Clean up the kitchen
And scrub up the floor.
Scrub up the bar
And the corridor.
Dust the tables and then the chairs.
Spigots and taps must glisten bright!
Polish good, Sonya, up and downstairs.
Bedrooms, bathrooms, and kitchen don’t shirk—
Hard-working girls aren’t afraid of work,
Uncle Volrab’s work instructions set to rhyme contained 52 verses, and the poet persisted in adding additional lines.
Making up the rooms is the finest hour of the day. From the corridor with a pail, mop, and two rags, Sonya would climb the staircase up to the second floor. A broad hallway goes up the middle of the second floor; on the left it ends with a window that looks out on the backyard, on the right it ends with the white door of the largest and most luxurious room, No. 1, which Volrab called the BRIDAL SUITE (although nothing “bridal” had ever taken place in it: room No. 1 had remained permanently without occupants).
From the staircase, the left side of the corridor appears very short, with the two cream-colored doors of the bathroom and the WC, and then just the window. On the right side are rooms Nos. 6 and 5 (with windows facing the courtyard), opposite them the three cream-colored doors of rooms Nos. 4, 3, and 2 (with windows facing the street), the last of which adjoins the Bridal Suite.
Volrab’s instructional ballad makes cleaning the WC the first assignment. (“—so you can have the nasty part taken care of right up front!”).
To wash the toilet nicely,
The handle polish too,
First raise the lid precisely.
What can a girl do, whose father, unfinished gymnasium, and student love affairs have in seventeen years taught her nothing but a few French, Russian, and Latin phrases, to sing, to dance, to play the piano and the harp, to make light cheese pastries to be eaten with wine, to ride a horse, Ovid and Anna Karenina, to embroider silk stretched tight on a tambourine and French kissing, to polish old silver and make flower arrangements, to stop nose bleeds and greet customers in the entryway, to change a record or a diaper, E=mc2 and to iron a shirt by spreading it out both ways over the ironing board, the powers that drive history, to teach children to speak, to behave as required, patiently or aggressively, to tend a sick person, to smile prettily at and listen to men?
But then Father died when I was barely seventeen (my mother even earlier), leaving our beautiful villa, but along with it nothing but debts, and of course the dental center needs the villa more than me, and so I am most grateful to Uncle and Auntie for my high bed with its sardines, where I’m warm and don’t go hungry, for all this I give my all (the very first day, Uncle Volrab took my suitcase just because it appealed to him), I can always get married even without the villa and without my father, the famous surgeon, and of course without the suitcase, only I’m sorry I didn’t finish gymnasium, and there are too many verses in Volrab’s poem:
Grease its joints with vaseline,
So it won’t squeak anymore—
Scrub the porcelain with Super-Clean.
Bathrooms, toilets, and kitchen don’t shirk—
Hard-working girls aren’t afraid of work,
And dance around it as if in crinoline.
Ahead of her schedule, Sonya locked herself in the bathroom. She had three wonderful times each day: her nightly reading, cleaning the bathroom, and—for the last two months—cleaning room No. 5.
Before the water had filled the tub, Sonya carefully hung up her dress (since Monday the one made of green silk) on the bakelite hook on the wall and examined herself critically in the mirror. I’m not exactly awful-looking and that for women is always extremely important, that’s what we told one another when, day before yesterday, we last talked to Jarunka Slana (she always took a bath here before going to see Ruda Mach), we’re a lot like one another, as all young girls are a lot alike, only what I do with what I have is somehow more provocative—I suppose more conspicuous and more to the point—and for that reason less proper (I don’t really care, but Jaruna does envy me), and I have an unpleasant suspicion that this will bring me a great deal of trouble— (but perhaps not only trouble—). But there’s no question that I have better skin than Jaruna’s (it’s because Grandmother rubbed the foam from fresh milk on my face) and Jaruna has thousands of freckles on her face (I don’t have a single one). And that’s why men are so interested in me (I’m interested in them too), only I won’t settle for just anyone. Because I want nothing less than the IDEAL MAN.
Refreshed, happy, in good cheer from the ice-cold water, with her pail and her broom Sonya danced down the hall past the window and slipped right into the cream-colored door No. 4 opposite:
Hard-working girls are beloved by the Lord—
They start with No. 4 for their reward.
With the exception of the Honeymoon Suite, all the rooms in the Hubertus were exactly the same, each one had the same double bed and wardrobe, a night table, and an identical chair with an identical table covered with a lace tablecloth (Volrabka enthuses about beauty) and on it an earthenware bowl (Volrabka bought them by the dozen from a traveling salesman so she could get the thirteenth free, those not used were stored away in the kitchen under Sonya’s bed) and on the identical washbasin a mirror.
From the point of view of cleaning up, No. 4, Jakub Jagr’s room, would have seemed ideal: there was nothing in it to clean up. The only evidence that anyone lived here was his toothpaste and toothbrush—she was not allowed to open wardrobes or drawers—who would have guessed that such an orderly young man, who polishes his shoes like a mirror every day and goes to bed every night precisely at nine, would break into the kitchen to declare his love and attack me so that the poor orphan had to take refuge in her guardians’ room — but still that was more amusing than reading Armand Lanoux with my flashlight under the covers.
So Jakub loves me and he’s a quite acceptable young man, quite good-looking with his straw-colored hair, blue eyes, rosy girlish skin, and athletic figure … but to clean up his room is nothing short of a horror story or detective novel:
For starters, he leaves four boobytrapped hundred-notes in a drawer, and then letters sprinkled with salt (to see if I’m reading them. I always read them—nothing interesting—and I sprinkle salt back on the top envelope), there’s candy in a bag that’s clearly been counted (there are always exactly eight pieces!) and he likes to mark the wardrobe door and the suitcase (nothing interesting inside) with a hair. Only his hair is quite shiny.
With the tip of her tongue and much delight, Sonya removed Jakub’s shiny hair from the wardrobe door and expertly investigated the closet: this time he’s brought white shirts, not only that, but six of them! That’s on my account. And those fancy red silk trunks are also new — you can see that by the price-tag from the store, good God, how he has planned his campaign against me! Otherwise nothing interesting.
Carefully Sonya examined Jakub’s suitcase and found a shiny hair attached, this time on the side. Sneaky! In the suitcase a pile of magazines with questionnaires and tests which were intended to show if HE and SHE would make a happy couple. In the left pouch questionnaires that have already been filled in (Jakub brought them to the bar and Sonya had to fill them in while she was serving customers) and in the margins in four colors of pencil, Jakub’s countless subtotals, glosses, marginalia, exclamations, queries, and diagrams. In the right pouch questionnaires and tests newly prepared for further interrogation of Sonya (nothing interesting).
But what is it that Mr. Jagr has arranged for me next, the test claims, TELL US WHAT MAKES YOU LAUGH AND WE’LL TELL YOU WHO YOU ARE. For instance, joke No. E2: Relaxed and enjoying himself, a young man is smoking a cigarette in bed. Beside him his girlfriend is lost in reverie. “You know what,” she says, “we ought to think about getting married, don’t you agree?” The young man: “You’re right, dear, but who would marry either of us?” Sonya laughed at this (4 points), banged the suitcase shut, replaced
the hair on the side of the suitcase, and turned to read the white sheet of paper that had been placed on the end table.
I LOVE YOU AND WANT TO MARRY YOU.
J. J.
Sonya closed her eyes halfway and walked slowly toward the mirror, she stood in front of it for a while and smiled prettily at herself:
Sonya Jagrova—
— — “Good day, Mrs. Jagrova. How are the children?”
You know, as long as they’re healthy.”
— — “…we’ve always considered you a member of our family, Sonya, as our very own daughter!”
“Yes, Mr. Jagr. Yes, Mrs. Jagrova.”
— — “It’s nine o’clock already — throw that novel away—”
“Yes, Jakub. Yes, dear. Yes—”
Sonya breathed on the mirror and rubbed it with a dry rag, she rinsed out Jakub’s cup, he can keep his Kamila—the one you call “My beloved” in your letters, and she calls you “Darling,” she washed Jakub’s washbasin (already painstakingly washed), I won’t surrender my virginity to you, Engineer Jagr.
A careful chambermaid never stops,
And after No. 4 to No. 3 she hops.
Room No. 3 was like a pigsty, with suitcases open on the floor and clothing tossed about, on the table mushrooms were drying and on the chair three shoes and across its arm one suspender — in bed on an enormous pile of all sorts of bedding (they even required three extra blankets!) Beda Balada (an intellectual from Usti) was lounging in striped pajamas, reading a thick tome and munching on cherries (he spat the pits on the floor).
“Just listen, Sonya, what the philosopher Yang-chu had to say about life,” Beda called enthusiastically, and already he was reading: “Half of time is taken up by childhood and senility. Almost half of the half that’s left man sleeps away all night and dozes away all day. Almost half of what’s left is squandered on illness, pain, and sorrow. I don’t believe that from what is left you could find a whole hour of complete satisfaction. So what’s life for?” Beda stuck two cherries in his mouth and repeated gloomily: “So what’s life for?” And contemptuously he spat both pits on the floor.
“If you don’t get out of bed, I can’t clean up your room.”
“Leave it the way it is. Why disturb the natural flow of things…?”
“If you really don’t want the room cleaned—”
“Throw away that rag and open up your soul. Only Buddha, the Light of Truth, can lead you to the infinite ocean of divinity which we call Atma. Buddha dozes in your body unutilized,” Beda leaped agilely out of bed and placed his big white right hand on Sonya’s shoulder, “if he is supported by the will, he will release the divine force of Kundalini, which dozes in the form of a coiled serpent at the lower end of the spine — you, Sonya, have it somewhere around—”
With her wet rag Sonya pushed the scholar’s groping hand away and, laughing, ran out into the hall.
Room No. 2 had been rented for the entire year to Engineer Ziki Holy, this gentleman could obviously afford to pay twenty-two crowns a day for his room even though he came here only a few times in summer and in winter just for the weekend — this gentleman had shown his true colors when I brought him his tea yesterday at five … he was wearing a robe and that’s it.
But Mister Ziki adapted extremely well to the Hubertus dearth. With pleasure Sonya strode on the soft purple carpet made of sheepskins (Ziki had brought it from home, of course), carefully dusted the remarkable gong made of beaten metal (once at night it resounded through the entire hotel), and couldn’t restrain herself from fondling Ziki’s ostentatious playthings: the set of silver goblets in a travel case of black leather and red silk, costly chased vials—on the shelf beneath the mirror a whole perfume shop—on the table in blue leather a large manicure set with golden scissors, on the window sill a travel mirror with a leather calendar and an array of bottles with wine labels like fairy-tale banknotes, he even has his own special sugar, carved cubes shaped like the four card suits in red and blue, in the wardrobe a lot of wonderful sparkling things in cases—all leather—and on a pile of elegant shirts made of natural chocolate-brown silk there lay, like a coiled serpent, a woven whip made of painfully yellow leather.
With horror Sonya banged shut the door of the wardrobe, she quickly finished her cleaning, but once again, trembling, she opened the wardrobe; the end of the frightful sulfur-yellow object seemed slightly darkened, as if worn—
The preceding weekend his wife Aja Hola had slept here, she liked to sleep till noon and could even sleep the whole day through, that beautiful suntanned woman with intense black eyes. “Pour me a little from that bell-shaped bottle and come drink with me—” he told me that past Sunday. Ziki has bright gray eyes like the ash of a fine cigarette, but yesterday they suddenly turned yellow and began to burn. If I have to serve him tea again, I’ll call on Mr. Ruda Mach … But what if Mr. Mach goes away?
On the table a cream-colored envelope marked SONYA. Inside three hundred crowns and Zikmund Holy’s card, on the back of the card: “100 crowns for Room No. 5, the rest for you. A room in Usti is reserved for you until 7/15. Z.”
Sonya helped herself to the two hundred crowns (curious that after two years without a single crown I’ve suddenly got some money: yesterday five crowns and today two hundred already) and she shoved them into her bra.
Then she closed her eyes halfway and walked slowly toward the mirror, she stood silently in front of it for a while, and (with a facetious look at the crystal and the golden bottles of Paris perfume) she smiled prettily at herself:
Engineer Ziki’s newest flame—
— — “Miss, do you wish to take the one with pearls or the one with emeralds?”
“Wrap them both up and send me the bill.”
— — “Sir, your room is No. 105. And yours, Madam, is No. 106. I am your obedient servant, and I wish you a good night.”
“Send a bottle of bubbly up to 106. Very dry. And a masseur at eleven in the morning.”
— — “You’re leaving this evening. Your suitcase is at the station. And that cream-colored envelope on the desk is for you.”
“Yes, sir. You’ve been most kind to me, sir.”
Sonya breathed on the mirror and rubbed it with a dry rag, she rinsed out Ziki’s cup, I don’t want to have anything to do with you, Mister Ziki, you horrify me, she cleaned his washbasin and with the tip of her rag she danced over the bottles: I will not surrender my virginity to you, sir.
Sonya crossed the corridor diagonally, in the direction of the stairs, and stopped in front of room No. 6 (no key for it). Inside, the voice of Ph.Dr. Berka (raised an octave): “If you don’t stop that I’ll get up and let you have it—” and simultaneously the voice of Ph.Dr. Berkova (raised two octaves): “If you keep driving me crazy, I’ll get up and turn you into a slobbering little wretch—”
Sonya turned the handle (locked), knocked loudly, and called: “Shall I make the room up now?!”
“For God’s sake, let us sleep some more,” and “For God’s sake, is it morning already? Get out or I’ll shoot you!” the married Ph.D.’s. raised their voices simultaneously. OK, they can clean up after themselves for all I care. Cleaning up after them is like trying to bind sand into bundles.
Sonya smoothed her hair down over her temples and, holding her breath, entered Room No. 5.
There was a special scent here—not of perfume and leather as in Ziki’s room, and certainly not of boot polish and soap as in Jakub’s—it comes from the rumpled bed, fleeting as the odor of all his things, there is a strong odor of leather, but of skin as well … and instead of perfumed soap, there is something in it like what wafts up from a cold stream of water. And of course the smell of tobacco (that most of all), but also something like fresh hay, and something from a stable … perhaps a horse’s mane? And the smoky smell of a campsite and something like the sun beating down on felled young pine trees. Definitely the smell of grass — no, it’s blueberries! And of burning leaves. . . And then something metallic, th
e way old polished brass would smell. And of blood … And a thousand more things can be smelled here, and the whole effect is a rich cranberry tart, a total mystery. That special smell in here is the smell of a man.
Sonya picked up object after object and they lingered in her hands before she put them carefully back in places she herself had chosen for them, here in Mr. Ruda Mach’s room I don’t give a damn about Uncle Volrab’s verses and I arrange the inside of the wardrobe every day (Mr. Mach doesn’t stick his hairs on the wardrobe door, but then he doesn’t have anything in it that wouldn’t be nice to pick up and stroke), in fact poor Mr. Mach doesn’t have much of anything.
A handsome dark suit on a hanger marked HOTEL SUVOROV.
Two torn shirts of checkered flannel (one green and yellow and the other gray and blue — I prefer the latter).
Two handsome white shirts.
A black leather tie mounted on rubber.
Four Sonyas Page 5