Director's Cut by Arthur Japin Page B

the start of their careers, still free of professional jealousy. He bloomed in their presence. After rehearsals, he took them to exhibitions or bookshops where he bought them expensive gifts, solely to nurture their interest in the arts. He could always spot the ones who hung around for the material benefits alone, and gave them even more expensive gifts, just to make them feel uncomfortable, and then excluded them from the dinners he held for the rest of the group in the city’s best restaurants. He insisted that everyone try all the dishes, knowing that these youngsters earned little and were used to eating badly. They worshipped him, needless to say. Most had never met a man of his caliber, and to this day it’s easy to point out the artists who were inspired by him.
    During the meals, he entertained everyone with poems or scenes from old movies, and his own life was a source of incredible anecdotes, the most roguish of which he acted out in different languages and strange dialects. Although a melancholy expression came over his face whenever he felt completely at ease, he clearly enjoyed the attention. When someone caught one of his cynical interjections, which were mostly lost between his jokes, a grateful smile appeared on his somber face, as on that of a child who has briefly forgotten why exactly he was crying.
    These meals were even more colorful around premieres, when the viscount flew in old friends from abroad to show them his dreams. Forthose who had known him in happier days, he hosted intimate dinners, where he would be accompanied by whichever extra he happened to be most fond of at the time. After a premiere in Scheveningen, for example, Maxim once ate in a
chambre separée
at the Badhotel with Louis Jourdan and James Baldwin, and they endlessly tried to outdo each other with tales of their sexual escapades. Soon after, he found himself sitting across from a thin elderly woman in Amsterdam’s Amstel Hotel. Wearing a silk turban and hidden behind enormous sunglasses, she hardly said ten words all evening, and as a result it wasn’t until midway through the second course that Maxim realized she was Marlene Dietrich, whereupon he became so nervous that he forgot to keep eating. By dessert, she could bear it no longer. She slid a plate of confectionery over to him.
    â€œAnd now,” she said, “it is eat or die.”
    The viscount is tall and heavy as a bear, yet his massive body is as nimble as his mind. It’s hard to believe that someone who seems to weigh so upon the earth can zigzag through a room like a dragonfly. He shuffles along so quickly that it’s hard for a young man in sneakers to keep up with him. Now he’s standing on the balcony, picking some basil from a pot and drawing it through a plate of honey. He holds it up to the light and watches the golden liquid drip off the leaves. Then he puts them in Maxim’s mouth as though feeding an infant. When his fingers touch Maxim’s lips he is suddenly embarrassed, afraid he’s gone too far. He puts down the plate and peers into the distance at the heavy clouds over the cypresses of Villa Ada.
    â€œWe shall have to discover Rome anew,” he says after a while, “nothing else for it. Come Sunday morning and I’ll have a car.”
    Maxim is already in the hall when Sangallo asks him to write down the number of his hotel.
    â€œI’ll only be here one more night. Everything’s full. I don’t know where I’ll end up.”
    â€œJust give me the number where you’ll be tonight. In case something comes up. Oh, and put your name with it, otherwise I’ll lose it.” The viscount slips the piece of paper with the name that’s eluded him the whole time into his pocket without looking at it. He gives the young man an umbrella with a walnut handle, a paper bag full of grapes,a couple of sprigs of basil and the jar of honey he liked so much, a bound edition of