Yesterday afternoon at six I felt a little uneasy. Darkness settled very early, and I felt a certain nameless fear. I sat at my desk and waited. I felt an almost unconquerable urge to go to the window certainly not to hang myself, but to look at Clarimonde. I jumped up and stood back of the curtain. It seemed as if I had never seen her so clearly, although it was already quite dark. She was spinning, but her eyes looked across at me. I felt a strange comfort and a very subtle fear.
The telephone rang. I was furious at the silly old Commissioner for interrupting my dreams with his stupid questions.
This morning he came to visit me, along with Madame Dubonnet. She seems to be satisfied enough with my activities: she takes sufficient consolation from the fact that I have managed to live in Room No. 7 for two whole weeks. But the Commissioner wants results besides. I confided to him that I had made some secret observations, and that I was tracking down a very strange clue. The old fool believed all I told him. In any event I can still stay here for weeks and that"s all I care about. Not on account of Madame Dubonnet"s cooking and cellar G.o.d, how soon one becomes indifferent to that when one always has enough to eat! only because of the window, which she hates and fears, and which I love so dearly: this window that reveals Clarimonde to me.
When I light the lamp I no longer see her. I have strained my eyes trying to see whether she goes out, but I have never seen her set foot on the street. I have a comfortable easy chair and a green lampshade whose glow warmly suffuses me. The Commissioner has sent me a large package of tobacco. I have never smoked such good tobacco. And yet I cannot do any work. I read two or three pages, and when I have finished I realize that I haven"t understood a word of their contents. My eyes grasp the significance of the letters, but my brain refuses to supply the connotations. Queer! Just as if my brain bore the legend: "No Admittance". Just as if it refused to admit any thought other than the one: Clarimonde...
Finally I push my books aside, lean far back in my chair, and dream.
Sunday, March 13 This morning I witnessed a little tragedy. I was walking up and down in the corridor while the porter made up my room. In front of the little court window there is a spider web hanging, with a fat garden spider sitting in the middle of it. Madame Dubonnet refuses to let it be swept away: spiders bring luck, and Heaven knows she has had enough bad luck in her house. Presently I saw another much smaller male spider cautiously running around the edge of the web. Tentatively he ventured down one of the precarious threads towards the middle; but the moment the female moved, he hastily withdrew. He ran around to another end of the web and tried again to approach her. Finally the powerful female spider in the centre of the web seemed to look upon his suit with favour, and stopped moving. The male spider pulled at one of the threads of the web first lightly, then so vigorously that the whole web quivered. But the object of his attention remained immovable. Then he approached her very quickly, but carefully. The female spider received him quietly and let him embrace her delicately while she retained the utmost pa.s.sivity. Motionless the two of them hung for several minutes in the centre of the large web.
Then I saw how the male spider slowly freed himself, one leg after another. It seemed as if he wanted to retreat quietly, leaving his companion alone in her dream of love. Suddenly he let her go entirely and ran out of the web as fast as he could. But at the same instant the female seemed to awaken to a wild rush of activity, and she chased rapidly after him. The weak male spider let himself down by a thread, but the female followed immediately. Both of them fell to the windowsill; and, gathering all his energies, the male spider tried to run away. But it was too late. The female spider seized him in her powerful grip, carried him back up into the net, and set him down squarely in the middle of it. And this same place that had just been a bed for pa.s.sionate desire now became the scene of something quite different. The lover kicked in vain, stretched his weak legs out again and again, and tried to disentangle himself from this wild embrace. But the female would not let him go. In a few minutes she had spun him in so completely that he could not move a single member. Then she thrust her sharp pincers into his body and sucked out the young blood of her lover in deep draughts. I even saw how she finally let go of the pitiful, unrecognizable little lump legs, skin and threads and threw it contemptuously out of the net.
So that"s what love is like among these creatures! Well, I can be glad I"m not a young spider.
Monday, March 14 I no longer so much as glance at my books. Only at the window do I pa.s.s all my days. And I keep on sitting there even after it gets dark. Then she is no longer there; but I close my eyes and see her anyhow...
Well, this diary has become quite different than I thought it would be. It tells about Madame Dubonnet and the Commissioner, about spiders and about Clarimonde. But not a word about the discovery I had hoped to make Well, is it my fault?
Tuesday, March 15 Clarimonde and I have discovered a strange new game, and we play it all day long. I greet her, and immediately she returns the greeting. Then I drum with my fingers on my windowpane. She has hardly had time to see it before she begins drumming on hers. I wink at her, and she winks at me. I move my lips as if I were talking to her and she follows suit. Then I brush the hair back from my temples, and immediately her hand is at the side of her forehead. Truly child"s play. And we both laugh at it. That is, she really doesn"t laugh: it"s only a quiet, pa.s.sive smile she has, just as I suppose mine must be.
For that matter all this isn"t nearly as senseless as it must seem. It isn"t imitation at all: I think we would both tire of that very quickly. There must be a certain telepathy or thought transference involved in it. For Clarimonde repeats my motions in the smallest conceivable fraction of a second. She hardly has time to see what I am doing before she does the same thing. Sometimes it even seems to me that her action is simultaneous with mine. That is what entices me: always doing something new and unpremeditated. And it"s astounding to see her doing the same thing at the same time. Sometimes I try to catch her. I make a great many motions in quick succession, and then repeat them again; and then I do them a third time. Finally I repeat them for the fourth time, but change their order, introduce some new motion, or leave out one of the old ones. It"s like children playing Follow the Leader. It"s really remarkable that Clarimonde never makes a single mistake, although I sometimes change the motions so rapidly that she hardly has time to memorize each one.
That is how I spend my days. But I never feel for a second that I"m squandering my time on something nonsensical. On the contrary, it seems as if nothing I had ever done were more important.
Wednesday, March 16 Isn"t it queer that I have never thought seriously about putting my relations with Clarimonde on a more sensible basis than that of these hour-consuming games? I thought about it last night. I could simply take my hat and coat and go down two flights of stairs, five steps across the street, and then up two other flights of stairs. On her door there is a little coat-of-arms engraved with her name: "Clarimonde..." Clarimonde what? I don"t know what; but the name Clarimonde is certainly there. Then I could knock, and then...
That far I can imagine everything perfectly, down to the last move I might make. But for the life of me I can"t picture what would happen after that. The door would open I can conceive that. But I would remain standing in front of it looking into her room, into a darkness a darkness so utter that not a solitary thing could be distinguished in it. She would not come nothing would come; as a matter of fact, there would be nothing there. Only the black impenetrable darkness.
Sometimes it seems as if there could be no other Clarimonde than the one I play with at my window. I can"t picture what this woman would look like if she wore a hat, or even some dress other than her black one with the large purple dots; I can"t even conceive of her without her gloves. If I could see her on the street, or even in some restaurant, eating, drinking, talking well, I really have to laugh: the thing seems so utterly inconceivable.
Sometimes I ask myself whether I love her. I can"t answer that question entirely, because I have never been in love. But if the feeling I bear towards Clarimonde is really well, love then love is certainly very, very different from what I saw of it among my acquaintances or learned about it in novels.
It is becoming quite difficult to define my emotions. In fact, it is becoming difficult even to think about anything at all that has no bearing on Clarimonde or rather, on our game. For there is truly no denying it: it"s really the game that preoccupies me nothing else. And that"s the thing I understand least of all.
Clarimonde well, yes, I feel attracted to her. But mingled with the attraction there is another feeling almost like a sense of fear. Fear? No, it isn"t fear either: it is more of a temerity, a certain inarticulate alarm or apprehension before something I cannot define. And it is just this apprehension that has some strange compulsion, something curiously pa.s.sionate that keeps me at a distance from her and at the same time draws me constantly nearer to her. It is as if I were going around her in a wide circle, came a little nearer at one place, withdrew again, went on, approached her again at another point and again retreated rapidly. Until finally of that I am absolutely certain I must go to her.
Clarimonde is sitting at her window and spinning. Threads long, thin, infinitely fine threads. She seems to be making some fabric I don"t know just what it is to be. And I can"t understand how she can make the network without tangling or tearing the delicate fabric. There are wonderful patterns in her work patterns full of fabulous monsters and curious grotesques. For that matter but what am I writing? The fact of the matter is that I can"t even see what it is she is spinning: the threads are much too fine. And yet I can"t help feeling that her work must be exactly as I see it when I close my eyes. Exactly. A huge network peopled with many creatures fabulous monsters, and curious grotesque...
Thursday, March 17 I find myself in a strange state of agitation. I no longer talk to any one; I hardly even say good morning to Madame Dubonnet or the porter. I hardly take time to eat; I only want to sit at the window and play with her. It"s an exacting game. Truly it is.
And I have a premonition that tomorrow something must happen.
Friday, March 18 Yes, yes. Something must happen today...I tell myself oh, yes, I talk aloud, just to hear my own voice that it is just for that I am here. But the worst of it is that I am afraid. And this fear that what has happened to my predecessors in this room may also happen to me is curiously mingled with my other fear the fear of Clarimonde. I can hardly keep them apart. I am afraid. I would like to scream.
6 p.m.
Let me put down a few words quickly, and then get into my hat and coat.
By the time five o"clock came, my strength was gone. Oh, I know now for certain that it must have something to do with this sixth hour of the next to the last day of the week...Now I can no longer laugh at the fraud with which I duped the Commissioner. I sat on my chair and stayed there only by exerting my will-power to the utmost. But this thing drew me, almost pulled me to the window. I had to play with Clarimonde and then again there rose that terrible fear of the window. I saw them hanging there the Swiss travelling salesman, a large fellow with a thick neck and a grey stubble beard. And the lanky acrobat and the stocky, powerful police sergeant. I saw all three of them, one after another and then all three together, hanging from the same hook with open mouths and with tongues lolling far out. And then I saw myself among them.
Oh, this fear! I felt I was as much afraid of the window-sash and the terrible hook as I was of Clarimonde. May she forgive me for it, but that"s the truth: in my ignominious fear I always confused her image with that of the three who hanged there, dangling their legs heavily on the floor.
But the truth is that I never felt for an instant any desire or inclination to hang myself: I wasn"t even afraid I would do it. No I was afraid only of the window itself and of Clarimonde and of something terrible, something uncertain and unpredictable that was now to come. I had the pathetic irresistible longing to get up and go to the window. And I had to do it...
Then the telephone rang. I grabbed the receiver and before I could hear a word I myself cried into the mouthpiece: "Come! Come at once!"
It was just as if my unearthly yell had instantly chased all the shadows into the farthest cracks of the floor. I became composed immediately. I wiped the sweat from my forehead and drank a gla.s.s of water. Then I considered what I ought to tell the Commissioner when he came. Finally I went to the window, greeted Clarimonde, and smiled.
And Clarimonde greeted me and smiled.
Five minutes later the Commissioner was here. I told him that I had finally struck the root of the whole affair; if he would only refrain from questioning me today, I would certainly be able to make some remarkable disclosures in the very near future. The queer part of it was that while I was lying to him I was at the same time fully convinced in my own mind that I was telling the truth. And I still feel that that is the truth against my better judgement.
He probably noticed the unusual condition of my temper, especially when I apologized for screaming into the telephone and tried to explain and failed to find any plausible reason for my agitation. He suggested very amiably that I need not take undue consideration of him: he was always at my service that was his duty. He would rather make a dozen useless trips over here than let me wait for him once when I really needed him. Then he invited me to go out with him tonight, suggesting that that might help distract me it wasn"t a good thing to be alone all the time. I have accepted his invitation, although I think it will be difficult to go out: I don"t like to leave this room.
Sat.u.r.day, March 19 We went to the Gaiete? Rochechouart, to the Cigale, and to the Lune Rousse. The Commissioner was right: it was a good thing for me to go out and breathe another atmosphere. At first I felt rather uncomfortable, as if I were doing something wrong (as if I were a deserter, running away from our flag). But by and by that feeling died; we drank a good deal, laughed, and joked.
When I went to the window this morning, I seemed to read a reproach in Clarimonde"s look. But perhaps I only imagined it: how could she know that I had gone out last night? For that matter, it seemed to last for only a moment; then she smiled again.
We played all day long.
Sunday, March 20 Today I can only repeat: we played all day long.
Monday, March 21 We played all day long.
Tuesday, March 22 Yes, and today we did the same. Nothing, absolutely nothing else. Sometimes I ask myself why we do it. What is it all for? Or, what do I really want, to what can it all lead? But I never answer my own question. For it"s certain that I want nothing other than just this. Come what may, that which is coming is exactly what I long for.
We have been talking to one another these last few days, of course not with any spoken word. Sometimes we moved our lips, at other times we only looked at one another. But we understood each other perfectly.
I was right: Clarimonde reproached me for running away last Friday. But I begged her forgiveness and told her I realized that it had been very unwise and horrid of me. She forgave me and I promised her never again to leave the window. And we kissed each other, pressing our lips against the panes for a long, long time.
Wednesday, March 23 I know now that I love her. It must be love I feel it tingling in every fibre of my being. It may be that with other people love is different. But is there any one among a thousand millions who has a head, an ear, a hand that is like anyone else"s? Everyone is different, so it is quite conceivable that our love is very singular. But does that make it any less beautiful? I am almost happy in this love.
If only there would not be this fear! Sometimes it falls asleep. Then I forget it. But only for a few minutes. Then it wakes up again and will not let me go. It seems to me like a poor little mouse fighting against a huge and beautiful snake, trying to free itself from its overpowering embrace. Just wait, you poor foolish little fear, soon our love will devour you!
Thursday, March 24 I have made a discovery: I don"t play with Clarimonde she plays with me.
It happened like this.
Last night, as usual, I thought about our game. I wrote down five intricate movements with which I wanted to surprise her today. I gave every motion a number. I practised them so as to be able to execute them as quickly as possible, first in order, and then backwards. Then only the even numbers and then the odd, and then only the first and last parts of each of the five motions. It was very laborious, but it gave me great satisfaction because it brought me nearer to Clarimonde, even though I could not see her. I practised in this way for hours, and finally they went like clockwork.
This morning I went to the window. We greeted each other, and the game began. Forward, backward it was incredible to see how quickly she understood me, and how instantaneously she repeated all the things I did.
Then there was a knock at my door. It was the porter, bringing me my boots. I took them; but when I was going back to the window my glance fell on the sheet of paper on which I had recorded the order of the movements. And I saw that I had not executed a single one of these movements.
I almost reeled. I grabbed the back of the easy chair and let myself down into it. I couldn"t believe it. I read the sheet again and again. But it was true: of all the motions I had made at the window, not a single one was mine.
And again I was aware of a door opening somewhere far away her door. I was standing before it and looking in...nothing, nothing only an empty darkness. Then I knew that if I went out, I would be saved; and I realized that now I could go. Nevertheless I did not go. That was because I was distinctly aware of one feeling: that I held the secret of the mystery. Held it tightly in both hands. Paris I was going to conquer Paris!
For a moment Paris was stronger than Clarimonde.
Oh, I"ve dropped all thought of it now. Now I am aware only of my love, and in the midst of it this quiet, pa.s.sionate fear.
But in that instant I felt suddenly strong. I read through the details of my first movement once more and impressed it firmly in my memory. Then I went back to the window.
And I took exact notice of what I did: not a single motion I executed was among those I had set out to do.
Then I decided to run my index finger along my nose. But instead I kissed the window-pane. I wanted to drum on the window-sill, but ran my hand through my hair instead. So it was true: Clarimonde did not imitate the things I did: on the contrary, I repeated the things she indicated. And I did it so quickly, with such lightning rapidity, that I followed her motions in the same second, so that even now it seems as if I were the one who exerted the will-power to do these things.
So it is I I who was so proud of the fact that I had determined her mode of thought I was the one who was being so completely influenced. Only, her influence is so soft, so gentle that it seems as if nothing on earth could be so soothing.
I made other experiments. I put both my hands in my pockets and resolved firmly not to move them; then I looked across at her. I noticed how she lifted her hand and smiled, and gently chided me with her index finger. I refused to budge. I felt my right hand wanting to take itself out of my pocket, but I dug my fingers deep into the pocket lining. Then slowly, after several minutes, my fingers relaxed, my hand came out of the pocket, and I lifted my arm. And I chided her with my index finger and smiled. It seemed as if it were really not I who was doing all this, but some stranger whom I watched from a distance. No, no that wasn"t the way of it. I, I was the one who did it and some stranger was watching me. It was the stranger that other me who was so strong, who wanted to solve this mystery with some great discovery. But that was no longer I.
I oh, what do I care about the discovery? I am only here to do her bidding, the bidding of my Clarimonde, whom I love with such tender fear.
Friday, March 25 I have cut the telephone wire. I can no longer stand being perpetually bothered by the silly old Commissioner, least of all when the fateful hour is at hand...
G.o.d, why am I writing all this? Not a word of it is true. It seems as if someone else were guiding my pen.
But I do I want to set down here what actually happens. It is costing me a tremendous effort. But I want to do it. If only for the last time to do what I really want to do.
I cut the telephone wire...oh...
Because I had to...There, I finally got it out! Because I had to, I had to!
We stood at the window this morning and played. Our game has changed a little since yesterday. She goes through some motions and I defend myself as long as possible. Until finally I have to surrender, powerless to do anything but her bidding. And I can scarcely tell what a wonderful sense of exaltation and joy it gives me to be conquered by her will, to make this surrender.
We played. And then suddenly she got up and went back into her room. It was so dark that I couldn"t see her; she seemed to disappear into the darkness. But she came back very shortly, carrying in her hands a desk telephone just like mine. Smiling, she set it down on the window-sill, took a knife, cut the wire, and carried it back again.
I defended myself for about a quarter of an hour. My fear was greater than ever, but that made my slow surrender all the more delectable. And I finally brought my telephone to the window, cut the wire, and set it back on the table.
That is how it happened.
I am sitting at the table. I have had my tea, and the porter has just taken the dishes out. I asked him what time it was it seems my watch isn"t keeping time. It"s five fifteen...five fifteen...
I know that if I look up now Clarimonde will be doing something or other. Doing something or other that I will have to do too.
I look up anyhow. She is standing there and smiling. Well...if I could only tear my eyes away from her!...now she is going to the curtain. She is taking the cord off it is red, just like the one on my window. She is tying a knot a slipknot. She is hanging the cord up on the hook in the window-sash.
She is sitting down and smiling.
...No, this is no longer a thing one can call fear, this thing I am experiencing. It is a maddening, choking terror but nevertheless I wouldn"t trade it for anything in the world. It is a compulsion of an unheard-of nature and power, yet so subtly sensual in its inescapable ferocity.
Of course I could rush up to the window and do exactly what she wants me to do. But I am waiting, struggling, and defending myself. I feel this uncanny thing getting stronger every minute...
So, here I am, still sitting here. I ran quickly to the window and did the thing she wanted me to do: I took the curtain cord, tied a slipknot in it, and hung it from the hook...
And now I am not going to look up any more. I am going to stay here and look only at this sheet of paper. For I know now what she would do if I looked up again now in the sixth hour of the next to the last day of the week. If I see her, I shall have to do her bidding...I shall have to...
I shall refuse to look at her.
But I am suddenly laughing loudly. No, I"m not laughing it is something laughing within me. I know why, too: it"s because of this "I will not..."
I don"t want to, and yet I know certainly that I must. I must. I must look at her...must, must do it...and then the rest.
I am only waiting to stretch out the torment. Yes, that is it...For these breathless sufferings are my most rapturous transports. I am writing...quickly, quickly, so that I can remain sitting here longer...in order to stretch out these seconds of torture, which carry the ecstasy of love into infinity...
More...longer...
Again this fear, again! I know that I shall look at her, that I shall get up, that I shall hang myself. But it isn"t that that I fear. Oh, no that is sweet, that is beautiful.
But there is something else...something else a.s.sociated with it something that will happen afterwards. I don"t know what it will be but it is coming, it is certainly coming, certainly...certainly. For the joy of my torments is so infinitely great oh, I feel it is so great that something terrible must follow it.
Only I must not think...
Let me write something, anything, no matter what. Only quickly, without thinking.
My name Richard Bracquemont, Richard Bracquemont, Richard oh, I can"t go any farther Richard Bracquemont Richard Bracquemont now now I must look at her...Richard Bracquemont I must no no, more more...Richard...Richard Bracquemont The Commissioner of the Ninth Ward, after failing repeatedly to get a reply to his telephone calls, came to the Hotel Stevens at five minutes to six. In Room No. 7 he found the body of the student Richard Bracquemont hanging from the window-sash, in exactly the same position as that of his three predecessors.
Only his face had a different expression; it was distorted in horrible fear, and his eyes, wide open, seemed to be pushing themselves out of their sockets. His lips were drawn apart, but his powerful teeth were firmly and desperately clenched.
And glued between them, bitten and crushed to pieces, there was a large black spider, with curious purple dots.
On the table lay the medical student"s diary. The Commissioner read it and went immediately to the house across the street. There he discovered that the second apartment had been vacant and unoccupied for months and months...
The Hungry Stones.
Rabindranath Tagore.
Rabindranath Tagore (18611941) was a n.o.bel Prize-winning Indian Bengali writer who forever changed Bengali literature and music through his fiction, poetry, drama, music, and advocacy. At the height of his international popularity, he was almost as well-known as Mahatma Gandhi. Tagore modernized Bengali art by rejecting traditional forms. His work encompa.s.sed both the personal and the political, with many critics praising his lyricism, colloquialism, and naturalism. Tagore"s short stories hold the highest reputation among his writings, perhaps in part because he is credited with originating the Bengali-language version of the form. "The Hungry Stones" (1916) is among the most overtly weird, or supernatural, of his tales.
MY kinsman and myself were returning to Calcutta from our Puja trip when we met the man in a train. From his dress and bearing we took him at first for an up-country Mahomedan, but we were puzzled as we heard him talk. He discoursed upon all subjects so confidently that you might think the Disposer of All Things consulted him at all times in all that He did. Hitherto we had been perfectly happy, as we did not know that secret and unheard-of forces were at work, that the Russians had advanced close to us, that the English had deep and secret policies, that confusion among the native chiefs had come to a head. But our newly-acquired friend said with a sly smile: "There happen more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are reported in your newspapers." As we had never stirred out of our homes before, the demeanour of the man struck us dumb with wonder. Be the topic ever so trivial, he would quote science, or comment on the Vedas, or repeat quatrains from some Persian poet; and as we had no pretence to a knowledge of science or the Vedas or Persian, our admiration for him went on increasing, and my kinsman, a theosophist, was firmly convinced that our fellow-pa.s.senger must have been supernaturally inspired by some strange "magnetism" or "occult power," by an "astral body" or something of that kind. He listened to the tritest saying that fell from the lips of our extraordinary companion with devotional rapture, and secretly took down notes of his conversation. I fancy that the extraordinary man saw this, and was a little pleased with it.
When the train reached the junction, we a.s.sembled in the waiting-room for the connection. It was then 10 p.m., and as the train, we heard, was likely to be very late, owing to something wrong in the lines, I spread my bed on the table and was about to lie down for a comfortable doze, when the extraordinary person deliberately set about spinning the following yarn. Of course, I could get no sleep that night.
When, owing to a disagreement about some questions of administrative policy, I threw up my post at Junagarh, and entered the service of the Nizam of Hyderabad, they appointed me at once, as a strong young man, collector of cotton duties at Barich.
Barich is a lovely place. The Susta "chatters over stony ways and babbles on the pebbles," tripping, like a skilful dancing girl, in through the woods below the lonely hills. A flight of 150 steps rises from the river, and above that flight, on the river"s brim and at the foot of the hills, there stands a solitary marble palace. Around it there is no habitation of man the village and the cotton mart of Barich being far off.
About 250 years ago the Emperor Mahmud Shah II had built this lonely palace for his pleasure and luxury. In his days jets of rose-water spurted from its fountains, and on the cold marble floors of its spray-cooled rooms young Persian damsels would sit, their hair dishevelled before bathing, and, splashing their soft naked feet in the clear water of the reservoirs, would sing, to the tune of the guitar, the ghazals of their vineyards.
The fountains play no longer; the songs have ceased; no longer do snow-white feet step gracefully on the snowy marble. It is but the vast and solitary quarters of cess-collectors like us, men oppressed with solitude and deprived of the society of women. Now, Karim Khan, the old clerk of my office, warned me repeatedly not to take up my abode there. "Pa.s.s the day there, if you like," said he, "but never stay the night." I pa.s.sed it off with a light laugh. The servants said that they would work till dark, and go away at night. I gave my ready a.s.sent. The house had such a bad name that even thieves would not venture near it after dark.