The Dark Arena - Mario Puzo [92]
Eddie Cassin left the country club with no idea of where he could go. The sight of Mosca sitting on the grass, his head resting against Hella's knees, one hand on the wheel of the cream-colored carriage, the sight of this was painful to him. He caught a Strassenbahn and thought, I'll go see the gorilla. This cheered him up enough to watch the girls walking their way to the center of town. At the far end of the city he walked down to the river, crossed the bridge over the Weser, and caught another Strassenbahn that continued on through the Neustadt. He got off at the last stop before the streetcar went out to the air base.
The row of buildings here was intact. He entered one and climbed up three flights of stairs and knocked. He heard Elfreida's voice say, “One moment.” Then the door opened.
Eddie Cassin was shocked each time he saw her. The soft figure, full but really fuller than it looked, the trim ankles and hips and then that monstrosity of ft head with its delicate violet eyes, red rimmed like rabbit eyes.
Eddie Cassin went in and sat down on the couch against the wall. “Get me a drink, baby,” he said. He kept a supply of liquor here; he felt safe doing so. He knew Elfreida never touched the stuff unless he was present. As she mixed the drink he watched with fascination the movements of her head.
It was a little too large for its body and the hair was like mounds of brassy wire spikes. The skin was old and looked like chicken skin, with the yellow, fatty sheen and huge pores. The nose was splayed as if smashed by many vicious blows, and her lips, until she made them up as she always did when Eddie came, were two puffy welts the color of veal. She had a great sagging chin and jaw. But as she moved around the room and spoke to him, her voice was soft and musical and somewhere in it the trill of a long-passed adolescence. She spoke English very well, was adept at languages, and made her living as a translator and interpreter. Sometimes she gave Eddie lessons in German. Eddie felt comfortable and safe here. She always lighted the room with candles and Eddie thought, chuckling, that probably they had other uses. On the opposite wall was a bed and near it, against the wall which faced the window was a bureau on which stood a picture of her husband, a handsome-looking fellow whose uneven teeth showed in a good-natured smile.
“I didn't expect you tonight,” Elfreida said. She gave him his drink and sat away from him on the couch. She had learned that if she made any gesture of affection or desire he would leave, but that if she waited until he had drunk enough he would put out the candles and drag her violently to the bed, and she knew then she had to pretend unwillingness.
Eddie lay back on the couch drinking, staring at the picture. The dead husband had fallen before Stalingrad and Elfreida had often told him how, with her fellow countrywomen, she had donned her widow black on the special day of mourning decreed for German men who had died there, so many that now the very name Stalingrad had a terrible sound in their hearts.
“I still think he was a fairy,” Eddie Cassin said. “How come he ever married you?” He watched her agitation and distress which he always caused her on his bad nights.
‘Tell me, did he ever make love to you?” Eddie Cassin asked.
“Yes,” Elfreida said in a low voice.
“How often?”
She didn't answer.
“Once a week?”
“More,” she said.
“Well, maybe he wasn't a complete fairy,” Eddie said with a judicial air. “But I'll tell you one thing, he was unfaithful to you.”
“No,” she said, and he noted with satisfaction that she was already crying.
Eddie stood up. “If you're going to act that way, not even talking to me, I might as well leave.” He was playacting, she knew but she knew what her response must be. She fell to her knees and clasped his legs in her arms.
“Please, Eddie, don't go. Please don't go.”
“Say your husband was a fairy, tell me the truth.”
“No,” she said, rising to her feet and crying with anger. “Don't say that word again. He was a poet.”
Eddie took another