The Prize (58 page)

Denise felt the heat high on her cheeks. ‘Cecilia, what
are
you saying?’

‘I think your Claude is playing it fast and loose. I have reason to believe this—’

‘What a terrible thing even to imagine!’

‘Hear me out, Denise. Last Friday night, I was burdened with showing some Americans—friends of friends—life on the Left Bank. We decided to walk a good deal, so that they could see more. I was on my way to show them St.-Germain-des-Près. We were in the rue du Bac, going slowly, chatting. A taxi pulled up across the street, beneath the lamp. I hardly paid attention, until I saw Claude step out of it. He was facing me. He did not see me, but I saw him. He was under the light, and there was no mistake. I almost called out to him—but just then someone else emerged from the taxi. A young lady. I could not see her well, except that she was tall, young, extremely smart in her grooming and clothes. Claude paid the taxi, and it left. He put his arm around the girl’s waist, and kissed her cheek, and they went into the apartment building. I even noted the address—53 rue du Bac. I cannot tell you how upset I was for the remainder of the evening. It was so difficult to believe—Claude, so conservative, and famous now—taking such risks. And then I thought of you, and what I had been through. I tell you, I had quite a weekend trying to reach a decision. Should I tell Denise? Shall I not? Now you know my decision, and you can act as I once acted.’

Denise had sat paralysed with shock and disbelief throughout the recital. She was still unable to find her voice.

‘It was about nine o’clock Friday night,’ Cecilia added. ‘Was he out then?’

With uneasiness, Denise peeled back the days. Nine o’clock Friday night. Callaux’s stag party. No. That was Thursday evening. Nine o’clock Friday night, Friday night. Yes, yes, Pavillon d’Armenonville in the Bois de Boulogne. A late dinner and reunion with a former colleague from Lyon who was doing work in the structure of proteins.

‘Yes, he was out then,’ said Denise, hardly hearing her voice. ‘He—he had a meeting. With a chemical researcher.’

‘Well, we must be fair. Maybe this girl I saw him with was the chemical researcher.’

‘No. His friend is an old man with a beard.’

‘This friend had no beard, I can tell you.’

‘I cannot believe it, Cecilia,’ Denise said brokenly. ‘Claude’s never been like that. We are happy. He—now that he is so well-known—why, there is always loose talk about famous people, that they are adulterers or homosexuals or dope addicts. People have to do that. They cannot stand idols too long. They have to tear the famous ones down to their level.’

Cecilia saw that her friend was distraught, and Cecilia was not offended. ‘Denise,’ she said levelly, ‘this is not secondhand gossip. I was a witness. My own eyes saw it.’

Denise suddenly pushed her chair back. ‘Let us go from here. I want some air.’

They walked, the poodle preceding them, under the arcades of the rue de Rivoli to the rue de Castiglione, and then turned right and walked to the Place Vendôme. Denise remained unseeing, unhearing, totally unaware of the expensive shops, the pedestrians in the streets, or her friend’s monologue about Gaston and the deceit of men in general and the traps of marital life.

In the Place Vendôme, circling towards the Ritz Hotel, Denise felt her legs giving, and knew that she could not continue. She wanted to be alone, in her bedroom, and she wanted to think.

‘I had better get home, Cecilia,’ she said. ‘It is the maid’s day off. I have to make dinner for Claude.’

‘Well, you just remember the man’s name, he’s a marvel,’ said Cecilia.

Denise looked at her without comprehension, ‘What man’s name?’

Cecilia shook her head. ‘You haven’t been listening at all. Poor darling. I do not blame you. I remember how I felt that day. I was trying to tell you that before I had it out with Gaston, I got facts and data, so that he would have no comeback. I located this private detective. Monsieur Jean Sarraut. He is off the
ة
toile in the Boulevard Haussmann. Very discreet and expert. He used to be with the Sûreté Nationale. It is costly, of course. Somewhere about a hundred and fifty new francs a day, as I remember. I hired Monsieur Sarraut for two weeks. The results were a revelation. When I brought out Monsieur Sarraut’s portfolio of reports, Gaston was unable to utter a word. I advise you to hire this man, learn the facts, and then confront Claude. You will win, I assure you. A few years from now, you will thank me.’

They had reached the taxi stand. ‘Cecilia, I cannot hire a detective. I mean, it is all right in the cinema—but Claude—he’s my husband.’

‘You do as I say, or perhaps he won’t be your husband.’

When Denise returned to the apartment, it was cold, and she put on the heat. She was too shaken to cook. For an hour, she moved restlessly around the living-room, searching the recent past for clues to support Cecilia’s fanciful story, and finding some so circumstantial that she had to reject them. At seven o’clock, after changing her clothes, she determined to start dinner. Before she could proceed, the telephone rang, and it was Claude. He was sweet and apologetic. He told her that he had, by chance, run into an old acquaintance from Toulouse University, and the man was doing some remarkable work in a new area of genetics, and it would be valuable to spend the evening with him. Pretending scientific interest, Denise wondered who this man was, and Claude said that he was someone she had never met, a Dr. Lataste. Casually as possible, Denise wondered where they would be dining. They were going directly to the Méditerranée, said Claude, where they had a reservation, and then they would retire to Dr. Lataste’s hotel suite for further talk. With effort, Denise forced herself to ask what hotel, and Claude replied promptly that it was the California in the rue de Berri.

Denise waited one hour, smoking cigarette after cigarette, and then another half-hour to be certain, and then she telephoned the Méditerranée, not at all sure what she would say if Claude was brought to the phone. When someone at the restaurant answered, she inquired if they held a reservation for Dr. Marceau or Dr. Lataste for this evening. She was told there were reservations for neither one. Allowing for a chance of error in the reservation, she requested that Dr. Marceau be paged. She waited. At last, she was informed that no Dr. Marceau was present.

Still, she said to herself, this was not evidence enough. Often she and Claude, at the very last moment, had changed their minds about the restaurant at which they intended to dine. Now she waited another hour, smoking incessantly, and then, with trembling hand, she lifted the receiver and dialed the California Hotel. She asked to be connected with Dr. Lataste’s suite. There was an interminable wait. She listened for the hotel phone to ring the room, tempering her fears. It did not ring. The operator’s voice came on shrilly. There was no person named Dr. Lataste registered in the California Hotel. Denise said thank you dully, and hung up.

Her next act was directnd simple. She took down the telephone book for the eighth
arrondissement
, leafed through it, returned it to its shelf, and then she dialled M. Sarraut, private investigator, and was not surprised to be put through to him even at this hour. She asked for an appointment in his office the following morning, and it was granted.

All of this took place the day and the evening of November eighth. One week later, almost exactly to the hour, on November fifteenth, M. Sarraut telephoned. He said, in his neutral bass, that he possessed the goods she had ordered and wondered if she was free to accept delivery within the next thirty minutes. With thumping heart, she said that she was quite alone this evening and would eagerly await the delivery.

In twenty minutes, the thin manila envelope, securely gummed and sealed, was delivered by a sallow-faced young man, whom Denise tipped 200 old francs. The moment that he was gone, she shut and latched the front door, made her way unsteadily to the coffee-table where her half-finished whisky waited, sat down on the edge of the sofa and ripped open the detective’s envelope. There were three pages of type, neatly single-spaced, terse and ineloquent, yet the raw material of ten thousand novels.

She read, and reread, and reread once more, the pitiless report, rocking silently on the sofa like an old lady suddenly widowed and bereft, until only phrases came up at her like daggers. ‘Shadowed by four operatives in relays . . . on two occasions in six days met and dined with the same young lady at the restaurant, Le Petit Navire, in the rue des Fossés-St.-Bernard, and on both occasions retired later to the young lady’s apartment on the third floor at 53 rue du Bac. . . . The first occasion was November 10. They met inside the restaurant at 7.22P.M. They emerged at 8.47. They walked on the Boulevard St.-Germain for 17 minutes, holding hands. The man in question summoned a public vehicle. They arrived at the rue du Bac at 9.21. They proceeded inside together. The man in question emerged at 11.43 in the evening. He walked to a kiosk, found it closed, and returned to his dwelling by public vehicle. . . .

‘The second occasion was November 12. The man in question arrived at Le Petit Navire at 7.50P.M. The lady arrived eight minutes later. They emerged together at 8.59. They talked in the street. He kissed her. They walked, his arm about her waist, to the corner of the Quai de la Tournelle, where they waited four minutes until they found a public vehicle. They arrived at 53 rue du Bac at 9.16. The door was locked. She rang for the concierge. They waited and embraced. They entered the building at 9.19. The man in question emerged alone at 12.04A.M. Apparently a public vehicle had been summoned by telephone. He waited, and when the vehicle arrived he proceeded directly home. . . .

‘For future reference, our operatives have superficially investigated the young lady in question. . . . Name: Mlle Gisèle Jordan. Birthplace: Rouen. Age: 27. Occupation: Mannequin. Place of Employment: Balenciaga, Avenue George-V near the Alma. Hair colour: Blonde. Height: 5 feet, 7 inches. Weight: 112 pounds. Other dimensions, bust—32 inches; waist—23 inches; hips—34 inches. Marital status. Never married. Miscellaneous: Leaves work daily 5.05, takes bus No. 63 from the Pont de l’Alma, departs bus corner of Boulevard St.-Germain and rue du Bac, arrives home generally 5.25. Has long-term lease on flat subdivided from landlady’s quarters. Rental 580 new francs per month. Apartment consists of living-room, bedroom, one bath, no kitchen. Hot-plate on premises. Décor Louis XV. . . . If client wishes more information on lady in question, it can readily be obtained.’

The threat of these cold facts froze Denise into a state of stupor. It was as if she had suffered concussion of the brain. Until now, she had gone ahead protected by a safe sense of unreality, somehow certain that it was all a low Gallic comedy of errors, and that in the end all would be well in this best of all possible worlds. But here before her, as vitrified as the sperms that she and Claude had worked upon so long, were the facts. The other person was real, young, glamorous, with dimension. The assignations were real, time, place, with sensual intervals implied. A superior enemy named Gisèle. Her own Claude!

Denise’s emotions ran the usual cycle of this unique grief: she was in turn revolted, appalled, horrified, agitated, intimidated. As Denise sat shivering, the cycle had run its course from amazement to mourning to fear. There was not yet self-pity, and so she did not drink. She merely sat in a comatose state, unmoving, unthinking, as stone.

How long she sat, she did not know. Much later, when she realized that the buzzer was sounding, she tried to rally, expecting Claude and preparing defences. Beyond the door, when she opened it, stood an elderly, well-dressed gentleman—she thought he had worn a pince-nez—carrying a bouquet of red roses and a telegram. He was, he said, the Swedish Ambassador to France. He had come, he said, as the bearer of good tidings.

She found sufficient social instinct to allow him into her living-room. She took the telegram and read it, and half heard his profuse congratulations. She remembered little else. The rest would remain a blank to history. Had she replied? Had she offered him a liqueur? Had she shown happiness? All was amnesia. Perhaps he had stayed five minutes. Surely he had mistaken her speechless state for one of ecstasy usually seen in the stigmatic. A proud, kind man, he had disappeared with understanding.