“Well,” he said, “there’s nothing so terrible in all that, is there?”
“No,” I said sulkily. He made me feel like a fool.
He sighed and leaned back in his chair.
“You run away and forget this little interview,” he told me. “But just so that you don’t start imagining things, let me point out something to you. The police are in business too, in a way.
In their own business, that is, and when an officer in my position gets an inquiry from higher up he’s got to investigate it, hasn’t he?
He may well think that the crime of destroying currency—“defacing the coin of the realm,” we call it — is not very serious compared with some of the things he’s got to deal with; but all the same if he’s asked about it he’s got to make some sort of move and send in some sort of report. Then it can all be…er…filed and forgotten, can’t it?”
“Yes,” I agreed, very relieved. “Yes, I suppose it can.”
They showed me out and that seemed to be the end of it. I’d had my lesson though, and I never opened my lips again on the subject to anybody. It quite put me off Louise and for a time I avoided her.
I made excuses and didn’t go in to eat with her. However, I could still see her through the window — see her sitting at the cashier’s desk; and I could still see Adelbert peering at her from his doorway.
For a month or two everything went on quietly. Then I heard that Violetta’s boy had got tired of the restaurant business and had taken a job up North. He had given the girl the chance of marrying and going with him, and they’d gone almost without saying goodbye. I was sorry for Louise, being left alone that way; so I had to go and see her.
She was taking it very well — actually she was pretty lucky, for she had got a new waiter almost at once and her number one girl in the kitchen had stood by her and they managed very well. Louise was very lonely though, so I drifted back into the habit of going in there for a meal once a week. I paid, of course, but she used to come and have hers with me.
I kept her off the subject of Adelbert, but one day near the midsummer’s quarter day she referred to him outright and asked me straight if I remembered my promise to be witness on the next pay-day. Since Violetta was gone, she’d mentioned me to Adelbert, and he’d seemed pleased.
Well, I couldn’t get out of it without hurting her feelings and since nothing seemed to turn on it I agreed. I don’t pretend I wasn’t curious: it was a love affair without, so far as I could see, any love at all.
The time for payment was fixed for half an hour after closing time on Midsummer’s Day, and when I slipped down the street to the corner the blinds of Le Coq au Vin were closed and the door shut.
The new waiter was taking a breath of air on the basement steps and he let me in through the kitchens. I went up the dark service stairs and found the two of them already sitting there, waiting for me.
The dining room was dark except for a single shaded bulb over the alcove table where they sat and I had a good look at them as I came down the room. They made an extraordinary pair.
I don’t know if you’ve seen one of those fat little Chinese gods whom people keep on their mantel shelves to bring them luck? They are all supposed to be laughing but some only pretend and the folds of their china faces are stiff and merciless for all the upward lines.
Adelbert reminded me of one of those. He always wore a black dinner jacket for work, but it was very thin and very loose. It came into my mind that when he took it off it must have hung like a gown.
He was sitting swathed in it, looking squat and flabby against the white paneling of the wall.
Louise, on the other hand, in her black dress and tight woolen cardigan, was as spare and hard as a withered branch. Just for an instant I realized how furious she must make him. There was nothing yielding or shrinking about her. She wasn’t giving any more than she was forced to — not an inch. I never saw anything so unbending in my life. She stood up to him all the time.
There was a bottle of Dubonnet on the table and they each had a small glass. When I appeared, Louise poured one for me.
The whole performance was very formal. Although they’d both lived in London all their lives, the French blood in both of them was very apparent. They each shook hands with me and Adelbert kicked the chair out for me if he only made a pretense of rising.
Louise had the big bank envelope in her black bag which she nursed as if it was a pet, and as soon as I’d taken a sip of my drink she produced the envelope and pushed it across the table to the man.
“Five hundred,” she said. “The receipt is in there, already made out. Perhaps you’d sign it, please.”
There was not a word out of place, you see, but you could have cut the atmosphere with a knife. She hated him and he was getting his due and nothing else.
He sat looking at her for a moment with a steady, fishy gaze; he seemed to be waiting for something — just a flicker of regret or resent-ment, I suppose. But he got nothing, and presently he took the envelope between his sausage fingers and thumbed it open. The five crisp green packages fell out on the white table-cloth. I looked at them with interest, as one does at money. It wasn’t a fortune, of course; but to people like myself and Louise, who have to earn every cent the hard way, it was a tidy sum that represented hours of toil and scheming and self-privation.
I didn’t like the way the man’s fingers played over it and the sneaking spark of sympathy I’d begun to feel for him died abruptly.
I knew then that if he’d had his way and married her when she was little more than a child all those years ago, he would have treated her abominably. He was a cruel beast; it took him that way.
I glanced at Louise and saw that she was unmoved. She just sat there with her hands folded, waiting for her receipt.
Adelbert began to count the money. I’ve always admired the way tellers in banks handle notes, but the way Adelbert did it opened my eyes. He went through them the way a gambler goes through a pack of cards — as if each individual note were alive and part of his hand. He loved the stuff, you could see it.
“All correct,” he said at last, and put the bundles in his inside pocket. Then he signed the receipt and handed it to her. Louise took it and put it in her bag. I assumed that was the end of it and wondered what all the fuss was about. I raised my glass to Louise, who acknowledged it, and was getting up when Adelbert stopped me.
“Wait,” he said. “We must have a cigarette and perhaps another little glass — if Louise can afford it.”
He smiled but she didn’t. She poured him another glass and sat there stolidly waiting for him to drink it. He was in no hurry.
Presently he took the money out again and laid a fat hand over it as he passed his cigarette case round. I took a cigarette, Louise didn’t.
There was one of those metal match stands on the table and he bent forward. I moved too, expecting him to give me a light; but he laughed and drew back.
“This gives it a better flavor,” he said, and, peeling off one note from the top wad, he lit it and offered me the flame. I had guessed what was coming, so I didn’t show my surprise. If Louise could keep a poker face, so could I. I watched the banknote burn out, and then he took another and lit that.
Having failed to move us, he started to talk. He spoke quite normally about the restaurant business — how hard times were and what a lot of work it meant getting up at dawn to go to the market with the chef and how customers liked to keep one up late at night, talking and dawdling as if there was never going to be a tomorrow. It was all directed at Louise, rubbing it in, holding her nose down to exactly what he was doing. But she remained perfectly impassive, her eyes dark like lead, her mouth hard.