The Door (10 page)

Hearing his (for once) unmodulated tones, I rushed in. Never before had I heard my husband express himself with such force, or realised what blind fury lay hibernating beneath his habitual calm. He did not confine himself to an analysis of what might reasonably wake a man in his own house. The argument assumed a wider philosophical scope. What was the point of living if such things were possible — if a godless garden gnome could take over his rug, next to half of a pair of cavalry boots with spurs shaped like eagle's wings? In his rage he leaped from one topic to another. It was a dreadful morning. I didn't know what to do. I tried in vain to explain to him that the old woman expressed herself through means determined by her own interests. Everything there — he had to accept — was motivated by love. This was her peculiar way of demonstrating her feelings. Her choices were an expression of her individual point of view. There was no need to jump around from topic to topic, and no need to shout! It was horrible to listen to. I would sort it all out myself.

My husband dashed out of the house. In truth, I felt sorry for him. I had never before, not once, seen him quite so upset, or so entirely at a loss. Later, when he was at last able to make nervous jokes about it, he told me that Emerence had been outside, sweeping the street. She greeted him, and as he shot past her, she smiled at him as if he were a badly brought-up child who, at his age, ought to know how to say hello nicely, but if he didn't, well, so be it. One had to remember that he would learn in time. Generally, Emerence regarded our relationship as a complete mystery. She didn't understand why I had involved myself in it, but since that was how things were, she accepted it, just as I had accepted that she would never open her door. If that's how the master was, what was one to do? There was no such thing as a sane man.

Among the gifts there was only one intended for him, which I had failed to notice at first among all the junk. It was a truly beautiful leather-bound edition of
Torquato Tasso.
I hid it among the rest of the books. I couldn't at first think what to do with the other things: the gnome, for example, who carried a lamp and sported a tattered green apron and a tassel on the peak of his cap. I had arranged our kitchen rather idiosyncratically, with bits and pieces inherited from my great-grandmother. It had everything: a flour tin, a tool for shaping pasta into snails, a sausage-making machine, a hanging scale with some old weights, and a Peugeot coffee grinder, by then a listed industrial relic. The dwarf fitted snugly into a space under the sink. I fished out the ducal water heater (its little bucket would be just the thing for my scouring powder) and into the actress's make-up box I stuffed my own cosmetics.

But there remained the unresolved problems of the painting, the riding boot and the falcon. The falcon I entrusted to Viola, with excellent results. Within minutes of my letting him out of my mother's room the dog had gnawed it to pieces, leaving only fragments. I hoped the embalming chemicals wouldn't harm him, but the bird looked so very old that the poison can have been doing little for it. It had shed half its feathers, and some rodent had taken a bite out of it, so its wooden perch instantly broke off. I tapped the painting out of its frame. On its stretcher a ravaged-looking young woman stood beside a seething black ocean, staring at the foam with morbid intent. Behind her stood a mansion, and a row of cypresses plunging down a steep slope. I hung the painting on the inside of the translucent window in the kitchen door and stood the boot in the entrance hall. We had no umbrella stand, and I thought it would do as one, since Emerence had polished it so beautifully. The madwoman on the kitchen door, the antique coffee-grinder, the garden gnome by the sink next to the tub of lard, inscribed, in huge letters,
She who loves her husband cooks with lard,
which had bedecked my aunt's kitchen — so extreme was the overall impression created by the apartment that our visitors reacted in one of two ways. Either they were paralysed with amazement, or they were overcome with laughter. Even the walls of our kitchen were something else. Instead of wallpaper or paint, we had oilcloth covered in squirrels, geese and other poultry. Most of our visitors were artists. For them, the place was a familiar world of gentle lunacy. My ultra-correct relatives, with no fantasy life of their own, I had written off long ago. The only real opposition I might have encountered would have been from Emerence. It would have been quite reasonable for her to resist my having turned the kitchen and entrance hall into a madhouse. But from the first she took pleasure in being able to move around among the decor and props of this eccentric private theatre. She had a real feeling for the strange world of E.T.A. Hoffman. Emerence loved anything out of the ordinary. She considered it among the great events of her life when she asked for, and was given, an old-fashioned dressmaker's dummy left me by my mother. She carried it home in triumph, like a sacred relic. I tried in vain to understand why she filled her house with such fantastically useless objects, and then never opened her door to anyone. In any case I was stunned by the honour she had done me by asking for something. As I said, Emerence as a rule never accepted anything. Later, only very much later, in one of the most surreal moments I have ever experienced, I wandered amidst the ruins of Emerence's life, and discovered, there in her garden, standing on the lawn, the faceless dressmaker's dummy designed for my mother's exquisite figure. Just before they sprinkled it with petrol and set fire to it, I caught sight of Emerence's ikonostasis. We were all there, pinned to the fabric over the doll's ribcage: the Grossman family, my husband, Viola, the Lieutenant Colonel, the nephew, the baker, the lawyer's son, and herself, the young Emerence, with radiant golden hair, in her maid's uniform and little crested cap, holding a baby in her arms.

Emerence's passion for strange objects wasn't anything new. What surprised me that morning was that she had been collecting not for herself but for me. I didn't dare offend her, nor did I wish to, but with the dog with the chipped ear, there was nowhere to begin. It was a desperate sight, an error of judgement perpetrated by a dilettante with a disturbed view of the world. I stowed it away behind the pestle and mortar. I knew that if my husband found it he would throw it in the bin. That little dog was a step too far.

By the time Emerence arrived, I was already sitting at work by my typewriter, alone.

"Did you see what those idiots threw away?" she asked. "I took the lot. There wasn't a thing left for anyone else. Weren't you thrilled?"

How could I not have been thrilled? I'd rarely known such a harmonious morning! I made no reply, but carried on banging at the typewriter, stunted embryos of meaningless sentences emerging under my exasperated fingers. She went through all the rooms, one by one, to see where I had placed everything. She objected to the gnome and the painting being assigned to the kitchen. Why hide such rare things away? She hit Viola on the head for destroying the falcon — the poor thing couldn't tell her that I had put its tempting corpse right under his nose. So far I had got off lightly, but what most interested her was where I had put her beautiful little dog. I told her I had hidden it because it wasn't fit to be seen. She stood on the other side of my desk and shouted at me:

"So, have you become so much of a slave you're too scared to do anything for yourself? Just because the master doesn't like animals, you can't even have statues of them, they're banned? Do you think this horrible shell is any prettier? But you keep it on your desk and you're not ashamed to store your invitations and calling cards in it. Dogs no, shells yes? Get it out of my sight, or one of these days I'll smash it to pieces. I loathe the touch of it."

She snatched up the shell. It was a nautilus, on a base of coral. It once sat on Maria Rickl's console, and was left to my mother when the Kismester apartment was divided up. Emanating disgust, Emerence carried it off to the kitchen, with all the invitations and calling cards, parked it between the semolina and the icing sugar, and in its place set down the dog with the tattered ear. This was going too far. I had accepted Emerence's presence both in the places and the events of my life, but she wasn't going to take over the way I arranged my surroundings.

"Emerence," I said, with more than usual seriousness, "kindly take the little statue back to the street where you found it, or, if you don't want to throw it away, put it where I had it, out of sight. It's a piece of commercial junk. It's damaged; it's in appalling taste, and it cannot remain here. It's not only the master who can't stand it. I can't either. It's not a work of art. It's kitsch."

Her blue eyes blazed at me. For the first time I saw in them, not interest, affection or concern, but undisguised contempt.

"What is this kitsch?" she asked. "What does it mean? Explain it to me."

I wracked my brain for a way to explain to her the vices of the innocent, ill-proportioned, cheaply-made little dog.

"Kitsch is when a thing is in some way false, created to provide trivial, superficial pleasure. Kitsch is something imitative, fake, a substitute for the real thing."

"This dog is fake?" she asked, with rising indignation. "A fraud? Well, hasn't it got everything — ears, paws, a tail? But it's all right for you to keep a brass lion's head on your desk. You think it's wonderful, and your visitors gush over it, and make knocking noises with it, like idiots, though it doesn't even have a neck — nothing — just a head, but they go bang bang with it on the stationery cupboard. So the lion, which doesn't even have a body, is not a fake, but the dog, that's got everything a dog has, is? Why are you telling me such lies? Just tell me straight that you don't want any presents from me, and that's that. So what if the top of the ear is chipped? You'll take a bit of pottery your friend from Athens dug up on some island and stick it behind glass. Do you have the nerve to tell me that filthy black thing is
complete?
At least, don't lie to yourself. Admit it. You're scared of the master. I can understand that. But don't try to hide your cowardice by calling things kitsch."

The shocking thing was, she had hit on something that was in a way true. I did find the statue repulsive, but that wasn't the real reason I had stuck it behind the mortar. It was as she said. I was afraid of, or rather for, my husband. The entire contents of the Heraklion museum wouldn't have been worth causing him a return of his bad times — so I had gabbled away like a left-wing art critic. Emerence maintained a sarcastic silence. Then she buried the dog deep in the bag she always carried, and set off. On her way out through the hall she noticed the boot, standing in shadow against the wall. She seized it, and scattered the umbrellas at my feet. She was so angry she turned scarlet, and shouted at me:

"Are you out of your mind? Do you think sane people keep umbrellas in a boot? Do you think I brought it here to be used as a box? That I'm so stupid I don't know what's right and proper?"

She yanked open the hall cupboard, took a screwdriver from the toolbox and set to work on the boot. She stood with her back to me, facing the light, cursing me without pause. It was an unusual experience for me. I was never scolded as a child. My parents' method of punishment was more refined. They hurt me with silence, not words. It upset me more if I was made to feel I didn't deserve to be spoken to, asked questions or given explanations. Emerence tucked the boot under her arm, as if she were intending to take it home with her, and flung the spur she had removed down on the table top.

"Because you're blind and stupid and a coward," she continued. "God knows what I love about you, but whatever it is, you don't deserve it. Maybe, as you get older, you'll acquire a bit of taste. And a bit of courage."

And out she went, leaving the spur on the table. I picked it up. My husband might appear at any moment, and I didn't want any further upset. The large centrepiece glinted blood-red. I stood, dumbstruck, holding a tiny piece of pure craftsmanship, blackened as it was with age, in which someone had set a garnet. Emerence, having thoroughly cleaned everything before bringing it to the flat, must have noticed what was on it. It was the reason she had given it to us — obviously not only a single boot, but a precious stone she'd found in the centre of the silver spur. A goldsmith might make it into a piece of jewellery. The stone was flawless, wonderful.

Once again, as I gazed at the winking, blood-red garnet, all I felt was deep shame. I was about to run after the old woman, but then the thought returned: I had to break her habit of demonstrating her attachment to me by these undisciplined, insane means. I know now, what I didn't then, that affection can't always be expressed in calm, orderly, articulate ways; and that one cannot prescribe the form it should take for anyone else.

My husband returned, bearing a large pile of newspapers. He had walked his anger off, and come back to a peaceful apartment. He searched each room to see if the offensive items had been removed. The kitchen was a surprise, but by then he had pretty much calmed down, and he realised that that area was beyond help or hurt. Ever since we'd moved in, my playful nature had been collecting the most impossible objects — it would have made no difference if we'd suspended a stuffed whale from the ceiling, like something in my great-grandparents' vast emporium. The madly staring woman and the ducal water heater merely added to the general air of an occupational therapy museum made to look like a kitchen-diner. Luckily he failed to spot the gnome lurking in the shadow of the U-bend. At last order was restored. And once again I had misread the calm before the storm. I was enjoying it, even though Viola's head was drooping miserably. His listless demeanour should have warned me that something was brewing.

By midday it was clear that I would have to walk the dog. Emerence obviously intended to punish me. Fine. I would take him myself. Viola's behaviour was demonic; he almost wrenched my wrist from its socket. For some reason a police convoy was moving down the avenue, so we couldn't go on the grass, and the pavements still bore the remains of the junk clearance. Viola wanted to sniff everything and honour it with his calling card. At one point I caught sight of Emerence in the far distance. She was bending over to pick up a brightly painted box. I turned my back on her and dragged the furious Viola home.