Anatomy of Restlessness by Bruce Chatwin Read Free Book Online Page B

clean. Hull is bad, my dear, but Londres is worse than Hull. This German man and me, we go to a film. Un film cochon. I don’t speak lies. Old people naked. Gens de soixante ans tous nus. Doing things you can’t imagine. Then they invite us to sing a hymn to the Queen. And in Hyde Park, my God, under the trees! Feet, my God! Que des pieds!’
    The men fed the juke-box and played Togolese rock. The legionnaire stumbled to his feet and dragged Mamzelle Dela by the arm and tried to dance. She put on a long-suffering look and winked at Jeb.
    He winked back.
    â€˜You have loved an Africaine?’ asked Annie.
    â€˜Never,’ Jeb said in an even voice. He had never been to bed with a woman, but he did not want to show this.
    â€˜You must go with Mamzelle Dela. She wants it.’
    Jeb turned red and felt his self-confidence running away.
    â€˜Listen,’ she said protectively. ‘I speak with you as a mother. You are afraid to go with her because you have heard bad things. I tell you, African women are cleaner than white women. They are très pudique. And they are much more beautiful.’
    â€˜You think I should?’
    â€˜I know it.’
    The legionnaire was too drunk to dance and stood with his arms round her buttocks. His head nuzzled her breasts, but he was slipping gradually to the floor.
    â€˜Down,’ he spluttered. ‘Down ... down ... down ... down ...’
    â€˜Down where?’
    â€˜Down into the cave.’
    â€˜Monsieur, you know very well the price of entry is five thousand francs.’
    â€˜Ah! Dela. Black, beautiful and cruel.’
    Now he was sitting crouched and trying to get a hand up her legs. Dela clamped them tight. She winked again.
    â€˜Black, beautiful and cruel.’
    â€˜C’est un con,’ she said definitely.
    Jeb helped get the legionnaire back to his chair. There Dela pulled him and they were dancing. He loosened up and his legs flew. Then they closed and her hard belly burned through his pants, and he was pumped hard, and there were hot shivers up his back. Then they were in her room, he standing and she sitting on the bed, her quick fingers unzippering, and he praying, thinking of nothing and nobody else now, but praying it would come right. And then they were on the bed and clinching, and then she pushed him away and sat up.
    â€˜I need a sandwich,’ she said. ‘You pay my sandwich.’
    â€˜Oh! No. God. Not now.’
    â€˜You pay my sandwich.’
    â€˜I pay your sandwich.’
    â€˜You pay my beer.’
    â€˜I pay also your beer.’
    He got up and took a note from his pocket. She put on a blue boubou and stalked out into the kitchen. She was back in five minutes munching a chicken sandwich and smacking her lips. Then she tied her hair in a bandana and was ready.
    But Jeb was face down on the pillow, his head spinning from the whisky. She lay beside him and her hand felt him soft and limp.
    â€˜Pederast,’ she snorted.
    â€˜No. No.’ Jeb hit the pillow miserably. ‘No. No.’
    â€˜All Americans are pederasts.’
    She rolled over and began to snore, and her snores did not keep him from sleeping.
    But in the morning it was different. From that morning he would never forget the white light and blowing curtains, and never stop thanking for the taut breasts; the hard mouth freely given; the powerful arms; the nails that raised red welts on his back; the soles of her feet sandpapering his thighs; again and again, two bodies floating and then heavy along the uneven line where the brown met white; and afterwards, when they were both tired together, her amused smile and her fingers gently disentangling his hair. He left her and walked across the terrace. Madame Gerda turned her face to the wall. Madame Annie was knitting a pink jumper. She looked over her spectacles and smiled.
    â€˜You are even walking differently,’ she said.
    Â 
    1977

THE ATTRACTIONS OF FRANCE

THE JOURNEY