Jonathan Carroll - Sleeping In Flame

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SLEEPING IN FLAME

by Jonathan Carroll

FIRST VINTAGE CONTEMPORARIES EDITION, JULY 1990

Conventions. Published in the United States by Vintage Books, a division of

Random House, Inc., New York. Originally published by Doubleday, a division of

Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc., in 1988. Published by

arrangement with Doubleday, a division of Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing

Group, Inc.

Greed, Part 1-13_ with the permission of Black Sparrow Press.

"A Space in the Air" by Jon Silkin reprinted from _Selected Poems_, Routledge

Chapman and Hall, Inc.

"The Night Comes Every Day to My Window" from _Monolithos: Poems 1962 and

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Carroll, Jonathan, 1949-

Sleeping in flame / Jonathan Carroll.

p. cm. ISBN 0-679-72777-9

I. Title.

PS3553.A7646S54 1990 813'.54 -- dc20 89-40549

CIP

Manufactured in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3

_Without the insight, imagination,_

_and support of Martina Niegel, this_

_story would still be a held breath._

_For Ryder Pierce Carroll_ --

_where the heart begins_

_There lives within the very flame of love_

_A kind of wick or snuff that will abate it;_

_And nothing is at a like goodness still,_

_For goodness, growing to a plurisy,_

_Dies in his own too much . . ._

-- _Shakespeare_, Hamlet,

_Act 4, Scene 7, 113-17_

_Isn't that a large shadow on the road_

_running parallel to us or our dream?_

_Is it loaded?_

-- _Joseph McElroy_, Women and Men

PART ONE

STEALING HORSES

CHAPTER ONE

It took me less than half a lifetime to realize that regret is one of

the few guaranteed certainties. Sooner or later everything is touched by it,

despite our naive and senseless hope that just this time we will be spared its

cold hand on our heart.

The day after we met, Maris York told me I had saved her life. We were

in a café, and she said this through the folds of a black sweater she was

pulling over her head. I was glad she was lost in the middle of that pullover

because the statement, although true, made me feel much too brave and adult

and embarrassed. I didn't know what to answer.

"It's quite true, Walker. The next time I saw him he would have killed

me." "Maybe he just wanted to go on scaring you."

"No, he would have tried to kill me."

The voice carried no emotion. Her big hands lay open and still on the

pink and blue marble table. I wondered if the stone was cold under her palms.

If I had been really brave I would have covered her hand with mine. I didn't.

Every once in a while my friend Nicholas Sylvian calls, in a huff, and

says he wants us to make another movie together. He's got some new moneybags

lined up to finance one of the many projects we've discussed. When that

happens, I usually stop what I'm doing and give him my full attention. Life

with Nicholas is fun and exciting, and sometimes very peculiar. I think in our

past lives we were probably related in some close and aggravating way --

revolutionaries who couldn't agree on tactics, or brothers in love with the

same woman. We always fight a lot when we're together, but that's only because

we love the same things, despite seeing them from different angles.

This time there was a Herr Nashorn in Munich who was very interested in

producing _Secret Feet_, our adaptation of an obscure short story by Henry de

Montherlant to which I owned the rights. The scoop was, Herr Nashorn wanted us

to fly to Munich that weekend and talk the whole idea over, courtesy of

Nashorn Industries.

So at 6 A.M. on Saturday, forty-five minutes before our flight was due

to leave, Nicholas picked me up in his little white delivery truck. The first

time I saw that odd vehicle, I asked my friend what had possessed him to buy

it. "Because it looks like the kind of truck the Pope tours in."

When I got into the Popemobile that dark morning, Nicholas looked at me

and said, "We've got four problems. One, I don't have any gas. Two, I think I

forgot my passport. Three, the radio says the traffic out to the airport is

impossible. Four . . . I can't remember, but I'll think of it. Do you have any

money for gas?"

There was no fourth problem, he had his passport, and we made it to the

airport on time. When we were settled on the plane and had ordered coffee, he

lit a cigarette and smiled to himself.

"Listen to me, Walker. No matter what happens with this Nashorn meeting

today, there's a woman in Munich I've got to call. She's an American

sculptress you have to meet. You'll love her." He said no more about it for

the rest of the trip, but kept the same smile on his face.

The idea excited me. I had always liked blind dates. If nothing else, it

was an interesting way of discovering what people thought of you. How often do

we have the chance to see what we are in a friend's eyes? On a blind date

you're told "You'll love her. I think she's very much your kind of woman." And

whether she is or not, you end the evening knowing something new: As far as

this friend is concerned, you're the "sexy blond" type. Or a "smoky brunette

who has to be convinced" kind of guy.

My wife and I met on a blind date and that date led to seven good years

together. In the end we separated after both of us spent time in other

people's beds for greedy, bad reasons, and even worse results. The divorce

consisted of two raw, mean people saying sordid half-truths about each other.

Why did things go wrong? Perhaps because wonderful as it can sometimes

be, you can be sure marriage is at all times a quirky, difficult thing to

maintain. In certain ways, it is very much like the solid gold family heirloom

watch your father gives you for graduation. You love looking at it and owning

it, but it isn't like the twenty-dollar liquid-crystal thing made of plastic

and rubber that needs no maintenance to keep perfect time.

Every day you have to wind the gold beauty to make it run right, and you

have to keep setting it, and you have to take it to the jeweler to be cleaned.

. . . It _is_ lovely and rare and valuable, but the rubber watch keeps better

time with no work at all. The problem with twenty-dollar watches is that they

all suddenly stop dead at some point. All you can do then is throw them away

and buy another.

I realized this after my marriage wound down and stopped. It made me

feel stupid and bitterly sad, but by then things were way beyond fixing, and

neither of us wanted to see the other again.

My wife Victoria (a name I still say slowly and carefully) remained in

the United States after our divorce and entered graduate school. I am sure she

is a serious, diligent student.

The worst part of being alone was memories often cornered me and

wouldn't let me get away. A pumpkin-colored coat in a women's boutique froze

me in front of the store window, remembering a meal with Victoria in Cyprus

where most of the things on the table were that same Halloween orange. Or

waking with a fierce cold, and the first thing you think of is, the last time

I had one this bad, someone right here was genuinely worried about how high my

temperature was.

In the year after the divorce, I returned to Europe and wrote two good

screenplays for films that had only an outside chance of ever being made. But

that wasn't bad because the work kept me busy and eager to see what the final

drafts would look like.

There are long quiet periods in life that are very much like waiting for

a bus on a nice day. You don't mind being there so much because the weather is

sunny and nice, and you're in no hurry. But after a while you start looking at

your watch because there _are_ more interesting things you could be doing, and

it really is time the bus came.

Maris just read these pages, and indignantly said I hadn't once

mentioned where all of this happened. I told her I was going to get around to

that; I had been saving Vienna for a place in our story where I would be able

to describe it in the roundabout, leisurely way it deserves. But since there

is less and less time now, perhaps she is right.

Victoria and I had come to Vienna eight years before, newly married,

full of zip, curiosity, and enthusiastic love for each other. I was acting in

a low-budget spy movie being filmed there. I'd gotten the role because I have

the looks of a vaguely sinister pretty boy. In my short acting career, I'd

played a cowardly Nazi soldier, a show-off baseball player, an arrogant

college student, and a mad killer in a Hawaiian shirt. The Vienna role, which

turned out to be one of my last, was that of a golden boy-Ivy League diplomat

in the American Embassy who just happened to be a Russian spy.

One of the first things that struck me about Vienna was the

funny-sounding street names: Schulz-Strassnitzkigasse, Ottakringer Strasse,

Adalbert Stifter Strasse, Blutgasse. Usually you took a big breath before

saying one of these names so you wouldn't run out of air halfway through the

pronunciation.

Everything was clean and gray and too heavy with history. Round a

corner, and there would be a white plaque on the side of some building

describing Schubert's birth here, Freud's office there.

American cities shrug at their brief histories. There are few signs of

pride in past tenants or events, notwithstanding the kitschy Disneyland

atmosphere of places like "Colonial Williamsburg." It is as if the places are

saying no, we're not so old, but who cares? Look how far we have come. Look

what we've got _now_.

Like so many European cities, Vienna has an old heart and is arrogantly

proud of its long, confused life. Its art school rejected the candidacy of

young Adolf Hitler. Yet some years later, the Viennese greeted him with

delighted fervor in one of their most revered places, Heldenplatz (Heroes

Square), a few days after he had invaded their country. In the first years of

his life, Mozart blossomed fully in Vienna into the exquisite shortlived

orchid he was. Then, only a couple of decades later, he died there and was

dumped into a paupers' grave somewhere outside the city walls. They're still

not sure where.

Because so many old people live there, the city's personality is a

reflection of theirs: careful, suspicious, orderly, conservative. It is a town

where you needn't be afraid, where taking a walk is still a great visual

pleasure, where real cream is used in the cafés.

Victoria and I had never been to Europe together, so being in Vienna in

those first days of our marriage was one long adrenaline rush to wonder.

Nicholas Sylvian was the director of the film, and our friendship began

quickly when we discovered how similar our tastes were.

When shooting for the day was over, we often went together to the Café

Zartl where we talked about rock and roll, how both of us had at one time

wanted to be painters, and only as an end-of-the-evening subject, how to make

our movie better than it was.

The producers had taken a chance on Nicholas because he was still

relatively young and, until then, had never made a "big" film. But his lovely

documentary about old Russians living in Vienna, _Opa Suppe_ (_Grandfather

Soup_), had won a Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival and caused a lot of

talk. Women loved Nicholas because he was completely attentive to them and

seemed to promise every good trait they ever wanted in a man. But he was

volatile and moody, and quick to wipe you off his list if he ever felt you

weren't with him all the way.

I learned all of this in the three months it took to shoot the film. And

working with Nicholas Sylvian, director, I learned I was a mediocre actor. I

knew I would be able to play golden bad boys for a few more years, but that

didn't matter: I didn't want to spend my life working hard to be just _okay_

at what I did, no matter what it happened to be. After a time, when I felt I

could trust my new friend with a few big secrets, I told Nicholas my doubts.

"No, Walker, you're not a bad actor. You've just got that perverse face

up against a sunny temperature."

"You mean _temperament_?"

"Exactly. It takes a really great actor to overcome that. A man can have

a baby's face and be a villain in the movies, but it's hard to be the reverse.

People in the audience don't believe it. In real life it's okay, but not in

the movies.

"You don't want to be an actor anyway. I keep waiting to see that script

you wrote."

"How did you know about that?"

"Victoria told me. She said you're dying to show it to me, but won't

because you're too afraid."

"I'm not a writer, Nicholas. As soon as I show it to you, I start

pretending I am."

He shook his head and rubbed his nose at the same time. "You don't have

to be Tolstoy to write a movie. You were a painter once. Writing for the

movies is like giving the eyes direction. Dialog comes second in this kind of

writing. Only guys like Lubitsch and Woody Allen get away with great language.

If you want great words, read a book. Let me see the script tomorrow."

After I had finished my part in the film, we decided to stay in Vienna

to enjoy some of a spring that had arrived in the quick, unexpected way it

often does in Central Europe: two days ago sleet, today summery-slow pink

clouds, and all tops down on the horse-drawn carriages.

Nicholas didn't like my screenplay, but surprisingly, _did_ like the way

I wrote. He said I should start another. That gave me heart to leap into

another story idea I had hiding in my shadows.

Every morning I kissed my sleeping wife good-bye and, full of

inspiration, marched out the door of our apartment, notebook and fountain pen

ready to go.

Two blocks away was my beloved Café Stein where, after coffee strong as

a stone and a fresh croissant, I would get down to work on my newest _magnus

opum_. The waiters glided by in a professional hush. If I looked up and caught

their eye, they'd nod approvingly at the fact I was writing in their café.

They carried silver trays that caught the early sun's rays, which threw silver

back against the smoke-stained walls.

Anyone who doesn't want to be an "artist" in Europe, raise your hand.

If you are very lucky, you're allowed to be in certain places during

just the right season of your life: by the sea for the summer when you're

seven or eight and full of the absolute need to swim until dark and exhaustion

close their hands together, cupping you in between. Or in another country when

there is both an exciting _now_ and enough dust and scent of the past

everywhere to give fall light a different, violent color, the air a mixed

aroma of open flower markets, people named Zwitkovitz, a passing tram's dry

electricity.

Victoria and I were very lucky. While I wrote my movie, she discovered

the Wiener Werkstatte group, which resulted in her eagerly enrolling in a

Viennese architecture and design course at the university.

A month, then two, came and went. Whenever we discussed leaving Europe

and returning to the United States, a blank look crossed both our faces, and

we either smiled or shrugged: Neither of us was ready to go, so why even talk

about it?

One day a friend of Nicholas's called and sheepishly asked if I would be

interested in acting in a television commercial. They would dub a German voice

over mine after filming, so all I would have to do would be to smile

convincingly and mouth how much I loved feeding _Frolic_ to my bulldog.

Things worked out well, and I talked with a number of people on the set.

A few days later one of them called and asked if I wanted another job.

For the next two years, my modeling for magazines and television

commercials allowed us to continue living in Vienna. By then, both of us had

made contacts all over the place. Victoria had been hired as a researcher by a

professor at the School for Applied Art. In addition to modeling, I was

working at an assortment of free-lance jobs, including a commissioned script

for Nicholas.

Since we had first met, he had made a reputation as a smart, able

director who put together good-looking highbrow films for very little money.

Our spy film had been his only real shot at a big commercial success, but it

had done only so-so. He worked all the time, but never on as large a scale as

he wished.

Along the way, he had married a woman who designed furniture and had a

last name so long and impressive that even she couldn't put all of her money

in it. Unfortunately, Eva Sylvian didn't like Victoria Easterling (and vice

versa), so most of the time just Nicholas and I went out together.

He knew so many different people -- opera singers, neo-Nazi politicians,

a black American who owned the only Mexican restaurant in all of Austria.

Nicholas wanted you to meet all of his friends. They were the greatest gift he

could give: He wanted to give you to them. Some of these people became

friends, others simply filled the evenings with funny lines or pompous

chatter.

At first, Victoria wanted to hear all about these gatherings, but as

time passed, only about who famous was there, or the juiciest morsels.

We had so many things together, Victoria and I. A life fully shared

three-quarters of the time. But from the beginning, my wife and I plotted our

courses on separate, albeit adjoining, maps. I don't know if that's what led

to the death of our marriage, but I don't think so. Those different courses

made our time together richer and more precious. When we met in the evening,

it was to give each other the gift of our day, how it had opened, what it

meant or had done to us.

But in the midst of one of those death-throe arguments you have at the

end of a long and successful relationship, Victoria said we were guilty of

having given each other too much room, too much rope, too much time away. I

said that wasn't true. We were guilty of having grown lazy about things that

should have been checked and rechecked all the time; adjusted quickly when we

saw the gauges registering in the red zone of the heart. I am not being

facile, either. Life itself is fine-tuning. Marriage, that, times two.

Life starts to go bad when irony begins. Or is it the converse? The

ironies in our life began with my first lover outside marriage: a classmate of

Victoria's from the university who came to our apartment one night to discuss

a project they were doing together on Josef Hoffmann.

Victoria's first lover? Naturally, an actor I introduced her to, who

owned a lot of Josef Hoffmann-designed furniture.

Having an affair is like trying to hide an alligator under the bed. It

is much too dangerous and big to be there, it sure doesn't _fit_, and no

matter how carefully you try to conceal it, some part of the beast inevitably

sticks out, is seen, sends everyone running and screaming.

The last time we traveled together was to America to get a divorce.

Victoria said divorce was never having to say you're sorry . . . again.

After it was over, my family urged me to stay with them in Atlanta

awhile, but I used pain as my excuse to escape to Vienna: My friends were

there, my work, everything. So I returned to the town as if it were an old

best friend who would put its arms around me and, over drinks, listen

sympathetically to my problems.

I was thirty, and that is a turning point for anyone, even those not

freshly divorced and out on the track again.

Nicholas and some other nice people were wonderful. They squired me

around, fed me lots of delicious meals, often called late at night to make

sure I wasn't leaning too far out the window . . .

At one of those dinners, someone asked me if I knew how flamingoes got

their color. I didn't. Apparently those funny, long-legged birds are not

naturally that psychedelic coral pink. They're born a sort of dirty white. But

from the beginning, they exist on a diet of plants rich in carotene, "a red

hydrocarbon." If you are a flamingo, you turn from white to pink when you eat

enough carotene.

Anyway, the image fascinated me. I kept thinking I had gone through

almost a decade with Victoria, largely unaware of either our original colors

or the shade our relationship had eventually turned us after all that time

together.

And almost more important, what color was I then, back in Vienna, alone?

To go from a good marriage to a stranger's bed was a pretty big change from a

"carotene diet." It is not only God who is in the details, it is also very

much us.

It was time for me to pay attention to those details. Next time around,

assuming I would be lucky enough to have another chance at a shared lifetime

with someone, I would know the color of my skin (and heart!) before offering

it to another.

Did that mean carrying a hand mirror with me at all times so I could see

myself from every angle? No, nothing so drastic or inane. Self-examination is

usually a half-hearted, spontaneous thing we do when we're either scared or

bored. As a result, whatever conclusions we reach are distorted either by a

clumsy urgency or a listless sigh. But in my own case, I simply wanted to be

less surprised by what I did _after_ I did it.

About six months after I returned to Austria, luck, like a boomerang,

came flying back to me on a wide slow arc. The movie I had been commissioned

to write was shot. For some unknown, delightful reason, it did great business

in Italy and Spain. Its success led to another Nicholas Sylvian-Walker

Easterling collaboration that happened at just the right time. I also liked

the idea of this new one more, so the actual writing came much more easily. It

was a romantic comedy and I was able to plug many of my own good memories into

the story. Another time, those memories would have left me feeling blue and

failed. But integrating them into a film world that ended happily, with a long

kiss and a fortune in the pocket of the lovers was the best way to relive that

part of the recent past.

The film was never made, but it led to another producer, another script,

and a basic assurance that, for the time being, I would be able to rely on the

writing profession to keep me going.

I bought a small, sunny apartment on Bennogasse, two black leather

chairs that looked like matching pistols, and a blind cat from the _Tierheim_

that somewhere had picked up the mysterious name Orlando. He came when I

called and spent the first week in my new home walking carefully through the

rooms like an astronaut just landed on a new planet. He was the

salt-and-pepper gray of week-old snow, and spent most of his day asleep on top

of an old baseball glove I kept on the edge of my desk. Orlando's greatest,

his only, trick was knowing when the telephone was going to ring before it

did. If he was asleep on the desk, a few seconds before the call came he would

lift his head suddenly and move it left and right, as if a fly were somewhere

in his neighborhood. Then, _ring_! I liked to think that being both a cat

_and_ blind made him privy to certain small cosmic secrets. But the longer we

lived together, his early-warning telephone look appeared to be his only

talent in that direction.

I also tried to make the days more orderly and worthwhile. Wake up,

exercise, eat, write, go for a long walk. . . . In certain ways I felt like a

lucky survivor; someone just out of the hospital after a dangerous operation

or terrible illness.

A direct result of all this reshuffling and reappraisal was that,

despite meeting a number of attractive and interesting women, I did not want

to get involved in any kind of relationship then, not even just to "fool

around." Sex with new faces held little appeal in those days, although that

had been one of the prime causes of my dead marriage. There were so many other

things that needed to be sorted out and understood before I visited the Land

of Ladies again.

Four months later I was married again.

The whole ride in from the Munich airport Nicholas talked about the

woman he wanted me to meet. It was characteristic though, because whatever

Nicholas liked, he liked whole-heartedly and described in glowing, mountainous

terms."Do you know Ovo, the fashion photographer?"

"Sure, he's the guy who does models parachuting out of planes in ball

gowns, doesn't he?"

"That's right. Maris York was his main model for two years. You'll know

her face when you see it, I'm sure."

"Is she beautiful?"

He frowned, hesitated before answering. "Beautiful? I don't know about

that. She is six feet tall, has hair as short as yours, and brown eyes that

are a miracle. But no, she's not what most people would call beautiful. But

she's the kind of woman you see someplace and wish you were going to spend the

rest of your life with."

I laughed and nodded to show I was impressed. He wasn't finished.

"She drives an old Renault R4 with no heater and the radio is always

broken. The wires stick out of the dashboard. You love her even more for that

car." "Have you ever been together with her?"

He looked at me as if I had said something terrible.

"Hell no! It would be like blowing out the candles on a birthday cake."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"Walker, some people you touch and some you dream about."

Herr Nashorn looked like a goldfish in aviator glasses. We had coffee

and cake in his office and talked about films we'd all enjoyed. It was

get-acquainted chatter, and we were all waiting to see who would be the first

to mention our project.

In the middle of the gabbing, Nicholas stood up abruptly and asked if he

could make a telephone call. He winked at me, and started dialing from a phone

in the corner of the office.

While he called, Nashorn began talking to me, so I couldn't really hear

what my friend was saying. But when he reached her, his voice went low and

sexy, and his face was truly happy.

"Herr Nashorn, where are we eating lunch, and at what time?"

"The _Vier Jahreszeiten_, I guess. About two o'clock."

"Good." Nicholas held the receiver up and pointed to it. "Do you mind if

I bring a guest?"

We waited half an hour before ordering. She didn't show up. The food

came, we ate and talked, she didn't show up. Nicholas went twice to look for

her, but came back both times shaking his head.

"It's not like Maris to do this, damn it. I wonder if something is

wrong. It has me worried."

"Did you call her?"

"Yes, but there was no answer."

After lunch we went back to the office and spent the afternoon talking,

but Nicholas was clearly preoccupied with his friend and not much help selling

our picture. Every half hour he got up to call again. Nashorn didn't like

these interruptions one bit. He kept shooting exasperated, annoyed looks at

one or another of his associates every time Nicholas excused himself to go to

the phone.

I did what I could to keep the ball rolling, describing wonderful scenes

I already had in mind to write, suggesting actors I thought would be right for

the different roles. Whenever someone made a suggestion or comment, I listened

carefully and even pretended to take notes.

Someone said you should never be a housepainter because others all think

they know how to do it and, as a result, will always be telling you how to do

it better. The same is true with making movies. Some of the things said in the

meeting that afternoon were so dumb and off-base that I frequently had to gulp

to keep my exasperation down.

Fortunately, Nashorn was very interested in making a movie, and despite

Nicholas's strange behavior, our meeting ended with the boss of Nashorn

Industries smiling and actually rubbing his hands together.

"This kind of work is what I like. Lay the plans and then get going. I

think we can pull something together here, Mr. Sylvian. And Mr. Easterling,

you have the right ideas for the screenplay: clever, funny, and sexy. Don't

forget those sexy parts though -- that's what makes people like me go to the

movies!"

Everyone shook hands, backs were patted, and finally we were out on the

street in an adamant winter rain before either of us spoke again.

"'Don't forget the sexy parts!' Nicholas, are we really going to have to

work with that dope?"

"He's just an asshole, Walker. Don't worry about him. We'll take his big

money and make our own film. Come on, I've got to find a phone. I want to try

her one more time before we go to the airport. What time is the flight?"

I looked at my watch. "A little under two hours."

We walked some blocks in the rain before spying the ghostly yellow block

of a lit phone booth. While Nicholas called, I stood outside and tried to

shield myself from the mean, icy drops that were coming down like ball

bearings.

He reached her and gave me a big thumbs up. But he spoke only a few

words before shouting "He did _what_?" and slamming his hand hard against one

of the walls. The booth shook.

With the phone to his ear he looked at me and said, "The fucking guy

tried to kill her!"

I didn't know which fucking guy he was talking about, but assumed he

meant the man she was living with.

"He killed me" is one of the more overused phrases of our already

hyperbolic times. As a result, it has lost most of its punch. People use it to

say "killed" in business, in bed, on the golf course. I've learned not to pay

attention when people use it, but the look on Nicholas's face behind the wet

glass said there was no fooling around here.

He spoke for a short time into the receiver, looking at me while he

mumbled and nodded and tightened his lips repeatedly. Suddenly, he hung up

with a bang and came out.

"We've got to meet her at the Käfer. She'll be there in twenty minutes."

The streets were jammed with five o'clock traffic but we found a taxi.

It was a brand-new Mercedes full of that great mystical new-car smell.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

He nodded. "She's been living with a French guy for about a year. Luc

something. He thinks he's a director, but the only films he's ever made have

been industrial shit about how to work a computer or a storm window. I don't

know where she got him, but I never liked him. He's about five feet five,

spends most of his time lying around home complaining, and walks around in

T-shirts in winter so you'll see his muscles. A real weekend Rambo, you know?

"Anyway, she got smart about two months ago and threw him out of her

house. Since then he's been following her everywhere she goes. Stands outside

her apartment all night, shows up in every restaurant she goes to, calls her

up and threatens her --"

"Threatens her? How?"

"Hey, listen, a couple of days ago he broke into her place and tried to

rape her! Tore off her clothes and threatened to stab her with a pair of

scissors if she didn't come across. Jesus Christ, she's such a sweet woman.

Wait till you meet her. How could somebody do that? She was able to talk him

out of it, but then today he grabbed her on the street and started hitting her

in the face. Said _no one_ ever left him. Can you believe it?"

"I can believe it if he's a madman. How did she stop him?"

"Started screaming. Luckily, a couple of cops showed up. He ran away!

_Ran away_. The guy is forty years old and he runs away! But when she went

back to her apartment, he called her and said he was going to get her, no

matter what she did."

Nicholas patted my knee and shook his head. "A nice man to get involved

with, huh?"

The Käfer is a Munich "in" spot of the first order. It is full of people

wearing leather, jewels, or very little. During the last part of the cab ride

Nicholas cheered up some, and was smiling again as we went through the door of

the restaurant.

It felt as if all the people there were waiting: for their date, for the

right moment, for whatever they felt was their due. I have always felt

uncomfortable in places like that, places where no one tastes the expensive

food or drink because they are too busy watching the door to see who comes in.

I was thinking about that as we made our way across the room to a staircase

leading to the bar.

As we were about to start climbing, Nicholas turned to me and said

something exciting, but which later turned out to be eerily prophetic.

"Walker, now you are going to fall in love with a unique woman." He said

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SLEEPINGINFLAMEbyJonathanCarrollFIRSTVINTAGECONTEMPORARIESEDITION,JULY1990Copyright(c)1988byJonathanCarrollAllrightsreservedunderInternationalandPan-AmericanCopyrightConventions.PublishedintheUnitedStatesbyVintageBooks,adivisionofRandomHouse,Inc.,NewYork.OriginallypublishedbyDoubleday,adivisionofBan...

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Jonathan Carroll - Sleeping In Flame

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