Kiss of the Spider Woman

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Copyright

  About the Author

  Also by Manuel Puig

  Kiss of the Spider Woman

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Footnotes

  This eBook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  Epub ISBN: 9781407054094

  Version 1.0

  www.randomhouse.co.uk

  Published by Vintage 1991

  17 19 20 18 16

  Copyright © Manuel Puig 1976

  This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser

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  ISBN 9780099342007

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  About the Author

  Manuel Puig was born in 1932 in a small town in the Argentine pampas. He studied philosophy at the University of Buenos Aires, and in 1956 won a scholarship from the Italian Institute in Buenos Aires and chose to pursue studies in film direction at the Cinecitta in Rome. There he worked in films until 1962, where he began to write his first novel. Exiled from Argentina, he settled in New York City in 1963. Puig’s novels – Betrayed by Rita Hayworth, Heartbreak Tango, The Buenos Aires Affair, Kiss of the Spider Woman and Eternal Curse on the Reader of These Pages – have been translated into fourteen languages and secured his international reputation. He died in July 1990.

  ALSO BY MANUEL PUIG

  Betrayed by Rita Hayworth

  Heartbreak Tango

  The Buenos Aires Affair

  Eternal Curse on the Reader of These Pages

  CHAPTER 1

  * * *

  —Something a little strange, that’s what you notice, that she’s not a woman like all the others. She looks fairly young, twenty-five, maybe a little more, petite face, a little catlike, small turned-up nose. The shape of her face, it’s . . . more roundish than oval, broad forehead, pronounced cheeks too but then they come down to a point, like with cats.

  —What about her eyes?

  —Clear, pretty sure they’re green, half-closed to focus better on the drawing. She looks at her subject: the black panther at the zoo, which was quiet at first, stretched out in its cage. But when the girl made a noise with her easel and chair, the panther spotted her and began pacing back and forth in its cage and to growl at the girl, who up to then was still having trouble with shading in the drawing.

  —Couldn’t the animal smell her before that?

  —No, there’s a big slab of meat in the cage, that’s all it can smell. The keeper drops the meat near the bars, and it blocks out any smell from outside, that’s the point, so the panther won’t get excited. And noticing the anger of the wild animal the girl begins to work more feverishly, with faster and faster strokes, and she draws the face of an animal that’s also a devil. And the panther watches her, a male panther, and it’s hard to tell if he’s watching to tear her to pieces and make a meal of her, or if he’s driven by some other, still uglier instinct.

  —Nobody else at the zoo that day?

  —No, almost nobody. It’s winter, it’s freezing. The trees are bare in the park. There’s a cold wind blowing. So the girl’s practically by herself, sitting there on the folding chair she brought out herself, along with the easel to clip her drawing paper to. A little further off, near the giraffe cage, there’s some boys with their schoolteacher, but they go away quickly, the cold’s too much for them.

  —And she’s not cold?

  —No, she’s not thinking about the cold, it’s as if she’s in some other world, all wrapped up in herself drawing the panther.

  —If she’s wrapped up inside herself, she’s not in some other world. That’s a contradiction.

  —Yes, that’s right, she’s all wrapped up in herself, lost in that world she carries inside her, that she’s just beginning to discover. She has her legs crossed, her shoes are black, thick high heels, open toed, with dark-polished toenails sticking out. Her stockings glitter, that kind they turned inside out when the sheen went out of style, her legs look flushed and silky, you can’t tell if it’s the stockings or her skin.

  —Look, remember what I told you, no erotic descriptions. This isn’t the place for it.

  —Whatever you want. Okay then, she’s wearing gloves, but to get on with her drawing she slips off the right one. Her fingernails are longish, they’re painted almost black, and the fingers are white, until the cold begins to turn them slightly blue. She stops working for a minute, puts one hand inside her coat to warm it. It’s a heavy coat, black plush, very padded in the shoulders, but thick plush, more like the coat of a Persian cat, no, a lot thicker. And who’s there behind her? Someone tries to light a cigarette, the wind blowing out the flame of the match.

  —Who is it?

  —Wait. She hears the striking of the match and it startles her, she spins around. It’s a guy, kind of good-looking, not a pretty boy, just a likable face, hat brim turned down and a baggy overcoat, full-cut trousers. He touches the brim of his hat by way of introduction and apologizes, tells her it’s sensational that drawing. She sees the guy’s okay, face gives him away, he’s the quiet, understanding type. With her fingers she touches up the hairdo a little, partly messed by the wind. It’s cut in bangs with curls, and down to the shoulders, that’s how they used to wear it, with little curls at the ends too, almost like a permanent wave.

  —I picture her dark-looking, not too tall, really nice figure, and she moves like a cat. A real piece.

  —Who didn’t want to get aroused?

  —Go on.

  —She answers that he didn’t frighten her. But with all this, and the business of fixing her hair, the page works loose and the wind blows it away. The fellow runs and catches it, he brings it back to the girl and offers an apology. She says it’s nothing, and by the accent he can tell she’s a foreigner. The girl explains to him she’s a refugee, she studied fine arts in Budapest, when the war broke out she left for New York. He asks her if she’s homesick for her city, and it’s as if
a dark cloud passes over her eyes, the whole expression of her face darkens and she says she doesn’t come from a city, she’s from the mountains, way off in the Carpathians.

  —Where Dracula comes from.

  —Mmm-hmm, those mountains with dark forests, where wild beasts live who go mad with hunger in the wintertime and have to come down into the villages to kill. And people are scared to death, and hang sheep and other dead animals in their doorways and make vows, for protection. After all that, the fellow wants to see her again, and she tells him she’ll be back to draw again tomorrow afternoon, like almost every day recently, whenever there’s been sun. Then you see him in his studio, he’s an architect, the next afternoon with his architect colleagues and his assistant, a young woman, who’s an architect too. But when three o’clock comes and not much daylight’s left, he gets the urge to put away his compass and ruler and go over to the zoo, almost directly across the way in Central Park. The assistant asks him where he’s going, and why he’s so happy. He treats her like a friend but it’s obvious that deep down she’s in love with him, even though she hides it.

  —She’s a dog?

  —No, friendly face, chestnut hair, nothing out of this world, but nice enough. He leaves without giving her the pleasure of knowing where he’s going. It upsets her but she doesn’t let anybody see and buries herself in work so that she doesn’t get more depressed. At the zoo it still hasn’t begun to get dark yet, it’s been a day with very strange light for wintertime, everything seems to stand out more sharply than ever, the black bars, the white tile walls of the cages, the gravel looks white too, and the leafless trees gray with no leaves. And the bloodred eyes of the beasts. But the girl, whose name is Irena, isn’t there. Days go by and the architect can’t forget her, until one day walking down some fashionable avenue something in the window of an art gallery catches his attention. They’re showing works by an artist who draws nothing but panthers. The architect walks in, Irena’s there, getting congratulated from all sides. And I don’t know exactly what happens then.

  —Try to remember.

  —Wait a minute . . . I don’t know if this is when someone gives her a greeting that scares her . . . Anyway, then the architect congratulates her too and notices something different in Irena, something like happiness, she’s got no dark look in her eyes like the first time. And he invites her to a restaurant and she walks out on all those critics, and they go off together. She looks as though she can walk down the street for the first time, like she’d been a prisoner, and now she’s free to go wherever she wants.

  —But you said he takes her to a restaurant, not wherever she wants.

  —Hey, don’t take me so literally. Anyhow, when he stops in front of some restaurant, Hungarian or Rumanian, something like that, she starts feeling funny again. He thought she’d enjoy being taken someplace like that, with her own kind of people, but it backfires on him. And he figures something’s going on and asks her. She lies and says something about memories of the war, which is still going strong at the time. Then he tells her they can go someplace else for lunch. But she realizes that he, the poor guy, doesn’t have much time, he’s on his lunch break and has to go back to the studio later. So she gets a grip on herself and walks into the restaurant, and everything’s fine, because the atmosphere’s relaxed and the food’s good, and she’s back to feeling how pleasant life is.

  —And him?

  —He’s happy, because he sees how to please him she got her complex under control, just the way he planned, to go there in the first place, to please her. The kind of thing when two people get to know each other and things start working. And he’s so swept off his feet by her he decides not to go back to work that afternoon. He tells her how he happened by the gallery by chance, that he was actually out on another errand to buy a present.

  —For the other girl, the assistant.

  —How did you know?

  —Didn’t, just guessed it.

  —You saw the film.

  —No, I swear. Go on.

  —And the girl, Irena I mean, says that then they can go do that errand. Well, right away, he wonders if he has enough cash to buy two identical presents, one for the assistant’s birthday and another for Irena, so he can win her over completely. On the way Irena says how this afternoon, oddly enough, it doesn’t make her sad to see it getting so dark already, when it’s only three in the afternoon. He asks her why the nightfall upsets her, is it because she’s afraid of the dark. She thinks about it and answers yes. And he stops in front of the store where they’re going and she stares at the window uncomfortably, it turns out to be a petshop that only sells birds, marvelous, in cages you can see from the window there are all kinds of birds happily flying from one perch to another, or swinging back and forth on swings, or pecking at little shreds of lettuce, or birdseed, or taking sips of cool water, freshly changed for them.

  —Wait a minute . . . Is there any water in the bottle?

  —Mmm-hmm, I refilled it when they let me out of the john.

  —Oh, that’s all right then.

  —You want a little? It’s nice and fresh.

  —No, just so there’s no problem with tea in the morning. Go on.

  —Don’t worry so much, we have enough for the whole day.

  —But I’m getting into bad habits. I forgot to bring it along when they opened the door for showers, if it wasn’t for you remembering, we’d be stuck without water later on.

  —There’s plenty, I’m telling you . . . But when the two of them walk into the petshop it’s as if who knows what walked in, the Devil himself. The birds go crazy, flying at the bars of their cages, blind with fear, beating their wings. The owner doesn’t know what to do. The little birds squawk with terror, but it’s like the squawking of vultures, not some little birdsong. She grabs the architect by the arm and pulls him outside. The birds calm down right away. She asks if he’d mind her leaving. They make a date and separate until the next night. He goes back into the petshop, the birds go on singing peacefully, he buys a little canary for the other one’s birthday. And afterwards . . . well, I don’t remember so clearly what comes next, guess I’m tired.

  —Go on a little more.

  —Just that I get sleepy and forget the film. What do you say we go on with it tomorrow?

  —If you really don’t remember, better go on tomorrow.

  —I’ll pick it up in the morning then.

  —No, it’s better at night, during the day I don’t want to be thinking about such trivia. I’ve got more important things to think about.

  — . . .

  —If I’m not busy reading and I’m still keeping quiet, it’s just because I’m thinking. So don’t take it personally.

  —No, it’s okay. I’m not going to disturb you, don’t worry.

  —I knew you’d understand, I really appreciate it. Good night.

  —Night. Sweet dreams of Irena.

  —I prefer the assistant.

  —I figured that already. Ciao.

  —Good night.

  —We left off where he went back into the petshop and the birds weren’t scared of him. It was her they were scared of.

  —I didn’t say that, you thought that up yourself.

  —All right, what happens?

  —Well, they go on seeing one another and they fall in love. She fascinates him incredibly, because she’s so strange, on the one hand so openly affectionate, and always looking at him, caressing him, putting her arms around him, but as soon as he wants to hold her close and kiss her she slips away and barely lets his lips brush against her. She asks him not to kiss her, just to let her kiss him, very tender kisses, but like a baby’s, with her lips so soft and fleshy, but shut.

  —Back then, there was no sex in movies.

  —Wait and you’ll see. The thing is that one night he takes her out to that same restaurant again, which isn’t first-class but very quaint, with checkered tablecloths and everything in dark wood, or no, it must be stone, no, wait, now I know, i
nside it’s like being in a log cabin, with gaslight and just candles on the tables. And he lifts up his glass of wine, his goblet, and proposes a toast, because tonight a man who is very much in love is going to commit himself to marry if his chosen one will accept him. And her eyes fill up with tears, but from being so happy. They touch goblets and drink without saying another word, just holding hands. All of a sudden she lets go of his hand: she’s seen someone coming over to their table. It’s a woman, beautiful-looking at first sight, but a second later you notice something really strange about her face, something frightening and yet it’s hard to know what it is. Because it’s a woman’s face but it’s also the face of a cat. The eyes slant up, and so peculiar, I don’t know how to tell you, she has no whites to her eyes, her eyes are completely green in color, with black pupils at the center, and nothing else. And her skin very pale, as if she had a lot of powder on.

  —But you told me she was pretty.

  —Yes, she’s beautiful. And from the strange outfit it’s obvious she’s European, her hair fixed in a sausage roll.

  —What’s a sausage roll?

  —Like a . . . how can I explain it to you? a chignon . . . a coil of hair something like a tube that goes around the head, over the forehead and all the way around in back.

  —Doesn’t matter, go on.

  —But come to think of it maybe I’m wrong, I think she had more of a braid around her head, that’s more like that part of the world. And a long dress down to the floor, and a fox stole over her shoulders. And she comes to the table and looks at Irena as if with hatred, or not quite, more the way a hypnotist looks, but an evil look in every way. And she speaks to Irena in an incredibly strange language, pausing there by the table. And he, being a gentleman, gets up from his chair at the approach of a lady, but this minx doesn’t even look at him and says something else to Irena. Irena answers her in that same dialect, but very frightened. He can’t understand one word of what they’re saying. Then, so he’ll understand too, the woman says to Irena: “I recognized you instantly, but you know why. Be seeing you . . .” And she walks away, without having so much as looked at the guy. Irena is petrified, her eyes are filled with tears, but dark tears, looking like filthy water from a puddle. She gets up without a word and wraps a long scarf, a white one, over her head, he drops some money on the table and walks out with her, taking her by the arm. They don’t say anything to each other, he sees that she’s frightened. Looking over at Central Park, it’s snowing lightly, the snow deadens every sound and noise, the cars almost slide down the street, very quietly, the streetlamp lights up the pure white snowflakes that are falling, and it’s as though way off somewhere the cries of wild animals can be heard. And that’s not so unlikely, because just a little distance from there is the city zoo, in that same park. She can’t seem to go on, she begs him to hold her close. He holds her in his arms. She’s shivering, from cold or from fear, although the distant cries seemed to have died down. She tells him, almost in a whisper, that she’s afraid to go home and spend the night alone. A taxi comes by, he signals it to pull over and the two of them get in without saying a word. They go to his apartment, not talking the whole way there. His building, it’s one of those old apartment houses, very well kept up, carpets, very high-beamed ceiling, dark wooden staircases all hand-carved, and there in the entranceway by the foot of the stairs a giant palm set into a magnificent urn. It must have had Chinese motifs. The palm is reflected in a tall mirror with a very elaborate frame, also carved like the staircase. She looks at herself in the mirror, examines her face, as if searching for something in her own features. There’s no elevator, he lives on the first floor. Their footsteps can barely be heard on the carpet, like out in the snow. Apartment’s huge, with everything turn-of-the-century, very proper, the fellow’s mother had it first.