Immortality by Milan Kundera

Author:Milan Kundera [Kundera, Milan]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3, mobi
Tags: Literary, Classics, Fiction
ISBN: 9780060932381
Google: 5fEOD1rUMmcC
Amazon: 0060932384
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 1990-01-02T05:00:00+00:00

There was a moment of silence.

Then Laura said, "That gun is lying in front of me. I can't take my eyes off it."

"So put it back where it was," said Paul.

"Paul, you were in the army, weren't you?"

"Yes."

"You were an officer?"

"A lieutenant."

"That means you know how to shoot a gun?"

Paul hesitated. But he had to say, "Yes."

"How does one know that a gun is loaded?"

"If it goes off, it's loaded."

"If I press the trigger will it go off?"

"It might."

"What do you mean, it might?"

"If the safety catch is off, the gun will fire."

"And how do you know the catch is off?"

"Come on now, you're not going to explain to her how to kill herself!" shouted Agnes, and she tore the receiver from Paul's hand.

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Laura continued, "I only want to know how to handle it. After all, that's something I should know, how one handles a gun. What does it mean when the catch is off? How do you turn it off?"

"That's enough," said Agnes. "Not another word about guns. Put it back where it was. We've had enough of this joking."

Laura's voice suddenly became quite different, serious: "Agnes! I am not joking!" and once again she started to cry.

The conversation was endless, Agnes and Paul kept repeating the same sentences, they assured Laura of their love, they begged her to stay with them, not to leave them, until she finally promised to return the gun to the drawer and go to sleep.

When they put down the receiver they were so exhausted that for quite some time they were unable to say a single word.

Agnes said at last, "Why is she doing this! Why is she doing this!"

And Paul said, "It's my fault. I sent her there."

"She would have gone in any case."

Paul shook his head. "No. She was ready to stay. I did the stupidest thing of my life."

Agnes did not want Paul to suffer from a sense of guilt. Not out of compassion for him, but rather out of jealousy: she didn't want him to feel so responsible for Laura, to be so tied to her in his thoughts. That's why she said, "How can you be so sure that she actually found a gun?"

At first, Paul had no idea what she meant: "What are you trying to say?"

"That there may not be any gun there at all."

"Agnes! She is not putting on an act! That's obvious!"

Agnes tried to formulate her suspicion more carefully: "It's possible there is a gun in the house. But it is also possible that she took some barbiturates along and deliberately brought up the gun in order to confuse us. And you cannot also rule out the possibility that she has neither barbiturates nor a gun and only wants to torment us."

"Agnes," said Paul, "you're being cruel to her."

Paul's reproach again put her on her guard: without his realizing it, Laura had lately become more important to him than she was; he had

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been thinking about her, occupying himself with her, worrying about her,

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