The Yellow Eyes of Crocodiles (8 page)

“How’s it going, Jo? Life still a bowl of cherries?”

The things Marcel says!
she thought.
He must be the only person on earth who still says things like “That’s swell!” or “How ’bout them apples?”

“That would be one way of putting it, Chief.”

He winked at her, went back to his newspaper for a moment, and then, noticing that she was still there, realized he had to make conversation.

“What about your husband? Still up a creek jobwise?”

Joséphine nodded.

“If he can’t find anything, he can always come see me. I’ll find somewhere to put him.”

“That’s sweet of you, Chief, but—”

“He’ll have to tone it down a bit, though. Pretty full of
himself, that husband of yours, isn’t he? You can’t afford to be proud these days. Me, I fought my way out of the gutter, so . . .”

Joséphine had to make an effort not to confess to Marcel that she wasn’t far from the gutter herself.

“But you know what, Jo? If I had to hire a member of the family, I’d hire you. You’re a hard worker. I think your husband is afraid to get his hands dirty. At least that’s how I see it.”

He chuckled.

“It’s not like I’m asking him to be a grease monkey.”

“I know, Chief. I know.”

She patted Marcel’s fleshy forearm and looked at him tenderly, which made him uncomfortable. He nodded, cleared his throat, and dove back into his newspaper.

That’s the way it always is with Marcel
, Joséphine thought.
He’ll talk to me for five minutes, and when he feels he’s done his duty, he moves on. These family gatherings must be a real drag for him. Just like they were for Antoine.

She glanced over at Iris, who was talking to their mother while fiddling with the long earrings she had taken off. Jo noticed that Iris’s toenails and fingernails matched perfectly. As usual, she felt alien to her sister’s relaxed femininity. Iris exuded the ease that comes from having money. Henriette, try as she might to rise to her eldest daughter’s station, would always seem to be striving.
Her hairdo is too tight
, thought Jo,
her lipstick too heavy, her handbag too obvious—and why doesn’t she ever put it down, anyway?

The silence was broken only by Marcel turning the pages of
his paper. He wondered what Josiane was doing. Sprawled on her living room couch, watching one of her beloved sitcoms? Or flat on her back, like an enormous blond crěpe, in the same bed they had been rolling around on this very afternoon? The thought gave Marcel a hard-on, and he had to discreetly cross his legs. At Henriette’s insistence, he was wearing a pair of tight gray pants that wouldn’t hide Mister Johnson’s inopportune resurrection.

“A macaroon to go with your coffee, monsieur?”

Carmen was holding out a plate of chocolate, caramel, and marzipan candies.

“No thanks, Carmen. I’m stuffed to the gills.”

Henriette overheard and stiffened. Why did he have to talk like that? The vulgarity of the man was the cross she had to bear. She let out a deep sigh, rose, and in silent protest walked over to the window where Joséphine was standing.

“Let’s have a little chat,” she said, leading her daughter to a couch at the other end of the living room. Iris was next to them in a flash.

“So, my dear, what are you going to do now?”

“Keep going,” Joséphine said.

“Keep going?” asked Henriette with surprise. “Keep going with what?”

“Well, um, with my life.”

“Really, darling . . .”

When her mother called her “darling,” it meant things were really bad.

“Actually, Mom, it’s none of your business,” Joséphine blurted. “It’s my problem.”

She sounded more aggressive than she intended—or than Henriette was accustomed to.

“That’s no way to speak to your mother!”

“What did you decide to do?” Iris asked in her most soothing voice.

“I’ll manage on my own. And I don’t want to talk about it anymore. Is that all right with everyone?”

Joséphine’s voice was louder, and by the end of her sentence it had risen to a shout, ripping the stuffy atmosphere.

Hm, what’s all the ruckus about?
wondered Marcel, looking up from his paper.
No one ever tells me anything in this family.

“When I was left to raise you alone,” said Henriette, “I rolled up my sleeves, and I worked.”

“But I
am
working, Mom! You always seem to forget that.”

“I don’t call what you do working, dear girl.”

“Just because I do research, and don’t work in an office? Because it doesn’t fit the way you see things? Well, I’m earning a living, whether you like it or not.”

“It’s a pittance!”

“I’d like to know how much you earned when you started out with Chief. I bet it wasn’t much more.”

“Don’t you take that tone with me, Joséphine!”

Marcel sat up, suddenly alert.
Hey, the evening’s finally getting interesting. And with Her Royal Highness, it’ll be balls to the wall. Any second now, she’ll play the poor widow who sacrificed everything for her children.

“It was very hard, that’s true,” said Henriette. “We really had to tighten our belts. But Chief soon saw how talented I was, and we managed to pull through.” Henriette glowed with her astonishing triumph. Bringing up her two girls alone was her Bronze Star, her Legion of Honor. She was Mother Courage.

Marcel went back to his newspaper.
You pulled through because I kept slipping you envelopes stuffed with cash
, he thought, licking his finger to turn the page.
You were as hard-nosed and grasping as any hooker!
But Marcel had already fallen for her, and would have done anything to please her.

Henriette had warmed to her favorite topic.

“My work earned me recognition from one and all, even from Marcel’s competitors. But he wanted to keep me at all costs.”

That’s not the half of it
, thought Marcel.
I wanted to sleep with you so badly I would have paid you a CEO’s salary without your even having to ask for it. What a fool I was! I ate so much shit, chasing you. And now you’re giving sermons! Why don’t you tell your daughter how you led me around by the nose? Speaking of which, I better watch my step with Josiane. I don’t much like this thing with Chaval.

“I’ll do just what you did, Mom. I’ll work. And I’ll manage on my own.”

“You’re not on your own, Joséphine! You have two daughters, in case you’ve forgotten.”

“You don’t have to remind me.”

“Well, you don’t seem very concerned about them, Joséphine. I’ve always thought that you were too naive for today’s world. You’re a poor, defenseless child!”

At that, Joséphine exploded.

“You know what, Mom? You can take those inspiring stories of yours and shove them! Do you really think I believe those tales of the noble widow? Don’t you realize I see through your pathetic maneuvers? You married Chief for his money. If he’d been poor, you wouldn’t have given him the time of day, and we both know it. You always talk to me in that condescending way, as if I were a total failure. I can’t stand your hypocrisy! You were just plying the world’s oldest profession.”

Joséphine turned to Marcel, who was no longer pretending to read. “I’m sorry, Chief. I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings.”

Looking at Marcel’s kind, jowly face, she felt ashamed.

“Not to worry, little Jo. I wasn’t born yesterday.”

Joséphine blushed. “I couldn’t help myself. It just all came out.”

As she said this, her mother collapsed on the sofa, pale with fury and fanning herself dramatically. She was prepared to faint if it would bring the room’s attention back to her.

Joséphine looked at her mother in exasperation. In a moment she would ask for a glass of water, sit up, request a pillow for her back. She was an expert in sowing guilt, waiting until the other person cowered at her feet and begged forgiveness. Joséphine had seen her do it, first with her father and now with her stepfather.

“One more thing, Mom,” she added in a firm voice. “I won’t ask you for anything, not a penny, not a hint of advice. I’m going to make it on my own—just me and the girls.”

Henriette turned her head away, as if the sight of her daughter was too much to bear. Joséphine shrugged and walked out of the
room. Pushing open the door to the living room, she nearly knocked Hortense over. Her daughter had been listening at the keyhole.

“Hortense! What are you doing?”

“That was real smart! I hope you feel better now.”

Joséphine strode past her into a nearby room, hoping to be alone for a few moments to compose herself. It was Philippe’s study. She didn’t see him at first, but she heard his voice. He was standing, partly hidden in the shadows of the heavy, gold-rimmed red curtains, and speaking in a hushed voice into his phone.

“Oh, Philippe, I’m sorry!”

He immediately ended the call, saying, “I’ll call you back.”

“I . . . I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

She felt her forehead getting sweaty, and waited awkwardly for him to invite her to sit down. He observed her for a moment, apparently unsure of what to say. At the slightest intrusion into his private life, Philippe became cold and prickly. And he hated getting involved in Iris’s family matters. He pitied Joséphine, but her almost pathological shyness always made him uncomfortable, and he wanted to get rid of her quickly.

“Tell me, Joséphine, do you speak English?”

“English? Of course! English, Russian, and Spanish.” She coughed, embarrassed to seem boastful.

“I might have a job for you translating business contracts. It’s pretty boring work, but the pay is good. We used to have a person at the firm doing it, but she just left. Russian, you said? Do you speak it well enough to understand the subtleties when it comes to business?”

“Sure. I speak it quite well.”

Philippe remained quiet for a while. Joséphine didn’t dare interrupt his thoughts. He had always intimidated her, and yet, strangely, he’d never seemed as human to her as he did at this moment. His cell phone rang, but he didn’t answer. Joséphine was grateful for that.

“The only thing I’d ask is that you not to mention this to anyone. Absolutely no one. Not your mother, not your sister, not your husband. I want this to stay strictly between us.”

“That’s fine with me. You have no idea how sick and tired I am of justifying myself to people who think I’m just a pushover and a ninny.”

The words
pushover
and
ninny
made her smile, and all the tension fell away. Philippe smiled as well. Those were exactly the words he would have used to describe her, too. He suddenly felt a wave of affection for his awkward sister-in-law.

“I really like you, Jo, and I respect you. Don’t be embarrassed. I think you’re very brave, and you’re a good person.”

“Philippe, stop! I’m going to start crying. I’m kind of fragile right now. If you only knew what I just did . . .”

“I heard Antoine left. Is that true?”

“Yes.”

“These things happen.”

“Yes, they do,” Joséphine said with an ironic grimace. “See? Even in misfortune, I can’t manage to be original.”

They stood there for a moment, quietly smiling at each other. Then Philippe got up and looked at his calendar.

“How about three tomorrow afternoon at my office? Does that work for you?”

“Sure. Thanks, Philippe. Thanks so much.”

He put a finger to his lips to remind her about the secret. She nodded.

In the living room Hortense was perched on Marcel’s lap. She was rubbing his bald scalp and wondering how she could somehow undo her mother’s incredible screwup.

I
t was October, and Joséphine was at the kitchen table, paying bills. School was in session, and she had paid for everything: school supplies, backpacks, gym outfits. She had even paid the insurance, taxes, and maintenance on the apartment.

And I did it all by myself!
She sighed, letting her pencil drop.

The translation work she got from Philippe’s law firm helped, of course. She’d worked hard right through July and August, skipping her vacation and staying in Courbevoie. Her only distraction was watering the plants on the balcony. The white camellia gave her a lot of trouble. As agreed, Antoine took the girls for the month of July, and Iris invited them to her beach house in Deauville for August. Jo took a week off that month and joined them. The girls seemed in great shape: tan, rested, taller. Zoé had won the sand castle contest and was busy taking pictures with her prize, a digital camera.