Death on the Installment Plan

by Louis-Ferdinand Celine

  But that big palooka had got me down with his line about the country … Just like that, he’d punctured me completely. Hell, I wouldn’t do a damn thing all day. That was a safe bet … I couldn’t think of anything but skylarking, the open spaces, the country … Hell, he’d demoralized me … I was suddenly frantic to see greenery, trees, flowerbeds … I couldn’t control myself … I was wild … Dammit to hell! … I says to myself: “I’ll do my shopping for supper right away …” That was my idea … “Then I’ll go out to the Buttes-Chaumont … First we’ll get that out of the way! I won’t go home until seven … I’ll be free all afternoon!” Not bad! …

  I run to the nearest place … Ramponneau’s … I make it fast … on the corner of the rue Etienne-Marcel … a model delicatessen store … even better than Carquois’ … Really luxurious for those days and clean … I buy the seventy centimes’ worth of ham … The kind my father liked best, hardly a speck of fat … I bought the head of lettuce at Les Halles across the street … The cream cheese too … They even lend me a container.

  So I start moseying down the Boulevard Sébastopol, then the rue de Rivoli … I’ve kind of lost track. It’s so stifling you can hardly move … I drag myself through the arcades … along the shop fronts … “How about the Bois de Boulogne!” I says to myself … I kept on walking quite a while … But it was getting to be unbearable … unbearable … When I see the gates of the Tuileries, I turn off … across the street and into the gardens … There was a hell of a crowd already … It wasn’t easy to find a place on the grass … Especially in the shade … It was full up …

  I get pushed around some, I slide down an embankment near the big basin … It was nice and cool, really pleasant … But just then a red-faced mob appears on the scene, a compact mass, griping and greasy, pouring out of all fourteen adjoining quarters … Whole buildings disgorging their inhabitants on the spacious lawns, every last tenant and janitor, driven out by the heat, the bedbugs, the itch … They swept on in a sea of wisecracks, the gags burst like rockets … More hordes were on their way from the Invalides, you could hear their awful rumbling …

  They tried to close the gates, to rescue the rhododendrons, the bed of daisies … The horde broke down the gates, bending the bars, tearing them up by the roots, they ruptured the whole wall … It was worse than a landslide, a cavalry charge over ruins … They howled bestially to make the storm burst at last over the Concorde … But not a drop of rain fell, so they rushed into the basins … rolling and wallowing, whole battalions of them, naked, in their underdrawers … They made it overflow, they drank up the last drop …

  I was flat on my ass on the grassy bank, I really had nothing to complain about … I was safe … I had my provisions to the left of me, within easy reach … I could hear the stampeding herds trampling the flowerbeds … More were coming from all directions … The numberless legions of thirst … They were battling to lick the bottom of the pond … sucking mud, worms, slime … They’d plowed up the whole place, disemboweled the earth, dug deep crevices. There wasn’t a single blade of grass left in the whole park … Only delirium, a chopped-up crater for three miles around, rumbling with disaster and drunks …

  At the bottom of the crater, in the red-hot oven of hell, thousands of families were looking around for their pieces … Sides of meat, chunks of rump, kidneys gushing and spurting as far as the rue Royale and up into the clouds … The stink was merciless, tripe in urine, whiffs of corpse, decomposed liver patty … You got a mouthful with every breath … You couldn’t get away from it … The terraces were inaccessible, blocked off by three impregnable bulwarks … Baby carriages piled as high as a six-story building …

  But as the purple dusk fell, strains of song were wafted through the putrid breezes … Slumped on top of the martyrs, the monster with a hundred thousand cocks stirs up music in his guts … I had a couple of beers, swiped free of charge … and two more … and two more … which makes twelve … Why not?… I’d spent my five francs … I hadn’t a red cent left … I snagged a quart of white wine … Nothing to it! … and a whole bottle of mousseux … Why wouldn’t I do a little trading with that family on the bench? … Sure … I swap my cream cheese for a real live Camembert … Better watch out! … I change my sliced ham for a quart of red ink … There’s no other word for it … Just then the mounted police attack … they’re brutal … Some nerve! … The damn fools … They can’t get anybody to move … In half a second they’re toppled off their horses, disgraced … jerked off … beheaded … put to flight before you can count three! … They run for it, they scatter behind the statues! … The masses are in revolt! … A storm … that’s what they’re demanding … The crater rumbles, grumbles, thunders … Spewing empty bottles as far as the Étoile!

  I break my salad in two, we eat it just like that, raw … I kid around with the young ladies … I sit there, drinking whatever I find on the corner of the bench. No more beer! … it doesn’t quench your thirst … It actually heats up your mouth … Everything is scorching, the air, the girls’ tits. You’d throw up if you moved, if you tried to get up … it’s a fact, you can’t move at all … My eyelids are drooping … my eyes are closing … Just then a sweet refrain passes through the air … “I know you’re lovely …”

  Bing! Rat-tat-tat! That’s the street lamp, the big white globe breaking into smithereens. A vicious stone. A slingshot! They give a jump. They screech something awful. It’s those toughs over there in the corner on the other side of the ditch, wise guys, bastards … They want it to be pitch-dark … The lousy little heels … I sprawl over on the guy next to me … He’s a fat son of a bitch … He’s snoring! It’s terrible … Cut it out! … I’m comfortable, though! … His hullabaloo is putting me to sleep … A lullaby … I thought it was Camembert I had … It’s cream cheese … I can see that … I’ve still got some in my breast pocket … I shouldn’t have left any in the box … in the box … Here we are … here we stay … Seems like a breeze is coming up … The cream cheese is sleeping … It must be very late … Or even later … Like the cheese … Absolutely.

  I was sleeping nicely. I wasn’t bothering anybody … I’d slipped deep down into the ditch … I was wedged against the wall …

  Then some fool comes stumbling around in the darkness … He bumps into my neighbor. He falls back on me, he knocks me over … He feels me up. I half open my eyes … I give a ferocious grunt … I look at the horizon … way in the distance … I see the dial … The one over the Gare d’Orsay, those great big clocks … It’s one o’clock in the morning. Christ! Hell and damnation! Stinking mess! I start up. I disentangle myself … I’ve got two floozies crushing me, one on each side … I roll them over … All around me they’re sawing wood and wheezing … Got to get up … Got to beat it home … I pick up my good jacket … But I can’t find my collar … To hell with it. I was supposed to be home for dinner. Hell. My lousy luck. It was the heat too. Besides, I was in a daze, I wasn’t all there. I was scared and I was drunk … I was still completely befuddled … Christ, was I drunk! Hell!

  I remember the way all the same … I take the rue Saint-Honoré … then the rue Saint-Roch on the left … rue Gomboust … then straight ahead. I reach the Passage gate … It’s not closed yet on account of the heat … All the neighbors are there … in their shirtsleeves with their collars open, outside their shops … taking the air … chewing the fat from chair to chair, astraddle, on their doorsteps … I’m still kind of tipsy … It’s obvious that I can’t walk straight … That throws them. I never got drunk … They’d never seen me that way … They’re amazed … “Hey, Ferdinand!” they holler, “You land a job? The frogs having a party? … You run into a cloud? Been struck by a cyclone? …” A lot of hooey anyway … Visios was rolling up his awning, he called after me: “Say, Ferdinand. Your mother’s been down here at least twenty times since seven o’clock, asking if we hadn’t seen you. So help me. She’s mad as a hornet … Where you been keeping yourself anyway?”

  So I stag
ger over to the shop. It wasn’t closed at all … Hortense was standing in the hall … She must have been waiting for me …

  “Oh, if you could see your mother … the state she’s in. Poor woman! It’s dreadful. She’s been out of her mind since six o’clock … They say there’s been a riot in the Tuileries. She’s sure you were in it … She went out this afternoon for the first time when she heard the rumors … She saw a runaway horse on the rue Vivienne … She came home more dead than alive. She was all in a tizzy. I’ve never seen her so upset!” Hortense herself was in a terrible state just telling me about it … Her face was all in a sweat and she was dabbing at it with her big filthy apron. It left her streaked with green and yellow and black … I took the stairs four at a time … I went to my room … My mother was there on the bed, prostrated, completely beside herself, her smock unbuttoned … her petticoats pulled up to her waist … She was still bathing her leg with Turkish towels. She rolled them up into big wads, the water dripped down on the floor … “Ah!” she starts up … “So there you are!” She’d thought they’d made hash of me …

  “Your father’s in a terrible rage. Oh, the poor man! He was just going to the police station. Where on earth have you been?”

  Just then I hear my father coming out of the toilet. He comes slowly up the stairs, adjusting his suspenders … He straightens out the bandage on his boils … First he doesn’t say a word … He pretends not to see me … He goes back to his typewriter … He types with one finger … He puffs like a porpoise, he sponges his forehead … It’s stifling, that’s a fact … absolutely suffocating … He stands up … He takes the towel from the nail … He splashes water all over his face … He’s done in … He comes back … He gives me a crosseyed look … He looks at my mother too, stretched out on the bed … “Good Lord, Clémence, cover yourself …” he bellows at her, furious on account of her leg … Here we go again … He motions at her. He thinks I’m looking at her bare legs … She doesn’t see what he’s excited about … She’s innocent, she has no sense of shame … He raises his hands to high heaven … He’s scandalized, outraged! She’s naked up to her stomach … Finally she pulls her skirt down … She changes her position a little … She turns over on the mattress … I want to say something … something to put an end to the embarrassment … I’ll say something about the heat … You can hear the cats screwing … way over there on the glass roof … chasing each other … jumping over chasms between tall chimneys …

  A breath of air comes up … an honest-to-goodness breeze … Glory be! “It’s cooling off,” my mother says right away. “Well, it’s none too soon … You know, Auguste, I can feel it in my leg that it’s going to rain … I’m positive … It’s always the same pain … A drawing pain in the ass … That’s the sign all right, it never fails … Do you hear, Auguste, it’s going to rain! …”

  “Ah! Can’t you shut up a minute! Let me work! Christ! Can’t you stop gassing the whole time?”

  “Why, Auguste, I haven’t said a word. It’s getting on to two o’clock. My goodness, child, and we aren’t in bed yet.”

  “As if I didn’t know it, Christ almighty asshole blazes. I know it’s two o’clock. Is it my fault? … Pretty soon it’ll be three. Hell fire! And four! And thirty-six! And twelve! Blast it to stinking hell! Why do I have to be badgered day and night? Is it right? Is it fair?” He gives his contraption a terrifying blow, enough to smash all the type, to flatten out the keyboard … He turns around. He’s blue in the face … Now he turns on me … He gives it to me straight: “Wah!” he bellows. He roars at the top of his lungs: “You give me a pain in the ass, the whole lot of you. D’you hear me? … That’s right. And you, you dirty little louse! You no-good bum! Where’ve you been again? Since eight o’clock this morning? Well? Are you going to answer me? Speak up, dammit …”

  At first I didn’t say a thing … All of a sudden I remember what I’d done with the stuff I’d bought. It was true, I hadn’t brought home a thing! Jesus Christ! What a mess!

  I’d forgotten all about the ham … I’d forgotten everything … Now I begin to catch the tune. Christ! “What about your mother’s money? … And the food you were supposed to be bringing home? … Well? Ahh!” He was exultant. “You see, Clémence? … Your handiwork … Now do you see what you’ve done … with your idiotic leniency … your stupid blindness … You trust that little thug with money! Your unpardonable trustfulness! Your idiotic credulity! … You give him money … you hand him your purse! Why not give him everything? Give him the whole house. Why not? … Ah! Ah! I predicted it, didn’t I! … He’ll shit in your hand! Ah! Ah! He’s drunk it all up! He’s guzzled it all down! … He stinks of liquor. He’s drunk! He’s caught the syphilis! And the clap! He’ll bring us the cholera! Then you’ll be satisfied! … Ah! Well, you’ll reap the fruits. You and nobody else, you hear me? … Whose fault is it if we’ve a stinker for a son? Yours! You can have him. All for yourself! Lousy, stinking, cocksucking life!”

  He winds himself up again … He surpasses himself. He goes all out … He rips his shirt open … He bares his chest …

  “Thunderation asshole Jesus! Why, he’s a scoundrel through and through! He’ll stop at nothing! … It’s high time you realized … you can’t trust him with anything … not with a single centime! not with a sou! … You promised me a dozen times! twenty times! a hundred thousand times! But you had to start right in again! Ah! Ah! You’re incorrigible!”

  He bounces up from his stool … He comes clear across the room and shouts at me point-blank. He blows spit in my face, he puffs himself up like a balloon … two inches from my nose … Here comes his hurricane act! … I see his eyes right up against mine … Strangely revulsed … Quivering in their sockets … It’s a tempest between the two of us … He stammers so furiously that the spit flies thick and fast … he’s drowning me! He clouds my vision, I’m dazed … He flails around so violently he tears the bandages off his neck. That only makes him thrash harder … He twists around and bellows at me … He grabs hold of me … I push him back and recoil … I’ve got my dander up too … I don’t want the dirty bastard to touch me … That stops him for a second …

  “What?” he goes. “What’s this? … Ah, if I didn’t control myself! …”

  “Go right ahead!” I say … I can feel the gall rising.

  “Ah, you little skunk! You defy me? You little pimp! You swine! The insolence of it! The shame! Do you want to kill us? Is that it? … Why don’t you say so right away? … You little coward! You bum! …” He fires all this in my face … And then some more incantations …

  “Suffering asshole Christ almighty! My poor dear, what did we do to produce such vermin? As corrupt as three dozen jailbirds! … Profligate! Scoundrel! Idler! And then some! He’s calamity personified! Good for nothing except to rob us and clean us out! A pestilence! Gouge us without mercy! That’s all his gratitude! … for a whole life of sacrifice! Two lives of torment! We’re nothing but a couple of old fools … We’re the ones that get it in the neck! Every time! … Go on, say it again, say it, you poison toad! Come on, out with it. Admit you want to be the death of us … that you want us to die of grief … and misery! Let me hear you say it at least before you finish me off! Go on, you stinking scum!”

  At this point my mother gets up and limps across the room, trying to come between us …

  “Auguste! Auguste! Listen to me, my goodness. Listen to me, I beg of you. Come, Auguste. You’re going to be laid up again. Think of me, Auguste. Think of all of us! You’re going to make yourself sick. Ferdinand. Go away, child. Go outside! Don’t stay here …”

  I didn’t budge. It was he who sat down again …

  He mops himself off, he grunts … He strikes one or two keys … Then he starts to bellow again … He turns toward me, he points a finger at me … He takes a solemn tone …

  “Ah yes. today I can admit it … How I regret it! I was weak. I’m to blame for not having disciplined you with a vengeance! Christ, yes! Disciplined you! Befo
re it was too late! When you were twelve, do you hear, at the latest. That’s when I should have collared you and locked you up good. That’s right. No later … locked you up in a reform school … That’s the ticket! They’d have taught you a thing or two … And things wouldn’t have come to such a pass … But now the die is cast … Our doom is sealed … Too late! Too late! Do you hear me, Clémence? Much too late! This blackguard is incorrigible! It’s your mother that prevented me! And now you’ll pay for it, my dear!”

  He points at her as she limps around the room, sighing at every step. “It was your mother. Yes, your mother. If she’d listened to me, you’d never have sunk so low … Jumping Jesus, no! Ah, Christ almighty! …”

  He pounds the keyboard again … wicked punches with both fists … He’s going to demolish it for sure.

  “Do you hear me, Clémence? Do you hear me? I’ve told you often enough! … Didn’t I warn you? I knew how it was going to be!”

  He’s going to explode again … His rage is coming back … He puffs up all over … his head and his eyes are bulging … all you can see is the whites … She’s stumbling in all directions, she can’t stand up anymore. She climbs back on the bed. She collapses … She hikes her petticoats way up … She uncovers her thighs, the bottom of her belly … She writhes with pain … She gently massages herself … She’s bent double …

  “Jesus, cover up. Cover up, will you, it’s disgusting!”

  “Please, please, I beg you, Auguste. You’re going to make us all sick …” She was at the end of her rope. She was besides herself …