The Tenant (12 page)

Trelkovsky pressed his hands against his forehead. He wanted to tear himself away from this spectacle, but he did not have the strength.

Simone Choule was moving again. None of her gestures escaped Trelkovsky. He saw her lift her arm to pull the chain, make a final adjustment to her clothing, and then go out. The light in the toilet went dark.

Only then did he manage to turn away from the window. He went on taking off his clothes, but his fingers trembled when he tried to unbutton his shirt. He had to pull it open to get it off, and the cloth made a mournful sound as it tore. He didn’t notice it. He was thinking of nothing but what he had just seen.

It wasn’t so much the sight of Simone Choule’s ghost that bothered him, since he was reasonably sure that his fever was responsible for that hallucination; but there had been another, even more bizarre sensation, while he was watching her.

For the space of several seconds he had thought himself transported across the courtyard and into the toilet, and from there he had been looking into the window of his own apartment. He had seen a face pressed against the glass, the face of a man who resembled him like a twin, and the eyes in that face had stared at him as if they were seeing a vision of unutterable horror.

11
The Revelation

T
he fever had passed, but Trelkovsky was finding it difficult to return to his normal way of life. As it receded, the fever must have carried with it some particle of himself, because now he had the feeling of being somehow incomplete. His blunted senses constantly gave him the impression of being out of step with his body. He was disturbed by it.

When he got out of bed that morning he seemed to be obeying a will that was not his own. He thrust his feet into the slippers he always wore in the apartment, slipped a bathrobe around his shoulders, and went to boil some water for his tea. He was still too weak to go back to the office.

When the water boiled, he poured it over the strainer that held the tea leaves—fresh ones, this time. The liquid in the cup was a beautiful color, as delicate as some Chinese inks, and with: an aroma that was soft, discreet, and yet irresistible. Trelkovsky never put sugar in his tea. Instead, he put a lump of sugar in his mouth and then drank the tea in little sips.

He could hear the hammering of the workmen repairing the glass roof over the courtyard. Automatically, Trelkovsky put a lump of sugar on his tongue, took the cup in his hand, and walked over to the window. The two workmen happened to be looking up at the time. When they saw Trelkovsky they burst into vulgar laughter. He thought at first that he was mistaken about it, that he was simply the victim of an optical illusion. But the truth of the matter was almost immediately apparent: the workmen were quite openly making fun of him. He was baffled, and then he became annoyed. He drew his eyebrows together in a frown, hoping to show them what he thought of their behavior, but this produced no results whatever.

“It’s too much,” he thought. “What the devil do they think they’re doing?”

He opened the window angrily and leaned out over the guard rail. The workmen began laughing even louder.

By this time Trelkovsky was trembling with rage. To such an extent, in fact, that the cup fell out of his hand. When he bent over to pick up the pieces, he heard another burst of noisy laughter. The workmen were apparently vastly amused by his clumsiness. When he looked out of the window again they were still watching him, smiling in a manner that was oddly nasty.

“What have I done to them?” he wondered.

Obviously, he had done nothing. But for some reason they were his enemies, and since he could not imagine why, he felt he could not tolerate it any longer.

“What’s the matter?” he cried, pretending he had not understood what the men were doing. “What do you want?”

The loud, vulgar character of their laughter became even more pronounced. They watched for a few moments longer and then went back to their work. But even with their backs to him, Trelkovsky was conscious of the smile that twisted their lips, and from time to time they glanced up at his window, shook their heads, and muttered something to each other.

He felt as if he were rooted to the floor, petrified by his astonishment and anger, seeking vainly for a reason for what had happened.

“What on earth can it be? Why should they have started laughing the minute they saw me?”

He went over to the mirror and stared at his reflection.

But he was no longer himself.

He leaned closer to the mirror, and a muted scream of terror welled up in his throat. Then he fainted.

When he recovered consciousness some time later he realized at once that he had hurt himself in falling. He pulled himself painfully to his feet, and the first thing he saw was his image in the mirror—the face of a woman, heavily made-up. He could see it all now; the lipstick on his mouth, the rouge on his cheeks, the mascara on his eyelashes.

His fear became so tangible a thing that he could feel it forming a solid ball in his throat. Its surface was as sharp and rough as the teeth of a saw, tearing at his larynx. Why was he disguised like this?

He didn’t walk in his sleep, he was certain of that. And where had the cosmetics come from? He began a frantic search of the apartment, and found them very quickly, in a drawer of the little chest. There were at least a dozen bottles of every size and color, as well as tubes and jars of creams.

Was he going mad?

He snatched the bottles out of the drawer and hurled them against the wall, where they shattered noisily.

The neighbors promptly rapped on the wall.

So he was going mad, was he? He burst out laughing.

The neighbors rapped again, harder this time.

He stopped laughing. He was beginning to understand. And it was not funny.

His pajama jacket was soaked with sweat; it felt glued to his skin. He collapsed on the bed, fighting with all his strength against the explanation that had come to mind. But he knew that it was useless; the truth was there in front of him, bursting across his vision like fireworks in a night sky.

It was their doing.

The neighbors were slowly transforming him into Simone Choule!

Using a thousand shabby little tricks, an unceasing vigilance, an iron determination, they were altering his whole personality. They were all in it together, they were all equally guilty. And he had fallen into their incredible trap like the innocent fool he was. They had disguised themselves and lied about each other, just to trick him. They had acted in this weird manner for no reason except to demoralize him and make him lose faith in his own intelligence. He had been nothing but a toy in their hands. When he thought back to all the details of his life in this apartment he realized that it had been that way from the very first. The concierge had called his attention to the window of the toilet the minute he stepped foot in this room. She had known all about the things that would happen there. And there was no point in wondering any longer who had cleared away the trash he dropped on the staircase. It was the neighbors.

It was also the neighbors who had robbed him, burning his bridges behind him, removing all possibility of a return to normalcy by depriving him of his past. And whenever his earlier personality showed signs of returning, it was the neighbors who rapped on the walls. They had made him abandon his friends, and forced him into wearing bedroom slippers and a bathrobe. It was a neighbor working in the café across the street who had made him drink chocolate instead of coffee, and smoke Gitanes instead of Gauloises. They had cunningly dictated all of his actions, all of his decisions. Nothing of himself had been left to him.

And now, taking advantage of the fever and his exhausted sleep, they had decided to strike a major blow. They had painted him to resemble a woman. But they had made a mistake this time; he wasn’t quite ready for this. It had come too soon.

He remembered the thoughts he had had on the subject of virility. So that was it! Even his most private reflections had been imposed on him by others.

He took a pack of cigarettes from the pocket of the bathrobe and lit one. He was going to have to think about all this, as calmly as possible. And above everything, he must not lose his head. He inhaled deeply from the cigarette, watching the wisps of smoke drift upward from his nostrils. What about the landlord?

He was certainly the leader. He was the one who controlled all the movements of his pack of assassins. And the old woman, Madame Dioz? And the woman with the crippled daughter? Victims, like himself? Or neighbors? Neighbors, undoubtedly, charged with some inexplicable secret mission. And what about Stella?

Had she been warned that he would be coming to the hospital? Had she been sent there only to intercept him, to subject him to an influence he would have no reason to mistrust, because she had no connection with the apartment or the neighbors? He decided that, for the time being at least, he must believe in her innocence. He couldn’t afford to see enemies everywhere he looked. He was not mad!

But what crime had he committed, that they should be so intent on his destruction? Perhaps the same crime as that of a fly caught in the trap of a spider’s web. The building was a trap, and the trap functioned. It was even possible that they had no personal animosity toward him. But when he thought of the stern, unbending faces of the neighbors, he abandoned this hypothesis. There could be no doubt of their personal animosity to Trelkovsky. They could not forgive him, just because he was Trelkovsky; they hated him for that, and they had determined to punish him for it.

Had this whole enormous machine been set in motion for no purpose except to punish him? Why such an effort, just for him? Had he done something to deserve it? Why should he be their chosen victim?

He shook his head. No, that wasn’t possible. There must be something else.

Another question came to mind: Was he the first victim?

And then another: Was it really Simone Choule he had seen beneath the bandages in the hospital? And if not, how had they transformed her?

How long had the trap been functioning? How long was the list of tenants thus destroyed or transformed? Had they all chosen the same end as Simone Choule, or had some of them been charged with the task of perpetuating the deceased? Was this their way of reproducing themselves, of continuing their species? And in that case, had Simone Choule been a party to the conspiracy? Were they all some sort of creature produced from endless mutation, or were they simply murderers? Trelkovsky thought of the former tenant as he had last seen her, shrouded in bandages, her mouth gaping.

Would one of the neighbors commit suicide? Oh, no—Simone Choule was a victim, not an executioner.

He crushed the stub of his cigarette into the ashtray. Why? Why should they want to transform him?

Then his breathing stopped, his eyes opened wide with terror.

The day when he came to resemble Simone Choule completely,
totally,
he would be forced to do as she had done.
He would be forced to commit suicide.
Even if he had no wish to do so, he would have nothing to say about it.

He ran to the window. In the courtyard below, the workmen began to laugh as soon as they saw him. That was why they were repairing the glass roof! For him!

He suddenly felt dizzy, and put out his hand to catch at the chair, sinking back into it before he fell.

But he didn’t want to die! This was murder! He thought of going to the police, but realized they would be no help to him. What could he say to convince a policeman of all of this, or to a superintendent who was a friend of Monsieur’s Zy’s? But what else was there to do? Run away? Where to? Anywhere at all, it didn’t matter, just get out of this building while there was still time. But he couldn’t just throw away the money he had invested in the lease. There must be some solution. He sat by the window for a long time, thinking, and at last he found one that he thought might work.

He would have to go on for a little while longer, letting them think the transformation was taking place, so they would have no cause for suspicion. In the meantime, he would find someone else to take the apartment and then go off without leaving any new address.

There were two points to this solution which were not entirely satisfactory. The first was that the next tenant, coming into the apartment unwarned, would be the next victim; and the second was that the landlord might not give his consent to any transfer of the lease. It was impossible to do it without first notifying him. The ideal solution would have been to leave without notifying anyone—simply abandoning everything—but all of Trelkovsky’s savings had gone into buying up this lease. He would have nothing left to fall back on. His only chance lay in gaining time, and money.

He decided to go downstairs and take a little walk through the streets of the neighborhood, painted and scented as he was. He would have to put up with the jeers of the children and the contempt of the unknowing passersby, but this was the price he would have to pay if he wanted to cling to some hope of saving his skin.

Part Three
THE
FORMER  TENANT

12
Revolt

E
ver since Trelkovsky had become aware of the existence of a plot to destroy him, he had derived a morbid pleasure from making the transformation of his character as complete and perfect as possible. Since they wanted to make him into someone else in spite of himself, he would show them what he was capable of by himself. He would beat them on their own ground. He would reply to their monstrous plan with one of his own.

The shop he went into smelled of dust and soiled linen. The old woman who ran it did not seem in the least astonished by Trelkovsky’s appearance, and he decided that she must be accustomed to this sort of thing. He spent a good deal of time making a selection from the wigs she brought out to show him. They were more expensive than he had thought, but in the end he decided in favor of the most expensive one she had. When he tried it on, it felt like a headpiece of heavy fur. It wasn’t at all disagreeable. He left the shop without taking it off. In the breeze of the street outside, the long strands of hair slapped gently against his face, like the folds of a flag.