“The breakdown!” Emma wipes a morsel of salmon from the corner of her mouth, takes a sip of wine and explains. “It’s hard for us all, yes! He gets into these great shouting rages, which are really quite childish, but terrify the children. They’re still very young, as you saw. However, from my point of view and from his too, I think, the withdrawals are worse than the rages. He locks himself in his study or goes wandering off along the lakeshore muttering to himself and sometimes shouting about people whom only he can see. He dreams a lot – bad nightmares! – and flails about in bed. To tell you the truth, I’m quite glad when he doesn’t sleep with me now. I’m frightened he’s going to hurt the baby.”
I watch her as she takes another mouthful of food. She is not beautiful, and yet there is a grave and tender charm about her that tugs at my heartstrings. It makes me wonder, for one poignant instant, what my own daughter looks like. I ask her:
“Is he a good father?”
“Yes. When he can be. I know that’s a silly way to put it; but he really is two people, more perhaps! One of them is a kind and loving man; the other is a dark dreamer, a kind of troubled poet, swinging all the time between hope and black despair. That’s the one I don’t like. I’m very ordinary, you see. When Carl was working at the Burgholzli and lecturing at the university, he was much better, at least for us, than he is now. There was how shall I call it? – an architecture, a structure that held him together. He had routines; he had colleagues; he had a standing place. Now he doesn’t have those things. Just when he needs them most, he doesn’t have them. I can’t supply them. I’m at the wrong stage of life. I have children tugging at my skirts all day. I’m wiping noses and treating coughs and settling nursery quarrels. I don’t have time – even if I had the talent – to sit down and help Carl work things out. Besides, I’m not sure that’s what he wants. He gets bored with people very quickly. Watch him eating an orange! He sucks the juice out and tosses the pulp and the rind away. That’s why women are so attracted to him at first and so angry afterwards.” She laughs and splutters over the wine. I reach out and wipe her lips. She pats my hand in thanks. “He gives them his whole attention, makes them feel like great, complicated romantic heroines. Then he walks away and leaves them screaming or crying into their handkerchiefs. He hates to be committed, you see. He has to spread himself to feel safe.”
I can restrain myself no longer. I have to ask:
“What about Toni? Will that happen to her, too?”
Emma takes a long swallow of wine and waits until I refill her glass. This time she has to labour a little over the answer.
“I don’t know about Toni. She’s young and attractive; so she’ll probably hold Carl longer than the others. But there’s more to her than that. She’s got a first-class mind, very subtle, very well organised, but highly imaginative, too. She writes good poetry. Carl claims, seriously, that she’s a female Goethe. That’s an exaggeration, of course. He’s just besotted with her! But she is very good. I know this sounds strange, coming from a wife, but she’s very good for Carl, too. Oh yes, she’s passionate and she enjoys sex, but that’s not what I mean. Carl is wandering in very strange country just now. Toni seems to understand the geography, to be able to hold his hand and share the experience, without getting herself lost, as Carl often does. I don’t know if that makes sense, but . . .”
It does make sense. It also disturbs me. I have to take a risk now and ask her a question she may not care to answer.
“You told me that I was very like your husband and that you weren’t sure whether that was good or bad.”
“I remember.”
“Your husband went further. He said he couldn’t continue the analysis, because he and I were dangerous to each other.”
“I think he was right. I’m glad he had sense enough to recognise it.”
“Can you explain what he meant?”
“I think I can; but please . . .” She gives me a dubious little smile and reaches out to clasp my hand in that familiar protective gesture. “Please don’t be hurt or angry. We’re friends now. I want us to stay friends. Promise?”
“I promise.”
“Well. Let’s go back to Carl. One of the things that is happening to him – and he is making it happen, too! – is that his unconscious life, all the memories, fears, hopes, fairy tales, myths and legends, everything, everything in his past, is coming to the surface. He can’t cope with the experience. It’s as if a great fountain were welling up from the deepest part of the ocean and creatures he has never seen, never dreamed of, are now swimming about on the surface. There are people, and you’re one of them, who seem to have power to unlock those mysterious fountains and set them gushing out of control. It’s not something you do deliberately. It just happens. In Carl’s case, however, it’s bad and dangerous. He can no longer shut down the fountain; he can no longer cope with the strange creatures. He’s trying to, but I think he’s making a great mistake. He’s going about it the wrong way. He’s trying to open more and more caverns in the deep. That toy village he showed you in the garden. I find that sinister. He’s trying to rebuild his childhood and his primaeval past too, stone by stone. I say it’s a terribly dangerous experiment. He claims his only hope is to make the backward journey. So you see, I’m glad you’re not going on with Carl, but I’m sorry you’re not staying with me.”
“I set no fountains gushing for you, is that it?”
“On the contrary. How often do you think I talk to anyone as I’ve talked to you tonight? I feel good with you: good and tender and loving. Oh yes! You’ve turned on a fountain; but it’s a small, happy, bubbling spring of clear sweet water.”
Suddenly, without warning, I find myself weeping quietly. The next instant she is standing by my chair holding my face against her breast, my breast against her swollen body, so that I feel, or dream I feel, the stirring of the new life she carries. She rocks me gently to and fro and croons over me:
“Have your cry. It’s good for you. Emma’s here.”
Afterwards, I ring for the waiter to remove the food and bring us coffee and brandy, because tonight, says Emma, she has the right to be a little crazy. Over the brandy she tells me:
“I’d like to do something for you, my dear.”
“What’s that?”
“I’d like to write to your daughter and ask her whether she’d consider either meeting you or at least opening a correspondence with you. I’d find the words to say, believe me. After all, you want to contact her, but you just can’t find the right way to do it. She probably feels the same; but even if nothing comes of it, you’ll feel better because you’ve tried. Will you let me do it, please?”
I cannot tell her that I shall probably not be here to see the end of the correspondence; so I agree. It is a tender thought. I am touched and grateful. I give her Gunhild’s address in Semmering. She will forward the letter to Anna Sibilla. I give her the address of Ysambard Frères in Pans. They will know where I am, dead or alive! Then I have a question for Emma: how does she propose to order her life now that she has virtually accepted a ménage à trois with Toni Wolff?
“I’ve thought about it a lot. I think I’ve got it straight in my mind – which doesn’t make it easier by any means! I’m going to go on living at Küsnacht, just as we are now. I’m not going to quarrel. I’m going to try to enjoy what is still left between Carl and me. It’s quite a lot, one way and another. I’m going to hold the family together, make sure they respect their father and that he still gives them what love and affection he can. I’ll be nice to Toni. However, a line will be drawn. The study is Carl’s territory and hers. The rest is mine. I want no invasions, no advice, no nothing! And that’s as far as I’ve gone. The rest will have to sort itself out, day by day.”
“There’s one thing you haven’t mentioned.”
“What’s that?”
“You! What are you going to do for Emma?”
“Well.” She blushes like a schoolgirl and gives an embarrassed little laugh. “I wasn’t going to mention this; but now that you’ve asked, I’m going to write a book.”
“Good for you! When do you start? What’s the book about?”
“I haven’t started it yet. It will probably take years to do. It’s about the Holy Grail, the cup or the dish – it varies, you see – that Christ used at the Last Supper. It is also said – the legend is very complicated – that Joseph of Arimathea used it to catch Christ’s blood at the crucifixion and then later carried it to Glastonbury in England. After that it was lost and the Knights of the Round Table set out to find it. The legend is everywhere in Europe. There are even versions in the East.”
“It sounds fascinating, but why you?”
“Promise you won’t laugh!”
“I promise.”
“According to the legend, the Grail search goes on in every generation. It’s a very profound symbol of our common search for happiness and contentment and inner peace. Well, I know now that my life is never going to turn out the way I dreamed it would when I was a girl. Carl is always going to be the wanderer. There will always be a Toni in his life. So, I need a hope to keep me going. I need my own Grail search, a real one but a symbolic one too! I know it sounds silly, but . . .”
I take her in my arms and hold her to me, trying to pour into her all the love I have left, trying to call back all the wasted love and pour that in too, because I know that none of it will ever be enough for the journey she has to make. Finally, To break the tension that threatens to stifle us both, I make a silly joke:
“The way we keep falling into each other’s arms, you might just as well stay the night. The bed’s big enough.”
To my surprise, she takes me quite seriously.
“Don’t think I wouldn’t like it. You’re not old enough to be my mother; but you could certainly be my big sister, and I’d love to lie in bed and talk to you and fall asleep in your arms. But my brood at home need me. I’m going to have one more tiny brandy and then go. What are you going to do with yourself – not just tomorrow, but afterwards?”
“God knows! But I’m not going to think about it tonight. I’m going to curl up and remember what a simple, lovely evening we’ve had.”
“Oh, I almost forgot!” She opens her purse and brings out an envelope with two tablets in it. “Carl gave me these as he rushed out of the house. He said you were to take them both, half an hour before bedtime, and I was to stand over you and make sure you did it. So, please, will you take them now, so I don’t have to tell lies for you?”
I do as she asks. I telephone the concierge and ask him to make sure the chauffeur is standing by and that he will accompany my guest from her front gate to the front door and wait until she is safely locked inside. This done, we sit over the last of the brandy, saying little, feeling much, not wanting to open any more doors to any more caverns, because next time we may not be so lucky. Emma’s last words to me are strange:
“I’ll write to your daughter. I’ll write to you. I won’t tell Carl. You and I will never see each other again. That’s probably a good thing, because nothing can get spoiled. I don’t know what you’ve done in your life that makes you feel so unhappy. I don’t care either. I’ve known you only one day; but I love you and I think you love me. That makes a clean start for both of us.”
We embrace. We kiss. She leaves without a backward glance. I drain the last of the brandy, throw myself on the bed in a tearless rage of grief – and tumble off the edge of the world.
I awake with a dry throat and head full of cottonwool to find Gianni di Malvasia sitting on the edge of the bed, tapping my cheeks, urging me to open my eyes and tell him my name, age and birthplace. I don’t do it very well the first time; so he makes me repeat the performance until he is satisfied. I ask drowsily:
“What brings you here?”
“Jung rang me last night. He thought you might try to do yourself in. When I saw you first, I thought you had. For God’s sake! You know better than to mix bromides and alcohol.”
“How the hell do you know what I mixed?”
“The brandy bottle’s in the lounge, half empty. And Jung told me he’d sent you two sleeping tablets for bedtime.”
“When did he tell you that?”
“This morning. I went straight from the train to his house. He told me all about yesterday and gave me his notes.”
“Oh Christ! So you know.”
“Yes.”
“Jung had no right.”
“He had every right. I’m the recommending physician. Don’t worry! I burned the notes in your fireplace. Now you’re going to bathe, dress and pack. I’m going to feed you lunch. Then we take a three o’clock train back to Paris.”
“I’m not going to Paris!”
“Where are you going then?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t worked it out. Rome, perhaps.”
“I’m your doctor. I’ve worked it out. You’re coming to Paris. You’re going to stay with me for a while.”
“I am not going to Paris!”
“Then, dear girl, here is what will happen. The good Doctor Jung and I will sign a paper that declares you a suicidal depressive and gets you committed – presto! presto! to the Burgholzli Clinic, until you are restored to sanity. That’s all it takes, two signatures. Well?”
“So we go to Paris.”
“Good. There’s hope for you yet.”
“And what am I supposed to do in Paris? How do I cope with Zaharoff?”
“You leave Zaharoff to me. At the moment he’s suffering from an inflamed prostate; so he’s not going to be chasing you or anyone else for a little while. As to what you do in Paris, we’ll talk about that when we get there. If you’re willing to gamble some money and some effort, I’ve got just the project for you. It will take your mind off all your other problems.”
“Including murder?” I have to be sure he knows; and he does. He deals with it in a very offhand fashion.
“The murder’s not the problem. It’s done; but it doesn’t show on the balance sheet. It’s history or myth, whichever way you want to plead it; but nothing can be proved. The real problem is what the murder has done to you. That’s what our friend Jung couldn’t handle. He’s given up the God of his father. Now he doesn’t know whether he’s deist, theist or the High Panjandrum of Ying Yang. I’m a practical fellow whose ancestors – Florentine snobs all of them . . .”
“Oh, shut up, Gianni!”
“. . . Whose ancestors made a lively art out of assassination. They dealt with the aftermath very tidily, too. The family chaplain gave you absolution. Your uncle the bishop sold you indulgences to keep you out of purgatory and, as part of the bargain, provided you with some friendly surveillance by the city watch, so that the other side didn’t knife you in an alley. However, that’s all water under the bridge. We’re off to Paris. Get up and take a bath. There are two smells I can’t stand on a woman – stale perfume and stale alcohol!”