The Other Side of Silence

“I like you, Herr Wolf,” he said before he went upstairs. “Do come again. Come again soon.”

SIX

Anne French was thrilled when, the following night at her house in the hills above Villefranche, I told her that I’d been up to the Villa Mauresque to have dinner and play cards.

“How exciting. What’s it like? Is it very camp?”

“Camp” was not an English word I understood, and Anne had to explain.

“It’s very English,” she said, “although its origins are French, oddly enough. From the French term se camper, meaning ‘to pose in an exaggerated fashion.’ But in English we use it to describe anything outrageously or ostentatiously homosexual.”

“Then, yes, it’s very camp. Although I can’t fault the old man’s taste. He lives very well. Everything is the best. There’s a staff of about ten, including a butler and several gardeners. He doesn’t eat a lot and doesn’t drink much. Just talks and plays cards. Although there’s no talk allowed when we’re playing cards. He’s a ferocious player. We’re going to have to work hard to get you up to a standard where I can recommend that you take my place.”

“Until then you can be my spy. The next time you go I want detailed descriptions of everything. Especially the house and gardens. Are there naked statues? Who still comes to stay? And find out what his opinions are on writers today. Who he rates. Who he hates. And his friend, of course. Do find out about him. By all accounts, the last one, Gerald, was a complete drunk and a rotter. Tell me, were there lots of boys? Was there an orgy?”

“No. That was disappointing. Maugham’s friend and companion is a man with bad psoriasis named Alan Searle, who’s also his secretary. Not obviously queer, unlike the nephew, who I’m surprised to find that I like. He’s very genial and I think something of a war hero, on the quiet. It was all a very long way from Petronius.” I shook my head. “If it comes to that, I liked the old man, too. Felt sorry for him. He’s got all the money in the world, a beautiful house, famous friends, but he’s not happy. Turns out we have that in common.”

“You’re not happy?”

I laughed. “Next question.”

“Is he writing?”

“Essays.”

“Oh. Nobody’s interested in those. Essays are for schoolchildren. Did you get a look at his writing room?”

“No, but he told me you can see an exact reproduction of it in a television film called Quartet that was filmed in a studio three or four years ago.”

“When are you going back?”

“I don’t know. When they ask me, I suppose. If they ask me.”

“Do you think they will?”

“He’s eighty-two. At that age anything is possible.”

“I’m not sure I agree. Surely-”

“Time is short for someone like that. Chances are, yes, they’ll ask me again.”

It so happened that it was the following night when I received a call at the hotel front desk asking if I might be free that evening; I was.

This time the great man was in a more expansive mood. He talked about meeting the Queen, and the many other famous people who’d been to the villa, including Churchill and H. G. Wells.

“What was Churchill like?” I asked politely.

“Looked like an old china doll. Very pink. Very doddery. Hair like spider’s web. If you think I’m senile you should see him.” He sighed. “It’s very sad, really. Before the war-the first war-we used to play golf together. I made him laugh, you see. Lord, that must have been what-nineteen ten? Christ. Doesn’t time fly?”

I nodded, and then for no reason that I can think of except that I wanted him to know I could, I quoted Goethe, in German.

“‘Let’s plunge ourselves into the roar of time, the whirl of accident; may pain and pleasure, success and failure, shift as they will-it’s only action that can make a man.’”

“That’s Goethe, isn’t it?” said Maugham.

“Faust.” I swallowed with difficulty. “Always chokes me a little.”

Maugham nodded. “You’re still a young-looking man, Walter. With a good twenty years of action ahead of you. But don’t fuck it up, dear boy.”

“No, sir. I’ll try not to.”

“I’ve fucked and fucked up a great deal in my life.” He sighed. “Quite often of course they amount to the same thing. Seriously. I’d have been a knight of the realm by now if I hadn’t fucked quite so egregiously. But then I expect you’re used to that. You must see all kinds of egregious behavior down at the Grand Hotel.”

“Of course. But nothing I can talk about.”

“The rich have time to fuck. But the poor only have time to read about it. They’re too busy trying to make a living to fuck a lot.”

“I expect you’re probably right.”

“And before the war, Robin tells me that you used to be the house detective at the Adlon Hotel in Berlin.”

“That’s right.”

“You must have seen some even worse behavior then. Berlin was the place to be in the twenties. Especially for someone like me. My first play was produced in Berlin. By Max Reinhardt. At the Schall und Rauch cabaret theater. Tiny place.”