Giovanni's Room

by James Baldwin

  He stopped and sat down, staring at the wall. Then he turned to me. He watched me for a long time, in silence. Then, If you were not here,' he said, very slowly, 'this would be the end of Giovanni.'

  I stood up. 'Don't be silly,' I said. It's not so tragic as all that.' I paused. 'Guillaume's disgusting. They all are. But it's not the worst thing that ever happened to you. Is it?'

  'Maybe everything bad that happens to you makes you weaker,' said Giovanni, as though he had not heard me, 'and so you can stand less and less.' Then, looking up at me, 'No. The worst thing happened to me long ago and my life has been awful since that day. You are not going to leave me, are you?'

  I laughed, 'Of course not.' I started shaking the broken glass off our blanket onto the floor.

  'I do not know what I would do if you left me.' For the first time I felt the suggestion of a threat in his voice—or I put it there. I have been alone so long—I do not think I would be able to live if I had to be alone again.'

  'You aren't alone now,' I said. And then, quickly, for I could not, at that moment, have endured his touch: 'Shall we go for a walk? Come—out of this room for a minute.' I grinned and cuffed him roughly, football fashion, on the neck. Then we clung together for an instant. I pushed him away. Ill buy you a drink,' I said.

  'And will you bring me home again?' he asked.

  'Yes. I'll bring you home again.'

  'Je t'aime, tu sais?'

  'Je le sais, mon vieux'

  He went to the sink and started washing his face. He combed his hair. I watched him. He grinned at me in the mirror, looking, suddenly, beautiful and happy. And young—I had never in my life before felt so helpless or so old.

  'But we will be alright!' he cried. 'N'est-ce pas?'

  'Certainly,' I said.

  He turned from the mirror. He was serious again. 'But you know—I do not know how long it will be before I find another job. And we have almost no money. Do you have any money? Did any money come from New York for you today?'

  'No money came from New York today,' I said, calmly, 'but I have a little money in my pocket.' I took it all out and put it on the table. 'About four thousand francs.'

  'And I'—he went through his pockets, scattering bills and change. He shrugged and smiled at me, that fantastically sweet and helpless and moving smile. 'Je m'excuse. I went a little mad.' He went down on his hands and knees and gathered it up and put it on the table beside the money I had placed there. About three thousand francs worth of bills had to be pasted together and we put those aside until later. The rest of the money on the table totalled about nine thousand francs.

  We are not rich,' said Giovanni grimly, 'but we will eat tomorrow.'

  I somehow did not want him to be worried. I could not endure that look on his face. Til write my father again tomorrow,' I said. I'll tell him some kind of he, some kind of he that he'll believe and I'll make him send me some money.' And I moved toward him as though I were driven, putting my hands on his shoulders and forcing myself to look into his eyes. I smiled and I really felt at that moment that Judas and the Savior had met in me. 'Don't be frightened. Don't worry.'

  And I also felt, standing so close to him, feeling such a passion to keep him from terror, that a decision—once again!—had been taken from my hands. For neither my father nor Hella was real at that moment. And yet even this was not as real as my despairing sense that nothing was real for me, nothing would ever be real for me again—unless, indeed, this sensation of falling was reality.

  The hours of this night begin to dwindle and now, with every second that passes on the clock, the blood at the bottom of my heart begins to boil, to bubble, and I know that no matter what I do, anguish is about to overtake me in this house, as naked and silver as that great knife which Giovanni will be facing very soon. My executioners are here with me, walking up and down with me, washing things and packing and drinking from my bottle. They are everywhere I turn. Walls, windows, mirrors, water, the night outside—they are everywhere. I might call—as Giovanni, at this moment lying in his cell, might call. But no one will hear. I might try to explain. Giovanni tried to explain. I might ask to be forgiven—if I could name and face my crime, if there were anything or anybody anywhere with the power to forgive.

  No. It would help if I were able to feel guilty. But the end of innocence is also the end of guilt.

  No matter how it seems now, I must confess: I loved him. I do not think that I will ever love anyone like that again. And this might be a great relief if I did not also know that, when the knife has fallen, Giovanni, if he feels anything will feel relief.

  I walk up and down this house—up and down this house. I think of prison. Long ago, before I had ever met Giovanni, I met a man at a party at Jacques' house who was celebrated because he had spent half his life in prison. He had then written a book about it which displeased the prison authorities and won a literary prize. But this man's life was over. He was fond of saying that, since to be in prison was simply not to live, the death penalty was the only merciful verdict any jury could deliver. I remember thinking that, in effect, he had never left prison. Prison was all that was real to him; he could speak of nothing else. All his movements, even to the lighting of a cigarette, were stealthy, wherever his eyes focused one saw a wall rise up. His face, the color of his face, brought to mind darkness and dampness, I felt that if one cut him, his flesh would be the flesh of mushrooms. And he described to us in avid, nostalgic detail the barred windows, the barred doors, the judas, the guards standing at far ends of corridors, under the light. It is three tiers high inside the prison and everything is the color of gunmetal. Everything is dark and cold, except for those patches of light, where authority stands. There is on the air perpetually the memory of fists against the metal, a dull, booming tom-tom possibility, like the possibility of madness. The guards move and mutter and pace the corridors and boom dully up and down the stairs. They are in black, they carry guns, they are always afraid, they scarcely dare be kind. Three tiers down, in the prison's center, in the prison's great, cold heart, there is always activity: trusted prisoners wheeling things about, going in and out of the offices, ingratiating themselves with the guards for privileges of cigarettes, alcohol, and sex. The night deepens in the prison, there is muttering everywhere, and everybody knows—somehow—that death will be entering the prison courtyard early in the morning. Very early in the morning, before the trusties begin wheeling great garbage cans of food along the corridors, three men in black will come noiselessly down the corridor, one of them will turn the key in the lock. They will lay hands on someone and rush him down the corridor, first to the priest and then to a door which will open only for him, which will allow him, perhaps, one glimpse of the morning before he is thrown forward on his belly on a board and the knife falls on his neck.

  I wonder about the size of Giovanni's cell. I wonder if it is bigger than his room. I know that it is colder. I wonder if he is alone or with two or three others; if he is perhaps playing cards, or smoking, or talking, or writing a letter —to whom would he be writing a letter?—or walking up and down. I wonder if he knows that the approaching morning is the last morning of his life. (For the prisoner usually does not know; the lawyer knows and tells the family or friends but does not tell the prisoner. ) I wonder if he cares. Whether he knows or not, cares or not, he is certainly afraid. Whether he is with others or not, he is certainly alone. I try to see him, his back to me, standing at the window of his cell. From where he is perhaps he can only see the opposite wing of the prison; perhaps, by straining a little, just over the high wall, a patch of the street outside. I do not know if his hair has been cut, or is long—I should think it would have been cut. I wonder if he is shaven. And now a million details, proof and fruit of intimacy, flood my mind. I wonder, for example, if he feels the need to go to the bathroom, if he has been able to eat today, if he is sweating, or dry. I wonder if anyone has made love to him in prison. And then something shakes me, I feel shaken hard and dry, like some
dead thing in the desert, and I know that I am hoping that Giovanni is being sheltered in someone's arms tonight. I wish that someone were here with me. I would make love to whoever was here all night long, I would labor with Giovanni all night long.

  Those days after Giovanni had lost his job, we dawdled; dawdled as doomed mountain climbers may be said to dawdle above the chasm, held only by a snapping rope. I did not write my father—I put it off from day to day. It would have been too definitive an act. I knew which he I would tell Mm and I knew the he would work—only—I was not sure that it would be a he. Day after day we lingered in that room and Giovanni began to work on it again. He had some weird idea that it would be nice to have a bookcase sunk in the wall and he chipped through the wall until he came to the brick and began pounding away at the brick. It was hard work, it was Insane work, but I did not have the energy or the heart to stop him. In a way he was doing it for me, to prove his love for me. He wanted me to stay in the room with him. Perhaps he was trying, with his own strength, to push back the encroaching walls, without, however, having the walls fall down.

  Now—now, of course, I see something very beautiful in those days, which were such torture then. I felt, then, that Giovanni was dragging me with him to the bottom of the sea. He could not find a job. I knew that he was not really looking for one, that he could not. He had been bruised, so to speak, so badly that the eyes of strangers lacerated him like salt. He could not endure being very far from me for very long. I was the only person on God's cold, green earth who cared about him, who knew his speech and silence, knew his arms, and did not carry a knife. The burden of his salvation seemed to be on me and I could not endure it.

  And the money dwindled—it went, it did not dwindle, very fast. Giovanni tried to keep panic out of his voice when he asked me each morning, 'Are you going to American Express today?'

  'Certainly,' I would answer.

  'Do you think your money will be there today?'

  I don't know.'

  'What are they doing with your money in New York?'

  Still, still I could not act. I went to Jacques and borrowed ten thousand francs from him again. I told him that Giovanni and I were going through a difficult time but that it would be over soon.

  'He was very nice about it,' said Giovanni.

  He can, sometimes, be a very nice man.' We were sitting on a terrace near Odéon. I looked at Giovanni and thought for a moment how nice it would be if Jacques would take him off my hands.

  'What are you thinking?' asked Giovanni.

  For a moment I was frightened and I was also ashamed. I was thinking,' I said, 'that I'd like to get out of Paris.'

  'Where would you like to go?' he asked.

  'Oh, I don't know. Anywhere. I'm sick of this city,' I said suddenly, with a violence that surprised us both. I'm tired of this ancient pile of stone and all these goddam smug people. Everything you put your hands on here comes to pieces in your hands.'

  'That,' said Giovanni gravely, 'is true.' He was watching me with a terrible intensity. I forced myself to look at him and smile.

  'Wouldn't you like to get out of here for awhile?' I asked.

  'Ah!' he said, and raised both hands briefly, palms outward, in a kind of mock resignation. I would like to go wherever you go. I do not feel so strongly about Paris as you do, suddenly. I have never liked Paris very much.'

  'Perhaps,' I said—I scarcely knew what I was saying—'we could go to the country. Or to Spain.'

  'Ah,' he said, lightly, 'you are lonely for your mistress.'

  I was guilty and irritated and full of love and pain. I wanted to kick him and I wanted to take him in my arms. That's no reason to go to Spain,' I said sullenly. 'I'd just like to see it, that's all. This city is expensive.'

  'Well,' he said brightly, let us go to Spain. Perhaps it will remind me of Italy.'

  'Would you rather go to Italy? Would you rather visit your home?'

  He smiled. I do not think I have a home there anymore.' And then: 'No. I would not like to go to Italy—perhaps, after all, for the same reason you do not want to go to the United States.'

  'But I am going to the United States,' I said, quickly. And he looked at me. 'I mean, I'm certainly going to go back there one of these days.'

  'One of these days,' he said. 'Everything bad will happen—one of these days.'

  'Why is it bad?'

  He smiled, 'Why, you will go home and then you will find that home is not home anymore. Then you will really be in trouble. As long as you stay here, you can always think: One day I will go home.' He played with my thumb and grinned. 'N'est-ce pas?'

  'Beautiful logic,' I said. 'You mean I have a home to go to as long as I don't go there?'

  He laughed. 'Well, isn't it true? You don't

  have a home until you leave it and then, when you have left it, you never can go back.'

  'I seem,' I said, 'to have heard this song before.'

  'Ah, yes,' said Giovanni, 'and you will certainly hear it again. It is one of those songs that somebody somewhere will always be singing.'

  We rose and started walking. 'And what would happen,' I asked, idly, 'if I shut my ears?'

  He was silent for a long while. Then: 'You do, sometimes, remind me of the kind of man who is tempted to put himself in prison in order to avoid being hit by a car.'

  'That,' I said, sharply, 'would seem to apply much more to you than to me.'

  'What do you mean?' he asked.

  'I'm talking about that room, that hideous room. Why have you buried yourself there so long?'

  'Buried myself? Forgive me, mon cher Américain, but Paris is not like New York; it is not full of palaces for boys like me. Do you think I should be living in Versailles instead?'

  There must—there must,' I said, 'be other rooms.'

  'Ca ne manque pas, les chambres. The world is full of rooms—big rooms, little rooms, round rooms, square ones, rooms high up, rooms low down—all kinds of rooms! What kind of room do you think Giovanni should be living In? How long do you think it took me to find the room I have? And since when, since when'—he stopped and beat with his forefinger on my chest—have you so hated the room? Since when? Since yesterday, since always? Dis-moi.'

  Facing him, I faltered. I don't hate it. I—I didn't mean to hurt your feelings.'

  His hands dropped to his sides. His eyes grew big. He laughed. 'Hurt my feelings! Am I now a stranger that you speak to me like that, with such an American politeness?'

  'All I mean, baby, is that I wish we could move.'

  'We can move. Tomorrow! Let us go to a hotel. Is that what you want? Le Crillon peut-être?'

  I sighed, speechless, and we started walking again.

  'I know,' he burst out, after a moment, I know! You want to leave Paris, you want to leave the room—ah! you are wicked. Comme tu es méchant!"

  'You misunderstand me,' I said. 'You misunderstand me.'

  He smiled grimly, to himself. 'J'espère bien.'

  Later, when we were back in the room putting the loose bricks Giovanni had taken out of the wall into a sack, he asked me, 'This girl of yours—have you heard from her lately?'

  'Not lately,' I said. I did not look up. 'But I expect her to turn up in Paris almost any day now.'

  He stood up, standing in the center of the room under the light, looking at me. I stood up, too, half smiling, but also, in some strange, dim way, a little frightened.

  'Viens m'embrasser,' he said.

  I was vividly aware that he held a brick in his hand, I held a brick in mine. It really seemed for an instant that if I did not go to him, we would use these bricks to beat each other to death.

  Yet, I could not move at once. We stared at each other across a narrow space that was full of danger, that almost seemed to roar, like flame.

  'Come,' he said.

  I dropped my brick and went to him. In a moment I heard his fall. And at moments like this I felt that we were merely enduring and committing the longer and lesser and more perpetual m
urder.

  Chapter Four

  At last there came the note which I had been waiting for, from Hella, telling me what day and hour she would arrive in Paris. I did not tell this to Giovanni but walked out alone that day and went to the station to meet her.

  I had hoped that when I saw her something instantaneous, definitive, would have happened in me, something to make me know where I should be and where I was. But nothing happened. I recognized her at once, before she saw me. She was wearing green, her hair was a little shorter, and her face was tan, and she wore the same brilliant smile. I loved her as much as ever and I still did not know how much that was.

  When she saw me she stood stock-still on the platform, her hands clasped in front of her, with her wide-legged, boyish stance, smiling. For a moment we simply stared at each other.

  'Eh bien,' she said, 't'embrasse pas ta femme?'

  Then I took her in my arms and something happened then. I was terribly glad to see her. It really seemed, with Hella in the circle of my arms, that my arms were home and I was welcoming her back there. She fitted in my arms, she always had, and the shock of holding her caused me to feel that my arms had been empty since she had been away.