J. Coetzee - Slow Man

The cohabitation he envisioned for the pair of them was to be on the mildest scale: a few companionable evenings together, Drago hunched over his homework at the dining table, he in an armchair with a book, while they waited for tempers in the casa Jokic to cool down.

But that is not how it turns out to be. Drago brings in friends; soon the flat has become as noisy and confused as a railway station. The kitchen is a mess of take-away cartons and dirty plates; the bathroom is forever occupied. None of the quiet growth in intimacy that he had looked forward to has come about. In fact, he feels that Drago is pushing him away. After the evening of the mushroom risotto they do not even eat together.

'I'm making myself an omelette for supper,' he announces as casually as he can. 'Shall I make one for you too? Ham and tomato?'

'Not for me,' says Drago. 'I'll be going out. One of my mates is picking me up. We'll get something to eat.'

'You have money?'

'Yeah, thanks, my mum gave me money.'

The mate in question is a pimply red-head named Shaun, to whom he has taken a dislike at first sight. Shaun, who according to Drago doesn't go to school much because he plays in a band, haunts the flat. He and Drago go out after dark, stay away till late, then return and shut themselves up in his ex-study, which has become Drago's room. Music and the murmur of their voices keep him awake into the early hours of the morning. Grumpy and miserable, he lies in the dark listening to the BBC.

'It is not just the noise,' he complains to Elizabeth Costello. 'Drago is used to a large family, I don't expect a monkish silence from him. No, what upsets me is the way he reacts when I dare to ask for a little consideration.'

'How does he react?'

'A shutter falls. He does not see me any more. I might as well be a stick of furniture. Marijana says he and his father are always at loggerheads. Well, I begin to see why. I begin to sympathise with his father.'

After her cold words at the riverside, he had thought he might not see Elizabeth Costello again. But no, she is back, perhaps because she cannot give up on him, but also perhaps because she is not well. She has lost weight; she looks more than a little frail; she has a persistent cough.

'Poor Paul!' she says. 'So late in life, so monkish, as you say, so set in your ways, and now so grumpy too! What a reckless venture into childminding! In the abstract I am sure you would like to love young Drago, but the facts of life keep getting in the way. We cannot love by an act of the will, Paul. We have to learn. That is why souls descend from their realm on high and submit to being born again: so that, as they grow up in our company, they can lead us along the hard road of loving. From the beginning you have glimpsed something angelic in Drago, and I am sure you are not wrong. Drago has remained in touch with his other-worldly origins longer than most children. Overcome your disappointment, your irritation. Learn from Drago while you can. One of these days the last wisps of glory that trail behind him will vanish into the air and he will simply be one of us.

'You think I am crazy, don't you, or deluded? But remember: I have raised two children, real-life, unmystical children; you have raised none. I know what children are for; you are still ignorant. So pay heed when I speak, even when I speak in figures. We have children in order that we may learn to love and serve. Through our children we become the servants of time. Look into your heart. Ask yourself whether you have the reserves of fortitude you will need for the journey, and the stamina. If not, perhaps you should withdraw. It is not too late.'

Speaking in figures. Angels from on high. It is the most mystifying speech she has made since the hocus-pocus about the woman with the dark glasses. Is she light-headed from fasting? Is she trying to make a fool of him again? Ought he to offer her more than a cup of tea? He gives her a hard look, as hard a look as he can. But she does not waver. She believes what she is saying, it would seem.

As for the contract solemnly concluded between Marijana and himself, that seems to have gone up in smoke. Day after day she stays away without a word of explanation. Her son, on the other hand, is blessed with frequent telephone calls. Of Drago's end of their conversations, which are in Croatian, he hears only a monosyllable here and there.

Then one afternoon, when he least expects it, Marijana drops in. Drago is not back from school; he is taking a nap.

'Mr Rayment, I wake you? Sorry – I knock and no one come. You want I make you tea?'

'No, thank you.' He is piqued at being caught asleep.

'How is your leg?'

'My leg? My leg is fine.'

A stupid question and a stupid answer. How can his leg be fine? There is no leg. The leg in question was long ago hacked off and incinerated. How is the absence of your leg?: that is what she ought to be asking. The absence of my leg is not fine, if you want the truth. The absence of my leg has left a hole in my life, as anyone with eyes in her head ought to be able to see.

Marijana has brought Ljuba with her. For the sake of the child he tries to hide his irritation.

Marijana picks her way through the mess on the floor and perches at the foot of his bed. 'You have nice life, nice and peaceful,' she says. 'Then pfu! car hit you. Then pfu! Jokic family hit you. Not so nice any more, eh? Sorry. No tea? You sure? How you and Drago get on?'

'Nothing to complain of. We get on well enough. It does me good, I am sure, to be with young people. Livens me up.'

'You and him make friend, eh? Good. Blanka say thank you.'

'It was nothing.'

'Blanka come one day to say thank you in person. But not today. She is still, you know, father's girl.' Which he takes to mean: There are still two camps among the Jokics, the father's camp and the mother's camp. And all on account of you, Paul Rayment. Because of the tempest you have unleashed. Because of the inchoate passion for your cleaning lady that you were so foolish as to declare.

'So! You have new visitor!'

For a moment he cannot work out what she means. Then he recognises what she is holding up for inspection: the nylon stocking that Mrs Costello used to blindfold him, the stocking that for some reason he knotted around the base of the bedside lamp and forgot.

Marijana brings the stocking delicately within range of her nose. 'Lemon flower!' she says. 'Very nice! Your lady friend like lemon, eh? In Croatia, you know, we throw lemon flowers on woman and man when they get married in church. Old custom. Not rice, lemon flowers. So they have lots of children.'

Marijana's humour. Nothing subtle about it. He ought to adjust, if he aspires to one day be her mystical bridegroom and be showered with lemon petals.

'It is not what it seems,' he says. 'I am not going to explain. Just accept what I tell you. It is not what you think.'

Marijana holds the stocking at arm's length and ostentatiously lets it drop to the floor. 'You want to know what I think? I think nothing. Nothing.'

A silence falls. It is all right, he tells himself, we know each other well enough by now, Marijana and I, to have our little contretemps.

'OK,' says Marijana. 'Now I check your leg and give you wash and then we do exercise like usual. We fall behind our exercise, eh? Maybe you don't do exercise so good when you alone like. You sure you don't want prosthese?'

'I don't want a prosthesis, now or ever. The subject is closed. Please don't talk about it.'

Marijana leaves the room. Ljuba continues to stare at him with the great black-eyed stare that he finds more and more eerie. 'Hi, Ljuba,' he says. 'Ljubica.' The endearment sounds foreign in his mouth, presumptuous. The child makes no reply.