The Diary of a Chambermaid (42 page)

After a few days of this they would make it up, as though there had never been any real reason for their quarrel. Then, after floods of tears, off they would go to a restaurant to celebrate, and the following morning they would stay in bed late, exhausted by love-making …

It didn’t take me long to realize that all this was just play acting, poor fools, and that though they threatened to leave each other they never had the least intention of doing so. They were firmly bound to one another—he by self interest, she by vanity. The master held on to Madame because she had the money, and Madame clung to the master because of his name and title. But, because fundamentally they couldn’t stand each other—and all the more so because they were aware of the sordid bonds that kept them together—they felt obliged to have it out now and then, to express, in words as ignoble as their hearts, all the shame and bitterness they felt.

‘Whatever purpose do such creatures serve?’ I would say to William.

‘Bibi’s!’ he would reply. He always found the most apt and definitive answer for every occasion.

And, as an immediate and practical demonstration of how right he was, he would produce a magnificent Corona Corona, stolen that morning, carefully cut the end, light it with the utmost satisfaction, and, between puffs of fragrant smoke, declare sententiously:

‘You should never complain about the stupidity of your employers, my dear Célestine … It is the surest guarantee of happiness that we poor devils can ever hope for. The stupider the boss, the happier the servants … Run and fetch me a glass of brandy love …’

Lying back in a rocking-chair, his legs crossed, the cigar stuck in his mouth and a bottle of old Martell within reach, he would slowly and methodically spread out
L’Autorité,
and continue with the utmost good humour:

‘You see, honey, it is essential to keep the upper hand of the people you work for. That’s the whole secret … God knows, Cassagnac’s a tough kind of bloke … God knows, he suits me down to the ground and I have the greatest admiration for the old devil … But I’ll tell you one thing: I wouldn’t work for him, not for anything in the world. And what goes for Cassagnac goes for Edgar as well. You mark my words, and try to profit from them. Working for intelligent people, who know their way around, is simply a waste of time, my little beauty.’

And, after a silence, during which he continued to savour the aroma of his cigar, he added:

‘When you think how many servants there are, who spend their lives arguing the toss with their employers, plaguing the life out of them, threatening them … yes, even wanting to kill them … you can’t help feeling what fools they are! Because what then? Do we kill the cow that gives us milk and the sheep that gives us wool? Of course not. We milk the one and shear the other … and we do it skilfully … gently.’

And then he would immerse himself silently in the mysteries of conservative politics.

All this time Eugenie was still wandering around the kitchen, lovesick and dreamy. She did her work mechanically, as though she was sleep-walking, far away from the couple upstairs, far away from us and from herself, her eyes regardless of their foolishness and of ours, her lips forever murmuring unhappy words of love and adoration.

I don’t know why, but all this used to make me feel sad, so sad I could have cried … Yes, somehow that strange household, where everyone, the silent old butler, William, I myself, seemed to me like restless, futile ghosts, filled me with a heavy, indescribable melancholy.

The last scene I was present at was a particularly funny one … One morning, the master happened to come into the boudoir, where I was helping Madame try on a new pair of corsets … hideous things, made of mauve satin, with small yellow flowers and yellow laces. But then, taste was scarcely her strong point.

‘What?’ said Madame, in a gay, reproachful voice. ‘So that’s the way you enter women’s bedrooms … without even knocking.’

‘Women’s?’ cooed the master. ‘But you’re not
women.’

‘Well, if I’m not, I’d like to know what I am, then.’

The master screwed up his mouth—God, what a fool he looked!—and murmured with an affectation of tenderness:

‘But you’re my wife, of course … My sweet little wife. Surely it’s not a crime to visit one’s own little wife.’

Whenever the master behaved like a love-sick idiot, it usually meant that he was hoping to cadge some money, as Madame realized. Already suspicious, she replied:

‘I’m not so sure … You and your “little wife”, indeed! .., I’m not sure I want to be your “little wife”’ …

‘What? … You’re not sure? …’

‘How can you ever be? … Men are such funny creatures …’

‘But of course you’re my little wife, my one and only darling little wife.’

‘Get along with you … And I suppose you’re just my own great big baby?’

While I was lacing her up, Madame stood with her hands raised above her head, regarding herself in the mirror and stroking the tufts of hair in her armpits … I could have laughed. All this ‘little wife, big baby’ stuff was enough to drive you round the bend. And they looked such utter fools … the pair of them.

After glancing into the bathroom and picking up some petticoats and a pair of stockings, the master began fidgeting about with all the brushes and flasks and pots of cold cream. Then, taking up a fashion magazine that was lying on the dressing table, he seated himself on a kind of plush stool and asked:

‘Is there a puzzle this week?’

‘I expect so.’

‘Have you solved it?’

‘No, I haven’t.’

Seeing that he had become absorbed in the puzzle, Madame said rather drily:

‘Robert.’

‘Yes, darling.’

‘Haven’t you noticed anything?’

‘What? In the puzzle?’

Pulling a face and shrugging her shoulders, she said

‘No, not in the puzzle … Haven’t you really noticed anything? But there, you never do notice anything.’

The master gazed vacantly round the room, from the carpet to the ceiling, from the bathroom to the door, with a ludicrously vacant expression on his face.

‘What on earth are you talking about? Do you mean there’s something new, here in this room, that I haven’t noticed? I can’t see anything, on my word of honour.’

‘Then you simply don’t love me any more, Robert,’ Madame groaned.

‘Not love you? … Surely, that’s coming it a bit thick!’

He stood up, waving the magazine.

‘Not love you?’ he repeated. ‘Where on earth do you get that idea?’

‘Oh, I’m sure you don’t, because if you did, there’s one thing you certainly would have noticed …’

‘But what?’

‘Can’t you see I am wearing a new pair of corsets?’

‘Corsets, what corsets? … Oh, now I see. To tell you the truth, I hadn’t noticed them. I must be going crazy … Oh but aren’t they sweet … perfectly ravishing …’

‘Yes, it’s all right to say that now, but you don’t care tuppence … It’s me who’s crazy, wearing myself out trying to make myself look nice for you … and you don’t care in the slightest … Anyhow, what do I really mean to you? Nothing, less than nothing! You come in here, and all you do is read that beastly magazine … The only thing you’re interested in is that ridiculous puzzle … Oh, it’s a nice life you lead me. We never see anyone … we never go anywhere … we just live here like savages without any money …’

‘Come, come, now, I implore you … Don’t get all worked up. Look here! …’ And he tried to put his arm round her waist and kiss her.

But she angrily pushed him away.

‘No, leave me alone … you get on my nerves .. .’

‘But, see here, darling, my own little wife …’

‘You get on my nerves, d’you hear? Leave me alone … Don’t come near me … You think of nobody but yourself, you great lout … You never do a thing for me … You’re just a pig, there!’

‘Whatever are you talking about? This is all nonsense. Look, it’s no good getting in such a tizzy … All right, then, I’m in the wrong … I ought to have seen them straight away … they’re very pretty corsets … I just can’t understand why I didn’t! … Look at me, love. Smile at me … God, yes, they really are sweet, and they suit you perfectly.’

But the master was trying too hard. He was even getting on my nerves, though their quarrel did not concern me in the slightest. Madame was stamping her foot, growing more and more hysterical. Her lips were pale, and her hands clenched, and she kept repeating:

‘You get on my nerves … you get on my nerves … you get on my nerves … Is that clear? … Get out!’

The master went rambling on, but he, too, was beginning to get annoyed.

‘Now, sweetheart. you’re being unreasonable. All this over a pair of corsets. They’ve simply no connection … Come, look at me, darling, smile at me … It’s stupid to get so worked up about a pair of corsets …’

‘Oh, for Christ’s sake, get out,’ she shouted in a voice like a washerwoman’s. ‘Go on, get out and leave me alone.’

I had finished lacing her up. At these words I stood up, delighted that they had both completely given themselves away in front of me and, later on, would feel humiliated. They seemed to have forgotten that I was there, and anxious to see how the scene ended I made myself as inconspicuous as possible, not saying a word …

It was now the master’s turn. Having contained himself as long as he could, he suddenly lost his temper and, screwing the magazine up into a ball, flung it with all his strength at the dressing-table mirror and shouted:

‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, this is really impossible! It’s always the same. You can’t say a word without being treated like a dog … And always the same coarseness, the same filthy language … I’ve had just about enough of this kind of thing. I’m absolutely fed up with you behaving like a fishwife … And shall I tell you something? Those corsets are simply impossible … Nobody but a whore would dream of wearing them!’

‘You swine!’ Her eyes bloodshot, her mouth foaming and her fists clenched, she bore down upon the master, in such a fury that when she tried to speak her words almost choked her …

‘You swine,’ she managed to bring out at last. ‘And you dare to speak to me like this. Why, it’s unforgivable … Who was it that picked you up out of the gutter … a fine, broken-down gentleman, up to his eyes in debt, blackballed by his club? … You were glad enough when I pulled you out of the shit! … I suppose you think I did it just for your name, your title? A fat lot they counted, when the moneylenders wouldn’t even advance you another sou … Well, you can take your title back and wipe your backside with it … Talk about your noble ancestors … why, wasn’t it I that bought you in the first place? And haven’t I been keeping you ever since? Well, you’re not getting another penny out of me! And as to your ancestors, you cheap skate, just you try hocking them, and see if you can raise ten sous on the whole thieving pack of them … There’s going to be no more of all that, you understand. Never, never! … So you’d better take up gambling again, you cheat … or find yourself a whore, you ponce!’

She was really terrifying … Trembling with fear, his body sagging, not knowing where to look, the master recoiled before this flood of filth … As he reached the door, he caught sight of me and fled, while Madame went on shouting after him down the corridor, in a still more terrible voice:

‘A ponce, that’s all you are!’

Then she sank down on the couch, overcome by a terrible attack of nerves, which I only managed to calm by making her inhale ether …

Eventually she returned to her novelettes and started tidying her drawers again, while the master became more absorbed than ever in his complicated games of patience and yet another rearrangement of his pipes … And the correspondence started all over again … shyly at first, and at long intervals, though before long it had become as fast and furious as ever. I almost ran myself into the ground, hurrying backwards and forwards between the bedroom and the study, carrying their ridiculous notes … Oh how I laughed!

Three days later, as she was reading one of the master’s messages written on pink paper stamped with his coat of arms, Madame suddenly turned pale and asked me breathlessly:

‘Célestine, do you believe the master really means to kill himself? Have you seen him with a revolver? My God, what if he were to commit suicide!’

I just burst out laughing, straight in her face … I didn’t do it on purpose, but I couldn’t help myself. I simply couldn’t stop. My laughter just grew louder and louder. It was choking me. I thought I should really die of laughing.

For a moment she looked absolutely bewildered. Then she said:

‘What on earth’s the matter with you? What are you laughing about? Be quiet … Will you shut up, you wicked girl.’

But it was no use. I just couldn’t stop. At last I managed to stammer out:

‘Oh no … it’s really too funny, this nonsense of yours … Too stupid, ha-ha, ha-ha-ha. Oh, but it’s ridiculous!’

Naturally, that evening I had to leave the house, and, once again, I found myself in the street. What a bitch of a job, what a bitch of a life!

This was a bad blow, especially as I realized—though too late—that I could never hope to find such a good situation again … It had everything: good wages, all kinds of perks, easy work, and plenty of freedom and amusement. All I had to do was to let myself drift along. Any other girl, not a crazy idiot like me, would have managed to save up a nice bit of money, and fixed herself up with a handsome trousseau. In five or six years or so, who knows, I might have got married, bought a little business, had my own place, with no fear of being hard up … happy, almost a lady … As it was, I had to start the whole wretched business all over again, submit once more to the mercies of chance … I was vexed by what had happened, furious with myself, with William, Eugenie, Madame, everybody. What is so curious, and hard to explain, is that, instead of hanging on to this place by hook or crook, which, with a woman like Madame, would have been quite easy, I allowed myself to behave more stupidly than ever; and even, by my sheer impertinence, made the position irreparable when it could quite well have been patched up … Isn’t it strange, the things that sometimes go on inside you? It just isn’t possible to understand them. It’s as though you were seized by a kind of madness that shocks and excites you so that you start shouting and insulting people, though you haven’t the least idea where it comes from or what it is. Dominated by such madness, I had treated Madame absolutely outrageously. I had jeered at her parents, and drawn attention to the ridiculous lie she was living. I had treated her worse than anybody would dare treat a whore, and had said the filthiest things about her husband … It frightens me to think about it, and it makes me ashamed as well … These sudden outbursts of shamelessness, this intoxication with filth, that sometimes drives me almost to the point of murder, and makes me feel that I’m going out of my mind … What stopped me strangling her, killing her, I simply don’t know … Yet, God knows, I’m not a bad woman. Now, later, when I think about that poor creature and remember the wretched, muddled kind of life she was leading with that miserable weakling of a husband, I feel immensely sorry for her … I only hope she had the strength of mind to leave him, and that now she has found some kind of happiness …