The Recognitions (Dalkey Archive edition) (26 page)

—Yes, Otto said, —I know. I mean when I stay cooped up like that working, I mean staying inside working on this play, it gets . . . I mean I get . . . I mean it doesn’t seem to sound right after awhile.

—Yes, yes. I imagine it might not.

Though the tone of this response was an absent one, Otto was encouraged to go on, looking away, just then, from something he would never forget, a detail, he would tell himself, of no significance or consequence whatever; still Otto would remember him unsurprised, his lower lip drawn, exposing his lower teeth, as he spoke and finished speaking. —I mean, trying to get everything to fit where it belongs, there’s so much that . . . well you know what I mean, I mean you’ve talked to me about these things before, but . . . well, you’ve really taught me a great deal.

—Have I?

—Yes but, well I mean to know as much as you do, it must be . . . I mean you can really do anything you want to by now, I mean, you don’t feel all sort of hedged in by the parts you don’t know about, like I do. Otto finished speaking, and looked anxiously for response; there was none but a sound which indicated that he needn’t try to repeat what he had said. They walked on in silence, but any silence was a difficult state for Otto, most especially in the company of another person it seemed an unnatural presence which must be assailed and broken into pieces, or at least shaken until it rattled. Finally he said, —I’ve been wondering, I mean are you on a vacation now? Or are you just sort of taking time off.

—From what?

—Well I mean from your job, the drafting . . .

—Oh that. That. I’m through with that.

—Really? That’s wonderful. I mean, it is, isn’t it? From what Esther’s said, now you’ll be able to . . . do what you want to do.

Attentive only to pools of water, the curbs, and shining bits of ice, they walked on. Before they reached the block they had set out from, Otto had looked at his watch a half-dozen times, and drawn only one response which he turned over in his mind, not to try to understand it immediately, face to face, for itself, nor the source from which it came, but fitting it to the lips of Gordon, through whom, though he did not know it, nor plan it so, he would one day overtake himself. As he walked he pictured Gordon in one after another setting, saying to one after another of the characters who were distinguished only by sex, —And if I cannot teach anyone how to become better, then what have I learned?

—It’s just as though that dog’s following us, Otto said looking back. He snapped his fingers. The black poodle bounded away. —But I mean, you don’t see dogs like that running around loose in the streets. Otto looked up. It was the first time his companion had shown any interest in anything but the ground before them. —I mean, somebody must have lost it.

—Yes, she is odd. Running around us in circles, getting a little closer each time.

—Looking for its master probably, and all it sees is two strangers, Otto said. —But with all that fine trimming, that fancy coiffure and red collar, look at it, just another dog, crouching on its belly.

—Here. Come here.

—I’ve heard they’re terrifically bright, though. The dog was off again. But when they got up the steps, they looked round to see the black poodle halfway up behind them.

Esther was putting her hat on when they came in. —What . . . wherever . . . she said, as the dog ran past her, entering as though it knew the house better, had more right there than she did.

—I thought you’d be just coming back, Otto said to her.

—I did, but the Bildows just called and asked us down for drinks. Do you want to come?

—Why yes, I mean if I . . .

—Well
he
wouldn’t come, certainly, she said good-humoredly. —He’s never forgiven her for trying to kiss him New Year’s Eve. They both turned to include him on this, but he had stepped inside the door of the studio where he was fumbling with the phonograph;

—Esther, I . . .

—He . . .

—I’ll just be a minute, she said going toward the bedroom.

Otto stood, examining his fingernails. Then he looked at his watch, and music burst upon him. —What is it? he asked, approaching the door of the studio.

—This? Something of Handel’s, an oratorio
Judas Maccabaeus
.

—Oh. It’s . . . it’s splendid isn’t it, Otto went on, unable to show his appreciation by listening. —
Lo the conqueror comes
, sang the bass.

—It always seems too bad when they have to translate these things. I mean, it must sound much more impressive in the original.

—The
original?

—I mean . . . in German, he said, as Esther entered, emptying the unexamined jumble of one purse into another. She dropped a lipstick. Her skirt pulled tightly against the long line of her thigh as she stooped to pick it up. The day had begun to darken. The poodle watched them both without interest.

—Please don’t let the dog mess up the house.

—Goodbye, I . . .

—Goodbye.

On the first landing of the staircase, Esther fumbled in her purse and got out a piece of paper. —Can you read it? She handed it over. —It’s their address, I never remember it.

—What’s this?

—No. The other side. God knows what that is, something of his.

—The equation of x
ⁿ
plus y
ⁿ
has no nontrivial solution in integers for n greater than 2.

—The other side. She pulled the outside door open herself.

—He is so . . . strange by now, Esther, Otto said catching up with her. —You can hardly . . . I mean all this time we were walking I couldn’t reach him at all.

—I hardly know him at all now. It is strange. She looked up at Otto as they walked. —Do you know, there’s something alike about you both.

—Yes, but . . . with his ability . . .

—With his ability and your ambition, she said taking Otto’s arm, and looking away too soon to see the expression she brought to his face, —I’d have quite a remarkable man.

The poodle, lying on the floor with its forelegs extended, watched him drink down a glass of brandy. —The original! Good God, how can anyone clinging to such foolishness keep any hope in his head? He walked over to the window and stood before it, his back turned upon the room. Outside it had begun to rain. The room was warm,
water clattered against the glass. As these minutes went by, the place took on the aspect of any quiet room on a winter’s raining afternoon, the room cut away from everything else which the sun and opened windows allow, and here even the music an extensive furnishing which served rather to order the silence than to break it, building upon the impression that the room shall not be returned as part of the world until it has enclosed an assignation. —A boy, brittle as a preconception, I suppose I ought to thank him, I ought to thank him for getting me out of that damned feeling that . . .

The dog stretched its forelegs, and digging its nails into the floor pulled itself toward him, inclining its head slightly to one side as it listened. He turned, and they stared at each other, the man and the dog: and the dog saw a man whose appearance held nothing in the least remarkable, though dressed to confirm the fact that he looked some years older than he was. The dog raised its forequarters and sat, without taking its eyes from him, to watch him go over and turn the phonograph down until it was almost inaudible. He stood beside it for a moment, and then picked up a book. When he opened it, a slip of paper fell out, which he caught between his fingers. As he sat down to read, the dog’s eyes caught his again, each eyed the other obliquely, he as though to discountenance the dog’s presence, the black poodle to suggest that the book was a distraction unworthy of notice.

“The first discovery” (it was an account of the oracle at Delphos) “is said to have been occasioned by some goats which were feeding on Mount Parnassus near a deep and large cavern, with a narrow entrance. These goats having been observed by the goatherd, Coretas, to frisk and skip after a strange manner, and to utter unusual sounds immediately upon their approach to the mouth of the cavern, he had the curiosity to view it, and found himself seized with the like fit of madness, skipping, dancing, and foretelling things to come . . .”

—Damn you! he cried out as the dog barked. —If I have to share this room with you, he commenced, lowering his tone, though the black animal did not seem at all upset by his curse. —Damn you, he repeated, confirming it more quietly, and threw down the book, —skipping, dancing, and foretelling things to come . . . He got up and poured himself another glass of brandy. The dog watched him look around the room. The music was still going on, and he suddenly crossed to stop it, so suddenly that the dog reared as though ready to jump behind him. He stood beside the silent phonograph, looking at the slip of paper between his fingers. —I A O, I A E, he read, copied in a delicate Italian semi-gothic hand he’d once worked
on. Before him, on the wall and in sight of the other room where the dog sat poised, watching him, hung the soiled beginning of Camilla on gesso. He stood looking at it; then something moved. He swung about. It was the dog’s reflection in the mirror. But the dog sat still in the door. —Damn it, he said directly to its face, —what is it you have, or don’t have, that you sit there completely self-contained, that you can sit and know . . . and know exactly where your feet are? Yes, that’s what makes cats incredible, because you know they’re aware every instant of where their feet are, and they know how much they have to share with other cats, they don’t try to . . . pretend . . . He came out muttering, and drank down this third glass looking out the window at the rain. The black poodle had followed and was quite close upon him, sitting looking up at the back of his head. He did not realize it, and when he turned, he dropped his glass and it broke on the floor between them. The dog did not move. —What are you doing in here? he burst out. —What do you want here? What are you . . . what do you want of me? He swayed a little, wiped his cheek with his hand, and found he was perspiring freely. Then he suddenly wiped his cheek again. The dog watched him drop his hand slowly, met his eyes, and did not move.

—Move! he demanded. —Get out of my way, get out! The dog sat with the broken glass at its feet, looking up at him. The rain beat on the glass behind him. Then instead of pushing the dog aside he turned and went round the couch. He had started for the brandy bottle, there on the table where the dog blocked his way; but he stopped again at the door of the studio, and went through a pile of records on the floor. The dog came over and stood sniffing at the doorway. He put a record on the turntable, and stood with a fingernail in the groove as it turned. Then the dog startled for the first time, when he put the needle on the record and turned up the volume. The music was Arabic. The dog put its head on one side, then the other, watching him. —There are shapes, he murmured, raising his right hand to move it on the air as though shaping the line of the flute from the dissonance. The dog had laid its ears back, its mouth was closed, no longer panting, no longer exposing teeth. —There are shapes, and . . . exquisite strength . . . They both watched his hand move slowly between them. —Change a line without touching it . . . there’s delicacy. The dog turned slightly to look up at his face, at his perspiring forehead, as though seeking there evidence or betrayal of the signs he made in the air between them. —Not a word. Not an instant of adultery. “You can really do anything you want to by now!” The dog bared its teeth at his harsh laughter, and watched his hand drop, all the way to snatch
up the slip of paper he’d dropped a few minutes before. —I A O, I A E, in the name of the father and of our Lord Jesus Christ and holy spirit, iriterli estather, nochthai brasax salolam . . . yes, very good for cows in Egypt . . . opsakion aklana thalila i a o, i a e . . .

The dog growled at him. He crumpled the paper and hurled it, but it fell slowly, at the dog’s feet. The dog stood up instantly and backed into the other room, which was already getting darker, though not yet as dark as the studio, where he’d sat down gripping the edge of the table, looking feverishly over the books and papers spread before him. He caught at Remigius’
Demonolatria
and pushed it aside, raised the cover of the
Libro dell’ Arte
, and pushed it off to the floor, then found pen and paper, and the ink bottle already opened, and wrote, slow, and with great care and application,

Emperor

His lips moved over the letters, as the flute disappeared, the music broke, recovered, rose into collision, fell in clangor, and the dog in the other room commenced trotting in irregular circles, sniffing the air which the heat seemed to have weighed down the more heavily with lavender.

. . . by the power of the grand ADONAY
 . . . his lips were moving, over letters, then words,

. . . to appear instanter, and by ELOIM, by ARIEL, by JEHOVAM, by AQUA, TAGLA, MATHON, OARIOS, ALMOAZIN, ARIOS, MEMBROT, VARIOS, PITHONA, MAJODS, SULPHÆ, GABOTS, SALAMANDRÆ, TABOTS, GINGUA, JANNA, ETITNAMUS, ZARIATNATMIX
 . . .

He stopped and listened. Then,

A. E. A. J. A. T. M. O. A. A. M. V. P. M. S. . . .

The music stopped, leaving the sounds of the dog’s nails clicking on the wood floor. Then as abruptly that stopped, and the pen hung in his hand over the wet black letters on the paper. A movement caught the corner of his eye; he turned his head quickly, saw the arm of the phonograph raise itself, pause. He looked through the door, unable to see the black poodle. —Dog, he whispered in a hoarse tone. —
Dog! Dog! Dog!
No sound contested his challenge, no recognition of men imprisoned in the past for spelling the Name of God backwards, no response to God, if not the Name, reversed three times in his whisper.

He jumped to his feet, slipped against the table, spilling the ink on the papers there, and in three steps was through the door to the other room. The dog lay in the darkened foyer before the front door, facing the door and apparently at rest. —Damn you! he said. —I’ll . . .

The dog turned to look at him, as he threw his hands out before him. —Damned . . . animal out of hell are you . . . The dog, only partially distinguishable in the darkness, got up, the hair on its shoulders bristling as he took two steps closer, and paused. They both listened to the footsteps on the lower staircase, he with his hands still in the air as though counting the steps, heavy and even, neither casual nor hurried, reaching the hallway below, the foot of the stairs, and up the stairs with no more apparent effort than one step at a time, though too soon
knock knock knock