The Well of Loneliness (55 page)

To this room would come Monsieur Pujol’s old cronies for a bock or a petit verre before business; and sometimes, like many another collector, Monsieur Pujol would permit himself to grow prosy. His friends knew most of the pictures by heart; knew their histories too, almost as well as he did; but in spite of this fact he would weary his guests by repeating many a threadbare story.

‘A fine lot, n’est-ce pas?’ he would say with a grin. ‘See that man e Ah, yes—a really great poet. He drank himself to death. In those days it was absinthe—they liked it because it gave them courage. That one would come here like a scared white rat, but Crénom! when he left he would bellow like a bull—the absinthe, of course—it gave them great courage.’ Or: ‘That woman over there, what a curious head! I remember her very well, she was German. Else Weining, her name was—before the war she would come here with a girl she’d picked up here in Paris, just a common whore, a most curious business. They were deeply in love. They would sit at a table in the corner—I can show you their actual table. They never talked much and they drank very little; as far as the drink went those two were bad clients, but so interesting that I did not much mind—I grew almost attached to Else Weining. Sometimes she would come all alone, come early. “Pu,” she would say in her hideous French; “Pu, she must never go back to that hell.” Hell! Sacrénom—she to call it hell! Amazing they are, I tell you, these people. Well, the girl went back, naturally she went back, and Else drowned herself in the Srine. Amazing they are—ces invertis, I tell you!’

But not all the histories were so tragic as this one; Monsieur Pujol found some of them quite amusing. Quarrels galore he was able to relate, and light infidelities by the dozen. He would mimic a manner of speech, a gesture, a walk—he was really quite a good mimic—and when he did this his friends were not bored; they would sit there and split their sides with amusement.

And now Monsieur Pujol was laughing himself, cracking jokes as he covertly watched his clients. From where she and Mary sat near the door, Stephen could hear his loud, jovial laughter.

‘Lord,’ sighed Pat, unenlivened as yet by the beer; ‘some people do seem to feel real good this evening.’

Wanda, who disliked the ingratiating Pujol, and whose nerves were on edge, had begun to grow angry. She had caught a particularly gross blasphemy, gross even for this age of stupid blaspheming. ‘Le salaud!’ she shouted, then, inflamed by drink, an epithet even less complimentary.

‘Hush up, do!’ exclaimed the scandalized Pat, hastily gripping Wanda’s shoulder.

But Wanda was out to defend her faith, and she did it in somewhat peculiar language.

People had begun to turn round and stare; Wanda was causing quite a diversion. Dickie grinned and skilfully egged her on, not perceiving the tragedy that was Wanda. For in spite of her tender and generous heart, Dickie was still but a crude young creature, one who had not yet learnt how to shiver and shake, and had thus remained but a crude young creature. Stephen glanced anxiously at Mary, half deciding to break up this turbulent party; but Mary was sitting with her chin on her hand, quite unruffled, it seemed, by Wanda’s outburst. When her eyes met Stephen’s she actually smiled, then took the cigarette that Jeanne Maurel was offering; and something in this placid, self-assured indifference went so ill with her youth that it startled Stephen. She in her turn must quickly light a cigarette, while Pat still endeavoured to silence Wanda.

Valérie said with her enigmatic smile: ‘Shall we now go on to our next entertainment?’

They paid the bill and persuaded Wanda to postpone her abuse of the ingratiating Pujol. Stephen took one arm, Dickie West the other, and between them they coaxed her into the motor; after which they all managed to squeeze themselves in—that is, all except Dickie, who sat by the driver in order to guide the innocent Burton.

3

At Le Narcisse they surprised what at first appeared to be the most prosaic of family parties. It was late, yet the mean room was empty of clients, for Le Narcisse seldom opened its eyes until midnight had chimed from the church docks of Paris. Seated at a table with a red and white cloth were the Patron and a lady with a courtesy tide. ‘Madame,’ she was called. And with them was a girl, and a handsome young man with severely plucked eyebrows. Their relationship to each other was…well…all the same, they suggested a family party. As Stephen pushed open the shabby swing door, they were placidly engaged upon playing belote.

The walls of the room were hung with mirrors thickly painted with cupids, thickly sullied by flies. A faint blend of odours was wafted from the kitchen which stood in proximity to the toilet. The host rose at once and shook hands with his guests. Every bar had its social customs, it seemed. At the Ideal one must share Monsieur Pujol’s lewd jokes; at Le Narcisse one must gravely shake hands with the Patron.

The Patron was tall and exceedingly thin—a clean-shaven man with the mouth of an ascetic. His cheeks were delicately tinted with rouge, his eyelids delicately shaded with kohl; but the eyes themselves were an infantile blue, reproachful and rather surprised in expression.

For the good of the house, Dickie ordered champagne; it was warm and sweet and unpleasantly heady. Only Jeanne and Mary and Dickie herself had the courage to sample this curious beverage. Wanda stuck to her brandy and Pat to her beer, while Stephen drank coffee; but Valérie Seymour caused some confusion by gently insisting on a lemon squash—to be made with fresh lemons. Presently the guests began to arrive in couples. Having seated themselves at the tables, they quickly became oblivious to the world, what with the sickly champagne and each other. From a hidden recess there emerged a woman with a basket full of protesting roses. The stout vendeuse wore a wide wedding ring—for was she not a most virtuous persona But her glance was both calculating and shrewd as she pounced upon the more obvious couples; and Stephen watching her progress through the room, felt suddenly ashamed on behalf of the roses. And now at a nod from the host there was music; and now at a bray from the band there was dancing. Dickie and Wanda opened the ball—Dickie stodgy and firm, Wanda rather unsteady. Others followed. Then Mary leant over the table and whispered:

‘Won’t you dance with me, Stephen?’

Stephen hesitated, but only for a moment. Then she got up abruptly and danced with Mary.

The handsome young man with the tortured eyebrows was bowing politely before Valérie Seymour. Refused by her, he passed on to Pat, and to Jeanne’s great amusement was promptly accepted.

Brockett arrived and sat down at the table. He was in his most prying and cynical humour. He watched Stephen with coldly observant eyes, watched Dickie guiding the swaying Wanda, watched Pat in the arms of the handsome young man, watched the whole bumping, jostling crowd of dancers.

The blended odours were becoming more active. Brockett lit a cigarette. ‘Well, Valérie, darling? You look like an outraged Elgin marble. Be kind, dear, be kind; you must live and let live, this is life…’ And he waved his soft, white hands. ‘Observe it—it’s very wonderful, darling. This is life, love, defiance, emancipation!’

Said Valérie with her calm little smile: ‘I think I preferred it when we were all martyrs!’

The dancers drifted back to their seats and Brockett manoeuvred to sit beside Stephen. ‘You and Mary dance well together,’ he murmured. ‘Are you happy? Are you enjoying yourselves?’

Stephen, who hated this inquisitive mood, this mood that would feed upon her emotions, turned away as she answered him, rather coldly: ‘Yes, thanks—we’re not having at all a bad evening.’

And now the Patron was standing by their table; bowing slightly to Brockett he started singing. His voice was a high and sweet baritone; his song was of love that must end too soon, of life that in death is redeemed by ending. An extraordinary song to hear in such a place—melancholy and very sentimental. Some of the couples had tears in their eyes—tears that had probably sprung from champagne quite as much as from that melancholy singing. Brockett ordered a fresh bottle to console the Patron. Then he waved him away with a gesture of impatience.

There ensued more dancing, more ordering of drinks, more dalliance by the amorous couples. The Patron’s mood changed, and now he must sing songs of the lowest boites in Paris. As he sang he skipped like a performing dog, grimacing, beating time with his hands, conducting the chorus that rose from the tables.

Brockett sighed as he shrugged his shoulders in disgust, and once again Stephen glanced at Mary; but Mary, she saw, had not understood that song with its inexcusable meaning. Valérie was talking to Jeanne Maurel, talking about her villa at St. Tropez; talking of the garden, the sea, the sky, the design she had drawn for a green marble fountain. Stephen could hear her charming voice, so cultured, so cool—itself cool as a fountain; and she marvelled at this woman’s perfect poise, the genius she possessed for complete detachment; Valérie had closed her ears to that song, and not only her ears but her mind and spirit.

The place was becoming intolerably hot, the room too over-crowded for dancing. Lids drooped, mouths sagged, heads lay upon shoulders—there was kissing, much kissing at a table in the corner. The air was foetid with drink and all the rest; unbreathable it appeared to Stephen. Dickie yawned an enormous uncovered yawn; she was still young enough to feel rather sleepy. But Wanda was being seduced by her eyes, the lust of the eye was heavy upon her, so that Pat must shake a lugubrious head and begin to murmur anent General Custer.

Brockett got up and paid the bill; he was sulky, it seemed, because Stephen had snubbed him. He had not spoken for quite half an hour, and refused pointblank to accompany them further. ‘I’m going home to my bed, thanks—good morning,’ he said crossly, as they crowded into the motor.

They drove to a couple more bars, but at these they remained for only a few minutes. Dickie said they were dull and Jeanne Maurel agreed—she suggested that they should go on to Alec’s.

Valérie lifted an eyebrow and groaned. She was terribly bored, she was terribly hungry. ‘I do wish I could get some cold chicken,’ she murmured.

4

As long as she lived Stephen never forgot her first impressions of the bar known as Alec’s—that meeting-place of the most miserable of all those who comprised the miserable army. That merciless, drug-dealing, death-dealing haunt to which flocked the battered remnants of men whom their fellow-men had at last stamped under; who, despised of the world, must despise themselves beyond all hope, it seemed, of salvation. There they sat, closely herded together at the tables, creatures shabby yet tawdry, timid yet defiant—and their eyes, Stephen never forgot their eyes, those haunted, tormented eyes of the invert.

Of all ages, all degrees of despondency, all grades of mental and physical ill-being, they must yet laugh shrilly from time to time, must yet tap their feet to the rhythm of music, must yet dance together in response to the band—and that dance seemed the Dance of Death to Stephen. On more than one hand was a large, ornate ring, on more than one wrist a conspicuous bracelet; they wore jewellery that might only be worn by these men when they thus gathered together. At Alec’s they could dare to give way to such tastes—what was left of themselves they became at Alec’s.

Bereft of all social dignity, of all social charts contrived for man’s guidance, of the fellowship that by right divine should belong to each breathing, living creature; abhorred, spat upon, from their earliest days the prey to a ceaseless persecution, they were now even lower than their enemies knew, and more hopeless than the veriest dregs of creation. For since all that to many of them had seemed fine, a fine selfless and at times even noble emotion, had been covered with shame, called unholy and vile, so gradually they themselves had sunk down to the level upon which the world placed their emotions. And looking with abhorrence upon these men, drink-sodden, doped as were only too many, Stephen yet felt that some terrifying thing stalked abroad in that unhappy room at Alec’s; terrifying because if there were a God His anger must rise at such vast injustice. More pitiful even than her lot was theirs, and because of them mighty should be the world’s reckoning.

Alec the tempter, the vendor of dreams, the dispenser of illusions whiter than snow; Alec, who sold little packets of cocaine for large bundles of notes, was now opening wine, with a smile and a flourish, at the next-door table.

He set down the bottle: ‘Et voilŕ, mes filles!’

Stephen looked at the men; they seemed quite complacent.

Against the wall sat a bald, flabby man whose fingers crept over an amber chaplet. His lips moved; God alone knew to whom he prayed, and God alone knew what prayers he was praying—horrible he was, sitting there all alone with that infamous chaplet between his fingers.

The band struck up a one-step. Dickie still danced, but with Pat, for Wanda was now beyond dancing. But Stephen would not dance, not among these men, and she laid a restraining hand upon Mary. Despite her sense of their terrible affliction, she could not dance in this place with Mary.

A youth passed with a friend and the couple were blocked by the press of dancers in front of her table. He bent forward, this youth, until his face was almost on a level with Stephen’s—a grey, drug-marred face with a mouth that trembled incessantly.

‘Ma soeur,’ he whispered.

For a moment she wanted to strike that face with her naked fist, to obliterate it. Then all of a sudden she perceived the eyes and the memory came of a hapless creature, distracted, bleeding from bursting lungs, hopelessly pursued, glancing this way, then that, as though looking for something, some refuge, some hope—and the thought: ‘It’s looking for God who made it.’

Stephen shivered and stared at her tightly clenched hands; the nails whitened her flesh. ‘Mon frčre,’ she muttered.

And now someone was making his way through the crowd, a quiet, tawny man with the eyes of the Hebrew; Adolphe Blanc, the gentle and learned Jew, sat down in Dickie’s seat beside Stephen. And he patted her knee as though she were young, very young and in great need of consolation.