'Quite like old times,' the room says. 'Yes? No?'

There are two beds, a big one for madame and a smaller one on the opposite side for monsieur. The wash-basin is shut off by a curtain. It is a large room, the smell of cheap hotels faint, almost imperceptible. The street outside is narrow, cobble-stoned, going sharply uphill and ending in a flight of steps. What they call an impasse.

I have been here five days. I have decided on a place to eat in at midday, a place to eat in at night, a place to have my drink in after dinner. I have arranged my little life.

The place to have my drink in after dinner. . . . Wait, I must be careful about that. These things are very important.

Last night, for instance. Last night was a catastrophe. . . . The woman at the next table started talking to me -- a dark, thin woman of about forty, very well made-up. She had the score of a song with her and she had been humming it under her breath, tapping the accompaniment with her fingers.

'I like that song.'

'Ah, yes, but it's a sad song. Gloomy Sunday.' She giggled. 'A little sad.'

She was waiting for her friend, she told me.

The friend arrived -- an American. He stood me another brandy-and-soda and while I was drinking it I started to cry.

I said: 'It was something I remembered.'

The dark woman sat up very straight and threw her chest out.

'I understand,' she said, 'I understand. All the same. . . . Sometimes I'm just as unhappy as you are. But that's not to say that I let everybody see it.'

Unable to stop crying, I went down into the lavabo. A familiar lavabo, and luckily empty. The old dame was outside near the telephone, talking to a girl.

I stayed there, staring at myself in the glass. What do I want to cry about? . . . On the contrary, it's when I am quite sane like this, when I have had a couple of extra drinks and am quite sane, that I realize how lucky I am. Saved, rescued, fished-up, half-drowned, out of the deep, dark river, dry clothes, hair shampooed and set. Nobody would know I had ever been in it. Except, of course, that there always remains something. Yes, there always remains something. . . . Never mind, here I am, sane and dry, with my place to hide in. What more do I want? . . . I'm a bit of an automaton, but sane, surely -- dry, cold and sane. Now I have forgotten about dark streets, dark rivers, the pain, the struggle and the drowning. . . . Mind you, I'm not talking about the struggle when you are strong and a good swimmer and there are willing and eager friends on the bank waiting to pull you out at the first sign of distress. I mean the real thing. You jump in with no willing and eager friends around, and when you sink to the accompaniment of loud laughter.

ohdionysia

Public Shelves

Submissions