The Alexandria Quartet - Lawrence Durrell [298]
Combien durra vostre folie?
Trop avez mené ceste vie.
He heard himself saying things which belonged elsewhere. With a bitter laugh, for example: ‘The Anglo-Saxons invented the word
“fornication” because they could not believe in the variety of love.’
And Melissa, nodding so gravely and sympathetically, began to look more important — for here was a man at last confiding in her things she could not understand, treasures of that mysterious male world which oscillated always between sottish sentimentality and brutish violence! ‘In my country almost all the really delicious things you can do to a woman are criminal offences, grounds for divorce.’ She was frightened by his sharp, cracked laugh. Of a sudden he looked so ugly. Then he dropped his voice again and continued pressing her hand to his cheek softly, as one presses upon a bruise; and inside the inaudible commentary continued:
‘ What meaneth Heaven by these diverse laws?
Eros, Agape — self-division’s cause? ’
Locked up there in the enchanted castle, between the terrified kisses and intimacies which would never now be recovered, they had studied La Lioba! What madness! Would they ever dare to enter the lists against other lovers? Jurata fornicatio — those verses dribbling away in the mind; and her body, after Rudel,
‘ gras, delgat et gen’ . He sighed, brushing away the memories like a cobweb and saying to himself: ‘Later, in search of an askesis he followed the desert fathers to Alexandria, to a place between two deserts, between the two breasts of Melissa. O morosa delectatio. And he buried his face there among the dunes, covered by her quick hair.’
Then he was silent, staring at her with his clear eyes, his trembling lips closing for the first time about endearments which were now alight, now truly passionate. She shivered suddenly, aware that she would not escape him now, that she would have to submit to him fully.
‘Melissa’ he said triumphantly.
They enjoyed each other now, wisely and tenderly, like friends long sought for and found among the commonplace crowds which thronged the echoing city. And here was a Melissa he had planned to find — eyes closed, warm open breathing mouth, torn from sleep with a kiss by the rosy candle-light. ‘It is time to go.’ But she pressed nearer and nearer to his body, whimpering with weariness. He gazed down fondly at her as she lay in the crook of his arm.
‘And the rest of your prophecy?’ he said gaily. ‘Rubbish, all rubbish’ she answered sleepily. ‘I can sometimes learn a character from a hand — but the future! I am not so clever.’
The dawn was breaking behind the window. On a sudden
impulse he went to the bathroom and turned on the bathwater. It flowed boiling hot, gushing into the bath with a swish of steam!
How typical of the Mount Vulture Hotel, to have hot bathwater at such an hour and at no other. Excited as a schoolboy he called her. ‘Melissa, come and soak the weariness out of your bones or I’ll never get you back to your home.’ He thought of ways and means of delivering the five hundred pounds to Darley in such a way as to disguise the source of the gift. He must never know that it came from a rival’s epitaph on a dead Copt! ‘Melissa’ he called again, but she was asleep.
He picked her up bodily and carried her into the bathroom. Lying snugly in the warm bath, she woke up, uncurled from sleep like one of those marvellous Japanese paper-flowers which open in water. She paddled the warmth luxuriously over her shallow pectorals and glowed, her thighs beginning to turn pink. Purse-warden sat upon the bidet with one hand in the warm water and talked to her as she woke from sleep..’You mustn’t take too long’
he said, ‘or Darley will be angry.’
‘Darley! Bah! He was out with Justine again last night.’ She sat up and began to soap her breasts, breathing in the luxury of soap and water like someone tasting a rare wine. She pronounced her rival’s name with small cringing loathing that seemed out of character. Pursewarden was surprised. ‘Such people — the Hosnanis’ she said with contempt. ‘And poor Darley believes in