Daniel Browde - The Relatively Public Life of Jules Browde

In which we meet a young storyteller who feels the need to lie about the subject of his book

It had rained earlier that evening. The air coming down off the dark slope held the smell of pine needles and wet earth. A few paces from where I stood on the patio at the rear of the house I could see the beginning of some stone steps, slick and puddled after the rain. The steps rose quickly and curved into the darkness. Id been here before, so I knew what Id find if I climbed them: the heavy palisade fence that marked the edge of the property; the enormous rocks beyond the fence; and the view, back over the house, to the lights on the Brixton ridge. I considered these steps. I knew the climb would probably do me good. But I stayed where I was, held by the faint sounds of the dinner party still going on inside. I looked up at the stars and I tried to enjoy them, to take them in.

Id been out here less than five minutes when a thickset man in a panama hat appeared in the kitchen doorway and lit a cigarette. With his hat and cigarette he made a neat silhouette against the rectangle of yellow light. This was one of the more well-known guests, a sculptor who had recently returned from mounting a show in the United States.

He must have seen me looking at him.

Taking a breather? he asked.

I nodded. Yup.

I was standing in what I imagined to be the beginning of the shadow, at the far end of the bricks.

Its lovely out here, he said.

I said, Aah, its great.

And for a few seconds, that seemed like it was going to be it. I tried to think of something to add, but before I could think of anything he left the doorway, took a few steps towards me and told me his name, as if I didnt already know it.

Id spoken to him once before, and told him so not to prove a point so much as to establish a truthful context. Hed given a talk at the Johannesburg Art Gallery and Id stayed behind afterwards to ask him a question. He nodded neutrally at this information and asked if I often went to the JAG.

Now and then, I said. When theres something on.

I told him about my girlfriend, Thenji, and explained that this was how I knew our hosts, Diana and David. Diana was an established painter who for reasons of her own kept a studio in the same run-down building in Fordsburg as Thenji had hers.

He said, And you? Are you an artist too?

I hesitated for an instant. Sometimes I do think of myself as a sort of artist, usually when Im overtired, but how are you going to say youre an artist, especially to some famous sculptor?

I said, No, Im not an artist.

I said, I work at a newspaper, as a subeditor.

Often people dont know what that is, a subeditor, but I could see he did. He even seemed quite interested to hear this, and nodded again, this time just once, abruptly, as if a fly had landed on the end of his nose. He had finished his cigarette and was half looking around for what to do with it.

I told him the name of the newspaper I worked at.

Thats probably the best paper we have, he said distractedly.

Watching him, I realised I could still feel the effects of the wine Id drunk during the first part of the meal.

Do you want an ashtray? I asked. There was a square metal ashtray on a heavy wooden bench at the far end of the patio.

He smiled.

On that thing over there, I said, nodding towards it.

He walked over and mashed his stompie into the ashtray and came back. I felt a small sense of accomplishment then, to have been of use.

The sculptor put his hands in his pockets and asked me if I enjoyed working at the newspaper.

I told him that I liked the repetitive, meditational aspect of the job, and also the fact that my workday only started at two in the afternoon.

I saw his interest pick up a notch. That always happened when I told people about the two oclock-start thing.

So I have my mornings to myself, I said. Which was what I always said at this point. Some conversations have you, instead of the other way around.

What do you do with your mornings? he asked.

For a moment I had the uncomfortable sensation that he was humouring me. There was really nothing to give me that impression, though, and I tried to put it out of my mind. I said that in the mornings I usually went for a run, and then worked for a bit on my own stuff before going in to the paper.

And whats your own stuff ? he pressed, rocking slightly on his heels.

This was all surprising to me. Id always assumed that in a social setting he would be arrogant, or at least aloof, because of his fame and his hat and everything. But he seemed genuinely interested in what I had to say. And maybe it was because of this, or maybe it was the wine, or the fresh air and the trees, or all of it together whatever it was that encouraged me I told him that I was working on a biography of my grandfather. This wasnt something Id said out loud before, and the minute the words were out of my mouth I regretted them. Because then it came: Oh really? he said. Whos your grandfather?

Now if this were a scene in a movie, here would be what is called the turning point . That moment, that question right there, which sobered me up in a second, and not because it took me by surprise, but precisely the opposite: the point is just how ready I was to hear it, just how clearly I understood (or thought I understood) what he meant by it. Because even if the sculptor didnt intend it, I heard in his question a challenge, and saw before me in the space between us the same thing I saw whenever I considered that I might, in fact, be writing the book Id told him about: I saw a pantheon.