A Love Story Read online

  He reflected for a moment and looking into the distance with his mouth open as though trying to guess what was over there, beyond his own little world, he said in hushed tones:

  ‘We shan’t see her again.’

  Meanwhile more little girls came in. At a signal from his mother, Lucien went to meet them. Marguerite Tissot, in a cloud of muslin with her big eyes, looked like a child Virgin. Her blonde hair, which was escaping from the little cap, looked like a gold braided pelerine under the whiteness of the veil. A discreet smile went round at the arrival of the five Levasseur girls. They all looked alike. You would have thought they were from a boarding school, the oldest first, the youngest at the end of the line. And their skirts were so voluminous they took up a whole corner of the room. But when the little Guiraud girl appeared the whispers grew louder. They laughed and passed her around to look at her and kiss her. She looked like a white turtle dove in her ruffled feathers, no bigger than a bird, in the rustling layers of gauze which made her look enormous and round. Even her mother couldn’t find her hands. The salon gradually filled up with this snowfall. A few boys in coat-tails stained the purity with black. Lucien, because his little wife was dead, was looking for another. He wasn’t sure, he would have liked one bigger than him, like Jeanne. However, he seemed to settle on Marguerite, whose hair astonished him. He did not leave her side.

  ‘The corpse has not been brought down yet,’ Pauline came to inform Juliette.

  Pauline was busy, as though she had to make preparations for a ball. Only with difficulty had her sister been able to persuade her not to come in white.

  ‘What!’ cried Juliette. ‘Whatever are they thinking of? I’ll go up. Stay with the ladies.’

  She left the salon swiftly, where the mothers in dark clothes were chatting in low tones, while the children did not dare risk moving for fear of creasing their clothes. Upstairs when she entered the dead girl’s room, she was petrified. Jeanne was still lying on the bed with her hands together; and like Marguerite, like the Levasseur girls, she was wearing a white dress, a white bonnet, white shoes. A crown of white roses placed on her bonnet made her queen of all her little friends, celebrated by everyone waiting below. In front of the window the satin-lined oak coffin lay across two chairs and looked like an open jewellery box. The furniture was in its place, a candle burned. The room, enclosed and dark, smelled like a damp, silent vault that had been walled up for some time. And Juliette, coming in out of the sunshine, out of the joyous outdoors, was speechless, stopped in her tracks, and did not dare tell them to make haste.

  ‘There are a lot of people here already,’ she finally whispered.

  Then, not having received an answer, she added, in order to say something:

  ‘Henri has had to go to a consultation in Versailles, and sends his apologies.’

  Hélène, seated in front of the bed, raised her vacant eyes. It was impossible to drag her away from that room. She had been there for thirty-six hours, in spite of the entreaties of Monsieur Rambaud and Abbé Jouve, who were keeping vigil with her. She had found the two nights especially agonizing. Then there had been the torment of dressing her for the last time, the white silk slippers which she had insisted on putting on the little dead child’s feet herself. She could not move, she was quite exhausted, as though the excess of sorrow had sent her to sleep.

  ‘Have you got flowers?’ she stammered with an effort, her eyes still on Madame Deberle.

  ‘Yes, yes, my dear, don’t fret,’ the latter replied.

  Since her daughter had breathed her last, Hélène had only been concerned with that one thing: flowers, armfuls of flowers. She anxiously asked every new person about that, seeming to be afraid that they would never find enough flowers.

  ‘Have you some roses?’ she went on, after a moment’s silence.

  ‘Yes, you will be pleased, I assure you.’

  She nodded and sank into a torpor again. But the undertakers were waiting on the landing. They needed to get on with their task. Monsieur Rambaud, stumbling around like a man who was drunk, made a pleading gesture to Juliette to help him take the poor woman downstairs. Both of them took her gently by the arm. They got her to her feet and led her towards the dining room. But when she realized what they were doing she pushed them away in one last despairing outburst. It was a heartbreaking scene. She threw herself on her knees in front of the bed, clutching at the sheets, filling the room with the tumult of her revolt. But Jeanne’s face, as she lay in her eternal silence, cold and rigid, still looked like stone. It had hardened a little, her mouth had taken on the expression of a vindictive childish pout. And it was this dark, unforgiving mask of jealousy that drove Hélène into a frenzy. She had clearly seen her in the last thirty-six hours becoming more and more frozen in her resentment, and fiercer as she drew nearer to the earth. What comfort it would have been if Jeanne had been able to smile at her one last time!

  ‘No no!’ she cried. ‘Leave her there a moment, I beg you. You can’t take her away from me. I want to kiss her. Oh, one moment, just one moment...’

  And she held her in her trembling arms, defying the men who were out of sight on the landing, with their backs turned, looking bored. But her lips could not warm the cold face, and she sensed Jeanne’s obstinate refusal. Then she gave herself up to the hands that were leading her, and collapsed on a chair in the dining room, repeating her dull moan a score of times:

  ‘Oh God, oh God...’

  The outpouring of emotion had exhausted Monsieur Rambaud and Madame Deberle. After a short silence, when Madame Deberle half-opened the door, it was all over. There had not been the least noise, scarcely a rustle. The screws, which had been previously oiled, closed the lid for ever. And the bedroom was empty, the coffin hidden under a white sheet.

  Then the door remained open and Hélène was left alone. When she went back in she looked distractedly at the furniture, and round the walls. They had just carried off the corpse. Rosalie had pulled up the coverlet to obliterate the very slight imprint of the girl who had gone. And opening her arms in a wild gesture, her hands outstretched, Hélène rushed out on to the stairs. She tried to go down. Monsieur Rambaud held her back, while Madame Deberle explained to her that it wasn’t done. But she swore she would be sensible and not follow the cortège. Surely they would let her watch, she would sit quietly in the conservatory. Both of them were crying as they heard her words. They must get her dressed. Juliette concealed her indoor dress beneath a black shawl. But she could not find a hat. Eventually she found one and tore a sprig of red verbena off it. Monsieur Rambaud, who was chief mourner, took Hélène on his arm. When they were in the garden Madame Deberle whispered:

  ‘You stay with her. I’ve got a lot to do.’

  And she escaped. Hélène walked with a struggle, searching ahead of her. As she went out into the daylight she uttered a sigh. Oh God! What a lovely day! But her eyes had gone straight to the gate, she had just caught sight of the little coffin under the white sheets. Monsieur Rambaud only let her walk another two or three steps.

  ‘Come now, be brave,’ he said, trembling all over.

  They looked. The narrow coffin was bathed in a ray of light. A silver crucifix was placed on a lace cushion at the foot. On the left an aspergillum was soaking in a stoup. The large candles were burning without a flame, staining the sunshine with their little dancing spirits darting off into the air. Beneath the draperies branches of trees formed a cradle with their violet buds. It was a corner of springtime, where, through a gap in the drapes, the golden dust fell from the wide shaft of sun and opened the cut flowers strewn over the coffin. There was a profusion of flowers. Sheaves of white roses were piled high, white camellias, white lilac, white carnations, a whole snowdrift of white petals. The corpse was vanishing, white sprays slid off the sheet, on the ground white periwinkles, white hyacinths had slipped off and were losing their petals. The occasional passers-by in the Rue Vineuse stopped with a sympathetic smile outside this sunny garden where the little dead g
irl slept beneath the flowers. All this whiteness sang, a dazzling purity blazed in the light, the sun warmed the drapery, the bouquets of flowers, the wreaths with a shiver of life. Above the roses a bee buzzed.

  ‘The flowers... the flowers...’, Hélène whispered, unable to say anything else.

  She pressed her handkerchief to her lips, her eyes filled with tears. It seemed to her that Jeanne must be too hot and that thought was even more painful, in an access of love where there was also gratitude to those who had just covered the child with all these flowers. She made to move forward, Monsieur Rambaud no longer thought to hold her back. How pleasant it was under the draperies! The warm air was perfumed and there was no breeze. So she leaned over and chose just one rose. It was a rose she wanted, to place in her corsage. But she started to shake and Monsieur Rambaud was afraid.

  ‘Don’t stay,’ he said, leading her away. ‘You promised not to make yourself ill.’

  He was trying to usher her into the conservatory, when the door of the salon opened wide. Pauline was the first to appear. She had taken charge of organizing the funeral procession. One by one the little girls came down. They seemed like a sudden flowering, may trees miraculously in flower. Their white dresses billowed out in the sunshine, creating against the light a watery effect, through which all the delicate tones of white passed, as though on swans’ wings. An apple tree shed its petals, gossamer threads floated round, the dresses were the very essence of spring. They came on and on, surrounding the lawn and still they were coming lightly down the steps, taking flight like thistledown, blossoming suddenly in the fresh air.

  So when the garden was completely white, looking at that mass of little girls who had issued forth, Hélène suddenly remembered something. She recalled the ball from that other spring with the joyous dancing of little feet. And she once more pictured Marguerite as a milkmaid, with her milk-can hanging from her belt, Sophie as a soubrette, turning on the arm of her sister Blanche, whose Folly costume jangled like a ring of bells. Then she thought of the five Levasseur young ladies, the multitude of Red Riding Hoods with their bright red satin caps edged in black velvet, while the little Guiraud girl with the Alsatian butterfly clip in her hair jumped around like a mad thing opposite a Harlequin who was twice as big as her. Today they were all in white. Jeanne was also in white on a pillow of white satin, among the flowers. The exquisite Japanese girl, her chignon fastened with long pins, with the tunic of purple embroidered with birds, was leaving dressed all in white.

  ‘How they have grown!’ murmured Hélène, bursting into tears.

  Everyone was there, except her daughter. Monsieur Rambaud made her go into the conservatory, but she stayed in the doorway, wanting to see the start of the cortège. Some ladies came over and discreetly shook hands. The children looked at her with blue bewildered eyes.

  Meanwhile Pauline was going round giving orders. She kept her voice down, in the circumstances, but she forgot from time to time.

  ‘Come on now, behave yourselves. Look, you little pig, you’ve already dirtied yourself... I’ll come and fetch you, don’t move.’

  The hearse arrived, they could leave. Madame Deberle appeared and cried:

  ‘They’ve forgotten the bouquets! Quick, Pauline, the bouquets!’

  Then there was some confusion. A bouquet of white roses had been prepared for each little girl. They had to give them out. The children, delighted, held the large bunches in front of them, like candles. Lucien, who still stood close to Marguerite, was sniffing them ecstatically while she pushed them under his nose. All these little girls, their hands full of flowers, were laughing in the sunshine, then all at once grew serious as they watched the men loading the coffin on to the hearse.

  ‘Is she in there?’ Sophie enquired in a whisper. Her sister Blanche nodded. Then she said to her:

  ‘For a man, it’s as big as this.’

  She was talking about the coffin, and opened her arms as wide as she could. But little Marguerite laughed with her nose buried in the roses, saying that it tickled. Then the others buried their noses in them as well to see. Someone called them, and they were well behaved again.

  Outside the procession started off. At the end of the Rue Vineuse, a woman in slippers with her hair loose was crying and wiping her cheeks with the corner of her apron. Some people had gone to their windows, exclamations of sympathy rose into the silent street. The hearse rolled along quietly, draped in white with silver fringes. All you could hear was the rhythmic clip-clop of the two white horses, muffled by the earth surface of the road. It was a real harvest of flowers, bouquets and wreaths borne along by the funeral cart; the coffin was invisible, little bumps shook the sheaves of blossoms, the cart strewed branches of lilac in its wake. Long streamers of white watered silk were held at the four corners by four little girls, Sophie and Marguerite, one of the Levasseur girls and the little Guiraud girl, the last so sweet, tottering along, that her mother walked along beside her. The others crowded around the hearse, holding their bouquets of roses. They walked quietly, their veils rose and fell, the wheels turned amid the chiffon as though borne along on a cloud, through the delicate heads of smiling cherubins. Then, behind, after Monsieur Rambaud, his face pale and bowed, came some ladies, a few little boys, Rosalie, Zéphyrin, the Deberles’ servants. Five empty funeral carriages followed. In the sunny street, white pigeons flew off as the spring procession passed by.

  ‘Oh my goodness, how annoying!’ Madame Deberle said again, when she saw the cortège move off. ‘If only Henri had postponed his consultation! I told him to.’

  She did not know what to do with Hélène, who had sunk on to a seat in the conservatory. Henri could have stayed with her. He would have comforted her a little. It was very disagreeable him not being there. Luckily Mademoiselle Aurélie was happy to help. She did not care for sad events, and at the same time she would look after the food the children were to find there on their return. Madame Deberle hastened to join the procession that was heading for the church along the Rue de Passy. Now the garden was empty, workmen were clearing away the hangings. All that remained on the sandy path, where Jeanne had been, were the petals of a camellia. And Hélène, suddenly sunk into this solitude and deep silence, felt once more the anguish, the agony of the eternal separation. One more time, to be near her only one more time! The idea which she could not get out of her head, that Jeanne had left the world discontented, with her mute face dark with resentment, went through her like the sudden burning of a hot iron. So when she saw that Mademoiselle Aurélie was keeping watch on her, she looked for a chance to escape and run to the cemetery.

  ‘Yes, it’s a great loss,’ repeated the old maid, settling comfortably back into an armchair. ‘I would have loved children, especially a little girl. Oh well, when I weigh it up, I am pleased I didn’t get married. It saves you a lot of worries.’

  She thought she was taking Hélène’s mind off it. She talked about one of her friends who’d had six children. They were all dead. Another lady was left on her own with a grown-up son who hit her. He should have died himself, his mother would have had no trouble getting over that. Hélène was apparently listening. She did not move, but shook with impatience.

  ‘You’ve calmed down a little now,’ Mademoiselle Aurélie said finally. ‘Heaven knows you have to come to terms with it eventually.’

  The door of the dining room led into the Japanese conservatory. She got up, pushed open the door, and stretched. Plates of cakes covered the table. Hélène quickly fled into the garden. The gate was open, the workmen from the funeral parlour were taking away their ladders.

  The Rue Vineuse turns left into the Rue des Réservoirs. That’s where the cemetery of Passy lies. A colossal retaining wall rises from the Boulevard de la Muette, the cemetery is like an immense terrace towering over the hill, the Trocadéro and the avenues, and over the whole of Paris. In twenty strides Hélène was outside the wide-open gate, revealing the deserted field of white tombs and black crosses. She went in. Two large l
ilac trees were in bud at the end of the first avenue. They did not use that place for burial very much, weeds grew there, some cypresses pierced the greenery with their dark shapes. Hélène hurried straight ahead. A band of sparrows took fright, a gravedigger shovelling out earth looked up. The procession had very likely not arrived yet, the cemetery looked empty. She cut across to her right, and pushed on as far as the parapet of the terrace. And as she was walking round it, she caught sight of the little girls in white behind some acacias kneeling down in front of the temporary vault into which they had just lowered Jeanne’s body. Abbé Jouve, his hand held up, was pronouncing a last blessing. All she heard was the dull thud of the stone falling shut. It was over.

  Meanwhile Pauline had caught sight of her and pointed her out to Madame Deberle. The latter was almost annoyed, murmuring:

  ‘What! She’s come! But it’s not done! It’s in very bad taste.’

  She went over and showed her disapproval by her expression. Other ladies drew near as well out of curiosity. Monsieur Rambaud had joined her, and stood silently next to her. She had leant against one of the acacias, feeling faint and tired with all the crowd of people. While she answered the expressions of sympathy with nods, one thought, and one only, was choking her. She had arrived too late, she had heard the sound of the stone falling shut. And her eyes constantly returned to the vault, whose step was being swept by a graveyard attendant.

  ‘Pauline, look after the children,’ instructed Madame Deberle.

  The little girls, who had been kneeling, rose like white sparrows taking flight. Some who were too tiny, with legs hidden in their skirts, sat down on the ground and had to be picked up. While Jeanne was being lowered, the older ones strained to see the bottom of the hole. It was extremely black, they shivered and turned pale. Sophie assured everyone in a whisper that you stayed there for years and years. ‘Night-time too?’ enquired one of the Levasseur girls. Of course night-time too... For ever. Oh, Blanche would die if she had to be there at night! They all looked at one another with very wide eyes as though they had just heard a story about robbers. But once on their feet and let loose from around the vault the colour came back in their faces; it wasn’t for real. People told you such silly stories. It was lovely weather, this garden was pretty with its tall grasses. They could have had such good games of hide-and-seek behind all those stones! Their little feet were already dancing, the white dresses beating like wings. In the silence of the tombs, the warm, steady falling of the sunshine made these children blossom. Eventually Lucien had shoved his hand under Marguerite’s veil. He touched her hair, wanting to find out if she put anything on it to make it so yellow. The little girl puffed up with pride. Then he told her they would get married. Marguerite wanted to, but was afraid he would pull her hair. He touched it again, and discovered it was as soft as tissue paper.