discreet.”
“If one why not another? What about your father? What I mean to ask is, is it likely he might find out if we go to your room?”
“He never has,” she said. He was momentarily surprised at her answer and then accepted it without another question. Why wrestle with a fact?
They went silently along the corridor, Zina hobbling, Yakov tiptoeing behind her, to her perfumed bedroom. The Pekinese, lying on the bed, looked at the fixer and yawned. Zina picked it up and went again down the hall to lock it in the kitchen.
Her room was full of knickknacks on numerous small tables, and pictures of kerchiefed girls on the wall. Peacock feathers stuck out from behind the frame of a mirror. In the corner of the room hung an ikon of the Holy Mother with a small red oil lamp lighted before it.
Should I stay or should I go? Yakov thought. On the one hand it’s been a long season without rain. A man is not a man for nothing. What do the Hasidim say? “Hide not from thine own flesh.” On the other hand what does this mean to me? At my age it’s nothing new. It means nothing.
When she returned he was sitting on the bed. He had taken off his shirt and undershirt.
Yakov watched uneasily as Zina, after removing her shoes, knelt at the ikon, crossed herself, and for a moment prayed.
“Are you a believer?” she asked.
“No.”
“I wish you were, Yakov Ivanovitch,” she sighed.
Then she rose and asked him to undress in the lavatory while she got ready in the bedroom.
It’s her leg, he thought. She’ll be under covers when I come in. Better that way.
He removed his clothes in the lavatory. His hands still stank of paint and turpentine, and he soaped them twice with her pink bar of perfumed soap. He smelled them again but now they stank of the perfume. If there’s a mistake to make I’ll make it, he thought.
Seeing himself naked in the mirror he was at first uneasy, then sickened by what he was about to do.
Things are bad enough, so why make them worse? This isn’t for me, I’m not the type, and the sooner I tell her the better. He went into the bedroom, carrying his clothes.
Zina had braided her hair. She stood naked, her bosom full, sponging herself from a white bowl, in the gaslight. He saw a dribble of bright blood run down her crippled leg and said, stupefied. “But you are unclean!”
“Yakov!—You startled me.” She covered herself with the wet cloth. “I thought you would wait till I called you.”
“I didn’t know your condition. Excuse me, I had no idea. You didn’t mention it, though I realize it’s personal.”
“But surely you know this is the safest time?” Zina said. “And there’s no inconvenience to speak of, the flow stops the minute we begin.”
“Excuse me, some can but I can’t.”
He was thinking of his wife’s modesty during her period and until she had been to the baths, but could not say that to Zina.
“Excuse me, I’d better be going.”
“I’m a lonely woman, Yakov Ivanovitch,” she cried, “have mercy a little!” but he was already dressing and soon left.
3
One night in the dead of winter, in the cold thick dark at 4 A.M., after the drivers Serdiuk and Richter had come for two teams of horses—leaving six horses in the stalls— and he had heard them clomp out of the stable and clack dully across the snow-covered cobblestones, Yakov, who had been two days in the brickyard, got quickly out of bed, lit a short candle and hurriedly dressed. He sneaked down the outer stairs from his room above the stable and went along the fence of palings, past the squat brickkilns to the cooling shed. Motionless in the wet cold, he watched the drivers and their helpers, in steaming sheepskins, the horses’ flanks steaming, loading the straw-covered long wagon-trucks with large heavy yellow bricks. The work progressed slowly, helper tossing a brick to helper, who
“If one why not another? What about your father? What I mean to ask is, is it likely he might find out if we go to your room?”
“He never has,” she said. He was momentarily surprised at her answer and then accepted it without another question. Why wrestle with a fact?
They went silently along the corridor, Zina hobbling, Yakov tiptoeing behind her, to her perfumed bedroom. The Pekinese, lying on the bed, looked at the fixer and yawned. Zina picked it up and went again down the hall to lock it in the kitchen.
Her room was full of knickknacks on numerous small tables, and pictures of kerchiefed girls on the wall. Peacock feathers stuck out from behind the frame of a mirror. In the corner of the room hung an ikon of the Holy Mother with a small red oil lamp lighted before it.
Should I stay or should I go? Yakov thought. On the one hand it’s been a long season without rain. A man is not a man for nothing. What do the Hasidim say? “Hide not from thine own flesh.” On the other hand what does this mean to me? At my age it’s nothing new. It means nothing.
When she returned he was sitting on the bed. He had taken off his shirt and undershirt.
Yakov watched uneasily as Zina, after removing her shoes, knelt at the ikon, crossed herself, and for a moment prayed.
“Are you a believer?” she asked.
“No.”
“I wish you were, Yakov Ivanovitch,” she sighed.
Then she rose and asked him to undress in the lavatory while she got ready in the bedroom.
It’s her leg, he thought. She’ll be under covers when I come in. Better that way.
He removed his clothes in the lavatory. His hands still stank of paint and turpentine, and he soaped them twice with her pink bar of perfumed soap. He smelled them again but now they stank of the perfume. If there’s a mistake to make I’ll make it, he thought.
Seeing himself naked in the mirror he was at first uneasy, then sickened by what he was about to do.
Things are bad enough, so why make them worse? This isn’t for me, I’m not the type, and the sooner I tell her the better. He went into the bedroom, carrying his clothes.
Zina had braided her hair. She stood naked, her bosom full, sponging herself from a white bowl, in the gaslight. He saw a dribble of bright blood run down her crippled leg and said, stupefied. “But you are unclean!”
“Yakov!—You startled me.” She covered herself with the wet cloth. “I thought you would wait till I called you.”
“I didn’t know your condition. Excuse me, I had no idea. You didn’t mention it, though I realize it’s personal.”
“But surely you know this is the safest time?” Zina said. “And there’s no inconvenience to speak of, the flow stops the minute we begin.”
“Excuse me, some can but I can’t.”
He was thinking of his wife’s modesty during her period and until she had been to the baths, but could not say that to Zina.
“Excuse me, I’d better be going.”
“I’m a lonely woman, Yakov Ivanovitch,” she cried, “have mercy a little!” but he was already dressing and soon left.
3
One night in the dead of winter, in the cold thick dark at 4 A.M., after the drivers Serdiuk and Richter had come for two teams of horses—leaving six horses in the stalls— and he had heard them clomp out of the stable and clack dully across the snow-covered cobblestones, Yakov, who had been two days in the brickyard, got quickly out of bed, lit a short candle and hurriedly dressed. He sneaked down the outer stairs from his room above the stable and went along the fence of palings, past the squat brickkilns to the cooling shed. Motionless in the wet cold, he watched the drivers and their helpers, in steaming sheepskins, the horses’ flanks steaming, loading the straw-covered long wagon-trucks with large heavy yellow bricks. The work progressed slowly, helper tossing a brick to helper, who
Similar Books
