“About yesterday,” he said. “I didn’t want you to think that I was trying to force you into anything.”
“Really,” she said, and it seemed as though she wanted to say something else.
“But I’d have had no other opportunity of speaking to you…”
“You wanted to speak to me?”
“Yes,” he said, and looked down.
She leant against the gate and smiled, although he didn’t notice it. But when he looked up again, she merely said, “What about?”
“I just wanted,” he said after a pause, “to… just to see you…”
She took her handbag, which was under her left arm, transferred it to the other arm, fiddled for a moment with the fingers of her glove, and then looked up at Sponer again.
“But,” he said, “you walked away so quickly… I quite understand you were annoyed that I spoke to you yesterday, I do apologize, but otherwise I wouldn’t have had any opportunity to…”
She watched him while he spoke, and also, after he broke off, she kept looking into his face; finally, she lowered her eyes. “Look here,” she said, pulling her gloves on, “you really shouldn’t be talking to me like this here.”
“Would you,” he said, “at least allow me to…”
She remained silent.
“…accompany you for a short distance?”
“No,” she said. She stood there for a moment, drew the fox round her shoulders, and strode off.
He took two or three steps after her, stopped and glanced around. No one appeared to have noticed them. He took another couple of steps, hesitated, and then followed Marisabelle at a distance of about thirty yards.
She walked in the direction of the centre, without turning round once. At the next side street she stopped for a moment and then crossed the street. She reached up to her shoulder once and adjusted her fur. She acknowledged the greetings of a man whom she passed near Karlskirche. Her gait was carefree and relaxed, as if unconcerned whether anyone was following her or not.
Sponer caught up with her at Karlsplatz Gardens.
She neither appeared surprised, nor gave any indication that she suspected he had been following her. But she stopped at the edge of the gardens, where the leaves were falling. A couple of large crows pecked about on the grass. She placed one foot on the base of a low trellis that bordered the grass, opened her handbag, looked in the mirror and pulled her short veil farther down. Then she let her handbag slide down, and looked at him.
His eyebrows were drawn tight. “You know,” he said, “what I’m going to say to you, don’t you?”
She lifted the mirror once more and looked at her mouth. “And what do you expect me to answer?” she asked.
He remained silent.
She wiped some powder from her cheek. Then she snapped her handbag shut. “Well?” she said.
He shrugged his shoulders.
“You’re a strange person,” she said.
“Why?” he asked in astonishment.
She looked at him. She nearly said, “Because you’ve such beautiful eyes,” but instead she only said, “Because to start with, you accost me, and then you just stand there and expect me to carry on talking. Is that what you always do?”
He blushed. “No,” he said.
Every woman wants to have an affair with a man who finds her attractive.
“You wouldn’t even have spoken to me otherwise.”
He hesitated for a second. “I’ve fallen in love with you,” he said.
She looked at the lawn, where the leaves were falling. “You just can’t say a thing like that,” she said. “All right, you can say a few words to me, but you can’t suddenly say you love me. You don’t even know me.”
“I know, of course, who you are,” he said.
She looked hard at him.
“You’ve been making enquiries about me?” she asked.
“Yes.”
So, he’d been making enquiries about her, had he? She had got in his cab, he’d driven her just that once, fallen in love with her, tried to find out who she was, waited in front of her house either in his cab, when on duty, or without his cab, when off duty. He had fallen in love with her. He had beautiful eyes. She’d spoken a few words to him. He was a handsome man, a driver. That was all there was to it.
She thrust her handbag under her arm.
“Listen,” she said, “please go now. You’ve told me that you like me, but you don’t have to fall in love with everyone you like. Perhaps you don’t even realize yourself that we don’t have anything in common. We can’t just stand here any longer like this. Someone passing may see us. You’d better go now.”
He didn’t finish work till about eight. Then he telephoned Marie Fiala at her neighbour’s, who had a phone; after that, they met in a small coffee house out in the suburbs.
They had often met there before, and would sit happily for hours on end, even if sometimes they didn’t say a word to each other, but just sat there and smoked. As usual, there were a few people sitting at the tables and on the red benches along the wall, reading newspapers; waiters rested their trays on the counter for an instant; the cashier dispensed lumps of sugar; and the waiters carried on serving. The lamps were enveloped in a fine haze of cigarette smoke; the fan hummed for a bit and then went dead; everything was still again.
Later, however, the silence was interrupted when she remarked that he wasn’t talking. They knew each other too well. She loved him, of course, and had no end of things to say, but one can’t carry on talking if the other person is unwilling to speak. For his part, he loved her after a fashion. She was there and he simply took her for granted. He’d had a few fleeting affairs on the side, but had broken them off every time, and always returned to her just because she was there. She hadn’t even noticed anything — at least that’s what he thought.
By the time he had entered the coffee house, she still hadn’t arrived. He had sat down on one of the benches and stared in front of him. She arrived a few minutes later. He stood up and helped her out of her coat. They then chatted, and though the conversation dragged rather, they still continued talking. The waiter placed a couple of newspapers on the table. Sponer picked one up and, answering her every so often, leafed desultorily through the paper.
After some time he realized that Marie was no longer speaking. He looked at her and saw tears in her eyes.
She wiped them away hastily.
“What’s the matter?” he asked.
“Nothing,” she said, and forced herself to smile.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
She merely shook her head.
“Shall we leave?” he asked after a pause.
“No,” she said. “Unless you’d rather…”
He asked for the bill.
They left the premises, but instead of going back to his room, he took her home. They didn’t have far to go, just a couple of hundred yards. They’d been going out for years; now it was just a couple of minutes’ walk together.
At the main entrance they kissed each other, and she suddenly let her head fall on his shoulder.
He stroked her hair. Then she opened the front gate and went in.
It was the end of a love affair that just would not end.
The next day he was on duty again. At about eleven he drove to Alleegasse, parked the cab in the side street, next to the other cabs, and walked to the corner.
The commissionaire was there as usual and struck up a conversation with Sponer, but since the latter answered only in monosyllables, he left him and strode over to the other drivers. At half past eleven Marisabelle appeared. She must have reckoned that Sponer would be there, for she glanced round, saw him and remained standing at the main entrance.
He walked straight up to her.
“I’m sorry,” he said hastily, “to bother you again… but my car’s over there, otherwise I’d have waited for you farther down. I…”