He—the unbidden guest—did, however, mount the broad staircase, without a doubt running his fingers up the silky bannister and pausing in the dim upstairs hall. It was in this hall, between bathroom and bedroom, that Hildë suffered the stroke that killed her, a thunderbolt many times the force of the tiny haemorrhage that knocked Cruzzi off balance for a few minutes last summer, and that he at first thought was nothing but a touch of sunstroke.
Four doors open from the upstairs hall. One, of course, leads to a bathroom, but there is little in a bathroom, even a hundred-year-old bathroom, to excite the interest of a prowler.
A second door leads to the bedroom that Frederic and Hildë Cruzzi shared for so many years. What would catch a thieving eye in such a bedroom? Not the excellent new stainless-steel reading lamp, just two years old, not the wool-filled comforter from Austria, not the marble-topped bureau or the plants by the window or the pine-framed mirror, which can be tipped back and forth, or the comfortable wicker chair in the corner. The scenes that have taken place in this room are unguessable. Memory, that folded book, alters and distorts our most intimate settings so that passion, forgiveness, and the currency of small daily bargains are largely stolen from us—which may be just as well.
The very large room running across the front of the house is where Frederic and Hildë Cruzzi kept their books. (Because this room, forty years ago, was painted a brilliant yellow, it has always been known as the “Gold Room.”) There are some chairs here and a desk that holds an old typewriter, but this room is mainly a resting place for books. They line the four walls and reach from floor to ceiling. Other rooms in the house contain odd shelves of books, but Cruzzi’s most cherished books are kept here. They number in the thousands, and are arranged on the shelves according to language, then subject or author. Any reasonably intelligent adult entering this room could, in a matter of minutes, find what he or she was looking for. If, for example, a person were looking for one of the various editions published by the Peregrine Press between the years 1957 and 1977, it could be spotted easily by the logo—a set of blue wings—on the narrow grey spine. The four copies of Mary Swann’s book, Swann’s Songs, published in 1966, were in the middle of the Peregrine shelf, since their publication occurred about halfway through the life of the press. All four of these books were stolen by the Christmas Eve burglar, and the books on either side pushed together, presumably to make the gap less noticeable.
In the ordinary course of events it might have been weeks or months before Cruzzi noticed the missing books, but, in fact, he was alerted to the theft on Christmas Day. He wakened late after the revels of the night before, made himself coffee, which he drank sitting on a kitchen chair and listening to the mutters and rumbles of the house. After a while he went upstairs and was about to take up a volume of his beloved Rashid when he remembered that he had as yet done nothing to prepare for the little talk he had promised to present at the Swann symposium, now just ten days away.
He had, however, given it some thought. It was his intention to keep his remarks simple and tuned to a tolerant orthodoxy, to discuss the manner in which he had met Mary Swann, and the decision, not an easy one, of the Peregrine Press to go ahead with publication after her death. He planned also to comment, savouring the irony of it, on how little stir the book had originally caused. The notoriety of the Swann murder had been brief and confined to the immediate region. The poems in Swann’s Songs were passed over by most reviewers as simple, workmanlike curiosities, and the 250 copies that the press printed sold poorly, even in Nadeau Township. In the end he and Hildë gave most of them away, keeping just four copies for themselves. It was these four copies that were missing.
Gazing at the shelf, Cruzzi felt pierced with the fact of his old age, his helplessness, and the knowledge that a long-delayed act of reprisal had taken place. It was unbearable; some menacing reversal had occurred, leaving him with nothing but his old fraudulent skin hanging loose on his bones. He felt his vision blur as he made his way to the little back bedroom that Hildë had once used as the Peregrine office. He opened the door. There was nothing in the room but a table, two chairs, and a rather large file cabinet. The drawers of the cabinet were open and the contents were scattered over the whole of the room.
It took him the rest of the day to put things back in order. As he sorted through twenty years of manuscripts and correspondence, he listened to Handel’s Messiah on the radio and felt a feeble tide of balance reassert itself.
Occasionally he hummed along with the music, and the sound of his voice, creaky and out of tune, kept bewilderment at bay. The music soared and plunged and seemed to coat the little room with luminous, concurrent waves of colour. By late afternoon he was finished. Everything was in place, with only the file on Mary Swann missing. He supposed he should be grateful, but instead found his face confused by tears.
THE SWANN SYMPOSIUM
DIRECTOR’S NOTE: The Swann Symposium is a film lasting approximately 120 minutes. The main characters, Sarah Maloney, Morton Jimroy, Rose Hindmarch, and Frederic Cruzzi, are fictional creations, as is the tragic Mary Swann, poète naïve, of rural Ontario. The film may be described (for distribution purposes) as a thriller. A subtext focuses on the more subtle thefts and acts of cannibalism that tempt and mystify the main characters. The director hopes to remain unobtrusive throughout, allowing dialogue and visual effects (and not private passions) to carry the weight of the narrative.
Fade in: Full screen photograph, black and white, grainy, blurred, of MARY SWANN, a farm wife, standing on the ramshackle porch of her rural house. She is wearing a house dress and bib apron; her lean face clearly indicates premature aging; her eyes are shut against the sun. TITLES roll across the photograph. SOUND: a sprightly (faintly Scottish) organ tune that gradually grows heavier as the CAMERA concentrates on Mary’s face.
Dissolve to: Exterior shot, main street of Nadeau, Ontario. Early morning, winter, still dark.
The darkness gradually yields up a hint of light. Snow is falling. The main street of Nadeau becomes faintly visible. One or two cars pass, then a pick-up truck; their headlights glow yellow through the swirled snow. A Greyhound bus comes into view, then pulls to a stop at the side of the road. The CAMERA picks up a sign, NADEAU.
A woman steps from the shadows and boards the bus. She is small, middle-aged, somewhat awkward, and hesitant in the manner of someone who has recently been ill. This is ROSE HINDMARCH. She wears a too-large padded blue coat with an artificial fur collar and a wool muffler pulled loosely over her plastic headscarf.
CLOSE SHOT of driver’s face. He is about thirty, with a fresh, alert face. Seeing Rose, his eyes widen.
DRIVER: Hi ya, Rose. Hey you’re up early, aren’t ya? You off to Kingston?
He stands up, takes her suitcase and wedges it behind his seat. Rose opens her purse and takes out a five-dollar bill. The bus is nearly empty, with three or four shadowy figures dozing at the back.
ROSE (cheerful, newsy): I’m getting the ten o’clock train. For Toronto, as a matter of fact.
DRIVER (making change): You’ll be in plenty of time. You’ll be sitting around the station waiting. Couple hours anyways.
Rose, seating herself in one of the front seats, carefully removes her muffler and her plastic scarf and pats at her hairdo. The bus starts up slowly.
* * *
ROSE: Well, I didn’t want to … you know, take a chance. And you never know this time of year.
DRIVER: Right you are, Rose. Don’t blame you one little bit.
ROSE (still fussing with her hair): Wouldn’t you just know we’d get snow today? I watched the forecast last night.
DRIVER: Yeah?
ROSE: Snow, he said. Of all days, just when —
DRIVER: (shifting gears to climb a hill): S’posed to get six inches.
ROSE:—and I said to myself, just my luck, the roads closed and just when I have to get my train to Toronto for —
CAMERA pans open highway and fields. Snow is blowing across
the road, but houses and barns can be glimpsed in outline. MUSIC, an alto clarinet, makes a jaunty counterpoint to the rather laconic conversation.
DRIVER: Jeez, yeah, the train’s your best bet this time of the year. I mean, they tell ya six inches, but it looks to me like —
ROSE (chattily): I’d of worn my good coat, but with this snow, well, you can’t wear a suede coat in weather like this. Oh, it’s warm enough, that’s not the trouble, but suede can’t take it, getting wet.
Rose’s natural garrulousness is augmented by the excitement of the journey to Toronto, and she sits on the seat tensely, jerking off her gloves and examining her nails.
DRIVER: So! You’re having yourself a trip to Toronto, eh, Rose?
ROSE (still fussing): Just four days, that’s all I can spare, what with having to shut the library down, and —
DRIVER: Fuck! (He swerves hard, brakes, barely missing a car.) Where the … did he come from? (Relaxing): ‘Scuse me, Rose, but that bugger came out of that side road without even —
ROSE (staring dreamily out of the window, not hearing): You know, I do believe it’s letting up. The snow. Maybe I should have—(She fingers her coat, questioningly, regretfully.)
The bus stops and a woman with a baby gets on. She greets Rose and the driver and makes her way to the back of the bus.
DRIVER (starting up again, adjusting the mirror): So I suppose you’re going to hit the January sales, eh Rose? Go on a spending spree. (His tone is teasing; Rose is by nature a woman who is subject to good-natured kidding.)
ROSE (dreamily): Pardon? Sorry, Roy, you were saying?
DRIVER (louder, as though addressing a deaf person): Shopping spree, I said. You going on a spree?
ROSE (delighted at this show of interest): It’s for a symposium. (She loves this word.) In Toronto.
DRIVER (self-mocking): A who?
ROSE: A symposium. (Apologetic now): It’s sort of a meeting.
DRIVER (concentrating on road): Yeah?
ROSE: You know, people talking and discussing and so on. It’s about —
DRIVER: Makes a change, I guess.
ROSE: It’s about Mary Swann. She came from Nadeau, you know. A poetess. You probably never heard of her, but she’s —
DRIVER (scratching an ear): She the one whose old man shot her up and stuffed her in the silo? Way back when?
ROSE (almost proudly): That’s the one.
DRIVER: Whaddaya know!
ROSE: She’s got real famous now. Not because of … that, but on account of her poems, her book of poems that was published. Oh, people’ll be coming from all over, the States, everywhere. She’s got quite a reputation now. She’s real well thought of, people writing books about her and —
DRIVER: Why’d he do it, her husband I mean. Do her in?
ROSE (ignoring the question): It’s going to be at the Harbourview. The Harbourview Hotel, that’s where the meetings are and that’s —
DRIVER: The Harbourview, eh? (He negotiates a curve.) Was there another guy or what? I think I heard my dad saying once … anyways, I can’t remember the details, but —
ROSE: How is your dad, Roy? Better? (Rose knows everyone).
CAMERA pans countryside, buried in snow. There are a few billboards indicating that the bus is approaching Kingston. SOUND of clarinet, cooler now.
DRIVER: Not bad. He’s a lot better, in fact. You can’t keep the old man down.
ROSE: Your mom? She taking it pretty well?
DRIVER: Oh yeah, you know Mom.
ROSE (regarding snow): Look at that, will you. Definitely letting up. I wish now—(She looks down at her coat mournfully.)
DRIVER: So whaddaya think of all this hijacking jazz, Rose? Real mess over there, people getting roughed up —
ROSE: Terrible. (A long pause.) Terrible. (She stares dreamily out the window as the bus enters town.) Terrible. (Dissolve.)
Fade to: Interior, the train station. Daytime.
Clearly this is the train station of a small city. There is a rather old-fashioned air about it: brown wooden benches, drab posters, and windows through which can be seen the double train tracks, this morning interfilled with snow. Rose, her muffler now nearly tucked into the neck of her coat, her plastic head scarf removed, is standing nervously and looking through the window to the platform. She looks at the station clock, which says 9:50, then at her wristwatch. She gazes about her. A few people come and go carrying luggage. She opens her purse, takes out a compact and looks at herself, pats her hair; she is obviously waiting for someone. She checks her watch once more, and then a voice takes her by surprise.
CRUZZI: Miss Hindmarch? (FREDERIC CRUZZI is a tall, thin, elderly man, wearing a long dark overcoat and a fur hat, and carrying a cane, which he clearly needs.)
ROSE (startled): You’re … are you —?
CRUZZI (bowing very slightly): Frederic Cruzzi. How do you do?
ROSE (nervously): How do you do? (Her handbag slips to the floor; they both bend to retrieve it.) Thank you, but … oh dear, I’ve got such a handful. And that’s all you have? (She gestures at Cruzzi’s small carry-on.)
CRUZZI (smiling): A light traveller.
ROSE (rattled): I was … was starting to think, maybe you’d changed your mind, and, well, when I saw it was 9:50 on the station clock, I thought maybe you’d decided not to … meet me, the way we arranged like. (Her words are drowned by the sound of the train entering the station.)
CRUZZI: Shall we? (He offers his arm, but Rose, juggling her handbag, suitcase, and shopping tote, doesn’t have a free arm. She attempts to rearrange things. Cruzzi picks up her suitcase.)
ROSE (alarmed): No! You mustn’t. It’s very, very heavy. No matter how I try I always end up with too much. And shoes weigh such a lot, and then there’s my hair dryer and, well, what I need, I was saying to a friend of mine, is one of those backpacks (laughs) like the kids wear nowadays.
CRUZZI (listening patiently, amused and polite): Ready?
They exit, arm in arm, MUSIC swells, a Scottish air, and the CAMERA follows them through the station window as they walk slowly, almost a matrimonial march, to the waiting train. Dissolve.
Fade to: Interior, SARAH MALONEY’S bedroom, Chicago. It is early morning.
A very small bedroom is revealed in half-darkness, a room nearly overwhelmed by a king-size waterbed. The walls and furniture are white. There are books on shelves, plants, one piece of white sculpture. From under a thick white blanket come murmurs and grunts and sighs of sensual pleasure. They are suddenly interrupted by an alarm clock ringing musically.
SARAH (reaching out and shutting off alarm): Morning!
She kisses Stephen’s bare shoulder, yawns, slips from the bed, stretches, and tiptoes into the adjoining bathroom. When she returns, she is fresh from a shower, a towel around her body, her long hair wet. In the half-light she dresses: underwear, a suit in a subtle shade of dusty pink, a soft blouse in a lighter shade, shoes. As she dresses she steals smiling looks at her watch and at Stephen, who is observing her from the bed. Her gestures are quick, hurried, absent-minded, though she touches her clothes, especially the silk blouse, with loving attention. She pulls a brush through her wet hair without glancing in the mirror. She applies no makeup. She opens a briefcase, checks its contents, and snaps it shut. For a moment she stands, holding the clasp, and goes through a mental checklist, then sets the briefcase by the bedroom door, puts on a heavy coat of white fleece, hoists up her shoulder bag, and approaches the bed. She sits down beside Stephen and opens her arms.
SARAH: Well?
STEPHEN (sitting up; he is a large, handsome shaggy man, he is wearing no clothes): You want some coffee? I could —
SARAH: I’ll get some at the airport. (She starts to rise, but he pulls her down in an embrace more comradely than sexual; for a moment they rock back and forth; still embracing, she checks her watch, and this makes Stephen smile.)
STEPHEN: Time?
SARAH: Time.
STEPHEN: Good luck. With your s
peech.
SARAH (lazily): Not a speech, a paper.
STEPHEN: Good luck, anyway.
SARAH (pulling away): I’d better go. The cab should be here.
You be shiftless and go back to sleep.
STEPHEN: It’s still night! (He hoists himself out of bed, reaching for the white wool blanket, which he wraps around him Indian style; he puts an arm around her, and together they go down a miniature staircase, so narrow they bump against the walls as they descend.) This is a crazy hour. You live a crazy life, you know.
Stephen opens the door to a city street; there is no front yard and it is only a few feet to the curb where a taxi waits, its light gleaming in the darkness.
STEPHEN: So long. (He hugs her.)
SARAH (peering at him critically): For a minute there I thought you were going to say “take care.” Or “be good.” (She is scornful of such phrases.)
STEPHEN: How about … (miming)… ciao?
SARAH (pulling away as she hears the taxi toot): All of a sudden I hate to go.
STEPHEN: Toronto in January. (He phrases this so that it sounds both a question and a declaration.)
SARAH: Not just that. I feel spooked for some reason.
STEPHEN: Four days. (He gives a clownish shrug.)
SARAH (stepping across the snowy sidewalk and getting into the cab): O’Hare. (She rolls down the window and looks at Stephen, who is shivering in the doorway, wrapped in his blanket. She waves slowly; he waves back. The taxi pulls away.)
TAXI DRIVER: Jesus, it’s cold. (Good naturedly): Whyn’cha say goodbye to your boyfriend inside?
SARAH (with music-hall rhythm): That’s not my boyfriend, that’s my husband.
They both laugh. The cab proceeds slowly down the street. Sarah, still waving, rolls up the window. SOUND: a cheerful, piping woodwind.