finish our meal, we pushed back the cloth, my father went to fetch a lamp, pens, and some notepaper; we sat down opposite each other, almost smiling because our preparations had made Anne's return seem probable. A bat was circling round outside the window. My father started writing.
An unbearable feeling of disgust and horror rises in me when I think of the letters full of fine sentiments we wrote that evening, sitting under the lamp like two awkward schoolchildren, applying ourselves in silence to the impossible task of getting Anne back. However, we managed to produce two works of art, full of excuses, love, and repentance. When I had finished, I felt almost certain that Anne would not be able to resist us, and that a reconciliation was imminent. I could already imagine the scene as she forgave us, it would take place in our drawing-room in Paris, Anne would come in and .. .
At that moment the telephone rang. It was ten o'clock. We exchanged a look of astonishment which soon turned to hope; it was Anne telephoning to say she forgave us and was returning. My father bounded to the telephone and called "Hello" in a voice full of joy.
Then he said nothing but "Yes, yes, where is that? yes" in an almost inaudible whisper. I got up, shaken by fear. My father passed his hand over his face with a mechanical gesture. At length he gently replaced the receiver and turned to me:
"She has had an accident," he said. "On the road to Estérel. It took them some time to discover her address. They telephoned to Paris and got our number from there."
He went on in the same flat voice, and I dared not interrupt:
"The accident happened at the most dangerous spot. There have been many at that place, it seems. The car fell down fifty metres. It would have been a miracle if she had escaped."
The rest of that night I remember as if it had been a nightmare: the road surging up under the headlights, my father's stony face, the door of the clinic. My father would not let me see her. I sat on a bench in the waiting-room staring at a lithograph of Venice. I thought of nothing. A nurse told me that this was the sixth accident at that place since the beginning of the summer. My father did not come back.
Then I thought that once again by her death Anne had proved herself different from us. If we had wanted to commit suicide, even supposing we had the courage, it would have been with a bullet in the head, leaving an explanatory note destined to trouble the sleep of those who were responsible. But Anne had made us the magnificent present of giving us the chance to believe in an accident. A dangerous place on the road, a car that easily lost balance. It was a gift that we would soon be weak enough to accept. In any case it is a romantic idea of mine to call it suicide. Can one commit suicide on account of people like my father and myself, people who have no need of anybody, living or dead? My father and I never spoke of it as anything but an accident.
The next day we returned to the house at about three o'clock in the afternoon. Elsa and Cyril were waiting for us, sitting on the steps. They seemed like two comic, forgotten characters; neither of them had known Anne, or loved her. There they were with their little love affairs, their good looks, and their embarrassment. Cyril came up to me and put his hand on my arm. I looked at him: I had never loved him. I had found him gentle and attractive. I had loved the pleasure he gave me, but I did not need him. I was going away, leaving behind me the house, the garden, and that summer. My father was with me; he took my arm and we went indoors.
In the house were Anne's jacket, her flowers, her room, her scent. My father closed the shutters, took a bottle out of the refrigerator and fetched two glasses. It was the only remedy to hand. Our letters of excuse still lay on the table. I pushed them off and they floated to the floor. My father, who was coming towards me holding a full glass, hesitated, then avoided
An unbearable feeling of disgust and horror rises in me when I think of the letters full of fine sentiments we wrote that evening, sitting under the lamp like two awkward schoolchildren, applying ourselves in silence to the impossible task of getting Anne back. However, we managed to produce two works of art, full of excuses, love, and repentance. When I had finished, I felt almost certain that Anne would not be able to resist us, and that a reconciliation was imminent. I could already imagine the scene as she forgave us, it would take place in our drawing-room in Paris, Anne would come in and .. .
At that moment the telephone rang. It was ten o'clock. We exchanged a look of astonishment which soon turned to hope; it was Anne telephoning to say she forgave us and was returning. My father bounded to the telephone and called "Hello" in a voice full of joy.
Then he said nothing but "Yes, yes, where is that? yes" in an almost inaudible whisper. I got up, shaken by fear. My father passed his hand over his face with a mechanical gesture. At length he gently replaced the receiver and turned to me:
"She has had an accident," he said. "On the road to Estérel. It took them some time to discover her address. They telephoned to Paris and got our number from there."
He went on in the same flat voice, and I dared not interrupt:
"The accident happened at the most dangerous spot. There have been many at that place, it seems. The car fell down fifty metres. It would have been a miracle if she had escaped."
The rest of that night I remember as if it had been a nightmare: the road surging up under the headlights, my father's stony face, the door of the clinic. My father would not let me see her. I sat on a bench in the waiting-room staring at a lithograph of Venice. I thought of nothing. A nurse told me that this was the sixth accident at that place since the beginning of the summer. My father did not come back.
Then I thought that once again by her death Anne had proved herself different from us. If we had wanted to commit suicide, even supposing we had the courage, it would have been with a bullet in the head, leaving an explanatory note destined to trouble the sleep of those who were responsible. But Anne had made us the magnificent present of giving us the chance to believe in an accident. A dangerous place on the road, a car that easily lost balance. It was a gift that we would soon be weak enough to accept. In any case it is a romantic idea of mine to call it suicide. Can one commit suicide on account of people like my father and myself, people who have no need of anybody, living or dead? My father and I never spoke of it as anything but an accident.
The next day we returned to the house at about three o'clock in the afternoon. Elsa and Cyril were waiting for us, sitting on the steps. They seemed like two comic, forgotten characters; neither of them had known Anne, or loved her. There they were with their little love affairs, their good looks, and their embarrassment. Cyril came up to me and put his hand on my arm. I looked at him: I had never loved him. I had found him gentle and attractive. I had loved the pleasure he gave me, but I did not need him. I was going away, leaving behind me the house, the garden, and that summer. My father was with me; he took my arm and we went indoors.
In the house were Anne's jacket, her flowers, her room, her scent. My father closed the shutters, took a bottle out of the refrigerator and fetched two glasses. It was the only remedy to hand. Our letters of excuse still lay on the table. I pushed them off and they floated to the floor. My father, who was coming towards me holding a full glass, hesitated, then avoided
Similar Books
