I Don't Want to Know Anyone Too Well, and Other Stories

by Norman Levine

  “Then they come. They look giants with fur hats and big boots and long overcoats. Very impressive.

  “After a while—what happens? First the women. They say to Russian soldiers—you want drink? They give them drink. A little later, in the street, you see the women wearing the Russian furs for—”

  Georges indicated with his hands.

  “Muffs,” I said.

  “Yes, muffs, muffs. The women all have muffs.

  “Then the French men give drink. Later, the French men you see in the street—they are wearing the Russian boots.

  “The peasants—they drowned the Russians.”

  Marie-Jo brought ripe peaches, large peaches, lovely colours, dark and light, red to crimson. They were juicy and delicious.

  “How did your sister meet her husband?”

  “At the Sorbonne. My sister always joking. He serious. I did not think they would stay together. When she go to Poland to meet his family we are worried. We Catholic. They Jew. They have two children. Then the war. The Nazis. He is taken away. My mother, a tough woman, get priest and doctor to make fake certificate—say the two boys baptized. But my mother did not think that was enough. She tell me to take the boys to a farmer she know in the Auvergne. I take them. When I meet the farmer I begin to tell story. But the farmer just shake my hand. Say nothing. The children stay with him for the war.”

  “What happened to the Polish Jew?”

  “He died.”

  We went to have coffee in the barn. The main room of the house. High ceiling with large windows and the original beams. To get to it from the inside you would go up some stairs. But you could walk to it from the garden by going up a grass slope. “All farmers have this for the cattle to go up and down,” Georges said.

  It was also his studio. On the walls were oil paintings by his uncle who was dead. Impressionist paintings of the landscape around here. “They sell for 40,000 francs,” Georges said. “I have about thirty good ones. Some in the flat in Paris, some in the flat in Cannes. A few here.” He also had his own paintings—on the wall, and one on an easel—like his uncle’s but not as good.

  Marie-Jo appeared with a jug full of coffee.

  “I am working on book,” he said. “I have contract with Paris publisher. Eleven years—! am not finished. It will be traveller’s dictionary of every place in world that someone has written.”

  We had coffee. He lit a cigarette and went over to his record player.

  “Roman—have you heard the Japanese Noh?”

  I answered no with a movement of my face.

  “Very strange. Sounds like a cat . . . and a chain with bucket . . . and a man flogging his wife. I was twenty, a midshipman on cruiser. We visit Japan. Suddenly I was put there, for six hours, listening to this.”

  He put a record on. “This is the cat . . .”—a single note vibrated—“looking for another cat . . .” Georges was standing, talking with gestures. “Now, the long chain with a bucket going down well . . . it needs oil. This is a man flogging his wife . . .”

  He stopped the record.

  “The Japanese, they are different from the French. They believe the dead are with us all the time.”

  He showed me a photograph of his wife, Colette.

  She looked a determined woman, in her late forties. A strong jaw, thin lips, blond hair pulled back on her head, light eyes.

  “She had beautiful voice,” Georges said. “One of the things I like in people is the voice. If they have bad voice it is difficult for me to stay long with them.”

  “How long is it since she died?”

  “Three years.”

  He must have thought of something else for he said abruptly, “If you do not come into the world—then you cannot go.”

  He took me for a walk through the countryside. There were all kinds of wild flowers I didn’t know, and butterflies, and some, like the small black and white, I had not seen before either. But it was the trees that dominated. And I like trees. Probably because I have lived so long in Cornwall facing stone streets and stone terraces.

  I wondered why Georges was not curious about my past. He appeared not interested in my personal life. Though I did give him bits of information.

  “How long will you be in Dieppe?”

  “Two, maybe three days more,” I said. “I want to go to England, to a flat I have in Cornwall, and do some work.”

  It was after nine, but still light, when we got back to Dieppe. “I know a small place but good,” Georges said. And brought me to a restaurant opposite the docks called L’Espérance.

  We were both tired and for a while didn’t talk. I ordered marinated mackerel, a salad, and some chicken. And Georges ordered a half-melon, veal, and cheese. Also coffee and a bottle of red wine.

  Two tables away a man and a woman, both plump, in their late fifties or early sixties, were eating with relish. The woman had a large whole tongue on her plate to start with, the man a tureen of soup. He tucked his napkin into his open-neck shirt. Then they both had fish, then meat with potatoes, then cheese, then a large dessert with whipped cream on top . . . And all the time they were eating they didn’t speak.

  Beside them, going away towards the centre of the restaurant, were two young men. They were deaf and dumb. They were talking with their hands. They also mimed. When they saw us looking they included us in their conversation. One of the men looked Moroccan, with a black moustache on the top lip and down the side of his face. He was lean. And he mimed very quickly and well. He pointed at Georges’ cigarette and at my cigarillo. And shook his head. He touched his chest and pretended he was coughing. And shook his head. He then showed himself swimming, the breast stroke. He was smiling. He showed us that he was also a long-distance walker, getting up and staying in one place, he moved heel and toe, heel and toe, and that curious rotation of the hips.

  “Roman,” Georges said loudly. “The woman you see is fat. Her husband is fat. Look how they eat. Beside them two men, slim, young. They have to talk with their hands. They look happy—all the time the food comes—they are talking. But the two beside them—they do not talk at all—they concentrate on next bite. If I had movie camera—that is all you need. No words. No explanation. If I was young man, Roman, I would make films.”

  As he drove me to the hotel, Georges could not forget the scene in the restaurant. On the hotel’s front door there was a sign saying it was full.

  “Tomorrow,” Georges said, “I no see you.”

  As tomorrow was Sunday I asked him if he was going to church.

  “No, I do not like the clergy. The elm tree need spray. They get disease. I know a young man. He will do it. But I have to get him. And I go to see an old friend. He was officer with me. He now alone in Rouen. We eat lunch on Sunday when I am here. Two old men. I see you the day after.”

  And we shook hands.

  Next morning, I opened the large window of the room. The sun was out. It was warm. A blue sky. After breakfast I decided to go for a walk. I crossed the harbour by an iron bridge. And went up a steep narrow street of dose-packed terraced houses. It looked working class. The houses were small, drab, unpainted. And the sidewalks were narrow and in need of repair. They had red and pink geranium petals that had fallen from the window boxes on the small balconies.

  I passed an upright concrete church with a rounded top. It stood by itself, stark, against the skyline. I went through tall undergrowth and, when clear of it, I saw I was on top of cliffs. They were an impressive sight: white-grey, sheer, and at the bottom pebbles with the sea coming in.

  I walked along for about an hour, on top of the cliffs, when I noticed the path becoming wider as it started to slope down. The cliffs here went back from the sea and left a small pebbled beach. People were on it.

  I was looking at the dirt path as I walked down because it was uneven and steep, when I saw a shrew, about two inches l
ong, over another shrew lying on its side. The one on its side was flattened as if a roller had gone over it. I watched the head of the live shrew over the belly of the dead one—there didn’t seem to be any movement. Then, for no reason, I whistled. The live shrew darted into the grass. And I saw the open half-eaten belly of the one on its side, a brilliant crimson. The colour was brighter than any meat I had seen at the butcher’s.

  The small beach wasn’t crowded. The surf gentle . . . the water sparkled . . . a family was playing boules. Someone was windsurfing across the length of the beach . . . going one way then turning the sail to go the other, and often falling in. A man in a T-shirt brought a dog, a terrier, on a leash. Then he let him go into the shallows. Under an umbrella a young woman was breastfeeding a baby. Nearer to the water a tall woman with white skin and red hair was lying on her back, topless. People were changing using large coloured towels, while there was the continual sound of the low surf as it came in breaking over the pebbles and sliding back.

  I had brought a picnic: bread, a hard-boiled egg, cheese, tomatoes, a pear. And a can of cider to wash it down. After I had eaten I took off my shirt, shoes, socks, and lay down on the stones.

  A loud noise woke me. It was two boys running over the stones between my head and the cliffs. I sat up. I didn’t know how long I had been asleep. The surface of the water sparkled. The click of the boules was still going. From somewhere a dog was barking. The cliffs, a few yards behind me and on both sides, had light green streaks in the massive white-grey. And high up, on the very top, a thin layer of grass.

  The tide was coming in. I put on shirt, socks, and shoes, and walked over the pebbles to a paved slope that led from the beach to the road. I could now see a narrow opening between the cliffs. And as I walked up the slope the opening fanned out to show a suburb of houses with gardens, green lawns, and trees. As I came to the top of the paved slope I saw, across the road, on a stone, in French and English.

  On this beach

  Officers and Men of the

  Royal Regiment of Canada

  Died at Dawn 19 August 1942

  Striving to Reach the Heights Beyond

  You who are alive on this beach

  remember that these men died far from home

  that others here and everywhere might freely

  enjoy life in God’s mercy.

  When I got back to the hotel the “full” sign had been taken down. Madame greeted me with a smile.

  “You have caught the sun. I have surprise for you.”

  She soon reappeared with a thin blond girl of about twelve or thirteen.

  “This is Jean. She is from Canada,” Madame said proudly. “From Alberta.”

  “Where from in Alberta?” I asked.

  “Edmonton,” the girl replied in a quiet voice.

  “How long will you be in Dieppe?”

  “I live here. I go to school.”

  “When were you in Edmonton?”

  “Three weeks ago.”

  “Is your father there?”

  “No, he is somewhere else. He travels. I’m with my mother.”

  “Can you speak French as well as you can English?”

  “I can speak it better,” she said.

  And she was glad to go off with Madame’s only daughter, who was older and not as pretty, to roller skate on the promenade.

  “She is charming,” Madame said as we watched both girls run to get out.

  “I went for a walk today, Madame,” I said, “and came to the beach where in the war the Canadians—”

  “Ah.” She interrupted and shook her head, then raised an arm, in distress or disbelief. She tried to find words—but couldn’t.

  “I have read many books about it,” she said quickly. “Do you want to see the cemetery?”

  “No,” I said.

  That evening, while in the dining room, I decided to leave tomorrow. For over three weeks I had been travelling in France. All inland, until Dieppe. It had been a fine holiday. I had not been to France before. But now I wanted to get back to the familiar. I was also impatient to get back to work. I had brought with me a large notebook but I had written nothing in it.

  I said to Madame at the desk, “I will be leaving tomorrow. Could you have my bill ready?”

  “Of course,” she said. “You will have it when you come down for breakfast.”

  “It is a very comfortable hotel. Are you open all year?”

  “In December we close.”

  “Has it been a good season?”

  “I think I go bankrupt,” she said loudly. “Oil—up three times in two months. It is impossible to go on—” She held up a sheaf of bills.

  “I will tell my friends,” I said.

  “Is kind of you,” she said quietly. And gave me several brochures that said the hotel would be running a weekly cookery course in January and February of next year.

  Late next morning, with my two cases in the lounge, I was having a coffee and smoking a cigarillo, when Georges appeared. He saw the cases.

  “Yes,” I said. “I’m going today.”

  “What time is your boat?”

  “It goes in an hour.”

  “I’ll take you.”

  He insisted on carrying the cases to his car. Madame came hurrying away from people at the desk to shake my hand vigorously and hoped she would see me again.

  While Georges was driving he gave me a card with his address in the country, in Cannes, and in Paris. And the dates he would be there. Then he gave me a large brown envelope. I took out what was in it, a small watercolour of Dieppe that he had painted. It showed the mustard and orange cafe with people sitting at the outside tables and others walking by. On the back he had written, “For Roman, my new friend. Georges.”

  “When I get to England,” I said, “I will send you one of my books.”

  “Thank you. I should like to improve my English. Perhaps I find in it something for my traveller’s dictionary.”

  At the ferry I persuaded Georges not to wait.

  “Roman, I do not kiss the men.”

  We shook hands.

  I sat in a seat on deck, at the stern, facing Dieppe. The ferry turned slowly and I saw Dieppe turn as well. The vertical church with the rounded top, the cathedral, the square, the houses with the tall windows and wooden shutters and small iron balconies.

  Then the ferry straightened out and we were in the open sea. After a while it altered course. And there were the cliffs where I had walked yesterday and the narrow opening. I kept watching the cliffs and the opening. And thought how scared they must have been coming in from the sea and seeing this.

  The sun was warm, the sea calm. And when I next looked at the cliffs the opening had disappeared. All that was there was the white-grey stone sticking up. I thought of gravestones close together on a slope . . . You could see nothing else. Just gravestones. And they were gravestones with nothing on them . . . they were all blank.

  On the loudspeaker the captain’s voice said that coming up on the left was one of the world’s largest tankers. People hurried to the rails with their cameras.

  I went down to a lower deck and stood in the queue for the duty free.

  DJANGO,

  KARFUNKELSTEIN

  & ROSES

  In late october, on the morning of my fiftieth birthday, we had breakfast early—my wife and three daughters. On the plain wooden table: a black comb, a half-bottle of brandy, a red box of matches from Belgium, a felt pen, a couple of Dutch cigars, a card of Pissarro’s Lower Norwood under Snow, and a record. They wished me happy birthday. And we kissed.

  After breakfast the children went to school. We continued to talk, without having to finish sentences, over another cup of coffee. Then my wife went to make the beds, water the plants, do the washing. And I went to the front room, lit the coal fire, sm
oked a Dutch cigar, drank some of the brandy, put the record on, listened to Django Reinhardt and Stephane Grappelli—The Hot Club of France. And looked out for the postman.

  The mimosa tree was still in bloom in the small front garden, as were some roses. To the left, a road of terraced houses curved as it sloped down to the church steeple and the small shops. And at the end of the road—above houses, steeple, shops—was the white-blue of the bay.

  Directly opposite, past the garden and across the road, was Wesley Street. A short narrow street of stone cottages. I watched the milkman leave bottles on the granite by the front doors. Mr. Veal—a tall man with glasses, a retired carpenter, a Plymouth brethren (“I have my place up there when I die,” he told me, pointing to the sky)—came out of his cottage holding a white tablecloth. He shook the tablecloth in the street. From the slate roofs, the red chimney pots, came jackdaws, sparrows, and a few gulls. They were waiting for him. Mr. Veal swirled the tablecloth—as if it was a cape—and over his shoulder it folded neatly on his back. He stood in the centre of the street with the white tablecloth on his back, the birds near his feet. (“I need to get wax out of my ears,” he said when we were walking. “I don’t hear people—but I hear the birds.”) Then he went inside.

  The postman appeared and walked past the house. This morning it didn’t matter. My wife hung the washing in the courtyard and pulled up the line. Then left the house to buy the food for the day. The sun came through the coloured glass of the inside front door and onto the floor in shafts of soft yellow, blue, and red. I went upstairs to the large attic room. And got on with the new story . . .

  Within a few years this life changed. And for my wife it ended. The children left home. I would get up early—the gulls woke me—wondering what to do. (I wasn’t writing anything.) Living by oneself like this, I thought, how long the day is. How slow it goes by. I went from one empty room to another . . . looked outside . . . such a nice-looking place . . . and wondered how to go on. And there were times when I wondered, why go on?

  Then a letter came from Zurich. It came from the people who worked in a literary agency. They told me that my literary agent was going to be seventy. They were planning a surprise party. Could I come?