Borislav Pekic - Houses

Your head is covered by the marriage crown ,

Beside you at the altar stands another—

My vibrant love for you too lowly grown!

However, there was this difference, decisive for the future: I was Arsénie Negovan, a property owner, and not a whimpering poet; I couldn’t forgive a passion, once begun, as charitably as the poet; and I was not, even then by the gate, prepared to give up so easily and promise, like Master Rajić:

I shall not cast my curse on him or you ,

Or even on bitter fate which caused our meeting;

Nor can I curse myself, poor loving fool ,

For thus I would my own true love be cursing .

How could I? Of course I wouldn’t go around cursing anyone, there is no profit from anathema, still less from severing relations. What I was going to undertake was much closer to common than poetic sense: I’d simply try to get possession of the house.

(I must say at once that for some time I considered building elsewhere exactly the same house — without the portal, of course — but I soon gave up the idea. In the first place, however true a copy it might have been, it would still not have been that house, nor would it have been tolerable for me to think that I was living with a copy, no more than a lifeless imprint.)

I took my first step toward gaining possession of the house at the housewarming, when I presented Stefan with a carved ivory miniature of Michelangelo’s Moses, to whose face the sculptor at my request had given, most discreetly of course, something of my features (the horns were in fact very much in accord with my position). At the same time I requested that my gift be placed at the very heart of the house: in the central, gallerylike hall, on the magnificent fireplace of light-brown Carrara marble in which half-burnt logs with skillfully installed little purple lamps behind them gave the appearance of a slowly burning fire, and on whose extensive mantelpiece, consistently faithful to her humble taste, Madame Negovan-Georgijević had set out alum-white griddles, bowls, goblets, pots, jugs, vessels, and majolica beakers, and among them, like some devilish guard, ornately dressed miniature figures which one would have thought baked of fairground marzipan rather than of Meissen porcelain. In this way I was constantly with Niké (Niké was the secret name I gave to the house as soon as we fell in love), and as it were, legitimized our adulterous relationship.

Indeed, during my ever more frequent visits to Stefan, all that happened between myself and his house can hardly be described in any other way than adultery, and since it all took place under cover of the host’s innocent hospitality, adultery in the most shameful circumstances. But when did great passions worry about such small considerations? Did Abélard and Héloïse think about trifles? So for some time Niké and I illicitly, and therefore rather unhappily, carried on our affair — though I don’t say that in our cautious concealment, with all its tension, there wasn’t a certain conspiratorial excitement, and worthy reward in plenty in those lightninglike changes of feeling which we underwent, usually when, awaiting the arrival of Niké’s master or mistress, we remained alone in one of the salons, in the hall, on the stairs, or somewhere else. Our romantic meetings in the street can also be counted here, for in the course of my business walks, which I continued according to the schedule in my saffian leather notebook, I used to pass her every day at a predetermined time. On these occasions quite brazenly, almost leaning out over her luxurious conservatories and balconies, she would give herself up to my wondering gaze, and her face, intent on keeping our sinful secret, would let slip those four clear Corinthian tears which I could only interpret as unsatisfied desire for me.

With respect to the future, however, Niké was a provocative and negligently chosen name for a house with which I dreamed of finding happiness. Viewed superficially, the name suited the house very well, for long before Katarina there had been a Niké in my life. (To tell the truth, that wasn’t her real name — she was christened Gospava. I called her Niké, not at all for those reasons which led Mrs. Nego-van-Georgijević to permutate the vulgar letters of her maiden name, but because of the likeness of that powerful, ripe woman to the Paeonian Niké of Olympus, the herald and patroness of military, gymnastic, and therefore why not amorous victories — in all cases, of course, except mine.) That Niké too had been proud, vulgar, and — why should I conceal it? — ugly, yet I had had a relationship with her which no one could understand, myself included, and had embarked upon it with the greatest pleasure. So, bearing in mind the adulterous nature of our relations, I should add that the original Niké, Gospava-Niké, was unhappily married to some clerk in the Adriatic Danube Bank. So the choice of name suited Stefan’s palace perfectly, except that regarding the future of our relations it was more than ominous, for it seemed to announce loud and clear the ill-fated end of my adventure.

This desire, however, which I could discern in Niké in a less and less cautious form with every meeting — a desire which by the laws of reciprocity was only strengthened by that feverish need for me to possess her — had grown so much in the meantime that it could no longer be concealed. Furthermore, its heightened suffering threatened to destroy our relationship completely, not to speak of its unfortunate effect on my work and my mental state.

So it had gone as far as it could go. I had to take action. Although I’m by no means proud of my behavior at that time, I’m setting it down here so that someone will at least know exactly what Arsénie Negovan was capable of doing, to make sure that the right house should get into the right hands — setting it down in the hope that my nobility of purpose can guarantee to these, my devious actions, at least that minimum of indulgence which history commonly affords in great abundance to other selfish human exploits. Doesn’t medicine inflict pain in order to drive some dangerous illness out of us? Doesn’t a mother use deception to guard her child from various temptations?

I’ve already said that there would have been nothing to gain from building a second Niké. To knock on Niké’s door as a buyer gave no promise of success either, for Stefan was far from sated with the advantages of owning a European palace in what till recently had been a remote Turkish province; it is well known what new householders are like when they begin to be reimbursed for all the pains that building has entailed for them. Moreover, the admiration for the house which the doyen of Belgrade landlords would have shown by his offer of purchase would have gone to Stefan’s head, and he might well have carried on with his building operations; instead of Niké, I might have acquired a competitor.

To keep Stefan in the dark about my intentions, I found, or rather hired, an intermediary whose special position — he was a minister without portfolio — made it natural for him to live in a magnificent house like Niké. But as I had to give serious consideration to my cousin’s still unfulfilled expectations as a houseowner, I was obliged in any case to soften up the ground for the intermediary: first, by complicating Stefan’s ownership of the house, and if possible even his occupation of it, by administrative subterfuges and deceptions; then, as though it were indirectly, through rumor, by hampering his enjoyment of his possessions. This latter I accomplished by undermining the self-esteem acquired by the house, and by destroying his and Jelena’s conviction that they had gained some great advantage from Niké by advancing their social standing in the most spectacular way.