I picked the notebook at the end of the row; I knew that they would be in absolute order. I glanced inside. Yes. This was the one I wanted.
I went to the door.
Nounou had still not stirred. I sped to my own room and with wildly beating heart began to read.
“So I am going to have a child. This time it may be a boy. That will please him. I shall tell no one yet. Lothair must be the first to know. I shall say to him: ” Lothair, we are going to have a child. Are you pleased? ” Of course I am frightened. I am frightened so much. But when it is over it will be worthwhile. What will Papa say? He will be hurt… disgusted. How much happier he would be if I went to him and told him I was going into a convent. Away from the wickedness of the world, away from lust, away from vanity. That is what he would like.
And I shall go to him and say, “Tapa, I am going to have a child.” But not yet. I shall choose the right time. That is why I must say nothing yet. In case Papa should get to know. “
“They say a woman changes when she is going to have a child. I have changed. I could have been so happy. I almost am. I dream of the child. He will be a boy for that is what we want. It is right that the Comtes de la Talle should have sons. That is why they marry. If it were not necessary they could be content with their mistresses. They are the ones they really care for. But now it will be different. He will look at me in a different light. I shall not be only the one he was obliged to marry for the sake of the family; I shall be the mother of his son.”
“It is wonderful. I should have known this before. I should not have listened to Papa. Yesterday when I went to Carrefour I did not tell him. I could not bring myself to do so. And the reason is that I am so happy because it is so, and he will besmirch it. He will look at me with those stem cold eyes of his and he will be seeing it all… everything that led up to my having the child … not as it was … but as he believed it to be … horrible … sinful… I wanted to cry to him: ” No, Papa, it is not like that. You are wrong. I should never have listened to you. ” Oh, that room where we knelt together and you prayed that I should be protected from the lusts of the flesh! It was because of that that I shrank from him. I keep thinking now of the night before my marriage. Why did he agree? He regretted it almost immediately afterwards. I remember after the night of the contra! de mari age dinner how we prayed together and he said: “My child, I wish this need never take place.” And I said: “Why, Papa, everyone is congratulating me!” And he answered: “That’s because a match with the de la Talles is considered a good one, but I would be happy if I thought you would be living a life of purity.” I did not understand then. I said I would try to be a pure woman; and he kept murmuring about the lusts of the flesh. And then the night before the church wedding we prayed together and I was ignorant and knew nothing of what was expected of me, except that it was shameful and that my father regretted he could not spare me such shame. And thus it was I came to my husband. “
“But it is different now. I have come to understand that Papa is wrong. He should never have married. He wanted to be a monk. He was on the point of becoming one and then he found that he wanted to marry and he changed his mind and married my mother. But he hated himself for his weakness and his monk’s robe was his greatest treasure. He is mistaken. I know that now. I might have been happy. I might have learned how to make Lothair love me if Papa had not frightened me, if he had not taught me that the marriage bed was shameful. I try not to blame him. All these years when my husband turned from me, when he has spent his nights with other women perhaps they need not have been. I begin to see that I have turned him from me with my shivering shrinking sense of sin. I shall go to Carrefour tomorrow and I shall tell Papa that I am going to have a child. I shall say: ” Papa, I feel no shame only pride. Everything is going to be different from now on. ” ” I did not go to Carrefour as I promised myself. My wisdom tooth started to ache again. Nounou said to me:
“Sometimes when a woman has a baby she loses a tooth. You’re not so, are you?” I flushed and she knew. How could I keep a secret from Nounou? I said: “Don’t tell anyone yet, Nounou. I haven’t told him. He should know first, shouldn’t he? And I want to tell Papa too.” Nounou understood. She knows me so well. She knows how Papa makes me pray when I go there. She knows that Papa would like to see me in a convent. She knows what he thinks of marriage. She rubbed a clove on my gum and said that should make it better; and I sat on the footstool leaning against her as I used to when I was little. And I talked to Nounou. I told her how I felt. I said: “Papa was wrong, Nounou. He made me feel that marriage was shameful. It was because of this … because I made my marriage intolerable that my husband turned to others.”
“You’re not to blame,” she said.
“You have broken none of the commandments.”
“Papa made me feel unclean,” I said.
“From the beginning it was so. So my husband turned from me. I could never explain to him. He thought me cold, and you know, Nounou, he is not a cold man. He needed a warm, affectionate, clever woman. He has not been treated fairly.” Nounou wouldn’t have it. She said I had done no wrong. I accused her of agreeing with Papa. I said: “I believe you too would rather have seen me in a convent than married” And she did not deny it. I said:
“You too think marriage is shameful, Nounou.” And she did not deny that, either. My tooth was no better so she gave me a few drops of laudanum in water and made me lie on the couch in her room. Then she locked the bottle in her cupboard and sat down beside me.
“That’ll make you drowsy,” she said.
“That’ll send you into a nice sleep.” And it did. “
“This is too terrible. I do not believe I shall ever forget it as long as I live. It keeps coming in and out of my mind. Perhaps if I write it down I can stop going over and over it. Papa is very ill. It began like this: I went to see him today. I had made up my mind I would tell him about the child. He was in his room when I arrived and I went straight to him. He was sitting at the table reading the Bible when I went in. He looked up and then laid the red silk book-marker in the place and closed the book.
“Well, my child,” he said. I went to him and kissed him. He seemed to notice the change in me at once, for he looked startled and a little alarmed.
He asked me about Genevi eve, and if I had brought her. I told him I had not. Poor child, it is too much to expect her to pray for so long.
She grows restive and that agitates him more than ever. I assured him that she was a good child. He said that he thought that she had a tendency to waywardness. It must be watched. Perhaps it was because I am about to become a mother again that I felt rebellious. I did not want Genevi eve to go to her husband when her time came as I had gone to mine. I said rather sharply that I thought she was normal, as a child should be. One did not expect children to behave as the holy saints. He stood up and he looked terrible.
“Normal,” he said.
“Why do you say that?” And I answered: “Because it is natural for a child to be a little wayward, as you call it, now and then. Genevieve is. I shall not punish her for it.”
“To spare the rod is to spoil the child,” he replied.
“If she is wicked she should be beaten.” I was horrified.
“You are wrong. Papa,” I said.
“I do not agree with you.
Genevieve shall not be beaten. Nor shall any of my children. ” He looked at me in astonishment and I blurted out: ” Yes, Papa, I am going to have a child. This time a boy, I hope. I shall pray for a boy . and you must pray too. ” His mouth twitched. He said:
“You are to have a child….” I answered joyfully: “Yes, Papa. And I’m happy … happy … happy….”