Wittgenstein's Mistress by David Markson, Steven Moore Read Free Book Online Page B

broken but only sprained.
    The next morning it was swollen to twice its normal size nonetheless.
    One moment I had been halfway up the stairs, and a moment after that I was making believe I was Icarus.
    What I had been doing was carrying that monstrosity of a canvas, which was extraordinarily unwieldy.
    How one carries such a monstrosity is by gripping the crossbars between the stretchers, at its back, meaning that one has noway whatsoever of seeing where one is going.
    Still, I had believed I was managing. Until such time as the entire contraption floated away from me.
    Possibly it was a wind, which caused that, since there were many more broken windows in the museum than those I had broken on purpose, by that time.
    Presumably it was a wind from below, in fact, since what the canvas seemed to do was to rise up in front of me. And then to rise up some more.
    Remarkably soon after that it was underneath me, however.
    The pain was excruciating.
    I am gushing, being what I thought at first, however. And I do not even have underpants on, under this wraparound skirt.
    To tell the truth, when I had actually thought that had been perhaps two seconds earlier.
    And so had shifted the way in which I was standing, naturally, to close my thighs.
    Forgetting for the same instant that I was carrying forty-five square feet of canvas, on stretchers, up a stone stairway.
    In retrospect it does not even become unlikely that there had been no wind after all.
    And naturally all of this had occurred with what seemed no warning whatsoever, either.
    Although doubtless I had been feeling out of sorts for some days, which I would have invariably laid to other causes.
    The museum of course possessed crutches, and even wheelchairs, for just such emergencies.
    Well, perhaps not for exactly just such.
    All of these were on the main floor, in any event, along with other first aid items.
    It would have been inordinately easier for me to crawl to the top of the stairs, rather than to the bottom.
    Most of my accouterments were down there too, however. I believe I have mentioned having still possessed accouterments, in those days.
    As it turned out, I became astonishingly adept at maneuvering my wheelchair in next to no time.
    Skittering from one end of the main floor to the other, in fact, when the mood took me.
    From the Greek and Roman antiquities to the Egyptian, or whoosh! and here we go round the Temple of Dendur.
    Often even with music by Berlioz, or Igor Stravinsky, to accompany myself.
    Now and again, the same ankle still pains me.
    This is generally only in regard to the weather, actually.
    For the life of me I cannot remember what I had been trying to get that canvas up the stairway for, on the other hand.
    To paint on it, would be a natural supposition.
    Then again, after not having painted on it for months, perhaps I had wished to put it someplace where I would not have to be continually reminded that I had not done so.
    A canvas nine feet tall and five feet wide being hardly your most easily ignored reminder.
    Doubtless I had had something in mind, at any rate.
    There is a tape deck in the pickup truck here, now that I think about it.
    There would appear to be no tapes, however.
    Once, changing vehicles beside some tennis courts at Bayonne, in France, I turned an ignition key and found myself hearing the Four Serious Songs, by Brahms.
    Though I am possibly thinking about the Four Last Songs, by Richard Strauss.
    In either event it was not Kathleen Ferrier singing.
    Actually, a fairly high percentage of the vehicles that one comes upon will have tape decks, many still set to the on position.
    Rarely would it occur to me to give this any attention, however.
    Obviously, one's chief interest at such moments would concern whether the battery on hand still functioned.
    Assuming one had already determined that there was a key in the vehicle, and gasoline.
    Kirsten Flagstad was singing, at Bayonne. Which was in fact Bordeaux.
    To tell the truth, one was