by Trevanian
I wandered the room absently, examining the furnishings, which were a queer mélange of heavy, ugly objects in dubious repair, and fine expensive old pieces. I assumed it to be a mixture of furniture left behind by the leasor and a few treasured things the Trevilles had brought with them. As I passed the double doors leading to the hall, I could not help overhearing parts of a whispered conversation between Katya and Paul, who were standing without. Only occasional words were audible, but the timbre of the exchange was intense and strained.
“. . . of course. But was that wise, Paul?”
“What. . . . . . our options?”
(Something incomprehensible from Katya.)
“I assume. . . . fond of. . . . ?”
(A pause) “Yes. . . . very nice.”
“. . . . sorry, Katya. If only. . . . different.”
“It’s pointless. . . . the impossible. Perhaps. . . . explain to Dr. Montjean?”
“. . . . foolish. Very foolish indeed!”
“Yes, you’re right, of course. Well . . . for supper. Papa just rang.”
PAPA’S “ringing” to announce that he was done with his studies for the day and ready for his supper was a topic of conversation, as the four of us sat around the oaken table in the dining room.
“It’s not exactly accurate to say he rings,” Katya told me, smiling from beyond the encrusted old candelabrum. “This poor pile of a house is falling apart and almost nothing functions. The kitchen signal bells have long ago disappeared. But one can hear the scratching of the wire in its channel quite clearly, so it works in its own fashion after all.”
I thought it delightful the way Katya maintained light chat at table with all the grace of an experienced hostess. So much did I endow her with exceptional gifts that I was surprised to discover she also possessed those common to all well-brought-up women.
“Perhaps,” Paul Treville said, “we could say that Father scratches for his supper . . . or does that have an unfortunately canine implication?”
Monsieur Treville looked up from the rich potage that had occupied his attention since sitting down, and he blinked. “I beg your pardon? Did you speak to me?”
“More of than to, Papa,” Paul said.
Monsieur Treville nodded. “Aha! I thought so. Yes, I thought so.” He turned to me. “So you are a doctor, are you?”
“My superior in the village, Dr. Gros, might dispute that, sir. But in fact I have leapt all the barriers of doubt and memorized all the rote trivia required to affix the word Doctor to my name.” I blush even now to recall those memorized set pieces I used to trot out when the occasion presented itself.
“Yes, but are you a doctor or not?” the old man asked, inadvertently deflating my pompous phrasing by failing to comprehend it.
“Yes, sir, I am.” From the first moment, I took a liking to Monsieur Treville and his vague, absent-minded ways, although we had been at the table the better part of ten minutes before he realized I was sitting amongst them. His large, open features, his thick grey hair tousled with fingers raked through it nervously as he studied, his clear eyes sparkling with intelligence and almost boyish energy whenever he spoke of something of interest to him—all of these were my ideal image of the kindly old scholar.
Then too, he was Katya’s father.
“Doctor, eh?” Monsieur Treville said. “Oh yes, of course!” He turned to Paul. “You had some sort of accident, didn’t you? Fell over something, wasn’t it?”
“I fell off the roof, Papa, while I was trying to catch clouds in a net. Fortunately, I landed headfirst in a pool of crocodiles and that broke my fall.”
“Yes, yes, I remember. So you’re a doctor, young man. That’s very interesting. Your studies didn’t happen to lead you to an interest in medieval village life by any chance, did they?”
I glanced in confusion at Katya, who smiled impishly. “Ah . . . well, not in any very direct way, sir. But I’ve always been fascinated by the subject.”
Monsieur Treville’s face lit up. “Oh? Have you indeed? What aspects particularly interest you?”
“Yes, Doctor,” Paul said, leaning forward with mock interest. “Do tell us.”
Katya gave him a reproving frown, but he raised his eyebrows in blandest innocence, as I stammered out, “Well . . . the whole topic is fascinating. Particularly . . . ah . . . particularly the medical . . . ah . . .”
“The plague!” Monsieur Treville injected. “Yes, I am sure the arrival of the Black Death in ’48/’49 would be of particular interest to a doctor.”
“That would be 1348 and ’49,” young Treville clarified helpfully.
Monsieur Treville frowned at his son and blinked several times. “Did someone say something about crocodiles? What’s all this about crocodiles?”
“I didn’t understand that completely myself, Father,” Paul confessed. “Something to do with the Great Plague perhaps. Could you clarify that for us, Doctor?”
“No, no, young man,” Monsieur Treville said laying his hand on my arm and chuckling. “Rats! Rats and lice. Nothing to do with crocodiles at all. Possibly the fact that the plague entered Europe through Mediterranean ports gave birth to this fiction about crocodiles—though I confess that I’ve never run across the legend myself. You wouldn’t happen to recall where you read it, would you?”
Katya came to my rescue, diverting the conversation into light channels until dinner had progressed to the fruit and a disk of the strong, salty local cheese, at which Paul poked distastefully with the tip of his knife. I could sense that Katya was pleased with me, pleased with my evident liking for her father and with his delight at having someone new with whom to talk. My romantic imagination staged domestic daydreams concerning an at-home dinner with the brother-in-law and father-in-law visiting our modest (but charming) home, and in neglect of my social responsibilities I allowed myself to become lost in these pleasant reveries to such a depth that I was quite surprised when Monsieur Treville’s voice intersected my egoistic wanderings.
“. . . or don’t you agree, Doctor?”
“Ah . . . yes. Yes! I do indeed agree. Yes, indeed.”
Monsieur Treville’s eyes sparkled with interest. “That’s fascinating, Doctor. I need hardly tell you that very few modern scholars of medieval life share our view on this. Would you mind telling me what evidence brought you to this opinion?”
“What evidence? Ah . . . well, not so much any given single bit of evidence as . . . ah . . . as the general impression I . . . ah . . .”
Katya earned my undying gratitude when she placed her hand on my arm and interrupted, saying, “Now, you two mustn’t spend the whole evening talking about things that Paul and I don’t understand.”
“I don’t mind,” Paul said. “In fact, I’d be delighted to hear Montjean’s response.” He smiled at me broadly. Then he made a sudden motion, and I realized that Katya had kicked him under the table.
“No,” she said, “I won’t have it. We shall take our coffee in the salon like well-bred people, and we shall talk of trivial and amusing things, as we were taught to do when we were young.” She stood and offered me her arm. “Dr. Montjean?”
For half an hour, as we four sat around the good fire in the hearth, Katya was as good as her word, guiding the conversation from one subject to another with such subtle skill that each of us—even Paul—had his moment to shine forth and appear witty and well-informed. Brandy was served with the coffee, and I noticed that Paul refilled his glass more often than was wise and ended with sitting deep in his chair with a leaden and dour attitude that bordered on the inhospitable, but my delight in and admiration of Katya overweighed my feelings towards her brother and I was left with the impression that I had never passed a more pleasant and entertaining evening, though I could recall no single event of particular moment.
Paul broke the spell by rising suddenly and saying, “I’m afraid that Katya should be going to bed soon.”
“Really, Paul—” she protested.
“No, no Kik
i.” Paul crossed to her and put his arm around her waist. “You’ve risked catching a cold, being out in the rain. Now you must go to bed, pull the covers up to your nose, and count crocodiles. You’ll be asleep in no time. Father and I will entertain Dr. Montjean.”
“Have you been out in the rain?” Monsieur Treville asked Katya with concern.
“Not really, Father,” Paul answered. “Just a figure of speech.”
Monsieur Treville blinked. “Figure of speech?”
“Yes, and a silly and ineffective one too. I promise I’ll never use it again. Now, up you go, Kiki.”
“Good-night, Papa,” Katya said, giving him a kiss on the cheek. “And good-night to you, Jean-Marc Montjean.” She held her hand out for me to press. I was pleased at the way she had devised of using my given name so soon in our acquaintance. “Will I have the pleasure of seeing you so soon?”
“Never fear,” Paul said. “The doctor has promised—or perhaps it was a threat—to come by tomorrow to bind up my wounds. No doubt we shall be able to persuade him to take a cup of tea with us.”
“I shall look forward to it, Mlle Treville,” I said, my eyes full of her.
“So shall I.”
After she left, Monsieur Treville settled back in his chair as though for a good long talk and asked me how long I had been devoted to the study of the Black Death. . . . .
. . . . . An hour later, when finally Paul was seeing me to the door, the rain had lightened to a frying hiss on the gravel outside. He had not been sparing of the brandy, and there was something beyond nonchalance in the way he leaned against the archway of the hall door.
“You’ve done well, Montjean. I am sure Father hasn’t the slightest hint that your interest in us is not solely medical. That bespeaks an admirable streak of duplicity in your nature. You really should cultivate this gift, not only as a means of surviving in a world of rogues and merchants, but as leavening in a personality that is altogether too serious and sincere to be interesting.”
“Are you always this uncivil, Treville?”
“Not always. You bring out the best in me.”
“I’m delighted to be of service. May I wish you a good-night?”
“Please do.”
BEFORE the trap had reached the end of the poplar lane, the rain stopped, and as the mare walked comfortably back to Salies through the night air rinsed clean of dust, I troubled over several events of the evening. There was that strange, tense conversation I had overheard between Katya and Paul. And there was Paul’s warning that his father must know nothing of my interest in Katya while, so far as I could judge, the old man was a gentle pedant with no harm in him. Perhaps most troubling of all was the fact that I rather liked Paul Treville, although I had every reason not to. Was it his physical resemblance to Katya that drew me to forgive his adolescent discourteousness? I didn’t think so. Not that alone, anyway. There was a kind of desperate melancholy in the man, not quite concealed by his waspish wit, that made me sympathize with a person of lucid if brittle intelligence who had no outlet for his energies and mind in our rural corner of the Basque country.
Why did he accept this self-imposed isolation from the world he was born to, the world in which his gifts and talents were valued? Why, indeed, were the Trevilles living in an ancient heap of stone so far from their Paris? Katya had made an allusion to their being here for their health, but I could see no evidence of ill-health, and I could see every evidence, in Monsieur Treville’s eagerness to share ideas and concepts with me, of a hunger for the civilized society they had left.
In a selfish way, of course, I was delighted that they were here in Salies. How else would I ever have met Katya?
Katya . . . And the rest of my ride into town was occupied with fabricating little scenes and swatches of dialogue between Katya and me.
DIRECTLY the clinic closed at three the next afternoon, I borrowed Doctor Gros’s trap again and rode out to Etcheverria, arriving in time for tea, which was taken on the terrace overlooking the derelict garden. Paul’s attitude had changed totally; he was full of light chat and jokes that had no trace of vitriol in them. And when Monsieur Treville joined us from his study, Paul asked him about his work with every evidence of genuine interest and concern, which was a far cry from the tone of impish baiting that had colored his conversation the night before.
At first, Monsieur Treville seemed confused to see me at their tea table, and there was an uncomfortable moment when I was afraid he didn’t recognize me and hadn’t the slightest idea who I was. But Katya used my title several times until, with a little start of comprehension, her father said, “Ah, yes! You’re the fellow who’s deeply involved in studies of the Black Death, aren’t you? Yes. Fascinating subject. Fascinating.”
Paul excused himself after only one cup of the thin tisane Katya served, claiming that there were a thousand things demanding his attention, so he had best take a little nap and give them a chance to solve themselves under the influence of his benign neglect. Monsieur Treville rose and pled the demands of scholarship, shaking my hand in farewell and cautioning me not to devote myself overly much to my study of medieval medicine, as I was a young man and must not allow life to pass me by.
Katya smiled after her departing father and shook her head affectionately. “He likes you, Jean-Marc Montjean.”
“I like him, too.”
She looked at me, her grey eyes soft and smiling. “Yes, I know. And that pleases me. But you may have to bone up a little on things medieval.”
“I shall make it my constant study.”
She laughed lightly and rose. “Shall we stroll down to my library?”
“You speak of the library that disguises itself so cleverly as a half-ruined summerhouse?”
“What other library have I? Come along.”
And for the better part of two hours we chatted, she sitting in the battered wicker chair that was the gazebo’s only furnishing or perched upon the balustrade rail, while I sat on the steps or leaned against the frame of the latticed arch entrance. Our conversation ranged freely, shallow and deep, now and ago, serious and light-hearted, personal and global, the topic pivoting on a word or branching off in a new direction under the impulse of a non sequitur image or idea that appeared in one of our minds or the other. Time acted in a most paradoxical way: on the one hand, it was suspended and frozen, on the other it fled like water through our fingers.
I accepted her invitation to return for tea the next day, when again we chatted about everything and nothing. And so it was the following day, and the day after that. In my memory, all the hours we passed in the summerhouse blend together as a prolonged, but all-too-brief, time spent sitting in the dappled light, concealed in the overgrown garden, while above the trees the sky was always an ardent blue and the air was always cool and gently moving in the perfect weather of that July.
We came to using first names. We came to sharing long silences without that sense of social embarrassment that strangers have. I fell into the habit of groaning at her puns, even though some of them were admirable tricks of sound and sense requiring a considerable exercise of literary or political allusion. She came to teasing me for being typically Basque in my unlikely combination of dour earnestness and theatrical romanticism.
I was particularly fascinated by an ambivalence of mood that was so especially Katya’s. Most of the time, she was vividly alive and alert to everything around her: she pointed out birds in branches that I could not discover even when she directed my gaze to the spot; she took pleasure in the close examination of the form and structure of the petals and leaves of such flowers as had survived the long neglect the garden had suffered; she delighted in the feel of the sun on her face and the smell of the heated summer air; she loved to play with words and ideas, twisting and re-forming them with her particular sense of the ridiculous. But at other moments—rather rarely—she would suddenly retire within herself, sometimes in midsentence, and I could tell from the vague and distant look in her eyes that she was
elsewhere, not in this garden, not in this world . . . not with me. She would gaze in silence across the garden, alone and serene in her thoughts, then there would be a slight flicker in her eyes and she would glance at me, and I knew she had returned from her reverie.
She would joke about it, saying something like, “Well, I’m back. Were there any letters for me while I was away?”
And I would say something like, “No, but there was a telegram from your brother. It seems his grandson is getting married next month.”
“Oh, really?” she would laugh. “Have I been gone all that long?”
“Very long. Nearly a minute. And very far away. Nearly beyond my reach.”
Fragments of the things we talked about during those delicious afternoon hours return to me even now, fresh and whole, like those snatches of melody from one’s youth that slip back unsolicited from the hidden reaches of the memory. Often we exchanged moments and incidents from our childhoods, shards of ourselves shared unself-consciously, and not so much shared as remembered aloud. She recalled that she was once given a blue silk dress with a bow that she loved so much she saved it for some very special occasion, saved it so long that when she at last found a sufficiently worthy event, it was too small to be worn. She had wept bitterly. But she kept the dress and had it even now. And I told her of a bully in my mountain village who enjoyed taunting me because I did particularly well in school. He took up the practice of slapping me on the back of my head, which expression of subtle wit delighted the other children. I used to cry with rage and shame, but I never dared to challenge the bigger lad until my wise old uncle took me aside and explained that, while the bully was strong, I had the advantage of being quick and adroit. And, what is more, I would be strengthened by the rightness of my cause. So, the next time that fat butcher’s son hectored me, I put up my fists and took a stand . . . only to experience the soundest thrashing of my life, with my nose bloodied and my lip broken. And when I reported the event to my uncle, he shook his head and advised me not to be so stupid in future as to pick fights with bigger boys. And she told me of the shadow of a tree branch at night on the wall of her bedroom that looked like a monkey and used to frighten her each time a storm made it dance, rippling insanely over the draperies. She would hide under her covers and peek out through a little hole, fascinated, horrified, but unable to look away from the dancing monkey because she had convinced herself that it could not harm her so long as she kept her eyes on it. She dared not even blink. And I told her of the one time I cheated in school and . . .