The Stories of William Sansom

by William Sansom

  ‘Why doesn’t he behave like a normal man? Why doesn’t he say something like … like what normal men say?’ She switched herself round frowning, clutching the bath-steps for support, and looked up at the brass-bound clock in the wall. Five minutes more. Five minutes to lie warm and think. She looked down her long white body and watched her hair float up like the feelers of a pale anemone.

  So they lay in their big private baths and gave themselves to the warm healing water. Neither needed healing. But in such tiled seclusion, in the little tall rooms with their ample graves of water, and with the high black windows above showing the white beat of the snow outside, demonstrating as an aquarium feature all the coldness of the Austrian mountain night outside against the warmth within—in such clean tiled seclusion and such large warm water not only the body but also the mind was healed.

  ‘Come, come,’ de Broda thought. ‘Don’t let’s be intolerant. Don’t let’s us be hurried. It was only a lapse—why, in any case, shouldn’t she like the films? A young girl has her interests. There are very good films, too. Sometimes. She was really most charming … that is, earlier …’ And alone there his lips parted in a wide smile as he remembered the pleasant feelings he had, the expanded sense of himself, before the unfortunate matter of the Wettertelegraf. Then he kicked his foot right out of the water in self-reproach, ‘Vanity!’ he said sternly. He stared suddenly hard at his big toe sticking up as from a separate body. There were several long black hairs streaming down beneath the nail. ‘Why!’ he thought in wonder, ‘I’ve never noticed those before.’

  Laure grew warmer and more comfortable. ‘Still, I like a man to be different. He’s different, all right.’ She grimaced. Then, suddenly startled by all the water round her, wondered: ‘Should I put my head under?’ She decided not. Relieved, she thought: ‘He’s really rather charming. He’d be a credit. I can just see him at the head of the table, a party for just six….’ And her mind crept about silver candlesticks, a glitter of glasses, and the form of de Broda across the polished table with his polished manners so ably discoursing—he inclined a little forward to the lady seated on his right. That lady too inclined forward, her eyes never leaving his face…. Laure rose with an abrupt splash and began soaping herself severely. ‘As for her …’ she muttered decisively.

  ‘I wonder,’ de Broda mused, ‘what her body’s like?’ He thought hard, suspended now on the water on his stomach, only his chin jutting on to one of the marble steps and supporting all. It proved difficult to imagine a strange woman’s body: a known one was always substituted. ‘Anyway, she’s beautiful.’

  ‘But I suppose,’ she thought, ‘I suppose he’s hairs all over….’

  And he who liked most kinds said ponderously to himself, ‘She’s just my type.’

  ‘Laure!’ She giggled to herself as she made an untranslatable pun.

  During the next few days they saw much of each other. They went for sleigh-rides up and down the mountain tracks. The sleighs were trimmed with brass and curved ironwork, their high seats were padded with green plush—and as they carved their soft-belled way through the steep alleys, as they passed fir-trees with fretted branches moulded by snow to look themselves like huge fir-cones, as they mounted to Rudolfshöhe or descended past a curtain of icicles to the lower rocks, all was romantic all most altoesterreichisch. The sleigh-drivers wore moss-green hats or hats of Styrian black and emerald. But once—much to de Broda’s disgust—one of them wore an old leather flying-bonnet. De Broda had noticed this the moment they approached the line of sleighs waiting for hire. And he had shuffled about in the snow for a few minutes, hoping someone else would take the man. But no—and Laure had looked at him suspiciously as he made false conversation. He was about to try to explain to her—and suddenly found this impossible. It would sound like so much whimsy. Such refinements are only communicable between people of similar taste. And he had, in fact, too good a sense of humour to persist—so they had hired the man. The drive was nevertheless spoilt. He could not take his eyes off that flying-bonnet.

  However, that morning produced its great compensation. They descended at one of the largest of the enormous hotels. There in the immense empty lounge they had ordered glasses of the bubbling spa water itself—for it was too late for coffee. Cold water after the brisk cold drive! They had laughed. And for some reason he had mentioned—perhaps à propos of the desolate air of an out-of-season hotel—the works of Thomas Mann. She had read them. And she had read much else. To his surprise he found she had developed quite a reasonable taste in literature. He found with joy that at last they had one taste in common.

  But why? Then he thought of a girl’s life, of her gentle bringing up, of the hours of careful seclusion imposed on her. He did not think of the hours of seclusion imposed on a working girl, hours in a room alone with an empty purse. However, in a way and not knowing it, he was right. For without her early education, Laure might have preferred to books the little radio, or hour-long experiments with her own face in the mirror.

  Thenceforward they talked a lot about books. Once, de Broda found himself wondering: If she has read so much, if her imagination is thus so livened—why does she not respond more easily to the other things I talk about? The senses of time? Myths of the past? Gould I—after all—be phrasing these things badly? He could not believe so. But then he did not know that books for Laure were in the first place a last resort, When she was out and about—and especially now on her holiday—her desire was for action and life. Though she understood much of de Broda’s discourse, she was impatient of it. She listened with half an ear. She wanted to escape sentiments that in her reading she had only half-experienced, for in its way the grey page was a prison.

  Still, they had a subject in common. It greased their passage. As the days went on, they became more intimate. However—it was not all easy. There was the afternoon, for instance, when it snowed again. Even the quiet air of Gastein grew quieter. Sounds underfoot were muffled by the old snow, and the new fall filled the air with a dizzy kinematic flicker. One looked up, and the white sky was black with flakes forever dropping: one looked at the black firs and the dark plastered houses and the flakes fell white: it was the sight of so much falling without sound that added to the soundlessness. In such air they walked a little—snow mounted and melted in Laure’s orange hair, on the brim of de Broda’s hat. To avoid getting wet through they turned into a hotel. The light was fading. It was time for coffee.

  Out of the soundlessness of the snow—through the double swing-doors into steamheat and light and suddenly voices from everywhere!

  ‘It’s not!’

  ‘It is!’

  ‘Der Bobby!’

  ‘Bobby! In Gastein!’

  And for a moment it seemed an endless number of people in high spirits and smart clothes crowded round de Broda. He was startled, confused—and then annoyed. These were old friends from Vienna, friends from ten years ago when he had led—despite the time, perhaps because of the times—a gayer and more frivolous life. Before the worm had crept in—before he had reached that point in early middle years when a tiredness, a certain intolerant familiarity with life had claimed him. One could not call this a false tiredness; but it was disproportionate; and perhaps a little later on it would melt with the tolerance of years and he would regain some of his easier, earlier, priceless, worthless joys.

  But now he had the worm. And greeted by this group of light people he felt angry, embarrassed and ashamed. Indeed, the latter he might be allowed—for this little lot were not the best kind of company. They might have been gay, but they made a strident flashy exhibition of themselves too. They talked, among the quiet coffee-drinkers, at the tops of their voices: in their actions they pirouetted and gestured with too great an ease—their absolute indifference to the room was a conscious insult; a boordom.

  ‘But Bobby—you must come with us!’

  ‘Here—this table by the piano?’

  ‘Egon’s going to play!’

  �
�Oh—the Bobby … how serious! … this way to the museum, please!’

  De Broda had so many to shake hands with that he had time to plan his retreat. With his back to Laure—whom he had not introduced—he made his face into a mask of theirs and winked at them. He winked that he wanted to be alone with his little piece. Ah, they thought, the Bobby! The old Bobby! And instantly they acknowledged the formality of the occasion—it was the only convention they bowed to. They nodded knowingly and left him.

  De Broda led Laure over to the furthest end of the room. He felt ashamed that he had denied his real personality, thus he was awkward.

  ‘Awful people,’ he apologized. ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘But they seemed quite gay.’

  ‘I used to know them once—a long time ago.’

  They ordered coffee. Near them hung a picture of a fat German Count—a famous and ferocious General—seated on a horse. He was in full hunting-dress, and from his magnificent eminence on the great stallion he held proudly in his hand a single desolate dead hare. It was entitled: ‘Jagd.’

  De Broda tried to find some aesthetic quality in the picture, found none, and was driven to talking again of the atmosphere of period it now described. Laure listened, but listlessly. Meanwhile the other party had grouped themselves round the piano, and the Hungarian Egon—a small round dapper man with a black moustache, an oiled and energetic man—had begun to play the piano. The others hummed, then broke into song. It was a tango: ‘Küss’ mich heut’ portugiesisch.’ One or two of the other people in the lounge looked round and smiled. An old man shook his head, but benevolently behind his paper. Plainly the room was not so insulted as de Broda had thought. Laure’s eyes gleamed a growing delight.

  Suddenly she turned to him: ‘Why don’t we go over there?’

  ‘But Laure….!’

  ‘So little happens here—they look fun. Do let’s!’

  He felt sad and funless, clumsily and drily a spoiler of fun. He felt how much older he was. Yet persisted:

  ‘Look, Laure—those are silly people. They’re not worth while. I don’t want you to know them.’

  ‘But they’re your friends?’

  ‘Of a kind—of an old vintage, gone sour.’

  ‘I’m not so sure who’s sour.’ She paused. ‘Why don’t you want me to meet them? Why me?’

  He made an earnest expression, He made a grave, thoughtful face of care for her:

  ‘Because, Laure, I take you seriously.’

  It should have worked. But it didn’t. It was a mistake. It gave Laure exactly the confirmation of this interest in her that she had wanted. He had never said anything like that before, and the spoken word, however often it is spoken, is important.

  Power is an ugly word. Let us say it gave her a feeling of certainty, and with this of exhilaration.

  ‘Oh how sweet!’ she smiled. And then giggled. ‘… Bobby dear!’

  He was still looking shocked when she put her finger to her lips and, standing up, asked him to excuse her. She went as if to the ladies’ room. But on the way she passed the piano, just as ‘Kiss me today in a Portuguese way’ was coming to an end. Not stopping, she smiled at them unreservedly and sang out the last two bars. They clapped. And she was out through the swing-doors.

  So that when after a few minutes she returned they felt they knew her and implored her to sing more with them. She did, and for a long time she stood and chatted and laughed and sang.

  De Broda was left alone with the German Count and his hare. He stared up at the picture and fumed.

  *

  But later, lying in his warm appeaseful bath, he forgave her. After all, she didn’t know the crowd in question. And it showed she was lively. A girl should have her fun. It was indeed, he concluded happily, a very rare combination—an intelligent girl, an intellectual girl with a liking for liveliness. But he thanked heaven the party had already driven off back to Vienna.

  *

  Two days later, up towards the Villa Cäcilie, a young man skied straight into them.

  They all fell down.

  But no one was hurt. The young man had come fast round the bend, had tried to check as he saw them, had struck a patch of ice, but then in fact had fallen and come only slithering into them on his behind. De Broda had thrown Laure back into the snow and himself across her. Now, surprised and covered with white patches, they all sat in the snow and felt themselves. Only Laure laughed.

  The young man—he was plainly a visitor, he wore no local fawn or green but a dark blue ski-suit and a long peaked cap—was most apologetic. He asked repeatedly if they were not hurt? He showed not only politeness but real concern. De Broda was mollified. He laughed, shaking the snow off his coat, and assured the young man that no harm was done. He felt rather pleased that he had thrown himself in protection across Laure.

  That evening the young man called at their hotel. He held some tickets in his hand. He was dressed in American clothes, but moved with European gestures of courtesy.

  ‘I can’t forgive myself for this morning’s accident … it was really so foolish of me,’ he said to de Broda. ‘Please let me make some slight recompense—there is a gala dance tomorrow at the …’

  ‘But, my dear fellow, don’t for a moment think—’

  ‘I would be honoured if your daught—if the Fräulein and yourself would be my guests.’

  He turned for the first time to Laure.

  ‘You must persuade him, Fräulein!’

  Of course de Broda had not missed that suppressed ‘daughter’. His instant reaction was to accept, to show how young he was, to show he could dance as gaily as anyone else. But reactions have their own reactions: and irritated by the youthful parade forced upon him, and moved also by his underlying dislike of dancing—he protested that he himself did not enjoy such evenings at a holiday resort. He inferred that they could be better had in the metropolis.

  It was half-past seven, the cleaned and rested hour after the bath. De Broda, comfortable and thus the more generous, gestured towards Laure. ‘But naturally,’ he said, ‘if Fräulein Perfuss would like to go—’

  The young man said nothing; but he looked at Laure with a polite questioning smile. Consideratively, as though this kind of invitation occurred nightly at Gastein, Laure said: ‘Well—let’s see, tomorrow night. No, I’m not doing anything. I don’t think—yes. I’d be delighted to accompany you.’

  ‘Excellent!’

  Then the young man out of politeness, without much emphasis, tried again to persuade de Broda.

  ‘No, no, no. I wouldn’t think of it. You two enjoy yourselves.’ He held his hand up to ward off finally all protestation. Then: ‘But I must introduce you—Fräulein Perfuss. And my name is de Broda.’

  ‘Peter Hörnli. Enchanted.’

  ‘Hörnli?’

  ‘From Zürich.’

  ‘Ah. And how are you finding our Austria?’

  After a while the young man left. They agreed he seemed a nice enough young fellow. De Broda felt pleased and strangely possessive. It showed him, really for the first time, how intimate they had become in these few days. He knew, and it pleased him to know, that he could let her go off for an evening without fear. Besides, the chap was just a young Swiss.

  Laure seemed to have appreciated his action. She grew even more charming during the next few days. She had enjoyed the dance very much, she said. It was a change. Herr Hörnli had proved a most pleasant companion.

  Then one evening, two days later, de Broda took her up above Gastein to dinner in an inn on the Böckstein plateau. Plateau? It was another valley, another great U above the Gastein U. In Gastein one could think there was nothing higher, in Gastein one had touched the sky. But lo! a five minutes’ walk up the mountainside that enclosed the great valley—and there one was on the ground floor of another valley again enclosed by horseshoe mountains! One felt this stepped ascent might go on for ever, it was like entering a hall of mirrors. In such discovery there is magic. Laure and de Broda, as they ste
pped up on to Böckstein, felt as if they had entered a dream. And that evening was indeed enchanted.

  First, the magic of discovering such a valley—as mysteriously exciting as a strange garden discovered in childhood, a garden through a gate in a wall, a garden that one feels, in the instant one finds it, will disappear the next day never to be found again. Secondly, the snow had ceased to fall, and a clear crescent moon stood high in the sky, casting blue light everywhere: icicles in fir-trees flashed this light, and one saw how people had first thought of putting tinsel on Christmas trees. They went into an inn and ate trout freshly fished from the rocky river: trouts cooked in butter from the cream of the valley, herbed from the valley, and followed down by a bottle of one of the valley’s cold clear rain-gold wines. Coffee, imported on a tired schilling, was hell. But then out into the moonlight, out cleansing the mouth with the smell of snow, and a wine-warmed walk to another inn just across the way. In there, a live merriment prevailed; it was the weekly zither-abend. Two squat coarse men with faces of the mountains, gnome-faces with close eyes and great noses, plucked at the little stringed boards before them. Their fingers were broad and swollen, too big for the finely-laid strings. Yet they plucked, plucked with curiosity—as if this were a strange cabalistic game and the zithers magic boards—and out sang the heavy little mountain waltzes.

  More wine, and de Broda found himself linking arms and leaning close against a warm, flushed, happy Laure. Sometimes everybody in the room sang and thumped the tables, and Laure and de Broda sang too. They were closer, easier, more comfortable with each other than ever before. In that white room, clean as a dairy, and among the villagers in their sober suits and their drunken orderliness—they had touched an atmosphere removed a hundred miles from the grave majesty of Gastein, By some miracle of ventilation, the smoke of cigars vanished instantly; much wine was drunk, yet none spilled; it was unusual and dreamlike to see so many swaying wine-filled bodies and to hear such boisterous music in so orderly, so white and scrubbed a room. But this was no place of Swiss prettiness, it was heavy and solid.