Disgrace Read online

There is still Soraya. He ought to close that chapter. Instead, he pays a detective agency to track her down. Within days he has her real name, her address, her telephone number. He telephones at nine in the morning, when the husband and children will be out. ‘Soraya?’ he says. ‘This is David. How are you? When can I see you again?’

  A long silence before she speaks. ‘I don’t know who you are,’ she says. ‘You are harassing me in my own house. I demand you will never phone me here again, never.’

  Demand. She means command. Her shrillness surprises him: there has been no intimation of it before. But then, what should a predator expect when he intrudes into the vixen’s nest, into the home of her cubs?

  He puts down the telephone. A shadow of envy passes over him for the husband he has never seen.

  TWO

  WITHOUT THE Thursday interludes the week is as featureless as a desert. There are days when he does not know what to do with himself.

  He spends more time in the university library, reading all he can find on the wider Byron circle, adding to notes that already fill two fat files. He enjoys the late-afternoon quiet of the reading room, enjoys the walk home afterwards: the brisk winter air, the damp, gleaming streets.

  He is returning home one Friday evening, taking the long route through the old college gardens, when he notices one of his students on the path ahead of him. Her name is Melanie Isaacs, from his Romantics course. Not the best student but not the worst either: clever enough, but unengaged.

  She is dawdling; he soon catches up with her. ‘Hello,’ he says.

  She smiles back, bobbing her head, her smile sly rather than shy. She is small and thin, with close-cropped black hair, wide, almost Chinese cheekbones, large, dark eyes. Her outfits are always striking. Today she wears a maroon miniskirt with a mustard-coloured sweater and black tights; the gold baubles on her belt match the gold balls of her earrings.

  He is mildly smitten with her. It is no great matter: barely a term passes when he does not fall for one or other of his charges. Cape Town: a city prodigal of beauty, of beauties.

  Does she know he has an eye on her? Probably. Women are sensitive to it, to the weight of the desiring gaze.

  It has been raining; from the pathside runnels comes the soft rush of water.

  ‘My favourite season, my favourite time of day,’ he remarks. ‘Do you live around here?’

  ‘Across the line. I share a flat.’

  ‘Is Cape Town your home?’

  ‘No, I grew up in George.’

  ‘I live just nearby. Can I invite you in for a drink?’

  A pause, cautious. ‘OK. But I have to be back by seven-thirty.’

  From the gardens they pass into the quiet residential pocket where he has lived for the past twelve years, first with Rosalind, then, after the divorce, alone.

  He unlocks the security gate, unlocks the door, ushers the girl in. He switches on lights, takes her bag. There are raindrops on her hair. He stares, frankly ravished. She lowers her eyes, offering the same evasive and perhaps even coquettish little smile as before.

  In the kitchen he opens a bottle of Meerlust and sets out biscuits and cheese. When he returns she is standing at the bookshelves, head on one side, reading titles. He puts on music: the Mozart clarinet quintet.

  Wine, music: a ritual that men and women play out with each other. Nothing wrong with rituals, they were invented to ease the awkward passages. But the girl he has brought home is not just thirty years his junior: she is a student, his student, under his tutelage. No matter what passes between them now, they will have to meet again as teacher and pupil. Is he prepared for that?

  ‘Are you enjoying the course?’ he asks.

  ‘I liked Blake. I liked the Wonderhorn stuff.’

  ‘Wunderhorn.’

  ‘I’m not so crazy about Wordsworth.’

  ‘You shouldn’t be saying that to me. Wordsworth has been one of my masters.’

  It is true. For as long as he can remember, the harmonies of The Prelude have echoed within him.

  ‘Maybe by the end of the course I’ll appreciate him more. Maybe he’ll grow on me.’

  ‘Maybe. But in my experience poetry speaks to you either at first sight or not at all. A flash of revelation and a flash of response. Like lightning. Like falling in love.’

  Like falling in love. Do the young still fall in love, or is that mechanism obsolete by now, unnecessary, quaint, like steam locomotion? He is out of touch, out of date. Falling in love could have fallen out of fashion and come back again half a dozen times, for all he knows.

  ‘Do you write poetry yourself?’ he asks.

  ‘I did when I was at school. I wasn’t very good. I haven’t got the time now.’

  ‘And passions? Do you have any literary passions?’

  She frowns at the strange word. ‘We did Adrienne Rich and Toni Morrison in my second year. And Alice Walker. I got pretty involved. But I wouldn’t call it a passion exactly.’

  So: not a creature of passion. In the most roundabout of ways, is she warning him off?

  ‘I am going to throw together some supper,’ he says. ‘Will you join me? It will be very simple.’

  She looks dubious.

  ‘Come on!’ he says. ‘Say yes!’

  ‘OK. But I have to make a phone call first.’

  The call takes longer than he expected. From the kitchen he hears murmurings, silences.

  ‘What are your career plans?’ he asks afterwards.

  ‘Stagecraft and design. I’m doing a diploma in theatre.’

  ‘And what is your reason for taking a course in Romantic poetry?’

  She ponders, wrinkling her nose. ‘It’s mainly for the atmosphere that I chose it,’ she says. ‘I didn’t want to take Shakespeare again. I took Shakespeare last year.’

  What he throws together for supper is indeed simple: anchovies on tagliatelle with a mushroom sauce. He lets her chop the mushrooms. Otherwise she sits on a stool, watching while he cooks. They eat in the dining-room, opening a second bottle of wine. She eats without inhibition. A healthy appetite, for someone so slight.

  ‘Do you always cook for yourself?’ she asks.

  ‘I live alone. If I don’t cook, no one will.’

  ‘I hate cooking. I guess I should learn.’

  ‘Why? If you really hate it, marry a man who cooks.’

  Together they contemplate the picture: the young wife with the daring clothes and gaudy jewellery striding through the front door, impatiently sniffing the air; the husband, colourless Mr Right, apronned, stirring a pot in the steaming kitchen. Reversals: the stuff of bourgeois comedy.

  ‘That’s all,’ he says at the end, when the bowl is empty. ‘No dessert, unless you want an apple or some yoghurt. Sorry – I didn’t know I would be having a guest.’

  ‘It was nice,’ she says, draining her glass, rising. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Don’t go yet.’ He takes her by the hand and leads her to the sofa. ‘I have something to show you. Do you like dance? Not dancing: dance.’ He slips a cassette into the video machine. ‘It’s a film by a man named Norman McLaren. It’s quite old. I found it in the library. See what you think.’

  Sitting side by side they watch. Two dancers on a bare stage move through their steps. Recorded by a stroboscopic camera, their images, ghosts of their movements, fan out behind them like wingbeats. It is a film he first saw a quarter of a century ago but is still captivated by: the instant of the present and the past of that instant, evanescent, caught in the same space.

  He wills the girl to be captivated too. But he senses she is not.

  When the film is over she gets up and wanders around the room. She raises the lid of the piano, strikes middle C. ‘Do you play?’ she says.

  ‘A bit.’

  ‘Classics or jazz?’

  ‘No jazz, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Will you play something for me?’

  ‘Not now. I’m out of practice. Another time, when we know each other better.’

/>   She peers into his study. ‘Can I look?’ she says.

  ‘Switch on the light.’

  He puts on more music: Scarlatti sonatas, cat-music.

  ‘You’ve got a lot of Byron books,’ she says when she comes out. ‘Is he your favourite?’

  ‘I’m working on Byron. On his time in Italy.’

  ‘Didn’t he die young?’

  ‘Thirty-six. They all died young. Or dried up. Or went mad and were locked away. But Italy wasn’t where Byron died. He died in Greece. He went to Italy to escape a scandal, and settled there. Settled down. Had the last big love-affair of his life. Italy was a popular destination for the English in those days. They believed the Italians were still in touch with their natures. Less hemmed in by convention, more passionate.’

  She makes another circuit of the room. ‘Is this your wife?’ she asks, stopping before the framed photograph on the coffee-table.

  ‘My mother. Taken when she was young.’

  ‘Are you married?’

  ‘I was. Twice. But now I’m not.’ He does not say: Now I make do with what comes my way. He does not say: Now I make do with whores. ‘Can I offer you a liqueur?’

  She does not want a liqueur, but does accept a shot of whisky in her coffee. As she sips, he leans over and touches her cheek. ‘You’re very lovely,’ he says. ‘I’m going to invite you to do something reckless.’ He touches her again. ‘Stay. Spend the night with me.’

  Across the rim of the cup she regards him steadily. ‘Why?’

  ‘Because you ought to.’

  ‘Why ought I to?’

  ‘Why? Because a woman’s beauty does not belong to her alone. It is part of the bounty she brings into the world. She has a duty to share it.’

  His hand still rests against her cheek. She does not withdraw, but does not yield either.

  ‘And what if I already share it?’ In her voice there is a hint of breathlessness. Exciting, always, to be courted: exciting, pleasurable.

  ‘Then you should share it more widely.’

  Smooth words, as old as seduction itself. Yet at this moment he believes in them. She does not own herself. Beauty does not own itself.

  ‘From fairest creatures we desire increase,’ he says, ‘that thereby beauty’s rose might never die.’

  Not a good move. Her smile loses its playful, mobile quality. The pentameter, whose cadence once served so well to oil the serpent’s words, now only estranges. He has become a teacher again, man of the book, guardian of the culture-hoard. She puts down her cup. ‘I must leave, I’m expected.’

  The clouds have cleared, the stars are shining. ‘A lovely night,’ he says, unlocking the garden gate. She does not look up. ‘Shall I walk you home?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Very well. Good night.’ He reaches out, enfolds her. For a moment he can feel her little breasts against him. Then she slips his embrace and is gone.

  THREE

  THAT IS WHERE he ought to end it. But he does not. On Sunday morning he drives to the empty campus and lets himself into the department office. From the filing cabinet he extracts Melanie Isaacs’s enrolment card and copies down her personal details: home address, Cape Town address, telephone number.

  He dials the number. A woman’s voice answers.

  ‘Melanie?’

  ‘I’ll call her. Who is speaking?’

  ‘Tell her, David Lurie.’

  Melanie – melody: a meretricious rhyme. Not a good name for her. Shift the accent. Meláni: the dark one.

  ‘Hello?’

  In the one word he hears all her uncertainty. Too young. She will not know how to deal with him; he ought to let her go. But he is in the grip of something. Beauty’s rose: the poem drives straight as an arrow. She does not own herself; perhaps he does not own himself either.

  ‘I thought you might like to go out to lunch,’ he says. ‘I’ll pick you up at, shall we say, twelve.’

  There is still time for her to tell a lie, wriggle out. But she is too confused, and the moment passes.

  When he arrives, she is waiting on the sidewalk outside her apartment block. She is wearing black tights and a black sweater. Her hips are as slim as a twelve-year-old’s.

  He takes her to Hout Bay, to the harbourside. During the drive he tries to put her at ease. He asks about her other courses. She is acting in a play, she says. It is one of her diploma requirements. Rehearsals are taking up a lot of her time.

  At the restaurant she has no appetite, stares out glumly over the sea.

  ‘Is something the matter? Do you want to tell me?’

  She shakes her head.

  ‘Are you worried about the two of us?’

  ‘Maybe,’ she says.

  ‘No need. I’ll take care. I won’t let it go too far.’

  Too far. What is far, what is too far, in a matter like this? Is her too far the same as his too far?

  It has begun to rain: sheets of water waver across the empty bay. ‘Shall we leave?’ he says.

  He takes her back to his house. On the living-room floor, to the sound of rain pattering against the windows, he makes love to her. Her body is clear, simple, in its way perfect; though she is passive throughout, he finds the act pleasurable, so pleasurable that from its climax he tumbles into blank oblivion.

  When he comes back the rain has stopped. The girl is lying beneath him, her eyes closed, her hands slack above her head, a slight frown on her face. His own hands are under her coarse-knit sweater, on her breasts. Her tights and panties lie in a tangle on the floor; his trousers are around his ankles. After the storm, he thinks: straight out of George Grosz.

  Averting her face, she frees herself, gathers her things, leaves the room. In a few minutes she is back, dressed. ‘I must go,’ she whispers. He makes no effort to detain her.

  He wakes the next morning in a state of profound wellbeing, which does not go away. Melanie is not in class. From his office he telephones a florist. Roses? Perhaps not roses. He orders carnations. ‘Red or white?’ asks the woman. Red? White? ‘Send twelve pink,’ he says. ‘I haven’t got twelve pink. Shall I send a mix?’ ‘Send a mix,’ he says.

  Rain falls all of Tuesday, from heavy clouds blown in over the city from the west. Crossing the lobby of the Communications Building at the end of the day, he spies her at the doorway amid a knot of students waiting for a break in the downpour. He comes up behind her, puts a hand on her shoulder. ‘Wait for me here,’ he says. ‘I’ll give you a ride home.’

  He returns with an umbrella. Crossing the square to the parking lot he draws her closer to shelter her. A sudden gust blows the umbrella inside out; awkwardly they run together to the car.

  She is wearing a slick yellow raincoat; in the car she lowers the hood. Her face is flushed; he is aware of the rise and fall of her chest. She licks away a drop of rain from her upper lip. A child! he thinks: No more than a child! What am I doing? Yet his heart lurches with desire.

  They drive through dense late-afternoon traffic. ‘I missed you yesterday,’ he says. ‘Are you all right?’

  She does not reply, staring at the wiper blades.

  At a red light he takes her cold hand in his. ‘Melanie!’ he says, trying to keep his tone light. But he has forgotten how to woo. The voice he hears belongs to a cajoling parent, not a lover.

  He draws up before her apartment block. ‘Thanks,’ she says, opening the car door.

  ‘Aren’t you going to invite me in?’

  ‘I think my flatmate is home.’

  ‘What about this evening?’

  ‘I’ve got a rehearsal this evening.’

  ‘Then when do I see you again?’

  She does not answer. ‘Thanks,’ she repeats, and slides out.

  On Wednesday she is in class, in her usual seat. They are still on Wordsworth, on Book 6 of The Prelude, the poet in the Alps.

  ‘From a bare ridge,’ he reads aloud,

  we also first beheld

  Unveiled the summit of Mont Blanc, and grieved
/>   To have a soulless image on the eye

  That had usurped upon a living thought

  That never more could be.

  ‘So. The majestic white mountain, Mont Blanc, turns out to be a disappointment. Why? Let us start with the unusual verb form usurp upon. Did anyone look it up in a dictionary?’

  Silence.

  ‘If you had, you would have found that usurp upon means to intrude or encroach upon. Usurp, to take over entirely, is the perfective of usurp upon; usurping completes the act of usurping upon.

  ‘The clouds cleared, says Wordsworth, the peak was unveiled, and we grieved to see it. A strange response, for a traveller to the Alps. Why grieve? Because, he says, a soulless image, a mere image on the retina, has encroached upon what has hitherto been a living thought. What was that living thought?’

  Silence again. The very air into which he speaks hangs listless as a sheet. A man looking at a mountain: why does it have to be so complicated, they want to complain? What answer can he give them? What did he say to Melanie that first evening? That without a flash of revelation there is nothing. Where is the flash of revelation in this room?

  He casts a quick glance at her. Her head is bowed, she is absorbed in the text, or seems to be.

  ‘The same word usurp recurs a few lines later. Usurpation is one of the deeper themes of the Alps sequence. The great archetypes of the mind, pure ideas, find themselves usurped by mere sense-images.

  ‘Yet we cannot live our daily lives in a realm of pure ideas, cocooned from sense-experience. The question is not, How can we keep the imagination pure, protected from the onslaughts of reality? The question has to be, Can we find a way for the two to coexist?

  ‘Look at line 599. Wordsworth is writing about the limits of sense-perception. It is a theme we have touched on before. As the sense-organs reach the limit of their powers, their light begins to go out. Yet at the moment of expiry that light leaps up one last time like a candle-flame, giving us a glimpse of the invisible. The passage is difficult; perhaps it even contradicts the Mont Blanc moment. Nevertheless, Wordsworth seems to be feeling his way toward a balance: not the pure idea, wreathed in clouds, nor the visual image burned on the retina, overwhelming and disappointing us with its matter-of-fact clarity, but the sense-image, kept as fleeting as possible, as a means toward stirring or activating the idea that lies buried more deeply in the soil of memory.’