by Milan Fust
What's more, it seemed like an innocuous, neutral kind of laugh, neither sarcastic nor supercilious, God only knows exactly what kind—soulless perhaps. But this, too, felt so good; for the first time in my life I had a real rest. And let's add one more thing: I traveled without luggage. The first time I saw anything like this was in Sweden. I met up with an American millionaire who—and this is God's honest truth—arrived there hatless with only an attache case in his hand. I couldn't get over it, and decided then and there that if I ever became rich I'd do what he did. Just think, how very comfortable it is to step off the train like that, not having to worry about anything. If I am cold, or if I need something, I just buy it as I go along. And when I have no more use for it, I simply leave it in the hotel—let the chambermaids rejoice.
Let me add just one more thought: happiness is the highest expression of self-love, its greatest fulfillment, yet it can't be conceived of without obliviousness, without abandon. Actually, this is one of the reasons why I quoted at such length from Gregory Sanders's letter just before—because he, too, comments on this, on what it means to let go, to be free of ourselves. Well, that is exactly how I lived then. It was almost as if I wasn't on this earth any more. I was truly happy.
Only once in a great while did dreams, born of selfishness, appear before my eyes, and even then, quite faintly, hesitantly, in the following form, for instance:
I roam the French countryside until I spot a young maiden . . . Ah, how clever an invention it is in the ancient Jacob story to have him catch sight of that girl quite suddenly, near a well, and learn that they are distantly related. That's what I would need, I say to myself, someone who would not need any explanation about myself, who would know all there was to know. She'd know me, God only knows how or from where, from which secret recess of forgotten time.
There was this sign in the café window—I still remember the two names: Los Vivienos and Carricada, Spanish musical clowns, and underneath it in big letters: DODOFÉ. But all of that was long gone, the café was empty, only a few glass lamps flickered inside— it's true it was almost three o'clock in the morning, yet very much nighttime, totally dark, and stormy, too.
Actually it was a beautiful winter storm, the kind in which oversized snowflakes swirl hypnotically about, like so many cherubs, in the great blackness.
All the murdered children, I thought . . . Who the hell knows what was going through my mind?
I had just gotten off the train and thought I'd sit out the night in this café. I have always liked such places with their papier-mache roses on the wall and the mirror. A nice fire was still crackling in the stove, so I sat down nearby. Behind me there was a wall-hanging, also made of paper, with painted swans swimming in some lake.
It was quiet in the place, quiet all around, with only a single waiter on duty, and even he was pretty sleepy, though after a while he perked up. When I ordered a bottle of champagne and some brandy to go with it, that's when.
But the room itself seemed to stir in response to my voice, I somehow sensed attentiveness in the air. Actually, it started earlier. From the beginning I had the distinct impression somebody was standing behind that wall-hanging, possible more than one person, and they were all listening. And—what do you know—I was right.
I took a closer look and saw there was a little hole near the edge of that drapery, and in that hole I could discern the gleam of a human eye.
Well, well, I thought to myself, something's going to happen here, after all. There is no denying that until now I'd been crisscrossing France, this wicked land, as though it were some garden paradise. And I couldn't be more light-hearted and carefree doing it. In spite of the stories one kept hearing. A foreign professor disappeared without a trace. (So what? He probably didn't weigh two hundred-fifty pounds.) An Egyptian lady was slain on the train. (Poor dear; what a cheerless death.) ... I could go on.
This time, though, I was a bit startled. To see that eye in the hole was rather disconcerting. And I happened to have quite a lot of money in my pocket.
So, the next few minutes were sheer agony, as if the passing seconds were moving across my taut nerves in the manner of tightrope-walkers. But then all that passed, dissolved into something amazing.
A young man emerged from someplace, an incredibly young man, all dressed up in silks. He was so white, his tunic so sheer and sleek, I hardly dared to look . . . This man was Dodofé.
A regular little chap otherwise, with modest sidewhiskers and bright rosy cheeks. All in all, a modest chap, truly—he very politely nodded towards me, even bowed when he saw the champagne. Then he stretched, walked around for a bit, looked outside at the snowfall, acting like a man who had been sleeping in some corner and just awakened. Finally, he asked where Lizzy was— asked the waiter, that is, not me.
"Lizzy," he cried cheerfully.
At that point I put down my glass.
It all seemed like a vision. A man wrapped in silk, the paper flowers and all . . . and that weird storm outside . . .
Is this where she ended up? I asked myself. Is it possible??
Yet, how can I ever describe the effect a single word can have on the human heart. Lizzy, he said.
Once, long ago, I also said Lizzy. It wasn't even that long ago; it seems like yesterday. In all that time, though, the name never once passed my lips.
Must be a rare name. I never once heard it since then.
Oh God, did she end up in this place?
I never would have believed it . . . though I could imagine her doing plenty of strange things. But the mere thought that this is why she went to Spain, to do this, and that same road should lead her back here . . .
Then again, that's what she wanted to be: an actress . . . always.
At any rate, I had this absurd feeling that she was right here with me in this room. It was more than a feeling, it was certain knowledge. I was caught up in a mad whirlgig by now . . . She was there, I would have staked my life on it. And quite close, too, no more than a few paces away.
Why of course she was here, she even saw me just before, why sure . . . The one staring at me, that was her . . . that's why she's afraid to show herself.
"The bill please," I called to the waiter. But then . . . then all the blood rushed to my heart.
I'll wait for her, I suddenly decided.
Why not? What's the sense of running away? Maybe this is what's been foreordained for us: that we shall each roam the world, on our own, until one day in such and such location, in this very dive, we shall accidentally meet. But then why should I run away? Why couldn't we meet and talk for a while?
Why couldn't I just see her for an instant. . . ?
As I was saying, I couldn't adequately describe the pressure I felt in my heart. Nor the terrible and melancholy longing, which then found all sorts of expression, revolting expression, too, let's be totally honest about it.
An early morning fling was what I was really after, and with the person I had once loved so much. It was an intriguing and utterly shameless feeling. But you see, it was lightness I wanted, pleasure without consequences, without soul; I wanted to pretend I had never seen her before. And that is why my heart was racing so . . .
But then it passed. This Lizzy person turned up; it seems she had been sleeping, too—another sleepyhead. She was a heavy, sluggish, disheveled-looking woman with matted hair. Presently, she threw a black robe over her husband's shoulder—these folks from the south must shiver in this snowy weather . . . And by then, what I took to be a vision melted away.
But I remained seated for a while longer; I was tired.
Just then soldier boys streamed into the café, soldiers on morning duty. Not even young officers but ordinary conscripts. And what seemed amazing was that they overran the place, like mice, in a matter of minutes. I had no idea where they were coming from.
By then I was really getting ready to leave. In a wink of an eye, in a flash, I decided so much ... I will relate only the essentials.
I must
never ever see her again; I mustn't even think of the possibility of meeting her. I had resolved this before, but now I felt stronger about it, more adamant. Or rather . . . but this is precisely what I have trouble expressing.
It's true I had made up my mind long ago not to see her again; yet the hope in me could never be extinguished that this would only be temporary, and that one day we would talk again. If not here, then in another life. I had a gentle feeling about this, a feeling that promised great calm, ultimate calm.
So when this strange plump woman entered, this other Lizzy, I got so depressed, I said to myself:
Why don't you look her up? So you travel a day to get there and another to return—half hour is all you would need.
And hence the new vow. Because this momentary weakness, this faltering, was frightful. And this is the thing I couldn't possibly explain. But why try even? My sufferings are mine alone; whatever I learn from them are lessons only for me. The justice inherent in suffering can be known only by he who must know, who's experienced it. I may protest again and again that I shall be stronger, but words remain words, and I've had enough of them.
Only this much I knew: neither here nor in the hereafter; never again.
Remember those morning soldier boys, I instructed myself. And only I could say what lay at the bottom of that instruction.
And thus my adventures came to an end. I forced myself to go on traveling a while longer, but the old thrill was gone. Before long I returned to Paris for good.
Let me backtrack a little now, for I just realized I had completely forgotten about something. While still in London it occurred to me that as long as I was there I might as well have another look at the place where my life took such a radical turn—the house where they had that ball. Let's just see how it looks in broad daylight, I said. And who knows: under some pretext or other I might even be able to make my way into the salon. Well, it worked. I found Madame Poulence in the telephone book—the address was still the same . . .
Only thing was I got there too early. I have this habit, you see, of getting up at the crack of dawn and as a result I misjudge things— eight or nine o'clock for me is not nearly as early as it is for many other people. But I realized of course that it's bad manners to ring somebody's bell at that early hour.
But no matter . . . Let me just retrace my steps. I had other plans that morning, actually; I wanted to see other things as well. As long as I came this far, I decided, why not follow the same route—the one I took going home after the ball?
And this, too, turned out better than I expected. The sun began to shine gloriously, and I, too, was urged on by some fortuitous instinct. Of course at times like these one is also guided by certain associations and inferences, like where did I walk past a theatre, where exactly did a sidestreet join a thoroughfare, on which side did I spot the dome of St. Paul's, and so on. It so happened I remembered all the details—remembered them so precisely, in fact, so sharply, I was quite surprised myself. For apart from minor slip-ups, I found everything I was looking for: the pillared gateway where I tore off my beard, that tiny street where I slipped and almost broke my foot—except the square where ill fate had me confront that cabdriver, that I couldn't find, not for the life of me. It seems to have vanished, or been swallowed up by this huge city. Or was the square built up? Is it possible? I tried in vain to explain to people that there was a church somewhere nearby—I clearly remembered the flickering lights in the windows, and faint organ music floating through the mist (at the time I was even surprised at that: a mass with music at this hour? or was somebody practicing?). At any rate, I was walking up and down now for hours, the midday bells had already been rung, but nothing. The square seemed to have disappeared off the face of the earth.
I felt badly about this. And although it wasn't feelings of melancholy or grief or anything like that made me come here, I did in the course of time develop a kind of attachment to that old man. Not only did I feel sorry for him, his sad fate rather interested me—the odd happenstance, for example, that brought us together.. . . Why did he have to die? My rage at that time sprang from quite a different source, yet I went ahead and broke his neck—wasn't that a monstrous deed? To make him the victim and myself the instrument of that rage?
In spite of all that, however, I was neither agitated nor sad, really; I contemplated these scenes of past turmoil rather indifferently. Though not when finally the door opened before me, and I walked through the same Gothic archway once again. By then my stomach had risen all the way to my heart.
For this was different, you see. It was the place where my life had suddenly turned around . . . For ever since then—let's come out with it finally—I am not really alive any more . . . Oh, I go through the motions, I eat, I run around, still I am not at all convinced I am alive. Could anybody be that fatally important to a serious and mature person? Least of all a two-legged caterwauler in a skirt. . . ? These are the sort of questions I used to amuse myself with. For needless to say, I refused to believe it could actually be so, except when I walked through that pseudo-Gothic entranceway.
Though the extraordinary impact of that moment could also have another explanation. Some of our memories we put to rest. We do not recall them, we never wish to evoke them, they seem to run their own course in the heart. The yesterday of such memories is not the real yesterday but the last time we contemplated them. I myself have never thought about this house; the cabdriver was often on my mind, but never the house. The fateful, tragic events of my life I keep quiet about. Their memories reside within me, lodged there like a bullet, sentenced to utter silence.
You were sitting right here in this garden, I said to myself. And it did seem like yesterday that I was here; that garden seemed so close. I was only going home to change or something . . .
I hadn't bothered to go back to the ballroom downstairs, I just didn't have the strength. When I came down from the studio I said to myself: Enough.
Actually, there was nothing special about that studio—it was an informal acting school, that is all, a preparatory course for film-acting, something like that—big cities are full of them. As I later learned, Mme. Poulence set it up for her older sister who was sick or something. A retired ballerina she was, that's it . . . She not only gave dancing lessons but taught you how to move gracefully, and oh yes, how to court, how to love . . .
There were expensive cars parked in front of the house, young men in top hats darted to and fro in the hallway . . . From under their half-closed lids their eyes glistened coldly, like water. These privileged gentlemen are so cool, they never let you know they noticed you.
Oh, I know how magical, how delicious it could be to neck with some Persephone in a darkened studio, while a play is in progress, with the young lady herself still panting, still affected by those classical passions. Idle gentlemen in every age are given to such diversions. But to think that the one I once loved could come here, could find pleasure in this . . .
This was merely one side of the coin, though; the other side was this:
At times like these the notion of near and far plays tricks on your nerves. For all this seemed to have happened only yesterday, yet where was that yesterday. . . ? In the unreachable distance, as far removed as the dead. Impenetrable fog, cries, gestures, confusion separated us . . . And what lay behind all that were clearly those sleepless nights when I endlessly tossed and turned in bed, or those afternoons, when I walked down the agave-lined promenade with the already mentioned young lady, whose tress was as beautiful as her demeanor, and tipped my hat to the gentlemen passing by in their light runabouts. How very strange human life can be! How fleeting, how insubstantial. Perhaps it's best expressed by a mere sigh. Who would ever believe, for instance, that I even wore a beard in South America? That I kept lovers there— this or that mysterious Italian or other foreign lady? It's these things that are truly far away.
And still, although so much had come between us, so much time, she herself lived in me unchanged. Wrapped in
a kind of enchanted, crystallized silence, she remained next to my heart, in another room as it were, which you just had to enter and there she was, immersed in silence, reading one of her odd books. That this was really so I only now realized; all these years I was unaware of it, or what is perhaps more likely: unwilling to recall it. But now how I would have loved to walk into the Brighton, sit at my usual corner table, lean against the wall, and from there go home and spread out my notes and lists under the table lamp's warm glow.
This, then, is the reason I had to relate the events of that day.
For her nearness that afternoon was portentous. In this town, I realized, I was in her hands. Hadn't she once snatched me from death's clutches? Of course she did. The same image kept going through my mind—something I hadn't thought of in all this time: I am sick and pretending to be asleep . . . yes, pretending because I want her to get some rest, too. But just the same, she leans over and looks at me—her face is all flushed, her eyes filled with anxiety.
In other words she still loved me—that is what I wanted to prove to myself of course, and as ardently as I could. At this point I had to stop on the street. I was overcome with bliss, a sweet, sweet feeling; a radiance seemed to envelop my heart.
All because of that momentary hope that she did love me after all.
But wasn't this terrible! That the mere thought could still cheer me up?
Oh the little chatterbox ... I kept muttering, trying to brush it all away.
To no avail, for as I said, I would have given anything to be able to go home as in the old days. That is where I wanted to go, nowhere else. Back to those despised rooftops, where at dawn white pigeons take to the sky.
And now that early morning encounter with a strange Lizzy in a wretched café . . . But that's when I realized I had to lock the door to that other room ... for good.
I can hardly remember the color of her eyes, try as hard as I might. I said blue before but that may not be so. They were jade-colored, I believe, which grew deeper and darkened into blue as her emotions grew more intense, or as the weather turned gloomy.
