Vladimir Nabokov - Mary

‘And we’ll buy you some more drops. Would you like to move over into my bed?’

‘No, I’ll sit here a while and then go back to my room. It’s gone now. And tomorrow morning —’

‘Let’s put it off until Friday,’ said Ganin. ‘The visa won’t run away.’

Podtyagin licked his dried lips with his thick, rough tongue. ‘They’ve been waiting for me in Paris for a long time, Lyovushka. And my niece hasn’t got the money to send me any for the journey. Oh, dear!’

Ganin sat on the window ledge (in a flash he wondered where it was that he had sat like this not long ago — and in a flash he remembered: the stained-glass interior of the pavilion, the white folding table, the hole in his sock).

‘Please put the light out, my dear fellow,’ Podtyagin asked him. ‘It hurts my eyes.’

Everything seemed strange in the semidarkness: the noise of the first trains, the large, gray ghost in the armchair, the gleam of water spilled on the floor. And it was all much more mysterious and vague than the deathless reality in which Ganin was living.

It was morning and Kolin was making tea for Gornotsvetov. On that day, Thursday, Gornotsvetov had to leave town early in order to see a ballerina who was engaging a troupe. Everyone in the house, therefore, was still asleep when Kolin shuffled into the kitchen for hot water, wearing a remarkably dirty little kimono and battered boots on bare feet. His round, unintelligent, very Russian face with its snub nose and languorous blue eyes (he saw himself as Verlaine’s ‘half Pierrot and half Gavroche’) was puffy and shiny, his uncombed blond hair fell across his forehead, the untied laces of his boots pattered against the floor with a noise like fine rain. Pouting like a woman, he fiddled with the teapot and then began to hum quietly and intensely. Gornotsvetov was finishing dressing: he put on his polka-dotted bow tie, and lost his temper over a pimple which he had just nicked while shaving and which was now oozing pus and blood through a thick layer of powder. His features were dark and very regular, and long curled eyelashes gave his brown eyes a clear, innocent expression. He had short, black, slightly frizzled hair; he shaved the back of his neck like a Russian coachman and had grown sideburns which curved past his ears in two dark strips. Like his companion he was short, very thin, with highly developed leg muscles but narrow in the chest and shoulders.

They had made friends comparatively recently, had danced in a Russian cabaret somewhere in the Balkans and had arrived in Berlin two months ago in search of their theatrical fortune. A particular nuance, an odd affected manner set them somewhat apart from the other lodgers, but in all honesty no one could blame this harmless couple for being as happy as a pair of ringdoves.

Kolin, left alone in their untidy room after his friend had gone, opened a manicure case and, crooning softly, began to pare his fingernails. Although not remarkable for his cleanliness, he kept his nails in excellent condition.

The room reeked of Origan perfume and sweat; a ball of haircombings floated in the washbasin water. Ballet dancers pranced in photographs on the walls; on the table lay a large open fan and a dirty starched collar.

Having admired the coral varnish of his nails, Kolin carefully washed his hands, smeared his face and neck with sickly-sweet toilet water and threw off his dressing gown. Naked, he took a few steps on his points, did a little entrechat, quickly dressed, powdered his nose, and made up his eyes. Then, having fastened all the buttons of his gray, close-fitting topcoat, he went out for a walk flicking the tip of his fancy cane regularly up and down.

At the front door, as he returned home for lunch, he overtook Ganin, who had just bought some medicine for Podtyagin. The old man was feeling better; he was doing a little writing and walking about his room, but Klara, by agreement with Ganin, had decided not to let him out of the house that day.

Sneaking up behind him, Kolin gripped Ganin’s arm above the elbow. Ganin turned round.

‘Ah, Kolin. Had a good stroll?’

‘Alec’s away,’ said Kolin as he climbed the stairs beside Ganin. ‘I’m terribly worried, I hope he’s going to get that engagement.’

‘Yes, of course,’ said Ganin, who was always at a complete loss for conversation with him.

Kolin laughed. ‘Alfyorov got stuck in the lift again. Now it’s not working.’

He ran the knob of his cane along the banisters and looked at Ganin with a shy smile. ‘May I sit in your room for a bit? I’m so bored today.’

‘Don’t imagine you can make eyes at me just because you’re bored,’ Ganin mentally snapped at him as he opened the door of the pension , but aloud he said, ‘Unfortunately I’m busy at the moment. Some other time.’

‘What a pity,’ drawled Kolin, following Ganin inside and pulling the door after him. The door did not shut, as someone had thrust in a large brown hand from behind and a deep bass Berlin voice boomed, ‘One moment, gentlemen.’

Ganin and Kolin looked round. A stout, mustachioed postman crossed the threshold.

‘Does Herr Alfyorov live here?’

‘First door on the left,’ said Ganin.

‘Thank you,’ sang out the postman and knocked on the door he had been shown.

It was a telegram.

‘What is it? What is it? What is it?’ Alfyorov babbled feverishly, twisting it in his clumsy fingers. He was so excited that at first he was unable to read the glued-on strip of faint, uneven letters: arriving saturday 8 a.m. Suddenly Alfyorov understood, sighed and crossed himself.

‘Thank the Lord. She’s coming.’

Smiling broadly and stroking his bony thighs, he sat down on the bed and started to rock backward and forward. His watery eyes were blinking rapidly, a slanting shaft of sun gilded his little dung-colored beard.

‘ Sehr gut ,’ he muttered to himself. ‘The day after tomorrow! Sehr gut. What a state my shoes are in! Mary will be amazed. Still, we’ll survive somehow. We’ll rent a nice cheap little flat. She’ll decide. Meanwhile we’ll live here for a bit. Thank goodness there’s a door between the two rooms.’

A short while later he went out into the passage and knocked at his neighbor’s.

Ganin thought, ‘Why can’t they leave me alone today?’

Coming straight to the point, Alfyorov began as he surveyed the room all around, ‘I say, Gleb Lvovich, when are you thinking of leaving?’

Ganin looked at him with irritation. ‘My first name is Lev. Try and remember.’

‘But you are leaving on Saturday, aren’t you?’ Alfyorov asked, thinking to himself, ‘We’ll have to place the bed differently. And the wardrobe must be moved away from the communicating door.’

‘Yes, I’m leaving,’ Ganin replied, and again, as at lunch the day before, he felt acutely embarrassed.

‘Well, that’s splendid,’ Alfyorov put in excitedly. ‘Sorry to disturb you, Gleb Lvovich.’

And with a final glance round the room he went noisily out.

‘Idiot,’ muttered Ganin. ‘To hell with him. What was I thinking about so delightfully just now? Ah, yes — the night, the rain, the white pillars.’

‘Lydia Nikolaevna! Lydia Nikolaevna!’ Alfyorov’s oily voice called loudly from the corridor.

‘There’s no getting away from him,’ thought Ganin angrily. ‘I won’t lunch here today. Enough!’

The street asphalt gave off a violet gloss, the sun tangled with the wheels of motorcars. Near the beer-hall there was a garage and from the gaping gloom of its entrance came a tender whiff of carbide. And that chance exhalation helped Ganin to remember more vividly yet the rainy Russian late August and early September, the torrent of happiness, which the specters of his Berlin life kept interrupting.