Aslan Norval Read online

  “I like you,” she said. “Really, I like you. It’s a shame.”

  “What’s a shame?”

  “That I am not forty years old. I think I could get along with you extremely well.”

  “Do you know how old I am? I’m fifty-five.”

  “That’s about what I thought. I’m twenty-four.”

  “You’re twenty-four and have so much responsibility and such a highly paid position in the film industry?”

  “Why not? Twenty-four is also a very nice age. But not very enjoyable. You lack experience,” she said, tossing out a sigh like a fifteen-year-old with a crush.

  She’s so young, thought Holved. I would love to know whether she is married, divorced, or widowed. If she were married she wouldn’t have to work, at least not such a stressful job.

  Out loud he said: “It appears, miss, that you are constantly traveling to all corners of the country.”

  “Not constantly but quite often. Almost as much as a businessman.”

  She started to get up, tugged on her dress, and said in a changed tone: “I think I’ll walk around a little to stretch my legs. When you sit for such a long time you forget that you even have legs and can walk.”

  He nodded. She got up and began walking up and down the length of the plane. When she returned about ten minutes later, to sit back down in her seat, Holved was sleeping restfully and seemingly without a worry in the world. His book on ancient Toltec architecture was lying open on his knees. Both his hands were covering the book as if to prevent someone from taking it while he slept. She studied his face for quite a while. It gave her a certain satisfaction that she could study him unobtrusively for such a long time.

  It’s strange, she thought, you can recognize a person’s character on their sleeping face. When they’re awake they’re constantly hiding behind fake smiles, always frowning, squinting, pulling on their hair or earlobes.

  As she watched him sleep so peacefully, she came to the conclusion that he looked much better, kinder, friendlier while sleeping than awake. He also looked younger without the tension in his face.

  He is, she said to herself, completely different from all those worms that crawl around in the film industry. They’re constantly excited, constantly in a hurry, and everything has to be done that second. They always rush, swear, and stammer apologies. They can’t ever be sure that they will still have the same job twenty-four hours from now. That goes for me too. Everyone is your friend if the boss likes you. And everyone gets overlooked if the boss or one of his protégés looks at you funny. Constant fear that you might lose your daily bread or the house you bought a year ago … Of course, she continued to herself, as far as I’m concerned, they need me more than I need them.

  Contentedly, she snuggled into the pillow that smelled of fresh detergent. The stewardess had pushed it behind her back. With one last glance at the calmly sleeping man next to her, she went to sleep, wishing that she could slumber as peacefully and without worry as he did.

  She woke as the stewardess was passing from passenger to passenger with a trained glance, making sure that their seat belts had been tightened and that all cigarettes, cigars, and pipes had been extinguished. The loudspeaker squeaked something no one could understand, but every experienced traveler knew what was being announced. Not that it mattered whether they did or not, since they could not influence the plane or its movements at all. They were human beings, once again conscious of their dignity as they used both feet to walk to the exit across the hard concrete floor of the airport.

  Each one of the travelers was now very happy that the journey was over.

  Side by side, and clad in light spring coats, Holved and the young lady of the film company’s review board waited for their luggage at baggage claim.

  “Honestly, miss, it was a pleasure to have such a kind and pretty passenger at my side,” said Holved suddenly.

  “And I,” she answered, “could not have wished for a more interesting person as my travel companion than you, Mr.—Mr.—?”

  “My name is Suthers, Holved Suthers. I never carry my cards with me. But—” He pulled out a notebook, tore out a page, wrote a few numbers on it, and gave her the page.

  “My private address and my private phone, if I can ever be of service to you.”

  “My name is Aslan Norval,” she said. “I am reachable at—please hand me your pen and a piece of paper.”

  She hurried to write a few numbers on the piece of paper.

  “The first number connects you through to my office and the second one to my apartment,” she said, giving Holved his pen and the paper she had written on. “You can’t find either of these numbers in the phone book. Strictly private.”

  At that moment, they both received their luggage. Almost abruptly, two different porters separated them, hailing two different taxis that left in two different directions.

  6.

  Beckford had shaved just an hour ago and wore a well-brushed suit that he had bought more than a year ago. His shirt was stiff with starch, and he wore a long dark brown tie with it. His shoes were polished to perfection and had new rubber soles. He stood like that in front of the iron gate of a large villa surrounded by a huge parklike garden and a tall steep wall.

  He pulled out a pocket comb and tiny mirror and carefully brushed his hair. Since he never wore a hat, it had gotten pretty messed up on the way from the bus stop. Again, he looked at the bronze number attached to the concrete post of the iron gate to verify for the fifth time that this was indeed the house to which he had been invited for an early dinner.

  Next to the bronze number was a small yellow button. Underneath was a thin small arrow pointing to the right where a narrow iron door led to the front garden. Above the bronze arrow, he saw a small aristocratic-looking bronze sign with a name engraved in black letters.

  “Suthers,” he read. Nothing else.

  “So that is her name,” he said to himself. “It’s about time I figure it out. Suthers. That can mean all kinds of things. Maybe it’s her name. Maybe it’s the name of her rich impotent husband. The one she wants to get rid of with my help to cash in on his life insurance. Probably six or seven million. And then she’ll go have fun somewhere in Europe with gigolos or impoverished dukes. Who knows? Of course, I can still pull out. I will just say that I am not doing this. And go my merry way.”

  He really did walk just then, venturing around the entire estate so as to plan an escape route in case the lady had her henchmen at the ready to get him to comply. He walked along the front of the estate, to the right and then to the left.

  So, this is where the multimillionaires spend their nights. During the day, they can’t even enjoy this display of wealth. They have to hoard money so they don’t lose their precious castles. It’s some kind of life, I guess! he philosophized.

  In the meantime, he had returned to the iron gate and stood there hesitating for quite a while before he finally decided to press the yellow button.

  I would love to know whether this button is plastic or ivory. Probably ivory. Plastic is for the proletariat. I’m not even part of the proletariat. I’m nothing, I’m just hanging around. Who knows, the lady might be fun to play with after all. Why not? Nice curves. Dressed in velvet and silk. Sexy perfume.

  To his right the buzzer sounded with a melody, as the thin arrow under the yellow button glowed.

  Beckford noticed that the narrow iron door next to the wide gate had opened as if by a ghost. He entered the front garden. Three steps later, he turned and noticed that the door had already closed behind him.

  For several seconds he looked at the door. Goddamn it, now I’m trapped. The door opens and closes automatically. Probably triggered by my own shadow.

  He walked back toward the door, but it remained closed.

  Okay, so now it’s electronic magic. They control it from inside the house.

  He estimated the height of the iron gate and the tall, steep wall made of brownstone that surrounded the park. If she thinks t
his gate and wall can keep me here, well, my dear, you’ve got another think coming. In miserable, unforgettable Korea, where it was always a question of life or death, I jumped over walls twice as high as this one.

  He crossed the large front garden and found the entrance door to the house wide open. A Negro dressed in black pants, a brown leather vest, and long green sleeves greeted him.

  “This way, please, sir,” the servant said, inviting Beckford with a slight movement of his hand to follow him.

  He opened a door in the back of the spacious entrance hall, allowed Beckford to enter, and closed the door soundlessly behind him.

  “Excellent, wonderful that you’ve arrived so early, Mr. Beckford,” the lady said in greeting. She got up from an armchair by the large floor-to-ceiling window and walked toward him with an outstretched hand.

  She is probably expecting that I kiss her hand like in the movies, he thought. As rudely as possible, he let her come toward him longer than any well-mannered man would have dared. But he had never claimed to be a man with good manners, let alone well educated, except for the education he had received in the Marine Corps.

  He knew that such behavior was not proper, especially with regard to such an elegant lady and in such a fancy house, but he told himself: While I was rolling in dirt, mud, and blood in Korea for years, this little doll cuddled in silk beds and dedicated herself to all kinds of fun and entertainment. No one asked me about good manners and hand kisses when the Chinks attacked us, howling like wolves with a sound so piercing that it froze your spinal-cord fluid and burst your eardrums. Slaughter them, goddamn it, slaughter them or you will be slaughtered yourself! Good manners. Hand kisses. It’s all worth shit if you don’t know whether you’ll be breathing ten seconds later.”

  In the meantime, the lady offered him an armchair, which she pushed closer to her own. She laughed at him intimately. Good God, he thought, she has beautiful teeth! They seem to be real. And with her open laugh she might get me after all, one day when I feel especially sentimental. But not so fast, my dear. First, let’s put all the cards on the table and let’s see who has the trump card.

  “Finally, we can talk with more privacy,” she said, interrupting his thoughts.

  The Negro rolled a small cart into the salon. Spread across three tiers were bottles and glasses, tongs, little bowls with ice cubes, nuts, and a large selection of tiny thin toast slices topped with caviar, anchovies, and Roquefort cheese.

  With a somber expression, the Negro rolled the cart close to the lady’s side and then disappeared mysteriously through a side door, which Beckford had not noticed before. It opened and closed without a touch.

  “Whiskey? Cognac? Bourbon? Napoleon? Tequila? Jamaica? Vodka? Aquavit? Gin? Bénédictine? Bols? Dubonnet? What would you like?” asked the lady with a smile.

  She probably thinks she is captivating,” he thought. But she can’t captivate me.

  “Scotch, please.”

  She filled his glass halfway.

  “With soda? Or with a chaser?”

  “Neat, please.”

  She filled a small glass with curaçao. Lifting her glass slightly, she said: “This is how it’s done.”

  Laughing loudly, she added: “Mud in your eye. It’s a vulgar toast, but sometimes it feels good to use a vulgarity. It’s like a sigh of relief, like after a dance when you take off a pair of shoes one size too small.”

  He drank half of his glass at once.

  “I don’t see anything unusual in using vulgar words. It’s actually the only language I speak, with the exception of a few Korean phrases and the Greek alphabet, which I had to learn in the Technical Institute to understand the elements of mathematics. It can’t be taught in English but only in Greek.”

  “Now wait a minute! This thing with the Greek alphabet is fantastic. You can show off with that, especially in the right circles, chimpanzees who want to invest millions but don’t know where and how to do it. I urge you to practice the Greek alphabet up and down and add a dozen Latin and French phrases, they won’t know the difference. You’ll leave a huge impression. You can wrap anyone around your little finger if you have a rich vocabulary. You don’t even need to know the exact meaning of the words you are rattling off. The effect is stunning. I’ve used this trick in Hollywood again and again. There’s no place where it works better than among the guys of the film industry.”

  Surprised, Beckford looked up, taking the lady seriously for the first time.

  “In the film industry, you say?”

  “Yes, in the film industry.”

  “I have never read your name anywhere. I have also never seen you in a movie,” he said, hemming and hawing.

  “Of course you couldn’t have read my name anywhere because you don’t even know my name.”

  “That’s right, very true. You have never told me your name.”

  “Aslan Norval.”

  “Aslan Norval?” he repeated, looking as if he were trying to remember whether he had ever heard the name and if so in which context. “Aslan Norval?” he said again. “I have really never heard it.”

  “You couldn’t have. I belonged to the army of people who work behind the scenes and are therefore unknown. The public only knows about those who dance around in front of the camera. Nevertheless, in many cases, my work was more important to a good movie than that of the actress. You can make a film, even a very good film, without actors and especially without professional actors. But to date, not a single film has been made without the crew behind the scenes. They’re the ones who work so hard that they tear out their hair in despair and get nervous breakdowns. I belonged to that crowd.”

  “Belonged? Not anymore?” asked Beckford, looking at her as if he were seeing a completely new person.

  “No, not anymore. Since I got married, about three years ago. Sometimes, I feel nostalgic for the time I spent working in movies.”

  “Unhappy marriage? Is that why?”

  As soon as he asked, he realized again why he was in this house and what this woman expected of him.

  “Unhappy marriage? Me? You guessed wrong. Completely wrong. I’m happily married. I’m blessed that I met this man, my husband, and that he married me.”

  “So, then you are not planning to—”

  He coughed then so he wouldn’t say anything wrong.

  “Planning to what? What are you talking about?”

  “I—I—I thought—that maybe you—um—wanted to get a divorce.”

  “You thought I wanted a divorce? But my dear, you didn’t even know that I was married until a second ago. How could you think about a possible divorce?”

  “Well, it’s not unheard of to guess something like that about a beautiful young woman like yourself, who always drives around alone in her car and invites a man her own age all over the place and gives him all kinds of presents.”

  “Invites a man all over the place? Just once, to an Arab restaurant! And here today. In my house. And presents? Oh, you mean the office, right?”

  “Exactly. The office. You might consider that a present, don’t you think?”

  “The office! Oh, the office. If you only knew what that office means to me.”

  “Well, what does it mean?”

  “It’s hard to explain. It’s pretty complicated. If everything goes as planned, you might understand later tonight why I need that office.”

  “Your husband is obviously very rich.”

  “Very. He earned it all with his vision, energy, and enterprising spirit. Everything he touches turns to gold.”

  “You too, when he touches you?” Beckford grinned, because he thought he had shown her he could be funny.

  “Yes, me too, if you must know.”

  “Is he good-looking?”

  “Not particularly. To me he’s the best-looking man in the world, of course.”

  “Young?”

  “Depends what you consider young. To me, he’s young.”

  “Okay, so he’s old. Just like I thoug
ht.”

  “As you wish. But if you’re thinking that I’m planning an affair with you for whatever reason, then you’re way off, really way off.”

  Indifferently, or at least in a tone that he thought would imply that he was not interested, he replied: “That may be. But admittedly, I thought I could compete for your love one day.”

  “My love? And to you my love is probably just good enough to brighten your dreary daily life. My love is worth more than that, I think. Don’t try to get romantic. At least not with me. That’s not your role at all. You would do better playing a wrestler.”

  “I never thought of being romantic. Believe me.”

  “Maybe I’ll even believe that you seriously considered competing for my love. A second whiskey?”

  “Yes, please, ma’am.”

  He looked at his drink for a long time, turning the glass around in his hands without taking a sip. His eyes focused on the glass, he said quietly: “Yes, it’s true. I thought you were an easy conquest and that all I’d have to do is take your hand in mine as I am holding this glass right now. Given the way you were offering yourself to me—”

  “Offering myself? Now, wait a minute! You’re saying I offered myself to you? I never considered doing that even for one second.”

  “A misunderstanding again. It seems I express myself rather clumsily, since every time I say something you misunderstand me. When I said offering yourself, I meant the way you sought my friendship from day one and saddled me with that breathtaking office.”

  “Saddled you! Good God, you really do use the weirdest expressions. The fact that I am interested in you and want to help you doesn’t mean that I expect you to start an affair with me out of gratitude. I may have my own reasons why I’m intensely interested in you, but it never had anything to do with love.”

  Her own reasons, he thought. So, it’s the husband she wants to get rid of after all.