One afternoon we went to tea with Cyril’s mother. She was a placid, smiling old lady who talked to us about the difficulties she had experienced as a widow and a mother. My father commiserated with her, looked across to Anne to indicate that he recognized what was being described and complimented the lady profusely. I must say he was always confident of being able to put his time to good use. Anne gazed upon the spectacle with an amiable smile. On our return she declared the lady to be charming. I burst out in imprecations against old ladies of that type. They each bestowed an indulgent, amused smile on me, which made me furious.
‘You don’t realize how pleased with herself she is,’ I cried. ‘She congratulates herself on the life she has had because she feels she has done her duty and …’
‘But it’s true,’ said Anne. ‘She has fulfilled her duties as a wife and mother, as the saying goes …’
‘And what about her duty as a whore?’ I said.
‘I dislike coarseness,’ said Anne, ‘even when it’s meant to be clever.’
‘But it’s not meant to be clever. She got married just as everyone gets married, either because they want to or because it’s the done thing. She had a child. Do you know how children come about?’
‘I’m probably less well informed than you,’ said Anne sarcastically, ‘but I do have some idea.’
‘So she brought the child up. She probably spared herself the anguish and upheaval of committing adultery. She has led the life of thousands of other women and she thinks that’s something to be proud of, you understand. She found herself in the position of being a young middle-class wife and mother and she did nothing to get out of that situation. She pats herself on the back for not having done this or that, rather than for actually having accomplished something.’
‘What you’re saying doesn’t make much sense,’ said my father.
‘You get lured into it,’ I cried. ‘Later on you can say to yourself “I’ve done my duty” but only because you’ve done nothing at all. If, with her background, she had become a street-walker, then she would have deserved some credit.’
‘Your ideas may be fashionable,5 but they’re worthless,’ said Anne.
That was perhaps true. I believed what I was saying but it was true that I had heard other people say those things. Even so, the life my father and I led tended to support the theory and, in casting scorn on it, Anne was being hurtful to me. One can be just as much attached to frivolity as to anything else. But Anne did not consider me to be a creature capable of thought. All at once it seemed urgent, indeed essential, to disabuse her. I did not think that the opportunity would present itself to me so soon, nor that I would know how to grasp it. Anyhow, I was the first to admit that in a month’s time I would have a different opinion on any given subject and that my convictions would not last. I could hardly be said to have high ideals.
Five
And then one day things came to a head. One morning my father decided that we were going to spend the evening in Cannes, gaming and dancing. I remember how pleased Elsa was. In the familiar atmosphere of casinos she expected to rediscover her identity as a femme fatale, which had become somewhat diminished by the sunburn and by the semi-isolation in which we lived. Contrary to my expectations, Anne put up no objection to these worldly pleasures; she even seemed quite pleased at the prospect. So it was without any sense of unease that, once dinner was over, I went up to my room to put on an evening dress – the only one that I possessed, in fact. My father had chosen it for me. It was made of some exotic material, probably rather too exotic for me, because my father, whether from inclination or habit, liked to dress me up as a femme fatale. I found him downstairs, resplendent in a new dinner jacket, and I put my arms around his neck.
‘You are the most handsome man I know!’
‘Apart from Cyril,’ he countered, without really believing what he said. ‘And you’re the prettiest girl that I know.’
‘After Elsa and Anne,’ I said, without believing it myself.
‘Since they’re not down yet and have taken the liberty of making us wait, come and dance with your rheumaticky old father.’
I felt again the elation I always experienced before we went out places together. There was really nothing of the ageing father about him. As we danced I breathed in that familiar smell of his, made up of eau de cologne, warmth and tobacco. He danced in time, with his eyes half-closed and with a happy little smile, as irrepressible as my own, playing at the corners of his lips.
‘You’ll have to teach me to bebop,’6 he said, forgetting his rheumatism.
He stopped dancing in order to acknowledge the arrival of Elsa with an automatically murmured compliment. She was coming slowly down the stairs, wearing her green dress and the knowing smile of a woman of the world, the smile she wore for going to casinos. She had, to her credit, done the best she could with her dried-out hair and sunburnt skin but the result was not brilliant. Fortunately she did not seem to realize this.
‘Shall we go?’
‘Anne’s not here,’ I said.
‘Go upstairs and see if she’s ready,’ said my father. ‘It will be midnight at this rate by the time we get to Cannes.’
I went up the stairs, getting entangled in my dress, and knocked on Anne’s door. She called to me to come in but I stopped on the threshold. The dress she was wearing was grey but it was the most amazing grey, almost white, and the light clung to it with the kind of iridescence that the sea takes on at dawn. She seemed, that evening, to combine together everything that was attractive about maturity.
‘You look magnificent!’ I said. ‘Oh Anne, what a dress!’
She smiled at herself in the mirror, in the way you smile at someone you are about to leave.
‘This grey is a complete success,’ she said.
‘You are a complete success,’ I said.
She took hold of my ear and looked at me. She had dark blue eyes. I saw them light up in a smile.
‘You’re a nice little girl,’ she said, ‘even though you can sometimes be tiresome.’
She left the room ahead of me without paying any attention to my own dress, which I was glad about and yet mortified by at the same time. As she descended the stairs ahead of me, I saw my father come to meet her. He stopped at the bottom of the staircase with his foot on the first step and his face raised in her direction. Elsa too was watching her come downstairs. I recall the scene exactly. Immediately in front of me I was looking at Anne’s golden neck and perfect shoulders. A little lower down stood my father with a dazzled expression on his face and with his hand outstretched. And already fading into the distance was the silhouette of Elsa.
‘Anne,’ said my father, ‘you are amazing!’
She smiled at him briefly and picked up her coat.
‘We’ll meet up once we’re there,’ she said. ‘Cécile, are you coming with me?’
She let me drive. The road at night was so beautiful that I drove slowly. Anne did not speak. She did not even seem to notice the trumpets blaring away on the radio. When my father’s convertible overtook us on a bend she did not raise an eyebrow. I felt that I was already a mere onlooker to a performance in which I could no longer play any part.
At the casino, thanks to my father’s manoeuvrings, we soon got split up. I found myself at the bar with Elsa and someone she knew, a tipsy South American. He was involved in theatre and, in spite of being in a state of inebriation, was still interesting for the passion he brought to it. I spent nearly an hour with him, most agreeably, but Elsa was bored. She knew one or two of the big names but was not interested in theatrical technique. All of a sudden she asked me where my father was, as if I might have had some idea, and then she went off. That seemed to make the South American sad for a moment but another whisky got him going again. My mind was nowhere, I was in a state of complete euphoria, having, out of politeness, joined him in his libations. Things got funnier still when he wanted to dance. I had to hold him round the waist and get my feet out from under his
, all of which required a lot of energy. We were laughing so much that, when Elsa tapped me on the shoulder and I saw her look of foreboding, I nearly told her to go to hell.
‘I can’t find him,’ she said.
She looked distraught. Her powder had worn off, leaving her face all shiny, and her features were drawn. She was a pitiful sight. I suddenly felt very angry with my father. He was being incredibly rude.
‘Ah, I know where they are,’ I said, smiling as if what it amounted to was something quite natural that she could easily have envisaged without feeling anxious. ‘I’ll be back.’
Deprived of my support, the South American collapsed into Elsa’s arms and seemed to be better off for it. I reflected sadly that she was more generously endowed than I was and that I couldn’t begrudge her that. It was a large casino. I went all round it twice, in vain. I checked the terraces and finally thought of the car.
It took me a little while to find it in the grounds. They were sitting in it. I arrived from behind and caught sight of them through the rear window. I saw them in profile, very close together and looking very serious, strangely beautiful in the lamplight. They were facing each other and they must have been speaking in low voices because I saw their lips moving. I wanted to make myself scarce, but the thought of Elsa made me open the car door.
My father had his hand on Anne’s arm. They barely looked at me.
‘Are you enjoying yourselves?’ I asked politely.
‘What is it?’ said my father, sounding irritated. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘And what are you doing? Elsa has been looking everywhere for you for the last hour.’
Anne turned to face me, slowly, as if with regret.
‘We’re going home. Tell her I was tired and that your father has taken me back. When you’ve finished enjoying yourselves you can go back in my car.’
I was almost speechless and trembling with indignation.
‘When we’ve finished enjoying ourselves! But you don’t realize! It’s disgusting!’
‘What is disgusting?’ asked my father in astonishment.
‘You take a red-headed girl to the seaside, to sun that she can’t cope with, and when she’s all peeling you abandon her. It’s too easy! And what am I supposed to say to Elsa?’
Anne had turned back towards him wearily. He was smiling at her and wasn’t listening. I could not have been more exasperated.
‘I’m … I’m going to tell her that my father has found another lady to go to bed with and that she should get lost, is that it?’
The exclamation my father gave and the slap I got from Anne were simultaneous. I hastily withdrew my head. She had hurt me.
‘Apologize!’ said my father.
I stood motionless by the car door, my thoughts in a whirl. I always think of dignified responses when it is too late.
‘Come here,’ said Anne.
She did not seem to threaten, so I approached. She put her hand on my cheek and spoke gently and slowly, as if I were rather stupid.
‘Don’t be nasty. I am very sorry on Elsa’s account. But you are tactful enough to sort this out in the best possible way. Tomorrow we’ll explain. Did I hurt you badly?’
‘No, not at all,’ I said politely. This sudden gentleness of hers and my earlier vehemence made me want to burst into tears. I watched them drive off, feeling completely drained. The only thing that consoled me was the notion of my own tactfulness. I walked slowly back to the casino, where I found Elsa with the South American clamped to her arm.
‘Anne wasn’t feeling well,’ I said breezily. ‘Daddy has had to take her back. Shall we have something to drink?’
She looked at me without replying. I tried to find something to say that sounded convincing.
‘She was feeling sick,’ I said. ‘It’s awful, her dress got all stained.’
This detail seemed highly authentic to me but Elsa began to weep, softly and sadly. I watched her, completely at a loss.
‘Cécile,’ she said, ‘oh Cécile, we were so happy!’
Her sobs redoubled. The South American began to weep too, and to repeat: ‘We were so happy, so happy!’ At that moment I detested Anne and my father. I would have done anything to stop poor Elsa from weeping and her mascara from running and the South American from sobbing.
‘Nothing is final yet, Elsa. Come back with me,’ I said.
‘I’ll come back soon for my cases,’ she sobbed. ‘Goodbye, Cécile, we got on really well.’
I had only ever talked to her about the weather or fashion but, even so, it seemed as if I were losing an old friend. I turned away abruptly and ran to the car.
Six
The following morning was dreadful, no doubt on account of the whiskies of the night before. I awoke in darkness to find myself lying crooked across my bed, with a dry mouth and unbearably clammy limbs. A ray of sunlight filtered through the chinks in the shutter, with specks of dust floating up in it in serried ranks. I had no wish either to get up or to stay in bed. I wondered if Elsa would come back and how Anne and my father would be looking that morning. In an attempt to get up I forced myself to think about them but my efforts came to nothing. When I finally managed to, I found myself standing on the cool, tiled floor of the bedroom, aching and not thinking straight. The mirror offered me a sad reflection and I leant against it and contemplated that strange face with its dilated eyes and swollen mouth – my face. Could those lips, those ill-proportioned features, those odious, arbitrary limitations of mine mean that I was weak and characterless? And if I really were limited, how did I know this so clearly, in spite of being what I was? I found amusement in detesting myself and the wolfish face in the mirror, hollow and crumpled from debauchery. Looking into my eyes, I began to repeat the word ‘debauchery’ silently to myself, and all of a sudden I saw myself smile. What debauchery had there in fact been? A few wretched drinks, a slap in the face and some sobbing. I brushed my teeth and went downstairs.
My father and Anne were already on the terrace, sitting next to each other with their breakfast tray in front of them. I muttered a greeting and sat down opposite them. At first I was so embarrassed I did not venture to look at them, but their silence forced me to raise my eyes. Anne’s features were drawn – that was the only evidence of a night of passion. They were both smiling and looking happy. I was impressed by that. Happiness has always seemed to me to be a validation, to represent a successful outcome.
‘Sleep well, did you?’ my father asked.
‘So-so,’ I replied. ‘I drank too much whisky last night.’
I poured myself a cup of coffee, took a sip, then immediately put my cup down. There was a certain quality to their silence, a sense of anticipation that made me uneasy. I was too tired to be able to bear it for long.
‘What’s going on? There’s something mysterious about you.’
My father lit a cigarette, trying to appear nonchalant as he did so. Anne was looking at me, for once clearly embarrassed.
‘I’d like to ask you something,’ she said at last.
I imagined the worst:
‘Not another mission involving Elsa?’
She turned her face away to look at my father.
‘Your father and I would like to get married,’ she said.
I stared first at her, then at my father. For a moment I expected some sign to come from him, a wink of the eye that would have made me indignant but would at the same time have reassured me. He was looking down at his hands. I was saying to myself: ‘This can’t be true,’ but I knew already that it was true.
‘That’s a very good idea,’ I said, playing for time.
I just could not understand: here was my father, so stubbornly opposed to marriage and to being tied down, having made up his mind in the course of one night. Our whole life was being changed by this. We were losing our independence. At that moment I had a glimpse of how life would be with the three of us: it would be a life suddenly brought into balance by Anne’s intelligence and refinement, the
kind of life that I envied her for, with intelligent, discreet friends … happy, sedate gatherings … All at once I despised raucous dinner parties, South Americans, the Elsas of this world. I was overcome by a sense of pride and superiority.
‘That’s a very, very good idea,’ I said again, and I smiled at them.
‘My little kitten, I knew you’d be pleased,’ said my father.
He was relaxed and delighted. The effects of love-making had redefined Anne’s features and her face seemed gentler and more open than I had ever seen it.
‘Come here, kitten,’ said my father.
Holding out his hands, he drew me to them both. I was half-kneeling in front of them while they looked on at me fondly and stroked my head. For my part, I kept thinking that even though my life just then was maybe at a turning-point, to them I was in fact nothing but a kitten, an affectionate little creature. I sensed them hovering above me, united by a past and a future, by ties, unknown to me, that could not bind me. I deliberately closed my eyes, laid my head on their laps, laughed along with them and resumed my role. In any case, I was happy, wasn’t I? Anne was a fine person. To my mind there was nothing mean-spirited about her. She would guide me, she would take responsibility for my life, in every circumstance she would show me which path to follow. I would reach my full potential and so would my father.
Bonjour Tristesse & a Certain Smile Page 4