Sintès was busy fixing his bandage while he talked, and I was sitting on the bed. “So you see,” he said, “it wasn’t my fault; he was asking for it, wasn’t he?”
I nodded, and he added:
“As a matter of fact, I rather want to ask your advice about something; it’s connected with this business. You’ve knocked about the world a bit, and I daresay you can help me. And then I’ll be your pal for life; I never forget anyone who does me a good turn.”
When I made no comment, he asked me if I’d like us to be pals. I replied that I had no objection, and that appeared to satisfy him. He got out the black pudding, cooked it in a frying pan, then laid the table, putting out two bottles of wine. While he was doing this he didn’t speak.
We started dinner, and then he began telling me the whole story, hesitating a bit at first.
“There’s a girl behind it—as usual. We slept together pretty regular. I was keeping her, as a matter of fact, and she cost me a tidy sum. That fellow I knocked down is her brother.”
Noticing that I said nothing, he added that he knew what the neighbors said about him, but it was a filthy lie. He had his principles like everybody else, and a job in a warehouse.
“Well,” he said, “to go on with my story … I found out one day that she was letting me down.” He gave her enough money to keep her going, without extravagance, though; he paid the rent of her room and twenty francs a day for food. “Three hundred francs for rent, and six hundred for her grub, with a little present thrown in now and then, a pair of stockings or whatnot. Say, a thousand francs a month.
But that wasn’t enough for my fine lady; she was always grumbling that she couldn’t make both ends meet with what I gave her. So one day I says to her, ‘Look here, why not get a job for a few hours a day? That’d make things easier for me, too. I bought you a new dress this month, I pay your rent and give you twenty francs a day. But you go and waste your money at the café with a pack of girls. You give them coffee and sugar.
And, of course, the money comes out of my pocket. I treat you on the square, and that’s how you pay me back.’ But she wouldn’t hear of working, though she kept on saying she couldn’t make do with what I gave her. And then one day I found out she was doing me dirt.”
He went on to explain that he’d found a lottery ticket in her bag, and, when he asked where the money’d come from to buy it, she wouldn’t tell him. Then, another time, he’d found a pawn ticket for two bracelets that he’d never set eyes on.
“So I knew there was dirty work going on, and I told her I’d have nothing more to do with her. But, first, I gave her a good hiding, and I told her some home truths. I said that there was only one thing interested her and that was getting into bed with men whenever she’d the chance. And I warned her straight, ‘You’ll be sorry one day, my girl, and wish you’d got me back. All the girls in the street, they’re jealous of your luck in having me to keep you.’ ”
He’d beaten her till the blood came. Before that he’d never beaten her. “Well, not hard, anyhow; only affectionately-like. She’d howl a bit, and I had to shut the window. Then, of course, it ended as per usual. But this time I’m done with her. Only, to my mind, I ain’t punished her enough. See what I mean?”
He explained that it was about this he wanted my advice. The lamp was smoking, and he stopped pacing up and down the room, to lower the wick. I just listened, without speaking. I’d had a whole bottle of wine to myself and my head was buzzing. As I’d used up my cigarettes I was smoking Raymond’s. Some late streetcars passed, and the last noises of the street died off with them. Raymond went on talking. What bored him was that he had “a sort of lech on her” as he called it. But he was quite determined to teach her a lesson.
His first idea, he said, had been to take her to a hotel, and then call in the special police. He’d persuade them to put her on the register as a “common prostitute,” and that would make her wild. Then he’d looked up some friends of his in the underworld, fellows who kept tarts for what they could make out of them, but they had practically nothing to suggest.
Still, as he pointed out, that sort of thing should have been right up their street; what’s the good of being in that line if you don’t know how to treat a girl who’s let you down? When he told them that, they suggested he should “brand” her. But that wasn’t what he wanted, either. It would need a lot of thinking out. … But, first, he’d like to ask me something. Before he asked it, though, he’d like to have my opinion of the story he’d been telling, in a general way.
I said I hadn’t any, but I’d found it interesting. Did I think she really had done him dirt?
I had to admit it looked like that. Then he asked me if I didn’t think she should be punished and what I’d do if I were in his shoes. I told him one could never be quite sure how to act in such cases, but I quite understood his wanting her to suffer for it.
I drank some more wine, while Raymond lit another cigarette and began explaining what he proposed to do. He wanted to write her a letter, “a real stinker, that’ll get her on the raw,” and at the same time make her repent of what she’d done. Then, when she came back, he’d go to bed with her and, just when she was “properly primed up,” he’d spit in her face and throw her out of the room. I agreed it wasn’t a bad plan; it would punish her, all right.
But, Raymond told me, he didn’t feel up to writing the kind of letter that was needed, and that was where I could help. When I didn’t say anything, he asked me if I’d mind doing it right away, and I said, “No,” I’d have a shot at it.
He drank off a glass of wine and stood up. Then he pushed aside the plates and the bit of cold pudding that was left, to make room on the table. After carefully wiping the oilcloth, he got a sheet of squared paper from the drawer of his bedside table; after that, an envelope, a small red wooden penholder, and a square inkpot with purple ink in it. The moment he mentioned the girl’s name I knew she was a Moor.
I wrote the letter. I didn’t take much trouble over it, but I wanted to satisfy Raymond, as I’d no reason not to satisfy him. Then I read out what I’d written. Puffing at his cigarette, he listened, nodding now and then. “Read it again, please,” he said. He seemed delighted. “That’s the stuff,” he chuckled. “I could tell you was a brainy sort, old boy, and you know what’s what.”
At first I hardly noticed that “old boy.” It came back to me when he slapped me on the shoulder and said, “So now we’re pals, ain’t we?” I kept silence and he said it again. I didn’t care one way or the other, but as he seemed so set on it, I nodded and said, “Yes.”
He put the letter into the envelope and we finished off the wine. Then both of us smoked for some minutes, without speaking. The street was quite quiet, except when now and again a car passed. Finally, I remarked that it was getting late, and Raymond agreed. “Time’s gone mighty fast this evening,” he added, and in a way that was true. I wanted to be in bed, only it was such an effort making a move.
I must have looked tired, for Raymond said to me, “You mustn’t let things get you down.” At first I didn’t catch his meaning. Then he explained that he had heard of my mother’s death; anyhow, he said, that was something bound to happen one day or another. I appreciated that, and told him so.
When I rose, Raymond shook hands very warmly, remarking that men always understood each other. After closing the door behind me I lingered for some moments on the landing. The whole building was as quiet as the grave, a dank, dark smell rising from the
