Let’s drop it, eh?
At first I didn’t believe it. I figured you’d come back, that you’d gone to watch the sun rise, disgusted with the drunk lying in bed and snoring — I know how that annoys you. I always snore when I’ve been drinking. I thought you’d come back, so I didn’t move from bed. I looked at the newspaper by the chair and thought I’d pretend to be still asleep, so I could see you get wound up. Do you know that you forgot a pair of shoes? In your hurry to get away, you left them there on a chair. I noticed them, and only then did I realize that your suitcase was missing. But I still didn’t get out of bed.
And then?
Then I got up. I’ll get over it, I said to myself as I got dressed. It was very hot outside. I went back into the room and picked up the newspaper.
You’d have done better to leave it there.
You’re right — I said the same to myself afterward. But why didn’t you take it with you? You left it on purpose, like you did the shoes. Otherwise I’d have figured you’d gone to watch the sun rise — and I’d have gone back to bed.
You’d have woken up sooner or later. But tell me more. .
How easy it is for you to be right! Of course I woke up. But I thought you’d gone to watch the sun rise. You’d been wanting to do that for a long time and I hadn’t let you; I used to hold you tight in my arms, and if you tried to wriggle free I’d wake up and stop you going. Why do you want to see the sun rise? So you took advantage of my drunken sleep, plus my snoring, and you hit the road. I’d have gone back to bed.
And never woken up?
I know that’s what you’ll say, what you could say, what you might have said. But you went off and left me in that wretched bed that creaked at the slightest movement — do you remember? — full of woolen balls, or maybe it was kelp, I mean the mattress, how many bodies must have writhed on it, you left me sleeping there like a log. It was terrible. When I woke up, I left the room, then came back and read the paper, then went out again. I felt I was suffocating. I didn’t want to think of him anymore: there was no point. I tried to forget and I got drunk the next few days too. When I woke up, I’d see your shoes and the paper left by the chair, and it would begin all over again.
But tell me, did you really see him?
I know the question in your eyes, the surprise that is doubtless feigned, because if you’d just stop and think (though you don’t stop, you only go away), if you wanted to be completely sincere, you’d realize that in fact it doesn’t interest you. Isn’t that splendid! Since it doesn’t interest you, you could have made me forget him too. We’d have made love in that disgusting bed full of balls of wool or kelp and teeming with bedbugs; we’d have thrown the newspaper out with the trash and, if necessary, we wouldn’t have gone out until he’d made up his mind to fly. But you left. You stroked my hair maternally and left. You’d known for a long time that you’d be leaving — ever since you arrived. It couldn’t have been otherwise. The evening before, we both saw him and you seemed more troubled than me. Perhaps you were even. .
Tell me more, rather.
Tell you what? There’s nothing to tell. You forgot your shoes, or maybe you left them on purpose like you did the newspaper. So I left the hotel and just wandered around. I always came back drunk. Like that I escaped the bedbugs: I could no longer feel them. I was sleeping like a log. But, as you said, I’d still have woken up eventually. In the same room. The light raced joyfully over the walls: I noticed the shoes and the newspaper, and I tried to doze off again — maybe you’d gone to watch the sun rise or simply to take a walk — but sleep wouldn’t come and I had to get up and go out. To tell the truth, I didn’t really miss you. But it would have been easier together — I mean, if we’d stayed together. Perhaps I’d have ended up forgetting. You’d have gotten upset now and then; I’d have held you in my arms, protectively, and the time would have passed more quickly.
Sure, sure, at some point I’d have woken up alone, but later, a little later.
A few days after you left, the sea was no longer so rough: it became calmer, as if by magic. Probably that’s what gave him some hope — I don’t know. On the other hand, the waves weren’t what had been stopping him. It was nearing evening and I was walking on the cliff. Alone. I watched the ebbing waves become smaller and smaller, and as the sun went down on the other side the sea grew pale and a thin but increasingly visible mist spread from the horizon over the increasingly white, liquid expanse; it was like steam, as if the sea was gasping for breath. .
Oh, please! Tell me what you saw, rather. Is it true that you saw him?
Sure I saw him. But he was standing with his back to me, one hand lightly touching the parapet. And, well, there was even the top hat — although surely other people can wear those too?
Cut the jokes! What top hat are you talking about?
I’m serious! What I mean is that it isn’t because of the top hat that I’m sure I saw him. The top hat! I agree, there was a touch of defiance in it, in that ostentatious elegance. But there was also something else, something he could always be recognized by. I’m not from here! I’m not from these parts! Do you understand? That hat of his was a cry, like his wings. Pride and despair at the same time — both ridiculous, both without any point. It’s hard for me to explain. .
So, you saw him? Are you sure about that?
Let’s be methodical about this. Why can’t you leave me alone? You keep interrupting all the time, even when you’re not here beside me, even if you left me in that hotel room full of bedbugs. .
Cut it out!
Anyway, the sea was calm, the waves had retreated as if under orders. Then the fog started to clear. It was wonderful! You’ve no idea how sad and wonderful it was! I walked on the cliff, shoulders bent, hands behind my back, and from time to time I moved close to the parapet and ran my hands over the rough stone. Fascinated by the view, I didn’t look around me. Besides, the cliff was deserted, more or more deserted. I stood motionless, looking at the thin vapor that joined the sea to a sky of the same grayish-white, and I didn’t notice when or from where he appeared.
And it really was him?
I told you, it’s not a question of the top hat; it may not even have been a top hat he was wearing. I was quite a long way from him: fifty or sixty meters, maybe more. A lion was lying by his side.
A lion?
Yes. Like we saw together in that picture book. The one you pointed out to me.
As I stood there, resting against the parapet and stroking the warm rough stone, I suddenly felt that I was no longer alone. I turned my head and saw him. His wings were trembling slightly. You could see he was excited. Dressed in his worn black suit, with a flower coquettishly placed in the buttonhole, he was staring toward the horizon. He saw nothing around him. He kept his eyes fixed on the sea and sky, the mist.
He must have wanted to fly!
Yes. He raised himself on tiptoe a few times, ready to take off, but then the lion roared; I could see its curled lips, as if it was laughing. He didn’t turn round. He remained stock-still. He had been abandoned here, in some hotel room crawling with bedbugs; he no longer had anything to do and each morning would look at his increasingly dirty wings, the top hat, the newspaper on the floor by the chair, the shoes. . And even if he had tried to fly, even if he had decided to climb onto the parapet, holding his hat in place with one hand and keeping his balance with the other, then stood on tiptoe to head suddenly heavenward with desperately flapping wings, higher and higher, looking like a seagull, swallow, or ladybird, even then, after describing a circle and another and another, each one lower than the last, I’m sure he would have returned, perhaps without the top hat, which would have made him, if not more ridiculous, more insignificant — the top hat had its purpose. Or else it’s that I’ve gotten used to it.