by Henry Miller
The aunt to whose care he had been confided was the only relative the family possessed. Leslie’s mother was not without misgivings concerning the wisdom of sheltering her son under her sister-in-law’s roof. Aunt Sophie was a woman approaching forty, rather plump, and unmistakably gross and sensual. Her husband had died soon after their marriage and left her in the predicament of proving her charms to the world. She had a meager talent which she leased for a pittance to the services of the Jewish stage. Her life was hectic, disordered, and without a foundation of any sort. The remnants of an intellect with which she confronted the exigencies of life were salvaged from the swamps of adolescence. Her movements oscillated between the satisfying of her appetites and the meretricious arts of the theater. Incapable of attracting a permanent consort, she converted her boudoir into a lupanar. In this flourishing atmosphere Leslie sprouted like a weed. Here he found such treasures as Aphrodite, the Satyricon, and Flossie, gifts which had been deposited by her whilom admirers. The pernicious influence of this premature initiation into the splendors of an antique world his Aunt Sophie supplemented by making him privy to her scandalous amours, occasionally exploiting him as an instrument to abet her passionate intrigues. Later he became the turbid spring at which she slaked her unquenchable thirst.
It was to dispel the premonitions of impending disaster that Leslie’s mother had taken him to task, in a gentle way, one morning shortly after her arrival. She was amazed at the flagrant disrespect her son exhibited toward his aunt. There was in it a great deal more than the mere defiance of rebellious youth; a painful intimacy obtruded and buried its corruption in her heart like a canker. She observed with grief that her son had thrust her out of his heart, that he reveled in the possession of vile secrets, oppressive and suffocating in their turpitude.
“Leslie, you must come and live with us,” she remonstrated. “Your father has been anxious about you.”
“He’s not my father,” Leslie replied with bitterness. “He’s a dirty kike. I don’t want to hear anything about him.”
“Shame, Leslie, shame! What a way to speak. Is that the way you have learned to behave in my absence?”
Harsh and ugly as these words appear, they were not the first that his mother had listened to. Hitherto she had made excuses for these outbursts. She attributed his vehemence to jealousy. But the word “kike” rankled. It lent an unfamiliar interpretation to his hostility.
“My father wasn’t like him, you know that. You say he used to beat you. I never saw it. . . maybe I was too young to notice. But he treated me all right. That kike—the only education he ever gave me was in crime.”
“Why do you use that word? I’m a Jew just as your step-father is. You’re a Jew, too, though you’re proud of your drop of Gentile blood. Don’t be a silly little boy. I don’t like to speak of such things—I know how much you love your own father—but Leslie, my child”—“child” irritated him beyond words—“your father wasn’t half as good to me as . . .”
“Well,” he snarled, “he wasn’t a jailbird. His worst fault was drink. You could have stopped that. Instead of complaining about him you should have trained him differently. At least he didn’t make his living trimming a bunch of poor suckers. That bum would steal the pennies off a dead man’s eye!”
“Leslie, I forbid you to speak this way about your stepfather. If he ever heard of this he’d beat you within an inch of your life.”
“Oh, he would? Let him try. I guess I can handle myself against a tub of fat like him. . . . Tell him what I said. I’m not afraid of him—anymore.” (The beatings he had received reminded him that he had yet to establish his supremacy.)
His mother became conciliatory. She recognized his father’s sullen obduracy, the futility of combating him with threats.
“Why have you become so bitter against your own people?” she asked. “Haven’t I brought you up to be a good Jew? Have I ever said anything against the Christians like you’re talking now about your father . . . your stepfather, I mean?”
“You bring me up like a Jew and you two masquerade as Christians—because it’s better for your business. Is that being a good Jew? Besides, I’m only half a Jew, and from now on I disown that half. It’s only a religion anyway and I can choose what I like to believe in. ... I don’t believe in anything—but I won’t be a Jew! Nobody takes me for one, so why should I pretend to be what I don’t want to be? I’m not taking your religion away from you, Mom, but I want to be free to lead my own life, to think as I please, and believe what I please. I’ve been doing a lot of reading . . . and thinking”—an afterthought— “since you left. My ideas are changed.”
“I’m sorry that they haven’t improved, Leslie,” said his mother sadly. She had been intending to speak to him about the strange books she had noticed in his possession. She feared they were corrupting him.
“Who has been giving you these books?” she asked. She knew they were not of his own choice.
“Moloch,” he answered.
“Moloch? who is that?”
“My boss.”
“Don’t you say Mister Moloch?”
Leslie smiled disdainfully. “It ain’t necessary. I’m his friend. We pal around together.”
“I should like to meet this man. What can he find so interesting in a boy like you? You’re hardly out of your short pants. You’re not a man yet.” Leslie glowered at her. “Oh! I know you think you are.”
Leslie ignored the thrust and swept on enthusiastically about his employer. “That’s just it, Mom. He doesn’t treat me like a boy. He trusts me and lets me into his confidences. Why, I know all about him. When I’m with him I feel as if I were a man, too, just like him. He’s my idea of a real guy.”
“What a way to speak about your boss. How old is he?”
“Aw, I don’t know. He must be thirty or forty. He’s married and has a kid ... a pretty little girl, and bright—you ought to hear her speak. He treats her great. Gee, if I had a kid that’s the way I’d like to bring it up. You never see him get angry with her or scold her. He talks so sensibly to her . . . that’s the way he is, Mom. He treats every one the same. He’s a prince!”
Several times during the course of this panegyric his mother restrained her emotions. She wanted to laugh, at first—his ideas were so diffuse—and then, impressed by his sincerity and earnestness, the passion of his avowals, a new feeling surged up in her and put a catch in her throat. Was she being dispossessed so soon? She had hardly come to know her boy and he was being snatched away. Already the worship which she had always counted on, which warmed her and sustained her in her secret trials, had been transferred to this being who was strange to her and whom she feared instinctively. The influence of this man whom she had never met, who in the space of a few months had taken complete possession of her boy, filled her with trepidation.
“Bring him here,” she said quietly, betraying no sign of her disquietude. “I want to talk to him. I want to see what he has to say about you.”
“I’ll bring him tonight, Mom. He wants to meet you, too. I didn’t tell him anything about—” he refused to sully his lips with the name—“about him. I’ll bring Marcelle along, too, that’s his . . . she’s his secretary. You’ll like her. I’d take her myself if Moloch wasn’t...” He stopped short, aware that he had said too much.
“So that’s the kind of man he is? Runs about with his secretary—and takes you along to chaperon the party? I see now. Oh, I thought there was something like that. And what does his wife say to this, or doesn’t he tell her about his secretary?”
Leslie reddened to the ears and stammered: “He isn’t in love with his wife anymore. They never did get along. Anyway, she doesn’t understand him. You’ve got to see him, Mom. I can’t explain it to you. He isn’t what you think. Wait till you hear him talk ... I know you’ll believe in him.”
“So that’s it! You can’t excuse him yourself, but you know that he can convince me. He’s a smooth talker, eh? If he tells you white is black tha
t’s the end of it. You believe him. Oh, you poor boy, you can’t see any further than the end of your nose. You don’t want to believe in your religion any more; it isn’t good enough for you. But you fall down on your knees and worship this profligate who lends you his crazy books, who lets you share his harlot. . . .” She forgot herself completely. A spate of ugly epithets slid from her tongue. Having nothing concrete to fasten on she drowned her hatred (there was no longer any disguising it) in a flood of calumny.
Leslie grew white with rage. He couldn’t believe his ears. His own mother talking this way, hurling these dastardly insults at Moloch. It was idiotic. It amazed him. Such fury! Such violence! Why? Why? What was Moloch to her? She didn’t know a thing about him, except for the careless remark he had dropped. At that, he hadn’t said what was on his tongue. He remembered now distinctly—he had checked himself in the nick of time. Supposing she had struck on the truth? How could she be sure? People ought to have proofs before they spoke so hastily.
His mother ceased raving. Her impetuosity frightened her, as though she had listened to the speech of some lunatic. She was ashamed, too, but her pride stifled any admission of it. Nevertheless she was adamant.
“I won’t have him here, Leslie,” she said, with muffled anger. “Don’t you dare to bring him without my permission.”
He grew insolent. “I wouldn’t think of bringing him here after this explosion. Do you think I’d stand by and see him insulted?
Not much. If you want to know something, I’m clearing out. Talk about your harlots and adulterers—do you think I’s blind to Aunt Sophie’s ... er ... er ...” He didn’t know just how to describe his aunt’s behavior in a pithy term.
His mother recoiled. “My God,” she thought, “what have they done to my son? Where has his innocence fled?” She entreated him to stay, to give her a chance to show her affection. Oh, he needn’t worry about his stepfather. She’d keep him in his place. She’d do everything for him to make him happy, but he must not go away. “My arms are aching for you,” she cried. “You’ve been away from me so long. I should never have let you go. Oh, Leslie, Leslie, forgive me. I did not mean to hurt you. Bring Mr. Moloch here. You will see, I shan’t say anything to offend him. We will be good friends. Do ask him, Leslie, do. Only don’t leave me.” She began to sob and weep bitterly.
He was affected. “Come, Mom,” he whispered, “don’t carry on like this. I won’t decide anything today, but I can’t go on living with that sl—” The word almost slipped out of his mouth. He had started to say “slut,” but he felt his mother shiver and restrained himself. “You know what Aunt Sophie’s like,” he added. His mother knew too well what he meant. . . .
“Foul whore!” she cursed under her breath as Leslie turned to wipe his eyes.
At the close of business that day Leslie suggested to Marcelle and Moloch that they take dinner with him at his aunt’s house. To clinch their assent he added that there was a barrel of sacramental wine in the cellar.
Leslie’s determination to “clear out” was grounded in the belief that Moloch would take him in. He avoided mentioning this idea to his mother partly from a desire to pour oil on the troubled waters and partly because there was a doubt in his mind that Moloch would acquiesce. Moloch had been insisting right along that Leslie go to live with his parents.
Leslie seized this occasion to open a serious discussion with Moloch. He would have preferred to talk to him alone but he had a fear that Moloch would not consider it important enough; the invitation was therefore extended to Marcelle also. They thought it a capital idea—Moloch because he was strapped, and Marcelle because she was weary of defraying the expenses.
“What are you going to do about Blanche?” Marcelle inquired.
“You say that with such solicitude!” Moloch sneered. “One would think we had a real problem to contend with. Call her up, Leslie, and . . . put a little color into it this time. Make it plausible.”
Marcelle objected to this strenuously.
“I’d rather speak to her myself than listen to these abominable lies. Can’t you be kind to her, at least?
They wrangled for a few minutes, and then Moloch turned to Leslie again.
“Go ahead, do as I say. What’s the use of starting something new? It’s too late in the day to be developing a conscience.”
Leslie obeyed, but as he hung up the receiver he said gravely: “That’s the last time. I’m through with that dirty business. Why don’t you get a divorce?”
Moloch threw him a withering glance.
“Oho! Moralizing now? The next thing we know, little Leslie will be joining the church ... or will it be the synagogue, Leslie?”
The boy was stung in a tender spot. He glared savagely.
“Go easy,” murmured Marcelle. “You’ve hurt him enough today.”
Moloch ignored her. “You’re not ashamed of your Jewish blood, are you, Leslie? I wouldn’t be. That’s where you get your originality . . . and your moral promptings. Don’t think that for a minute that you’re a hundred percent rotten. Give the Jewish blood a chance . . . there’s where your salvation lies.”
Leslie hung his head and flushed crimson. He detested Moloch now with his whole heart. No one could bruise his so—not even his stepfather. He preferred a beating to this vindicative tongue-lashing.
In a few minutes, however, his good humor was restored. He had an opportunity to observe Marcelle wincing under the scourge of Moloch’s retorts. “God,” he said to himself, “I wish I could say things as cruel as that . . . and not mean it.”
* * *
It was one of those sticky, sultry nights when the heat seems to coil about the body like a woolen fog. Up in Leslie’s flat the heat was oppressive. The walls looked moldy and the upholstery had a mildewed appearance. Moloch amused himself, as Marcelle scraped a meal together, by running through the family album. He thought Aunt Sophie looked like a cream puff. “What is she,” he asked, “a Lapp or a Croat?” Leslie screwed up his face in the way one does when he recognizes a bad odor. “What does she do on the stage?” asked Moloch. “Her legs are fat and adulterous.”
Leslie tried to explain. He had often asked himself the same question.
“She missed her calling,” said Moloch. “She should have been a matron in a comfort station.”
He snooped about, examining objects that interested him as if he were in the Egyptian wing of the Metropolitan Museum.
Leslie uncorked a demijohn and together they sampled the sacramental wine. A mood of relaxation followed. Moloch permitted himself a few pleasantries.
“What a glorious life—for the priest; porterhouse steaks, Havana cigars, a short trip now and then to the bawdy house or the convent, an earful of smut behind the curtain ... no wonder they look sleek and contented. They always remind me of the hindquarter of a calf. ...” He downed another tumblerful of the sacramental wine and slipped Leslie a huge wink. . . . “Drink ye all of it!” Down went the wine, making a pleasant gurgling sound as it swished down his throat.
Marcelle had removed her stockings. She was still complaining about the heat. “Lower the lights,” said Moloch, as they sat down to the table. “And, say, can’t you give Marcelle a kimono? She’s dying to slip out of her dress.”
Leslie jumped to his feet, Marcelle protesting.
“Very well, then, let her stew, Leslie.”
With the progress of the meal, and a few drafts of wine, Marcelle reconsidered. She wanted to be coaxed.
“But supposing your aunt returns suddenly . . . ?”
“She won’t,” said Leslie promptly. “And what if she did? You’re not going naked.” He looked to Moloch for support.
“Of course!” Moloch chimed in. “Don’t be stupid, Marcelle. Make yourself comfortable.” (He was in his suspenders.) “Here, have another glass of wine.”
“All right, then,” she assented timidly. “Where can I undress?”
Leslie showed her to the bathroom and handed her a piece of silk.
Leslie wondered when he would get the opportunity to speak to him privately.
“Another time I remember a peculiar thing happening to me,” Moloch was saying. “It was a night similar to this ... frightfully close. I was at the beach with a girl—I don’t remember how or where I picked her up. We were buried in the shadow of a giant Ferris wheel. There was a peculiar fascination about—the way it swished slowly and majestically through the suffocating blanket of humidity. An insane desire took hold of me to rip off my clothes and plunge into the surf. I mean this seriously. It wasn’t just an idea that you toy with and dismiss after you’ve had your fill of it. This was an obsession that I had to fight against with all my strength. Each time I got to the point of jumping up and carrying out this impulse one of the big carriages on the Ferris wheel would come sliding out toward the rim as though to make a nose dive into the sea. You could hear the occupants gasp and shriek when it started on its terrific lunge into space. I suppose my mind was diverted, for an instant, each time this happened by the notion of what would take place should these merrymakers suddenly be hurled to death by that twisted piece of steel. And that led me to thinking about God. No profound thoughts, mind you . . . just the ordinary lazy speculations about a frowning giant, with long whiskers, floating on his throne, over a heap of beautiful clouds. I thought to myself—old man, if you actually do exist, there is nothing I envy you except, perhaps, your memories. In three seconds, no doubt I went through five hundred pages of history. For an endless time I lay there, hypnotized by the incessant purring of this enormous, senseless contraption. The young lady in my arms was slightly peeved because I didn’t ask her to do things which I knew she would refuse. And then— golly, it must have been right on top of us!—an accordion suddenly broke loose. It had just the effect you might expect if you suddenly saw a comet swing out of its orbit—and you had nowhere to run.”