Farewell Waltz

by Milan Kundera

  Bertlef interceded: "I too think you would do better to wait until Thursday. Today our friend would be unable to concentrate. Anyway, I don't believe he has brought his trumpet with him."

  "That's a good reason!" Skreta acknowledged, and began to lead his two friends to the restaurant on the other side of the park. But Skreta's nurse caught up with them and begged him to return to his office. The doctor excused himself and let the nurse take him back to his infertile patients.

  7

  About six months earlier Ruzena had left her parents' house in a nearby village to move into a small room in Karl Marx House. God knows what she promised herself from this room's independence, but she soon real-

  ized that her room's and her freedom's benefits were much less pleasant and much less intense than what she had dreamed of.

  This afternoon, having returned to her room from the thermal building a little after three o'clock, she had the unpleasant surprise of finding her father waiting for her sprawled on the daybed. That was hardly convenient, for she wanted to devote herself entirely to her appearance, to do her hair and carefully choose a dress.

  "What are you doing here?" she asked irritably. She held it against the doorkeeper that he was an acquaintance of her father's and always ready to let him into her room in her absence.

  "I had a bit of free time," said her father. "We're having an exercise in town today."

  Her father was a member of the Public Order Volunteers. Because the spa's medical staff made fun of the old men pacing up and down the streets with their armbands and their self-important manner, Ruzena was ashamed of this activity of her father's.

  "If that's what amuses you!" she muttered.

  "You should be glad to have a papa who's never been a loafer and never will be. We're pensioners, but we're going to show you young people we still know how to do things!"

  Ruzena decided to let him talk while she concentrated on choosing her dress. She opened the wardrobe.

  "I'd really like to know what things you do," she said.

  "A lot of things. This town, my little girl, is an inter-

  nationally known spa. And what do you see? Kids running all over the grass!"

  "So what?" said Ruzena, rummaging through her dresses. Not a single one pleased her.

  "Not only kids, but dogs too! The Municipal Council a long time ago issued an order that dogs have to be leashed and muzzled outdoors! But nobody here obeys it. Everybody does what he pleases. Just look at the park!"

  Ruzena took out a dress and began to change behind the open wardrobe door.

  "They piss everywhere. Even in the playground sandbox! Think of a toddler dropping his slice of bread and jam in the sand! And then people wonder why there's so much sickness! Here, all you have to do is look," said her father, heading toward the window. "Right now four dogs are running loose there."

  Ruzena reappeared and examined herself in the mirror on the wall. The little mirror was the only one she had, and she could barely see down to her waist.

  "You're not interested, are you?" her father asked.

  "Of course I'm interested," said Ruzena, moving back from the mirror on tiptoes to try to gauge how her legs would look in that dress. "But, please don't be angry, I've got to meet somebody and I'm in a hurry."

  "The only dogs I can tolerate are police dogs and retrievers," said her father. "But I don't understand people who keep dogs at home. Soon women will stop bearing children and cradles will be filled with poodles!"

  Ruzena was dissatisfied with the image the mirror reflected. She went back to the wardrobe to find a more becoming dress.

  "We've decided that people should be allowed to have dogs at home only if everybody in the building agrees to it at the tenants' meeting. Also, we're going to increase the dog-license fee."

  "I can see you have serious concerns," said Ruzena, delighted that she no longer lived with her parents. Ever since childhood, her fathers moral lessons and commands had been repugnant to her. She craved a world in which people spoke a language other than his.

  "It's no laughing matter. Dogs really are a serious problem, and I'm not the only one who thinks so, the highest authorities think so too. You've probably never been asked what's important and what isn't. Of course you'd answer that the most important things in the world are your dresses," he said, noting that his daughter had again hidden behind the wardrobe door to change.

  "They're certainly more important than your dogs," she replied, once again standing on tiptoes in front of the mirror. And once again she was dissatisfied. But dissatisfaction with herself slowly changed into rebellion: spitefully she thought that the trumpeter would have to accept her just as she was, even in this cheap dress, and this gave her an odd feeling of satisfaction.

  "It's a question of hygiene," her father went on. "Our towns will never be clean as long as dogs leave their

  loads on the sidewalk. And it's also a question of morality. It's intolerable for dogs to be pampered in housing constructed for people."

  Something was happening that Ruzena did not suspect: her rebellion was mysteriously, imperceptibly merging with her father's indignation. She no longer felt the intense repugnance for him that had filled her just a while ago; on the contrary, she unknowingly drew energy from his vehement words.

  "We never had a dog in the house, and we weren't missing anything,'' said her father.

  She continued to look at herself in the mirror and felt that being pregnant gave her a new advantage. Whether she found herself beautiful or not, the trumpeter had made the trip expressly to see her and very nicely invited her to meet him at the brasserie. For that matter (she looked at her watch), at this very moment he was already waiting for her there.

  "But were going to make a clean sweep, little girl, you'll see!" her father said, laughing, and this time she reacted gently, almost with a smile: "I'm glad, Papa. But now I have to leave.''

  "Me too. The exercise starts again any minute."

  They left Karl Marx House together and then went their separate ways. Ruzena headed slowly toward the brasserie.

  8

  Klima had never managed to identify entirely with his role of a famous and popular artist, and particularly now, with his private worries, he felt it as a flaw and a handicap. When he entered the brasserie with Ruzena and, opposite the checkroom, saw his enlarged photo on a poster left over from the last concert, he was gripped by a sensation of anxiety. He crossed the room with the young woman, automatically trying to guess which of the customers recognized him. He was afraid of their gaze, thought he saw eyes everywhere observing him, spying on him, dictating his expressions and behavior to him. He felt several curious looks fixed on him. He tried to ignore them and headed for a small table in the back, near a bay window with a view of the park's foliage.

  When they were seated he smiled at Ruzena, caressed her hand, and said that her dress became her. She demurred modestly, but he insisted and tried to talk for a while on the topic of the nurse's charms. He was surprised, he said, by her good looks. He had been thinking about her so much for two months that the pictorial efforts of his memory had fashioned an image of her that was remote from the reality. What was extraordinary about it, he said, was that her real appearance, although he had very much desired it as he thought of her, nonetheless topped the imaginary one.

  Ruzena pointed out that she had not heard from the trumpeter for two months, and from that she gathered that he had not thought of her very much.

  This was an objection he had carefully prepared for. He sighed wearily and told the young woman she could have no idea of the terrible two months he had just spent. Ruzena asked him what had happened, but the trumpeter didn't want to go into the details. He merely replied that he had been the victim of great ingratitude and had suddenly found himself all alone in the world, without friends, without anyone.

  He was a little afraid that Ruzena would start questioning him in detail about his worries, with the risk of his becoming entangled in lies. H
is fears were excessive. Ruzena was of course very interested to learn that the trumpeter had gone through a difficult time, and she readily accepted this excuse for his two-month silence. But she was completely indifferent to the exact nature of his troubles. About those sad months he had just lived through, only the sadness interested her.

  "I thought a lot about you, and it would have made me so happy to help you."

  "I was so disgusted I was even afraid to see people. Sad company is bad company."

  "I was sad too."

  "I know," he said, caressing her hand.

  "I've known for quite a while that I'm carrying your child. And you gave no sign of life. But I'd have kept the child even if you never wanted to see me again. I told myself that even if I'm left all alone, I'll at least

  have your child. I'd never get rid of it. No, never…"

  Klima was speechless; mute terror took hold of his mind.

  Fortunately for him the waiter, who was casual about serving the customers, now stopped at their table for their order.

  "A brandy," said the trumpeter, and immediately corrected himself: "Two brandies."

  There was another pause, and Ruzena repeated in an undertone: "No, not for anything in the world would I ever get rid of it."

  "Don't say that," Klima replied, regaining his wits. "You're not the only one involved. A child is not only the woman's business. It's the couple's business. Both of them have to agree, or else things could end very badly."

  When he finished he realized he had just indirectly admitted that he was the child's father. From now on any conversation with Ruzena would be based on that admission. He was well aware that he was acting according to plan and that this concession was part of it, yet he was terrified of his own words.

  The waiter brought them the two brandies: "Are you really Mister Klima, the trumpet player?"

  "Yes," said Klima.

  "The girls in the kitchen recognized you. That's really you on the poster?"

  "Yes," said Klima.

  "It seems you're the idol of all the women between twelve and seventy!" said the waiter, adding for

  Ruzena's benefit: "All the women are so envious they want to scratch your eyes out!" As he left he turned around several times to smile at them with impertinent familiarity.

  "No, I'll never agree to get rid of it," Ruzena repeated. "And you too, someday, you'll be happy to have it. Because, you understand, I'm not asking you for anything at all. I hope you don't imagine I want something from you. You can absolutely set your mind at rest. This concerns only me, and if you wish, you don't have to deal with any of it."

  Nothing makes a man more anxious than such reassurances. Klima suddenly felt that he had no strength left to salvage anything at all and that he had better give up the game. He was silent and Ruzena was silent too, and the words she had just spoken became so rooted in the silence that the trumpeter felt more and more miserable and helpless in their presence.

  But the image of his wife suddenly came to mind. He realized that he must not give up. He moved his hand on the marble tabletop until it touched Ruzena's fingers. He gripped them and said: "Forget about the child for a minute. The child is not at all the most important thing. Do you think we don't have anything to say to each other about the two of us? Do you think I came to see you only because of the child?"

  Ruzena shrugged.

  "The most important thing is that I feel sad without you. We saw each other only for a brief moment. And yet there wasn't a single day that I didn't think of you."

  He paused, and Ruzena remarked: "I never heard from you for two months, and I wrote to you twice."

  "Don't hold it against me," said the trumpeter. "It was on purpose that you didn't hear from me. I didn't want to be in touch with you. I was afraid of what was happening inside me. I was resisting love. I wished to write you a long letter, I actually filled pages and pages, but I finally threw them all away. I was never so in love before, and it scared me. And why not admit it? I also wanted to make sure that my feelings were something other than a passing enchantment. I told myself: If I go on being like this for another month, what I'm feeling for her isn't an illusion, it's a reality."

  Ruzena said softly: "And what do you think now? Is it only an illusion?"

  When Ruzena said this, the trumpeter realized that his plan was beginning to work. So he kept holding her hand and went on talking, the words coming more and more easily to him: Now that he was here looking at her, he said, he realized it wouldn't be necessary to submit his feelings to any more tests because everything was clear. And he didn't wish to speak of the child because most important to him was not the child but Ruzena. The significance of the child she was carrying was precisely that of having called him, Klima, to Ruzena's side. Yes, the child she was carrying inside her had called him here to this small spa and made him see how much he loved Ruzena, and that was why (he raised his glass of brandy) they were going to drink to the child's health.

  Of course he was instantly frightened by the appalling toast to which his verbal exhilaration had brought him. But the words had been uttered. Ruzena raised her glass and whispered: "Yes, to our child," and downed her brandy in one gulp.

  The trumpeter quickly did his best to make her forget this inept toast by changing the subject, asserting yet again that he had been thinking of Ruzena every hour of every day.

  She said that in the capital the trumpeter was surely surrounded by women more interesting than she.

  He responded that he was fed up with their refinement and pretentiousness. He preferred Ruzena to all other women, regretting only that he lived so far from her. Didn't she want to come to work in the capital?

  She replied that she would like to live in the capital. But it was not easy to find a job there.

  He smiled condescendingly and said that he had many connections in the hospitals there and could with no difficulty get her a job.

  He talked to her this way for a long time, continuing to hold her hand, and thus didn't notice when a girl approached them. Unafraid of intruding, she said enthusiastically: "You're Mister Klima! I recognized you right away! I just want your autograph!''

  Klima blushed. He was holding Ruzena's hand and had made a declaration of love to her in a public place in front of everyone present. He thought that it was as if he were in an ancient arena and that the whole world had been transformed into amused spectators observ-

  ing with malicious laughter his struggle for life.

  The girl handed him a piece of paper, and Klima wanted to sign it as quickly as possible, but he had no pen and neither did she.

  "Do you have a pen?" he asked Ruzena, whispering because he feared the girl would notice his use of the familiar pronoun. But he instantly realized that the familiar was far less intimate than his hand in Ruzena's, and he repeated his question more loudly: "Do you have a pen?"

  Ruzena shook her head, and the girl went back to her table, where several boys and girls instantly took advantage of the opportunity and with the girl rushed over to Klima. They handed him a pen and from a notepad tore sheets of paper for him to sign.

  From the standpoint of the plan, this was all to the good. Ruzena would be all the more easily convinced that he loved her if there were numerous witnesses to their intimacy. But however rational he was, anxiety's irrationality threw the trumpeter into a panic. The idea came to him that Ruzena was conniving with all these people. In a confused vision he imagined them all testifying against him in a paternity case: "Yes, we saw them, they were sitting facing each other like lovers, he was caressing her hand and gazing lovingly into her eyes…

  The anxiety was further aggravated by the trumpeter's vanity; he actually considered Ruzena not beautiful enough for him to hold her hand in public. That was a bit unjust to Ruzena. She was much prettier than

  she seemed to him at this moment. Just as love makes the beloved woman more beautiful, anxiety inspired by a woman one fears brings her smallest flaws into disproportionate relief…
>
  "I don't like this place," said Klima when they were finally alone again. "Do you want to go for a drive?"

  She was eager to see his car, and she agreed. Klima paid the check, and they left the brasserie. Opposite them was a broad, yellow sand path. Some ten men were lined up there, facing the brasserie. For the most part they were old men, wearing red armbands on the sleeves of their wrinkled jackets and holding long poles in their hands.

  Klima was dumbfounded: "What is that?"

  Ruzena responded: "It's nothing, show me your car," and she quickly started to drag him away.

  But Klima was unable to take his eyes off the men. He could not fathom the purpose of the long poles with wire loops at the ends. The men were like lamplighters, like fishermen in search of flying fish, like militiamen with a secret weapon.

  While he was scrutinizing them, he thought one of them was smiling at him. He was afraid, even afraid for himself, thinking that he was beginning to hallucinate and seeing everyone as following and watching him. He let Ruzena drag him away to the parking lot.

  9

  "I'd like to go somewhere far away with you," he said. He had his right arm around Ruzena's shoulders and his left hand on the steering wheel. "Somewhere south. Where you drive for hours on a corniche along the sea. Have you been to Italy?"

  "No."

  "Well then, promise you'll come with me."

  "Aren't you overdoing it a bit?"

  Ruzena had said it only out of modesty, but the trumpeter was instantly on guard, as if that "overdoing it" applied to all of his demagogy, which she had suddenly seen through. But he could no longer back out: "Yes, I'm overdoing it. I always have crazy ideas. That's how I am. But unlike other people, I carry out my crazy ideas. Believe me, nothing is more beautiful than to carry out crazy ideas. I'd like my whole life to be one single crazy idea. I'd like us not to go back to the spa, I'd like us to go on driving nonstop until we get to the sea. Down there I'd find a job in a band, and we'd go along the coast from one resort to another."