Laughter in the Dark

by Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov

  As soon as the lights were out, Rex, who was seated between Margot and Albinus, fumbled for her hand and clasped it. In front of them, Dorianna Karenina was sitting in her sumptuous fur coat, although the room was hot, between the producer and the film-man with the stye, to whom she was trying to be very nice.

  The title, and then the names, unrolled with a diffident quiver. The apparatus hummed softly and monotonously, rather like a distant vacuum cleaner. There was no music.

  Margot appeared on the screen almost at once. She was reading a book; then she slapped it down and lurched to the window; her fiancé was riding past.

  Margot was so horrified that she wrenched her hand away from Rex. Who on earth was that ghastly creature? Awkward and ugly, with a swollen, strangely altered, leech-black mouth, misplaced brows and unexpected creases in her dress, the girl on the screen stared wildly in front of her and then broke in two with her stomach on the window sill and her buttocks to the spectators. Margot thrust away Rex’s groping hand. She wanted to bite someone, or to throw herself on the floor and kick.

  That monster on the screen had nothing in common with her—she was awful, awful! She was in fact like her mother, the porter’s wife, in her wedding photograph.

  “Perhaps it’ll be better later on,” she thought miserably.

  Albinus bent over to her, almost embracing Rex, as he did so, and whispered tenderly:

  “Sweet, marvelous, I had no idea …”

  He really was enchanted: somehow he recalled the little “Argus” cinema where they had first met, and it touched him that Margot should act so atrociously—and yet with such a delightful childish zeal, like a schoolgirl reciting a birthday poem.

  Rex was delighted too. He had never doubted that Margot would be a failure on the screen, and he knew that she would revenge herself on Albinus for this failure. Tomorrow, by way of reaction, she would come. At five punctually. It was all very pleasant. His hand went groping once more, and suddenly she gave him a violent pinch.

  After a short absence Margot reappeared: she stole furtively along house-fronts, patting the walls and looking over her shoulder (although, queerly enough, causing not the slightest surprise to the passers-by) and then crept into a café where a good soul had told her she might find her lover in the company of a vamp (Dorianna Karenina). She crept in, and her back looked fat and clumsy.

  “I shall yell in a moment,” thought Margot.

  Fortunately, there came a timely fade-in, and there was disclosed a little table in the café, a bottle in an ice-pail and the hero offering Dorianna a cigarette, then lighting it for her (which gesture, in every producer’s mind, is the symbol of newborn intimacy). Dorianna threw back her head, breathed out the smoke and smiled with one corner of her mouth.

  Someone in the hall began to clap; others joined in. Then Margot appeared, the applause was hushed. Margot opened her mouth, as in real life she never opened it, and then, with drooping head and dangling arms, came out into the street again.

  Dorianna, the real Dorianna, who was sitting in front of them, turned round and her eyes beamed amiably in the semi-darkness: “Bravo, little girl,” she said in her husky voice, and Margot would have liked to scratch her face.

  Now she so dreaded her every re-appearance on the screen that she felt quite faint and was no longer capable of pushing and pinching Rex’s persistent hand. He felt her hot breath in his ear, as she moaned gently: “Please, stop, or I’ll change my seat.” He patted her knee and withdrew his hand.

  The forsaken sweetheart returned and her every movement was agony to Margot. She felt like a soul in Hell to whom the demons are displaying the unsuspected lining of its earthly transgressions. Those stiff, clumsy, angular gestures … In her bloated face she somehow recognized her mother’s expression when the latter was trying to be polite to an influential tenant.

  “A most successful scene,” whispered Albinus, bending over to her again.

  Rex was getting bored with sitting in the dark, watching a bad film and having a large man lean over him. He closed his eyes, saw the little colored caricatures he had been doing lately for Albinus, and meditated over the fascinating though quite simple problem of how to suck some more cash out of him.

  The drama was drawing to a close. The hero, deserted by the vamp, made his way to a chemist’s, in a good cinematic downpour, to buy himself some poison, but remembered his old mother and went back to his native farm instead. There, among hens and pigs, his original sweetheart was playing with their illegitimate baby (it would not remain illegitimate long now, judging by the way he peered over the fence). This was Margot’s best scene. But, as the infant snuggled up to her, she suddenly stroked down her dress with the back of her hand (quite unintentionally) as if she were wiping her hand—and the infant gazed at her askance. A laugh rippled through the hall. Margot could stand it no longer and began to cry softly.

  As soon as the lights went up, she left her seat and walked rapidly toward the exit.

  With a worried look of apprehension, Albinus hurried after her.

  Rex got up and stretched himself. Dorianna touched his arm. Beside her stood the man with the stye, yawning.

  “A failure,” said Dorianna, winking. “Poor little lass.”

  “And are you satisfied with your performance?” asked Rex curiously.

  Dorianna laughed. “I’ll tell you a secret: a true actress cannot be satisfied.”

  “Nor can the public sometimes,” said Rex calmly. “By the way, do tell me, my dear, how did you come to hit on your stage name? It sort of disturbs me.”

  “Oh, that’s a long story,” she answered wistfully. “If you come to tea with me one day, I shall perhaps tell you more about it. The boy who suggested this name committed suicide.”

  “Ah—and no wonder. But what I wanted to know … Tell me, have you read Tolstoy?”

  “Doll’s Toy?” queried Dorianna Karenina. “No, I’m afraid not. Why?”

  24

  THERE were stormy scenes at home, sobs, moans, hysterics. She flung herself on the sofa, the bed, the floor. Her eyes sparkled brilliantly and wrathfully; one of her stockings had slipped down. The world was swamped in tears.

  Albinus, as he tried to console her, unconsciously used the very words with which he had once comforted Irma when he kissed a bruise—words which now, after Irma’s death, were vacant.

  At first Margot vented her whole wrath upon him; then she abused Dorianna in terrible language; after which she assailed the producer. On the way she had a fling at Grossman, the old man with the stye, though he had had nothing at all to do with the matter.

  “All right,” said Albinus at last. “I’ll do everything I possibly can for you. But I really don’t think it was a failure. On the contrary, in several of the scenes you acted very well—in that first one, for instance, you know, when you—”

  “Hold your tongue!” shrieked Margot, flinging an orange at him.

  “But do listen to me, my pet. I’m prepared to do anything to make my darling happy. Now let’s take a fresh handkerchief and dry up our tears for good. I’ll tell you what I’ll do. The film belongs to me. I’ve paid for the rubbish—I mean the rubbish Schwarz has made of it. I shall refuse to allow it to be shown anywhere, and I’ll keep it as a souvenir for myself.”

  “No, burn it,” sobbed Margot.

  “Very well, I’ll burn it. Dorianna won’t be overpleased with that, I can assure you. Now—are we satisfied?”

  She still went on sobbing, but more quietly.

  “Come, come, don’t cry any more, darling. Tomorrow you shall go and choose yourself something. Shall I tell you what? A big thing on four wheels. Have you forgotten that? Now, won’t that be fun? Then you’ll show it to me, and perhaps” (he smiled and raised his eyebrows, as he slyly drawled the word “perhaps”) “I’ll buy it. We’ll drive miles and miles away. You shall see the spring in the South.… Eh, Margot?”

  “That’s not the point,” she said sulkily.

  “The poi
nt is that you should be happy. And happy you’ll be. Where’s that hanky? We’ll come back in the autumn; you shall take some more courses in film-acting, and I’ll find a really clever producer for you—Grossman, for instance.”

  “No, not him,” muttered Margot with a shudder.

  “All right, another one then. And now, wipe away your tears like a good girl, and we’ll go out to supper. Please, little one.”

  “I’ll never be happy until you get a divorce,” she said, sighing deeply. “But I’m afraid you’ll leave me, now that you’ve seen me in that disgusting film. Oh, another man in your place would have slapped their faces for making me look so monstrous! No, you shan’t kiss me. Tell me, have you done anything about the divorce? Or has the whole thing been dropped?”

  “Well, no … You see, it’s like this,” stammered Albinus. “You … We … Oh, Margot, we have just … That is to say, she in particular … in a word, this bereavement makes it rather difficult for me.”

  “What’s that you say?” asked Margot, rising to her feet. “Does she still not know that you want her to divorce you?”

  “No, I didn’t mean that,” said Albinus lamely. “Of course, she feels … That is to say, she knows … Or, better say …”

  Margot slowly drew herself up higher and higher, like a snake when it uncoils.

  “To tell the truth, she won’t divorce me,” said Albinus at last, for the first time in his life telling a lie about Elisabeth.

  “Oh, is that so?” asked Margot, as she advanced on him.

  “She’s going to strike me,” thought Albinus wearily.

  Margot came right up to him and slowly placed her arms round his neck.

  “I can’t go on being only your mistress,” she said, pressing her cheek against his tie, “I can’t. Do something about it. Say to yourself tomorrow: I’ll do it for my baby! There are lawyers. It can all be arranged.”

  “I promise you I’ll do it this autumn,” he said.

  She sighed softly, walked to the mirror and languidly gazed at her own reflection.

  “Divorce?” thought Albinus. “No, no, that’s out of the question.”

  25

  REX had converted the room which he had rented for his meetings with Margot into a studio, and whenever Margot came she found him at work. He generally whistled tunefully while he drew.

  Margot gazed at his chalk-white cheeks, his thick, crimson lips pursed into a circle as he whistled, and she felt that this man meant everything to her. He wore a silk shirt with an open collar and a pair of old flannel trousers. He was performing miracles with Indian ink.

  They met like this almost every afternoon, and Margot kept putting off the day of departure, although the car was bought and it was already spring.

  “May I offer a suggestion?” said Rex to Albinus one day. “Why do you need to take a chauffeur for your trip? I’m rather good at driving cars, you know.”

  “That’s very kind of you,” answered Albinus, rather hesitatingly. “But … well, I’m afraid to take you away from your work. We want to go rather a long way.”

  “Oh, don’t bother about me. I meant to take a holiday in any case. Glorious sun … quaint old customs … golf-links … trips included …”

  “In that case we shall be delighted,” said Albinus, wondering anxiously what Margot would think of it. But Margot, after a little hesitation, agreed to the suggestion.

  “All right, let him come,” she said. “I really quite like him, but he’s got into the habit of confiding his love-affairs to me, and he sighs over them as if they were the normal thing. It gets a little tedious.”

  It was the day before their departure. On her way home from the shops, Margot ran in to see Rex. The box of paints, the pencils, a dusty ray of sunlight slanting across the room—all this reminded her of the time when she posed in the nude.

  “Why are you in such a hurry?” said Rex lazily, as she was making up her lips. “Today is the last time. I don’t know how we’re going to manage on the journey.”

  “We are both smart enough,” she answered with a throaty laugh.

  She ran into the street and looked for a taxi. But the sunlit thoroughfare was empty. She came to a square—and as she always did when she was returning home from Rex’s room, she thought: “Shall I turn to the right, then across the garden, and then to the right again?”

  There lay the street where she had lived as a child.

  (The past was safe in its cage. Why not have a look?)

  The street had not changed. There was the baker’s at the corner, and there was the butcher’s with the gilt ox-head on the signboard, and outside the shop a bulldog was tied up—it belonged to the major’s widow from No. 15. But the stationery shop had turned into a hairdresser’s. There was the same old newspaper woman at her stand. There was the beer-house which Otto used to patronize; and over there was the house in which she had been born: it was undergoing repairs, judging by the scaffolding. She did not care to go any nearer.

  As she was walking back, a familiar voice called to her.

  It was Kaspar, her brother’s companion. He was pushing a bicycle with a violet frame and a basket in front of the handlebar.

  “Hullo, Margot,” he said, smiling a little shyly, and he walked along the pavement by her side.

  The last time she had seen him he had been very surly; but that had been a group, an organization, almost a gang. Now that he was alone, he was simply an old friend.

  “Well, how are you getting on, Margot?”

  “Splendidly,” she laughed. “And what about you?”

  “Oh, just rubbing along. Did you know that your people have moved? They’re living in North Berlin now. You should pay them a visit one day, Margot. Your father won’t hold out much longer.”

  “And where’s my dear brother?” she asked.

  “Oh, he’s gone away. I fancy he’s working at Bielefeld.”

  “You know yourself how much they loved me at home,” she said, frowning at her feet, as she walked on the very edge of the curb. “And did they bother about me afterward? Did they care what became of me?”

  Kaspar coughed and said:

  “All the same, they’re your people, Margot. Your mother got the sack here and she doesn’t like the new place.”

  “And what do people say about me here?” she asked, looking up at him.

  “Oh, a lot of rubbish. Back-biting. The usual thing. I’ve always said that a girl has the right to do as she likes with her own life. And are you getting on well with your friend?”

  “Oh, yes, more or less. He’s going to marry me soon.”

  “Fine,” said Kaspar. “I’m very glad for your sake. Only it’s a pity that it’s impossible to have any fun with you, like in the old days. A great pity.”

  “Haven’t you got a sweetheart?” she asked, smiling.

  “No, not at the moment. Life’s very hard sometimes, Margot. I’m working in a confectioner’s. I should like to have a confectioner’s shop of my own some day.”

  “Yes, life can be hard,” said Margot pensively, and after a little pause she called a taxi.

  “Perhaps one day we might—” Kaspar began; but no—they would never again bathe in that lake.

  “She’s going to the dogs,” he thought as he watched her seat herself in the cab. “Ought to marry some good, simple man. I wouldn’t take her, though. A fellow would never know where he was …”

  He swung himself onto the bicycle and rode rapidly after the taxi to the next street corner. Margot waved to him as he swerved gracefully into a side street.

  26

  ROADS bordered with apple trees, and then roads with plum trees, were lapped up by the front tires—endlessly. The weather was fine, and toward night the steel cells of the radiator were crammed with dead bees, and dragon-flies, and meadow-browns. Rex drove wonderfully, reclining lazily on the very low seat and manipulating the steering wheel with a tender and almost dreamy touch. In the back-window hung a plush monkey, gazing toward the No
rth from which they were speeding away.

  Then, in France, there were poplars along the roads; the maids in the hotels did not understand Margot, and this made her wild. It was proposed that they should spend the spring on the Riviera, and then push on to the Italian lakes. Shortly before reaching the coast, their last stopping place was at Rouginard.

  They arrived there at sunset. An orange-flushed cloud curled in wisps across the pale green sky, above the dark mountains; lights glowed in the squatting cafés; the plane trees on the boulevard were already shrouded in darkness.

  Margot was tired and irritable, as she always was toward night. Since their departure—that is to say, for almost three weeks (for they had not hurried, stopping in a number of picturesque little places with the same old church in the same old square), she had not once been alone with Rex. When they drove into Rouginard, and Albinus was going into ecstasies over the outlines of the purpling hills, Margot muttered through her clenched teeth: “Oh, gush away, gush away.” She was on the brink of tears. They drove up to a big hotel, and Albinus went to ask about rooms.

  “I shall go mad if this goes on much longer,” said Margot, without looking at Rex.

  “Give him a sleeping draught,” suggested Rex. “I’ll get one from the chemist.”

  “I’ve tried already,” answered Margot, “but it doesn’t act.”

  Albinus returned a little upset.

  “No good,” he said. “It’s very tiresome. I’m sorry, darling.”

  They drove to three hotels in succession, and they were all full up. Margot flatly refused to go on to the next town, as she said that the curves of the road made her sick. She was in such a temper that Albinus was afraid to look at her. At last, in the fifth hotel, they were asked to enter the lift in order to go up and see the only two rooms available. An olive-skinned lift-boy who took them up stood with his handsome profile toward them.

  “Look at those eyelashes,” said Rex, nudging Albinus gently.

  “Stop that damfoolery,” exclaimed Margot suddenly.