The Bachelors (12 page)

It was astonishing to hear the baron reciting this eulogy of manual labour — or rather not so astonishing, since the
sacred
character of manual labour is a specifically bourgeois invention. M. Octave's speech was interrupted by Léon who, always passionately devoted to his uncle and longing to do him a favour, both in order to oblige him and in order not to be continually at the receiving end, pounced on the detail about cleaning clothes and gave his uncle the name of a stain-remover far superior to anything else of the kind, a name which M. Octave made a note of, out of politeness, even checking the spelling, although he had made up his mind never to buy this product, which was doubly suspect because it was not he, M. de Coëtquidan, who had discovered it, and because it was Léon who recommended it.

In this connexion, Léon gave free rein to his 'bachelor' spirit with a string of domestic anecdotes in which the name Mélanie cropped up at every turn, as a normal man has an itch to bring the name of his mistress into everything he says, however dangerous it may be. According to whether the conversation revolved round him or a subject that had nothing to do with him, the baron's face alternately lit up or clouded over, as the sun alternately appears and disappears in a sky that is clear but dotted with small clouds. Léon, on the other hand, even when he was not talking about himself, kept his eyes lit up by an effort of the will, feigning a violent interest in everything connected with his uncle.

'And what if I haven't found a job by 15 October?' he asked at length, sensing that the atmosphere was propitious.

'I think between the two of us we'll manage somehow,' said the baron, looking down at his fingers and making an odd face. Léon, jumping for joy as well as anxious to compromise his uncle, rose in his seat and, leaning forward, grasped the old man's hands.

'Ah! Uncle Octave, I knew you wouldn't desert me. Think how happy you're making Mama! You really haven't changed a bit!'

M. Octave, his hands still in Léon's, had drawn back a little, squirming with embarrassment. As soon as he could do so without being rude, he extricated his hands and on the spur of the moment treated his nephew to a splendid, traditional panegyric of poverty, with the object of convincing him that he ought not to read more into what his uncle had said than his uncle had meant, and that in fact he would always be poor. He finished up with these words: 'You, my boy, ought to be able to put up with poverty more than most. You're lucky to have simple tastes and few needs. And then socially . . . how shall I put it... you, at least, if you're short of money, nobody notices. Whereas if I were obliged to lower my standard of living, it would be obvious to everyone.'

M. de Coantré was glad to learn that he was, after all, in
A
privileged position. They parted on a note of optimism.

On his return home, Léon wrote in the notebook in which he was wont to record succinctly the day's events and sometimes a short reflection: 'Sentimental session with old Oct. We shall see!...' This may shock some lady readers, who would prefer 'poor Léon' to be unreservedly lovable. But it is not for us to create lovable characters, but to show them as they were. And it is certainly true that Léon's remark in his diary revealed him as a man who, for all his naïvety and his often touching sentiments, was not entirely innocent.

When his nephew had gone, M. Octave wondered whom he could approach on Léon's behalf with any chance of success. He ruled out automatically all his colleagues at the bank. He had no desire for these people to know that he had a nephew who was prepared to work with his hands, and, moreover, it was a strict rule of his never to mix family affairs with those of 'the house' (as, characteristically, he called the bank, having transferred to his profession, in his 'American' way, the respect which people of his class usually reserve for their family). He also ruled out M. Héquelin du Page, because, having always obtained whatever he wanted from his
alter ego
without having to do anything in exchange, he made it a point of honour never to ask him for anything. And he ruled out others simply because he did not want to use up his credit with them, doubtless to no purpose. When we ask people in high places to help this or that person and they say they can do nothing, we are incredulous, we question their goodwill. But the process of elimination, which worked for M. Octave, works for us all, and if we ourselves look round among our acquaintances for people who would really be useful in any given circumstance, we find that their number, when it comes to the point, is always remarkably small.

The baron eventually hit on the idea of tackling one of his friends, an ex-solicitor called Maître Beauprêtre. He was about to telephone him, but was overcome by diffidence, which he translated as scruples; even on the telephone, which is a godsend for shy souls, asking favours embarrassed him, and he decided to write instead. But suddenly, with his pen already poised, the letter seemed difficult. He addressed and stamped the envelope, and placed it in front of him against a replica of the Statue of Liberty, as though the envelope was more than half the battle and might give out a sort of aura of encouragement and inspiration — but the letter would not
come.
And, unfortunately, letters do not usually count until they are written and posted.

A card of introduction serves no purpose at all. A letter of introduction seldom serves any purpose. Only a visit carries weight, a personal approach in the most warm and pressing terms, and moreover one must return to the charge. All else is vanity. Yet people refuse to recognize this, and go on asking for scribbled notes which one gives for the sake of peace and quiet. The baron's letter, without his realizing it, was the prototype of all such letters, which are in the last degree futile since they exude the unmistakable impression that the writer is not interested in what he is asking for and does not believe he will get it. And indeed M. de Coëtquidan hated asking. He had never done it for himself, having been given everything, and he found it galling, if not unjust, to have to do it for others, and especially for someone as
uninteresting
as his nephew. Nevertheless, he wrote four pages to M. Beauprêtre.

Then he wrote another — or rather, more or less the same — four-page letter to a first cousin who was reputed to be kind-hearted and went in for good works. 'If you can't find anything that looks at all suitable,' he told her, 'don't bother to answer.'

That evening he was dining with a stockbroker, an ostentatious vulgarian. While he was dressing, he thought of approaching him about Léon. In the smoking-room, in the drawing-room, all through the evening it worried him. But it seemed somehow improper to mix these sordid matters with a social occasion, and to ask a favour of someone who had just plied him with extremely expensive fodder. So that, though the words were always on the tip of his tongue, he continued to keep them to himself.

M. Octave gauged what he did for other people not so much by its efficacy as by the trouble he took doing it. Having written two letters, each four pages long, he considered that he had done enough for the time being, and that there was nothing more to be done but 'wait and see'.

Léon for his part, having written three letters, each four pages long, and received a promise, or an ostensible promise, from his uncle, also considered that he had done enough for the time being and that there was nothing more to be done but 'wait and see'.

However, the days went by and mail after mail brought him nothing, either from the people he had written to or from his uncle, to whom he dared not write again for fear of irritating him. When the postman rang, instead of going at once to the kitchen he waited for ten minutes in order to conceal his impatience from Mélanie. Then his face would light up at the sight of an imposing packet of letters on the kitchen table. But, on closer inspection, what a disappointment! Prospectuses from motor-car dealers, wine merchants, jewellers — everything that is likely to be sent to a count whose name appears in
Tout-Paris
and the
Bottin mondain
with H. P. (
hôtel particulier —
town house) beside it — together with begging letters from charities, which reminded him of a remark of his mother's in the bitterness of her last years: 'The only thing you get through knowing the best people is trade cards.'

It also happened that for two days running the postman did not come at all. (Previously he had been obliged to come every day, because M. de Coantré subscribed to
L'Action française;
but he had not renewed his subscription the previous month, both as a measure of economy and because any intellectual exercise, even reading a newspaper, had become more and more of an effort.) 'No mail?' he could not help asking Mélanie, thinking that she might have forgotten to give it to him.

'No, monsieur. How quiet things are!'

'No question about it, we're certainly being left in peace,' said Léon with a forced laugh. His whole life had been spent in such a way as to guarantee his being left in peace. But now this peace frightened him. It is a time-honoured process: those who are anti-social at thirty live to regret it at fifty.

Léon's plight required not so much, perhaps, a strictly financial effort as someone to examine it
seriously.
Over a dozen people knew about it, but, like a bunch of racing cyclists, nobody wanted to go into the lead. Most sufferers know the cure for their ills, and people around them also know the cure. And yet from all this knowledge nothing comes to bring them relief.

In this way a week went by after Léon's visit to M. Octave. At last, on the eighth day, Léon received a letter from the doctor at his auxiliary hospital. It was full of kind words: they remembered his devotion to 'our dear wounded'; they could offer him nothing for the time being, but promised to bear him in mind, 'although at the moment, in every branch, there are many applications and few vacancies'. The letter ended with 'kindest regards'.

This was not quite what Léon had expected; he expected to be given an interview. But still, the doctor was
au courant
and his letter was 'very friendly'...

Léon went to the boulevard Haussmann, to 'report' to his hierarchical chief.

Unfortunately, since his last visit, M. Octave's movements had been as follows. It will be remembered that he had asked his brother to obtain from Bourdillon a written statement of his present income and to bring it to him on an agreed day. That day, and those which followed it, he waited for Élie, who never came. He turned up the following week and declared quite simply he had not been able to see Bourdillon because 'that damned shop was always closed . ..'

'Always closed?'

'Arrived at quarter to six: not a soul. A bunch of idlers! There's your modern Frenchman!'

The baron, convinced that he would never get the details of his brother's finances unless he himself spoke to Bourdillon, went to the lawyer's office. The chief clerk told him that Élie had an income of nine thousand francs, which in itself was enough to put M. Octave's nose out of joint, since he realized that his brother would never be able to manage without his help, when Bourdillon added parenthetically, after having confirmed Léon's even more disastrous situation: 'M. de Coantré isn't very easy to deal with. He spoke to me the other day in such a way that if it weren't for his family ties with yourself and your brother, I would have answered him back in kind.'

Bourdillon was too clever not to have sensed that he was giving pleasure to M. Octave by speaking ill of his nephew. The baron was outraged: Léon was penniless, and yet presumed to be insolent!

Added to this, M. Octave had received a visit from Beauprêtre, who said to him: 'Let me be perfectly frank: don't send your nephew to see me. I'm a sensitive soul. . . for example, when I see a beggar on the pavement, I cross to the other side, because I know that if I looked him in the face it would be too much for me, I'd give him something. What will happen? I shall feel sorry for your nephew, and ruin myself for him. Well, I don't
want
to do that: I owe it to my family.'

Moreover, it was a fortnight since he had written to his cousin about Léon, and she had not answered. 'For fifty years I've got on extremely well with Marceline — from a distance — and this fool of a nephew has to come along and spoil it! Because after all I can't feel at ease with a relation who doesn't even bother to answer a four-page letter! It's typical of Léon de Coantré. He brings bad luck all round!' True, he had said to Marceline: 'Don't answer if you can't think of anything suitable.' But of course that was simply out of politeness.

When, that evening, Papon announced Léon, M. Octave did not hide his feelings from his servant; in fact, succumbing to his fury, he almost paraded them. He threw up his hands as though he were about to tear his hair, and shouted: 'This time, no, no and no! Tell him I'm out.'

Papon complied. But he did it so well (with a secret spite?), laying it on so thick, saying that Monsieur had 'just this minute' gone out etc., that Léon guessed the truth, and went away filled with a sense of catastrophe. He always expected Bourdillon's letters to bring him bad news, and indeed the news they brought was nearly always bad. He always expected that the moment would come when Uncle Octave would turn on him, and at last that moment had come. We have said it before and we repeat it now: the tragic thing about anxious people is that they always have cause for anxiety.

6

O
LIVE
-
SKINNED
, with slender, well-bred wrists, eyes that would set a haystack alight at a range of ten yards (Mlle de Bauret was Provençal), two beauty spots on the front of her neck and one in the crook of her left arm (which was blue, like a patch of sky reflected in water in the hollow of a ditch), Mlle de Bauret, having arrived unexpectedly at one o'clock, was sitting in the dining-room at Arago, the picture of charm and grace. She was holding in her hand one of those literary reviews that a self-respecting man will never read in public without wrapping his newspaper round it, lest he should be taken for a humbug. Her low forehead bespoke her lack of intelligence but added to her facial attraction; her bosom,
miserabile dicta,
was on the whole conspicuous by its absence; the aura of warmth that always emanates from a woman's body was in her case an aura of
fresh
warmth, for she was still nubile although twenty-five years old; and so charming withal that if you looked at her for any length of time you gradually experienced (no joking!) a slight feeling of lévitation — a sensation which, however literary, is not so far removed from that expressed by Mélanie when she said, 'How elegant Mlle de Bauret is! When you see her move, you'd think she was walking on air.'