Authors: Bernard Malamud
A New Life (29 page)
They had met rarely by chance before they became lovers, but in March, as though for compensation, he began to see her almost every time he left the house, and he left the house to see her. Walking downtown he would spot her driving the family Buick, tall in the seat, her straight hair touching her shoulders, nose pointing direction—where Levin must go. They met by accident in the post office, library, market. She greeted him vaguely and hurried the kids on. He would pass her on the street and tip his hat. Last fall, when they had met, she had stopped to exchange a word; he was the one in a hurry. Now her greetings were hesitant, formal. She hid love, a concealment
painful to him. But there were times when for the slightest second her eyes were in love with him. Sometimes he saw her alone across the street; he liked her brisk high-heeled walk. Each noticeable new thing about her was an event: what she wore: a split skirt showing a bit of white slip against her leg. Long dark blue socks awoke forest memories. He knew when she had washed her hair. Once in a food market, Gilley and both kids waiting outside in the car, when Levin approached Pauline dropped a can of tuna fish she had just taken off the shelf. It rolled along the floor. He bent for it, remembering the casserole she had ladled into his lap the night they had met. As he gave her the can their fingers touched and his heart grew flowers. Leaving the store, she glanced back at him. He lived on that for a week.
painful to him. But there were times when for the slightest second her eyes were in love with him. Sometimes he saw her alone across the street; he liked her brisk high-heeled walk. Each noticeable new thing about her was an event: what she wore: a split skirt showing a bit of white slip against her leg. Long dark blue socks awoke forest memories. He knew when she had washed her hair. Once in a food market, Gilley and both kids waiting outside in the car, when Levin approached Pauline dropped a can of tuna fish she had just taken off the shelf. It rolled along the floor. He bent for it, remembering the casserole she had ladled into his lap the night they had met. As he gave her the can their fingers touched and his heart grew flowers. Leaving the store, she glanced back at him. He lived on that for a week.
One Saturday morning when she had not telephoned, Levin hurried downtown hoping for a glimpse of her. Wherever he went, she wasn’t. At noon he was returning in disappointment to his car when he passed a photographer’s shop displaying some enlarged shots of the Cascadia basketball team in its window. An intuition stopped Levin and he went to the window. Almost at once he discovered Pauline in a picture (“Profs and Wives Cheer Team”), nothing less than revelation. While the photographer was posing a bridal party in the studio at the rear of the store, Levin entered, plucked the picture out of the window, folded it once, and slipped it into his pocket. He drove home in a hurry and in his room cut out her intense, open, lovely face. Levin then tore up Gilley, the Bullocks, and the rest of the crowd he had extracted her from. He kept this little picture of her hidden among the best thoughts in his notebook and would often gaze at it.
Now and then he saw her at people’s houses, a star, a flower amid the full-breasted faculty wives. What they lacked she had. What she hadn’t nobody needed. It was high adventure for him when she walked in, even with Gilley, even if she hardly seemed to recognize her lover. Better that than not appear; that broke the night. At these social gatherings talk was
small and wit rare, but hospitality and warmth were undeniable; Levin eagerly laid hold of any invitation that might produce her. He was surprisingly often invited where she was, almost as though people sensed romance and fostered it, though he hoped not. Whenever they met the action was as before: although they had talked together casually in the past, now, as on the street, she gave him little more than hello, how are you? She was no actress. He loved, therefore, behind the eyes; always conscious of what she was doing, when alone, talking to Jeannette, Alma or another woman, or to men and which men, when in the kitchen, on the sofa, or momentarily gone to the bathroom. He must know where she was. From where Levin observed, standing among others apart from her, sitting near her at a dinner table, trying not to stare, or watching from the next room, her face was gentle and luminous, sometimes a little sad; he created her quality as love created him; her loveliness enriching her clothes, the air around her. Once she drew back a lock of hair to adjust a barrette and revealed an ear pinned like a jewel to her head. Another time she was wearing her hair in a bun and he whispered, “Your neck is stupendous.” Pauline, in spite of herself, laughed. Lord, thought Levin, how beautiful women are, and how hungry my heart is. But how short life, how soon gone. Where will I find the patience to go on hungering? Love entitled him to create her beauty but never to embrace it when he most desired.
small and wit rare, but hospitality and warmth were undeniable; Levin eagerly laid hold of any invitation that might produce her. He was surprisingly often invited where she was, almost as though people sensed romance and fostered it, though he hoped not. Whenever they met the action was as before: although they had talked together casually in the past, now, as on the street, she gave him little more than hello, how are you? She was no actress. He loved, therefore, behind the eyes; always conscious of what she was doing, when alone, talking to Jeannette, Alma or another woman, or to men and which men, when in the kitchen, on the sofa, or momentarily gone to the bathroom. He must know where she was. From where Levin observed, standing among others apart from her, sitting near her at a dinner table, trying not to stare, or watching from the next room, her face was gentle and luminous, sometimes a little sad; he created her quality as love created him; her loveliness enriching her clothes, the air around her. Once she drew back a lock of hair to adjust a barrette and revealed an ear pinned like a jewel to her head. Another time she was wearing her hair in a bun and he whispered, “Your neck is stupendous.” Pauline, in spite of herself, laughed. Lord, thought Levin, how beautiful women are, and how hungry my heart is. But how short life, how soon gone. Where will I find the patience to go on hungering? Love entitled him to create her beauty but never to embrace it when he most desired.
They sat in circles and talked; or, depending on the specialty of the house, watched slides, listened to records, or acted charades. He was pleased when his play acting amused her. There was no mood to a party but Levin’s own. Once after dancing with her at Bullocks, he followed her into a bedroom. Pauline returned his kiss then drew back. “Please don’t when Gerald’s around.” She walked out as he wiped his lips clean. He felt there was no future in their love, until a few minutes later, when as they met in a momentarily empty hall, she took his hand and pressed it to her cheek.
Although during the evening he could blot Gilley out of his mind, what most tormented him was their leaving together, Levin locked out, a dirty trick on a lover. At midnight one of the women mentioned her baby sitter, her husband automatically stood up, and the whole company rose in a body. That ended the party, a blow to a bachelor who slept with his beard. Gilley gave his wife the eye and she went for her coat. They left for what lands, what voyages Levin couldn’t make. He sometimes walked downtown and ordered a meal, to eat up his hunger.
One night at Bullocks she stayed as far from him as she could. She clung to Gilley, on her fourth drink without George’s assistance. He recalled the time she had said she hoped for a revival of Gerald’s love. He doesn’t deserve it, Levin thought; but he felt she loved short of his love for her —his usual fate. Pauline saw him watching her and went into another room. She stayed apart from him all night. He was embittered, desolate. At midnight when the Bullocks served their elaborate buffet—coffee and cake was the customary nightcap elsewhere—Pauline filled up a plate and brought it to Gilley. He took it with a grin, placing a public arm around her. Levin, jealous of the years and substance of her Gerald had had, put down his glass and went out into the garden. It had begun to drizzle. As he was thinking he would leave from the garden and come around tomorrow for his coat, he heard footsteps on the patio. She was in his arms before he could turn.
“Forgive me, darling, Gerald’s been awfully sweet, and I’ve felt very guilty. At times I hate myself.”
“Don’t feel bound to me.”
“The truth is I do.”
“Then don’t feel guilty.”
“If it were only that easy.”
“Is that why you’re drinking?”
“To forget you a little.”
They kissed. “I’d better go,” she said.
He took her hand. “You’re so lovely.”
“I feel lovely with you.”
“My heart aches for you.”
“I for you.”
“When can you come?”
“I’ll try tonight.”
“Don’t if you feel bad.”
Pauline said she would try.
It was past two when she tapped on the glass. She had slept in Erik’s room after Gilley had fallen asleep. When Erik called for his water she gave it to him, then changed the baby in her sleep and left. “I can only stay a few minutes.”
“Did you take the car?”
“I was afraid of the noise it would make.”
“I’ll drive you back.”
“Not all the way.”
But she had not touched her earrings.
“Aren’t you going to undress?”
She looked at him then looked away. “I can’t tonight. Gerald wanted to and I couldn’t say no.”
He was struck by a grave sadness.
A few nights later she came in at nine. “I’m supposed to be at a late movie he doesn’t want to see, and I’ve got to be home just after it lets out.”
It was a time of fulfillment. Afterwards Levin said, “I hate to see you so scared. We’ve got to think of something we can do.”
“What, for instance?”
“Whatever you say.”
“What about your plans?”
“Sometime we’ll have to tell him the truth.”
“Not yet,” she said. Then she said, “Let’s wait till summer, then we’ll talk about it.”
“Why till summer?”
“To see how things go.”
“Don’t you think we have a future together?”
“Sometimes I do and sometimes not.”
“When do you think so?”
“When it suddenly looks possible. I feel calm and see it that way.”
“When doesn’t it?”
“When I feel you ought to have someone with fewer problems to bring you.”
“Forget that. How does it look now?”
“Possible.”
“That creates the future,” Levin said.
Before she left he asked, “Are you sure you love me?”
“So much it takes me time to think how much. Why do you ask so often?”
“All my life I’ve been engaged in wanting.”
“Love makes a long journey in you.”
“Your love inspires me. It always will.”
“Don’t make me cry, darling,” Pauline said.
She left at midnight, it was raining. She had stayed longer than she had intended; but she had taken the precaution of dropping in at the Scowers before, to say she had been there too if Gerald asked anything.
“The lies shame me most,” she said.
He lit her way down the stairs with a flashlight and watched her leave the yard, regretting her going. Tonight the room was empty after she had gone. Levin switched off the light and tried to fall quickly asleep. He was beginning to doze when he heard a knock on his door and roused himself.
The landlady, her gray hair in braids, held her battery box in her hand. She was upset.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Levin, but I have my self-respect to think of. I asked Mrs. Gilley not to come here again. I’m sorry for her and I’m sorry for you, but it’s not right, and I have the reputation of my house to think of.”
He listened with battered heart and stone ear.
“A few nights ago when I awoke to get my medicine I
thought I saw her coming out of the alley with you. Since then I waited up every night, and tonight I missed her going in but I heard her high heels come down your stairs. At first I was going to talk to you, but then I decided to talk to her. She isn’t the right person for you, Mr. Levin, and you’ll get into real trouble at the college if you go on with her. Whether you do or you don’t, I don’t want her coming here any more.”
thought I saw her coming out of the alley with you. Since then I waited up every night, and tonight I missed her going in but I heard her high heels come down your stairs. At first I was going to talk to you, but then I decided to talk to her. She isn’t the right person for you, Mr. Levin, and you’ll get into real trouble at the college if you go on with her. Whether you do or you don’t, I don’t want her coming here any more.”
“It would have been merciful if you had spoken to me.”
“I’m not sure that a married woman carrying on deserves much mercy. I feel sorry for Mr. Gilley.”
“What did she say when you spoke to her?”
“All she did was run away.”
Levin groaned.
After the old woman went downstairs he felt a furious desperation. What had happened now seemed inevitable. He dressed and left the house. Levin walked in the rain to Pauline’s. Her house was dark except for the white tree on the front lawn. He stood across the street, wanting her through walls. Half the night he wandered in the rain.
In the morning he was impatient to call her but Gilley wasn’t at his desk during his office hours and Levin did not want to risk it. Later he found a letter in his office mailbox, a blue envelope addressed in block letters. She had never written him here before.
“Just a word, dearest. I suppose you know?—I’m awfully sorry. I was afraid of something like this. I can’t tell you how bad I feel, God knows how I’ll get through the night. I’m writing this in Erik’s room. Call me Thurs. between 9 & 10, no later. I just had to get in touch. I love you. I miss you so. Destroy this. Pauline.”
He kissed the letter.
Thursday at nine he called. Hearing her voice made him feel as though they had been separated for years.
“When can I see you?” he asked.
“Lev, I’m frightened to death. Let’s be careful. Not for a while is best.”
“I could look for another room or maybe a small apartment with a private entrance?”
“If you move now she may tell people If she lets you stay I doubt she’d talk. Has she said anything to you?”
“Just only what happened. She hasn’t asked me to move but we ought to have plans.”
“You have plans, Lev.”
“I mean in case something happens.”
“I don’t want anything else to happen, nothing, nothing.”
“Don’t be scared.”
“I was brought up to be.”
“If I could just see you.”
“Not for a while, please. Just call me Tuesdays and Thursdays, about this time. I may write but please don’t you. I’m terribly sorry—I shouldn’t have come so often. She wasn’t nasty but I felt awful. I’m sorry I’m not somebody else, I mean someone not married. You don’t deserve this.”
“I deserve you.”
“I’d better hang up. I don’t want to cry on the phone.” Though he telephoned twice a week for a brief word of love, he saw her only in passing, in motion away from him. He thought of her with such intensity it was like waking when he stopped thinking. So Levin lived, famished, except for the sound of her voice on the phone and an occasional letter to the office, which he dutifully tore up. Beyond the word he lived on memory: her heart easing presence in his arms. Levin inspired, by her embrace, breath, beauty, the smell and feel of her, their consummation, and aftermath, when because of love’s possibilities the previous minute’s love was deepened. Otherwise hunger.
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