Let it come down

by Пол Боулз

  As she came nearer and saw him staring at her she waved, but said nothing. Dyar, behaving like a small child, stood watching her approach, did not even acknowledge her greeting.

  «Oh!» she exclaimed, gasping a little as she came on to the level piece of ground where the house stood. She walked toward the door and put her hand out. He took it, still looking at her, unbelieving. «Hello,» he said.

  «Look. Will you please not think I’m a busybody. How are you?» She let go of his hand and directed a piercing glance at his face; unthinkingly he put his hand to his chin. «All right?» Without waiting for an answer she turned to the man in the chauffeur’s uniform. «Me puedes esperar ahí abajo». She pointed to the native waiting below. The man made a listless salute and walked away.

  «Oh!» said Daisy again, looking about for a place to sit, and seeing nothing but the wet earth. «I must sit down. Do you think we could go in where it’s dry?»

  «Oh, sure». Dyar came to life. «I’m just surprised to see you. Go on in». She crossed the room and sat down on the mat in front of the dead fireplace. «What are you doing here?» he said, his voice expressionless.

  She had her knees together out to one side, and she had folded her hands over them. «Obviously, I’ve come to see you». She looked up at him. «But you want to know why, of course. If you’ll be patient while I catch my breath, I’ll tell you». She paused, and sighed. «I’ll lay my case before you and you can do as you like». Now she reached up and seized his arm. «Darling» (the sound of her voice had changed, grown more intense), «you must go back. Sit down. No, here, beside me. You’ve got to go back to Tangier. That’s why I’m here. To help you get back in».

  She felt his body stiffen as he turned his head quickly to look at her. «Don’t talk,» she said. «Let me say my little piece. It’s late, and it’s going to rain, and we must leave Agla while there’s still daylight. There are twenty-seven kilometers of trail before one gets to the carretera. You don’t know anything about the roads because you didn’t come that way».

  «How do you know how I came?»

  «You do think I’m an utter fool, don’t you?» She offered him a cigarette from her case and they smoked a moment in silence. «I saw the little business in the garden the other night, and I thought I recognized that drunken brother of the Beidaoui’s. And I had no reason to doubt his wife’s word. According to her he brought you here. So that’s that. But all that’s of no importance».

  He was thinking: «How can I find out how much she knows?» The best idea seemed to be simply to ask her; thus he cut her short, saying: «What have they told you?»

  «Who?» she said drily. «Jack Wilcox and Ronny Ashcombe-Danvers?»

  He did not reply.

  «If you mean them,» she pursued, «they told me everything, naturally. You’re all bloody fools, all three of you, but you’re the biggest bloody fool. What in God’s name did you think you were doing? Of course, I don’t know what Jack was thinking of in the first place to let you fetch Ronny’s money, and he’s so secretive I couldn’t make anything out of his silly tale. It wasn’t until I met Ronny yesterday at the airport that I got any sort of story that hung together at all. Ronny’s an old friend of mine, you know, and I can tell you he’s more than displeased about the whole thing, as well he may be».

  «Yes,» he said, completely at a loss for anything else to say.

  «I’ve argued with him until I’m hoarse, trying to persuade him to let me come up here. Of course he was all for coming himself with a band of ruffians from the port and taking his chances on getting the money back by force. Because obviously he can’t do it by legal means. But I think now he understands how childish that idea is. I made him see how much better it would be if I could get you to come back of your own accord».

  Dyar thought: So Ashcombe-Danvers is an old friend of hers. He’s promised her a percentage of everything she can get back for him. And he remembered Mme. Werth’s reservation at the hotel in Marrakech; Daisy might as well have been saying to him: «Do come back and be a victim again for my sake».

  «It’s out of the question,» he said shortly.

  «Oh, is it?» she cried, her eyes blazing. «Because little Mr. Dyar says it is, I suppose?»

  He flushed. «You’re God-damned right».

  She leaned toward him. «Why do you think I came up here, you bloody, bloody fool, you conceited idiot? God!»

  «I don’t know. I’m wondering, myself,» he said, tossing his cigarette into the fireplace.

  «I came,» she paused. «Because I’m the biggest fool of all, because through some ghastly defect in my character, I — because I’ve somehow — let myself become fond of you. God knows why! God knows why! Do you think I’d come all the way here only to help Ronny get his money back?» («Yes, you would,» he thought.) «He’s better equipped for a manhunt than I am, with his gang of cutthroats from the Marsa». («She doesn’t believe any of that. She thinks she can do the job better,» he told himself.) «I’m here because Ronny’s a friend of mine, yes, and because I should like to help him get back what belongs to him, what you’ve stolen from him». (Her voice trembled a little on the word stolen.) «Yes, of course. All of that. And I’m here also because what will help him happens to be the only thing that’ll help you».

  «Do my soul good. I know. Walk in and make a clean breast of it».

  «Your soul!» she snapped. «Bugger your soul! I said help you. You’re in a mess. You know damned well what a mess you’re in. And you’re not going to get out of it without some help. I want very much to see you through this. And if I must be quite frank, I don’t think anyone else can or will».

  «Oh, I know,» he said. «I don’t expect anybody to take up a collection for me. Nobody can help me. Fine. So how can you?»

  «Don’t you think Luis knows a few people in Tangier? It’s a question of getting you and the money across the frontier. In any case, I’ve borrowed a diplomatic car. With the CD plates one goes right through, usually. Even if we don’t it’s all seen to. You run no risk».

  «No risk!» he repeated, with a brief laugh. «And in Tangier?»

  «Ronny? What can he do? I assure you he’ll be so delighted to see his money, he’ll» —

  He cut her short. «Not that,» he said. «I’m not worried about that. I’m just thinking».

  She looked puzzled an instant. «You don’t mean the check you accepted from that hideous little Russian woman?»

  «Oh, Jesus,» he groaned. «Is there anything you don’t know?»

  «In the way of Tangier gossip, no, darling. But everyone knows about that. She’s been ordered to leave the International Zone. Day before yesterday. She’s probably already gone. The only useful thing Uncle Goode’s done since she arrived in Tangier. I don’t know what the official American attitude would be toward your sort of stupid behavior. But that’s a chance you’ll have to take. I think we’ve talked about enough, don’t you?»

  «I guess we have,» he said. It was a solution, he thought, but it was not the right one, because it would undo everything he had done. It had to be his way, he said to himself. He knew what the other way was like.

  «Do you think we could have some tea before we leave?» Daisy inquired suddenly. «It would help». («She doesn’t understand,» he thought.)

  «I’m not going,» he said.

  «Oh, darling, don’t be difficult». He had never seen her eyes so large and serious. «It’s late. You know God-damned well you’re going. There’s nothing else you can do. The trouble is you just can’t make up your mind to face Jack and Ronny. But you’ve got to face them, that’s all».

  «I tell you I’m not going».

  «Rot! Rubbish! Now come! Don’t disgust me with your fear. There’s nothing more revolting than a man who’s afraid».

  He laughed unpleasantly.

  «Come along, now,» she said in a comfortable voice, as though each sentence she had uttered until then had succeeded in persuading him a little. «Make some good hot tea and we’ll
each have a cup. Then we’ll go back. It’s that simple». As a new idea occurred to her, she looked around the room for the first time. «Where’s the Beidaoui boy? Not that I can take him; he’ll have to get back by himself, but I daresay that offers no particular problem».

  Because what had been going on for the past half-hour had been in a world so absolutely alien to the one he had been living in (where the mountain wind blew and rattled the door), that world of up here, like something of his own invention, had receded, become unlikely, momentarily effaced itself. He caught his breath, said nothing. At the same time he glanced swiftly over her shoulder toward the kitchen door, and felt his heart make a painful movement in his chest. For an instant his eyes opened very wide. Then he looked into her face, frowning and not letting his eyelids resume their natural position too quickly. «I don’t know,» he said, hoping that his expression could be interpreted as one of no more than normal concern. With the wind, the door had swung outward a little, and a helpless hand showed through the opening. «I haven’t seen him all day. He was gone when I woke up».

  Now his heart was pounding violently, and the inside of his head pushed against his skull as if it would break through the fragile wall. He tried to play the old game with himself. «It’s not true. He’s not lying there». It would not work. He knew positively, even without looking again; games were finished. He sat in the room, he was the center of a situation of whose every detail he was aware; the very presence of the hand gave him his unshakable certainty, his conviction that his existence, along with everything in it, was real, solid, undeniable. Later he would be able to look straight at this knowledge without the unbearable, bursting anguish, but now, at the beginning, sitting beside Daisy in the room where the knowledge had been born, it was too much. He jumped to his feet.

  «Tea?» he cried crazily. «Yeah, sure. Of course». He stepped to the front door and looked out: the chauffeur and the guide were still sitting down there in the gathering gloom, on opposite sides of the path. «I don’t know where he is,» he said. «He’s been gone all day». It was still raining a little, but in a moment it would fall harder. A dense cloud was drifting down from the invisible peaks above. In the wet gray twilight everything was colorless. He heard a sound behind him, turned and stood frozen as he watched Daisy rise slowly, deliberately, walk into the patio, her eyes fixed on the bottom of the kitchen door. She pulled it all the way open, and bent down, her back to him. He was not sure, but he thought he heard, a second later, a slight, almost inaudible cry. And she stayed crouching there a long time. Little by little the dead, flat sound of the falling rain spread, increased. He started to walk across the room toward the patio, thinking: «This is the moment to show her I’m not afraid. Not afraid of what she thinks». Because of the rain splattering from the eaves into the patio, she did not hear him coming until he was almost in the doorway. She looked up swiftly; there were tears in her eyes, and the sight of them was a sharp pain inside him.

  He stood still.

  «Did?» She did not try to say anything more. He knew the reason: she had looked at his face and did not need to finish her question. She stood only a second now in front of him, yet even in that flash many things must have crossed her mind, because as he stared into her eyes he was conscious of the instantaneous raising of a great barrier that had not been there a moment before, and now suddenly was there, impenetrable and merciless. Quickly she walked in front of him into the room and across to the door. Only when she had stepped outside into the rain did she turn and say in a smothered voice: «I shall tell Ronny I couldn’t find you». Then she moved out of his vision; where she had paused there was only the rectangle of grayness.

  He stood there in the patio a moment, the cold rain wetting him. (A place in the world, a definite status, a precise relationship with the rest of men. Even if it had to be one of open hostility, it was his, created by him.) Suddenly he pushed the kitchen door shut and went into the room. He was tired, he wanted to sit down, but there was only the mat, and so he remained standing in the middle of the room. Soon it would be dark; stuck onto the floor was the little piece of candle the other had blown out last night when the fire was going. He did not know whether there was another candle in the kitchen, nor would he look to see. More to have something to do than because he wanted light, he knelt down to set the stub burning, felt in his pocket, in all his pockets, for a match. Finding none, he stood up again and walked to the door. Out in the murk there was no valley, there were no mountains. The rain fell heavily and the wind had begun to blow again. He sat down in the doorway and began to wait. It was not yet completely dark.

  — Amrah, Tangier

  Let It Come Down copyright 1952 by Paul Bowles.

  Reprinted by permission of Black Sparrow Press.

  The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences — Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48—1984.

  Distributed to the trade in the United States by Penguin Putnam, Inc. and in Canada by Penguin Books Canada Ltd.

  Library of Congress Catalog Number: 2002019453

  For cataloging information, see end of Notes.

  ISBN 1-931082-19-7

  First Printing

  The Library of America — 134

  Manufactured in the United States of America

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