Stone's Fall (45 page)

“The maid nodded and withdrew. The door shut, and I heard it being locked.

“‘You can come back down now. It’s quite safe.’

“He had a gentle voice, not the voice of someone who was going to throw me out into the night, but nonetheless I was petrified, shivering from fright and cold.

“‘Stand by the fire and warm yourself,’ he said. ‘And don’t be frightened. I’m not going to eat you.’

“I began to stammer out an apology, which he brushed away. ‘I have been keeping an eye on you for several days,’ he said with a faint smile. ‘I wondered who was moving my books, but as nothing went missing, I didn’t mind. Then two evenings ago I was up there, working, and I saw you come and curl up on my chair. I thought it was so charming I couldn’t bring myself to disturb you. And very curious, too. Why do you spend so much time reading?’

“I did not really trust myself to answer. ‘I can’t stop myself,’ I said eventually.

“The answer seemed to please him. ‘And which of those books did you like the most?’

“I felt like saying all of them. ‘The ones with Rastignac in.’

“‘Really? You don’t find stories of young girls finding true love more appealing? Why do you like Rastignac?’

“‘Because he is trying to make something of himself.’

“He seemed to find this reply quite fascinating, and he came across the room, sat opposite me and stared hard at me. ‘How extraordinary,’ he said. ‘How remarkable. Well, well…’

“‘I’m truly sorry, sir…’

“‘What for?’

“‘For my impertinence.’

“‘No, you are not. At least, I very much hope you are not. Are you?’

“‘No.’

“‘You notice that this room of mine is terribly untidy and messy? Not to say dusty?’

“I looked around, and could not see a book or ornament out of place. And as for dust, I don’t think there was a single speck anywhere.

“‘I think that what I need is someone to tidy it up more often. Once the job is done, there would be no reason why that person could not fill up the remaining hours reading a book. As long as they put it back in its proper place again. Once they were finished. Can you think of anyone that might suit?’

“I could hardly believe what he was saying. ‘Oh, sir…’

“‘Would you be so kind as to assist me, do you think?’

“I never knew that anyone could feel such happiness as I felt just then. The idea that I could spend hours a day in that room, just reading and tidying, made me want to skip and sing as I went back up the stairs. It was beyond my wildest dreams, and it was not a dream. I was given my instructions the next day by the head maid, and told to watch myself. Be quiet, be obedient. For once I intended to do just that.

“Nearly all day, every day, I spent in that library; Dr. Stauffer said he had given me the task of reorganising all the books and dusting all the shelves and making a catalogue of them. He reckoned it would take up to a year. So it would have done, had he really wanted me to do it. I was occasionally instructed to put papers in files, or find things for him, but apart from that I simply read. And talked.

“The other servants were scandalised that I should have to work so hard, and I did not enlighten them. Every day I went to the library at eight in the morning, and stayed there, reading. Part of the time I read what I wished, but I also had to read what he gave me, and he evidently decided to give me an education. My knowledge of the world came entirely from books, and bit by bit it deepened. He gave me Voltaire, and Montaigne, then Shakespeare in translation, Victor Hugo, Dumas, Chateaubriand. In German Goethe, Schiller, then other books as well, history, philosophy. He suggested Homer, Cicero, Plato. Some I understood, others not, but all fascinated me, and often in the evenings he would summon me to talk about them. What did I think of this passage, or that? Was this author correct? Why did he say such a thing? I’m sure my ideas and responses were foolish and naïve, but he didn’t seem to mind, and never corrected me, or told me the right answer. This went on for months and months; it was the happiest time of my life. For the first time, I felt as though I was loved, that someone cared for me. I had never imagined that it was possible to be so happy.

“Need I say that I fell in love with him, a man in his late forties, and me a girl of fifteen, as I was by then? He was everything I needed and didn’t even know existed. He was even lonelier than I was, and knew little about how to inspire warmth or friendship in his equals. So he turned to me, and sought intimacy through books and ideas. He liked having me around him. There is a joy in that, I can see, watching someone else discover the pleasures that you first learned yourself in your youth. To see someone growing and flourishing in front of you. I will have children, one day. I know I will. And I will watch them grow.”

I was thoroughly confused now, for she was telling me a story of being saved, something out of those books she had devoured so avidly. A pretty little orphan, adopted by a kindly old man and given an education and love. I knew the story; she grew up with her devoted guardian and looked after him in his old age, or married some respectable, upright youth exactly like him. It was a tale of safety and contentment. Of warm emotion and fulfilment. It did not end on the streets of a small border town in winter.

She was in her own world now, and I could not interrupt. I did not want to and I was too tired; I didn’t really hear her words; they just seeped into my mind as I sat next to her on the sofa. I do not think she meant to tell me this story when she started. She was asking for help, not giving a confidence. But once she started talking, she could not stop. I think I was the only person who ever heard the tale.

“He taught me other things as well,” she went on. “All about prints and paintings, statues and cathedrals. Porcelain, jewellery; he was immensely cultivated, and had a small collection of art. He would sit beside me with a folder of prints and get me to look at them, describing what I saw, giving my opinions. I was never very good at it; I think he thought me rather weak in that area. But he persisted, and seemed to like being beside me. But, bit by bit, the sort of pictures he showed me changed. He began to show me prints by Boucher, of nudes, and scenes of seduction, and asked me to describe them in the greatest detail. I could hear him breathing more irregularly as I spoke and I didn’t know why. Nothing had ever been said in the orphanage and the maids were all highly respectable and prim. My ignorance was total; all I knew was that a sort of playfulness came on me, and I realised that I could make him sound even more uncomfortable the more I described. His hands on her breasts. The whiteness of the skin. The hair falling down the nape of the neck.

“‘And what do you think it is about?’

“‘I don’t know, sir. But I imagine she is very cold, sitting there in an open field with no clothes on like that. I hope it was painted on a warm summer’s day.’

“‘But do you think she is enjoying it?’

“‘I don’t know, sir.’

“‘But does this please
you
?’

“And he put his hand on my breast and began to stroke it. He was now breathing really hard, and I was frozen in confusion. I did not dislike it, but I knew enough to think I should. So I said nothing at all, but began trembling as his hands moved down my body.

“I gave him no encouragement. I did nothing. I didn’t know what to do. I just sat, rigidly still, as he took my immobility for consent. Then there was a rattle on the doorknob, as one of the maids opened the door to bring in his morning coffee. He pulled his hand away quickly, and stood up. I still had only very little idea of what was going on, but I could see from his behaviour that it shouldn’t be happening. That he was doing something wrong.

“The scene did not repeat itself for a very long time; on the outside, we resumed our normal way, and he was as kind and attentive as ever. But, of course, everything had changed; I had a first glimpse of my power; I knew that I could make him tremble. And I practised. With my eyes, and my gestures, and the way I sat and talked. I learned how to make him uncomfortable. I wasn’t aware of what I was doing; there was no malice in me. But I think I was putting him through the tortures of hell, nevertheless. One evening, when his wife was out at the theatre, he could resist me no more.

“It hurt. It does, you know, and I cried. He was overcome with remorse, and kept stroking my hair and saying how sorry he was, and could I forgive him. I ended up comforting him, and telling him not to worry. It didn’t matter. Then he went and sat on the armchair, far away from me, and looked at me in horror. I must not say anything about this to anyone. It would be our secret. Otherwise I wouldn’t be allowed to come back here and read books anymore.”

“So I became a whore, at the age of fifteen. I would have died rather than give up those books and if that was the necessary payment, it was one I was willing to make. I assured him I wouldn’t say anything, and the tone of panic in my voice made him realise that I meant it. I was totally in his power, and he knew it.

“And that was how my education was completed. Everything went back to the way it was before; I would read, and we would talk. Except that some days, normally in the evening, I could sense a change of tone in his voice, a look in his eye. Was I paying him or was he paying me? It was an exchange. Both had something the other wanted. I did not feel wicked or sinful, although I knew I ought to, and I could not ask anyone else’s opinion. Had any of the other maids known, they would have set me right immediately, I am sure. But they did not. The other thing I learned was how to be absolutely discreet. I knew enough to realise that everything that made life worthwhile depended on it.

“He was, in his way, a good man, Dr. Stauffer, but he was weak. With me he could be the gallant lover, and father, all in one, depending on his mood, and I would play whichever part he required of me.

“I was growing, and learning fast, and I came to despise the Stauffers. I should not have done so; it was not in the play he had written out in his mind. There was no scope for me to grow and to change. But I saw how husband and wife behaved to each other and to the outside world, and learned that this marriage which was so enviable was pretence. It worked well enough, I suppose, but you must remember I had been schooled by novels; Madame Bovary was my best friend; Rastignac my real lover. The barely concealed hatreds that kept the Stauffer marriage together began to excite in me disdain and loathing. I would love, or I would be free. The price for my liberty would be high; the man willing to pay it would be extraordinary. Not like Dr. Stauffer, with his moustache, and fat belly, and smell of cigars, and fumbling grunts as he pawed me.

“But there was also a man called Wichmann, a man I hated more than any man I have ever known. He was sly, mendacious, cruel. A dirty man with a dirty soul. He found out about me and Dr. Stauffer, and set a price for his silence. The price was me, and Dr. Stauffer paid it. I was handed over to him, when he wanted me. For all his failings, Dr. Stauffer was a kindly man; Wichmann was not. He liked to do things, and made me do things, which were horrible. But he taught me, as well; I learned that I could even control a man like that, by doing more than he wanted, and allowing him to do as he pleased. Do you want to hear what I learned to do at his hands? I will tell you, if it pleases you. I will tell you anything you wish to hear.”

I shook my head.

“I think I deserve better than that from you,” I replied reproachfully.

She shook her head.

“You are an unusual man,” she said.

“Perhaps.”

“I couldn’t stand it, eventually. So I brought it all to an end. Not deliberately, not thought out; I didn’t really know what I was doing; but we were caught, and it was my doing. Dr. Stauffer became bolder, and I encouraged him into taking more and more risks. One day his wife was due to go out for a lunch, but I heard it had been cancelled, so she decided to go for a short walk instead, and come back to eat at the house. Dr. Stauffer did not know this, and I goaded him into wanting me. I could do that easily by then.

“So we were surprised, in the grossest way imaginable. His wife came in, stared, and walked out again. She was a kind but fairly stupid woman, given to generosity to orphans, but incapable of understanding adults, or herself. I do not think it ever crossed her mind that her pre occupation with charities and lunches might have left a hole in her husband’s life which he would seek to fill elsewhere. A more sophisticated woman would have had a blazing row and let the matter drop. She would not. She wished to separate, and then I learned that this, for Dr. Stauffer, would be cataclysmic. He had no money of his own; the family fortune was hers, and she intended to make him realise it. I do not know the details; I was, naturally, packing my things. Dr. Stauffer dismissed me within seconds of his wife leaving the room; before I had even managed to pull my dress down. He was going to throw all the blame on me. Wiles of a temptress. Well, of course he was; I couldn’t blame him.

“But it didn’t work; I only gathered approximately what had happened, but I think she was not prepared to take his excuses. She was stupid, but not that stupid. That was all I knew; what happened then was not my concern anymore. I had to leave, and leave quickly. It was obvious that I would never get another position in Lausanne. So I left the city, and left Switzerland.”

“You did not murder Madame Stauffer?”

“How do you know about that?”

She had not mentioned it; Jules had discovered it. She was suspicious now and on the brink of closing up on me.

“How do you know about that?”

“It was not hard,” I said. “And it does not matter. You must tell me everything. Good, bad and shameful. It is not as if I am in a position to judge.”

She looked coolly at me for a few more seconds, then relaxed. “I suppose you’re not,” she said quietly. “Very well. To answer your question, no. I would never have done that. She had been good to me. I meant her no harm at all. Do you believe me?”

I shrugged.

“Listen to the rest of my story and decide. It seems I am to lay myself bare to you, so you might as well know everything.”