Money and other stories/Three

he sun, which since early morning had been scorching the yellow walls of the farmyards opposite, slowly advanced in grim silence. The walls opposite were already in shadow, and it seemed really as if this made it a little cooler. Now a narrow streak of sunlight lodged on the window-frame, presently it would broaden, and when it fell across the room her husband would wake up, yawn noisily and come in to her, just as he did every Sunday. Marie shrugged her shoulders in dreary disgust and dropped her sewing into her lap.

She stared vacantly out of the window. The chestnut in the court had flowered not long before, but now the blossom had a look as if corroded. Why was it that even the tree filled her with disgust, when it at least was not to blame? A restless, ever increasing, grievous heaviness descended on Marie's heart. If she had wished to talk about herself she might have said that perhaps it was memories; but she never talked about herself, not even to her ​husband, not even to the other one. However, it was not even memories. It was only as if all the past had rolled into a heavy ball of thread; she had only to pick up the end and one event after another, those which she would gladly recall to life for her own pleasure, and those which she wanted to forget for ever, began to unroll. Marie was thinking of nothing, she did not want to think of anything, but she was conscious of everything about which she might be thinking now. It was all there, and so close that she was afraid to think lest she should touch it.

The little streak of sunshine had jumped across the window-frame.

Above all there was the helpless consciousness that everyone knew about it—everyone knew all about her conjugal infidelity. Oh, at first she had borne it defiantly when so many people made it quite clear to her that they knew. . . . Some of them did it brutally, others with offensive familiarity, others wishing to chastise, and still others—why, there was not one who did not feel she had the right to say something nasty to her. One neighbour muttered audibly something about light women whenever she met her; another shook her head and declared that young people must have their fling, what was the use of being virtuous; another kept making meaning allusions to her ​husband; another spat; another did not acknowledge her greeting; another over-flowed with shrill sympathy and then proceeded to borrow all manner of things. Oh God, must she bear all this?

Yes, at first Marie had forced herself to be defiant, but it is hard to defy one’s own evil conscience. And then she shed tears of rage and indignation, but without relief. She could not even complain to her lover, she had never anything to say to him herself; she was kept a speechless captive by the silent, heavy and masterful love of a clumsy and passionate man. Finally she took to pretending that she did not understand the allusions, that they did not refer to her; one gets accustomed to anything, though this “anything” does not thereby become purified, changed or undone.

The ray of sunshine glided down the cords of the blinds.

And then there was her husband. At first perhaps he had not believed what people said about his wife; then he was seized by harrowing despair, and without saying a word to her he took to drink. He became a dreadful drinker, he who had been so temperate a man, and went down in a pitiable way; at last, in the office they threatened to retire him, so he changed abruptly, gave up drinking, and began again in his old way, becoming even more ​economical and stay-at-home than before. For a long time he said nothing to Marie, but finally he had to discuss expenses, laundry, food. . . . He became particular about his food and grew miserly, after he “reformed”; he exacted much consideration and contrived to be content with that. Once he found Baudys, Marie’s lover, at his house; he banged the door, and without looking at anybody went into the other room; but as soon as the visitor had gone he allowed himself to be called to supper; he did not speak at first, but after the meal he began to talk about something or other with painful pauses, like a man who knows that he ought to be silent. Then, when Marie preferred to go to Baudys’ home, he made a fuss several times because she had been out too long. Yes, he had had to wait for his supper. People said he was a good-natured soul. Marie hated him, partly because she was wronging him and partly because he took no trouble over himself any more.

The sunshine glided along the wall. Marie followed it like the fateful hand of a clock. She could still hear her husband snoring regularly; but after a little while the sofa in the other room would creak, her husband would yawn, get up with an effort, scratching the back of his neck, and with waistcoat unbuttoned and in his stockinged feet, come over ​to her as he did every Sunday. Then he would wander round the room, finger the furniture, examine damaged places which had been there for years, mutter about expenses, and then carefully and in an indirect way begin his strange weekly discourse. Marie shuddered. He had started the subject that way for a long time now. Hundreds of times he talked of how much a wife cost her husband, and what an expensive business marriage was. Bachelors get the best of it, he began one day, when they run after a married woman. Another man provides for her, another man clothes her; all that costs them nothing. A bunch of violets, perhaps, he observed, looking fixedly at Marie. They get it cheap, he repeated, dwelling on the subject, as if he had made a discovery. For a whole month he had lived on that theme, and Marie fancied he was jealous.

One day she was sewing trimming on a dress. He came up after a good sleep and asked how much the lace cost, and what was the price of one thing and another. However, he never worried her much about such things; perhaps he understood her need to be pretty; all the same he talked about it and grumbled at the cost. Nowadays, he had begun, one man alone has not enough to dress a wife; no, as things are to-day, one man alone has not a big enough income. Some men, of course, get ​things cheap, they get a wife for nothing as she is not theirs. . . . Marie began to understand, and it seemed to her that her heart grew cold, but she was silent as if it were nothing to do with her. Her husband looked at her with a fixed and heavy stare and burst out “How about Baudys!” This was the first time that he had uttered the name.

“What about Baudys?” Marie was alarmed now.

“Nothing,” he said evasively, and after a time: “What-er-er income does he get?”

That was how it began, Marie remembered. And from that time it was the same every Sunday. Why was he sleeping so long to-day? He would come and scratch his back, “Have you spoken to Baudys? And how often? And what salary does he get?” Then he would begin about himself. No money and needing a new hat—his was really a disgrace; but what could one do when housekeeping swallowed up everything? He went on talking by himself. Disgust made a lump rise in Marie’s throat which she wanted to get rid of. Her husband shook his head and ended with strange gloominess: “Of course, you don’t worry yourself about anything.”

Marie looked at the advancing ray of sunlight and dug her finger-nails into her palms. If she could only be spared that memory! It ​was one day at her lover’s house—after such a Sunday as this. Baudys put her on the sofa, but she resisted him and began to cry; she felt it was necessary to cry, and for a long, long time she let him beg for an explanation—that her husband was stingy, he wouldn’t give her money for clothes or anything. Her lover listened with a frown and as if damped; he was so . . . so clumsy, perhaps, that he calculated mentally how much it would cost. At last he said hesitatingly and reluctantly: “I’ll see to that, Marie.” Marie felt that now she could cry without pretence, but instead she had to let herself be caressed; oh, more than she had, more than she had till then.

He was waiting for her next time with a gift; it was some dress material which Marie did not like; she went home feeling crushed with shame. Up to that time her relations with her lover had been those of a wife with her husband; her caresses were grave and devoted; now she closed her eyes on herself so as not to shudder. While she was cutting out the material her husband had come in. “Did Baudys give you that?” he asked eagerly.

Marie sighed and began to sew with long stitches. She was sewing a silk blouse; even the stuff for that had been bought by her lover. It was strange how it pleased him to load her with costly, extravagant and tempting ​presents. Sometimes she reflected happily how fond he was of her; sometimes, however, she thought otherwise and felt terribly uneasy; her restrained, passive love was gone; these gifts exhaled something feverish and luxurious, and Marie forced herself into a state of unnatural and frivolous high spirits which did not itself ripen in her tranquil and healthy body. This was a fiery change which the lover received like a thirsty drunkard, but Marie as something unwelcome and repulsive. It seemed to her inexpressibly sinful, because it was against her own nature; but she could not defend herself and swallowed it all, striving desperately and vainly not to think about it. A week ago he had tried to make her drink wine; he himself was tipsy. She refused to drink, but when later he breathed on her with his drunken, burning, passionate breath, she could have screamed with horror.

The streak of sunlight gently settled on her mother’s photograph. It was the round, clear, happy face of a countrywoman who had borne children, and with blessings in her heart rendered back to life all it had given her. Marie’s hands dropped into her lap; her husband’s breathing grew quiet; the heat was scorching and the silence very oppressive. A grunt from her husband in the next room, the sofa creaked, the floor creaked under unsteady ​steps. Marie began to sew rapidly. Her husband opened the door, yawned aloud, and all unbuttoned, still stupid from his sleep, perspiring, came up to her, scratching his neck. Marie did not even raise her eyes, but went on sewing more rapidly still.

Her husband wandered round the room in his stockinged feet, stood over her unsteadily, yawned, and asked:

“What’s that you’re sewing?”

Marie did not reply, she merely spread out her work for him to see.

“You had this from Baudys?” he asked without interest. She stuck the needle in her mouth and did not reply. Her husband sighed and fingered the silk with the air of a connoisseur, as though he understood it.

“You had this from Baudys,” he answered his own question.

“Ages ago,” said Marie, from the corner of her mouth.

“Ah-h,” yawned her husband, and began to walk about the room.

“You might at least put your shoes on,” observed Marie after a time.

Her husband said nothing and continued to walk about. “Oh yes,” he began, “always rags. What’s the use of such nonsense? Money’s nothing to you. That’s what I say, Marie, money’s nothing to you.”

​“At any rate you don’t pay for it,” Marie’s voice was hard. She knew that the conversation was beginning as it had so many Sundays.

“I don’t pay for it,” repeated her husband. “Of course I don’t pay for it. Where should I find the money for it? I—have to pay for other things. I have to pay insurance premiums. . . . We haven’t anything to spare for unnecessary things. You don’t think of what is being paid out. A hundred and fifty for rent. And insurance. It’s all one to you. Have you spoken to Baudys?”

“Yes.”

Of course. Oh, my Lord,” yawned her husband, and looked at Marie’s work. “You don’t think of the money, Marie. How much would that cost, that kind of material, do you know?”

“No.”

“How often have you spoken to him this week?”

“Twice.”

“Twice,” he repeated thoughtfully. “It’s waste of money. And you’ve such a lot of frocks already. Now listen, Marie.”

The young woman bent her head; now it was coming.

“For two years we haven’t saved anything. It’s like that, Marie. Suppose something ​happened, illness or anything. . . . And you think of nothing but having pretty frocks.”

Marie remained obstinately silent.

“We ought to put something by; and then coal for the winter. I should be glad if I—for old age—if you had. . . . At least you might think of your own old age.”

There was a torturing silence; Marie pulled her needle through the stuff hardly knowing how. Her husband gazed out of the window over her blonde head and tried to say something; his wretched unshaven chin, stained from a meal, was trembling.

“Stop!” cried Marie.

His chin fell; he gave a helpless gulp and said: “You know, I could do with some clothes myself; but I know that we haven’t the money to spend on them. That’s how it is, Marie.”

He sat down, huddled up, and stared at the floor.

Marie stuck her needle into the silk. Yes, a week ago he had talked like that; she herself could have wept over his shabby clothes. She turned them over every day, was familiar with each frayed thread; she was ashamed when he went to the office in them.

The day before she had been at her lover’s house; she went there with a plan prepared, but it did not turn out as she wanted. She ​sat on his knee (thinking this necessary in view of the circumstances) and worked herself up into petulant gaiety; he was at once on the alert and asked what she wanted. She laughed and asked him not to buy her any more presents; she would rather buy them herself if only she had something to buy them with. He looked at her, and his hands fell to his sides. “Get up,” he said, rose and walked up and down the room; then he counted out two hundred crowns and put them beside her handbag. Ah, she had purposely left her handbag on the table; she had thought it all out beforehand; why did he not understand, why did he leave it to her, when she said good-bye, to gather up the notes and cram them hastily and clumsily into her handbag? Why, at least, did he not turn away while she did so, why did he watch it all with a fixed, scrutinizing stare? Marie looked at the point of her needle with dry wide eyes; unconsciously she tore the silk, making a crooked hole in it with absent-minded thoroughness.

“That is just it, Marie,” observed her husband with difficulty. “We haven’t enough money.”

“My handbag,” said Marie irritably.

“What do you want?”

“Take . . . my handbag.”

He opened the handbag; found the crumpled ​bunch of notes just as she had stuffed them in the day before. “Is this yours?” he gasped.

“Ours,” said Marie.

Her husband stared dumbfounded at his wife’s bent neck; he did not know what to say.

“Am I to put it by?” he asked softly.

“If you like.”

He shuffled about in his stockinged feet, trying to find a word of offence or tenderness; finally without a word he went into the next room with the money. He was there a long time; when he returned he found Marie still with bent head tearing the silk with her needle.

“Marie,” he said softly, “wouldn’t you like to come for a walk with me?”

Marie shook her head.

Her husband lingered helplessly, it was impossible to talk about it now. . . . “Look here, Marie,” he broke out at last with an air of relief, “suppose I go to a café now? It’s years now since I———”

“Go,” whispered Marie.

He dressed, not knowing what to talk about; but Marie did not stir, bent over the many-coloured silk, pretty, buxom, speechless. . . .

He dressed hurriedly as though he would take to flight; at the door he hesitated again, stopped, and said vaguely: “You know, ​Marie, if you like to go out—well—you can. I may be out to supper.”

Marie laid her head on the torn silk. That day she was not granted the gift of tears.