The Stories of Paul Bowles (75 page)

Postscriptum:
Destroy my letters once you’ve read them. There won’t be all that many, in any case. The summer’s too short.

(sent to Pamela Loeffler)

So everything meshed,
grace à Dieu.
And now Suky’s with you. Could you gauge her immediate reaction to the new environment? I ask you because I don’t expect her to tell me accurately in her letters, if she ever decides to write me. I’m a little surprised that she hasn’t sent me even a few words. I suppose she thought a letter from you would be enough.

While we’re still talking about Suky, I’m so glad you find her companionable. One never knows with the very young; their moods are mercurial. She’s been alone far too much. Her parents both died when she was twelve, and I’ve seen her only once, and briefly, since then. She will have changed.

There never was such a thing as hashish in Morocco; it was the Americans who first manufactured it here. Kif is volatile, and they were looking for a more compact and durable form of it, so they used a vise. This made an ersatz sort of hashish. The Moroccans, not knowing hashish, good or bad, followed suit, and found the product salable abroad. They’ve been pressing this inferior merchandise ever since, and are still making great fortunes exporting it. There’s a direct relationship between the commerce in hashish and the prevalence of corruption. A. huge sum can silence anyone. I take it the situation is very different where you are; do you know anything about it? That is, more than you can read in the press?

Suggest to Sue that she write me a note at least, if she can find the time between dates. Two boyfriends? Who are they? I imagined you as fairly isolated. Apparently you’re not.

What makes you say I’m “obsessed” by the girl? If you’ve even suggested such an idea to her, inevitably she’ll see it in a Freudian light. This would give her a perfect pretext for not writing. In what other way could she take it? And in what way did
you
mean it, for that matter? “Obsessed” is a word used too often.

(sent to Pamela Loeffler)

I can’t help feeling some anxiety over not having had some word from Sue. I know you say she’s fine, but I’m not convinced. If she were her usual self, she’d write. It’s clear that something is troubling her that she
shrinks from telling me, something more than this nonsense she’s been feeding you about being “terrified” of me. She knows that’s laughable. How can she speak of me as “authoritarian”? We haven’t seen each other in several years, and no one can terrify by mail.

What’s got into her? The difficulty is that you don’t know her, so you can’t notice any little changes that might have come over her recently. Have you tried to persuade her to sit down and scribble a few words?

It goes without saying that I don’t expect you to choose her friends for her. I have no objection to her seeing a Japanese mechanic three nights a week, or every night, so you needn’t feel uneasy on my account. Please understand that I don’t consider you in any way responsible for her behavior. She’s old enough to account for it herself. As she undoubtedly has told you, she’s a partisan of feminine “liberation.”

(sent to Susan Choate)

I saw something this morning that amused me. Two little boys about five years old were playing at bullfighting. The bull was a perambulator containing a strapped-in baby under blankets, and the one pushing the pram was making frantic attempts to gore the torero, who dodged and side-stepped the attacks. At one point the bull made an all-out desperate attempt and charged with such force that it banged into a telephone pole. Torero delighted. Baby jolted but impervious.

Do write a few lines about the place, about the general setup. Remember, I’ve never been there, and am curious. A few sentences in a personal report mean more than pages of a travel article. I’m not asking for an essay; you can tell it all in two paragraphs. One on the place and the other on Pamela.
Finis.

(sent to Susan Choate)

And now you write me, when you’re just about ready to leave, so that I can’t even be sure this will reach you in time. At least you gave what is probably an honest reason for your silence: you were having too good a time. That is of course the best reason, and I’m glad it turned out that way. It would have been awful if you’d hated the place and been bored by Pamela. But what a peculiar creature you are, to keep me waiting all summer for a sheet of paper it would have taken five minutes to cover.

The last message I had from you was the wire you sent from San Francisco, so I have no idea of your present finances, or even whether you bought a round-trip passage. One can only worry so much, however; then one becomes philosophical. I suppose philosophy is merely sublimated worry. If this were a telephone conversation I could say: Let me speak to Pamela. So I shall speak to her, in a letter I’ll write as soon as I get this one into its envelope. I’m very happy you’ve loved your vacation.

(sent to Pamela Loeffler)

I just finished a note to the culprit. As you probably know, she finally decided to write me before she returned to college. She describes everything and all in glowing terms—particularly you, about whom she made some highly astute observations, all favorable. I think she has seen the entire spectrum of your personality, complex though it is, and for that I give her good marks. I can see from your last letter that you loved having her there with you.

Does she seem at all preoccupied by the thought of money? If she’s been sensible, she should have more than enough to get her back to Massachusetts. Nevertheless, if you get this in time, and think she should have a bit more, please let her have it. I’ll repay you immediately.

I’ll try to write an actual letter soon, which this is not. What I’d call a true letter ought to be an amalgam of personal conversation, diary (what happened) and journal (what one thinks about what happened). But anyway.

(sent to Pamela Loeffler)

Your letter was indeed bad news. Are you really satisfied with the doctor? I ask because I’m surprised that he didn’t seem to be sure whether it was a return of the hepatitis she caught in Haiti, or simple dysentery (nonamoebic, I mean).

Poor Suky! Tell her to relax, and not to worry about being late in getting back to classes. She can make up the work easily.

I wonder if it occurred to your doctor that she might have sunstroke. You spoke of her long hours at the beach. Her symptoms sound a little like my own when I was struck by the sun in Cuba. It’s at times like this
that I wish I had a telephone. Wire me if there’s any sudden change for the worse in her condition.

I saw something incredible in a French magazine last week. A friend of de Gaulle was being interviewed. One question: “Then de Gaulle was not anti-Semitic?” The reply: “Well, in 1940, I remember that André Maurois came and asked to speak to de Gaulle privately. The general turned to someone beside him and said: ‘What’s that kike doing here?’ But that was just his way of speaking. De Gaulle was never anti-Semitic.” Little things like that make life worth living.

The dog may be man’s best friend, but only if he has a master who feeds him. Here the dogs with no human ties are a menace. They hunt in packs of fifteen or twenty, and have formed the habit of attacking tethered donkeys when night comes. They crowd around the donkey’s head, trying to reach its neck. It backs up, and slowly winds its chain tightly around the tree. When it can no longer move, it belongs to the dogs, which devour it. In Tangier there used to be a dogcatcher, who piled ownerless dogs into his little truck and took them to the pound. Now there’s neither catcher nor pound. The dogs are considered a natural hazard, like wild boars and snakes.

I hope it doesn’t make too much extra bother for you to have Suky laid up in bed. I’m sorry I was instrumental in bringing this on you. You’re an angel, as always. Write me soon.

(sent to Pamela Loeffler)

You don’t sound very sanguine about Sue’s improvement. Of course she hasn’t written me, but I can scarcely expect her to if she feels miserable. She knows you keep in touch.

So now Florence pays her visit, and unannounced. And naturally she defends herself with the story of the letter she sent from Santa Barbara, even though she saw that it hadn’t arrived until three days after her own arrival. And of course she appears just when you’ve got Suky in bed sick. I know you say guests never bother you, but it always takes a lot of one’s time to care for a sick person, I hope by now that sick person is on her feet. It’s almost a month since she came down with whatever she has.

Still the doctor doesn’t want to commit himself on what’s wrong with her? After all the laboratory tests? I find that unheard-of, but apparently you don’t, since you calmly quote him as though he were Pasteur.
This sort of thing strikes me as one of the disadvantages of living in Kahului. You can see that I’m not at home with illness. I’d much rather be ill myself than have to cope with a sufferer.

And you, are you all right? I’m sorry that Sue’s holiday had to end this way. I hope she’s already on her way back to Mount Holyoke.

In my case, I’ll be waiting to hear from you. And tell me more about Florence; she’s always amused me. (At a distance.)

(sent to Pamela Loeffler)

You’re as bad as Suky herself, if not worse, for as far as I know you’re in good health, whereas I have to assume she’s still in bed, having heard nothing to the contrary. How can you let an entire month go by without sending me some sort of word? I’m not berating you, but I’m curious and blessé at the same time. I get an indistinct impression that in spite of my being what you call “obsessed” by Suky, you think I don’t care deeply about her.

It’s true that I don’t really know her; I’ve never had the opportunity. But that’s beside the point. I’ve taken on the responsibility for her education and I want it to go well. Surely you can understand that.

As I was waking up this morning (a moment when things of the distant past can suddenly reappear in detail) I recalled the opening lines of two songs my mother used to sing when I was very young. They were both songs of rejection, I now realize. One went: “Take back your gold, for gold will never buy me,” and the other, even more absurd: “I don’t want to play in your yard; I don’t love you any more.” According to her, they were both very popular ditties. Have you ever heard of either?

I’m in a hurry to get this off, because I have a forlorn hope that in the event you haven’t written, my pleas will make you decide to do so. Consider this note to be one long supplication. Let me hear about Sue!

(sent to Pamela Loeffler)

Your postcard from Fiji was a slap in the face. You think I’ll be “amused” to see where you are, but I’m not. I’m astounded and exasperated that you should be dragging Sue off on a South Pacific trip when she should be in college. And I don’t subscribe to your theory that such a voyage is a part of her convalescence. In fact, I think you don’t believe it yourself.
Obviously you imagine that old age makes people ingenuous. Or was that remark merely the first pretext that came to your mind? Do you find it incredible that having invested nervous energy, time and money in her education, I should want to see her complete it?

It goes without saying that this year is lost. It strikes me as an irresponsible act to gather the girl under your wing and fly off with her to God knows where and for God knows how long.

I suppose you won’t receive this for many weeks. Tell S. that I’m disappointed to see how basically indifferent she is to her own well-being. Tell her I’m glad she’s well (if indeed she ever was as ill as you gave me to believe) and tell her that when she gives a sign of life I’ll reply. But she probably feels guilty and doesn’t want to be in touch with me.

I’ll get over my shock and indignation, but it won’t be right away.

(sent to Pamela Loeffler)

In the past ten weeks I’ve had three postcards from you: from Fiji, Apia and Papeete, plus Sue’s silly attempt at humor: “Having wonderful time. Glad you’re not here.” Tell her that message doesn’t count. (Although it does show me it was only thanks to the security she felt in your presence that she was able to express her hostility toward me.) She’ll have to write me a letter if she wants to hear from me.

If you’ve followed the schedule you outlined on your card from Papeete, you’re back at home now. I’ll expect to hear from you.

I’m still at a loss to understand why you went on that senseless trip. Perhaps when you’re settled again you’ll feel like explaining. Or perhaps you won’t. It really doesn’t matter. I think I perceive the general pattern.

(sent to Pamela Loeffler)

We seem to have arrived at an impasse: mutual misunderstandings due to I.P.I. (insufficient preliminary information). You take exception to whatever I say. You’re unreasonable. I get the impression that you two are arrayed against me. I can also see that S. confided in you completely, and at my expense. I did tell her you were generous, which you always have been.

My mistake with her, I think, was in advising her to destroy my letters. It was foolish because there was nothing incriminating in them,
as I’m sure you’re aware, having read them. But it must have set her to thinking, so that she now imagines I used her as a “pawn” in my own “financial planning.” It must be clear to you that this line of reasoning is unjustified. If it’s not clear, there’s nothing I can do about it, and it doesn’t matter.

I had a brief note from Florence—the first in at least fifteen years. She wanted me to know what a fine time she’d had with you, and how much she liked Sue. Loved the climate, the landscape, the picnics and the bathing, and incidentally had not a word to say about anyone being sick in bed. According to her you all went everywhere together, and it was perfect. This deviates considerably from the official version.

(sent to Pamela Loeffler)

A few postmortem thoughts. You can tell S. that I’ve written her Aunt Emily West (who became her guardian when her parents died) informing her that her niece has left college and has an address in Hawaii where she can reach her. I’ve also been in touch with my lawyer in New York, explaining that my financial obligations to Susan Choate terminated with the end of her academic career, and asking him to cancel whatever future arrangements he had expected to make.