To Room Nineteen: Collected Stories Volume One. Doris Lessing

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СКАЧАТЬ the streets of every city I happened to be in, looking into every face. I looked at photographs in the papers – actresses, society women; I used to follow a woman I had glimpsed in the street, thinking that perhaps this was she at last. But no,’ said Herr Scholtz dramatically, bringing down his hand on the table, so that his ring clicked again, ‘no, never, never was I successful!’

      ‘What did she look like?’ asked the Captain agitatedly in English, his anxious eyes searching the by now very irritated eyes of Herr Scholtz.

      Herr Scholtz moved his chair back slightly, looked towards Rosa, and said loudly in German: ‘Well, she was beautiful, as I have told you.’ He paused, for thought. ‘And she was an aristocrat.’

      ‘Yes, yes,’ said the Captain impatiently.

      ‘She was tall, very slim, with a beautiful body – beautiful! She had that black hair, you know, black, black! And black eyes, and beautiful teeth.’ He added loudly and spitefully towards Rosa: ‘She was not the country bumpkin type, not at all. One has some taste.’

      With extreme discomfort the Captain glanced towards the plump village Rosa. He said, pointedly using English even at this late stage, ‘Mine was fair. Tall and fair. A lovely girl. Lovely!’ he insisted with a glare. ‘Might have been an English girl.’

      ‘Which was entirely to her credit,’ suggested Herr Scholtz, with a smile.

      ‘That was in 1913,’ said the Captain insistently, and then: ‘You say she had black hair?’

      ‘Certainly, black hair. On that occasion – but that was not the last time it happened to me.’ He laughed. ‘I had three children by my wife, a fine woman – she is now dead, unfortunately.’ Again, there was no doubt tears filled his eyes. At the sight, the Captain’s indignation soared. But Herr Scholtz had recovered and was speaking: ‘But I ask myself, how many children in addition to the three? Sometimes I look at a young man in the streets who has a certain resemblance, and I ask myself: Perhaps he is my son? Yes, yes, my friend, this is a question that every man must ask himself, sometimes, is it not?’ He put back his head and laughed wholeheartedly, though with an undertone of rich regret.

      The Captain did not speak for a moment. Then he said in English, ‘It’s all very well, but it did happen to me – it did.’ He sounded like a defiant schoolboy, and Herr Scholtz shrugged.

      ‘It happened to me, here. In this hotel.’

      Herr Scholtz controlled his irritation, glanced at Rosa, and, for the first time since the beginning of this regrettable incident, he lowered his voice to a reasonable tone and spoke English. ‘Well,’ he said, in frank irony, smiling gently, with a quiet shrug, ‘well, perhaps if we are honest we must say that this is a thing that has happened to every man? Or rather, if it did not exist, it was necessary to invent it?’

      And now – said his look towards the Captain – and now, for heaven’s sake! For the sake of decency, masculine solidarity, for the sake of our dignity in the eyes of that girl over there, who has so wounded us both – pull yourself together, my friend, and consider what you are saying!

      But the Captain was oblivious in memories. ‘No,’ he insisted. ‘No. Speak for yourself. It did happen. Here.’ He paused, and then brought out, with difficulty, ‘I never married.’

      Herr Scholtz shrugged, at last, and was silent. Then he called out, ‘Fräulein, Fräulein – may I pay?’ It was time to put an end to it.

      Rosa did not immediately turn around. She patted her hair at the back. She straightened her apron. She took her napkin from one forearm and arranged it prettily on the other. Then she turned and came, smiling, towards them. It could at once be seen that she intended her smile to be noticed.

      ‘You wish to pay?’ she asked Herr Scholtz. She spoke calmly and deliberately in English, and the Captain started and looked extremely uncomfortable. But Herr Scholtz immediately adjusted himself and said in English, ‘Yes, I am paying.’

      She took the note he held out and counted out the change from the small satchel under her apron. Having laid the last necessary coin on the table, she stood squarely in front of them, smiling down equally at both, her hands folded in front of her. At last, when they had had the full benefit of her amused, maternal smile, she suggested in English: ‘Perhaps the lady changed the colour of her hair to suit what you both like best?’ Then she laughed. She put back her head and laughed a full, wholehearted laugh.

      Herr Scholtz, accepting the defeat with equanimity, smiled a rueful, appreciative smile.

      The Captain sat stiffly in his chair, regarding them both with hot hostility, clinging tight to his own, authentic, memories.

      But Rosa laughed at him, until with a final swish of her dress she clicked past them both and away off the terrace.

       Through the Tunnel

      Going to the shore on the first morning of the holiday, the young English boy stopped at a turning of the path and looked down at a wild and rocky bay, and then over to the crowded beach he knew so well from other years. His mother walked on in front of him, carrying a bright striped bag in one hand. Her other arm, swinging loose, was very white in the sun. The boy watched that white, naked arm, and turned his eyes, which had a frown behind them, towards the bay and back again to his mother. When she felt he was not with her, she swung around. ‘Oh, there you are, Jerry!’ she said. She looked impatient, then smiled. ‘Why, darling, would you rather not come with me? Would you rather –’ She frowned, conscientiously worrying over what amusements he might secretly be longing for, which she had been too busy or too careless to imagine. He was very familiar with that anxious, apologetic smile. Contrition sent him running after her. And yet, as he ran, he looked back over his shoulder at the wild bay; and all morning, as he played on the safe beach, he was thinking of it.

      Next morning, when it was time for the routine of swimming and sunbathing, his mother said, ‘Are you tired of the usual beach, Jerry? Would you like to go somewhere else?’

      ‘Oh, no!’ he said quickly, smiling at her out of that unfailing impulse of contrition – a sort of chivalry. Yet, walking down the path with her, he blurted out, ‘I’d like to go and have a look at those rocks down there.’

      She gave the idea her attention. It was a wild-looking place, and there was no one there; but she said, ‘Of course, Jerry. When you’ve had enough, come to the big beach. Or just go straight back to the villa, if you like.’ She walked away, that bare arm, now slightly reddened from yesterday’s sun, swinging. And he almost ran after her again, feeling it unbearable that she should go by herself, but he did not.

      She was thinking, Of course he’s old enough to be safe without me. Have I been keeping him too close? He mustn’t feel he ought to be with me. I must be careful.

      He was an only child, eleven years old. She was a widow. She was determined to be neither possessive nor lacking in devotion. She went worrying off to her beach.

      As for Jerry, once he saw that his mother had gained her beach, he began the steep descent to the bay. From where he was, high up among red-brown rocks, it was a scoop of moving bluish green fringed with white. As he went lower, he saw that it spread among small promontories and inlets of rough, sharp rock, and the crisping, lapping surface showed stains of purple and darker blue. Finally, as he ran sliding and scraping down the last few yards, he saw an edge СКАЧАТЬ