Fernand VandErem

“HIS brother ... M. Rainda brother!” Mme. Chambannes murmured dreamily, leaning on the edge of her bed. Her lace-edged pillow made a soft frame for her scattered curls. Distractedly she gathered together the rest of her mail. There was an advertisement of a perfume house, a modist bill which she thrust aside with a disgusted pout, two newspapers and, under them, a closed letter-card. It was a strange card; the address was written in awkward capitals falling over each other—the suspicious appearance of an anonymous letter! ZozÉ tore it open slowly. Sensations of weakness vibrated along her arms. She read the following lines, traced on the gray paper in characters similar to those on the outside:

Should you have nothing better to do some morning, pass, towards 11 lock, the rue Godot-De Mauroi, in the neighborhood of number 12 bis; you will once more ascertain that the friends of our lady-friends are our friends.

She fell back, one hand over her heart as if to shield a wound; she had not a doubt, felt no hope. She remained motionless at first, her eyes closed; then she began to stammer indistinctly.

“Oh!... oh!... oh! mon Dieu!... The wicked people! What an atrocious wickedness!”

A burning sensation was in her heart, and every query she invented, every possibility seemed a new burn that made her wound deeper.

They were denouncing Gerald, of course; but the woman, the mean wretch, the unknown betrayer—who could she be?

ZozÉ called to her mind in turn the names of all her friends but she could not lay the guilt on any special one. All seemed equally suspicious to her. Gerald had indulged in equivocal flirtations and familiar gestures with them all in turn; in each of them she now successively thought, according to her memories, that she held the accomplice. Then came the names of others who seemed more guilty, Flora Pums after Germaine de Marquesse, Rose Silberschmidt after Flora Pums. In the end she was altogether confused, the accumulation of equivalent proofs and contradictory presumptions. She made an attempt at finding a clue by seeking to guess at the name of the writer. Names surged to her mind, names of men who desired her and who might have been capable of wishing to destroy her happiness: Pums, Burzig, Mazuccio. It would surprise her were this infamous action to come from either of these. She realized how easily she suspected them all, men and women, and a sudden bitter grimace caused her lips to contract. Phew! In what company of cads and harlots was she living then, since none of them could be free from her mistrust, since she had not once been afraid of wrongly accusing any of them? This sudden clearsight passed, however, like lightning and was clouded at once by her foaming anger. The little Mouzarkhi had no time for philosophy! She exaggerated the tone of her insults, like one in the delirium caused by disillusion; she had no love left, no tenderness, no illusion for anyone but Gerald, her beloved Gerald whom she was perhaps going to lose forever! Tears veiled her eyes. With anguish she visualized through their mist the inconceivable parting scene! She thought of herself, in the rue guesseau, on the threshold of the apartment, after the final explanation. She was turning back for a last glance at him. She came back once more to kiss him!... Oh, no, no! She did not want to see him any more; and a rushing terror caused her to draw the light linen sheet over her face. Convulsive sobs shook her sinuous form, which was plainly discernible under this burial-sheet. Suddenly she heard the clock on her mantelpiece striking ten and, with a more violent start, she threw back the coverings, jumped out of bed and rang nervously.

“Quick! hot water in the dressing-room.... My tailored costume of brown cloth.... My black coat!...” she said to the maid who came in at her call.

“What corset?”

“I do know! Any one!... Hurry up, that is all, hurry up, hurry up!”

“Does madame want a carriage?”

“Yes, tha it! A closed carriage ... or, rather, no! No carriage.... Hurry up!”

A bellicose haste speeded her on. She must be ready in time. She was rushing towards this supreme torture: to surprise the guilty ones as if it were a matchless joy; her nostrils vibrated, a savage smile lurked in the corner of her lips and her eyes shone with eagerness.

She was out at a quarter of eleven. She walked up the rue de Prony and crossed the parc Monceau. A gardener was removing the narrow sheathes of straw from round the exotic trees. The budding foliage spaced their masses which still admitted daylight; it had not lost its very pale green tints; a fresh perfume rolled softly on the breeze. The contrast of this riot of the elements saddened ZozÉ. She opened her sunshade, for the sun was already hot; as she walked she uttered long regretful whispers as if she were never again to see these graceful lawns nor breathe the balmy air.

She made an effort to stiffen herself against the softening reverie and called a passing closed cab:

“Listen carefully,” she ordered the driver. “We are going to the rue Gaudot-de Mauroi.... When I knock on the glass, you are to stop ... not to move again.... You will keep your seat and wait.... If I knock twice, you are to start again, slowly.... If I knock three times, you start at a trot.... Do you understand?”

“Yes, Madame!” the driver said paternally. He was fat and wore a moustache; the mystery of the affair and her young captai tone amused him.

“Very well then, start!... There will be a good tip for you!”

The carriage went down the avenue de Messine.

As she approached the point of attack, ZozÉ saw her ardor weakening. She felt as if she were choking under heavy blows on her chest; then she fancied that her heart had become a poor little bird, and a brutal hand squeezed it. She kept her eyes closed, so as not to count the houses which were passing too fast.

A sudden motion caused her to open them again. The carriage turned into the rue Godot-de Mauroi. ZozÉ was barely in time to knock on the window pane. The driver stopped outside No. 9. From there, she could see diagonally No. 12 bis, an old house, whose gray faÇade merged into similar ones. But, above the door, two yellow signs proclaimed that small apartments were to let.

“Here it is!” thought ZozÉ with a distressful sigh. She looked at her watch and saw that it was five minutes after eleven. She put up the windows so as to hide her face behind their mock transparency. She huddled in the left-hand corner, aggressively facing No. 12 bis and began to look.

A quarter of an hour passed. Green-vegetable-hawkers cried their wares and pushed their heavy barrows in the silent, half-deserted street. At intervals, the cab-horse shook himself with a bored shiver that rocked the shafts; or the driver made a movement which set the harness rustling and the wood creaking. ZozÉ perceived these noises no more clearly than she noticed the neighboring shop, the passers-by who paused to look at her or the saddler opposite, whose face was bent down over his work behind a glass window. Invisible blinkers kept her eyes fastened ahead, as did the anxious attention which kept her body stiff, toward the small square of stones where the lovers would appear.

What were they saying now to each other, in what abject caresses were they swooning, on what floor were they, near which of these windows? Her memories helped her somewhat to visualize Gerald. But the woman escaped her. She guessed all of the perfidy, her waist, her nakedness, her breast and her arms, she could see everything but the head, all but the face! She was as one struggling in one of those terrible nightmares, when the features of one of the participants are dissolved and vanish as soon as one attempts to distinguish them.

A nearby clock announced the half hour. The delay of the two accomplices exasperated ZozÉ even more than their betrayal. Unconsciously, she called them forth in a vehement, and silent prayer: “Come! Come on! Hasten!” as one calls belated friends to an urgent appointment.

A sudden idea upset her. The letter might have lied! She might be the victim of a hoax! But no joy came in the wake of this idea. She could not accept its plausibility. Her suspicions had wandered in every direction, and now she could not force them back. It was as if they scented their prey and were anxious for the imminent running down of the quarry.

Again, she consulted her watch. “Quarter of twelve! Very well.... At twelve, l go in and ask the concierge!...” Then she looked up again; her head fell back tragically.

There, in front of the arch of No. 12 bis, a woman, dressed in a gray serge costume, was calling a cab; in spite of the white veil she wore, the thick, flowery embroidery, ZozÉ recognized a well-known profile, a plane-like jaw, her friend, her best friend, Germaine de Marquesse herself!

Now the carriage opposite started. It almost touched the wheels of her own. The hood was down and, under it, Germaine was arched in a resolute pose, one hand stretched on each end of her sunshade which lay across her knees. The wretch! It was indeed she! And she was not taking any notice of anything, this Germaine, so blinded was she with satisfaction!... Oh! the little Mouzarkhi never could have believed that the pleasure of surprising these two could be so heavy with sorrow! She almost fainted, seized with sudden cowardice, as would a woman on the operating table, at the first contact of the steel. What would the second hurt be, if the first one left her feeling so terribly rent?

But she had no time to change her mind; Gerald appeared outside the accursed house.

He was in morning dress, a black cape, a blue suit with a bunch of flesh-colored carnations that “the other one” herself had no doubt pinned on the lapel of his coat. ZozÉ looked intently at him, her eyes dilated with horror and love.

He glanced right and left, as if hesitating. Then he set out, in his usual lolling gait, towards the rue des Mathurins; he carried his walking-stick under his arm; his shoulders were bent forward and his hands curled, shell-like, to light a cigarette.

Maddened, ZozÉ forgot the agreed signals. She pulled the window down and shouted to the driver:

“Go!”

The horse started at a slow trot. Madame Chambannes knocked frantically on the glass pane and, without waiting for the carriage to stop, jumped to the pavement.

The sound of the cab stopping caused Gerald to turn round. He saw the young woman and paled with uneasiness. Yet, he constrained himself to say with a heavy smile:

“What! is it you!...”

ZozÉ pointed to the cab and its open door: “Get in!” she commanded, harshly.

“You wish me to get in? What a funny tone of voice you are using!” stammered Gerald, again attempting a smile.

“I tell you to get in!” repeated ZozÉ, herself astounded at her audacity. “Come on, get in!... I am not afraid of anything, neither of people nor of scandal.... I want you to get in!”

A band of young working girls going out to lunch looked at them and nudged each other.

“Very well!” said Gerald, embarrassed.... “All the same!... you must admit that you have a strange way of....”

“Enough! We shall talk by and by.”

And, while the young count settled himself in the carriage, she told the driver.

“Drive where you like!... To the Bois.... Go towards the Bois.”

They started out. Both were seasoned navigators of Paris, experts in the ways of carriage driving; they pulled down the blinds. Then ZozÉ cried out:

“Well?”

Then her energy left her and she burst into tears.

“What is the matter?... What is it?... I assure you I do not understand!” Gerald murmured hypocritically, as he stretched out his arm to hold her.

She avoided him with a brusque movement.

“Do not touch me!... You make me sick.... Do stop your stupid lies.... I saw Germaine.... Do you understand now?” Geral silence caused her rage to break out: “How shameful! What an ignominious affair!... With one of my own friends, with the one I loved best! Bah! you are just as worthless!... You are two bandits, two blackguards! It was natural that you should take to each other....”

Gerald attempted to come closer.

“Come, come, my little ZozÉ, mon petit Zozo.... Do cry.... This has no importance at all.... Yes, it is true ... and it is not nice.... But it was even more stupid than wicked.... Look here, if the rules that govern decent society allowed me to speak openly....”

“Well, what then?” said ZozÉ, without repulsing him.

“No!” said Gerald. “It would be disgusting.... You yourself could not wish it.... Be sure, nevertheless, that to-day was the first time and that, at once, on leaving ... do you know what I was saying to myself just now when you jumped on me?... I was telling myself that it was the first and also the last time....”

“Will you swear it to me?” asked ZozÉ, with a passion that gave her face, which was convulsed with rage, even a stranger look.

“I do!” Gerald replied.

She examined him tenderly, laying her two hands on his shoulders, then pushed him back far from her with an angry thrust: “I do believe you.... You lie.... You have a woma eyes!” She began to cry again. In the half light which came through the blinds, as at the rehearsal of a play, near his mistress who moaned as if she were in the last act of a melodrama, Gerald began to feel too weary to justify himself.

“Come, my little ZozÉ, mon petit Zozo!” he still murmured from time to time, mechanically, to put himself in countenance.

Nevertheless, the scene lasted too long; it was getting on his nerves. The proud nobleman confusedly rebelled under the love anxiety. Zoz brusque way had really hurt his feelings. He, Gerald de Meuze, allowing himself to be bullied by a mere Mme. Chambannes? No matter how docile, no matter what a charming pal ZozÉ was, he was beginning almost to regret the women of his own caste. Of course, among them there were a few amoureuses, a few sentimentalists, notorious sticklers who were known as such. But one was duly warned and only ventured into an affair with open eyes! On the other hand, what agreeable natures these people had; how easy and merry they were; and how well they understood life! Ah! neither the young ChitrÉ, for instance, nor Mme. de Baugy, nor even that plump cherub, Mme. Torcieux, would have made so much noise for such a banal little trick! They would have pouted a while; they might have left him. But there would have been neither scandal nor sobs. Two or three sharp words at first—then a firm handshake, to make it up or to part, and that would have been all. For they knew what a man was, what a flirtation or an adventure meant. They were women of the world!...

Suddenly, between two jolts, ZozÉ asked in a tone of stupefaction.

“Oh! Raldo.... How could you?... How?... How?...”

How could he! Poor little one, what exquisite things she said! He repressed a smile, then, softened at once by the candor of her query, he replied:

“l tell you later ... some day, when I am absolutely sure that it can no longer hurt you....”

“Some day?... What day?” ZozÉ exclaimed haughtily.... “Do you suppose that I shall ever see you again?... Do you feel that it is all over?”

He drew her close to him.

“So, then, do you love me any more?”

ZozÉ panted, unable to answer. Tears ran down her cheeks which were contracted by a spasm of pain.

“Of course you love me, since you cry!” Gerald said, caressing her. And he went on, with more assurance. “Listen, my little ZozÉ.... Of course, to meet you again now, at once, to-morrow or the next day, that could only bring about more scenes, sadness ... painful interviews.... You need rest and reflection.... You must have time ... to forgive me.... Oh! I am not a brute, be sure that I guess what you are feeling.... Here is what I suggest.... I was to leave next week for Poitou, to visit my aunt at Cambres.... Well, I am going to advance my departure.... I shall leave this very night.... l stay at Cambres until the end of the month and write to you as often as you like.... And when I come back, everything will be forgotten, I give you my word on it.... Tell me, does this suit you?”

With each jolt Mme. Chambannes let her head dreamily bump upon Geral shoulder. The young man repeated:

“Answer me, my little ZozÉ.... Does this suit you?”

“Yes, yes!” Mme. Chambannes said meditatively. “I have an idea, too....”

“Tell me, my poor ZozÉ!...”

“I should be bored in Paris.... I should be too sad without you.... So, I am going to recuperate at the Frettes, until you return.... When I get home, I am going to pack my trunks and I shall leave by the 5 lock express.”

“Alone?”

“No! I am going to mobilize my Aunt Panhias!...”

“Tha right! An excellent idea.”

There came a pause. She felt throughout her body a lifting sensation of beatitude, a feeling of being rescued, which prevented her from speaking. She nestled quite close to Gerald, with an outpouring of avowal which was stronger than her will, and sighed languorously:

“Oh, my little Raldo! How good it is to have kept you!”

It was 2 lock before she returned home.