Night by Edna O’Brien Read Free Book Online Page B

consolation, or a preamble, some for a fuck. The waiter for instance. There are times when our limbs make our decisions for us. Quite a sniper he was. Tight trousered. His dangle brought me to considering him, that and his ferocious impertinence. Not even a head waiter, a flunkey, throwing platters down and then waiting to be told thank you in a foreign Erse. Insisted I eat snails, I who lack co-ordination with any kind of implement. Made my escort, who is a duke, and allergic to shellfish, have a lobster thermidor. Poor man was obliged to spend the bulk of the ensuing time over a washbasin. The waiter, finding himself unimpeded, removed his striped apron so that I could have a better view of him, à la hips, pelvis, and groin. There he was, aiding and abetting himself in a too-tight trousers. The plans forour liaison got completed in ten seconds. He bowed when we were leaving and called me madam. The Duke had to appropriate one of their pink linen napkins lest the jogging of the taxi induce another bout. He couldn’t understand why I didn’t drop in and stroke his forehead, do a bit of palming as we called it. That was one of my favours, that and donning suspenders, in return for which I got treats, dinners, bunches of flowers and numerous little bottles of bath essence. I had to feign a migraine and hurried home.
    I thought of him and his preen. It didn’t matter the colour or how pimpled or how tufted, or how pink or how ochre or how egalitarian or how distended or how not. I went around the house tidying, crooning, said “A lover is coming,” sang it, then did exercises to get into a more strapping condition. He arrived, wearing smoke-blue sunglasses in this a winter solstice. He sat on the pouffe. If there had been a cheetah he would have sat on that. He sought to impress. He mentioned blue blood and Botticelli, and frescoes on bathroom ceilings. He said he would drink anything I drank, he would drink my words. First major setback. Then a most hideous development. He started on about the vicissitudes of fortune. His life story, his poverty, his growing pains, long years of apprenticeship, his culinary courses, getting double-crossed; and in his immediate circumstances having to miss the bus home each night due to the thoughtlessness of customers who dallied. It seems they dallied more after they were served some liquor that he had set fire to, some colourless liquor strewn with coffee beans. He said some ofthem were so drunk that they aspired to eat the flames, especially the ladies, scalding themselves, their tongues and their tonsils; crying out for ointment and jellies, asking him to be a first-aid man. Lo, and behold, a sadder tale. His room was cold, his walls were damp and devoid of pictures or engravings, he had no wardrobe and only two metal hangers. He was in possession of an oil heater but forbore from lighting it before he went out in the morning because he had read of numerous catastrophes concerning oil heaters and families of small children. I was waiting for news of chilblains. I made a serious attempt to thwart him. I flung questions at him, questions pertaining to the libido. I said “What is your type, do you like it straight or sausage, and do you like rubber goods?” He droned on. Yes, he had had girl friends and the sequence of relationships was that he acted chivalrous on the first occasion, gave them their kicks; on the second occasion satisfied himself and on the third and fourth, picked for a fight. Picked. I looked down at his fingernails and received a most inglorious shock. One nail was black and had grown inordinately, and as far as I could gauge had grown soft, was nearer to flesh than to horn. Alas for the little preparations upstairs, the whip placed strategically on the bedspread, the black whip, the white bedspread, the pebble of soap, yellow as egg yolk. The whip was a gift from a beady-eyed lady, a Lebanese, who had said “You might like to hang it in