by B. TRAVEN
It was too early to go to sleep. She could not have gone to sleep, as excited as she was alone in her room thinking about the details of Beckford’s report. She would never have expected that her seemingly innocent plan could cause such an upheaval in the country.
She drank some wine, opened the book she intended to read, glanced at the first page, and closed the book again. She began to daydream: For her, the canal or the railway, whichever it would turn out to be, was an enterprise like the construction of a large ship, a skyscraper, or a mighty dam. And now her undertaking had shaken a whole nation and was provoking the most conflicting political and economic opinions.
Thinking about all this almost made her afraid of herself. “Why the devil,” she asked herself, “did I have to have this crazy idea, which most people would consider a pipe dream? Why did I have to come up with a project that most people would consider impossible? I could have led a calm life instead of getting all tangled up in national and international politics. I’m sure now the British will make a fuss about this project running counter to their own interests, and the U.S. government will deny our permits in order to stay in good standing with them. We’re basically still a British colony. We can’t step on England’s toes under any circumstances, because the Antichrist, the sworn enemy of all true culture and civilization, lurks in the East.”
While Aslan was daydreaming, there was a knock on the door. It could not have been the room service waiter checking in again; he would have called. There was another knock.
“Who is it?” asked Aslan, without getting up from the divan.
“It’s me, Beckford, ma’am.”
“What do you want, Beckford? I hope you know how late it is.”
“Yes, it’s ten thirty. But I have a terribly important message for you, ma’am.”
Aslan could tell from his voice that he had imbibed more whiskey than was good for his equilibrium. But she could be wrong. She did not know him well enough to know for sure.
“I’m sure you can tell me tomorrow at breakfast.”
“It really is urgent, ma’am, and should not wait till the morning.”
Her curiosity was piqued. She opened the door, not so much to hear the important message, but so they wouldn’t have to keep talking through the closed door. She feared Beckford would draw the unwanted attention of other hotel guests.
As soon as Aslan had cracked open the door, Beckford shoved past her into the room. Only then did Aslan wonder why Beckford had not called instead of coming to her room directly. And she asked herself why she had not told him that he should have called instead.
Now it was too late. Beckford was in her room and alone with her. She could, of course, call reception and ask for hotel security, but that would only make the situation worse. The hotel management would wonder why she had let the man into her room in the first place and would misunderstand. The reality was that she was alone with Beckford in her room late at night, and that she was standing in front of him wearing nothing but a flimsy nightgown.
She’d guessed correctly: He wasn’t entirely wasted, but he definitely wasn’t sober, either. The amount of whiskey he had consumed had clearly left an impact. His decision-making was impaired, but Aslan felt that he knew what he was doing. He did not even attempt to feign drunkenness. The events of this late evening would have gone very differently had he succeeded in meeting an easy woman at the bar, some neglected housewife.
On the hotel terrace earlier that afternoon, Aslan had let herself slip a little under the influence of the mild air and the lulling roar of the waves. She remembered her assessment of Beckford’s body as she sat down on the divan, pulling her bathrobe tightly around her body. She thought of asking him what the important message was, but the words died on her lips. She felt a lump in her throat apparently caused by her growing arousal.
Indecisive about what he should do next, Beckford felt insecure like a sixteen-year-old alone with a prostitute for the first time in his life. He needed to do something, he thought in his befuddled brain. He looked at Aslan and stepped closer to her. His knees touched hers as he stood in front of her. He pressed his knees harder into her body. Then his hand found its way under her nightgown. As if she meant to refuse him, she turned her body a little, but this movement allowed his hand to explore her breasts. With her left hand, she tried to remove his from her body, but the feebleness of her gesture implied that she could properly defend herself if she were serious about doing so.
She let it happen without enjoying it, without any satisfaction. She found that it did nothing to cool her arousal. After, skillfully, she turned away from him and, lying on her side, kicked him with all her might. He would never have guessed that she was so strong. The kick sent the sturdy sergeant all the way to the door, where he stumbled and fell.
“That’s the door, Mr. Beckford. Good night.”
He left the room without answering and without even turning around.
Aslan stood and closed the door behind him. Out in the hall, Beckford tried to collect himself. The only thing he could think was, Good Lord, that woman can kick! She would make it far in the Marine Corps.
The following day, at three in the afternoon, he called her and asked whether she would not like to invite him for tea in her rooms.
Aslan answered: “Okay, four thirty,” and hung up without another word.
When Beckford arrived in Aslan’s living room at four thirty on the dot, the waiter had already served tea and disappeared. Several different tiny toasted sandwiches and a crystal flask of cognac accompanied the tea.
Beckford tried to hide his insecurity at being alone with Aslan again by being intentionally brusque. He gave up after a few minutes because he felt he was making a fool of himself. Aslan paid him no attention. She knew he was only attempting to regain a sense of his masculinity. Aslan acted as though she had no recollection of what had passed between them the night before.
Maybe she was too drunk to remember what happened, he thought.
Aslan acted as she always did toward him: as his superior, his employer, on whom he depended financially. Aslan poured the tea and when she offered him the tray with the sandwiches, she said, as if she did not care very much: “What was it that was so important that you wanted to tell me last night?”
“Oh, yes, ma’am. I almost forgot. I think I was too drunk last night, and therefore acted so foolishly.”
“That’s possible,” said Aslan sipping her tea, “but certainly you weren’t that drunk. More sugar?”
Does she really not remember? Beckford asked himself.
“Do you actually have important news? Or was it just an excuse to bother me so late at night?”
“It was very important, ma’am, and it is still very important. Two newspapers published letters to the editor by readers who propose that you should run as a candidate in the next presidential election. They claim your transnational infrastructure would get you elected by a landslide.”
“May all the known and unknown gods protect me from such a fate,” said Aslan, laughing. “I don’t think it’s necessary that I run for office. If we don’t execute our project, someone else will. If not during my lifetime, then after I die, but I’m convinced we won’t have to wait that long.”
She changed her tone. “Let’s talk about something else, Mr. Beckford. I’m going back to New York at seven o’clock. If you want, you can come with me. We will be back before ten o’clock.”
“Well, ma’am, that would be great.”
Beckford poured himself a glass of cognac and another for Aslan. He started to feel out of place now that tea was officially over and as usual, he had nothing interesting to say. As usual, Aslan was beginning to grow bored as she did whenever she had to spend more than thirty minutes with him.
Glaring sunlight filled the room. Aslan got up, walked over to the large window and closed the curtains. Immediately, the room took on a comfortable coziness.
“I think I will go now, ma’am,” said Beckford,
hesitating as if he were waiting for something. “Thank you for the tea.”
“You are welcome, Mr. Beckford. And don’t forget, seven o’clock in the lobby, unless you plan to stay a few more days. For your studies,” she added, without the slightest hint of irony.
“Not at all. I am very happy to go back with you and to be home tonight.”
He still did not make to leave. He poured himself a second cognac at the little table where tea had been served and downed it.
Aslan, still at the window, turned and stared at Beckford in puzzlement.
“You just said you wanted to leave, Mr. Beckford.”
Aslan came back slowly from the window, as if she intended to come closer to him to show him more clearly that his presence was no longer welcome, and that he was getting on her nerves. She stood close to the divan and turned toward the bedroom, apparently to change for the return trip and to pack.
Beckford happened to glance at the book that was lying on the side table of the divan.
“May I see what you are reading, ma’am?” he asked. His voice shook.
“Why not? It’s no secret,” answered Aslan, walking around the divan and coming close to the side table as if to hand him the book.
Beckford was also standing close to the divan, so close to Aslan that his body was lightly touching hers. He turned and Aslan found herself wedged between Beckford and the divan. As he had done the night before, he pressed his knees against hers. She said nothing but fixed her eyes on his.
He expected that she would rebuff him, but she didn’t attempt to defend herself. She just looked at him indifferently for several seconds. He thought it quite possible she would kick him again, but he’d endured so many kicks in his life, what was one more, especially if it came after all the fun.
Aslan’s lips curved into a mysterious smile, which could mean everything or nothing at all. It confused Beckford. He did not know how to interpret it. He grabbed her harshly by the shoulders and pushed her onto the divan. She covered her eyes with her left arm, but kept her right arm free to defend herself. The smile on her lips had only widened.
He wanted to kiss her, to erase that smile from her lips. But she pushed his face away with the palm of her hand, while pressing her left arm more tightly against her eyes. He pushed up her dress, much higher than necessary, she thought. Again, she let it happen with complete indifference. She felt nothing. She could not even muster disgust.
Afterward, he tried to kiss her again. And as unexpectedly as last night, she kicked him, except this time she kicked him in his groin so hard that he sank to the floor, moaning. She got up, pulled down her dress, searched for her panties, went inside the bedroom, and slammed the door.
Beckford quickly gained his bearings and picked himself up off the floor, as you would expect from a well-drilled sergeant of the Marine Corps. In basic training, he had endured worse beatings. In his naivete, he saw the kick as proof of her love for him, delivered in the moment of climax that had finally overcome the little woman. He tidied his clothes and left the room.
17.
At exactly seven o’clock, Beckford was in the lobby with his small suitcase, which the bellboy was clutching tightly. Ten minutes later, he was sitting next to Aslan in her car.
She was driving, although he had offered to do so. She had declined curtly. They did not speak a single word on the way back to the city. They were both lost in thought.
He was basking in the wonderful feeling of returning victoriously, crowned by laurels. He had finally managed to make her his lover. And he had not even had to resort to rape to win her over. She had come to him like a lamb to slaughter.
Speaking of rape, he remembered several he had committed here and there. As he was remembering those incidents, he concluded that any prostitute, occasional whore, or hussy whom he had picked up on the street had provided him with greater pleasure than the women with whom he had had to use force.
Fortunately, this is all over now, thought Beckford, as the car was racing toward the city. For right now and hopefully for a long time, no more bar girls and no more girls picked up on the street. That is all over now, thank the Lord! Now I have what I have always wanted. A posh, elegant lover. Divine figure. And as a welcome extra: heaps of money. Riches beyond measure. Finally, a lover. How much she must have missed it! Married to that old geezer for years. He’s probably at least sixty. And he always thinks about construction. Day and night. Construction. If you should play the part of the uppity lady as you did before, my dear, I’ll slap you until you have understood who has taken over control now.
He was dreaming like this as the car was gently and almost silently gliding along. In the meantime, night had fallen. In this darkness, his thoughts only revolved around the details of the next intimate moments with Aslan. As her current master and ruler, he would make sure that those would occur the next day.
They reached the first streets of the suburbs, which were already illuminated. Aslan suddenly slowed down the car.
“Out of gas?” asked Beckford, turning toward her rather grumpily, because he had been so abruptly interrupted in his pleasant thoughts.
“Not at all,” answered Aslan. “The tank is still almost half full.”
Driving at this reduced speed, she looked left and right. Maybe she was searching for a particular street or a certain building. Beckford, who was still lingering in dreamland, woke up suddenly. He thought that he was finally understanding what she was trying to find.
She is looking for a discreet hotel where she can spend the night with me, he thought with satisfaction.
Finally, Aslan seemed to have found what she had been looking for. However, she avoided letting Beckford guess what was going on inside her. Beckford looked all around, almost straining his neck, but he could not see any kind of hotel, neither elegant nor common. Aslan brought the car close to the shoulder of the street and turned off the engine. Traffic was not very heavy here, and if necessary, she could park in this spot all night without anyone bothering her. She leaned back comfortably in her seat.
In the light of the shop windows and the streetlights, Beckford could see the same mysterious smile that had irritated him so much that afternoon. It was a smile that could mean everything or nothing, but never anything in between.
Without looking at Beckford or turning toward him, and without giving up her comfortable position, she declared with devastating sarcasm in her voice: “Mr. Beckford, on this long trip from the hotel, you have thought about nothing else but that you have conquered me, and that I am your lover now and you are my gigolo, or whatever you might have imagined. Isn’t that right, Mr. Beckford?”
“Well—um—I thought—um—what happened between us—”
He stammered terribly since he found himself knocked off the saddle so unexpectedly. The sharp tone of her voice abruptly tore him down from the throne on which he had been sitting in his dreams. He knew this hard, ironic tone of voice from previous occasions. He remembered it well: Whenever Aslan used this tone with him, what followed was like being thrown into ice-cold water. Usually it would take him some time to appear in front of her with any kind of semblance of self-esteem.
“Only someone who is as inexperienced in real life as you are, Mr. Beckford, could imagine something so idiotic. Who do you think I am? One of your bar girls? What you thought of me truly and deeply offends me. Every one of your thoughts was an affront to me.”
“But, ma’am, I never thought anything like that at all about you. On the contrary, ma’am, I honestly and sincerely respect you.”
“Blah-blah-blah! Don’t lie so shamelessly. You are not a gentleman with a single fiber of your being. A gentleman would respect a woman who gives herself to him for whatever reason more rather than less. You are a sergeant of the Marine Corps and will remain a sergeant of the Marine Corps until the end of your days. I think I already told you that once.”
“But then I don’t understand, ma’am, why you—why you—” He could not find the r
ight words.
“—why I made it so easy for you is probably what you wanted to say.”
“Exactly, that is exactly what I wanted to say but I didn’t know how to express it.”
“And now, don’t be shocked, Mr. Beckford, and don’t go crazy when I tell you why I made it so easy for you.”
“Yes, ma’am?”
“I needed a human guinea pig for my own peace of mind. I found you to be an excellent guinea pig. Probably the best I could have found.”
“A guinea pig? I don’t understand what you mean, ma’am.”
“You never understand anything. That’s what’s so pitiful about you. A long time ago, I promised, well, I didn’t promise, but I hinted that I could give myself to you under certain undefined circumstances—for your enjoyment if you wish. It doesn’t hurt me if you interpret it that way. And as far as that insinuated promise is concerned, I don’t owe you a thing anymore. I even kept the promise twice instead of once, as intended.”
“That’s right, ma’am, and I am very grateful, to be honest.”
“Forget your gratitude. I am the one who should say ‘thank you very much’ like humans plagued by illnesses who should erect monuments to the guinea pigs, apes, dogs, mice, and rats for all the experiments these innocent animals had to suffer.”
Beckford glanced up and down the street and only twenty feet away he saw a bar.
“Excuse me, ma’am, I urgently need a whiskey. I will be back in a minute. I need to fortify myself for the guinea pig.”
“No worries, I’ll wait. Would you please ask the waiter to bring me a double vermouth bitter here to the car?”
Beckford brought back an extra-large double whiskey when he returned and sat back down in the car.
“I will most likely tell my husband what happened, Mr. Beckford,” said Aslan suddenly, thoughtfully sipping her vermouth bitter.
“Have you completely—well, I don’t know what I should call it,” Beckford exploded.
