Chapter Ninety-Two
Charlotte Drig had sneaked back to her room, to collect a dress, having been notified by Aloysius that her husband had been spotted moping through the other wing of the hotel, only to be surprised by his startled entry just on her way back out.
They stood and stared—at each other, obviously—any accusation or justification that came to their minds seeming too flimsy to emit.
“Oh, Artie,” Charlotte finally sighed.
“What should I do?” he asked. “What has he got that I haven’t?”
He looked so much older to her, even in the short time since she’d taken up with Aloysius, with the chassis of his visage, his cheeks and jaw, corroded away, leaving his face a formless mess of irresolution.
“It’s nothing like that,” she said.
“I know I’m nothing special. I’m not young. I’m not virile. I know me bone might not have as much meat on it as you’d like.”
“Please, Artie.”
“When we make love, I only last a minute and you’re unsatisfied—I understand all that.”
“It’s not about that.”
“I can change! I’ve heard tell—a fellow in the office was talking—there’s this sort of ring, which you place round your manhood, see—”
“Artie—”
“I don’t mean your manhood, I mean, you know, one’s manhood—on the assumption that the person being talked about has a manhood. That is, a penis.”
“Arthur, it’s nothing to do with penises. You’ll just have to take me word on that.”
“Well, if it ain’t about penises, then what’s it about?”
She couldn’t meet his eyes, but she knew well what they looked like, so she wasn’t missing much. “It’s like we’ve all been doused in a vat of acid, and all the ties what bound us to things have burnt away.”
“Wouldn’t we burn away, too?”
“What?”
“In a vat of acid.”
“Well, maybe I’m not describing it very well.”
“Try again. Please.”
She sighed. “All right: It’s like we’d all been stuck on various points of a spider’s web, all our lives, and now, finally, with an almighty gust, all the strands have come apart, and we’re free.”
“Are we flies?”
“You can be whatever insect you like, Artie.”
“Because if we’re, say, ants, then we’re bound to fall to the ground and crush our legs and, in any event, be trampled to death by the next creature of any significant size which happens to come along.”
“Would you rather I pretended it was about penises?! Would that be easier for you to take in?!”
“Don’t you even believe in God anymore?”
Then there was silence. She looked at him with a little girl’s fear, and whispered, with a little girl’s honesty: “I haven’t thought about Him. He’s—He’s gone away from me.”
He nodded, sadly. “Said the sailor of the shore: ‘It’s gone away from me.’”
“Artie, please—I’m not in control of meself anymore. Or, I meant to say, I’ve finally won control of meself, for the first time. Or maybe it only feels like I have. How to describe it? I’m on a ship, all right, and the pilot’s gone and croaked and willed me the wheel, and after spinning it this way and that, screaming and panicking ’cause I don’t swerve from the waterfall, I find that it’s not affixed to the ship, after all. I don’t expect any of this to make sense. I don’t expect you to understand. . .”
He nodded. “I do understand. But you understand this: so long as you and the waiter violate the sanctity of marriage, neither one of you is safe; by a hand mortal or divine, judgement must ensue.”