Читать книгу A Woman, In Bed - Anne Finger - Страница 27

Train

It was quite acceptable for a married woman to put her hand into the crook of the elbow of a man who was not her husband, who was a guest of the family, as the two of them walked through the streets of Juan-les-Pins, as this constituted an act of everyday masculine protection to the frail sex of which Simone was a member, although none of her family friends and acquaintances, passing them and offering a smile, a nod, a tip of the hat, could have known the pleasure it gave her to have her thin fingers wrapped around his arm, could have known she was thinking: I never before knew my hand, my very hand itself, could experience joy.

It was also quite within the realm of that which was proper for a young woman of a good bourgeois family to stand on the railway platform with said lodger, even though it might be observed that the smile upon her face revealed she was quite smitten. It was not quite acceptable, but still these things happen, it’s not comme il faut, but nonetheless, a shrug, a wink, for Simone to have her fling with Jacques. After all, women were weak, easily tempted, and men had desires that were like the engine of that train now entering the station.

But to step onto the train with this man with the brooding eyes and furrowed brow, to travel with him to Carcassonne to visit the poet Joë Bousquet, was to cast herself outside the bounds of decency.

Simone, right foot on the step, left on the platform, hesitated for a fraction of a second, not filled with second thoughts, but rather with the desire to prolong this moment, her break with the past.

She drew a deep breath, grabbed hold of the bar, and hoisted herself onto the train.

Chez Vidal, Odette was wailing: “Mama, Mama, Mama, Mama, Mama,” holding out her arms. “Mama, Mama, Mama, Mama, Mama.”

They were lucky enough to find a compartment alone.

“Did I ever tell you,” Simone said, leaning her head against Jacques’ shoulder, “that the first man I ever loved was wounded in the war?”

Did I ever tell you…she said, as if she had told him many, many things about her life. The fact is, they have said very little to one another, and most of that in the presence of others: Albert, the guests crowded together in the parlor after dinner. The words they have spoken to one another when alone have mostly been monosyllables: yes, there, oh, hold me, oh, yes, my God, oh, oh; oh yes, yes, right there, oh.

He knew she had had a stout sister named Elise who had died of Spanish influenza leaving behind a dress of cornflower blue; a husband named Luc who had an ornate and ridiculous mustache and had gone to a costume party as a concubine; a father who had died some years before—his portrait hung in the lodging-house parlor. Quite frankly, he did not want to know the year of this husband’s birth, his place of origin nor particulars about Simone’s mother’s social background, any facts that might enable him to create a smooth narrative of her life.

“I like the way things are between us now. When I feel I know everything essential about you and nothing superfluous.”

She fell silent and when he realized, belatedly, that his words had wounded her, he said, “Go on,” and stroked her hand affectionately.

“My father died when I was twelve years old. For a while I became very devout. I’d set penances for myself—walk with my head bent down, looking for jagged pebbles to put in my shoes. I went to Mass every day—the old crones, and me. They kept urging me to kneel on a prie-dieu but I liked—wanted—the sensation of the flagstone against my knees. And then there was the war—I became devoted to France—”

“Rather than to God?”

“I wasn’t devoted to God so much as to my father’s salvation. My mother’d say, ‘You’d better pray for him. He needs every single one of your prayers.’ But then, when France was invaded, it was so—concrete. I kept a map, with colored pins—black for Germany, red for France. At school, we were allowed to knit. For the soldiers at the front, as long as we used wooden needles and not steel ones. The clack of steel ones drowned out the teacher. One day, my teacher, Mme. LeDuc—I idolized her—held up my socks and said, ‘These are socks for deformed feet.’”

“I suppose that was the end of her as your idol.”

“Oh no. After that I loved her even more.”

When vexed by her pupils’ vast, collective stupidity, Mme. LeDuc slapped implements against her open palm—a ruler, the rod kept propped in the classroom corner. Sometimes she used these to rap knuckles, the tender spot where the shoulder and neck meet. Simone never felt the bite of the rod or the ruler, although she often imagined she did.

“Don’t weep when you are being reprimanded,” Mme. LeDuc said to her. “It’s like allowing a dog to see your fear. It’s true, I’m harder on you than I am on the other girls. You’re not hopeless.”

A trace of contempt is like a hint of bitterness in the mouth: the flesh of a veal roast can be insipid, unless dusted with tart hyssop.