The Merry Month of May (32 page)

“We no longer have control,” Raymond said apologetically. “It has become completely out of hand.”

I wasn’t angry any longer. Certainly not at small gentle Raymond. “But when you did have control, you still were hiring types like those,” I said. “Tell me, do you not find a philosophical discrepancy in what you students declare are the aims of your Revolution and in the fact that you hire gutter stormtroopers like that to fight for you?”

He smiled ruefully. “Of course it is there. But the police and the Government forced us to it. I could not get out on those barricades and fight like that. I wouldn’t have a chance.”

“You are small, but you are not smaller than those four boys,” I said.

“I am not smaller than half the policemen in uniform, either,” Raymond said. “It is not a question of the size. It is a question of the temperament. Of the mentality. I could not do it.”

“But lots of the students have.”

“Yes, but you do not know that in the fighting, the real fighting, they were fighting always side by side with boys like those four.”

“No, I did not know that,” I said.

“The only answer I can give you is that when we have won, when the Gaullist Government is toppled and replaced by a truly Socialist Government, we will try to rectify all the bad things we had to do to achieve it.”

“Yes,” I said. “And the Government says that, too.”

“I know it,” Raymond said, “I know they do. But it is the only honest answer I can give you.”

“And you really think you can overturn de Gaulle?”

“That is why we are out here,” Raymond said.

“You see?” Weintraub said to me.

We were still standing near the corner of St.-Germain. Behind us a spluttering, chattering noise started up, loud even in all that noise. We turned around to look. A crowd of people had gathered around one of the huge old flowering trees. It was impossible to see what was going on and we walked back up to look. Two young men had attacked the big old tree with gasoline-driven chain saws. They looked absolutely hysterical. As the saws cut through the tree, the crowd around moved fast suddenly, to get out of the way.

“We better get back,” Weintraub shouted to us.

We backed off further up the Boulevard, watching. There was a warning shout, and the great tree came down into the Boulevard, where a group of students had cleared a space for it and were holding hands to hold back the crowd. I looked at Raymond and he shrugged sorrowfully.

“I guess I have seen enough,” I said. “Let’s go back to Odéon.” Further up the Boulevard on our way to rue Racine two other youths with big double-bitted woodsmen’s axes were attacking another of the big trees.

“It will take a long time for your Government to rectify that,” I said as we turned into Racine, “don’t you think?”

“I hate to see it as much as you do,” Raymond said. “Believe me, if I were giving the orders, I would not give such an order, or allow it. But now, now nobody is giving orders. It is completely out of hand.”

“I do not think you can win,” I said bluntly. “De Gaulle is tough. And the people will get tired of the discomfort and the misery. The workers will take what they can get from the Patronat and give up and go back to work. And they will be worse off than before, even with their pay raises. Because what your Revolution is doing to those trees along the Boulevard, it is also doing to the national economy of France.”

“At least we will have made an impression,” Raymond said. “Our existence will be proved.”

At the corner of rue Monsieur-le-Prince I left them and cut back up toward the top of the Boulevard and rue Soufflot. I could not stand the thought of going back to the Odéon with them, or even without them. The narrow old street was filled with a visible thick mist of tear gas that made my eyes smart badly. I had to pick my way over the remains of barricades and debris, and around the weirdly dressed student fighters who moved along it. At the top of the Boulevard at Place Edmond Rostand where the crowds ceased I stopped just once and looked down the strife-torn Boul’ Mich’, then went on home by Cardinal Lemoine feeling very very down.

Saturday things were much quieter. The students were trying hard to get back control and all their unions issued orders against rioting in the Quartier. The next day Sunday things were even quieter, but they always were on the Sundays. The three-way negotiations between the Government, labor and management had begun and went on through the weekend. On Monday Harry Gallagher came home from Cannes.

17

T
HE REASON
H
ARRY CAME BACK
on Monday was because there was to be a huge joint parade of students and workers Monday evening, followed by a mass meeting at the Charléty Stadium in the south part of Paris.

This meeting had been announced on Friday and had received government permission. Harry was a big member of the main committee of the Film Directors and Writers Union, which would be taking part, and he felt he had to be present for the parade and meeting. Otherwise, he told me later, he might not ever have come back.

I did not see Harry on the Monday. He was not at the nightly gathering of Americans at his place because he was out all afternoon helping organize, and lead, the Directors and Writers Union part of the parade, which even as we met at the Gallaghers’ apartment was already going on. Louisa told me he rushed in just long enough to shower, shave and change clothes before rushing off to his committee. Louisa did not appear to know anything about Cannes.

So Harry was not at our nightly meeting of Americans. Neither was Samantha, about whom and whose whereabouts I knew nothing at all.

But good old Weintraub was there. He had not missed an evening since Harry and Samantha had left for Cannes.

As soon as I got a chance I got him off in a corner.

“Harry’s back,” I said quietly. “Have you heard anything from Sam?”

“He is?” Weintraub seemed surprised.

“Louisa told me,” I said impatiently. “He came back because of the parade and meeting tonight. That’s why he’s not here. But what about Sam?”

“I haven’t heard a word from her,” Weintraub said. “Maybe she’s still in Cannes?”

“Could she have gone from there to Italy?”

“She could have,” he said. “With Harry’s money.” He had that pained, battered look on his face again. “If she hired a car to take her to San Remo, she could catch a train there to take her to Rome and fly from Rome to Israel.”

I felt a sudden great rush of relief. “Maybe that’s what she did.”

“Could be,” Weintraub said. “Well,” he said and suddenly turned away from me. “Well, well.” Then he turned back. “Anyway, I was over at the Odéon most of the afternoon, and she didn’t show up there. Nor has she tried to contact me at my pad.”

The Odéon, I thought. “Did you see Hill while you were there?” I asked.

“Hill? Yeah. Yeah, he was there.”

“How was he?”

“All right. Morose. Beat down, maybe. But he seemed okay.” He sighed. “Maybe he’ll pull out of it.”

“Maybe he will,” I said. “Tell me, how long did Hill know Sam?”

“Hill? About a week, I guess. I don’t
really
know if she was screwing anybody else but him. And occasionally me. I suppose she was.”

“That’s an awfully short time to get rid of all those so firmly ingrained philosophies of his about free love,” I said.

“Yeah,” Weintraub said in a dulled voice. “Well, women can do that to you, I guess.”

Before I could say anything else Louisa came toward us from across the room.

“What have you two got your heads together about?” she said.

“We were talking about Dave’s girl,” I said, truthfully enough.

“Oh. That beautiful little colored girl?” Louisa smiled. “I’ve been wondering what had happened to her.”

“She seems to have disappeared,” I said.

“Oh! That’s bad luck for you, Dave,” she said.

“Yeah,” Weintraub said, equally truthfully. “It sure is.”

“Let’s all go and have another drink,” I suggested. At the bar I patted Weintraub on the back, somehow unaccountably moved by his mood. Normally he was such a buffoon. But now even that shell had broken. And what was inside, a lonely man, shown through. I told him I would see him at the Odéon later.

Later, after the others had left, I had dinner with Louisa and Ferenc, who was going over to the lady painter’s apartment near Maubert after dinner. It was a gay dinner. Ferenc was always an amusing and funny conversationalist. He had Louisa and me laughing much of the time.

Weintraub did not show up at the Odéon on that Monday night of the 27th. I stayed there until four
A.M.
waiting for him. Hill was there though, moping around, but he would hardly talk to me. He had it really bad.

Most of the kids were jubilant. The parade and the meeting at the Charléty Stadium had resulted in a resounding “No!” to de Gaulle and the Government’s proposals of wage raises. They—the students; and lots of the younger workers—were out for a serious, complete Revolution. They wanted to bring down the de Gaulle Government and replace it with a “Socialist” one, though I don’t think they knew what they meant by that. I could not honestly see, personally, how any of them could have run any God damned Government.

But then, when I finally left Odéon, I ran into Weintraub, entirely by accident. He was sitting all alone at an outdoor table of an all-night café across the square, looking bemused, and I happened to pass by.

“Hey, Weintraub!” I called and went over and sat down with him. “What the hell happened to
you?
You were supposed to meet me at the Committee office.”

“I’m sorry about that,” he said, a sort of dreamy look all over his face. Then, as he really became aware of me, I watched it change to that depressed, pained, battered expression I had begun to get used to.

“Sit down, Hartley,” he said, though I already was sitting. “Samantha is back, all right.”

“You saw her?”

“Did I ever,” Weintraub said. “Did I ever. And her little French friend.”

“You mean you—” I began. I did not know quite how to say it. “You mean you did them?”

“Did I not,” he said. “Did I not. Did I ever.”

I decided to shut up and just listen. After his frugal dinner on his hotplate in his room, he had gone around to Castel’s, just to look in, and maybe have one drink if somebody offered, before coming to Odéon. And who should be sitting in the ground floor bar totally at home? Sam and her little friend. Castel had presented her with another bottle. Dave sat down with them and had a drink. He was full of questions. He wanted to know everything, and Sam told him. Yes, she had come back with Harry from Cannes. Yes, she was staying in a hotel. Yes, Harry was paying. Yes, he had given or would give her the money to get to Israel. Yes, she was looking into the possibility of flying out from Paris. It was possible, she thought. She knew some people who might help. No, her little friend was not going with her. What in the name of God would I do in Israel? the friend interjected in French. But why had she come back to Paris? Dave wanted to know, when she could have taken a car direct to San Remo from Cannes? Well, she hadn’t thought of that really, that was the truth, and she did not quite feel like leaving Paris yet. She did not know why. Yes, Harry was very
sympathique, très sympathique,
one of her kind. She had known it from the moment she first shook hands with him. No, she didn’t hate to leave him at all. They were not in love. They just understood each other, and what was fun. The hotel she was staying at was on the Île, on Île St.-Louis.

“Jesus Christ,” I said in a low breath. That fact bothered me more than any of the rest of it.

It was one of those small hotels on the rue St.-Louis-en-l’Île, Dave said. I was sure I knew the one.

“Yeah,” he said. Well anyway he had asked her why she wasn’t with Harry tonight, and she had laughed. Harry was out doing his thing with the God damned Revolution. Well, if that was Harry’s bag, let him climb into it. She was not about to go and sit in some smelly stadium with a bunch of students and workers who might flip out into a crazy mob at any moment. So she, and her little friend, had come here. No, there was no commitment between her and Harry. They were both free agents. Harry had paid, and paid elegantly, for the fun and she had delivered. That was it. Then she smiled at Dave. Why didn’t they all three go over to Dave’s place? she had asked. For old time’s sake. Why not? Dave answered quickly. He was ready and willing, more than. Such a windfall. Did he have any booze in the joint? Well no, he was a little short, a little short on booze, at the moment. But he could sure as hell get some, somewhere. Never mind, was the answer, she had money. She would pay. She didn’t like booze, but her little friend did and it turned her on. They would pick up a bottle on the way. So the three of them had gone to his place. That had been around eleven or eleven-thirty. The two girls had only just left about half an hour ago. Such a windfall. Weintraub peered at me with that dreamy look in the half light of the outdoor café.

“I really didn’t feel much like coming up to the Odéon,” he said huskily.

He was really so simpleminded about it. I could not somehow feel shocked at his going to bed with two girls who liked to have a man in the act when they went to bed together. It was just something I did not understand. I knew I ought to be shocked about it. But he was so simple and happy about it, like a child. Maybe Harry felt the same way? But Harry was not the same case as Dave. Weintraub didn’t have a wife who loved him, and two kids. It was not the same at all.

“Oh,” Weintraub said dreamily. “Incidentally. She asked me if I had ever been up to Harry’s studio up under the roof. Said it was a lovely pad. I’ve never been up there. Have you?”

“She said what!” I exclaimed.

“Just that,” he said. “Apparently she, they, were up there in the afternoon.”

“Great God!” I said. “He must be out of his mind to do something like that!”

“Yeah,” Weintraub sighed, “I guess he’s hooked, all right.” The battered look came back over his face. “Christ, I wish I had some of his money.”