The Eleventh Year (35 page)

“Too busy for your husband and your best friend?”

She heard the quiet of his tone and met his eyes. It was impossible to tell him, because if she did, he'd have to know the rest. And if he knew, he'd leave.

She found herself thinking of him, of her, of their marriage. He was kind, honest. Justin Reeve had been unkind and a crook. She looked at Alex and shook her head. It was impossible to explain anything to him. Let him think what he wanted, even if it meant an estrangement from her. Let him—

“I understand your answer,” he whispered, dropping his hands from her arms. “Sometimes, Lesley, silence is more eloquent than words.”

She opened her mouth, then shook her head helplessly. Rapidly, she clasped her coat and opened the door. He heard her bang it closed. Alexandre realized, with panic, that he was shaking. His whole body seemed out of control. And she still hadn't answered about the chair. He stood by his desk, wondering what to do about Franchot, and then sat down, wondering what to do about his wife.

S
he knew
that somehow she had broken his trust. “Never tell a lie,” Ned had told her when she'd been four years old. “It's the first step to theft. If you don't lie to me, I shall always tell you the truth. It's a sacred trust between people who love each other.”

Now that the white cocoon protecting them had been broken, Lesley felt herself watching her own behavior, and Alex's, as if she were an outsider. A continual headache nagged at her. She took aspirin, and when that didn't work, an eighth of a grain of morphine. That worked, but she felt dulled, in a world above reality, floating. It wasn't an unpleasant feeling, but it made her feel she wasn't truly there.

They circled each other, he not trusting, she guilty, afraid. If he spoke once more to Franchot, he'd be certain she had lied to him. She could never be sure he wouldn't talk, so she dismissed Franchot and hired another, less renowned decorator. It wasn't important. What mattered was that she have the funds to pay off Paul and Elena and keep Alex at bay.

She examined their marriage, wondering why she was trying so hard to hold onto it. Wasn't it an error? I'm not in love with him, she thought coldly at dinner, watching him from across the table. He's a stranger; we don't even know each other. She felt no desire to make love to him. He lived in a different, remote world, where he met with members of the Banque de France and she tried to make the set designs for one of the
Soirées de Paris.
She didn't know what he really did all day, and he rarely asked her.

She couldn't sleep. But Jamie was sleeping all the time now, her baby due imminently. In the middle of the night Lesley, restless and lonely, threw down Radiguet's satiric novel on their decadent society and went downstairs to find some brandy. Alexandre had taken the Armagnac into the study, and she suddenly had a taste for its fine apple flavor. She opened the door and was astounded to find him seated at his desk, his reading glasses perched on his nose. Both exchanged oddly guilty looks.

“What are you doing?” she asked, trying to sound pleasant and casual. But since the day he had confronted her about the Louis XVI armchair, they'd both been ill at ease around each other.

“Some paperwork from the office.”

She nodded, stymied for more conversation. She wondered how best to ask him for the bottle of Armagnac. She stood stiffly eyeing it on its silver tray, his snifter half filled beside it. Finally he saw her expression and made an offhand gesture. “Help yourself. There's another bottle in the cupboard here.”

She turned red with embarrassment. “It's that I can't go to sleep.”

He shrugged, half smiling. She felt piqued by what she considered his superior attitude and said: “You obviously aren't sleeping either.”

“I have a lot of work to do.”

She made an effort not to meet his eyes and moved instead to the desk, scooping up the nearly full bottle of apple brandy. “If you're sure you've got more…”

“Be my guest.”

Her heart pounding, she turned around, left the room. On the threshold she faced him, murmured tentatively: “If you still can't sleep, later on . . .”

“Thank you.”

So much formality. It cut inside her. She went upstairs and sat on her bed, pouring herself a small glass of Armagnac. She propped herself on her pillows, took up her reading. Alex used glasses now to work. Strange how such details of daily life escaped one.

The morphine combined with the brandy was wreaking havoc on her stomach. She turned off the light, let the book slide to the floor. The room was whirling. She wanted to breathe deeply but couldn't.

All at once she felt something breaking inside her. She flicked on the light, saw that she had drunk half the contents of the bottle of Armagnac. The nausea had passed a little but had been replaced by a great, aching emptiness. She remembered wondering about the child she'd carried. How old would it have been? And, she wondered vaguely, whatever happened to Justin?

She sat up, poured herself another glass, drank it down. And then heard the knock, a light tapping. He was coming in, his suit put aside, a neat maroon bathrobe tied about him.

His face appeared fuzzy to her from the Armagnac, and she was afraid he'd notice the amount she'd consumed. But instead he was sitting down, putting his hands on her shoulders. Her head was buzzing a bit and she wanted to forget all the bad thoughts, forget Justin and the woman in Poughkeepsie. She put her own arms around his neck. He smelled of cologne.

“Lesley,” he was saying. “If I run for political office next year, I'll have to leave most of the legal work to my assistants. They'll have to be paid higher stipends.”

“So?”

“So we can't go on like this.”

“You mean, not trusting each other?”

“I mean, redecorating the house every month. The market is doing all right, but it won't continue on its upswing forever. Everyone's doing like you: spending fortunes on consumer goods. We've got to watch it.”

She wondered how drunk she was. She wanted to cry but didn't. She pushed her face into the lapel of his bathrobe, heard his heart beat. He smelled a little of perspiration. “My head hurts,” she said. “Can't we discuss money tomorrow?”

She felt him sigh. The tightness within him stiffened his body. She kissed his lips, tried to part them. At length she succeeded. He yielded, kissing her back, his arms encircling her waist. It was always better to make love when you were a bit tipsy, because then there was less pain and more flow. She couldn't respond very well but let him position her on her bed, felt with a soft moan the stroking of her breasts. They'd make love and then in the morning, the ease would return to them, the awkward, mistrustful atmosphere would dissipate.

“I'm scared,” she whispered.

“Of what?”

“Of things ending.”

“What things?”

“My youth. You. Everything.
Things.”

She raised her face to him, and he kissed her again, and then she untied the belt of his bathrobe. He was a singularly hairless man, with small circles of black fuzz around his nipples, that was all. Justin had had a different body. His muscles had been more obviously palpable, and he'd had more hair. She felt Alex penetrating her, but with the liquor, the pain was decreased. It was payment for the life she'd led: a selfish life. She owed him this easy access to her body. She lay back and let him move, and remembered for an instant how she had frantically moved along with Justin. Now she felt no impulse to do anything but lie back and let him do all the work. He liked to work. It was part of his character. She realized suddenly how bored she was. And then the nausea came back in a sweep, and she felt sick. She wanted everything to be done with, over. She groaned, tossed her head. He stopped in his gliding motions and touched her on the cheek. “What's wrong?”

“Hold me, Alex,” she whispered. “Just hold me.”

She felt him slip away, and once again her body was hers alone, unviolated. How lucky men were that nothing ever touched their insides, their wholeness. He lay beside her in the dark, and she felt the warmth of his silent presence. It brought her comfort. She felt enveloped in this comfort, in this warmth. She'd felt it from the very beginning, in his Bugatti. Maybe now she could go to sleep.

“Stay,” she murmured, but the word came out a soft, unformed moan. He kissed her gently on the temple and then sat up. He was going away. She opened her mouth to ask him again, but he was tiptoeing out of the boudoir and the words stayed on her lips. He was letting himself out, and she felt the desolation of his exit. She had interrupted his pleasure, and now she was paying for it by having to remain alone in bed.

I shouldn't drink this much, she thought vaguely. Then the walls closed about her and she stopped having to feel, and to think.

In his bedroom, he pulled the covers up, and lay naked between the cool, crisp sheets. All his life he'd been prevented from the final reward. He'd heard her tell him to stay. But for what? As an additional security blanket? I am tired of taking care of other people, he thought bitterly. Tired of their never giving any of it back to me.

And he couldn't sleep for the resentment, the sour anger. He'd always been alone.

T
he
Soirées de Paris
were a great success. Léonide Massine danced for the intelligentsia of Paris, and there was an aura of the forbidden about the performance. Diaghilev had many followers, many friends and admirers. Those who came to the mansion of Charles and Edith de Beaumont to watch Massine looked nervously over their shoulders and were a little afraid to clap, out of a sense of disloyalty. After all, the choreographer
/danseur
had been fired from the Ballets Russes after his marriage; he was the third of Diaghilev's lovers to have so betrayed him. But, argued the elegant ladies of Paris, Massine, unlike his predecessor Nijinsky, had always been an unwilling homosexual. “Diag”—Seriozha—should have realized this and predicted his eventual defection.

Lesley sat with her husband and Sara Murphy and was amazed at her own sense of color, at the way her decorations blended in with the ballet. Chiffons and velvets and soft moiré silks—what fun they had been to work with! She looked over shyly at Gabrielle Chanel, severe in her black pants outfit. The
couturière
was accompanied by Misia Sert, Diaghilev's best friend. Pushing out her pigeon breast, pouting her lips, Misia, loyal, sat haughtily surveying the work before her. She wanted to disapprove. But Coco Chanel suddenly, briefly, smiled at Lesley. Then Lesley sat back, feeling proud, vindicated. Natalia Gontcharova would be so pleased….

At intermission, the pagelike Edith de Beaumont, who, with her dandified husband, had started these ballet extravaganzas the previous year, strode up to Alexandre and Lesley. “You must work for us more often,” she stated. “I've heard whispers growing to loud cries of approval. You have a gift for costume.”

“Thank you.” Lesley blushed, aware that Edith was regarding her in a peculiar manner. “It's Gontcharova's lessons,” she stammered.

“The results are breathtaking.”

Alexandre stood rather awkwardly, not knowing what to say. He cleared his throat. “Lesley's been working night and day,” he commented.

“Well, then, you can take her on a lovely vacation.” Edith's eyes were piercing, unkind. He wondered why. They'd always gotten along well. “Men,” she was saying, “should be more generous with their wives.”

Why was she telling him this? It sounded like a veiled accusation. “I've never denied Lesley anything,” he retorted, and then stopped. He had no reason to defend himself to this woman who, after all, had nothing to do with the Varennes. But he felt piqued, insulted in his honor. He glanced at Lesley and saw that her cheeks were scarlet. He couldn't help himself. “Isn't it so, Lesley?” he insisted.