The Governesses
Page 7
Then their excitement falls abruptly away, like a dress dropping to the ground when the straps are loosened. Their gargantuan stature lies stranded at their feet, like a sagging hot-air balloon. When they crawl out from underneath this sea of fabric, they’re stark naked and very small. It’s the house now that starts to swell, to the point where they’re suddenly the size of puppies, and then, in no time at all, ducklings. They waddle through the enormous rooms, getting knocked around by the young maids’ feet, and the windows are so high that they can’t see the sky, they feel trapped. It takes them hours to get downstairs, and what a business that is, too. When the doors are closed, how will they be able to open them? The doorknobs are far too high and impossible to turn. They blunder around, it takes them days to find their way back to their rooms. In the garden, right before their eyes, is a huge savannah. There aren’t even gates on the horizon anymore. Then they return to their normal size.
When the governesses were twenty and cooing under the trees, the little boys were crazy about them. Whenever one of the little boys drew a face, it was theirs, whenever one of them wondered what he might do to please people later in life, all he had to do was imagine himself under the watchful eye of the governesses.
Left to their own devices much of the time, the little boys formed a sort of fourth section in the house. First, you had Monsieur and Madame Austeur who, because they shared the same room, were bound together and formed a single unit. Next, you had the little maids who, because they all slept in the attic, were also bound together by having identical rooms. And last, but by no means least, you had the governesses who, though less powerful than Monsieur and Madame Austeur combined, were much more powerful than the little maids and likewise formed a single unit.
These four sections were bound together, at different moments in time and in no particular order, in batches of two. Some of the little boys found these shifts of alliance very hard to follow, for they would occur without any real warning. They would get in a muddle and have to use all their powers to find the right match. Sometimes, for example, the governesses would mysteriously and inexplicably be paired for a while with the little maids. When that happened, it was important to understand that the governesses had no time to look after you, and that your plant collections, however beautifully assembled, inspired nothing but a big yawn. Foolishly, the little boys would imagine the governesses had lost all interest in their collections, perhaps even in the little boys themselves. It was tough, but they got used to it after a while. They found ways to console themselves, piecing together as best they could a small new life shorn of the governesses’ love but tolerable just the same. Then, all of a sudden, without warning, the alliances would change. This time it was the little boys who were teamed up with the governesses. Once again they had to pull out their herbariums and show them to the governesses, who would clap their hands in delight and now seemed to dote on them, while the little maids sobbed away in their attic rooms.
They would just be getting used to the governesses’ love again — it didn’t take very long to reacquire the habit, it was so easy to sink back into their love — when all of a sudden Monsieur and Madame Austeur would regain the upper hand. You would see them strolling through the garden with the governesses; they’d spend whole evenings chatting and laughing together, just the five of them. Under the circumstances, the only thing the little boys could do was form an alliance with the little maids, in order to balance things out, as it were. At the same time, they blushed at the idea of being teamed up with them. Not that they thought the little maids inferior in any way — on the whole, they had the most fun with them — but they would have preferred to choose their allies, rather than fall back on whoever was left over for them.
As they were proud, the boys would pretend they had made their choice of their own free will, lavishing a great show of affection on the little maids, who henceforth imagined they were loved by them and figured prominently in their airy young lives. And when the roles changed yet again — not because of anything done by the little boys, who weren’t powerful enough to influence the movements of the household, but for reasons that remain mysterious — the little maids, cruelly cast aside, would feel betrayed in their trust, while the little boys, who were quicker off the mark, would rush into the first set of arms held out to them, regardless of what group they might belong to.
It was like musical chairs. There was always someone left on their own while the others struck up alliances, friendships that would last a lifetime perhaps. Experience had shown you, however, that no pact lasts forever. You knew that the members of the household would once again be shuffled together like playing cards, and that when the next hand was dealt the alliances would fall out differently. There might even be a place for you. But how could you be sure a new hand would be dealt? Perhaps this was the final hand, and henceforth everyone would be stuck in the place that fate had assigned them? Still, you had to be on your guard, just in case, one last time, the bonds were broken and new ones formed. At which point you would have to quickly rush over to the right side.
The governesses had teamed up with the little maids of late. They formed a gracious scene, seated in their flared skirts under the high trees, sewing and gossiping. The little boys felt abandoned, but lingered nearby, dawdling, hardly playing at all and not taking their eyes off them. At the slightest hint of a change — were the governesses to stop talking to the little maids, say, or yawn in a supercilious way — they would creep up, ready to pounce and take the little maids’ place. But, often as not, the change that a moment before had seemed imminent never occurred: the governesses would start chatting with the little maids again, holding their balls of wool for them or playing with their hair.
The alliance the little boys least enjoyed was the one with Monsieur and Madame Austeur. It made them a bit uneasy, as though they were falling into line and doing what was expected of them. It was much more dangerous and exciting to be teamed up with the governesses. And even with the little maids there was something voluptuous about feeling yourself bound together by some strange perversity of fate. In attaching yourself to Monsieur and Madame Austeur, you couldn’t help feeling that, though reason might be on your side, it was on the other side that you had all the fun.
With Monsieur and Madame Austeur they were like those model children you see strolling around with their model parents. The parents are happy, but the children feel ashamed. They would rather resemble one of those mysterious courting couples who walk by without noticing them. When strolling around with their model parents, model children see everything. Their eyes look outward, they’re not remotely interested in the spectacle of the family; they pretend to be no part of it, bond immediately with any stranger who happens along and follow him. The shame they feel is further exacerbated by the fact that their parents don’t even realize they have escaped. If only their parents would lose their temper once in a while! Demand that they be there with them and nowhere else! Then perhaps they would snuggle up in the bosom of the family, glad to belong there in the end, now that the battle is over. But what makes them so ashamed is the model parents’ blind trust, their self-delusion. They’d like to feel sorry for them in their blindness, but they can’t. It’s abhorrent to see them so sound asleep.
So when the little boys are in a group with Monsieur and Madame Austeur, they pretend they have chosen the alliance of their own free will. A bit like with the little maids, but for different reasons. It’s certainly not for Monsieur and Madame Austeur’s benefit that they keep up the pretense, it’s for the eyes of the world — for themselves, in other words.
The alliance they most enjoy, of course, is the one they form with the governesses. With them, they feel empowered; with them, they can come and go as they please, screaming their heads off and running wild through the gardens, lashing the high grass and any flower that raises its unassuming head. But though that alliance is flattering to them and opens up thrilling new paths to ex
plore, they’re still not completely satisfied with it. At the end of the day, they can’t help feeling, it’s all just make-believe.
No, what they prefer more than anything, though they would never admit to it for fear of looking a bit soppy, is their extramural alliance with the elderly gentleman. It’s in his orbit that they feel their best. Not like little boys, as they do with Monsieur and Madame Austeur, nor like savages as they do with the little maids, nor torn by a thousand misgivings as they do with the governesses, but in their rightful place, calm and full of self-respect, and at the same time brimming with life.
Sometimes, to give the governesses a rest and keep up good neighborly relations with Monsieur and Madame Austeur, the elderly gentleman takes the little boys for a walk. They stroll cheerfully around him, chasing butterflies and only too happy to follow in the wake of the overcoat in which the elderly gentleman is wrapped as he marches calmly, steadily on.
If anyone can be said to be the little boys’ friend, it’s the elderly gentleman. With him you can be a numbskull or a sissy, cry because you’ve sprained your ankle, talk about girls, hum a word you’re fond of a hundred times over even if it’s a rude one, say nothing and go about your little life, or march solemnly at the head of the group, your neck wrapped in the elderly gentleman’s scarf and waving a branch around like a flag.
You don’t have to bend over backwards to please the elderly gentleman, not at all. Whether you bend over backwards or are a bit of a clumsy dolt, he speaks to you and looks at you in exactly the same way. He doesn’t say much, but when he does speak he stays on his side of the fence, which obliges you to stay on yours. What’s strange, even miraculous in a way, is that when you all stay on your own side of the fence you manage to get on much better than in circumstances where you have to step out of your own skin, as it were, and inhabit someone else’s world; or, conversely, when someone gets it into their head to pay you a visit and comes in through a passageway you’re not so sure you wanted to unlock for them.
The elderly gentleman, for all his great age, is an equal. He doesn’t lead you on a mad dance like the governesses. He lets you go at your own good speed. And on days when he himself, it seems, is feeling unusually cheerful and goes striding on ahead, he couldn’t care less whether you chase along behind him or not. He’s glad you’re there, that’s all there is to it.
There came a day, however, when, much to everyone’s surprise, the elderly gentleman withdrew, for he was tired of watching the governesses. They could sense this from the fall in the number of reflections in the garden, of shadows outside their bedroom windows. It didn’t worry them at first: they were so accustomed to being watched that they gave it no thought except when playing; the rest of the time, they behaved as though the elderly gentleman didn’t exist. Perhaps it was this that had annoyed or upset him in the end — who knows? One day, he went up to the window overlooking the garden and drew the curtains. For a few days, he remained in a comforting half dark, then parted the curtains to the other window, the one overlooking the countryside behind his house. Henceforth, it was here that he would position himself with his telescope. The first objects he saw were a fern leaf and a hare.
A few days later, despite the continued presence of Monsieur and Madame Austeur and the little boys and little maids, the governesses started to feel distinctly queasy. It was almost as if they were disappearing. They looked puzzled, examined themselves in the mirrors, and darted questioning glances at each other without knowing quite what it was they were asking. “We’re fading,” announced Eléonore one day. “We’re melting away,” replied Laura. Worried, Inès went down to the garden and started striding toward the gates. She was still on the path when she vanished. The gardens shrank, the little boys toppled over, the house lost its walls, Monsieur Austeur his cigar, Madame Austeur her gray dress, the little maids the platters they had been carrying. In place of Eléonore was a small flower between two pebbles; where Laura had been standing, a lizard darting away.