The Ravishing of Lol Stein (6 page)

The rye rustles beneath her loins. Young, early-summer rye. Her eyes riveted on the lighted window, a woman hearkens to the void—feeding upon, devouring this non-existent, invisible spectacle, the light from a room where others are.

In the distance, with fairy-like fingers, the recollection of a certain memory flits past. It grazes Lol not long after she has lain down in the field, it portrays for her, at this late evening hour in the field of rye, this woman who is gazing up at a small rectangular window, a narrow stage, circumscribed as a stone, on which no actor has yet appeared. And perhaps Lol is afraid, but ever so slightly, of the possibility of an even greater separation from the others. She is none the less fully aware that some people would struggle—yesterday she still would have—that they would go running home as fast as they could the moment some vestige of reason had made them discover themselves in this field. But this is the last fear Lol has learned, the fear that others might have in her place, that evening. They would bravely destroy it within themselves. But she, on the contrary, cherishes it, tames it, caresses it with her hands on the rye.

Beyond the other side of the hotel, the horizon has lost its last traces of color. Night is falling.

The shadow of the man crosses the rectangle of light.

Once, then a second time, back in the opposite direction.

The light changes, grows brighter. Now it is no longer coming from the back of the room, to the left of the window, but from the ceiling.

In turn, Tatiana Karl, naked in her black hair, crosses the stage of light, slowly. It is perhaps in Lol's rectangle of vision that she pauses. She turns back to the room where the man presumably is.

The window is small, and no doubt Lol can see only the upper part of the lovers' bodies, from the waist up. Thus it is that she cannot see the full length of Tatiana's tresses.

From this distance she cannot hear them when they talk. All she can see is their facial expressions—coinciding with the movements of parts of their bodies— which bespeak disenchantment. Their words are few. But then, she can only see them when they pass back and forth, in line with the window, at the back of the room. The mute expressions on their faces are also much alike, Lol finds.

Again he passes through the light, dressed this time. And not long after him, Tatiana Karl, still naked: she stops, stretches, her head slightly raised and, pivoting the upper part of her body, her arms in the air, her hands ready to receive it, she pulls her hair around in front of her, coils it, and puts it up. Compared to the slenderness of her body, her breasts are heavy, time has wrought its damaging effect upon them, the only part of her body which has so suffered. Lol must remember how pristine and lovely they once had been. Tatiana Karl is the same age as Lol Stein.

I remember: the man comes over while she is busy fixing her hair, he leans over and buries his head in the supple, abundant mass, kisses her, while she, still busy putting up her hair, acquiesces, neutral and indolent.

They disappear from the window for a fairly long time.

Then Tatiana comes back again alone, with her hair down once more. This time she goes to the window, a cigarette in her mouth, and leans out.

Lol, I can see Lol: she does not stir. She knows that, unless they had been forewarned of her presence in the field, they would never be able to detect her. Tatiana does not see the dark spot in the rye.

Tatiana moves away from the window, to reappear dressed once more in her black suit. He too goes by, one last time, his suitcoat slung over his shoulder.

A moment later, the light goes out in the room.

A taxi, probably summoned by phone, stops in front of the hotel.

Lol gets up. It is completely dark now. She is numb, at first she has trouble walking, but she sets off at a brisk pace. When she reaches the small square she finds a taxi. It's time for dinner. She is terribly late.

Her husband is outside in the street, waiting, beside himself with worry.

She lies, and is believed. She tells them that she had to go all the way to the outskirts of town to do an errand, something she could buy only in the nurseries in the suburbs, plants for a hedge she was thinking of putting in to help screen the grounds from the street.

They commiserated with her, told her how sorry they were that she had had to walk so long and so far down dark, deserted streets.

The love that Lol had once had for Michael Richardson was her husband's best guarantee of his wife's faithfulness. It was impossible that she should ever find, a second time, a man made of the same cloth as the man from Town Beach, or, if she did, she would have to invent him, and she invented nothing, John Bedford believed.

D
URING
THE
DAYS
that followed, Lol looked high and low for Tatiana's address.

She did not give up her walks.

But the light of the ball was suddenly extinguished. She can no longer see it clearly. The faces, the bodies of the lovers are covered over with an even layer of gray mildew.

The Karls had never lived in South Tahla. It was at school that Lol and Tatiana had become fast friends, and they used to spend their vacations together in Town Beach. Their parents were barely acquainted. Lol had forgotten the Karls' address. She wrote to the alumnae association of the school: after Tatiana's father had retired, the family had moved away, they lived near the seashore now, not far from Town Beach. Since they had moved the association had lost track of Tatiana. Lol refused to admit defeat, she wrote a long, embarrassed letter to Mrs. Karl, telling her how much she would have liked to renew ties with Tatiana, the only friend she had not forgotten. Mrs. Karl wrote back a very affectionate letter and gave Lol the address of her daughter, who had been married for eight years to a Dr. Beugner, in South Tahla.

Tatiana was living in a large house in the southern part of South Tahla, not far from the forest.

On several occasions, Lol went out for walks in the vicinity of this house, with which she was already familiar, as she was familiar with all the houses in town.

The house was situated on a slight rise. The grounds, which were large and well-wooded, made it difficult to see the house from the front, but from behind, by looking up the winding vista of a broad pathway, it was more easily visible, with balconies on the upper stories and a large terrace where, in summer, Tatiana could often be found. It was here, in the rear, that the main gate was located.

It was probably not Lol's plan to rush over
and call
on Tatiana, she no doubt planned first to scout out the area near her house, to loiter in the neighboring streets. Who could tell? Perhaps Tatiana would come out, they would meet in this way, run into each other again, to all appearances quite by chance.

That did not happen.

The first time, Lol must have seen Tatiana Karl on the terrace, lying on a deck chair, wearing a bathing suit, her eyes closed against the bright sunlight. The second time as well. Once, Tatiana Karl seemed not to be home. Her deck chair was there, and a coffee table covered with brightly colored magazines. That day the sky was overcast. Lol lingered in the neighborhood, but Tatiana failed to appear.

It was at that point that Lol made up her mind to call on Tatiana. She told her husband that she intended to go and see an old school friend, Tatiana Karl, whose picture she had happened to come across while she was straightening up some things. Had she ever spoken to him about her? She couldn't remember. No. It was the first time John Bedford had ever heard the name.

As Lol never expressed any desire to see anyone or look up anyone again, John Bedford was somewhat taken aback by this show of initiative. He questioned Lol. She stuck to the sole reason that she had given him: she was interested in catching up on the news of her old school friends, and especially this particular one, Tatiana Karl, who, as she recalled, was the most endearing of them all. How did she know her address in South Tahla? She had happened to see her come out of a cinema in the center of town, and had written to the alumnae association.

John Bedford had grown used to seeing his wife, all these years, fully contented with him alone, with no need of any outside contacts. The notion of Lol exchanging small talk with anyone, no matter who, was inconceivable, and even, apparently, somewhat distasteful, for anyone who really knew her. Still, it would appear that John Bedford did nothing to try and prevent Lol from finally acting the way other women did. It was something that had to happen sooner or later, and it confirmed how vastly improved she had grown over the years, it was something he had devoutly desired, John Bedford doubtless remembered, or, by then, did he really prefer that she remain the way she had been for ten years in Uxbridge, in that irreproachable promise of something different? I suspect that he had a moment of panic: what he had to be afraid of was himself. He had to pretend that he was pleased by Lol's initiative. He was delighted, he told her, by anything that would take her away from her daily routine. Didn't she realize that? And what about her walks? Would he have the pleasure of meeting Tatiana Karl? Lol promised that he would, sometime within the next few days.

Lol bought herself a dress. She put off her visit to Tatiana Karl for two days, the time it took her to make this difficult purchase. She decided on a white, summer dress. The dress, according to everyone in her house, suited her perfectly.

In secret, not allowing her husband or the children or the maids to see, she spent hours that day primping and preening. Her husband wasn't the only one, they all knew that she was going to pay a visit to an old school friend who had once been very close to her. They were surprised, but they carefully refrained from saying anything. When she was on the point of leaving the house, they complimented her on her appearance, and she felt obliged to offer certain additional information: she had chosen that white dress so that Tatiana Karl would be able to recognize her more readily, more easily. The last time she had seen Tatiana had been at the seashore in Town Beach, she could remember it very clearly, it was ten years ago, and during that vacation she had, at the request of a friend, worn nothing but white.

The deck chair was in its usual position, as were the table and the magazines. Tatiana Karl was perhaps in the house. It was a Saturday afternoon, about four o'clock. The sun was shining.

This is what I surmise:

Once again, Lol circles the house, no longer in the hope of running into Tatiana, but to try and control to some extent that impatience welling within her, impelling her to run: she must not give these people the slightest hint of her impatience, these people who are as yet unaware that their peace and tranquility is about to be shattered forever. In the course of the past few days, Tatiana Karl has become so dear to her that, if her attempt were to fail, if she were not able to see her again, the town would become unlivable, stifling and deadly. She had to succeed. For these people, the next few days are going to be—more specifically than a more distant future would be—whatever she cares to make of them, she, Lol Stein. She will invent the necessary circumstances, then she will open whatever doors have to be opened: they will pass through them.

She circles the house, until it is slightly past the time she has set for the visit.

In what lost universe has Lol Stein acquired this fierce will, this method?

Perhaps it would have been preferable for her to arrive at Tatiana's in the evening. But she has decided that she ought to show a certain discretion and abide by the customary visiting hours of the upper middle-class to which both she and Tatiana belong.

She rings the bell at the gate. It is as though she can feel the blood rising in her cheeks. Today she must be beautiful enough for it to be visible. Today, in keeping with her desire, they must see Lol Stein.

A maid came out onto the terrace, looked for a moment, and went back inside. A few seconds later, Tatiana, in a blue dress, appeared on the terrace in turn and looked.

The terrace is about a hundred yards from the gate. Tatiana is trying to make out who it is who has dropped in this way unannounced. She fails to discern who it is and gives the order to open the gate. Again the maid disappears. The gate opens with an electric click that startles Lol.

She is inside the fence, on the grounds. The gate closes behind her.

She advances up the path. She is half way up it when two men come out and join Tatiana. One of them is the man she is looking for. He sees her for the first time.

She smiles at the group and keeps on walking slowly toward the terrace. Flower beds come into view on the lawn, and on either side of the path hydrangeas are withering in the shade of the trees. They are already turning purple, is probably her only thought. The hydrangeas, Tatiana's hydrangeas, at the same time as Tatiana now, she who from one moment to the next is going to shout my name.

"Lola, is that really you?"

He looks at her. She discovers the same intrigued expression she had seen in the street. It really is Tatiana, here is Tatiana's voice, tender, suddenly tender, with its old modulations, her sad, childlike voice.

"But, is it Lol! I'm not mistaken?"

"It's Lol," she said.

Tatiana comes running down the terrace steps and over to Lol, stops before she reaches her, looks at her, her expression one of undisguised surprise but also slightly wild, changing from pleasure to displeasure, from fear to reassurance. Lol the intruder, the little girl in the playground, Lol from Town Beach, that ball, that ball, mad Lol, did she still love her? Yes.

Lol is in her arms.

On the terrace, the men watched them embrace. They have heard Tatiana speak of her.

They are almost at the terrace. At any moment, the distance separating them from that terrace is going to be covered, forever.

Before that happens, the man Lol is looking for suddenly finds himself in the direct line of her gaze. Lol, her head on Tatiana's shoulder, sees him: he almost lost his balance, he turned his head away. She was not mistaken.