Пол Боулз - Let it come down

«I don’t know,» Dyar said. «Don’t know what?» he thought, suppressing a tickling desire to laugh aloud. «Jack’s pretty careful. He’s nobody’s fool, you know. I can’t see him getting into any serious trouble, somehow». He felt that he must put a stop to this conversation or it would bring him bad luck. The mere fact that he was in a position for the moment to be offhand about the subject, even though his nonchalance was being forced upon him, seemed to indicate likely disaster. «Pride before a fall,» he thought. It was a moment for humility, a moment to touch wood. The expression get away with it bothered him. «I don’t know,» he said again.

«Ten pounds!» Daisy reiterated, handing him a whiskey-soda. He sipped it slowly, telling himself that above all things he must not get drunk. At the end of ten minutes or so she noticed that he was not drinking.

«Something’s wrong with your drink!» she exclaimed. «What have I done? Give it to me. What does it need?» She reached out for the glass.

«No, no, no!» he objected, hanging on to it. «It’s fine. I just don’t feel like drinking, somehow. I don’t know why».

«Aha!» she cried, as though she had made a great discovery. «I see! Your system’s hyperacid, darling. It’s just the moment for a little majoun. I don’t feel much like whiskey myself tonight». She made a place for her glass among the bottles and tubes on the night-table, opened the drawer and took out a small silver box which she handed him.

«Have a piece,» she said. «Just don’t tell anyone about it. All the little people in Tangier’d be scandalized, all but the Arabs, of course. They eat it all the time. It’s the only thing allowed the poor darlings, with alcohol forbidden. But a European, a Nazarene? Shocking! Unforgivable! Depths of depravity! Tangier, sink-hole of iniquity, as your American journalists say. ‘Your correspondent has it on reliable authority that certain members of the English colony begin their evening meal with a dish of majoun, otherwise known as hashish.’ Good God!»

He was looking with interest at the six cubes of greenish black candy which exactly filled the box. «What is it?» he said.

«Majoun, darling. Majoun». She reached out, took a square and bit it in half. «Have a piece. It’s not very good, but it’s the best in Tangier. My sweet old Ali gets it for me». She rang the bell.

The candy was gritty, its flavor a combination of figs, ginger, cinnamon and licorice; there was also a pungent herbal taste which he could not identify. «What’s it supposed to do?» he asked with curiosity.

She put the box back onto its shelf. «The servants would be horrified. Isn’t it ghastly, living in fear of one’s own domestics? But I’ve never known a place like Tangier for wagging tongues. God! The place is incredible». She paused and looked at him. «What does it do?» she said. «It’s miraculous. It’s what we’ve all been waiting for all these years. If you’ve never had it, you can’t possibly understand. But I call it the key to a forbidden way of thought». She leaned down and patted his arm. «I’m not going mystical on you, darling, although I easily could if I let myself go. J’ai de quoi , God knows. There’s nothing mystical about majoun. It’s all very down to earth and real». A maid knocked. Daisy spoke to her briefly in Spanish. «I’ve ordered tea,» she explained, as the girl wheeled the table of drinks away.

«Tea!»

She laughed merrily. «It’s absolutely essential».

To Dyar, who had pulled his left cuff up so he could glance surreptitiously now and then at his watch, the time was creeping by with incredible slowness. Daisy talked about black magic, about exhibitions of hatta-yoga she had seen in Travancore, about the impossibility of understanding Islamic legal procedure in Morocco unless one took for granted the everyday use of spells and incantations. At length the tea came, and they each had three cups. Dyar listened apathetically; it all sounded to him like decoration, like the Pekineses, incense-burners and Spanish shawls with which certain idle women filled their apartments, back in New York. He let her talk for a while. Then he said: «But what’s the story about that candy? What is it? Some kind of dope, isn’t it? I think you were cheated. I don’t feel anything».

She smiled. «Yes, I know. Everyone says that. But it’s very subtle. One must know which direction to look in for the effect. If you expect to feel drunk, you’re looking the wrong way, it takes twice as long, and you miss half the pleasure».

«But what is the pleasure? Do you feel anything, right now?»

She closed her eyes and remained silent a moment, a slightly beatific expression coming to rest on her upturned face. «Yes,» she answered at length. «Definitely».

«You do?» The incredulity in his voice made her open her eyes and look at him an instant reproachfully. «You don’t believe me? I’m not just imagining things. But I’ve had it before and I know exactly what to expect. Darling, you’re not comfortable there on the edge of the bed. Draw up that big chair and relax».

When he was sprawled in the chair facing the bed, he said to her: «Well, then, suppose you try and tell me what it feels like. I might as well get some benefit out of the stuff, even if it comes second-hand».

«Oh, at the moment it’s nothing very exciting. Just a slight buzzing in my ears and an accelerated pulse».

«Sounds like fun,» he scoffed. For a few minutes he had forgotten that this evening he was waiting above all for time to pass. Now he turned his arm a bit, to see the face of his watch; it was eight-twenty. He had set the meeting with Thami for no definite hour, not knowing exactly when he would be able to get away, but he had assured him it would not be after midnight. The understanding was that the Jilali would go back to town to the port, and would bring the boat to a small beach just west of Oued el Ihud, also not later than twelve o’clock. In the meantime Thami was to sit and wait, a little below the far end of the garden, so that when Dyar left the house he could lead him down across the face of the mountain, directly to the beach. Thami had insisted he would not be bored by waiting so long: he had his supper and his kif pipe with him.

«Yes,» Daisy was saying. «If I let too much time go by, I shan’t be able to tell you anything at all. One becomes fantastically inarticulate at a certain point. Not always, but it can happen. One thinks one’s making sense, and so one is, I daresay, but in a completely different world of thought».

It seemed to him that the wind outside was rising a little, or else a window had opened a minute ago to let the sound in. He turned his head; the drawn curtains did not move. «What are you looking at?» she asked. He did not answer. At the same time he had a senseless desire to turn his head in the other direction and look at the other wall, because he thought he had seen a slight movement on that side of the room. Instead, he pulled out a pack of cigarettes and offered her one.

«No thanks, darling. I couldn’t. You have a house. You see?»

«What?» He stared at her.

«I’m explaining, darling, or at least trying to. You have a house. In the middle of some modest grounds, where you’re used to walking about». She waited, apparently to be certain he was following her argument. Since he said nothing, she went on. «You can always see the house. At least, from most parts of the property, but in any case, you know it’s there. It’s the center of your domain. Call it your objective idea about yourself».

He toyed with the pack of cigarettes, extracted one and lighted it, frowning.

«Say it’s the idea of yourself by which you measure what’s real. You have to keep it straight in your mind, keep it in working order. Like a compass».