Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0010034, Mon, 12 Jul 2004 08:22:44 -0700

Subject
TT-3: shooting drawers with pencils and pawns (ADA) (fwd)
Date
Body
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‘Well, that secretaire,’ continued Lucette, considering her left shoe, her
very chic patent-leather Glass shoe, as she crossed her lovely legs, ‘that
secretaire enclosed a folded card table and a top-secret drawer. And you
thought, I think, it was crammed with our grandmother’s love letters,
written when she was twelve or thirteen. And our Ada knew, oh, she knew,
the drawer was there but she had forgotten how to release the orgasm or
whatever it is called in card tables and bureaus.’

Whatever it is called.

‘She and I challenged you to find the secret chuvstvilishche(sensorium) and
make it work. It was the summer Belle sprained her backside, and we were
left to our own devices, which had long lost the particulein your case and
Ada’s, but were touchingly pure in mine. You groped around, and felt, and
felt for the little organ, which turned out to be a yielding roundlet in
the rosewood under the felt you felt ? I mean, under the felt you were
feeling: it was a felted thumb spring, and Ada laughed as the drawer shot
out.’

‘And it was empty,’ said Van.

‘Not quite. It contained a minuscule red pawn that high’ (showing its
barleycorn-size with her finger ? above what? Above Van’s wrist). ‘I kept
it for luck; I must still have it somewhere. (p. 374)


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