A Sport and a Pastime (15 page)

“I think he must love me,” Anne-Marie tells her mother.

They are alone in the kitchen. The mother is not sure. Perhaps. Perhaps not.

“
Si
,” her daughter insists.

“Perhaps.”

It’s irritating to Anne-Marie. She’s very proud. To the mother it is unsettling. One should not believe too strongly in a life which can easily vanish. There are many things to fear, things her daughter may tell her about if she remains patient, if she is wise enough not to ask.

“Well, I think he may love you…”

“
Oui
,” Anne-Marie insists.

“…but will there be any reason left for him to want to marry you?”

Anne-Marie shrugs.

“There are reasons,” she finally says without conviction.

“He doesn’t work…”

“So…his father is rich.”

“That’s not the same.”

“Then it’s not the same,” Anne-Marie says, impatient.

Her mother reaches across to touch her hand, but she has risen and is looking at herself in the mirror. There she finds all she needs. She turns her face a little this way, then that. The sea will appear before them, washed in sunlight. They will walk along the rocks. The white birds rise up lazily as they approach. All the hotels of the coast beckon with their white façades, plum, oyster, dove blue.

Chambord, built by François I, a great, bearded king with eyes small as a boar’s. He loved to hunt. He went there with his mistresses and walked up and down in the firelit rooms with his long hair, his rich, dark beard… Dean puts a circle around it. The workmen have gone. The sky is a last, clear blue. The air is calm. It’s the hour for dinner. Tables are set. In the restaurants the waiters stand quietly near the bar. The monuments, the buildings disappear. There is not long to wait before the first, solitary star.

They descend into evening. The small alleys are darkening now. Old women appear in the entrances in their shapeless, black dress. Cats move along close to the wall, pause, and then hurry off as Dean closes the car door. The full voice of the engine. Through a twilight as calm, as enormous as a night at sea, they pass. The villages are still. The buildings are anchored like ships.

In a café she happens to meet a boy who knew her. He is amazed. You’ve changed a hundred per cent, he tells her. She smiles. Afterwards Dean asks,

“Who was that?”

The brother of a girl she knew. Dean is looking towards the door as if he might return. It annoys him.

The evening is warm. The place reminds her of the one where, all that summer, she went to dance. They must go there sometime, she says. There were two waiters who liked her. One was Italian. The other was very young and sent her flowers, but he was shy. She never went out with him. She never even thought of him until now, this evening, by chance. It was the Italian with whom she spent those noisy hours, who had her for the first time. But the young waiter, how well I know him. He saves his money. His clothes are neat. He walks quietly through town, his eyes lowered. Sometimes at night he stands in the crowd. He sees her smile and his heart falls out of him. Among the dancers turning in the orange light his eyes can find her in an instant. He knows her calves, the shape of her body better than her lover, and those high-heeled shoes with their thin straps, as they move around the floor they are ripping his dreams.

The theatre is half empty. It’s a white building cold as a meat plant. Inside, the ceiling is blue, the walls are hung with pleated cloth, like a skirt. The floor is tilted backwards. Everybody sits in back, staring at advertisements on the drop that covers the screen. Suddenly, having come down the aisle, a man mounts the stage. He has a small beard, like Lincoln. His voice is alarming and clear.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” he begins. “It’s with great pleasure that we are able to present to you tonight one of the most remarkable women in Europe. She is able–I promise this without exception or hesitation–to read the mind of anyone in this room, to describe them without seeing them, to answer questions she cannot hear, to reveal secret longings. Don’t be afraid. There is nothing embarrassing, nothing unnecessary. It is a demonstration of a unique mental power, a communication known to the Hindus, to the peoples of the East. I present to you: Yolande!”

He summons her. She comes up on the stage and stands beside him in a black, Spanish hat, a gold dress, her hair in little ringlets. She bows. The audience is too stunned to applaud, too cautious. She turns to face the screen. Her partner walks back to where the first row of people are sitting. He begins to ask her questions which she answers with her back turned.

“This person…”

“
Monsieur
…”

“Is it a man or a woman?”

“A man.”

“The color of his hair?”

“Brown.”

“His suit…”

“Grey.”

“His shoes…”

“Black.”

“
Voilà
!” he says.

He moves on.

“These first three…” He leans over and whispers to them. Their heads are close together. He nods, nods, then stands erect once more. “Can you give me their names?”

Her voice is curiously mechanical. It’s as if she is reading a list.

“Robert. Gilbert. Jean-Paul.”

“Their occupations, please. In order.”

“Teacher. Clerk. Mechanic.”

“Is that right?” he asks them.

They nod. He takes the wrist of a man behind them. He holds it up.

“And here…?”

“A watch.”

“The make?”

“Intra.”

“Is that right?” he asks the man. Yes. A nod. “And now, please, Yolande, the exact time…”

“Eleven minutes after nine.”

“The seconds?”

“Thirty-five.”

He allows the owner to look.

“
Voilà!
” he cries.

Some applause. It’s just the beginning. She reads the serial number on franc notes, identifies objects in people’s hands, perceives missing buttons, tells dates of birth, hours. The dialogue is sharp and fast.

“This gentleman…”

“
Monsieur
…” she cries.

“Is holding …”

“A ticket.”

“Yes?”

“A railroad ticket.”

“To where?”

“To Chalons!”

“
Voilà!
”

The audience is whispering. He strides back to the stage, arm extended in triumph, fingers curved. Now Yolande herself turns around. She is prepared, she announces, to answer, individually and privately, all questions.

“Your most secret questions,” she says as she coolly straps on a leather belt that has a purse attached. For two francs, she will give a personal response. She begins to circulate, asking only the first name before she selects, with great speed, an envelope from the basket she carries. Her partner walks ahead, encouraging people to concentrate on the question they want answered.

“Can I ask her?” Anne-Marie says.

“Go ahead.”

He sorts out his change. She raises her hand. Yolande sees her immediately.

“
Mademoiselle
…”

“
Oui
.”

“Your first name.”

“Anne-Marie.”

“Born,” Yolande says, holding out her arm, indicating one moment, “born…in the month of October. Correct?”

Anne-Marie smiles dazedly. She nods.

“
Voilà!
” the man cries. He moves ahead. “Who else? Raise your hands, please.”

It’s a pale blue envelope, unsealed. Inside is a single sheet of paper, numbered 7. In the top corner, a constellation. At the bottom, a red star. Some of the phrases are underlined in red. She begins reading it quickly.

“Let me see,” he says.

There’s no answer to any question. It’s printed in a style to look like handwriting.

Your nature
, it says,
predisposes you to dream
.
You are capable of deep feelings
… Some words he cannot read…
at the moment
,
you are not very lucky
,
but don’t fall into despair
.
Your destiny will soon be revealed
.
Courage! Belief!
Her scent is Iris. Her lucky day Monday. He was wrong–at the very bottom there is a response to her thought:
Your desire will be realized if you open your heart
.

“Is that right?” Dean asks.

“No,” she says. “It’s printed.”

“Let me read it again,” he says. “Maybe she gave you mine.”

“But how did she know the month I was born?” Anne-Marie says.

“She smelled your scent. Iris.”

“What do you mean?” she says.

They drive home at midnight. It’s not often they’re out so late. Usually their evenings are quite simple. A meal somewhere. A stroll from which they return after dark. The trees above them are rich with silence. From the radio stations of Europe music pours forth faintly in the cheapest rooms. Her portable is on the floor. The dial is illuminated. It glows mysteriously. Luxembourg is on. Geneva. The orchestras of the world beat softly. The muscle in her behind is tight. It feels like a string around the shaft. He pushes in slowly and then, at last, plunges, like the bottom dropping out. Anne-Marie moans, her head buried in her arms. After he was dead I thought often of these moments, of this one. Perhaps it is her moan, her face pressing against the sheet. He can feel her tight around him, like a noose. He closes her legs and lies there contented, looking out the window, feeling the tender spasms.

“
Es-tu contente?
” he asks after a while.

Her voice, her very presence, seems summoned from afar. She answers quietly.

“
Oui
.”

[26]

“D
ON’T YOU GET TIRED
of being down there for months on end?” Cristina says. “God!”

I don’t know what to say. They’re all looking at me. I’m really not sure. It’s not a question of being tired of something. It really can’t be compared.

“What on earth do you do there?” Alix says.

“Well, I’m doing some work.” A pause. “I’m doing a lot of reading–I know that sounds funny.”

“It must be fascinating,” she says. “Whatever you’re reading.”

They laugh.

“What is he really doing?” she asks. “It’s all so secretive. It must be something marvelous.”

I can’t tell whether she means it or not. They’ve asked her to dinner because of me. I’m uncertain how to take her though. She’s beautifully dressed in a blue silk suit, and she seems to be completely unaffected by my presence. At first, in fact, she ignored me, but her attention is worse. Billy asks if I want another drink.

“How long are you here for?” Alix says.

“Just a few days. You don’t mean in France? Altogether?”

“Yes, in France.”

“I don’t know,” I tell her. “I’ve already stayed longer than I expected.”

“Um,” she says. “You like it then.”

I can’t answer that. Finally I nod. I say,

“Yes.”

She turns to Cristina.

“He’s rather nice,” she says and then, talking to them, abandons me.

By the time we go to dinner, I am nervously trying to play this game with her. It’s exciting to be in her company, but I’m always a little afraid of what she might say next, and this fear causes me to be helpless. She’s as tall as I am with a very beautiful complexion, not at all pale. I can’t tell how old she is. Twenty-six perhaps. I can’t very well ask. When Billy and I go down for the car, he tells me she’s been married. This puts me more at ease for some reason.

“She was married to Teddy Leighter,” he says.

“Who?”

“Teddy Leighter. Don’t you know him?”

“I’m not sure. Who is he?”

“Oh, you know him,” Billy says.

“I do?”

“Sure you do,” he says. “He played hockey.”

Then he says something I don’t hear. But we’ve arrived at the level of the garage.

We have dinner at the Calvados in a room filled with candles. I notice she reads the menu carefully, even with interest, but she practically ignores the food when it arrives. In the middle of the meal she tells me she’d like some Evian water. She goes on talking to Cristina while I try to find a waiter. A night, a long night in which I am captive, is beginning. It will end with a determined search for the negress we saw last time in the club near the Champs. Alix and I have to see her, Billy decides.

“I’ve seen her.”

“But Alix hasn’t,” he says.

Billy looks like a bullfighter, Alix says. She’s jealous of him. He’ll always be beautiful. She stares at him very directly, her chin in her hand. No, he says and orders more wine. He even moves like a bullfighter, she says. Cristina seems to think it’s funny.

The negress cannot be found. Paris is filled with the fresh smell of trees as we go from place to place. She cannot be found, but finally there is another in a dress made of flowers. The room is crowded. Alix dances very close to me.

“Have you really been down there all winter long?” she says.

“Yes. Why?”

“I’ve been thinking about it, that’s all.”

“You’re embarrassing me,” I say. “It’s not that interesting to talk about.”

“You like it though.”

“Yes.”

“You must have fallen in love,” she says.

“No.” Perhaps there was a slight pause.

“Ahh,” she says. “That’s it. You have a girl.”

She smiles at me for the first time. At last we have found each other.

“That’s right, isn’t it?” she says.

“No.”

“Oh, you’re lying.”

“I’m not.”

“You have a little French girl.”

“I’m ashamed of it, but I don’t.”

“They can be very nice,” she says.

“I’m sure.”

Back at the table she tells them I’ve confessed. Carrying on a wild affair, she says.

“It’s not that woman across the street?” Cristina says.

“Madame Picquet?”

“Is that right?” Billy says happily.

“No, no. She’s getting married.”

“I thought she was married,” Cristina says.

“She’s divorced.”

“The town whore,” Cristina explains.

“Who’s she marrying?” Billy says.

“Oh, some student. I don’t know. I’ve never seen him.”