Humboldt's Gift (1976 Pulitzer Prize) - Saul Bellow [220]
After this I lay awake all night because I had used the word faithful. This might queer the whole deal, with its implied accusation and the hint or shadow of forgiveness. But I had really meant no harm. I was betwixt and between. I mean, if I were a true hypocrite I wouldn’t forever be putting my foot in my mouth. On the other hand, if I were a real innocent, pure in heart, I wouldn’t have to fret the night out over Renata’s conduct in Milan or her misinterpretation of my wire. But I lost a night’s sleep for nothing. The wording of the message didn’t matter. She didn’t reply at all.
So that night, in the romantic dining room of the Ritz where every bite cost a fortune, I said to the Señora, “You’ll never guess who’s been on my mind today.” Without waiting for an answer I then uttered the name “Flonzaley!” as a surprise assault on her defenses. But the Señora was made of terribly hard material. She seemed hardly to notice. I repeated the name. “Flonzaley! Flonzaley! Flonzaley!”
“What is this loudness, what is the matter, Charles?”
“Maybe you’d better tell me what’s the matter. Where is Mr. Flonzaley?”
“Why should his whereabouts be my problem? Would you mind asking the camarero to pour the wine?” It was not only because she was the lady and I the gentleman that the Señora wished me to speak to waiters. She was fluent in Spanish all right, but her accent was pure Hungarian. Of this there was no doubt now. I learned a thing or two from the Señora. For instance, did I think that people concluding their lives would all be in a fever to come to terms with their souls? I went through agonies of preparation before I blurted out Flonzaley’s name and then she asked for more wine. And yet it must have been she that masterminded the plan to bring Roger to Madrid. It was she who made certain that I was pinned down here and prevented me from rushing to Milan to burst in on Renata. For Flonzaley was there with her, all right. He was mad for her and I didn’t blame him. A man who met more people on the mortuary slab than he met socially could not be blamed for losing his head that way. A body like Renata’s was not often seen in the living flesh. As for Renata, she complained of the morbid element in his adoration, but could I be altogether sure that it was not one of his attractions? I was certain of nothing. I sat trying to make myself drunk on a bottle of acid wine, but I made no headway against my bitter sobriety. No I didn’t understand.
The activities of higher consciousness didn’t inevitably improve the understanding. The hope of such understanding was raised by my manual—Knowledge of the Higher Worlds and Its Attainment. This gave specific instructions. One suggested exercise was to try to enter into the intense desire of another person on a given occasion. To do this one had to remove all personal opinions, all interfering judgments; one should be neither for nor against this desire. In this way one might come gradually to feel what another soul was feeling, I had made this experiment with my own child Mary. For her last birthday she desired a bicycle, the ten-speed type. I wasn’t convinced that she was old enough to have one. When we went to the shop it was by no means certain that I would buy it. Now what was her desire, and what did she experience? I wanted to know this, and tried to desire in the way that she desired. This was my kid, whom I loved, and it should have been elementary to find out what a soul in its fresh state craved with such intensity. But I couldn’t do this. I tried until I broke into a sweat, humiliated, disgraced by my failure. If I couldn’t know this kid’s desire could I know any human being? I tried it on a large number of people. And then, defeated, I asked where was I anyway? And what did I really know of anyone? The only desires I knew were my own and those of nonexistent people like Macbeth or Pros-pero.