She’s rich. John’s decisions are always calculated. I’ll give him his divorce without an argument, but I want my son. Eric means life to me. I need him and he needs me. Every child needs a mother—his real mother, if she wants him. And I want my son
.
No, I know I can’t keep Eric for good. John would never give him up. I told you before that wherever John goes, he wants Eric with him. You know Jamaican men and their firstborn sons. It must be so for African men, too. Their sons belong to them
.
I broke off reading. “Not so for my father. Not my father,” I whispered to myself. How raw that ache remained in me! And as suddenly as it returned, it vanished and I refocused my eyes on the letter before me.
Eric belongs to John, so he believes. So, yes, I know I can’t have him all the time. I am so desperate that I’ll agree to have Eric go to school where John is and spend the summers with me in Jamaica. Will you tell him that for me, Oufoula, and get him to send my son to me? You are an honorable man. I know you will do it. You probably have a child now, perhaps a son. You know what your son means to you, means to your wife. Can you imagine the pain your wife would feel if your son were taken away from her? Can you imagine, Oufoula? No, don’t try to imagine it. I wouldn’t want even my enemies to know my hell
.
Here is my phone number in Geneva: 022 555 55-55. It’s a new number. Call me when you receive this letter. I am going to give you Marguerite’s phone number, too. You remember I talked to you about Marguerite? Call her when you get to New York. Give her my love. Don’t tell her about my troubles with John. It will only worry her, and there is nothing she can do
.
Yours in love and desperation
,
Catherine
Oh, P.S.: Marguerite’s phone number is 212-555-5224
.
I memorized the number greedily, and everything else Catherine had written to me vanished, disappeared, became unimportant, insignificant in the angles and curves of those ten blue digits. It was as if a boulder had suddenly been lifted from the memory that in recent times, content with Nerida in Washington, I had managed to suppress, and I relived at that moment the same thrill and fear I felt when Catherine told me, at that unfortunate cocktail party, that Marguerite lived in New York and in a fit of irrational desire I made that impossible leap from one world to the next.
For what man made of flesh and bones, of spirit, too, but not only, could calm the rising rivers of blood pounding through hisveins if he had the chance to meet in reality the sexual fantasy of his nocturnal emissions?
Marguerite!
“And she is more beautiful than Margarete,”
Catherine said.
I could call this Marguerite. I could speak to her. I could hear with my ears the voice of the woman who spoke to me only through my dreams. I could see her. I could touch her.
I tried to steady myself, to remind myself that I did not know her, that I had no need to know her, to meet her. I had a wife. I wanted no one but my wife. Marguerite was an illusion, a figment of my imagination.
It was not enough to dissuade me. Perhaps I had gone mad, but how different was I from the rational man who goes to his therapist once a week to recapture dreams I could recapture with a telephone call, a visit?
I reasoned—I let reason beguile me—that when I saw Marguerite, when I spoke to her, I would finally put an end to the incomprehensible yearning that still persisted even when I made love to Nerida, a longing for a thing I could not see or touch or name. Perhaps, I convinced myself, calling Marguerite would strengthen my marriage, rescue me for Nerida alone.
8
I do not consider myself a callous man. I can sympathize with the pain others feel. I am moved when they weep. I am happy when things go their way. I dance at weddings, I visit the sick. I cry at funerals. I am a kind man. I put money in the tin cans beggars proffer to me. When I lived in Washington, D.C., my colleagues
.
No, I know I can’t keep Eric for good. John would never give him up. I told you before that wherever John goes, he wants Eric with him. You know Jamaican men and their firstborn sons. It must be so for African men, too. Their sons belong to them
.
I broke off reading. “Not so for my father. Not my father,” I whispered to myself. How raw that ache remained in me! And as suddenly as it returned, it vanished and I refocused my eyes on the letter before me.
Eric belongs to John, so he believes. So, yes, I know I can’t have him all the time. I am so desperate that I’ll agree to have Eric go to school where John is and spend the summers with me in Jamaica. Will you tell him that for me, Oufoula, and get him to send my son to me? You are an honorable man. I know you will do it. You probably have a child now, perhaps a son. You know what your son means to you, means to your wife. Can you imagine the pain your wife would feel if your son were taken away from her? Can you imagine, Oufoula? No, don’t try to imagine it. I wouldn’t want even my enemies to know my hell
.
Here is my phone number in Geneva: 022 555 55-55. It’s a new number. Call me when you receive this letter. I am going to give you Marguerite’s phone number, too. You remember I talked to you about Marguerite? Call her when you get to New York. Give her my love. Don’t tell her about my troubles with John. It will only worry her, and there is nothing she can do
.
Yours in love and desperation
,
Catherine
Oh, P.S.: Marguerite’s phone number is 212-555-5224
.
I memorized the number greedily, and everything else Catherine had written to me vanished, disappeared, became unimportant, insignificant in the angles and curves of those ten blue digits. It was as if a boulder had suddenly been lifted from the memory that in recent times, content with Nerida in Washington, I had managed to suppress, and I relived at that moment the same thrill and fear I felt when Catherine told me, at that unfortunate cocktail party, that Marguerite lived in New York and in a fit of irrational desire I made that impossible leap from one world to the next.
For what man made of flesh and bones, of spirit, too, but not only, could calm the rising rivers of blood pounding through hisveins if he had the chance to meet in reality the sexual fantasy of his nocturnal emissions?
Marguerite!
“And she is more beautiful than Margarete,”
Catherine said.
I could call this Marguerite. I could speak to her. I could hear with my ears the voice of the woman who spoke to me only through my dreams. I could see her. I could touch her.
I tried to steady myself, to remind myself that I did not know her, that I had no need to know her, to meet her. I had a wife. I wanted no one but my wife. Marguerite was an illusion, a figment of my imagination.
It was not enough to dissuade me. Perhaps I had gone mad, but how different was I from the rational man who goes to his therapist once a week to recapture dreams I could recapture with a telephone call, a visit?
I reasoned—I let reason beguile me—that when I saw Marguerite, when I spoke to her, I would finally put an end to the incomprehensible yearning that still persisted even when I made love to Nerida, a longing for a thing I could not see or touch or name. Perhaps, I convinced myself, calling Marguerite would strengthen my marriage, rescue me for Nerida alone.
8
I do not consider myself a callous man. I can sympathize with the pain others feel. I am moved when they weep. I am happy when things go their way. I dance at weddings, I visit the sick. I cry at funerals. I am a kind man. I put money in the tin cans beggars proffer to me. When I lived in Washington, D.C., my colleagues
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