“Then what are you saying?”
“I’ll see him tomorrow. You go on with your holiday, tell me where you’ll be and I’ll join up with you as soon as I can.”
“Do you mean that?” I said.
“Of course I do!”
“What will you say to him? Are you going to tell him about me?”
“If I can.”
“Then why don’t I wait for you here?”
“Because … I can’t just tell him. I’ll have to stay with him for a while.”
“How long will that be?”
“I don’t know. Three or four days … maybe a week.”
“A week!” I turned away from her angrily. “For God’s sake, how long does it take to tell someone you’re finished with him?”
She bent her head. “Let me do it my way. You don’t understand the problem with Niall. I’ll have to break it to him in stages. First of all he’s got to be told I’ve met someone else, someone who matters more than him. Don’t you think that’s enough to be going on with? I can say the rest when he gets used to that idea.”
I left the bed and poured us both some wine from the bottle we had bought earlier. There was no other way but her way, I knew that. I passed her a glass of wine but she put it aside untouched.
“When you see Niall, will you be sleeping with him?”
“I’ve been sleeping with him for six years.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
“It’s none of your business.”
It hurt to hear it, but it was true. I looked at her naked body, trying to imagine some other man with her, deeply abhoring the idea. She had become so precious to me. Her head was bent, her hair concealing her face. I went to touch her, laying my hand on her arm. She responded at once, clasping my hand.
“All right, Sue. I’ll do what you suggest. I’ll leave you in Saint-Raphael tomorrow and go on down the coast. If you haven’t caught up with me within a week, I’ll either go on without you or head back to England.”
“It won’t take a week,” she said. “Three days, maybe less.”
“Just make it as soon as you can.” I found I had drained my glass of wine without even noticing I had started it. I put it aside. “Now, what about money?”
“What about it?”
“You said you were almost out. How are you going to travel after you leave Niall?”
“I’ll borrow some from somewhere.”
“You mean you’ll get it from Niall.”
“Probably. He’s always got plenty.”
“You’ll borrow his money, but you won’t borrow mine. Don’t you see that gives him just one more hold over you?” She shook her head. “Anyway, I thought you said he didn’t have any money.”
“I said he didn’t have a job. He’s never short of cash.”
“Where does he get it? Does he steal?”
“I don’t know. Please don’t go on with this. Money means nothing to Niall. I can get what I need.”
It was a small insight into what must have been their relationship. She could intend to tell him she was throwing him over in favor of someone else, and still expect him to lend her money. Everything I knew about Niall, all of it from her, was unpleasant: a bully, a parasite, a manipulator, perhaps a thief. At that moment I even hated his damned name.
I got up from the bed again, and while she watched silently I pulled on a pair of trousers and a T-shirt. I left the room, closing the door noisily. I walked along the corridor, then went down the four flights of stairs to the ground floor.
Outside, in the warm night, I walked down the street toward the café on the corner. It was closed. I turned the corner and started down the next street. This was a neglected, ill-lit part of Nice, the houses crowding one on the next, the plaster peeling and broken in many places. Lights showed from a few windows, and ahead of me at the next intersection I could see traffic moving to and fro. I went as far as this road, then came to a halt. I knew I was being unfair, that I had no hold over her, that in my own way I was being as manipulative as Niall. Just then I did not care, seeing Sue as someone who provoked such behavior in men, who probably always would. A week ago I had not known she even existed; now she preoccupied me entirely. I wanted her more than I had ever wanted any other woman.
Minutes passed, and my quick anger subsided. I blamed myself: I had walked into her life and now expected her to change everything. By my demands on her I was forcing a choice on her, making her see us as alternatives to each other. She knew Niall better than she knew me, and I knew nothing of him.
I turned and hurried back to the hotel, convinced that I was going to lose her. I took the stairs two at a time and went quickly into the room, half expecting to find her already gone. But she was there, lying in the bed with her back to the door, a single sheet covering her thin body. She made no move as I entered.
“Are you asleep?” I said softly.
She turned to look at me; her face was damp and her eyes were red.
“Where have you been?” she said.
I pulled off my clothes and climbed onto the bed beside her. We put our arms around each other, kissing and holding tenderly. She cried again, sobbing against me. I stroked her hair, touched her eyelids, and then at last, far too late but wholly meant, I said the words I had been holding back.
All she said, indistinctly, was, “Yes. And me. I thought you knew.”
VI
The morning brought another silence between us, but now I was content. We had made a sort of accommodation. She knew my itinerary, and where and when we could meet.
We boarded a bus in the center of Nice, and soon set off westward. Sue held my hand and pressed herself close against me. The bus drove first to Antibes and Juanles-Pins, then to Cannes. Passengers changed over at every stop. After Cannes we passed through some of the most beautiful scenery I had seen in France: wooded hills, steep valleys, and of course one vista of the Mediterranean after another. Cypresses and olive trees grew beside the road, and wild flowers flourished in every untended patch of ground. The roof panels of the bus were open, and rich scents blustered in; sometimes, because of the road, the smell was of gasoline or diesel oil. The whole coastline was scattered with houses and apartment blocks, high on the hills or standing among the trees; occasionally they ruined the view, but so too, in a different way, did the road.
We saw a sign saying that Saint-Raphael was another four kilometers, and immediately we drew closer, holding each other tightly and kissing. I wanted both to prolong the farewells and be done with them, but there was nothing more to say.
Except one thing. As the bus halted in the center of Saint-Raphael, a square opening out onto the tiny harbor, Sue put her mouth to the side of my face and said quietly, “I’ve got good news for you.”
“What’s that?”
“I started my period this morning.”
She squeezed my hand, kissed me lightly, then went down the center aisle with the other passengers. I stayed in my seat, looking at her as she waited for her luggage to be unloaded from the hold. Once or twice she glanced up at me, smiling nervously. The little square was crowded with holidaymakers, and I looked at them, wondering if Niall was somewhere among them. Everyone was young, tanned, attractive. Sue stood by my window, looking up at me, and I wished the bus would leave.
At last we were off. Sue stayed still, smiling up at me and waving. The bus turned into a side street, heading back to the main road, and I lost sight of her.
Alone, I fell almost at once into a depressed mood. I thought only of the worst: that I would never see her again, that in Niall’s hands she would be manipulated against me, that her feelings would diminish, that torn between two men she would settle on the one she knew better.