The Investigation

XXVII

TO HIS GREAT ASTONISHMENT, he found the bathroom a model of refined luxury. He’d never have suspected that such a grandiose space, its walls decorated with pale-green mosaics topped by a fretwork frieze of studs gilded with fine gold, could exist within the precincts of the Hope Hotel; the bathroom was probably the sole remaining vestige of a time when the establishment really did provide first-class lodging. And to think, this sumptuous bathroom came with the room he’d been put in, which was, as he could certify, incontestably the narrowest, nastiest, wretchedest room in the Hotel — it was a mystery that passed his understanding!

A pearly light caressed the heavy gold fixtures of the two sinks, the bidet, the large bathtub — which had been hollowed out of a block of porphyry — and the shower, a spacious enclosure completely covered with bluish glass-paste tiles. From multiple loudspeakers — none of which he was able to locate, but which seemed to have been built into the walls — came music that mingled the cries of exotic birds, a gently stroked tambourine, soft brasses mimicking the sound of small coins falling on a stone floor, and flutes simultaneously shrill and mellow. In the center of the room, a small fountain threw up a stream of water, whose blithe gurgling and steamy vapor sent the Investigator into a reverie of distant seaports, of black and naked female slaves, of palm fronds wielded to cool his brow, of big ships anchored in the harbor, of their ebony macassar-wood decks laden with sacks of spices, pearls, amber, and bitumen. He’d been compelled to read a little poetry for school assignments in his youth, but he’d never understood any of it. And what he’d found especially hard to understand was that men could waste their time writing poems, which served no useful purpose, none at all; cold, precise investigative reports written to give an account of proven facts, to narrow a search for truth, and to draw valid conclusions struck him as a more intelligent — indeed, as the only valid — way of using language and serving humanity. How ill and unnerved must he be, that the mere sight of an opulent bathroom could set him daydreaming about languorous Negresses and palm wine, Oriental pastries and belly dances?

A set of crystal shelves held bottles of multicolored bath salts and liquid soap. The Investigator opened a few and tried to inhale their scent, but his cold was so severe that he could smell nothing at all. He settled for reading the labels and decided on Mauve Lilac.

He let the sheet fall. Once again totally naked, but not feeling the slightest embarrassment on that account, the Investigator poured the entire contents of the soap bottle into his hands and rubbed the liquid into his remaining hair and over his face and body. Then he turned on the two faucets in the shower, and at once a generous stream of water rained down, giving off a vapor that the opalescence of the glass-paste tiles turned blue.

He thrust his right foot into the shower, shouted in sudden pain, and quickly drew back: The water was boiling! Not hot, but boiling! He closed the hot water faucet a little, opened the cold water faucet almost all the way, waited, and then ventured again to stick his foot into the cascade. It was even worse! He felt as though molten lead were being poured onto his flesh. He abandoned the shower for the bathtub, turned on the tap, waited: Clouds of steam rose at once from the porphyry block, and he didn’t dare put his foot in. He made do with holding one hand close to the water and determined that it, too, was flowing out at an atrociously high temperature. His only remaining choices were the sinks and the bidet. He hurried over to them and turned on the faucets, mixing a little hot water with a great deal of cold. Wasted effort: The water that came out of those faucets could have cooked an egg in thirty seconds. It was then that he examined the pipes and came to the astounding conclusion that there was no cold-water pipe leading to any tap in the bathroom.

Even in the basin of the little fountain, the water, whose fine vapor he’d taken for the product of some sort of sophisticated atomizing system, was at the boiling point, as indicated by the three Japanese carp floating belly-up in it, their flesh white, cooked, and already disintegrating.

The beauty of the bathroom served no useful purpose. It was a Paradise warmed by the flames of Hell. Washing oneself in it was impossible, just as it was impossible to dry oneself, since there was no towel and no bathrobe. His body entirely coated with sticky, redolent Mauve Lilac, the Investigator felt his recent and very modest upsurge in optimism plunging down again. At the moment when he stooped to gather up his bedsheet, a door opened behind him, and a big, heavily mustachioed man in his seventies entered, passed close to him, sat on the toilet, unfolded a newspaper, and began to read.

The Investigator dared not move. Where had this old man come from? He was absolutely naked, just like him; he’d practically grazed him without even noticing; and he resembled, feature for feature, the old fellow on the Enterprise key rings, the one whose immense photographic portrait adorned the Manager’s office, the one whose image was reproduced in the pictures that hung in the Hotel rooms. Was this really the same person? It was difficult to say; people, whether naked or clothed, make such different impressions. And what immodesty! Whoever he was, his behavior was unbelievable. To come in like that and sit down on the toilet!

The Investigator was on the verge of calling out when it occurred to him that perhaps it was he himself who was not in his proper place. Suppose this bathroom wasn’t his? After all, hadn’t he had to expend a considerable amount of effort and ingenuity to unblock a door that had no doubt been barricaded on purpose? But, yes, of course, that was it — he wasn’t where he ought to be. His only thought was to get out, to get out at once, before the septuagenarian noticed his presence and caused a scandal.

The old man was thoroughly absorbed in his newspaper. A benevolent smile brightened his wrinkled face. The Investigator straightened up, very slowly. Then, equally slowly, he slid his feet inch by inch toward the door of his room, but when he reached it, he couldn’t open it. He didn’t try too hard, for fear of alerting the old man, who kept on reading and paid no attention to him. The Investigator resolved that his salvation lay in the only other exit, the door through which the old man had come in. It was directly opposite the spot he’d just laboriously reached, at the cost of great pain in his toes, particularly those on his scalded right foot, which had turned scarlet. But he had no other choice. He therefore set out again, smeared head to foot with Mauve Lilac, and, after a ploddingly slow slide across the marble floor, he reached the other door, opened it in silence, and disappeared.