A Coffin For Two

54

There is a bridge across the Riu Ter, near Verges. I stopped the Frontera half way across, got out, and threw a two-inch thick, two-foot long stainless steel bolt into its rushing water.

As always, Davidoff’s word had been his bond. The slab had moved at a touch. It looked like a good video camera too.

It was just after 2 a.m. when I slipped the Frontera silently into St Marti, and stepped silently up the stairs to the apartment. I didn’t think that there were any more surprises for the old bastard to throw at me, but as always with him, I was wrong.

I had expected to find Prim asleep, but the balcony doors were ajar and she was sitting outside, looking at the sea with a white shawl around her shoulders. She looked round as the front door opened. As I stepped out of the darkness, all the shocks and horrors of the evening must have shown in my face, for a frown swept across hers. ‘Oz …’ she whispered.

Then she saw what I was carrying. I switched on the terrace light and showed her the portraits. The third, I had left in the boot of the car, to be delivered in the morning, once I had come up with a story to explain it.

Prim glanced at my likeness, and then she looked at herself, recumbent, nude. I had never seen her really blush before. The pinkness just exploded, from the swell of her breasts, into her neck, and to her face.

‘The old bastard had quite an imagination,’ I said, with a half-smile.

‘Had?’ she murmured, fearfully.

‘Yes love. It’s over.’

I sat down beside her and, because I know that he would have expected it, I told her the story of Davidoff, the second Dali, of his secret life and of his secret love.

I told her, because I knew she wouldn’t disturb the old man’s rest, and because I knew that someone else had to share the burden. Davidoff believed in possession of the spirit. So do I now, because I’m certain that a part of his soul, a part too crazy to die, possesses me, and that in the final analysis he agrees with me that his story is just too magnificent to be lost forever.

So I related to Primavera the tale of Davidoff’s gift to his friend, and of the revenge he had taken on the men who had betrayed him. My voice crackled several times during the tale, and at the end, as I described how I had positioned the beautiful carved lid of his coffin, and as I repeated my commendation of his soul, I broke down completely, crying like a baby for the first time as a man.

When I composed myself, she was looking at me, her hand on mine. Then she stood up, moved to the edge of the balcony, and turned back to face me. As I looked at her a disturbing feeling gripped my stomach.

‘I have something to share with you now, Oz,’ she murmured. ‘Something about Davidoff. I have to tell you now, because every day I keep it secret, the more dangerous it will be to you and me.’

I looked at her, and realised at once why I was so disconcerted. She looked vulnerable, more so than I had ever seen her. ‘Best tell me then,’ I replied, as quietly as she.

‘His portrait of me,’ she said. ‘It isn’t painted from his imagination.’ I looked at her, and I’m sure my jaw dropped, for the second time that night.

‘When he and I were left alone together, at Shirley’s, ‘she went on,’after you and she had gone off to identify Adrian’s body, Davidoff made love to me. And I let him; not as a gift to an old man, but because I wanted him.’

She stopped, and seemed to flinch, very slightly, as if she was expecting me to roar at her, or worse. But such thoughts never crossed my mind; I just stood there staring at her, numb.

At last she went on. ‘He touched me as we sat there in the garden. He held me with that black eye of his, and he touched me; he stroked my breast with the tips of his fingers. He just kissed my hand and reached across. And the strange thing is, I wasn’t surprised, or shocked …’ she hesitated ‘… or upset.

‘His fingers were smooth, very soft, incredibly sensitive. As he stroked me, he just kept looking at me, until all I could see was that eye, and the depth there was to it. For a moment or two, I tried to break away by picturing you, but I couldn’t. All that I was conscious of was him, his sandalwood smell, and his look. I knew that it was asking me a question.

‘Neither of us said a word, but I answered him all the same. I took his hand from me, I stood up, and I undressed for him, slowly, completely. Then I lay back down with him on the lounger. He didn’t seem old to me, not there in the dark. He was a man; and a unique, dynamic man at that, unlike anyone I’ve ever known. There and then I wanted him, very much, as much as I wanted you when we first met.

‘I kissed him. I didn’t feel anything but sincere when I asked him, “Would you like to make love?” He smiled at me and he said, “My darling, in the way you mean I could not do you justice, not any more.” I rubbed my hand against those tight satin pants. “Let’s try,” I said. “Let’s go into the summerhouse, where it’s warmer.” But he shook his head. “Please,” I asked him. “Let me drink from the well.” The way he smiled at me, I thought I’d given him the keys to heaven. But when I reached down to unfasten him, still he stopped me.

‘Instead, he laid me along the lounger, then he knelt beside me. And he showed me his way of making love. He began to massage me, with those soft, dark, velvet hands of his. They were strong too, stronger than you could imagine in anyone as old as him. He kneaded my body, slowly, turning me over on to my face, then back again: my arms, my back, my breasts, my legs, my belly, my thighs. I felt as if I was swimming, that light way you go. Until at last, he came to …’ She stopped, and shivered slightly, as if in recollection.

‘At the very end, there was a little trick he did with his fingers, the sort of thing that very few men learn in a whole lifetime. And I had an orgasm, as fine as any I’ve had with you. I really thought I might die.’

She looked down at me. ‘There was nothing sordid about it, Oz. Davidoff made love to me, in his way, and in it he was an artist. I let him, because I wanted to. I sensed a huge longing in him, and it transferred itself to me.’

I stared at her wide-eyed, still numb, still stunned. And yet I realised, that there was no anger in me. I knew that I couldn’t summon it up either, even if I’d tried. ‘And afterwards?’ I asked her, quietly.

‘Afterwards,’ she whispered, ‘he cried. We lay there in the moonlight, on the lounger. I was gasping still, his hand was hot on my belly, and I could hear him sobbing, very gently.

‘We looked at each other and I could see that there were tears running down his face, soft and glistening on his cheeks. “What’s wrong?” I asked him. “You’ve given me pleasure. I wanted you.”

‘His face sort of crumpled. “That’s it,” he said, and I remember every word. “You wanted me, because you love Davidoff. The idea may be too ludicrous for you to admit, but tonight you love Davidoff. I know this, for my Primavera would not let a man touch her like that if she did not love him. Yet look at us. I glory in your body, so beautiful, and I think of mine, which just now I could not bear to let you see. You are so young, and I am so, so old. I have had my last moment, and that is what makes me sad. Now I must return you to my friend Oz. He is alive, and I am dead. But thank you for being the other love of my life. You will not see me again, after tonight.”

‘Then he stood up, and walked around the pool, back to the summer house. At first I thought he had gone inside. After a while, I stood up to follow him. I wanted to dry his tears; they had upset me. I wanted to ask him about his first love, who she was. I wanted …’ Her voice faltered, for a moment.

‘I was in the doorway of the summer house when I heard his car start, and he was gone. I listened until the engine sound had faded away. Then I dived into the pool, and swam and swam. I was still there, remember, when you got back and found me.’

Yes, maybe I should have been angry. I don’t know. In the event, I was unspeakably moved. I gazed at her and saw her tears glistening, as had Davidoff’s. I reached out and touched them on her cheeks. I felt their softness.

‘I really won’t see him again, Oz, will I?’ She was only just beginning to believe that he was dead.

I shook my head. ‘No.’

‘And Davidoff killed Eames and Adrian? That’s what he said?’

‘Oh yes. You can believe it, too.’

‘But why?’

‘For what he saw as the best of motives, I suppose. For honour. They killed his friend. He killed them.’

‘And the picture, the Toreador?’

‘Davidoff painted it.’

‘So it really isn’t a fake, after all.’

I shrugged. ‘Maybe it isn’t, maybe it is. I don’t know the answer to that. I’ve already told Gavin Scott that it is, though. I called him last week. He accepted it pretty well. He said he’d hang it on the wall of his boardroom anyway and let it be judged on its merit. The artist would have been okay with that. He’ll have to tell the shareholders, of course, but he’s made three million profit this year, so he reckons he’ll survive.’

I looked at her again. ‘But tell me, love. Just suppose Davidoff’s Noddy car hadn’t started first time. Would you have gone with him?’

She smiled through her tears. ‘You mean would I have left you and gone off with a man as old as Methuselah? Probably not.’

‘But you did feel for him?’

She looked at me for a long time. ‘I was drawn to him,’ she said, at last. ‘He was a fantasy, I suppose.’

‘The coming together in the garden. Could that have been a fantasy too?’

She shook her head, vigorously. ‘Oh no, Oz. That was for real. That’s what’s got me so shaken up.’

A large part of me wanted to hug her; but the ruling majority in my mind told me not to, that a moment of decision was approaching.

Instead I said, ‘And has it affected the way you feel about us?’

Her face twisted into an expression that was half smile, half despair. ‘You mean don’t I love you any more?’ she blurted out. ‘Oh, I love you. That hasn’t changed. But what Davidoff said about why I let him touch me … yes, let him make love to me … well, that was true. That night in Shirley’s garden, I loved him too, and I will every time I remember it.

‘I guess you can love two people at the same time.’

She paused. ‘I have to ask you now; now that I’ve told you. Can you bear to touch me again?’ She twisted her fingers together. ‘The thing is, I can’t say that I’m sorry for what happened, and I can’t ask you to forgive me; because that would mean that I regretted it, and I don’t. All I can say is that I love you just as much as I ever did, and that when you and I have made love since my night with Davidoff, there’s been no one else in our bed.’ She shivered in the cool of the night.

‘Call me a selfish wee cow if you like, but I have to know that there’s still a solid foundation to my life. I need you to ask me again like you did a couple of weeks ago, to know you still love me, even if it’s only so I can tell you again to wait for a year.’

Her voice rose slightly. ‘Whatever, I need some sort of reaction. Christ, I confess my infidelity to you and you just stand there. Show me you care, can’t you, even if it’s by getting mad. Imagine I fucked Steve Miller, if that helps!’

I felt as if the floor was moving under my feet, but I just stood there. Inside my head, something swam to the surface. I opened my mouth to tell her, to spill the beans about Jan leaving Noosh, about our weekend together, about my infidelity to her, not with a demi-ghost like Davidoff, but with a strong, lasting spirit that I had loved since our childhood. I opened my mouth to tell her all that, and to throw her own question back at her. Could she still bear to touch me? But she cut me off.

‘And anyway, Oz,’ she burst out. ‘I have to say this, I sense something else. Something in you. I don’t know what it is, but I have a feeling that it’s been there for a while now, waiting to come out. I think it’s time that it did, don’t you?’

I looked at Primavera, and as I did, the truth broke the surface at last. The fundamental reason for a lifetime commitment for which I had been rummaging through my cluttered, untidy mind. Ellie, as always, had given it to me, only I had mislaid it for a while. I think that putting the lid on Davidoff’s coffin must have helped me to recover it.

Like my sister said, ‘If I died tomorrow, who would grieve for me the most?’

It isn’t just about who you want to live with for the present, and to have with you. It’s about who you’ll want beside you to hold your hand at the very end of the last day, when it’s all over. Or, if that can’t be, it’s about whose face you’ll see with your mind’s eye at the dying of the light.

I wondered how Prim would answer that one. I wondered how Gala would have answered it.

I looked at her some more, then smiled at her. ‘Okay,’ I said. ‘But before it does emerge, if you don’t mind I’m going for a walk. Down on the beach, to consult some of my own ghosts in the moonlight.’

So I left her in our apartment, and strode down the path to the acres of sand below St Marti. And there I walked through the night, almost as far as L’Escala, and back again. I thought of Davidoff, of his honour, and of the softness of his tears. I thought of Jan. And I thought of Primavera.

She was right. You can love two people; but you can only be with one.