Authors: Irene Nemirovsky
“Planes,” Florence replied, looking up at the sky.
“Won’t they leave me the hell alone?” he thundered.
He hated the war; it threatened much more than his lifestyle or peace of mind. It continually destroyed the world of the imagination, the only world where he felt happy. It was like a shrill, brutal trumpet shattering the fragile crystal walls he’d taken such pains to build in order to shut out the rest of the world.
“God!” he sighed. “How upsetting, what a nightmare!”
Brought back down to earth, he asked to see the newspapers. She gave them to him without a word. They came in from the terrace and he leafed through the papers, a dark look on his face. “All in all,” he said, “nothing new.”
He didn’t want to see anything new. He dismissed reality with the bored, startled gesture of a sleeping man awakened abruptly in the middle of a dream. He even shaded his eyes with his hand as if to block out a dazzling light.
Florence walked towards the radio. He stopped her. “No, no, leave it alone.”
“But Gabriel . . .”
He went white with anger. “Listen to me! I don’t want to hear anything. Tomorrow, tomorrow will be soon enough. If I hear any bad news now (and it can only be bad with these c**** in government) my momentum will be lost, my inspiration blocked. Look, you’d better call Mademoiselle Sudre. I think I’ll dictate a few pages!” She hurried to summon the secretary.
As she was coming back to the drawing room, the telephone rang. “It’s Monsieur Jules Blanc phoning from the Presidential Office, wishing to speak to Monsieur Corte,” said the valet.
She carefully closed all the doors so that no noise could filter through to where Gabriel and his secretary were working. Meanwhile, the valet went to prepare a cold supper for his master, as he always did. Gabriel ate little during the day but was often hungry at night. There was some leftover cold partridge, a few peaches, some delicious little cheeses (which Florence herself had ordered from a shop on the Left Bank) and a bottle of Pommery. After many years of reflection and research, Corte had come to the conclusion that, given his poor digestion, only champagne would do. Florence listened to Jules Blanc’s voice on the telephone, an exhausted, almost imperceptible voice, and at the same time heard all the familiar sounds of the house—the soft clinking of china and glass, Gabriel’s deep, languid voice—and she felt as though she were living a confusing dream. She put down the phone and called the valet. He had been in their service for a long time and trained for what he called “the workings of the house,” an inadvertent pastiche of seventeenth-century parlance that Gabriel found quite charming.
“What can we do, Marcel? Jules Blanc himself is telling us to leave . . .”
“Leave? To go where, Madame?”
“Anywhere. To Brittany. The Midi. It seems the Germans have crossed the Seine. What can we do?” she repeated.
“I have no idea, Madame,” said Marcel frostily.
They’d waited long enough to ask his opinion. They should have left last night, he thought. Isn’t it just pathetic to see rich, famous people who have no more common sense than animals! And even animals can sense danger . . . As for him, well, he wasn’t afraid of the Germans. He’d seen them in ’14. He’d be left alone; he was too old to be called up. But he was outraged: the house, the furniture, the silver—they hadn’t thought about anything in time. He let out a barely audible sigh.
He
would have had everything wrapped up long ago, hidden away in packing cases, in a safe place. He felt a sort of affectionate scorn towards his employers, the same scorn he felt towards the white greyhounds: they were beautiful but stupid.
“Madame should warn Monsieur,” he concluded.
Florence started walking towards the drawing room, but she had barely opened the door when she heard Gabriel’s voice. It was the voice he assumed on his worst days, when he was most agitated: slow, hoarse, interrupted now and again by a nervous cough.
She gave orders to Marcel and the maid, then thought about their most valuable possessions, the ones to be taken when there’s danger, when you have to escape. She placed a light but sturdy suitcase on her bed. First she hid the jewellery she’d had the foresight to get out of the safe. Over it she put some underwear, her washing things, two spare blouses, a little evening dress, so she’d have something to wear once they’d arrived—she knew there’d be delays on the road—a dressing gown and slippers, her make-up case (which took up a lot of space) and of course Gabriel’s manuscripts. She tried in vain to close the suitcase. She moved the jewellery box, tried again. No, something definitely had to go. But what? Everything was essential. She pressed her knee against the case, pushed down, tried to lock it and failed. She was getting annoyed.
Finally, she called her maid. “Do you think you can manage to close it, Julie?”
“It’s too full, Madame. It’s impossible.”
For a second Florence hesitated between her make-up case and the manuscripts, chose the make-up and closed the suitcase.
The manuscripts could be stuffed into the hatbox, she thought. I know him, though! His outbursts, his crises, his heart medicine. We’ll see tomorrow, it’s better to get everything ready tonight and not tell him anything. Then we’ll see . . .
4
Along with their fortune, the Maltête family of Lyon had bequeathed to the Péricands a predisposition to tuberculosis. This illness had claimed two of Adrien Péricand’s sisters at an early age; his son, Philippe, had suffered from it a few years earlier. Two years in the mountains, however, seemed to have cured Father Philippe, his recovery coinciding with the moment when he was finally ordained a priest. His lungs were still weak, so when war was declared he was exempt. Nevertheless, he looked strong. He had good colour in his cheeks, thick black eyebrows and a healthy, rugged appearance. His parish was a little village in the Auvergne. As soon as his vocation had become apparent, Madame Péricand had given him up to the Lord. In exchange for this sacrifice, she had hoped for a bit of worldly glory and that he might be destined for great things; instead, he was teaching the catechism to the small farmers of Puy-de-Dôme. If the Church was unable to find some greater responsibility for him, even a monastery would be better than this poor parish. “It’s such a waste,” she would say to him vehemently. “You are wasting the gifts the Good Lord has given you.” But she consoled herself with the thought that the cold climate was good for him. He seemed to need the kind of air he’d breathed in the high altitudes of Switzerland for two years. Back on the streets of Paris, he strode along in a manner that made passers-by smile, for it seemed out of keeping with his cassock.
And so that morning he stopped in front of a grey building and entered a courtyard that smelled of cabbage. The Penitent Children of the 16th Arrondissement were lodged in a small private residence set behind a tall administrative building. As Madame Péricand explained in her annual letter to the Friends of the charitable institution (Founding Member, 500 francs per year; Benefactor, 100 francs; Member, 20 francs), the children lived in the best possible material and moral conditions, were apprenticed to a variety of trades and participated in healthy physical activities: a small glass lean-to had been built on to the house, providing a carpenter’s workshop and a cobbler’s bench. Through the window-panes, Father Péricand saw the round heads of the little inmates look up for a second when they heard his footsteps. In one part of the garden, between the steps and the lean-to, two boys aged fifteen and sixteen were working with a supervisor. There were no uniforms. The Institution hadn’t wanted to recall the prisons already known to some of them. They wore clothing made by charitable people using leftover wool. One of the boys had on an apple-green cardigan that revealed his long, thin, hairy wrists. In perfect discipline and silence, he and his companion were digging the earth, pulling out grass, repotting flowers. They nodded to Father Péricand, who smiled at them. The priest’s face was calm, his expression stern and a bit sad. But his smile was very sweet, slightly shy, with a kind of gentle reproach: “I love you,” it seemed to say. “Why don’t you love me?” The children were watching him, saying nothing.
“What beautiful weather,” he murmured.
“Yes, Father,” they replied, their voices cold and forced.
Philippe said a few more words to them, then went into the house. Inside it was grey and clean, and the room where he found himself was almost bare, containing only two cane chairs. It was the reception room, where the charges could have visitors, a practice tolerated but not encouraged. In any case, almost all of them were orphans. From time to time some neighbour who had known their dead parents, some older sister living in the country, would remember them and come to visit. But Father Péricand had never met a living soul in this room. The director’s office was on the same floor.
The director was a short, fair man with pink eyelids and a pointed nose that trembled like an animal’s snout when he smelled food. His charges called him “the rat” or “the tapir.” He stretched both arms out to Philippe; his hands were cold and clammy. “I simply do not know how to thank you for your kindness, Father! You are really going to take charge of our boys?”
The children had to be evacuated the following day. He’d just been called urgently to the Midi, to his sick wife’s side . . .
“The supervisor is afraid he’ll be snowed under, that he won’t be able to manage our thirty boys all alone.”
“They seem very obedient,” Philippe remarked.
“Oh, they’re good boys. We get them into shape, teach the rebellious ones how to behave. But without wishing to seem proud, I’m the one who keeps everything going here. The supervisors are afraid. In any case, the war has claimed one of them and as for the other . . .” He pouted. “Excellent if he follows a rigid routine, but incapable of taking any initiative whatsoever, one of those people who could drown in a glass of water. Anyway, I was wondering which Saint to pray to in order to evacuate these boys when your good father told me you were passing through, leaving tomorrow for the mountains and that you wouldn’t refuse to help us.”
“I’ll gladly do it. How are you planning to get the children out?”
“We’ve been able to get hold of two trucks. We’ve got enough petrol. They’re going somewhere that is only about fifty kilometres from your parish, you know. It won’t take you too far out of your way.”
“I’m free until Thursday,” said Philippe. “One of my Brothers is replacing me.”
“Oh, the journey won’t take that long! Your father tells me you are familiar with the house one of our benefactresses has placed at our disposal. It’s a large estate in the middle of the woods. The proprietor inherited it last year and the furniture, which was very beautiful, was sold just before the war. The children can camp in the grounds. They will enjoy doing that in this lovely weather. At the beginning of the war they spent three months camping in another château in Corrèze kindly offered to us by one of these good ladies. We didn’t have any heating at all there. Every morning we had to break the ice on the jugs. The children have never behaved so well. The days of peacetime luxury and ease,” said the director, “are over.”
The priest looked at the clock.
“Would you do me the honour of having lunch with me, Father?”
Philippe declined. He’d arrived in Paris that morning having travelled through the night. He was worried that Hubert might do something hot-headed and had come to get him, but the family was leaving that very day for Nièvre. Philippe wanted to be there when they left: an extra pair of hands wouldn’t go amiss, he thought, smiling.
“I’ll go and tell the boys you’ll be taking my place,” said the director. “Perhaps you’d like to say a few words to them to get acquainted. I had intended to speak to them myself, to tell them the whole country’s at war, but I’m leaving at four o’clock and . . .”
“I’ll speak to them,” said Father Péricand.
He lowered his eyes, joined his hands and placed his fingertips on his lips. His face took on an expression of harshness and sadness as he looked into his heart. He disliked these unfortunate children. He walked towards them with all the kindness and goodwill he was capable of, but all he felt in their presence was coldness and disgust, not a single glimmer of love, nothing of that divine feeling which even the most miserable of sinners awoke in him when begging for forgiveness. There was more humility in bragging atheists, in hardened blasphemers, than in the eyes and words of these children. Their superficial obedience was terrifying. Despite being baptised, despite the holy sacraments of Communion and penance, no divine light illuminated them. They were children of Satan, without even enough spirituality to elevate themselves to a point where they desired divine light; they didn’t feel it; they didn’t want it; they didn’t miss it. Father Péricand thought tenderly of the good little children to whom he taught the catechism. He had no illusions about them, of course. He knew very well that evil had already planted solid roots in their young souls, but at certain moments they showed such promise of kindness, of innocent grace, that they trembled with pity and horror when he spoke to them of the Passion of Christ. He was eager to get back to them. He thought of the First Communion they would celebrate the following Sunday.
Meanwhile, he followed the director into the hall where the boys had been assembled. The shutters were closed. In the darkness, he tripped on one of the steps near the doorway and had to grab on to the director’s arm to avoid falling. He looked at the children, waiting, hoping for some stifled laughter. Sometimes a ridiculous incident like this breaks the ice between students and teachers. But no. Not one of them reacted. They stood in a semicircle against the wall with the youngest—those between eleven and fourteen—in front; their faces were pale, their lips tightly clenched, their eyes lowered. Almost all of them were small for their age and scrawny. The older ones, aged fifteen to eighteen, stood at the back. Some of them had the low brow, the thick hands of killers. As soon as he was in their presence, Father Péricand again felt a strange sensation of aversion, almost fear. He must overcome it at all costs. He walked towards them and they stepped back imperceptibly, as if they wanted to sink into the wall.