Above all I was fascinated by they tremendous Gorgon-like heads of the old men of Naples. They seemed to emerge full-blown out of the Renaissance: great lethal cabbages with fiery coals in their foreheads. Like the Urizens of William Blake’s imagination. They moved about condescendingly, these animated heads, as if patronizing the nefarious Mysteries of the mundane Church and her spew of scarlet-robed pimps.
I felt very very much at home. It was a bazaar which made sense. It was operatic, mercurial, tonsorial. The buzz-buzz at the altar was discreet and elegant, a sort of veiled boudoir atmosphere in which the priest, assisted by his gelded acolytes, washed his socks in holy water. Behind the glittering surplices were little trellised doors, such as the mountebanks used in the popular street shows of medieval times. Anything might spring out at you from those mysterious little doors. Here was the altar of confusion, bangled and diademed with baubles, smelling of grease paint, incense, sweat and dereliction. It was like the last act of a gaudy comedy, a banal play dealing with prostitution and ending in prophylactics. The performers inspired affection and sympathy; they were not sinners, they were vagrants. Two thousand years of fraud and humbug had culminated in this side-show. It was all flip and tutti-frutti, a gaudy, obscene carnival in which the Redeemer, made of plaster of Paris, took on the appearance of a eunuch in petticoats. The women prayed for children and the men prayed for food to stuff the hungry mouths. Outside, on the sidewalk, were heaps of vegetables, fruits, flowers and sweets. The barber shops were wide open and little boys, resembling the progeny of Fra Angelico, stood with big fans and drove the flies away. A beautiful city, alive in every member, and drenched with sunlight. In the background Vesuvius, a sleepy cone emitting a lazy curl of smoke. I was in Italy—I was certain of it. It was all that I had expected it to be. And then suddenly I realized that she was not with me, and for a moment I was saddened. Then I wondered… wondered about the seed and its fruition. For that night, when we went to bed hungering for Europe, something quickened in me. Years had rolled by… short, terrible years, in which every seed that had ever quickened seemed to be mashed to a pulp. Our rhythm had speeded up, hers in a physical way, mine in a more subtle way. She leaped forward feverishly, her very walk changing over into the lope of an antelope. I seemed to stand still, making no progress, but spinning like a top. She had her eyes set on the goal, but the faster she moved the farther removed became the goal. I knew I could never reach the goal this way. I moved my body about obediently, but always with an eye on the seed within. When I slipped and fell I fell softly, like a cat, or like a pregnant woman, always mindful of that which was growing inside me. Europe, Europe…. it was with me always, even when we were quarreling, shouting at each other like maniacs. Like a man obsessed, I brought every conversation back to the subject which alone interested me: Europe. Nights when we prowled about the city, searching like alley cats for scraps of food, the cities and peoples of Europe were in my mind. I was like a slave who dreams of freedom, whose whole being is saturated with one idea: escape. Nobody could have convinced me then that if I were offered the choice between her and my dream of Europe I would choose the latter. It would have seemed utterly fantastic, then, to suppose that it would be she herself who would offer me this choice. And perhaps even more fantastic still that the day I would sail for Europe I would have to ask my friend Ulric for ten dollars so as to have something in my pocket on touching my beloved European soil.
That half-voiced dream in the dark, that night alone in the desert, the voice of Ulric comforting me, the Carpathian mountains moving up from under the moon, Timbuctoo, the camel bells, the smell of leather and of dry, scorched dung, («What are you thinking of?» «I too!») the tense, richly-filled silence, the blank, dead walls of the tenement opposite, the fact that Arthur Raymond was asleep, that in the morning he would continue his exercises, forever and ever, but that I had changed, that there were exits, loopholes, even though only in the imaginations, all this acted like a ferment and dynamized the days, months, years that lay ahead. It dynamized my love for her.
It made me believe that what I could not accomplish alone I could accomplish with her, for her, through her, because of her. She became the water-sprinkler, the fertilizer, the hot-house, the mule pack, the pathfinder, the bread-winner, the gyroscope, the extra vitamin, the flame-thrower, the go-getter.
From that day on things moved on greased skids. Get married? Sure, why not? Right away. Have you got the money for the license? No, but I’ll borrow it. Fine. Meet you on the corner….
We’re in the Hudson Tubes on our way to Hoboken. Going to get married there. Why Hoboken? I don’t remember. Perhaps to conceal the fact that I had been married before, perhaps we were a bit ahead of the legal schedule. Anyway, Hoboken.
In the train we have a little tiff. The same old story—she’s not sure that I want to marry her. Thinks I’m doing it just to please her.
A station before Hoboken she jumps out of the train. I jump out too and run after her.
«What’s the matter with you—are you mad?»
«You don’t love me. I’m not going to marry you.»
«You are too, by God!»
I grab her and pull her back to the edge of the platform. As the next train pulls in I put my arms around her and embrace her.
«You’re sure, Val? You’re sure you want to marry me?»
I kiss her again. «Come on, cut it out! You know damned well we’re going to get married.» We hop in.
Hoboken. A sad, dreary place. A city more foreign to me than Pekin or Lhassa. Find the City Hall. Find a couple of bums to act as witnesses.
The ceremony. What’s your name? And your name? And his name? And so on. How long have you known this man? And this man is a friend of yours? Yes sir. Where did you pick him up—in the garbage can? O.K. Sign here. Bang, bang! Raise your right hand! I solemnly swear, etc, etc. Married. Five dollars, please. Kiss the bride. Next, please….
Everybody happy?
I want to spit.
In the train…. I take her hand in mine. We’re both depressed, humiliated. «I’m sorry, Mona… we shouldn’t have done it that way.»
«It’s all right, Val.» She’s very quiet now. As though we had just buried some one.
«But it isn’t all right, God damn it! I’m sore. I’m disgusted. That’s no way to get married. I’ll never….»
I checked myself. She looked at me with a startled expression.
«What were you going to say?»
I lied. I said: «I’ll never forgive myself for doing it that way.»
I became silent. Her lips were trembling.
«I don’t want to go back to the house just yet,» said she.
«Neither do I.»
Silence.
«I’ll call up Ulric,» said I. «We’ll have dinner with him, yes?»
«Yes,» she said, almost meekly.
We got into a telephone booth together to call up Ulric. I had my arm around her. «Now you’re Mrs. Miller,» I said. «How does it feel?»
She began to weep. «Hello, hello? That you, Ulric?»
«No, it’s me, Ned.»
Ulric wasn’t there—had gone somewhere for the day.
«Listen, Ned, we just got married.»
«Who got married?» he said.
«Mona and I, of course… who did you think?»
He was trying to joke about it, as though to say he couldn’t be sure whom I would marry.
«Listen, Ned, it’s serious. Maybe you’ve never been married before. We’re depressed. Mona is weeping. I’m on the verge of tears myself. Can we come up there, drop in for a little while? We’re lonely. Maybe you’ll fix us a little drink, yes?»
Ned was laughing again. Of course we were to come—right away. He was expecting that cunt of his, Marcelle. But that wouldn’t matter. He was getting sick of her. She was too good to him. She was fucking the life out of him. Yes, come up right away… we’d all drown our sorrows.
«Well, don’t worry, Ned’ll have some money. We’ll make him take us to dinner. I suppose nobody will think to give us a wedding present. That’s the hell of getting married in this informal fashion. You know, when Maude and I got married we pawned some of the wedding gifts the next day. Never got them back again either. We wouldn’t want a lot of knives and forks sterling, would we?»
«Please don’t talk that way, Val.»
«I’m sorry. I guess I’m a bit screwy to-day. That ceremony let me down. I could have murdered that guy.»
«Val, stop, I beg you!»
«All right, we won’t talk about it any more. Let’s be gay now, what? Let’s laugh….»
Ned had a warm smile. I liked Ned. He was weak. Weak and lovable. Selfish underneath. Very selfish. That’s why he could never get married. He had talent too, lots of talent, but no genius, no sustaining powers. He was an artist who had never found his medium. His best medium was drink. When he drank he became expansive. In physique he reminded one of John Barrymore in his better days. His role was Don Juan, especially in
