The Left-Handed Woman Read Online Free PDF Page A

quickly to the woman, “Why do you defend the man?”
    As though in answer, the woman tickled the child, kissed him on the head, picked him up, put him on her lap, hugged him.
    The publisher: “Don’t you like my company? I have the impression that you keep so busy with the child only so you won’t have to pay any attention to me. What’s the
sense of this mother-and-child game? What have you to fear from me?”
    The woman pushed the child away and said, “Maybe you’re right.” And to the child, “Go to bed.”
    The child didn’t move, so she picked him up and carried him off.
    She came back alone and said, “Stefan doesn’t want to sleep. The champagne makes him think of New Year’s Eve, when he can always stay up until past midnight.” The publisher drew the woman down beside him on the broad armchair; with an air of forbearance she let him.
    The publisher said slowly, “Which is your glass?”
    She showed him and he picked it up. “I want to drink out of your glass, Marianne.”
    Then he smelled her hair. “I like your hair because it only smells of hair. It’s more a feeling than a smell. And another thing I like is the way you walk. It’s not a special kind of walk, as with most women. You just walk, and that’s lovely.”
    The woman smiled to herself. Then she turned to him as though a sudden desire to talk had come over her. “One day a lady was here. She played with Stefan. All of a sudden he sniffed at her hair and said, ‘You smell.’ The woman was horrified. ‘Of cooking?’ she cried. ‘No, of perfume,’ he said, and that relieved her completely.”
    After a while the publisher looked at her as if he didn’t know what to do next. The child called her, but she did
not respond. She looked back toward his room as though curious. The publisher kept his eyes on her but lowered his head. “You have a run in your stocking.” She waved her hand, meaning she didn’t care, and when the child called her again she stood up but didn’t leave the room.
    She sat down in her old place, across from the publisher, and said, “What I can’t bear in this house is the way I have to turn corners to go from one room to another: always at right angles and always to the left. I don’t know why it puts me in such a bad humor. It really torments me.”
    The publisher said, “Write about it, Marianne. One of these days you won’t be with us any more if you don’t.”
    The child called a third time and she went to him instantly.
    Left alone, the publisher looked tired. His head sagged slightly to one side. He straightened up; then he smiled, apparently at himself, and let his body go limp again.
    The woman came back and stood in front of him. He looked up at her. She laid her hand on his forehead. Then she sat down across from him again. He took her hand, which was resting on the table, and kissed it. For a long time they said nothing.
    She said, “Should I play some music for you?” He shook his head without a moment’s reflection, as though he had expected the question. They were silent.
    The publisher: “Doesn’t your telephone ever ring?”
    The woman: “Very seldom in the last few days. Not
much in the winter, anyway. Maybe in the spring?” After a long silence she said, “I think Stefan is asleep now.” And then, “If you weren’t my boss now, in a manner of speaking, I might let you see how tired I am.”
    The publisher: “And besides, the bottle is empty.”
    He got up and she saw him to the door. He took his coat, stood with bowed head, then straightened up. Brusquely she took his coat out of his hands and said, “Let’s have another glass. I just had a feeling that every minute I spend alone I lose something that can never be retrieved. Like death. Forgive the word. It was a painful feeling.