Of Time and the River (139 page)

“Ah, oui!” La Marquise broke in, with a vigorous nod of satisfaction, after a brief inspection of him. “C’est trčs évident! Il est intelligent! Bon!” she said decisively, and turned to him with the air of a person whose mind is made up and whose course of action determined—“Now, monsieur,” she said, “I tell you vat I have in mind. I have beeg ‘ospital—non?” she said, smiling a little at his puzzled look. “I am—vat you call it?—le présiDENT—le directeur, n’est-ce pas?—of beeg ‘ospital in de Nort’—ve have zere ze soldats, n’est-ce pas—ze oh so many blessés—les pauvres!” she said in a tone of pity—“les mutilés de la guerre. . . . Ve have old building—eet ees no good, eet ees not beeg enough—not MODERNE—and so,” she added simply, “ve build anozzer—beeg, moderne—and”—the conclusion of the matter—“ve need monnee.” She was silent for a moment, beaming hopefully at him. “Monsieur,” she said presently, in an ingratiating tone, and with an air of naďve confidence that was astounding—“I s’ink ven I tell you vat ve need—‘ow much monnee,” her voice sank craftily, “you vill get for us—eh?”

He stared at her for a moment with a bewildered face, unable to reply.

“But how,” he stammered at length—“how do you think—what do you think I can do?” he said bluntly.

“Ah!” La Marquise cried triumphantly. “C’est facile!” Again her voice became low, confiding, crafty. “You are a journalist—eh? You write for ze grand journal américain—ze New York Times— yes? . . . Vell, I tell you vat to say,” she went on placidly. “You write ze article for ze Times—you spick of zis beeg ‘ospiTAL— you tell of ze grand vork of restauration—you tell of ze poor soldats—les blessés—les mutilés—you say La France have nozzing— zey have no monnee—ze poor pipples ‘ave lose everys’ink—you say, ve ‘ave so motch—ze rich Américains—ve must not let zis great vork die—ve must help ze poor soldats—ve must give ze monnee for ze ‘ospital. . . . You see—I show you,” she cried with a confident chuckle—“if you like I write eet out myself—and zen all you have to do is meck—vat do you say?—la traduction.”

“How—how much do you want?”

“Un million de francs,” she said, dismissing this bagatelle airily. “—For ze Américains vat ees dat? Pouf! Nozzing! Mais pour les Français—ah!” she said sadly, “for ze French eet ees too motch. Un millionaire américain—he see your story—he say, ‘Ve cannot let zis grand vork die’—he write vun cheque out for ze whole amount— and zen,” her smile of satisfaction deepened, “he send to me, eh?— He meck out cheque to Marquise—he never miss eet—and he send to me.” For a moment she was silent, smiling triumphantly at him. When she spoke again, she bent towards him, her voice became low, confiding, craftily conspiratorial—“And I tell you vat I do. . . . You write ze piece and get for me ze monnee . . . and I give you a fourt’—twanty-five per cent—non?”

In a moment, as he continued to stare at her with an expression of gape-mouthed astonishment, she straightened, with an air of satisfied finality, nodded her head, and then said with businesslike decision:

“Bon. Eet ees settled zen.” She rose decisively from the table, and her guests followed her—“You come vit me,” she said, as she led the way out of the dining-room, “and I give you—vat you say?— ze fects.”

She was already gone, before he could blurt out a few words of bewildered protest; the Countess was at his side, prodding him sharply with a skinny finger and muttering in a tone of reproachful entreaty:

“Go on, my dear! Go on! And you should ask more questions! Don’t sit there saying nothing. It will make a good impression. And use your little book more often,” the Countess whispered cunningly. “You should write more in it when she speaks to you.”

“Now you see here,” he burst out furiously, “I’m not going to write down anything. I’m tired of this foolishness—I’m not going to be a party any longer to your damned schemes or for this woman’s either. I’m going to tell her once and for all that I’ll write no article—not for The Times nor any place else!”

“Oh, my boy,” the old woman whispered imploringly. “You wouldn’t do that! Please don’t say a thing like that, I beg of you! . . . Think what it means to me,” she whispered—“I am so poor, so miserable—for years I have waited for an opportunity to see this woman—it means so much to me, so little to you. Please be polite, my dear—it’s only for a little time. You’ll be going soon. What can it matter to you? She has her schemes like everybody else . . . keep silent if you feel you must, but be polite to her, for God’s sake; pretend to listen—don’t ruin everything for me now.”

“All right,” he muttered grimly. “I’ll listen, but I’m damned if I’ll write anything down in the little book.”

When they returned to the salon La Marquise had provided herself with various letters, folders, and descriptive circulars about the institution for which she was now soliciting aid. They seated themselves around the fire again, with coffee and liqueurs; by the time La Marquise had finished the description of her hospital project, the grey light of the brief wintry afternoon was fading rapidly, and the time for their departure had approached.

Before they left she took them on a brief tour of inspection of the château, showing them the portraits of her ancestors, the great room with the huge, gold-canopied bed where King Henri IV had slept, on one of his visits to the château—unoccupied since, now closed save for museum visits such as this.

Their last visit, before departure, was to the library: it was a pleasant, warm-looking room adjacent to the grand salon, and had the appearance of being seldom used. La Marquise smiled at the eager curiosity with which the young man looked over the storeyed rows of books, the costly elegance and rich colour of their bindings.

“You like to reat, eh?”

He told her that he did. She smiled, and said indifferently:

“I do not like so motch. It bore me ven I reat so long.”

He asked her a few questions about some of the modern French writers—Proust, Gide, Romains, and Cocteau, among others, for a moment her face was hardened by the arrogant look it had worn when he had asked her about the government, and she said rather impatiently:

“I know nozzing about zose pipple. Yes, I have heard of some of zem. But I never reat zem. Zere is no good writing in France any more. Ze latest s’ing I have here,”—she nodded towards the shelves of books—“is Paul Bourget. But I never reat him, eizer.”

In a few moments they had said farewell and were being driven away from the château. Rain had begun to fall again, the dull, grey light was almost gone and, since there was no convenient train, La Marquise had instructed her driver to take them back to Blois in the car.

During the ride back to town he spoke seldom to the Countess. And she, as if recognizing the impatience, weariness and dislike he had come to feel towards her, the approaching end of their brief and curious relationship, was silent, too. When they got back to the hotel he told her rather curtly he was tired and was going to his room to wash and take a brief rest before dinner.

“But yes, my dear,” she said instantly. “Of course you should. I can see that you are tired. Perhaps,” she added quietly, “I shall see you again when you come down.”

“Of course you will,” he said shortly, almost angrily, in a tone that showed the irritable exasperation which too long association with the woman had now caused him to feel.

“Good-bye my dear. Get some rest now. You need it.”

When he got to his room he took off his coat and shoes, lay down on his bed, and instantly fell asleep. When he awoke he discovered he had slept almost three hours, that it was eight o’clock. Already late for dinner, washing and dressing hastily, he went downstairs to find no one but the proprietor’s wife in the bureau. Even before he could ask her where the Countess was, the woman had smilingly informed him that the old woman had gone, had already taken a train back to Orléans.

“Mais elle vous a remis de trčs affectueux adieux,” the woman said with a smile. “Elle vous a fait des grands compliments.”

And for a moment, when he realized that she was gone, he was conscious of a strange, mixed feeling of pity, loss and regret. He remembered suddenly the curt exasperation of his parting and something lonely, sad, and silent in the eyes of the old woman as she had said good-bye. The old loneliness had closed in around him again, he felt the sense of loss and sorrow that one feels when someone he has known a long time has gone.

BOOK VII

KRONOS AND RHEA: THE DREAM OF TIME

XCVI

Play us a tune on an unbroken spinet, and let the bells ring, let the bells ring! Play music now: play us a tune on an unbroken spinet. Do not make echoes of forgotten tune, do not strike music from old broken keys, do not make ghosts with faded tinklings on the yellowed board; but play us a tune on an unbroken spinet, play lively music when the instrument was new, let us see Mozart playing in the parlour, and let us hear the sound of the ladies’ voices. But more than that; waken the turmoil of forgotten streets, let us hear their sounds again unmuted, and unchanged by time, throw the light of Wednesday morning on the Third Crusade, and let us see Athens on an average day. Let us hear the sound of the voices of the Greeks, and observe closely if they were all wise and beautiful at ten o’clock in the morning; let us see if their limbs were all perfect, and their gestures grave and stately, also let us smell their food and observe them eating, and hear, if only once, the sound of a wheel in a street, the texture of just four forgotten moments.

Give us the sounds of Egypt on a certain day; let us hear the voice of King Menkaura and some of the words of the Lady Sennuwy; also the voices of the cotton-farmers. Let us hear the vast and casual sound of life, in these old peoples: their greetings in the street, the voices of the housewives and the merchants. And let us hear the laughter of a woman in the sixteenth century.

The cry of the wolf would always be the same; the sound of the wheel will always be the same; and the hoof of the horse on the roads of every time will be the same. But play us a tune on an unbroken spinet; and let us hear the voices of the knights at dinner. The cry of a man to his dog, and the barking of the dog; the call of the plough-driver to his horse, and the sound of the horse; the noise of the hunt, and the sound of the flowing water, will always be the same.

By the waters of life, by time, by time, play us a tune on an unbroken spinet, and let us hear the actual voices of old fairs; let us move backward through our memories, and through the memory of the race, let us relive the million forgotten moments of our lives, and let us see poor people sitting in their rooms in 1597, and let us see the rich man standing with his back before the fire, in the Middle Ages, and his wife knitting by the table, and let us hear their casual words.

Let us see the men who built the houses of Old Frankfort; let us see how they worked, and let us see them sitting on hewn timbers when they ate their lunches; let us hear their words, the sound of their voices. Unwind the fabric of lost time out of our entrails, repair the million little threads of actual circumstance until the seconds grow grey, bright and dusty with the living light, and we see the plain unfabled faces of the people; let us awake, and hear the people in the streets, and see Tobias Smollett pass our window.

Then, play us a tune on the unbroken spinet, let time be as the road to London and we a traveller on it; and let us enter London and find out what year it is there in the Mile End Road; let it be dark, and let us enter London in the dark, and hear men’s voices, and let us see if we could understand them; and let us then find out what year it is, a lodging for the night, and see if they read mystery on us, or would fly away from us.

But there are times that are stranger yet, there are times that are stranger than the young knights and the horses, and the sounds of the eating taverns. The far time is the time of yesterday: it is the time of early America, it is the voices of the people on Broadway in 1841, it is the sounds of the streets in Des Moines in 1887, it is the engines of the early trains at Baltimore in 1853, it is the faces and voices of the early American people, who are lapped up in the wilderness, who are hid from us, whose faces are in mystery, whose lives are more dark and strange than the lives of the Saxon thanes.

The time that is lovely is the time of the fatness and of the bright colours; it is the elfin time of the calendars, and the sad and mysterious time of the early photographs. It is the time of the early lithographs, it is the time when the word was green and red and yellow. It is the time of the red barn and the windmill, and the house of the seven thousand gables; it is the time of the green lawn and the blue sky and the white excursion-steamer in the river, and the flags, the streamers, and gay brown-and-white buntings, the brass bands and the tumult of all the people who cry out Hurray, hurray!

It is the time of the boy rolling his hoop down the pink path, and of Mama in a bonnet and with a muff, and a stuck-out bottom, and Papa with a derby; it is the time of peace and plenty and the fair stripes of colour, and the iron stag. It is the time of the lightning-rod salesman and the summer boarder, it is the time of Farmer Hayseed and of Dusty Rhodes the tramp, it is the time when boys started on the downward path through cigarettes; it is a lovely time. It is the time of the lures and snares of the wicked city and of the Great White Way; it is the time of pitfalls that await the innocent country girl with a whaleboned collar and a small waist; it is the time of Palaces of Sin or the Devil on Sunday; it is the time of the Tenderloin, of the nests of vice; it is the time of the gilded resorts with mirrors and soft carpets, where the mechanical piano played and you bought champagne, and of the High Class places and the Madam who would not stand for any ungentlemanly behaviour, the time of the girls who wore evening dresses and were Perfect Ladies.

It is the time of the opera and theatre parties, and the Horse Show, and of late jolly suppers in the walnut dining-rooms; it is the time of elegant ladies with long gloves on naked arms, and Welsh rarebit in the chafing-dish; it is the time of the Four Hundred, and the great names of the millionaires—the Vanderbilts, the Astors, and the Goulds—it is the time of the powdered flunkeys and the twenty-dollar favours; it is the time of Newport, and the canopied red-carpeted sidewalks, and the great mansions on Fifth Avenue, and the splendid gilt and plush marble halls, and the time of the fortune-hunting foreign noblemen (London papers please copy).