From the moment Ildiko and I stepped down from the Milan express in the station at Lausanne, the good grey city set midway along the great banana that is Lake Geneva, it was clear we had entered a different kind of world. Here everything seemed so sober and Protestant after Vienna, so solid and lasting after Budapest, so very neat and honest after northern Italy. Fine, let the Austrians, with their taste for baroque abandon, celebrate two hundred years of Amadeus in their own Alpine wonderland next door. The Swiss had seven hundred years of mountain democracy, of alphorns and liberty, watches and banks, to celebrate that same year, but they did it without any excess. When I went into the tourist information office in the station concourse, leaving Ildiko to keep guard over our luggage, the girl behind the desk was solemn, dour, and reserved. So were all the maps and guidebooks she handed me. ‘Here it is the quality of life that counts,’ said the first guide I opened, ‘Each district, street, park and shop attempts to outshine the others, but always in the best of good taste and with due moderation.’ No doubt about it; we had definitely arrived in Switzerland
I went back to the station concourse with my tourist trophies, and looked round for Ildiko. Our luggage still stood there, an untidy pile of my rucksack and Ildiko’s plastic-bagged Western purchases, tumbled among the cautious feet of passengers. Of Ildiko herself there was no sign at all. Then I saw her at last, coming towards me through the quiet crowds. I had been away for only a few minutes, but she’d used the time very well. She had already effortlessly acquired several boxes of chocolates, a cheeseknife, two cowbells, a designer watch, and a sweater that said ‘I ♥ Lausanne.’ I asked you to guard the luggage,’ I said. ‘It’s all right, everything is safe here, the Swiss do not steal,’ said Ildiko, ‘Everyone knows that.’ ‘I couldn’t find you anywhere,’ I said. ‘It was all right,’ said Ildiko, ‘I just saw this very little shop, over there. I bought you a sweater, see, so you can remember where you have been. Did you find out where is the hotel of Criminale Bazlo?’
‘It’s at Ouchy,’ I said, ‘down by the lake. The girl said there’s a little cogwheel railway that goes straight down there, right from under the station.’ ‘Do we go there?’ asked Ildiko, gathering up her ever-growing pile of luggage, ‘I think so.’ ‘We might as well take a look,’ I said. ‘I expect it is very good hotel,’ said Ildiko. ‘One of the ten best in Europe,’ I said, ‘Even the gardener’s shed has five stars. Criminale must have been round at the bank already.’ ‘Oh, I think so,’ said Ildiko, as we went down the stairs toward the funicular railway, ‘That is why people come to Switzerland, to come to the bank.’ ‘Even Bazlo Criminale?’ I asked. ‘I know you imagine that Criminale is a great philosopher who does not think about money,’ said Ildiko, ‘But even a wise man needs some, yes, especially when he has found a new girl.’ ‘He could have got it without coming to Lausanne,’ I pointed out. ‘I expect he has some good reasons,’ said Ildiko, ‘Oh, is this the train? Very nice.’
So we boarded one of those jolly Swiss funicular railways, which ran on ropes down the steep hillside from the centre of the grey city to the side of the grey lake. It was called la ficelle, the girl in the travel bureau had explained to me; and as we rode down it occurred to me that this was not the first time in my pursuit of Criminale that I’d been towed across Europe at a curious angle on the end of a string. We rode down between expensive, tidy apartments, with wonderfully kept window-boxes, set in streets of — and how I should have worried — very elegant shops. When the doors of the little train clanged open at the Ouchy terminus, we walked out to find ourselves in full view of the lake. There was the usual steamer pier, with moored at it the usual white Swiss paddle steamer, with its flapping red and white flag. Across the waters we could see, through the fading wintry day, the lights of the French spa of Evian, friend to smart dinner-tables everywhere, and behind it the Savoyard mountains, already dusted white with early snow and awaiting the coming of the skiing season, now not so far away.
I stopped, checked my guidebook, and then led the way across the square, with its statue of General Guisan, who had rallied the Swiss to fight for their neutrality during the Second World War. We passed the façade of the Hotel d’Angleterre, where, a plaque told us, Lord Byron had sat on the terrace in 1816 and written his long sad poem of liberty lost, The Prisoner of Chillon. But that was not what we were looking for. The hotel where Bazlo Criminale was staying, if Cosima Bruckner was right, was a grand affair indeed. There was nothing secretive or inconspicuous about the Hotel Beau Rivage Palace. Its vast, great-balconied façade shone white even in the dusk. The flags of all major nations fluttered on its high flagpoles. Capped chauffeurs buffed every splash and dustmark off the gleaming Rolls-Royces and Cadillacs that stood in its drives. Arabs in white robes swept in and out of its entrance; the Western suits that passed through its portico were clearly handmade. It was a place where peace conferences were held and treaties were signed. I was impressed, and so, plainly, was Ildiko.
This is really quite nice,’ she said, ‘And we are staying here?’ ‘No, Ildiko, we’re not staying here,’ I said, ‘Bazlo Criminale is staying here. To stay here you have to be very rich, very old, and on a diplomatic mission. In fact you probably have to be of royal blood as well.’ ‘Criminale Bazlo is not of royal blood,’ said Ildiko. ‘Maybe not,’ I said, ‘He’s into royalties of another kind. But you’re right, his sales have to be doing very nicely. You’d have to sell one hell of a lot of books before you could afford a suite at the Beau Rivage Palace.’ ‘But I like it here,’ said Ildiko. ‘Maybe you do,’ I said, ‘But we’ve come here to investigate Criminale, not share the highlife with him. Anyway, remember the television budget. I’m sorry, Ildiko, but I just don’t happen to be one of the world’s bestselling novelists.’ ‘And if I could find some money myself?’ asked Ildiko. ‘I doubt if they even take forints,’ I said, ‘You saw that plaque back there? Lord Byron wasn’t a man to stint on his comforts, and even he couldn’t afford a room at the Beau Rivage Palace. So let’s go and find somewhere nearby we can actually pay the bill for.’ ‘I hate you,’ said Ildiko, picking up her luggage, ‘I don’t know why you are always so mean.’
Now to be absolutely frank (and you know I can be, when I feel like it), I’ve no doubt I got the next bit badly wrong. But then I got quite a lot of things wrong over the course of my confusing quest for Bazlo Criminale. I’d already had my eye on the Hotel d’Angleterre. It was handily right next door to the place where Criminale was staying, always assuming that Cosima Bruckner had the right information, which I was starting to doubt, and its very name somehow satisfied my feeble but not totally exhausted sense of patriotism. Unluckily, thanks to the fact that Lausanne seemed to be hosting a conference or two at the time, its rooms were already fully booked. So, turned away, we walked on and, somewhere around the corner, almost in view of the lake — if you sat on its pavement, or rather gutter, terrace and leaned forward a little, you got a very decent sight of it — we found another hostelry, the small Hotel Zwingli. There is no doubt it was not exactly a Grand Hotel, but I felt Lavinia’s breath at my shoulder, and I knew she would wear nothing better. In fact the Zwingli had earned itself no stars in the guidebook at all, and, as things eventually turned out, for very good reason.
Still, it seemed a nice family place: neat, clean, and orderly, in the good Swiss way. The Swiss had, after all, won the world with their tradition of hotelkeeping and hospitality, and one could scarcely go wrong. I went over to the stern young daughter of the house who presided over the cubbyhole of a reception desk; she acknowledged they had vacant rooms and quoted what sounded a reasonable rate. With Ildiko standing crossly beside me, I signed the book (Mr and Mrs Francis Jay), changed some money, lira to Swiss francs, handed over our passports, and asked for a double room. That was when I found out that the Hotel Zwingli did have one or two disadvantages that the better class of guest over at the Beau Rivage Palace, just round the corner, was very probably spared. The girl handed me two keys. ‘No, a double room,’ I said. ‘With nice big double bed,’ said Ildiko. ‘Ah, non, m’sieu,’ said the girl.
‘Non?’ I asked. The girl held up our two passports, one British and one Hungarian, with two unmatching names, and tapped them. ‘Voilà, m’sieu!’ she said triumphantly. ‘But we’re together,’ I said. ‘Ce n’est pas possible, en Suisse,’ said the girl. Now of course I should at that moment have cancelled the contract, and gone looking for something elsewhere along the Ouchy shore, or maybe just handed over a small tip. But I was young then, the hotel was cheap, cheap enough for even Lavinia not to complain, and Bazlo Criminale was just round the corner. ‘Oh, very well, two single rooms then,’ I said, taking the keys. ‘C’est mieux, m’sieu,’ said the girl. ‘Two single rooms, why?’ asked Ildiko, looking at me mystified. ‘Switzerland is a Calvinist country,’ I said. ‘You mean they don’t have sex here?’ asked Ildiko. ‘I’m sure they do,’ I said, ‘There are plenty of them about. But maybe only on Protestant feast days.’ ‘But you don’t like this, do you?’ asked Ildiko, ‘Why don’t you protest? Maybe she likes a little something.’ ‘It’s no use,’ I said, ‘This is a very strict country. They like you to mind your manners. They don’t even let you do your washing on Sundays.’ ‘I did not come to Lake Geneva to do washing,’ said Ildiko, ‘And I did not come here to sleep alone in a single bed either.
I saw the girl at the desk staring at us with deep disapproval; I pulled Ildiko away. ‘It’s very unfortunate,’ I said, ‘but at least they’ve got room for us.’ ‘You think they make Bazlo Criminale and Miss Blasted Belli have two single rooms there at Beau Rivage Palace?’ asked Ildiko. ‘I can’t afford the Beau Rivage Palace,’ I said, ‘And it’s just for a couple of days.’ ‘A couple of days?’ asked Ildiko, ‘You don’t mind to be without me in your bed for a whole couple of days?’ ‘Of course I mind,’ I said. ‘Are you so tired at making love with me?’ asked Ildiko, rather loudly, ‘Don’t you like my body so much any more?’ ‘I love your body,’ I said, glancing at the girl at the desk, who was tapping her pencil furiously, ‘It’s a terrific body, really. But we can meet from time to time . . .’ ‘Where, in the corridor?’ asked Ildiko, ‘What fun.’ ‘Let’s go and unpack,’ I said, turning to the girl at the desk, ‘Where’s the elevator?’ ‘II n’y en a pas,’ said the girl, ‘Par 1’escalier.’ ‘Oh, no lift also?’ asked Ildiko, ‘Wonderful. How lucky the Swiss have at last invented stairs.’
So our visit to Lausanne got off to a less than perfect start, and things remained that way for some little time afterwards. We climbed the stairs, went along one of those dim, ill-lit corridors where the lights go out just at the time when you need them most, and found Ildiko’s room. ‘Just look at it,’ said Ildiko, throwing her bags down furiously on the bed, ‘You call this a nice chamber? I have seen much better in prison. And been treated nicer by the secret police.’ True, the room could have been improved on: it had one small single bed, a tiny bedside table with a bible on it, and on the wall a large stained lithograph of John Knox. The view through the grimy window was of an enclosed, cemented courtyard; the highlight at its centre was a big skip for the collection of dead bottles. ‘It’s not perfect,’ I said. ‘Wonderful, he admits it,’ said Ildiko. ‘But we can put up with it just for a night or two,’ I said, ‘Just while we do what we came for. I have to find out what Bazlo Criminale is up to in Lausanne.’
‘I will tell you what Criminale Bazlo is up to in Lausanne,’ said Ildiko, ‘He is lying in a very big bed with nice covers with his mistress. He is stroking her body and drinking champagne and counting his royalties and thinking about his bankings and enjoying himself very very nicely. And me, I am here, over where they throw the bottles. And I am with you, who doesn’t want to sleep me any more. Where is your room?’ I glanced at the number on my key. ‘It looks as though it’s a couple of floors ‘ higher up,’ I said. ‘Go there then, now,’ said Ildiko, ‘I like to take a shower.’ I’ll go and call the Beau Rivage Palace,’ I said. ‘We will move there?’ asked Ildiko. ‘No, Ildiko, we won’t,’ I said, ‘I want to find out if Bruckner is right and he’s really staying there.’ ‘Of course he is there,’ said Ildiko, ‘That is where he would stay, of course. He is a rich Western celebrity, that is how he lives these days.’ ‘You take your shower, and I’ll check,’ I said, ‘And then why don’t we meet on the terrace for a drink before dinner?’ ‘Maybe,’ said Ildiko, ‘I do not know if I will still be here by dinner.’ ‘Ildiko, look, I’m sorry, but it’s just for . . .’ ‘Out, out, go!’ cried Ildiko, pushing me out into the corridor and slamming the door.
I had scarcely reached the foot of the next staircase when her door was flung open again. ‘There is no shower!’ she shouted after me. ‘Try along the corridor,’ I suggested. ‘I don’t want to try along the corridor!’ she cried. A door along the corridor opened and a maid peered out. ‘M’sieu, madame, taisez-vous!’ she said. I had just reached the next landing when I heard her voice shouting up the stairwell again. ‘Francis! No toilet either! Nowhere to take a pee! Pig! Pig! Pig!’ My own room was no more comfortable, and it had, of course, no telephone. I had to go back down to the lobby again and speak to the disapproving girl at the desk, who handed me some jetons and pointed me to a telephone booth in the corner. Under her stern gaze I called the desk at the Beau Rivage Palace. After a complicated conversation I really found out only one thing. Bruckner was right; a Doctor Bazlo Criminale had taken a suite for a few days and was indeed in residence.
I went back to my room, lay on the lumpy bed, and thought for a while. What was honest, if flexible, Bazlo Criminale doing here? He had fled from Barolo and come to Lausanne. With him, I presumed, was Miss Belli. And this time, as I understood it, his trip could hardly be one of his familiar pieces of absent-minded wandering. He must have broken with his past, thrown up his marriage, begun gathering up his Western royalties, and was heading for a new life. This meant he must imagine that no one knew where he was, and wanted to preserve his sweet sexual secret. I needed to move carefully. On the other hand, I wanted to know more. Far from having too little on Criminale, I now seemed to be acquiring almost too much: not just the stuff for a single TV programme, but a whole dramatic series. In fact Criminale now seemed to me a great porridge of confusing stories, an excess of signs, financial and political and historical and sexual, a bulging bundle of obscurities and secrets. I’d now come to see that his past was strange and tricky, in the Eastern European way; but his life in the present didn’t seem to be any clearer either. Why then was he in Lausanne? Fraud appeared to have little to do with it; cash, comfort, Miss Belli and a whole new life seemed answer enough. And if Lavinia wanted life and loves, she would surely get them. I made some notes in my notebook, then went downstairs to look for Ildiko.
She was already sitting on the tiny glazed terrace that lay outside the hotel, wearing the ‘I ♥ Lausanne’ sweater and drinking coffee. I saw when I sat down beside her that her fine Hungarian temper had most definitely not cooled. Early evening darkness was just beginning to settle on the lake, and though the air was chilly the view was pleasant. The lamps were beginning to sparkle all along the smart promenade, and the lights of Evian twinkled on the further shore, elegantly reflected in the waters of the lake. Skateboarders were skating in the park that lay in front of the steamer pier, and a more exotic nightlife was just beginning to emerge. This was evidently the smart area, the place where the jeunesse dorée of Lausanne chose to gather at this time of day. Bronzed youths and very well-dressed maidens were already out, performing the local version of the Italian corso. Driving round at speed in their Porsches, Audi Quattros and customized Range Rovers, or on their BMW speedbikes, they were calling from car to car at each other and the more attractive samples of the passers-by.
Trying to delight Ildiko a little, though it was plainly going to be a formidable job, I opened up the guidebook and read to her about the delights of Ouchy. ‘“Famous people sit on the terraces to watch the students and pretty girls go by and meet with other locals, or travellers from afar, perhaps experts at an international congress taking time off to savour life,”’ I read. I looked up; Ildiko was already watching some traveller from afar, probably an expert from an international congress, stop a girl in a tight-rumped skirt, give her money, and go off with her up the street. ‘You see that!’ she cried, ‘There is sex in Switzerland. They do it just like everyone else!’ ‘I’m sure,’ I said, ‘They just do it differently.’ ‘So why must I be the only one in a room alone?’ asked Ildiko. This should only take a couple of days,’ I said, ‘I’ve already tracked down Bazlo Criminale.’ ‘So where is he?’ she asked. ‘Cosima was right, he is staying at the Beau Rivage Palace,’ I said. ‘He is, and I am not,’ said Ildiko, ‘You went there? You saw him?’
‘No, I just called on the telephone,’ I said. ‘Oh, how?’ asked Ildiko, turning to me, ‘In my room there is not a telephone. Also no shower, no toilet. I have to walk half a kilometre just to make a little pee.’ ‘You just go down to the booth in the lobby,’ I said, Then you get a little counter from the desk.’ To pee?’ asked Ildiko. To telephone,’ I said. ‘So you called Bazlo?’ asked Ildiko,. ‘How is he? Is his room very nice? Is toilet included?’ ‘I didn’t actually talk to him,’ I said, The Beau Rivage looks after its guests very carefully.’ ‘How wonderful,’ she said. ‘Apparently some Middle East talks are going on over there,’ I said, The place is full of Arab potentates with their own security guards. You have to answer all these questions about who you are.’ ‘And did you know?’ asked Ildiko, ‘I don’t think so.’ ‘I told them I was a close friend of Criminale’s Hungarian publisher,’ I said. ‘You did that?’ asked Ildiko, furiously, ‘Well, you are not. I do not want him to know I am here.’ ‘Why not?’ I asked, ‘An hour ago you wanted to share a hotel corridor with him.’ ‘Because he is with Belli,’ said Ildiko. There was no doubt about it; Ildiko, as I’d noticed before, was a mass of Hungarian contradictions.
‘Is Belli really with him?’ she now asked, looking up at me. ‘I don’t know,’ I said, ‘He’d left instructions with the desk not to be disturbed. He said he was in the middle of some very important congress.’ ‘Yes, you see, with Belli,’ said Ildiko. ‘Not that sort of congress,’ I said, ‘They said he was attending some big conference here. And you know the more I think about that, the less it makes sense.’ ‘Well, you don’t understand anything, I think,’ said Ildiko, ‘Why doesn’t it make sense?’ ‘Look, here’s Criminale,’ I said, ‘He breaks with his previous life, he runs away from his wife, he comes to Lausanne with this wonderful designer bimbo . . .’’You think she is wonderful?’asked Ildiko, ‘She is the one you really like?’ ‘It’s not a question of whether I like her,’ I said, ‘Criminale likes her. He’s changed his life because of her.’ ‘If you think so,’ said Ildiko. ‘Why else would he run away from Barolo?’ I asked, ‘He comes to Lausanne where no one can find him. And then what does he do? He collects his royalties, books in at one of the world’s best hotels, sticks a badge on his lapel and goes straight off to another congress.’
‘Do you know what I think?’ asked Ildiko, ‘I think I would like a very big ice-cream.’ ‘Isn’t it a bit cold for that?’ I asked. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll survive,’ said Ildiko, waving at the miserable waiter who stood halfheartedly in the doorway, ‘You know, really you do not understand a single thing about Bazlo Criminale.’ That’s very likely,’ I said, ‘In fact he baffles me completely. One minute he’s the world most famous philosopher, the next he’s off screwing around.’ ‘He is a philosopher, he has to do something with himself when he’s not thinking,’ said Ildiko, ‘Also he has to do something with his mind when he is not screwing. And this is his life today, congress after congress. You do not have to give up one for the other. Or maybe you do, but not Criminale Bazlo.’ ‘But if you were on the run, would you show up on the platform at a congress?’ I asked. ‘Why do you say he is on the run?’ said Ildiko, ‘Only because you listen too much to your nice little Miss Black Trousers.’ ‘No, I don’t,’ I said. ‘She is crazy, didn’t I tell you?’ asked Ildiko, ‘What is Criminale supposed to have done wrong? Why is he always a crook? Why do you like to accuse him?’
‘I’m not saying he’s done something wrong,’ I said, ‘I think the stuff about fraud is nonsense.’ ‘Good,’ said Ildiko, accepting her ice-cream from the waiter. ‘I’m saying it’s no way to spend a dirty weekend. When he’s out at his congress what happens to poor Miss Belli?’ ‘Oh, listen to him now,’ said Ildiko, ‘So thoughtful about other women. At least he shares his room with her. What about your dirty weekend with me?’ ‘We can enjoy ourselves when we’ve caught up with him,’ I said, ‘Anyway, after we’ve had some dinner, why don’t we go and have a drink over at the Beau Rivage Palace.’ Ildiko looked at me. ‘Why?’ she asked. ‘Because I thought you’d like it,’ I said, ‘And because we might get a glimpse of Criminale and Belli.’ ‘I don’t think so,’ said Ildiko, as contradictory as ever, ‘Maybe it is a bad idea. He will not expect to see us.’ ‘We have to get nearer to him somehow,’ I said. ‘Why?’ asked Ildiko. ‘Because I’m making a programme about him,’ I said, ‘It’s either that or going round the banks and asking some questions.’ ‘I don’t think so,’ said Ildiko, ‘In Switzerland the banks do not like to be asked questions. Maybe they will throw you out of the country.’
‘So what do you suggest we do, then?’ I asked. ‘I know, tomorrow you go to his congress,’ said Ildiko, ‘What is the name of it?’ ‘That’s the problem,’ I said, ‘When I asked the clerk at the Beau Rivage, he couldn’t or wouldn’t tell me.’ ‘It is not hard,’ said Ildiko, ‘I don’t suppose there are so many congresses in Lausanne.’ ‘That’s where you’re wrong,’ I said, ‘Lausanne is chock-full of congresses. It must be the conference centre of the world. Every second person in this city must be going around in a lapel badge.’ ‘Maybe this is what they do instead of sex,’ said Ildiko. ‘If you think people go to congresses instead of having sex, you can’t have been to many congresses,’ I said. ‘Now he is an expert on sex,’ said Ildiko, ‘Why don’t you get a list of these congresses?’ ‘There’s one in the weekly guidebook,’ I said, showing her, ‘And just look at it, congresses everywhere. There’s a winemakers’ congress, a crime-writers’ congress. There’s a gastronomy congress, there’s a gastro-enteritis congress. There’s a volleyball congress, an investment bankers’ congress, I bet that one’s hard to find, there’s a pipesmokers’ congress. And a ballet congress, a watchmakers’ congress. An Olympics congress, an Esperanto congress. It’s the perfect place for a man like Criminale to disappear, if you ask me. We’ll never find him.’
Ildiko licked her fingers and took the guidebook from me. ‘You are hopeless again, let me see it,’ she said, ‘If you were just a little bit clever, you would know at once which one it is.’ ‘All right, which one is it?’ I asked. ‘That one,’ said Ildiko, putting her finger against one of the entries. I looked, and saw at once that, as the French say, Ildiko had reason. She was pointing to the entry for an International Congress on Erotics in Postmodern Photography, held under the auspices of the Musée Cantonal de l’Elysée, from the day previous to our arrival to a couple of days forward. ‘You’re brilliant, do you know that?’ I said. ‘And you are not, do you know that?’ asked Ildiko, pouting, and then sucking furiously at her ice-cream again, ‘So all you must do tomorrow is get yourself included in the congress on erotic photography.’ ‘What about you?’ I asked. ‘Tomorrow I like to do some other things,’ she said. ‘Oh no,’ I said, ‘Not shopping.’ ‘No, I must call my office and tell them I am not there.’ ‘Surely they’d notice,’ I said. ‘Well, you don’t notice when I am not there,’ said Ildiko.
Clearly my punishment was not yet complete. ‘All right,’ I said, ‘How do I get myself included in a congress on eroticism and photography?’ ‘Well, I can tell you, you will not get in on the eroticism side,’ said Ildiko, ‘Maybe if you bought a camera? You know, with the wallet?’ ‘I don’t think the people who come to international conferences on photography are snapshot types,’ I said, ‘Some of them are way out beyond the camera altogether. They’re into the chaos of the sign and the randomness of signification. And parodic intertextuality and contrived depthlessness and photographing their own urine.’ ‘Well, if you only have to talk cowshit, you can do that very easy,’ said Ildiko. ‘And when I find him, what do I say to him?’ I asked. ‘You say, oh my dear Doctor Criminale, how nice to see you again. I just happened to pass by and saw you in a congress, and look, here you are with your nice new mistress, Miss Blasted Belli. What a coincidence! And by the way, do you still smuggle all those cows?’
And it was then a strange thing happened. ‘Speaking of coincidence, just look at that,’ I said, pointing across the Place General Guisan. Ildiko lifted her head from her ice-cream and looked round idly. ‘The girl in the Porsche?’ she asked, ‘No, you wouldn’t like her, tits too big for you, I think.’ ‘No, not the girl in the Porsche,’ I said, ‘Look over at the promenade. You see that crowd of people walking towards the pier? All dressed up and somewhere to go?’ Ildiko checked on what I had seen: a largish group of people all dressed up to the top of their best, and carrying what looked like conference wallets, walking towards the park in front of the pier. ‘Okay, what about them?’ asked Ildiko. ‘You see the man walking along in the middle of them, with a girl in an orange dress?’ I asked, ‘Wouldn’t you say that was Bazlo Criminale?’
‘I don’t have my contacts,’ said Ildiko, with what seemed to me a strange lack of enthusiasm. ‘I didn’t know you wore any,’ I said, ‘It is, I’m sure of it.’ ‘So?’ asked Ildiko. ‘So come on, let’s go,’ I said. ‘Why do we go?’ asked Ildiko, spooning in ice-cream. ‘To catch up with them,’ I said. ‘And then?’ asked Ildiko. ‘We’ll work it out,’ I said, pulling her up by the hand, ‘Quick, before we lose them.’ I dropped some Swiss francs onto the table. ‘Amazing, he pays,’ said Ildiko, following me across the square, between the Porsches and the Audis. We passed another grand hotel, the Château d’Ouchy, also a place where diplomats gathered and treaties were signed. ‘This also is very nice,’ said Ildiko, looking inside. ‘Quick, or they’ll disappear,’ I said. ‘I do not think this is such a very good idea,’ said Ildiko, ‘What do you say to him when you see him?’ ‘I don’t know,’ I said, ‘Let’s just catch them first.’
The party ambled on somewhere ahead of us, going through the park. They were an obvious congress group, headed for an evening out. ‘Where do you think they go?’ asked Ildiko. I pointed ahead: the white lake steamer we had seen earlier at the pier was in steam, black smoke pouring out of its funnel. ‘Oh, they make a trip on the lake, how nice,’ said Ildiko, ‘They will not let us on, of course.’ By now the forward battalions from the congress were already passing through the turnstiles and onto the pier, then mounting the gangplank of the white lakeboat. Among them I could now clearly see the impressive, grey-haired, stocky bulk of Bazlo Criminale, clad in one of his shining suits and wearing, of course, his yachting-cap. I could also see more clearly the girl in a bright orange dress who was holding his arm and steering him up the plank. ‘I was right,’ I said, ‘He is with Miss Belli.’ ‘How wonderful,’ said Ildiko.
Ildiko was right too. At the entrance to the pier, a sign said ‘Privé,’ and a sailor taking rickets guarded the gate. ‘It’s a charter,’ I said, ‘It must be a special trip just for the congress. We’ll have to wait until tomorrow.’ But Ildiko’s mood seemed to change; evidently she was now taken up by the thrill of the chase. ‘You know you are hopeless?’ she said, ‘If you want to get on, you must think a little Hungarian. Wait, and give me your wallet.’ ‘My wallet?’ I asked. ‘If you want to catch him, it will cost you something,’ she said, ‘Do you want it or not?’ I handed her my wallet, and Ildiko ran off, disappearing into the mêlée at the pier entrance. For a few terrible seconds it occurred to me that I had been very foolish: maybe that would be the last I would see of both of them, and that the small supply of funds Lavinia had sent me would soon be making its merry way round the stores of Lausanne. This was, it seemed, an unworthy thought. A few moments later Ildiko re-emerged, running towards me, and carrying a large conference briefcase.
‘How did you get that?’ I asked. ‘Very easy,’ she said, ‘It cost a hundred Swiss francs from one of the delegates. I hope you don’t mind I spend some of your very precious money?’ ‘No,’ I said, ‘But what did you do?’ ‘Of course, I asked if anyone there was Russian,’said Ildiko, ‘I found one and he sold his briefcase to me. Those people will sell you anything.’ ‘Ildiko, sometimes you are absolutely wonderful,’ I said. Ildiko had opened the wallet and was looking inside. ‘And sometimes you are a true pig,’ said Ildiko, taking out a conference lapel badge and pinning it onto me, ‘But now you are a quite different pig, a pig called Dr Pyotr Ignatieff. Take this, before they move away the plank. Then walk through there with me on your arm as if you really belonged to a photo congress, yes?’ We went through the turnstile and up the gangplank of the waiting ship. Moments later, the ship’s whistle sounded shrilly, the seagulls, or lakegulls, fluttered and fled, the great metal armatures of the ship’s well-oiled engines began to lever and turn, the paddle-wheels churned the grey water into a thick white foam. Soon our ship was backpaddling out into the misty lake; we stood on the deck and watched Lausanne and the port of Ouchy standing off on the shore. In the middle of the shoreline stood the great illuminated façade of the Beau Rivage Palace; somewhere out of sight round the corner was the hidden low frontage of the Hotel Zwingli, which I now conceded deserved its want of stars in the local guide. Bells clanged, the saloons were bright with a crowd of happy people. Thanks to Ildiko, we were now, for the moment, members of the Lausanne International Congress on Erotics in Postmodern Photography, and I was Dr Pyotr Ignatieff of Leningrad: quite a change of life.
By this stage I was beginning to learn a good deal about congresses and conferences, as anyone would whose task was to follow in the footsteps of Doctor Bazlo Criminale. I had certain half-formed thoughts on the subject which might in fact have made quite a good paper, if they ever decided to hold a conference on the topic of conferences (and I’ve no doubt that sooner or later they will). In one sense all congresses are like each other: they all have lapel badges and briefcases, banquets, trips, announcements, lectures in the congress hall, intimate liaisons in the bar. In another sense every congress, like every love affair (and the two are often closely connected), is different. There is a new mix of people, a new surge of emotion, a new state of the state of the art, a new set of ideas and chic philosophies, a changed order of things. There are congresses of politics and congresses of art, congresses of intellect and congresses of pleasure, congresses of reason and congresses of emotion.
In this simple scale of things, the Lausanne International Congress on Erotics in Postmodern Photography, which, standing in the entrance of the ship’s saloon, we began to inspect, was pretty clearly a congress of art, pleasure, and emotion. At Barolo, now seemingly so far away, we had been a group of paper-giving introverts. The photographers of Lausanne, who numbered about eighty strong and had come from everywhere, were clearly a group of ego-fondling extroverts. Writers are sometimes inclined to let their work do the talking; photographers have to let their talking do much of the work. Helped by waiters who served them Dole, and Pendant, and various of the local Vaudois vintages, they had quickly turned the ship into a noisy babble. They stood close to each other, pawing and fussing and fluttering and flapping. They chatted and embraced and laughed and shouted; they kissed and gasped and flirted and posed.
Yes, they were a flamboyant crowd. One woman was barebreasted. One man wore a Napoleonic uniform. Many had crossdressed: several of the men had on what looked like chiffon bedroom wear, and several of the women were clad in ties, tweeds or dress shirts and dinner-jackets. They had a band on board, so they began to dance. There was a bar on board, so they began to drink. There was finger-food on board, so they began to snack. There were celebrities on board, so they started celebrating. There were evidently illegal substances on board, so they began to dream. There were lips and breasts and buttocks on board, so they began to neck and fondle and nuzzle and suck. They were beautiful people, and they knew they were, so they started to do beautiful and outrageous and infinitely photographable things. They also photographed themselves doing them, making their circle of unreality complete.
But amid all this glitzy excitement there was one small pool of calm, sanity and metaphysical reason. It surrounded, of course, Bazlo Criminale. We wandered round the ship — the chilly top deck, the back of the lower deck, the front saloon, the rear saloon — and at first we couldn’t find him. Then there he was, sitting stockily at a table in a corner of the rear saloon. His great erotic adventure — and, looking at Miss Belli, who sat beside him, it surely must have been a great erotic adventure seemed to have changed him a little. His humour seemed much brighter, and the air of domesticity had gone. He wore a bright Ralph Lauren sports shirt under his fine suit, and his hairstyle was no longer bouffanted in the style of Romanian dictators but had been slicked firmly down in the style of a Thirties seducer. Belli, beside him in her bright orange dress, chattered, laughed, flirted, and constantly touched him on the arm. And in a crowd of flamboyant celebrities, he seemed somehow to be the true celebrity, as perhaps the constant flash of cameras insisted. I saw now how Criminale and People magazine could somehow go together.
But he was still the hardy philosopher. As at Barolo, a crowd had gathered round, small at first, but growing all the time, listening to what he was saying. I stood on the fringes and caught some of it. ‘I read in the newspaper today a very interesting thing,’ he was remarking. ‘Always first in the morning when he wakes he reads the newspapers,’ explained Miss Belli. ‘I see the Japanese have now invented a special new toilet, the Happy Stool,’ said Criminale, ‘It takes what you drop in the bowl each morning and at once makes a medical diagnosis of it.’ ‘Bazlo, caro, you are disgusting,’ said Belli. ‘In goes your effluent, out from a slot in the wall comes your health report,’ said Criminale, ignoring this, ‘Too much vodka last night, sonny, now look what you have done with your cholesterol. Maybe even a needle comes into your rump and puts the matter right.’ ‘Bazlo caro, eat something,’ said Miss Belli, pushing forward a tray of canapés, ‘All this blasted lovely food and you don’t take any!’ ‘After I read this, how can I eat something?’ asked Criminale, ‘You see what it means, there is no secret anywhere any more.’
‘“Bazlo caro, eat something,”’ said Ildiko, beside me, mimicking, ‘See how she pushes him around? Poor man, he might as well have stayed with Sepulchra, yes?’ ‘Belli has quite a few qualities Sepulchra lacks these days,’ I said, watching as Miss Belli began stuffing small morsels into Criminale’s upturned mouth. ‘Oh, you wish you could run away with her as well?’ asked Ildiko. I looked at her; her attitude seemed increasingly strange to me, but it was clear that the sight of Criminale on his erotic holiday had done her no good at all. I took her by the arm and led her outside onto the deck. It was chilly by now, and nearly dark. Our bright-lit steamer was thumping on down the lake, Swiss flag flying out behind. Where were we headed: Geneva, Evian, Montreux? I saw we were close to the shoreline, and there were odd illuminated glimpses of finely latticed vineyards sloping down to the edge of the lake. We must have been going toward Vevey and Montreux.
‘Don’t they look happy?’ asked Ildiko, very bitterly, I thought, ‘I remember once when he was just like this before.’ ‘When was that?’ I asked. ‘When he first left Gertla for Sepulchra,’ said Ildiko. ‘Gertla?’ I asked. ‘His second wife, you remember her, I think,’ she said, ‘You saw her nude in Budapest.’ ‘I did what?’ I asked. ‘Her photograph,’ said Ildiko, ‘You saw her nude in Budapest. He was married to Gertla many many years. Oh, some affairs, of course, he is a Hungarian man, after all. Then one day Sepulchra walked into his life. Not as she is now, she was a painter, very very pretty. So they had this nice thing, you know about these nice things, and he left Gertla. He was all excited, happy, looking quite different, just as he is here.’ ‘Well, why not?’ I asked. ‘Because it is when he is with women that Bazlo always destroys himself. Now he does it again.’ ‘Destroys himself, how?’ I asked. ‘He lets them make nonsense of his life,’ said Ildiko.
This rather baffled me: the last thing the Criminale I had just seen resembled was a man who was destroying himself, making nonsense of his life. Although I was no expert on love (a fact that must be fairly clear to you by now), it seemed to me that any rational man (and Criminale was above all things a rational man), faced with the choice between fat, fussy Sepulchra and beautiful Miss Belli, would be likely to make the same decision. No doubt I saw only what I wanted to see, as we all do, and Ildiko saw something else (in fact she must have seen quite a lot else). ‘Anyway, I think it’s time one of us spoke to him,’ I said. ‘But he will think we are following him,’ said Ildiko. ‘We are following him,’ I said, ‘Now we have to get in closer. Anyway, I thought you wanted to warn him.’ ‘I warn him?’ asked Ildiko, ‘Why?’ ‘About little Miss Black Trousers,’ I said. ‘Let her have him if she wants to,’ said Ildiko bitterly. ‘I thought you were worried for him,’ I said. ‘Why should I worry?’ asked Ildiko, ‘He is looked after so nicely by this other person.’ ‘You came all the way from Budapest to talk to him,’ I said. ‘Well, now I don’t like to,’ said Ildiko, Talk to him if you like, but do not tell him I am here. Do whatever you like, but all I like is to be left alone and get something a little to eat, okay? Do not come.’
And Ildiko walked angrily off, disappearing inside the ship. I stayed there chilly against the ship’s rail, feeling very confused. I was a young man then — I still am to this day, this very day — and the truth is that for all my fondness for Ildiko (and I was, and still am, very fond of her indeed) I was finding her very difficult to handle and understand. In fact I wasn’t an inch anywhere nearer understanding her complicated and mercurial temper than I was on the day I met her with Sandor Hollo in Buda at the Restaurant Kiss. Of course I too had my own faults and failings. I’m something of a New Man, of course, but I realize from the magazine articles that I do lack some of the graces and subtleties I probably ought to possess. And when it comes to the crunch no one would admit more readily than I will that I’m not always the most thoughtful of lovers or the most understanding of friends. I had my obsession, of course, as she presumably had hers. If Ildiko was difficult, I suppose I was too.
So, there at the rail, I tried to think what had gone wrong with our joint quest for Criminale, and why we were at cross-purposes. It was true that, in the simple matter of finding adequate hotel accommodation, I had been less than an ideal travelling companion when I found us single bunks at the Hotel Zwingli. I regretted it already, and I’d made up my mind to shift camp next day down to the Hotel Movenpick, a very modern-looking chain hotel I’d spotted just a little way further down the Ouchy promenade, where good old-fashioned Swiss Calvinism was more likely to be tempered by some good old-fashioned Swiss commercialism. But even then of course it would be nothing like the splendours of the Beau Rivage Palace, which I could never provide. In fact nobody could, except for Bazlo Criminale. But perhaps that was the point. The more I thought about it, the more I was sure something more than a bad room in a bad hotel was making Ildiko behave in this angry and temperamental way.
I put it down to jealousy. It was clearly a part of her temperament; she had even been jealous of myself and Cosima Bruckner, one of the more unlikely sexual pairings to come out of the great dateline computer in the sky, it seemed to me. At Barolo, I had thought I understood her feelings. Here was Bazlo Criminale, breaking with Sepulchra at last, looking for some new erotic excitement in his life. There was Ildiko, back in his space again, but instead he’d opted for some brand-new Italian charmer he had just met at a conference. In spite of what she’d seen at Barolo Ildiko had insisted on following him to Lausanne. Yet she had kept in the background then, just as she did now. So what had changed, why was she suddenly so angry with him now? It seemed to me it was at Barolo, on the night of the storm and Criminale’s sudden departure, that her mood had really changed. Something new had begun to agitate her, but I couldn’t see at all what it was. No, the simple fact was I just didn’t understand Ildiko, and as I say I’m not really sure I do to this day.
I was still there, out on the cold deck, watching the Swiss lights flicker by on the shore and thinking these confused thoughts, or something very much like them, when someone came and leaned on the rail beside me. I turned, and there was a neat young man with a small beard, in a plum-coloured jacket, with a congress briefcase tucked under his arm. There then followed a familiar conference ritual, which resembles that of dogs sniffing each other; I checked his lapel badge, he checked mine. I saw that he was Hans de Graef, from somewhere in Belgium, and he saw that I was — well, whoever I was, because whoever I was I had completely forgotten by now. He said he knew my city very well, and how interested he was in the fact that it would not be called by that name for very much longer. ‘Why not?’ I asked. ‘But I thought you all voted to call it Saint Petersburg now?’ he said. ‘Oh yes, that’s right,’ I said, trying to remember what the place was called before; and I quickly explained that, over the years of glasnost, I had chosen to move to the West and pursue my photographic career in the more attractive studios and dark-rooms of the British Isles.
He then began addressing me in Russian; I had to explain that I refused to speak my language until my native city regained its traditional name. He seemed, I thought, a little suspicious, but began talking to me about the day’s congress proceedings, especially the intense discussion of the Feminist Non-Erotic Nude in Scandinavia, which had provoked such fury right after lunch. I must have acquitted myself quite well on this, though, because he switched to more general conference gossip, which provided me with a good deal of useful information. I now learned that the congress was in its second day, that there had been a good deal of bad blood between the Americans and French until they had been united by common hatred of the British, and that it was very unfortunate that Susan Sontag had failed to come; apparently she had preferred to attend some writers’ congress somewhere in northern Italy.
I shifted the talk, or maybe he did, to Bazlo Criminale. Had he, I enquired, been a sudden new addition to the congress programme? No, he said, glancing at me in obvious surprise; he had been in the congress information from the very beginning. In fact that was why he, de Graef, had chosen himself to come. He was, after all, the leading thinker in the field. I nodded, explaining that I myself had been a very late enroller. But his news came, of course, as a considerable surprise. Criminale hadn’t, as I’d been supposing, suddenly descended at whim on the conference, like some god from heaven deciding to lower his golden car. His flight from Barolo to Lausanne was not sudden after all; it had been down there in his diary all the time. But then why was it such a surprise to Professor Monza, Mrs Magno and the Barolo organization, who had sent security guards out everywhere to look for him? And if it wasn’t a sudden flight, did it mean that Criminale had all the time intended to go back to Barolo after all? And did that mean he hadn’t abandoned Sepulchra either, and that his trip with the splendid Belli was no more than a joyous weekend fling?
And it now began to occur to me that, having totally failed to understand Ildiko, I had also totally failed to understand Bazlo Criminale as well. In fact from that moment onward, the things I thought I had understood began to grow ever more obscure. Just behind the two of us, in the saloon, the band was going through its eclectic repertoire, which seemed to range from ‘Mirabelle, Ma Belle’ to the latest Madonna hits. The decks of the vessel bounced; the erotic photographers were clearly in the best of spirits. Then, glancing through the port, I suddenly caught another, momentary glimpse of Bazlo Criminale. He was twirling and turning in a stiff and stately waltz: rather surprisingly, since the band was playing something entirely different. I couldn’t, from this angle, see his dancing companion, though the dress in his arms was clearly not the bright orange garb of Miss Belli. And there was a moment, though it made no sense to me at all, when I actually thought the partner in his arms was Ildiko, who was so determined not to speak to him.
But just then we were both interrupted by a very physical-looking young Frenchwoman — she was strapping, entirely bald, and wearing what seemed to be a bathing-dress; in fact in every detail except the grease she appeared indistinguishable from an Olympic swimmer — who came over to us, seized young de Graef by both hands, and demanded he come to the dance-floor. He smiled at me apologetically — I rather gathered that this was exactly what he had come out onto the deck to get away from — and then I was left alone again, leaning over the rail, listening to the water splash and crash in the paddle-boxes below me, and seeing the lighted streets and rising towers of a reasonably sized lakeside town come out of the darkness ahead. Then a moment later, someone else joined me by the rail, puffing somewhat, wiping his brow with a handkerchief. I turned, and saw, to my complete surprise, that it was Bazlo Criminale.