The Abortion: An Historical Romance 1966 Read online

  The Abortion: An Historical Romance 1966

  Richard Brautigan

  A reclusive young man works in a San Francisco library for unpublishable books. Life's losers, an astonishing number of whom seem to be writers, can bring their manuscripts to the library, where they will be welcomed, registered and shelved. They will not be read, but they will be cherished. In comes Vida, with her manuscript. Her book is about her gorgeous body in which she feels uncomfortable. The librarian makes her feel comfortable, and together they live in the back of the library until a trip to Tijuana changes them in ways neither of them had ever expected.

  Richard Brautigan

  The Abortion: An Historical Romance 1966

  DEDICATION

  Frank:

  come on in —

  read novel —

  it’s on table

  in front room.

  I’ll be back

  in about

  2 hours.

  Richard

  Book One: Buffalo Gals, Won’t You Come Out Tonight?

  The Library

  This is a beautiful library, timed perfectly, lush and American. The hour is midnight and the library is deep and carried like a dreaming child into the darkness of these pages. Though the library is ‘closed’ I don’t have to go home because this is my home and has been for years, and besides, I have to be here all the time. That’s part of my position. I don’t want to sound like a petty official, but I am afraid to think what would happen if somebody came and I wasn’t here.

  I have been sitting at this desk for hours, staring into the darkened shelves of books. I love their presence, the way they honour the wood they rest upon.

  I know it’s going to rain.

  Clouds have been playing with the blue style of the sky all day long, moving their heavy black wardrobes in, but so far nothing rain has happened.

  I ‘closed’ the library at nine, but if somebody has a book to bring in, there is a bell they can ring by the door that calls me from whatever I am doing in this place: sleeping, cooking, eating or making love to Vida who will be here shortly.

  She gets off work at 11.30.

  The bell comes from Fort Worth, Texas. The man who brought us the bell is dead now and no one learned his name. He brought the bell and put it down on a table. He seemed embarrassed and left, a stranger, many years ago. It is not a large bell, but it travels intimately along a small silver path that knows the map to our hearing.

  Often books are brought in during the late evening and the early morning hours. I have to be here to receive them. That’s my job. I ‘open’ the library at nine o’clock in the morning and ‘close’ the library at nine in the evening, but I am here twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week to receive the books.

  An old woman brought in a book a couple of days ago at three o’clock in the morning. I heard the bell ringing inside my sleep like a small highway being poured from a great distance into my ear. It woke up Vida, too.

  ‘What is it?' she said.

  ‘It’s the bell,' I said.

  ‘No, it’s a book,’ she said.

  I told her to stay there in bed, to go back to sleep, that I would take care of it. I got up and dressed myself in the proper attitude for welcoming a new book into the library.

  My clothes are not expensive but they are friendly and neat and my human presence is welcoming. People feel better when they look at me.

  Vida had gone back to sleep. She looked nice with her long black hair spread out like a fan of dark lakes upon the pillow. I could not resist lifting up the covers to stare at her long sleeping form.

  A fragrant odour rose like a garden in the air above the incredibly strange thing that was her body, motionless and dramatic lying there.

  I went out and turned on the lights in the library. It looked quite cheerful, even though it was three o’clock in the morning.

  The old woman waited behind the heavy glass of the front door. Because the library is very old-fashioned, the door has a religious affection to it.

  The woman had a look of great excitement. She was very old, eighty I’d say, and wore the type of clothing that associates itself with the poor.

  But no matter… rich or poor… the service is the same and could never be any different.

  ‘I just finished it,’ she said through the heavy glass before I could open the door. Her voice, though slowed down a great deal by the glass, was bursting with joy, imagination and almost a kind of youth.

  ‘I’m glad,’ I said back through the door. I hadn’t quite got it open yet. We were sharing the same excitement through the glass.

  ‘It’s done!’ she said, coming into the library, accompanied by an eighty-year-old lady.

  ‘Congratulations,’ I said. ‘It’s so wonderful to write a book.’

  ‘I walked all the way here,’ she said. ‘I started at midnight. I would have gotten here sooner if I weren`t so old.’

  ‘Where do you live?’ I said.

  ‘The Kit Carson Hotel,’ she said. ‘And I’ve written a book,’ Then she handed it proudly to me as if it were the most precious thing in the world. And it was.

  It was a loose-leaf notebook of the type that you find everywhere in America. There is no place that does not have them.

  There was a heavy label pasted on the cover and written in broad green crayon across the label was the title:

  GROWING FLOWERS BY CANDLELIGHT

  IN HOTEL ROOMS

  BY

  MRS CHARLES FINE ADAMS

  ‘What a wonderful title,’ I said. ‘I don’t think we have a book like this in the entire library. This is a first.’

  She had a big smile on her face which had turned old about forty years ago, eroded by the gases and exiles of youth.

  ‘It has taken me five years to write this book,’ she said. ‘I live at the Kit Carson Hotel and I’ve raised many flowers there in my room. My room doesn’t have any windows, so I have to use candles. They work the best.

  ‘I’ve also raised flowers by lantern light and magnifying glass, but they don’t seem to do well, especially tulips and lilies of the valley. ‘I’ve even tried raising flowers by flashlight, but that was very disappointing. I used three or four flashlights on some marigolds, but they didn’t amount to much.

  ‘Candles work the best. Flowers seem to like the smell of burning wax, if you know what I mean. Just show a flower a candle and it starts growing.’

  I looked through the book. That’s one of the things I get to do here. Actually, I’m the only person who gets to do it. The book was written in longhand with red, green and blue crayons. There were drawings of her hotel room with the flowers growing in the room.

  Her room was very small and there were many flowers in it. The flowers were in tin cans and bottles and jars and they were all surrounded by burning candles.

  Her room looked like a cathedral.

  There was also a drawing of the former manager of the hotel and a drawing of the hotel elevator. The elevator looked like a very depressing place.

  In her drawing of the hotel manager, he appeared to be very unhappy, tired and looked as if he needed a vacation. He also seemed to be looking over his shoulder at something that was about to enter his vision. It was a thing he did not want to see and it was just about there. Under the drawing was written this:

  MANAGER OF THE KIT CARSON HOTEL

  UNTIL HE GOT FIRED

  FOR DRINKING IN THE ELEVATOR

  AND FOR STEALING SHEETS

  The book was about forty pages long. It looked quite interesting and would be a welcomed addition to our collection.

  ‘You’re probably very tired,’ I said. ‘Why do
n’t you sit down and I’ll make you a cup of instant coffee.’

  ‘That would be wonderful,’ she said. ‘It took me five years to write this book about flowers. I’ve worked very hard on it. I love flowers. Too bad my room doesn’t have any windows, but I’ve done the best I can with candles. Tulips do all right.’

  Vida was sound asleep when I went back to my room. I turned on the light and it woke her up. She was blinking and her face had that soft marble quality to it that beautiful women have when they are suddenly awakened and are not quite ready for it yet.

  ‘What’s happening,’ she said. ‘It’s another book,' she replied, answering her own question.

  ‘Yes,' I said.

  ‘What’s it about?’ she said automatically like a gentle human phonograph.

  ‘It’s about growing flowers in hotel rooms.’

  I put the water on for the coffee and sat down beside Vida who curled over and put her head on my lap, so that my lap was entirely enveloped in her watery black hair.

  I could see one of her breasts. It was fantastic!

  ‘Now what’s this about growing flowers in hotel rooms?’ Vida said. ‘It couldn’t be that easy. What’s the real story?’

  ‘By candlelight,’ I said.

  ‘Uh-huh,’ Vida said. Even though I couldn’t see her face, I knew she was smiling. She has funny ideas about the library.

  ‘It’s by an old woman,’ I said. ‘She loves flowers but she doesn't have any windows in her hotel room, so she grows them by candlelight.’

  ‘Oh, baby.' Vida said, in that tone of voice she always uses for the library. She thinks this place is creepy and she doesn’t care for it very much.

  I didn’t answer her. The coffee water was done and I took a spoonful of instant coffee and put it out in a cup.

  ‘Instant coffee?’ Vida said.

  ‘Yes,' I said. ‘I’m making it for the woman who just brought the book in. She’s very old and she walked a great distance to get here. I think she needs a cup of instant coffee.’

  ‘It sounds like she does. Perhaps even a little amyl nitrate for a chaser. I’m just kidding. Do you need any help? I’ll get up.’

  ‘No, honey,’ I said. ‘I can take care of it. Did we eat all those cookies you baked?’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘The cookies are over there in that sack.’ She pointed towards the white paper bag on the table. ‘I think there are a couple of chocolate cookies left.’

  ‘What did you put them in the sack for?’ I said.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘Why does anyone put cookies in a sack? I just did.’

  Vida was resting her head on her elbow and watching me. She was unbelievable; her face, her eyes, her…

  ‘Strong point,’ I said.

  ‘Am I right?’ she said, sleepily.

  ‘Yup.’ I said.

  I took the cup of coffee and put it on a small wooden tray, along with some canned milk and some sugar and a little plate for the cookies.

  Vida had given me the tray as a present. She bought it at Cost Plus Imports and surprised me with it one day. I like surprises. ‘See you later,’ I said. ‘Go back to sleep.’

  ‘OK,’ and pulled the covers up over her head. Farewell, my lovely.

  I took the coffee and cookies out to the old woman. She was sitting at a table with her face resting on her elbow and she was half asleep. There was an expression of dreaming on her face.

  I hated to interrupt her. I know how much a dream can be worth, but, alas… ‘Hello,’ I said.

  ‘Oh, hello,’ she said, breaking the dream cleanly.

  ‘It’s time for some coffee,’ I said.

  ‘Oh, how nice,’ she said. ‘It’s just what I need to wake me up. I’m a little tired because I walked so far. I guess I could have waited until tomorrow and taken the bus here, but I wanted to bring the book out right away because I just finished it at midnight and I’ve been working on it for five years.

  ‘Five Years,’ she repeated, as if it were the name of a country where she was the President and the flowers growing by candlelight in her hotel room were her cabinet and I was the Secretary of Libraries.

  ‘I think I’ll register the book now,’ I said.

  ‘That sounds wonderful,’ she said. ‘These are delicious cookies. Did you bake them yourself?’

  I thought that was a rather strange question for her to ask me. I have never been asked that question before. It startled me. It’s funny how people can catch you off guard with a question about cookies.

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘I didn’t bake these cookies. A friend did.’

  ‘Well, whoever baked them knows how to bake cookies. The chocolate tastes wonderful. So chocolatey.’

  ‘Good,’ I said.

  Now it was time to register the book. We register all the books we receive here in our Library Contents Ledger. It is a record of all the books we get day by day, week by week, month by month, year by year. They all go into the Ledger.

  We don’t use the Dewey decimal classification or any index system to keep track of our books. We record their entrance into the library in the Library Contents Ledger and then we give the book back to its author who is free to place it anywhere he wants in the library, on whatever shelf catches his fancy.

  It doesn’t make any difference where a book is placed because nobody ever checks them out and nobody ever comes here to read them. This is not that kind of library. This is another kind of library.

  ‘I just love these cookies,’ the old woman said, finishing the last cookie. ‘Such a good chocolate flavour. You can’t buy these in a store. Did a friend bake them?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘A very good friend.’

  ‘Well, good for them. There isn’t enough of that thing going on now, if you know what I mean.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Chocolate cookies are good.’

  Vida baked them.

  By now the old woman had finished the last drops of coffee in her cup, but she drank them again, even though they were gone. She wanted to make sure that she did not leave a drop in the cup, even to the point of drinking the last drop of coffee twice.

  I could tell that she was preparing to say good-bye because she was trying to rise from her chair. I knew that she would never return again. This would be her only visit to the library.

  ‘It’s been so wonderful writing a book,’ she said. ‘N0w it’s done and I can return to my hotel room and my flowers. I’m very tired.’

  ‘Your book,’ I said, handing it to her. ‘You are free to put it anywhere you want to in the library, on any shelf you want.’

  ‘How exciting,’ she said.

  She took her book very slowly over to a section where a lot of children are guided by a subconscious track of some kind to place their books on that shelf.

  I don’t remember ever seeing anyone over fifty put a book there before, but she went right there as if guided by the hands of the children and placed her book about growing flowers by candlelight in hotel rooms in between a book about Indians (pro) and an illustrated, highly favourable tract on strawberry jam.

  She was very happy as she left the library to walk very slowly back to her room in the Kit Carson Hotel and the flowers that waited for her there.

  I turned out the lights in the library and took the tray back to my room. I knew the library so well that I could do it in the dark. The returning path to my room was made comfortable by thoughts of flowers, America and Vida sleeping like a photograph here in the library.

  The Automobile Accident

  This library came into being because of an overwhelming need and desire for such a place. There just simply had to be a library like this. That desire brought into existence this library building which isn’t very large and its permanent staffing which happens to be myself at the present time.

  The library is old in the San Francisco post-earthquake yellow-brick style and is located at 3150 Sacramento Street, San Francisco, California 94115, though no books are ever accepted by mail. They m
ust be brought in person. That is one of the foundations of this library.

  Many people have worked here before me. This place has a fairly rapid turnover. I believe I am the thirty-fifth or thirty-sixth librarian. I got the job because I was the only person who could fulfil the requirements and I was available.

  I am thirty-one years old and never had any formal library training. I have had a different kind of training which is quite compatible with the running of this library. I have an understanding of people and I love what I am doing.

  I believe I am the only person in America who can perform this job right now and that’s what I’m doing. After I am through with my job here, I’ll find something else to do. I think the future has quite a lot in store for me.

  The librarian before me was here for three years and finally had to quit because he was afraid of children. He thought they were up to something. He is now living in an old folks’ home. I got a postcard from him last month. It was unintelligible.

  The librarian before him was a young man who took a six-months leave of absence from his motorcycle gang to put in his tenure here. Afterwards he returned to his gang and never told them where he had been.

  ‘Where have you been the last six months?’ they asked him.

  ‘I’ve been taking care of my mother,’ he said. ‘She was sick and needed lots of hot chicken soup. Any more questions?’ There were no more questions.

  The librarian before him was here for two years, then moved suddenly to the Australian bush. Nothing has been heard from him since. I’ve heard rumours that he’s alive, but I’ve also heard rumours that he’s dead, but whatever he’s doing, dead or alive, I’m certain he’s still in the Australian bush because he said he wasn’t coming back and if he ever saw another book again, he’d cut his throat.

  The librarian before him was a young lady who quit because she was pregnant. One day she caught the glint in a young poet’s eye. They are now living together in the Mission District and are no longer young. She has a beautiful daughter, though, and he’s on unemployment. They want to move to Mexico.