The Wapshot Scandal полностью

The doctor groaned. Why couldn’t they be put up at the International Hotel? he asked the stewardess. She explained that all planes were grounded and the airport hotels were full. A bus drove into the hangar and they boarded it with perfect passivity and returned to the city, where they were received in what was very definitely a third-class hotel. It was nearly noon and Cameron went into the bar and ordered a drink and lunch. “Are you with flight seven?” the waitress asked. He said that he was. “Well, I’m very sorry,” she said, “but passengers for flight seven have to eat in the dining room where they serve the plat du jour.”

“I will pay for my lunch,” Cameron said. “And please bring me a drink.”

“The courtesy of cocktails is not extended to tourist passengers,” the waitress said.

“I will pay for my drink and I will pay for my lunch,” Cameron said.

“That won’t be necessary,” the waitress said, “if you go into the other dining room.”

“Does it look to you as if I couldn’t pay for my lunch?” Cameron asked.

“I am just trying to explain to you,” the waitress said, “that the airline is responsible for your meals.”

“I understand,” said Cameron. “Now please bring me what I have ordered.”

After lunch he watched a television play in his hotel room and rang for a bottle of whisky at four. At six the airline called to say that the flight was scheduled for midnight and that they would board the bus in front of the hotel at eight o’clock. He ate some supper in a restaurant around the corner and joined the other passengers, whom he had begun to detest. They boarded the plane at half-past eleven and were airborne on schedule but the plane was old and noisy and flew so low that he could clearly see the lights of Nantucket when they passed the island. He had his whisky bottle with him and he sipped at this until he fell asleep to suffer an excruciating dream about Luciana. When he woke it was dawn and they were coming in for a landing but it was not Rome; it was Shannon, where they made an unscheduled stop for motor repairs. He cabled Luciana from Shannon but it was five before they took off again and they didn’t reach Rome until a little after dawn the next day.

The airport bar and restaurant were shut. He telephoned Luciana. She was asleep, of course, and cross at being waked. She had not received his cable. She could not see him until evening. She would meet him at Quinterella’s at eight. He pleaded with her to let him see her sooner—to let him come to her then. “Please, my darling, please,” he groaned. She broke the connection. He took a cab into Rome and got a room at the Eden. It was still early in the morning and the people on the streets were dressed for work and hurrying, with that international sameness of people hurrying to work on a hot morning anywhere. He took a shower and lay down on his bed to rest, yearning for her and cursing her but his anger did nothing to palliate his need and the crudeness of his thinking seemed like one of the realities of hell. Oh, the wind and the rain and to hold in one’s arms a willing love!

There was the day to kill. He had never seen the Sistine Chapel or any of the other sights of the city and he thought he could do that. It might clear his head. He dressed and went out onto the street looking for one of those famous museums or churches about which one heard so much. Presently he came to a square where there were three churches that looked old. The doors of the first and the second were locked but the third was open and he stepped into a dark place that smelled heavily of spices. There were four women in a front pew and a priest in soiled lace was celebrating mass. He looked around him, anxious to appreciate the art treasures, but there seemed to be a roof leak above the chapel on his right and while he guessed that the painting there must be valuable and beautiful it was cracked and stained with water like the wall of any furnished room. The next chapel was decorated with naked men blowing on trumpets and the next was so dark that he could see nothing. There was a sign in English saying that if you put ten lire in the slot the lights would go on and he did this, revealing a large and bloody picture of a man in the death agonies of being crucified upside down. He did not ever like to be reminded of the susceptibilities of his flesh to pain and he quickly left the church for the smashing light and heat of the square. There was a café with an awning and he sat there and drank a campari. A young woman, crossing the street, reminded him of Luciana, but even if she was a tart it was Luciana and not her he wanted. Luciana was a tart but she was his tart and somewhere in the crudeness of his drives was a touching strain of romance. Luciana, he thought, was the kind of woman who could make the simple act of stepping into her pumps seem as if she had slammed a door on time.