Authors: Matt Cohen
Tags: #Fiction, #General, #Literary Criticism, #Canadian
“I’m going to Toronto this afternoon,” Erik said.
“Ah yes, well. The play is over. Now we all go home and darn our socks.” He turned from the window and extended his hand. His face was still evolving with his death, thinning, sliding from square to hawk-like and now to a ferret, the nose even more prominent, long and pointed, his chin beginning to recede, cheeks sunken narrow triangles.
Now Erik imagines that perhaps the poet and Mr. Zeller are somehow the same, that the poet too had this cruel pointed face, but without the formality, simply moral and clear, like the man who gives back what he has received. Looking out the girl’s window he could see that people had begun to turn their lights on. Where they hadn’t, the sun left only a dull yellow reflection, rays of yellow and red barely visible against the evening sky. There was a visual transition from day to night in the city but the sounds were the same, the traffic never seemed to vary, a continuous stream of cars and trucks with faulty mufflers and loud horns. The girl’s apartment was a big room with a cupboard converted into a bathroom. There was a sink in the room, a sink with a small counter and a door underneath to get at the plumbing. Above the sink were some shelves. All the girl’s food seemed inedible: Mexican spices, dried soups, a giant can of corn oil, canned Portuguese fish, ten pounds of sugar, ten pounds of whole wheat flour, three cans of cubed carrots. There was a box of crackers on the counter; he began to eat these, eating them and drinking water. He looked under the sink and
found a pot and a can opener. When he was finished eating, he took off his shirt and inspected his wounds in the mirror. The poet’s words had transformed them into martyr’s welts. The antiseptic had washed away with the shower and Erik could see that the skin was growing scabs, bulging half-cylinders that were healing quick and confident, despite everything. He found a hot-plate for the soup and while it was cooking the girl came in, knocking first, as if this guest required everything that was possible. She had two salmon sandwiches with her, salmon on brown bread with thin slices of cucumber. She reminded him of a picture of Mr. Zeller’s teenage daughters, of Rose Garnett when he first met her. While they ate, she cleared away the mess in the apartment, stacking objects on her shelf, putting clothes in a cardboard box. She did all this briskly, making it clear that the routine was entirely normal, the way things were meant to be. She had brought a candle with her too. She lit it, lit a stick of incense with the same match, put a record on. The overhead light shone into all the corners of the room. With everything ready she made a pot of tea and then brought out a deck of cards. According to the alarm it was now ten o’clock. “Do you want to play cards?” she asked.
“Sure,” Erik said. He was sitting cross-legged, opposite her. While she spread all the cards out on the floor he straightened his legs, rubbed his knees, wondered if she would think that he was impossibly old, already arthritic. They had told each other their names. She said that it was the first time she had lived away from home. She took special vitamins and food pills for her baby. Now she pulled some knitting out of her purse, something blue with three needles sticking out of it: it was going to be a boy.
“The idea is to get pairs,” she said. “You get to turn up two cards each time.” She poured the tea, for both of them, and passed the sugar bowl to Erik. “You have to try to remember the cards,” she said. “That’s why they call it concentration.” She beat him easily, several games in a row. While they played, she knitted. When it was eleven o’clock she yawned and put away her wool and her needles. Erik stood up and took the dishes to the sink. “You don’t have to wash them.”
“That’s okay,” Erik said. “You bought the sandwiches.” He wondered who he was saying this to. While he washed the cups and plates she went into the bathroom. She came out carrying her clothes over her arm. She was wearing a pink nightgown. She got into bed, the same side she had slept on the previous night, and curled into the pillow. It was possible that her parents had given her the nightgown for Christmas, that they didn’t know where she was.
“Don’t forget the lights,” she said.
“All right.” She closed her eyes. Erik tiptoed around the apartment, rescuing the diary from the bedspread, emptying the ashtray, planning to go back to his apartment but not wanting to leave.
“Don’t go,” the girl said. “Come and say good-night to me.” Erik went to the bed and kneeled down beside her. She put her arms around his neck, pushing the flannel up against his face, kissed him chastely on the cheek. “Don’t leave me alone tonight,” she said. “You can read and listen to my records. You like reading, don’t you?” She spoke with her face in front of Erik’s, her nose touching his.
“All right,” Erik said. “That would be nice.”
“All right,” the girl said, enlarging the tones of his voice. She was holding Erik’s hand. She slid down under the covers. Then she closed her eyes, kissed each of his fingers. His hand beside her face now seemed gigantic, overwhelming, as if she was a child that he could hurt through mere carelessness. But she already carried more life within her: his hands had created nothing at all: their greatest achievement was that they were too weak or faint-hearted to kill. Erik moved away from the bed and sat beside the girl’s shelf, beneath the crucifix. He put the diary on the shelf, found an ashtray and put it there too. Perhaps tomorrow he would make another light for the room, hang it from the ceiling over this place like an altar, somewhere he could sit and read while the girl slept. It was hot in this attic, no floors over it to keep away the heat. It was necessary to leave the windows open so all the sounds of traffic came right into the room, the sounds of traffic and of people in the street, talking and arguing in foreign languages, endlessly climbing in and
out of cars, sitting on the street playing radios and waiting for the heat to dissipate, walking up and down from house to house, street to street, waiting for something to happen, trying to justify another day gone by, have something happen to make it worth going through again. The girl’s breath rattled in her sleep. She shifted and was silent. Erik opened the diary where he had marked the place with the ribbon, let the ribbon hang free, watching the ring swing on this short pendulum:
The week after my punishment the Captain sent for me & asked me to come up to the bridge with him. From there the other ships were visible & counting them I saw that there were now only ten other than ourselves & I asked the Captain what had happened. & he said that ship had been lost in the storm; but that some of the men had been saved. The day was clear & we looked always towards the horizon in the hope of land; & the Captain said that earlier in the day one of the sailors had reported seeing certain birds which indicated we might be only three days away from Newfoundland. & there, the Captain said, we might stop; for although the island had rocky shores & was covered with forest so dense it was difficult to walk in, there it would be possible to get fresh water. All the while he talked to me in this most unusual civilized & kind way as if we were gentry & seated in his parlour. As he spoke he gripped the railing with his hands which were thick & muscular with the little finger on each hand stumped & nail-less & missing one knuckle. He was not a tall man but thick-set & strong with a paunch that hung jauntily over his wide belt. His face was no mask at all but cruel & rough-skinned, with the appearance of muscles working beneath the surface in continuous rhythms of rage. He had not yet actually used it but he always carried with him, in one of those four-and-a-half fingered hands, an oiled leather whip which he said had been bequeathed to him by his great-grandfather, along with the antique silver pistol in his belt. That man, he said, had been a pirate & a Spaniard & had bought his peerage with Aztec gold. & in his unusual & soft voice which
seemed to betray his own cruelty by its very lowness & the look of him as he spoke — the look of those men who in the name of their false religion attempted to destroy me & have killed so many others in the exercise of their power which is only death & has destroyed Europe & made it reach for the New World as a drowning man — he told me that if I liked he would tell me the story of his hands. He said that it had happened to him fifteen years ago when he was twenty-seven years of age & in charge of his first ship. He had been taking on cargo in Morocco & one night he had gone to a place to drink & have a woman. & the woman he had chosen had taken him to a room & given him some food & some drink which had loosened something in him & made the time flow as if it was a river. He had wanted the woman very much but she would not have him; so he said he would give anything for her because by this time he was so weak he was unable to take her by force. & she said that if he wanted her he must walk over to a place in the wall that she showed him & put his finger through a small hole that was there. He did as she asked & then felt a terrible pain & when he drew his hand back it was as it is. & then, he said, she made a great fuss over his wound & wiped away the blood with a white bandage & put a poultice on his wound. She commended him & agreed that he was a brave man to trust her & that she would offer herself to him gladly if he would trust her once more. & he said that she was of great beauty & that her eyes glittered & that she had a power that was unlike any other woman’s for as she spoke & gazed at him he felt himself become an instrument of her will & felt her will overcome his own so that despite himself she pulled his body up with the force of her mind & made him walk to the wall again. & he said that he was still able to speak to her but despite his words he once more trusted her for she said she would not hurt him twice. & she said that she had been with no man for many months & that he would not regret this night for she knew already that she loved him with great passion. He told her that he believed her but that she should show her
love by releasing her power over him & letting him come to her in his own way as it was meant to be. Then she laughed at him & said that in truth she cared for him not at all & that he was free to go. He felt her power leave him; & though he could not move his body towards her he could walk towards the door. Then, he said, he walked from the wall to the door & the door to the wall, back and forth several times, mapping out his exact freedom. & then she said to him again that she would offer herself to him if he would trust her & that it was not asking more of him than he had already asked of her. & he wanted to know what she felt for him; & she said that she did not know or care. He walked to the door & knew she had no power over him. He opened the door to step outside but on the other side there was nothing at all, not even air as if they were floating in the sky, nothing at all, neither light nor darkness nor emptiness nor fullness. He closed the door & came back into the room & she was still sitting where she had been, on a long curved couch that had a Persian cloth thrown over it. & he noted that the area of his freedom was as it had been & that he could not approach her. She began to sing & not in words but humming & short cries & words that were no words but nonsense. Again he felt her power overtake his will but this time it was different because there was nothing it would make him do; so he sat down on a pillow near the door. After a time he rose & opened the door again & through the door he saw nothing at all; & if he stepped out the door he would fall into an endless abyss; & he closed the door & walked towards her & this time she let him approach her & she told him to put his hand on the table which was in front of her & he did & she drew out a sharp knife & quickly cut the other finger, with a single fast stroke, & again, like the first, washed & cared for the wound. She showed him the ring that was on her hand & it was silver with a mysterious green translucent stone unlike any he had ever seen. She held the stone near to him so he could see the light of the lamp in it & he felt her power in him again & the stone was the source of the power; & it made him bend
closer & closer to it until the light had the brilliance of a sun & it shone from the stone with this deep & penetrating brightness which was absolutely round & surrounded by a halo of exquisite violet of such colour it was of a living flower; & the brilliance of the light entered not only his eyes but seemed to have filaments stretching to the severed stumps of his fingers which now throbbed & bled. She leaned forward with the ring until it was touching the floor & he followed it with his eyes & with his hands & then he was lying on the floor too with the ring in front of him & she said she had been a fool because she had thought that an Englishman would be able to resist the power of a pagan ring & that it was foolish to waste it & she drew the ring into the shadows again so it seemed only dull green & unremarkable & he felt the power of it leave him & was again passive & she told him to come & lie beside her on the couch & he did & she said that he had fulfilled his part of the bargain & that now she must fulfill hers & she took off her clothes & he saw that she was only a whore, fat & used; & she laughed & held out to him her own hands which were whole & perfect.
While the Captain spoke he looked out at the sea & had his hands grasping the rail, squeezing it the whole time & by the end of his story there were flecks of blood forced out onto the stumps of his little fingers. & he said that every time he told the story or dreamed about her the blood appeared that way though the skin was never broken & had healed without even leaving a scar. He showed me his fingers closely & I could see that the skin was all connected without line or seam as if he had been born like that — for the skin had grown about the tips of the bone & had even formed its surface in curves & whorls; so whole was the skin that it seemed these little fingers were as they were meant to be — small parodies following the hand in impotent mime. Then he drew a ring out of his pocket & he showed it to me. It was a small ring, gold, with fine engravings of snakes in its arch. He said that she had told him to take this ring to remind him of his dreams; & that if we reached land
he would give it to me because all the crew said I had saved them & the ship. Four days later we were in sight of the forests of Newfoundland & the following morning, when a boat was sent ashore, the Captain made me his present of the ring, as he had promised.