Eleven Minutes (15 page)

That night, the man came in, greeted the Colombian woman, but went over to the Yugoslav's table. They had a drink, danced and the Yugoslav winked at the Colombian
a provocation too far in Maria's view), as if saying:

'See? He chose me!'

But that wink contained many unspoken things: he chose me because I'm prettier, because I went with him last week and
he enjoyed it, because I'm young. The Colombian said nothing. When the Yugoslav came back, two hours later, the Colombian
sat down beside her, took the razor out of her pocket and
made a cut on the Yugoslav's face, near her ear. It wasn't a deep cut, and it wasn't dangerous, but it was enough to leave
a small scar to remind her of that night. The two started righting, blood spurted everywhere and the frightened customers fled.

When the police arrived, wanting to know what was going
on, the Yugoslav said that she had cut her face on a glass that had fallen from a shelf (there are no shelves in the Copacabana). This was the law of silence, or what Italian prostitutes like to call omerta: any problem to be resolved in Rue de Berne, from love to death, would be resolved, but
without the interference of the law. They made their own laws there.

The police knew about the omerta and could see that the
woman was lying, but they didn't insist - arresting someone, trying them and then keeping them in prison would cost the Swiss taxpayer far too much money. Milan thanked the police for their prompt response, but, he said, it was all a misunderstanding or else a rival nightclub owner trying to make trouble.

As soon as they left, he asked the two women not to come back to his club. After all, the Copacabana was a
family place (a statement Maria found hard to grasp) and had a reputation to keep up (this left her still more
intrigued). There were no fights there, because the first law was to respect another woman's client.

The second law was total discretion, 'just like a Swiss bank', he said. This was largely because, there, the women
could trust the clients, who were selected much as a bank selects its clients, based on the state of their current account and on personal references. Mistakes were
occasionally made; there were a few rare cases of nonpayment, of girls being threatened or roughed up, but in the many
years he had spent struggling to create and develop his
club's reputation, Milan had become an expert at recognising
who should or shouldn't be invited in. None of the women knew exactly what these criteria were, but they had often seen
some well-dressed man being told that the club was full that night (even though it was empty) and that it would be full
the following nights too please don't come back). They had also seen unshaven men dressed in casual clothes being enthusiastically invited by Milan to a glass of champagne.

The owner of the Copacabana did not judge by appearances, and he was always right.

It- was a good working relationship, and seemed to suit Parties involved. The great majority of the clientele were married, or held important positions in some company or
power - Some of the women who worked there were also married and had children and went to parents' evenings at
their children's schools, but knew that they ran no risk of
being exposed; if one of the other parents turned up at
the Copacabana, they would be compromised too and so could say nothing: that is how omerta worked.

There was comradeship amongst the women, but not
friendship; no one talked much about their lives. In the few conversations she had had, Maria found no bitterness, guilt
or sadness amongst her colleagues, only a kind of
resignation, and a strangely defiant glint in the eye, as if they were proud of the way they confronted the world, independently and confidently. After a week, any new arrival was considered a 'fellow professional' and received instructions always to help keep marriages intact (a
prostitute cannot be seen as a threat to the stability of the home), never to accept invitations to meet outside working hours, to listen to confessions without offering an opinion, to moan at the moment of climax (Maria learned that everyone
did this, but that they hadn't told her on her very first day because it was one of the tricks of the trade), to say hello
to the police in the street, to keep her work permit up to
date as well as any health checks, and, finally, not to probe
too deeply into the moral or legal aspects of what she was doing; they were what they were, and that was that.

Before it got busy, Maria could always be seen with a book
in her hand, and she soon became known as the intellectual of the group. At first, they wanted to know if she was reading a love story, but when they saw that the books were about
dry-as-dust subjects like economics, psychology and - recently - farm management, they left
her alone to continue her researches and her note-taking in
peace.

Because she had a lot of regular clients and because she
went to the Copacabana every night, even when it wasn't busy, Maria earned both Milan's confidence and her colleagues'

envy; they said she was ambitious, arrogant and thought only about earning money - the last bit was true, but she felt
like asking if they weren't all there for the very same reason.

Anyway, remarks like that never killed anyone - they were
part of the life of any successful person, and it was best to get used to them, rather than let herself be diverted from
her two goals: going back to Brazil on the chosen date and buying a farm.

Ralf Hart was in her thoughts from morning to night now, and for the first time she was able to feel happy with an absent love - although she slightly regretted having confessed her love, thus running the risk of losing
everything. But what had she got to lose, if she was asking for nothing in exchange? She remembered how her heart had
beat faster when Milan mentioned that Ralf was - or had been
- a special client. What did that mean? She felt betrayed and jealous.

It was normal to feel jealous, although life had taught her that it was pointless thinking you could own another person - anyone who believes that is just
deceiving
themselves. Despite this, she could not stop herself having
these feelings of jealousy, or of having grand intellectual
thoughts about it, or even thinking it was a proof of fragility.

'The strongest love is the love that can demonstrate its fragility. Anyway, if my love is real (and not just a way of distracting myself, deceiving myself, and passing the time, that never seems to pass in this city), freedom will conquer jealousy and any pain it causes me, since pain is also part
of the natural process. Anyone who practises sport knows
this: if you want to achieve your objectives, you have to be prepared for a daily dose of pain or discomfort. At first, it's unpleasant and demotivating, but in time you come to realise that it's part of the process of feeling good, and
the moment arrives when, if you don't feel pain, you have a sense that the exercises aren't having the desired effect.' The danger lies in focusing on that pain, giving it a particular person's name, and keeping it always present in
your thoughts. Maria, thank God, had managed to free herself from that.

Even so, she sometimes found herself wondering where he was, why he didn't come and see her, if he had found that whole story about the train station and repressed desire
stupid, if he had gone away forever because she had confessed her love for him.

To avoid beautiful thoughts turning into suffering, she developed a method: when something positive to do with Ralf Hart came into her head - and this could be the fire
and the wine, an idea she would like to discuss with him, or simply the pleasurable longing involved in wanting to know when he would come back - Maria would stop what she
was doing, smile up at the sky and give thanks for being alive and to be expecting nothing from the man she loved. On the other hand, if her heart began to complain about
his absence or about things she shouldn't have said while they were together, she would say to herself:

'Oh, so you want to think about that, do you? All right, then, you do what you like, while I get on with more important things.'

She would continue to read or, if she was out, she would focus her attention on everything around her: colours, people, sounds - especially sounds, the sound of her own footsteps, of the pages turning, of cars, of fragments of conversations, and the unfortunate thought would eventually
go away. If it came back five minutes later, she would repeat the process, until those thoughts, finding themselves
accepted but also gently rejected, would stay away for quite
considerable periods of time.

One of these 'negative thoughts' was the possibility of never seeing him again. With a little practice and a great deal of patience, she managed to transform this into a
'positive thought': when she left, Geneva would have the face
of a man with old-fashioned long hair, a child-like smile and
a grave voice. If someone asked her, many years later, what the place she had known in her youth was like, she could reply:

'Very beautiful, and capable of loving and being loved.'

From Maria's diary, on a slack night at the Copacabana: After all the time I've spent with the people who come
here, I have reached the conclusion that sex has come to be used as some kind of drug: in order to escape reality, to forget about problems, to relax. And like all drugs, this is
a harmful and destructive practice.

If a person wants to take drugs, in the form of sex or whatever, that's their problem; the consequences of their
actions will be better or worse depending on the choices they make. But if we are talking in terms of making progress in
life, we must understand that 'good enough' is very different from 'best'.

Contrary to what my clients think, sex cannot be practised
at any time. We all have a clock inside us, and in order to make love, the hands on both clocks have to be pointing to the same hour at the same time. That doesn't happen every
day. If you love another person, you don't depend on the sex act in order to feel good. Two people who live together and love each other need to adjust the hands of their clocks, with patience and perseverance, games and 'theatrical representations', until they realise that making love is more than just an encounter, it is a genital 'embrace'.

Everything is important. If you live your life intensely, you experience pleasure all the time and don't feel the need for sex. When you have sex, it's
out of a sense of abundance, because the glass of wine is so full that it overflows naturally, because it is
inevitable, because you are responding to the call of life, because at that moment, and only at that moment, you have allowed yourself to lose control.

P.S. I have just re-read what I wrote. Good grief! I'm getting way too intellectual!

Shortly after writing this, and when she was preparing
for another night as Understanding Mother or Innocent Girl, the door of the Copacabana opened and in walked Terence, the record company executive, one of the special clients.

Behind the bar, Milan seemed pleased: Maria had not disappointed him. Maria remembered the words that simultaneously said so much and so little: 'pain, suffering, and a great deal of pleasure'.

'I flew in from London especially to see you. I've been thinking about you a lot.'

She smiled, trying not to look too encouraging. Again he had failed to follow the ritual and hadn't asked if she wanted a drink, but just sat down at her table.

'When a teacher helps someone to discover something, the teacher always learns something new too.'

'I know what you mean,' said Maria, thinking of Ralf Wart
and feeling irritated with herself for doing so. She was with another client, and she must respect him and do what she
could to please him.

'Do you want to go ahead?'

A thousand francs. A hidden universe. Her boss watched her. The certainty that she could stop whenever she
chose. The date set for her return to Brazil. The other man, who never came to see her.

'Are you in a hurry?' Maria asked.

He said no. What was it she wanted?

'I'd like my usual drink and my usual dance, and some respect for my profession.'

He hesitated for a moment, but it was all part of the theatre, dominating and being dominated. He bought her a drink and danced with her, then ordered a taxi and gave her
the money while they drove across the city to the same hotel. They went in, he greeted the Italian porter just as he had on the night they first met, and they went up to the same suite with a view over the river.

Terence got up and took out his lighter, and only then did Maria notice that there were dozens of candles arranged around the room. He started lighting them.

'What would you like to know? Why I'm like this? Because, unless I'm very much mistaken, you really enjoyed the other evening we spent together. Do you want to know why you're like this too?'

'I was just thinking that in Brazil we have a superstition that you should never light more than three things with the same match. You're not respecting that superstition.'

He ignored her remark.

'You're like me. You're not here for the thousand francs, but out of a sense of guilt and dependency, because of your various complexes and insecurities. That is neither good nor bad, it's simply human nature.'

He picked up the remote control and changed channels several times until he found the TV news and a report on refugees trying to escape a war.

'Do you see that? Have you ever seen those programmes in which people discuss their personal problems in front of everyone? Have you been to a newspaper kiosk and seen the headlines? The world enjoys suffering and pain. There's sadism in the way we look at these things, and masochism in our conclusion that we don't need to know all this in order to be happy, and yet we watch other people's tragedies and sometimes suffer along with them.'

He poured out two glasses of champagne, turned off the television and continued lighting candles, in contravention of the superstition Maria had mentioned.

'As I say, it's the human condition. Ever since we were
expelled from paradise, we have either been suffering, making other people suffer or watching the suffering of others. It's beyond our control.'