The Collector

by John Fowles

  She started talking about going several days before the end. She kept on saying that she would never tell a soul, and of course I had to say I believed her, but I knew even if she meant it the police or her parents would screw it out of her in the end. And she kept on about how we’d be friends and she’d help me choose pictures and introduce me to people and look after me. She was very nice to me those days; not that of course she didn’t have her reasons.

  At last the fatal day (November 10th, the 11th was her release day) came. The first thing she said when I took her in her coffee was, could we have a celebration party tonight?

  What about guests, I said, joking, not that I was feeling lighthearted, need I add.

  “Just you and me. Because … oh, well, we’ve come through, haven’t we?”

  Then she said, “And upstairs, in your dining-room?”

  To which I agreed. I had no choice.

  She gave me a list of things to buy at the posh grocer’s in Lewes, and then she asked if I’d buy sherry and a bottle of champagne and of course I said I would. I never saw her get so excited. I suppose I got excited too. Even then. What she felt, I felt.

  To make her laugh I said, evening dress, of course. And she said, “Oh, I wish I had a nice dress. And I must have some more hot water to wash my hair.”

  I said, I’ll buy you a dress. Just tell me like before the colour and so on and I’ll see what there is in Lewes.

  Funny, I’d been so careful, and there I was, going red. She gave me a smile, however.

  “I knew it was Lewes. There’s a ticket on one of the cushions. And I’d like either a black dress, or no, a biscuit, stone—oh, wait…” and she went to her paint-box and mixed colours like she did before when she wanted a scarf of a special colour when I was going to London. “This colour, and it must be simple, knee-length, not long, sleeves like this (she drew it), or no sleeves, something like this or like this.” I always liked it when she drew. She was so quick, fluttery, you felt she couldn’t wait to draw whatever it was.

  Naturally my thoughts were far from happy that day. It was just like me not to have a plan. I don’t know what I thought would happen. I don’t even know if I didn’t think I would keep the agreement, even though it was forced out of me and forced promises are no promises, as they say.

  I actually went into Brighton and there after looking at a lot I saw just the dress in a small shop; you could tell it was real class, at first they didn’t want to sell it without a fitting although it was the right size. Well, going back to where I parked the van I passed another shop, a jeweller’s, and I suddenly had the idea that she would like a present, also it might make things easier when it came to the point. There was a sapphire and diamond necklace lying on a bit of black velvet, shape of a heart I remember—I mean they’d arranged the necklace into a heart shape. I went in and it was three hundred pounds and I nearly walked right out again, but then my more generous nature triumphed. After all, I had the money. The woman in the shop put it on and it looked really pretty and expensive. It’s only small stones, she said, but all very fine water and these Victorian designs. I remembered Miranda talking one day about how she liked Victorian things, so that did it. There was trouble about the cheque, of course. The woman wouldn’t take it at first, but I got her to ring my bank and she changed her tune very quick. If I’d spoken in a la-di-da voice and said I was Lord Muck or something, I bet … still, I’ve got no time for that.

  It’s funny how one idea leads to another. While I was buying the necklace I saw some rings and that gave me the plan I could ask her to marry me and if she said no then it would mean I had to keep her. It would be a way out. I knew she wouldn’t say yes. So I bought a ring. It was quite nice; but not very expensive. Just for show.

  When I got home I washed the necklace (I didn’t like to think of it touching that other woman’s skin) and hid it so that I could get it out at the correct time. Then I made all the preparations she said: there were flowers, and I put the bottles on the side-table, and laid out everything really grand hotel, with all the usual precautions, of course. We arranged I was to go down and fetch her at seven. After I took in the parcels I wasn’t to see her, it was like it is before a wedding.

  What I decided was I would let her come up ungagged and untied just this once, I would take the risk but watch her like a knife and I would have the chloroform and CTC handy, just in case trouble blew up. Say someone knocked at the door, I could use the pad and have her bound and gagged in the kitchen in a very short time, and then open up.

  Well, at seven I had my best suit and shirt and a new tie I bought on and I went down to see her. It was raining, which was all to the good. She made me wait about ten minutes and then she came out. You could have knocked me down with a feather. For a moment I thought it wasn’t her, it looked so different. She had a lot of French scent which I gave her on and she was really made up for the first time since she was with me; she had the dress on and it really suited her, it was a creamy colour, very simple but elegant, leaving her arms and her neck bare. It wasn’t a girl’s dress at all, she looked a real woman. Her hair was done up high unlike before, very elegant. Empire, she called it. She looked just like one of those model girls you see in magazines; it really amazed me what she could look like when she wanted. I remember her eyes were different too, she’d drawn black lines round them so she looked sophisticated. Sophisticated, that’s exactly the word. Of course, she made me feel all clumsy and awkward. I had the same feeling I did when I had watched an imago emerge, and then to have to kill it. . I mean, the beauty confuses you, you don’t know what you want to do any more, what you should do.

  “Well?” she said. She turned round, showing off.

  Very nice, I said.

  “Is that all?” She gave me a look under her eyebrows. She looked a real sensation.

  Beautiful, I said. I didn’t know what to say, I wanted to look at her all the time and I couldn’t. I felt sort of frightened, too.

  I mean, we seemed further apart than ever. And I knew more and more I couldn’t let her go.

  Well, I said, shall we go up?

  “No cords, no gag?”

  It’s too late for that, I said. That’s all over.

  “I think what you’re doing today, and tomorrow, is going to be one of the best things that ever happened to you.”

  One of the saddest, I couldn’t help saying.

  “No, it’s not. It’s the beginning of a new life. And a new you.” And she reached out her hand and took mine and led me up the steps.

  It was pouring and she took one breath only before she went into the kitchen and through the dining-room into the lounge.

  “It’s nice,” she said.

  I thought you said that word meant nothing, I said.

  “Some things are nice. Can I have a glass of sherry?” I poured us one out each. Well, we stood there, she made me laugh, she kept on pretending that the room was full of people, waving at them, and telling me about them, and them about my new life, and then she put a record on the gramophone, it was soft music, and she looked beautiful. She was so changed, her eyes seemed alive, and what with the French scent she had that filled the room and the sherry and the heat from the fire, real logs, I managed to forget what I had to do later. I even said some silly jokes. Anyway she laughed.

  Well, she had a second glass and then we went through to the other room where I’d slipped my present in her place, which she saw at once.

  “For me?”

  Look and see, I said. She took off the paper and there was this dark blue leather case and she pressed the button and she just didn’t say anything. She just stared at them.

  “Are they real?” She was awed, really awed.

  Of course. They’re only little stones, but they’re high quality.

  “They’re fantastic,” she said. Then she held out the box to me. “I can’t take them. I understand, I think I understand why you’ve given them to me, and I appr
eciate it very much, but … I can’t take them.”

  I want you to, I said.

  “But … Ferdinand, if a young man gives a girl a present like this, it can only mean one thing.”

  What, I asked.

  “Other people have nasty minds.”

  I want you to have them. Please.

  “I’ll wear them for now. I’ll pretend they’re mine.”

  They are yours, I said.

  She came round the table with the case.

  “Put them on,” she said. “If you give a girl jewellery, you must put it on yourself.”

  She stood there and watched me, right up close to me, then she turned as I picked up the stones and put them round her neck. I had a job fastening them, my hands were trembling, it was the first time I had touched her skin except her hand. She smelt so nice I could have stood like that all the evening. It was like being in one of those adverts come to life. At last she turned and there she was looking at me.

  “Are they nice?” I nodded, I couldn’t speak. I wanted to say something nice, a compliment.

  “Would you like me to kiss you on the cheek?”

  I didn’t say, but she put her hand on my shoulder and lifted up a bit and kissed my cheek. It must have seemed hot, I was red enough by that time to have started a bonfire.

  Well, we had cold chicken and things; I opened the champagne and it was very nice, I was surprised. I wished I’d bought another bottle, it seemed easy to drink, not very intoxicating. Though we laughed a lot, she was really witty, talking with other people that weren’t there again and so on.

  After supper we made coffee together in the kitchen (I kept a sharp eye open, of course) and took it through to the lounge and she put on jazz records I’d bought her. We actually sat on the sofa together.

  Then we played charades; she acted things, syllables of words, and I had to guess what they were. I wasn’t any good at it, either acting or guessing. I remember one word she did was “butterfly.” She kept on doing it again and again and I couldn’t guess. I said aeroplane and all the birds I could think of and in the end she collapsed in a chair and said I was hopeless. Then it was dancing. She tried to teach me to jive and samba, but it meant touching her, I got so confused and I never got the time right. She must have thought I was really slow.

  The next thing was she had to go away a minute. I didn’t like it, but I knew I couldn’t expect her to go downstairs. I had to let her go up and I stood on the stairs where I could see if she did any monkey business with the light (the planks weren’t up, I slipped there). The window was high, I knew she couldn’t get out without my hearing, and it was quite a drop. Anyhow she came right out, seeing me on the stairs.

  “Can’t you trust me?” She was a bit sharp.

  I said, yes, it’s not that.

  We went back into the lounge.

  “What is it, then?”

  If you escaped now, you could still say I imprisoned you. But if I take you home, I can say I released you. I know it’s silly, I said. Of course I was acting it a bit. It was a very difficult situation.

  Well, she looked at me, and then she said, “Let’s have a talk. Come and sit here beside me.”

  I went and sat.

  “What are you going to do when I’ve gone?”

  I don’t think about it, I said.

  “Will you want to go on seeing me?”

  Of course I will.

  “You’re definitely going to come and live in London? We’ll make you into someone really modern. Someone really interesting to meet.”

  You’d be ashamed of me with all your friends.

  It was all unreal. I knew she was pretending just like I was. I had a headache. It was all going wrong.

  “I’ve got lots of friends. Do you know why? Because I’m never ashamed of them. All sorts of people. You aren’t the strangest by a long way. There’s one who’s very immoral. But he’s a beautiful painter so we forgive him. And he’s not ashamed. You’ve got to be the same. Not be ashamed. I’ll help you. It’s easy if you try.”

  It seemed the moment. Anyway, I couldn’t stand it any longer.

  Please marry me, I said. I had the ring in my pocket all ready.

  There was a silence.

  Everything I’ve got is yours, I said.

  “Marriage means love,” she said.

  I don’t expect anything, I said. I don’t expect you to do anything that you don’t want. You can do what you like, study art, etcetera. I won’t ask anything, anything of you, except to be my wife in name and live in the same house with me.

  She sat staring at the carpet.

  You can have your own bedroom and lock it every night, I said.

  “But that’s horrible. It’s inhuman! We’ll never understand each other. We don’t have the same sort of heart.”

  I’ve got a heart, for all that, I said.

  “I just think of things as beautiful or not. Can’t you understand? I don’t think of good or bad. Just of beautiful or ugly. I think a lot of nice things are ugly and a lot of nasty things are beautiful.”

  You’re playing with words, I said. All she did was stare at me, then she smiled and got up and stood by the fire, really beautiful. But all withdrawn. Superior.

  I suppose you’re in love with that Piers Broughton, I said. I wanted to give her a jolt. She was really surprised, too.

  “How do you know about him?”

  I told her it was in the papers. It said you and him were unofficially engaged, I said.

  I saw right off they weren’t. She just laughed. “He’s the last person I’d marry. I’d rather marry you.”

  Then why can’t it be me?

  “Because I can’t marry a man to whom I don’t feel I belong in all ways. My mind must be his, my heart must be his, my body must be his. Just as I must feel he belongs to me.”

  I belong to you.

  “But you don’t! Belonging’s two things. One who gives and one who accepts what’s given. You don’t belong to me because I can’t accept you. I can’t give you anything back.”

  I don’t want much.

  “I know you don’t. Only the things that I have to give anyway. The way I look and speak and move. But I’m other things. I have other things to give. And I can’t give them to you, because I don’t love you.”

  I said, that changes everything then, doesn’t it. I stood up, my head was throbbing. She knew what I meant at once, I could see it in her face, but she pretended not to understand.

  “What do you mean?”

  You know what I mean, I said.

  “I’ll marry you. I’ll marry you as soon as you like.”

  Ha ha, I said.

  “Isn’t that what you wanted me to say?”

  I suppose you think I don’t know you don’t need witnesses and all, I said.

  “Well?”

  I don’t trust you half an inch, I said.

  The way she was looking at me really made me sick. As if I wasn’t human hardly. Not a sneer. Just as if I was something out of outer space. Fascinating almost.

  You think I don’t see through all the soft as soap stuff, I said.

  She just said, “Ferdinand.” Like she was appealing. Another of her tricks.

  Don’t you Ferdinand me, I said.

  “You promised. You can’t break your promise.”

  I can do what I like.

  “But I don’t know what you want of me. How can I prove I’m your friend if you never give me a chance of doing so?”

  Shut up, I said.

  Then suddenly she acted, I knew it was coming, I was ready for it, what I wasn’t ready for was the sound of a car outside. Just as it came up to the house, she reached with her foot like to warm it, but all of a sudden she kicked a burning log out of the hearth on to the carpet, at the same moment screamed and ran for the window, then seeing they were padlocked, for the door. But I got her first. I didn’t get the chloroform which was in a dra
wer, speed was the thing. She turned and scratched and clawed at me, still screaming, but I wasn’t in the mood to be gentle, I beat down her arms and got my hand over her mouth. She tore at it and bit and kicked, but I was in a panic by then. I got her round the shoulders and pulled her where the drawer was with the plastic box. She saw what it was, she tried to twist away, her head side to side, but I got the pad out and let her have it. All the time listening, of course. And watching the log, it was smouldering badly, the room was full of smoke. Well, soon as she was under good and proper, I let her go and went and put the fire out, I poured the water from a vase over it. I had to act really fast, I decided to get her down while I had time, which I did, laid her on her bed, then upstairs again to make sure the fire was really out and no one about.

  I opened the front door very casual, there was no one there, so it was O.K.

  Well, then I went down again.

  She was still out, on the bed. She looked a sight, the dress all off one shoulder. I don’t know what it was, it got me excited, it gave me ideas, seeing her lying there right out. It was like I’d showed who was really the master. The dress was right off her shoulder, I could see the top of one stocking. I don’t know what reminded me of it, I remembered an American film I saw once (or was it a magazine) about a man who took a drunk girl home and undressed her and put her to bed, nothing nasty, he just did that and no more and she woke up in his pyjamas.

  So I did that. I took off her dress and her stockings and left on certain articles, just the brassiere and the other so as not to go the whole hog. She looked a real picture lying there with only what Aunt Annie called strips of nothing on. (She said it was why more women got cancer.) Like she was wearing a bikini.

  It was my chance I had been waiting for. I got the old camera and took some photos, I would have taken more, only she started to move a bit, so I had to pack up and get out quick.

  I started the developing and printing right away. They came out very nice. Not artistic, but interesting.