Leave Your Sleep

by R. B. Russell

  A few moments later she let go of me and looked to the chair again. Once more she laughed, then pushed me away from her teasingly. With deliberation she pulled her shirt up and over her head. She wasn’t wearing a brassiere; her chest was so flat that she didn’t really need one. She walked towards me, took my head in her hands and pulled me down to her left breast; her areolas were like two-pence pieces. I kissed her and her nipple swelled and hardened. Once again she then pulled away from me, laughing loudly, and with relief.

  ‘It’s working! She’s going!’ Bernadette exclaimed. ‘She can’t stand it.’

  Bernadette came towards me once more and kissed me again, forcing her tongue inside my mouth and I was too confused to struggle. She pulled away, swung around behind me and looking over my shoulder hugged me tight, staring at the chair. She almost shouted into my ear: ‘She’s left us! The old devil has gone!’

  I was bewildered, shocked even. I stood there stupidly as Bernadette let go of me and started to dance around the room, her big skirt billowing out as she twirled and twirled in sheer ecstasy. ‘The old devil has gone!’ she said, time and time again. ‘The old devil has gone!’

  ‘I think I had better go too,’ I said, tucking my shirt back into my trousers. Bernadette gave me a grin as she twirled, and on her next revolution a childish wave of her hand. I backed out and down the stairs and she was still dancing around and around. From the front door I ran the short distance through the rain to my car and once inside I started it immediately and reversed down the drive and into the road. Before I drew away I looked back at the house; the big Modern-Movement machine for living in; the cut-price Le Corbusier. From time to time, when she approached the windows of the upstairs living room, I could see her; bare-chested, still dancing, around and around.

  The Red Rose and the Cross of Gold

  ‘I am sure that a professional gentleman such as yourself could afford to rent rooms like this as a single tenant?’ The landlord smiled at Komenský ingratiatingly. ‘We could come to an arrangement so that I wouldn’t have to find another occupant to share with you?’

  ‘No, thank you,’ Komenský shook his head. ‘I enjoy sharing. I always have done.’

  ‘But you might end up with somebody who is, shall we say, incompatible?’

  ‘I hope not…I got on well enough with the last man.’

  ‘Well, maybe that was luck.’

  ‘I’m easy-going. I get on with most people.’

  ‘So far you may have done.’

  ‘I have to move with my work, from city to city. Sometimes I stay for six months, sometimes a couple of years. I don’t have time to make friends; not proper friends. And I like to have some companionship.’

  ‘But how long are you expecting to stay here in our city? If you are only resident for perhaps another month or so, then I suppose I could wait. After you, I could put a nice young couple in these rooms.’

  ‘The city authorities have extended my contract.’

  ‘They’ve found more sewers for you to survey?’

  ‘This city is crumbling all around us; it is decaying. It has been poorly built, above and below ground. And there are more and more motor vehicles on the streets.’

  ‘This building shakes when they pass!’

  ‘By the middle of this century the streets will be infested with them, and they are getting bigger and bigger. There is the danger that all will come tumbling down.’

  The landlord poured a little more Becherovka into Komenský’s coffee, as he always tried to do. He came up once a month for his rent and the engineer had long-since stopped protesting that he didn’t want any of the landlord’s drink. The man who had previously shared the rooms had been convinced that their landlord was a dipsomaniac, but Komenský was not sure. He hoped that the bottle of Becherovka that the man carried around with him was simply a gesture of friendliness. He imagined that he offered it to all of his tenants to make the process of collecting the rent a little easier. The landlord lived in one of the two sets of rooms on the rather unsanitary ground floor, and at nine o’clock prompt on the first of every month he would begin with the old couple in the rooms opposite his own. It would often be the early afternoon before he had climbed up to the fourth floor where Komenský lived. The landlord wasn’t a confident man, and needed to think of his tenants as friends. To a certain extent Komenský understood this. He thought that the man, like himself, was perhaps a little lonely.

  ‘You’ve never found anyone special to live with?’ the landlord asked. ‘Wanted to settle down, have a family?’

  ‘No, not really. A couple of times, perhaps…But my skills are specialised, and I’ve always had to move around to find work. I’ve tried to keep up long-distance relationships…There was one woman in the north who I would go back to…I would visit every weekend, for several years, but she tired of the arrangement.’

  ‘Couldn’t you get a permanent job with the authorities?’

  ‘I specialise in sewers, vaults, crypts…I have a sense for when they are becoming dangerous and liable to fail, long before it is obvious to untrained, inexperienced eyes. I’ve saved cities untold sums by highlighting where repairs are required before collapses have occurred.’

  ‘And they pay well for your expertise?’

  ‘I cannot complain.’

  ‘Enough for you to rent these rooms on your own?’

  ‘I am careful with my money.’

  ‘Ah, very sensible. An early retirement? A good pension?’

  ‘I am just careful.’

  ‘I understand.’

  He clanked his mug of Becherovka-infused coffee with Komenský’s own, by way of suggesting a newly discovered comradeship.

  ‘So, I must find another person for the second room,’ said the landlord, resigned.

  ‘I’m afraid so. And if it can be somebody congenial, I’d appreciate that. Another professional man? Of quiet habits?’

  ‘Well, there is a gentleman who has recently asked me for a single room. He didn’t want to share, and I had only the room here to offer. I told him about it, and how he would get on well with you. But I think he is looking elsewhere first. You never know, he might come back.’

  ‘What’s he like?’

  ‘What’s anybody like? I don’t know. He seems nice enough. But he looks like Mephistopheles himself.’

  Mephistopheles himself did not move in, but his doppelgänger did: Damian von Tripps.

  ‘A very old family,’ he insisted when Komenský asked after his impressive name, ‘But very much decayed. We have a branch in Lithuania that struggles along, but I am the last of the line here.’

  ‘Any chance of additions to your part of the family tree?’ Komenský asked him. The man had only moved in a few days before but Komenský thought he understood his humour well enough to be able to ask such a question.

  ‘No, not officially. But who’s to say that there aren’t a few illegitimate von Tripps scattered around the city?’

  The man was preparing himself for an evening out, and Komenský had to admit that he was fascinated by the care and fastidiousness with which he went about getting ready. He had bathed for nearly an hour, then shaved and meticulously trimmed his arrangement of beard and moustache. The latter was slightly comical, being very wide and requiring wax to keep it horizontal and cantilevered out on either side of his face. He dressed in expensive clothes, quite brightly coloured, and Komenský was never sure whether the strong smell he left in his wake was aftershave or simply perfume. He really was quite the dandy.

  As von Tripps was about to go out of the door he turned to where Komenský sat reading under the lamp by the fireplace. Putting his weight slightly on the ebony walking cane that was usually for show rather than support he asked:

  ‘A delicate question, if I may?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘The landlord stressed that the arrangement here was for two single men to have tenancy of these rooms. I do not propose to move anyone else in with me, but I hope you
have no objection, if I should find myself in congenial company after the play tonight…?’

  He must have seen that Komenský did not quite understand his meaning.

  ‘If I was to bring a young lady back with me, I hope that you wouldn’t be…disturbed?’

  Komenský laughed and shook his head: ‘No, so long as you don’t wake me up.’

  Komenský was not convinced that von Tripps was the man’s name at all. Perhaps he really was from aristocratic stock and down on his luck, but something about him suggested that it was all an act. Komenský had not met many aristocrats, but those he had come across were not so affected as von Tripps. Presumably they were confident enough of their position in society that they did not need to prove anything. It was as if the role of dandified gentleman was being played by an over-zealous actor. However, the engineer found the man’s formality amusing, and when they were both together Komenský somehow slipped into it as well. It was like a game, and Komenský was happy to play along. He was concerned, at first, that von Tripps might be offended but, on the contrary, he seemed pleased that Komenský reacted in this way. Often, in the evenings, if von Tripps was not engaged elsewhere, they opened a bottle of wine and conversed in exceedingly formal, long-winded and over-elaborate sentences, often containing convoluted sub-clauses.

  Komenský thought of their conversations as an intellectual game, and von Tripps was obviously a very clever man, being well-read and knowledgeable on a wide range of subjects. He did not appear to have an occupation, or rather, he would not admit to one; he kept his personal and professional life very much to himself but still Komenský felt that he had the measure of the man. And then one morning he had cause to re-evaluate von Tripps.

  Komenský was awake earlier than usual, dragged from sleep, he discovered, by the sound of von Tripps and another person moving about in the apartment. When Komenský left his room he was in time to see a woman leaving by the front door and he was struck by how young, awkward and ill-dressed she was. He also noticed the old-fashioned courtesy that von Tripps used when showing her out. When they breakfasted briefly together neither man mentioned her, although Komenský was very curious; earlier that week he had seen von Tripps, from the window, leaving the building with a different woman entirely.

  However, it was the man’s own business and Komenský was not going to interfere. He did feel awkward, though, that von Tripps seemed to bring his women home long after Komenský had gone to bed, and that they always left before he got up.

  Komenský resolved that he would work the subject into conversation. He wanted to tell the man that he had no objection to him seeing women in the apartment at other hours of the day and, indeed, if he would ever like to be left alone with them Komenský was always happy to go out for a few hours. The day he had seen the second woman, however, they had little opportunity to discuss anything because Komenský had to be at the other side of the city by nine o’clock. He did not return until the early evening when von Tripps was leaving, dressed up as usual, and saying that he would not be back until late.

  It so happened that Komenský too went out that evening, to meet up with some people to celebrate the birthday of the City’s Chief Engineer. The man had just turned sixty, apparently, and he and his colleagues were drinking steadily from the early evening. By ten o’clock Komenský was tired and excused himself from the revelry. They were very scathing, drunk and belligerent, and called him a ‘dirty foreigner’.

  So, that was what they really thought of him, Komenský told himself.

  He walked home rather than take the tram, hoping to sober up, but the cold night air only made him drowsy. As he walked through the streets to his own tenement, angry and a little sad, his thoughts turned to the buildings around him and the sewers below. He thought of all the weight of crumbling brick and powdery mortar that held everything together, his eyes going up to the dark eaves of the building he was passing. Then he looked to his feet which struck the pavement with a strangely hollow sound. Back up his eyes went and suddenly the buildings around him seemed to sway and the very pavement to move. He felt nauseous and had to grasp at some railings to steady himself. For a few seconds the buildings around him had appeared to be toppling, falling inwards towards him and if he had been able to find the breath at that moment he might have screamed.

  A fainting fit, he told himself, brought about by the beer. He took several deep breaths and walked on. When he finally got back to his rooms it was as much as he could do to take off his coat and fall into an armchair. Still he could not dismiss the idea that his own tenement was moving, although he knew that it was his sense of balance that was awry.

  Komenský slept in the chair until just after midnight. When he opened his eyes he did not know where he was although the lamp still illuminated the room. However, he recognised the sound of von Tripps coming in through the front door.

  The man was surprised to see Komenský, and for the briefest moment he looked unsure of himself. His confidence returned, though, along with his bravado, as soon as he had appraised the situation.

  ‘Good evening!’ he said jovially. ‘Or should I say good morning?’

  Behind him, uncertain in the shadows, was a woman. Komenský couldn’t see her properly but he knew her to be different again from the other two he had seen. This one looked a little older.

  ‘Please forgive us,’ the man implored. ‘But I think we shall be retiring.’ And he turned around and ushered his companion into his room.

  Uncomfortable in the chair, Komenský got out of it and made himself ready for bed. When he turned-in he had to find the earplugs that he had bought when he had discovered that the last man to share the rooms snored loudly. The earplugs were good ones; the snoring that had previously reverberated through the walls would have otherwise kept Komenský awake. Now they were able to exclude the sounds of rather vigorous lovemaking from the next room.

  When Komenský got up the next morning Von Tripps’ companion of the night before had obviously already left. The man himself was in his dressing gown, drinking coffee at the table on the balcony and reading a newspaper. The morning was already warm and he had his slippered feet up on the wrought-ironwork. When Komenský had prepared his first coffee of the morning he joined him and von Tripps was the first to broach the subject.

  ‘That was Iva, last night,’ he said, looking Komenský straight in the eye without the slightest embarrassment. ‘I’ve always liked Iva.’

  ‘I had earplugs,’ Komenský replied, as coolly as he was able. ‘They were useful. They allowed your enjoyment to remain private.’

  ‘My apologies. It was very rude of me. Iva can be rather too enthusiastic. I don’t go to her very often. But you know how it is sometimes…’

  ‘No, I don’t know, not really. But that’s your affair.’

  He smiled: ‘I simply meant that one doesn’t always have the choice one would hope for. Not that she isn’t worth the money.’

  Komenský frowned and von Tripps smiled.

  ‘She’s a prostitute,’ he said by way of explanation, and took a sip of his coffee.

  ‘Oh,’ was all Komenský could manage to say. He had hoped that his reply might have conveyed a whole range of meaning, but von Tripps seemed to take it as shock. Komenský would have liked to give the impression that he was broad-minded, a man of the world, but, if he was honest, he supposed that, yes, he was shocked.

  ‘I frequently use prostitutes,’ said von Tripps lightly.

  ‘I hadn’t realised. I mean, I knew you often had company.’

  ‘My failing is that I enjoy sexual intercourse. I find it transcendent. I am investigating…’

  Komenský nodded vigorously, rather hoping they could leave the subject there, but von Tripps sensed the disapproval.

  ‘You do not wish to know. I understand.’

  ‘It is a private matter. I don’t intend to judge you.’

  ‘I assumed that you wouldn’t, but I would understand if you’d prefer me to move out, to fi
nd alternative accommodation?’

  ‘No, not at all,’ Komenský replied, a little too hastily, but honestly. Von Tripps was an odd man, but enjoyable company and despite his unorthodox behaviour he had not been any real trouble.

  ‘I was married, twice,’ von Tripps said. ‘I was very young. I loved both my wives, but I craved variety. Do you understand? I get bored easily. I’m actually rather besotted with a girl right now, but I know that if I was to ask her to marry me, and promised to shun all other women, then I’d soon enough tire of her. It is a weakness of mine, I know: a flaw in my character.’

  ‘I can see how that might happen,’ Komenský said, wishing that the conversation could be at an end.

  ‘But there is a charge of exploitation to answer,’ the man admitted. ‘Prostitutes are victims. It’s rare that prostitution is ever a woman’s first career choice. The women I go with are poor, vulnerable creatures who need protection.’

  ‘And how do you feel about that?’

  ‘Concerned, naturally. But I fancy that I’m not the same as all their other customers.’

  ‘How would you be any different?’

  He leant forward, slightly conspiratorially, and pulled his moustache out to it’s maximum length.

  ‘The girls all know me, and how generous I can be. We never discuss money, oh no. I’m never asked to pay, because when they leave they know I’ll slip into their hand twice as many notes as they would normally have asked for. And I occasionally give them valuable gifts. Very often I’ll take them to a restaurant, or get them tickets for the theatre. Some even refuse to take any money from me at all! I always make sure it’s worth their while going with me.’