Quiet Days in Clichy (10 page)

“I tell you,” she blurted out, “had it been any other man but you I would have stopped talking English long ago. It tires me to talk English. But now I don't feel tired at all. I think it is beautiful to talk English to someone who understands you. Sometimes I go with a man and he never talks to me at all. He doesn't want to know
me, Mara
. He doesn't care about anything except my body. What can I give a man like that? Feel me, how hot I am . . . I'm burning up.”

In the cab, going towards the Avenue Wagram, she seemed to lose her bearings. “Where are you taking me?” she demanded, as if we were already in some unknown and outlandish section of the city. “Why, we're just nearing the Avenue Wagram,” I said. “What's the matter with you?” She looked around bewilderedly, as though she had never heard of such a street. Then, seeing the somewhat astonished expression on my face, she drew me close and bit me on the mouth. She bit hard, like an animal. I held her tight and slipped my tongue down her throat. My hand was on her knee; I pulled her dress up and slid my hand over the hot flesh. She started to bite again, first the mouth, then the neck, then the ear. Suddenly she pulled herself out of the embrace, saying—
“Mon Dieu, attendez un peu, attendez, je vous en prie.”

We had already gone past the place I had in mind to take her. I leaned forward and told the driver to turn back. When we stepped out of the cab she seemed dazed. It was a big café, on the order of the Marignan, and there was an orchestra playing. I had to coax her to go inside.

As soon as she had ordered her food she excused herself and went downstairs to tidy up. When she came back I noticed for the first time how shabby her clothes were. I was sorry that I had forced her to come to such a brilliantly lit place. While waiting for the veal cutlet which she had ordered she got out a long file and began to manicure her nails. The varnish had worn off some of the nails, making her fingers look even uglier than they were. The soup came and she laid the nail file aside temporarily. Her comb she put beside the nail file. I buttered a slice of bread for her and, when I handed it to her, she blushed. She swallowed the soup hastily, then tackled the bread, gobbling down big chunks of it with head down, as if ashamed to be seen eating so ravenously. Suddenly she looked up and, taking my hand impulsively, she said in a low, confiding voice: “Listen, Mara never forgets. The way you talked to me tonight—I'll never forget that. It was better than if you had given me a thousand francs. Look, we haven't spoken about this yet,
but
—if you'd like to go with me . . . I mean . . .”

“Suppose we don't talk about that now,” I said. “I don't mean that I don't
want
to go with you. But. ..”

“I understand,” she blurted impetuously. “I don't want to spoil your beautiful gesture. I understand what you mean,
but
—anytime you want to see Mara”—and she began to fumble through her bag—“I mean that you don't ever have to
give
me anything. Couldn't you call me up tomorrow? Why not let me take
you
to dinner?”

She was still searching for a piece of paper. I tore off a bit of the paper napkin; she wrote down her name and address in a large scrawling hand with the blunt stump of a pencil. It was a Polish name. The name of the street I didn't recognize. “It's in the St. Paul quarter,” she said. “Please don't come to the hotel,” she added, “I'm only living there temporarily.”

I looked at the name of the street again. I thought I knew the St. Paul quarter well. The more I looked at the name the more I was convinced that there was no such street, not in any part of Paris. However, one can't remember the name of every street. . . .

“So you're Polish, then?”

“No, I'm a Jewess. I was
born
in Poland. Anyway, that's not my real name.”

I said nothing more; the subject died as quickly as it had been born.

As the meal progressed I became aware of the attention of a man opposite us. He was an elderly Frenchman who appeared to be engrossed in his paper; every now and then however, I caught his eye as he peered over the edge of the paper to give Mara the once—over. He had a kindly face and seemed rather well-to-do. I sensed that Mara had already sized him up.

I was curious to know what she would do if I slipped away for a few moments. So, after the coffee had been ordered, I excused myself and went downstairs to the
lavabo
. When I returned I could tell by the quiet, easy way she was puffing at her cigarette that things had been arranged. The man was now thoroughly absorbed in his newspaper. There seemed to be a tacit agreement that he would wait until she had done with me.

When the waiter came by I asked what time it was. Almost one, he said. “It's late,
Mara, I must be going,” said I. She laid her hand on mine and looked up at me with a knowing smile. “You don't have to play that game with me,” she said. “I know why you left the table. Really, you're so kind, I don't know how to thank you. Please don't run away. It isn't necessary, he will wait. I told him to . . . Look, let me walk with you a little way. I want a few more words with you before we part, yes?”

We walked down the street in silence. “You're not angry with me, are you?” she asked, clutching my arm.

“No, Mara, I'm not angry. Of course not.”

“Are you in love with someone?” she asked, after a pause.

“Yes, Mara, I am.”

She was silent again. We walked on for another block or so in eloquent silence and then, as we came to an unusually dark street, she hugged my arm still tighter and whispered . . . “Come this way.” I let her steer me down the dark street. Her voice grew huskier, the words rushing out of her mouth pell-mell. I haven't the slightest recollection now of what she said, nor do
I think she herself knew when the flood broke from her lips. She talked wildly, frantically, against a fatality that was overpowering. Whoever she was, she no longer had a name. She was just a woman, bruised, badgered, broken, a creature beating its helpless wings in the dark. She wasn't addressing anyone, least of all
me
; she wasn't talking to herself either, nor to God. She was just a babbling wound that had found a voice, and in the darkness the wound seemed to open up and create a space around itself in which it could bleed without shame or humiliation. All the while she kept clutching my arm, as if to verify my presence; she pressed it with her strong fingers, as if the touch of her fingers would convey the meaning which her words no longer contained.

In the midst of this bleeding babble she suddenly stopped dead. “Put your arms around me,” she begged. “Kiss me, kiss me like you did in the cab.” We were standing near the doorway of a huge, deserted mansion. I moved her up against the wall and put my arms around her in a mad embrace. I felt her teeth brush against my ear. She
had her arms locked around my waist; she pulled me to her with all her strength. Passionately she murmured: “Mara knows how to love. Mara will do anything for you . . .
Embrassez-moi!
. . .
Plus fort, plus fort, chéri
. . .” We stood there in the doorway clutching one another, groaning, mumbling incoherent phrases. Someone was approaching with heavy, ominous steps. We pulled apart and, without a word, I shook hands with her and walked off. After I had gone a few yards, moved by the absolute silence of the street, I turned around. She was standing where I had left her. We remained motionless several minutes, straining to see through the darkness. Then impulsively I walked back to her.

“Look here, Mara,” I said, “supposing he's not there?”

“Oh, he'll be there,” she answered, in a toneless voice.

“Listen, Mara,” I said, “you'd better take this . . . just in case,” and I fished out the contents of my pocket and stuffed it in her hand. I turned and walked off rapidly, throwing a gruff “
au revoir
” over my shoulder.
That's that, I thought to myself, and hastened my steps a little. The next moment I heard someone running behind me. I turned to find her on top of me, breathless. She threw her arms around me again, mumbling some extravagant words of thanks. Suddenly I felt her body slump. She was trying to slide to her knees. I yanked her up brusquely and, holding her by the waist at arm's length, I said: “Christ Almighty, what's the matter with you—hasn't anybody ever treated you decently?” I said it almost angrily. The next moment I could have bitten my tongue out. She stood there in the dark street with her hands to her face, her head bowed, sobbing to break her heart. She was trembling from head to toe. I wanted to put my arms around her; I wanted to say something that would comfort her, but I couldn't. I was paralyzed. Suddenly, like a frightened horse, I bolted. Faster and faster I walked, her sobs still ringing in my ears. I went on and on, faster, faster, like a crazed antelope, until I came to a blaze of lights.

“She will be at the corner of such and
such a street in ten minutes; she will be wearing a red dotted Swiss dress and she will have a porcupine handbag under her arm
. . .”

Carl's words kept repeating themselves in my brain. I looked up, and there was the moon, not silvery but mercurial. It was swimming in a sea of frozen fat. Round and round and round as if it were huge, terrifying rings of blood. I stood stock still. I shuddered. And then suddenly, without warning, like a great gout of blood, a terrifying sob broke loose. I wept like a child.

A few days later I was strolling through the Jewish quarter. There was no such street as she had given me in the St. Paul district, nor anywhere in Paris. I consulted the telephone book to find that there were several hotels by the name she had given, but none of them were anywhere in the vicinity of St. Paul. I was not surprised, merely perplexed. To be honest, I had thought little about her since I had taken flight down that dark street.

I had told Carl about the affair, of course. There were two things he said, on
hearing the story, which stuck in my crop.

“I suppose you know whom she reminded you of?”

When I said no, he laughed. “Think it over,” he said, “you'll remember.”

The other remark was this, which was typical of him: “I knew that you would meet someone. I wasn't asleep when you left; I was only pretending. If I had told you what was going to happen you would have taken another direction, just to prove me wrong.”

It was a Saturday afternoon when I went over to the Jewish quarter. I had started out for the Place des Vosges, which I still regard as one of the most beautiful spots in Paris. It being a Saturday, however, the square was filled with children. The Place des Vosges is a spot to go to at night, when you are absolutely tranquil and eager to enjoy solitude. It was never meant to be a playground; it is a place of memories, a silent, healing place, in which to gather one's forces.

As I was going through the archway leading to the Faubourg St. Antoine, Carl's words came back to me. And at the same
instant I recalled whom it was Mara resembled. It was Mara-St. Louis, whom I had known as Christine. We had driven here in a carriage one evening before going to the station. She was leaving for Copenhagen and I was never to see her again. It was
her
idea to revisit the Place des Vosges. Knowing that I came here frequently on my lonely nocturnal rambles, she had thought to bequeath me the memory of a last embrace in this beautiful square where she had played as a child. Never before had she mentioned anything about this place in connection with her childhood. We had always talked about the Ile St. Louis; we had often gone to the house where she was born, and had often walked through the narrow isle at night on our way home from a gathering, always stopping for a moment in front of the old house to look up at the window where she had sat as a child.

Since there was a good hour or more to kill before train time, we had dismissed the carriage and sat at the curb near the old archway. An unusual atmosphere of gayety prevailed this particular evening;
people were singing, and children were dancing about the tables, clapping their hands, stumbling over the chairs, falling and picking themselves up good-naturedly. Christine began to sing for me—a little song which she had learned as a child. People recognized the air and joined in. Never did she look more beautiful. It was hard to believe that she would soon be on the train—and out of my life forever. We were so gay on leaving the Place that one would have thought we were going off on a honeymoon . . .

At the Rue des Rosiers, in the Jewish quarter, I stopped at the little shop near the synagogue, where they sell herrings and sour pickles. The fat, rosy-cheeked girl who usually greeted me was not there. It was she who had told me one day, when Christine and I were together, that we should get married quickly or we would regret it.

“She's married already,” I had said laughingly.

“But not to
you
!”

“Do you think we would be happy together?”

“You will never be happy unless together. You are meant for one another; you must never leave each other, no matter what happens.”

I walked about the neighborhood, thinking of this strange colloquy, and wondering what had become of Christine. Then I thought of Mara sobbing in the dark street, and for a moment I had an uncomfortable, crazy thought—that, perhaps at that very moment when I was tearing myself away from Mara, Christine was also sobbing in her sleep in some dreary hotel room. From time to time rumors had reached me that she was no longer with her husband, that she had taken to wandering from place to place, always on her own. She had never written me a line. For her it was a final separation. “Forever,” she had said. Still, as I walked about at night thinking of her, whenever I stopped before the old house on the Ile St. Louis and looked up at the window, it seemed unbelievable that she had relinquished me forever, in mind and heart. We should have taken the fat girl's advice and married, that was the sad truth. If I could only have divined where she was, I
would have taken a train and gone to her, immediately. Those sobs in the dark, they rang in my ears. How could I know that she, Christine, was not sobbing too, now, this very moment?
What time was it!
I began to think of strange cities where it was night now, or early morning: lonely, Godforsaken places, where women bereft and abandoned were shedding tears of woe. I got out my notebook and wrote down the hour, the date, the place . . . And Mara, where was she now? She too had dropped out,
forever
. Strange how some enter one's life for just a moment or two, and then are gone,
forever
. And yet there is nothing accidental about such meetings.