—And him, what’s he do?
—Nothing, he knows there’s something going on inside the girl that’s torturing her. He offers her a drink, a cup of coffee, whatever she’d like. She doesn’t want anything, she asks him to sit down please, she has something to say to him. He lights up his pipe and gives her the warm look he has all the time. She can’t get herself to look him in the eyes, she sits resting her head on his knees. Then she begins to tell how there was some terrible legend back in her mountain village, that always terrified her, even as a kid. And this part I don’t remember too well how it goes, something to do with the Middle Ages, something about villages that once were cut off for months and months by the snow, and they were starving to death, and all the men had gone off to the wars, something like that, and the starving wild beasts of the forest came right up to the people’s houses, I don’t remember exactly, and the Devil appeared and said a woman had to come outside if they wanted any food from him, and one woman, the bravest, went out to him, and at his side the Devil had a ravenously hungry black panther, and the woman made a pact with the Devil, so as not to die, and I don’t know what happened but the woman had a daughter with the face of a cat. And when the Crusaders returned from the Holy Wars, the soldier who was married to this same woman came home, and when he tried to kiss his wife she tore him to pieces, as if a panther had done it.
—I don’t really get it, it’s very confusing the way you tell it.
—I can’t remember right now, that’s all. But it doesn’t matter. What Irena tells that I do remember is that they were still giving birth to panther women in those mountains. Anyway, by that time the soldier was dead but a fellow Crusader figured out it was the wife who murdered him and set out to follow her, and meantime she escaped through the snow and at first the tracks she left behind were a woman’s footsteps until close to the forest they turned into a panther’s, and the Crusader followed them and struck deep into the forest where it was already night, and in that darkness he saw two bright green eyes of someone lying in wait for him, and with his sword and dagger he made the sign of the cross and the panther lay still and turned back into a woman, lying there half asleep, as if hypnotized, and the Crusader backed away because he heard other roaring coming near, the wild beasts aroused by the woman’s smell and coming to eat her. The Crusader made it back to the village more dead than alive and told them everything. And the legend is that the race of panther women never died out and remains hidden in some corner of the world, and they all seem like normal women, but if a man happens to kiss any of them, the woman can turn into a savage beast.
—And she’s one of those panther women?
—All she knows is that the stories frightened her terribly when she was a girl, and she’s always lived with that fear of being a descendant of such women.
—And the one back in the restaurant, what’d she have to say?
—That’s just what the architect asks her. And Irena throws herself into his arms, crying, and says the woman was only saying hello to her. But then no, she gets up her courage and tells him how in the dialect of her own village she told her to remember who she was, that the sight of her face alone was enough to make it obvious they’re sisters. And that she’d better watch out for men. The architect bursts out laughing. “Don’t you realize,” he says to her, “she saw you were from the same part of the world because people from the same country always recognize each other. If I see an American in China I go out of my way to say hello. And because she’s a woman and maybe a little old-fashioned, she tells you to watch out, don’t you see?” That’s what he says, and it’s enough to calm her down. And she feels so peaceful now, she begins to fall asleep in his arms, and he lifts her onto the sofa that’s right there, fixes a pillow under her head, and brings a blanket from his bed for her. She’s fast asleep. Then he goes to his room and the scene ends with him in his pajamas and robe, good but not too expensive-looking, a solid color, and he’s watching her from the doorway, the way she’s sleeping, and he lights up his pipe, standing there pensive. The fireplace is lit, no, I can’t remember, light must be coming from the lamp on the night table, in his room. When she finally wakes up, the fire’s gone out, hardly any embers left. Dawn already breaking.
—The cold wakes her up, just like us.
—No, that’s not what wakes her up, I knew you’d say something like that. The canary singing in the cage wakes her. Irena’s afraid to go near it at first, but she hears how happy the little bird seems to be and that gives her the courage to go up close. She looks at it carefully, breathes a deep sigh of relief, satisfied because the little creature isn’t afraid of her. She goes to the kitchen and makes toast with butter, and that crunchy cereal they have up there and . . .
—Don’t talk about food.
—And pancakes . . .
—Really, I’m serious about it. No food and no naked girls.
—Okay, so she wakes him up and he’s happy to see her so comfortable in his home and he asks her if she wants to stay and live there forever.
—He’s still in bed?
—Mmm-hmm, she brought him his breakfast in bed.
—Me, I never liked to have breakfast right away, the first thing I have to do is brush my teeth. Sorry, go ahead.
—Okay, so then he wants to kiss her. And she won’t let him get close.
—He must have bad breath, he didn’t brush his teeth yet.
—If you’re going to make fun, there’s no reason to tell you anything more.
—No, please, I’m listening.
—He asks her again if she wants to marry him. She answers yes she wants to with all her heart, and she doesn’t want to ever have to leave that house again, she feels so at home there, and she looks all around and the drapes are dark velvet to block the light out, and so to let the light in she draws them open and behind them there’s another set of lacy curtains. Then you get to see the whole turn-of-the-century decor. She asks who picked out all the lovely things and I think he tells her how much his mother had to do with all that, every piece of furniture, how she was such a good mother and how much she would have loved Irena, like her own daughter. Irena goes over to him and kisses him almost with adoration, the way one kisses a holy saint, you know? On the forehead. And she begs him please never to leave her, she wants to be together with him always, all she could ever ask for is to wake up each morning to see him again, always by her side . . . But, to become a real wife to him, she asks him to give her a little time, until all those fears have a chance to subside . . .
—You get what’s going on, don’t you?
—That she’s afraid she’ll turn into a panther.
—Well, I think she’s frigid, she’s afraid of men, either that or she has some idea about sex that’s really violent, and so she invents things.
—Wait, will you? He says okay, and they marry. And when the wedding night comes, she sleeps in the bed, and he’s on the sofa.
—Keeping an eye on his mother’s furniture.
—If you’re going to laugh I won’t go on, I’m telling you this in all seriousness, because I really like it. And besides there’s something else I can’t tell you, that makes me really like this film a lot.
—Tell me what, what is it?
—No, I was about to bring it up but now I see you’re laughing, and, to tell you the truth, it makes me angry.
—No, I like the picture, but you have the fun of telling it and I just want to chime in once in a while too, see what I mean? I’m not the type who knows how to sit around and just listen all the time, you get what I mean? And all of a sudden I have to sit quiet listening to you for hours on end.
—I thought it helped you pass the time, and fall asleep.
—Yeah, that’s true, absolutely, it does both things, it passes time and puts me to sleep.
—Well?
—Only, if it doesn’t rub you the wrong way, I’d like us to discuss the thing a little, as you go on with it, so I get a chance now and then to ra
p about something. Doesn’t that seem fair to you?
—If it’s so you can crack jokes about a picture I happen to be fond of, then the answer is no.
—No, look, it could be just a simple discussion. Like for example: I personally would like to ask you how you picture the guy’s mother.
—If you’re not going to laugh anymore.
—I promise.
—Let’s see . . . I don’t know, a really good person. A lovely lady, who gave her husband every happiness and her children too, always managing everything perfectly.
—Do you picture her doing housework?
—No, I see her as impeccably attired, a dress with a high collar, edged in lace to cover the wrinkles on her neck. She has that marvelous thing of certain respectable ladies, which is that little touch of coquettishness, beneath all the properness, on account of her age, but what you notice about them is the way they go on being women and wanting to please.
—Yes, always impeccable. Perfect. She has her servants, she exploits people who can’t do anything else but serve her, for a few pennies. And clearly, she felt very happy with her husband, who in turn exploited her, forced her to do whatever he wanted, keeping her cooped up in a house like a slave, waiting for him—
—Listen . . .
—waiting for him every night, until he got back from his law firm, or from his doctor’s office. And she was in perfect agreement with the whole system, and she didn’t rebel, and she fed her own son the same crap and now the son runs smack into the panther woman. Good luck with that one.
—But tell the truth, wouldn’t you like to have a mother like that? Full of affection, always carefully dressed . . . Come on now, no kidding . . .
—No, and I’ll tell you why, if you didn’t follow me.
—Look, I’m tired, and it makes me angry the way you brought all this up, because until you brought it up I was feeling fabulous, I’d forgotten all about this filthy cell, and all the rest, just telling you about the film.
—I forgot all the rest, too.
—Well? Why break the illusion for me, and for yourself too? What kind of trick is that to pull?
—I guess I have to draw you a map, because you sure don’t get the idea.
—Here in the dark he starts drawing things for me, well that’s just wonderful.
—Let me explain.
—Sure, but tomorrow, because right now I’m up to here with it, so skip it till tomorrow . . . Why couldn’t I have the luck to get the panther woman’s boyfriend to keep me company, instead of you?
—Oh, now that’s another story, and I’m not interested.
—Afraid to talk about such things?
—No, not afraid. Just not my bag. I already know all about yours, even if you didn’t tell me a thing.
—Well I told you what I’m in for, corruption of minors, and that tells it all, so don’t start playing the psychologist now.
—Come on, admit it, you like him because he smokes a pipe.
—No, because he’s the gentle type, and understanding.
—His mother castrated him, plain and simple.
—I like him and that’s enough for me. And you, you like the assistant, some urban guerrilla that one!
—I like her, sure, more than the panther woman.
—Ciao, you tell me why tomorrow. Let me get some sleep.
—Ciao.
—We were just where she’s going to marry the pipe-smoker. I’m all ears.
—What’s the little sneer for?
—Nothing, tell it to me, go ahead, Molina.
—No, you go ahead, you tell me about the pipe-smoker, since you know him so much better than me, I only saw the film.
—The pipe-smoker’s no good for you.
—Why not?
—Because what you have in mind’s not strictly platonic, right? Admit it.
—Obviously.
—Okay, the reason he likes Irena is because she’s frigid and he doesn’t have to make her, that’s why he looks after her and takes her home where the mother’s all over the place. Even if she’s dead she’s there, in every stick of furniture, and the curtains and all that junk, didn’t you say so yourself?
—Go on.
—If he’s left all his mother’s stuff in the house just the way it was, it’s because he still wants to be a little boy, back in his mama’s house, and what he brings home with him isn’t a woman, it’s a little playmate.
—But that’s all your own concoction. How do I know if the house was the mother’s? I told you that because I liked the apartment a lot, and since it was decorated with antiques I said it could be the mother’s, but that’s all. Maybe he rents the place furnished.
—Then you’re inventing half the picture.
—No, I’m not inventing, I swear, but some things, to round them out for you, so you can see them the way I’m seeing them . . . well, to some extent I have to embroider a little. Like with the house, for example.
—Admit that it’s the house you’d like to live in yourself.
—Yes, obviously. And now I have to put up with you while you tell me the same old thing everybody tells me.
—Is that so . . . What is it exactly I’m supposed to tell you?
—You’re all alike, always coming to me with the same business, always!
—What?
—How they spoiled me too much as a kid, and that’s why I’m the way I am, how I was tied to my mother’s apron strings and now I’m this way, and how a person can always straighten out though, and what I really need is a woman, because a woman’s the best there is.
—That’s what they tell you?
—Yes, and my answer is this . . . great! I agree! And since a woman’s the best there is . . . I want to be one. That way I save listening to all kinds of advice, because I know what the score is myself and I’ve got it all clear in my head.
—I don’t see it so clear, at least not the way you just worked it out.
—Okay, I don’t need you to clear up anything for me, and now if you want I’ll go on with the film for you, and if you don’t, so much the better, I’ll tell it to myself in a whisper, and saluti tanti, arrivederci, Sparafucile.
—Sparafucile?
—Obviously you don’t know anything about opera. He’s the villain in Rigoletto.
—Tell me the picture and then ciao, because now I want to know what happens.
—Where were we?
—The wedding night. When he doesn’t touch her.
—That’s right, he’s sleeping on the living-room sofa, and oh, what I didn’t tell you is they’ve arranged, they’ve come to an agreement, that she’ll go see a psychiatrist. And she starts going, and she gets there the first time and finds that the guy’s incredibly good-looking, a fantastic flirt.
—What’s your definition of incredibly good-looking? I’d like to hear.
—Well, he’s tall, dark, wears a mustache, very distinguished-looking, broad forehead, but with a pencil-line mustache a little bit like a pimp’s . . . I don’t know if I’m making it very clear . . . a wise-guy’s mustache, which gives him away. Anyhow, since we’re on the subject, the guy who plays the psychiatrist’s definitely not my type.
—What actor was it?
—I don’t remember, just a supporting role. He’s good-looking but too thin for my taste, if you want to know the truth, the type that looks good in a double-breasted suit, or if it’s a regular suit they have to wear a vest. He’s the type women find attractive. But with this little hotshot something shows, I don’t know, how he’s so positive women find him attractive. But the minute he comes on . . . you have to dislike him. And so does Irena, who’s over on the couch beginning to talk about her problems, but she doesn’t feel comfortable, doesn’t feel like she’s with a doctor, but with some guy, and she’s afraid.
—This picture’s really something.
—Really what? Silly?
—No, coherent, it’s fantastic, go on. But don’t get so uptight.
&
nbsp; —She begins to talk about how afraid she is of not being a good wife and they decide next time she ought to tell him something about her dreams, or nightmares, and how in one dream she turned into a panther. So that’s okay, they end the session at that point, but the next time she has her appointment she doesn’t show up, she lies to her husband, and instead of going to the doctor she goes to the zoo, to look at the panther. And she stands there as if she’s fascinated, she’s wearing that thick plush coat, it’s black but glistens almost iridescent in the light, and the panther’s fur is iridescent black too. The panther is pacing back and forth in the huge cage, never taking his eyes off the girl. And here the keeper comes along, and opens the door on one side of the cage . . . opens it for just a second, tosses the meat in and shuts it again, only he’s so busy with the hook the meat was slung on, he forgets and leaves the key in the lock of the cage. Irena sees all that, keeps quiet, the keeper picks up a broom and sets to work sweeping up the scraps of paper and cigarette butts strewn all over the place near the cages. Irena moves a little closer, stealthily, toward the lock. She removes the key and looks at it, a large key, covered with rust, she stands there pensively, a few seconds go by . . .