best course, he felt, was to circle about her softly, slowly, until he could determine her tastes and prejudices.
He groomed himself carefully, shaving although he had shaved that morning. He used a women’s cologne,
He left early to walk over to her apartment. It wasn’t far, and it was a pleasant evening.
His loose topcoat was a black lightweight British gabardine, styled with raglan sleeves, a fly front, and slash pockets. The pockets, in the British fashion, had an additional opening through the coat fabric so that the wearer did not have to unbutton his coat to reach his trouser or jacket pockets but could shove his hand inside the concealed coat openings for tickets, wallet, keys, change, or whatever.
Now, strolling toward Celia Montfort’s apartment through the sulfur-laden night, Daniel Blank reached inside his coat pocket to feel himself. To the passer-by, he was an elegant gentleman, hand thrust casually into coat pocket. But beneath the coat…
Once, shortly after he was separated from Gilda, he had worn the same coat and walked through Times Square on a’ Saturday night. He had slipped his hand into the pocket opening, unzipped his fly, and held himself exposed beneath the loose coat as he moved through the throng, looking into the faces of passersby.
Celia Montfort lived in a five-story greystone townhouse. The door bell was of a type he had read about but never encountered before. It was a bell-pull, a brass knob that is drawn out, then released. The bell is sounded as the knob is pulled and as it is released to return to its socket. Daniel Blank admired its polish and the teak door it ornamented…
…A teak door that was opened by a surprisingly tall man, pale, thin, wearing striped trousers and a shiny black alpaca jacket. A pink sweetheart rose was in his lapel. Daniel was conscious of a scent: not his own, but something heavier and fruitier.
“My name is Daniel Blank,” he said. “I believe Miss Montfort is expecting me.”
“Yeth, thir,” the man said, holding wide the door. “I am Valenter. Do come in.”
It was an impressive entrance: marble-floored with a handsome staircase curving away. On a slender pedestal was a crystal vase of cherry-colored mums. He had been right: she did like long-stemmed flowers.
“Pleath wait in the thudy. Mith Montfort will be down thoon.”
His coat and hat were taken and put away somewhere. The tall, skinny man came back to usher him into a room paneled with oak and leather-bound books.
“Would you care for a drink, thir?”
Soft flames flickering in a tiled fireplace. Reflections on the polished leather of a tufted couch. On the mantel, unexpectedly, a beautifully detailed model of a Yankee whaler. Andirons and fireplace tools of black iron with brass handles. “Please. A vodka martini on the rocks.”
Drapes of heavy brocade. Rugs of-what? Not Oriental. Greek perhaps? Or Turkish? Chinese vases filled with blooms. An Indian paneled screen, all scrolled with odd, disturbing figures. A silvered cocktail shaker of the Prohibition Era. The room had frozen in 1927 or 1931.
“Olive, thir, or a twitht of lemon?”
Hint of incense in the air. High ceiling and, between the darkened beams, painted cherubs with dimpled asses. Oak doors and window mouldings. A bronze statuette of a naked nymph pulling a bow. The “string” was a twisted wire. “Lemon, please.”
An art nouveau mirror on the papered wall. A small oil nude of a middle-aged brunette holding her chin and glancing downward at sagging breasts with bleared nipples. A tin container of dusty rhododendron leaves. A small table inlaid as a chessboard with pieces swept and toppled. And in a black leather armchair, with high, embracing wings, the most beautiful boy Daniel Blank had ever seen.
“Hello,” the boy said.
“Hello,” he smiled stiffly. “My name is Daniel Blank. You must be Anthony.”
“Tony.”
“Tony.”
“May I call you Dan?”
“Sure.”
“Can you lend me ten dollars, Dan?”
Blank, startled, looked at him more closely. The lad had his knees drawn up, was hugging them, his head tilted to one side.
His beauty was so unearthly it was frightening. Clear, guileless blue eyes, carved lips, a bloom of youth and wanting, sculpted ears, a smile that tugged, those crisp golden curls long enough to frame face and chiselled neck. And an aura as rosy as the cherubs that floated overhead.
“It’s awful, isn’t it,” the boy said, “to ask ten dollars from a complete stranger, but to tell you the truth-”
Blank was instantly alert, listening now and not just looking. It was his experience that when someone said “To tell the truth-” or “Would I lie to you?” the man was either a liar, a cheat, or both.
“You see,” Tony said with an audacious smile. “I saw this absolutely marvelous jade pin. I know Celia would love it.”
“Of course,” Blank said. He took a ten dollar bill from his wallet. The boy made no move toward him. Daniel was forced to walk across the room to hand it to him.
“Thanks so much,” the youth said languidly. “I get my allowance the first of the month. I’ll pay you back.”
He paid then, Blank knew, all he was ever going to pay: a dazzling smile of such beauty and young promise that Daniel was fuddled by longing. The moment was saved of souring by the entrance of Valenter, carrying the martini not on a tray but in his hand. When Blank took it, his fingers touched Valenter’s. The evening began to spin out of control.
She came in a few moments later, wearing an evening shift styled exactly like the black satin she had been wearing when he first met her. But this one was in a dark bottle green, glimmering. About her neck was a heavy silver chain, tarnished, supporting a pendant: the image of a beast-god. Mexican, Blank guessed.
“I went to Samarra to meet a poet,” she said, speaking as she came through the door and walked steadily toward him. “I once wrote poetry. Did I tell you? No. But I don’t anymore. I have talent, but not enough. The blind poet in Samarra is a genius. A poem is a condensed novel. I imagine a novelist must increase the significance of what he writes by one-third to one-half to communicate all of his meaning. You understand? But the poet, so condensed, must double or triple what he wants to convey, hoping the reader will extract from this his full meaning.”
Suddenly she leaned forward and kissed him on the lips while Valenter and the boy looked on gravely.
“How are you?” she asked.
Valenter brought her a glass of red wine. She was seated next to Blank on the leather sofa. Valenter stirred up the fire, added another small log, went to stand behind the armchair where Anthony coiled in flickering shadow.
“I think the Mortons’ party will be amusing,” he offered. “A lot of people. Noisy and crowded. But we don’t have to stay long.”
“Have you ever smoked hashish?” she asked.
He looked nervously toward the young boy.
“I tried it once,” he said in a low voice. “It didn’t do anything for me. I prefer alcohol.”
“Do you drink a lot?”
“No.”
The boy was wearing white flannel bags, white leather loafers, a white knitted singlet that left his slim arms bare. He moved slowly, crossing his legs, stretching, pouting. Celia Montfort turned her head to look at him. Did a signal pass?
“Tony,” she said.
Immediately Valenter put a hand tenderly on the boy’s shoulder.
“Time for your lethon, Mathter Montfort,” he said.
