The Collected Stories

slime.”
    “I’m not crawling anywhere.”
    “You’re taking her to America?”
    “I’m not taking anyone.”
    “Well, I’d better keep my mouth shut.” Mrs. Weyerhofer turned away from me.
    I leaned my head back against the seat and closed my eyes. I knew well that the woman was paranoid; just the same, her last words had given me a jolt. Who knows? What she told me might have been the truth. Sexual perversion is the answer to many mysteries. I was almost overcome with nausea. Yes, I thought, she is right. I’m crawling into a quagmire.
    I had but one wish now—to get off this bus as quickly as possible. It occurred to me that for all my intimacy with Mrs. Metalon and Mark, so far I hadn’t given them my address.
    I dozed, and when I opened my eyes Mark informed me that we were in Seville. I had slept over three hours.
    Despite our late start, we still had time for a fast meal. I had sat as usual with Mrs. Metalon and Mark. Mark had ordered a bottle of Malaga and I had drunk a good half of it. Vapors of intoxication flowed from my stomach to my brain.
    The topic of conversation at the tables was Dr. and Mrs. Weyerhofer. All the women concluded that Dr. Weyerhofer was a saint to put up with such a horror.
    Mrs. Metalon said, “I’d like to think that this is her end. Even a saint’s patience has to burst sometime. He is a banker and a handsome man. He won’t be alone for long.”
    “I wouldn’t want him for a father,” Mark said.
    Mrs. Metalon smiled and winked at me. “Why not, my son?”
    “Because I want to live and study in America, not in Switzerland. Switzerland is only good for mountain climbing and skiing.”
    “Don’t worry, there’s no danger of it.”
    As she spoke, Mrs. Metalon did something she had never done before—she pressed her knee against mine.
    Coaches waited in front of the hotel to take us to a cabaret. Candles flickered in their head lanterns, casting mysterious designs of light and shadow. I hadn’t ridden in a horse-drawn carriage since leaving Warsaw. The whole evening was like a magic spell—the ride from the hotel to the cabaret with Mrs. Metalon and Mark, and later the performance. Inside the carriage, driving through the poorly lit Seville streets Mrs. Metalon held my hand. Mark sat facing us and his eyes gleamed like some night bird’s. The air was balmy, dense with the scents of wine, olive oil, and gardenias. Mrs. Metalon kept on exclaiming, “What a splendid night! Look at the sky, so full of stars!”
    I touched her breast, and she trembled and squeezed my knee. We were both drunk, not so much from wine as from fatigue. Again I felt the heat of her body.
    When we got out of the coach Mark walked a few paces in front and Mrs. Metalon whispered, “I’d like to have another child.”
    “By whom?” I asked.
    “Try to guess,” she said.
    I cannot know whether the actors and actresses and the music and the dancing were as masterly as I thought, but everything I saw and heard that evening enraptured me—the semi-Arabic music, the almost Hasidic way the dancers stamped their feet, their meaningful clicking of the castanets, their bizarre costumes. Melodies supposed to be erotic reminded me of liturgies sung on the night of Kol Nidre. Mark found an unoccupied seat close to the stage and left us alone. We began to kiss with the ardor of long-parted lovers. Between one kiss and the next, Mrs. Metalon (she had told me to call her Annette) insisted that I accompany her to Ankara. She was even ready to visit America. I had scored one of those victories I could never explain except by the fact that in the duel of love the victim is sometimes as eager to surrender as the attacker is to conquer. This woman had lived alone for a number of years. She was accustomed to the embraces of an elderly man. As I thought these things, I warned myself that Mark would not allow our relationship to remain an affair.
    From time to time he glanced back at us searchingly. I didn’t believe Mrs. Weyerhofer’s slanderous tale of mother and son, but it was obvious that Mark was capable of killing anyone he considered to be dishonoring her. The woman’s words about wanting another child portended danger. However strong my urge for her body, I knew that I had no spiritual ties with her, that after a while misunderstandings, boredom, and regrets would take over. Besides, I had always been afraid of Turks. As a child, I had heard in detail of Abdul-Hamid’s savageries. Later, I