Night Without Stars (20 page)

The first two were French, a M. and Mme. Lemaître. I'd heard his name in Nice and knew he was on the Conseil Général and had a hand in a good deal of local administration. A close-cropped man of fifty-odd with a serious unhumorous look, and wearing the ribbon of the Legion of Honour. His wife was a tiny little nonentity, round and soft and wrapped in wool. On their heels were Sir Robert and Lady Funchal, whom Claire had run to earth somewhere in Monte Carlo. Sir Robert had just retired from the Diplomatic Service and was thin and grey with a lot of delicate veins at his temples and the sides of his nose. Lady Funchal was nearly as tall as he was and looked like a neglected monument; all the ruins of great beauty were there.

A gap then, and we were all getting going among ourselves and drinking champagne cocktails when another man drifted in. He was about forty-five, tall, wary, and sharp-faced, with thin nostrils. He talked like a Parisian and his name was Deffand. Behind him, but not with him, was a French actress, called Maggie Sorques. “In Nice all through the war, dear Giles,” Claire cooed in my ear, “and collaborated with practically
everyone
.” A fat little author called Henri Cassis came just before nine, and then a French naval officer, a Captain Vigre, who was a prominent Gaullist. The last guests to arrive were Charles Bénat and Alix.

It was the second time in three days I'd had that sort of shock. It begins in the middle and works its way out, to the shoulders, the elbows, the knees, and the joints of the fingers. Then it's gone and everything's moving again.

Alix was wearing a frock of heavy white crepe cut Grecian style with a gold ornament, and the rest of the company suddenly looked drab. Claire sometimes did the introductions casually, but to-night, perhaps knowing Americans like the thing done properly, she was careful to go round.

Both Bénat and Alix had seen me and Alix had changed colour under her make-up; but there was no backing out of the door this time. When they got to me Bénat said:

“Mr. Gordon, of course, we've had the pleasure of meeting before.”

After a minute I was holding Alix's hand for the first time for thirteen months.

“Mme. Delaisse?” I said. “Yes, indeed.”

Something in the way Alix looked made Claire raise her post-impressionist eyebrows. I watched them pass on. I'd just changed into ordinary untinted glasses, but didn't yet think they realised I could see. Anyway, it didn't much matter now. I made no movement towards them and we all chatted amiably until half-past nine, when dinner was served.

I got Mme. Lemaître on one side of me, which wasn't much fun, and Defraud, the Parisian, on the other, there being not enough women to go round. Alix was put right opposite me, between Captain Grabo and Sir Robert Funchal. I stared at her and stared at her.

I knew now why I sometimes caught the glint of her eyes in those first near-blind days. She had those rare eyes which attract the light, and whenever she turned her glance there was a glint from their clear whites. Claire had always been crazy about candles—at least ever since she was old enough to care about looking younger—and to-night there were three silver candelabra down the table. The general talk was partly in English in deference to the American guests— which was hard on Mme. Lemaître, who didn't know a word of it; but I found that Alix knew more than she admitted. The exception was where Bénat talked in an undertone to Maggie Sorques. I noticed Alix look towards him once or twice. Claire had put Lemaître opposite Bénat, but although they must have known each other they hardly exchanged a word.

Alix kept glancing at me and then glancing away with a puzzled frown. Her skin was very fine with a faint tan, her amber-brown hair thick and with a deep sheen. She had a look of frankness and spirit. I'd thought her very young when we first met, but now she looked all of twenty-four, or whatever it was. I wondered if she'd matured a lot this year.

Halfway through the meal talk at the head of the table came round to the increase of violence everywhere. Sir Robert didn't take it seriously: crime always increased after a war, he said, the wonder was the majority of people were still so law-abiding. In five years things would be back to normal—always provided political revolutions didn't occur. Henri Cassis, the little author, had been listening, and he said in a voice just loud enough to carry up the table:

“Is it true there were two people murdered in Nice last night?”

A quiet voice will sometimes shut conversation down, and this did. Most of us looked at Lemaître, who seemed to be directly in the line of fire.

Lemaître said after a minute: “ In the Old Town. An affair of knives, I understand.”

“What was the cause of it?”

Lemaître shrugged his shoulders.

Admiral Carrol said: “ I read some place that the incidence of crime in the Alpes-Maritimes was higher than for the rest of France. That true, monsieur?”

“The difference is negligible, M. l'Amiral. I would say that any department with a land frontier is slightly more susceptible.”

Lady Funchal said in her tired drawing-room voice: “ I suppose this department—French for only a matter of eighty years—has problems specially its own. And the large commingling of Italian blood—that will make it more liable to affrays. Like Corsica, in fact.”

Lemaître said: “I see it differently. People have no faith these days, no courage. What symptoms of lawlessness there are are too widespread to be the problem of one department. The cause is not racial but moral.”

“You mean the Communists?”

“Ah, yes, the Communists,” said Captain Vigre, sitting up.

Lemaître chewed for a bit. “Of course, inevitably in their own way. But Sir Robert, I think, excluded political unrest. For the moment I was doing the same.”

Walter said: “ Well, what's at the bottom of it all?”

Lemaître shrugged again. “I'm sure it's not a subject to thrash out at your dinner-party.”

Charles Bénat sighed. “ We talk of courage. But perhaps M. Lemaître hasn't quite the moral courage to call a spade a spade.”

It was the first time he had joined in any general discussion. Lemaître said stiffly: “ That is as M. Bénat is pleased to think.”

Cassis put down his glass. “I don't see how you can divide the social scene. Political, moral, economic causes: they all inter-relate and overlap. The sources of people's behaviour are always complex when you dig under the surface. It's pleasant to say, this man is a bad citizen because he is a Communist, or because he doesn't go to church or because he hasn't a living wage, but nothing is ever as simple as that.”

“I suppose you'd have us all psychoanalysed,” said Claire, staring interestedly at the tips of her silver-blue fingernails.

Lady Funchal said: “I always think of psychoanalysis as a science which explains everything and solves nothing.”

The conversation was a bit ragged and, except for the spark between Bénat and Lemaître, didn't seem to be getting anywhere. Lady Funchal had a way of flattening things out. Next to me the Parisian Deffand breathed hard through his long, thin nose.

“I have no objection to speaking plainly,” said Lemaître suddenly, as if he had made up his mind about something. “The cause is moral—or social if you will. Its origins no doubt are as wide as M. Cassis insists. But much I lay at the door of the young men of M. Cassis's profession.…”

“At mine, m'sieu?”

“Well … the young writers, the intellectuals, the students, the men who think for their generation, who set the example—men often prominent in the best sense during the war. They were the leaders then, fighting the invader, risking death and torture. Those who died were rightly honoured as heroes. But some of those who lived—where are they now? Many are betraying their country as eagerly as they defended it!”

Bénat said something to Maggie Sorques which made her giggle. There was a minute's pause. Lemaître was getting heated. I think, from her expression, Claire thought of changing the subject, but didn't get it out in time. Alix unexpectedly was ahead of her.

“That's one side of the picture, M. Lemaître.”

“And what is the other side, please, madam?”

She glanced at Bénat with her clear, cool eyes. “Being a woman, I don't know it all. But one can see a little—try to understand. When a soldier comes back home from a war he has to change all his habits—just overnight. Yesterday he was a hero to kill other men. To-day he would be a criminal. That is hard for a time, but there are many other changes to bring his mind back to peaceful ways. So often he comes back and there is no trouble.… The man who has been in a resistance is different. He doesn't come back; he stays just in the same place, and life goes on in the same way around him. His nerves have been at a greater stretch than the soldier, because for him there are no rest times, no leaves—and often for weeks he has worked alone, out of touch with his friends, not knowing if they are dead or have betrayed him. Well, he is in civil life already so he cannot come back to it—but all the laws of his land which it has been good to break are now suddenly no longer good to break. Everything is upside down. It isn't killing; it is the little things. Yesterday it was clever to travel without a ticket, to hoard food, to tear up the tramlines, to print false notes, to lie, to cheat, to steal. To-day it is wrong. And not only have all the good laws come back but all the bad ones and the petty ones as well. Instead of the new world that he wanted to see he finds the old one thrust back on him with all its shabbiness, its frustrations, its betrayals.…” She stopped and looked again rather appealingly at Bénat. “I cannot finish. You go on, Charles.”

Captain Vigre said: “ Yes. Bénat is still a name to conjure with.

Twice captured, seven identity cards, decorated by De Gaulle. Let us hear you speak for your contemporaries, monsieur.”

Bénat moistened his lips with the tip of his tongue. “This isn't the time for speeches. I shouldn't want to be thought of as the Fuhrer of the dinner table.”

There was a laugh.

“No,” said Walter in his gentle drawl. “We'd like to hear what you feel. If you go on too long we can always cry quits.”

“I shall not go on too long because I have nothing to go on about,” said Bénat. “What is M. Lemaître complaining of? He talks of betrayal, but that's a big word. He casts up the shadow of a lion, but I think it's only a mouse.”

“I'm complaining,” said Lemaître, “of just what Mme. Delaisse has spoken of. The revolt has continued. And I differ from her because I'm sure that with any faith or understanding it need not have continued at all. The intellectuals of M. Bénat's generation—seven out of ten of them—are working against France. Many have become Communists, I know. Their aim is the overthrow of liberty as generations of Frenchmen have come to know it. As for the de Gaullists, they claim a better intention, but I wonder sometimes what the end would be—”

“That” said Vigre, “is not the—”

“But to-night I'm speaking specially of a third group. They are the men who are anti-social for shoddy personal ends. They became outlaws under Darnard and Pétain. They remain outlaws under the Fourth Republic. The highly organised black market, the immense illegal currency deals, the smuggling of gold, the manufacture of absinthe, the violence and intimidation where it occurs: these are all the work of educated and intelligent men. One can tell by a sort of conceptual stamp.… Such men would be of untold value in any legitimate sphere.”

“Well said!” muttered Deffand.

“As it is, they are striking at the heart and stability of the country. And some of them, as I say, men with the most
admirable
of war records. They risked everything for France—now they are lining their pockets and living in luxury without caring what the cost will be.”

This time I heard what Bénat whispered to the actress. “ I thought
I
was supposed to be making the speech.”

“And so you shall,” said Lemaître, also hearing. “But at least you can't say now that my complaint is unspecified.”

Another course was served. But there was no chance of the talk being diverted. Everyone was waiting for Bénat.

He dabbed his mouth with his table napkin. Alix was looking a bit upset, and one could tell the argument touched her closely. I didn't like the way she looked at Bénat.

Bénat said: “I haven't been briefed for the defence of my generation, so I can follow no instructions. Anyway, I'm entirely an individualist and couldn't pretend to speak for them.” He looked at Admiral Carrol with narrowed eyes. “Always supposing there is any truth at all in M. Lemaître's accusations, which I of course question, I am going to shift the responsibility elsewhere. First, I'd say that what M. Lemaître mistakes for the failure of a generation is really the symptoms of a graver complaint. In fact, the most fatal of all diseases: old age. Europe has been civilised for centuries; senile dementia is now setting in. People try to disguise it; but the heirs are already quarrelling over the death-bed. America has drawn from its parent most of Europe's one-time faith in human progress. Russia—a half-brother, for its mother was Asiatic—believes in the civilisation of the ant. They are irreconcilable and argumentative. Would you blame our generation for slipping away from the noise and smell of the sick room?”

Captain Vigre tried to say something, but Bénat went on.

“No doubt you blame those who accept the Marxist mystique. But why should you blame the few who have abandoned themselves with courage of the doctrine of despair? Simply because it makes them less satisfactory citizens in a world where an acceptance of citizenship means exploitation? How very good this Veuve Clicquot is, Mr. Winterton. I've not often tasted better.”

“Thanks,” said Walter.

Deffand beside me broke his long silence. “I'm a plain man, not an intellectual,” but he didn't say it apologetically. “ If you'll pardon me, all this seems to be a pretentious way of dressing up what's really only an evasion of common loyalty and common responsibility.”