That evening, Bonne de Boisrosé, with her milky-coffee wig perched on her receding hairline, her Bourbon nose, her perch-in-a-court-bouillon lips, emerged earlier and more actively than usual from her somnolent state to play her part in this barbaric and childish campsite that was the Boisrosés’ family life.
“Do you know a Pierre Niox, an antique dealer?” she asked her brother excitedly.
“By name… and by reputation,” mumbled Monsieur de Rocheflamme sourly.
“He’s bought the Mas Vieux.”
“Congratulations. So is he very wealthy, this swindler?”
“He didn’t strike me as a swindler in the least,” said Hedwige.
Monsieur de Rocheflamme’s spitefulness was not merely the distaste of a second-hand goods dealer for a licensed colleague, or that of an old man for a younger one — in short, that natural antagonism that arises from the confrontation of two opposing situations; it was also his passive yet heartfelt antipathy for anything he didn’t know and that did not concern his family.
“Uncle André, have some cold leg of lamb; there’s still a bit of meat left on it.”
Uncle André stopped talking, forgot about Pierre, whom he knew nothing about in any case, and continued to gnaw away at the leg of lamb.
CHAPTER VIII
PIERRE’S STAY IN BRUSSELS went on long enough to arouse the anxiety of the Boisrosés even though they had no notion of time. Hedwige, in particular, was rather more impatient than her sisters, who never stopped teasing her about her very successful initiative.
Finally, very early one morning, that is to say at about eleven o’clock, the dairywoman who normally provided their telephone link came to tell them that Hedwige was wanted on the phone.
“It’s Hédiard, the mangoes have arrived!” cried Madame de Boisrosé, a gluttonous expression on her face.
“It’s Monsieur Pierre Niox!” yelled Fromentine simultaneously, with a gleam in her eyes. “Hurry up, Hedwige!”
Hedwige descended the stairs at the nonchalant pace of a goddess. A moment later she came back upstairs.
“It was indeed Monsieur Pierre Niox. He’s inviting us to dinner at a restaurant and to the cinema afterwards.”
“What,” said Madame de Boisrosé, “he’s inviting the entire family? And why to the cinema? That’s a weird idea. Why not to his office since it’s a business matter?”
Hedwige explained not without some difficulty that, from Pierre’s point of view, it was a way in which to establish a connection, to initiate future conversations in order to clarify—
“What a curious language you’re speaking in, Hedwige. Where did you pick up these expressions? It sounds like an official announcement,” Angélique interrupted. “At last we’re to see this famous Monsieur Niox!”
“Not you, Angélique,” said Hedwige. “Only Fromentine and I are invited.”
Pierre called at Saint-Germain to collect Hedwige and Fromentine in his small car. Being seldom invited out, they had made a great fuss about the occasion and had begun to get themselves ready immediately after lunch. Hedwige had foregone her siesta, and at three o’clock Fromentine had started to do her hair; she was now trying on her few little dresses before deciding on her elder sister’s evening dress (clothes, stockings and shoes were interchangeable in the Boisrosé family).
As he drove up the hill to Saint-Germain, Pierre repeated Hedwige’s remark to himself: “We shall try not to keep you waiting.” “I hope they’re going to keep their promise,” he thought. “For my part, I want to respond to this effort to be punctual, not by being punctual myself, I always am, but by restraining and controlling myself should they not be. It’s just too absurd to turn pleasure into suffering.”
Pierre drew up his car in front of the Boisrosés’ house. Those were his instructions. Since, however, it had gone half past seven and Hedwige had advised him not to come up, “given that the entrance to their house was via a dark alleyway and badly lit by old lights buried in the ivy, there was no concierge and he would certainly get lost”, he started to sound his horn, gently at first, then very loudly.
Pierre began to feel distressed and was not very proud of the fact. He liked to cope with things. He felt cold beneath the hood and the canvas material was vibrating. Beads of mist were forming on the windows. A smell of damp leaves and grass seeped in through the doors. “After all,” he thought, “waiting for one woman is not unpleasant; waiting for two is even better.”
Cats could be heard mewing. Diligently, Pierre kept himself busy by smoking, dipping the headlights on and off, then the sidelights. He thought about his appointments for the following day, and the day after, he checked his diary.
“Being a chauffeur is the last thing in the world I’d want to do, especially a chauffeur to a Parisienne. I’d rather drive a bus in the country with suitcases that need tying onto the roof rack.”
He took a bet with himself that the Boisrosé girls would be there by ten to eight, lost his bet, risked another fortune and got nothing for his money.
“One ought to have a collection of books in the car pocket. For years I haven’t found the time to reread my classics. Nowadays they print lengthy masterpieces on India paper… I feel like bounding up the steps four at a time, but I risk going through the wrong door and then causing them to wait, which would be a disaster… I should have brought Placide along. It’s true the car can only fit three and it’s raining so hard I couldn’t ask him to sit in the dickey-seat.”
Two shadows passed by in the gleam of the lamplights. Pierre gave a start: “Here they are.” No, it was servant girls on their way to the cinema.
“My waiting is a sacrifice,” he said. “May the smoke be pure, at least, and the aroma pleasing to the gods. It is good for me to be here, to be hanging around (an odd expression for a man who is seated) and widening the range of my connections, because if my tendency to hurry increases, I shall need to surround myself with new friends, friends who can forewarn me as it were, who are not yet used to me and can give the alarm call.
“If I did not desire what are conventionally termed pleasures, it would be simple; I would obtain them on my own. But I want something else; I want to feel myself being projected forward through my own will; I long for Russian mountains, to be out of breath, to have an empty stomach, for a life gulped down in a trice. I shall kick the bucket one fine day if someone doesn’t hold me back, but if anyone does I should prefer, much prefer, that it should be the pretty arm of a woman doing so rather than a sermon from Dr Regencrantz.”
“Watch out!” whispered Pierre’s liberating angel to him, “you’re setting out today on an unfamiliar path, in which you will meet with only troubles and disappointments; you’ve received an attractive gift from me and it could be a wonderful one if you had an ounce of genius (that ounce of genius that you lack). That noble instinct that singles you out from the throng of mankind, that practical ability to move quickly and alone amid the general mêlée, you’re going to lose all that if you become interested in ladies.”
These angelic comments tempted Pierre, for one is never tempted quite so dangerously as one is by angels. He struggled with difficulty against the unpleasant thoughts that beset those who are impatient. Thus it was that he happened to see the image of his alluring bed pass by, thus it was that it occurred to him he could very well dine on his own. It would be a good trick to play on these girls. He drummed his fingers nervously on the window pane and traced esoteric monograms in the condensation on the windscreen.