Sponer sprang from his seat and approached her.
“A cab?” he asked.
She shook her head and was about to continue on her way, when she recognized him.
“Ah!” she said, and since he was standing so close to her, “It’s you, is it?” But she didn’t stop and kept walking.
“Yes, it’s me,” he said, and, searching for words, tried to stand in her way. “Would… would you like me to give you a lift? I was so upset yesterday about that little incident. My driving’s really quite good…”
She looked at him. A shadow of a smile flitted across her mouth. A row of dazzlingly white teeth flashed for a brief second.
“I’m glad!” she said. “How long have you been a driver then?”
“Four years. Do you drive yourself?”
“Me?” she asked in surprise.
“Yes.”
“A little,” she said.
“I had an idea you would have a car. Of course,” he added immediately, “I learnt to drive somewhere else… with my relatives, you understand.” And he paused for a split second. She looked at him as though she couldn’t quite fathom why he had said “you understand”. And it must have crossed her mind: “What relatives? What on earth have they got to do with it?”
“When I first started,” he continued immediately, “I’d far rather have done something else than be a driver…”
“Really?” she said, and made as if to walk on again.
“Yes,” he said hastily, “I even spent a whole year in… a cadet school… Actually, my father was…”
It seemed she couldn’t care less that he had been a cadet. “Yes,” she said, “nowadays all sorts become drivers. That’s the way it is… one just has to…”
He tried to smile. She looked away, but then turned towards him again. He was above average height, well built, only his hands were rough. As she looked at his face, she noticed he had beautiful eyes.
She blushed slightly, nodded curtly, and turned away.
“So, no car?” he asked.
“No, thank you,” she said quickly, and walked on.
He stared after her.
2
HE FINISHED HIS SHIFT AT SIX. He didn’t take the car home, however, but gave it, together with the day’s takings, to the other driver, Georg Haintl, in Margaretenstrasse. Then he caught a tram to Fünfhaus, one of the outer suburbs, where he rented a room from Herr Oxenbauer, a railwayman, near the garage where he kept his cab.
Without taking off his coat, he sat down on his bed and leant against the shabby old wall-hanging depicting a lurcher giving chase to a hare.
The smell of petrol wafted from the adjacent room; the door to it, blocked by a washstand, was shut.
He got up and flung the window open.
On the far side of a backyard, which was bordered only by a low wall, rows of street lights flickered around the perimeter of a large undeveloped plot of land. In the darkness of an adjoining garden, shrubbery rustled in the wind. He pulled off his coat, threw himself on the bed and lit a cigarette.
Shortly afterwards, the railwayman’s teenage daughter brought him his supper on a black tray with a faded golden pattern. She was about to put it on his bedside table, but he motioned with his head to the other table.
“Why does it smell of petrol?”
“I can’t smell anything,” she said.
“I should have known!” he turned on her. “Every time there’s a smell, I’m told there’s no smell at all, every time the soup’s off, I’m told it’s not off at all, and so on!”
She went out, slamming the door. He followed her with his eyes from under closely knit brows.
She didn’t like him because she couldn’t stand Marie Fiala.
Marie Fiala was his girlfriend.
She arrived about ten minutes later. When she entered, he was still lying on his bed and hadn’t eaten anything.
She kissed him and asked why he hadn’t touched his food. Wasn’t he hungry? They’d be late for the film. Unless, of course, he didn’t want to go. In which case there was no need to go out at all. She didn’t really mind. And she sat down in her coat, next to him.
“I don’t really feel like going anywhere,” he said.
She nodded, got up and took her coat off. In the meantime he went over to the table and ate a few mouthfuls. She joined him at the table. She wasn’t pretty, but had a good figure and marvellous blonde hair, which now shimmered in the light of the lamp.
“Would you like me to sort out some of your things?” she asked.
“That’d be nice,” he mumbled, picking up the tray with the uneaten food and putting it outside the door. “Have you eaten already?” he asked, when he was back in the room.
“Yes,” she said. She had opened the wardrobe, taken out a few of his underclothes, and was holding them up to the light.
“We can always go to the cinema later,” he said.
“I’m easy either way,” she replied.
She took her handbag and rummaged in it for a needle and thread. He offered her a cigarette, which she stuck between her lips before getting down to work.
He shut the window, sat down on the bed, leant on his elbows and looked at her. The light played on her hair.
They were planning to get married, but kept putting it off for various reasons: if the truth be known, only because they’d already known each other for too long. In the meantime she’d lost her job as a shop assistant, had then been unemployed for months at a stretch, and was now helping out here and there at a friend’s, taking in washing and doing mending and stitching jobs.
She still hoped, of course, that he’d marry her, only she never mentioned it.
He watched her all the while she was working, and sometimes made a comment or two. She asked him where he’d been all day, and he in turn asked her what she’d been doing.
Every now and then, she returned the inspected items to the wardrobe and brought new ones to the table.
Finally she put her needle away. He kissed her hands, drew her to him and kissed her on the lips. Then they stroked each other’s cheeks.
They remained like that for some time and listened to the wind blowing round the house. And they thought how long they had already known each another. Or rather, they didn’t think, they simply felt how unhappy they were.
At about nine they went to the cinema after all.
Then he took her home.
He didn’t have to go to work till midday the next day.
At about nine he took the tram to the centre.
In Alleegasse he didn’t see the commissionaire, who was probably on an errand. He was therefore able to walk up and down in front of Marisabelle’s house without having to engage in tedious conversation.
It was a sunny autumn day. At the top of the street, where it climbed slightly, the wind blew dead foliage from the Theresianum Gardens. The tall windows of the palace reflected the sky above.
Sponer stopped at a Packard that was parked in front of one of the houses.
The chauffeur started talking to him, but almost immediately the owner of the car appeared, and they drove off.
At about eleven Marisabelle came out of the entrance. She was again wearing the same grey suit and a fox over her shoulders.
Sponer went up to her straight away, before she had even closed the gate, and his heart began to pound.
“Excuse me,” he said, “for troubling you yesterday, I only wanted… I’m…”
She looked at him while the gate swung shut.
“I don’t have my car today,” he continued quickly. “I only wanted to apologize.”
She didn’t reply immediately. “What for?” she asked, finally.