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OTHER WORKS BY ALAIN ROBBE-GRILLET IN ENGLISH TRANSLATION
The Erasers
The Voyeur
Jealousy
In the Labyrinth
For a New Novel
La Maison de Rendez-vous
Topology of a Phantom City
Recollections of the Golden Triangle
Djinn
Ghosts in the Mirror
Why I Love Barthes
CONTENTS
Selected Dalkey Archive Titles
The first scene goes very fast. Evidently it has already been rehearsed several times: everyone knows his part by heart. Words and gestures follow each other in a relaxed, continuous manner, the links as imperceptible as the necessary elements of some properly lubricated machinery.
Then there is a gap, a blank space, a pause of indeterminate length during which nothing happens, not even the anticipation of what will come next.
And suddenly the action resumes, without warning, and the same scene occurs again … But which scene? I am closing the door behind me, a heavy wooden door with a tiny narrow oblong window near the top, its pane protected by a cast-iron grille (clumsily imitating wrought iron) which almost entirely covers it. The interlacing spirals, thickened by successive layers of black paint, are so close together, and there is so little light from the other side of the door, that nothing can be seen of what might or might not be inside.
The wood around the window is coated with a brownish varnish in which thin lines of a lighter color, lines which are the imitation of imaginary veins running through another substance considered more decorative, constitute parallel networks or networks of only slightly divergent curves outlining darker knots, round or oval or even triangular, a group of changing signs in which I have discerned human figures for a long time: a young woman lying on her left side and facing me, apparently naked since her nipples and pubic hair are discernible; her legs are bent, the left one more than the right, its knee pointing forward, on the floor; the right foot therefore crosses over the left one, the ankles are evidently bound together, just as the wrists are bound behind her back as usual, it would seem, for both arms disappear from view behind the upper part of the body: the left arm below the elbow and the right one just above it.
The face, tilted back, is framed by curling waves of very dark, luxuriant hair spread loose on the tiles. The features themselves are difficult to make out, as much because of the position of the head as because of a broad hank of hair slanting across the forehead, the line of the eyes, and one cheek: the only indisputable detail is the mouth, open in a long cry of suffering or terror. From the left part of the frame spreads a cone of harsh light, emanating from a lamp with a jointed arm whose base is clamped to the comer of a metal desk; the shaft of light has been carefully directed, as though for an interrogation, toward the harmonious curves of amber flesh lying on the floor.
Yet it cannot be an interrogation; the mouth, which has been wide open too long, must be distended by some kind of gag: for example, a piece of black lingerie stuffed between the lips. Besides, a scream, if the girl were screaming, would be audible even through the thick pane of the oblong window with its cast-iron grille.
But now a silver-haired man in a white doctor’s coat appears in the foreground from the right; he is seen from behind, so that only a hint of his face can be glimpsed in profile. He walks toward the bound girl whom he stares at for a moment, standing over her, his own body concealing a part of her legs. The captive must be unconscious, for she does not react to his approach; moreover, a closer look at the gag’s shape and arrangement just under the girl’s nose reveals that it is a wad of cloth soaked in ether which was necessary to overcome the resistance indicated by the disheveled hair.
The doctor bends forward, kneels down on one knee and begins to untie the cords binding her ankles. The girl’s body, docile now, lies prostrate as two steady hands part the knees, spreading the smooth brown thighs which glisten in the lamplight; but the upper part of the body does not lie flat because of the arms which remain bound together behind the back; the breasts, in this change of position, are merely easier to see: firm as two foam-rubber domes and splendidly proportioned, they are slightly paler than the rest of the body, their lovely sepia aureoles (which are not very large, for a half-caste girl) swelling a little around the nipples.
After getting up a moment and taking from the metal desk a sharp-pointed instrument about a foot long, the doctor has resumed his kneeling position, but a little farther to the right, so that his white coat now conceals the upper part of the girl’s thighs. The man’s hands, invisible for the moment, are performing some operation in the pubic region, though its exact nature is difficult to determine. Granted that the patient has been anesthetized, it can scarcely be a question, in any case, of some torture inflicted by a madman upon a victim chosen for her beauty alone. There remains the possibility of an artificial insemination effected by force (the object the surgeon is holding would then be a catheter) or of some other medical experiment of monstrous nature, performed of course without the subject’s consent.
What the person in the white coat was going to do to his captive will never be known, unfortunately, for at this moment the rear door opens quickly and a third figure appears: a tall man who stands motionless in the doorway. He is wearing a tuxedo and his face and head are entirely hidden by a thin soot-colored leather mask with only five openings: a slit for the mouth, two tiny round orifices for the nostrils and two larger ovals for the eyes. These remain fixed on the doctor, who slowly straightens up and begins backing toward the other door, while behind the masked figure appears another one: a short bald man in workman’s clothes with the strap of a toolbox over one shoulder, apparently a plumber, or an electrician, or a locksmith. The whole scene then goes very fast, still without variation.
It has obviously been rehearsed several times: everyone knows his part by heart. The gestures follow each other in a relaxed, continuous manner, the links as imperceptible as the necessary elements of some properly oiled machinery, when suddenly the light goes out. The only thing left in front of me is a dusty pane in which no more than a dim reflection of my own face can be made out, and the housefront behind me, between the interlacing spirals of the heavy black ironwork The surface of the wood around it is coated with a brownish varnish in which thin lines of a lighter color are supposed to represent the grain of the oak. The bolt falls into place with a muffled click, prolonged by a cavernous echo which spreads through the entire mass of the door, immediately dying out into complete silence.
I release the bronze doorknob shaped like a hand holding a skewer or stylus or slender dagger in its sheath, and I turn all the way around to face the street, about to descend the three imitation-stone steps between the threshold and the sidewalk, its asphalt glistening now after the rain, people hurrying by in hopes of reaching home before the next shower, before their delay (they must have waited somewhere a long while) causes alarm, before dinner time, before nightfall.
The click of the lock has set off the customary mechanism: I have forgotten my key inside and I can no longer open the door to get it back. This is