“I’ve heard that,” he murmured.
“Listen…”
He was empty, at peace. The darkened windows made the room seem bright. He had come in from the sea, from a thrilling voyage. He had straightened his clothes, brushed his hair. He was filled with secrets, deceptions that had made him whole.
“The eel is a fish,” she read, “of the order Apode. It is brown and olive, its sides are yellow, its belly pale. The male lives in harbors and rivers. The female lives far from the sea. The life of the eel was always a mystery. No one knew where they came from, no one knew where they went.”
“This is a book,” he said.
“A book or a story. Just for us. I love the descriptions. They live in fresh water,” she continued, “but once in their life, and once only, they go to the sea. They make the trip together, male and female. They never return.”
“This is accurate, of course.”
“The eel comes from an egg. Afterwards it is a larva. They float on the ocean current, not a quarter of an inch long, transparent. They feed on algae. After a year or longer they finally reach the shore. Here they develop into true young eels, and here, at the river mouths, the females leave the males and travel upstream. Eels feed on everything: dead fish and animals, crayfish, shrimp. They hide in the mud by day and eat at night. In the winter they hibernate.”
She sipped her drink and went on. “The female lives like this for years, in ponds and streams, and then, one day in autumn, she stops and eats nothing more. Her color changes to black or nearly black, her nose becomes sharper, her eyes large. Moving at night, resting by day, sometimes crossing meadows and fields, she travels downstream to the sea.”
“And the male?”
“She meets the male who has spent all his life near the river mouth, and together, by hundreds of thousands, they return to the place where they were born, the sea of weeds, the Sargasso Sea. At depths of uncounted feet they mate and die.”
“Nedra, it sounds like Wagner.”
“There are common eels, pike eels, snake eels, sharp-tailed eels, every kind of eel. They are born in the sea, they live in fresh water and they go to the sea to spawn and die. Doesn’t it move you?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t know how to end it.”
“Perhaps with a beautiful drawing.”
“Oh, there’ll be drawings on every page,” she said.
“I want it filled with drawings.”
His eyes felt tired.
“I want it to be on pale, gray paper,” she said. “Here, draw one.”
The children were coming downstairs.
“An eel?” he said.
“Here are a lot of pictures of them.”
“Are they allowed to see what I’m doing?”
“No,” she said. “No, it should be a surprise.”
They ate in a Chinese restaurant that was crowded on weekends but this night rather empty. The menus were worn and coming apart at the fold. He had two vodkas and showed his children how to use chopsticks. The dishes were set on the table and uncovered: shrimp and peas, braised chicken, rice. Two lives are perfectly natural, he thought, as he picked up a water chestnut. Two lives are essential. Meanwhile he was talking about China: legends of emperors, the stone pleasure boats in Peiping. Nedra seemed watchful, quiet. He suddenly grew cautious and became almost silent, afraid of betraying himself. There was something he had overlooked, he tried to imagine what it was, something she had noticed by chance. The guilt of the inexperienced, like a false illness, bathed him. He tried to remain calm, realistic.
“Would you like some dessert?” he asked.
He called the waiter, who wore a name tag on his jacket.
“Kenneth?” Viri said in surprise.
“Kennif,” the Chinese confirmed.
“Ah, yes. Kenneth, what is there for dessert? Do you have fortune cookies?”
“Oh yes, sah.”
“Kumquats?”
“No kumquat,” Kenneth said.
“No kumquat?”
“Jerro,” he said appeasingly.
“Just the cookies, then,” Viri said.
In clean pajamas he lay in bed waiting. His shoes were in the closet, his clothes put away. The coolness of the pillow beneath his head, the sense of weariness and well-being that filled him, he examined these things as if they were forewarnings. He lay resigned and cautious, ready for the blow.
Nedra took her place beside him. He lay there silent; he could not close his eyes. Her presence was the final pledge of sanctity and order, like those great commanders who were the last to sleep. The house was quiet, the windows dark, his daughters were in their beds. On Nedra’s finger, somewhere near him, was a gold band of marriage, an ink-stained finger possibly, a finger that he longed to stroke, that he had not the nerve to touch.
They lay beside one another in the dark. In a drawer of the writing table, buried in back, was a letter composed of phrases clipped from magazines and papers, a pasted letter of love with jokes and passionate suggestions, a famous letter sent from Georgia before they were married when Viri was in the army, aching, alone. There were bees nesting in the greenhouse, erosion along the river shore. On a child’s bureau, in a box with four small legs, were necklaces, rings, a starfish hard as wood. A house as rich as an aquarium, filled with the rhythm of sleep, limbs without strength, partly open mouths.
Nedra was awake. She suddenly rose on one elbow.
“What is that ungodly smell?” she said. “Hadji? Is that you?”
He was lying beneath the bed.
“Get out of there,” she cried.
He would not move. She continued to command. At last, ears flat, he came forth.
“Viri,” she sighed. “Open the window.”
“Yes, what is it?”
“Your damned dog.”
10
MARCEL-MAAS LIVED IN AN UNFINISHED stone barn, much of it built with his own hands. He was a painter. He had a gallery that showed his work, but he was largely unknown. His daughter was seventeen. His wife—people found her strange—was in the last years of her youth. She was like a beautiful dinner left out overnight. She was sumptuous, but the guests were gone. Her cheeks had begun to quiver when she walked.
A thick beard, wartiness of nose, corduroy jacket, long silences: that was Marcel-Maas. His effort was all on canvas now; the window frames of the barn were flaking, the inside walls were stained. He repaired nothing, not even a leak; he seldom went out, he never drove a car. He hated travel, he said.
His wife was a mare alone in a field. She was waiting for madness, grazing her life away. She went to the city, to Bloomingdale’s, the gynecologist, to art supply stores. Sometimes she would see a movie in the afternoon.
“Travel is nonsense,” he announced. “The only thing you see is what’s already inside you.”
He was in his carpet slippers. His black hair lay loose on his head.
“I can’t agree, somehow,” Viri said.
“The ones who could gain something from travel, who have sensitivity, they have no need to travel.”
“That’s like saying those who could benefit from education have no need to be educated,” Viri said.
Marcel-Maas was silent. “You’re too literal,” he said finally.
“I love to travel,” his wife remarked.
Silence. Marcel-Maas ignored her. She was standing at the window, looking out at the day, drinking a glass of red wine. “Robert is the only one I’ve ever heard of who doesn’t like to,” she said. She continued to look out the window.
“Where have you ever traveled?” he said.
“That’s a good question, isn’t it?”
“You’re talking about something you don’t know anything about. You’ve read about it. You hear about these doctors and their wives who go to Europe. Bank clerks go to Europe. What is there in Europe?”