Five Spice Street

Something else occurred to her after she finished weeping. ‘‘Sometimes I’ve thought that maybe there wasn’t anything wonderful about him, that he was mediocre, and that it was only when I had that kind of relationship with him and at the same time bestowed my physical charms on him that he overwhelmed me. If he hadn’t met me, he would have been only an ordinary man, no different from any other. It’s only through a woman that a man can realize his virtues-and the woman must be strong, filled with the charm of sex. Otherwise, because of their fragile nature, men are likely to be corrupted by depraved women and become degenerate troublemakers disturbing the tranquility of the world.’’

We can be sure of this much: although the widow had had a sexual relationship with only one man, she’d had plenty of experience. She was almost a master of sexology. Her experience didn’t come from sexual relationships with a variety of men, but from her clear-headed, precise understanding of this sort of thing. And so the further away she was from men, the more dispassionate she was and the clearer her experience: she had a complete grasp of it. In men’s eyes, this made her even more potent: you could look, but you couldn’t touch. It’s no exaggeration to say: the widow is the ideal incarnation of sex. The men’s conduct on Five Spice Street proves this. Whenever she walks slowly and regally down the street, almost all the men stop in their tracks and idiotically ‘‘look back and smile.’’ They promptly undress her in their minds and keep their eyes on the private parts of her body. They’re intoxicated, flushed, and panting, and it’s a long while before they calm down. They’re distracted all day and continually look for chances to make up erotic stories. They imagine they’re big heroes. They keep it up until nightfall, when they wake up and become despondent. Then they’re deflated, unable even to make it with their wives. They vent. They rage at their wives for ‘‘having no sex appeal,’’ for ‘‘being like dried fish.’’ ‘‘It would be better to screw a hospital mannequin.’’ ‘‘What could you do with this kind of wife?’’ ‘‘If it weren’t for the ball and chain of this family, I’d long ago have become somebody,’’ and so on and on. They can’t help spouting nonsense like this. Some even leap out from the quilts, rashly spend the night naked on the floor, and get so sick they can’t recover for a long time. Our widow understood all of this as well as the palm of her hand: she just calmly observed it and drew these deranged followers to her even more. Never tiring, she hoped to change society by her ‘‘refined influence.’’