Woman in the Fifth

have been happy working out of such an apartment, I sensed. So too would an immigre writer … or an immigre translator.

‘This is a lovely place,’ I said.

‘If you don’t mind things being a little on the old-fashioned side. There are times when I think I should update it, move into the modern world. But that’s impossible for me.’

‘Because of your Luddite tendencies?’

‘Perhaps.’

‘You actually work on an old manual typewriter?’

‘I cannot deal with computers.’

‘Or with CDs?’

‘My father had a fantastic collection of records, which was sent on after my mother and I left for Paris.’

‘Your dad didn’t come with you?’

‘He died before we left Hungary.’

‘A sudden death?’

‘That is correct,’ she said in a voice that hinted I shouldn’t press further. ‘Anyway, he was a music fanatic, so he had this huge collection. When we left Budapest, we traveled with just a small suitcase each. Later on, when we had immigre status here, we had to apply to the Hungarian government to get certain personal effects shipped here. Among the things that arrived from our old apartment was Papa’s record collection. Over the years, I added to it myself — but then, when the compact disc arrived, I thought, I have all the music I will ever need, so why switch over? ‘

‘You mean, you don’t like that consumerist frisson called shopping?’

‘Shopping is an act of despair.’

‘That’s extreme.’

She lit up a cigarette.

‘But true. It’s what people do with their time now. It’s the great cultural activity of this epoch — and it speaks volumes about the complete emptiness of modern life.’

I laughed … a little nervously.

‘Well, I certainly need a drink after that homily,’ I said. ‘And in “an act of total despair”, I bought you this.’

I handed her the brown paper bag. She pulled the bottle out of the bag.

‘I don’t know if it’s a good champagne …’ I said.

‘It will do just fine. Did you get it at the shop three doors up from here?’

‘How did you know … ?’

‘Because it’s my local place. I even remember when Mustapha, the owner, opened it in the early seventies. He’d just arrived from Bone in Algeria …’

‘Camus’ birthplace.’

‘Chapeau,’ she said. ‘Anyway, when he was new in Paris and had just opened the shop, he was timid and eager to please, and was also subjected to a lot of brusqueness, as the idea of a commercant from the Maghreb in this corner of Paris offended many of the long-term residents of the quartier. Now, three decades later, he’s fully assimilated — and subjects everyone who comes into his shop to the same sort of brusqueness he once received.’

She found two glasses in the kitchen, then placed the bottle down on a countertop and undid the foil and gently levered the cork out of the bottle. There was the decisive pop and she filled the two glasses.

‘That was very professional.’

‘I could say something very banal like …’

‘”… if there’s one thing you learn after three decades in Paris, it’s how to open a bottle of champagne”?’

She smiled and handed me a glass. I downed it quickly.

‘Precisely.’

‘But you would never indulge in banalities like that,’ I said.

‘It would offend my Hungarian sense of the sardonic.’

‘Whereas Americans like me …’

‘You toss back half a glass of champagne in one go.’

‘Are you saying I’m uncouth?’

‘My, my, you’re a mind reader.’

She had her face up against mine. I kissed her.

‘Flattery,’ I said, ‘will get you …’

‘Everywhere.’

Now she returned the kiss, then removed the champagne glass from my hand and set it down alongside her own on the kitchen counter. Then turning back to me, she pulled me toward her. I didn’t resist and we were instantly all over each other. Within moments, we had collapsed on the sofa, and she was pulling down my jeans. My hands were everywhere. So were hers. Her mouth didn’t leave mine, and it felt as if we were both trying to devour each other. The idea of using a condom went south. I was suddenly inside her, and responding to her ferocious ardor. Her nails dug into the back of my skull, but I didn’t care. This was pure abandon — and we were both lost within it.

Afterward I lay sprawled across her, half-clothed, completely spent. Beneath me, Margit also looked shellshocked and depleted, her eyes closed, her arms loosely around me. Several silent minutes went by. Then she opened one eye and looked at me and said, ‘Not bad.’

We eventually staggered up from the sofa, and she suggested we take the champagne and get into bed. So I picked up the bottle and the two glasses and followed her to the bedroom. As we took off our clothes I said, ‘Now this is a first for me: taking off my clothes after sex.’

‘Who says the sex is finished for the afternoon?’

‘I’m certainly not proposing that,’ I said, sliding between the stiff white sheets.

‘Good,’ she said.

I watched her finish undressing. She said, ‘Please don’t stare at me like that.’

‘But why? You’re beautiful.’

‘Oh, please. My hips are too wide, my thighs are now fatty, and …’

‘You’re beautiful.’

‘And you are in a post-coital stupor, where all aesthetic discernment goes out the window.’

‘I’ll say it again: you’re beautiful.’

She smiled and crawled in beside me.

‘I appreciate your myopia.’

‘And you say I’m hard on myself.’

‘After fifty, all women think: C’est foutu. It’s finished.’

‘You barely look forty.’

‘You know exactly how old I am.’

‘Yes, I know your deep, dark secret.’

‘That is not my deep, dark secret,’ she said.

‘Then what is?’

‘If it’s a deep, dark secret …’

‘Point taken.’

Pause. I ran my fingers up and down her back, then kissed the nape of her neck.

‘Do you really have a deep, dark secret?’ I asked.

She laughed. And said, ‘My God, you are terribly literal.’

‘All right, I’ll shut up.’

‘And kiss me while you’re at it.’

We made love again. Slowly, without rush at first … but eventually it built up into the same crazed zeal that marked our first encounter on the sofa. She was still remarkably passionate, and threw herself into lovemaking with ravenous intemperance. I had never been with anyone like her — and could only hope that my own ardor came close to the level that she reached.