The window of my room was opposite the window of Odette’s room. How many minutes, hours, and maybe even whole Sundays I would watch her from my window: especially at night when she took off her stockings and got into bed.
In this way a mysterious relationship had developed between us. If I didn’t see her for one day, it was as if I had lost something. Some days I would look at her so long that she would get up and close her window. We had been watching each other for two weeks, but Odette’s glance was cold and indifferent. She did not smile or make any move to reveal her feelings towards me. Basically her expression was serious and self-contained.
The first time that I came face to face with her was one morning when I had gone to the café at the end of our alley to have breakfast. When I came out, I saw Odette. Her violin case was in her hand and she was going towards the metro. I said hello and she smiled. Then I asked if I could carry her violin case. She nodded her head in answer and said “Thanks”. Our acquaintance started with this one word.
From that day on, when we opened our windows, we talked to each other from afar with hand motions and gestures. But it always resulted in our going down to the Luxembourg Gardens and meeting each other. Afterwards we would go to a film or to the theatre, or spend several hours together in some other way. Odette was alone at home. Her stepfather and her mother had gone on a trip, and she remained in Paris because of her job.
She spoke very little. But she had the temperament of a child: she was wilful and stubborn, and sometimes she infuriated me. We had been friends for two months. One day we decided to go that evening to the Friday market at Neuilly. That night Odette wore her new blue dress and seemed happier than usual. When we came out of the restaurant, she spoke of her life all the way on the metro, until we came out opposite Luna Park.
A large crowd was coming and going. All kinds of amusements were spread along the street. Entertainers were performing. There were shooting games, lottery games, sweet-sellers, a circus, small electric cars that went around a track, balloons which revolved around themselves, rides, and various exhibits. The sounds of girls’ screams, conversation, laughter, murmuring, and the noise of motors and different sorts of music were mingled together.
We decided to go on a car ride. It was a train of cars which went around in a circle and when it was moving, a cloth would cover it, making it look like a green worm. When we wanted to get on, Odette gave her gloves and purse to me so they wouldn’t fall during the ride. We sat close beside each other. The ride started and the green cover slowly rose and hid us from the eyes of the onlookers for five minutes.
When the cover fell back, our lips were still pressed together. I was kissing Odette and she was not holding back. Then we got out, and while walking, she told me that this was only the third time she had come to the Friday market, because her mother had forbidden her. We went to look at several other places. It was midnight when, tired and worn out, we finally started to return. But Odette didn’t want to leave. She stopped at each show, and I was obliged to wait. Two or three times I dragged her by the arm, and she was forced to come with me, until she stopped in front of the stand of somebody who was selling Gillette razor blades. He was delivering a speech and demonstrating how good they were and inviting people to buy. This time I became really infuriated. I pulled her arm hard and said, “This has nothing to do with women.” But she pulled her arm away and said, “I know. I still want to watch.”
I went towards the metro without answering her. When I got home, the alley was deserted and Odette’s window was dark. I went into my room and turned on the light. I opened the window, and since I wasn’t sleepy, I read for a while. It was one in the morning. I went to close the window and go to sleep. I saw that Odette had come and was standing in the alley by the street light beneath her window. I was surprised by her behaviour. I slammed the window shut. As I started to undress, I realized that Odette’s beaded purse and her gloves were in my pocket and I knew that her money and door key were in the purse. I tied them together and dropped them out the window.
Three weeks passed and during all that time I paid no attention to her. When her window opened, I closed mine. In the meantime it happened that I had to make a trip to London. The day before I left for England, I ran into Odette at the end of the alley, going towards the metro with her violin case in her hand. After saying hello and exchanging a few pleasantries, I told her about my trip and apologized for my behaviour that night. Odette coldly opened her beaded purse and handed me a small mirror which was broken in the middle. She said, “This happened that night you threw my purse out of the window. You know this will bring bad luck.”
I laughed in answer and called her superstitious, and promised her that I would see her again before I left, but unfortunately I couldn’t make it.
After I had been in London about a month I received this letter from Odette:
Paris, 21st September 1930
Dearest Jamshid,
You don’t know how lonely I am. This loneliness hurts me. I want to say a few words to you tonight, because when I write to you it’s as if I am speaking with you. If I address you familiarly please excuse me. If you only knew how much I am suffering!
How long the days are – the hands of the clock move so slowly that I don’t know what to do. Does time seem so slow to you too? Perhaps you’ve met a girl there, although I’m sure that your head is always in a book, just the way you were in Paris, in that tiny room that is always before my eyes. Now a Chinese student has moved in, but I’ve hung a heavy curtain across my window so that I won’t be able to see out, because the person that I loved isn’t there. It’s just like the refrain in the ballad says: “A bird that’s gone to another land won’t come back.”
Yesterday Helen and I went walking in the Luxembourg Gardens. When we got to that stone bench, I remembered the day we sat on the same bench and you spoke of your country, and how you made me all those promises and I believed them. And now I’ve become an object of ridicule to my friends, and people talk about me. I always play the Garizari Waltz to remember you. The picture we took in the Bois de Vincennes is on my table. When I look at your picture it reassures me. I say to myself, “No, this picture doesn’t fool me!” But alas, I don’t know if you share my feelings or not. But ever since that night my mirror broke, the very mirror that you gave me yourself, my heart has been warning me of some unfortunate event. The last day that we saw each other, when you said that you were going to England, my heart told me that you were going very far and we would never see each other again. And the thing that I worried about has happened. Madame Burle asked, “Why are you so sad?” and she wanted to take me to Brittany, but I didn’t go with her, because I knew that I would get worse.
Never mind – what’s over is over. If I’m sounding cross, it’s because I’m feeling depressed. Please forgive me, and if I’ve harassed you I hope you will forget me. You’ll tear up my letters, won’t you, Jimmy?
If you knew how much pain and sorrow I’m in at this moment. I’m tired of everything. I’m disillusioned with my daily work, although it wasn’t like this before. You know, I can’t bear to be left hanging any longer, even if it becomes a cause of grief to others. All of their sorrow can’t equal mine. I have decided to leave Paris on Sunday. I’ll take the six-thirty train and go to Calais, the last city that you passed through. Then I’ll see the blue water of the ocean. That water washes all misfortunes away. Every moment its colour changes, and it laps the sandy shore with its sad, enchanting murmur. It foams. The sand nibbles the foam and swallows it and then those very same waves will take my last thoughts with them, because when death smiles at someone, it draws him to it with this smile. Perhaps you will say that she couldn’t do such a thing, but you will see that I don’t tell lies.
Accept my distant kisses,
Odette Lasour
I sent two letters in answer to Odette, but one of them remained unanswered and the seco
nd was stamped “Return to Sender” and came back to me.
The next year, when I returned to Paris, I went as quickly as possible to Rue Saint Jacques, where my old house was. From my room a Chinese student was whistling the Garizari Waltz. But the window of Odette’s room was shut, and a paper had been stuck on the front door which said “To Let”.
Davoud the Hunchback
(from Buried Alive)
“No, no. I will never follow this path. I must completely close my eyes to it. It brings happiness to others, while for me it’s full of pain and torture. Never, never…” Davoud was talking to himself, striking the ground with the short yellow-coloured stick which he had in his hand, and with which he struggled along, as if he kept his balance with difficulty. His big head was sunken between his thin shoulders onto his protruding chest. From the front he appeared hollow, terrible, and repulsive: thin withered lips, thin curved eyebrows, drooping eyelashes, sallow colour, prominent bony cheeks. But when someone looked at him from a distance with his coat covering his hump-back, his long disproportionate hands, his big hat pulled down on his head, and especially the serious attitude he assumed, hitting his stick with force on the ground, he seemed rather more laughable.
From the intersection of Pahlavi Avenue he had turned into a street out of the city and was going towards the Government Gate. It was near dusk and the weather was slightly warm. On the left, in the vague light of the sunset, the mud-covered walls and brick columns thrust their heads towards the sky in silence. On the right was a gully that had just been filled and next to that at intervals, half built brick houses were visible. Here it was fairly empty, and sometimes a car or a droshky would pass which raised a little dust into the air even though water had been sprinkled on the road. Saplings had been planted on both sides of the street, by the gutter.
He was thinking that from the beginning of his childhood up to the present he had always been the object of other people’s ridicule or pity. He remembered that the first time the teacher in the history class said the inhabitants of Sparta used to kill deformed children all the students turned around and looked at him, and it had made him feel strange. But now he wished that this law had been enforced everywhere in the world, or at least that, as in most places, they would have banned syphilitic people from marrying, since he knew that all this was his father’s fault. The scene of his father’s death, the pale face, bony cheeks, sunken blue eyes, half-open mouth, passed before his eyes just as he had seen it: his old syphilitic father, who had taken a young wife and all of whose children had been born blind or lame. One of his brothers who had survived was dumb and an idiot and had died two years ago. He would say to himself, “Maybe they were the lucky ones!”
But he remained alive, weary of himself and others, and everyone avoided him. He had grown somewhat accustomed to living for ever a life apart. From childhood in school he was left out of sports, jokes, races, ball games, leapfrog, tag and all the things which brought about the happiness of his classmates. During playtime he would crouch in the corner of the school playground holding a book in front of his face and watching the children stealthily from behind it. But there was a time when he truly worked, and he wanted to find superiority over the others at least through study. Day and night he worked, and because of this one or two of the lazy students became friendly with him, because they wanted to copy his exercises and his solutions to maths problems. But he knew that their friendship was insincere and was to their advantage, since he saw that the students tried hard to be friends with Hasan Khan, who was handsome, well-built, and wore nice clothes. Only one or two people among the teachers showed Davoud any consideration and attention, and this wasn’t for his work but because they pitied him, since even with all his labour and hardship he couldn’t complete his work.
Now he remained empty handed. Everyone avoided him. His acquaintances would be embarrassed to walk with him, women would say “See the hunchback!” This made him more angry than anything else.
Twice, several years before, he had asked for a girl’s hand. Both times the women had ridiculed him. By coincidence one of them, Zibandeh, lived near here in Fisherabad. They had seen each other several times, and they had even talked to each other. In the afternoons when he came home from school he used to come here to see her. The only thing he could remember was that she had a mole by her lip. Later when he sent his aunt to ask for her hand that same girl had ridiculed him and said, “But is there a dearth of men, that I should become the wife of a hunchback?” No matter how much her father and mother had beaten her, she hadn’t accepted. She kept saying, “But is there a dearth of men?” But Davoud still loved her, and this counted as the best memory of his youth. Even now, wittingly or unwittingly, he mostly wandered here, and the past memories would become fresh again before his eyes. He was disappointed in everything. Mostly he went for walks alone and kept aloof from crowds because he suspected that everyone who laughed or talked quietly to his friend was talking about him, was making fun of him. With his brown staring eyes and fierce attitude he would laboriously move his neck and the upper half of his body and would pass on looking down contemptuously. When he went out all his senses were attuned to others, all the muscles of his face were tense. He wanted to know other people’s opinion about him.
He was passing slowly by the side of a gutter and sometimes he stirred the water with the end of his stick. His thoughts were frenzied and distressed. He saw a white dog with long hair who lifted its head because of the sound of his stick hitting against a rock, and it looked at him as if it was sick or on the verge of death. It couldn’t move from its place and once again its head dropped to the ground. He stooped down with difficulty. In the light of the moon their eyes met. A strange thought occurred to him: he felt that this was the first time that he had seen a simple and sincere look and that both of them were unfortunate and unwanted, rejected and useless, driven out from human society. He wanted to sit by this dog, who had dragged its misery out of the city and had hidden it from men’s eyes, and take it in his embrace, press its head to his protruding chest. But he thought that if someone passed by here and saw, he would make fun of him even more. It was dusk. He passed by the Yusef Abad Gate. He looked at the circle of the incandescent moon, which in the calm of this sorrowful and tender evening had come up from the shore of the sky. He looked at the half-built houses, the piles of bricks which they had heaped on each other, the sleepy background of the city, the tin roofs of the houses, the blue-coloured mountain. Grey blurred curtains were passing before his eyes. No one could be seen, near or far. The distant muffled sound of singing was coming from the other side of the gully. He lifted his head with difficulty. He was tired, extremely sad and unhappy, and his eyes burned. It was as if his head was too heavy for his body. Davoud left his walking stick by the side of the ditch and went over to the other side. Without intending to, he walked towards the rocks and sat down beside the road. Suddenly he became aware of a woman in a chador who was sitting near him beside the ditch. His heartbeat speeded up. Suddenly the woman turned her head and said with a smile, “Hushang! Where were you until now?” Davoud was surprised by the women’s easy tone, surprised that she had seen him and hadn’t been startled. It was as if he had been given the world. From her question it was evident that she wanted to talk with him, but what was she doing here at this time of night? Was she decent? Maybe she was in love. He took a chance, saying to himself, come what may, at least I’ve found someone to talk to, maybe she’ll give me comfort. As if he had no control over his own tongue he said, “Miss, are you alone? I’m alone too. I’m always alone. I’ve been alone all my life.”
His words weren’t yet finished when the woman, wearing sunglasses, turned her head again and said, “Then who are you? I thought it was Hushang. Whenever he meets me, he tries to be funny.”
Davoud didn’t follow much of this last sentence, and he didn’t understand what the women meant. But he didn’t expect to, either. It had been a long
time since any woman had talked to him. He saw this woman was pretty. Cold sweat streamed down his body. With difficulty he said, “No, miss, I’m not Hushang. My name is Davoud.”
The woman answered with a smile, “I can’t see you – my eyes hurt. Aha, Davoud!… Davoud the Hunch…” she bit her lip. “I’m Zibandeh. Don’t you know me?” The curled hair which had covered her cheek moved, and Davoud saw the black mole at the corner of her lip. He throbbed from chest to throat. Drops of sweat rolled down his forehead. He looked around. No one was there. The sound of the singing had come near. His heart beat. It beat so fast that he couldn’t breathe. Without saying anything, trembling from head to foot, he got up. Sobs choked his throat. He picked up his cane. With heavy steps rising and falling he went back the same way he had come and with a scratchy voice he whispered to himself, “That was Zibandeh! She didn’t see me… Maybe Hushang was her fiancé or husband… Who knows? No… Never… I must close my eyes completely!… No, no I can’t any more…”
He pulled himself along to the side of the same dog that he had seen, sat and pressed its head to his protruding chest. But the dog was dead.
Madeline
(from Buried Alive)
The night before last I was there, in that small living room. Her mother and her sister were there too. The mother wore a grey dress and the daughters wore red dresses. The furniture, too, was of red velvet. I was resting my elbow on the piano and looking at them. There was silence except for the record player, from which was coming the stirring, sorrowful song of ‘The Volga Boatman’. The wind roared; drops of rain beat against the window. The rain trickled, and with a constant sound blended with the melody of the record. Madeleine sat in front of me, thoughtful and gloomy, with her head leaning on her hand, listening. I looked stealthily at her brown, curly hair, bare arms, lively, childish neck and profile. This mood she was in struck me as being artificial. I thought she should always run, play and joke. I couldn’t imagine that thoughts came to her or that it was possible for her also to be sad. I liked her childish and unrestrained attitude.