The Voyeur Page 8

  The old woman was going to pass without speaking to him. She had stared at him and then looked away as if she did not know him. At first he felt a kind of relief, then wondered if the contrary would not have been preferable. Finally it occurred to him that perhaps she had pretended not to recognize him on purpose, though he could not see why she should show any reluctance to gossip with him for a few minutes, or in any case to say good morning, if nothing more. On the off chance, he decided to speak first, in spite of the considerable effort it cost him at this particular moment. That way, at least, he would know how far he could go. He emphasized the grimace he had begun, imagining it resembled a smile.

  But now it was too late to attract the woman's attention by a mere change of expression. She had already passed between the dried corpse of the frog and the rounded extremity of the telegraph pole. Soon she would be far behind him, and it would take a human voice to keep her from continuing toward still more inaccessible regions. Mathias clenched his right hand around the polished metal of the handlebars.

  A sentence jolted out of his mouth—obscure and overlong, too sudden to be altogether friendly, grammatically incorrect—in which he could make out, nevertheless, the essential formulas: “Marek,” “good morning,” “not recognized.” The old woman turned toward him without understanding what he had said. He managed to repeat the indispensable words more calmly, completing them by giving his own name.

  “Well, well!” the old woman said, “I didn't recognize you.”

  She thought he seemed tired, “funny-looking” was how she put it. At the time of their last meeting, more than two years ago (the last time she had been in town, at her son-in-law's), Mathias was still wearing his little mustache. . . . He protested: he had never worn a mustache, or a beard either. But the old woman did not seem convinced by his insistence. To change the subject, she asked him what he was doing so far from town: there wasn't much chance of his finding many electric appliances to repair—especially out here in the country where almost everyone used oil anyway.

  Mathias explained that he was no longer an itinerant electrician. He was selling wrist watches these days. He had arrived on the steamer this very morning, and planned to spend the day. He had rented a bicycle, which unfortunately was not working so well as its owner had claimed it would. (He showed his grease-stained hand.) Besides, he had wasted so much time getting as far as the crossroads that when he . . .

  Madame Marek interrupted him. “That's right, you wouldn't have found anyone at the house.”

  The salesman let her talk on. She told him about her daughter-in-law's departure for a fifteen-day trip to the mainland. And her eldest son would be in town all morning (the other two were sailors). Josephine had lunch at her family's on Tuesdays. Her grandchildren didn't come home from school until twelve-thirty, except the eldest boy, who worked as an apprentice at the bakery and didn't come home until evening. That boy wasn't all there: why only the week before . . .

  Mathias might have met the father, or the son, for he had begun his rounds at the harbor, contrary to his original plans. Relying more on his country customers, he had then doggedly called at all the houses along the road. Here as in town he had wasted still more time. He hoped for a more favorable reception at the Marek's at least—he wouldn't have missed visiting his old friends for anything; he had been disappointed to find the house closed and apparently empty; he had been obliged to leave without news of the family—of Madame Marek, her children, her grandchildren. He was wondering what their absence—everyone's—could mean at such an hour, when most people are at home eating dinner. How could he help worrying over this incomprehensible solitude?

  His ears, straining for a clue, hear nothing; even his breathing, that might break the silence, stops of its own accord. Yet he cannot hear the slightest noise inside. No one speaks. Nothing moves. Everything is dead still. Mathias leans toward the closed door.

  He knocks again, this time with his ring, on the door panel which echoes as if he had struck an empty box; but he already knows how futile such a gesture is: if someone were at home the door would be open on a sunny day like this, and probably the windows too. He lifts his head toward those on the first floor; not a sign of life there either—shutter pushed open, lifted curtain falling back, silhouette disappearing—not even that premonitory confusion of the gaping window recesses where someone leaning out might have just disappeared, or someone who has suddenly appeared is going to lean out.

  Propping his bicycle against the wall, he takes a few undecided steps on the beaten earth floor of the courtyard. He reaches the kitchen window and tries to look in, but it is too dark inside to see anything. He turns back toward the door by the same way he came into the courtyard, walks two or three yards in that direction, stops, turns around and walks in the opposite direction, glances again at the door and at the closed shutters of the ground-floor windows, continuing this time as far as the garden fence. The lattice-gate is locked too.

  Returning to the house, he approaches what must be the kitchen window and checks to see if the heavy wooden shutters are bolted or merely drawn: useless, in that case, trying to see anything inside.

  He returns to where he left the bicycle. There is nothing else to do but leave.

  He is very disappointed. Here, at least, he was hoping for a more favorable reception. All the way to the farm his spirits had been rising at the prospect of a visit to his old childhood friends, never suspecting they could all be away from home at once.

  Ever since that morning—ever since the night before—his spirits had been rising at the prospect of a visit to his old childhood friends; he told himself how surprised they would be to see him—he had never revisited the island, and after all he had been born here. He had already seen Robert Marek's four children on several occasions, however, when they were spending their short vacations with their uncle in the city, only a few doors away from his own house. They must have grown since the last time, there was a good chance he might not even recognize them now, but he would make sure that their parents didn't notice that. Perhaps he would be invited to stay to lunch; that would certainly be more pleasant than gobbling down the two sandwiches he had brought along for a snack; the heat had turned them to jelly in the left pocket of his duffle coat.

  The heat was certainly becoming excessive. And the road was growing steeper, obliging him to slow down. He stopped twice at isolated houses along the road. Realizing at once that he would sell nothing, he left them almost immediately. When he reached the fork to the mill, he continued straight ahead: his information about the people there left him no hope of selling even the cheapest of his wares; it was useless going there under such conditions; he had wasted enough time that way.

  A little farther on he noticed a cottage set back from the road at the end of a long, ill-kept path. Its poverty-stricken appearance excused him from even attempting a visit there. He looked at his watch: it was after midday.

  It was easier riding now that the road had stopped going uphill. Soon he was at the crossroads. On the white milestone he read the freshly repainted directions: “Black Rocks Lighthouse—One Mile.” Everyone on the island called it “the big lighthouse.” After another fifty yards he left the road, turning left on the fork to the Marek farm.

  The countryside was noticeably different here: there was an embankment on either side of the road lined with a thick, virtually unbroken hedge behind which rose the occasional trunk of a pine leaning toward the southwest, the direction of the prevailing winds (that is, the trees on the left side of the drive leaning over the hedge, those on the right leaning away from it).

  In his haste to reach his immediate goal, Mathias tried to pedal faster. The bicycle chain began to make an unpleasant sound—as if it were rubbing sideways against the sprocket-wheel. He had already felt something strange about it shifting gears on the last hill, but he had not given it any thought, and the grating noise had gradually diminished—unless he had merely ceased noticing it. Now, on the contra
ry, it grew more pronounced—so rapidly that the traveler decided to stop. He put his suitcase down on the road and crouched down to examine the transmission, turning the pedal with one hand. He decided that he needed only to apply a little pressure to the sprocket-wheel, but in manipulating it he brushed against the chain itself and covered his fingers with spots of grease which afterward he had to wipe off as well as he could on the weeds growing along the road. He got back onto the seat. The suspicious noise had virtually disappeared.

  As soon as he had entered the courtyard of beaten earth that extended in front of the farmhouse (actually the terminal enlargement of the road which came to a dead end here), he saw that the heavy wooden shutters of both ground-floor windows were drawn. The door between them, which he expected to find wide open, was also closed. The two upper-floor windows, situated just over those on the ground floor, had their shutters open but were closed in spite of the bright sunshine on the panes. Between them, above the door, was a large expanse of gray stone where a third window seemed to be missing; instead a little niche had been cut into the wall, as if for a statuette; but the niche was empty.

  On either side of the door was a clump of mahonia; the still-greenish flowers were beginning to turn yellow. Mathias propped his bicycle against the wall of the house under the drawn shutters of the first window, to the left of the left mahonia bush. He walked to the door, still holding his suitcase in his hand, and knocked on the door panel—for conscience’ sake, since he knew that it would not be opened.

  After a few seconds he knocked again, this time with his ring. Then he stepped back and lifted his head toward the first-floor windows. Obviously no one was there.

  He looked toward the haysheds at the end of the courtyard, turned back toward the door by the same way he had entered the courtyard, walked three yards in that direction, stopped, turned around and walked in the opposite direction again, and continued this time as far as the garden fence. The lattice-gate was padlocked.

  He returned to the house. The shutters of what must have been the kitchen window looked as if they had been merely pushed together to keep out the sunlight. He walked over and tried to open them, but did not succeed: the bolts had been shot inside.

  Mathias could do nothing but leave. He returned to where he had propped the bicycle against the wall under the other window, got on it and took the same road back, holding the handlebars in his right hand and the suitcase in his left—which he also used to apply a slight pressure to the left grip of the handlebars. He had hardly reached the main road when the grinding noise began again—much louder this time. About a hundred yards in front of him a country woman carrying a knapsack was walking in his direction.

  He would have to get off again in order to push the chain back onto the cogs of the sprocket-wheel. As before, he could not help dirtying his fingers. When the operation was completed and he stood up, he realized that the wizened, yellow-faced woman about to pass him was old Madame Marek.

  She did not recognize him right away. If he had not spoken to her first, she would have gone on without looking at him, so little chance did she think there would be of meeting him here. To excuse herself she claimed that Mathias’ face had changed since the last time they had seen each other, in the city, and that he looked very tired today—which was to be expected, since he had had to get up much earlier than usual to take the boat, and without having gone to bed earlier the night before. Besides, he hadn't been sleeping well for several days.

  Their last meeting had been at least two years ago. Mathias announced that he had changed his job since then: he was selling wrist watches these days. He was disappointed to have found no one at the farm, for his moderately-priced wares would certainly have interested Robert and his wife. How did it happen that neither of them was at home, nor any of the children? Mathias hoped that they were all well, nevertheless.

  Yes, they were all in good health. The grandmother specified the reason for the absence of each one in turn—the father in town, the mother on the mainland for fifteen days, the children not yet back from school, etc. . . . —and declared that if Mathias passed by again in the course of the afternoon he would find Robert at home, and Josephine as well; the poor girl certainly needed a watch to get her work done on time—she was always fifteen minutes late for something.

  The salesman had doubtless just missed the father and the three younger children who generally came home around twelve-thirty. They took the short cut across the fields and came in through the garden, behind the house. Perhaps, she added, they had arrived by now; but she did not invite Mathias to join her, which he dared not propose himself, hesitating to disturb them all at dinnertime. She merely asked him to let her see the watches and he had to show them there at the roadside, putting the suitcase down on the ground. Just next to it, flattened in the dust of the road, was the dried corpse of a toad.

  In a hurry to get home, the old woman did not take long to decide. She wanted to give a nice present to her grandson—the one who worked as an apprentice at the bakery—for his seventeenth birthday. She took the hundred-fifty-crown model (with metal strap)—that was good enough, she said, for a boy. The salesman assured her she would not regret her choice, but the old woman was not interested in a description of the item's qualities; she cut short his explanations and guarantees, paid him, thanked him, wished him good luck, and hurried away. Not knowing where to put the watch which the salesman, accustomed to home sales, was not equipped to wrap very carefully, the old woman had fastened it around her own wrist—but without setting the hands at the correct time, although the watch was wound.

  Crouching in front of his suitcase, Mathias replaced the cardboard strips, the prospectuses, the black canvas memorandum book, closed the cover, and fastened the clasp. He looked more closely at the grayish spot on the white dust of the road which he had first taken for the remains of a frog. The hind legs were too short—it must have been a toad (besides, it was always toads that got run over). Its death could not have occurred earlier than the night before, for the creature's body was not as dry as the dust made it look. Near the head, which was distorted by being flattened, a red ant was trying to find a scrap that was still usable.

  The surrounding patch of road changed color. Mathias raised his eyes toward the sky. Moving rapidly, a cloud half-torn apart by the wind covered the sun again. The day was gradually becoming overcast.

  The salesman mounted his bicycle and continued on his way. The air was growing cooler, the duffle coat more bearable. The ground neither rose nor fell; the good condition of the road made riding easy. The wind blew from the left, not impeding the bicyclist, who was pedaling rapidly, almost effortlessly, his little suitcase in one hand.

  He made a stop at an isolated cottage at the edge of the road—a simple one-story dwelling of the most ordinary kind. Two clumps of mahonia framed the doorway, as in front of most of the island's houses, and at the rear too. He leaned his bicycle against the wall under the window and knocked at the door panel.

  The person answering the door appeared in its opening at a much lower level than he had expected. It was doubtless a child—height and size considered—even a rather young child—but Mathias could not decide whether it was a boy or a girl, for the silhouette quickly retreated into the shadow of the hallway. He stepped in and closed the door behind him. Because of the half-darkness to which his eyes had not yet had time to grow accustomed, he did not know by what means the next door he passed through was opened.

  A man and a woman were seated facing each other across a table. They were not eating; perhaps they had already finished. It looked as though they were expecting the salesman.

  Mathias set down his suitcase on the unpatterned oilcloth. Taking advantage of their tacit consent, he unpacked his merchandise while delivering his sales-talk with some assurance. The two people sitting in their chairs listened politely; they even examined the strips of cardboard with a certain interest, passing them back and forth to each other and attempting one or two co
mments: “This is a practical shape,” “This is a more elegant case,” etc. . . . But they seemed to be thinking of something else—or of nothing at all—to be weary, distressed, chronically ill, or perhaps suffering from some tremendous disappointment; their comments were confined to scrupulously objective remarks: “This one is thinner,” “The other has a convex glass,” “Here's a rectangular face,” . . . of which the obvious futility did not seem to disturb them.

  Finally they decided on one of the cheapest models—one just like the one the old country woman had bought. They indicated their choice without enthusiasm, and as if without reason. ("Why wouldn't this one do just as well?") They exchanged no words with the salesman himself. It was as if they scarcely saw him. When the man had taken out his wallet and paid for the watch, Mathias regretted not having insisted on an item two or three times as expensive, thinking that they would have paid for it with no more hesitation, with the same indifference.

  No one came to show him out. The new watch (with the metal strap) was still lying on the oilcloth between the woman and her already distracted companion: shiny, lost, unjustified.

  There was not another house until the village at Black Rocks. Mathias pedaled steadily for about two-thirds of a mile. The bicycle cast only a pale—and intermittent—shadow which soon disappeared altogether. Against the gray background of the sky, in which only a few vague blue spots remained, rose the lighthouse, now quite near.

  The structure was one of the highest of the countryside, as well as one of the most massive. Besides the white-painted, slightly conical tower itself, it included a semaphore, a radio station, a small power-house, four enormous foghorns for bad weather, and several accessory structures sheltering machines and equipment, as well as lodgings for the workmen and their families. Had these employees been engineers or even mechanics, they would have constituted a wealthy enough clientele for Mathias, but unfortunately the lighthouse workers were not the sort who bought their watches from traveling salesmen.