Chapters (33)
He got up, covered Annette, and asked her gently if he should pour her another drop of liqueur. Or should he make some tea?
She sat up violently, clutching the grubby sheet to her chest, groped for a cigarette, lit it furiously, and said:
“What a bastard you are.”
Fima, who was struggling to dress while covering himself to hide his shameful rhino horn, muttered like a punished child:
“But what have I done? I didn’t do anything to you.”
And he knew that these words were both true and false, and he almost burst into grim laughter, almost mumbled, Azoy. But he controlled himself, apologized, blamed himself, he couldn’t understand what had come over him, it was being with her that put him in a spin and made him forget himself, could she find it in her to forgive him?
She dressed hurriedly, roughly, like an angry old woman, with her back to him; she combed her hair violently, her tears dried. She lit a fresh cigarette and told Fima to call her a taxi and never to phone her again. When he asked if he could see her downstairs, she replied in a flat, icy voice:
“That will not be necessary. Good-bye.”
Fima got under the shower. Even though the water was tepid, almost cold, he steeled himself, lathered himself thoroughly, and stayed under for a long time. The real villain of the three, he mused, was the lawyer. Then he put on clean underwear, and furiously gathering the dirty sheets and towels as well as the dishtowel and his shirt, he packed them all into a plastic bag and put it near the front door so that he would not forget to take it to the laundry the next morning. While he made the bed with clean sheets, he tried whistling between his two front teeth, but he couldn’t do it. We’re all in the same boat was what the pretty settler had said, and Fima discovered, much to his surprise, that in a certain sense he was right.