And of course she then proved to be fully informed about him and his business; she knew that he had a meeting the next day in Tordesillas, which was more or less on her route. If they had met anywhere else, at home in the riverport city, in an international airport, or in one of the well-known metropolises, he would have avoided her, even hidden from her, and, if forced to be in her presence, would have preserved an obstinate silence. But in this environment, far from the beaten path, it seemed curiously easy for them to deal with each other. And his speaking seemed to come of its own accord. It may be that the war impending not far from here did its part. (Except that by this time there were so many reports and such contradictory ones every day, and from all over the world, that we could hardly lend credence to yet another.)
He talked and talked, and almost all the while she listened in silence, as she chauffeured her once and perhaps future client across the plateau, deserted now that it was evening. Especially at this hour it became obvious, as at hardly any other, how ancient this region was; one could see it in the residual mountains, silhouetted against the very distant horizon and without exception bare of trees, in the residual hills, in the remnants of cliffs poking up from the earth, worn down and eroded over millions of years. And yet precisely this ancient land here seemed to have the strength to rejuvenate one. At least it rejuvenated them, the two new arrivals. At least it rejuvenated him.
His speaking was lighthearted, and in the course of the drive, over which night soon fell, it grew more lighthearted still. This was a period in which the atmosphere, the “ether,” was buzzing, humming, reverberating with dialogues. The word “dialogue” itself constantly crackled from all channels. According to the most cutting-edge dialogue research, a newly established scholarly discipline that promptly boasted of attracting a huge groundswell of interest, the term “dialogue” by now occurred more frequently — and not merely in the media, the interfaith synods, and philosophical treatises — than “I am,” “today,” “life” (or, alternately, “death”), “eye” (or “ear”), “mountain” (or “valley”), “bread” (or “wine”). Even among prisoners in the exercise yard, “dialogue” was registered with greater frequency than, for instance, “motherfucker,” “scumbag,” or “bitch”; and likewise “dialogue” was recorded ten times more often among the insane and the mentally retarded taking supervised walks in town or in the woods than expressions like “the man in the moon,” “apple” (or “pear”), “God” (or “Satan”), “fear” (or “meds”). Even the few remaining farmers, located at least a day’s journey from each other, were understood to be involved in ongoing dialogue, or at least they were shown again and again engaged in dialogue, and children were also shown dialoguing, even in the last picture in the children’s books approved for adoption as school texts.
But here and there a voice made itself heard, without being raised or seeking a public forum, asserting that in the meantime the truly authentic conversations were taking quite a different form, for instance that of the monologue — while the partner, who could also be many in number, an actual audience, was all eyes and ears — the form of telling a story and listening, listening and passing the story on, listening some more, and passing the story on and on. And the most intense conversation (which, to be sure, was not suitable, not suitable at all, for just any old audience) occurred nowadays, especially nowadays! without words, not in the silent exchange of glances but in the interplay of your sex and mine, not merely without words but if possible also almost without sound, but all the more eloquent and emphatic, in the course of which I transmit to you each of my conversational fragments with even more than all my senses, and in turn absorb each of your conversational fragments with more than all my senses? yes, absorb, and inscribe them on myself from A to Z: a conversation, or dialogue, if you will, more enduring than almost any other nowadays, or at the time when this adventure took place; a dialogue-narrative of which not one of the exchanges, however minute — toward the end of the telling, more and more intense in the pattern of question-response-response-question-response-response — will ever be forgotten; the most unforgettable of all the conversations in our lives; ineradicable from your and my memory; even if later we will become strangers to one another, or even enemies.
“When I was young, I was full of enthusiasm,” the entrepreneur told her during that drive, on which after a while they were the only ones on the road. In the fallow fields, nocturnal bonfires were burning here and there, with the silhouettes of feral dogs flitting by, no humans in sight. She drove very fast, as if through enemy territory (but she always drove that way).
“In all the pictures of me as a boy I have glowing eyes. My enthusiasm mystified children of my own age. It even put them off and made me an outsider, also a figure of fun. But older children appreciated me all the more, and adults still more — some of them, not all. Even as a very small child I was always bouncing with enthusiasm; in my baby pictures I already had that glowing look, always turned toward a sun and not blinded by it. My original enthusiasm was completely unfocused, it seems to me. And at the same time I — or how should I refer to that earlier being — was completely caught up in my enthusiasm; possessed by it as by a demon, though a thoroughly benevolent and lovable one; that entire newborn body a bundle of unfocused enthusiasm.
“As I got older, it remained unfocused for a long time. Except that after a while it no longer emanated from the center of my body, radiating from there to all my limbs — making it seem as if I had nine times nine arms — but became concentrated in my head: my eyes, my ears, and especially my tongue. I would talk a blue streak, until there was a rushing in my ears, my eyes bugged out, and my skull felt as if it were about to burst (as is happening again now, by the way).
“On other occasions, when my enthusiasm did have a focal point for a change, it was always a human being, always an adult, to be specific. I felt enthusiasm for some adult or other. How I could venerate him then, send my thoughts in his direction, summon him in a dream, believe in this person, yes, believe in him! An adult who could elicit my enthusiasm in this fashion was never my father or my mother — or was it? search your heart — but rather, for instance, a distant relative or a teacher (usually in a so-called minor subject, who perhaps came to our classroom only once a week), but it could also be a businessman, a soccer player (perhaps merely a local celebrity, or precisely such a person), and, strange to say, especially a person who, according to hearsay, for instance my parents’ stories, had been stricken with misfortune. Ah, once you were filled with enthusiasm for the unfortunate — not the unfortunate of your own age, but the unfortunate adults! And then you yourself became an adult, neither unfortunate nor fortunate, but bent on success, and very soon successful, and how.
“If only I could recall when I lost my enthusiasm, and why. The energy remained, or a sort of thrust, always stirring, or ready to leap into action. Yet you no longer radiated light. Instead of your head’s glowing and your tongue’s shooting sparks, after a while all your doings, your entire existence, came more and more only from the back of your head, and finally withered into mere calculation. Instead of enthusiasm, nothing but alertness, and alertness was eventually crowded out by hypervigilance. Instead of your childlike enthusiasm, drives and a sense of being driven.