I ventured.
"Symbolic!" interrupted Lirat. "You are talking nonsense, my little Mintié! Symbolic! Why that's life itself! Let's go out and eat."
Our dinner was a very gay affair; Lirat displayed a charming disposition; he was full of original ideas, without extremes or paradoxes, on art. He had again found his normal self, as in the better days of his life. Several times I had a notion to tell him that I had seen Juliette. A kind of shame held me back; I had not the courage.
"Work, work, my little Mintié," he said to me, when we were parting. "To create, always to create, to draw from one's sinews or from one's brains no matter what … be it only a pair of rubbers. There is nothing outside of that!"
Six days later I went again to Juliette and gradually I formed the habit of calling regularly and spending an hour before dinner. The disagreeable impression left on me at the time of my first visit had vanished. Little by little, without suspecting it, I grew so used to the red tapestry in her parlor, to the terra cotta statue of Cupid, to Juliette's childish prating, even to Spy who had become my friend, that whenever I passed a day without seeing her, it seemed as though a great void had been created in my life.
Not only did the things which at first had shocked me no longer do so, but, on the contrary, they now moved me, and each time Juliette talked to Spy or attended to him with exaggerated care, it was a positive pleasure to me, appearing as an added proof of the simplicity and affectionate qualities of her heart. In the end I, too, began to speak this dog language. One evening, when Spy was sick, I grew uneasy and, removing the covers and quilts which covered him, I gently murmured: "Baby Spy has a hurt; where does it hurt our little baby?" Only the image of the singer, rising near Juliette, somewhat disturbed the tranquility of our meetings, but I only had to close my eyes for a moment or turn away my head, and the image would instantly disappear. I persuaded Juliette to tell me her life. Until now she had always refused.
"No! no!" she would say.
And she would add with a smile, looking at me with her large, sad eyes:
"What will we gain, my friend?"
I insisted, I begged.
"It is your duty to reveal it to me and my duty to know it."
At last, conquered by this argument which I never tired of using in various and appealing forms, she consented. Oh, with what sadness!
Her home was in Liverdun. Her father was a physician and her mother, who led a frivolous life, had left her husband. As for Juliette, she had been placed in the home of the Sisters. Her father came home drunk every evening, and there were terrible scenes, for he was very ill-natured. The scandal grew to such proportions that the Sisters sent Juliette away, not wishing to keep the daughter of a wicked woman and a drunkard in their house. Ah, what a miserable life it was! Always locked up in her room and sometimes beaten by her father for no cause whatever! One night, very late, the father entered Juliette's room. "How shall I express it to you!" Juliette said blushing. "Oh, well, you understand. … " She jumped out of bed, shouted, opened the window. But the father was frightened and went away. The next morning Juliette left for Nancy, planning to live by working. It was here she had met Charles.
While she was talking in a gentle, even voice I took her hand, her beautiful hand which I pressed with feeling, at the sad points of the story. I was indignant over the action of her father. And I cursed the mother for abandoning her child. I felt the stirrings of a self-sacrificing devotion, and a vindictive desire to avenge her wrongs. When she had finished I wept with burning tears. … It was an exquisite hour.
Juliette received very few people; some of Malterre's friends, and two or three of Malterre's feminine friends. One of them, Gabrielle Bernier, a tall, pretty blonde woman, always entered the house in the same fashion.
"Good morning, Monsieur, good morning, dearie. Don't trouble yourself, I'll be gone in a minute."
And she would sit down on the brace of the armchair, smoothing her muff with a brusque motion of her hand.
"Just think of it, I have just had another scene with Robert. If you only knew what sort of a man he is! He comes to my house and says whimpering: 'My dear little Gabrielle, I must leave you, my mother told me so this morning, she won't give me any more money.' 'Your mother! I wish I had a chance to answer her. Well, you can tell your mother in my name, that whenever she is ready to give up her lovers, I'll quit you that very day. But in the meantime, she'll have to dig into her pockets alright.' And I don't believe it's true either—a dirty trick like that! I think it's Robert who has cooked it up! We are going to the Ambigu tonight. Are you going?"
"Thank you."
"Well, I must be off! Don't trouble yourself. Good day, Monsieur; good day, dearie."
Gabrielle Bernier irritated me very much.
"Why do you receive such women?" I would say to Juliette.
"What harm is there, my friend? She amuses me."
Malterre's friends, on the other hand, spoke of races and high life; they always had club and women stories to tell and never tired of discussing theatrical matters. It seemed to me that Juliette took an exaggerated pleasure in these conversations, but I excused her, ascribing it to excessive politeness. Jesselin, a very rich young man, considered a serious fellow, was the leader of the circle and all bowed before his evident superiority. "What will Jesselin say? We must ask Jesselin. Jesselin did not advise that." He was very much sought after. He had traveled widely and knew better than anyone else the best hotels. Having been in Afghanistan, he remembered one particular thing of the entire trip through Central Asia, namely that the Emir of Caboul, with whom he had had the honor of playing chess one day, played as fast as the French. "Why that Emir certainly amazed me." Quite often he would also offer this information: "You know how much I enjoy travel. Well, I can say this much. In sleeping cars, in cabins, in a Russian telega, no matter how or where I was, at half past seven every evening I was in my dress suit!"
Malterre did not like me, friendly though he was. Having a quiet, timid nature, he dared not show his aversion for me, for fear of displeasing Juliette, but I could see it flaring up in his smiling look which was like that of a good-natured but frightened dog, and in his handshake I felt it clamoring for an outlet.
I was happy only when alone with Juliette. There, in the red parlor, under the ægis of the terra cotta statuette of Cupid, we sometimes sat for hours, without uttering a word. I would look at her, she would droop her head, pensively playing with the trimming of her dress or the lacework of her waist. Often my eyes for some reason unknown, filled with tears, which rolled down my cheeks like some perfume, flooding my soul with its magic liquid. And my whole being felt a sensation of satiety and delicious torpor.
"Ah! Juliette! Juliette!"
"Come, come my friend, be sensible."
Those were the only words of love that escaped us.
Some time after this, Juliette gave a dinner to celebrate Charles' birthday. During the whole evening she appeared nervous and irritated. To Charles who offered a timid remark, she replied harshly and curtly, in a manner which seemed foreign to her. It was two o'clock in the morning before the crowd left. I alone remained in the parlor. Near the door, Malterre stood with his back to me, talking to Jesselin who was putting on his overcoat in the vestibule. And I saw Juliette, her elbows resting on the piano, looking fixedly at me. A gleam of fierce passion flashed in her eyes, suddenly turned dark, almost terrible, marking them as with a novel flame. The wrinkle on her forehead deepened, her nostrils quivered; a strange expression of something unchaste wandered on
