Wouldn’t that be a perfect ending? It’s not the way it happened, but it made me feel so good to say it: All is forgiven.
I don’t know where I got my lack of mercy, my suspicious nature, my inability to forgive, even when I say I have. My mother wasn’t especially angry or suspicious, so it must have been my father, whom, as you know, I met as a wee child, but about whom I have no recollection except for my mother’s descriptions of his heroism in battle and his sacrificial death. The white cross on his grave in Bayeux: John Smythe (I added the Weatherby to give myself a little more panache) 1918–1945. I don’t know why I let things fester in my soul, but I do.
I ate my oatmeal and banana and sipped my tea and watched it snow from the cozy warmth of the bunkhouse kitchen. Matt and Suzie were already over in the main house, stoking fires and preparing breakfast for the house-guests, who’d spent a lively evening at the Caribou Club and slept soundly, oblivious to the first act of a dashing little real-life drama being played out in the basement. William had been up and gone to work before I emerged from my room, where I’d spent a restless, tortured night. It would take me ages to recover from his duplicity. I didn’t care if he was a crook, I used to be one myself. But he was a liar. Oh, hell, what am I saying? I’m a liar, too. I bit into a slice of dry toast.
At eight o’clock, I balanced a breakfast tray on one hand and knocked softly on Madam’s bedroom door.
“Come in,” she called.
Snow-flattened morning light made the room feel cold in spite of the fact that all the lights were on and the fire had already been stoked to a roaring blaze. She and Armand were sitting in bed, covers to their waists, with CNN on the television. Armand’s chest was well-muscled, tan, and hairless. He was wearing his glasses and reading the Wall Street Journal, which William had dropped at the door earlier. Madam had on the lace-trimmed nightgown that matched the peignoir.
“Good morning, Madam,” I said with a jauntiness I did not feel. “Sir. Good night’s sleep?”
“You aren’t going to believe this, Nigel, but guess what I’m doing today?” she asked.
“I could not begin to guess, Madam.”
“Going skiing.”
“Wonderful,” I answered. “Seems a perfect day for it. It’s only twenty or thirty below and snowing.” I poured her coffee into a plain white breakfast cup.
The dynamics among us had changed, as they obviously had to. We now knew so much about each other, it was as if we’d been transformed or melded into an accidental family, or a gang of thieves, of highwaymen, desperadoes on the lam, hunted, fearful, and suspicious of everything and everyone, including and perhaps especially, each other. I tried to pretend it hadn’t happened, tried to act as though everything was the way it had been before our wrenching discoveries, but I was still weepy and slightly afraid of what Armand would do. Apparently my phony good spirits were obvious because Armand read them perfectly and very kindly sought to reassure me.
“Nigel, we opened up a lot of doors last night, and there’s no going back. We know more about each other than many friends do after years and years. We can either accept what we’ve learned and choose to hold together, work together, enjoy each other, and grow closer, as we were beginning to do before our revelations, or we can choose anxiety and mistrust, and destroy all our lives.” He reached over and took Madam’s hand. “Your Madam and I talked all night, and we realized that in spite of our counterfeit beginnings, what we feel for each other is genuine.”
It could be argued that Armand was overheated, still at that stage of infatuation where he would say whatever it took to get what he wanted, to get between Madam’s legs. But on the other hand, Armand wasn’t a child, nor was he inexperienced. In spite of his kind, generous words, he had been manipulated, duped, and one of these days when things cooled to mere boiling, he was going to figure that out and then we’d see where we were. Like Koebler-Ross’s five stages of grieving, he was still in denial, but anger and then revenge were just around the corner.
“I’m delighted, sir. Very relieved.”
“Armand’s going to teach me to ski.” Always the chameleon, I thought. Love me, love me, love me. What can I do to get you to love me? I’ll do anything.
“You’re a brave man, sir.” I handed him a cup of coffee and smiled.
The guests were suited up and gone at ten, just as Armand had recommended the night before. And since I had no household duties and my one assignment—finding out whether the stolen paintings were there, a question to which I still didn’t have what I considered to be a satisfactory answer—had been suspended by mutual agreement, I decided to explore the town.
“Will you let me buy you lunch?” William asked as I pulled on my brand new Sorel boots and prepared to walk down the hill.
“No thanks,” I said.
“Are you ever going to forgive me?”
“Not likely.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You should be.”
“I hope you’ll change your mind. I really would like to explain. Every word I told you on the boat was true.” “Tell it to someone who cares.”
As I trudged to town, the sun came out and I felt I’d been delivered—not a deliverance from reality, nothing could change the facts, but at least from the darknesses of the night. I decided to begin my day again. I walked across the meadow and started down Red Mountain, crossing the lovely stone bridge that arced over the tiny frozen creekbed. I passed a dog-grooming shop called Barking Beauties, and it made me miss the dogs. There were dogs everywhere, mostly huskies and malamutes. Our dogs would love it here.
I turned down Hopkins Avenue, spotted Caribou Alley across the street, and decided to go in—not into the club itself, but into the entryway. I just wanted to see what it looked like, what all the hullabaloo was about. What could they do, throw me out? After last night, it would take something much stronger than threat of expulsion from a private alleyway to raise my pulse. The passageway was ablaze with masses of tiny white lights that circled the edges of the ceiling. There was a jewelry shop on one side and a beauty salon on the other, and at the far end were mahogany doors with “C” shaped golden handles. Above was a half-moon of etched glass with interlocking “Cs.” This was it. Mecca. The Caribou Club. The place Madam had been dying to see, and probably now would go to regularly. No sign, only a brass plaque on the door: “PRIVATE.” Two couples, beautiful people and no doubt recognizable if I’d been more up on my movie stars, pushed past me and went in. “Harley, darling,” the woman in the real coyote coat said. “Aren’t you looking smart in that vest.” The doors closed behind them with the hush of a secret handshake.
Across the street I spotted a small café, Zélé. Bustling with smartly dressed nonskiers like myself, it looked like just the place for a coffee. I took a tiny table out in the sun and studied the menu. It left my beloved Starbucks in the dust, with Raspberry Mocha, Orgeat Latte (espresso, steamed milk, and almond), Espresso Cioccolato, frappes, and fruit smoothies, like a Rocky Mountain High, with blueberries, strawberries, raspberries, and yogurt. There were a dozen different fruit and vegetable juice concoctions: Aspen Cooler, Tropical Snowdance, Rocky Mountain Sunrise, Key Western, or Caesar’s Choice, which was made with carrot, tomato, and celery. I ordered a double cappuccino and a carrot muffin and sorted through a copy of the Aspen Times. The real estate was expensive, but nothing compared to Palm Desert or Indian Wells. The muffin was loaded with dates, raisins, and shredded coconut. It was so good, I ordered another.
Then I set out to explore the town. I looked in everyone’s windows, Louis Vuitton, the Baldwin Gallery, Celine, Chanel. The Hard Rock Café and Planet Hollywood were small and empty. There was a Federal Express drop off box and an ATM on every corner. I ambled along, visited with a relaxed husky lying atop a brick wall in the sun, and got some cash from a ski-up machine. I smiled at everyone and they smiled back. When I rounded a corner onto Hunter Street, I saw a shop with a bright blue and red sign: Himalaya Mon Amour. William’s Explorer was parked in front. I then remembered Armand’s invitation of the night before: a Nepalese trek. I guess he was serious.
A tiered cone of golden bells jangled merrily when I pushed open the door, followed by a total immersion of my sinuses and senses into a loony bin of incense and music that clanged in a random combination of bells, cymbals, and flutes. The shop, which looked deceptively small, turned out to be three rooms deep, each more cluttered than the other with brass trinkets, carved Buddhas, brightly embroidered shirts and blouses (mostly red). There were shelves and shelves of books, portraits of the bespectacled Dali Lama—always smiling, always peaceful—in every possible size and medium, and heaps of tapestries. Strings of prayer flags—some as large as pillowcases, others as small as handbooks—fluttered from the ceiling.
William’s back was just visible in the very last room. He seemed to be poring over a map with a small, caramel-skinned man. I approached tentatively. “Nigel,” William stood and greeted me warmly, his reading glasses perched on the end of his nose. “So glad you’re here. Allow me to introduce you to Mr. Sinuwa. He is helping me finalize arrangements for the trek.”
“I thought Patty Hammond was arranging everything.”
“Well, she is leading it, certainly, but she isn’t particularly helpful about getting us outfitted or telling us what to expect. Mr. Sinuwa is Tibetan and knows everything.”
“Please don’t let me interrupt.”
A large map under a sheet of Plexiglas covered the table, and Mr. Sinuwa had marked it with a red grease pencil, tracing the route of our trip.
“Dolpo,” Mr. Sinuwa said, tapping the map.
“Dolpo?” I asked.
“Very beautiful. Very beautiful flowers, very beautiful rivers,” Mr. Sinuwa sang. “Very holy.”