the Arctic instead, among the Eskimos. This experience in Africa has been tremendous. It has been tough, it has been perilous, it has been something! But I’ve matured twenty years in twenty days.”
Lily would not sleep in the igloo with me, but I continued my polar experiments anyway. I snared a few rabbits. I practiced spear-throwing. I built a sled, following the descriptions in the books. Four or five coats of frozen urine on the runners and they scooted over the snow like steel. I am positive that I could have arrived at the Pole. But I don’t think I would have found what I was looking for there. In that case, I would have overwhelmed the world from the North with my trampling. If I couldn’t have my soul it would cost the earth a catastrophe.
“Here they don’t know what tourists are, and therefore I’m not a tourist. There was a woman who told her friend, ‘Last year we went around the world. This year I think we’re going somewhere else.’ Ha, ha! Sometimes the mountains here seem very porous, yellow and brown, and remind me of those old molasses sponge candies. I have my own room in the palace. This is a very primitive part of the world. Even the rocks look primitive. From time to time I have a smoldering fever. It feels like one of those coal mines that have been sealed because of combustion. Otherwise I seem to have benefited physically here, except that I have a persistent grunt. I wonder if this is new, or did you ever notice it at home?
“How are the twins and Ricey and Edward? I would like to stop in Switzerland on the way home and see little Alice. I may have my teeth looked after, too, while in Geneva. You might tell Dr. Spohr for me that the bridge broke one morning at breakfast. Send me the spare c/o American Embassy, Cairo. It is in the trunk of the convertible under the wire spring that fastens the jack to the spare tire. I put it there for safekeeping.
“I promised Romilayu a bonus if he would take me off the beaten track. We have made two stops. Humankind has to sway itself more intentionally toward beauty. I met a person who is called the Woman of Bittahness. She looked like a fat old lady, merely, but she had tremendous wisdom and when she took a look at me she thought I was a kind of odd ball, but that didn’t faze her, and she said a couple of marvelous things. First she told me that the world was strange to me. It is strange to a child. But I am no child. This gave me pleasure and pain, both.”
The Kingdom of Heaven is for children of the spirit. But who is this nosy, gross phantom?
“Of course there’s strangeness and strangeness. One kind of strangeness may be a gift, and another kind a punishment. I wanted to tell the old lady that everybody understands life except me-how did she account for it? I seem to be a very vain and foolish, rash person. How did I get so lost? And never mind whose fault it is, how do I get back?”
It is very early in life, and I am out in the grass. The sun flames and swells; the heat it emits is its love, too. I have this self-same vividness in my heart. There are dandelions. I try to gather up this green. I put my love-swollen cheek to the yellow of the dandelions. I try to enter into the green.
“Then she told me I had grun-tu-molani, which is a native term hard to explain but on the whole it indicates that you want to live, not die. I wanted her to tell more about it. Her hair was like fleece and her belly smelled like saffron; she had a cataract in one eye. I’m afraid I will never be able to see her again, because I goofed and we had to get out. I can’t go into details. But without Prince Itelo’s friendship I might have been in serious trouble. I thought I had lost my opportunity to study my life with the aid of a really wise person, and I was very downcast over it. But I love Dahfu, king of the second tribe we came to. I am with him now and have been given an honorary title, King of the Rain, which is merely standard, I guess, like getting the key to the city from Jimmy Walker used to be. A costume goes with it. But I am not in a position to tell you much more, except in general terms. I am participating in an experiment with the king (almost an M.D., I told you) and this is an ordeal, daily.” The animal’s face is pure fire to me. Every day. I have to close my eyes.
“Lily, I probably haven’t said this lately, but I have true feeling for you, baby, which sometimes wrings my heart. You can call it love. Although personally I think that word is full of bluff.” Especially for somebody like me, called from nonexistence into existence: what for? What have I got to do with husbands’ love or wives’ love? I am too peculiar for that kind of stuff.
“When Napoleon was out at St. Helena, he talked a lot about morals. It was a little late. A lot he cared for them. So I’m not going to discuss love with you. If you think you are in the clear you can go ahead and talk about it. You said you couldn’t live for sun, moon, and stars alone. You said your mother was dead when she wasn’t, which was certainly very neurotic of you. You got engaged a hundred times and were always out of breath. You conned me. Is this how love acts? All right, then. But I expected you to help me. This king here is one of the most intelligent people in the world, and I have great faith in him, and he tells me I should move from the states that I myself make into the states which are of themselves. Like if I stopped making such a noise all the time I might hear something nice. I might hear a bird. Are the wrens still nesting in the cornices? I saw the straw sticking out and was amazed that they could get inside.” I could never take after the birds. I would crash all the branches. I would have scared the pterodactyl from the skies.