The Four-Chambered Heart (2 page)

As they walked along the quays, as they passed
the station through a street being repaired, she picked up one of the red
lanterns left by the repair men, and carried it, all lit, across the bridge.
Halay they met the same policeman who had helped her find the barge. Djuna
thought: “He will arrest me for stealing a street lantern.”

But the policeman did not stop her. He smiled,
knowing where she was going, and merely appraised Rango’s build as they passed.

The old watchman appeared suddenly at the trap
door and shouted: “Hey, there! Who goes there? Oh, it’s you, petite madame.
Wait. I’ll open for you.” And he threw the trap door fully open.

They descended the turning stairway and Rango
smelled the tar with delight. When he saw the room, the shadows, the beams, he
exclaimed: “It’s like
The Tales of Hoffmann.
It’s a dream. It’s a fairy
tale.”

Old grandfather of the river, ex-captain of a
pleasure yacht, snorted insolently at this remark and went back to his cabin.

“This is what I wanted,” said Rango.

He bent down to enter the very small room at
the tip of the barge which was like a small pointed prison with barred windows.
The enormous anchor chain hung before the iron bars. The floor had been worn
away, rotted with dampness, and they could see through the holes the layer of
water which lies at the bottom of every ship, like the possessive fingers of
the sea and the river asserting its ownership of the boat.

Rango said: “If ever you’re unfaithful to me, I
will lock you up in this room.”

With the tall shadows all around them, the
medieval beams cracking above their heads, the lapping water, the mildew at the
bottom, the anchor chain’s rusty plaintiveness, Djuna believed his words.

“Djuna, you’re taking me to the bottom of the
sea to live, like a real mermaid.”

“I must be a mermaid, Rango. I have no fear of
depths and a great fear of shallow living. But you, poor Rango, you’re from the
mountain, water is not your element. You won’t be happy.”

“Men from the mountains always dream of the
sea, and above all things I love to travel. Where are we sailing now?”

As he said this, another barge passed up the
river close to theirs. The whole barge heaved; the large wooden frame cracked
like a giant’s bones.

Rango lay down and said: “We’re navigating.”

“We’re out of the world. All the dangers are
outside, out in the world.” All the dangers…dangers to the love, they believed
as all lovers believe, came from the outside, from the world, never suspecting
the seed of death of love might lie within themselves.

“I want to keep you here, Djuna. I would like
it if you never left the barge.”

“I wouldn’t mind staying here.”

(If it were not for Zora, Zora awaiting food,
awaiting medicines, awaiting Rango to light the fire.)

“Rango, when you kiss me the barge rocks.”

The red lantern threw fitful shadows, feverish
red lights, over their faces. He named it the aphrodisiac lamp.

He lighted a fire in the stove. He threw his
cigarette into the water. He kissed her feet, untied her shoes, he unrolled her
stockings.

They heard something fall into the water.

“It’s a flying fish,” said Djuna.

He laughed: “There are no flying fish in the
river, except you. When you’re in my arms, I know you’re mine. But your feet
are so swift, so swift, they carry you as lightly as wings, I never know where,
too fast, too fast away from me.”

He rubbed his face, not as everyone does, with
the palm of the hand. He rubbed it with his fists closed as children do, as
bears and cats do.

He caressed her with such fervor that the
little red lantern fell on the floor, the red glass broke, the oil burst into
many small wild flames. She watched it without fear. Fire delighted her, and
she had always wanted to live near danger.

After the oil was absorbed by the thick dry
wooden floor, the fire died out.

They fell asleep.

The drunken grandfather of the river,
ex-captain of a pleasure yacht, had lived alone on the barge for a long time.
He had been the sole guardian and owner of it. Rango’s big body, his dark
Indian skin, his wild black hair, his low and vehement voice frightened the old
man.

When Rango lit the stove at night in their
bedroom, the old man in his cabin would begin to curse him for the noise he
made.

Also he resented that Rango did not let him
wait on Djuna, and he would mutter against him when he was drunk, mutter
threats in apache language.

One night Djuna arrived a little before
midnight. A windy night with dead leaves blowing in circles. She was always
afraid to walk alone down the stairs from the quays. There were no lights. She
stumbled on hobos asleep, on whores plying their trade behind the trees
.
She
tried to overcome her fear and would run down the steps along the edge of the
river.

But finally they had agreed that she would
throw a stone from the street to the roof of the barge to warn Rango of her
arrival and that he would meet her at the top of the stairs.

This night she tried to laugh at her fears and
to walk down alone. But when she reached the barge there was no light in the
bedroom, and no Rango to meet her, but the old watcan popped out of the trap
door, vacillating with drink, red-eyed and stuttering.

Djuna said: “Has Monsieur arrived?”

“Of course, he’s in there. Why don’t you come
down? Come down, come down.”

But Djuna did not see any light in the room,
and she knew that if Rango were there, he would hear her voice and come out to
meet her.

The old watchman kept the trap door open,
saying as he stamped his feet: “Why don’t you come down? What’s the matter with
you?” with more and more irritability.

Djuna knew he was drunk. She feared him, and
she started to leave. As his rage grew, she felt more and more certain she
should leave.

The old watchman’s imprecations followed her.

Alone at the top of the stairs, in the silence,
in the dark, she was filled with fears. What was the old man doing there at the
trap door? Had he hurt Rango? Was Rango in the room? The old watchman had been
told he could no longer stay on the barge. Perhaps he had avenged himself. If
Rango were hurt, she would die of sorrow.

Perhaps Rango had come by way of the other
bridge.

It was one o’clock. She would throw another
stone on the roof and see if he responded.

As she picked up the stone, Rango arrived.

Returning to the barge together, they found the
old watchman still there, muttering to himself.

Rango was quick to anger and violence. He said:
“You’ve been told to move out. You can leave immediately.”

The old watchman locked himself in his cabin
and continued to hurl insults.

“I won’t leave for eight days,” he shouted. “I
was captain once, and I can be a captain any time I choose again. No black man
is going to get me out of here. I have a right to be here.”

Rango wanted to throw him out, but Djuna held
him back.

“He’s drunk. He’ll be quiet tomorrow.”

All night the watchman danced, spat, snored,
cursed, and threatened. He drummed on his tin plate.

Rango’s anger grew, and Djuna remembered other
people saying: “The old man is stronger than he looks. I’ve seen him knock down
a man like nothing.” She knew Rango was stronger, but she feared the old man’s
treachery. A stab in the back, an investigation, a scandal. Above all, Rango
might be hurt.

“Leave the barge and let me attend to him,”
said Rango. Djuna dissuaded him, calmed his anger, and they fell asp at dawn.

When they came out at noon, the old watchman
was already on the quays, drinking red wine with the hobos, spitting into the
river as they passed, with ostentatious disdain.

The bed was low on the floor; the tarred beams
creaked over their heads. The stove was snoring heat, the river water patted
the barge’s sides, and the street lamps from the bridge threw a faint yellow
light into the room.

When Rango began to take Djuna’s shoes off, to
warm her feet in his hands, the old man of the river began to shout and sing,
throwing his cooking pans against the wall:

Nanette gives freely

what others charge for.

Nanette is generous,

Nanette gives love

Under a red lantern

Rango leaped up, furious, eyes and hair
wild, big body tense, and rushed to the old man’s cabin. He knocked on the
door. The song stopped for an instant, and was resumed:

Nanette wore a ribbon

In her black hair.

Nanette never counted

All she gave…

Then he drummed on his tin plate and was
silent.

“Open the door!” shouted Rango.

Silence.

Then Rango hurled himself against the door,
which gave way and tore into splinters.

The old watchman lay half naked on a pile of
rags, with his beret on his head, soup stains on his beard, holding a stick
which shook from terror.

Rango looked like Peter the Great, six feet
tall, black hair flying, all set for battle.

“Get out of here!”

The old man was dazed with drunkenness, and he
refused to move. His cabin smelled so badly that Djuna stepped back. There were
pots and pans all over the floor, unwashed, and hundreds of old wine bottles
exuding a rancid odor.

Rango forced Djuna back into e bedroom and went
to fetch the police.

Djuna heard Rango return with the policeman,
and heard his explanations. She heard the policeman say to the watchman: “Get
dressed. The owner told you to leave. I have an injunction here. Get dressed.”

The watchman lay there, fumbling for his
clothes. He could not find the top of his pants. He kept looking down into one
of the pant’s legs as if surprised at its smallness. He mumbled. The policeman
waited. They could not dress him because he would turn limp. He kept muttering:
“Well, what do I care? I used to be captain of a yacht. Something white and
smart, not one of these broken-down barges. I used to have a white suit, too.
Suppose you do throw me into the river, it’s all the same to me. I don’t care
if I die. I’m not a bad old man. I run errands for you, don’t I? I fetch water,
don’t I? I bring coal. What if I do sing a bit at night?”

“You don’t just sing a bit,” said Rango. “You
make a hell of a noise every time you come home. You bang your pails together,
you raise hell, you bang on the walls, you’re always drunk, you fall down the
stairs.”

“I was sound asleep, wasn’t I? Sound asleep, I
tell you. Who knocked the door down, tell me? Who broke into my cabin? I’ll not
get out. I can’t find my pants. These aren’t mine, they’re too small.”

Then he began to sing:

Laissez moi tranquille,

Je ferais le mort.

Ma chandelle est morte

Et ma femme aussi.

Then Rango, the policeman, and Djuna all began
to laugh. No one could stop laughing. The old man looked so dazed and innocent.

“You can stay if you’re quiet,” said Rango.

“If you’re not quiet,” said the policeman,
“I’ll come back and fetch you and throw you in jail.”

“
Je ferais le mort
,”said the old man.
“You’ll never know I’m here.”

He was now thoroughly bewildered and docile.
“But no one has a right to knock a door down. What manners, I tell you! I’ve
knocked men down often enough, but never knocked a door down. No privacy left. No
manners.”

When Rango returned to the bedroom, he found
Djuna still laughing. He opened his arms. She hid her face against his coat and
said: “You know, I love the way you broke that door.” She felt relieved of some
secret accumulation of violence, as one does watching a storm of nature,
thunder and lightning discharging anger for us.

“I loved your breaking down that door,”
repeated Djuna.

Through Rango she had breathed some other realm
she had never attained before. She had touched through his act some climate of
violence she had never known before.

The Seine River began to swell from the rains
and to rise high above the watermark painted on the stones in the Middle Ages.
It covered the quays at first with a thin layer of water, and the hobos quartered
under the bridge had to move to their country homes under the trees. Then it
lapped the foot of the stairway, ascended one step, and then another, and at
last settled at the eighth, deep enough to drown a man.

The barges stationed there rose with it; the
barge dwellers had to lower their rowboats and row to shore, climb up a rope
ladder to the wall, climb over the wall to the firm ground. Strollers loved to
watch this ritual, like a gentle invasion of the city by the barges’
population.