Paul Theroux - My Secret History

“You don’t need them,” she said. “You’ve got me.”

I wondered what she meant by that. Why was I here? It seemed the most inconvenient place to have a meal. You ordered a drink and waited twenty minutes. You ordered food and a half an hour later you were still waiting.

She said, “What sort of people stay here, do you think?”

She seemed to be genuinely wondering.

“People from out of town,” I said. “Society people.”

“Oh, society people,” she said, and made a disapproving noise in her throat. “Have you been reading the papers?”

I said no, I never read the newspaper. I was too busy with books.

“The scandal about that so-called debutante — Olivia Harrison? The one who was jilted by that Brazilian? The one they just locked up? Know what they locked her up for?”

I didn’t know what she was talking about.

“After the greaseball jilted her for another so-called deb, she went to Brazil — just got onto a plane and flew there. She saw the guy and shot him dead. But she wasn’t finished with him. She cut his penis off and took it back to Boston in a box, and gave it to his new girlfriend.” Mrs. Mamalujian took a sip of her drink. “Society people.”

The food came on a wheel-in table. There was an upside-down silver bowl over my hamburger and Mrs. Mamalujian’s crab salad was in a dish balanced on cracked ice.

“I’m really impressed that you’re reading Moby Dick.”

“I’m rereading it.”

“Any particular reason?”

She put her fork down and wiped her mouth carefully so that she wouldn’t smudge her lipstick. Was she through after two mouthfuls?

I was too embarrassed to tell her how I imagined eating whale steaks and reading her passages from the chapters “Stubb’s Supper” and “The Whale as a Dish.” I wanted to eat whale, so that I could say that whale was my favorite meat.

“You’ve finished your hamburger,” she said. “I wish I had your appetite. Can you eat any of my salad?”

I ate all the crab salad, and all the rolls, and even chewed the thin slices of orange and the sprigs of parsley that decorated the plate. But I had only drunk one Grasshopper.

Mrs. Mamalujian had finished her gins. She took a small gin bottle out of her bag and said, “Be prepared,” and poured herself another drink.

“You’re a great reader, aren’t you?” she said, raising her glass.

“I guess so.”

“But you can get lost in books. Remember you once told me you were writing a play set in a department store — something about a notions counter?”

I nodded, too humiliated to speak, hearing the thing described to me. I had said that in order to keep what I was really trying to write a secret.

She said, “I got so sad thinking of you indoors staring at a blank piece of white paper on a beautiful summer day.”

That was exactly what I loved doing.

She was too drunk to notice that I hadn’t said anything.

“I love books, but sometimes you have to put them down and go into the next room. Art is wonderful, but — you know what’s in the next room?”

I said I didn’t know.

“Life,” she said.

The first time I heard that I was deeply impressed: it was an experienced woman’s wisdom.

She said, “You’re very bad — you’re making me drink too much!”

“Isn’t it supposed to be healthy?”

“It has a nice clean taste,” she said. “That’s why I like gin.” She plopped a little more gin into her glass. “Moby Dick,” she said, and giggled.

She still wore her hat. She stood up unsteadily and sat down beside me on the sofa. I wondered whether anyone would find her attractive — her face was somewhat lined, probably more from sitting in the sun than from old age. She was big-breasted and had skinny legs and her high heels made her seem tall. She was well-dressed — the sort of woman who had her picture taken: an important man’s wife.

“I bet you have a fur coat,” I said.

“I have three fur coats.” she said. “What a thing to say on a hot summer day! You’re a scream.”

She became very quiet and nodded a little: I had the impression that time was passing very quickly for her, though it was passing very slowly for me.

She said, “Sometimes you have to put your books down.”

I finished the thought in my head and this second time it sounded corny.

“Look at the time,” she said, putting one eye against the dial of her watch. “I’m too drunk to go home. I’ll have to take a shower.”

She plumped her hand on my knee, and then my shoulder, struggling to her feet.

“Excuse me,” she said.

“I don’t mind.”

“I’m just going to get into the shower.” She tottered a little as she made for the bedroom.

I didn’t know what to say.

“I’ll be in the next room.”

“That’s all right,” I said.

She went into the bedroom, leaving doors open and talking to herself, repeating things, sort of narrating what she was doing. “Right in here … Pull the drapes … Put my bag down …” In a muffled and straining voice she said, “Get these clothes off.”

After a while I heard water running very loudly. The bathroom door was open. I heard the hiss and crackle of the shower curtain being hit by spray.

I picked up Moby Dick .

That mortal man shall feed upon the creature that feeds his lamp, and, like Stubb, eat him by his own light, as you might say; this seems so outlandish a thing that one must needs go a little into the history and philosophy of it .

I read on and became so absorbed in it, and in the subsequent chapters, that I was startled when I heard “Have you seen my dress?” Mrs. Mamalujian was standing over me, very wet, and dripping, and wrapped in a small towel.

Fear made me jump up and find her dress in the next room.

“My eyes are terrible,” she said. “I can’t tell whether you’ve got your clothes on or not.”

“They’re on,” I said.

It was four o’clock. I had been reading for half an hour or more. When Mrs. Mamalujian dried off and got dressed and put on her lipstick, it was after four-thirty.

She said, “Will you do me a very big favor?”

I was afraid to say yes, but I managed it.

“I have to go home now, but I want you to pay for the room.”

She paused, making me choke for a moment at the thought of my paying for the room with the three dollars I had in my pocket.

“I’ll give you the money.” She took out crushed and crumpled bills, not seeming to count them. “That should be enough,” she said, adding another one to the pile.

It was over a hundred dollars.

“If there’s any left, you can keep it. Buy some books.” She kissed me. “I have this feeling you never want to see me anymore.”

“No,” I said. “I had a good time. Really.”

She smiled and kissed me again, and her lips moved as though she were speaking to me.

“You don’t have to go home,” she said. “Sit here. Stay as long as you like. Stay overnight. I can think about you sitting here, reading — what?”

“Moby Dick.”

She laughed in her deep-throated way. “That title kills me!”

“It’s the whale,” I said.

Then she left, mumbling a little. I read a few pages, and put the book down. I couldn’t read. I went into the other room — her smell was here, of perfume and clothes, and the shampoo or soap. The bathroom was unpleasantly wet and the towels soggy. The bed was the biggest, the widest, I had ever seen.

I picked up the telephone and called Lucy.

“Darling,” she said.

“I’m sorry I’m so late in calling you.”

“I don’t mind,” she said. “I knew you’d call.”