Читать книгу The Wonder Singer - George Rabasa - Страница 19

At night the dark house in Anaheim echoes with whispers. Lockwood turns the recorder down to a murmur, but the voices curl under the door, around the corners, up the stairs. They slide on the hardwood floor and crawl along the carpeting and cling to the walls and drapes. First the low questioning tones, then the rise and fall of the lighter voice, musical even in the rapid cadence of argument and persuasion, of apology and derision.

In the past few weeks the sound of this voice has become as familiar as any in his life. He fears he has spent more hours within its range than hearing those of his closest friends, his mother, his wife—no other voice in his life has gone on so continuously, so relentlessly. Yet this is a voice without clear features. Sometimes she is a girl of twenty, plump and good-natured; at others she wears a garish mask, features distorted by a pain bigger than ordinary life; in a book of press clippings, her expression is often angry, afraid, humiliated. But rarely the face in repose, as Lockwood has seen it, softened and humbled by forgiveness and time.

Claire has asked Lockwood about Mercè Casals. There is no one answer, he says. She was like anybody’s grandmother. She was like any be-jeweled crone on Rodeo Drive. She was an old woman fading, fading away. Mostly, her features changed. Her face often surprised him. Her eyes were some days dry and dull with cataracts. Other times, when she remembered a particular moment, they glistened with tears.

The long drive from the beach always brought Lockwood home with his mind brimming with the possibilities of the life he has been handed, but frustrated and impatient with the elusiveness of his story. Like a new lover, the scribbler cannot pull the sum total of his beloved’s tastes and scents and features into a stable image.

“I liked you better before,” Claire blurts out one morning over breakfast. She has started sitting at the far end of the table to give him the increased room he has demanded for the biographies, the books on opera, and the files of magazine articles he continually pores over. “You were not so moody. You were content.”

Lockwood looks up from a scattering of clippings while the eggs and toast grow cold. “Ah, but I’m happy now, sometimes, anyway. Content is just one step away from resigned. I was getting resigned to being a drudge.”

“More coffee?” Claire reaches for the carafe. She pours even as he’s shaking his head. “Hell, Mark, drink coffee. It will help the foul mood you woke up in.”

He holds his cup toward her. “Thank you. I’ve been a jerk.”

“No, just somewhat self-absorbed.”

“Just absorbed in the object.”

“Of your affections?”

“Of my obsessions,” he corrects glumly.

“Not the same thing?”

“Jesus, Claire. Do you really think I was in love with this woman? At eighty-something?”

“Well?”

“Actually, I like her nurse. She’s from Mexico City. Very pretty. Twenty-six.”

“Why are you telling me this?” She frowns.

“She thinks I’m a loser, actually,” he adds cheerfully, as if to set her mind at ease. “I’ve got to run.” He pushes back from the table. “The Señora always visited her ex-husband on Wednesday afternoons.”

“Will they let you see him when they’re expecting his wife?”

“I’ll find out.” He gathers the files and envelopes into a leather satchel.