‘I have to be at the Impasse Jules-Chaplain at five o’clock,’ said Gerbert. ‘I must beat it.’
He looked at Xavière.
‘Well, are you coming with me? Otherwise Chanaud won’t ever give up the part.’
‘I’m coming,’ said Xavière. She put on her raincoat and carefully tied her scarf under her chin.
‘Will you be staying here much longer?’ said Gerbert.
‘One week, I hope,’ said Françoise, ‘and then I’ll go home.’
‘Goodbye, until tomorrow,’ said Xavière a little coldly.
‘Until tomorrow,’ said Françoise.
She smiled at Gerbert, who waved to her. He opened the door and uneasily stepped back for Xavière; he must have been wondering what he could possibly talk about. Françoise dropped back against the pillows. It delighted her to think that Gerbert was fond of her. Naturally, he was far less fond of her than of Labrousse, but it was a personal affection that was really meant for her. She, too, was very fond of him. She could think of no more delightful relationship than this friendship, devoid of any demands and always so full. She closed her eyes; she was at ease; years in a sanatorium … even this thought inspired no rebellion in her. In a few moments, she would know; she felt prepared to accept any verdict whatsoever.
The door opened softly.
‘How do you feel?’ said Pierre.
The blood rushed to Françoise’s cheeks; it was something more than pleasure that Pierre’s presence brought her. In front of him alone her calm indifference disappeared.
‘I’m getting better and better,’ she said, holding Pierre’s hand in hers.
‘They’re going to X-ray you in a little while, aren’t they?’
‘Yes. But you know, the doctor thinks that my lungs are completely healed.’
‘I only hope they don’t wear you out,’ said Pierre.
‘I’m full of beans today,’ she said.
Her heart was filled with tenderness. How unfair she had been in comparing Pierre’s love to an old whited sepulchre! Thanks to this illness, she had attained its living abundance. It was not only his constant presence, his telephone calls, his attentions, for which she was grateful to him. What had been unforgettably sweet to her was that, over and above his avowed tenderness, she had seen in him a passionate anxiety that was not volitional, but which overwhelmed him. At this moment, the face turned towards her was utterly without reserve; it was useless to tell him over and over that the X-ray was hardly more than a formality: worry had affected him deeply. He put a bundle of books on the bed.
‘Look what I’ve chosen for you! Are they all right?’
Françoise looked at the titles: two detective stories, an American novel, a few magazines.
‘They’ll do splendidly, I’m sure,’ she said. ‘You’re so kind.’
Pierre took off his overcoat.
‘I passed Gerbert and Xavière in the garden.’
‘He was taking her to rehearse a marionette show,’ said Françoise. ‘It’s dreadfully funny to see them together. They pass from the wildest volubility to the bleakest silence.’
‘Yes,’ said Pierre, ‘they are amusing.’ He took a step towards the door. ‘I think someone’s coming.’
‘Four o’clock. That was the time,’ said Françoise.
The nurse entered, walking importantly ahead of two stretcher-bearers who were carrying a huge arm-chair.
‘How’s our patient doing?’ she said. ‘I hope she is going to stand her little expedition nicely.’
‘She looks well,’ said Pierre.
‘I feel very well.’ said Françoise.
To cross the threshold of this room, after these long days of incarceration, was a real adventure. She was lifted up, wrapped in blankets, and settled in the arm-chair. It was strange to find herself sitting: it was not the same thing as sitting up in bed; it made her somewhat dizzy.
‘All right?’ asked the nurse, turning the door handle.
‘Fine,’ said Françoise.
She looked with slightly shocked surprise at this door that was opening to the outside world; normally, it opened to let people in; now it had suddenly changed direction and was transformed into an exit. And the room too was shocking, with its empty bed. It was no longer the heart of the nursing-home, to which all corridors and stairs led: it was the corridor laid with sound-deadening linoleum that became the vital artery on to which a vague series of small cubicles opened. Françoise had the feeling of having come from the other side of the world. It was almost as strange as stepping through a looking-glass.
The arm chair was set down in a tiled room filled with complicated apparatus. It was terribly hot. Françoise half-closed her eyes. This voyage into the beyond had tired her.
‘Can you stand up for two minutes?’ said the doctor, who had just come in.
‘I’ll try,’ said Françoise: she was no longer so sure of her strength.
Strong arms placed her in a standing position and guided her among the apparatus; the ground swirled out from under her feet, it made her feel sick. She could never have imagined that it was such an effort to walk, big beads of perspiration stood out on her forehead.
‘Remain absolutely still.’ said a voice. She was placed against a piece of the apparatus and a wooden screen was pressed against her chest. She was choking; she would never be able to hold out for two minutes without suffocating. Night fell suddenly and silently: she heard nothing more than the short, quick wheeze of her breathing. Then, there was a click, a sharp noise, and everything was blotted out. When she regained consciousness, she was again reclining in the arm-chair; the doctor was bending gently over her, and the nurse was sponging her dripping forehead.
‘It’s all over,’ he said. ‘Your lungs are in excellent condition. You can sleep in peace.’
‘Are you feeling better?’ asked the nurse.
Françoise nodded ever so slightly; she was exhausted, she felt as if she would never regain her strength, she would have to remain in bed all her life. She flopped against the back of the arm-chair and was carried off down the corridors; her head was empty and heavy. She saw Pierre marching up and down in front of the door of her room. He gave her an anxious smile.
‘It’s all right,’ she murmured.
He started to move towards her.
‘Just a second, please,’ said the nurse.
Françoise turned to him, and seeing him so firmly on his own legs, she was overcome with distress. How weak and crippled she was! Nothing more than an inert bundle which was being carried by the strength of men’s arms.
‘Now you’re going to have a good rest,’ said the nurse. She settled the pillows and pulled up the sheets.
‘Thank you very much,’ said Françoise, stretching herself out with delight. ‘Would you mind saying it’s all right for him to come in?’
The nurse left the room. A short conference took place behind the door and Pierre entered. Françoise watched him enviously; it seemed so natural for him to move across the room.
‘I’m so happy,’ he said. ‘It seems that you’re as sound as a bell.’
He leaned over her and kissed her; the joy reflected in his smile warmed Françoise’s heart; he had not invented it intentionally to bestow on her, he lived this joy for itself with complete freedom. His love had again become dazzlingly apparent.
‘What a wild look you had when you were in that sedan-chair,’ he said tenderly.
‘I was almost sick,’ said Françoise.
Pierre took a cigarette from his pocket.
‘You may smoke your pipe, you know,’ she said.
‘Certainly not,’ said Pierre. He looked longingly at the cigarette. ‘I shouldn’t even smoke this.’
‘No, no, my lungs are completely cured,’ said Françoise cheerfully.
Pierre lit his cigarette.
‘And now well soon be taking you home; you’ll see what a pleasant convalescence you’ll have. I’ll get you a gramophone and records, you’ll have visit
ors, you’ll be in clover.’
‘Tomorrow, I’ll ask the doctor when he’ll let me leave,’ said Françoise. She sighed. ‘But I feel as if I shall never be able to walk again.’
‘Oh! That will soon come back,’ said Pierre. ‘We’ll put you in your arm-chair for a little while every day, and then we’ll get you to stand up for a few minutes, and you’ll end up by taking real walks.’
Françoise smiled at him trustingly.
‘It seems you had a wonderful time last night, you and Xavière.’ she said.
‘We found a rather amusing place,’ said Pierre.
He suddenly became glum. Françoise felt that she had all at once thrust him back into a world of unpleasant thoughts.
‘She told me about it with her eyes popping out of her head,’ she said, with disappointment in her voice.
Pierre shrugged his shoulders.
‘What is it?’ she said. ‘What are you thinking?’
‘Oh! It’s of no interest,’ said Pierre with a reticent smile.
‘How strange you are! Everything interests me,’ said Françoise, a little anxiously,
Pierre hesitated.
‘Well?’ said Françoise. She looked at Pierre. ‘Please tell me what’s in your mind.’
Pierre still hesitated, then he seemed to take the plunge,
‘I wonder if she isn’t in love with Gerbert.’
Françoise stared at him dumbfounded.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Just what I said,’ said Pierre. ‘That would be only natural. Gerbert is young and charming. He has the sort of charm that appeals to Xavière.’ He looked vacantly at the window. ‘It’s even more than likely,’ he said.
‘But Xavière is much too absorbed in you,’ said Françoise. ‘She seemed bowled over by the evening she’d just had.’
Pierre thrust his lip forward and Françoise, with discomfort, again saw that sharp and slightly caddish profile which she had not noticed for a long time.
‘Naturally,’ he said arrogantly. ‘I can always give someone a wonderful time if I want to take the trouble. What does that prove?’
‘I don’t understand why you think that,’ said Françoise.
Pierre seemed hardly to hear her.
‘We are dealing with Xavière and not Elisabeth,’ he said. ‘It’s quite clear that I have a certain intellectual attraction for her, but surely she doesn’t make the mistake of confusing the issue.’
Françoise felt a slight jolt of dismay. It was Pierre’s intellectual charm that formerly had made her fall in love with him.
‘She’s sensual,’ he continued, ‘and her sensuality is unadulterated. She quite likes my conversation, but her desires are for a handsome young man’s kisses.’
Françoise’s dismay was deepened; she liked Pierre’s kisses, did he despise her for that? But she was not the person under discussion.
‘I’m sure Gerbert isn’t making up to her,’ she said. ‘First of all, he knows that you’re interested in her.’
‘He doesn’t know anything,’ said Pierre. ‘He only knows what he is told. Anyway, that’s beside the point.’
‘All the same, did you notice anything between them?’ said Françoise.
‘When I caught a glimpse of them in the garden just now, it struck me as obvious,’ said Pierre, who had begun to gnaw one of his nails. ‘You’ve never seen the way she looks at him when she thinks she’s not being watched. She looks as if she’d like to eat him.’
Françoise recalled a particularly avid look which she had caught sight of on the night of the Christmas Eve party.
‘Yes,’ she said, ‘but she was also in a trance over Paule Berger. Those are snapshots of passion, they don’t really amount to feeling.’
‘And you don’t remember how furious she was when we joked once about Aunt Christine and Gerbert?’ said Pierre; at the rate he was going, he would gnaw his finger down to the bone.
‘That was the day she first met him,’ said Françoise. ‘You aren’t going to suggest that she was already in love with him?’
‘Why not?’ said Pierre. ‘He appealed to her at first sight.’
Françoise thought for a moment: she had left Xavière alone with Gerbert that evening, then, when she had rejoined her, Xavière had been in a strange mood. Françoise had asked if he had been rude to her, but perhaps, quite the contrary, she was angry with him because she was too attracted by him. Several days later, there had occurred that strange indiscretion …
‘What are you thinking?’ said Pierre nervously.
‘I’m trying to remember,’ she said.
‘You see, you’re hesitating,’ said Pierre in an urgent tone. ‘Oh! There are any number of indications. What did she have in mind when she deliberately went and told him that we had gone off without him?’
‘You thought that that was the first time she felt drawn to you?’
‘There was something of that in it-it was then that she began to take an interest in me; but it must have been more complicated than that. Perhaps she really was sorry not to have spent the evening with him: perhaps she was looking for a momentary complicity with him against us. Or further, she wanted then to take revenge on him for the desire he aroused in her.’
‘In any case, that gives no indication one way or the other,’ said Françoise. ‘It’s all too ambiguous.’
She raised herself a little on the pillows; this discussion was tiring her, the perspiration was beginning to ooze in the small of her back and the palms of her hands. She, who had thought that all these interpretations, these analyses, in which Pierre could circle round and round for hours on end, were over and done with … She would have liked to remain peaceful and detached, but Pierre’s feverish agitation was infecting her.
‘She didn’t give me that impression a little while ago,’ she said.
Pierre’s lip was again thrust forward. He had a strange expression, as if he were congratulating himself on keeping back the very spiteful words he was, in fact, uttering.
‘You see only what you want to see,’ he said.
Françoise flushed.
‘I’ve been away from the world for three weeks now.’
‘But there had been many signs already.’
‘Which ones do you mean?’
‘All those we’ve talked about,’ said Pierre vaguely.
‘That’s not much,’ said Françoise.
Pierre looked annoyed.
‘I tell you I know what’s up,’ he said.
‘Then don’t ask me,’ said Françoise; her voice quavered a little. Faced with an unexpected harshness in Pierre, she felt weak and utterly miserable.
Pierre looked at her with self-reproach.
‘I’m tiring you with my talk,’ he said, in a burst of tenderness.
‘How can you think that?’ said Françoise. He seemed so tormented, she would very much have liked to help him. ‘Frankly, your evidence seems to me to be a little weak.’
‘At Dominique’s, on the opening night, she danced once with him. When Gerbert put his arm round her, she shivered from head to foot, and she had a voluptuous smile that could not be misinterpreted.’
‘Why didn’t you say so?’ said Françoise.
‘I don’t know.’ He thought for a moment. ‘Yes, I know. It’s the most unpleasant memory I have, the one that carries the most weight with me. In a way, I was afraid that if I told you, I would be sharing my proof with you and thus be making it final.’ He smiled. ‘I didn’t think I’d come to that.’
Françoise recalled Xavière’s face when she was talking about Pierre, her caressing lips, her tender look.
‘It doesn’t seem to me to be so conclusive,’ she said.
‘I’ll speak to her tonight,’ said Pierre.
‘She’ll fly into a rage.’
Pierre smiled, with a somewhat irritating air.
‘Of course not, she loves me to talk to her about herself. She thinks I can appreciate all her subtleties. In fact, that’s my gre
atest attraction in her eyes.’
‘She very fond of you,’ said Françoise. ‘I think Gerbert appeals to her for the moment, but it doesn’t go any further than that.’
Pierre’s face brightened a little, but he remained tense.
‘Are you sure of what you’re saying?’
‘Sure? No, one can never be sure,’ said Françoise.
‘You see, you’re not sure,’ said Pierre. He looked at her almost threateningly. He had to hear her say the calming words, that he might as if by magic feel reassured. Françoise set her teeth. She did not want to treat Pierre like a child.
‘I’m not an oracle,’ she said.
‘What are the odds, in your opinion, that she’s in love with Gerbert?’
‘They can’t be calculated,’ said Françoise, rather impatiently. It was painful to her that Pierre should be so puerile, she refused to be his accomplice.
‘Still, you can make a shot at them,’ said Pierre.
Her temperature must have risen considerably during the course of the afternoon: Françoise felt that her whole body was going to dissolve into sweat.
‘I don’t know. Ten to one,’ she said in an off-hand way.
‘No more than ten to one?’
‘How on earth should I know?’
‘You’re not even making an effort,’ said Pierre tartly.
Françoise felt a lump rise in her throat. She felt like crying; it would be easy to say what he wanted to hear, to give in. But an obstinate resistance once more came to life within her, again things had meaning and value and were worth fighting for. Only, she was not equal to the fight.
‘It’s stupid,’ said Pierre. ‘You’re right. Why should I come and pester you with all this?’ His face cleared. ‘Please note that I want nothing more from Xavière than what I have, but I could not bear that anyone else should have more.’
‘I fully understand,’ said Françoise.
She smiled, but peace did not return to her; Pierre had broken into her isolation and her repose. She was beginning to catch sight of a world filled with riches and obstacles, a world in which she wanted to join him, that she might desire and fear at his side.
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