Paris: The Novel (33 page)

“Not in the Maquis, I hope.”

“In the Maquis, madame. But they are quite respectable,” he added. “They sent me to school and made me take up a skilled trade.”

“I am glad to hear it.”

“You have run this home for Monsieur Ney for many years, madame?”

“I have. It’s a great responsibility.”

“That’s for sure,” chimed in Édith’s mother, though Aunt Adeline tried to ignore her. “He started with a much smaller place, you know. He was a lawyer in the backstreets of Belleville then. Just two rooms in a tenement. One for Mademoiselle Bac, and the other for a widow whose husband left her quite a good little business. An ironmonger’s. But she couldn’t run it. No idea. He did everything for her. Ran the business, looked after her. And when she died, she left it all to him. That was the start of his fortune. Then he moved to a bigger place, near the Gare du Nord. And now this.” She nodded. “But he is very loyal. He always took poor Mademoiselle Bac with him. She started in a tenement in Belleville, and now she lives in a big house near the Arc de Triomphe!”

“That’s enough,” said her sister-in-law.

“He’s got brains, Monsieur Ney,” continued Édith’s mother, feeling rather pleased with herself. “I asked him once, ‘What’s the secret of the ironmongery business, Monsieur Ney?’ And do you know what he replied? ‘It turns out,’ he said, ‘that it’s nails.’ Think of that. Just nails.”

She seemed finally to have exhausted her store of information. Aunt Adeline looked relieved. Thomas didn’t mind. He thought it was rather interesting.

“Shall I tell you something about Monsieur Ney?” said Édith. “You’ve heard of the great Ney, who was one of Napoléon’s marshals?”

“Of course.”

“Monsieur Ney and he are related. Isn’t that right, Aunt Adeline?”

“I believe it may be so. Monsieur Ney is too discreet to say it.”

“And he runs a good business here,” said Thomas.

Aunt Adeline gave him a sharp look.

“Monsieur Ney is wonderfully kind,” she said with a hint of reproof. “No one who has the good fortune to come here need ever worry again.”

“He’s an angel,” cried Édith’s mother, taking her cue at last. “An angel.”

“And he has a daughter?”

“That is correct,” said Aunt Adeline. “Mademoiselle Hortense is a charming young lady.”

“She will inherit a fortune, and make a fine marriage,” said Édith’s mother.

“No doubt,” said Aunt Adeline.

Thomas wondered if any food was to be forthcoming. It didn’t look like it. And he was just wondering what he was supposed to do next, when there was a sound from the entrance. Aunt Adeline looked surprised. They heard a key turning in the outer door.

“It must be Monsieur Ney,” she said. “He doesn’t normally come at this hour.”

A moment later, there was a soft footfall in the passage, then a light tap at the door, which Aunt Adeline quickly opened, and the owner of the establishment entered the room. Édith and Thomas stood, and Édith’s mother, unable to rise quickly enough, conveyed from her chair by an obsequious bow her cognizance of the profound respect that was due to him.

Monsieur Frédéric Ney was a small-time attorney of just under average height, but his presence gained its force from the fact that he was so remarkably thin, and that his pale face, which reminded Thomas of a fish, was too long for his body. His trousers fitted so tightly that they were almost like the stockings of the former age. His coat today was a dark chocolate color.

He surveyed them all. Could some sixth sense have told him that an alien presence had entered his domain? His eyes fixed upon Thomas.

“Bonjour, Monsieur Ney,”
said Édith with a winning smile—and a faint upward twitch of the corner of the lawyer’s slightly fleshy mouth suggested that she was in his good graces. “May I present my friend Thomas Gascon. He works on Monsieur Eiffel’s tower.”

Monsieur Ney inclined his head.

“My felicitations, young man.” His voice was so quiet that Thomas had to lean forward slightly to be sure he heard. “Opinions may vary about the tower, but I believe that we must not be afraid of progress, so long as we never forget tradition.”

“That’s for sure,” said Édith’s mother.

“I took him to see Madame Govrit,” said Édith to Ney. “She doesn’t like the tower at all,” she added with a laugh.

Again, the lawyer’s lip twitched.

“Madame Govrit has a fine room, monsieur,” said Thomas, hoping to be agreeable. And he seemed to have succeeded, for the lawyer suddenly became quite animated.

“It is indeed, young man, as befits a person of her station. I am proud to have such a room in this house. All our rooms, I hope, are satisfactory, but hers is, I may say, the best.”

Thomas knew that he shouldn’t, but he could not resist.

“I also saw Mademoiselle Bac. Her room was not so nice.”

It was foolish of him to challenge Ney, but if he expected the lawyer to be embarrassed, he underestimated his man.

“Ah, poor Mademoiselle Bac,” said Ney with a shake of his head. “She came to me many years ago, with little enough, but I took her in. And now …” He smiled. “It is I who pay for her food and keep.” He made a little gesture with his hands as though to say, “What can one do?”

“He is an angel,” murmured Édith’s mother.

“And I am sure that she is grateful, Monsieur Ney,” said Aunt Adeline, “even if she cannot express it.”

“I am glad you say that,” Ney responded with feeling. “I am glad because there are two things in the world that I especially value.” He turned to Thomas. “Take note, young man, for these will see you safely through life. The first is gratitude. And I hope that all the residents here may have cause to feel gratitude.”

“There is nothing that Monsieur Ney will not do for them,” cried Édith’s mother. “Nothing is too much.”

“I hope I provide everything they need, and more than that—if funds permit,” said Monsieur Ney. He turned to Thomas again. “The second quality, young man, is loyalty—such as I am fortunate enough to receive from Madame Adeline here. Gratitude and loyalty. These are everything.”

Thomas had the feeling that if people were ungrateful or disloyal to Monsieur Ney, they might live to regret it.

“Are you grateful and loyal?” Ney suddenly asked Thomas.

“I am grateful to Monsieur Eiffel for giving me a job,” said Thomas. “I should certainly be loyal to him.”

“Voilà. We are in perfect agreement,” said Monsieur Ney. He gave Thomas a glassy stare, then smiled at Édith. “What an excellent young man.” He turned to Aunt Adeline. “When I made my rounds yesterday, you may remember I was called away. And that is why I have come in
today to see the three or four of our residents that I missed. Mademoiselle Bac was one of those.”

“Do you wish me to accompany you, Monsieur Ney?” asked Aunt Adeline.

“No. There is no need.”

“She always has her picture of the Virgin and Child,” said Édith. “Margot polishes the glass whenever she goes in. You know how Mademoiselle Bac always seems completely still, but I can see her looking at the picture.”

“Religion is a great comfort,” said her mother with a wise nod of the head.

“Indeed,” said Ney, as he stepped toward the door, and Thomas secretly wondered if the comforting picture would remain.

“And Mademoiselle Hortense is well?” asked Édith’s mother.

“She is.”

“Ah,” said Édith’s mother, “she has everything. She is beautiful, she is kind …”

Monsieur Ney left the room.

A few minutes passed in desultory conversation, then Aunt Adeline pulled out a little silver watch on a chain and looked at it.

“I have duties now, and Édith will be helping me,” she said.

Thomas took the hint and began to rise.

“Perhaps the young man would like to stay with me and have a cognac,” said Édith’s mother.

Aunt Adeline looked at her as one might at a waterlogged old ship sinking inconveniently in a harbor.

“Sadly, I have to go, madame,” Thomas lied.

Outside in the street, he paused. He’d nothing special to do. Dusk would soon begin to fall. He went and stood opposite the handsome front door. Looking up, he was fairly sure he could identify the big window of Madame Govrit’s room. As for Mademoiselle Bac’s dingy attic, that would be up in the roof, toward the back, well out of sight.

Judging by what he’d seen of Édith’s mother, he supposed the lodgings she and Édith shared were not a lot better.

He walked back past the archway and turned the corner. This side of the building consisted of a high house wall, punctuated by some small, narrow windows, which continued as the courtyard wall. As he moved
along the house wall, he calculated that just before the courtyard began, he must be level with Aunt Adeline’s quarters. Just above his head there was a small window that was slightly open. He guessed that it probably belonged to her kitchen. He paused there for a moment, wondering if perhaps he might hear Édith’s voice.

But it was Aunt Adeline’s voice that he heard.

“You heard him,
ma chérie
. That stupid comment about Mademoiselle Bac. He was just trying to be cheeky to Monsieur Ney.”

“Monsieur Ney called him an excellent young man,” Édith’s voice replied.

“Yes. Out of kindness to you. But he was not pleased, I assure you. And you cannot afford a young man who annoys Monsieur Ney.”

Édith said something else, but Thomas couldn’t hear what it was.

“My child,” answered Aunt Adeline, “I don’t care if the young man went to the moon to look for you. We have one fool in the family already. Forgive me, but that’s your mother. We can’t afford two. Let us not see this Thomas Gascon again, if you please. You can do better.”

For the next three days, Thomas waited uneasily. He believed in fate. His parents might not like it, but he wanted Édith. Did she feel the same way?

On Wednesday, he waited near the lycée in the evening. Édith and her mother came out together as usual. But instead of separating, they went home together, and not wanting to encounter the mother, Thomas hung back. If Édith caught sight of him, she gave no indication. The next night the same thing happened.

Friday was a cold November day. An icy wind entered the city from the east. It hissed cruelly through the girders of the tower as he worked, biting his hands, and snaked down the boulevards, stripping the brown leaves from the trees.

Work ended at dusk and as soon as he got across the river he found a bar where he could get a large bowl of soup to warm himself up. Then he walked up the rue de la Pompe. The lights in the lycée were just being extinguished as he got there. He was determined to speak with her this evening, whether she separated from her mother or not. But a few moments later he saw her come out alone. He went straight up to her.

“Oh,” she said. “It’s you.”

“Of course it’s me. Where’s your mother?”

“She’s sick today.”

“I’ll walk with you,” he said. Then, as they passed a bar, he remarked that he needed to warm up, and guided her in.

“Only for a minute,” she said.

They sat at a table and he ordered them each a glass of wine.

“It’s good to see you,” he said. “I was glad to meet your family.”

“Yes.”

“What are you doing this Sunday?”

“Looking after my mother probably.”

“We could meet for a short while, perhaps?”

She hesitated.

“I don’t think so,” she answered. “Everything is difficult at the moment.”

“You haven’t time to see me?”

“Not at present. I’m sorry.”

“Do you want to see me?”

“Of course, but …”

He understood. He had thought that this was the woman whom fate had chosen for him. He had felt it to be so. Yet it seemed that his belief had been nothing but a foolish illusion.

That was bad enough. But why was she rejecting him? Because her aunt didn’t approve of him. Because Aunt Adeline thought he was stupid. Because he had not shown enough respect to Monsieur Ney. And the fact that she was right, that he shouldn’t have blurted out his foolish comment, only made his sense of resentment worse.

“Your family don’t approve of me,” he said.

“I didn’t say that.”