The Enchanter by Vladimir Nabokov Read Free Book Online

ham, she said such things as “At least her suffering did not last long” or “Thank God she was unconscious,” on the lumped-together assumption that suffering and sleep were the natural human lot, that the worms had kind little faces, and that the supreme supine flotation took place in a blissful stratosphere, he nearly answered that death, as such, always had been and always would be an obscene idiot, but realized in time that this might cause his consoler to have disagreeable doubts about his ability to impart a religious and moral education to the adolescent girl.
    There were very few people at the funeral (but for somereason a friend of sorts from former times, a gold craftsman, showed up with his wife), and later, in the home-bound car, a plump lady (who had also been at his farcical wedding) told him, compassionately but in no uncertain terms (as his bowed head bobbed with the car’s motion), that now, at least, something must be done about the child’s abnormal situation (meanwhile his late spouse’s friend pretended to gaze out into the street), and that paternal concerns would undoubtedly give him the needed consolation, and a third woman (an infinitely remote relative of the deceased) joined in, saying, “And what a pretty girl she is! You’ll have to watch her like a hawk—she’s already biggish for her age, just wait another three years and the boys will be sticking to her like flies, you’ll have no end of worries,” and meanwhile he was guffawing and guffawing to himself, floating on featherbeds of happiness.
    The day before, in response to a second telegram (“Worried how is your health kiss”—and this kiss written on the telegraph blank was the first real one), came the news that neither of them had any more fever, and, before leaving for home, the still runny-nosed friend showed him a small box and asked if she could take it for the girl (it contained some maternal trinkets from the remote, sacred past), after which she inquired what would happen next, and how. Only then, speaking extremely slowly and expressionlessly, with frequent pauses, as though withevery syllable he were overcoming the speechlessness of sorrow, he announced to her what would happen and how: after first thanking her for the year of care, he advised her that in exactly two weeks he would come to fetch his daughter (the very word he used) to take her south and then probably abroad. “Yes, that’s wise,” replied the other with relief (somewhat tempered, but only by the thought, let us hope, that, of late, she had probably been making a nice little profit on her ward). “Go away, distract yourself—there’s nothing like a trip to calm one’s grief.”
    He needed those two weeks to organize his affairs so he would not have to think about them for at least a year; then he would see. He was forced to sell certain items from his own collection. And while packing he happened to find in his desk a coin he had once picked up (which, incidentally, had turned out to be counterfeit). He chuckled: the talisman had already done its job.

 
    W HEN HE BOARDED THE TRAIN , day-after-tomorrow’s address still seemed a shoreline in a torrid mist, a preliminary symbol of future anonymity. The only thing he tentatively planned was where they would pass the night on the way to that shimmering South; he found it unnecessary to predetermine subsequent habitations. The locus did not matter—it would always be adorned by a little naked foot; the destination was immaterial—as long as he could abscond with her into the azure void. The telegraph poles, like violin bridges, flew past with spasms of guttural music. The throbbingof the car’s partitions was like the crackle of mightily bulging wings. We shall live far away, now in the hills, now by the sea, in a hothouse warmth where savagelike nudity will automatically become habitual, perfectly alone (no servants!), seeing no one, just the two of us in an eternal nursery, and thus any