Herzog (32 page)

    "It does relieve my feet. I think I will.

    They're already unlaced."

    The moon was high over the Hudson. Distorted by window glass, distorted by summer air, appearing bent by its own white power, it floated also in the currents of the river. The narrow rooftops below were pale, long figures of constriction beneath the moon. Ramona turned the record over, and now a woman was singing to the music of al Bakkar's band "Viens, viens dans mes bras - je te donne du chocolat."

    Sitting on the hassock beside him, Ramona took his hand. "But what they tried to make you believe," she said. "It just isn't true."

    This was what he was aching to hear from her. "What do you mean?"

    "I know something about men. As soon as I saw you I realized how much of you was unused. Erotically.

    Untouched, even."

    "I've been a terrible flop at times. A total flop."

    "There are some men who should be protected.. by law, if necessary."

    "Like fish and game?"

    "I am not really joking," she said. He saw plainly, clearly, how kind she was. She felt for him. She knew he was in pain, and what the pain was, and she offered the consolation he had evidently come for. "They tried to make you feel that you were old and finished. But let me explain one fact.

    An old man smells old. Any woman can tell you. When an old man takes a woman in his arms she can smell a stale, dusty kind of thing, like old clothes that need an airing. If the woman has let things go as far as that, and doesn't want to humiliate him when she finds that he really is quite old (people do disguise themselves and it's hard to guess), she will probably go on with it. And that is so awful!

    But Moses, you are chemically youthful." She put her bare arms about his neck. "Your skin has a delicious odor.... What does Madeleine know. She's nothing but a packaged beauty."

    He thought what a fine achievement he had made of Ms life that-aging, vain, terribly narcissistic, suffering without proper dignity-he was taking comfort from someone who really didn't have too much of it to spare him. He had seen her when she was tired, upset and weak, when the shadows came over her eyes, when the fit of her skirt was wrong and she had cold hands, cold lips parted on her teeth, when she was lying on her sofa, a woman of short frame, very full, but after all, a tired, short woman whose breath had the ashen flavor of fatigue. The story then told itself-struggles and disappointments; an elaborate system of theory and eloquence at the bottom of which lay the simple facts of need, a woman's need. She senses that I am for the family. For I am a family type, and she wants me for her family. Her idea of family behavior appeals to me. She was brushing his lips back and forth with hers. She was leading him (somewhat aggressively) away from hatred and fanatical infighting. Her head thrown back, she breathed quickly with excitement, skill, purpose. She began to bite his lip and he drew back, but only from surprise. She held fast to his lip, taking in more of it, and the result was a leap of sexual excitement in Herzog. She was unbuttoning his shirt. Her hand was on his skin. She also reached behind, turning on the hassock, to undo the back of her blouse with the other hand. They held each other. He began to stroke her hair. The scent of lipstick and the odor of flesh came from her mouth. But suddenly they interrupted their kissing. The phone was ringing.

    "Oh, lord!" said Ramona. "Lord, lord!"

    "Are you going to answer?"

    "No, it's George Hoberly. He must have seen you arrive, and he wants to spoil things for us. We mustn't allow him to...."

    "I'm not in favor of it," said Herzog.

    She turned over the phone and silenced it with the switch at the base. "He had me in tears again, yesterday."

    "He wanted to give you a sports car, last I heard."

    "Now he's urging me to take him to Europe. I mean, he wants me to show him Europe."

    "I didn't know he had that sort of money."

    "He doesn't. He'd have to borrow. It would cost ten thousand dollars, staying at the Grand Hotels."

    "I wonder what he's trying to get across?"

    "What do you mean?" Ramona found something suspect in Herzog's tone.

    "Nothing... nothing. Only that he thinks you have the sort of money a tour like that would take."

    "Money has nothing to do with it. There's simply nothing more in the relationship."

    "What was there to begin with?"

    "I thought there was something...." Her hazel eyes gave him an odd look; they reproved him; or, more in sadness, asked him why he wanted to say such queer things. "Do you want to make an issue of this?"

    "What's he doing in the street?"

    "It's not my fault."

    "He made his great pitch for you, and failed, so now he thinks he's under a curse and wants to kill himself. He'd be better off at home, on his sofa, drinking a can of beer, watching Perry Mason."

    "You're too severe," said Ramona. "Maybe you think I'm giving him up for you and it makes you uneasy. You feel you're pushing him out and will have to be his replacement."

    Herzog paused, reflecting, and leaned back in his chair. "Perhaps," he said. "But I think it's that while in New York I am the man inside, in Chicago the man in the street is me."

    "But you're not in the least like George Hoberly," said Ramona with that musical lift he very much liked to hear. Her voice, when it was drawn up from her breast, and changed its tone in her throat-that gave Moses great pleasure. Another man might not react to its intended sensuality, but he did. "I took pity on George. For that reason it could never be anything but a temporary relationship. But you- you aren't the kind of man a woman feels sorry for. You aren't weak, whatever else. You have strength...."

    Herzog nodded. Once more he was being lectured. And he didn't really mind it. That he needed straightening out was only too obvious. And who had more right than a woman who gave him asylum, shrimp, wine, music, flowers, sympathy, gave him room, so to speak, in her soul, and finally the embrace of her body? We must help one another.

    In this irrational world, where mercy, compassion, heart (even if a little fringed with self-interest), all rare things-hard-won in many human battles fought by rare minorities, victories whose results should never be taken for granted, for they were seldom reliable in anyone- rare things, were often debunked, renounced, repudiated by every generation of skeptics.- Reason itself, logic, urged you to kneel and give thanks for every small sign of true kindness. The music played. Surrounded by summer flowers and articles of beauty, even luxury, under the soft green lamp, Ramona spoke to him earnestly-he looked affectionately at her warm face, its ripe color. Beyond, hot New York; an illuminated night which did not need the power of the moon. The Oriental rug and its flowing designs held out the hope that great perplexities might be resolved.

    He held Ramona's soft cool arm in his fingers. His shirt was open on his chest. He was smiling, nodding a little as he listened to her. Much of what she said was perfectly right. She was a clever woman and, even better, a dear woman. She had a good heart. And she had on black lace underpants. He knew she did.

    "You have great capacity for life," she was saying.

    "And you're a very loving man. But you must try to break away from grudges. They'll eat you up."

    "I think that's true."

    "I know you think I theorize too much. But I've taken more than one beating myself-a terrible marriage, and a whole series of bad relationships. Look comy have the strength to recover, and it's sinful not to use it. Use it now."

    "I see what you mean."

    "Maybe it's biology," said Ramona. "You have a powerful system. You know what? The woman in the bakery told me yesterday I was looking so changed commy complexion, my eyes, she said. "Miss Don-sell, you must be in love." And I realized it was because of you."

    "You do look changed," said Moses.

    "Prettier?"

    "Lovely," he said.

    Her color deepened still more. She took his hand and placed it inside her blouse, looking steadily at him, eyes growing fluid. Bless the girl! What pleasure she gave him. All her ways satisfied him-her French-Russian-Argentine-Jewish ways.

    "Let's take off your shoes, too," he said.

    Ramona turned out all the lights except the green lamp by the bed. She whispered, "I'll be right back."

    "Would you switch off that whining Egyptian, please?

    He needs his tongue wiped with a dishrag."

    She stopped the phonograph with a touch, and said, "Just a few minutes," softly closing the door.

    "A few minutes" was a figure of speech. She was long at her preparations. He had gotten used to waiting, saw the point of it, and was no longer impatient. Her reappearance was always dramatic and worth waiting for. In substance, however, he understood that she was trying to teach him something and he was trying (the habit of obedience to teaching being so strong in him) to learn from her. But how was he to describe this lesson? The description might begin with his wild internal disorder, or even with the fact that he was quivering. And why? Because he let the entire world press upon him. For instance? Well, for instance, what it means to be a man. In a city. In a century. In transition. In a mass.

    Transformed by science. Under organized power.

    Subject to tremendous controls. In a condition caused by mechanization. After the late failure of radical hopes. In a society that was no community and devalued the person. Owing to the multiplied power of numbers which made the self negligible. Which spent military billions against foreign enemies but would not pay for order at home. Which permitted savagery and barbarism in its own great cities. At the same time, the pressure of human millions who have discovered what concerted efforts and thoughts can do. As megatons of water shape organisms on the ocean floor. As tides polish stones. As winds hollow cliffs. The beautiful supermachinery opening a new life for innumerable mankind. Would you deny them the right to exist? Would you ask them to labor and go hungry while you enjoyed delicious old-fashioned Values? You-you yourself are a child of this mass and a brother to all the rest. Or else an ingrate, dilettante, idiot. There, Herzog, thought Herzog, since you ask for the instance, is the way it runs. On top of that, an injured heart, and raw gasoline poured on the nerves. And to this, what does Ramona answer? She says, get your health back.

    Mens sana in corpore sano.

    Constitutional tension of whatever origin needed sexual relief. Whatever the man's age, history, condition, knowledge, culture, development, he had an erection. Good currency anywhere.

    Recognized by the Bank of England. Why should his memories injure him now? Strong natures, said F. Nietzsche, could forget what they could not master.

    Of course he also said that the semen reabsorbed was the great fuel of creativity. Be thankful when syphilitics preach cha/y.

    Oh, for a change of heart, a change of heart-a true change of heart!

    Into that there was no way to con yourself. Ramona wanted him to go the whole hog (pecca jortiter!).

    Why was he such a Quaker in lovemaking? He said that after his disappointments of recent date he was glad enough to perform at all, simple missionary style. She said that made him a rarity in New York. A woman had her problems here. Men who seemed decent often had very special tastes. She wanted to give him his pleasure in any way he might choose. He said she would never turn an old herring into a dolphin. It was odd that Ramona should sometimes carry on like one of those broads in a girlie magazine. For which she advanced the most high-minded reasons. An educated woman, she quoted him Catullus and the great love poets of all times. And the classics of psychology. And finally the Mystical Body. And so she was in the next room, joyously preparing, stripping, perfuming. She wanted to please. He had only to be pleased and to let her know it, and then she would grow simpler. How glad she would be to change! How it would relieve her if he said, "Ramona, what's all this for?" But then, would I have to marry her?

    The idea of marriage made him nervous, but he thought it through. Her instincts were good, she was practical, capable, and wouldn't injure him. A woman who squandered her husband's money, all psychiatric opinion agreed, was determined to castrate him. On the practical side-and he found it very exciting to have practical thoughts-he couldn't stand the disorder and loneliness of bachelorhood. He liked clean shirts, ironed handkerchiefs, heels on his shoes, all the things Madeleine despised. Aunt Tamara wanted Ramona to have a husband. There must be a few Yiddish words left in the old girl's memory- shiddach, tachliss.

    He could be a patriarch, as every Herzog was meant to be. The family man, father, transmitter of life, intermediary between past and future, instrument of mysterious creation, was out of fashion. Fathers obsolete? Only to masculine women-wretched, pitiful bluestockings. (how bracing it was to think shrewdly!) He knew that Ramona was keen about scholarship, his books and encyclopedia articles, Ph. D., University of Chicago, and would want to be Frau Professor Herzog. Amused, he saw how they would arrive at white-tie parties at the Hotel Pierre, Ramona in long gloves and introducing Moses with her charming, lifted voice: "This is my husband, Professor Herzog." And he himself, Moses, a different man, radiating well-being, swimming in dignity, affable to one and all. Giving his back hair a touch. What a precious pair they'd make, she with her tics and he with his! What a vaudeville show! Ramona would get revenge on people who had once given her a hard time.

    And he? He too would get back at his enemies.

    Yemach sh'mo!

    Let their names be blotted out! They prepared a net for my steps. They digged a pit before me. Break their teeth, O God, in their mouth!

    His face, his eyes especially, dark, intent, he took off his pants, further loosened his shirt.