Blue Labyrinth

44

Thierry Gabler took his seat on the outdoor terrace of Café Remoire and opened his copy of Le Courrier with a sigh. It took less than a minute for a waitress to come bustling up with his usual order: a glass of Pflümli, a small plate of cold cured meats, and a few slices of brown bread.

“Bonjour, Monsieur Gabler,” she said.

“Merci, Anna,” Gabler replied with what he hoped was a winning smile. She walked away, and he followed the sway of her hips with a long, lingering gaze. Then he turned his attention to the Pflümli, picked up the glass, and took a sip, sighing with quiet satisfaction. He had retired from his job as a civil servant the year before, and taking in an aperitif at a sidewalk café in the late afternoons had become something of a ritual. He particularly liked the Café Remoire: while it didn’t have a view of the lake, it was one of the few truly traditional cafés left in Geneva, and — given its location, centrally situated on the Place du Cirque — it was an ideal spot to enjoy the bustle of the city.

He took another sip of the eau-de-vie, folded the newspaper neatly onto page three, and glanced around. At this time of day, the café was bustling with the usual assortment of tourists, businessmen, students, and small knots of gossiping wives. The street itself was busy, cars rushing by, people walking hurriedly here and there. The Fêtes de Genève was not far away, and already the city’s hotels were filling with people anticipating the world-famous fireworks display.

He delicately folded a piece of cured meat onto a slice of bread, raised it to his lips, and was about to take a bite when all of a sudden — with a loud screech of brakes — a car nosed to the curb not four feet from where he was seated on the café’s terrace. Not just any car, either. This vehicle looked like something from a future century: slung very low, it was at once sleek and angular, seemingly sculpted from a single chunk of flame-colored garnet. The massive rims of its wheels came up to the top of the dashboard, itself barely visible behind smoked black glass. Gabler had never seen a vehicle like it. Unconsciously, he put his piece of bread down as he stared. He could make out the Lamborghini badge on the car’s evil-looking snout, where the grille should have been.

Now the driver’s door opened vertically, gullwing-style, and a man got out, heedless of the oncoming traffic: an approaching car almost hit him and it sheared away into the passing lane, honking angrily. The driver took no notice. He slammed the car door, then made for the entrance to the café. Gabler stared at him. He was as unusual looking as his vehicle: dressed in a severely tailored black suit, with a white shirt and expensive tie. He was pale — paler than any man Gabler had ever seen. His eyes were dark and bruised looking, and his walk was both deliberate and unsteady, like a drunk trying to pass himself off as sober. Gabler saw the man briefly speaking to the patroness inside. Then he emerged again and took a seat on the terrace a few tables down. Gabler took another sip of Pflümli, and then remembered the bread-and-meat he’d made for himself and took a bite of it, all the time trying not to stare openly at this stranger. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the man being served what looked like an absinthe, which had only recently been legalized in Switzerland.

Gabler picked up his newspaper and addressed himself to page three, now and then allowing himself a glance at the man a few tables down the terrace. He sat still as stone, paying attention to nothing or nobody, pale eyes staring into the distance, rarely blinking. Now and then he lifted the glass of absinthe to his lips. Gabler noticed that the man’s hand was shaking, and that the glass rattled whenever it was returned to the table.

In short order, the glass was emptied; another was ordered. Gabler ate his bread, drank his Pflümli, and read his copy of Le Courrier, and eventually the odd-looking stranger was forgotten in favor of the long-established activities of his typical afternoon.

And then something happened that attracted his attention. From down the Place du Cirque, Gabler spied a traffic officer slowly making his way toward them. He had a ticket book in hand, and was examining each parked car in turn. Now and then, when he came to an illegally parked vehicle, or one whose time had expired on the meter, he would pause, smile with private satisfaction, fill out a ticket, and slip it beneath a wiper blade.

Gabler glanced at the Lamborghini. Geneva’s parking rules were both byzantine and strict, but the vehicle was clearly improperly parked.

Now the officer was nearing the café’s terrace. Gabler watched, certain that the black-clad man would rouse himself and move his car before the meter man got there. But no: he remained where he was, now and then sipping his drink.

The officer reached the Lamborghini. He was a rather short, rotund figure, with a reddish face and thick white hair curling out from beneath his cap. The car was so obviously parked illegally — squeezed into the narrow space at a rakish angle demonstrating indifference, even contempt, for authority and order — that the officer’s smile was larger and more self-satisfied than usual as he licked his finger and flipped open the ticket book. The ticket was written and slipped beneath the wiper blade — it was recessed into the engine frame and took a moment to find — with a flourish.

Only now, as the traffic officer moved on, did the man in black get up from his table. Walking off the terrace, he approached the officer, placing himself between the man and the next parked car. Without speaking, he merely extended a finger and pointed at the Lamborghini.

The traffic officer looked from him, to the car, and back. “Est-ce que cette voiture vous appartient?” he asked.

The man slowly nodded.

“Monsieur, elle est…”

“In English, if you please,” the man said in an American accent Gabler recognized as southern.

As did most Genevans, the traffic officer spoke decent English. With a sigh — as if making a huge sacrifice — the man switched languages. “Very well.”

“It appears I have committed a parking transgression of some kind. As you can probably tell, I’m a stranger here. Kindly allow me to remove my car, and let us forget about the ticket.”

“I’m very sorry,” the officer said, though his tone of voice did not sound at all sorry. “The ticket is written.”

“So I’ve noticed. And what heinous act, pray tell, have I committed?”

“Monsieur, you are parked in a blue zone.”

“All these other cars are parked in a blue zone, as well. Hence my assumption that parking in a blue zone was permissible.”

“Ah!” said the officer, as if scoring an important point in a philosophic debate. “But your car does not display a disque de stationnement.”

“A what?”

“A parking disk. You may not park in a blue zone without displaying a parking disk that indicates the time that you arrived.”

“Indeed. A parking disk. How quaint. And how am I, a visitor, expected to know that?”

The traffic officer gave the man a look of bureaucratic disdain. “Monsieur, as a visitor to our city, it is you who are expected to understand, and abide by, my rules.”

“My rules?”

The officer looked slightly chagrined at this slip. “Our rules.”

“I see. Even if such rules are capricious, unnecessary, and, ultimately, pernicious?”

The little traffic officer frowned. He looked confused, uncertain. “The law is the law, monsieur. You have broken it, and—”

“Just a minute.” The American put a hand on the officer’s wrist, effectively stopping his progress. “What is the fine associated with this ticket?”

“Forty-five Swiss francs.”

“Forty-five Swiss francs.” Still blocking the man’s way, the American reached into his suit jacket and — with insolent slowness — removed a wallet and counted out the money.

“I cannot accept the fine, monsieur,” the officer said. “You must go to the—”

Suddenly, and violently, the American tore up the bills. First once, then twice, then again and again, until nothing was left but tiny squares. He tossed them in the air like so much confetti, so that they fluttered down, landing all over the traffic officer’s cap and shoulders. Gabler looked on, agape at this development. Passersby and others sitting on the terrace were equally astounded by this exchange.

“Monsieur,” the officer said, his face growing still redder. “You are clearly intoxicated. I must ask you not to enter this vehicle or—”

“Or what?” the American said with acid scorn. “You’ll write me a ticket for littering while under the influence? Pay attention, sirrah, and I’ll cross the street, right here. Then you can write me a ticket for jaywalking under the influence as well. But no, let me guess — you don’t have the authority to levy such a weighty punishment. That would take a real policeman. How very sad for you! ‘Take thy beak from out my heart!’ ”

Mustering all his dignity, the rotund traffic officer reached for a cell phone at his side and began to dial. As he did so, the American dropped the melodramatic attitude he’d abruptly assumed and reached into his jacket pocket again, this time pulling out a different wallet. This one, Gabler saw, contained a shield of some kind. He showed it to the officer for just a moment, then slipped it back into his jacket.

Immediately the manner of the officer changed. The chest-swelling, officious, bureaucratic behavior faded. “Sir,” he said, “you should have told me at first. Had I known that you were here conducting some kind of official business, I would not have issued the ticket. However, that doesn’t excuse—”

The American leaned in toward the smaller man. “You misunderstand. I am not conducting any official business. I am merely a traveler stopping off for a stirrup cup on my way to the airport.”

The traffic officer shook his head and backpedaled. He turned toward the Lamborghini and the traffic ticket, which flapped slowly back and forth in the breeze floating down the Place du Cirque. “Allow me, monsieur, to remove the ticket, but I must ask you—”

“Don’t remove that ticket,” the American barked. “Don’t even touch it!”

The officer turned back, now thoroughly cowed and confused. “Monsieur? I don’t understand.”

“You don’t?” returned the voice that grew icier with every word. “Then allow me to explain it in terms that, one would hope, even the meanest intelligence could grasp. I’ve decided I want that ticket, Goodman Lickspittle. I am going to contest that ticket, in court. And if I’m not mistaken, that means you will have to appear in court, as well. And at such a time I will take the greatest pleasure in pointing out to the judge, the lawyers, and everyone else assembled what a disgraceful shadow of a man you are. A shadow? Perhaps I exaggerate. A shadow, at least, can prove to be tall — tall indeed. But you: you’re a homunculus, a dried neat’s tongue, a carbuncle on the posterior of humanity.” With a sudden movement, the American knocked the officer’s cap from his head. “Look at you! You must be sixty if you’re a day. And yet here you are, still writing parking tickets, no doubt precisely as you were doing ten years ago, and twenty years ago, and thirty years ago. You must be so wonderful at the job, so singularly efficient, that your superiors simply don’t dare promote you. I salute the remarkable comprehensiveness of your insipidity. What a piece of work is a man, indeed! And yet I sense you aren’t entirely happy with your position — that gin-blossom I see writ large across your features implies that you frequently drown your sorrows. Do you deny it? I see not! Nor is your wife particularly happy about it, either. Oh, I detect in your hunted features, your bullying swagger that nevertheless yields instantly to superior force, a true Walter Mitty. Well, if it’s any consolation, I can at least predict what shall be inscribed upon your tombstone: ‘That will be forty-five francs, please.’ Now, if you will kindly step away from my vehicle, I’ll just head to the nearest police station and ensure… and ensure—”

During this rant, the American’s face had fallen apart, becoming loose, haggard, and gray. Beads of sweat stood at his temples. He’d hesitated once in his tirade to pass a hand across his forehead; another time to wave the hand in front of his nose, as if to brush away some odor. Gabler noticed that the entire café, in fact the entire street, had gone silent, watching this bizarre drama play out. The man was either drunk or on drugs. Now the man moved unsteadily toward the Lamborghini, the officer quickly giving ground before him. The American reached for the door handle — pawed for it, more exactly, with a blind, flailing gesture — and missed. He took another step forward; swayed; steadied himself; swayed again, and then crumpled to the sidewalk. There were cries for help, and some rose from their tables. Gabler, too, jumped to his feet, the chair tumbling away behind him. In his surprise and consternation, he didn’t even realize he had just spilled his half-full glass of Pflümli down one leg of his well-pressed pants.