The Radiant City Read Free Page B

on you in ‘Nam. It was like farm country in your boots,” he said.
     
     
     
    Whatever happened to Carl?Matthew wonders, back again in his body, at his desk, in this Paris apartment. Oh yes, newscaster somewhere in the American Midwest, last anyone heard. And then, knowing he should not, he reads over what he’s written. Frustration wells up from the bottom of his gut, bubbles over his chest and down to his fingertips. He thinks he should keep a large metal garbage bin next to his desk wherein he can have regular fires. It is difficult not to tear the page to shreds with his teeth. He has become, however, a very good crumpler, and his wastebasket is more than accepting.
     
    So, there will be no more writing today. But what then? He does not want to do what he mostly does. Mostly he sits and tries very hard not to remember things. Not Josh. Not the father. Not the daughter. Not Kate. Not his own father, brother, mother. Not Rwanda. Not Kosovo. Not Chechnya. Not so many places, not so many people. Not remembering them leaves very little room in his mind for anything else.
     
    It is now eleven o’clock in the morning, and from the window, he watches the young man at Chez Elias ¸ a tiny café on the square. He wears a white apron and uses a long-handled brush to wash the glass. Now he whistles optimistically, but Matthew has seen him sitting at a table in the window, no customers in the café, poring over maps with a look of deep dissatisfaction on his face.
     
    Matthew realizes he is jiggling his knee, tapping his foot, and he stops himself, because he knows from experience this nervous energy is not good for him. He tells himself he is adjusting to the tick-tock passing of time outside the crisis zones. He tells himself he is fine. He tells himself he should not have had that fourth cup of coffee. He tries to read the International Herald Tribune , a story about the North Africans, the san-papiers , who have occupied the Saint Bernard church in Barbès, demanding legal residence papers. It looks bad, with the government sounding tougher and tougher. It will not end well. He puts the paper aside. Folds it in a neat square and presses it flat. Looks around for somewhere to stuff his discontent.
     
    The sweep of the clock’s hands is agonizingly slow; the voices of the children on the street below are needles in his ears. He briefly considers calling Brent, back in New York, but it is too early, and besides, he already knows what Brent will say. How’s the book coming along? Come on, pal, get yourself together.
     
    Deciding what to do in a tourist town when one is not technically a tourist is a wretched task. Matthew has seen the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame on previous trips; he has chased the ghosts of Joyce and Hemingway through the cafés and bookshops. He does not want to stroll up the Gap-and-Planet-Hollywood-infested Champs Élysées. He certainly does not want to go to a museum. He begins pacing, which is a bad sign.
     
    Jack Saddler . Perhaps it is the morning’s work, the memories of Sid and Carl that make him think of Jack Saddler, but the name now springs to mind and he is surprised he has not thought of it before. Jack Saddler. Vietnam vet, ex-mercenary, sometime combat photographer. The last time he saw Jack, back in Kosovo, he had said he was heading to Paris, in need of a break. Jack Saddler, who knew a thing or two about lugging a sack of skulls.
     
    France Telecom proves helpful and a few minutes later Matthew dials a number for a mobile phone.
     
    “Hello?”
     
    “Jack?” This is a lot of noise in the background.
     
    “Who’s this?”
     
    “Matthew Bowles.”
     
    “Hey! You in Paris?”
     
    “Yup.”
     
    A moment’s silence and then, “How you holding up?”
     
    “Fair.”
     
    “I can imagine.” The sound of car horns. “Fuck off! Not you, Matthew. You’d think we were in Tehran the way the French drive. Can you hear me?”
     
    “I can hear you.”
     
    “Tell you