by Henry Miller
Quiet again. I have the feeling I could lie this . way indefinitely. I want to hear more.
«I've got a friend,» she whispers. «We could meet there... she wouldn't say anything. Jesus, Henry, I never through! it could be like this. Can you fuck like this every night?»
I smiled in the dark.
«What's the matter?» she whispered.
«Not every night,» I whispered, almost breaking into a giggle.
«Henry, fuck! Quick, fuck me... I'm coming.»
We came off simultaneously, a prolonged orgasm which made me wonder where the damned juice came from.
«You did it!» she whispered. Then: «It's all right... it was marvelous.»
Maude turned over heavily in her sleep.
«Good-night,» I whispered. «I'm going to sleep—
I'm dead.»
«Write me to-morrow,» she whispered, kissing my cheek. «Or phone me... promises I grunted. She cuddled up to me, her arm around my waist. We fell into a trance.
1 7
It was Sunday that this outing took place. I didn't see Mona until near dawn Tuesday. Not that I remained with Maude—no, I went straight to the office on Monday morning. Towards noon I telephoned Mona and was told that she was asleep. It was Rebecca who answered the telephone. She said Mona hadn't been home all night, that she had been rehearsing. «And where were you all night?» she demanded, almost with proprietary solicitude. I explained that the child had been taken ill and that I had been obliged to stay with her all night.
«You'd better think up something better than that,» she laughed, «before you talk to Mona. She's been telephoning all night. She was frantic about you.»
«That's why she didn't come home, I suppose?»
«You don't expect any one to believe your stories, do you?» said Rebecca, giving another low, throaty laugh. «Are you coming home tonight?» she added. «We missed you... You know, Henry, you ought never to get married...»
I cut her short. «I'll be home to-night for dinner, yes. Tell her that when she wakes up, will you? And don't laugh when you tell her what I said—about the child, I mean.»
She began to laugh over the telephone.
«Rebecca, listen, I'm trusting you. Don't make it hard for me. You know I think the world of you. If I ever marry another woman it will be you, you know that...»
More laughter. Then: «For God's sake, Henry, stop it! But come home to-night... I want to hear all about it. Arthur won't be home, I'll stand by you... though you don't deserve it.»
So I went home, after taking a nap in the roller skating rink. I was rather exhilarated too, on arriving, owing to a last minute interview with an Egyptologist who wanted a job as a night messenger. A statement he had let drop about the probable age of the pyramids had thrown me out of the rut so violently that it was a matter of complete indifference to me how Mona would react to my story. There was reason to believe, he had said, and I am sure I heard him rightly, that the pyramids might be sixty thousand years old—at least. If that were true, the whole god-damned notion of Egyptian civilization could be thrown on the scrap-heap—and a lot of other historical notions too. In the subway I felt immeasurably older than I ever thought it was possible to feel. I was trying to reach back twenty or thirty thousand years, some half-way point between the erection of these enigmatic monoliths and the supposed dawn of that hoary civilization of the Nile. I was suspended in time and space. The word age began to take on a new significance. With it came a fantastic thought: what if I should live to be a hundred and fifty, or a hundred and ninety-five? How would this little incident that I was trying to cover up—the Organza Friganza business— stack up in the light of a hundred and fifty years of experience? What would it matter if Mona left me? What would it matter three generations hence how I had behaved on the night of the 14th of so and so and so? Supposing I was still virile at ninety-five and had survived the death of six wives, or eight or ten? Supposing that in the 21st century we had a return to Mormonism? Or that we began to see, and ,not only to see but to practice, the sexual logic of the Eskimos? Supposing the notion of property were abolished and the institution of matrimony wiped out? In seventy or eighty years tremendous revolutions could take place. Seventy or eighty years hence I would only be a hundred or so years old— comparatively young yet. I would probably have forgotten the names of most of my wives, to say nothing of the fly-by-nights... I was almost in a state of exaltation when I walked in.
Rebecca came at once to my room. The house was empty. Mona had telephoned, she said, to say that there was another rehearsal on. She didn't know when she would be home.
«That's fine,» I said. «Did you make dinner?»
«God, Henry, you're adorable.» She put her arms around me affectionately and gave me a comradely hug. «I wish Arthur were like that. It would be easier to forgive him sometimes.»
«Isn't there a soul around?» I asked. It was most unusual for the house to be so deserted.
«No, everybody's gone,» said Rebecca, examining the roast in the oven. «Now you can tell me about that great love you were talking about over the phone.» She laughed again, a low, earthy laugh which sent a thrill through me.
«You know I wasn't serious,» I said. «Sometimes I say anything at all... though in a way I mean it too. You understand, don't you?»
«Perfectly! That's why I like you. You're utterly faithless and truthful. It's an irresistible combination.»
«You know you're safe with me, that's it, eh?» I said, sidling up to her and putting an arm around her.
She wriggled away laughingly. «I don't think any such thing—and you know it!? she burst out.
«I'm only making up to you out of politeness,» I said, with a huge grin. «We're going to have a cosy little meal now... God, it smells good... what is it? chicken?»
«Pork!» she said. «Chicken... what do you think? That I made this especially for you? Go on, talk to me. Keep your mind off the food a little longer. Say something nice, if you can. But don't come near me, or I'll stick a fork in you... Tell me what happened last night. Tell me the truth, I dare you...»
«That isn't hard to do, my wonderful Rebecca.
Especially since we're alone. It's a long story—are you sure you'd like to hear it?»
She was laughing again.
«Jesus, you've got a dirty laugh,» I said. «Well anyway, where was I? Oh yes, the truth... Listen, the truth is that I slept with my wife...»
«I thought as much,» said Rebecca.
«But wait, that isn't all. There was another woman besides...»
«You mean after you slept with your wife—or before?»
«At the same time,» I said, grinning amiably.
«No, no! don't tell me that!» She dropped the carving knife and stood with arms akimbo looking at me searchingly. «I don't know... with you anything's possible. Wait a minute. Wait till I set the table. I want to hear the whole thing, from beginning to end.»
«You haven't got a little schnapps, have you?» I said.
«I've got some red wine... that'll have to do you.»
«Good, good! Of course it'll do. Where is it?»
As I was uncorking the bottle she came over to me and grasped me by the arm. «Look, tell me the truth,» she said. «I won't give you away.»
«But I'm telling you the truth!»
«All right, hold it, then. Wait till we sit down-Do you like cauliflower? I haven't any other vegetable.»
«I like any kind of food. I like everything. I like you, I like Mona, I like my wife, I like horses, cows, chickens, pinochle, tapioca, Bach, benzine, prickly heat...»
«You like...! That's you all over. It's wonderful to hear it. You make me hungry too. You like everything, yes... but you don't love.»
«I do too. I love food, wine, women. Of course I do. What makes you think I don't? If you like, you love. Love is only the superlative degree. I love like God loves—without distinction of time, place, race, color, sex and so forth. I love you too—that way. It's not e
nough, I suppose?»
«It's too much, you mean. You're out of focus. Listen, calm down a moment. Carve the meat, will you? I'll fix the gravy.»
«Gravy.... ooh, ooh. I love gravy.»
«Like you love your wife and me and Mona, is that it?»
«More even. Right now it's all gravy. I could lick it up by the ladleful. Rich, thick, heavy, black gravy... it's wonderful. By the way, I was just talking to an Egyptologist—he wanted a job as a messenger.»
«Here's the gravy. Don't get off the track. You were going to tell me about your wife.»
«Sure, sure I will. I'll tell you that too. I'll tell you everything. First of all, I want to tell you how beautiful you look—with the gravy in your hand.»
«If you don't stop this,» she said, «I'll put a knife in you. What's come over you, anyway? Does your wife have such an effect upon you every time you see her? You must have had a wonderful time.» She sat down, not opposite me, but to one side.
«Yes, I did have a wonderful time,» I said. «And then just now there was the Egyptologist...»
«Oh, drat the Egyptologist! I want to hear about your wife... and that other woman. God, if you're making this up I'll kill you!»
I busied myself for a while with the pork and the cauliflower. Took a few swigs of wine to wash it down. A succulent repast. I was feeling mellow as could” be. I needed replenishment.
«It's like this.» I began, after I had packed away a few forkfuls.
She began to titter.
«What's the matter? What did I say now?»
It isn't what you say, it's the way you say it. You seem so serene and detached, so innocent like. God, yes, that's it—innocent. If it had been murder instead of adultery, or fornication, I think you'd begin the same way. You enjoy yourself, don't you?»
«Of course... why not? Why shouldn't I? Is that so terribly strange?»
«No-o-h,» she drawled, «I suppose it isn't... or it shouldn't be, anyway. But you make everything sound a little crazy sometimes. You're always a little wide of the mark... too big a swoop. You ought to have been born in Russia!»
«Yeah, Russia! That's it. I love Russia!»
«And you love the pork and the cauliflower—and the gravy and me. Tell me, what don't you love? Think first! I'd really like to know.»
I gobbled down a juicy bit of fatty pork dipped in gravy and looked at her. «Well, for one thing, I don't like work.» I paused a minute to think what else I didn't like. «Oh yes,» I said, meaning it utterly seriously, «and I don't like flies.»
She burst out laughing. «Work and flies—so that's it. I must remember that. God, is that all you don't like?»
«For the moment that's all I can think of.»
«And what about crime, injustice, tyranny and those things?»
«Well, what about them?» I said. «What can you do about such things? You might just as well ask me—what about the weather?»
«Do you mean that?»
«Of course I do.»
«You're impossible! Or maybe you can't think when you eat.»
«That's a fact,» I said. «I don't think very well when I eat, do you? I don't want to, as a matter of fact. Anyway, I was never much of a thinker. Thinking doesn't get you anywhere anyhow. It's a delusion. Thinking makes you morbid... By the way, have you any dessert... any of that Liederkranz? That's a wonderful cheese, don't you think?»
«I suppose it does sound funny,» I continued, «to hear some one say 'I love it, it's wonderful, it's good, it's great,' meaning everything. Of course I don't feel that way every day—but I'd like to. And I do when I'm normal, when I'm myself. Everybody does, if given a chance. It's the natural state of the heart. The trouble is, we're terrorized most of the time. I say 'we're terrorized,' but I mean we terrorize ourselves. Last night, for instance. You can't imagine how extraordinary it was. Nothing external created it—unless it was the lightning. Suddenly everything was different—and yet it was the same house, the same atmosphere, the same wife, the same bed. It was as though the pressure had suddenly been removed—I mean that psychic pressure, that incomprehensible wet blanket which smothers us from the time we're born... You said something about tyranny, injustice, and so on. Of course I know what you mean. I used to occupy myself with those problems when I was younger—when I was fifteen or sixteen. I understood everything then, very clearly... that is, as far as the mind permits one to understand things. I was more pure, more disinterested, so to speak. I didn't have to defend or uphold anything, least of all a system which I never did believe in, not even as a child. I worked out an ideal universe, all on my own. It was very simple: no money, no property, no laws, no police, no government, no soldiers, no executioners, no prisons, no schools. I eliminated every disturbing and restraining element. Perfect freedom. It was a vacuum—and in it I exploded.
What I really wanted, you see, was that every one should behave as I behaved, or thought I would behave. I wanted a world made in my own image, a world that would breathe my spirit. I made myself God, since there was nothing to hinder me..,»
I paused for breath. I noticed that she was listening with the utmost seriousness.
«Should I go on? You've probably heard this sort of thing a thousand times.»
«Do go on,» she said softly, placing a hand on my arm. «I'm beginning to see another you. I like you better in this vein.»
«Didn't you forget the cheese? By the way, the wine isn't bad at all. A little sharp, maybe, but not bad.»
«Listen, Henry, eat, drink, smoke, do anything you want, as much as you want. I'll give you everything we have in the house. But don't stop talking now... please.»
She was just about to sit down. I sprang up suddenly, my eyes full of tears, and I put my arms around her. «Now I can tell you honestly and sincerely,» I said, «that I do love you.» I made no attempt to kiss her—I just embraced her. I released her of my own accord, sat down, picked up the glass of wine and finished it off.
«You're an actor,» she said. «In the real sense of the word, of course. I don't wonder that people are frightened of you sometimes.»
«I know, I get frightened of myself sometimes. Especially if the other person responds. I don't know where the proper limits are. There are no limits, I suppose. Nothing would be bad or ugly or evil—if we really let ourselves go. But it's hard to make people understand that. Anyway, that's the difference between the world of imagination and the world of common sense, which isn't common sense at all but sheer buggery and insanity. If you stop still and look at things... I say look, not think, not criticize... the world looks absolutely crazy to you. And it is crazy, by God! It's just as crazy when things are normal and peaceful as in times of war or revolution. The evils are insane evils, and the panaceas are insane panaceas. Because we're all driven like dogs. We're running away. From what? We don't know. From a million nameless things. It's a rout, a panic. There's no ultimate place to retreat to—unless, as I say, you stand stock still. If you can do that, and not lose your balance, not be swept away in the rush, you may be able to get a grip on yourself... be able to act, if you know what I mean. You know what I'm driving at... From the time you wake up until the moment you go to bed it's all a lie, all a sham and a swindle. Everybody knows it, and everybody collaborates in the perpetuation of the hoax. That's why we look so god-damned disgusting to one another. That's why it's so easy to trump up a war, or a pogrom, or a vice crusade, or any damned thing you like. It's always easier to give in, to bash somebody's puss in, because what we all pray for is to get done in, but done in proper and no come back. If we could still believe in a God, we'd make him a God of Vengeance. We'd surrender to him with a full heart the task of cleaning things up. It's too late for us to pretend to clean up the mess. We're in it up to the eyes. We don't want a new world... we want an end to the mess we've made. At sixteen you can believe in a new world... you can believe anything, in fact... but at twenty you're doomed, and you know it. At twenty you're well in harness, and the most you can hope for is to
get off with arms and legs intact. It isn't a question of fading hope... Hope is a baneful sign; it means impotence. Courage is no use either: everybody can muster courage—for the wrong thing.
I don't know what to say—unless I use a word like vision. And by that I don't mean a projected picture of the future, of some imagined ideal made real. I mean something more flexible, more constant—a permanent super-sight, as it were... something like a third eye. We had it once. There was a sort of clairvoyance which was natural and common to all men. Then came the mind, and that eye which permitted us to see whole and round and beyond was absorbed by the brain, and we became conscious of the world, and of one another, in a new way. Our pretty little egos came into bloom: we became self-conscious, and with that came conceit, arrogance, blindness, a blindness such as was never known before, not even by the blind.»
«Where do you get these ideas?» said Rebecca suddenly. «Or are you making it up on the spur of the moment? Wait a minute... I want you to tell me something. Do you ever put your thoughts down on paper? What do you write about anyway? You've never showed me a thing. I haven't the least idea what you're doing.»
«Oh that,» I said, «it's just as well you haven't read anything. I haven't said anything yet. I can't seem to get started. I don't know what the hell to put down first, there's so much to say.»
«But do you write the way you talk? That's what I want to know.»
«I don't think so,» I said, blushing. «I don't know anything about writing yet. I'm too self-conscious, I guess.»
«You shouldn't be,» said Rebecca. «You're not self-conscious when you talk, and you don't act self-consciously either.»
«Rebecca,» I said, proceeding slowly and deliberately, «if I really knew what I was capable of I wouldn't be sitting here talking to you. I feel sometimes as though I'm going to burst. I really don't give a damn about the misery of the world. I take it for granted. What I want is to open up. I want to know what's inside me. I want everybody to open up. I'm like an imbecile with a can-opener in his hand, wondering where to begin—to open up the earth. I know that underneath the mess everything is marvelous. I'm sure of it. I know it because I feel so marvelous myself most of the time. And when I feel that way everybody seems marvelous... everybody and everything... even pebbles and pieces of cardboard... a match stick lying in the gutter... anything... a goat's beard, if you like. That's what I want to write about—but I don't know how... I don't know where to begin. Maybe it's too personal. Maybe it would sound like sheer rubbish... You see, to me it seems as though the artists, the scientists, the philosophers were grinding lenses. It's all a grand preparation for something that never conies off. Some day the lens is going to be perfect and then we're all going to see clearly, see what a staggering, wonderful, beautiful world it is. But in the meantime we go without glasses, so to speak. We blunder about like myopic, blinking idiots. We don't see what is under our nose because we're so intent on seeing the stars, or what lies beyond the stars. We're trying to see with the mind, but the mind sees only what it's told to see. The mind can't open wide its eyes and look just for the pleasure of looking. Haven't you ever noticed that when you stop looking, when you don't try to see, vow suddenly see? What is it you see? Who is it that sees? Why is it all so different —so marvelously different—in such moments? And which is more real, that kind of vision or the other? You see what I mean.... When you have an inspiration your mind takes a vacation; you turn it over to some one else, some invisible, unknowable power which takes possession of you, as we so aptly say. What the hell does that mean—if it makes sense at all? What happens when the machinery of the mind slows down, , or comes to a standstill? Whatever or however you I choose to look upon it, this other modus operandi is I of another order. The machine runs perfectly, but its object and purpose seem purely gratuitous. It makes another kind of sense... grand sense, if you accept it unquestioningly, and nonsense—or not nonsense, but madness—it you try to examine into it with the other machinery... Jesus, I guess I'm getting off the track.»