‘Very nice of you,’ he said. The finger went back onto the plaster, pressing hard.
‘Let’s have a look,’ said Imogen. Obediently he lifted an edge, revealing a cluster of sutures. She offered a tissue, which he took with a trembling hand. ‘You need to change that dressing,’ she told him.
‘This’ll be fine,’ he said, tapping his fingers on the tissue.
There was a pharmacy in the row of shops on the opposite side of the street. ‘I’ll be back in a minute,’ said Imogen.
He watched her cross the road; a man beguiled. In her absence, it was agreed that she was a very kind person. That was more or less the substance of our conversation. His coffee and slice of cake were deposited by the waitress. The cake was consumed in a matter of seconds, before Imogen returned.
‘How did it happen?’ she asked, applying a new dressing.
He murmured his reply, as though responding to a question from a nurse in A&E. There had been a bit of bother at the place where he’d been living.
‘Where’s that?’ she asked, in nurse-like mode, removing some specks of dried blood with the tissue.
He named a street. It was a squat; a defunct office building.
‘And what’s your name?’
‘William,’ he answered.
‘Imogen, and David,’ she said, giving him a hand to shake; he wiped his hand on his chest first. ‘Would you like anything else?’ she asked.
‘No, thank you,’ said William. He took a sip from his empty cup; he was worried that in return for this charity he would have to submit to questioning.
‘You sure?’ she asked.
‘Sure, thank you,’ he answered, nodding too much.
‘OK,’ she said; from her smile he understood that there would be no interrogation; he could leave.
‘That was very nice, thank you,’ said William.
‘Our pleasure,’ she said, and she handed him the pack of sticking plasters.
‘Really?’ he asked, as though this generosity were extreme. On leaving us, he bowed to her, with a hand over his heart.
Watched Jumièges last night. I remember speaking to Imogen about it; Franck Boudet had called her, to talk about the script. One of the crew on Maintenant had told Franck a story about his family, a story that was now becoming Franck’s screenplay. The man’s sister was the model for the character that Franck was hoping Imogen would play. Every week she visited their father with their mother; she was much closer to both parents than was the teller of the story. The father’s health was poor: his mind was falling apart; a stroke – the most severe of a series – had rendered his speech incoherent and indistinct. He was confused, and often perplexed as to where he was and how he had come to be there. But one afternoon he seemed to wish to communicate something. His daughter was showing him again, on a map, the location of the village where her husband had been born. Her father’s gaze slid around the map, apparently seeing nothing but a web of coloured lines, but then his eyes became focused, as though he had suddenly seen something that made sense to him. He became agitated, and more agitated with the effort of making himself understood. His finger quivered above the map, pointing to Jumièges; eventually it was established that he wanted to go there. Jumièges was located more than a hundred kilometres from where he had been born and had always lived. When his wife asked him why he wanted to visit it, she received no intelligible answer. Before the next visit he would have forgotten all about Jumièges, she was sure.
But he did not forget. He was like a child demanding a treat that had been promised to him. They went to Jumièges. The expedition was difficult; it was also unwise, his carers argued. But the old man would not relinquish the idea, and it was unlikely that he would live much longer. This might be his last request. So arrangements were made; a nurse travelled with the family. At Jumièges, the dying man managed to make it known that it was the river, not the great abbey, that he wished to see. They came to Rue du Perrey, and there he became calm. His daughter turned the wheelchair to face the direction her father seemed to be indicating. Some small cliffs, some trees, the ferry, the green-brown meander of the Seine – it was not a memorable vista. But at the sight of this scene the old man started to smile. In recent years, he had rarely smiled. The smile dwindled; then he was crying. ‘When were you here?’ his daughter asked. There was no answer. When she asked again he became angry. He wanted everyone to be quiet. He did not appear to notice that his wife was upset. Her own memory was becoming insecure, but she knew for a fact that she had never been to Jumièges with her husband. She would never know what memory was being revived at that place, by that ordinary view.
The actress playing the daughter is adequate, but Imogen would have been better. The long look that this actress gives the father, at the river, is simply sad; Imogen’s gaze, as I imagine it, would have made us understand that she is not only seeing what her father has become – she is seeing the man that he once was, and the woman that she used to be.
After Imogen’s departure, whenever I encountered William I did not linger; there was pressing business elsewhere, I would pretend. Finally he remarked that he had not seen her for a while. ‘She’s in Paris,’ I answered.
‘When’s she coming back?’ asked William.
‘I don’t know,’ I replied, neutrally. Imogen had grown tired of London, I told him; she wanted to live in Paris for a while. I told him about her family’s connection to Paris, of which he had known nothing.
Looking down the street, he said, gravely: ‘That’s a blow.’ It was as if this development might necessitate some revision of his plans.
‘It’s OK,’ I said. ‘We’re friends. We talk.’
‘That’s good,’ said William, still considering.
Imogen was about to start work on a new film, I told him. ‘My Friend Claire. She’s Claire. Top billing.’
‘Of course,’ said William. Then he looked at me, his companion in loss, and said: ‘She was lovely.’ The stress was strangely on the second word, I remember.
‘Indeed.’
It had been like having a part-time sister, he said; a bigger and more sensible sister. More words were exchanged in Imogen’s praise. When I gave him money, it felt as though I were honouring the terms of a contract.
From the adjoining room I heard Marcus, giving instructions. The physician’s murmuring was followed by a brief response from Beatrice. Again the physician spoke; though I stood by the door, I could not discern the words. Then silence. A minute later, a high gasp. A physicianassisted paroxysm had been enacted. Charles Perceval was known to have administered this treatment to some of his patients. The inference was confirmed by Imogen’s glance when she emerged from the room – a mock-sly smile, with startled eyes, as if she had been caught up in some mischief, not unwillingly.
In the first draft of Devotion, Beatrice’s sister, an ostentatiously devout young woman, was the hysterical patient whom Julius had been asked to attend, thereby bringing about his meeting with Beatrice. Considerations of cost had brought about the merging of the two characters, but this revision had improved the film, Marcus told me. It had brought the film’s central concerns – ‘obsession, madness, reason and faith’ – more sharply into focus. The lard-coloured doll lay in his lap, swaddled in a towel, its single eye turned towards me. He offered to donate it to the museum, for room seven, but it was not in good condition by the time they had finished with it.