kongo disko

AFTER THE ESTONIAN WRITER Paavo Matsin sold the movie rights to his books Gogoli Disko and Kongo Tango to Christopher Nolan, he found himself flush with cash, and invested in an estate up the Emajõgi River which he christened “Kongo Disko” in homage to his novels.

This was an old manor house that had belonged to the de la Gardie family, which Matsin promptly fashioned into a genteel plantation, modeled on the Greek Revival architecture of the Old South. Wild, anything-goes parties were held there, and Matsin’s notoriety for anything lewd, vulgar, and unbecoming of a European Man of Letters was only enhanced. He also used his plum perch on the river’s edge to engage in export of cotton, molasses, tar, tobacco, and local folk instruments, such as the Hiiu Kannel, which he shipped to a merchant in Equatorial Guinea. There was also a whiskey distillery at Kongo Disko, another solid source of revenue for Matsin Enterprises. King Charles was said to be fond of Kongo Disko whiskey.

There was no road to Kongo Disko though, and the approach was a stony path through the swamps and forests that divided this backwoods outpost from the Tähtvere Spordipark and the Supilinna Tiik. To get there, I had to rent an all-terrain vehicle and roll through the high grasses, being careful not to get upsot by any of the felled tree branches or jagged rocks along the way. It was an eerie, witchy place, and there was moss on the trees. Yet the yard of Kongo Disko was full of partygoers when I arrived, and a group of enslaved laborers from Viljandi were planting the next season’s crop of cotton and tobacco. One could hear their mournful Viljandi slave songs from the fields, and Mr. Matsin descended the steps of the plantation with a glass of whiskey in his hand. He was wearing his black top hat and pince-nez spectacles.

“Welcome to Kongo Disko!” he said.

“Paavo!” I said.

The man winced. “I’m afraid not. I’m not Paavo. If you like, I can take you to see the real Paavo.”

“That’s why I’m here. But I have to say, I am really confused. I mean, you look just like him.”

“Yes, but there are subtle differences, subtle differences,” the man who looked like Matsin said. “See these glasses? The real Paavo doesn’t wear glasses like these. Come. We’ll find Paavo now. Care for a drink?”

“Yes.”

He poured me a glass of smoky Kongo Disko whiskey, and we went around one side of the plantation. A fiddle and banjo duo had just started to pluck out a tune, and from behind, I could see the enormous and unmistakable frame of Paavo Matsin. He was wearing suspenders and a plaid shirt and directing his Viljandi laborers as they loaded ceramic jugs of molasses into a donkey-drawn wagon that would take them down to the wooden river docks for export. The man was perspiring in the sun and looked up.

“Paavo!”

The man squinted at me, and then grinned to the first man who looked exactly like him, the one in the top hat. “But I’m not Paavo Matsin,” said the man in the suspenders. “You’re joking!”

“But you also look just like him.”

“Yes, but there are subtle differences, very subtle differences,” the man in the suspenders said. “For one, Paavo Matsin wouldn’t be caught dead in a pair of suspenders.”

“I see.”

“He also does not own a plaid shirt.”

“I also see.”

“Do you want to meet the real Paavo though?”

“Yes, of course. That’s why I came here. We were supposed to talk about literature.”

“Very good. Take him to see the real Matsin then,” the man in the suspenders said to the man in the top hat. He nodded and took another sip of his whiskey. The man in the suspenders uncorked a bottle of molasses. “Before you go, you just have to try it,” he said. I took a swig of the strong, sweet stuff. The man in the suspenders grinned at me. “Oh, I told you it was good. Now you are really ready to see old Matsin!”

The man in the top hat led me back to the yard. From the corner of the property, I watched as a 1916 Model 34 Marmon automobile skidded and bounced over the fields and stones until it reached the edge of a tent, where a bar had been set out for the plantation’s many guests. The man in the top hat led me over to the side of the car. He plucked an umbrella from a bucket. The top hat man opened it in the hot sun and stood ready.

The door opened, and from its plush interior emerged the man I had been seeking all of this time. He looked just like the man with the top hat and the man with the suspenders. They all looked the same. There were only subtle differences between them. Subtle differences. The real Paavo Matsin drew a handkerchief from his front pocket and wiped the sweat from his brow. He stared at me and squinted. When he recognized me, he nodded, but only just so.

“Well butter my butt and call me a biscuit,” he said. “If it ain’t the American writer.”

“I made it, Paavo.”

“Good. Come with me. Let’s have another drink.”

At the tent, Matsin informed the bartender to fix him a mint julep, toot sweet.

“But who were those two men who looked like you?”

The bartender slid Matsin his drink and he peered into it. He took a sip and stared at the lawn. “Simple. Those are my pseudonyms,” he said.

“Your pseudonyms?“

“Yeah, pseudonyms. Pen names. Alter egos. Look, Gogoli Disko was not authored by Paavo Matsin, was it? It’s credited to Paša Matšinov. He is the one in the top hat. Matšinov is my butler. Must Päike, ‘Black Sun,’ is credited to Friederich Reinhold Kreutzmatsin,” he went on. “He’s in charge of my export business. Pseudonyms are wonderful. They’ll do anything for you.”

“Kreutzmatsin,” I repeated, dumbfounded. “That man in the plaid shirt and suspenders.”

Matsin just chuckled. “You’re still such a young writer,” he said. “You need to stay at Kongo Disko. Hang out. Learn the tricks of the trade. I’ll school you in the art of dystopian magical realism.” Matsin snapped his fingers at the bartender, who stood ready to serve us both.

“Yes, boss?”

“Villem,” he said. “I want you to fix our writer here a dystopian magical realist mint julep.”

“Sure thing, boss. Anything you say, boss.”

The bartender mixed the drink and slid it across the bar to me. I looked into its murky contents and then took a sip. It was very minty. Paavo was chewing on a stalk of wheat, pondering. From the fields, I could hear the chants and songs of the poor Viljandi laborers. Their sweet lamentations echoed to the river with blues and soul, melancholy and torment.

the villa johannes

AFTER THE WAR, my family invested in a piece of exclusive property on a knoll overlooking the lake and used their sizable dividends from the export business to erect the Villa Johannes, a deluxe, lofty, three-storey mansion with German and Scandinavian architectural influences. To get there from the center, you had to take Cat Tail Street, which looped around the side of a hill behind the Villa Schmidt and the Lutheran church. The ground here was overgrown with high grasses and weeds, though the grass was supple, green, and soft, and tickled your ankles.

I walked this same path on the day my family held a major party. It was a cool August day and the wind was in the grasses and in my hair. On the lake, there were several boats. Jane was there in the kitchen, and my parents, and so were my children, and so were Eloisa and Miguel, who had come to help out. Miss Maritime herself, whose real name was Isla, also managed to tumble in, and was seated at the counter. They were all refugees I suppose, because they were drenched in sea water after the ship went down. I remember Isla’s dress was especially damp, and water dripped from it onto the floor. Miguel and Eloisa were elbow deep in potato salad.

“But you have to go back,” Miguel said to me. “There were others on that great ship that went down. They should be here at the party too. They deserve to be rescued!” I decided to go back over to the other side to bring the others back. To get there, I had to take a special staircase in the Villa Johannes that would connect me with the wreck of the ship. Once I went through the door at its top, I would be at the bottom of the sea. Then I could pull the others to safety, and we could all attend the lakefront party together. I was afraid, of course. I ascended the steps and all of the others watched me as I neared the passageway. I saw Jane there, my parents, my children, and beautiful Isla. I saw Miguel and Eloisa. Everyone was watching me as I went up.

the buenos aires sea tunnel

SOMEWHERE ON THE COAST of Buenos Aires, the Argentine capital and metropole, there is a sea tunnel. Except that it’s not actually a tunnel per se. The coastal road just disappears into the blue waters of the Atlantic. Maybe it resurfaces on the other side, in Uruguay, around Colonia del Sacramento, or maybe you can ride it all the way to Senegal, Morocco, and France. I just don’t know. I couldn’t get that far driving in my rented Volkswagen.

I went to the tunnel during the South American winter, which for Northerners like us is summer. It was a gray day, and I wore a pair of jeans and a wool sweater. The horizon was gray and the sea was also gray, but a bluer, deeper gray. The coastal road emerged from an industrial area of the city, cut by factories and telephone lines, and then for some distance it was contained in by massive stone walls on both sides. I drove through this part of the coastal tunnel, and then emerged into a wide open breezy space, where the sea flowed on both sides, and the orange sandy road below was barely visible. My car began to slide on the sand and into the water, and I decided to turn around and park it by some roadside cantinas, where they sold snacks and drinks. There were other cars parked there while people waited for nightfall.

At night, I understood why they had waited so long, munching on hamburguesas and sipping hot mate. There were hieroglyphics cut into the stone walls of the coastal tunnel that glowed in the dark. The faces of the gods, heroes, and tricksters of the Charrúa people became visible in the moonlight. Grinning devil faces, and warriors with spears, animals pulling carts, dotted with the artistic flourishes of the indigenous tribes. I tried to take photos of the glyphs, but it was difficult because of the lights from the passing vehicles. I managed to get a few shots.

Later, when I returned from my trip, I shared the photos with my musician friend, the Argentine Luís, who said he knew all about the place, and that when he was a teenager growing up in Buenos Aires, he and his Catholic school classmates would sneak there at night to smoke pot, skateboard, and listen to the Rolling Stones on a portable cassette player. Even native Buenos Aires residents no longer bothered to visit it anymore, he said, and many were unaware of its very existence. “Ask anybody in the city about the ancient coastal tunnel these days, and you will get a blank stare, I think,” Luís told me. “It’s as if the place doesn’t exist.”

art nouveau

THE APARTMENT was on the central square in an old pre-war building constructed during some period of authoritarian government. I got the keys from a friend who lives abroad. Her grandmother recently died and she said she would allow me to stay there while I was visiting the city. I just needed to know the number to open the front door, and the keys would be waiting for me in the mailbox. The flat was at the top of the first flight of stairs. The door was heavy, wooden. I worked both keys until the ancient lock turned and the door creaked open.

I went in.

The apartment was being renovated. All of the kitchen appliances had been unplugged from the walls. One of the rooms was completely being refinished and the workman’s ladder still stood in place. Two rooms were overflowing with stacks of old books. In the library, they still were ordered across the shelves. In a second room, they were stacked into seas of old boxes, one toppling over into another. The old woman had been religious and there was Christian imagery everywhere. There was also a tall, stained glass art nouveau lamp in the library. I paid almost no attention to this lamp as I spread my sheets out on the couch and went to sleep. When I woke up again, the lamp was shimmying back and forth and had grown a set of eyes.

The air was different too, thicker, as dense as water, and yet breathable. The art nouveau lamp was glowing and dancing and I stumbled past it to the corridor. The old woman’s cane was set against the wall in the corner, beside a silver crucifix. I felt up the side of the wall until I found the light switch and turned it on. With that first burst of electric light, the room became stationary, and the lamp returned to its usual form and shape. I noticed, as I walked back to the couch, that it was covered in a fine layer of dust. It must have all been my imagination.

The second time I woke up, the art nouveau lamp was glowing again and staring at me. It was brighter in the room again, and the air was even denser than before, like maple syrup. Books were removing themselves from the shelves and then reshelving themselves. An old wood spinning wheel in the corner was spitting out thread all by itself, as if run by some invisible hand. The light in the corridor was off again, but the room was so noisy and alive with flying books that I couldn’t even make my way across it. That’s when the woman fell out of the wall.

She was dressed in a cotton nightgown and was thin. Her hair was long and so blonde it was almost white. I couldn’t see her face because it was covered with her hair. She sat down beside me and was still, quiet. This, as I understood it, was Woman Number 2. She thus began to admonish me. “You have not been treating women well,” she said. “You have one in your heart and yet you entertain and use the others. It’s just not right!” She was clutching at a ball of white yarn and knitting away with a pair of soft, sun-browned hands. The room continued to pulse with light, and when I looked over at the art nouveau lamp, it winked at me and swayed.

Thereafter arrived Katla with two of her favorite girlfriends. They all went into the bathroom, where they disrobed. They were standing there under the spray of the shower and soaping up each other’s beautiful breasts. The women were younger than Katla, and one had very curly hair. After the lesbian shower, Katla dried off and put on some white clothes. She came into the room with the lamp, and I noticed that a small café had opened up in the corner. In fact, the entire side of the room had been replaced by the side of a street. Katla sat there with her blouse halfway open and ordered a coffee. A French waiter stepped quickly and brought it to her on a tray. Katla began to read through the morning’s newspaper in the August sunshine.

“But you have such beautiful eyes,” I told Katla. She only squinted at me over the paper. “Won’t you have me?” I implored her. “Please, tonight?” Katla only shook her head. “You have another woman in your heart now,” she said. “So go be with her.” “But I can’t be with her.” “She’s just your little saint now, isn’t she?” “You don’t even know who she is!” “I know everything already,” Katla said, sipping her coffee, “besides, I have no use for you anyway. You’re just a silly boy.”

I stepped away from her table at the café and was back in the room with the art nouveau lamp. The books were still flying off the shelves and landing again, like tiny birds in a park. The old gramophone in the corner began to spin, and a jazz song was playing through the dust. Woman Number 2 was now lying on the couch before me. She had pulled her ropey, yarny hair back from her strange blue eyes. I could see her face. She had pleasant features but almost look frightened. “Take me,” she whispered, as I crawled on top of her. “Take me, you bastard!”

When I woke up again, I noticed the dust on the lamp in the corner. Everything was back in its proper place. It had been a dream. Someone had turned off the light in the corridor though, and so I went to turn it back on. I was beginning to suspect the old woman’s apartment was haunted. Supposedly, it had once belonged to a pair of long-dead Lutheran deacons, and most of the religious art had belonged to them and not to her. Who were they, and what did they have to do with all of this? As I passed the lamp, it began to glow brilliantly and I saw its big eyes again. The room turned orange and the air was thick. The gramophone spun back to life and the lights began to flicker violently. I bolted for the door. It was ajar, and there were neighbors standing in the hall who had come to see what was up. They were in their pajamas.

Looking back, I saw Woman Number 2 sitting on the bed, waiting patiently for me in her nightgown. Katla was behind her, reading her newspaper at the boulevard café. She lifted her cup of coffee and the books began to fly off the shelves again. The works of Balzac, or that faded special commemorative volume about the ’84 Sarajevo Olympics. The books began to swarm in my direction as the door to the apartment shut. The lost old woman’s cane flew up from the corner and wedged itself in the door. I turned around and the jazz only played louder.

The orange light was so intense, I could no longer see.

dreams of copenhagen

THE RAPID DESCENT was unexpected. It was an evening flight, and one could see the full moon shining through the gauzy clouds, which were rolled up in cottony layers across the expanse of the night time sky. There were plenty of stars in the sky, but these were distant, and looked more like holes in the fabric of a dark blanket. The plane had just reached cruising altitude when it began to descend. I was concerned. I didn’t know why we were landing, or where we were landing. But the descent was smooth. The plane’s pilots were still in control.

We landed at Kastrup. Jones was with me. His afrobeat group had a show there, and he was letting me listen to some new tunes through one end of a pair of headphones, while we rode the airport escalators. Jones then had to leave, but he forgot the headphones and his smartphone with me, so I was walking around listening to afrobeat music. I picked up the wrong bag from the luggage carousel, then returned it and got the right one. Mine was green, but the other bag had an orange logo on it. And then I was out in the morning sunshine of Copenhagen. There were Arabic fruit sellers in stations along the elevated railroad platform, selling bananas and oranges. Somewhere, a tiny radio was playing Basement Jaxx or Daft Punk.

I remembered then how at home I had once felt in that city, so long ago, and about how I once went to a club around Christmas and watched a teenage Danish girl with mermaid curly hair, who had obviously lied her way into the dance hall, get swirled around by some gruff executive from Maersk or Danske Bank while the DJ played Wham’s “Last Christmas.” In my mind, they were still dancing while George Michael sang. Love was in the air in Copenhagen, always.

I rode the train into Københavns Hovedbanegård, the central station, and disembarked, leaving my luggage downstairs. I didn’t know where to go next. Should I go to Christiania? Or to Christian’s Church to visit the tomb of Link Wray? Or maybe just head down the Strøget and get a cup of coffee somewhere? Some Danish girls went by on bikes and I could hear the bells of their bicycles ringing. It was an exuberant, holiday sound. The bells’ sound made me happy.

It had been so long since I had felt happy.

anthem of the sun

THEY OPENED UP a new restaurant on Oru Street, and put some nice apartments on the upper floors. The renovations were welcome and the food was good, if not even more overpriced than at the older competitor establishments. Nothing like dropping five euros for a cup of coffee to awaken one to his utter impoverishment. Also, the bathroom was in another house, so you would have to walk through the yard in a towel to take a shower, with all of the curious village ladies looking on. Vesta was there, of course, staring out the window and organizing a yoga retreat. Celeste was there too, sunning herself on the deck, looking pretty.

It was just like old times.

At some point, Celeste asked me about how I became a fan of the Grateful Dead, and I told her about how the band’s name had seeped slowly into my awareness over time. I knew of the Deadheads, and their tie-dye shirts, and their profound philosophical locker room dissections of tunes like “Touch of Grey” or “Ripple.” The first album I ever bought though was 1968’s Anthem of the Sun. I recalled how I had gone into the record shop and pointed at the cassette on the wall. I was 15. Even the mandala-inspired covert art seemed like a first-class ticket to another dimension. There was more to life than this. That was my first escape into their world.

“Just listen to the drums on ‘Quadlibet for Tender Feet,'” I told Celeste and played her the song. Celeste grasped her shawl like a Southern belle as if to say, ‘I do declare,’ and gave me a pitying look and said, “Oh you. You just love to talk about yourself.” “But I am not talking about myself this time,” I said. “We are talking about Kreutzmann and Hart. We are talking about the Dead.”

no role

THAT SUMMER I was cast in a film where I was set to play the father of a large family.

Filming would be at a warehouse in Tallinn, somewhere out by the airport and downwind of Lake Ülemiste. Koidu, my agent, got me the job. It didn’t pay especially well but she promised me that it might lead to steadier, more reliable work.

Though it was summer, much of the film would take place during winter. A traditional family Christmas dinner scene was planned, for example. Part of the role called on me to play Santa Claus too. I was expected to burst through the door with a big and bulky joulupukki outfit acquired during a summer sale at a Helsinki supermarket with a bag full of gifts for everyone. Fazer was sponsoring the production and Geisha chocolates would tumble out like gold coins. Playing the pater familias sure seemed like an easy gig but then everything went shit wrong.

To start, Koidu is an Estonian agent, which means she suffers from some mild communication impediments. She assumes beforehand that information is known and therefore believes there is no need to reiterate certain points, because telling me again what time I was expected on set would be, in her mind, a waste of time and energy. As such, I had no idea what time I was supposed to be there. I tried to reach out to Koidu that morning, but she was in an important meeting out at Noblessner, and didn’t respond. The timing of the filming was probably mentioned off-hand in some list. Everyone else had read every message, naturally, but me.

There was a second problem. I had lost my phone. It just disappeared from my fingers at the Sõõrikukohvik on Kentmanni Street. It was the strangest thing. I had just tapped out a message to Koidu, and then tried to scan the message list for more information, but found none. I sent a quick message to the director, but it went unread. He was understandably busy doing something else. A woman walked by and saw the day’s copy of Postimees spread before me and asked if I was done reading it. I said I was and handed her the newspaper and then, that was it. The phone was just gone. It wasn’t on the table, or under it. It wasn’t in my pocket, it wasn’t under my plate of widely-acclaimed and extra soft and sugary donuts. It was just gone, and I had this suspicion that I was already late. I ran out the door, got in my car, and drove off.

The rest of the cast was a group of twentysomething actresses from Nukuteater, one of whom was supposed to play my wife. Her name was Johanna and she had curly yellow-gold hair and a childlike look to her. Maybe they would need to age her face with AI, the same way that they de-aged Harrison Ford in the new Indiana Jones movie. We had met once to go over our lines. In the film, our marriage was on the rocks, but it was saved by the Christmas festivities. I had only seen the photos of the actresses who were set to play our daughters on social media. I imagined the whole production as a modern day version of Little Women, except with Estonians cast in all the main roles. Estonian Women? They were all on set at the right time, I was sure, but then I was upset by a third logistical issue: my car broke down near the Liivalaia Selver and I had to trudge the rest of the way to the set through a tropical July downpour.

By the time I reached the set, I was soaked and the door was locked. I could see Johanna through the glass. She was on the phone with someone and pacing. She came to the door and handed the phone over to me. “Koidu would like to speak with you,” was all she said. I held the phone up to my ear. “What’s going on?” “Where were you?” Koidu said. “They have been waiting for you for hours!” “I had some car trouble.” “So what! Couldn’t you have also taken a Bolt?” “I also had some phone trouble. Anyway I am here now. I am ready for my role.” There was a pause. “You’ve sabotaged your career again,” said Koidu. “There’s no role left for you anymore.” “What do you mean no role? I was supposed to play the father of the family. I even have my joulupukki costume!” “It doesn’t matter,” Koidu remarked. “They got some other guy to play the father. It’s not such a hard role to recast, you know. All of you guys are the same.”

I handed the phone back to Johanna who just stared at me. Then she disappeared behind the glass door again. I could see her walk across the set, talking to some man I didn’t know. He must have cracked a joke, because I saw Johanna laugh. I had never seen her laugh that way.

After that I walked alone for a while. It was a hot day and I decided to stop into a gas station. I skimmed through an issue of Kroonika. The cover story was about the exploits of middle-aged actor and his new 25-year-old love. I bought a bag of potato chips and a drink and stood reading about this new pair. They looked happy in the photos at least. I had to give them that.

elevator jazz

AFTER SONJA STOLE my lost book of erotica, she continued her music studies, later becoming a rather impressive jazz singer and all around chanteuse. She gave concerts on the top of the tallest hotel in Tallinn, which is not that tall, but still pretty tall. From there, on summer evenings, one could feel the brisk winds of the north and stare off into a Matisse swirl of stars and purple orange sunset fused into a stellar blue stardust trail of Baltic melancholy. It was pretty, in other words, and she was beautiful. She played with a little Finnish trio. They were not as beautiful as blonde Sonja was, but they played beautifully. There was a drum solo.

I started attending the rooftop jazz concerts around the time I returned from America, where I had to visit family with Jane and her new lover Hans, the Dutch screenwriter. They got to stay in the guest bedroom while I was there, and, well, I had no place to sleep. To make matters worse, nobody could understand why this fact bothered me. “Why are you so moody? You again with your moods! You should go see a psychologist! You seem to have a lot of issues.” Hans and her shacked up in my parents house, and I went and slept in the guesthouse. Agnetha was there, with her young daughter, and I gave them my bed. I curled up to sleep beside them on the hard floor. It was uncomfortable and I went back to Europe after that.

That was how I stumbled upon Sonja and the hotel concerts. She was a good singer. Usually this kind of elevator jazz bores me, but hers was a more ambrosial blend. But jazz alone doesn’t pay the bills, does it. Sonja was also working as a waitress at the hotel bar. At breakfast, she brought me a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice. In Islam, orange juice is a rich and promising symbol. If you are poor, you will become rich if you drink enough orange juice. If your heart is broken and you have suffered many hardships, your pain will be relieved by the tang of this tropical nectar. I don’t think Sonja knew this though. She just needed the money. Then she walked over to the elevator and took it back up to the roof for some rooftop jazz.

It was time to rehearse.

miss maritime

MISS MARITIME was seated at a desk in a silver dress. I saw her the day after I ran into Celeste. She was gentle, vivid, and memorable, like the slopes of the best childhood beaches. She was small. She was young and had blue eyes and brown hair. But at least Miss Maritime was still there.

The classroom was in the part of the school that used to house the theatre arts program. It was fall and there was lightning outside the windows. We had all been assigned group work and I had been placed on her team. She was apprehensive, but I guess it was all for the best.

Hours earlier there had been a jailbreak from the school. All of the students ran down the hallways. It had been sunny then and through the windows of the corridors you could see the dust in the light and smell the chalk. That chalky smell of an old school constructed in the 1930s. They tried to contain the uprising, but it was of no use. All of the students spilled into the streets. We went with them and by the ponds I saw a boy run into the Taylor House. He went inside and I could see there was a party going on there behind the door of Edwardian textured glass. By that time the weather had started to turn and a few of us went back to the school, Miss Maritime among us.

In previous incidents with her, various weird things had happened. Once, she had told me she needed to go to the Faroe Islands. Another time, she was being hoisted on a chair while well wishers wished her a happy birthday. This time she was seated across from me in a silver dress.

“Well, here we are again,” I said. We had to give a presentation about the Vikings. “Thank you,” Miss Maritime said, “for being on my team.”

second century romans

I WAS LOST AGAIN, driving a convertible in the dark. De Niro and Pacino were in the backseat, clutching their newborns, and feeding them formula. We were in a vast underground aquarium that had been built by the Romans in the second century. Some areas of the site were still unknown to archaeology. These were dark and blotted out by an ominous swirling mist. We drove beneath the arch of an aqueduct, but I decided to turn around. “Do you even know where you’re going?” De Niro piped up. “Well, we’re not going in there,” I said, gesturing. “If you go in there, you only fall more deeply asleep.”

We took another road and soon arrived at a brightly lit exhibit called “The History of Cheese,” which was on loan from the Smithsonian. Some pieces were contributed by the Amalienborg in Copenhagen too. Pacino was impressed by the Caseus Fumosus Velabrensis or Smoked Velabran Cheese. “Bobby, get over here. Try it, just try it.” Pacino slipped his baby a taste.

I left the veteran actors at the cheese exhibit and went to a book launch after that, and there was a lot of cake for the guests. Jane was there eating the cake and selling books and she didn’t want to leave. Antti, a spectacled Finnish reader who likes to talk geopolitics, also showed up and was having the cake and whispering to me about Bourdain and Nord Stream. “Splendid work,” he kept muttering aloud and pacing. He was carrying a fresh issue of The Economist. Jane couldn’t be pulled away from all of the after hours cake and mingling and networking.

On the steps on the way out, we did hug, and it felt refreshing, as if all was healed, but then she told me she had rented a garage in the city and was going to start raising some sheep there. She already had a few lambs. Bolt scooters soared by, and in the distance I heard the metallic clang of an urban fender bender. The lambs were pressing themselves against the walls. They were frightened. “Look, this is no place for sheep,” I kept trying to convince her. “The city is no place for sheep!” She wouldn’t listen to me, so I left.

My convertible was parked in a garage that had served as a site of crucifixion for early Christians. I paid the attendant a few euros for his troubles, coaxed De Niro, Pacino, and the brood from the cheese exhibit and we were off, but not empty handed. Pacino kept feeding me blocks of ancient cheese over my shoulder. “Try this, man. A precursor to Pecorino Romano. Hoo-ah! I just love this shit.”