“I’m at your disposal.”
At that point he burst out: “Kupi mne pistolet.” And as if he were afraid that I hadn’t understood him, he repeated it in French: “Buy me a pistol. I can’t go on like this.”
“I’m coming to see you immediately. Are you calling from home?”
“Yes, from Noémie’s apartment. You know where it is. Fourth floor, on the left.”
He opened the door quickly, as if he had been standing there behind it the whole time. To me he seemed to be looking better than ever. There were no rings around his eyes, he was freshly shaven, and his lean face had a rosy complexion; he resembled a man who had just stepped out of the sauna. He was wearing a new, tailored suit made of lustrous fabric, a light-colored shirt, and a colorful silk tie. It was the first time I’d seen him dressed up like that. The finish on the wood of the furniture gleamed, and the windows were flung open, even though it was cool outside. Porcelain ashtrays gleamed on the table.
Right away it hit me that the African sculpture collection was missing. On the wall between two windows there was just one single female figurine with large breasts, and on the opposite wall two modern drawings were hanging in narrow black frames.
“I’ve got some good wine,” Jurij Golec said, going into the kitchen; I heard him uncorking the bottle. Then he returned.
“I’ll have one little drink with you. Otherwise, I don’t drink.”
“You must be taking tranquilizers. I did that myself when I was going through my divorce. ”
“Alas,” he said with a wave of his hand, “it doesn’t help.”
“A physician once confided in me that he took his sedatives with whisky.”
“There’s no point to that anymore,” he stated. “I need a pistol, not pills.”
“Excuse me, but you must admit that I also have a certain amount of experience in such things.” (When Ana and I separated, I had a major crisis. Jurij Golec at that time comforted me with ambiguous words in the manner of a Talmudic sage: “Aside from getting married, there’s only one other really stupid thing a person can do in his or her life: get divorced. But the greatest stupidity of all is to regret it.”) “At night I put wax balls in my ears,” I said. “And a black blindfold over my eyes. I took sleeping pills and drank. When I woke up, my bed seemed like a grave. I thought that I would never sit down at a typewriter again.”
“You’ll write much more,” said Jurij Golec. “But in my case. You once said that you were on friendly terms with some Yugoslav gangsters in Montparnasse. You could procure a pistol for me with their help. She changed her will in the hospital. She considered my behavior of late. ”
At that point the telephone rang. He started conversing with someone in German.
Why the hell had I told him about my encounters with those “Yugoslav gangsters” in Montparnasse? I wondered. Besides, he’d blown it out of proportion. They were for the most part friends from my high school years, and when I got together with them, they were hardly packing any weapons. Or, at any rate, I never saw any in their possession. They just told me stories. About a guy who’d just come out of Le Select, or about someone they claimed I knew (“the tall fellow with the moustache”), since we had sat at the same table the day before yesterday. This man had gotten stabbed to death the other day at the Place Pigalle. Yet another guy killed two Corsicans with his pistol a few days earlier. Or he had been shot dead himself — I don’t remember anymore. A third got eight years: for smuggling weapons, and robbery, and pimping.
“One of my friends,” Jurij Golec said when he returned to the table. “Hasn’t left his house for ten years now. He tried to kill himself; the Metro took off both his legs above the knee. He lives on the eighth floor, but he lacks the courage to try it again. He drinks. Takes pills. And waits for death. Is that how you all want it to be for me?”
“I’ll get a pistol for you,” I said. “A year from now. On May 8, 1983. I have experience with things like this.”
“In a year?” he said. “I won’t be able to stand it for a month. Not for a week.”
“In a year, in the event that you still have need of one.”
“I thought you were different from the French. But you’re just like all the rest. You don’t understand me either. Why should I. ”
“Because you survived the camps.” (He had a number tattooed on his forearm.) “That’s why. Someone who’s lived through the camps. ”
“Leave the camps out of this,” said Jurij Golec. “Compared to this, the camp was a joy. Even Raoul, that unfortunate creature without legs, survived the camps.”
We were already on the second bottle of cabernet sauvignon. It was then that I noted the wine was going to my head and that I was hungry; all I’d had for breakfast was coffee. I suggested we go out for a bite to eat. Or we could have a proper lunch together. I was sure he hadn’t eaten anything.
“I’ll take you someplace,” he said. “Let’s go eat, somewhere close by. I have to be back here by five at the latest. A couple of people are coming by. And the clerks from the court could show up at any time. Oh, for the day when all these formalities are complete!”
We walk through the passage and come out on the boulevard. The air is cool, although from time to time the sun breaks through the clouds. One can feel spring’s incremental victory; the tables have been put out on the sidewalks; the women are sitting facing the sun, with their eyes closed and skirts pulled halfway up their thighs. A black man in shorts swishes past us on roller skates and then zips across the street. I watch as he goes out of sight into the Jardin du Luxembourg; on the gilded tips of the fence around the park the sun is leaving blood-red traces, like on some gaudy painting in the Louvre.
The restaurant has been recently renovated, and it still smells new. Lamps with red shades and gold tassels hang in the booths. Paper tablecloths cover the plastic tables. In the vases, artificial flowers, and next to them, in a metal rack, the holy trinity of French cuisine: salt-pepper-mustard.
In one of the alcoves, the restaurant owners are dining, a heavy blonde woman with painted fingernails and a corpulent red-faced man with a little moustache. With large knives they are slicing up bloody steaks. A bottle of red wine, unlabeled, stands on the table before them; the bottle is imprinting the paper tablecloth with red half-circles.
They greet us with handshakes.
“Ça va?”
“Ça va,” says Jurij Golec.
“How’s Madame?” asks the proprietress.
“She has died,” says Jurij Golec.
The owner takes a swallow of wine.
“But it hasn’t even been a week since Madame was here,” he says.
“Mon Dieu, mon Dieu. Automobile accident?”
“Leukemia,” says Jurij Golec. “We’d like something to eat.”
“Have a seat there,” the owner says, pointing to a table with his knife. “Or there. Gaston! Bring these gentlemen a menu. Yes, such is life. It just seems as if Madame had sat here only yesterday. Right there where you are sitting now. I’m afraid we’re out of menus d’hors. It’s three o’clock. I recommend you get the roast beef. Gaston!”
“Chicken for me,” Jurij Golec says. “With fries. And a salad. She’s been dead a month already.”
“And what will your friend be having?”
“An omelet,” I say. “And a carafe of red wine.”
“None for me,” Jurij Golec says. “I don’t drink.”
“Madame always took such good care of herself,” says the proprietress. “Only ate healthy things. Eggs, fish, vegetables. And lots of carrots. Gaston, bring the man a fork.”