Viper's Tangle

by François Charles Mauriac

  I told her the figure of the enormous profit which I had realised for her, just before the shares went down. I explained to her how I had reinvested the sum in bonds.

  “Your dowry has littered, Isa. Even if one takes account of the depreciation of the franc, you ought to be dazzled. Everything is in your own name, at the Westminster Bank, your original dowry and the profits....The children will not be disappointed—you may set your mind at rest about that. I am the master of my own money and of what my own money has produced; but what comes from yours belongs to you. Go and reassure those angels of unselfishness down there.”

  She caught my arm suddenly.

  “Why do you dislike them so much, Louis? Why do you hate your family?”

  “It is all of you who hate me. Or, rather, my children hate me. You—you ignore me, except when I irritate you or frighten you....”

  “You might add: ‘Or when I torture you.’ Don’t you think I have suffered in my time?”

  “Come, come! You had no eyes except for the children....”

  “I had to attach myself to them. What was left for me apart from them?” She went on in a lower voice. “You neglected me and betrayed me from the very first year, you know very well.”

  “My poor Isa, surely you are not asking me to believe that my little truancies hurt you very much—except, perhaps, in your pride as a young wife?”

  She laughed bitterly.

  “How sincere you sound! When I think that you never even took any notice of me....”

  I trembled with hope. It is a strange thing to say, since it was a question of feelings that were done with, ended. The hope of having been loved, forty years earlier, unknown to myself...but no, I could not believe it....

  “You never had a word, never a greeting, for me. The children sufficed for you.”

  She buried her face in her two hands. I had never noticed their big veins, their speckles, so much as that day.

  “My children! When I think that, from the moment when we started having separate rooms, I deprived myself for years of having any of them with me at night, even when they were ill, because I was always waiting, hoping that you would come.”

  Tears ran down her old hands. It was Isa. I alone could still find, in that stout, almost invalid old woman, the girl devoted to white, on the road in the Lys valley.

  “It’s shameful, it’s ridiculous at my age to recall such things....Yes, above all, it’s ridiculous. Forgive me, Louis.”

  I gazed at the vineyard without answering. A doubt came to me, at that moment.

  Is it possible for us, for nearly half a century, to observe only one side of the person who shares our life? Can it be that, out of habit, we pick and choose among the things they say and the things they do, retaining only that which nurtures our grievances and perpetuates our resentment? Have we a fatal tendency to simplify other people—to eliminate all those features which might be regarded as extenuating, which might render more human the caricature of them which our hatred needs for its justification?...

  Did Isa see how upset I was? She was too quick to try and score a point.

  “You’re not going away this evening?”

  I thought I could see that light in her eyes, when she believed that she had “got me.” I feigned surprise, and said that I had no reason for putting off my journey. We went back to the house together. On account of my heart, we did not take the slope through the elms, but followed the lime-tree walk that runs round the house.

  In spite of everything, I remained uncertain and upset. Suppose I did not go? Suppose I gave Isa this document? Suppose....

  She laid her hand on my shoulder. How many years was it since she had done that? The walk emerges in front of the house, on the North side. Isa said:

  “Cazau never puts the garden chairs straight....”

  I gave a casual glance. The empty chairs still formed a close circle. Those who had occupied them had felt the need of drawing together to talk in low voices. The ground was cut up by their heels. Everywhere there were butts of the cigarettes that Phili smokes.

  The enemy had camped there, the night before. They had held council under the stars. They had talked there, in front of my own house, opposite the trees planted by my father, about putting me under restraint or shutting me up.

  One night of humility, I had compared my heart with a tangle of vipers. No, no; the tangle of vipers was outside myself. They had gone out of me and rolled themselves together, that night. They formed that hideous circle at the foot of the steps, and the earth still bore their traces.

  You will get your money back, Isa, I thought to myself, your money that I have made fruitful; but nothing more than that—not another thing. And even the estate—I would find a way to prevent them from having that. I would sell Calèse; I would sell all my land. Everything that came from my family should go to that unknown boy with whom, tomorrow, I would have an interview.

  Whatever he might be, he did not know all of you. He had taken no part in your plots. He had been brought up away from me, and he might not hate me; or, if he did hate me, the object of his hatred would be an abstract being, without relationship with myself....

  I shook myself free angrily and hurried up the steps, forgetful of my old, weak heart. Isa cried: “Louis!” I did not even look back.

  Chapter XIV

  I could not sleep, and I dressed again and went out into the street. To reach the Boulevard Montparnasse, I had to make a way for myself through the midst of dancing couples. Formerly even a Republican as good as myself shunned the fêtes of July 14. The idea of taking part in the pleasures of the street did not enter the head of any respectable man.

  This evening, in the Rue Bréa and in front of the Rotonde, it is not corner-boys who are dancing. There is nothing debauched about them; they are healthy young fellows, bareheaded, some of them wearing open-necked shirts with short sleeves. Among the girls dancing there are few prostitutes.

  The crowd hangs on to the mud-guards of taxis that interrupt its sport, but good-humouredly and without offence. A young man, whom I jostled by accident, cried: “Make room for the old gentleman!” I passed between a double row of shining faces. “Aren’t you sleepy, Grandfather?” a dark boy, with his hair growing low on his forehead, laughed into my face.

  Luc would have learned to laugh like that, and to dance in the street; and I, who have never known what it is to let myself go, to amuse myself, would have learned how to do so from my poor boy. He would have been more overflowing with joy than anybody else; he would not have lacked for money....It was with earth that his mouth was filled....

  So ran my thoughts while, with my chest racked by the familiar pain, I sat on the terrace of a café right in the middle of the fun.

  And suddenly, amid the crowd that flowed between the pavements, I saw myself. It was Robert, with a shabby-looking comrade. Those long legs of Robert’s, that chest narrow as my own, that head sunk in his shoulders—how I hate them! In him all my defects are accentuated. I have a long face, but his is as long as that of a horse—the face of a hunch-back. His voice, too, is that of a hunch-back.

  I called him. He left his comrade, and looked around him with an anxious air.

  “Not here,” he said to me. “Come and meet me on the right-hand pavement, in the Rue Campagne-Première.”

  I pointed out to him that we could not be better hidden than in the midst of this hubbub. He let himself be persuaded, took leave of his comrade, and sat down at my table.

  He had a sporting paper in his hand. To start a conversation I made an effort to talk about horses. Long ago I had to do so with old Fondaudège. I told Robert that, when my father-in-law bet, he took considerations of the most widely differing lands into account: not merely the far-back pedigree of the horse, but also the nature of the ground that suited it best....He interrupted me.

  “As for me, I get tips at Dermas’s”—this was the draper’s shop where he had relapsed into a job, in the Rue des Petits-Champs.

&nbs
p; He added that the only thing that interested him was winning. Horses bored him. “Give me bicycles,” he said; and his eyes shone.

  “Very soon,” I told him, “it will be motorcars....”

  “Imagine that!”

  He wetted his thumb, pulled out paper and tobacco, and rolled a cigarette. There was a silence. I asked him whether the business depression was making itself felt in the shop where he worked. He told me that part of the staff had been dismissed, but that he was in no danger himself. Never did his thoughts go outside the narrowest circle of his personal interests. It was into the lap of this dullard that millions were to fall.

  “Suppose I gave them to charity,” I thought, “suppose I gave them away myself? No, they would have me put under restraint....By my will? It was impossible to exceed the stipulated proportion. Ah, Luc, if only you were alive!...It is true that he would not have accepted, but I should have found a means of enriching him without his suspecting that it was I—for example, by giving a dowry to the girl with whom he would have fallen in love....”

  “Listen, Monsieur....”

  Robert stroked his cheek with a red hand, with pudgy fingers.

  “I’ve been thinking things over. Suppose that lawyer, Bourru, died before the paper was burned....”

  “Well, his son would succeed him. The weapon which I shall give you against Bourru would serve equally well, if the case arose, against his son.”

  Robert went on stroking his cheek. I made no attempt to say anything more. The tightness in my chest, that torturing contraction, was enough to occupy me.

  “Listen, Monsieur....Take this case....Bourru burns the paper; I hand over to him the one which you have given me to compel him to keep his word. But after that, what is to prevent him from going to your family and saying to your children: ‘I know where the fortune is. I will sell you my secret. I ask so much for revealing it, and so much more if you are successful?’ He could make it a condition that his name should not appear....

  “From that moment he would run no further risk. There would be an inquiry. It would be discovered that I am really your son, and that my mother and myself had changed our way of life since your death....And of two things one: either we shall have made correct declarations for income-tax purposes, or else we shall have falsified them....”

  He spoke quite clearly. His mind lost its sluggishness. Slowly his reasoning-machine had started working, and there was no stopping it. What remained powerful in this counter-jumper was the peasant instinct of looking ahead, of distrust, of horror of taking risks, of anxiety to leave nothing to chance. No doubt he would have preferred to take a hundred thousand francs passed from hand to hand, rather than have to conceal that enormous fortune.

  I waited until my heart felt freer and the sense of constriction passed off.

  “There is something in what you say. Very well, I’ll agree to this: you will not sign any document. I will trust you. For that matter, it would always be easy for me to prove that this money belongs to me. Not that it is of much importance—in six months, in a year at the most, I shall be dead.”

  He made no gesture of protest; he could not find the commonplace expression that anybody else would have used. It was not that he was harder than any other young fellow of his age. Simply, he was badly brought up.

  “In that case,” he said, “it might be done.”

  He ruminated over the idea for a few moments, and added:

  “I should have to go to the safe from time to time, even while you were alive...so that they would get to know my face, at the bank. I could go and get money for you....”

  “As a matter of fact,” I interjected, “I have more than one safe abroad. If you prefer it, if you think it would be less risky....”

  “What, leave Paris?”

  I pointed out to him that he could go on living in Paris and make trips when it was necessary. He asked me whether the fortune was in securities or in liquid form, and went on:

  “All the same I should like you to write me a letter to the effect that, being of sound mind, you freely bequeath your fortune to me....In case the truth came out and I were accused of theft by the others—one never knows. Besides, to keep my conscience quiet....”

  He stopped again, bought some pea-nuts which he started gobbling, as though he were hungry, and added suddenly:

  “As a matter of fact, what have they done to you, the others?”

  “Take what I offer you,” I replied coldly, “and ask no questions.”

  A little blood flushed his colourless cheeks. He smiled that nettled smile of his, with which he was doubtless accustomed to meeting the reprimands of his employer, and so disclosed his sound, well-shaped teeth, the only redeeming feature in that graceless face.

  He went on shelling pea-nuts, without saying anything more. He did not seem to be dazzled. Clearly his imagination was working. I had stumbled upon the one person in the world capable of seeing nothing but the very small risks in this prodigious boon. I wanted to dazzle him at all costs.

  “Haven’t you a mistress?” I asked him point-blank. “You could marry her, you could live like rich middle-class people.”

  He made a vague gesture and shook his head sadly. I was persistent.

  “For that matter, you could marry anybody you liked. If there is a girl of your acquaintance who seems out of your reach....”

  He pricked up his ears, and for the first time I saw the flame of youth shine in his eyes.

  “I could marry Mademoiselle Brugère!”

  “Who is Mademoiselle Brugère?”

  “No, I was joking. A shopwalker at Dermas’s—think of that! A fine girl! She doesn’t even look at me; she doesn’t even know that I exist....Just think of that!”

  I assured him that, with a twentieth part of his fortune, he could marry any “shopwalker” in Paris.

  “Mademoiselle Brugère!” he repeated. Then he shrugged his shoulders. “No, it’s not to be thought of....”

  I had a pain in my chest again. I beckoned to the waiter. Then Robert did an astonishing thing.

  “No, Monsieur, please—I can at least offer you this.”

  I put the money back into my pocket with satisfaction. We got up. The musicians were packing up their instruments. The garlands of electric lights had been extinguished. Robert need no longer be afraid of being seen with me.

  “I’ll walk home with you,” he said.

  I asked him to walk slowly, on account of my heart. I was lost in admiration of the fact that he did nothing to hasten the execution of our plans. I told him that, if I died that night, he would lose a fortune. He gave a shrug of indifference. All I had done was to confuse the fellow.

  He was about my own height. Would he ever have the air of a gentleman? He seemed so paltry, this son and heir of mine!

  I tried to give our conversation a more intimate turn. I assured him that I could never think without remorse of the poverty in which I had left them, him and his mother. He seemed surprised. He found it “very handsome” that I should have given them a regular income. “There are many who would not have done as much.” He added a horrible remark: “After all, you were not the first....” Clearly he did not judge his mother indulgently. When we reached my door, he said to me suddenly:

  “Here’s an idea....Suppose I got a job which would compel me to frequent the Stock Exchange....That would explain my fortune.”

  “Don’t do anything of the kind,” I told him. “You would lose everything.”

  He stared down at the pavement with a preoccupied air. “It’s about the income-tax; if the inspector made inquiries....”

  “But when this is liquid money, an anonymous fortune, deposited in safes which nobody on earth has a right to open, except yourself... “

  “Yes, of course, but all the same....”

  I slammed the door in his face in exasperation.

  Chapter XV

  Calèse.

  THROUGH the window against which a fly is buzzing, I look out at the str
icken slopes of the vineyards. The wind moans as it brings up heavy clouds, whose shadow glides across the plain. This silence of death signifies the universal expectation of the first rumbling. “The vines are afraid,” Marie said, one sad summer’s day thirty years ago, a day like this.

  I have reopened this note-book. It is certainly my hand-writing. I examine its characters closely, the trace of the nail of my little finger beneath the lines.

  I shall go on with this narrative to the end. I know now for whom I intend it. I must finish this confession; but I shall have to suppress a good many pages, whose reading would be too much for them.

  As for myself, I cannot read them over again straight through. Every other moment, I interrupt myself and bury my face in my hands. Here is a man, here is a man among men, here am I. You may spew me forth. I exist just the same.

  That night, the night of July 13 to July 14, when I had parted from Robert, I scarcely had the strength to undress and lie down on my bed. An enormous pressure stifled me; and, despite this stifling, I could not die. The window was open: if I had been on the fifth floor...but, from the first, I could not kill myself. That was the only consideration which restrained me. I could barely stretch out my hand to take the pills which as a rule, relieve me.

  At dawn, they finally answered my bell. A local doctor gave me an injection, and I got my breath again. He ordered absolute immobility. Excessive pain makes us more submissive than little children. I had no difficulty about keeping still. The ugliness, the mouldy smell of that room, of that furniture, the noise of that stormy July 14—none of these things mattered to me, so long as I was no longer in pain. I asked nothing more than that.

  Robert came to see me one evening, and did not reappear. But his mother came and spent a couple of hours with me, when she left her office, did me a few small services, and brought me my letters from the poste restante. There was no letter from my family.

  I made no complaints, I was very docile, I drank everything I was told. She turned the conversation when I talked to her about our plans. “There is no hurry,” she kept on saying. I sighed: “There is the proof that there is a hurry,” and pointed to my heart.