Belle De Jour (13 page)

Before Belle de Jour’s flight Marcel had suggested going out with her one evening. Naturally she had flatly refused. At that time he’d wanted to keep up his reputation as a tough guy, and so had simply shrugged and dropped the subject. Now he persistently returned to it. In a confused way he’d sensed something strange and unknown to him in his new mistress, and he wanted to be linked to her by something more subtle than daily meetings in a public brothel.

On her side Séverine was victim of the fatal laws of that purely physical pleasure which, as it loses its sharpness, pushes its pursuer into seeking it out by ever more factitious means. In order to stimulate her desire for Marcel she had increasingly frequent recourse to imagining the dangerous and mysterious circles in which his young life moved. But her imagination soon wore out this resource. She became more amenable to the idea of
going out with him. She hoped to watch him in the underworld and revive in herself, if only for a while, the sense of fear which was at the core of her sensuality. She got all the more pleasure from imagining such an evening because she knew it to be impossible. How could she ever get out late at night without Pierre?

But unconsciously she was watching for just such an opportunity. It came, as it always will for those whose secret self is waiting for it. An operation in the country took Pierre out of town for twenty-four hours.

Marcel and Hippolyte waited for Séverine in the wine-store near Saint-Germain-l’ Auxerrois. As was usual when they were together, they didn’t speak; but tonight the deep security that usually fed their silence was lacking. Hippolyte wasn’t worried by the fact that Marcel wanted to take a woman out. Their customary consorts knew their place, and didn’t interrupt when the men were talking or thinking. But it was wrong for Belle de Jour to be his date. How could Marcel confer on that woman the honor of spending a whole evening with them, after she’d insulted him by going away like that without his permission? And Hippolyte felt sure he hadn’t even punished her properly. It made him unhappy, for Hippolyte recognized a hint of cowardice quite foreign to his friend in this behavior, just the sort of thing he’d watched break up really good guys, loyal and brave as you could ask for.

“Oh hell,” growled Hippolyte, “and to think I was the one to take him to Anaïs to start with.”

Then out of the wisdom of his unfathomable past he rolled a cigarette and thought how good it’d be to eat, since he was hungry.

Séverine arrived ahead of time. A sign of respect that mollified the colossus somewhat. He was equally pleased with the casual way Marcel remarked to Belle de Jour, “You look all right in a hat.”

But in his unbounded joy the youth knew he’d never have achieved that tone without Hippolyte beside him.

The latter now inquired, “Where are we going to eat?”

Marcel suggested some well-known restaurants on the boulevards. Séverine turned them down one after another.

“Shut up,” Hippolyte told her, “Marcel was talking to me.” To his friend he added, “Your big mouth. We’ll do it up good at Marie’s. The guys will be there.”

When Hippolyte made a decision he wasted no time over having it accepted. He paid and went out. The two others followed, but not without Marcel throwing Séverine a look. Hippolyte’s animal awareness intercepted it.

“You go on ahead, Belle de Jour,” he ordered.

Alone with Marcel the menace in his voice combined oddly with a note of request— “If you don’t want me to get rough, act like a man, see … at least while I’m around.”

The restaurant Hippolyte had singled out lay at the start of the rue Montmartre. They walked there. In a bad dream Séverine accompanied the two silent men leading her God knew where. They crossed the empty
market of Les Halles. If Marcel had been by himself she would have gone no further; but Hippolyte’s padding footsteps were enough to drive away all her will-power. And in any case the room they finally went into reassured her. Like everyone ignorant of the secret life of Paris, Séverine thought that since her companions led marginal existences they must spend their time in gangster joints. This small restaurant, however, was clean and welcoming. A counter shone brightly by the entrance. A dozen freshly laid tables completed the scene.

“Marie’ll be pleased to see you two,” said the man behind the counter; he wore a wool vest and his eyes were kindly.

While he was hospitably greeting Séverine a ball of a woman in a skirt and blouse shot out of the door that led to the kitchen; a strong smell of garlic and herbs came with her.

“You crooks, you should be ashamed of yourselves,” she exclaimed, planting vigorous kisses on the two men. “Four days without coming to see Marie.”

Her southern accent was quite touchingly warm and youthful and Séverine smiled as the woman looked her over. Her fine black eyes were so filled with goodness, and they were still huge, despite the fat that had made her face prematurely shapeless.

“Hello, sweetheart,” said Marie. “Whose are you?”

“Wait a minute,” declared Hippolyte gravely. “Let me do the honors here. My good friend, M Maurice”—he indicated the man behind the counter—“and Mme Maurice”—this was Marie. Then drawing Séverine forward he pronounced, “Mme Marcel.”

“I thought so,” Marie said maternally. “That Marcel, what a guy.”

Then she became serious and inquired confidentially: “Now what are you going to have? My stuffed cabbage, to start. And afterwards?”

Hippolyte ordered for them. Maurice threw in aperitifs free.

Marcel drew Séverine close. She yielded almost tenderly, since everything in the room had a strong, virile and somehow forbidden quality.

Men came in. They shook hands with Maurice, and Hippolyte, and Marcel. They greeted Séverine. A very few were followed by women, who didn’t stop by the counter but went and sat down discreetly at the table indicated by their escort’s glance or some brief word. These men might differ as to breadth of shoulder, dress, or accent, but they all bore an indefinable sign: that of leisure. Time lay on their gestures, on their words, their manner of holding their heads, on their lively idle eyes. Their conversation revolved about the turf or matters they spoke of by allusion.

The stuffy room grew hotter. The rich heavy dishes, highly spiced by Marie, and the heady wines added lively internal warmth. And though everyone in the place was highly “regular”—as Hippolyte liked to put it—the ponderous manner in which the men ate, the curve of their shoulders, even the bend of their necks gave Séverine the feeling of some dangerous, clandestine repast. She tried not to look around, tried not to hear the drawn-out conversations at nearby tables, nor even the one going on between Hippolyte and Marcel.
She was held in a state of suspended, sensual well-being by all the anonymous suspect lives surrounding her—“free” was Marcel’s expression for them. She knew what he meant. It all had the effect of some powerful potion on her.

No one seemed in a hurry to leave, except the women, who drifted off one by one.

To do what? Séverine asked herself with a faint shudder, as a tide of images more luridly sensual than even those of the rue Virène flowed over her.

“Time to go,” announced Hippolyte all of a sudden. “We’ll have a nightcap somewhere else.”

Marcel paused, whispered, “I can’t … Belle de Jour.”

“Say, Maurice,” Hippolyte raised his voice, “if there was the chance of trouble for you in a certain place, would you take your wife there with you?”

“She’d make me take her.”

Hippolyte got up. Then Marcel, and Séverine. Out in the street Hippolyte deigned to give Belle de Jour his arm.

“Looks like you’ve got guts.”

His shoulders slid up and he added to Marcel, “But after all, for all the danger there is …”

Séverine was in an agony of mortal fear, not so much at the idea of some unknown peril as at the crazy promiscuity she was letting herself get into. But there was a strange contagion in Hippolyte’s touch, as there had been about the bistro they’d just left, and her terror lay dormant.

Hippolyte led them to a little all-night bar opposite
the vegetable market in Les Halles. This was more like the low life: soiled tables, trash on the floor, a sense of emptiness in the room, and a queer light, dim but tiring. Séverine felt her heart catch. Slow carts passed by outside, piled with obscure plunder and drawn by gleaming horses in charge of sleepy men who wore huge boots and were armed with big whips. There was something barbaric about the place.

Hippolyte and Marcel settled for cheap brandy and gave up any interest in the outside world. But Séverine gripped her lover’s hand when she saw the group come in; for a second he seemed her sole protection against a ghastly threat.

“Take it easy,” he got out between his teeth. “It’s a good thing I came. All three of them.”

The men sat down peacably at Hippolyte’s table. The smallest, a seedy individual with a pocked face, cast a quick look at Séverine.

“Marcel’s wife,” explained Hippolyte. “Don’t worry.”

Séverine’s head was a dull void, but in any case she’d never have understood the talk that took place then, so mysterious and rapid. She was sitting between Hippolyte and the pockmarked man, each of whom was backed up by the silent presence of his own men. Suddenly Séverine heard the little man growl—“Thief.”

Marcel’s hand flew to his coat pocket and his three adversaries followed suit. But Hippolyte’s fist was wrapped around Marcel’s hand.

“We don’t want any trouble here, my friend,” he said softly, “not with these double-crossers.”

Pushing the table aside he gripped the pocked man’s
wrist and dragged it from the pocket in which it was buried. The fingers were curled round a revolver. Hippolyte directed the barrel at his own belly and said, “It’s a little better like that, I think.”

For a second it seemed the man might fire, then his eyes faltered under Hippolyte’s gaze.

“All right, let’s have it,” said Hippolyte. “I know you’ve got it on you.”

As if hypnotized the pocked man took a small package from his other pocket and handed it to Hippolyte.

“The weight’s O.K.,” commented the latter. “You can go now.”

The three got to the door. Marcel shouted after them, “For what you called me, don’t worry, I won’t shoot you in the back. We’ll settle that later.”

“Your man’s doing O.K. tonight,” Hippolyte remarked proudly to Belle de Jour.

Séverine’s mind whirled, but no longer with fear. Her widened eyes grew even more beautiful as they fastened on Marcel’s. He saw that she recognized his courage, and the fact that he’d been the first to unleash death.

“I’ll get that guy,” he said, “just like I did the other one, even if I have to follow him to Valparaiso to do it.…”

Hippolyte broke in gruffly, “You don’t have to tell stories to look big. You go to bed, I’ve got work to do.”

He turned to Séverine.

“You were all right. Want any, by the way?”

She hadn’t the faintest idea what he was offering, but she refused.

“Sure,” said Hippolyte, “that’s only for street whores, correct. Have yourselves a ball, kids.”

Alone with Marcel again Séverine asked, “What was it he wanted to give me?”

“Cocaine,” her lover replied with marked distaste. “The little guy just now gave him a few kilos’. You saw it. He’s going off to get rid of it somewhere, and we’re rich for a month.”

Séverine didn’t want to go to Marcel’s place, nor even leave the part of town they were in. She felt that the rue Virène, the wine-store, Marie’s restaurant and the bar they were leaving were the only places suitable for her excesses. But excited by all she’d just seen, she began to feel a burning desire for Marcel. She let him take her to a dirty hotel nearby; in a vile room, she knew unutterable joy.

Dawn had scarcely begun to show when Séverine slipped out of bed.

“I have to go.”

Marcel, reverting to his usual self, said threateningly —“You’re kidding.”

“No, I have to,” said Séverine.

As on the day when she’d grabbed his belt, he felt behind her some nameless invincible power.

“O.K.,” he muttered, “I’ll go with you.”

“No.”

Once more that unbearable stare of someone fighting for life. Marcel gave in. He got Séverine a taxi and let her go. As long as he could see the cab’s rear lights he stayed in the street as if spellbound. Then he cursed horribly and went to consult Hippolyte.

Only when she was safe in bed could Séverine think about what might have happened had Hippolyte’s reflexes been slower, or if the pockmarked man had fired. She began to shiver as if in fever.

Pierre came back a few hours later, his face drawn with fatigue.

“Please don’t leave me alone,” Séverine begged him. “I can’t live without you.”

For several days Marcel didn’t put in an appearance at the rue Virène. It didn’t bother Séverine; she didn’t want any more from him. When he did come he said immediately, “We’re going out tonight.”

She refused quite calmly. She had the feeling that he was now a harmless stranger. And, in fact, Marcel showed no violence. In an almost gentle tone he asked, “Would you kindly tell me why not?”

“Everyone here knows I’m not free to do as I like.”

“Then get free. I swear on my word of honor you’ll have everything you want.”

“No, it’s impossible,” Séverine answered.

“You’re in love with him, then?”

She was silent.

“O.K.,” said Marcel. And he left.

She thought she’d finally subdued him. All the same, on the way out she glanced back several times to see whether Marcel or Hippolyte were following her. Not noticing anything suspicious she continued on home.

That evening Hippolyte and Marcel drank silently in a bar off the Place Blanche. A young man joined them.

“I have the whole story, Monsieur Hippolyte,” he began deferentially. “I got in as an electrician.”

He gave the address, apartment number and real name of Belle de Jour.

Hippolyte released his spy and turned to Marcel.

“There you are, then. Whenever you want it.”

But if he had known the fate he was preparing for the only being in the world dear to him, Hippolyte —though he in fact detested bloodshed—would have murdered his pallid young informer before he had ever opened his mouth.