Was Maria’s fondness for mystical things due to his influence? Or, conversely, was it Joe who was affected by her? When he’d calmed down, Joe thought back on the two lamps reflected in her eyes. The roses in the backyard also seemed to be electrified, and his hand recoiled like lightning from the petals. He even heard the slight sound of sparks flying. Those roses were in a large patch of bushes Maria had planted, where she and Daniel sat among the flowering shrubs in summer drinking tea. As Joe looked down on them from the terrace, their voices floated up into the air. Daniel said, “Mama, once you pass the well you’ll see the quarry.” Maria’s arid voice answered, “Everything is possible right here if you stay at home.” Joe sighed, thinking of what kindred spirits the mother and son were. But one evening Joe saw Daniel wrecking the rosebushes. It was the day before he was going back to campus. Daniel was like a terrifying ghost in the moonlight, his movements irresolute and hasty as he mucked in the soil until it covered his body. Joe couldn’t bear to call out to him, and so stood off to one side watching. Finally Daniel wore himself out, and covered his face with both hands. Was he crying? Joe knew that even as a child he’d never cried. The lamps in Maria’s room dimmed, then brightened. Against the curtains a long, thin silhouette appeared where someone must be standing. In this southern town everyone went to sleep very early and fell to dreaming. . Was this why they were all on the brink of madness?
When Joe was young, his father had looked him over without blinking. “Joe, Joe, how are you going to support yourself?” When his father said this, Joe had felt unbearable shame. He didn’t know what he would do to get by. Daniel was much stronger than he’d been then, and this could be seen in his movements as he uprooted the roses and tossed them in the air. In his heart Joe envied him a little. The son was much more like his mother.
Joe wanted to draw a picture, to make a rough sketch outlining the story that lay deep in his mind. Time after time he worked out the composition, and time after time he rejected it. One day, he summoned his courage and picked up a pen, but what he ultimately drew was just a line that looked like an earthworm. It was completely meaningless. The day he finished reading the Japanese book, Joe was seized with an impulse to visit Daniel’s campus and speak with him. It was a Thursday, and he needed to wait until Saturday to go, and by then his intention was already worn away from waiting. Even though he hadn’t seen his son, Daniel’s image slipped into Joe’s dreams. It was a body without a head, with a rose on the shoulders in its place. Joe drew a picture of his son from the dream. He showed this picture to Maria, who said, “I’ve seen this person you’ve drawn before, it’s an uncle on my mother’s side.”
The Rose Clothing Company didn’t get caught up in Vincent’s domestic difficulty, and its business wasn’t affected. The prevailing spirit was in fact one of success. Even if Reagan grumbled, his farm still needed the company’s clothing. He had just signed another contract with Joe for a not inconsiderable sum. Joe sat at the window of his office watching Reagan’s form disappear around a corner and imagined the natural scenery of that small place in the far south called the Cape. Reagan had to rush back that very day. He was always hurried like this, and Joe had the impression that his life was full of vigorous activity. Out in the corridor there was a ceaseless crowd of people coming and going, accompanied by the weng weng buzz of their conversation. Joe knew his boss hadn’t come to work that day. Everyone in the building knew it, too, but people avoided discussing it.
Taking advantage of the racket outside his door, Joe drew a new book from his bag. After reading a page, he was enveloped by drowsiness. The opening of this novel was very strange. It told of a large palace with a few guards standing about in the doorway. An old fellow carrying charcoal was trying to enter the gates to deliver it, but he was continually driven out. The old fellow saw a man who looked like a steward rush out as if to meet him and bring him in. But in his hurry he fell to the ground, and for all his effort he couldn’t reach the old man’s side. The guards stuck out thick arms and swept the old fellow away. He tumbled down with the coal he was carrying onto the stairs outside the palace gates. He could dimly hear voices calling from inside, “The emperor is arriving.” As Joe ruminated on the murky scene on the steps, someone outside knocked twice on his door. Joe didn’t acknowledge the knock. His eyes continued to rest on the page because of an illustration of a cat on the left-hand side. This cat wasn’t like those cats from Africa; it looked a little like the indigenous cats of Country F. Many years earlier, Joe had visited that country and seen the far too numerous breed of yellow-eyed cats popping out of the cracks in the earth. There were few tourists who hadn’t encountered them. What did the cats of Country F and that old man delivering coal have to do with each other? The knocks on the door grew louder. The doorbell rang. Why couldn’t this guy call for an appointment? Joe had no choice but to stow his book in a drawer and answer the door.
“Vincent! What’s the matter?”
Joe looked at his boss in panic.
“Everything’s fine. It’s just that Lisa’s become paranoid. I came to see you to avoid her. God, what are you thinking of, shut up in here like this?”
He was asking Joe and himself at the same time.
“Me? I like getting lost in my thoughts. It doesn’t affect my work, does it?”
“No, it’s quite helpful for your work. You also just signed a big contract. How could we get by without people like you in this company?”
He watched Joe with an expression of sincerity. Joe felt that his glance was overbearing, but in the depths of Vincent’s pupils he saw rays of light like those emanating from the eyes of the cat in the book he’d just been reading, a stern look of repressed bitterness. Maybe Vincent had some connection to that archaic nation? Maybe his Arab woman wasn’t an Arab woman at all, but an even more mysterious woman of Country F? Joe lowered his eyes, not daring to look at his boss, and he became the old coal bearer in the book he’d just been reading: he collapsed on the stairs, his ears strained to hear the people inside the palace gates, the footsteps of groups running back and forth, back and forth.
Vincent continued, “So, what about that thing we were talking about earlier? What are you thinking? I’ve been to places like that. I mean a thatched hut in the wilderness, and from its doorway you can see the mountaintops burned by wildfires. You should consider things like this seriously. Don’t give up thinking about them just because you’re indispensable to the company.”
Joe’s boss was plainly standing right in front of him, but Joe felt more and more as though his voice was emanating from another room.
“You might end up like me,” Vincent said, repeating himself so Joe would hear.