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‘Oh, it will last,’ said Françoise.
She had never believed in the possibility of war. War was like tuberculosis or a railway accident: something that could never happen to me. Things like that happened only to other people.
‘Are you able to imagine some really terrible misfortune befalling you personally?’
Gerbert screwed up his face: ‘Nothing easier,’ he said.
‘Well, I can’t,’ said Françoise. There was no point in even thinking about it. Dangers from which it was possible to protect oneself had to be envisaged, but war did not come within the compass of man. If one day war did break out, nothing else would matter any more, not even living or dying.
‘But that won’t happen,’ murmured Françoise. She bent over her manuscript; the typewriter was clicking, and the room smelt of Virginian tobacco, ink, and the night. On the other side of the window-panes, the small, secluded square was asleep under the black sky; and, some way away, a train was moving through an empty landscape … And I am there. I am there, but for me this square exists and that moving train … all Paris, and all the world in the rosy shadows of this little office … and in this very instant all the long years of happiness. I am here, at the heart of my life …
‘It’s a pity that we have to sleep,’ said Françoise.
‘It’s even more of a pity we can’t know that we are asleep,’ said Gerbert. ‘The moment we begin to be aware that we are sleeping, we wake up. We gain nothing by it.’
‘But don’t you think it’s marvellous to stay awake while everyone else is asleep?’ Françoise laid down her fountain pen and listened attentively. Not a sound could be heard; the square was in darkness, the theatre in darkness. ‘I’d like to think that the whole world is asleep, that at this moment you and I are the only living souls on earth.’
‘Oh no, that would give me the creeps.’ He tossed back the long lock of black hair that kept falling into his eyes. ‘It’s like when I think about the moon; all those icy mountains and crevasses and nobody about on them. The first person to go up there will have to have a nerve.’
‘I wouldn’t refuse if anyone were to suggest going,’ said Françoise. She looked at Gerbert. Usually, they sat side by side, and she was happy to feel him near her even though they did not speak. Tonight, she felt that she wanted to talk with him. ‘It seems queer to think of what things are like when one isn’t there,’ she said.
‘Yes, it does seem queer,’ said Gerbert.
‘It’s like trying to imagine you’re dead; you can’t quite manage it, you always feel that you are somewhere in a corner, looking on.’
‘It’s maddening to think of all the goings-on one never will see,’ said Gerbert.
‘It used to break my heart to think that I’d never know anything but one small section of the world. Don’t you feel like that?’
‘Perhaps,’ said Gerbert.
Françoise smiled. From time to time, conversation with Gerbert reached a dead-end; but it was difficult to extract a definite opinion from him.
‘I feel calmer now, because I’m convinced that wherever I may go, the rest of the world will move with me. That’s what keeps me from having any regrets.’
‘Regrets for what?’ said Gerbert.
‘Having to live only in my own skin when the world is so vast.’
Gerbert looked at Françoise.
‘Yes, specially since you live such a well-regulated life.’
He was always so discreet; this vague question amounted to a kind of impudence for him. Did he think Françoise’s life too well regulated? Was he passing judgement on it? I wonder what he thinks of me … this office, the theatre, my room, books, papers, work … Such a well-regulated life.
‘I came to the conclusion that I must be resigned to making a choice,’ she said.
‘I don’t like having to make a choice,’ said Gerbert.
‘At first it was hard for me; but now I have no regrets, because I feel that things that don’t exist for me, simply do not exist at all.’
‘How do you mean?’ said Gerbert.
Françoise hesitated. She felt very strongly about this; the corridors, the auditorium, the stage, none of these things had vanished when she had again shut the door on them, but they existed only behind the door, at a distance. At a distance the train was moving through the silent countryside which encompassed, in the depths of the night, the warm life of her little office.
‘It’s like a lunar landscape,’ said Françoise. ‘It’s unreal. It’s nothing but make-believe. Don’t you feel that?’
‘No,’ said Gerbert. ‘I don’t think I do.’
‘And doesn’t it irk you never to be able to see more than one thing at a time?’
Gerbert thought for a moment.
‘What worries me is other people,’ he said. ‘I’ve a horror when someone talks to me about some chap I don’t know, especially when they speak well of him: some chap outside, living in his own sphere, who doesn’t even know that I exist.’
It was rare for him to speak about himself at such length. Was he, too, aware of the touching though transitory intimacy of the last few hours? The two of them were living within this circle of rosy light; for both of them, the same light, the same night. Françoise looked at his fine green eyes beneath their curling lashes, at his expectant mouth – ‘If I had wanted to …’ Perhaps it was still not too late. But what could she want?
‘Yes, it’s insulting,’ she said.
‘As soon as I get to know the chap, I feel better about it,’ said Gerbert.
‘It’s almost impossible to believe that other people are conscious beings, aware of their own inward feelings, as we ourselves are aware of our own,’ said Françoise. ‘To me, it’s terrifying when we grasp that. We get the impression of no longer being anything but a figment of someone else’s mind. But that hardly ever happens, and never completely.’
‘That’s right,’ said Gerbert eagerly, ‘perhaps that’s why I find it so unpleasant to listen to people talking to me about myself, even in a pleasant way. I feel they’re gaining some sort of an advantage over me.’
‘Personally, I don’t care what people think of me,’ said Françoise.
Gerbert began to laugh. ‘Well, it can’t be said that you’ve too much vanity,’ he said.
‘And their thoughts seem to me exactly like their words and their faces: things that are in my own world. It amazes Elisabeth that I’m not ambitious; but that’s precisely why. I don’t want to try to cut out a special place for myself in the world. I feel that I am already in it.’ She smiled at Gerbert. ‘And you’re not ambitious either, are you?’
‘No,’ said Gerbert. ‘Why should I be?’ He thought a moment. ‘All the same, I’d like to be a really good actor some day.’
‘I feel the same; I’d like to write a really good book some day. We like to do our work well; but not for any honour or glory.’
‘No,’ said Gerbert.
A milk-cart rattled by underneath the windows. Soon the night would be growing pale. The train was already beyond Châteauroux and approaching Vierzon. Gerbert yawned and his eyes became red-rimmed like a child’s full of sleep.
‘You ought to get some sleep,’ said Françoise.
Gerbert rubbed his eyes. ‘We’ve got to show this to Labrousse in its final form,’ he said stubbornly. He took hold of the bottle and poured himself out a stiff peg of whisky. ‘Besides, I’m not sleepy. I’m thirsty! ’ He drank and put down his glass. He thought for a moment. ‘Perhaps I’m sleepy after all.’
‘Thirsty or sleepy, make up your mind,’ said Françoise gaily.
‘I never really know what I want,’ said Gerbert.
‘Well, look,’ said Françoise, ‘this is what you are going to do. Lie down on the couch and sleep. I’ll finish looking over this last scene. Then you can type it out while I go to meet Pierre at the station.’
‘And you?’ said Gerbert.
‘When I’ve finished I’ll get some sleep too. The couch is wide, you won’t be in my way. Take a cushion and pull the cover over you.’
‘All right,’ said Gerbert.
Françoise stretched herself and took up her fountain pen. A few minutes later she turned round in her chair. Gerbert was lying on his back, his eyes closed, his breath coming in regular intervals from between his lips. He was already asleep.
He was good-looking. She gazed at him for a while, then turned back to her work. Out there, in the moving train, Pierre was also asleep, his head resting against the leather upholstery, his face innocent … He’ll jump out of the train, and draw up his slight frame to its full height; then he’ll run along the platform; he’ll take my arm …
‘There,’ said Françoise. She glanced at the manuscript with satisfaction. ‘Let’s hope he likes this. I think it will please him.’ She pushed back her chair. A rosy mist was suffusing the sky. She took off her shoes and slipped under the cover beside Gerbert. He groaned and his head rolled over on the cushion till it rested on Françoise’s shoulder.
‘Poor Gerbert, he was so sleepy,’ she thought. She pulled up the cover a little, and lay there motionless, her eyes open. She was sleepy, too, but she wanted to stay awake a little longer. She looked at Gerbert’s smooth eyelids, at his lashes as long as a girl’s; he was asleep, relaxed and impersonal. She could feel against her neck the caress of his soft black hair.
‘That’s all I shall ever have of him,’ she thought.
There must be women who had stroked his hair, as sleek as that of a Chinese girl’s; pressed their lips against his childish eyelids; clasped this long, slender body in their arms. Some day he would say to one of them: ‘I love you.’
Françoise felt her heart thumping. There was still time. She could put her cheek against his cheek and speak out loud the words which were coming to her lips.
She shut her eyes. She could not say: ‘I love you.’ She could not think it. She loved Pierre. There was no room in her life for another love.
Yet, there would be joys like these, she thought with slight anguish. His head felt heavy on her shoulder. What was precious was not the pressure of this weight, but Gerbert’s tenderness, his trust, his gay abandon, and the love she bestowed upon him. But Gerbert was sleeping, and the love and tenderness were only dream things. Perhaps, when he held her in his arms, she would still be able to cling to the dream; but how could she let herself dream of a love she did not wish really to live?
She looked at Gerbert. She was free in her words, in her acts. Pierre left her free; but acts and words would be only lies, as the weight of that head on her shoulder was already a lie. Gerbert did not love her; she could not really wish that he might love her.
The sky was turning to pink outside the window. In her heart Françoise was conscious of a sadness, as bitter and rosy as the dawn. And yet she had no regrets: she had not even a right to that melancholy which was beginning to numb her drowsy body. This was renunciation, final, and without recompense.
Chapter Two (#ulink_e54b876f-ec31-5e3c-a015-510eaed71686)
From the back of a Moorish café, seated on rough woollen cushions, Xavière and Françoise were watching the Arab dancing girl.
‘I wish I could dance like that,’ said Xavière. A light tremor passed over her shoulders and ran through her body. Françoise smiled at her, and was sorry that their day together was coming to an end. Xavière had been delightful.
‘In the red-light district of Fez, Labrousse and I saw them dance naked,’ said Françoise. ‘But that was a little too much like an anatomical exhibition.’
‘You’ve seen so many things,’ said Xavière with a touch of bitterness.
‘So will you, one day,’ said Françoise.
‘I doubt it,’ said Xavière.
‘You won’t remain in Rouen all your life,’ said Françoise.
‘What else can I do?’ said Xavière sadly. She looked at her fingers with close attention. They were red, peasant’s fingers, in strange contrast to her delicate wrists. ‘I could perhaps try to be a prostitute, but I’m not experienced enough yet.’
‘That’s a hard profession, you know,’ said Françoise with a laugh.
‘I must learn not to be afraid of people,’ said Xavière thoughtfully. She nodded her head. ‘But I’m improving. When a man brushes against me in the street, I no longer let out a scream.’
‘And you go into cafés by yourself. That’s also an improvement,’ said Françoise.
Xavière gave her a shamefaced look. ‘Yes, but I haven’t told you everything. At that little dance-hall where I was last night, a sailor asked me to dance and I refused. I gulped down my calvados and rushed out of the place like a coward.’ She made a wry face. ‘Calvados is terrible stuff.’
‘It must have been fine rot-gut,’ said Françoise. ‘I do think you could have danced with your sailor. I did all sorts of things like that when I was younger, and no harm ever came out of them.’
‘The next time I shall accept,’ said Xavière.
‘Aren’t you afraid that your aunt will wake up some night? I should think that might very well happen.’
‘She wouldn’t dare to come into my room,’ said Xavière, with defiance. She smiled and began to hunt through her bag. ‘I’ve made a little sketch for you.’
It was of a woman, who had a slight resemblance to Françoise, standing at a bar with her elbows resting on the counter. Her cheeks were green and her dress was yellow. Beneath the drawing Xavière had written in large, purple lettering: ‘The Road to Ruin.’
‘You must sign it for me,’ said Françoise.
Xavière looked at Françoise, looked at the sketch, and then pushed it away. ‘It’s too difficult,’ she said.
The dancing girl moved towards the middle of the room; her hips began to undulate, and her stomach to ripple to the rhythm of the tambourine.
‘It seems almost as if a demon were trying to tear itself from her body,’ said Xavière. She leaned forward, entranced. Françoise had certainly had an inspiration in bringing her here; never before had Xavière spoken at such length about herself, and she had a charming way of telling a story. Françoise sank back against the cushions; she, too, had been affected by the shoddy glamour of the place, but what especially delighted her was to have annexed this insignificant, pathetic little being into her own life: for, like Gerbert, like Inès, like Canzetti, Xavière now belonged to her. Nothing ever gave Françoise such intense joy as this kind of possession.
Xavière was absorbed in the dancing girl. She could not see her own face, its beauty heightened by the state of her excitement. Her fingers stroked the contours of the cup which she was holding lightly in her hand, but Françoise alone was aware of the contours of that hand. Xavière’s gestures, her face, her very life depended on Françoise for their existence. Xavière, here and now at this moment, the essence of Xavière, was no more than the flavour of the coffee, than the piercing music or the dance, no more than indeterminate well-being; but to Françoise, her childhood, her days of stagnation, her distastes, were a romantic story as real as the delicate contour of her cheeks. And that story ended here in this café, among the vari-coloured hangings, and at this very instant in Françoise’s life, as she sat looking at Xavière and studying her.
‘It’s seven o’clock already,’ said Françoise. It bored her to have to spend the evening with Elisabeth, but it was unavoidable. ‘Are you going out with Inès tonight?’
‘I suppose so,’ said Xavière gloomily.
‘How much longer do you think you’ll be staying in Paris?’
‘I’m leaving tomorrow.’ A flash of rage appeared in Xavière’s eyes. ‘Tomorrow, all this will still be going on here and I shall be in Rouen.’
‘Why don’t you take a secretarial course as I suggested? I could find you a job.’
Xavière shrugged her shoulders despondently. ‘I couldn’t do it,’ she said.
‘Of course you could. It’s not difficult,’ said Françoise.
‘My aunt even tried to teach me how to knit,’ said Xavière, ‘but my last sock was a disaster.’ She turned to Françoise with a discouraged and faintly provocative look. ‘She’s quite right. No one will ever manage to make anything of me.’
‘Definitely not a good housewife,’ said Françoise cheerfully. ‘But one can live without that.’
‘It’s not because of the sock,’ said Xavière hopelessly. ‘Yet that was an indication.’
‘You lose heart too easily. But still, you would like to leave Rouen, wouldn’t you? You have no attachments there to anyone or anything.’
‘I hate the people and the place,’ said Xavière. ‘I loathe that filthy city and the people in the streets with their leering glances.’
‘That can’t go on,’ said Françoise.
