The Story of My Wife

by Milan Fust

  "You'll be the death of me yet," she said to me, quite annoyed. But then she came up with this solution, telling her milliner that she'd like to use her room now and then for a little chat. Of course we were terribly well-behaved while there; the lady was sawing hats in the next room.

  But on this particular day she had to leave, which may have been a mistake. She stuck her head in through the door and said:

  "I am going to the green grocer."

  So we stayed alone in a flat that smelled of green apples.

  Miss Borton was a little taken aback; we were never alone before.

  I began stroking her hair.

  "Don't be afraid of me," I said, and looked into her eyes. Whereupon she broke into tears.

  "Oh, you do really love me then," she said, flaring up with passion.

  I then told her what my plans were, or rather, all I said was:

  "Will you be good?" And miraculously enough, she knew right away what I was hinting at.

  "You want to marry me then? But how can that be? You'll never do it, you are like me. You could never banish her from your heart."

  I looked at her in amazement. There was something about this girl, something so unusual, it baffles me still. On the one hand she was immature, child-like almost, but sometimes, out of the blue, in a deep sleep, as it were, she said something which made you sit up and take notice. She had a way—I don't know—of stumbling upon your most secret feelings. Could it be that she knew me better than I thought, better than I knew myself?

  "That would be a shame, wouldn't it," I said at first, "if it were true, I mean." Obviously, it wasn't so pleasant hearing such a thing from somebody else. But then I tried to make light of it:

  "Don't frighten me so, little girl. Is that the kind of man you think I am? A sad sack who's too scared to make a move, too scared to touch anything new. . . ?"

  And already I was getting hot under the collar.

  For if this was really so . . .

  I tried to change tack: "Look, what can I tell you about all this? Where should I begin? Should I tell you my whole life story? You ought to be smart enough to get my drift. If I told you I wouldn't want to go on living if my life stayed the same, you should know exactly what I have in mind."

  I shocked myself in a way. As soon as I said these words, it was as though somebody touched my arm and said: That's enough. I realized just then why I fell silent the other time, why I needed to defend my wife in front of Miss Borton. It seems I had not known the meaning of the word shame till then. The very idea that I should make confessions, to anyone, about my life, what it had been like before, seemed absurd, impossible . . . Tempting but impossible. No way was I going to own up. No, not to anyone, let alone to this girl.

  So I started berating her, for that's something altogether different. It makes dealing with serious matters so much simpler.

  Did she think I was a fraud and a cheat? A prattler who abused her confidence? What else would explain why she never believed me, why she kept asking me if I really loved her?

  "I am here, aren't I?" I said to her. "Or is it only words that you need? You, too, like all the rest? A man, in the flesh, is not enough? I by myself am not proof enough? Or should I start proving to you now that my feelings are genuine? Whatever I said or did up to now doesn't count? Don't you feel right now what my life is all about? Can't you see that for me being with you is better than anything else in the world?"

  The funny thing was that all this time I was suffused with such warmth, such tenderness . . . There she stood before me, her mouth moist and half open, but also determined and defiant, like a sulking child. With all her little might, it seemed, she wanted to think this through. So I took her hand and would have looked into her eyes, but she turned away.

  "Could this be true?" was all she said, but so gloomily, as if she didn't dare think on the matter any more.

  This felt even better, even more titillating. Here at long last was someone who was all mine; I could tell her anything I wished, anything at all, and she remained unflinchingly loyal. At this point I tried, like a strict uncle at a family council, to advise her against me:

  "Now the only question remaining is whether you love me," I said, half in jest. "No, no, just a minute; let's be rational about this. It won't hurt you to think it over, young lady, to look into your heart one more time. To make sure it's not a mere infatuation. For here we have a young girl who's decided to marry a sailor. Now we know all about sailors, and also about young girls' dreams. Life is hard as it is (and here I raised my voice) but with men like these . . ." And I began to list the faults of seafaring men: we were uncouth, unreliable, tyrannical—not too many women would be willing to put up with us . . .

  "I would," she said, and so eagerly, too.

  "I am not so young any more, you know," I added. The girl shook her head.

  "And I am not a rich man, let's not forget that either. You couldn't live the way you have until now. Do you have any idea what it's like to take a two-penny notebook, rule it carefully, and enter every single expense? Would you really like to live that way?"

  "Why," she whispered, "what is your income?" And at that even my heart began to beam, so sweet that word "income" was, coming from her lips. And her eyes became dewy, her brow glistened. I gently swept back her hair, and explained to her that I had no fixed income—sometimes it was more, sometimes less. In such circumstances one had to learn to economize. Did she have any idea what that meant?

  "Oh, you don't know me then," she said. "I have lots of experience. You just have to be thrifty, that's all. Suppose you have an income of six hundred a year. That's not very much, is it? But it's enough for me."

  She figured it all out, she said, and it was enough. She even began to learn to cook, in secret.

  Here I had to stop. What absolutely captivated me was the idea of her cooking for me. Which was a proposition not without its danger, as I was a man with a sensitive stomach. But that this angel should want to do it still, with her lovely, fragile hands ... It was sheer enchantment.

  I began to tell her about my mother, herself a wonderful cook, to encourage her perhaps to go ahead and learn as much as she can. Ah, those cakes of hers . . . Our mother did her baking in a huge, wood-burning oven and used a long baker's peel. What fantastic fires we saw through the curtained glass door when the oven was opened (mother usually baked at night), and how those breads purred and seethed ... as if they were having a hell of a good time in there. And how exciting it all was for us children; we got out of bed even in winter, just so we wouldn't miss any of that music. De wafels, I said to myself and smiled. Yes, de wafels, the waffles, and all the rest ... I was touched.

  Wasn't it strange, though? Decades had passed and I never thought of any of this. I realized now what power my own words have over me.

  But what is it with me? I wondered. Am I such an eloquent speaker, such a clever conjurer? Though what I spoke of did seem beautiful, to me at least. I could almost see the golden-brown loaves being removed from the fiery oven, I could almost touch them with my hand.

  Ah well ... In South America I once tasted a curious sort of berry—or was it a fruit?—that the Indians enjoyed on their feast days. Well, those things induced an intoxication a hundred times more powerful than wine. I can still remember seeing mounds of berries shimmering, and feel the whole world rising in a crescendo of motion. It was the same now. And what followed was pure enchantment—visions out of a dream.

  I told her I would work very hard again, but this time it would be worth it. Until now I was chasing after an impossible dream, but now I realized these dreams were life's own gifts to me. ... It was with such high-flown phrases that I tried to impress her, though I knew that much of it was vapid nonsense. And I realized, too, that I wasn't exactly in a rapturous state, I wasn't a lanky young man confessing his feelings to his beloved for the first time, touching her knees with his under the table and leaning close to hear her say, breathlessly: "This was a magical afternoon."


  "Oh my heaven, you can touch fire," she suddenly said, and her eyes lit up in amazement. Yes, a bit of glowing tobacco fell out of my pipe and I swept it off with my hand. Only what's so amazing about that?

  But that's enchantment for you.

  Outside it was raining quietly. I touched her hand, and felt for the first time that afternoon that this was an ineffable moment. Her hand was burning, and that made me shiver. This whole exchange, I realized, was more significant than I could ever imagine; the significance amounted to . . . well, love. Which is an extraordinary thing, after all; we all thirst for it, like dry soil for rain. It cannot be helped.

  Still, I didn't kiss her, not just then. It would be all wrong, I decided. Now she trusted me, I ought to be virtuous.

  It may have been a mistake, though. But then, who can ever be sure what another person wants? How do I know if she'll take it as a sign of cowardice or as evidence of sublime virtue? Actually, she may have wanted to be kissed now, because she was still in a daze, walking in a dream.... I asked her to bring me a glass of water, and she went to get it. But I couldn't sit still, I ran after her . . . There she stood by the sink, letting the water run, not knowing what to do next. Her hands shaking, she looked at me, her eyes wide open.

  "Marry me," she said quietly. "Please?" But as if in a dream. Then almost pleading:

  "I will be very good, you'll see." She leaned back her head on my shoulder, and her mouth was like a flower offering itself to the spring sun . . . And with that the enchantment was over. For as soon as she said these words, as if caught by a flame, she fled to the other room.

  She sat in the middle of the room, sulking. "What's the matter, why are you angry now?" I asked.

  No, no, she said, she wasn't angry.

  "Why do you say you aren't when you are?" And I tried to kiss her hand. But that's just what she wasn't going to let me do; it was definitely too late for that. I turned on the light, but that was even worse; she prefered the dark.

  "Come now, don't be cross," I said and leaned over closer.

  "Ah, let me be, for Christ's sake," she exclaimed. And went on, telling me not to torture her, she wasn't the type of person who got angry. But then she got so flustered, she almost broke into tears.

  "You don't know us Irish," she said, flushing crimson. "Just don't forget who you are dealing with; I am not one of your French chippies."

  What was that supposed to mean? The Irish never lost their temper, was that it? I tried the lighter approach:

  "Do you really hate French girls that much?" But there was no answer. "Look here, you are angry with me now because of my wife; but that's not quite fair. Besides, what have you got to do with her? I already told you that I will be divorcing her shortly."

  "Oh, stop it," she cut in, "you will never marry me and you know it." And she said this with such finality, such bitterness, I didn't quite know what to answer.

  "What must I do to make you believe me?"

  But she turned away, still angry. And no wonder: I no longer sounded that convincing, my words just didn't have the same force as before, when it was dark in the room.

  "But you mustn't be quite so impatient," I said, trying again to bring her around. "You must realize that getting a divorce is never easy, especially in a case like mine.

  Actually, I had no idea what I should be telling her.

  But then, a sudden inspiration: "There is the other party to consider. I don't even know if she is willing to divorce me. So you see, it's not as simple as all that. I have every hope that we'll be able to go through with it, but what if I can't get her to agree, if she says she won't do it, what then?"

  "Then kill her," she blurted angrily.

  I had to laugh at that, though at least it was a practical idea.

  I didn't bother to ask why she felt I should kill my wife. I was getting ideas myself.

  * * *

  One of which was that my wife may have been thinking of the same thing herself—that it wouldn't be a bad idea to get rid of me. I surmised this from the following tell-tale signs:

  She began to show a lively interest in stories of this kind, in crimes reported in the newspapers, for instance. She began to follow these conspicuously, provocatively even, now that I think of it. Some of them she even read to me. There was an interesting one just the other day. It seems there were two women, two cousins, who lived together somewhere in the Highlands, one of them still young, the other quite a bit older. The young one was getting awfully tired of her old cousin who gave her no peace. She was also in love, so she didn't waste much time and killed the old hag; and she did it cleverly, too, with nicotine. No one would have found out if she didn't give it away herself; for after the murder she stopped being so clever. . . . My wife wanted to know what I thought about the story.

  What could I say?

  "Is it so easy to kill somebody with nicotine?" she inquired.

  "How should I know? Why don't you try it?"

  At first I didn't pay much attention to the whole thing. But then, what I heard began to sound more interesting.

  "Poor woman," sighed my wife. I though she meant the older one, of course, the one who got killed. But no, she felt sorry for the young one for giving herself away. She even defended her, and proceeded to give me a little lecture about people who become unneeded, superfluous. About those insolent and aggressive powers, as she put it, who are no longer useful but who nevertheless linger on, for the sole purpose, it seems, of torturing those around them.

  "You know something?" she continued. "I not only sympathize with that woman, I think she was right for doing what she did. Whoever becomes a burden to others should learn to be modest and get out of the way. That's exactly what I will tell myself if I should find myself in that situation. If you're no longer capable of making anything of your life, at least let others live. That's precisely what I will say to myself."

  Was I one of those superfluous powers? No, she couldn't possibly mean me, I wasn't that old yet. So I even smiled at her words, and couldn't get over how forthright and incisive her train of thought was . . . No wonder she liked to read philosophy. She was at once impartial and passionately involved, as though it was her personal concern. With such conviction she spoke, such empathy . . . What an odd creature . . .

  "Fine," I said, "with yourself you can do as you please. But with others? Your are not trying to suggest, I hope, that you can always tell who is superfluous and who is not."

  "Oh please," she said with a dismissive wave, "of course you can."

  I took her word for it; she may have been right, for all I knew. I am uncertain about so many things, and have been all along. So like often before, I told myself: This is her great advantage over me, her instincts. That's what gives her such confidence; and that's why she is so original and so vigorous mentally. She is not overburdened, as I'd always been, with the clutters of an antiquated and self-absorbed world.

  I couldn't even decide which was the greater act of folly: not to take what she said personally, or to start believing, as I did the following day, that she did in fact have me in mind. Perhaps there was no way of knowing. One thing is certain, though: the more troubled your conscience, the more menacing your imagination becomes. And as a matter of fact, I was pretty guilt-ridden at that time; I thought of many of these things when I was with Miss Borton, and even afterwards, while walking home alone.

  "Superfluous power?" I'd mumble to myself on these solitary walks, and my words seemed to lighten the black pavement.

  I ought to be more modest, then. That's what my lady wants. Because I am in the way. Because I no longer count. What could be clearer than this?

  And didn't she do a fine job explaining to me what I had never understood before: that we were two people thrown together by chance, who were now mired in cloying sensuality? Ach, it turned my stomach just to think about it. . . .

  But why does she want to get rid of me? I tried arguing with myself. And why now, when she seemed perfectly happy lolli
ng about the house all day. It didn't make sense. Or maybe it did. She was in love, or would have liked to be. With whom? Somebody. Anybody. But so soon after the bitter Paris disappointment?

  Why not? When it comes to love, everyone is in a hurry, trying to get a little more, a little faster. Am I not the same way? Didn't I once threaten to turn my scalesman loose on her, if she was going to leave me? Now she was threatening me, daring me to get out of her way. Why, of course. . . .

  Now no one should misunderstand me, and imagine that I am a hotheaded fool who trembles for his life and is beset by terrifying visions. That's not the case at all, we seamen are made of sterner stuff. And while we are at it, let me say something about this grand subject: Life and Death. Let me explain how our kind of people feel about it.

  We don't easily get scared, and don't much bother about death, if only because we don't put such a high value on life. For example, this is what my dear papa said a half hour before his death:

  "I am so very tired of all this," and he put down his newspaper. But then he corrected himself: "I am tired of all of you!" And shortly thereafter he gracefully expired.

  But that's how we all are. We are not crazy about life; we are pessimists, yes, let me emphasize that (though I am not using the word pessimist the way the philosophers do, but in a simpler sense).

  "Have you ever seen a little pig?" my father once asked me. "It's a soft little thing, isn't it? People hold it in their hand, but when they want to kill it, of course it squeals. Well, that's your lot in life, son—to squeal," instructed my old man in his calmest, friendliest manner.

  Yes, that is my lot, my soul's burden. That man is not happy here I never doubted. This is not just an opinion I hold—the feeling is part of me. The whole world is a desperate joke, and to be human is an outrage. The soul man is endowed with is most cruelly abused; he is deceived, led on with untold promises. He carries within him—how is it usually said?—the momentousness of his existence, a longing for eternity. And what is his fate? Fear and flight; mortal danger from first to last. That tiny, borrowed fire is forever threatened with extinction.