Just a Corpse at Twilight by Janwillem Van De Wetering

Author:Janwillem Van De Wetering
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Soho Press
Published: 2009-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter 11

Grijpstra's nap lasted till late evening. He walked along the island's little beaches after that, and set off a bear alarm, a nylon line strung between large boulders, that brought out de Gier.

"Nice here," de Gier said, putting his camera away. So it was, Grijpstra thought. Moonlight on a calm sea, the never-figure-out-able zillion stars everywhere, seals assuming their tail-up, head-up banana postures on rocks being bared by low tide, a quiet ripple further along, cut, de Gier claimed, by a curious dolphin's dorsal fin.

"Very nice," Grijpstra agreed. "Proves things are okay maybe. Here, for instance."

"But there are lots of Heres. Most Heres are bad"

"Bad enough to row away from forever?"

"But ifI row out ofHere altogether," de Gier said, "no bad Here is anywhere."

Grijpstra frowned.

"It goes further than that," de Gier said. "It includes you too. The world needs me to be. You need me to be."

"If you're not here, none of any possible Heres are here?" Grijpstra asked. "You know that's all bullshit, don't you? I'll still be here. Eating hundred-dollar crab rolls in Amsterdam and watching people starve in the Here-Too places that the news is always checking out for dying babies."

"Switch off your TV," de Gier said, "then use your unlimited Diners Club credit card and spend the night harmonizing your spirit with the likes of Aki."

"Just one night," Grijpstra said. "One night ofFdoesn't mean that I don't suffer the human problem. Don't get so smart, Rinus."

"Now that we're on the subject again"—de Gier raised an eyebrow—"did anything between you and Aki, eh . . ."

"No," Grijpstra said.

"Look," de Gier said. "Maybe we don't agree philosophically but we can still be friends. Tell me. I've got this reputation but I don't really ever know how to be with women. It's very complicated. There's this theory that homosexuality is linked to being immature, and you must have done your fatherly/friendly thing again. You're sure nothing happened?"

They were back in the pagoda, drinking Louisiana coffee and chicory on the second floor's gallery. "This coffee is good and strong," Grijpstra said. "Most coffee here is weak."

"Regular American coffee is weak so that the citizens can drink it all day," de Gier lectured. "Because the country is worked by robots now. There's nothing more to do. Humans pour coffee into the great gap offree time. Drinking thirty cups a day is something to do."

Grijpstra glared.

"I'm sorry," de Gier said. "I thought you wanted me to explain America."

"Bah," Grijpstra said.

"But you already know it all," de Gier said. "Aki explained local degeneration. Where? In bed?"

Grijpstra smiled. "In your Ford product, on the way back from Boston. Hawaiian degeneration only. She was upset about the exhibition of Hawaiian historical art she saw in Boston while I was at the bank getting dollars for guilders. The paintings showed what the pre-Coca-Cola-and-hamburger era must have been like."

"Pre-Captain Cook-y scenes by a cookie-tin artist?"

"You know you amaze me?" Grijpstra asked. "You're the accused here. How can you try to be witty?"

"I forget sometimes," de Gier said.

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