chair, his knees higher. They looked wrinkled, suddenly loose, in contrast now with his spotless, gleaming shoes with their too-smooth soles (an accident waiting to happen, Mrs Berry had been rather inattentive there), if his socks continued on their downward path, his shins would be left uncovered. And if that happened, I might have to point it out to him, he would be displeased at this unnoticed fault, he who was always so particular, so impeccably dressed, even though I was the sole witness and the only one who could point it out.
'Well, if you must know, I wouldn't hold out any hope for that couple at all, things seem distinctly unpromising for your friend Tupra. The last thing she looks like is someone's latest girlfriend. On the contrary, it's as if she was with him out of laziness or routine or because she had nothing better or worse to do, which seems a very strange attitude to take if theirs is a new relationship. The impression I had was precisely one of over-familiarity and lassitude, as if they were old flames,' I said, 'who are still on good terms, but who know everything there is to know about each other and very soon reach saturation point, although they put up with each other and still feel a flicker of reciprocal nostalgia, which has more to do with their roles as representatives of their respective past lives. It was as if, how can I put it, Tupra had turned to her so as not to have to come to the party alone, you know the kind of arrangement. And that strikes me as odd in someone of his appearance and style, you wouldn't think he was a man who would have difficulty finding company, and very beautiful company at that. And if he was the one doing her a favour by taking her out, it still doesn't make sense, since, as I said, Beryl was clearly bored, almost as if she had been obliged to come, as part of an agreement, perhaps, yes, almost as if she had been forced to be here. She didn't even seem bothered about making a good impression on his friends, assuming those people are his friends. In the early stages of a relationship, you seek the approval of the other person's cat, or their canary, or their chiropodist, even the milkman. You make a continual effort to get on with your beloved's entire circle of friends, however repugnant her world might be. And I didn't see her making the slightest effort. She wasn't even trying.'
Wheeler studied the fit end of his cigar, holding it very close to his eyes, whose metallic gleam was brighter than the burning ember; he blew on it to stir it into life, his cigar wasn't drawing well or so he pretended; and without looking at me, feigning an indifference he doubtless did not feel, he urged me to continue. But although he kept his eyes from me, I saw his very white, smooth eyebrows pucker with pleasure, and in his voice I noticed a contained excitement and disquiet, the feelings of someone putting another person to the test and who can see, as the test proceeds, that the person is likely to acquit themselves well (though he still waits with fingers crossed, not yet daring to claim victory).
'Really,' he said, not quite making that word into a question. 'Like old flames, eh? And she came here
'I don't know that I can tell you much more, Peter, I didn't talk much to either of them, and I spoke to both of them separately, just the usual formalities with her and a few minutes spent talking to him, I didn't see them together. Why all this interest? Actually I have a few questions of my own to ask about Tupra, you still haven't explained why you talked to me about him for so long on the phone the other day. Did you know that he's offered me a job if I get fed up with the BBC? I don't even know what he does. He suggested I talk to you, by the way. That I consult with you. I assume you know about it. And presumably you'll tell me when you're ready to, Peter. At first sight, though, he seems a very pleasant fellow. With the ability to…' I hesitated: it wasn't an ability to seduce, or to intimidate, or to proselytise, although he was capable of doing all those things, 'to dominate, don't you think? What does he do, what's his field?'
'We'll talk about Tupra tomorrow over breakfast. And possibly about that job.' Wheeler wasn't being bossy, but his tone of voice did not really allow for objection or protest. 'Tell me more about Beryl, about her and Tupra. Go on.' And he indicated the idea on which I should focus. 'Old flames, well, well…' We were talking in English and he was pointing the way ahead, as if urging me on ('you're getting warmer') in the middle of deciphering a riddle. 'Representatives of their respective past lives, you say. Of their respective pasts.'
I was sure now that Wheeler was putting me through a test, but I had no idea why, or what the test was, I didn't know either if I wanted to pass the test, whatever it was. Confronted by that feeling of being examined, however, we all instinctively feel a need to pass, simply because it's a challenge, and still more if the person assessing and judging us is someone we admire. But I felt uneasy working in the dark. It obviously had to do with Tupra and with Beryl, and probably with the informal or hypothetical offer of work that Tupra had made me when he said goodbye, I had taken the offer as a kindness on his part or as a last-minute desire to make himself seem important, although such vain boasts didn't really fit with Tupra, he didn't seem to need them, that was more in De la Garza's line. In the mouth of Rafita the attache – the great dolt, the great dunderhead, the berk – they would doubtless have been mere empty words. I couldn't fathom Wheeler's ins and outs and meanderings, unless they were simply intended to amuse him and to intrigue me, he could, after all, speak openly to me. I understood that he was going to do so the following morning during breakfast, to each thing its chosen or allotted time, he would make a decision based on the crumbling, dwindling time of his old age, but then again whose time is not dwindling? So I obliged him, I let myself be drawn out, although I really didn't have much else to add: I invented a little, embellishing and elaborating on what I had already said, dragging things out, I possibly invented too much. I noticed that Wheeler's socks or knee socks (they had started out below the knee, like the socks I wear) had slid a little further down, from where I was sitting I could already see a narrow band of brown skin, now that I thought of it, his colour and complexion were more southern than English. He was holding his walking-stick with his two clenched fists one above the other, as if it were definitely a spear, he had placed his still smouldering cigar in the ashtray, and had it not been for the pleased expression on his face, I would have said he was on pins and needles, albeit rather blunt ones, which would never have inflicted much pain.
'Yes, well, I don't know, they both seemed to be too much into doing their own thing to be a new item, which wouldn't have surprised me if they'd been a battle-hardened couple, in a marriage where the excitement has become so faded and worn that it's basically well past its sell-by date, except when the couple are left alone with nothing to keep them amused, and even then. You, of course, didn't have time to experience that, with your brief marriage all those years ago, but you must have noticed such things: there is a terrible moment, a moment of tacit grief, in almost every such marriage, in which all it takes is for a third person to be present, anyone will do, even a taxi driver with his back to them, for either the wife or the husband to pay the other not the slightest attention. Fun is no longer ever to be found in themselves, his in her or hers in him or that of either in either, it depends who loses interest first or whether the sense of boredom is simultaneous, but it almost always ends up enveloping or affecting both if they stay together, and then neither suffers too much or only from their own disappointment or withdrawal, but during periods when that balance is lacking, this saddens one partner and irritates the other beyond words. The sad one doesn't know what to do or how to behave, trying first one thing and then another and then the opposite of each, racking their brains for ways to make themselves interesting again or to be forgiven even though they don't know what fault it is they've committed, and nothing works because they are already condemned, they try being charming or unpleasant, gentle or surly, indulgent or critical, loving or belligerent, attentive or uncouth, flattering or intimidating, understanding or impenetrable, but the result is confusion and a lot of wasted time. And the irritated partner is occasionally aware of his or her partiality and unfairness, but can do nothing to avoid it, they just feel permanently irascible, and everything about the other person gets on their nerves, and this is the ultimate proof, in personal, day-to-day life, that nothing is ever objective and that everything can be misinterpreted and distorted, that no merit or value is worth anything in itself without the recognition of another person which, more often than not, is purely arbitrary, that actions and attitudes always depend on the intention attributed to them and on the interpretation someone chooses to give them, and that without that interpretation they are nothing, they do not exist, they are either merely neutral or can, without a moment's hesitation, be denied. The most obvious truths are denied, something that has just happened and been witnessed by two people can be immediately denied by one of them, one can deny what the other has just said or heard that very moment, not yesterday or some time ago, but just the minute before. It's as if nothing mattered, nothing accrued or had weight and was, simultaneously, being destroyed, out of sheer indifference, mere uncounted, unremembered air, and grubby air at that, and it's equally maddening for both, although in a different way for each of them and more intensely so for the sad one. Until everything breaks apart. Or doesn't, and then the whole thing drags on, it's assimilated internally, while on the outside all is calm and languor, or else it's stored away and quietly, secretly rots, like something buried. And even though it's all over, the two remain together, as it seemed to me, more or less, Tupra and Beryl have stayed together.'
Wheeler clearly didn't want to lose sight of them, and I had returned to them at last after my long digression,
