Anna Kavan - Who Are You?

Suede Boots drops in for tea as usual, cheerful, smiling, matter of fact. At once the girl feels happier and more relaxed. She’s become much more tranquil under his influence.

But she’s still nervous about her husband, who has now recovered, and spends most of the time working in his office. He hasn’t said a word to her about the daily visits, which strikes her as ominous, sinister. She can’t believe Suede Boots is right in saying that, by keeping silent, he shows he has no objection.

Not that there’s anything for him to object to. Their relationship is perfectly innocent. Anybody might listen to their conversation, even when it’s personal. Their intimacy has not progressed beyond an almost childish enjoyment of being together, exchanging smiles, talking nonsense, or, alternatively, discussing life with great seriousness.

‘Before I met you I used to feel as if I was in a nightmare,’ she tells him, ‘and that I’d never escape.’ But she no longer remembers this feeling with any distinctness, and might be describing the sensations of a girl in a book.

Sometimes she has an uneasy sense of the precariousness of the present situation, and is afraid her new happiness may vanish suddenly. But she refuses to admit this or to think about it, though it shows itself in her superstitious desire to keep everything between them exactly the same as it always has been she can’t bear any change to creep in.

The young man is really fond of her and concerned for her welfare. He has made up his mind that her unsuitable marriage must end; then she’ll be able to go to the university as she’s always wanted. Whether their relationship is supposed to become closer eventually is not very clear in his mind. But he’s taken the step of writing to his family about her, so that she can stay with them, as she’s got nobody to take care of her over there.

She is touched when she hears this gratitude overwhelms her. She’s never known so much kindness existed in life. Carried away by his enthusiasm she eagerly discusses her future with him. They make up all sorts of different plans, each leading to a fresh favourable outcome. For the possibilities seem endless, each more glowing than the last. So that she gets quite excited about them; excitement perhaps goes to her head a little.

But as soon as her excitement dies down, the whole project begins to seem unreal. She can’t believe it will ever come off. Things don’t happen like that in her case — they always go wrong.

‘It’s just a fairy tale you’ve made up about me — it can’t possibly come true.’ Thus she demolishes all the plans they have been constructing together. It’s no good inventing a happy future for her, since she’s always been unlucky, and always will be.

Silence falls after this. The young man is disappointed; but he won’t give up, and is now thinking how he can persuade her to take a more optimistic view. She has told him she’d like to live through their original meeting all over again, so he asks if she remembers their conversation then. ‘We said that if I hadn’t killed the snake on that particular day, and you hadn’t happened to see me, everything would have been quite different.’ He sees her looking at him with interest, and is encouraged to go on. ‘I wouldn’t be here with you now. This wouldn’t be real something else would. You’d have been another you, instead of the one you are now. You can’t be tied down to a predestined fate when you change according to your situation, and your fate must change too. Everything depends on circumstances — on which “you” you happen to be at a given time…’

Interrupting exactly as if it wanted to join in, a brain-fever bird just outside starts shouting, Who-are-you? so loudly that no human voice can compete with it. He can only wait for it to stop. They smile at each other, sitting helplessly, while the monotonous, everlasting question is taken up by all the brain-fever birds for miles around. The girl can’t even think about what he’s been saying — though it sounded reasonable, she has a vague idea there’s a flaw in the argument somewhere. But she can’t detect it with this row going on — she’s never heard the birds make such a din.

Loud, flat and persistent, the repetitious cries come from all distances and directions, filling the room, the house, the whole afternoon with their exasperating sound, which expresses no normal bird-feeling, but seems only meant to drive people mad. Like mad machines nobody can stop, the birds go on and on. Their deafening chorus hammers upon her nerves until she’s half dazed.

This no doubt explains why she’s slower than her companion to hear the new mechanical noise he heard several seconds ago — she becomes aware of it first when she sees that the smile’s disappeared from his face. Now she strains her ears to follow the low continuous hum or buzz through the birds’ commotion, and has barely identified it as the noise of a car when it stops abruptly.

Everything else seems to stop with it. The bird-calls abruptly break off. In the ensuing silence, footsteps are heard approaching, loud, heavy, regular as machinery. The door flaps fly open to admit Mr Dog Head, who doesn’t speak but stands staring at the pair, a curious blend of indignation, contempt and triumph on his arrogant features. He’s delighted to have caught his wife in the act — of what, he doesn’t trouble to think, but tells himself that now he really has something to blame her for. For the moment, however, he concentrates his offensive gaze on the visitor, who gets up in confusion and holds out his hand.

Dog Head looks down his supercilious nose at him in amazed contempt, as much as to say, ‘Good God! Surely this scum of the earth doesn’t expect me to touch him’ — he’d never dream of contaminating his lordly self in this way! But aloud he says nothing, merely continuing to glare at the hand, until its owner withdraws it, muttering something incomprehensible in his indignation at the silent insolence of the man’s behaviour who the hell does he think he is, standing there as if he expected people to fall down and worship him?

Restraining his anger, the guest decides that the most dignified course is to shame him by his own politeness, and says: ‘I’m glad we’ve met finally; I’ve always missed you before. Our office hours must be different.’

Not a word comes in response to this. A lengthy pause follows, and then he goes on, although the other has shown not the slightest interest, ‘We have to start early, but then we get off early too,’ embarking on a rather detailed account of his work schedule, which would be more appropriate if he’d been questioned about it. Not a single inquiry is made, and no comment either. The man he’s talking to simply goes on staring at him with the same contemptuous arrogance; until his personal servant brings in a fresh pot of tea, and he sits down and pours himself a cup, taking no more notice of Suede Boots than if he were a fly buzzing round the ceiling. Apparently he doesn’t hear a word he is saying, not even glancing at him now, his overbearing countenance fixed in stony disdainful indifference, as if he’d been petrified with this expression.

Catching sight of his face, the young fellow suddenly interrupts himself, his own face turning scarlet. He looks like a furious little boy, but chokes back the angry words on his lips and turns to the girl instead, saying, ‘Well, I’ll be off now.’ He smiles at her with a cheerfulness he is far from feeling, then hurries out, the smile changing to a grimace as soon as he turns his back.

Humiliated, enraged and embarrassed, he leaves the house as fast as he can. Something makes him glance back at it over his shoulder while crossing the compound, and he sees a tall, gaunt bearded figure posted outside the door like a sentry, watching him off the premises. The same grimace, openly furious now, crosses his face. Soon he is out of sight.