by Paul Bowles
Sometimes, in spite of Malika’s efforts to restrain him, Tex drank too much whiskey. This generally happened in the bar after dinner. At such moments his face often took on an expression that made her think of a fish dragged up onto the beach. His eyes bulging, his jaw slack, he would take one of her hands in both of his, and groan: Oh, Honey! To Malika this was an expression of momentary despair. She would sigh and shake her head, and try to comfort him by saying that he would feel better in a little while.
The lessons were going very well; Malika spent most of the daylight hours on the snow with Tex. She would have eaten at his table, too, if Dinah had not indignantly forbidden it.
One day at lunch Dinah lit a cigarette and said: You’re going to have your last skiing lesson tomorrow. We’re leaving for Paris on Thursday.
Malika saw that she was watching her closely to observe the effect of her announcement. She decided to look slightly crestfallen, but not enough to give Dinah any satisfaction.
It’s been a marvelous holiday, Dinah went on, and we’ve all had a fine time, but now it’s over.
Así es la vida, murmured Malika with lowered head.
XII
THAT AFTERNOON WHEN the lesson was over, Malika and Tex sat side by side in the snow, looking out across the valley in the fading light. All at once she found that she was sobbing. Tex stared at her in consternation, then drew her to him, trying to comfort her. Through her sobs, she repeated what Dinah had told her at lunch.
When she felt his arms around her, she knew that the only reason for her unhappiness was that she did not want to leave him. She leaned her head on his chest and sobbed: Me quiero quedar contigo, Tex, contigo.
These words transformed him. He began to glow. While he soothed her with gestures, he told her he would do anything in the world for her. If she wanted him to, he would take her away that very night. She stopped weeping and listened.
Before they rose from the snowbank, they had agreed upon the following morning for their departure, while Dinah would be out skiing. Tex was determined to have no further meeting with Dinah, but Malika made him leave a note behind for her, which she dictated.
Dinah, I don’t want to go to Paris now. Thank you and thank Daphne. I loved Cortina. Now I’m going to learn to ski. I’ll be in Switzerland for a while. Good luck, Malika.
Tex had made arrangements to have a chauffeur-driven car large enough to hold Malika’s many valises pick them up at the hotel at half past nine in the morning. Everything went off smoothly. Malika handed the note for Dinah to the receptionist. He did not mention the subject of her bill, which she had feared he might do, but merely nodded gravely.
As they left Cortina behind them, Malika said: Dinah’s going to be very angry.
I’m thinking of that, said Tex. Will she make trouble?
She can’t do anything. She never saw my passport. She doesn’t even know my name.
Tex appeared to be stunned by this information, and began to put a whole series of questions to her, but she, being happy to see the beautiful white landscape outside, replied without answering them, seized his hand now and then to draw his attention to a detail in the landscape, and, by taking gentle command, succeeded in putting him off without his being aware of it.
They had lunch at a small restaurant in Mezzolombardo. The waiter brought a bottle of wine and poured out two glasses. No, said Malika, pushing it away.
Your friend Dinah’s not here now, Tex reminded her. You can do whatever you like.
Dinah! she scoffed. What’s Dinah beside the words of God?
He stared at her, mystified, without pursuing the matter further, and drank the bottle of wine by himself, so that he was in a happy and relaxed state when they got back into the car. As they rolled southward on the autostrada he devoted himself to crushing her hand in his, nuzzling her neck with his lips, and finally kissing her feverishly on the lips. Malika could not have hoped for more.
XIII
AT DINNER that night in Milano she watched him drink two bottles of wine. Later in the bar he had several whiskeys. At Cortina she would have begged him to stop, but this night she affected not to notice that he was resolutely sliding into a drunken state. Instead, she began to tell him a complicated story she had known since her childhood, about a female ghoul that lived in a cave and unearthed newly buried corpses to extract their livers. Seeing his expression of total bewilderment, she stopped halfway through the tale.
He shook his head. What an imagination! he said.
I want to learn how to speak English, Malika went on, leaving the ghoul behind. That’s what I’m going to do in Switzerland.
Tex was drunk by the time they went upstairs. She regretted this, for she liked him much better when he was sober. But she suspected that he was going to want to sleep with her and she thought it wiser for their first time together that he be in a state of befuddlement. It was imperative that he believe himself to be the first to have had her.
In the morning when he awoke staring, trying to remember, she confided that it had not been as painful as she had expected. Tex was contrite; he nearly wept as he begged her forgiveness. She smiled and covered him with kisses.
Having won this much, she pressed on, not with any specific purpose in mind, but simply to gain a stronger foothold. While he was still in the slough of early-morning remorse, she made him promise to abjure whiskey.
At the Grand Saint Bernard, as the police handed back their passports, Malika saw Tex stare at hers briefly with astonishment. When they were in the car, he asked to see the passport again. The Arabic characters seemed to cause him great excitement. He began to ask her questions about Morocco which she could not have answered even if she had been in the mood for such conversation. She assured him it was like any other country. Now I’m looking at Switzerland, she said.
They arrived in Lausanne at sunset and took rooms in a large hotel by the lake, at Ouchy. It was far grander than the hospice at Cortina, and the people living there, not being dressed for skiing, seemed to Malika much more elegant.
I like it here, she said to Tex that night at dinner. How long can we stay?
The next morning, at Malika’s insistence, they went together to the Berlitz School for intensive language courses: she in English and he in French. She saw that Tex imagined she would soon tire of the strict schedule, but she was determined not to leave Lausanne before she could converse in English. They spent each morning in their respective classes, had lunch together, and returned to the school at three for further tutoring.
Every Friday afternoon Tex would rent a car, and they would drive to Gstaad, stopping to have dinner on the way. Saturdays and Sundays if no snow fell, they skied at Wasserngrat or Eggli. Sometimes he would insist on staying over until Monday, even though it meant missing their morning classes. Malika could see that if she had let him have his way he always would have done this, and very likely would have extended the weekends further and further. He approved of Malika’s learning English, but he could not fathom her obsessive preoccupation with it. Nor, had he asked her, could she have explained it to him. She knew only that unless she kept on learning she was lost.
XIV
DURING THE WINTER there in Lausanne they made no friends, being entirely satisfied with each other’s company. One day as they were coming out of the Schweizerische Kreditanstalt, where Tex had opened an account for Malika, he turned to her and apropos of nothing asked her if she had ever thought of being married.
She looked at him wonderingly. I think of it all the time, she said. You know it makes me happy to be married to you.
He stared at her as if he had understood nothing she had said. After a moment he seized her arm and pulled her to him. It makes me happy, too, he told her. She could see, however, that something was on his mind. Later when they were alone, he said that of course it was true that they were married, but that what he had been speaking of was marriage with papers.
With papers or not with papers! It’s the same thing, isn’
t it? If two people love each other, what have papers got to do with it?
It’s the governments, he explained. They like married people to have papers.
Of course, she agreed. In Morocco, too. Many people are married with papers.
She was about to add that papers were important if you expected to produce children, but she checked herself in time, sensing that the observation bordered on dangerous ground. Already, from certain questions he had put to her, she suspected that he had begun to wonder if she were pregnant. His questions amused her, based as they were on the supposition that there had been no Tim before Tex, to show her how always to be safe.
One morning in early spring when she complained of feeling tired, he asked her outright.
You think Moroccan women don’t know anything? she cried. If they want to make children they make them. If they don’t, they don’t make them.
He nodded dubiously. Those home remedies don’t always work.
She saw that she was safe. He knew nothing about Morocco. Mine does, she said.
If she never mentioned America to him or asked about his family, it was because she could not envisage his life there with enough clarity to be curious about it. For his part, he spoke of America with increasing frequency. Never before had he stayed away for so long, he said. Malika interpreted these remarks as warnings that he had had enough of his present life and was contemplating a change. The thought struck terror to her heart, but she would not let him perceive this.
From time to time she would catch him in the act of staring at her, an expression of utter incomprehension on his face. By now, at Malika’s insistence, they often spoke together in English. She thought it suited him much better than Spanish; he seemed to have an altogether different voice.
Would you like to be married? With papers, I mean.
Yes, if you want to.
And you? he insisted.
Of course I want to, if you want to.
They were married in the rectory office of a Protestant minister, who remarked in an aside to Tex that personally he was not in favor of marriage where the bride was as young as Malika. In my experience, he said, very few such unions prove to be permanent.
To Malika the episode was a bit of nonsense of the sort that Nazarenes appear so much to enjoy. Nevertheless she saw clearly that it was a matter of great importance to Tex. Indeed, his character seemed to have undergone a subtle metamorphosis since the ceremony, in that he was now more self-assertive. She liked him rather better this way, and concluded that secretly he was a very devout man. The papers were obviously a requirement of the Nazarene religion; now that he had them he felt more secure.
It was only a fortnight later that Tex, after drinking a little more wine than was his habit, announced to her that they were going home. Malika received the news with a sinking sensation. She could see that he was glad to be leaving the world of hotels and restaurants, and she suspected that life in a house would be very different and not nearly so much fun.
Once again she saw nothing from the plane, but this time the journey went on for such a long time that she grew worried. Tex was sleepy, nevertheless she disturbed him several times to ask: Where are we?
Twice he answered jovially: In the air. The next time he said: Somewhere over the ocean, I suppose. And he stole a glance at her.
We’re not moving, she told him. We’re standing still. The plane is stuck.
He only laughed, but in such a way that she realized she had made a mistake of some sort. I don’t like this plane, she said.
Go to sleep, Tex advised her.
She shut her eyes and sat quietly, feeling that she had gone much too far away—so far that now she was nowhere. Outside the world, she whispered to herself in Arabic, and shivered.
XV
BEING IN Los Angeles persuaded Malika that she was right, that she had left behind everything that was comprehensible, and was now in a totally different place whose laws she could not know. They went from the airport to the top of the mountain, where a house was hidden in the woods. Tex had told her about it, but she had imagined something very different, like the Mountain in Tangier, where the villas had big gardens around them. This house was buried among the trees; she could not see the rest of it even when they went up to the door.
In the middle of the forest, she said wonderingly.
An ugly little Filipino in a white jacket opened the door for them. He bowed low and made a short formal speech of welcome to Malika. She knew he was speaking English, but it was not the English she had been taught in Lausanne. At the end she thanked him gravely.
Later she asked Tex what the little man had been saying.
He was hoping you’d be happy here in your new house, that’s all.
My house? But it’s your house, not mine!
Of course it’s yours! You’re my wife, aren’t you?
Malika nodded. She knew, no matter what anyone pretended, that when men grew tired of their wives they put them out, and took new ones. She loved Tex and trusted him, but she did not expect him to be different from other men. When the time came, she knew he would find a pretext to rid himself of her. The important point was to know how to fight off the fatal moment, to make it come as late as possible. She nodded again and said with a smile: I like this house, Tex.
The rooms had irregular shapes, with unexpected alcoves and niches where there were soft couches with piles of cushions. As she inspected the house she noted with satisfaction that the windows were barred with iron grillwork. She had already seen the massive front door with its heavy bolts.
That night as they sat in front of the fireplace they heard the yapping of coyotes.
Jackals, murmured Malika, turning her head to listen. Very bad.
She found it incomprehensible that anyone should waste money building such a pretty house in a place so far from everything. Above all she could not understand why the trees had been left growing so close to the house. Silently she determined never to go outside unless Tex accompanied her, and never under any circumstances to remain in the house without him.
The next morning, when Tex was about to drive down into the city, Malika began to run from room to room, crying: Wait! I’m going with you.
You’d be bored, he told her. I’ve got to go to a lawyer’s office. You stay here with Salvador.
She could not let Tex know that she was afraid to stay in the house; it would be an unforgivable affront. No, no, no. I want to see the town, she said.
He kissed her and they set out for the city. It was a bigger car than the one he had rented at the airport the day before.
I always want to go with you no matter where you go, she confided, hoping that this declaration would aid in establishing a precedent.
During these weeks, when she watched the life in the streets, she could find no pattern to it. The people were always on their way somewhere else, and they were in a hurry. She knew better than to imagine that they were all alike; still, she had no way of knowing who was who. In Morocco, in Europe, there had been people who were busy doing things, and there had been others watching. Always, no matter where one was or what one was doing, there were watchers. She had the impression that in America everyone was going somewhere and no one sat watching. This disturbed her. She felt herself to be far, far away from everything she had ever known. The freeways inspired her with dread, for she could not rid herself of the idea that some unnameable catastrophe had occurred, and that the cars were full of refugees fleeing from the scene. She had ample opportunity to observe the miles of small houses set side by side, and compare these simple dwellings with the house on the mountain. As a result it occurred to her that perhaps she was fortunate to live where she did. One day as they drove into the city she turned to Tex and said: Do you have more money than these people?
What people?
She moved her hand. The ones who live in these houses.
I don’t know about other people’s money, he said. I know I never have enough of my own.
She looked out at the rows of frail wooden houses with their dusty shrubbery, and could not believe him. You do have more money, she declared. Why don’t you want to say it?
This made him laugh. Whatever I have, I made myself. The day I was twenty-one my father handed me a check and said: Here. Let’s see what you can do with this. In three years I changed it into four and a half times as much. Is that what you meant, Dad? I asked him. That’s what I meant, son, he said.
Malika thought a moment, saying finally: And now when he needs money you give it to him.
Tex looked sideways at her and said gravely: Of course.
She wanted to ask him if he had no friends in Los Angeles. Since their arrival she had not met anyone, and she thought this strange. It could be a custom here for recently married couples to keep strictly to themselves during a specified period. Or perhaps Tex’s friends here were all girls, which would automatically preclude her knowing them. When she asked him, he said he seldom came to Los Angeles. I’m generally with my family in Texas, he said, or down at the hacienda.
There was a studio upstairs with a wide sun-deck that was not hidden by trees in the middle of the day. Malika did not feel entirely at ease sitting out there, with nothing between her and the dark forest. She suspected that the trees harbored dangerous birds. Sometimes she and Tex sat up here between dips in the pool, which, being below inside the closed patio, she considered safe. Tex would observe her as she lay stretched on a mattress, and assure her she was more beautiful than ever. She had noticed this herself, but she was pleased to know that he too had seen it.
XVI