In the meantime, Antoine was again scanning the room for Lucile. He knew she was around, and now he was watching the door just as anxiously out of fear that she might leave as he had been watching it only minutes earlier in the hope that she would come in. The sudden voice of Blassans-Lignières, coming from behind him, startled him, and he spun about. There was Lucile and he shook her hand, and he did likewise with Charles, in a cordial manner. Then his gaze once again met Lucile’s, and when he saw the sparkle in her eyes, such a powerful feeling of victory and overwhelming joy invaded him that he had to give a little cough in order to conceal the expression on his face.
“Diane,” said Blassans-Lignières, “it’s William who owns that Boldini that I was telling You about at dinner the other evening. William, You’ve simply got to show it to her.”
For a brief instant, Antoine and Charles chanced to look each other straight in the eye before Charles moved off, flanked by William and Diane, and what Antoine saw there was a totally honest look, betraying fear and worry. Was Charles suffering? Did he suspect anything? Antoine hadn’t previously asked himself such questions. He had been worried only about Diane, but even then, only slightly so. The truth was, ever since Sarah’s death, he hadn’t dared to ask any questions about anyone at all. But now here he was, alone, directly facing Lucile, and in his head he was asking her many questions: “Who are you? What do you want of me? What are you doing here? What am I to you?”
“I thought I’d never make it,” said Lucile. At the same time, she was thinking to herself, “I don’t know a thing about him except for how he makes love. So why is this situation that we’re in so intense? It’s everyone else’s fault. If we were free, not watched over, we would without any doubt be calmer, our blood would run cooler.” For a moment, she wanted to spin on her heels and go join the little crew that had set sail for the Boldini. What future awaited her — how many lies, how many quick trysts? She took the cigarette that Antoine was offering her, placing her hand on his while he gave her a light. She instantly recognized that heat, the feel of that hand, and she closed her eyes, first once and then once more, as if secretly giving herself permission to indulge…
Out of the blue, Antoine asked her, “Will You come again tomorrow?”, for some reason reverting from tu to vous. “At the same time?”
He was sure that he wouldn’t feel at ease for even a moment until he knew exactly when he would once again press her tightly against himself. She said yes. And the sense of relief that came flooding into his soul was so powerful that for a brief moment he even questioned if their getting together the next day really mattered to him at all or not. But that doubt was quickly dispelled, for he had read enough literature to believe that anxiety, even more deeply than jealousy, is the great driving force of passion. Moreover, he was quite convinced that all he would need to do was reach out his hand, draw Lucile to his side, right in the middle of this salon, and a huge scandal would erupt, an irreversible act would have been carried out; and it was this very conviction that allowed him to refrain from reaching his hand out, and even allowed him to savor an ambiguous but intense pleasure that he had seldom felt before: that of dissimulation.
“Well, well — so here you are, my little ones! And what have we done with our friends?”
Claire Santré’s throaty voice caught them both off guard. Draping herself with one hand over Lucile’s shoulder, she stared at Antoine admiringly, looking as if she’d tried to see him through Lucile’s eyes and had done a fine job of it. “So, the special issue on feminine complicity has just arrived,” thought Lucile but, to her great surprise, it didn’t upset her at all. Claire was right, Antoine was very handsome right now, looking somehow uneasy and self-confident at the same time. But he was too ill at ease to be able to keep up this façade for much longer — this was a man made to read books, to stride briskly, to speak softly, and to make sweet love; this was not a man made for the social whirl. Even less than she herself was, since her indifference and her devil-may-care attitude at least provided her with a protective diving suit that could withstand all the pressures in the fathomless depths of social relationships.
“It seems that there’s a Boldini in this fellow William’s apartment,” said Antoine contemptuously. “And Diane and Charles are taking it in.”
He realized this was the first time he’d referred to Blassans-Lignières by his first name. The act of deceiving someone forced you, without your quite knowing why, to accept a certain degree of intimacy.
Claire exclaimed, “A Boldini? Did he just get it? I wonder where he came across it! Nobody’s told me about it…” This last was spoken in a certain peeved tone of voice that she always had whenever a lacuna turned up in her vast stock of knowledge.
“Oh, poor William — I’m sure he was robbed blind again. Only an American would go out and buy a Boldini without consulting Santos.”
Somewhat calmed down by thinking of poor William’s naïve blunder, she turned her attention back to Lucile. It seemed about time, at last, to make this uppity girl pay for her cheekiness, her sullen silences, and her refusal to play the game. Lucile was looking up at Antoine with a calm and amused smile, a secure smile. That word, “secure”, hit the nail on the head. It was a smile that only a woman who is intimately involved with a man can have.
“But when, for God’s sake, when, could they have…” And Claire’s mind abruptly spun into high gear. “Now let’s see, the dinner in Marnes was three evenings back, and nothing had happened yet. It must have been some afternoon — nobody in Paris makes love at night any more, everybody’s just too worn out by then, and of course these two, on top of it all, have their other mates. So… this afternoon?!” And, with piercing eyes and a quivering nose, she scrutinized the couple, doing her best to make out any telltale traces of love’s pleasure left behind on their faces, seeking with that crazy intensity that curiosity gives to a certain type of woman.
Lucile picked up on what Claire was doing, and in spite of herself, burst out laughing. Claire backed off a little bit, letting her zealous hunting-hound stare melt into a gentler, more resigned look that said, “Now I understand everything, I accept everything” — but unfortunately no one noticed it at all.
Antoine instead was focused on Lucile and now was laughing comfortably with her, delighted to see her laughing, delighted to know that the next day she’d tell him all about it, lying beside him in his bed in that delicious, drowsy hour that always follows lovemaking. And so he didn’t ask her, “Why are You laughing?” Many a secret liaison unintentionally gives itself away through just such silences, or through a conspicuous lack of questions, through a leading remark that one doesn’t comment on, through the insertion of a secret phrase that had been deliberately chosen for its blandness but that is so exceedingly bland that it draws attention to itself. In any case, even the most casual observer who saw Lucile and Antoine laughing, who saw their faces glowing with happiness, could not have missed the signs.
They themselves vaguely realized this, and they took advantage, with a sort of pride, of the short truce that had been afforded them by the Boldini, these few moments when they could look at each other and enjoy doing so without setting off alarm bells in a certain pair of other guests. And although they would have denied it, the presence of Claire and the rest of the crowd doubled their pleasure. They felt like teen-agers, even children, who have been warned not to do something but who do it anyway, and who haven’t yet been caught and punished.
Diane was now slicing her way back towards them, tacking agilely through the crowd, unable to dodge a doting friend who took her hand and kissed it, but from whom she instantly ripped it away, at the same time ignoring his well-meaning question about her health as well as someone else’s warm words about how lovely she looked. Wading through a buzzing background of “How are you doing, Diane dear? How well You look, Diane! Do tell, where did you ever find that divine outfit, Diane?”, she hastened to get back to that dark and hateful corner where she’d left h
er lover, her love, with that stupid girl he seemed so smitten with. She hated Charles for having dragged her out of the main room, she hated Boldini, she hated William for the insipid and interminable tale he’d told of how he’d made his purchase.
He’d gotten it for a song, naturally — it had been a unique chance, the dumb seller had completely fallen for his ploys. God, it was a drag, this obsession of the super-rich for doing nothing but swinging deal after deal. Wangling discounts from dressmakers, cousin prices at Cartier’s, and being pleased as punch with themselves for these trivial accomplishments. At least she’d not fallen into this trap, thank the Lord — she wasn’t one of those coy rich dames who finagle each and every seller into giving them sweeter deals when they don’t in the least need to do so. It occurred to her she should tell this to Antoine — it would give him a good laugh. High society amused him; he was always quoting Proust on this topic and on a good many others, which somewhat rankled Diane, as she herself had practically no time at all to read. That little Lucile, though, had surely read all of Proust, you could just see it in her eyes — after all, living as she did off of Charles, she must have oodles of free time for reading.
All at once Diane cut these thoughts off. “My God,” she thought, “I’m growing vulgar. Is it unavoidable, as one grows older, to become vulgar in this way?” And though she ached, she still flashed a smile at Coco de Balileul and winked back at Maxime who’d just winked at her for no clear reason, and then she tripped over another half-dozen friendly, beaming hurdles; she was running a torturous steeplechase just to get back to Antoine, who was laughing over in that corner, laughing in that deep bass voice of his, and whose laugh she simply had to squelch. She took one more step and then shut her eyes with a sense of sweet relief: it was with Claire Santré that Antoine was laughing. Lucile had her back turned towards the two of them.
CHAPTER 9
“The party tonight was pretty wild,” said Charles. “Everyone’s drinking more and more, wouldn’t You say?”
It was raining and the car was gliding smoothly along the banks of the Seine. Lucile had stuck her head out the window as was her wont, and little raindrops were pelting her face; she was drinking in the smell of Paris on this April night, and she was recalling the despairing look on Antoine’s face when they’d had to say good-night politely to each other a half hour earlier, and she was filled with wonder at it all.
“Everyone seems more and more frightened these days,” she observed rather cheerily. “Frightened of growing old, frightened of losing what they have, frightened they won’t get what they want, frightened of getting bored, frightened of being boring — they all seem to be in a state of constant despair and yearning.”
“Do You find that amusing?” asked Charles.
“Sometimes I find it funny, and other times it touches me. Don’t You feel that way?”
“I don’t think about it all that much, to tell the truth,” said Charles. “I’m not much of a psychologist, as You know. All I know is that more and more often, people who I don’t even recognize come up to me and give me big hugs, and also, more and more people seem to be getting tipsy in these salon parties.”
What he couldn’t say to Lucile was this: “All I care about is You. I spend hours and hours trying to fathom Your psyche. I’m hounded by one single idea. And I, too, am frightened, just as You were saying, frightened of losing what I have. I, too, live in that perpetual state of despair and yearning You described.”
Lucile pulled her head back inside and looked at him. Out of the blue she felt an immense tenderness for him welling up inside of her — never had she felt so much love for him. She so badly wished she could share this wild joy coursing through her veins as she looked ahead to the next afternoon. “It’s ten o’clock at night, and in just nineteen hours, I’ll be in Antoine’s arms once again. I just hope I can sleep late tomorrow morning, so I won’t have to count the hours.” She placed her hand on Charles’ hand. His was an attractive hand, delicate and well cared for, though a few little brownish spots were starting to show.
“So how was that Boldini, anyway?”
“Oh, she’s trying to make me feel good,” thought Charles bitterly. “She knows that I’m not just a businessman but that I also love art. What she doesn’t know is that I’m fifty years old and that I’m desperately unhappy.”
“Quite lovely. From his best period. And William got it for a song!”
“He’s always getting things for a song, that William,” chirped Lucile with a little laugh.
“That’s exactly what Diane said to me,” said Charles.
There was an uneasy silence. “Well, I’m not going to let there be these awkward silences every time he brings up Diane or Antoine,” Lucile thought to herself. “That’s stupid. If only I could just tell him the truth: that I’m crazy about Antoine, that I dream of laughing with him and being in his arms. But what more terrible thing could I say to this man who loves me? He might be able to accept my sleeping with Antoine, but not my laughing with him. I’m very aware that nothing brings on jealousy like laughter.”
“Diane’s acting a bit weird these days,” said Lucile. “I was talking with Antoine and Claire when I saw her coming back into the salon. She had a kind of lost stare on her face… I was frightened to see her that way.” She tried to laugh.
Charles turned towards her and said, “Frightened? Didn’t You feel sorry for her?”
“Oh, yes,” said Lucile calmly. “I felt sorry for her, too. It’s no picnic for a woman to grow old.”
“Nor for a man,” said Charles emphatically. “Believe me.”
The obviously artificial mirth that ensued made their blood run cold. “All right,” said Lucile to herself, “so that’s how things are. We’ll dodge all the delicate areas, we’ll crack little jokes, we’ll do things his way. But come hell or high water, tomorrow afternoon at five I’m going to be in Antoine’s arms.” And this woman who had always despised love’s irrationality was thrilled to find herself brimming over with it.
The fact was, there was nothing — no person, no plea of any sort — that would be able to keep her from rejoining Antoine the next day, from reveling in the union with his body, his breath, his voice. This she knew, and the ferocity of her desire — she who was forever postponing and procrastinating because of her capricious moods or changes in the weather — astonished her even more than that surge of sheer joy she’d felt when she’d caught sight of Antoine a couple of hours earlier.
Her only prior affair of passion, at age twenty, had been an unhappy one, and it had left her with a curious aftertaste in which caring blended with melancholy, a sensation not all that different from her residual feeling about religion: both were bright hopes that she’d let go of. But now, coming in a huge rush, love — joyous love — was revealing its full force to her, and it seemed to her that the very core of her being, far from limiting its focus to just one other person, was growing huge, unlimited, exultant. She, whose days had been casually slipping through her fingers, each one of them indistinguishable from all the others, was suddenly terrified to think how little of life now remained: she would never have enough time to love Antoine.
“By the way, Lucile, I’m going to have to go off to New York fairly soon. Will You come with me?”
Charles’ voice was calm, as if he was expecting her to say yes; indeed, Lucile loved traveling and he knew it well. She didn’t answer immediately.
“Why not? Would You be gone for a long time?”
“Not a chance,” she was thinking. “Not a chance. What would I possibly do without Antoine for ten days? Charles is always giving me these big decisions to make, sometimes too early and sometimes too late, but in any case it’s just too hard on me. I’d trade all the cities in the world just for Antoine’s little room. The only voyages left for me now, the only discoveries I still hunger for, are those that he and I will make together, side by side in the darkness.” And as a certain little image suddenly bubbled up from her memor
y, she got all flustered and quickly turned her gaze toward the street.
“I’d say ten or fifteen days,” replied Charles. “New York in the springtime is really lovely. You only saw how it is in the dead of winter. I remember one evening when it was so bitterly cold that Your nose turned blue. Your eyes were bulging, Your hair was bristling out of indignation, and You were giving me these dirty looks that implied it was all my fault!”
The image made him come out with a tender and wistful little laugh. Lucile, too, vividly recalled the unbearable coldness of that winter, but for her there was no tender side to the memory. Mostly what she remembered was a mad dash in a taxi from their hotel to some restaurant. The one who cherished these melancholy and golden memories of the heart was Charles, not herself, and all at once this made her feel ashamed. Even in her emotional life, she was totally dependent on Charles, and that was what troubled her more than anything else. She didn’t want to make him suffer, didn’t want to lie to him, didn’t want to tell him the truth — all she wanted was for him to figure it out on his own without her having to tell him anything. Yes, indeed — she really was a coward, through and through.
They got together two or three times a week. Antoine demonstrated tremendous imagination in concocting pretexts for leaving work early, and as for Lucile, she had never made a practice of accounting for her daylight activities to Charles.