Last Night - James Salter [22]
— Stop it? Stop what?
My heart was skipping.
— Stop the sex, she said.
I knew she was going to say it. I had hoped something else, and the words were like a thick curtain tumbling down or a plate smashing on the floor.
— I don’t know what you’re talking about.
Her face was hard,
— Yes, you do. You know exactly what I’m talking about.
— Darling, you’re mistaken. There’s nothing going on with Des. He’s a friend, he’s my closest friend.
The tears began to run down her face.
— Don’t, I said. Please. Don’t cry. You’re wrong.
— I have to cry, she said, her voice unsteady. Anyone would cry. You have to do it. You have to stop. We promised one another.
— Oh, God, you’re imagining this.
— Please, she begged, don’t. Please, please, don’t.
She was wiping her cheeks as if to make herself again presentable.
— You have to do what we promised, she said. You have to give.
There are things you cannot give, that would simply crush your heart. It was half of life she was asking for, him slipping off his watch, holding him, having him in your possession, in indescribable happiness, in love with you. Nothing else could be like that. There was an apartment on 12th Street that we were able to use, the garden behind it, the dazzling chords of Petroushka—the record happened to be there and we used to play it—chords that would always, as long as I lived, bring me back to it, his pliancy and slow smile.
— I’m not doing anything with Des, I said. I swear to you.
— You swear to me.
— Yes.
— And I’m supposed to believe you.
— I swear to you.
She looked away.
— All right, she said at last.
A great joy filled me. Then she said,
— All right. But he has to leave. For good. If you want me to believe you, that’s what it takes.
— Anna . . .
— No, that’s the proof.
— How can I tell him to leave? What’s the reason?
— Make up something. I don’t care.
IN THE MORNING he got up late and was in the kitchen, the smoothness of sleep still on him. Anna had gone off. My hands were trembling.
— Good morning, he said with a smile.
— Good morning.
I couldn’t bring myself to it. All I could say was,
— Des . . .
— Yes?
— I don’t know what to say.
— About what?
— Us. It’s over.
He seemed not to understand.
— What’s over?
— Everything. I feel like I’m coming apart inside.
— Ah, he said in a soft way. I see. Maybe I see. What happened?
— It’s just that you can’t stay.
— Anna, he guessed.
— Yes.
— She knows.
— Yes. I don’t know what to do.
— Could I talk to her, do you think?
— It wouldn’t do any good. Believe me.
— But we’ve always gotten along. What difference does it make? Let me talk to her.
— She doesn’t want to, I lied.
— When did all this happen?
— Last night. Don’t ask me how it came about. I don’t know.
He sighed. He said something I didn’t get. All I could hear was my own heart beating. He left later that day.
I felt the injustice for a long time. He’d brought only pleasure to us, and if to me particularly, that didn’t diminish it. I had some photographs that I kept in a certain place, and of course I had the poems. I followed him from afar, the way a woman does a man she was never able to marry. The glittering blue water slid past as he made his way between the islands. There was Ios, white in the haze, where the dust of Homer lay, they said.
Platinum
THE BRULE apartment had a magnificent view of the park, bare and vast in winter and in the summer a rich sea of green. The apartment was in a fine building, narrow but tall, and it was in a way comforting to think of how many others there were, dignified and calm, building upon fine building, all with their unsmiling doormen and solemn entrances. Rare carpets, servants, expensive furniture. Brule had paid more than nine hundred thousand for it at a time when prices were high, but the apartment was worth far more now, priceless, in fact. It had high ceilings, afternoon sunlight, and wide doors with curved brass handles. There were deep armchairs, flowers, tables dense with photographs, and many pictures on the walls, including Vollard prints in the hallway that