Mavis Gallant - The Cost of Living - Early and Uncollected Stories

“I don’t feel that way, I’m sorry.” Jim brought out the useful answer. In his dismay he turned the book over and hid the author’s face. He was sparing Ahmed now at the expense of the unknown writer; but the writer was only a photograph, and he looked an imbecile with that pipe.

Ahmed’s attitudes were not acquired, like Jim’s. They were as much part of him as his ears. He expected intellectual posturing from men but detested clever women. He judged women by merciless, frivolous, secret rules. First, a girl must never be plain.

Veronica was not an intellectual, nor was she plain. She moved like a young snake; like a swan. She put a new pot of coffee down upon the table. She started the same record again, the same coffee-grinder sound. She stretched her arms, sighing, in a bored, frantic gesture. He saw the rents in the dressing gown when she lifted her arms. He could have given her more than Jim; she was not even close to the things she wanted.

Jim knew Ahmed was looking at Veronica. He wondered if he would mind if Ahmed fell in love with her. She was not Jim’s; she was free. He had told her so again and again, but it made her cry, and he stopped saying it. He had imagined her free and proud, but when he said “You’re free” she just cried. Would the fact that Ahmed was his friend, and a North African, mean a betrayal? It was a useless exercise, as pointless as pacing a room, but it was the kind of problem he exercised his brain with. He thought back and forth for a minute: How would I feel? Hurt? Shocked?

In less than the minute it was played out. Ahmed looked at Veronica and thought she was not worth a quarrel with his friend. “ Pas pour une femme ,” Sartre had said. Jim was too active in his private debate to notice Ahmed’s interest withdrawn. Ahmed’s look and its meaning were felt only by the girl. She turned to the window, with her back to the room. Suffering miserably, humiliated, she pressed her hands on the glass. The men had forgotten her. They laughed, as if Ahmed’s near betrayal had made them closer friends. Jim poured his friend’s coffee and pushed the sugar toward him. She saw the movement in the black glass.

She knew that Jim’s being an American and Ahmed a North African made their friendship unusual, but that was apart. She didn’t care about politics and color. They had nothing to do with her life. No, the difficulty for Veronica was always the same: when a man was alone he wanted her, but when there were two men she was in the way. The admiration of men, when she was the center of attention, could not make up for their indifference when they had something to say to each other. She resented the indifference more than any amount of notice taken of another woman. She could have made pudding of a rival girl.

“The little things are so awful,” said Jim. “Look, I was on the ninety-five bus. The bus stopped because they were changing drivers. There were two Algerians, and without even turning around to see why the bus stopped where it shouldn’t, they pulled out their identity papers to show the police. It’s automatic. Something unusual — the police.”

“It is nearly finished,” said Ahmed.

“Do you think so? That part?”

In one of the Sunday papers there was a new way of doing horoscopes. It was complicated and you needed a mathematician’s brain, but anything was better than standing before the window with nothing to see. She found a pencil and sat down on the floor. I was born in ’43 and Jim in ’36. We’re both the same month. That makes ten points in common. No, the ten points count against you.

“Ahmed, when were you born?”

“I am a Lion, a Leo, of the year 1939,” Ahmed said.

“It’ll take a minute to work out.”

Presently she straightened up with the paper in her hand and said, “I can’t work it out. Ahmed, you’re going to travel. Princess Margaret’s a Leo and she’s going to travel. It must be the same thing.”

That made them laugh, and they looked at her. When they looked, she felt brave again. She stood over them, as if she were one of them. “I can’t tell if I’m going to have twins or have rheumatism,” she said. “I’m given both. Actually, I think I’ll travel. I’ve got to think of my future, as Jim says. I don’t think Paris is the right place. Summer might be the time to move on. Somewhere like the Riviera.”

“What would you do there?” said Ahmed.

“Sell magazine subscriptions,” she said, smiling. “Do you know I used to sell the Herald Tribune ? I really and truly did. I wore one of those ghastly sweaters they make you wear. If I sold something like a hundred and ninety-nine, I could pay for my hotel room. That was before I met Jim. I had to keep walking with the papers because of the law. If you stand still on a street with a pile of newspapers in your arms, you’re what’s called a kiosk, and you need a special permit. Now I sell magazine subscriptions and I can walk or stand still, just as I choose.”

“I’ve never seen you,” said Ahmed.

“She makes a fortune,” said Jim. “No one refuses. It’s her face.”

“I’m not around where you are,” said Veronica to Ahmed. “I’m around the Madeleine, where the tourists go.”

“I’ll come and see you there,” said Ahmed. “I’d like to see you selling magazine subscriptions to tourists around the Madeleine.”

“I earn enough for my clothes,” said Veronica. “Jim needn’t dress me.”

She could not keep off her private grievances. As soon as his friend was attacked, Ahmed turned away. He looked at the books on the shelf over the table where Jim did his thinking and reading. Jim was mute with unhappiness. He tried to remember the beginning. Had either of them said a word about clothes?

She could go on standing there, holding the newspaper and the futures she had been unable to work out. There must be something she could do. In the kitchen, the washing up? The bedroom? She could dress. In the silence she had caused, she thought of questions she might ask. “Ahmed, are you the same as those Algerians in the café?” “Am I any better than that girl?”

They began to talk when Veronica was in the bedroom. Their voices were different. They were glad she was away. She knew it. Veronica thought she heard her name. They wanted her to be someone else. They didn’t deserve her as she was. They wanted Brigitte Bardot and Joan of Arc. They want everything, she said to herself. In the bedroom there was nothing but a double bed and pictures of ballet dancers someone had left tacked to the walls.

She returned to them, dressed in a gray skirt and sweater and high-heeled black shoes. She had put her hair up in a neat plait, and her fringe was brushed out so that it nearly touched her eyelashes.

Jim was in the kitchen. He had closed the door. She heard him pulling the ladder about. He kept books and papers on the top shelf of the kitchen cupboard. She sat down in his chair, primly, and folded her hands.

“You are well dressed these days,” said Ahmed, as if their conversation had never stopped.

“I’m not what you think,” she said. “You know that. I said ‘around the Madeleine’ for a joke. I sometimes take things. That’s all.”

“What things? Money?” He looked at her without moving. His long womanish hands were often idle.

“Where would I ever see money? Not here. He doesn’t leave it around. Nobody does, for that matter. I take little things, in the shops. Clothes, and little things. Once a jar of caviar for Jim, but he didn’t want it.”

“You’ll get into trouble,” Ahmed said.

“It’s all here, all safe,” said Jim, coming back, smiling. “I’m like an old maid, you know, and I hate keeping money in the house, especially an amount like this.”