Destroy, She Said
Page 2
Stein puts the letter back in the envelope and the envelope down on the table.
“How quiet it is,” Stein says. “Who'd believe our nights are such an ordeal?”
Stein leans back in his chair. They are both in the same position.
“You don't know anything?” Stein asks.
“Nothing. Only the face. And the way she sleeps.”
Stein switches on the lamp between the two chairs and looks at him.
Silence.
“She doesn't get any letters either,” Stein goes on. “But someone telephones. Usually after her siesta. She wears a wedding ring. But no one has come to see her yet.”
Silence.
Stein gets up slowly and goes out.
While Stein is gone the other man gets up, goes over to Elisabeth Alione's table, and puts his hand out toward the book, which is shut. But he draws back and doesn't turn it over.
Stein comes back with the hotel register. They go and sit down again under the lamp.
“They're never in the office at this hour,” he says. “It was easy.”
He leafs through the register, stops.
“Here she is,” Stein says.
“Alione,” Stein says very clearly. He goes on reading slowly, and more quietly. “Alione. Maiden name: Villeneuve. Born Grenoble, March 10, 1931. Occupation: none. Nationality: French. Address: 5 avenue Magenta, Grenoble. Date of arrival: July 2.”
Stein riffles through the pages and stops again.
“And here you are,” says Stein. “Right next to her. Thor. Max Thor, born Paris, June 20, 1929. Occupation: university professor. Nationality: French. Address: 4 rue Camille-Dubois, Paris. Arrived July 4.”
He shuts the register, goes out, comes back at once and sits down again beside Max Thor.
“So we know something,” he says. “We're gradually getting somewhere. We know about Grenoble. And the words: Villeneuve, Elisabeth—Villeneuve at eighteen!”
Stein seems to be listening. Someone is walking about overhead.
“They've gone up to bed,” he says. “We could take a walk outside now, if you like? There are still lights in the bedroom windows.”
Max Thor doesn't move.
“Alissa,” says Max Thor. “Alissa. I'm impatient for her to get here.”
“Come,” says Stein gently.
He gets up. They start to go. Before they reach the door Stein points to the letter on the table.
“Are we going to leave it on the table?”
“No one ever comes by here,” says Max Thor. “And there's no name on it.”
“Are you leaving it there for Alissa?”
“Oh . . . yes, perhaps for Alissa,” Max Thor says.
He points to Elisabeth Alione's table.
“She's been reading the same novel for a week,” he says. “The same shape, the same cover. She must keep starting it and forgetting what she's read and starting it all over again. Did you know?”
“Yes.”
“What kind of a book is it?”
Stein ponders.
“Would you like me to see? I can allow myself to do things you wouldn't do.”
“As you like.”
Stein goes over to Elisabeth Alione's table, opens the book at the title-page and comes back.
“It's nothing,” Stein says. “A bookrack novel. Nothing.”
“That's what I thought,” Max Thor says.
Dazzling light. It has rained during the morning. Sunday.
“My brothers were there with their wives and children,” says Alissa. “The house was full.”
Elisabeth Alione opens the book. Max Thor listens to Alissa.
“I must say it was very gay, especially in the evenings. Mother stays very young.”
Elisabeth Alione shuts the book. Her table is set for three. She looks toward the dining room door. She's in black. The bay windows are closed.
“You haven't changed your mind? We're still going there for Christmas?”
“I'd like to go for a few days, yes.”
“I wonder why you get so bored there,” says Alissa, smiling. “They're no more boring than most people . . . at least, I don't think so.”
“I feel rather awkward there. I'm not much younger than your mother.”
“I've sometimes thought I'm too young.”
Max Thor looks surprised.
“I've never thought about it. Except to realize I'll probably end up alone. But I accepted the idea of that desertion from the beginning.”
“So did I.”
They laugh.
And while Stein crosses the dining room, Elisabeth Alione gets up and smiles too, looking toward the door. A man and a little girl have just come in. Alissa looks at the man.
“Enter provincial heart-throb,” Alissa says.
“Anita,” Elisabeth Alione says.
The voice is distant, gentle, what you'd have expected. They've kissed each other and sat down.
“What sort of people are there here?”
“Invalids,” he smiles wryly. “I suddenly noticed it last Sunday. Their families come in the morning and go away again in the evening. There aren't any children.”
Alissa turns round and looks.
“Yes, I see . . . But you don't want to leave right away?”
“Did I say that?”
“Yes, in the room, when I arrived.”
“Oh, we could stay on just a few days. Or we could go tomorrow as planned.”
Silence.
“Perhaps you don't really feel like going away this year,” Alissa says after a pause. She smiles. “You've traveled such a lot already . . .”
“It's not that.”
They look at each other.
“I feel comfortable here, almost happy.”
Anita must be about fourteen.
Elisabeth Alione's husband may be younger than she is.
“Almost happy?”
“I mean at ease.”
Stein goes by again, with a brief nod to Max Thor. Alissa looks at Stein intently.
“That's a fellow called Stein. We talk sometimes.”
The first couples begin to leave the dining room. Alissa doesn't see them.
“Stein,” says Max Thor. “He's a Jew, too.”
“Stein.”
“Yes.”
Alissa looks over towards the bay windows.
“It is pleasant here. Especially with the grounds.” She listens.
“Where are the tennis courts?”
“Just outside, right next to the hotel.”
Alissa freezes.
“And then there's the forest,” she says.
Now, suddenly, she looks only at the forest.
“Yes.”
“Is it dangerous?” she asks.
“Yes. How did you know?”
“I'm looking at it,” she says. “I can see it.”
She ponders, still looking beyond the hotel grounds to the forest.
“Why is it dangerous?” she asks.
“I don't know, any more than you do. Why?”
“Because they're afraid of it,” Alissa says.
She leans back in her chair and looks at him fixedly.
“I don't feel hungry any more.”
Her voice has suddenly changed, grown faint.
“I'm so happy you're here,” he says.
She looks around. Then brings her eyes back, slowly.
“Destroy,” she says.
He smiles at her.
“Yes. Let's go upstairs before we go outside.”
“Yes.”
Elisabeth Alione is crying silently. It's not a scene. The man only banged on the table quite lightly; only he could see she's crying, and he's not looking.
“I haven't got to know anyone. Except Stein.”
“Did you say something just now about being ‘happy'?”
“No . . . I don't think so.”
“Happy in this hotel. Happy. How strange.”
“I'm rather surprised myself.”
“Why's that woman crying?” Alissa asks softly. “There, just behind me.”
“How did you know?” Max Thor cries.
No one turns round.
Alissa tries to think. Then indicates she doesn't know how she knew. Max Thor is calm again.
“That sort of thing often happens when there are visitors,” he says.
She looks at him.
“You're tired.”
He smiles.
“I'm not sleeping very well.”
She shows no surprise. Her voice grows fainter still.
“Sometimes the silence stops one sleeping—the forest, or the silence?”
“Perhaps, yes.”
“Or being in a hotel room?”
“It could be that.”
Alissa's voice is now almost inaudible. Her eyes are huge, deep blue.
“It might be an idea to stay on a few days,” she says.
She gets up. She totters slightly. Elisabeth and her husband are the only ones left in the dining room. Stein has come back.
“I'm going outside,” Alissa murmurs.
Max Thor stands up. He meets Stein in the hall. He is radiant with happiness.
“You didn't tell me Alissa was insane,” says Stein.
“I didn't know,” says Max Thor.
Outside. Day. Sunday.
Elisabeth Alione and her family approach Alissa and Max Thor and walk past them toward the porch. A man's voice:
“The doctor was very firm about it. You must get plenty of sleep.”
Elisabeth has her arm round Anita's waist. She smiles. A child's voice:
“We'll come again one last time.”
Is Alissa watching? Yes.
They are sitting in the shadow of a tree. Elisabeth walks slowly back in their direction. Alissa shuts her eyes. Elisabeth lies down on her chaise-longue. She too shuts her eyes. Her smile of farewell gradually fades, leaving her face completely expressionless.
“Is she an invalid too?” asks Alissa.
Her voice is low and flat.
“I expect so. She sleeps every afternoon.”
“All you can hear now is the birds,” Alissa wails.
She shuts her eyes.
Silence. Wind.
Elisabeth Alione opens her eyes, pulls a white rug up over her.
Silence.
“Don't worry,” Max Thor says.
“Something's happened, hasn't it?”
“I don't know.”
Here's Stein, coming out of the hotel.
“Something I can understand?”
“Yes.”
Stein doesn't stop beside them, but he looks at them as he goes by. They both lie there with their eyes shut. Both are pale. Stein walks with long hesitant strides toward the far side of the grounds.
“There's something in this hotel that troubles and intrigues me. I can't quite make out what it is. I don't really try. Others might say it had to do with old desires, the dreams one has as a child . . .”
Alissa doesn't move.
“Write it down, perhaps,” says Max Thor. “Because here it's as if I understood how one might . . .” He smiles, his eyes still shut. “Every night since I've been here I've been on the point of beginning . . . I don't write, I never shall . . . and every night what I'd write if I did write changes.”
“So it's at night it happens.”
“Yes.”
Silence. His eyes are closed.
“You look happy,” she says.
Silence.
“I was talking to you.”
“Yes. I don't understand. I don't understand yet,” she says.
He doesn't answer.
Stein is coming back.
Max Thor doesn't see him.
Stein is walking toward them.
“Here comes Stein,” says Alissa.
“Let him,” cries Max Thor. He calls out: “Here we are, Stein—over here.”
“He's coming.”
Stein is here.
“I came too soon,” Alissa cries.
Stein doesn't answer. He looks round the garden, at the people sleeping. No one has moved since he went by before. Stein stands by Alissa gazing down at her.
“I don't understand, I don't understand yet,” she cries to him.
He still stands looking down at her.
“Alissa,” he says, “he was waiting for you, he was counting the days.”
“That's what I mean,” Alissa cries.
Stein doesn't answer. Since he came up to them Max Thor seems to have sunk into deep repose.
“Perhaps we love each other too much?” asks Alissa. “Perhaps the love between us is too great, between him and me, too strong, much, much too strong?”
She goes on, her voice still raised. “Perhaps between him and me, just between him and me, there's too much love?”
Stein doesn't answer.
She stops. Looks at Stein.
“I'll never cry out like that again,” Alissa says.
She smiles at him. Her eyes are huge and deep blue.
“Stein,” she says softly.
“Yes.”
“Stein, he was there without me, at night, in his room. Everything had begun to exist again without me, even the night.”
“No,” says Max Thor, “the night could never exist without you now.”
“But I wasn't there,” Alissa cries faintly, “either in the room or outside.”
Silence. Sudden silence.
“You were in the grounds,” says Stein. “You were in the grounds already.”
She points to Max, who still has his eyes shut.
“Perhaps he doesn't know,” she says to Stein. “Doesn't know what has happened to him?”
“He doesn't,” says Stein.
“Meeting you wasn't indispensable any more,” says Max Thor to Alissa.
He opens his eyes and looks at them. They don't look at him.
“That's what I know,” he says.
“There's no point in suffering, Alissa,” says Stein. “No point.”
Stein sits down on the path, looks at Alissa's body, forgets. A little way away, Elisabeth Alione has turned over towards the porch of the hotel and fallen asleep again.
Silence. Silence about Alissa.
“Stein,” asks Alissa, “do you sleep out here in the grounds?”
“Yes. All over the place.”
Max Thor puts out his hand and takes the icy hand of Alissa, his wife, shattered into a blue stare.
“Don't suffer any more, Alissa,” Stein says.
Stein comes nearer, rests his head on Alissa's bare knees. He strokes, then kisses them.
“I want you so much,” Max Thor says.
“He wants you so much,” Stein says. “He loves you so much.”
Dusk. Grey.
It's still light enough for tennis. The balls thud through the grey dusk.
It's still light near the bay windows, too, though farther inside the dining room the lamps are on.
The windows are open. The hot spell is lasting. Elisabeth Alione gets up and goes over to the windows. She looks first at the tennis courts, then at the grounds.
“If we hadn't yet met,” says Alissa to Max Thor, “we wouldn't have said a word. I'd be sitting at this table. You'd be sitting at another—alone, like me.” She stops. “Stein wouldn't be there, would he? Not yet?”
“Not yet. Stein comes later.”
Alissa looks fixedly at the part of the dining room that's already dark. She points toward it.
“There,” she says. “You'd be there. You there. I here. We'd be separated. Separated by the tables, the bedroom walls.” She opens her clenched fists and says in a faint cry: “Still separated.”
Silence.
“There'd be our first words,” Max Thor says.
“No,” Alissa cries.
“Our first glances,” M
ax Thor says.
“Perhaps. No, no.”
Silence. Her hands are back on the table.
“I'm trying to understand,” she says.
Silence. Elisabeth Alione is leaning out of one of the windows, her body outlined against the square of grey air beneath the open window.
“What would it be like?” asks Max Thor.
She tries to think.
“A grey dusk,” she says at last. She points to it. “I'd be watching the tennis matches and you'd come up to me. I wouldn't hear anything. And suddenly you'd be there. You'd watch too.”
She hasn't made any actual reference to Elisabeth Alione, who is watching now.
Silence fills the hotel. Has the tennis playing stopped?
“You're trying to understand, too,” she says.
“Yes. Perhaps there'd be a letter?”
“Yes, perhaps.”
“I'd have been watching you for ten days,” says Max Thor.
“Yes. Just left lying about, without any address. I'd find it.”
No, there goes the tennis again. The balls ping in a liquid dusk, a grey lake. Elisabeth Alione pulls up a chair and quietly sits down. The game is a lively one.
“But it has happened, hasn't it?”
He hesitates.
“Perhaps,” he says.
“Yes. Perhaps it's not certain.”
She smiles, leaning toward him.
“Maybe we ought to separate every summer,” she says. “Forget one another, if that were possible?”
“It's possible.” He calls out to her: “Alissa, Alissa.”
She is deaf. She suddenly speaks, slowly, clearly.
“It's only when you're there that I can forget you,” she says. “How's the book getting on? Are you thinking about it?”
“No, I'm talking to you.”
She is silent.
“Who's the book about?”
“Max Thor.”
“What does he do?”
“Nothing. Someone is watching.”
She turns toward Elisabeth Alione, who is sitting up straight, in profile, looking at the tennis matches.
“A woman, for example?” asks Alissa.
“Yes. Perhaps. You, if I don't know you, or that woman watching.”
“Watching what?”
“The games of tennis, I think.”
It's as if Alissa didn't register the allusion to Elisabeth Alione.
“People are always looking at the tennis courts. Even when they're empty, even when it's raining. They do it mechanically.”
“In the book I haven't written there was only you,” Alissa says.