Transgression (24 page)

She should have brought presents. What was she thinking? She should have gone to a shop first. She moved toward the hall.

“Adele.” Simone was standing, too. “They’re not here. They were here for a little while. During the summer. They go to a boys’ school in Orleans. She had to send them away.”

“Why?”

“Because,” Simone said. Her long pale face looked even more strained. “It was impossible for them here. They were being bullied every day, called terrible names. And beaten up.”

Adele didn’t have to ask why.

Simone stood rigid as a post, her cigarette smouldering in her hand.

“That’s why it’s so quiet in here,” Adele said.

Adele walked down the hall. She looked into the parlour. It was empty.
She crossed toward the west wing. Madame Théberge was nowhere in sight. A blessing, Adele thought. One small blessing, anyway.

The adjoining door from the west wing to her father’s office was open. Adele could see her mother sitting at Henri Paul-Louis’ large desk. She seemed to be engrossed in a book. She was sitting very straight with her knees together as she’d no doubt been taught to do by the nuns in some long-ago school. Her hair had turned red again and was pinned up in soft curls. She was wearing a soft blue crepe dress and white shoes. Her face was made up as if she was about to leave for a social engagement.

Adele stood in the other room and watched her. After a moment, Madame Georges sensed her presence and turned. Her calm expression didn’t change.

“Hello, Mother,” Adele said, coming up to the open door. “How have you been?” She was about to depart for a foreign land and a new life, and she was determined to remain above everything now, all the old hurts and pains.

Madame Georges looked back down at her book and began to read aloud. “‘When we were baptized in Christ Jesus we were baptized in his death. In other words, when we were baptized we went into the tomb with him and joined him in death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the Father’s glory, we too might live a new life. But we believe that having died with Christ we shall return to life with him. Christ, as we know, having been raised from the dead, will never die again. Death has no power over him any more. When he died, he died, once for all, to sin, so his life now is life, with God, and in that way, you too must consider yourself to be dead to sin but alive for God in Christ Jesus.”

She looked back at Adele. “I have no idea what I just read.”

“You don’t?”

“No. I do it to please Father Salles.” She closed her book. “He wants the leading church ladies to be engaged in theological study. It seems very important to him and so I do it. I do it for him.”

“I see.”

Madame Georges arched her pencilled-in eyebrows and stared up at Adele as if there were some significant message in what she’d just said and she wanted to make sure Adele had received it.

Outside the house, the morning sun must have made an appearance because the blind covering the window seemed to glow. Adele could still smell the sharp smells of medicine in her father’s rooms.

“Kiss me,” her mother said.

Adele went around the desk and kissed her lightly on her forehead. She’s still mad, Adele thought.

“I’ve been expecting you. I didn’t know when but I knew you’d return.” She looked up at Adele. “You have more hair now than the last time I saw you.”

Adele could feel tears pushing into her eyes. She fought against them. Her mother’s bony hand clutched her arm.

“I am so sorry I didn’t love you more, dear.”

Adele couldn’t hold them back, tears ran down her cheeks and caught her by surprise. Madame Georges looked like they’d caught her by surprise, too, and confused her for the moment.

“You look like you’re getting along,” she murmured, looking away. “You look well. You must have made a life for yourself.” She rose from the chair and retreated around the desk. She began to brush invisible wrinkles out of her silk dress. “I’m afraid I have to ask you a favour.” She seemed to be addressing the wall. “René is going to have a brilliant career in government. He has everything it requires except for his family background. I am trying to repair this the best I can. I have always done for others, though you may not believe this. Henri Paul-Louis. Father Salles. René.”

She turned to Adele. Adele had forgotten how terrifyingly depthless her mother’s eyes could look.

“The Bible says it’s a good thing to be the servant of others. So I am asking you, begging you, to do the same. For the sake of your brother’s future. All your brothers’ futures. Don’t open old wounds.”

“You want me to leave?”

Madame Georges shook her head. “No. Not if we could go back in time and undo everything, but we can’t. You know, Adele, I could see that there was something wrong when you were very young and I didn’t do enough. A better mother would have tried harder.”

Adele felt like she was going to fall. “What do you mean?”

“I mean your strangeness of mind. If only I had addressed it at the time, the unnatural attraction you exhibited toward your father. The great regret of my life.”

Adele knew she was going to fall.

“Unseemliness of thought leads to unseemliness of action, which leads to perversity and to all those German soldiers.” Suddenly Madame Georges looked terribly upset. “Please go away, Adele!” She walked stiffly toward the open door and disappeared.

Adele stood there looking at the shelves full of well-worn reference books, at the locked dispensary cabinet, at her father’s black leather valise gathering dust on the window sill.

She knew at that moment, for an absolute certainty, that he was dead.

S
imone had gone outside.

Watching through the kitchen window, Adele could see her moving about. She pushed open the door.

A small orange cat, its sides bulging out, was purring and rubbing up against Simone’s legs. Simone tore off bits of bread and dropped them into a soupy mixture in a tin bowl. She kept her face down. “How did it go?”

“I just wanted to see her one last time.”

Simone nodded and scratched the cat’s ear. “Mischa is pregnant again, maybe this time she’ll get to keep them.”

“What happened to her before?”

“Madame Théberge followed her around until she found the kittens.”

“Did she eat them?”

“No.” Simone looked up at Adele a little warily. “She put them in a sack and drowned them in the sink.”

“Well, maybe she’ll follow her again.”

“I don’t think so. Madame Théberge is not here. She’s gone back home to Bretagne.”

“Really? Why?”

“René didn’t think she was a good influence on your mother. And she was beginning to act like she owned the house.”

“So he kicked her out?”

“He asked her to leave.”

“René can be very ruthless. Do you know that?”

“He can be decisive. He’s very protective.”

Simone looked as innocent as if she were standing in the Garden of Eden. For some reason Adele felt like waking her up. “In a way, you remind me of my mother.”

“Oh?” Simone said guardedly.

“Just that you both have this remarkable gift for thinking exactly what you want to think. I’m sure it’s an admirable quality, Simone. For instance, Mother thinks I’m dirt. You think René’s an angel.” Adele looked away. She didn’t want to turn into some bitter and bloody-minded person. She really didn’t. “Who’s been working in the garden?”

“René hired a gardener.” Simone’s voice sounded colder than before.

“Did he?”

“He likes things to be neat. That’s why I come over in the mornings, just to help out. I’m still living at home.” Simone began to untie her apron. She looked anxious to escape. “Adele, I have to go to class now. Will I see you later? When’s your train leaving?”

“Immediately.” Adele felt like something was burning inside her chest.

“Where are you going?”

“I do have some friends, Simone. They live in Le Havre. I’ll be staying with them.”

Simone kissed her lightly on her cheeks. “Write us, Adele.” Simone went back into the house and closed the door carefully behind her.

Adele had left her suitcase in the kitchen. She thought she’d wait a little while to retrieve it, at least until Simone had had a chance to retreat out the front door. With any luck her mother might retreat out the front door with her.

Adele sat down on the edge of the porch. She’d made an inquiry about the schedule when she’d first arrived in Rouen. There was only one daily train from Rouen to Le Havre, and it had left ten minutes before she’d arrived in Rouen. She’d have to stay somewhere until tomorrow.

She wasn’t sure where to go. The thought of staying with her mother made her feel ill-and she wasn’t sure her mother wouldn’t call the police, anyway. She could try going back to Lucille’s, but she didn’t seem to have any room. She could stay in a hotel-Alex had wired her enough money, or
she could be frugal and sit up overnight at the train station. The more she thought about it, the more the station seemed impossible. What if someone recognized her? And a hotel seemed almost as risky.

She reached into her pocket and put on Alex’s ring. It seemed to calm her a little.

Where else? Old Raymond’s cottage was a possibility. She looked toward it and for the first time noticed that it was missing its roof. It looked like a bomb had hit it. Now she could see that everything had been neatly removed, roof, rafters, floorboards. All used for firewood, no doubt. Madame Théberge, before she’d been forced to leave, had evidently gone into the heating business.

Adele wandered around the gardens. Whoever René had hired had done a very good job. René was staking his claim to everything. It was René’s house now.

Adele pushed open the kitchen door. She listened for Simone’s voice, her mother’s voice. She looked through the downstairs’ rooms. She climbed the stairs. The door to her mother’s bedroom was closed. She tapped on it. There was no answer.

She knew from long experience that a non-answer did not indicate that her mother was not there. She certainly wouldn’t respond unless she wanted to. Adele felt like pushing the door open. She wasn’t sure why, maybe to scream.

Adele pushed open the door. The room was empty.

She walked along to her old room. She was surprised that her bed was still there. So was the ridiculous picture of the blue boy. He was still riding his rocking horse.

She lay down on the bare mattress. She’d been awake all the previous night.

She could see Simone and her mother scurrying away from the house, arm in arm, making plans not to return until it was safe. Where would they go? Over to Madame Ducharme’s gracious mansion, probably. Clever René. Always smarter than she. Always.

She wondered what Alex was doing at that very moment. She tried to see him. He seemed a long way away.

She wished, more than anything else, that she had something to drink.

She slept for several hours. When she opened her eyes, though it was the middle of the afternoon, the room was full of shadows. She got up, stepped out into the hall and listened. If anything, the house seemed more silent than before.

Adele couldn’t make herself think of going anywhere else. Her mother might not return that evening or she might. It really wouldn’t matter. They would still manage to avoid each other, either way. They had long practised doing just that. And right now her old room seemed the safest place to be.

Adele went downstairs, nibbled on a sausage she found in the icebox and made herself a tea. She would stay one last night. It seemed a satisfying and fitting thing to do, in a way, a kind of memorial evening. She’d been happy in that house, a long time ago.

The light was fading from the window and Adele was sitting in the kitchen looking through one of her mother’s magazines when she heard the front door open. At first she thought her mother had returned, or perhaps Simone. René walked into the kitchen. He was wearing a dark grey suit and carrying a leather briefcase and he had a Paris newspaper tucked under his arm. Adele thought he looked completely bourgeois, almost silly, but still there was a leap of alarm in her blood.

“Hello,” she said.

René put the newspaper on the table and his briefcase down on a chair.

“Who called you to come home, Simone or Mother?”

“Both,” he said. He took off his suit jacket, folded it carefully and laid it over the back of the chair. His hair was neatly cut, his face cleanly shaven.

“Did you come all this way just to make sure I leave?”

“I understood that was your plan. But you haven’t gone. Why haven’t you?”

“I didn’t want to.”

René smiled a very tight smile.

“I’ll leave tomorrow. Early. My train leaves at seven o’clock.”

“All right,” René said, “I’ll be staying over, too.” He sat down at the table. “Have you eaten?”

“A little.”

He nodded. He seemed undecided about something. He studied his
hands for a while. “I’m sorry about how things turned out. You were very young. Foolish.” He looked up at her. “As impossible as the situation is for you here in Rouen, and obviously you can’t stay, I want you to know that in some ways, I forgive you.”

“You do?”

“We’ve all been through a lot,” René said.

And the bloody-mindedness came back, and the rage and the despair. “René, are you with Simone now?”

René smiled a little. “Yes.”

“Tell me something. I’ve been wanting to ask you this for a long time. Did you murder her father?”

René’s face turned dead white. He rose from his chair in a very slow and deliberate manner. “You can stay here by yourself tonight. Make sure you’re gone by tomorrow morning.” He began to gather up his suit jacket, his briefcase, and newspaper.

“How does it work, René?” Adele asked. “Is it a special pleasure for you, having murdered her father, to make love to her?”

Adele didn’t see René’s hand coming but she felt it. It caught her across the mouth and knocked her off the chair. She fell backwards and hit her head on the floor.

When Adele opened her eyes, René was standing over her.

“Adele,” he said. He leaned down and looked like he was about to cry. “Adele!”

Her voice had gone away. She couldn’t speak.

“Her father was the enemy. The enemy! And I do feel condemned for eternity. And I do owe Simone everything I can give her. And I’ve fallen in love with her. It’s all mixed in together. And this is my life. Can you understand all this? Is it too complicated for you?”

René was walking in a snowstorm. Flakes of snow were melting on his hair, in his silky beard. Her lovely lost brother. She could see him reach down and touch her mouth. She could see blood on his fingers.

“Go away,” her brother said.

Lucille opened her door. Adele was standing there with a dish cloth pressed against her mouth. Her blouse was streaked with blood.

“Adele!” Lucille said.

“Can I come in?”

Lucille nodded. Adele walked past her into the room and eased herself down on the couch. A young man was sitting in the kitchen at the table. Lucille went in to him, kissed his face, ruffled his hair, whispered in his ear. Adele knew what she was saying, that he’d have to leave.

He took his time getting to his feet. When he passed Adele, he glared down at her as if she’d conspired against him. He didn’t seem to care about her bloody face.

Lucille closed the door after him. “I’m not worried,” she said. Her pillowy breasts were almost falling out of the top of her dress. “He’ll be back.”

Lucille hurried into the kitchen again. Adele could hear water running. Her jaw had stopped throbbing. It felt like a large bee had stung her on the mouth, nothing more.

Lucille came back with a wet cloth. “Let’s see.” She moved Adele’s hand away.

Adele could feel the warmth of the cloth as Lucille dabbed at her mouth.

“It’s stopped bleeding. It could use a stitch. Or two.” She began to wipe off Adele’s chin and neck.

“I have to change my clothes.”

“Yes.”

“I have a change of clothes in my suitcase.”

“You went home, didn’t you?”

Adele nodded. Her mouth began to throb again.

“Who hit you?”

“I don’t know.”

“All right,” Lucille said, “let’s have a drink.” She got up and poured two generous glasses of gin. “Everyone’s drinking this stuff these days.”

Adele had trouble swallowing. She dribbled and the alcohol stung.

“That’s good, it’s sterilizing the cut,” Lucille said. “Want to look?”

“No.”

Lucille handed Adele a silver compact from off the table. The round mirror was smudged with rouge. Adele could see a half-inch of flesh yawning open on her lower lip. It was holding a bloody clot in its small mouth. She pinched it shut and then let it go. It opened again.

“Quit playing around with it, you’ll start it bleeding.” As Adele’s hands moved from her mouth, Lucille suddenly gasped, “Where did you get that ring?”

Adele pulled her ring off and handed it to Lucille. “I’m getting married.”

“You’re not!” Lucille examined the thin gold band. “It’s beautiful, Adele.”

“So’s he.” Adele smiled. It hurt to smile but it was worth it.

“Mother of God, Adele is getting married. Who to?”

“A Canadian.”

She told Lucille everything she could think of. About Alex. About her plans. She’d been thinking about training to be a nurse in Canada. Canada was untouched by the war. It was difficult to imagine such a place. No one had been driven crazy there and everything would look brand new. She’d had some experience with the Red Cross. She thought she could use that. Her father had been a doctor. Had she ever told Lucille that?

Lucille nodded. “Lots of times.” She wanted to see some photographs of Alex. Adele didn’t have any. She wanted to hear all about the wedding arrangements, every last detail. Adele didn’t know any. She knew where she was going, to a town called Paris in Canada, if Lucille could imagine such a place. And she knew Alex. She talked about Alex.

Adele fell asleep on the couch, and early the next morning she caught the train to Le Havre.

When she arrived she called the telephone number Alex had given her. Twenty minutes later Alex, dressed in his parade uniform and looking flustered and pleased, hurried in through the station door.

“Why didn’t you call from Strasbourg? Why didn’t you give me some warning?”

As Adele stood up from where she was sitting, Alex’s eyes lit on her mouth. His expression changed.

“Jesus Murphy, what happened?”

Adele had looked at herself in Lucille’s kitchen mirror first thing that morning. The cut on her lip had filled in with a dark spongy clot, and the
surrounding flesh had turned yellow. Her jaw was swollen.

“I fell down the stairs in Strasbourg,” Adele said in well-rehearsed English.

“Jesus.” Alex touched her cheek so gently she could hardly feel it. “I’m sorry. Does it hurt? Pain?”

“No.”

Alex made sewing motions. “You’re going to need stitches.”

“No.”

Adele reached up and kissed him. “You see?”

“Oh God, Adele, God, I missed you.” It was more a sigh than a statement.

“I missed you,” Adele said, and meant it with all her heart.

Alex walked Adele to a small house beside the river. The open sea was just beyond. They sat in a tiny room full of doilies and knick-knacks and shared a pot of tea with the proprietor, an elderly hunched-over lady with bones as slight as a bird’s. If she noticed Adele’s mouth she didn’t let on. Her son had died in the Great War. She showed them photographs of a smiling young man in uniform, she showed them a posthumous medal.

As soon as she tottered off to do some shopping, Alex led Adele up to the room he’d rented for her. They made love. Alex seemed desperate with desire and Adele clung to him as tightly as she could, even though the room swam in her eyes, even though her mouth was being jarred again and again.