SIMONE DE BEAUVOIR
She Came to Stay

Translated by Yvonne Moyse

and Roger Senhouse

Copyright

HarperPress

An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF

http://www.harpercollins.co.uk

This edition published by Harper Perennial 2006

Previously published in paperback by Flamingo 1984 and by Fontana 1975

This translation first published jointly by Seeker & Warburg

and Lindsay Drummond 1949

First published in France by Editions Gallimard under the title L’Invitée 1943

Copyright © Editions Gallimard 1943

PS section copyright © Louise Tucker 2006, except ‘The Pain of Freedom’ by

Fay Weldon © Fay Weldon 2006

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is available from the British Library

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Dedication

To Olga Kosakievicz

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

PART ONE

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

PART TWO

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

P.S. Ideas, insights & features …

About the Author

Finding a Voice by Louise Tucker

Life at a Glance

About the Book

The Pain of Freedom by Fay Weldon

Read On

Have You Read?

If You Loved This, You Might Like …

Find Out More

About the Author

By the Same Author

About the Publisher

PART ONE

Chapter One

Françoise raised her eyes. Gerbert’s fingers were flicking about over the keyboard of his typewriter, and he was glaring at his copy of the manuscript; he looked exhausted. Françoise herself was sleepy; but there was something intimate about her own weariness, something cosy. The black rings under Gerbert’s eyes worried her, his face was haggard and tense; he almost looked his full twenty years.

‘Don’t you think we ought to stop?’ she asked.

‘No, I’m all right,’ said Gerbert.

‘Anyway, I’ve only one more scene to revise,’ said Françoise.

She turned over a page. Two o’clock had struck a short time ago. Usually, at this hour, there was not a living soul left in the theatre: tonight there was life in it. The typewriter was clicking, the lamp threw a rosy glow over the papers … ‘And I am here, my heart is beating. Tonight the theatre has a heart and it is beating.’

‘I like working at night,’ she said.

‘Yes,’ said Gerbert, ‘it’s quiet.’

He yawned. The ashtray was filled with the stub-ends of Virginian cigarettes; two glasses and an empty bottle stood on a small table. Françoise looked at the walls of her little office: the rosy atmosphere was radiant with human warmth and light. Outside was the theatre, deprived of all human life and in darkness, with its deserted corridors circling a great hollow shell. Françoise put down her fountain pen.

‘Wouldn’t you like another drink?’ she asked.

‘I wouldn’t say no,’ said Gerbert.

‘I’ll go and get another bottle from Pierre’s dressing-room.’

She went out of the office. It was not that she had any particular desire for whisky; it was the dark corridors which were the attraction. When she was not there, the smell of dust, the half-light, and their forlorn solitude did not exist for anyone; they did not exist at all. And now she was there. The red of the carpet gleamed through the darkness like a timid night-light. She exercised that power: her presence snatched things from their unconsciousness; she gave them their colour, their smell. She went down one floor and pushed open the door into the auditorium. It was as if she had been entrusted with a mission: she had to bring to life this forsaken theatre now in semi-darkness. The safety-curtain was down; the walls smelt of fresh paint; the red plush seats were aligned in their rows, motionless but expectant. A moment ago they had been aware of nothing, but now she was there and their arms were outstretched. They were watching the stage hidden behind the safety-curtain: they were calling for Pierre, for the footlights and for an enraptured audience. She would have had to remain there for ever in order to perpetuate this solitude and this expectancy. But she would have had to be elsewhere as well: in the props-room, in the dressing-rooms, in the foyer; she would have had to be everywhere at the same time. She went across the proscenium and stepped up on to the stage. She opened the door to the green-room. She went on down into the yard where old stage sets lay mouldering. She alone evoked the significance of these abandoned places, of these slumbering things. She was there and they belonged to her. The world belonged to her.

She went through the small iron stage-door and out into the middle of the formal garden. The houses all round the square were sleeping. The theatre was sleeping, except for a rosy glow from a single window. She sat down on a bench. The sky was glossy black above the chestnut trees: she might well have been in the heart of some small provincial town. At this moment she did not in the least regret that Pierre was not beside her: there were some joys she could not know when he was with her; all the joys of solitude. They had been lost to her for eight years, and at times she almost felt a pang of regret on their account.

She leaned back against the hard wood of the bench. A quick step echoed on the asphalt of the pavement; a motor lorry rumbled along the avenue. There was nothing but this passing sound, the sky, the quivering foliage of the trees, and the one rose-coloured window in a black façade. There was no Françoise any longer; no one existed any longer, anywhere.

Françoise jumped to her feet. It was strange to become a woman once more, a woman who must hurry because pressing work awaits her, with the present moment but one in her life like all the others. She put her hand on the door-knob, then turned back with a qualm of conscience. This was desertion, an act of treason. The night would once more swallow the small provincial square; the rose-coloured window would gleam in vain; it would no longer shine for anyone. The sweetness of this hour would be lost for ever; so much sweetness lost to ali the earth. She crossed the yard and climbed the green wood steps. She had long since given up this kind of regret. Only her own life was real. She went into Pierre’s dressing-room and took the bottle of whisky from the cupboard. Then she hastened back upstairs to her office.

‘Here you are, this will put new strength into us,’ she said. ‘How do you want it? Neat, or with water?’

‘Neat,’ said Gerbert.

‘D’you think you’ll be able to get home?’

‘Oh, I’m learning to hold my whisky,’ said Gerbert with dignity.

‘You’re learning …,’ said Françoise.

‘When I’m rich and run my own house, I’ll always keep a bottle of Vat 69 in my cupboard,’ said Gerbert.

‘That will be the end of your career,’ said Françoise. She looked at him with a kind of tenderness. He had pulled his pipe out of his pocket and was filling it with great deliberation. It was his first pipe. Every evening, when they had finished their bottle of Beaujolais, he put it on the table and looked at it with childish pride; he smoked it over his glass of cognac or marc. And then they went out into the streets, a little dazed after the day’s work, the wine and the brandy. Gerbert strode along, his lock of black hair over his face and his hands in his pockets. Now that was all over. She would often be seeing him again, but only with Pierre or with all the others, and once more they would be like two strangers.

‘And what about you! You hold your whisky well for a woman,’ said Gerbert, quite impartially. He looked hard at Françoise. ‘But you’ve been overworking today, you ought to get a little sleep. Then I’ll wake you up, if you like.’

‘No. I’d rather finish it off,’ said Françoise.

‘Aren’t you hungry? Wouldn’t you like me to go out and get you some sandwiches?’

‘No, thanks,’ said Françoise. She smiled at him. He had been so considerate, so attentive. Whenever she felt discouraged she had only to look into his laughing eyes to regain her confidence. She would like to have found words in which to thank him.

‘It’s almost a pity that we’ve finished,’ she said. ‘I’ve become so used to working with you.’

‘But it will be even greater fun when we go into production,’ said Gerbert. His eyes glistened; the whisky had given a flush to his cheeks. ‘It’s so good to think that in three days everything will be starting all over again. How I love the opening of the season.’

‘Yes, it will be fun,’ said Françoise. She pulled her papers towards her. He was apparently not at all sorry to see the end of their ten days together; that was only natural. She was not sorry either; surely she had no right to expect Gerbert alone to be sorry.

‘Every time I walk through this dead theatre I get the shivers,’ said Gerbert. ‘It’s dismal. This time I really thought it was going to stay closed the whole year.’

‘We’ve had a narrow escape,’ said Françoise.

‘Let’s hope that this lasts,’ said Gerbert.

‘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

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.

‘It will go on,’ said Xavière. She jumped up suddenly. ‘I’m going now.’

‘Wait, I’ll go with you,’ said Françoise.

‘No, don’t bother. I’ve already taken up your entire afternoon.’

‘You’ve taken up nothing,’ said Françoise. ‘How strange you are!’ She looked in slight bewilderment at Xavière’s sullen face. What a disconcerting little person she was: with that beret hiding her fair hair, her head looked almost like a small boy’s; but the face was a young girl’s, the same face that had held an appeal for Françoise six months earlier. The silence was prolonged.

‘I’m sorry,’ said Xavière. ‘I’ve a terrible headache.’ With a pained look, she touched her temples. ‘It must be the smoke. I’ve a pain here, and here.’

Her face was puffy under her eyes and her skin blotchy. The heavy smell of incense and tobacco made the air almost unbreathable. Françoise motioned to the waiter.

‘That’s too bad. If you were not so tired, I’d take you dancing tonight,’ she said.

‘I thought you had to see a friend,’ said Xavière.

‘She’d come with us. She’s Labrousse’s sister, the girl with the red hair and a short bob whom you saw at the hundredth performance of Philoctetes.’

‘I don’t remember,’ said Xavière. Her face lighted up. ‘I only remember you. You were wearing a long tight black skirt, a lamé blouse and a silver net on your hair. You were so beautiful!’

Françoise smiled. She was not beautiful, yet she was quite pleased with her face. Whenever she caught a glimpse of it in a looking-glass, she always felt a pleasant surprise. For most of the time, she was not even aware that she had a face.

‘You were wearing a lovely blue dress with a pleated skirt,’ she said. ‘And you were tipsy.’

‘I brought that dress with me. I’ll wear it tonight,’ said Xavière.

‘Do you think it wise if you have a headache?’

‘My headache’s gone,’ said Xavière. ‘It was just a dizzy spell.’ Her eyes were shining, and her skin had regained its beautiful pearly lustre.

‘That’s good,’ said Françoise. She pushed open the door. ‘But won’t Inès be angry, if she’s counting on you?’

‘Well, let her be angry,’ said Xavière, pouting disdainfully.

Françoise hailed a taxi.

‘I’ll drop you at her place, and I’ll meet you at the Dôme at nine-thirty. Just walk straight up to the boulevard Montparnasse.’

‘Yes, I know,’ said Xavière.

In the taxi Françoise sat close beside Xavière and slipped an arm through hers.

‘I’m glad we still have a few hours ahead of us.’

‘I’m glad too,’ said Xavière softly.

The taxi stopped at the corner of the rue de Rennes. Xavière got out, and Françoise drove on to the theatre.

Pierre was in his dressing-room, wearing a dressing-gown and munching a ham sandwich.

‘Did the rehearsal go off well?’

‘We worked very hard,’ said Pierre. He pointed to the manuscript lying on the desk. ‘That’s good,’ he said, ‘really good.’

‘Do you mean it? Oh, I’m so glad! I was a little upset at having to cut out Lucilius, but I think it was necessary.’

‘Yes, it was,’ said Pierre. ‘That changed the whole run of the act.’ He bit into a sandwich. ‘Haven’t you had dinner? Would you like a sandwich?’

‘Of course I’d like a sandwich,’ said Françoise. She took one and looked at Pierre reproachfully. ‘You don’t eat enough. You’re looking very pale.’

‘I don’t want to put on weight,’ said Pierre.

‘Caesar wasn’t skinny,’ said Françoise. She smiled. ‘You might ring through to the concierge and ask her to get us a bottle of Château Margaux.’

‘That’s not such a bad idea,’ said Pierre. He picked up the receiver, and Françoise curled up on the couch. This was where Pierre slept when he did not spend the night with her. She was very fond of this small dressing-room.

‘There, you shall have your wine.’

‘I’m so happy,’ said Françoise. ‘I thought I’d never get to the end of that third act.’

‘You’ve done some excellent work,’ said Pierre. He leaned over and kissed her. Françoise threw her arms around his neck. ‘It’s you,’ she said. ‘Do you remember what you said to me at Delos? That you wanted to introduce something absolutely new to the theatre? Well, this time you’ve done it.’

‘Do you really think so?’ said Pierre.

‘Don’t you?’

‘Well, I’ve just a dawning suspicion.’

Françoise began to laugh. ‘You know you have. You look positively smug, Pierre! If only we don’t have to worry too much over money, what a wonderful year we’ll have!’

‘As soon as we’re a little better off I shall buy you another coat,’ said Pierre.

‘Oh, I’m quite accustomed to this one.’

‘That’s only too obvious,’ said Pierre. He sat down in an armchair near Françoise.

‘Did you have a good time with your little friend?’

‘She’s very nice. It’s a pity for her to rot away in Rouen.’

‘Did she tell you any stories?’

‘Endless stories. I’ll tell you them some day.’

‘Well then, you’re happy; you didn’t waste your day.’

‘I love stories,’ said Françoise.

There was a knock and the door opened. With a majestic air the concierge carried in a tray with two glasses and a bottle of wine.

‘Thank you very much,’ said Françoise. She filled the glasses.

‘Please,’ said Pierre to the concierge, ‘I’m not in to anyone.’

‘Very good, Monsieur Labrousse,’ said the woman. She went away.

Françoise picked up her glass and started on a second sandwich.

‘I’m going to bring Xavière along with us tonight,’ she said. ‘We’ll go dancing. I think that will be fun. I hope she’ll neutralize Elisabeth a little.’

‘She must be in the seventh heaven,’ said Pierre.

‘Poor child, it’s painful to see her. She’s so utterly miserable at having to return to Rouen.’

‘Is there no way out of it?’ said Pierre.

‘Hardly,’ said Françoise. ‘She’s so spineless. She would never have the strength of mind to train for a profession. And the only prospect her uncle can think of for her is a devoted husband and a lot of children.’

‘You ought to take her in hand,’ said Pierre.

‘How can I? I only see her once a month.’

‘Why don’t you bring her to Paris?’ said Pierre. ‘You could keep an eye on her and make her work. Let her learn to type and we can easily find a job for her somewhere.’

‘Her family would never consent to that,’ said Françoise.

‘Well, let her do it without their permission. Isn’t she of age?’

‘No,’ said Françoise. ‘But that isn’t the main point. I don’t think that the police would be set on her trail.’

Pierre smiled.

‘What is the main point?’

Françoise hesitated; actually she had never suspected that there was a debatable point.

‘In other words, your idea would be for her to live in Paris at our expense until she sorts herself out?’

‘Why not?’ said Pierre. ‘Offer it to her as a loan.’

‘Oh, of course,’ said Françoise. This trick he had of conjuring up a thousand unsuspected possibilities in only a few words always took her by surprise. Where others saw only an impenetrable jungle, Pierre saw a virgin future which was his to shape as he chose. That was the secret of his strength.

‘We’ve had so much luck in our life,’ said Pierre, ‘we ought to let others benefit from it whenever we can.’

Françoise, perplexed, stared at the bottom of her glass.

‘In a way I feel very tempted,’ she said. ‘But I would really have to look after her. I hardly have the time.’

‘Little busy bee,’ said Pierre affectionately.

Françoise coloured. ‘You know I haven’t much leisure,’ she said.

‘Yes, I know,’ said Pierre. ‘But it’s odd, the way you draw back as soon as you’re confronted by something new.’

‘The only something new which interests me is our future together,’ said Françoise. ‘I can’t help it. That’s what makes me happy. You’ve only yourself to blame for it.’

‘Oh, I don’t blame you,’ said Pierre. ‘On the contrary, I think you are far more honest than I am. There’s nothing in your life that rings false.’

‘That’s because you attach no importance to your life as such. It’s your work that counts,’ said Françoise.

‘That’s true,’ said Pierre. He began to gnaw one of his nails, and he looked ill at ease. ‘With the exception of my relationship with you, everything about me is frivolous and wasteful.’ He kept worrying his finger. He would not be satisfied until he had made it bleed. ‘But as soon as I’ve got rid of Canzetti, all that will be finished.’

‘That’s what you say,’ said Françoise.

‘I shall prove it,’ said Pierre.

‘You are lucky. Your affaires are always easily terminated.’

‘It’s because, basically, no one of these dear little creatures has ever been really in love with me,’ said Pierre.

‘I don’t think Canzetti is a self-seeking girl,’ said Françoise.

‘No, it’s not so much to get herself parts. Only she thinks I’m a great man and she has a notion that genius will rise from her sex-appeal to her brain.’

‘There’s something in that,’ said Françoise laughing.

‘I no longer enjoy these affaires,’ said Pierre. ‘It’s not as if I were a great sensualist, I don’t even have that excuse!’ He looked at Françoise confusedly. ‘The truth is that I enjoy the early stages. You don’t understand that?’

‘Perhaps,’ said Françoise. ‘But I would not be interested in an affaire which had no continuity.’

‘No?’

‘No,’ she said. ‘It is something stronger than myself. I’m the faithful sort.’

‘It’s impossible to talk about faithfulness and unfaithfulness where we are concerned,’ said Pierre. He drew Françoise to him. ‘You and I are simply one. That’s the truth, you know. Neither of us can be described without the other.’

‘That’s thanks to you,’ said Françoise. She took Pierre’s face between her hands, and began to kiss his cheeks, on which she could smell the fumes of tobacco somehow blended with the childish and unexpected smell of pastry. ‘We are simply one,’ she murmured.

Nothing that happened was completely real until she had told Pierre about it; it remained poised, motionless and uncertain, in a kind of limbo. When, in the past, she had been shy with Pierre, there were a number of things that she had brushed aside in this way: uncomfortable thoughts and ill-considered gestures. If they were not mentioned, it was almost as if they had not existed at all, and this allowed a shameful subterranean vegetation to grow up under the surface of true existence where she felt utterly alone and in danger of suffocation. Little by little she had resolved everything: she no longer knew aloneness, but she had rid herself of those chaotic subterranean tendrils. Every moment of her life that she entrusted to him, Pierre gave back to her clear, polished, completed, and they became moments of their shared life. She knew that she served the same purpose for him. There was nothing concealed, nothing modest about him: he was crafty only when he needed a shave or when his shirt was dirty; then he would pretend to have a cold and stubbornly keep his muffler wrapped around his neck, which gave him the appearance of a precocious old man.

‘I must be leaving you in a moment,’ she said regretfully. ‘Are you going to sleep here or come to my place?’

‘I’ll come over to you,’ said Pierre. ‘I want to be with you again just as soon as I can.’

Elisabeth was already at the Dôme. She was smoking a cigarette, and staring fixedly into space. ‘Something’s gone wrong,’ thought Françoise. She was very carefully made-up, yet her face had a puffy, tired look. She caught sight of Françoise and a fleeting smile seemed to release her from her thoughts.

‘Hullo, I’m so glad to see you,’ she said enthusiastically.

‘So am I,’ said Françoise. ‘Tell me, I hope it won’t annoy you, but I’ve asked the Pagès girl to come along with us. She’s dying to go to a dance-hall. We can talk while she dances. She’s no bother.’

‘It’s ages since I’ve heard any jazz,’ said Elisabeth. ‘That would be fun.’

‘Isn’t she here yet?’ said Françoise. ‘That’s strange.’ She turned towards Elisabeth. ‘Well, what about your trip?’ she said gaily. ‘Are you definitely leaving tomorrow?’

‘You think it’s as simple as that,’ said Elisabeth, laughing unpleasantly. ‘To do that, apparently, would hurt Suzanne, and Suzanne has already gone through so much because of what happened in September.’

So that was it. Françoise gave Elisabeth a look of indignant pity: Claude’s behaviour towards her was really disgusting.

‘As if you hadn’t suffered too.’

‘Yet, but I happen to be a strong, clear-minded individual,’ said Elisabeth sarcastically. ‘I’m a woman who never makes a scene.’

‘Yes, but Claude is no longer in love with Suzanne,’ said Françoise. ‘She’s old and frumpy.’

‘He’s no longer in love with her,’ said Elisabeth. ‘But Suzanne is a superstition. He’s convinced that, without her behind him, he’ll never succeed in anything.’

Silence ensued. Elisabeth was absorbed in watching the smoke from her cigarette. She gave no outward sign of it, but what blackness there must be in her heart! She had been expecting so much from this trip, and perhaps this long period together might finally persuade Claude to break with his wife. Françoise had grown sceptical, for Elisabeth had been waiting two years for the decisive hour. She felt Elisabeth’s disappointment with a painful tightening of her heart.

‘I must say Suzanne is clever,’ said Elisabeth. She looked at Françoise. ‘She’s now trying to get one of Claude’s plays produced with Nanteuil. That’s something else that’s keeping him in Paris.’

‘Nanteuil!’ Françoise repeated lazily. ‘What a strange idea!’ She looked toward the door a little uneasily. Why hadn’t Xavière come?

‘It’s idiotic.’ Elisabeth steadied her voice. ‘Besides, it’s obvious; as far as I can see only Pierre could put on Partage. He would be magnificent as Achab.’

‘It’s a good part,’ said Françoise.

‘Do you think he might be interested?’ said Elisabeth. There was an anxious appeal in her voice.

‘Partage is a very interesting play,’ said Françoise. ‘Only it’s not at all the sort of thing Pierre is looking for. Listen,’ she added hastily, ‘why doesn’t Claude take his script to Berger? Would you like Pierre to write to Berger?’

Elisabeth gulped painfully. ‘You have no notion of how important it would be to Claude if Pierre were to accept his play. He’s got so little self-confidence. Only Pierre could get him out of that state of mind.’

Françoise looked away. Batter’s play was dreadful, there was no possible question of accepting it; but she knew how much Elisabeth had staked on this last chance, and, confronted with her drawn face, she really felt pained herself. She was fully aware how much her life and her example had influenced Elisabeth’s life.

‘Frankly, that can’t be done,’ she said.

‘But Luce et Armanda was quite a success,’ said Elisabeth.

‘That’s why – after Julius Caesar Pierre wants to try to launch an unknown playwright.’

Françoise stopped almost in the middle of a sentence. With relief she saw Xavière coming towards them. Her hair was carefully arranged and a light film of make-up toned down her cheekbones and made her large sensual nose look more refined.

‘I think you’ve met already,’ said Françoise. She smiled at Xavière. ‘You’re terribly late. I feel sure you haven’t had dinner. Would you like something to eat?’

‘No, thanks, I’m not at all hungry,’ said Xavière. She sat down, hanging her head so that she seemed ill at ease. ‘I got lost,’ she said.

Elisabeth stared at her. She was sizing her up.

‘You got lost? Did you have far to come?’

Xavière turned a distressed face to Françoise.

‘I don’t know what happened to me. I walked straight up the boulevard, but it seemed endless. I came to an avenue that was pitch black. I must have passed the Dôme without seeing it.’

Elisabeth began to laugh. ‘That took some doing,’ she said.

Xavière scowled at her.

‘Well, here you are at last, that’s the main thing,’ said Françoise. ‘What about going to the Prairie? It’s no longer what it was when we were younger, but it’s not bad.’

‘Just as you like,’ said Elisabeth.

They left the café. Along the boulevard Montparnasse a strong wind was sweeping up the leaves of the plane-trees. Françoise derived a certain pleasure in crackling them underfoot, it gave her a faint suggestion of dried nuts and warm wine.

‘It’s at least a year since I’ve been to the Prairie,’ she said. No one answered. Xavière, shivering, clutched her coat collar; Elisabeth was carrying her scarf in her hand; she seemed neither to feel the cold nor to see anything.

‘What a crowd there is already,’ said Françoise. All the stools at the bar were taken. She chose one of the more secluded tables.

‘I’ll have a whisky,’ said Elisabeth.

‘Two whiskies,’ said Françoise. ‘And you?’

‘The same as you,’ said Xavière.

‘Three whiskies,’ said Françoise. This smell of alcohol and smoke took her back to her girlhood. She had always enjoyed the jazz-bands, the yellow lights and the swarming crowds in night clubs. How easy it was to live a full life in a world that held both the ruins at Delphi and the bare Provençal hill-sides, as well as this congeries of humanity! She smiled at Xavière.

‘Look at that snub-nosed blonde at the bar. She lives in my hotel. She wanders about the corridors for hours on end in a pale-blue nightgown. I think she’s trying to hook the Negro who lives above me.’

‘She’s not pretty,’ said Xavière. Her eyes opened wide. ‘There’s a dark-haired woman next to her who is very attractive. She’s really beautiful!’

‘I’d better tell you that her boy-friend is a wrestler; they stroll round our neighbourhood clinging to each other’s little fingers.’

‘Oh! ’ said Xavière reproachfully.

‘I’m not responsible,’ said Françoise.

Xavière rose to her feet: two young men had come up to their table and were smiling engagingly.

‘I’m sorry, I don’t dance,’ said Françoise.

Elisabeth hesitated and she too rose.

‘At this moment she hates me,’ thought Françoise. At the next table a rather tired blonde and a very young man were affectionately holding hands: the youth was talking ardently in a low voice, the woman smiling cautiously, without letting a single wrinkle furrow her once pretty face; the little professional from the hotel was dancing with a sailor, clinging tightly against him, her eyes half-closed; the attractive brunette, seated on her bar stool, was munching banana slices, with an expression of boredom. Françoise smiled proudly. Each one of these men, each one of these women present here tonight was completely absorbed in living a moment of his or her insignificant individual existence. Xavière was dancing. Elisabeth was shaken by convulsions of anger and despair. ‘And I – here I am at the very heart of the dance-hall – impersonal and free. I am watching all these lives and all these faces. If I were to turn away from them, they would disintegrate at once like a deserted landscape.’

Elisabeth returned and sat down.

‘You know,’ said Françoise, ‘I am sorry that it can’t be managed.’

‘I understand perfectly well …’ Her face fell. She was incapable of remaining angry for any length of time, especially in the presence of others.

‘Aren’t things going well with you and Claude at the moment?’ asked Françoise.

Elisabeth shook her head. Her face gave an ugly twitch, and Françoise thought she was going to burst into tears. But she controlled herself.

‘Claude is working up for a crisis. He says that he can’t work as long as his play has not been accepted, that he doesn’t feel really free. When he’s in one of those states he’s terrible.’

‘Surely, you can’t be held responsible?’ said Françoise.

‘But the blame always falls on me,’ said Elisabeth. Again her lips trembled. ‘Because I’m a strong-minded woman. It doesn’t occur to him that a strong-minded woman can suffer just as much as any other,’ she said in a tone of passionate self-pity.

She burst into sobs.

‘My poor Elisabeth!’ said Françoise, taking her hand.

Through her tears Elisabeth’s face regained a kind of child-like quality.

‘It’s ridiculous,’ she said, dabbing her eyes. ‘It can’t go on like this, with Suzanne always between us.’

‘What do you want him to do?’ said Françoise. ‘Divorce her?’

‘He’ll never divorce her,’ Elisabeth began to sob again in a kind of fury. ‘Is he in love with me? As far as I’m concerned, I don’t even know if I’m in love with him.’ She looked at Françoise and her eyes were wild. ‘For two years I’ve been fighting for this love. I’ve been killing myself in the process. I’ve sacrificed everything. And now I don’t even know if we’re in love with each other.’

‘Of course you’re in love with him,’ said Françoise, her courage failing. ‘At the moment you’re angry with him, so you don’t know what you feel, but that doesn’t mean anything.’ It was absolutely essential for her to reassure Elisabeth. What a terrible discovery she would make if one day she were to decide to be sincere from start to finish! She must have feared this herself, for her flashes of lucidity always stopped in time.

‘I don’t know any longer,’ said Elisabeth.

Françoise pressed her hand tighter. She was really moved.

‘Claude is weak, that’s all. But he has shown you a thousand times over that he loves you.’ She looked up. Xavière was standing beside the table, observing the scene with a curious smile on her face.

‘Sit down,’ said Françoise, embarrassed.

‘No, I’m going to dance again,’ said Xavière. Her expression was contemptuous, and almost spiteful. This malicious reaction gave Françoise an unpleasant shock.

Elisabeth had recovered. She was powdering her face.

‘I must be patient,’ she said. She steadied her voice. ‘It’s a question of influence. I’ve always played too fair with Claude, and I don’t make demands on him.’

‘Have you ever told him plainly that you couldn’t stand the situation?

‘No,’ said Elisabeth. ‘I must wait.’ She had resumed her hard, cautious expression.

Was she in love with Claude? She had thrown herself at his head simply because she, too, wanted to have a great love; the admiration she had showered on him was just another way of protecting herself against Pierre. Yet because of him she endured suffering in which both Françoise and Pierre were powerless to help her.

‘What a mess,’ thought Françoise with a pang.

Elisabeth had left the table. She was dancing, her eyes swollen, her mouth set. Something like envy flashed through Françoise. Elisabeth’s feelings might well be false, her objective false, and false her whole life, but her present suffering was violent and real. Françoise looked at Xavière while she was dancing, her head thrown back, her face ecstatic. Her life had not yet begun; for her everything was possible and this enchanted evening held the promise of a thousand unknown enchantments. For this young girl, and for this heavy-hearted woman, the moment had a sharp and unforgettable quality. ‘And I,’ thought Françoise, ‘just a spectator. But this jazz, and the taste of this whisky, and these orange-coloured lights, these are not mere stage effects, there must be some way of finding a proper use for them! But what?’

In Elisabeth’s fierce, tense soul, the music was gently transformed into hope; Xavière transmuted it into passionate expectation; and Françoise alone found nothing in herself that harmonized with the plaintive sound of the saxophone. She searched for a desire, a regret; but behind her and before her there stretched a radiant and cloudless happiness. Pierre – that name was incapable of awakening pain. Gerbert – she was no longer concerned about Gerbert. No longer was she conscious of risk, or hope, or fear; only of this happiness over which she did not even have control. Misunderstanding with Pierre was impossible; no act would ever be irreparable. If one day she tried to inflict suffering upon herself, he would understand so well, that happiness would once more close over her. She lit a cigarette. No, she could find nothing beyond this abstract regret of having nothing to regret. Her throat was becoming dry; her heart was beating a little more quickly than usual, but she could not even believe that she was honestly tired of happiness. This uneasiness brought her no pitiful revelation. It was only a ripple on the surface, a short and, in a way, foreseeable modulation that would be resolved in peace. No longer did she get caught up in the forcefulness of a passing moment: she knew that no one of these moments was of intrinsic value. ‘Imprisoned in happiness,’ she murmured to herself. But she was conscious of a smile somewhere deep down within her.

Françoise cast a discouraged look at the empty glasses and the over-full ashtray: it was four o’clock, Elisabeth had long since left, but Xavière had never left off dancing. Françoise did not dance, and to pass the time she had drunk and smoked too much. Her head was heavy and she was beginning to feel all over her body the lassitude of sleepiness.

‘I think it’s time to go,’ she said.

‘Already!’ said Xavière. She looked at Françoise with disappointment. ‘Are you tired?’

‘A little,’ said Françoise. She hesitated. ‘You can stay on without me,’ she said. ‘You’ve been to a dance-hall alone before.’

‘If you leave, I’ll go with you,’ said Xavière.

‘I don’t want to oblige you to go home,’ said Françoise.

Xavière shrugged her shoulders with an air that accepted the inevitable. ‘Oh, I may just as well go home,’ she said.

‘No, that would be a pity,’ said Françoise. She smiled. ‘Let’s stay a bit longer.’ Xavière’s face brightened. ‘This place is so nice, isn’t it?’ She smiled at a young man who was bowing to her and then followed him to the middle of the dance floor.

Françoise lit another cigarette. After all, nothing obliged her to resume her work the very next day. It was slightly absurd to spend hour after hour here without dancing, without speaking to a soul, but if one set one’s mind to it there was fascination to be found in this kind of self-absorption. It was years since she had sat thus, lost in alcohol fumes and tobacco smoke, pursuing little dreams and thoughts that led nowhere.

Xavière came back and sat down beside Françoise.

‘Why don’t you dance?’

‘I dance very badly,’ said Françoise.

‘But aren’t you bored?’ asked Xavière in a plaintive tone.

‘Not at all. I love to look on. I’m fascinated just listening to the music and watching the people.’

She smiled. She owed to Xavière both this hour and this evening. Why exclude from her life this offering of refreshing richness, a young, completely fresh companion, with her demands, her reticent smiles and unexpected reactions?

‘I can see that it can’t be very amusing for you,’ said Xavière. Her face looked quite dejected; she, too, now seemed a little tired.

‘But I assure you that I am quite happy,’ said Françoise. She gently patted Xavière’s wrist. ‘I enjoy being with you.’

Xavière smiled without conviction. Françoise looked at her affectionately. She no longer understood very clearly the resistance she had put up against Pierre. It was just this very faint scent of risk and mystery that intrigued her.

‘Do you know what I was thinking last night?’ she asked abruptly. ‘That you will never do anything as long as you stay in Rouen. There’s only one way out of it and that’s to come and live in Paris.’

‘Live in Paris?’ said Xavière in astonishment. ‘I’d love to, unfortunately!’

‘I’m in earnest,’ said Françoise. She hesitated; she was afraid Xavière might think her tactless. ‘I’ll tell you what you could do: you could stay in Paris, at my hotel, if you like. I would lend you what money you need and you would train for a career, a typist perhaps. Or, better still, I have a friend who runs a beauty-parlour and she would employ you as soon as you have your certificate.’

Xavière’s face darkened.

‘My uncle would never consent to that,’ she said.

‘You can do without his consent. You aren’t afraid of him, are you?’

‘No,’ said Xavière. She stared at her sharply pointed nails. Her pale complexion, her long fair hair a little in disorder from dancing, gave her the woebegone look of a jellyfish washed up on dry sand.

‘Well?’ said Françoise.

‘Excuse me,’ said Xavière. She rose to rejoin one of the young men who was making signs to her and her features were alive again. Françoise’s glance followed her in utter amazement. Xavière had strange abrupt changes of mood. It was a little disconcerting that she had not even taken the trouble to think over Françoise’s suggestion. And yet, this plan was eminently sensible. With some impatience she waited for Xavière to come back.

‘Well,’ she said, ‘what do you think of my plan?’

‘What plan?’ said Xavière. She seemed honestly at a loss.

‘To come and live in Paris,’ said Françoise.

‘Oh, to live in Paris,’ said Xavière.

‘But this is serious,’ said Françoise. ‘You seem to imagine that I’m romancing.’

Xavière shrugged her shoulders. ‘But it can’t be done,’ she said.

‘It can – if you want to do it,’ said Françoise. ‘What’s standing in your way?’

‘It’s impossible,’ said Xavière with annoyance. She looked round about her. ‘This place is getting sinister, don’t you think? All these people have eyes in the middle of their face. They are taking root here because they haven’t even the strength to drag themselves elsewhere.’

‘Well, let’s go,’ said Françoise. She crossed the room and opened the door. A faint grey dawn was visible in the sky. ‘We could walk a little,’ she said.

‘We could,’ said Xavière. She pulled her coat tight around her neck and began to walk very quickly. Why had she refused to take Françoise’s offer seriously? It was irritating to feel this small, hostile, stubborn mind beside her.

‘I must convince her,’ thought Françoise. Up to the present, the discussion with Pierre and the vague dreams of the evening, the very opening of this conversation, had been only a game. Suddenly, everything had become real. Xavière’s resistance was real and Françoise wanted to break it down. It was outrageous; she had felt so strongly that she was dominating Xavière, possessing her even in her past and in the still unknown meanderings of her future. And yet there was this obstinate will against which her own will was breaking.

Xavière walked faster and faster, scowling as if in pain. It was impossible to talk. Françoise followed her silently for a while, then lost her patience.

‘You’re sure you don’t mind walking?’ she said.

‘Not at all,’ said Xavière. Her face contorted tragically. ‘I hate the cold.’

‘You should have said so,’ said Françoise. ‘We’ll go into the first bistro we find open.’

‘No, let’s walk if you’d like to,’ said Xavière in gallant self-sacrifice.

‘I’m not particularly keen on walking any farther,’ said Françoise. ‘But I would very much like a cup of hot coffee.’

They slackened their pace a little. Near the Gare Montparnasse, at the corner of the rue d’Odessa, people were grouped at the counter of the Café Biard. Françoise went in and sat down in a corner at the far end of the room.

‘Two coffees,’ she ordered.

At one of the tables a woman was asleep, with her body slumped forward: there were suitcases and bundles on the floor. At another table three Breton peasants were drinking calvados.

Françoise looked at Xavière. ‘I don’t understand you,’ she said.

Xavière looked at her uneasily. ‘Do I aggravate you?’

‘I’m disappointed,’ said Françoise. ‘I thought you would be brave enough to accept my offer.’

Xavière hesitated. She looked around her with an agonized expression. ‘I don’t want to do facial massage,’ she said plaintively.

Françoise laughed.

‘There’s nothing to force you to do that. I might well be able to find you a job as a mannequin, for instance. Or you could certainly learn to type.’

‘I don’t want to be a typist or a mannequin,’ said Xavière vehemently.

Françoise was taken aback.

‘My idea was that it would be only a beginning. Once you are trained and in a job you would have time to look about you. What exactly would interest you? Studying, drawing, acting?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Xavière. ‘Nothing in particular. Is it absolutely necessary for me to do something?’ she asked a little haughtily.

‘A few hours of boring work wouldn’t seem to me too much to pay for your independence,’ said Françoise.

Xavière wrinkled her face in disgust.

‘I hate these compromises. If one can’t have the sort of life one wants, one might as well be dead.’

‘The fact is that you will never kill yourself,’ said Françoise a little sharply. ‘So it would be just as well to try to live a suitable life.’

She swallowed a little coffee. This was really early morning coffee, acrid and sweet like the coffee you drink on a station platform after a night of travel, or in country inns while waiting for the first bus. Its dank flavour softened Françoise’s heart.

‘What do you think life should be like?’ she asked amiably.

‘Like it was when I was a child,’ said Xavière.

‘Having things come to you without your having to look for them? As when your father took you for a ride on his big horse?’

‘There were a great many other moments,’ said Xavière. ‘When he took me hunting at six o’clock in the morning and the grass was covered with fresh cobwebs. Everything seemed important.’

‘But you’ll find similar happiness in Paris,’ said Françoise. ‘Just think, music, plays, dance-halls.’

‘And I would have to be like your friend, counting the number of drinks I’ve had and looking at my watch all the time, so that I can get to work the next morning.’

Françoise felt hurt, for she had been looking at the time.

‘She almost seems annoyed with me. But why? ’ she thought. This clearly unpredictable Xavière interested her.

‘Yet you are prepared to accept a far drearier life than hers,’ she said, ‘and one which is ten times less free. As a matter of fact, it’s obvious: you’re afraid. Perhaps not afraid of your family, but afraid of breaking with your own little ways, afraid of freedom.’

Xavière bent her head without replying.

‘What’s the matter?’ said Françoise softly. ‘You are so completely obstinate. You don’t seem to put any trust in me.’

‘But I do,’ said Xavière coldly.

‘What is the matter?’ repeated Françoise.

‘It drives me mad to think of my life,’ said Xavière.

‘But that’s not all,’ said Françoise. ‘You have been queer the whole evening.’ She smiled. ‘Were you annoyed at having Elisabeth with us? You don’t seem to care very much for her.’

‘Why?’ said Xavière. She added stiffly: ‘She must surely be a very interesting person.’

‘You were shocked to see her crying in public, weren’t you?’ said Françoise. ‘Admit it. I shock you too. You thought me disgracefully sentimental.’

Xavière stared, wide-eyed. She had the frank blue eyes of a child.

‘It seemed odd to me,’ she said ingenuously.

She remained on the defensive. It was useless to press the matter. Françoise stifled a little yawn. ‘I’m going home,’ she said. ‘Are you going to Inès’s place?’

‘Yes, I’m going to try to pick up my things and get out without waking her,’ said Xavière. ‘Otherwise she’ll tell me off.’

‘I thought you were fond of Inès?’

‘Yes, I am fond of her,’ said Xavière. ‘But she’s the sort of person in front of whom one can’t even drink a glass of milk without having a guilty conscience.’

Was the bitterness of her voice aimed at Inès or Françoise? In any case it was wise not to insist.

‘Well, let’s go,’ said Françoise. She put her hand on Xavière’s shoulder. ‘I’m sorry you didn’t have a pleasant evening.’

Xavière’s face suddenly fell and all the hardness disappeared. She looked at Françoise with despair.

‘But I’ve had a lovely time,’ she said. She looked down and said quickly: ‘But you can’t have had a very good time dragging me around like a poodle.’

Françoise smiled. ‘So that’s it,’ she thought. ‘She really thought that I was taking her out simply from pity.’ She looked affectionately at this touchy little person.

‘On the contrary, I was very happy to have you with me, otherwise I wouldn’t have asked you,’ said Françoise. ‘Why did you think that?’

Xavière gave her a look of loving trust.

‘You have such a full life,’ she said. ‘So many friends, so much to do, I felt thoroughly insignificant.’

That’s foolish,’ said Françoise. It was astonishing to think that Xavière could have been jealous of Elisabeth. ‘Then when I spoke to you about coming to Paris, you thought I wanted to offer you charity?’

‘I did – a bit,’ said Xavière humbly.

‘And you hated me for it,’ said Françoise.

‘I didn’t hate you for it; I hated myself.’

‘That’s the same thing,’ said Françoise. Her hand moved from Xavière’s shoulder and slipped down her arm. ‘But I’m fond of you,’ she said. ‘I would be extremely happy to have you near me.’

Xavière turned overjoyed and incredulous eyes towards her.

‘Didn’t we have a good time together this afternoon?’ said Françoise.

‘Yes,’ said Xavière embarrassed.

‘We could have lots of times like that! Doesn’t that tempt you?’

Xavière squeezed Françoise’s hand.

‘Oh, how I’d like to,’ she said enthusiastically.

‘If you agree it’s as good as done,’ said Françoise. ‘I’ll get Inès to send you a letter saying that she’s found you a job. And the day you make up your mind, all you’ll have to do is write to me “I’m coming,” and you will come.’ She patted the warm hand that lay trustingly in hers. ‘You’ll see, you’ll have a beautiful rich little life.’

‘Oh, I do want to come,’ said Xavière. She sank with all her weight against Françoise’s shoulder; for some time they remained motionless, leaning against each other. Xavière’s hair brushed against Francoise’s cheek. Their fingers remained intertwined.

‘It makes me sad to leave you,’ said Françoise.

‘So it does me,’ said Xavière softly.

‘My dear little Xavière,’ murmured Françoise. Xavière looked at her, with eyes shining, parted lips; mollified, yielding; she had abandoned herself completely. Henceforth Françoise would lead her through life.

‘I shall make her happy,’ she decided with conviction.

Chapter Three

A ray of light shone from under Xavière’s door. Françoise heard a faint jingling and a rustle of garments, and then she knocked. There was a prolonged silence.

‘Who is it?’

‘It is I, Françoise. It’s almost time to leave.’

Ever since Xavière had arrived at the Hotel Bayard, Françoise had learned never to knock at her door unexpectedly, and never to arrive early for an appointment. All the same, her arrival always created mysterious agitation on the other side of the door.

‘Would you mind waiting for me a minute? I’ll come up to your room in a moment.’

‘All right, I’ll wait for you,’ said Françoise.

She went upstairs. Xavière liked formality. She never opened her door to Françoise until she had made elaborate preparations to receive her. To be taken by surprise in her everyday privacy would have seemed to her obscene.

‘I only hope everything goes well tonight,’ thought Françoise. ‘We’ll never be ready in three days.’ She sat down on the sofa and picked up one of the manuscripts which were piled on the night table. Pierre had asked her to read the plays sent in to him and it was work that she usually found entertaining. Marsyas, or The Doubtful Metamorphosis. Françoise looked despondently at the titles. Things had not gone at all well that afternoon; everyone was worn out. Pierre’s nerves had been on edge and he had not slept for a week. With anything less than a hundred performances to a full house, expenses would not be covered.

She threw down the manuscript and rose to her feet. She had plenty of time to make up her face again, but she was too agitated. She lit a cigarette, and a smile came to her lips. Actually she enjoyed nothing better than this last-minute excitement. She knew perfectly well that everything would be ready when the time came. Pierre could do wonders in three days. That question of mercury lights would be settled. And if only Tedesco could make up his mind to fall into line with the rest of the company …

‘May I come in?’ asked a timid voice.

‘Come in,’ said Françoise.

Xavière was wearing a heavy coat and her ugly little beret. On her childlike face was a faint, contrite smile.

‘Have I kept you waiting?’

‘No, it’s all right. We’re not late,’ said Françoise hastily. She had to avoid letting Xavière think she might have been in the wrong; otherwise, she would become spiteful and sullen. ‘I’m not even ready myself.’

She powdered her nose a little, by force of habit, and turned quickly away from the looking-glass. Whatever face she wore tonight did not really matter: it did not exist for herself and she had a vague hope that it would be invisible to everyone else. She picked up her key and gloves and closed the door.

‘You went to a concert, didn’t you?’ she asked. ‘Was it good?’

‘No, I haven’t been out,’ said Xavière. ‘It was too cold and I didn’t feel like going.’

Françoise took her arm.

‘What have you done all day? Tell me about it.’

‘There’s nothing to tell,’ said Xavière plaintively.

‘That’s the answer you always give me,’ said Françoise. ‘But I’ve told you all the same that it gives me pleasure to imagine your life in detail.’ Smiling, she looked at her closely. ‘You’ve washed your hair.’

‘Yes,’ said Xavière.

‘You’ve set it beautifully. One of these days I’ll ask you to do mine. And what else? Did you read? Did you sleep? What sort of lunch did you have?’

‘I didn’t do anything at all,’ said Xavière.

Françoise insisted no further. It was impossible to achieve any fixed degree of intimacy with Xavière. The trifling occupations of a day seemed to her as indecent a subject of conversation as her bodily functions, and since she hardly ever left her room she rarely had anything to recount. Françoise had been disappointed by her lack of curiosity. Tempting movies, concerts, outings had been suggested to her to no purpose; she remained obstinately in her room. Françoise had been stirred by a moment of romantic excitement that morning in a Montparnasse café when she thought she had acquired a rare treasure. Xavière’s presence had brought her nothing fresh.

‘I had a full day myself,’ said Françoise gaily. ‘This morning I gave the wig-maker a bit of my mind; he’d only delivered half the wigs. And then I went hunting for props. It’s difficult to find just what I want; it’s a real treasure hunt. But you can’t imagine what fun it is rummaging among curious old theatre props. I must take you with me some day.’

‘I would like to come very much,’ said Xavière.

This afternoon there was a long rehearsal and I spent a lot of time giving the finishing touches to the costumes.’ She laughed. ‘One of the actors, who is very stout, had padded his buttocks instead of his stomach. You should have seen his figure!’

Xavière gently squeezed Françoise’s hand.

‘You mustn’t tire yourself out. You’ll make yourself ill!’

Françoise looked at the anxious face with sudden affection. At times Xavière’s reserve melted; she was no more than a fond ingenuous little girl, and one almost wanted to cover her pearly cheeks with kisses.

‘Now there won’t be anything else for a long time,’ said Françoise. ‘You know, I wouldn’t lead this sort of life all the time; but when it lasts only a few days and we hope to be successful, it’s worth while giving everything in one’s power.’

‘You are so energetic,’ said Xavière.

Françoise smiled at her.

‘I think it will be interesting tonight. Labrousse always has his finest inspirations at the last minute.’

Xavière said nothing. She always appeared embarrassed when Françoise spoke of Pierre, although she made a show of admiring him greatly.

‘It won’t bore you to go to this rehearsal?’ said Françoise.

‘I’ll enjoy it very much,’ said Xavière. She hesitated. ‘Obviously I’d prefer to see you under different circumstances.’

‘So would I,’ said Françoise without warmth. She hated these veiled reproaches which Xavière let fall from time to time. Unquestionably she had not given her much of her time, but surely she could not be expected to sacrifice to her the few hours she had for her own work!

They found themselves in front of the theatre. Françoise looked up affectionately at the old building with rococo festoons ornamenting its façade. It had a friendly, demure look that warmed the heart. In a few days, it would assume its gala appearance, it would be ablaze with all its lights: tonight, it was bathed in shadow. Françoise walked towards the stage-door.

‘It’s strange to think that you come here every day, much as you might go to an office,’ said Xavière. ‘The inside of a theatre has always seemed so mysterious to me.’

‘I remember before I knew Labrousse,’ said Françoise, ‘how Elisabeth used to put on the solemn air of an initiate when she led me along the corridors. I felt very proud of myself.’ She smiled; the mystery had faded. But this yard, cluttered with old stage sets, had lost none of its poetry by becoming an everyday sight. The little wooden staircase, the same colour as a garden bench, led up to the green-room. Françoise paused for a moment to listen to the murmur coming from the stage. As always, when she was going to see Pierre, her heart began to beat faster.

‘Don’t make any noise. We’re going to cross the stage-floor,’ she said.

She took Xavière by the hand and they tiptoed along behind the scenery. In a garden of green and purple shrubs, Tedesco was pacing up and down like a soul in torment. Tonight, his voice sounded curiously choked.

‘Sit down here. I’ll be back in a moment,’ said Françoise.

There were a great many people in the theatre. As usual, the actors and the small-part players were grouped together in the back stalls, while Pierre alone was in the front row. Françoise shook hands with Elisabeth, who was sitting beside a little actor from whom she had scarcely been separated for a moment during the last few days.

‘I’ll come and see you in a moment,’ she said. She smiled at Pierre without speaking. He sat all hunched up, his head muffled in a big red scarf. He looked anything but satisfied.

‘Those clumps of shrubbery are a failure!’ thought Françoise. ‘They will have to be changed.’ She looked uneasily at Pierre and he made a gesture of utter helplessness. Tedesco had never been so poor. Was it possible they had been mistaken in him up till now?

Tedesco’s voice broke completely. He put his hand up to his forehead.

‘I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s the matter with me,’ he said. ‘I think I’d better rest a while. I’m sure I’ll be better after a quarter of an hour’s rest.’

There was a deathly silence.

‘All right,’ said Pierre. ‘Meanwhile, well adjust the lighting. And will somebody get Vuillemin and Gerbert? I want someone to rearrange this scenery.’ He lowered his voice. ‘How are you? You don’t look well.’

‘I’m all right,’ said Françoise. ‘You don’t look too good, either. Stop rehearsals at midnight tonight. We are all worn out; you can’t keep up this pace till Friday.’

‘I know,’ said Pierre. He looked around. ‘Did you bring Xavière with you?’

‘Yes, I’ll have to spend a little time with her.’ Françoise hesitated. ‘Do you know what I’ve been thinking? All three of us could go and have a drink together when we leave. Would you mind that?’

Pierre laughed.

‘I haven’t told you yet. This morning when I was coming up the stairs I met her on her way down. She scurried off like a scared rabbit and locked herself in the lavatory.’

‘I know,’ said Françoise. ‘You terrify her. That’s why I’m asking you to see her just for this once. If you are really friendly towards her, it will simplify matters.’

‘I’d be only too glad to,’ said Pierre. ‘I find her rather amusing. Oh, there you are. Where’s Gerbert?’

‘I’ve looked everywhere for him,’ said Vuillemin, coming up almost out of breath. ‘I’ve no idea where he’s gone.’

‘I said goodbye to him at seven-thirty in the props-room. He told me he was going to try to get some sleep,’ said Françoise. She raised her voice: ‘Régis, would you please go and look back-stage and see if you can find Gerbert?’

‘It’s appalling, that barricade you’ve gone and landed me with over there,’ said Pierre. ‘I’ve told you a thousand times that I do not want any painted scenery. I want a built-up set.’

‘And another thing, the colour won’t do,’ said Françoise. ‘Those bushes could be very pretty, but at present it’s got a dirty rusty look.’

‘That’s easily done,’ said Vuillemin.

Gerbert ran across the stage and jumped down into the auditorium. His suède jacket was open over a check shirt. He was covered with dust.

‘I’m sorry,’ said Gerbert. ‘I fell sound asleep.’ He ran his hand through his uncombed hair. His face was livid and there were deep rings under his eyes. While Pierre vas speaking to him, Françoise affectionately scanned his pinched face. He looked like a poor sick monkey.

‘You make him do too much,’ said Françoise, when Vuillemin and Gerbert had gone off.

‘He’s the only one I can rely on,’ said Pierre. ‘Vuillemin will make a mess of things again if he isn’t watched.’

‘I know, but he isn’t as strong as we are,’ said Françoise. She got up. ‘I’ll see you later.’

‘We’re going to try out the lighting,’ shouted Pierre. ‘Give me night; only blue back-stage floods.’

Françoise went over and sat down beside Xavière.

‘Still, I’m not quite old enough,’ she thought. There was no denying it, she had a maternal feeling towards Gerbert – maternal, with a faintly incestuous touch. She would have liked to put that weary head against her shoulder.

‘Do you find it interesting?’ she said to Xavière.

‘I don’t understand what’s supposed to be happening,’ said Xavière.

‘It’s night. Brutus has gone down into his garden to meditate. He has received messages asking him to revolt against Caesar. He hates tyranny, but he loves Caesar. He’s perplexed.’

‘Then this fellow in the brown jacket is Brutus?’ said Xavière.

‘When he wears his beautiful white toga and make-up he looks much more like Brutus.’

‘I never imagined him like that,’ said Xavière sadly. Her eyes shone. ‘Oh, how beautiful the lighting is!’

‘Do you think so? That makes me very happy,’ said Françoise. ‘We worked like slaves to get just that impression of early morning.’

‘Early morning? ’ said Xavière. ‘It’s so chill. This light makes me think of …’ she hesitated and then added in one breath, ‘of a light like the beginning of the world, before the sun and the moon and the stars were created.’

‘Good evening, Mademoiselle,’ said a harsh voice. Canzetti was smiling with timid coquetry. Two thick black curls framed her charming gypsy face. Her lips and cheeks were very heavily made up.

‘Does my hair look all right now?’

‘I think it’s very becoming,’ said Françoise.

‘I took your advice,’ said Canzetti gently, pursing her lips.

There was a short blast of a whistle and Pierre’s voice shouted. ‘We’ll take the scene again from the beginning, with the lighting, and we’ll go right through. Is everyone here?’

‘Everyone’s here,’ said Gerbert.

‘Goodbye, Mademoiselle, and thank you,’ said Canzetti.

‘She’s nice, isn’t she?’ said Françoise.

‘Yes,’ said Xavière. She added petulantly: ‘I loath that type of face and I think she looks dirty.’

Françoise laughed.

‘Then you don’t think she’s at all nice.’

Xavière scowled and made a wry face.

‘I’d tear my nails out one by one rather than speak the way she spoke to you. A worm couldn’t be as low.’

‘She used to teach at a school near Bourges,’ said Françoise. ‘She gave up everything to try her luck in the theatre. She’s starving to death here in Paris.’ Françoise looked with amusement at Xavière’s inscrutable face. Xavière hated anyone who was at all close to Françoise. Her timidity towards Pierre was mingled with hatred.

A moment before, Tedesco had begun once more to pace the stage. Out of a religious silence, he began to speak. He seemed to have recovered himself.

‘That still isn’t it,’ thought Françoise in distress. Only another three days, and in the auditorium there would be the same gloom, on the stage the same lighting, and the same words would move through space. But instead of this silence they would come into contact with a world of sounds. The seats would creak, restless fingers would rustle programmes, old men would cough persistently. Through layer upon layer of indifference, the subtle phrases would have to blaze a trail to a blasé and intractable audience; all these people, preoccupied with their digestion, their throats, their lovely clothes, their household squabbles; bored critics, malicious friends – it was a challenge to try to interest them in Brutus’s perplexity. They had to be taken by surprise, taken out of themselves. Tedesco’s restrained, lifeless acting was inadequate.

Pierre’s head was bent: Françoise regretted she had not gone back and sat down beside him. What was he thinking? This was the first time that he had put into effect his aesthetic principles so systematically, and on such a large scale. He himself had trained all these actors. Françoise had adapted the play according to his instructions. Even the stage designer had followed his orders. If he succeeded he would have asserted decisively his conception of art and the theatre. Françoise’s clenched hands became moist.

‘There’s been no stint either in work or money,’ she thought, with a lump in her throat. ‘If we fail, it will be a long, long time before we’re in any position to start over again.’

‘Wait,’ said Pierre suddenly. He went up on to the stage. Tedesco froze.

‘What you’re doing is all very well,’ said Pierre. ‘It’s quite correct. But, don’t you see, you’re acting the words, but you’re not acting the situation enough. I want you to keep the same nuances – but at a different level.’

Pierre leaned against the wall and bowed his head. Françoise relaxed. Pierre just did not know how to talk to actors. It embarrassed him to have to bring himself down to their level. Yet when he demonstrated a part he was remarkable.

… ‘I know no personal cause, to spurn at him, But for the general’…

Françoise watched the miracle with inexhaustible wonder. Physically, Pierre in no way looked the part. He was stocky, his features were irregular, and yet, when he raised his head, it was Brutus himself who turned a tortured face to the heavens.

Gerbert leaned toward Françoise. He had sat down behind her without her having noticed him.

‘The angrier he gets the more amazing he is,’ he said. ‘At this very moment he’s seething.’

‘With good reason,’ said Françoise. ‘Do you think Tedesco will ever make anything of his part?’

‘He’s on to it,’ said Gerbert. ‘He’s only to make a start and the rest will follow.’

‘You see,’ Pierre was saying, ‘that’s the pitch you have to get and then you can be as restrained as you like. I will feel the emotion. If the emotion isn’t there, it’s no damn good.’

Tedesco leaned against the wall, and bowed his head.

‘It must be by his death: and for my part, I know no personal cause, to spurn at him, But for the general.’

Françoise gave Gerbert a triumphant smile. It seemed so simple, and yet she knew that nothing was more difficult than to awaken in an actor this sudden enlightenment. She looked at the back of Pierre’s head. She would never grow tired of watching him work. Of all her lucky breaks, the one she valued the most was that which gave her the opportunity of collaborating with Pierre. The weariness they shared and their efforts united them more surely than an embrace. There was not one moment of all these harassing rehearsals that was not an act of love.

The conspirators’ scene had gone off without a flaw; Françoise got up from her stall.

‘I’m just going to say something to Elisabeth,’ she said to Gerbert. ‘If I’m needed I’ll be in my office. I haven’t the energy to stay any longer. Pierre hasn’t finished with Portia.’ She hesitated. It was not very nice to leave Xavière, but she had not seen Elisabeth for ages; it was verging on rudeness.

‘Gerbert, I’m leaving my friend Xavière in your hands,’ she said. ‘You might take her back-stage while the scenery’s being changed. She doesn’t know what a theatre is like.’

Xavière said nothing: ever since the beginning of the rehearsal there had been a look of resentment in her eyes.

Françoise put her hand on Elisabeth’s shoulder.

‘Come and smoke a cigarette,’ she said.

‘I’d love to. It’s tyrannical not to allow people to smoke. I’ll have to speak to Pierre about it,’ said Elisabeth with mock indignation.

Françoise stopped in the doorway. A few days earlier, the room had been repainted a light yellow which gave it a welcome rustic look. A faint smell of turpentine still hung in the air.

‘I hope we never leave this old theatre,’ said Françoise, as they climbed the stairs.

‘I wonder if there’s anything left to drink,’ she said, pushing open the door of her office. She opened a cupboard half-filled with books and looked at the bottles lined up on the top shelf. ‘There’s a little whisky here. Would you like that?’

‘Splendid,’ said Elisabeth.

Françoise handed her a glass. There was such warmth in her heart that she felt a burst of affection for Elisabeth. She had the same feeling of comradeship and ease as when, in the past, they had come out of a difficult and interesting class and strolled arm in arm in the lycée yard.

Elisabeth lit a cigarette and crossed her legs.

‘What was the matter with Tedesco? Guimiot insists that he is taking drugs. Do you think that’s true?’

‘I’ve no idea,’ said Françoise, and she blissfully swallowed a long pull of whisky.

‘That little Xavière is not at all pretty,’ said Elisabeth. ‘What are you doing about her? Was everything put right with her family?’

‘I know nothing about that,’ said Françoise. ‘Her uncle may show up any one of these days and kick up a row.’

‘Do be careful,’ said Elisabeth, with an air of importance. ‘You may run into trouble.’

‘Careful of what?’ said Françoise.

‘Have you found her any work?’

‘No. She’s got to get used to things first.’

‘What’s her particular bent?’

‘I don’t think she’ll ever be capable of much work.’

Elisabeth thoughtfully exhaled a puff of smoke.

‘What does Pierre say about it?’

‘They haven’t seen much of each other. He rather likes her.’

This cross-examination was beginning to irritate her. It almost seemed as if Elisabeth were arraigning her. She cut her short.

‘Tell me, is there any news about you?’ she said.

Elisabeth gave a short laugh.

‘Guimiot? During the rehearsal last Tuesday, he came over to talk to me. Don’t you think he’s handsome?’

‘Very handsome. That’s just why we took him on. I don’t know him at all. Is he nice?’

‘He certainly knows how to make love,’ said Elisabeth in a detached tone.

‘You didn’t lose much time,’ said Françoise a little taken aback. Whenever Elisabeth took a liking to a man she began to talk about sleeping with him. But actually, she had remained faithful to Claude for the last two years.

‘You know my principles,’ said Elisabeth gaily. ‘I’m not the sort of woman who is taken. I’m a woman who does the taking. That very first evening, I asked him to spend the night with me. He was flabbergasted.’

‘Does Claude know?’ said Françoise.

Elisabeth very deliberately tapped the ash from her cigarette. Whenever she was embarrassed her movements and her voice became hard and resolute.

‘Not yet, I’m waiting for just the right moment.’ She hesitated. ‘It’s all very complicated.’

‘Your relations with Claude? It’s a long time since you’ve spoken to me about him.’

‘Nothing’s changed.’ said Elisabeth. The corners of her mouth drooped. ‘Only I have changed.’

‘Did you get nowhere when you had it out with him a month ago?’

‘He keeps on telling me the same old thing: that it’s me who has the better part of the bargain. I’m fed up with that old story. I almost said to him: “It’s much too good for me, thank you; I would be satisfied with the other.”’

‘You must have been too conciliatory again,’ said Françoise.

‘Yes, I think so,’ Elisabeth gazed fixedly into space; an unpleasant thought was passing through her mind. ‘He thinks he can make me swallow anything,’ she said. ‘He’ll get a big surprise.’

Françoise studied her with some interest. At this moment she was not consciously striking an attitude.

‘Do you want to break off with him?’ said Françoise.

Something relaxed in Elisabeth’s face. She became matter of fact.

‘Claude is far too attractive a person for me ever to let him go out of my life,’ she said. ‘But I would like to be less in love with him.’

She wrinkled the corners of her eyes and smiled at Françoise with a hint of mutual understanding, which passed between them only very rarely.

‘We’ve poked enough fun at women who let themselves be victimized. And say what you like, it’s not in my line to be a victim.’

Françoise returned her smile. She would have liked to advise her, but it was a difficult thing to do. What was necessary, was for Elisabeth not to be in love with Claude.

‘Putting an end to it in your own mind only won’t get you very far,’ she said. ‘I wonder if you shouldn’t compel him outright to make a choice.’

‘This isn’t the moment,’ said Elisabeth sharply. ‘No, I think that when I’ve won back my inner independence, I’ll have made great progress. But to do that, it’s essential for me to succeed in dissociating the man from the lover in Claude.’

‘Will you stop sleeping with him?’

‘I don’t know. But what I do know is that I shall sleep with other men.’ She added with a shade of defiance: ‘Sexual faithfulness is perfectly ridiculous. It leads to pure slavery. I don’t understand how you can tolerate it.’

‘I swear to you that I don’t feel that I’m a slave,’ said Françoise.

Elisabeth could not help confiding in someone; after which she invariably became aggressive.

‘It’s odd,’ said Elisabeth slowly, and as if she had been following a train of thought with surprised sincerity. ’The way you were at twenty, I would never have thought you would be a one-man woman. Especially as Pierre has affaires.’

‘You’ve already told me that, but I am certainly not going to put myself out,’ said Françoise.

‘Nonsense. You’re not going to tell me that it’s never happened to you to feel a desire for a man,’ said Elisabeth. ‘You’re talking like all the people who won’t admit they have prejudices. They pretend they are subject to them as a matter of personal choice. But that’s just so much nonsense.’

‘Pure sensuality does not interest me,’ said Françoise. ‘And besides, does pure sensuality even have a meaning?’

‘Why not? It’s very pleasant,’ said Elisabeth with a sneering little laugh.

Françoise rose.

‘I think we might go down. The sets must have been changed by now.’

‘You know, that young Guimiot is really charming,’ said Elisabeth as she walked out of the room. ‘He deserves more than a small part. He could be a worthwhile recruit for you. I’ll have to speak to Pierre about it.’

‘Do speak to him,’ said Françoise. She gave Elisabeth a quick smile. ‘I’ll see you later.’

The curtain was still down. Someone on the stage was hammering. Heavy footsteps shook the flooring. Françoise walked over to Xavière who was talking to Inès. Inès blushed furiously and got up.

‘Don’t let me disturb you,’ said Françoise.

‘I was just going,’ said Inès. She shook hands with Xavière. ‘When am I going to see you?’

Xavière made a vague gesture.

‘I don’t know. I’ll ring you up.’

‘We might have dinner together tomorrow, between rehearsals.’

Inès remained standing in front of Xavière looking unhappy. Françoise had often wondered how the notion of becoming an actress could have entered that thick Norman skull: she had slaved for four years without making any appreciable progress: out of pity, Pierre had given her one line to speak.

‘Tomorrow …’ said Xavière. ‘I’d rather ring you up.’

‘You’ll come through all right, you know,’ said Françoise encouragingly. ‘When you’re not excited your diction is good.’

Inès smiled faintly and walked away.

‘Will you never ring her up?’ asked Françoise.

‘Never,’ said Xavière irritably. ‘Just because I slept at her place three times, there’s no reason why I should have to see her all my life.’

‘Didn’t Gerbert show you round?’

‘He suggested it,’ said Xavière.

‘It didn’t interest you?’

‘He seemed so embarrassed,’ said Xavière. ‘It was painful.’ She looked at Françoise with unveiled bitterness. ‘I loathe foisting myself on people,’ she said vehemently.

Françoise felt herself in the wrong. She had been tactless in leaving Xavière in Gerbert’s hands, but Xavière’s tone surprised her. Could Gerbert really have been off-hand with Xavière? That certainly wasn’t his way.

‘She takes everything so seriously,’ she thought with annoyance.

She had decided once and for all not to let Xavière’s childish fits of surliness poison her life.

‘How was Portia?’ said Françoise.

‘The big dark girl? Monsieur Labrousse made her repeat the same sentence twenty times. She kept getting it all wrong.’ Xavière’s face glowed with scorn. ‘Is it really possible for anyone as stupid as that to be an actress?’

‘There are all kinds,’ said Françoise.

Xavière was bursting with rage: that was obvious. Without a doubt she felt that Françoise was not giving her sufficient attention. She would get over it. Françoise looked at the curtain impatiently. The change of scenery was taking far too long. At least five minutes would have to be saved.

The curtain went up. Pierre was reclining on Caesar’s couch and Françoise’s heart began to beat faster. She knew Pierre’s every intonation, his every gesture. She anticipated them so exactly that she felt as if they sprang from her own will. And yet, it was outside her, on the stage, that they materialized. It was agonizing. She would feel herself responsible for the slightest failure and she couldn’t raise a finger to prevent it.

‘It’s true that we are really one,’ she thought with a burst of love. Pierre was speaking, his hand was raised, but his gestures, his tones, were as much a part of Françoise’s life as of his. Or rather, there was but one life and at its core but one entity, which could be termed neither he nor I, but we.

Pierre was on the stage, she was in the audience, and yet for both of them it was the same play being performed in the same theatre. Their life was the same. They did not always see it from the same angle, for through their individual desires, moods, or pleasures, each discovered a different aspect. But it was, for all that, the same life. Neither time nor distance could divide them. There were, of course, streets, ideas, faces, that came into existence first for Pierre, and others first for Françoise; but they faithfully pieced together these scattered experiences into a single whole, in which ‘yours’ and ‘mine’ became indistinguishable. Neither one nor the other ever withheld the slightest fragment. That would have been the worst, the only possible betrayal.

‘Tomorrow afternoon at two o’clock, we’ll rehearse the third act without costumes,’ said Pierre. ‘And tomorrow morning we’ll go through the whole thing, in sequence and in costume.’

‘I’m going to beat it,’ said Gerbert. ‘Will you need me tomorrow morning?’

Françoise hesitated. With Gerbert the worst drudgery became almost fun; the morning without him would be arid, but his pathetic tired face was heart-breaking to behold.

‘No, there isn’t much left to do,’ she said.

‘Is that really true?’ said Gerbert.

‘Absolutely true. You can go and sleep like a log.’

Elisabeth walked up to Pierre.

‘You know, this Julius Caesar of yours is really extraordinary,’ she said. Her face had an intent expression. ‘It’s so different and at the same time so realistic. The silence at that moment when you raise your hand – the quality of that silence – it’s magnificent.’

‘That’s sweet of you,’ said Pierre.

‘I assure you it will be a success,’ she said emphatically. She looked Xavière up and down with amusement.

‘This young lady doesn’t seem to care very much for the theatre. So blasée already?’

‘I had no idea the theatre was like this,’ said Xavière in a disdainful tone.

‘What did you think it was like?’ said Pierre.

They all look like shop assistants. They look so’ intent.’

‘It’s thrilling,’ said Elisabeth. ‘All this groping, all this seemingly confused effort which finally bursts forth as a thing of beauty.’

‘Personally, I find it disgusting,’ said Xavière. Anger had swept away her timidity. She threw a black look at Elisabeth. ‘An effort is not a pretty thing to see. And when the effort miscarries, well then,’ she sneered, ‘it’s ludicrous.’

‘It’s the same in every art,’ said Elisabeth curtly. ‘Beautiful things are not easily created. The more precious they are, the more work they require. You’ll see.’

‘The things I call precious,’ said Xavière, ‘are those that fall like manna from heaven.’ She pouted. ‘If they have to be bought, they’re merchandise just like anything else. That doesn’t interest me.’

‘What a little romantic!’ said Elisabeth with a cold laugh.

‘I know what she means,’ said Pierre. ‘All our seethings and bubblings can scarcely appear very appetizing.’

Elisabeth turned an almost belligerent face towards him.

‘Well! That’s news! Do you now believe in inspiration?’

‘No, but it’s true that our work isn’t beautiful. On the whole, it’s a disgusting mess.’

‘I didn’t say this work was beautiful,’ said Elisabeth abruptly. ‘I know that beauty lies only in the completed work, but I find it thrilling to watch the transition from the formless to the pure and completed state.’

Françoise looked at Pierre imploringly. It was painful to argue with Elisabeth. If she couldn’t have the last word, she felt she had lost prestige in the sight of the onlookers. To compel their esteem, their love, she fought them with vicious dishonesty. This might go on for hours.

‘Yes,’ said Pierre looking vague, ‘but only a specialist can appreciate that.’

There was a silence.

‘I think it would be wise to go,’ said Françoise.

Elisabeth looked at her watch.

‘Heavens! I’ll miss the last métro,’ she said with dismay. ‘I’m going to dash away. I’ll see you tomorrow.’

‘Well take you home,’ said Françoise feebly.

‘No, no, you’ll only delay me,’ said Elisabeth. She seized her gloves and bag, cast a wavering smile into space and disappeared.

‘We could go somewhere and have a drink,’ said Françoise.

‘If you two aren’t too tired,’ said Pierre.

‘I don’t feel the least bit sleepy,’ said Xavière.

Françoise locked the door and they left the theatre. Pierre hailed a taxi.

‘Where shall we go?’ he said.

‘To the Pôle Nord. It’s quiet there,’ said Françoise.

Pierre told the driver the address. Françoise turned on the light and powdered her nose. She wondered if she had been well advised in suggesting that they go out together. Xavière was sullen and the silence was already becoming awkward.

‘Go in. Don’t wait for me,’ said Pierre, looking for change to pay the taxi.

Françoise pushed open the leather door.

‘Is that table in the corner all right?’ she said.

‘Yes. This place looks very nice,’ said Xavière. She took off her coat.

‘Excuse me for one moment. I feel a little untidy and I don’t like making up my face in public.’

‘What shall I order for you?’ said Françoise.

‘Something strong,’ said Xavière.

Françoise’s eyes followed her.

‘She said that deliberately because I powdered my face in the taxi,’ she thought. When Xavière adopted this attitude of discreet superiority, it was because she was frothing with rage.

‘Where has your little friend gone?’ said Pierre.

‘She’s titivating. She’s in a queer mood tonight.’

‘She really is rather charming,’ said Pierre. ‘What are you having?’

‘An aquavit,’ said Françoise. ‘Order two.’

‘Two aquavits,’ said Pierre. ‘But give us the real aquavit. And one whisky.’

‘You’re so thoughtful,’ said Françoise. The last time she had been brought some cheap brandy. That had been two months ago but Pierre had not forgotten. He never forgot anything connected with her.

‘Why is she in a bad mood?’ said Pierre.

‘She thinks I didn’t see enough of her. It’s annoying, all the time I waste with her and still she isn’t satisfied.’

‘You’ve got to be fair,’ said Pierre. ‘You don’t see much of her.’

‘If I were to give her any more time, I wouldn’t have a minute to myself,’ said Françoise vehemently.

‘I understand,’ said Pierre. ‘But you can’t expect her to be so particularly satisfied with you. She has only you and she’s very fond of you. That can’t be much fun.’

‘I don’t say it is,’ said Françoise. Perhaps she was a little off-hand with Xavière. She found the idea unpleasant. She didn’t want to have the slightest reason for blaming herself. ‘Here she is,’ she said.

She looked at her with surprise. The blue dress fitted revealingly over a slender, rounded body, and the delicate youthful face was framed by sleek hair. The supple, feminine Xavière was something Françoise had not seen since their first meeting.

‘I ordered an aquavit for you,’ said Françoise.

‘What is it?’ said Xavière.

‘Taste it,’ said Pierre, pushing a glass toward her.

Xavière cautiously put her lips to the transparent spirit.

‘It’s terrible,’ she said smiling.

‘Would you like something else?’

‘No, brandy is always terrible,’ she said soberly, ‘but one has to drink it.’ She leaned her head back, half-closed her eyes and lifted the glass to her mouth.

‘It burns all the way down my throat,’ she said. She ran her fingers along her slender neck. Her hand slipped slowly along her body. ‘And it burns here. And here. It is odd. I feel as if I were being lighted up from inside.’

‘Is this the first time you’ve been to a rehearsal?’ said Pierre.

‘Yes,’ said Xavière.

‘And you were disappointed?’

‘A little.’

‘Do you really believe what you said to Elisabeth?’ asked Françoise, ‘or did you say it because she annoyed you?’

‘She did annoy me,’ said Pierre. He pulled a tobacco-pouch out of his pocket and began to fill his pipe. ‘In point of fact, to a pure and uninitiated soul, the solemn way in which we seek to create the exact reproduction of something that doesn’t exist must seem positively obscene.’

‘There’s no choice, since we really do want to make it exist,’ said Françoise.

‘If at least we succeeded the first time, and enjoyed it! But no, we have to grumble and sweat. All that drudgery to produce a ghost …’ He smiled at Xavière. ‘You think it’s ridiculous obstinacy?’

‘I never like to take trouble over anything,’ said Xavière demurely.

Françoise was a little surprised that Pierre took these childish whims so seriously.

‘You are questioning the validity of art as a whole, if you take that line,’ she said.

‘Yes, why not?’ said Pierre. ‘Don’t you see that at this moment the world is in turmoil? We may have war within the next six months.’ He caught his left hand between his teeth. ‘And here I am trying to reproduce the colour of dawn.’

‘What do you want to do?’ said Françoise. She felt very upset. Pierre it was who had convinced her that the greatest thing in the world was to create beauty. Their whole life together had been built on this belief. He had no right to change his opinion without warning her.

‘Why, I want Julius Caesar to be a success,’ said Pierre. ‘But I feel the size of a bee’s knee.’

When had he begun to think that? Did it really worry him or was it one of those brief flashes of illumination which gave him a moment’s pleasure and then disappeared without leaving a trace? Françoise dared not continue the conversation. Xavière did not seem bored, but she was looking down.

‘Suppose Elisabeth were to hear you,’ said Françoise.

‘Yes, art is like Claude. It mustn’t be touched, otherwise …’

‘It will collapse immediately,’ said Françoise. ‘She seems almost to have a premonition.’ She turned to Xavière. ‘Claude, you know, is the chap who was with her at the Flore the other evening.’

‘That horrible dark fellow!’ said Xavière.

‘He’s not so ugly,’ said Françoise.

‘He’s pseudo-handsome,’ said Pierre.

‘And a pseudo-genius,’ said Françoise.

Xavière’s look brightened.

‘What would she do if you were to tell her that he is stupid and ugly,’ she said winningly.

‘She wouldn’t believe it,’ said Françoise. She thought a moment. ‘I think she would break with us and she would hate Battier.’

‘You haven’t a very high opinion of Elisabeth,’ said Pierre cheerfully.

‘Not very high,’ said Xavière a little embarrassed. She seemed determined to be pleasant to Pierre. Perhaps in order to show Françoise that her ill humour was directed at her alone. Perhaps, too, she was flattered that he took her side.

‘What exactly do you dislike about her?’ asked Pierre.

Xavière hesitated.

‘She’s so artificial. Her scarf, her voice, the way she taps her cigarette on the table, it’s all done deliberately.’ She shrugged her shoulders. ‘And it’s done badly. I’m sure she doesn’t like tobacco. She doesn’t even know how to smoke.’

‘She’s been practising since the age of eighteen,’ said Pierre.

Xavière smiled furtively. Her smile indicated a secret understanding with herself.

‘I don’t dislike people who act a part in front of other people,’ she said. ‘The ridiculous thing about that woman is that, even when she’s alone, she has to walk with a firm step and make deliberate movements with her mouth.’

Her voice was so hard that Françoise felt hurt.

‘I think you like to dress up yourself,’ said Pierre. ‘I wonder what your face is like without the fringe and those rolls that hide half of it. And your handwriting is disguised, isn’t it?’

‘I’ve always disguised my handwriting,’ said Xavière proudly. ‘For a long time I wrote in a round hand, like this.’ She traced letters in the air with the point of her finger. ‘Now I use a pointed hand. It’s more refined.’

‘The worst thing about Elisabeth,’ said Pierre, ‘is that even her feelings are false. Fundamentally, she doesn’t give a damn about painting. She’s a communist and she admits she doesn’t give a damn about the proletariat!’

‘Lying doesn’t bother me,’ said Xavière. ‘What I think is monstrous is making up one’s mind in that way, as if to order. To think that every day at a set hour she begins to paint without having any desire to paint. She goes to meet her man whether she has any desire to see him or not …’ Her upper lip curled in a contemptuous sneer. ‘How can anyone submit to living according to plan, with time-tables and homework, as if they were still at a boarding school? I’d rather be a failure!’

She had achieved her aim: Françoise had been struck by the indictment. Usually, Xavière’s insinuations left her cold; but tonight, it was a different matter. The attention Pierre was paying to Xavière’s opinions lent them weight.

‘You make appointments and then don’t keep them,’ said Françoise. ‘It’s all very well when you do that to Inès, but you might also ruin some real friendships by going through life like that.’

‘If I like people, I’ll always want to keep appointments,’ said Xavière.

That’s not bound to happen every time,’ said Françoise.

‘Well, that’s just too bad,’ said Xavière. She pouted disdainfully. ‘I’ve always ended up by quarrelling with everyone.’

‘How could anyone quarrel with Inès?’ said Pierre. ‘She’s like a sheep.’

‘Oh, don’t be too sure of that,’ said Xavière.

‘Really?’ said Pierre. His eyes wrinkled gaily. He was curiosity itself. ‘With that big, innocent face do you mean to tell me she’s liable to bite you? What has she done to you?’

‘She hasn’t done anything,’ said Xavière reticently.

‘Oh, please tell me,’ said Pierre in his most coaxing voice. ‘I’d be delighted to know what’s hidden in the depths of those still waters.’

‘Oh nothing. Inès is a dunce,’ said Xavière. ‘The point is, I don’t like anyone to feel they hold any proprietary rights over me.’ She smiled and Françoise’s uneasiness crystallized. When alone with Françoise, Xavière, despite herself, permitted loathing, pleasure, affection, to be visible on a defenceless face, a child’s face. Now she felt herself a woman in front of a man and her features displayed precisely the shade of confidence or reserve she wanted to express.

‘Her affection must be an encumbrance,’ said Pierre with a look of concurrence and innocence which trapped Xavière.

‘That’s right,’ said Xavière brightening. ‘Once I put off an appointment at the last minute – the evening we went to the Prairie. She pulled a face a yard long …’

Françoise laughed.

‘Yes,’ said Xavière excitedly. ‘I was rude, but she dared to make some uncalled-for remarks,’ she blushed and added, ‘about something that was none of her concern.’

So that was it. Inès must have questioned Xavière about her relations with Françoise, and perhaps, with her calm Norman heavy-handedness, had joked about it. Beneath all Xavière’s vagaries there was without question a whole world of obstinate and secret thoughts. It was a somewhat disquieting idea.

Pierre laughed.

‘I know someone, that young Eloy girl, who always answers when a friend breaks a date: “It so happens that I’m no longer free!” But not everyone has that amount of tact.’

Xavière frowned.

‘In any case, not Inès,’ she said. She must have been vaguely aware of the sarcasm, because her face had frozen.

‘It’s very complicated, you know,’ said Pierre seriously. ‘I can readily understand that you find it distasteful to follow the rules, but it’s also impossible to live only for the moment.’

‘Why?’ said Xavière. ‘Why do people always have to drag so much dead weight about with them?’

‘Look,’ said Pierre, ‘time isn’t made up of a heap of little separate bits into which you can shut yourself up in turn. When you think you’re living purely in the present, you’re involving your future whether you like it or not.’

‘I don’t understand,’ said Xavière. Her tone was not friendly.

‘I’ll try to explain,’ said Pierre. When he became interested in a person, he was capable of carrying on a discussion for hours with angelic sincerity and patience. It was one form of his generosity. Françoise rarely took the trouble to explain what she thought.

‘Let’s assume you’ve decided to go to a concert,’ said Pierre. ‘Just as you’re about to set out, the idea of walking or taking the métro there strikes you as unbearable. So you convince yourself that you are free as regards your previous decision, and you stay at home. That’s all very well, but when ten minutes later you find yourself sitting in an arm-chair, bored stiff, you are no longer in the least free. You’re simply suffering the consequences of your own act.’

Xavière laughed dryly.

‘Concerts! That’s another of your beautiful inventions. As if anyone could want to hear music at fixed hours! – It’s utterly ridiculous.’ She added in a tone of almost bitter hatred: ‘Has Françoise told you that I was supposed to go to a concert this afternoon?’

‘No, but I do know that as a rule you can never bring yourself to leave your room. It’s a shame to live like a hermit in Paris.’

‘Well, this evening isn’t going to make me want to change my mind,’ she said scornfully.

Pierre’s face darkened.

‘You’ll miss scores of precious opportunities if you carry on like that,’ he said.

‘Always being afraid of losing something! To me there’s nothing more sordid. If it’s lost, it’s lost, that’s all there is to it!’

‘Is your life really a series of heroic renunciations?’ said Pierre with a sarcastic smile.

‘Do you mean I’m a coward? If you knew how little I care!’ said Xavière smugly, with a slight curl of her upper lip.

There was a silence. Pierre and Xavière both assumed poker-faces.

‘I think we’d better go home to bed,’ said Françoise.

What was most aggravating was that she herself could not overlook Xavière’s ill humour as easily as during the rehearsal. Xavière had suddenly begun to count, though no one understood exactly why.

‘Do you see that woman facing us?’ said Françoise. ‘Listen to her a moment. She’s been telling her boy-friend all the particular secrets of her soul for quite a long time.’

She was a young woman with heavy eyelids. She was staring, as if hypnotized, at her companion. ‘I’ve never been able to follow the rules of flirting,’ she was saying. ‘I can’t bear being touched; it’s morbid.’

In another corner, a young woman with green and blue feathers in her hair was looking uncertainly at a man’s huge hand that had just pounced on hers.

‘This is a great meeting-place for young couples,’ said Pierre.

Once more a long silence ensued. Xavière had raised her arm to her lips and was gently blowing the fine down on her skin. Françoise felt she ought to think of something to say, but everything sounded false even as she was putting it into words.

‘Have I ever told you anything about Gerbert?’ said Françoise to Xavière.

‘A little,’ said Xavière. ‘You’ve told me he’s very nice.’

‘He had a queer childhood,’ said Françoise. ‘He comes from a completely poverty-stricken working-class family. His mother went mad when he was a baby, his father was out of work, and the boy earned a few sous a day selling newspapers. One fine day a pal of his took him along to a film-studio to look for a job as an extra, and it happened that both were taken on. He couldn’t have been more than ten years old at the time. He was very likeable and he attracted attention. He was given minor parts and, later on, more important ones. He began to make good money, which his father squandered royally.’ Françoise gazed apathetically at a tremendous white cake, decorated with fruit and arabesques of icing, which reposed upon a nearby tray; just looking at it was enough to make anyone feel sick. No one was listening to her story.

‘People began to take an interest in him. Péclard more or less adopted him; he’s still living with him. He’s had as many as six adoptive fathers at one time. They dragged him out to cafés and night clubs; the women used to stroke his head. Pierre was one of these fathers; he helped him with his work and his reading.’ She smiled and her smile was lost in space. Pierre, huddled into himself, was smoking his pipe. Xavière looked barely polite. Françoise felt ridiculous, but she kept talking with stubborn animation.

‘That boy had a very funny education. He was an expert on surrealism without ever having read a line of Racine. It was touching, because to fill in the gaps he used to go to the public libraries to pore over atlases and books on mathematics like a real little self-educator, but he kept it all a secret. And then he had a very hard time of it. He was growing up; people could no longer find amusement in him as if he were a little performing monkey. About the same time as he lost his job in the movies, his adoptive fathers dropped him, one after the other. Péclard dressed and fed him when he thought of it, but that was all. It was then that Pierre took him in hand and persuaded him to take up the theatre. Now he’s made a good start. He still lacks experience, but he’s talented and has a great stage-sense. He’ll get somewhere.’

‘How old is he?’ asked Xavière.

‘He looks sixteen, but he’s twenty.’

Pierre smiled faintly.

‘I must say, you do know how to spin out a conversation,’ he said.

‘I’m very glad you’ve told me his story,’ said Xavière eagerly. ‘It’s extremely amusing to picture that little boy and all those self-important men who condescendingly kicked him around, and so felt strong and generous, and patronizing.’

‘You can easily see me doing that, can’t you?’ said Pierre, pulling a wry face.

‘You? Why? No more than the others,’ said Xavière, in all innocence. She looked at Françoise with marked affection. ‘I always thoroughly enjoy your way of telling stories.’

She was offering Françoise a transference of her allegiance. The woman with the green and blue feathers was saying in a flat voice: ‘… I only rushed through it, but for a small town it’s very picturesque.’ She had decided to leave her bare arm on the table and as it lay there, forgotten, ignored, the man’s hand was stroking a piece of flesh that no longer belonged to anyone.

‘It’s extraordinary, the impression it makes on you to touch your eyelashes,’ said Xavière. ‘You touch yourself without touching yourself. It’s as if you touched yourself from some way away.’

She spoke to herself and no one answered her.

‘Have you noticed how pretty those green and gilt latticed windows are?’ said Françoise.

‘In the dining-room at Lubersac,’ said Xavière, ‘there were leaded windows, too. But they weren’t as wishy-washy as these, they had beautiful rich colours. When I looked out at the park through the yellow panes, there might have been a thunderstorm over the landscape; through the green and blue it appeared like paradise, with trees of precious stones and lawns of brocade; and when through the red, I thought I was in the bowels of the earth.’

Pierre made a perceptible effort to be amiable. ‘Which did you prefer?’ he asked.

‘The yellow, of course,’ said Xavière. She stared into space, as if in suspense. ‘It’s terrible the way one loses things as one grows older.’

‘But you can’t remember everything?’ he said.

‘Why not? I never forget anything,’ said Xavière scornfully. ‘For instance, I remember very clearly how beautiful colours used to transport me in the past; now …’ she said with a disillusioned smile, ‘I only find them pleasing.’

‘Yes, of course! That always happens when you grow older,’ said Pierre in a kind voice. ‘But there are other things to be gained. Now you understand books and pictures and plays which would have been meaningless to you in your childhood.’

‘But I don’t give a damn about understanding just with my mind,’ said Xavière with unexpected violence and with a kind of sneer. ‘I’m not an intellectual.’

‘Why do you have to be so disagreeable?’ said Pierre abruptly.

Xavière stared, wide-eyed.

‘I’m not being disagreeable.’

‘You know very well that you are. You hate me on the slightest pretext. Though I think I can guess why.’

‘What do you think?’ asked Xavière.

Her cheeks were flushed with anger. Her face was extremely attractive, with such subtly variable shadings that it seemed not to be composed of flesh, but rather of ecstasy, of bitterness, of sorrow, to which the eye became magically sensitive. Yet, despite this ethereal transparency, the outlines of her nose and mouth were extremely sensual.

‘You thought I wanted to criticize your way of life,’ said Pierre, ‘that’s not so. I was arguing with you as I would argue with Françoise, or with myself. And for the simple reason that your point of view interested me.’

‘Of course you chose the most malicious interpretation at once,’ said Xavière. ‘I’m not a sensitive child. If you think I’m weak and capricious and I don’t know what else, you can surely tell me.’

‘Not at all, I’m very envious of your capacity to feel things so strongly,’ said Pierre. ‘I understand your putting a higher value on that than on anything else.’

If he had taken it into his head to win his way back into Xavière’s good graces, this was only the beginning.

‘Yes,’ said Xavière with a certain gloom; her eyes flashed. ‘I’m horrified that you should think that of me. It’s not true. I don’t get annoyed like a child.’

‘Still, don’t you see,’ said Pierre in a conciliatory tone, ‘you put an end to the conversation, and from that moment on you were no longer in the least friendly.’

‘I wasn’t aware of it,’ said Xavière.

Try to remember; you’re sure to become aware of it,’

Xavière hesitated.

‘It wasn’t for the reason you thought’

‘What was the reason?’

Xavière made a brusque gesture.

‘No, it’s stupid, it’s of no importance. What good does it do always to hark back to the past? It’s over and done with now.’

Pierre sat up and faced Xavière squarely, he would spend the whole night here rather than give in. To Françoise, such persistence sometimes seemed tactless, but Pierre was not afraid of being tactless. He had consideration for other people’s feelings only in small things. What exactly did he want of Xavière? polite rencontres on the hotel staircase? an affaire? love? friendship?

‘It’s of no importance if we expect never to see each other again,’ said Pierre. ‘But that would be a pity: don’t you think we could establish pleasant relations?’ He had infused a kind of wheedling timidity into his voice. He had such absolute control over his face and his slightest inflections, that it was a little disconcerting.

Xavière gave him a wary and yet almost affectionate look.

‘Yes, I think so,’ she said.

‘Then let’s get this straight,’ said Pierre. ‘What did you hold against me?’ His smile already held an implication of secret understanding.

Xavière was playing with a strand of hair. Watching the slow and steady movement of her fingers, she said:

‘It suddenly occurred to me that you were trying to be nice to me because of Françoise, and I disliked that.’ She flung back the golden strand. ‘I have never asked anyone to be nice to me.’

‘Why did you think that?’ said Pierre. He was chewing the stem of his pipe.

‘I don’t know,’ said Xavière.

‘You thought that I’d been too hasty in putting myself on terms of intimacy with you? And that made you angry with me and with yourself? Isn’t that so? Therefore, out of some sort of surliness, you decided that my cordiality was only a pretence.’

Xavière said nothing.

‘Was that it?’ asked Pierre with a twinkle.

‘Yes, in a way,’ said Xavière with a flattered and embarrassed smile. Again she took hold of a few hairs and began to run her fingers up and down them, squinting at them with a stupid expression. Had she given it so much thought? Certainly Françoise, out of laziness, had over-simplified Xavière; she even wondered, a little uneasily, how she could possibly have treated Xavière like an insignificant little girl for the last few weeks; but wasn’t Pierre deriving some pleasure out of making her complicated? In any case, they did not both view her in the same light. Slight as it was, this variance was apparent to Françoise.

‘If I hadn’t wanted to see you, it would have been very simple to go straight back to the hotel,’ said Pierre.

‘You might have wanted to see me out of curiosity,’ said Xavière. ‘That would be natural; you and Françoise have a way of pooling everything.’

A whole world of secret resentment was discernible in this short off-hand sentence.

‘You thought we had mutually agreed to lecture you?’ said Pierre. ‘But that had nothing to do with the case.’

‘You were like two grown-ups giving a child a good talking-to,’ said Xavière, who seemed now to be sulking only on principle.

‘But I didn’t say anything,’ said Françoise.

Xavière assumed a knowing look. Pierre stared at her, smiling earnestly.

‘You’ll understand, after you’ve seen us together enough times, that you need have no fear of considering us as two distinct individuals. I could no more prevent Françoise from being friendly towards you, than she could force me to be friendly towards you if I didn’t feel so inclined.’ He turned to Françoise. ‘Isn’t that so?’

‘Certainly,’ said Françoise with a warmth that apparently did not ring false. She felt a little sick at heart; ‘we are but one’: that’s all very nice, but Pierre was demanding his independence. Of course, in a sense they were two, that she knew very well.

‘You both have so many ideas in common,’ said Xavière. ‘I’m never sure which of you is speaking or to whom to reply.’

‘Does it seem preposterous that I, personally, should have a feeling of affection for you?’ said Pierre.

Xavière looked at him in some hesitation.

‘There’s no reason why you should; I’ve nothing interesting to say, and you … you have so many ideas about everything.’

‘You mean that I’m so old,’ said Pierre. ‘You’re the one who drew the malicious conclusions. You think I fancy myself.’

‘How could you think that!’ said Xavière.

Pierre’s voice became grave, faintly betraying the professional actor.

‘Had I taken you for a charming inconsequential little person, I would have been more polite to you; I would wish for something other than mere politeness between us, because it so happens that I think very highly of you.’

‘You are wrong,’ said Xavière without conviction.

‘And it’s on purely personal grounds that I hope to win your friendship. Would you like to make a pact of personal friendship with me?’

‘Gladly,’ said Xavière. She opened wide her innocent eyes. She smiled a charming smile of assent, an almost amorous smile. Françoise looked at this unknown face, filled with reticence and promise, and she saw again that other face, innocent and childish, leaning on her shoulder one grey dawn. She had been unable to retain it; it had become obliterated; it was lost, perhaps, for ever. And suddenly, with regret, with resentment, she felt how much she might have loved her.

‘Shake hands on it,’ said Pierre. He put his open hand on the table. He had pleasing hands, dry and delicate. Xavière did not hold out her hand.

‘I don’t like that gesture,’ she said coldly. ‘It seems adolescent to me.’

Pierre withdrew his hand. When he was thwarted, his upper lip jutted forward, making him look unnatural and a little ill-bred. Silence ensued.

‘Are you coming to the dress rehearsal?’ asked Pierre.

‘Of course, I’m looking forward to seeing you as a ghost,’ said Xavière eagerly.

The room was almost empty. Only a few half-drunken Scandinavians were left at the bar. The men were flushed, the women bedraggled, and everyone was kissing everyone else roundly.

‘I think we ought to go,’ said Françoise.

Pierre turned to her anxiously.

‘That’s true, you’ve got to get up early tomorrow. Aren’t you tired?’

‘No more than I should be.’

‘Well take a taxi.’

‘Another taxi?’ said Françoise.

‘Well, that can’t be helped. You must get some sleep.’

They went out and Pierre stopped a taxi. He sat on the tip-up seat opposite Françoise and Xavière.

‘You look sleepy, too,’ he said amiably.

‘Yes, I am sleepy,’ said Xavière. ‘I’m going to make myself some tea.’

‘Tea!’ said Françoise. ‘You would do better if you went to bed. It’s three o’clock.’

‘I detest going to bed when I’m dead tired,’ said Xavière, with an apologetic look.

‘You prefer to wait until you’re wide awake?’ said Pierre in an amused tone.

‘The very thought of being subject to natural needs disgusts me,’ said Xavière haughtily.

They got out of the taxi and went upstairs.

‘Good night,’ said Xavière. She opened her door without holding out her hand.

Pierre and Françoise went on up another flight. Pierre’s dressing-room at the theatre was topsy-turvy these days and he had been sleeping in Françoise’s room every night.

‘I thought you were going to get angry again when she refused to put her hand in yours,’ said Françoise.

Pierre sat down on the edge of the bed.

‘I thought she was going to put on her shy act again and it irritated me,’ he said. ‘But on second thoughts, it sprang from a good motive. She didn’t want an agreement, which she took dead seriously, to be treated like a game.’

‘That would be just like her, certainly,’ said Françoise. She had a curiously murky taste in her mouth that she could not get rid of.

‘What a proud little devil she is! ’ said Pierre. ‘She was well disposed towards me at first, but as soon as I dared to express a shadow of criticism, she hated me.’

‘You explained things beautifully to her,’ said Françoise. ‘Was that out of politeness?’

‘Oh, there was a lot on her mind tonight,’ said Pierre. He did not go on, he appeared absorbed. What exactly was going on in his mind? She looked at his face questioningly. It was a face that had become too familiar and no longer told her anything. She had only to reach out her hand to touch him, but this very proximity made him invisible; it was impossible to think about him. There was not even any name with which to describe him. Françoise called him Pierre or Labrousse only when she was speaking about him to others; when she was with him, or even when she was alone, she never used his name. He was as intimate and as unknowable to her as she was to herself: had he been a stranger, she would at least have been able to form some opinion of him.

‘What do you want of her, when all’s said and done?’ she asked.

‘To tell the truth, I’m beginning to wonder,’ said Pierre. ‘She’s no Canzetti, I can’t expect just to have an affaire with her. To have a serious liaison with her, I would have to commit myself up to the hilt. And I’ve neither the time nor the inclination for that.’

‘Why not the inclination?’ asked Françoise. This fleeting uneasiness that had just come over her was absurd; they told one another everything, they kept nothing hidden from each other.

‘It’s complicated,’ said Pierre, the very thought of it tires me. Besides, there’s something childish about her that I find a little nauseating. She still smells of mother’s milk. All I want is for her not to hate me, but to be able to talk to her once in a white.’

‘I think you can count on that,’ said Françoise,

Pierre looked at her hesitatingly.

‘You weren’t offended when I suggested to her that she and I should have a personal relationship?’

‘Of course not,’ said Françcoise. ‘Why should I be?’

‘I don’t know, you seemed to be a little put out. You’re fond of her, you might want to be the only one in her life.’

‘You know perfectly well that she’s rather an encumbrance,’ said Françoise.

‘I know that you’re never jealous of me,’ said Pierre, smiling. ‘All the same, if you ever do feel like that, you must tell me. This confounded mania of mine for making a conquest … there’s another case of making myself feel as small as an insect; and it means so little to me.’

‘Of course I would tell you,’ said Françoise. She hesitated, perhaps she ought to attribute her uneasiness of this evening to jealousy; she had not liked Pierre taking Xavière seriously; she had been worried by the smiles Xavière gave Pierre. It was a passing depression, caused largely by fatigue. If she spoke of it to Pierre, it would become a disquieting and gripping reality instead of a fleeting mood. Thenceforth, he would have to bear it in mind even when she herself attached no importance to it. No, there was nothing to it, she was not jealous.

‘You may even fall in love with her, if you wish,’ she said.

‘There’s no question of that,’ said Pierre. He shrugged his shoulders. ‘I’m not even sure that she doesn’t hate me now even more than before.’

He slipped into bed. Françoise lay down beside him and kissed him.

‘Sleep tight,’ she said fondly.

‘Sleep tight,’ said Pierre, kissing her.

Françoise turned over towards the wall. In the room below theirs, Xavière would be drinking tea; she had probably lit a cigarette; she was free to choose the hour when she would get into bed, all alone in her bed, far removed from any alien presence; she was mentally and emotionally free. And without doubt, at this moment, she was revelling in this freedom, was using it to blame Françoise. She would be imagining Françoise, dead-tired, lying beside Pierre, and she would be delighting in her proud contempt.

Françoise stiffened, but she could no longer simply close her eyes and blot out Xavière. Xavière had been growing steadily all through the evening, she had been weighing on her mind as heavily as the huge cake at the Pôle Nord. Her demands, her jealousies, her scorn, these could no longer be ignored, for Pierre had entered into them to give them value. Françoise tried with all her strength to thrust into the background this precious and encumbering Xavière who was gradually beginning to take shape, and it was almost hostility that she felt within her. But there was nothing to be done, no way of going back. Xavière did exist

Chapter Four

Elisabeth opened the door of her wardrobe in a state of despair. Of course, she could keep on her grey suit; it did well enough for any occasion and it was for that very reason that she had bought it. But just for once in a while, she would have liked to change her dress to go out in the evening: a different dress, a different woman. Tonight, Elisabeth was feeling languid, unpredictable and sensuous. ‘A blouse for every occasion! – they make me sick with their millionaire’s conception of economy.’

At the back of the wardrobe there was an old black satin dress that Françoise had admired two years ago: it was not so badly out of date. Elisabeth made up her face again and then put on the dress. She looked at herself in the looking-glass a little dubiously. She was not sure what to think; in any case, her hair style was wrong now. With a sweep of the brush she tousled its tidiness. ‘Your beautiful burnished gold hair.’ She might have had a different life; but she regretted nothing, she had freely chosen to sacrifice her life to art. Her nails were ugly, an artist’s nails. However short she cut them, they were always smeared with a little cobalt or indigo; fortunately they made nail polish very thick nowadays.

Elisabeth sat down at her dressing-table and began to spread a creamy red lacquer over her nails.

‘I would have been really elegant,’ she thought, ‘more elegant than Françoise. She always looks unfinished.’

The telephone rang. Elisabeth carefully put the tiny wet brush back in its bottle and got up.

‘Is that you, Elisabeth?’

‘Yes.’

‘This is Claude. How are you? Well, everything is all right for tonight. Can I come back with you afterwards?’

‘Not here,’ said Elisabeth quickly. She gave a little laugh. ‘I’d like a change of atmosphere.’ This time she would really have it out with him, to the finish – not here, or it would only start all over again, as it had last month.

‘As you wish. But where then? At the Topsy, or the Maisonnette?’

‘No, just let’s go to the Pôle Nord, It’s the best place for talking.’

‘All right Half past twelve at the Pôle Nord. See you later.’

‘So long.’

He was looking forward to an idyllic evening. But Françoise was right. If she really wanted to do any good, he must be made aware of it. Elisabeth sat down again and resumed her painstaking labour. The Pôle Nord was perfect. The leather upholstery would deaden a voice raised in anger and the subdued lighting would be merciful to a ravaged countenance. All those promises Claude had made her! and everything remained obstinately the same; one moment of weakness was enough for him to feel reassured. The blood rushed to Elisabeth’s face. What a disgrace! For an instant, he had hesitated, his hand on the door-knob; she had driven him away with unforgivable words. All he had to do was to go; but without a word, he had come towards her. The memory smarted so that she closed her eyes. Again her mouth felt his mouth, so feverish that her lips parted despite herself; she felt on her breasts those gentle, urgent hands. Her breast swelled and she sighed as she had sighed in the intoxication of defeat. If only the door were to open now, if he were to come in … Elisabeth quickly put her hand to her mouth and bit her wrist.

‘I’m not to be had like that’ she said aloud. ‘I’m not a bitch.’ She had not hurt herself, but she noticed with satisfaction the small white marks her teeth had made on her skin; she also noticed that the wet polish had smeared on three of her nails; there was a kind of bloody deposit sticking round the edges.

‘What an ass!’ she murmured. Eight-thirty. Pierre would be dressed already. Suzanne would be putting on her mink cape over an impeccable dress, her nails would be glistening. On a sudden impulse, Elisabeth reached out for the nail-polish remover. There was a crystalline tinkle, and there on the floor lay little splinters of glass, sprinkled over a yellow puddle that reeked of pear-drops.

Tears rose to Elisabeth’s eyes; not for anything in the world would she go to the dress rehearsal with these butcher’s fingers: it would be better to go straight to bed. To attempt to be elegant on no money was a bad bet She slipped on her coat and ran down the stairs.

‘Hôtel Bayard, rue Cels,’ she told the taxi-driver.

When she got to Françoise’s she could repair the damage. She took out her compact-too much rouge on her cheeks, and her lipstick too heavy and badly applied. No, do not touch a thing in the taxi or everything will be ruined – taxis give one an excellent opportunity to relax – taxis and lifts – a brief respite for over-busy women-other women are lying on couches with fine linen tied around their heads, as in the Elizabeth Arden advertisements, with gentle hands massaging their faces-white hands, white linen in white rooms-they will have smooth, relaxed faces and Claude will say with his masculine naïveté: ‘Jeanne Harbley is really extraordinary.’ Like Pierre, we used to call them tissue-paper women – competition on that basis is impossible.

She got out of the taxi. For an instant she stood motionless in front of the hotel. It was most aggravating: she could never approach any place where Françoise’s life was spent without a throb in her heart. The wall was grey and peeling a little. It was a shabby hotel like a great many others; yet she certainly had enough money to rent a pleasant studio for herself. She opened the door.

‘May I go up to Mademoiselle Miquel’s room?’

The porter handed her the key. She climbed the staircase on which there lingered a faint smell of cabbage. She was in the very heart of Françoise’s life; but, for Françoise, the smell of cabbage and the creaking of the stairs held no mystery. Françoise passed through this setting without noticing what Elisabeth’s feverish curiosity distorted,

‘I must try to imagine that I’m coming home, just part of the daily routine,’ Elisabeth said to herself as she turned the key in the lock. She remained standing in the doorway. It was an ugly room, papered in grey with a pattern of huge flowers. Clothes were strewn over all the chairs, piles of books and papers on the desk. Elisabeth closed her eyes: she was Françoise, she was returning from the theatre, she was thinking about tomorrow’s rehearsal. She opened her eyes. Above the wash-basin was a notice:

Guests are kindly requested: Not to make any noise after ten p.m. Not to wash any clothes in the basin.

Elisabeth looked at the couch, at the mirror-wardrobe, at the bust of Napoleon on the mantelpiece beside a bottle of eau-de-Cologne, at some brushes and several pairs of stockings. She closed her eyes once more, and then opened them again. It was impossible to make this room her own: it was only too unalterably evident that it remained an alien room.

Elisabeth went over to the looking-glass in which the face of Françoise had so often been reflected and she saw her own face. Her cheeks were fiery. The least she could have done was to have kept on her grey suit; there was no doubt that she looked very well in it. Now she could do nothing about this unusual reflection, yet it was the permanent picture of her that people would take away with them tonight. She snatched up a bottle of nail-polish remover and a bottle of lacquer, and sat down at the desk.

A volume of Shakespeare’s plays lay open at the page Françoise had been reading when she had suddenly pushed back her chair. She had thrown her dressing-gown on the bed and it still bore, in its disordered folds, the impress of her careless gesture; the sleeves were puffed out as if they still enclosed phantom arms. These discarded objects gave a more unbearable picture of Françoise than would her real presence. When Françoise was near her, Elisabeth felt a kind of peace: Françoise never gave away her real, true face but at least, when her smile was friendly, her true face did not exist at all. Here, in this room, Françoise’s true face had left its mark and this mark was inscrutable. When Françoise sat down at this desk, alone with herself, what remained of the woman Pierre loved? What became of her happiness, her quiet pride, her austerity?

Elisabeth pulled towards her some sheets of paper which were covered with notes, rough drafts, ink-stained sketches. Thus scratched out and badly written, Françoise’s thoughts lost their definiteness; but the writing itself and the erasures made by Françoise’s hand still bore witness to Françoise’s indestructible existence. Elisabeth pushed away the papers in sudden fury. This was ridiculous. She could neither become Françoise, nor could she destroy her.

‘Time, just give me time,’ she thought passionately. ‘I, too, will become someone.’

A great many motors were parked in the square. With an artist’s trained eye, Elisabeth looked at the yellow façade of the theatre gleaming through the bare branches: those ink-black lines standing out against the luminous background were beautiful. A real theatre, like the Châtelet and the Gaieté Lyrique which we used to think so marvellous! All the same, it was tremendous to think that the great actor, the great producer, now the talk of Paris, was none other than Pierre. It was to see him that this surging perfumed crowd was thronging into the foyer-we weren’t ordinary children-we swore that we would be famous – I always had faith in him. But this is it, she thought, dazzled. This is it, really it; tonight the dress rehearsal at the Tréteaux, Pierre Labrousse in Julius Caesar.

Elisabeth tried to form the sentence as if she were just an ordinary Parisian and then to say quickly to herself: ‘He’s my brother,’ but it was difficult to carry off. It was maddening, for all around you there were hundreds of such potential pleasures, on which you could never quite succeed in laying your hands.

‘What’s become of you?’ said Luvinsky. ‘You’re never about these days.’

‘I’m working,’ said Elisabeth. ‘You must come and see my canvases.’

She loved dress rehearsals. Perhaps it was childish, but she derived tremendous pleasure from shaking hands with all these writers and actors; she had always needed a congenial environment really to find and be herself – ‘When I’m painting, I don’t feel that I’m a painter; its thankless and discouraging.’ Here she was, a young artist on the threshold of success, Pierre’s own sister. She smiled at Moreau who looked at her admiringly, he had always been a little in love with her. In the days when she used to spend a great deal of time at the Dôme with Françoise, in the company of the beginners with no future and the old failures, she would have looked with wide-eyed envy at that vigorous, gracious young woman who was talking casually to a newly-arrived group.

‘How are you?’ said Battier. He looked very handsome in his dark lounge suit. ‘The doors here are well guarded at least,’ he added peevishly.

‘How are you?’ said Elisabeth, shaking hands with Suzanne. ‘Did you have any trouble getting in?’

‘That doorman scrutinizes all the guests as if they were criminals,’ said Suzanne. ‘He kept on turning over our card in his fingers for at least five minutes.’

She looked handsome, all in black, exactly right; but, to be frank, she looked distinctly old now, one could hardly suppose that Claude still had physical relations with her.

‘They have to be careful,’ said Elisabeth. ‘Look at that fellow with his nose glued to the window, there are dozens like him in the square, trying to scrounge invitations: we call them “swallows”, gate-crashers.’

‘An amusing name,’ said Suzanne. She smiled politely and turned to Battier. ‘We ought to go in now, don’t you think?’

Elisabeth followed them in; for a moment or so, she stood motionless at the back of the auditorium. Claude was helping Suzanne to slip off her mink cape; then he sat down beside her; she leaned towards him and laid her hand on his arm. A sharp stabbing pain suddenly shot through Elisabeth. She recalled that December evening when she had walked through the streets drunk with joy and triumph because Claude had raid to her: ‘You’re the one I really love.’ On her way home to bed she had bought a huge bunch of roses. He loved her, but that had changed nothing. His heart was hidden; that hand on his sleeve could be seen by every eye in the theatre, and everyone took it for granted that this was its natural place. A formal bond, a real bond, that was perhaps the sole reality of which one could be actually certain; but for whom does it really exist, this love that exists between us? At this moment, even she did not believe in it, nothing remained of it anywhere in the whole of existence.

‘I’ve had enough,’ she thought; once more she was going to suffer all through the evening, she foresaw the whole gamut: shivers, fever, moist hands, buzzing head. The very thought of it made her feel sick.

‘Good evening,’ she said to Françoise. ‘How beautiful you look.’

She was really beautiful tonight. She had a large comb in her hair and her dress was ablaze with vivid embroidery; she attracted a great many glances without seeming to be aware of them. It was a joy to feel that this brilliant and calm young woman was her friend.

‘You look lovely, too,’ said Françoise. ‘That dress looks so well on you.’

‘It’s old,’ said Elisabeth.

She sat down on the right of Françoise. On her left sat Xavière, insignificant in her little blue dress. Elisabeth rucked up the material of her skirt between her fingers. It had always been her principle to own few but expensive things.

‘If I had money I would certainly be able to dress well,’ she thought. She looked with a little less distress at the back of Suzanne’s well-arranged hair. Suzanne belonged to the tribe of victims. She accepted anything from Claude – but we belong to a different species, we are strong and free and live our own lives. It was from pure generosity that Elisabeth did not reject the tortures of love, yet she did not need Claude; she was not an old woman – I shall say to him gently but firmly: ‘You see, Claude, I have thought it over. I think we ought to change the basis of our relationship.’

‘Have you seen Marchand and Saltrel?’ asked Françoise. ‘They’re in the third row on the left. Saltrel is already coughing; he’s getting ready to spring. Castier is waiting for the curtain to go up before taking out his spittoon. You know he always carries it with him; it’s an exquisite little box.’

Elisabeth glanced at the critics, but she was in no mood to be amused by them. Françoise was obviously preoccupied about the success of the play; that was to be expected, there could be no help from her.

The lights went down and three metallic raps rang out across the silence. Elisabeth felt herself growing completely limp. ‘If only I could be carried away by the acting,’ she thought, ‘but I know the play by heart – the scenery is pretty and so are the costumes – I’m sure I could do at least as well, but Pierre is like all relatives – no one ever takes members of their own family seriously – he ought to see my paintings without knowing they’re by me. I have no social mask – it’s such a nuisance to have to bluff all the time. If Pierre didn’t always treat me like an inconsequential little sister, Claude might have looked upon me as an important, dangerous person.’

The familiar voice startled Elisabeth.

Stand you directly in Antonius’ way … Calphurnia!

Pierre really had an amazing presence as Julius Caesar. His acting inspired a thousand thoughts.

‘He’s the greatest actor of the day,’ said Elisabeth to herself.

Guimiot rushed on to the stage and she looked at him a little apprehensively: twice during rehearsals he had knocked over the bust of Caesar. He dashed across the open space and ran round the bust without touching it; he held a whip in his hand; he was almost naked, with only a strip of silk around his loins.

‘He’s remarkably well-built,’ thought Elisabeth without being able to summon up any special feelings about him-it was delightful to sleep with him, but really that was forgotten as soon as over-it was light as thistledown – Claude …

‘I’m overwrought,’ she thought. ‘I can’t concentrate.’

She forced herself to look at the stage. ‘Canzetti looks pretty with that heavy fringe on her forehead – Guimiot says that Pierre doesn’t have much to do with her any longer, and that she’s now after Tedesco – I don’t really know – they never tell me anything.’ She studied Françoise. Her face had not changed since the curtain had risen; her eyes were riveted on Pierre. How severe her profile was! One would have to see her in a moment of affection or of love, but she would be capable even then of preserving that Olympian air – she was lucky to be able to lose herself in the immediate present in this way-all these people were lucky. Elisabeth felt lost in the midst of this docile audience that allowed itself to be glutted with images and words. Nothing held her attention, the play did not exist; these were only minutes that were slowly ebbing away. The day had been spent in the expectation of these hours, and now they were crumbling away, becoming, in their turn, another period of expectancy. And Elisabeth knew that when Claude stood before her she would still be waiting; she would await the promise, the threat, that would tinge tomorrow’s waiting with hope or horror. It was a journey without end, leading to an indefinite future, eternally shifting just as she was reaching the present. As long as Suzanne was Claude’s wife the present would be intolerable.

The applause crackled. Françoise stood up, her cheeks were a little flushed.

‘Tedesco never fumbled a line, everything went off perfectly,’ she said excitedly. ‘I’m going to see Pierre. If you wouldn’t mind, it might be better for you to go round during the next interval. The crush is terrible at the moment’

Elisabeth stood up as well.

‘We could go into the foyer,’ she said to Xavière. ‘We shall hear people’s comments. It’s quite amusing.’

Xavière followed her obediently. ‘What on earth can I say to her?’ Elisabeth wondered: she did not find her congenial.

‘Cigarette?’

‘Thank you,’ said Xavière.

Elisabeth held up a match.

‘Do you like the play?’

‘I like it,’ said Xavière.

How vigorously Pierre had defended her the other day! He was always inclined to be generous about strangers; but this time he really hadn’t shown very good taste.

‘Would you like to go on the stage yourself?’ Elisabeth asked.

She was trying to discover the crucial question, the question that would draw from Xavière a reply by which she could once and for all be classified.

‘I’ve never thought about it,’ said Xavière.

Surely she spoke to Françoise in a different tone and with a different look! But Francoise’s friends never showed their true selves to Elisabeth.

‘What interests you in life?’ Elisabeth asked abruptly.

‘Everything interests me,’ said Xavière politely.

Elisabeth wondered if Françoise had spoken to Xavière about her. How was she spoken of behind her back?

‘You have no preferences?’

‘I don’t think so,’ said Xavière.

With a preoccupied look, she was puffing at her cigarette. She had kept her secret well; all Francoise’s secrets were well kept. At the other end of the foyer, Claude was smiling at Suzanne. His features reflected his servile affection.

‘The same smile that he gives me,’ thought Elisabeth, and a savage hatred entered her heart. Without any gentleness, she would speak to him without a trace of gentleness. She would lean her head back against the cushions and she would break into ruthless laughter.

The second intermission bell sounded. Elisabeth caught a glimpse of her red hair and her bitter mouth as she passed a looking-glass: there was something bitter and smouldering in her. She had made up her mind, tonight would be decisive. At times Suzanne drove him mad and at others she filled him with maudlin pity: he never could decide to separate from her once and for all. The auditorium grew dark. A picture flashed through Elisabeth’s mind-a revolver-a dagger-a phial with a death’s head on it – to kill someone … Claude? Suzanne? Myself? – it didn’t matter. This dark murderous desire violently took possession of her heart. She sighed-she was no longer young enough for insane violence – that would be too easy. No – what she had to do was to keep him at a distance for a time; yes – to keep at a distance his lips, his breath, his hands. She desired them so intensely – she was being smothered with desire. There, in front of her, on the stage, Caesar was being assassinated. ‘Pierre is staggering across the Senate, and it is I, I who am really being assassinated,’ she thought in despair. This empty excitement in front of cardboard scenery was nothing but an insult to her, since it was she who was sweating out her agony, in her flesh, in her blood, and with no possibility of resurrection.

Although Elisabeth had sauntered slowly along the boulevard Montparnasse, it was only twenty-five minutes past twelve when she walked into the Pôle Nord. She could never succeed in being deliberately late, and yet she felt certain that Claude would not be punctual, for Suzanne would purposely be keeping him with her, counting each minute as a tiny victory. Elisabeth lit a cigarette. She was not specially anxious for Claude to be there, but the thought that he was elsewhere was intolerable.

She felt her heart contract. Each time it was the same: when she saw him in flesh and blood in front of her, she was seized with anguish. There he was: he held Elisabeth’s happiness in the palm of his hand and he was coming towards her casually; with no suspicion that each one of his gestures was a threat.

‘I’m so glad to see you,’ said Claude. ‘At last, a real evening to ourselves!’ He smiled eagerly. ‘What are you drinking? Aquavit? I know that stuff; it’s filthy. Give me a gin fizz.’

‘You may be glad, but you stint your pleasures,’ said Elisabeth, ‘it’s one o’clock already.’

‘Seven minutes to one, darling.’

‘Seven minutes to one, if you prefer,’ she said with a slight shrug.

‘You know very well it’s not my fault,’ said Claude.

‘Of course,’ said Elisabeth.

Claude’s face darkened.

‘Please, my pet, don’t look so cross. Suzanne left me with a face like a thunder-cloud. If you start sulking too, it will be the end of everything. I was so looking forward to seeing your warm smile again.’

‘I don’t smile all the time,’ said Elisabeth, hurt. Claude’s lack of understanding was at times stupefying.

‘That’s a pity. It’s so becoming to you,’ said Claude. He lit a cigarette and looked about him benignly. ‘This place isn’t bad. It’s a bit gloomy though, don’t you think?’

‘So you said the other day. On one of the rare occasions when I do see you, I’m not anxious to have a crowd all round us.’

‘Don’t be cross,’ said Claude. He put his hand on Elisabeth’s hand, but he looked annoyed. A second later she drew her hand away. This was a bad start: an important heart-to-heart explanation ought not to begin with petty squabbling.

‘On the whole, it was a success,’ said Claude. ‘But I wasn’t really carried away for an instant. I think Labrousse doesn’t know precisely what he’s after. He’s wavering between complete stylization and pure and simple realism.’

‘It’s just that touch of stylization that he’s after,’ said Elisabeth.

‘But there isn’t any special touch about it,’ said Claude in cutting tones. ‘It’s a series of contradictions. Caesar’s assassination looked like a funereal ballet, and as for Brutus’s watch in his tent – well, it was like going back to the days of the Théátre libre.’

Claude was being too clever. Elisabeth did not let him settle questions as arbitrarily as that. She was pleased because her reply came readily to her lips.

‘That depends on the situation,’ she said quickly. ‘An assassination has got to be stylized, or else it degenerates into melodrama, and by contrast, a supernatural scene has to be played as realistically as possible. That’s only too obvious.’

‘That’s just what I’m saying. There’s no unity. Labrousse’s aesthetic is simply a kind of opportunism.’

‘Not at all,’ said Elisabeth. ‘Of course, he takes the text into account. You’re amazing; you used to accuse him of making the setting an end in itself. Do make up your mind.’

‘But it is he who can’t make up his mind,’ said Claude. ‘I’d very much like to see him carry out his famous plan of writing a play himself. Then we might know where we stand.’

‘He’ll certainly do that,’ said Elisabeth. ‘Probably next year.’

‘I’d be curious to see it. You know I have a great admiration for Labrousse, but I don’t understand him.’

‘But it’s so easy,’ said Elisabeth.

‘I’d be very grateful if you’d explain it to me,’ said Claude.

Elisabeth was silent for a while, tapping her cigarette on the table. Pierre’s aesthetic was no mystery to her. From it she took the inspiration for her painting, but words failed her. She saw once again the Tintoretto that Pierre loved so much; he had explained things to her about the attitudes of the figures, just what, she could not remember. She thought of Dürer’s woodcuts, of a marionette show, of the Russian ballet, of the old silent movies; the idea was there, familiar and obvious, and this was terribly annoying.

‘Obviously, it’s not so simple that you can pin a label on it. Realism, impressionism, naturalism, if that’s what you want,’ she said.

‘Why are you being so gratuitously unkind?’ said Claude. ‘I’m not used to technical terms.’

‘I beg your pardon, but it was you who started talking about stylization and opportunism. But don’t make excuses; your fear of being mistaken for a professor is superbly comic’

More than anything, Claude dreaded sounding in the least academic, and, in all fairness, no one could look less like a professor than he.

‘I can promise that I have nothing to fear on that count,’ he said dryly. ‘It’s you who always deliberately introduce a kind of Germanic ponderosity into our discussions.’

‘Ponderosity …’ said Elisabeth. ‘Yes, I know, every time I disagree with you, you accuse me of being pedantic. You’re amazing. You can’t bear to be contradicted. What you mean by intellectual companionship is the devout acceptance of all your opinions. Ask Suzanne for that, not me! I have the misforunte to have a brain and to presume to use it.’

‘There you go! Can’t keep your temper!’ said Claude.

Elisabeth controlled herself This was hateful; he always found a way of putting her in the wrong.

‘I may be bad tempered,’ she said with crushing calm, ‘but you can’t hear yourself talk. You sound as if you were delivering a lecture.’

‘Let’s not squabble again,’ said Claude in a conciliatory tone.

She looked at him resentfully. He had clearly made up his mind to be nice to her tonight; he felt affectionate, charming and generous, but she would show him. She coughed a little to clear her throat.

‘Frankly, Claude, have you found this month’s experiment a happy one?’ she said.

‘What experiment?’ he said.

The blood rushed to Elisabeth’s face, and her voice trembled a little.

‘If we have kept on seeing one another after our heart-to-heart a month ago, it was only by way of an experiment. Have you forgotten?’

‘Oh, of course …’ said Claude.

He had not taken seriously the idea of a complete break; she had, of course, ruined everything by sleeping with him that very night For a moment she was put out of countenance.

‘Well, I think I’ve reached the conclusion that the present situation is impossible,’ she said.

‘Impossible? Why so suddenly impossible? What’s happened now?’

‘That’s just it, nothing,’ said Elisabeth.

‘Well, then, explain your meaning. I don’t understand.’

She hesitated. Of course, he had never mentioned that he would one day leave his wife; he had never made any promises; in a sense, he was unassailable.

‘Are you really happy like this?’ said Elisabeth. ‘I put our love on a higher plane. What intimacy have we? We see one another in restaurants, in bars, and in bed. Those are just meetings. I want to share your life.’

‘Darling, you’re raving,’ said Claude. ‘No intimacy between us? Why, I haven’t a single thought that I don’t share with you. You understand me so wonderfully.’

‘Yes, I have the best part of you,’ said Elisabeth, sharply. ‘Actually, you see, we should have kept to what, two years ago, you called an ideological friendship. My mistake was to love you.’

‘But since I love you …’

‘Yes,’ she said. It was most irritating; she was unable to pin down any definite grounds for complaint against him without their seeming nothing but petty grievances.

‘Well?’ said Claude.

‘Well, nothing,’ said Elisabeth. She had put a world of misery into these words, but Claude did not choose to take notice of it. He looked round the room with a beaming smile; he felt relieved and was already preparing to change the subject when she hurriedly added: ‘Fundamentally you’re a very simple soul. You were never really aware that I wasn’t happy.’

‘You take pleasure in tormenting yourself,’ said Claude.

‘Perhaps that’s because I’m too much in love with you,’ said Elisabeth dreamily. ‘I wanted to give you more than you were prepared to accept. And, if one is sincere, to give is a way of insisting on some return. I suppose it’s all my fault.’

‘We aren’t going to question our love every time we meet,’ said Claude. ‘This sort of conversation seems absolutely pointless to me.’

Elisabeth looked at him angrily. He could not even sense this pathetic lucidity that now made her so piteous. What was the good of it all? Suddenly, she felt herself growing cynical and hard.

‘Never fear. We shall never question our love again,’ she said. ‘That’s just what I wanted to tell you. From now on, our relations will be on an entirely different basis.’

‘What basis? What basis are they on now?’ Claude looked very annoyed.

‘Henceforth, I only want to have a peaceful friendship with you,’ she said. ‘I’m also tired of all these complications. Only, I didn’t think I could stop loving you.’

‘You’ve stopped loving me?’ Claude sounded incredulous.

‘Does that really seem so extraordinary to you?’ said Elisabeth. ‘Please understand me. I’ll always be very fond of you, but I shan’t expect anything from you, and as far as I am concerned, I shall take back my freedom. Isn’t it better that way?’

‘You’re raving,’ said Claude.

Elisabeth turned scarlet with anger.

‘But you’re insane! I tell you that I’m no longer in love with you! A feeling can change. And you – you weren’t even conscious of the fact that I had changed’

Claude gave her a puzzled look.

‘Since when have you stopped loving me? A few minutes ago, you said that you loved me too much.’

‘I used to love you too much.’ She hesitated. ‘I’m not sure just how it all happened, but it’s true, things are not as they used to be. For instance …’ she added quickly in a slightly choked voice, ‘before I could never have slept with anyone but you.’

‘You’ve been sleeping with someone?’

‘Does that upset you?’

‘Who is it?’ said Claude inquisitively.

‘It doesn’t matter. You don’t believe me.’

‘If it’s true, you might have been loyal enough to tell me,’

he said.

‘That’s exactly what I’m doing,’ said Elisabeth. ‘I am informing you. Surely you didn’t expect me to consult you beforehand?’

‘Who is it?’ repeated Claude.

His expression had changed, and Elisabeth was suddenly afraid. If he was suffering, she would suffer too.

‘Guimiot,’ she said in a wavering voice. ‘You know, the naked messenger in the first act.’

It was done; it was irreparable; it would be useless to deny it; Claude would not believe her denials – she didn’t even have time to think-she must go blindly ahead. In the shadows, something horrible was threatening her.

‘Your taste isn’t bad,’ said Claude. ‘When did you meet him?’

‘About ten days ago. He fell madly in love with me.’

Claude’s face became inscrutable. He had often showed suspicion and jealousy, but he had never admitted to it. He would far rather have been hacked to pieces than utter a word of censure, but that was of no reassurance to her.

‘After all, that’s one solution,’ he said. ‘I’ve always thought it a pity than an artist should limit himself to one woman.’

‘You’ll soon make up for lost time,’ said Elisabeth. ‘Why, that Chanaux girl is just waiting to fall into your arms.’

‘The Chanaux girl …’ Claude grinned. ‘I prefer Jeanne Harbley.’

‘There’s something to be said for that,’ said Elisabeth.

She clutched her handkerchief in her moist hands; now she could see the danger and it was too late. There was no way of retreat. She had thought only of Suzanne. There were all the other women, young and beautiful women, who would love Claude and who would know how to make him love them.

‘You don’t think I stand a chance?’ said Claude.

‘She certainly doesn’t dislike you,’ said Elisabeth.

This was insane. Here she was trying to brazen it out and each word she uttered sucked her deeper into the slough of despond. If only they could get away from this bantering tone. She swallowed and with great difficulty said: ‘I don’t want you to think, Claude, that I wasn’t open with you.’

He stared at her. She blushed. She did not know exactly how to go on.

‘It was really a surprise. I had always meant to speak to you about it.’

If he kept looking at her in that way she would cry. Whatever the cost, that must not happen; it would be cowardly, she ought not to fight with a woman’s weapons. Yet, that would simplify everything. He would put his arm round her shoulders, she would snuggle against him and the nightmare would be ended.

‘You have lied to me for ten days,’ said Claude. ‘I could never have brought myself to lie to you for one hour. I put our relationship on such a high plane.’

He had spoken with the dismal dignity of a judge, and Elisabeth rebelled.

‘But you haven’t been loyal to me,’ she said. ‘You promised me the best part of your life and never once have I had you to myself. You have never stopped belonging to Suzanne.’

‘You aren’t going to blame me for behaving correctly to Suzanne,’ said Claude. ‘Pity and gratitude alone dictated my behaviour towards her, as well you know.’

‘I don’t know anything of the kind. I know that you’ll never leave her for me.’

‘There was never any question of that,’ said Claude.

‘But if I were to raise the question?’

‘You’d be choosing a very strange moment,’ he said coldly.

Elisabeth remained silent. She should never have mentioned Suzanne. She could no longer control herself, and he was taking advantage of this. She saw him exactly as he was, weak, selfish, self-seeking and eaten up with petty conceit. He knew his faults, but with ruthless dishonesty he wanted to give a faultless picture of himself. He was incapable of the slightest impulse of generosity or sincerity. She loathed him.

‘Suzanne is useful to your career,’ she said. ‘Your work, your ideas, your career. You never gave me a thought.’

‘How contemptible!’ said Claude. ‘So I’m a careerist, am I? If that’s what you think, how could you ever have been fond of me?.’

There was a sudden burst of laughter and footsteps echoed on the black tiled floor. Françoise and Pierre were arm in arm with Xavière, and all three seemed hilariously happy.

‘Look who’s here!’ said Françoise.

‘I’m very fond of this place,’ said Elisabeth. She would have liked to have hidden her face, she felt as if her skin were stretched to the point of cracking! it was drawn tight under her eyes and round her mouth and beneath it the flesh was swollen. ‘So, you’ve got rid of the bigwigs?’

‘Yes,’ said Françoise. ‘We just about managed it.’

Why wasn’t Gerbert with them? Was Pierre suspicious of his charm? Or was it Françoise who feared Xavière’s charm? With an angelic and obstinate expression, Xavière smiled without uttering a word.

‘It was an undoubted success,’ said Claude. ‘The critics will probably be severe, but the applause was excellent.’

‘On the whole, it went off very well,’ said Pierre. He smiled warmly. ‘We must meet one of these days. We’ll have more time to spare now.’

‘Yes, there are a number of things I’d like to talk to you about,’ said Claude.

Elisabeth was suddenly dazed by an access of suffering. She saw her empty studio where she would no longer wait for the ring of the telephone, the empty letter rack in the concierge’s office, empty restaurants, empty streets. This was impossible. She did not want to lose him. Weak, selfish, hateful, that was of no importance. She needed him in order to live. She would accept anything at all if she could keep him.

‘No, don’t do anything about Berger until after you have your answer from Nanteuil,’ Pierre was saying. ‘That would be unwise. But I’m sure he’ll be very interested.’

‘Ring up some afternoon,’ said Françoise. ‘We’ll arrange to meet.’

They disappeared towards the back of the room.

‘Let’s sit here. It’s just like a little chapel,’ said Xavière.

This excessively suave voice grated on the nerves like a fingernail scraping over silk.

‘That youngster is very sweet,’ said Claude. ‘Is that Labrousse’s new love?’

‘I suppose so. For someone who dislikes attracting attention as much as he, their entry was a bit rowdy.’

There was a silence.

‘Don’t let’s stay here,’ said Elisabeth nervously. ‘It’s horrible to feel them staring at our backs.’

‘They’re not paying any attention to us,’ said Claude.

‘It’s odious … all these people,’ said Elisabeth. Her voice broke. Tears rose to her eyes. She would not be able to hold them back much longer. ‘Let’s go to my studio,’ she said.

‘Just as you like,’ said Claude. He called the waiter and Elisabeth put on her coat in front of the looking-glass. Her face was distraught. In the depths of the glass she caught sight of the others. Xavière was talking. She was gesticulating, and Françoise and Pierre were looking at her as if fascinated. That really was too inconsiderate. They could waste their time on any idiot, but they were blind and deaf to Elisabeth. Had they been willing to admit her with Claude into their intimate life, had they accepted Partage? It was their fault. Anger shook Elisabeth from head to foot; she was choking. They were happy, they were laughing. Would they be everlastingly happy, with such overwhelming perfection? Would not they, too, some day drop into the depths of this sordid hell? To wait in fear and trembling, to call vainly for help, to implore, to stand alone in the midst of regrets, anguish and an endless disgust of self. So sure of themselves, so proud, so invulnerable. By keeping careful watch, could not some way be found to hurt them?

Elisabeth stepped into Claude’s car without a word. They did not exchange a single sentence until they reached her door.

‘I don’t think we have anything left to say to each other,’ said Claude when he had stopped the car.

‘We can’t part like this,’ said Elisabeth. ‘Come up for a minute.’

‘What for?’ said Claude.

‘Come up. We haven’t really thrashed it out,’ said Elisabeth.

‘You don’t love me any more, you think hateful thoughts about me. There’s nothing to discuss.’ said Claude.

This was blackmail, pure and simple, but it was impossible to let him go-when would he come back?

‘You mean a great deal to me, Claude,’ said Elisabeth. These words brought tears to her eyes. He followed her. She climbed the stairs crying spasmodically, with no effort at self-control; she staggered a little, but he did not take her arm. When they had entered the studio, Claude began to pace up and down in a black mood,

‘You’re quite free not to love me any more,’ he said, ‘but there was something else besides love between us, and that, you should try to salvage.’ He glanced at the couch. ‘Did you sleep here, with that fellow?’

Elisabeth had let herself drop into an arm-chair.

‘I didn’t think you would be angry with me for it, Claude,’ she said. ‘I don’t want to lose you over a thing like that.’

‘I’m not jealous of a second-rate little actor,’ said Claude. ‘I’m angry with you for not having told me anything. You should have spoken to me sooner. And, besides, tonight, you said things to me that make even friendship between us impossible.’

Jealous, he was just plain jealous: she had wounded his male pride and he wanted to torture her. She was well aware of that, but it made matters no better, his steely voice was exacerbating.

‘I don’t want to lose you,’ she repeated. She began to sob undisguisedly.

It was stupid to abide by the rules, to play the game loyally; you got no thanks for that. You thought that one day all the hidden suffering and all the inner sensitivities and struggles would come to the surface, and that he would be overwhelmed with admiration and remorse. But no, this was just so much wasted effort.

‘You know that I’m at the end of my tether,’ said Claude. ‘I’m going through a spiritual and intellectual crisis that’s exhausting me. You were all I had to lean on, and this is the moment you have chosen!’

‘Claude, you’re unfair,’ she said weakly. Her sobs increased; it was an emotion which carried her away with so much violence, that dignity and shame became mere futile words, and she found herself saying anything. ‘I was too much in love with you, Claude,’ she said. ‘It’s because I was too much in love with you that I wanted to free myself from you.’ She hid her face in her hands. This passionate confession ought to call Claude to her side. Let him take her in his arms; let everything be blotted out! Never again would she utter a complaint.

She looked up, he was leaning against the wall, the corners of his mouth were trembling nervously.

‘Say something to me,’ she said. He was looking viciously at the couch, it was easy to guess what he saw there; she should never have brought him here, the picture was too vivid.

‘Will you stop crying?’ he said. ‘If you treated yourself to that little pansy, it was because you wanted to. You no doubt got what you wanted.’

Elisabeth stopped, almost choking in the effort; she felt as if she had received a direct blow on her chest. She could not bear coarseness, she was physically incapable of it.

‘I forbid you to speak to me like that,’ she said with violence.

‘I’ll speak to you in whatever way I choose,’ said Claude, raising his voice. ‘I find it amazing that you now take the line that you’re the victim.’

‘Don’t shout,’ said Elisabeth. She was trembling, it seemed to her that she was listening to her grandfather, when the veins on his forehead became swollen and purple. ‘I won’t allow you to shout.’

Claude directed a kick at the chimney-piece.

‘Do you want me to hold your hand?’ he said.

‘Stop screaming,’ said Elisabeth, in an even more hollow voice. Her teeth were beginning to chatter, she was on the verge of hysteria.

‘I’m not screaming. I’m going,’ said Claude. Before she could move, he was outside the door. She dashed to the landing.

‘Claude,’ she called. ‘Claude.’

He did not look back. She saw him disappear and the street door slammed. She went back into the studio and began to undress; she was no longer trembling. Her head felt as if it were swollen with water and the night, it became enormous, and so heavy that it pulled her towards the abyss – sleep, or death, or madness – a bottomless pit into which she would disappear for ever. She collapsed on her bed.

When Elisabeth opened her eyes again, the room was flooded with light; she had a taste of salt water in her mouth; she did not move. Pain, still somewhat deadened by fever and sleep, throbbed in her burning eyelids and in her pulsing temples. If only she could fall asleep again till tomorrow-not to have to make any decisions – not to have to think. How long could she remain plunged in this merciful torpor? Make believe I’m dead – make believe I’m floating – but already it was an effort to narrow her eyes and see nothing at all. She rolled herself up tighter in the warm sheets. Once again, she was slipping towards oblivion when the bell rang shrilly.

She jumped out of bed and her heart began to race. Was it Claude already? What would she say? She glanced in the looking-glass. She did not look too haggard, but there was no time to choose her expression. For one second, she was tempted not to open the door – he would think she was dead or had disappeared – he would be frightened. She listened intently. There was not a breath to be heard on the other side of the door. Perhaps he had already turned round, slowly; perhaps he was going down the stairs – she would be left alone – awake and alone. She jumped to the door and opened it. It was Guimiot.

‘Am I disturbing you?’ he said, smiling.

‘No, come in,’ said Elisabeth. She looked at him somewhat horror-stricken.

‘What time is it?’

‘It’s noon, I think. Were you asleep?’

‘Yes,’ said Elisabeth. She straightened the sheets and plumped up the bed; in spite of everything, it was better to have someone there. ‘Give me a cigarette,’ she said, ‘and sit down.’

She was irritated by his way of walking in and out between the furniture like a cat, he liked to show off his body; his movements were supple and smooth, his gestures graceful and overdone.

‘I was only passing by. I don’t want to be in your way,’ he said. He also overdid his smile, a thin smile that made his eyes wrinkle. ‘It’s a pity that you couldn’t come last night. We drank champagne until five o’clock this morning. My friends told me that I was a sensation. What did Monsieur Labrousse think?’

‘It was very good,’ said Elisabeth.

‘It seems that Roseland wants to meet me. He thinks I have a very interesting head. He is expecting to put on a new play soon.’

‘Do you think it’s your head he’s after?’ said Elisabeth. Roseland made no secret of his habits.

Guimiot gently pressed one moist lip against the other. His lips, his liquid blue eyes, his whole face made one think of a damp spring day.

‘Isn’t my head interesting?’ he said coquettishly. A pansy grafted on to a gigolo, that was Guimiot.

‘Isn’t there a scrap to eat here?’

‘Go and look in the kitchen,’ said Elisabeth-‘Bed, breakfast and what have you,’ she thought harshly – he always managed to cadge something, a meal, a tie, a little money borrowed but never returned. Today, she did not find him amusing.

‘Do you want some boiled eggs?’ shouted Guimiot.

‘No, I don’t want anything,’ she answered. The sound of running water, and the clatter of pots and dishes came from the kitchen – she did not even have the courage to throw him out – when he left she would have to think.

‘I’ve found a little wine,’ said Guimiot. He put a plate, a glass and a napkin on one corner of the table. ‘There’s no bread, but I’ll make the eggs soft-boiled. Soft-boiled eggs can be eaten without bread, can’t they?’

He sat himself on the table and began to swing his legs.

‘My friends told me that it’s a pity I have such a small part. Do you think that Monsieur Labrousse might at least let me be an understudy?’

‘I mentioned it to Françoise Miquel,’ said Elisabeth – her cigarette tasted acrid and her head ached – it was just like a hangover.

‘What did Mademoiselle Miquel say?’

‘That she would have to see.’

‘People always say they’ll have to see,’ said Guimiot sententiously. ‘Life is very difficult.’ He leapt toward the kitchen door. ‘I think I hear the kettle singing.’

‘He ran after me because I was Labrousse’s sister,’ thought Elisabeth – that was nothing new – she’d been well aware of it for ten days. But now she put her thoughts into words. She added: ‘I don’t care.’ With unfriendly eyes she watched him put the pot on the table and open an egg with finicky gestures.

‘There was a stout lady, rather old and very smart, who wanted to drive me home last night’

‘Fair, with a pile of little curls?’

‘Yes. I refused to go because of my friends. She seemed to know Monsieur Labrousse.’

‘That’s our aunt,’ said Elisabeth. ‘Where did you and your friends have supper?’

‘At the Topsy, and then we wandered round Montparnasse. At the bar of the Dôme we met the young stage-manager who was completely squiffy.’

‘Gerbert? Whom was he with?’

‘There were Tedesco and the Canzetti girl and Sazelat and somebody else. I think Canzetti went home with Tedesco.’ He opened a second egg.

‘Is the young stage-manager interested in men?’

‘Not that I know of,’ said Elisabeth. ‘If he made any advances to you it was because he was plastered.’

‘He didn’t make any advances to me,’ said Guimiot, looking shocked. ‘It was my friends who thought he was so handsome.’ He smiled at Elisabeth with sudden intimacy. ‘Why don’t you eat?’

‘I’m not hungry,’ said Elisabeth – this couldn’t last much longer – soon she would begin to suffer; she could feel it beginning.

‘That’s pretty, that thing you’re wearing,’ said Guimiot, his feminine hands running lightly over her silk pyjamas. The hand became gently insistent.

‘No, leave me alone,’ said Elisabeth wearily.

‘Why? Don’t you love me any more?’ said Guimiot. His tone carried the suggestion of some lewd complicity, but Elisabeth had ceased to offer any resistance. He kissed the nape of her neck, he kissed her behind her ear; strange little kisses; it almost seemed as if he were grazing. This would always retard the moment when she would have to think.

‘How cold you are!’ he said almost accusingly. His hand had slipped underneath the silk and he was watching her through half-closed eyes. Elisabeth surrendered her mouth and closed her eyes; she could no longer bear that look, that professional look. She felt suddenly that these deft fingers which were scattering a shower of downy caresses over her body were the fingers of an expert, endowed with a skill as precise as those of a masseur, a hairdresser, or a dentist. Guimiot was conscientiously doing his job as a male. How could she tolerate these services rendered, ironic as they were?

She made a movement to free herself. But she was so heavy, so weak, that before she could pull herself together she felt Guimiot’s naked body against hers. The ease with which he had stripped, this too, was one of the tricks of the trade. His was a sinuous and gentle body that too easily embraced hers. Claude’s clumsy kisses, his crushing embrace … She opened her eyes. Guimiot’s mouth was curved and his eyes were screwed up with pleasure. At this moment, he was thinking only of himself, with the greed of a profiteer. She closed her eyes again. A scorching humiliation swept over her. She was anxious for it to end.

With an insinuating movement Guimiot put his cheek on Elisabeth’s shoulder. She pressed her head against the pillow. But she knew that she would not be able to sleep any more. Now things must take their course, there was no help for it. That was that: one could no longer avoid suffering.

Chapter Five

‘Three coffees, and bring them in cups,’ said Pierre.

‘You’re pig-headed,’ said Gerbert. ‘The other day, with Vuillemin, we measured it out; the glasses hold exactly the same amount.’

‘After a meal, coffee should be drunk from a cup,’ said Pierre with finality.

‘He maintains that the taste is different,’ said Françoise.

‘He’s a dangerous dreamer!’ said Gerbert. He thought for a minute. ‘Strictly speaking, we might agree that it cools less rapidly in cups.’

‘Why does it cool less rapidly?’ said Françoise.

‘Surface of evaporation is reduced,’ said Pierre sententiously.

‘Now you’re well off the rails,’ said Gerbert. ‘What happens is that china retains the heat better.’

They were always full of fun when they debated a physical phenomenon. It was usually something they had made up on the spur of the moment.

‘It cools all the same,’ said Françoise.

‘Do you hear what she says?’ said Pierre.

Gerbert put a finger to his lips with mock discretion; Pierre nodded his head knowingly: this was the usual mimicry to express their impertinent complicity, but today, there was no conviction in this ritual. The luncheon had dragged out cheerlessly; Gerbert seemed spiritless, they had discussed the Italian demands at great length: it was unusual for their conversation to be swamped in such generalities.

‘Did you read Soudet’s criticism this morning?’ said Françoise.

‘He’s got a nerve. He asserts that to translate a text word for word is to falsify it.’

‘Those old drivellers!’ said Gerbert. ‘They won’t dare admit that Shakespeare bores them stiff.’

‘That’s nothing, we’ve got vocal criticism on our side,’ said Françoise, ‘that’s the most important thing.’

‘Five curtain calls last night, I counted them,’ said Gerbert.

‘I’m delighted,’ said Françoise. ‘I felt sure we could put it across without making the slightest compromise.’ She turned gaily to Pierre. ‘It’s quite obvious now that you’re not merely a theorist, an ivory tower experimenter, a coterie aesthete. The porter at the hotel told me he cried when you were assassinated.’

‘I’ve always thought he was a poet,’ said Pierre. He smiled, as if somewhat embarrassed, and Françoise’s enthusiasm subsided. Four days earlier, when they had left the theatre at the close of the dress rehearsal, Pierre had been feverishly happy and they had spent an intoxicating night with Xavière! But the very next day, this feeling of triumph had left him. That was just like him: he would have been devastated by a failure, but success never seemed to him to be any more than an insignificant step forward towards still more difficult tasks that he immediately set himself. He never fell into the weakness of vanity, but neither did he experience the serene joy of work well done. He looked at Gerbert questioningly.

‘What is the Péclard clique saying?’

‘That you’re right off the mark,’ said Gerbert. ‘You know they’re all for the return to the natural and all that tripe. All the same, they would like to know just what you’ve got up your sleeve.’

Françoise was quite sure she was not mistaken, there was a certain restraint in Gerbert’s cordiality.

‘They’ll be on the look-out next year when you produce your own play,’ said Françoise. She added gaily: ‘Now, after the success of Julius Caesar, we can count on the support of the public. It’s grand to think about.’

‘It would be a good thing if you were to publish your book at the same time,’ said Gerbert.

‘You’ll no longer be just a sensation, you’ll be really famous,’ said Françoise.

A little smile played on Pierre’s lips.

‘If the brutes don’t gobble us up,’ he said.

The words fell on Françoise like a cold douche.

‘Do you think we’ll fight for Djibouti?’

Pierre shrugged his shoulders.

‘I think we were a little hasty in our rejoicings at the time of Munich. A great many things can happen between now and next year.’

There was a short silence.

‘Put your play on in March,’ said Gerbert.

‘That’s a bad time,’ said Françoise, ‘and besides, it won’t be ready.’

‘It’s not a question of producing my play at all costs,’ said Pierre. ‘It’s rather one of finding out just how much sense there is in producing plays at all.’

Françoise looked at him uneasily. A week earlier when they were at the Pôle Nord with Xavière, and he had referred to himself as an obstinate mule, she had chosen to interpret it as a momentary whim; but it seemed that a real anxiety was beginning to possess him.

‘You told me in September that, even if war came, we should have to go on living.’

‘Certainly, but how?’ Pierre vaguely contemplated his fingers. ‘Writing, producing … that’s not after all an end in itself.’

He was really perplexed and Françoise almost felt a grudge against him, but she must go on quietly trusting in him.

‘If that’s the way you look at it, what is an end in itself?’ she said.

‘That’s exactly the reason why nothing is simple,’ said Pierre. His face had taken on a clouded and almost stupid expression: the way he looked in the morning when, with his eyes still pink with sleep, he desperately began searching for his socks all over the room.

‘It’s half-past two, I’ll beat it,’ said Gerbert.

He was never the first to leave as a rule; he liked nothing so much as the moments he spent with Pierre.

‘Xavière is going to be late again,’ said Françoise. ‘It’s most aggravating. Your aunt is so particular that we should be there for the first glass of port sharp at three o’clock.’

‘She’s going to be bored stiff there,’ said Pierre. ‘We should have arranged to meet her afterwards.’

‘She wants to see what a private view is like,’ said Françoise. ‘I don’t know what her idea of it can be.’

‘You’ll have a good laugh!’ said Gerbert.

‘It’s one of aunt’s protégés,’ said Françoise, ‘we simply can’t get out of it. As it is, I cut the last cocktail party, and that didn’t go down too well.’

Gerbert got up and nodded to Pierre.

‘I’ll see you tonight.’

‘So long,’ said Françoise warmly. She watched him walk off in his big overcoat which flapped over his ankles; it was one of Péclard’s old casts-off. ‘That was all rather forced,’ she said.

‘He’s a charming young fellow, but we don’t have a great deal to say to each other,’ said Pierre.

‘He’s never been like that before; I thought he seemed very depressed. Perhaps it’s because we let him down on Friday night; but it was perfectly plausible that we should want to go home to bed right away when we were so exhausted.’

‘At least so long as nobody else ran into us,’ said Pierre.

‘Let’s say that we buried ourselves at the Pôle Nord, and then jumped straight into a taxi. There’s only Elisabeth, but I’ve warned her.’ Françoise ran her hand across the back of her head and smoothed her hair. ‘That would be a bore,’ she said. ‘Not so much the fact itself, but the lie, that would hurt him terribly.’

Gerbert had retained from his adolescence a rather timid touchiness and, above all, he dreaded feeling that he was in the way. Pierre was the only person in the world who really counted in his life; he was quite willing to be under some sort of obligation to him, but only if he felt that it was not from a sense of duty that Pierre took an interest in him.

‘No, there’s not a chance,’ said Pierre. ‘Besides, yesterday evening he was still gay and friendly.’

‘Perhaps he’s worried,’ said Françoise. It saddened her that Gerbert should be sad and that she could do nothing for him. She liked to know that he was happy: his steady and pleasant life delighted her. He worked with discernment and success. He had a few friends whose varied talents fascinated him: Mollier who played the banjo so well, Barrisson who spoke in flawless slang, Castier who had no trouble in holding six Pernods. Many an evening in the Montparnasse cafés he practised bearing up under Pernod with them: he had more success with the banjo. The rest of the time he deliberately shunned company. He went to the movies; he read; he wandered about Paris, cherishing modest and persistent little dreams.

‘Why doesn’t that girl come?’ said Pierre.

‘Perhaps she’s still asleep,’ said Françoise.

‘Of course not, yesterday evening when she dropped into my dressing-room she said quite clearly that she’d have herself called,’ said Pierre. ‘Perhaps she’s ill, but then she would have telephoned.’

‘Not she, she’s got a holy fear of the telephone, she thinks it’s an instrument of evil,’ said Françoise. ‘But I do think it’s likely she’s forgotten the time.’

‘She never forgets the time except out of spite,’ said Pierre, ‘and I don’t see why she should have a sudden change of mood.’

‘She does occasionally, for no known reason.’

‘There’s always a reason,’ said Pierre, a little irritably. ‘Only you don’t try to understand them.’

Françoise found his tone unpleasant; it was in no way her fault.

‘Let’s go and fetch her,’ said Pierre.

‘She’ll think that’s indiscreet,’ said Françoise. Perhaps she did treat Xavière rather like a piece of machinery, but at least she handled the delicate mechanism with the greatest care. It was very annoying to have to offend Aunt Christine; but, on the other hand, Xavière would take it greatly amiss if they were to go to her room to fetch her.

‘But it’s she who’s in the wrong,’ said Pierre. Françoise rose. After all, Xavière might be ill. Since her discussion with Pierre a week earlier, she had not had the slightest change of mood: the evening the three had spent together, the Friday after the dress rehearsal, had passed in cloudless merriment.

The hotel was quite close and it took them only a moment to get there. Three o’clock. There was not a minute more to be lost. As Françoise disappeared up the stairs the proprietress called her.

‘Mademoiselle Miquel, are you going to see Mademoiselle Pagès?’

‘Yes, why?’ said Françoise a little arrogantly. This plaintive old lady was fairly accommodating, but her inquisitiveness was sometimes misplaced.

‘I would like to have a word with you about her.’ The old woman stood hesitatingly on the threshold of the little drawing-room, but Françoise did not follow her in. ‘Mademoiselle Pagès complained a little while ago that the basin in her room was stopped up. I pointed out to her that she had been throwing tea-leaves, lumps of cotton-wool and slops into it.’ She added: ‘Her room is in such a mess! There are cigarette ends and fruit-pips in every corner, and the bedspread is singed all over.’

‘If you have any complaints to make about Mademoiselle Pagès, please speak to her,’ said Françoise.

‘I have done so,’ said the proprietress, ‘and she told me that she wouldn’t stay here one day more. I think she’s packing her bags. You’ll appreciate that I have no trouble in letting my rooms. I have enquiries every day and I’d be only too happy to let a tenant like that go. The way she keeps the lights burning all night long, you have no idea how much it costs me.’ She added, ingratiatingly: ‘Only because she’s a friend of yours, I wouldn’t want to inconvenience her. I wanted to tell you, that if she changes her mind I won’t raise any objections.’

Ever since Françoise had lived there, she had been treated with unusual consideration. She showered the good woman with complimentary tickets and the old lady was flattered by it: and, most important of all, she paid her rent very regularly.

‘I’ll tell her,’ said Françoise. ‘Thank you.’ With decisive steps, she went on up the stairs.

‘We can’t let that little wretch become a damned nuisance,’ said Pierre. ‘There are other hotels in Montparnasse.’

‘But I’m very comfortable in this one,’ said Françoise. It was well heated and well located: Françoise liked its mixed clientèle and the ugly-flowered wallpaper.

‘Shall we knock?’ said Françoise hesitantly. Pierre knocked. The door was opened with unexpected promptitude and Xavière stood there, bedraggled and almost scarlet in the face; she had pulled up the sleeves of her blouse and her skirt was covered with dust.

‘Oh, it’s you!’ she said with a look of complete surprise.

It was useless to try to anticipate Xavière’s greeting, one was always wrong. Françoise and Pierre stood rooted to the spot.

‘What are you doing here?’ said Pierre.

Xavière’s throat swelled.

‘I’m moving,’ she said in a tragic voice. The scene was stupefying. Françoise thought vaguely of Aunt Christine whose lips must have already begun to tighten, but everything seemed trivial in comparison with the cataclysm that had ravaged this room as well as Xavière’s face. Three suitcases lay gaping in the middle of the room; the cupboards had disgorged on to the floor piles of crumpled clothing, papers, and toilet articles.

‘And do you expect to be finished soon?’ asked Pierre who was looking sternly at this havoc-stricken sanctuary.

‘I’ll never get finished!’ said Xavière. She sank into an arm-chair and pressed her fingers against her forehead. ‘That old hag …’

‘She spoke to me just now,’ said Françoise. ‘She told me that you could stay on for tonight, if that suits you.’

‘Oh!’ said Xavière. A look of hope flashed into her eyes and died immediately. ‘No, I ought to leave at once.’

Françoise felt sorry for her.

‘But you aren’t going to find a room this evening.’

‘Oh, surely not,’ said Xavière. She bent her head and sat prostrated for some time. Françoise and Pierre stood as if spellbound, staring at her golden head.

‘Well, leave all that,’ said Françoise with a sudden return to consciousness. ‘Tomorrow we’ll go and look together.’

‘Leave this?’ said Xavière. ‘But I couldn’t live in this rubbish heap for even an hour.’

‘I’ll help you to tidy it up tonight,’ said Françoise. Xavière gave her a look of plaintive gratitude. ‘Listen to me. You are going to get dressed and wait for us at the Dôme. We’ll dash off to the private view and we’ll be back in an hour and a half.’

Xavière jumped to her feet and clutched her hair.

‘Oh, I would so like to go! I’ll be ready in ten minutes. I just have to tidy myself up a bit.’

‘Aunt has already begun to fume,’ said Françoise.

Pierre shrugged his shoulders.

‘In any case, we’ve missed the port,’ he said angrily. ‘Now, there’s no longer any point in getting there before five o’clock.’

‘As you wish,’ said Françoise. ‘But the blame will fall on me again.’

‘Well, after all, you don’t give a damn,’ said Pierre.

‘You’ll smile at her winningly,’ said Xavière.

‘All right,’ said Françoise. ‘You’ll have to think of a good excuse for us.’

‘I’ll try,’ grumbled Pierre.

‘Then we’ll wait for you in my room,’ said Françoise.

They went upstairs.

‘It’s an afternoon wasted,’ said Pierre. ‘There won’t be enough time left to go anywhere after we leave the exhibition.’

‘I told you she couldn’t learn how to live,’ said Françoise. She walked over to the looking-glass: with this upswept coiffure it was impossible to keep the back of one’s neck looking neat. ‘If only she doesn’t insist on moving.’

‘You haven’t got to move with her,’ said Pierre. He seemed furious. He had always been so cheerful with Françoise that she had almost reached the point of forgetting that he was not good-tempered, that his fits of anger were legendary at the theatre. If he took this affair as a personal offence, the afternoon was going to be grim.

‘But I will; you know that. She won’t insist, but she’ll sink into black despair.’

Françoise glanced over the room.

‘My nice little hotel. Fortunately, I can rely on her inertia.’

Pierre walked over to the pile of manuscripts stacked on the table.

‘You know,’ he said. ‘I think I’ll hang on to Monsieur le Vent. This fellow interests me, he ought to be encouraged. I’ll ask him to have dinner with us one of these evenings so that you can form some opinion of him.’

‘I also want to look at Hyacinthe,’ said Françoise. ‘I think it’s promising.’

‘Show it to me,’ said Pierre. He began to look through the manuscript and Françoise leaned over his shoulder to read with him. She was not in a good mood: alone with Pierre, she would have got the private view over and done with very quickly, but with Xavière about, everything tended to become burdensome, it made one feel that one was walking through life with clods of clay on the soles of one’s shoes. Pierre should never have decided to wait for her; even he looked as though he had got out of the wrong side of the bed. Nearly half an hour passed before Xavière knocked. Then they hurried downstairs.

‘Where do you want to go?’ said Françoise.

‘I don’t mind,’ said Xavière.

‘Since we’ve only an hour,’ said Pierre, ‘let’s go to the Dôme.’

‘How cold it is,’ said Xavière, tightening her scarf round her face.

‘It’s only a few steps from here,’ said Françoise.

‘We haven’t got the same conception of distance,’ said Xavière whose face was screwed up.

‘Or of time,’ said Pierre dryly.

Françoise was beginning to read Xavière very well. Xavière knew that she was in the wrong. She thought they were angry with her and she was taking the lead; and besides, her attempts at moving had worn her out. Françoise wanted to take her arm: wherever they had gone on Friday night, they had walked arm in arm, and kept in step.

‘No,’ said Xavière, ‘it’s much faster on one’s own.’

Pierre’s face darkened again, Françoise was afraid he was going to lose his temper. They sat down at the back of the café.

‘You know,’ said Françoise, ‘this private view won’t be at all interesting. Aunt’s protégés never have an ounce of talent, she’s never been known to fail in that respect.’

‘I don’t care a hang about that,’ said Xavière. ‘It’s the reception I’m interested in. Pictures always bore me stiff.’

‘That’s because you’ve never seen any,’ said Françoise. ‘If you were to come with me to exhibitions, or even go to the Louvre …’

‘That wouldn’t make any difference,’ said Xavière. She made a wry face. ‘A picture is so arid, it’s completely flat.’

‘If you were to get to know a little about it, I’m sure you would enjoy it,’ said Françoise.

‘You mean I would understand why I ought to enjoy it,’ said Xavière. ‘I’d never be satisfied with that. The day when I no longer feel anything, I’m not going to look for excuses to feel.’

‘What you call feeling is really a way of understanding,’ said Françoise. ‘You like music, well then …!’

Xavière stopped her short.

‘You know, when people speak about good and bad music, it goes right over my head,’ she said with aggressive modesty. ‘I don’t understand the first thing about it. I like the notes for themselves; the sound alone is enough for me.’ She looked Françoise in the eye. ‘The pleasures of the mind are repulsive to me.’

When Xavière was being obstinate it was useless to argue. Françoise looked reproachfully at Pierre; after all, it was he who had wanted to wait for Xavière, he could at least join in the conversation, instead of entrenching himself behind a sardonic smile.

‘I warn you that the reception, as you call it, is not a bit amusing,’ said Françoise. ‘Just a lot of people exchanging polite remarks.’

‘Oh, still there’ll be a crowd, and excitement,’ said Xavière in a tone of passionate insistence.

‘Do you feel a need for excitement now?’

‘Of course I need it!’ said Xavière, and a wild untamed look glinted in her eyes. ‘Shut up in that room from morning till night, why, I’ll go mad! I can’t stand it there any more, you can have no idea how happy I’ll be to leave that place.’

‘Who prevents you from going out?’ asked Pierre.

‘You say that there isn’t any fun in going dancing with women, but Begramian or Gerbert would be only too glad to take you, and they dance very well,’ said Françoise.

Xavière shook her head.

‘Once you decide to have a good time to order, it’s always pitiful.’

‘You want everything to fall into your lap like manna from heaven,’ said Françoise, ‘you don’t deign to lift your little finger, and then you proceed to take it out on everyone. Obviously …’

‘There must be some countries in the world,’ said Xavière, as if in a dream, ‘warm countries – Greece or Sicily – where it surely isn’t necessary to lift a finger.’ She scowled. ‘Here you have to grab with both hands – and to get what?’

‘You have to do the same out there,’ said Françoise.

Xavière’s eyes began to sparkle.

‘Where is that red island that’s completely surrounded by boiling water?’ she said hungrily.

‘Santorin, one of the isles of Greece,’ said Françoise. ‘But that isn’t exactly what I told you. Only the cliffs are red, and the sea boils only between two small black islets thrown up by volcanic eruptions. Oh, I remember,’ she said, warming to her subject, ‘a lake of sulphurous water in the midst of the lava. It was all yellow and edged by a peninsula as black as anthracite and on the other side of this black strip the sea was a dazzling blue.’

Xavière looked at her with rapt attention.

‘When I think of all you’ve seen,’ she said in a voice filled with resentment.

‘You consider that it’s quite undeserved,’ said Pierre.

Xavière looked him up and down. She pointed to the dirty leather banquettes, the grubby tables.

‘To think, after seeing all that, that you can come and sit here.’

‘What good would it do to pine away with regrets?’ asked Françoise.

‘Of course, you don’t want to have any regrets,’ said Xavière. ‘You are so anxious to be happy.’ She looked away into space. ‘But I wasn’t born resigned.’

Françoise was cut to the quick. Surely she couldn’t contemptuously push aside the acceptance of this happiness that seemed to her so clearly to be asserting itself. Right or wrong, she no longer regarded Xavière’s words as outbursts: they held a complete set of values that ran counter to hers. However much she refused to acknowledge this fact, its existence was awkward.

‘This life of ours is no resignation,’ she said sharply. ‘We love Paris, and these streets, and these cafés.’

‘How can anyone love sordid places, and hideous things, and all these wretched people?’ Xavière’s voice emphasized her epithets with disgust.

‘The point is that the whole world interests us,’ said Françoise. ‘You happen to be a little aesthete. You want unadulterated beauty; but that’s a very narrow point of view.’

‘Am I supposed to be interested in that saucer because it presumes to exist?’ asked Xavière, and she looked at the saucer with annoyance. ‘It’s quite enough that it’s there.’ With intentional naïveté she added: ‘I should have thought that when one is an artist, it is just because one likes beautiful things.’

‘That depends on what you call beautiful things,’ said Pierre.

Xavière stared at him.

‘Heavens! you’re listening,’ she said, wide-eyed but gently. ‘I thought you were lost in deep thought.’

‘I’m paying close attention.’

‘You’re not in a very good mood,’ said Xavière, still smiling.

‘I’m in an excellent mood,’ said Pierre. ‘I think we’re spending a most delightful afternoon. We’re about to start off for the private view, and when we’re through with that, we’ll have just enough time to eat a sandwich. That works out perfectly.’

‘You think it’s all my fault,’ said Xavière, showing more of her teeth.

‘I certainly don’t think it’s mine,’ said Pierre.

It was simply for the purpose of behaving disagreeably towards Xavière that he had insisted on meeting her again as soon as possible. ‘He might have given me a thought,’ Françoise reflected with bitterness; she was beginning to find the situation intolerable.

‘That’s true. When for once in a while you’ve got some free time,’ said Xavière, whose grin became more perceptible, ‘what a tragedy it is, if a little of it is wasted!’

This reproach surprised Françoise. Had she once more misread Xavière? Only four days had passed since Friday and at the theatre, yesterday evening, Pierre had greeted Xavière most amiably. She would already have to be very fond of him to feel that she had been neglected.

Xavière turned to Françoise.

‘I imagined the life of writers and artists to be something quite different,’ she said in a sophisticated tone. ‘I had no idea it was regulated like that – by the ring of a bell.’

‘You would have preferred them to wander about in the storm with their hair streaming in the wind?’ said Françoise, who felt herself grow utterly fatuous under Pierre’s mocking look.

‘No. Baudelaire didn’t let his hair stream in the wind,’ said Xavière. She continued more naturally: ‘What it amounts to is that, except for him and Rimbaud, artists are just like civil servants.’

‘Because we do a little work regularly every day?’ Françoise asked.

Xavière pouted coyly.

‘And then you count the number of hours you sleep, you eat two meals a day, you pay visits, and you never go for a walk one without the other. It couldn’t possibly be otherwise …’

‘But do you consider that unbearable?’ asked Françoise with a forced smile. This was not a flattering picture of themselves which Xavière was showing them.

‘It seems queer to sit down every day at one’s desk and write line after line of sentences,’ said Xavière. ‘I admit that people should write, of course,’ she added quickly. ‘There’s something voluptuous about words. But only when the spirit moves you.’

‘It’s possible to have a desire for a piece of work as a whole,’ said Françoise. She felt a little inclined to justify herself in Xavière’s eyes.

‘I admire the exalted level of your conversation,’ said Pierre. His malicious smile was aimed at Françoise as well as at Xavière, and Françoise was disconcerted; was he able to judge her objectively, like a stranger, she who could never bring herself to keep the slightest thing from him? This was disloyalty.

Xavière never batted an eyelash. ‘It becomes home-work,’ she said and she laughed indulgently. ‘But then that’s the way you always do things, you turn everything into a duty.’

‘What do you mean?’ said Françoise. ‘I can assure you that I don’t feel myself so particularly handicapped.’