And as it did so, a strange thing happened to him. He felt that he had died.
He must have known that this would happen — for when the car had turned to the left, and for a brief interval crept along the road which paralleled the one on which he was himself standing, he had suddenly felt an almost overwhelming impulse to run, to shout at it, to keep abreast of it, shouting — like the people on a wharf who rush excitedly, desperately, along the dock’s edge as the ship begins to move, trying to keep up with it, trying to hold it, crying to it, as if they were mere bodies whose souls it was taking away. He had felt this, but of course had done nothing. He had stood still. And it seemed to him now, as he stood motionless, watching the departure of that somber limousine, with Jones inside it, as if life itself were going away from him, moving farther and farther away, fading and dying like the melancholy last flare of sunset seen for a moment through lifting rain. The thing was finished.
Finished!.. Finis coronat opus. King Coffin …
Before he knew it, he was in his car, was driving fiercely down Mount Auburn Street. He was angry, he half closed his eyes and said aloud, bitterly — it oughtn’t to be like that; to think that it was like that; my God, that it should be like that! The rain had stopped again, the sky over Boston was brightening, a pale beam of sunlight glistened for a moment on a distant roof and was extinguished. To write to Gerta — to write now to Gerta. Yes. He decided not to take the car to the garage, but parked it immediately in front of the fire station in Eliot Square, and hurried on foot to Boylston Street before they could have time to notice it and protest. Let them protest! By all means. Let them look him up, and come hunting for him — the more the merrier. View halloo! In Boylston Street, he stepped into the Western Union office, sat down, drew the yellow form toward him on the glass-topped table, seized the chained pencil, and began to write.
My dear Gerta — the impediment in my speech removed—
He crossed it out, took a fresh sheet, closed his eyes for a second, and began again.
“My dear Gerta — the master builder builds better than he knows. Things have happened. I write too quickly to shape my thoughts, this is—so to speak — the final dislocation. Is it the shadow of Kay, and were you right after all? You were wise, anyway, you saw the queer shape of things more clearly than I, and I can now salute your narrow vision with respect if not with gratitude. To hell with gratitude! I don’t know any longer what it all is, the show is too profound, goes too fast, it begins to escape me, if you know what I mean, or care to know, but with the impediment in my speech removed I can at least say that the thing will be perfect as it now stands, or only lacking in perfection as it lacked you, or a clear vision of you: but even this I can now look back to with Kaylike detachment. That isn’t quite all of it either, there must be a halfway point which would be good—too difficult, however, for me to try to analyze for you now. No, it’s all too despicable.… Ammen.”
The large electric clock over the counter said nineteen past nine. He sealed the yellow envelope, and addressed it; then marked it, after a moment’s thought, Not to be delivered till eleven o’clock. At the desk he said:
— This is important, do you understand? It might be a matter of life and death. I want this note delivered to this address at precisely eleven — not a moment before, and not a moment after. I’m willing to pay for it. Can that be done?
— Yes, sir — at eleven o’clock — we’ll send the messenger and have him wait there till the correct time exactly. Walnut Street?
— Right.
His calculations might or might not be exact — it was difficult to tell — but it ought to make a very nice little gamble. It was Gerta’s day at home, she wouldn’t be going to the Museum, and the chances were, of course, that she wouldn’t have gone out before eleven. If she had—?
The sun was coming out again, the rails in Massachusetts Avenue were brimming and sparkling. It was spring, it was more than spring, it was almost summer. There would be track meets at the Stadium, boat races, perhaps a revival of the straw hat. In another month Gerta would go to Ogunquit, Greenwich Village would move to Provincetown, everywhere the human being would be creeping out of his cellar or attic to lie naked on a beach and admire the beauty of his body, as if it were something of transcendental importance. Young ladies would be photographed on headlands doing ridiculous dances with wisps of scarf. In secret places in the Maine woods, in half darkened bedrooms of seaside boardinghouses, in the warm hollows of Cape Cod sand dunes, lovers would once more be renewing the flesh at the expense of the spirit, as certain that in this way they had discovered God as that a year hence they would be embracing the same partner.… The wrens go to it, and the small gilded fly.
He looked through the wide window of the Merle as he passed, saw the Findens sitting at the table at the front. He had always thought they might be lonely, had thought of asking them to come and see him, to come and have coffee or a drink. Opening the screen door, he leaned in and said:
— I’ve meant for a long time to ask whether you’d come in and have coffee with me some evening, or a drink — if you’re not doing anything special tomorrow night would you care to drop in?
They were visibly surprised, Finden half got up from his chair holding a paper napkin, Mrs. Finden, over a glass of orange-juice, was looking at him very peculiarly, her mouth open, her gray eyes narrowed: as if she were looking at some one whom she thought very queer. Finden said:
— Why, we’d like to very much, I think!
— Thank you, Mr. Ammen, we’d like to!
It was not entirely satisfactory, but he hugged it, just the same, he thought of it with grim pleasure as he ascended in the creaking elevator and walked lightly along the corridor. The empty metal wastebaskets stood at the doors, Jack had already done his morning round, he entered his apartment and flung his hat violently on to the sofa, under the seashell on the window sill. The room seemed very quiet. Dropping his raincoat on the floor, he went into the kitchenette, looked down at the gas-stove, returned to the sitting room to make sure that the window was open, and to pick up the little green book from the table. Then he went back to the kitchenette, closed the door behind him, turned on all four taps of the stove, and sat down at the table with the book.
The gas behind him made a steady sh-h-h-h-h-h-h, sh-h-h-h-h-h-h, soft and insistent, and opening the book he started reading — (all the while conscious of the little watch ticking on his wrist, the tiny hand creeping slowly towards eleven) — the page at which he had left off.
“This reaction is still subjective. When a child stiffens and draws away, when it screams with pure temper, it takes no note of that from which it recoils. It has no objective consciousness of that from which it reacts, the mother principally. It is like a swimmer endlessly kicking the water away behind him, with strong legs vividly active from the spinal ganglia. Like a man in a boat pushing off from the shore, it merely thrusts away, in order to ride free, ever more free. It is a purely subjective motion—”
Like a man in a boat pushing off from the shore.
He raised his eyes, looked through the kitchen window, saw the immense Greek coping of the library, the huge words cut in granite, Harry Elkins Widener Library, then beyond it the slate roof of Boylston Hall, and farther still the gray wooden steeple of the Unitarian Church. There was a faint smell of coffee coming from the professor’s apartment, it mixed oddly with the not unpleasant smell of the gas, he was aware that he was hungry.