“How do you mean?”
“In the West, the attitude toward death is denial. The West worships youth, lives in terror of age and disease. Most of all in terror of death. In the East it’s different. You know. You were there.”
This statement throws Kaiser off his rhythm. “How do you know that?”
“You’re a soldier. I saw it when you first came in.”
“I haven’t been a soldier for twenty-five years.”
De Becque smiles and waves his hand. “I see it in your walk, your way of watching. And since you’re American, your age tells me Vietnam.”
“I was there.”
“So. You know how it is. In America, someone gets bitten by a rattlesnake, they move heaven and earth to race to the hospital. In Vietnam, a man gets bitten by a krait, he sits down and waits to die. Death is part of life in the East. For many it’s a sweet release. That is part of what I see in the Sleeping Women. Only, the subjects aren’t Asian. They’re Occidental.”
“That’s interesting,” says Kaiser. “No one’s mentioned that interpretation before.”
De Becque touches the corner of his eye. “Everyone has eyes, young man. Not everyone can see.”
“You know that at least one of the subjects in the paintings is missing and probably dead?”
“Yes. This poor girl’s sister.”
“How do you feel about that?”
“I’m not sure I understand the question.”
“Morally, I mean. How do you feel about the fact that young women may be dying to produce these paintings?”
De Becque gives Kaiser a look of distaste. “Is that a serious question,
“Yes.”
“Such an American question. You fought in a war that cost fifty-eight thousand of your countrymen’s lives. A million Asian lives beyond that. What did those deaths buy, other than misery?”
“That’s a separate discussion.”
“You’re wrong. If nineteen women die to produce eternal art, then in the historical sense, the price was cheap. Laughable, really.”
“Unless you loved one of those women,” I say quietly.
“Quite so,” concedes de Becque. “That’s another matter entirely. I merely point out to Monsieur Kaiser that many human endeavors are begun with the knowledge that they will cost human lives. Bridges, tunnels, pharmaceutical trials, geographic exploration, and of course wars. None of these goals even approaches the importance of art.”
Kaiser’s face is reddening. “If you knew for a fact that women were being murdered to produce these paintings, and you knew the identity of the murderer, would you report him to the authorities?”
“Happily, I do not find myself in that dilemma.”
Kaiser sighs and puts down his wine. “Why wouldn’t you send your paintings to Washington for study?”
“I am a fugitive. I don’t trust governments, particularly the American government. I had many dealings with it in Indochina, and I was always disappointed. I found American officials naive, sentimental, hypocritical, and stupid.”
“That’s something, coming from a black marketeer.”
De Becque laughs. “You hate me, young soldier? For the black market? You might as well hate rainfall or cockroaches.”
“I’m no fan of the French, that’s for sure. I saw what you did in Vietnam. You were a lot worse there than we ever were.”
“We were brutal, yes, but on a small scale. The American infantry handed out chocolate bars while their air force killed civilians by the tens of thousands.”
“You were glad enough when we did it in Germany.”
“This isn’t getting us anywhere,” I cut in, giving Kaiser a sharp look. After years of traveling the world, I’ve learned to avoid conversations like this one. Most Europeans will never understand the American point of view, and even when they do, they’ll loudly condemn it. At the bottom of their fervor, I believe, lies jealousy, but there’s nothing to be gained by arguing with them. I would have thought Kaiser knew that.
“You’ve seen me in the flesh now,” I tell de Becque. “What do you think?”
His blue eyes twinkle like Maurice Chevalier’s. “I would love to see you au naturel,
“Would naked be enough? Or would naked and dead be better?”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I am a libertine. I celebrate life. But” – he holds up his glass in a silent toast – “death is always with us.”
“Did you commission the painting of my sister?”
His humor vanishes. “No.”
“Did you try to buy it?”
“I never had the chance. I never saw it.”
“Would you have known who she was?”
“I would have thought she was you.”
Kaiser says, “When did you first become aware of Ms. Glass’s existence?”
“When I saw her name beneath a photo in the
“I did that as an homage to him.”
“And a fine one it was. But a bit of a shock to those who knew him.”
“That happened to a lot of people. After a few years, I started using my full name.” Unable to focus on the task at hand, I steel myself and ask de Becque the question foremost in my mind. “What kind of man was my father?”
“In the beginning? A wide-eyed American, like a thousand others. But he had eyes to see. You only had to tell him a thing once. He had tasted little of Asia, but he was open to it all. And the Vietnamese loved him.”
“I presume that included women.”
Another Gallic gesture, this one I translate as
“Was there one woman in particular?”
“Isn’t there always? But in Jon’s case, I don’t really know.”
“Don’t you? Did he have a family over there, Monsieur de Becque? A Vietnamese family?”
“How would you feel if he did?”
“I’m not sure. I just want to know the truth.”
“You saw Li?”
“Yes.”
“She’s French-Vietnamese. They’re the most beautiful women in the world.”
“Did my father have a woman like her?”
“He was certainly exposed to them.”
“At your plantation?”
“Of course.”
De Becque is a man who speaks between the lines. I’m normally good at reading such men, but in this case I’m lost. If my father had a Vietnamese family there, why not tell me outright?
“Have you considered this?” asks de Becque. “The year your father disappeared,
“And?”
“They were the great picture magazines. That was the end of an era. Jonathan never had to live through shrinking markets, the dominance of television, the humiliating transformation of the industry in which he made his name.”
“Are you saying he had nothing to come back to?”
