Girl at the Lion D'Or (30 page)

‘Oh, working.’ He moved about the room, trailing his hand along the marble tops. ‘And you?’

‘Me? You know what I do.’

He looked at her. A button on her shirt had come loose and he could see one or two of the dark freckles at the top of her chest. Her hair was caught at the point of tumbling and held back, not quite successfully, from her neck and face. The earlier flush had gone from her cheeks, which were now the colour of milk, though seeming paler against the black of her lashes and the deep brown of her eyes.

Hartmann turned away and rested his elbow on the mantelpiece. He caught his reflection in the looking-glass and at once turned back into the room, this time gazing towards the window.

He heard Anne’s tread behind him and felt her lips against his ear.

‘How long is Christine away?’

He swallowed, his throat constricted by desire. ‘Three days.’

‘And there’s no one else here?’

He could feel the touch of her hair against his face and her breasts pressing against the crook of his arm. He shook his head.

‘I want to . . . ’ she began, then stopped. She didn’t know the right words. She wanted him to make love to her and make her life whole again, but how was she to say that?

She tried. ‘If you like . . . you can . . .’

While she gave way to the justness of instinct, Hartmann fought against it with all the strength of will and intellect he had.

He felt her hand tugging gently at his sleeve and he turned at last to face her. ‘Anne . . . oh, Anne.’ With a moan, he lowered his face to her shoulder and kissed the skin at the base of her neck, inhaling the smell of her and feeling the softness of her hair trail across his cheek.

She clung to him, frightened by his response.

He pushed her away. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Not now, not ever again.’

She looked at him, feeling a sudden panic. She hadn’t meant to precipitate anything so final.

His voice shook. ‘There’s nothing I want more in the world. Nothing at all. I don’t mind not having children, I don’t mind living forever with a woman I barely love, I don’t mind if I die in the coming war – anything if I could continue to make love to you.’

‘I . . . . I don’t understand.’

‘I don’t understand myself.’ Hartmann placed both hands on top of his head, as if to hold it together. ‘But I know one thing for certain – that if we were to continue it would cause more unhappiness. I believe that with all my heart, and that is my reason for saying no.’

Anne watched aghast.

‘Good God, I must be mad,’ he said, striding over to the window. ‘But I know, I know.’

Even in her state of shock Anne saw clearly that Hartmann was on the verge of making some terrible decision. There was only a moment for her to plead her case, and she had had no rehearsal. All her life she felt she had suffered from the effects of something over which she had no control, but here, if only for a few seconds, she had the chance to influence her own destiny.

‘How can you be so sure?’ she said. ‘I wouldn’t mind if you stayed here with Christine . . . I wouldn’t ask for anything. It’s just that I can’t . . . I can’t live my life any more without you.’

He turned around from the window and she threw herself towards him. As he took her in his arms she felt something neutral in his embrace as if it had become that of a protector, not a lover, and she realised with a rush that something she had thought a few moments before was imperishable was now lost.

‘My darling girl,’ he murmured, as he stroked her hair. He felt like a conductor of pain.

She pulled back from him. ‘You mustn’t leave me, you mustn’t. You can’t imagine how much . . . Oh God, how can I tell you what you’ve meant to me? You seemed so perfect in everything you did. And I was so frightened of making a fool of myself. You were the most perfect man I’d ever met. I thought you were flawless. So kind, so clever, so handsome. I – oh, but you must have
known
 . . .’

‘You’re wrong. I’m none of those things. I’ve no illusions about myself and that’s why I know you’d be better off without me.’

He sounded cold and disgusted with himself. Anne hated the deadness of his tone: it was as if there were some stranger within him. ‘But you are, you are,’ she said, looking up into his face. ‘You’re kind, the kindest person I’ve ever met. You’re tolerant, and you don’t care if people are servants or whatever. And you’re so clever – well, I think so, I think you’re brilliant. And everything you do is so right, so perfect.’

‘Oh yes. Perfect.’ Hartmann laughed. ‘I’m sorry, Anne. Oh God, I’m so sorry.’

She saw that he was using self-disgust to harden his resolve and that in this mood he might reject her not just in that instant but for all time. The panic this instilled made her begin to sob. She fought against the tears, thinking she would less easily be able to explain if she were incoherent; but she was overcome.

‘Oh God,’ she wailed, ‘this is worse than anything, worse than anything I’ve ever known.’

She began to tremble through the length of her body. ‘I can’t bear it,’ she sobbed. ‘I can’t bear it happening again. No, oh God,
no
!’

Hartmann said nothing. She sat down at the table and laid her face on her arms. The words that came out were muffled, and punctuated by wails. Suddenly she swung round, pushing back the chair and collapsed to her knees. She clung to Hartmann’s legs, speechless with sobbing.

He lifted her up and once more took her in his arms. She grew calmer for a moment and he said, ‘I will think of you every day for the rest of my life.’

‘I don’t want you to . . .’ she sobbed, ‘
think
of me. I want you to . . .
be
with – oh,’ and the words died away in another convulsion.

Hartmann began to guide her out into the hall. When she looked up and thought she might never see these walls again, she imagined for a moment that she loved the house as much as she loved him.

She felt herself being propelled towards the door, and screamed. ‘You can’t do this to me, you can’t
do
this!’ Her resolution faltered. ‘You couldn’t . . . Oh please, oh my darling please . . .’

Hartmann’s face was ugly with the effort of self-control. Anne hated the sight of it; she wanted that gentle humour back; she wanted back his strength which was to have redeemed her life.

He said, ‘You must go.’

‘
No!
’ She began to scream again. ‘I won’t go. You’re going to kill me, you’re a murderer. Oh my darling, oh my love, don’t make me, please, please . . .’

She was on her knees again. As he took her by the elbows to lift her to her feet she propelled herself once more into his arms.

He slapped her face hard and shouted at her. ‘You must go at once. Go
now!
’

Stunned, she fell silent and stopped crying.

Hartmann shouted at her again. ‘Get out of here at once. Go
now!
’

To her disbelief, Anne felt her fingers on the handle of the door, found that it turned under her pressure. She took a pace outside and then, struck by what she had done, stopped and looked back. She saw him. He was so beautiful to her eyes, but she heard him shout again, and found that she had begun to walk away.

He turned and flung his arms around a wooden pillar in the hall, sobbing tearlessly.

8

T
HAT NIGHT ANNE
was serving dinner at the Lion d’Or. She told herself, as she asked the diners, ‘Have you chosen?’, ‘What would you like for dessert?’ and all the other questions it was her job to put, that at least this was the last time she would be doing it. She would leave tomorrow. Moving on had worked before: it would work again.

After dinner she went to work for an hour in the bar, which was abnormally busy. The bad weather had kept ashore many of the fishermen from the coastal villages, and some of them had come into town. Anne gave them drinks and took their money with measured politeness, riding the lewd remarks, unaware of her surroundings. One fisherman offered her a drink and she accepted, even though it was strictly against the rules. What did it matter now, anyway? It seemed to have no effect on her, so she drank another, to the delight of the men at the bar.

Mattlin appeared at his usual time and elbowed his way through the press. He smiled at Anne in his abstracted way, suggesting he had better things he should be doing. Anne smiled back as she gave him his drink.

When her shift was ending, Mattlin asked her if she wanted to go with him for a drink. She didn’t but she was stunned by what had happened and befuddled by the three glasses of wine she had already had. It was kind of anyone to want her company, she thought; so she agreed. As she took her coat from a hook behind the bar she cast one last look around the room, at the earnest talkers and drinkers and the one or two foolhardy diners who had tackled Bruno’s dish of the day at the far end of the room where the lamps gave a splashed effect on the brown wallpaper behind them.

Mattlin took her to a bar near the station, the same one she had been to with Hartmann after their weekend away. He ordered a bottle of wine and a waitress lit the candle in their raised wooden stall where no one else could see them. Mattlin smoked and waved his hands around. Anne watched the shapes the glowing end of the cigarette made in the air. She was aware dimly that she was smiling in a vacant way and that Mattlin was becoming increasingly excited. He poured her more wine and she raised the glass again to her lips.

He grinned. ‘You seem very relaxed tonight, Anne.’

‘Oh yes, oh yes. Very relaxed.’

He spoke of a project he was working on and asked her about her work, but she answered only in the briefest sentences, still with the same dazed smile. He ordered another bottle of wine and she, to his delighted surprise, made no resistance when he filled her glass again. When he had taken her to a café or a bar before she had never drunk more than one glass.

He saw her put her head forward into her hands and took her by the wrist. ‘Would you like to go now?’ he said.

Anne nodded, and as she tried to extricate herself from the stall, she stumbled. Mattlin caught her arm and stopped her from falling.

‘Shall I walk you home?’

She nodded, and he took her arm, guiding her along the back streets towards the church.

At the street door in the rue des Acacias, Anne fumbled for her key and Mattlin opened the lock for her. He guided her across the courtyard and to the narrow black door. He said, ‘I’d better help you upstairs,’ and she made no protest.

She said, ‘I want to sleep,’ and moved over the polished wooden hallway towards the bedroom. Mattlin followed and took her in his arms. She wanted to cry, but no tears came, so she clung to him. He was someone; she was not alone.

He pressed his face into hers and parted her lips with his tongue. She pulled her head away, but she did not let go of his arms because she didn’t want to be on her own.

He began to run his hands over her body, squeezing her breasts, then pushing her towards the bed. She was overtaken by a fatigue so complete that even her will to resist was affected.

Again she felt his tongue, huge and hard, sticking into the corners of her mouth, crushing her own fluttering and retreating tongue with its muscular probing. She felt his weight on top of her and his right shoulder jarred into her chin as he tore off his jacket. His breath seemed to blow hotly through her head; so close were his lips that his whisper sounded like a shout and when he began to tell her the things he was doing and what further things he intended to do, it sounded like a threat.

He lifted himself from her to kneel on the bed and fumble with the buttons on his trousers. The sight of his urgency filled her only with indifference. When she felt him inside her she was reminded for an instant of the night at Merlaut when she had experienced this frightening but wonderful sensation for the first time. Then she had felt transfixed and defenceless but also powerful and renewed. Now she felt, more than anything else, exhausted.

Although she heard Mattlin grunting with the effort of self-restraint, it didn’t take him long to finish. He eased himself off her and felt in his abandoned jacket pocket for a cigarette. He lay back puffing the smoke to the ceiling.

‘I hope that was all right,’ he said.

Anne rolled over on her side and closed her eyes.

When he had finished his cigarette, he took her elbow and tried to rouse her. Anne, half-asleep, feigned deeper sleep. He spoke to her kindly and asked if he could fetch her anything. He sounded anxious when she didn’t reply.

He stumbled about the room, picking up pieces of discarded clothing. When he was dressed again he leaned over the bed and listened to her breathing with his ear against her face. He kissed her on the forehead.

She heard his footsteps going down the stairs and echoing as he crossed the courtyard. Without undressing or opening her eyes, she pulled the covers over her.

9

E
ARLIER IN THE
evening Christine had telephoned to say she would be back the next day. She and Marie-Thérèse had quarrelled, though Christine didn’t sound too upset. Hartmann said he would tell Marie to prepare lunch for two.

He couldn’t eat the dinner she had left him, but took a bottle of wine into his study where he tried to read. The sentences seemed to sit meaninglessly in front of his eyes, however many times he looked at them. He walked around the room and sorted out some papers into different files, but there was nothing really left to do. He had prepared all he needed for the insurance case arising from the negligence at the marsh reclamation works and none of the other cases he was working on needed attention. Marie came to ask him if there was anything else he wanted, and he told her she could go to bed.

He thought of driving into town for a drink at one of the small bars up by the station, but since he didn’t want to talk to anyone it seemed pointless. Normally he liked being on his own, but on this occasion he found his thoughts exhausting company. For minutes at a time he was quite calm, and then it was as if a sluice had been opened and his mind was filled again with anguish. He didn’t know if it was his own or someone else’s.