The Evenings

by Gerard Reve

  “Does your mother have enough coffee and tea?” Bep asked. “I’m not sure,” Frits replied. “As you know, our family is characterized by great thrift.” “What is going on?” he thought. Bep got up, went into the alcove behind the floral curtain and, when she came back, laid a package of tea and a bag of coffee beans on the table. “Take that with you,” she said. “What is this about?” he asked. “Did you borrow something from my mother?” “No,” she replied.

  “I wouldn’t dare claim that I understand a bit of it,” he thought, stuck the packages in his pocket, tucked the rabbit inside his coat, close to the armpit, and left. It was raining. “Still only a quarter to nine,” he thought, glancing at his watch.

  At home he opened the door without a sound, closed it quietly behind him and remained standing. “So what do you want?” he heard his mother say in the living room. “If I only knew what you wanted. But you don’t want anything. You yourself don’t even know what you want. You say that I harp at you. But I never say a thing. This morning I asked you: Do you comb your hair with that little nailbrush? Aren’t I allowed to ask that? Do you have to answer back: do you mind? And you looked as though you felt like strangling me. You feel threatened. Do I threaten you?”

  A brief silence descended. Frits opened the door again, backed silently into the hallway, closed the door carefully and then opened it again with a great display of noise. Then he slammed it shut and walked into the room, humming. His mother was sitting in the low armchair by the fire; his father was at the table. Both of them remained silent when he came in and wished them a good evening. “Not good,” he thought, “not good at all. Quick, quick.”

  “When was the first time you saw a film, Father?” he asked. “What?” asked his father. “Do you remember,” Frits asked loudly, “when your first saw a film?” “Yes, yes,” the man said, exhaling a deep sigh, “it was at the travelling carnival, as a young boy. Living pictures, they called them back then.” “That wasn’t a motion picture, though, was it?” his mother asked. “You didn’t have films back then, did you?” “How would you know?” asked his father, his face wrinkling in irritation. “I don’t believe a word of it,” she said. “Well then, don’t believe it,” his father said.

  “Did it actually move, or was it a slide show?” Frits asked. “No, of course not,” his father replied, “it was a film. A bit artless. And the pictures were quite shaky.” The angry expression on his face vanished. “The constables chasing a gang of smugglers. And shooting. Pow!” He moved his right hand as though firing a pistol. “I thought it was wonderful. It made quite an impression on me.” “Without any sound,” Frits said. “That’s right, without sound,” his father said. “Will I be able to come up with another question?” Frits thought. “No, I can’t.” “I’m going to bed a bit early,” he said, “I need to be fit tomorrow.” His eyes closed, he walked out of the room slowly. He put the two packages in the kitchen cupboard. The rabbit he took with him to his bedroom, where he placed it on the bookshelf.

  With a careless gesture, he tossed his clothes over the chair beside his bed. “No time for all that folding and hanging,” he mumbled. Once in bed, he thought: “I didn’t brush my teeth. I need to get up again.” He tried to sit up a few times, but was unable to rise. “I’ll count to twenty,” he thought. At twenty-four he hopped to his feet and went to the kitchen. After brushing his teeth, he dropped his underpants and, holding the shaving mirror between his legs, examined his crotch and, pulling a thigh aside with his free hand, his anus. “Very distasteful,” he mumbled. “If you saw a photograph of it, taken from below, you would hardly believe it was human. Oh, oh.”

  Hanging the mirror back in place he returned to his bed, but could not sleep right away. “That’s what you get, when you go to bed early,” he thought. “It doesn’t help, because sleep will not come. It makes you nervous as hell. Besides, I need another blanket. I have to get out again. Fetch one from the cupboard.” He rocked back and forth, striking the wall with his fist now and then, and fell asleep only forty minutes later.

  He was in a canoe, paddling across a large, calm lake. The sky was overcast. There was no wind, and the water’s black surface was smooth as glass. “The water is rising,” he thought. More and more water entered the canoe. He stuck his hand in it, then felt the water outside the boat. “A nasty sign,” he thought, “the water here inside the boat is much colder than that on the outside. It is different water. Where is it coming from?”

  He paddled as hard as he could. “As long as I can see the shore,” he said aloud. The water in the bottom of the boat rose and reached his legs and thighs. “I’m lost,” he thought. The water continued to rise, the canoe sank deeper and deeper and the sky grew dark. No matter how hard he paddled, the canoe moved more slowly all the time. Finally, the water reached the rim of the little boat.

  He stopped paddling. “As long as I don’t move, it will stay afloat,” he thought. At that moment, in the distance across from him, he saw a wave approaching in the dusk, high as a house. “A wall of water,” he thought, “it is the storm surge.”

  The suction drew the water around him steadily towards the approaching wave: he could tell by the clumps of debris, leaves and blades of straw drifting past him faster all the time. A constant thundering sounded from the distance. “The current hasn’t taken me yet,” he thought, “I have to try.” He turned the canoe around and started paddling, but made almost no progress. When he looked over his shoulder, the swell was already very close: a fine cloud of spray floated across the crest. In the roar one could clearly make out the spattering of foam and the groan of the mass of water as it fell.

  He awoke, but no clear thoughts came. Before he could recall the full content of his dream, he fell asleep again. It was three o’clock.

  IX

  ON MONDAY AFTERNOON, when he took his bicycle out of the shed after office hours, the front tyre was flat. Standing by a street lamp he turned the wheel slowly and discovered a tack jammed into the rubber. He removed it, felt in his coat pocket until he found a stub of red pencil, and drew a line across tyre and rim. “I know how it will go,” he thought. “I’ll put it in the storage cupboard and forget about it. I won’t get around to it. On foot it is then, for the time being.”

  The air was filled with a fine mist. Here and there on the pavement were puddles from the rain that had fallen that morning. “This is mist,” he said to himself, “that is getting ready to turn into rain. It is rain that is almost heavy enough to fall.” Walking along, he ran his hands from time to time over his coat, which was becoming wet.

  “The end of the year is approaching,” he thought. “I am here, walking through town, through the mist, on my way home, as darkness falls. These are the final days of the year.” He followed the pavements, lifting the front wheel carefully at each kerb. “Still, this the right weather to do some thinking,” he mused on. “At this atmosphere, one discovers one’s true worth.” He began singing to himself softly, half humming. Arriving at the front door he thought: “There is no single, valid reason why this evening should be a failure. I have a suspicion that it will succeed. An evening, the course of which is fixed beforehand, cannot possibly be a failure. The point is to imagine nothing more of it than can reasonably be expected, that’s all.”

  When he came into the living room, his mother said: “You’re a bit later today.” She was sitting at the table, writing a letter. “Yes, a little later,” Frits said. “A touching solicitude surrounds me,” he thought. He looked at her, how she held her head and how the pen moved across the lined paper. “One must not be unreasonable,” he thought, “they are people too, God’s children.” He was just about to start humming when she asked: “What about this horrible, wet cold? It cuts right through everything. There is nothing worse than that soaking-wet chill.”

  “Oh,” Frits said, “it has its advantages. The frost is gone. It’s quite possible that it won’t freeze again for the rest of the winter. Wet, of course, but when you make sur
e you’re wearing a coat, that’s no bother.” “It always makes my head ache so terribly,” she said. Frits went to his room, remained standing before the bookcase and took the toy rabbit in his hand. “Symbol of beneficence, beast of atonement,” he mumbled, holding it up to his cheek and looking in the mirror. “Not an appealing face,” he thought, “I have a sick soul.”

  When he heard someone come through the door to the hallway, he recognized his father, after listening for a moment, by his footsteps and the way he breathed as he hung up his overcoat. “He sired me,” he thought. “Let me view him charitably.” He patted the rabbit, making dust rise, then put it back in its place and went to the living room.

  “Hello, Father,” he said as he came in. “Hello, my boy,” the man answered. He was sitting by the fire, poking at a molar with his finger. “One may think whatever one likes,” Frits thought, “but one must never be unreasonable.” He went to the kitchen, drank water slowly from a ladle, and looked out of the window.

  Facing off in the gardens below, separated by the fence, were the downstairs neighbours’ brown dog and the white keeshond belonging to the people next door. “A unique opportunity,” he thought, filling a bowl with water, but then emptying it again in the sink. “It provides no real cheer,” he said aloud. “I won’t do it.”

  He went into the side room, lit the gas fire and observed how far the valve could be closed before the flames died. “A silly waste of time,” he thought. His mother called him to dinner.

  He ate mechanically of the red cabbage, potatoes, beets and the porridge. When they were finished, his father pulled out his pipe, felt at his pockets, put the pipe away and from the bookcase took down a box of cigars. As soon as Frits saw the box in his hand, he asked, his eyes fixed on the table: “Would you like to fill your pipe with my tobacco, Father?” “No, that’s fine,” the man answered with a smile. He offered Frits one of the little cigars.

  No one spoke as his mother cleared the table. As the table grew barer, Frits felt tension growing within him. “Now I must ask a question, with discernment and feeling,” he thought. “But first a few words to sharpen the hearing.”

  “Abadida didonkolo bolde netsowan intedus, Father,” he said, “igatedo bewank dedestel.” “What?” the man asked, leaning over to him. “Father,” Frits asked, “how old were you when you went to work at the factory? Significantly younger than is allowed these days, wasn’t it?” “That should keep us talking for fifteen minutes or so,” he thought. “After that, I’ll see what I do.”

  “The factory?” his father asked. His forehead wrinkled in a frown. “I was twelve. In the weaving mill.” “Did you go to work with the weavers right away?” his mother asked. She folded up the tablecloth. “I thought you worked in another part of the factory first.” “No, of course not,” his father said, pursing his lips as though against a cold wind. Slowly his features relaxed again. “Father,” Frits asked, “what time did you start work then, and what time were you finished?” “From six thirty,” the man replied, placing his hands on the table and lacing his fingers, “until seven in the evening.” “This isn’t quite the tenth time I’ve heard this,” Frits thought. “Were you allowed a break?” he asked. “Yes,” his father answered, “from noon to one thirty.”

  “Aha, I see,” said Frits. “Ask him about the bench now,” he thought. “It’s almost impossible for me to imagine,” he said, “a twelve-year-old boy in a factory, amid all those terrible machines. That would drive a child mad, wouldn’t it? If something was out of reach, well, you couldn’t get to it, could you?” “Here comes the bench,” he thought.

  “They brought in a bench for me,” his father said, using his hands to indicate breadth and height. “Uh-huh.” He looked straight ahead, pursed his lips, made a little tent with his fingertips and said: “When I stood on that bench, I could reach everything.” His eyes opened a bit wider and remained fixed on the curtains.

  “No,” Frits thought, “the fun and games end here. Hear ye, hear ye.”

  “When you come in,” his father said, “the whole factory hall is still dark. Only a few paraffin lamps are lit. At six thirty the big drive shafts, up at the top”—he lifted his arms—“start to turn. Slowly at first. Then the lights go on, gradually.” “Just like at the theatre,” Frits said, “when the curtains are raised. Then it gets lighter and lighter, but you can’t see that they’re increasing the current the whole time.” “What you see,” his father went on, “what you see is that long shaft with all those gears, as long as the whole factory, starting to turn”—he made a tumbling motion in the air with his hands—“and then the lights come on, and then it begins.”

  “Is it a roaring sound or a rattling sound?” Frits asked. “Everything is drowned out, right?” His father nodded. “What I mean is: is it only the zooming, the roaring that drowns everything out, or is it the rattling of all those machine parts taken together?” “A fairly stupid question,” he thought. “It’s both,” his father answered. “You can’t be heard above it. You have to speak in sign language, with your hands.” Leaning his temple against his right fist, he ran his free hand through his hair.

  “How long did you work there?” Frits asked. His father did not reply. “Father,” he asked again, “how long did that go on? How long were you there?” “Five years,” the man answered, probing at his molars with his thumb.

  Frits got up, went to his bedroom and remained standing at the desk. He stubbed out the cigar, which was only half consumed, and laid it in the penholder atop an inkpot. “I mustn’t leave too late, but also not too early,” he said to himself. “Not so that I give myself the feeling: I got there first, too early, out of boredom. And also not: I’m showing up at the very last moment, because all I care about is the film. No, halfway through the evening, between eight and nine. That’s the best time.” Rolling a cigarette, he said out loud: “All our goods are packed by hand, not touched by a finger, now isn’t that grand.” He picked up the rabbit, kissed it on the snout and sat down with it on the edge of the bed. “You are my sweet, good rabbit,” he said aloud, “and that’s that. Don’t you pay any mind.” He felt tears coming to his eyes, wrapped thumb and middle finger around the animal’s neck and bit down on one of the long, stiff ears. “Bah,” he said, spitting out little fluffs of wool, and placed it back in the bookcase. After pacing back and forth a bit, he picked it up again and, loosening two buttons of his shirt, tucked it between his vest and his bare chest. He sat down in the chair at his desk, pulled the animal out again, clasped it between his legs at the crotch and stroked its ears. “It’s cold in here,” he said aloud, then stuffed the animal behind a row of books, turned off the light and went to stand at the window. “Evening has come,” he mumbled.

  He walked back into the living room. On his way he heard his parents’ voices in the kitchen. “That is a stroke of luck,” he thought, “Father is drying the dishes.”

  He turned on the radio without changing stations. The news reports were being read. Even before the voice had reached full volume, he switched stations and listened to an accordionist, who was playing a musette waltz. His mother put her head around the door and asked: “Do you know what the real time is? Will you let us know when the news starts? Father would like to hear the news.” “I’ll listen for it,” he replied. She withdrew. He searched for the first station, kept the volume down and waited until the news was over and the sports results were being broadcast. “Yes, here’s the news, Mother,” he shouted. “The news!” he heard his mother shout in the kitchen. His father came in, hurried to the radio and sat down on the divan in front of it. “Shoot,” he said, “it’s already over.” “A pity,” Frits said, “I was listening to the other station and I waited too long. They always broadcast the news on that other station. When it lasted too long, I tried this one and they were already in progress. You missed the best part of the programme. A waste and a pity.” “Hoopla, hoopla, hoopla,” he said to himself. “What shall we do now?” he thought. “It is alread
y past eight. The best thing would be to leave and to walk slowly.” His father left the room, his head bowed. “There he goes,” Frits thought. “Life is not simple.” He turned off the radio.

  A few minutes later his mother came in with the dishes. “I’m going to Bep Spanjaard’s,” he said, “and from there we’re going to a midnight showing at The Lantern, at eleven thirty.” “What time will you come home then, for God’s sake?” she asked. “It will probably be around two o’clock,” he replied, “be sure not to bolt the door.” “One of these days you’ll go completely mad,” she said. “True,” Frits said, “I am already moving in that direction, by leaps and bounds. But don’t tell anyone.” “Where lies salvation?” he thought. His father came in and asked: “What is it now? What is all this fuss about?” “No, Father,” he said, “it is a matter of speaking loudly in order to explain something.” “What kind of a film is that, that people have to go to it so late at night?” his mother asked. “It’s The Green Pastures,” Frits answered slowly. “What is it about?” she asked. She was standing in front of the sideboard. His father had deposited himself on the divan. “That is what I shall find out this evening,” Frits replied. “Well, enjoy yourself,” she said. “Forward march,” Frits mumbled to himself. “Double time. Away, away.” He pulled on his coat without first grasping the sleeves of his jacket, so they ended up around his elbows. “We’ll take care of that in a minute,” he said quietly, “but first, out of the door.” “Goodbye, Mother. Goodbye, Father,” he called out at the living room door, “I wish you a pleasant evening. Should anyone come to visit me, please tell them that Mr van Egters will be home very late; warn them that it could be a very long wait indeed.” He closed the door quietly and hopped, holding onto the handrail, down the stairs, three steps at a time.