Marie

by Madeleine Bourdouxhe

  She says: ‘Have you seen Madame Palafroid recently, Mother?’

  Her mother has always made a mess of pronouncing this impossible name and Marie awaits her reply anxiously.

  ‘Yes, I have – Madame Palefroid is very well.’

  Marie seizes upon the word ‘Palefroid’, savouring the ‘e’ as if it were a precious object.

  She gets up and, standing next to the table, looks out of the window. From here you could see the little garden but not the path. She remembers herself and Claudine sitting at the table, heads bent over their big grey cloth-covered exercise books. Hearing someone on the path, they looked at each other and cried out: ‘A visitor!’ Then, disappointed: ‘It’s the baker …’

  Marie summons up and recalls all the sounds, the smells, the sights of this garden, and abandons herself to them.

  The maid, José, has just come up from the cellar with a basketful of vegetables; she then disappears again to tidy the bedrooms. Marie’s mother empties the vegetables on to the table and begins to scrape them. Marie finds a small kitchen knife in the drawer of the dresser and helps her. The two women do not speak: between them there is a peaceful silence inhabited only by the sound of the knives scraping the tough skin of the carrots. So as not to lose a second of her daughter’s presence, the mother has postponed the completion of her toilette: she has put on an apron over her morning dress and she is still wearing that odd little hairnet. The faces of both women are at peace.

  No more knife noises; the vegetables are scraped. From time to time a drop of water falls from the tap and, without making a sound, plops on to a small dishcloth in the sink. The silence is perfect, ineffable. Leaning over to her mother Marie puts her arm round her waist, pulls her towards her and says quietly: ‘On Thursday mornings we used to go to the market together …’

  ‘Yes, and you always made for the spot where there were the most bits and pieces … you’d ask me to buy you a heap of old rags …’

  It’s not hard to get a mother to talk about the past. As Marie’s mother talks and tells stories, she recreates in her heart the little girl that Marie used to be. Looking at this young woman now in her arms, she speaks of a Marie who was still rich in many different kinds of love, who had not yet been overtaken by a single love. Marie lets her go on: she cannot tell her mother that she no longer needs help from memories. She lets her head fall on to the maternal shoulder and rests it there, offering up that instant to her mother alone. A long, miraculous moment in which Marie gives herself back to her mother.

  CHAPTER TEN

  MARIE HAS JUST LEFT her parents’ house, and the wide streets are already less cold. It’s not yet midday, but the temperature seems to improve as she approaches the centre of the city. The avenue des Ternes, Beaujon Hospital and Saint-Philippe-du-Roule are cloudy and it is still dull when she reaches the Madeleine and the Opéra. But when she leaves the boulevards and emerges from the rue Laffitte, all at once something opens over Paris and Notre-Dame-de-Lorette is bathed in sun.

  It is half-past twelve; this seems like a good time. She won’t go to the post office: long-distance calls take so long to connect that she prefers to wait in the ambience of a café rather than in a public place.

  Receiver at her ear, she hears the distant voice of an old woman asking whom she is calling. As she speaks his name for the first time Marie hears her own voice sounding quite different from usual.

  In a few moments, no doubt, she will have to say it again, to its owner, to confirm the identity of the person she’ll be speaking to; and she will also have to give her own name. At this thought, an inexplicable fear rises within her. But now the receiver is emitting another sound, a slight intake of breath followed by a single word that fills it with an entire presence: ‘Hello?’

  ‘Hello …’

  The other voice enquires, confidently: ‘How are you?’

  ‘I’m fine … I was calling you because …’

  Marie is about to babble on nervously, but the voice interrupts, saving her yet again.

  ‘I can come to Paris, though it’s not desperately convenient – that is unless you’d like to come here – we could have twenty-four hours together, in this town that you’ve never visited before …’

  She wasn’t expecting him to suggest this alternative, and stammered out a vague reply that betrayed her fear of embarking on such an impetuous journey.

  He said: ‘OK, I’ll take the first train to Paris. Come and meet me at the station.’

  ‘I’ll be there.’

  The line goes dead. Thinking of the decision that he has just taken, at such speed, and comparing it with her own indecisiveness, Marie feels ashamed.

  She goes back into the main room of the café and asks for a train timetable. A train will leave in barely three-quarters of an hour …

  Outside the church is still shining bright. To her right the rue du Faubourg Montmartre, the rue Pelletier and the rue de Maubeuge are also bathed in sun. She feels as though the carrefour de Chateaudun is spreading out like the branches of a star, gently reawakening to life.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  THIS STATION seemed more attractive than the other one: more spacious, brighter, better designed. Its entrance halls didn’t open directly on to the street: a big deserted forecourt isolated it from the city, creating an island of arrival and departure and emphasising the gravity of a station’s status.

  Marie was waiting on the platform; it was cold, and she turned up the collar of her winter coat. It suddenly struck her, with some amazement, that the person she should be looking for in the crowd was not the tanned young man in a light jacket that she had known on holiday. But when he stepped off the train and walked towards her, she didn’t notice whether he was wearing a coat nor whether his skin was paler than before. She saw him, he was there, and that was all that mattered.

  They shook hands without a word. Crossing the forecourt, they left the station side by side, and walked along the streets in silence.

  Then Marie said: ‘Perhaps you’re hungry, after your journey?’

  He said yes, he was. It was lunch time, so it was all perfectly logical; yet it seemed strange to her that he was hungry and that she had dared ask him about it. She let him order the meal, listening to the way he talked to other people. She noticed that he preferred hors-d’oeuvres to soup, and for the first time she watched him eat. She looked at his town clothes, at the buttoned-up collar of his blue cotton shirt, at the dark, red-striped tie. There was the uncertain, unreal world of the holiday, which she had known, and there was the everyday, real life about which she knew nothing whatsoever. A daily life, full of signs, that he has only recently left in order to come to her.

  On the lapel of his jacket there gleams a university badge. She can’t see it clearly; she would have to lean forward, reach out her hand and pull the tiny object towards her. She does not dare touch this first secret. She lets herself wander down familiar paths: she looks at the fine, firm, rather bony face, at the delicate muscles stretched by the broad, always solemn, smile. She lingers for ages on his long, pointed chin, which stands out so well from his neck, and on his thin, sinuous mouth. She knows all about the suppleness of his thick hair; she knows, too, that his eyes never lose their profound lucidity. And yet, something new has permeated his features. It seems to her that he is even thinner than before, or perhaps he is simply worn out, either from his first days of study or from this sudden journey. Fatigue touches his young face, without causing any damage.

  They speak very little, and then only of things that do not matter. There are no tender gestures, no tender words. They keep the mystery of their lives tight, like a second presence – because a little time has passed, and because their first coming together has been incorporated into their lives, leaving a mark of which the other can have no knowledge. Do they even know themselves? If they spoke to each other more seriously, they would only be able to ask questions. And they share a passion for silence.

  Here they are again in the
street, side by side, treading the same furrow of life – without tenderness, without cries, without conspiratorial looks, anxiety, or remorse. In spite of the great unknown ahead of them, in spite of the torpor that has suddenly invaded their thoughts, they feel calm and strong. They know that whatever dangers might rise up to confront them, they would be courageous and powerful.

  Do they also know that this same strength that sometimes permeates everything is also a sign of fate? And if they do not know this, do they know that we all carry fate inside us, like a grace, and that it is our responsibility to fulfil it?

  SIDE BY SIDE, keeping in step, they walk along the streets until the place de l’Opéra sparkles in front of them. Here, without really knowing why, they come to a stop, in a brightly coloured place serving fruit juice that suddenly appeals to them. Once again they find themselves sitting opposite each other, in the same strange torpor.

  Looking at Marie he smiles and says: ‘How are you?’

  Her voice heavy, she replies: ‘I’m all right …’

  A little later, as if attempting to explain the ineffable, she says: ‘It’s like adjusting to a new landscape …’

  He answers in the same simple tones that she has used: ‘A landscape where memories must die.’

  Words that initiated and clarified nothing. All around them things are changing shape – the anticipation, the suspense of this strange land, so full of silent things. Where would it lead them – to future offers? to richness? to setbacks? to joy, surely? This new land contained an unknown power which held them both in its sway. It also held all the sweetness of a promise.

  THE RUE LAFAYETTE IS LONG, and they walk its entire length, at speed. After a while they begin to pant, and because they are not speaking they can hear the sound of each other’s breath. The church which shone so brightly this morning is now merely a dark shape; they pass along one side of it, then turn into a street that they follow together for the second time.

  The door that opened on to a brightly lit corridor one night in September is today closed.

  They do not slacken their pace, and nothing in their movements betrays the astonishment they feel when confronted by this little mystery. It could have been awkward – but Marie notices only that he now turns his head from time to time: she feels that he is looking for something. They have passed the door and are, quite simply, continuing their fast walk. When, a few moments later, he’ll place his hand on her shoulder, its soft pressure will tell her he has made his choice and they can again call a halt.

  THEY SAT ON A VERY LOW BED, at some distance from each other, but their hands were joined. They stayed like that, overwhelmed by this thing inside them, this thing they could not give a name to. They were overwhelmed by themselves.

  Marie turned her head towards him, took this new face in her hands. ‘Have you changed?’ she asked, in an anguished voice. ‘I can’t seem to find you again …’

  ‘No, I haven’t changed,’ he replied. ‘Perhaps I’ve developed.’

  It was the reply of a very young man. She couldn’t stop herself smiling, but she felt a profound tenderness arising in her. She pulled his big smooth face closer to her, and kissed him, quite chastely, on the forehead.

  They suddenly embraced violently, and immediately recaptured all their passion. But the sea which carried them off this evening was different from the profound depths of joy they had felt on the first night. Tonight, tumultuous waves envelop them, making them pitch, throwing them on to their sides, their backs. They utter no cries or moans, but their silent lips render ever more poignant the prolonged moan of their struggling bodies. They sink in water pockets; groundswells bring them brusquely to the surface only to roll them back again, throwing their heads to the right and then to the left. Hands clutching shoulders, ankles joined, limbs that would never ever disentangle; they want to die together or to let the sea abandon them, rescued, on the same shore.

  When, finally, the storm subsides, they still don’t know where they are. They know only that they have opened their eyes together, and that they have landed. But their legs and arms do not leave each other straight away – they remain entangled, as though still enveloped by damp seaweed.

  He has a secret little nickname for Marie: it’s only an adjective, perhaps one that all men use; but he pronounces it in a special way, stressing the consonant as if it were two syllables. She repeats the name in reply – it’s the same one she uses for him.

  ‘What is happening to us?’ she says.

  ‘I don’t know …’

  He lifts the sheets up towards her, gently, as far as her shoulders, but keeping her close to him. They sleep. How heavily they sleep that second night! Marie no longer has the look of a wild young warrior; this time, no lightning has burned their eyes. As they sleep, their features show signs of fatigue, their faces are more sorrowful, more human. How deep their second night is!

  THEY GOT UP LATE – it was already lunch time, and their young stomachs were starving. They ate ravenously and single-mindedly. In the afternoon they talked a little more, but not about anything that related to themselves.

  The same torpor soon enveloped them again, and each began to fear that the other was bored. At that point they felt a doleful desire to run away, to be free of each other, but the next moment they were back together again, sitting in front of hot drinks that went cold as they stared at each other with a hard expression in their eyes.

  It was getting late and the departure of the last train was, cruelly, about to release them. Once again they crossed the big deserted forecourt. They had arrived a little early; they walked backwards and forwards in small steps along the platform. They discussed no dates, took no steps at all to ensure that they might meet again.

  The train was ready to leave. Standing on the step his gaze took in Marie’s whole body; she looked into his eyes, but held them only for a moment: the train was leaving. He closed the door, did not lean out of the window. Marie stood absolutely still and followed the long, faceless train with her eyes until the very last moment.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  JEAN CAME BACK from Maubeuge with the dreaded news: the following month he and Marie would have to move there for an as yet indefinite length of time.

  A host of friends descended on the household wanting to make the most of Jean and Marie’s final weeks in Paris; they took up all their evenings. These were noisy times, and Marie became bored with having to listen to so-called intellectual discussions whilst records blared out incessantly, and glasses were filled and refilled. Around midnight or one o’clock, someone would say that the evening could not end so soon. Jean, uplifted by this orgy of pleasure, would propose new places they could go on to: looking exhausted, their enjoyment over, they’d trawl through the city. With luck, they might manage a new wave of excitement if one of the party, laughing uproariously, gesticulated at the long line of Hachette press lorries as they drove at full speed along the rue du Louvre. The night would always climax in a cacophony of delight when they reached Les Halles and saw the beautiful vegetables piled up in the icy dawn. These wan-looking creatures, who knew each other too well, would slacken their pace and look behind them, awaiting Marie. Then, overcome by fatigue, they’d be invaded by a sense of sadness and regret for their wasted lives.

  MARIUS DENIS WOULD TAKE Marie’s arm. ‘If you come back to Paris on your own from time to time, will you save your evenings for me?’

  Claudine, shivering in her evening dress, would lean her head on Marie’s shoulder and say: ‘I know you won’t write to me often. But if you managed to arrange your lessons in a bunch, say once a month, you could stay with us. You won’t abandon me completely, will you, Marie? Answer me, please!’

  Walking against Marie, Claudine’s slight, trembling body had to endure the slow, ample pace of her sister, so ill matched to her own.

  They would shake hands; some would hail taxis, while the rest stood around on the pavement in groups, waiting for more taxis to arrive.

  ‘Marie,
you’ll be leaving us soon,’ said a tall young man who held on to her hand a little too long. She looked at him as he went on: ‘Do let us know whenever you come back!’

  And Marie would feel other hands clasping her hands, and Denis’s arm through hers, and the weight of Claudine’s dear head on her shoulder. Already, this present seemed to be monopolising the future. She would clench her teeth to stop herself from expressing her genuine desire to be left alone. ‘Please, please, leave me …’

  After a while Marie was saying no to almost all invitations and Jean went to these evenings with friends on his own. Occasionally she would go out, too, walking haphazardly through a Paris which at that time seemed to belong to her alone. She always returned home well before Jean: she would read or, almost without thinking, make various preparations for their departure, tidying drawers, making a start at packing the cases.

  TIME PASSED SLOWLY; Jean was late. Marie suffered at the thought that he was enjoying himself without her, abandoning herself to a mood that still betrayed signs of the self-absorbed nature of her love. She waited for him without doing anything else. When he finally returned she’d take his beloved, familiar face in her hands and say: ‘How you wear yourself out!’

  ‘Are you cross?’

  ‘No, of course not.’

  On his way to the bedroom, Jean would call: ‘Are you coming to bed, too, Marie?’

  ‘No, not yet.’

  And she’d stay there until the blue light of dawn came through the window. Thrown back on herself, she’d feel quite alone at the heart of a well-worn past – even though she had created such fine things. Jean, Claudine: links that did not want to expire, that tightened their hold in a final struggle as others tried to replace them.