James Salter - Light Years

“Yes, of course I remember.”

She was placing things on the table, cheese, hard Italian sausage, wine.

“Do you have any beer?” he asked. “I’ll just have a glass of beer. Where’s Viri?”

“He’ll be home in a little while.”

“He’s the one who should be hearing this.”

“I doubt it would do him much good.”

That night he asked Jivan, “You have a car?”

“A car? Yes,” Jivan said. He had been invited to come and play poker. They were all at the table, red and blue chips piled before them, the cards being shuffled. “I have a Fiat.”

“Ante up five cents,” Nedra’s father said. He tapped the table in front of him with an index finger solid as a peg. The Camels were near at hand. He dealt shakily. “A jack,” he said. “A five. A seven. Another seven. A Fiat, eh? Why don’t you get a Chevrolet?”

“Chevrolet is a good car,” Jivan admitted.

“It sure is. It’s a better car worn out than that one of yours is new.”

“You think so?”

“I know so. It’s your bet, Yvonne.”

“Yes, let’s play,” Nedra said, “I feel lucky.”

“She likes to win,” her father said.

“I love to win,” she smiled.

A friendly game in the warmth of the kitchen. How carefully she arranged things for him, how thoughtful she was. This coughing salesman who was her father, she accepted him wholeheartedly. He asked nothing of her other than an occasional welcome. He never outstayed it. He wrote no letters, his life was passed in an automobile going from customer to customer, in bars where women slurred their speech, in the house from which Nedra had escaped years before, a house in which one could not imagine her: ancient furniture, a shade on the back door. A house without books, without curtains, the basement smelling of coal dust. Here she grew, day by day, a child who even at sixteen gave no hint of what she was about to become, till suddenly in one summer she shed it all and disappeared. In her place was a young woman who had inherited nothing, in whom everything was unique, as if she were a message or the bearer of one, numinous, composed, not a blemish on her body, not a flaw.

“Is that really your father?” Jivan murmured.

She did not answer. Her forearms were on the floor, she was speechless, unseeing. The rug was biting her elbows, her bare knees. He was kneeling behind her. He did nothing. With a grave, an atrocious slowness he was waiting, like a functionary, like a man who will toll a bell. He listened to far-off traffic, she could sense his dedication, his calm.

“He isn’t really?”

“Yes.”

It touched her. The word was drowned by her breath. She wept. It was like a snake swallowing a frog, slowly, imperceptibly. Her life was ending without struggle, without movement, only rare, involuntary spasms like helpless sighs. His voice seemed to wash over her as if in a dream, “I find that incredible.”

She said nothing. It was not finished, it was still being done. She was like a strangled woman. Her forehead was pressed to the rug.

“You’re very devoted to him. Speak to me.”

“Yes.”

“I love to hear your voice.”

She had to swallow first. “Yes.”

She was wearing the bracelet he had given her of deep violet stones. She wore it amid three gold bands. One could hear it when she moved, a faint, a sensual sound that declared her as his possession, even as he sat with her husband and heard her in the kitchen or in his absence she turned the pages of a magazine.

“I found a recipe,” he said. “Shall I read it to you?”

She could hear pages being turned.

“Rillettes d’Oie,” he said. “Am I saying it right?”

She did not reply.

“Remove the skin from the goose and cut the meat away from the bones.”

She was weak, fainting.

“Reserve some of the fat for the roasting pan.” His mouth watered for her. He could taste her flesh.

They had begun the unending journey, forward a bit, then back. The book had dropped to the floor, he was seizing her arms, her shoulders. She was moaning. She had forgotten him, her body was writhing, clenching like a fist.

In the stillness that followed, he said, “Nedra.”

She did not answer. A long silence.

“Do you know the story of the Arendts?”

“The Arendts?”

“He owned this store. I bought it from him.”

“The young man.”

“He’s an antique dealer.”

“Oh, yes.”

“His father was a sculptor.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“I have some of his things. I found them in back.”

They were two small pieces, one a horse, the metal etched like Assyrian mail.

“Do you like it?” he asked.

She was holding it in the air, over her face.

“This one too,” he said.

Her hands were weak, she could hardly hold it.

“He had talent, didn’t he?” Jivan asked. “His wife was a fabulous woman. Her name was Niiva.”

“Niiva.”

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it? They were famous, the two of them. She was very attractive, everyone liked her. She was passionate and strong, and he was very nice but something was missing. They had a house in France, in the South, beautiful books, they knew all the famous people of the thirties. But she was a mare, you see, and he was a goat—no, not a goat but a donkey, a nice, patient donkey.

“The result is the son. You’ve seen him; he’s like his father, weak. He has some of the books, they’re inscribed by the authors, and hundreds of clippings. The father finally left them and she began to drink. She didn’t take care of the house. There were bottles piled everywhere. Finally she died.”

“How?”

“She fell down the stairs. You know why I’m telling you this?”

“I’m not sure.” She gazed again at the small bronze horse.

“You know. Look,” he said suddenly, “I want to show you something. I’m a little tired at the moment, you understand that.”

He picked up the telephone book. It was the county book, as thick as one’s thumb. He took it in his teeth and, the muscles jumping in his neck and arm, began to tear it, slowly, steadily, between teeth and one hand, in two.

“You see?” he said.

“Yes. I know you’re strong. I know,” she said.

She received a letter from her father written on small sheets of lined paper. It thanked her for the three days he had spent there. He had caught a cold on the way home. He had made good time, though, even better than on the trip up. She was a good poker player; she must have inherited it. There are no real friends, he warned.

SUMMER AT AMAGANSETT. SHE was thirty-four. She lay in the dunes, in the dry grass. Her hand was marked in black, each finger divided in three parts, the thumb in two, the palm in quarters like a folded letter. At the base of her fingers she had circled the mounts, Jupiter, Saturn and Mercury, and colored the palm lines in red. She was deep in study, the chart beside her, entranced. Beneath, on the beach, her children played.

She was silent, an outcast, invisible except from the sea. Her body was dark brown. Her hidden breasts were pale, there was a thin band of white around her hips, a band no wider than a tie. Her eyes were clear, her mouth colorless; she was at peace. She had lost her desire to be the most beautiful woman at parties, to know celebrated people, to shock. The sun warmed her legs, her shoulders, her hair. She was not afraid of solitude; she was not afraid of growing old.

She stayed for hours. The sun reached its zenith, the cries of children faded, the sea became tin. The beach was never empty. It was wide, endless, there were always figures on it, distant, like nomads’ camps. She saw wealth in her hand; she saw a prodigious final third of life. Three clear rings, of thirty years apiece, circled her wrist; she would live to be ninety. She had lost her interest in marriage. There was nothing else to say. It was a prison.