The House I Loved (19 page)

“’Tis me, Monsieur Vincent. I only want to talk to you, Madame Rose, just for a minute. Please open the door.”

His voice sounded gentle and kind. The same kind voice he had been using with me for the past weeks. It fooled me. I opened up.

He swept in, too fast. There was a strong whiff of liquor on his breath. He looked down at me like an animal stares at its prey. Those glittering eyes. An icy fear seeped into my bones. And then I knew letting him in had been a terrible mistake. There was no small talk. He lunged out for me with those freckled hands, an ugly, greedy gesture, his fingers biting cruelly into my arms, his breath hot on my face. I managed to drag myself away with a sob, I managed to run up the stairs, a silent scream tearing my throat. But he was too quick. He caught me by the back of my neck as I entered the living room, and we tumbled down to the carpet, his loathsome hands at my breast, his wet mouth slippery on mine.

I tried to reason with him, I tried to tell him this was horribly wrong, that my daughter was in the upstairs room, that you were coming back, that he could not do this. He could not do this.

He was heedless. He did not listen. He did not care. He overpowered me. He crushed me to the ground. I feared my bones would break under his weight. I want you to understand there was nothing I could do. Nothing. I put up a fight. I fought him as hard as I could. I pulled his greasy hair, I writhed, I kicked, I bit, I spat. I could not bring myself to scream, because my daughter was just upstairs, and I could not bear her coming down to witness this. I wished above all to protect her.

When I realized that fighting was no good, I remained stonelike, a statue. I cried. I cried all the way through, dearest. I cried in silence. He had his way. I willed myself away from this hideous moment. I remember looking up at the ceiling and its slight cracks and waiting for this ordeal to end. I could smell the musty scent of the carpet, and his awful odor, the stink of a stranger, a stranger in my house, a stranger within my body. It happened very quickly, barely a couple of minutes, but to me it was a century. There was a ghastly leer on his face, his mouth was fully stretched out, turned up at the sides. Never will I forget that monstrous grin, the glistening of his teeth, the loll of his tongue.

He left without a word, sneering down at me, and I lay there like a corpse. I lay there for what seemed hours. Then I crept up and went to our room. I fetched water and I washed myself. The water was icy and I flinched. My skin was bruised and purple. I ached all over. I wanted to cower into a corner and shriek. I thought I would go mad. I felt filthy, contaminated.

The house was not safe. The house had been invaded. The house had been ravaged. I could almost feel the walls trembling. It had taken him five minutes. But the deed was done. The damage was done.

I did not sleep that night. His glittering eyes. His rapacious hands. That was when I had the nightmare for the first time. I went up to my daughter. She slept on, warm and drowsy. I lay there listening to her quiet breathing. I swore to myself I would never tell a living soul about this. Not even Père Levasque at confession. I could not even mention it in my most intimate prayers.

Who was there to tell, anyway? I was not close to my mother. I had no sister. My daughter was far too young. And I could not bring myself to speak of this to you. What would you have done? How would you have reacted? In my head I went back to the scene, again and again. Had I not egged him on? Had I not been inadvertently flirtatious? Was this not my fault? How could I have opened the door wearing my nightgown? I had not behaved decently. How could I have been duped by his voice through the door?

But wouldn’t this appalling event have shamed you profoundly, had I ever told you? Would you not think I’d been having an affair, that I was his mistress? I could not bear the shame. I could not bear imagining the expression on your face. I could not bear the gossip, the chatter, walking down the rue Childebert, the rue Erfurth, with eyes on me, the knowing smiles, the nudges, the whispers.

No one would know. No one would ever know.

The next morning he was there, smoking, in front of the printing house. I feared I would not have the strength to walk out of the building. For a moment I lingered there, pretending to look for my keys in my purse. Then I managed to take a few steps onto the cobblestones. I looked up. He was facing me. There was a long scratch down his cheek. He stared right at me, blatantly, a swagger in his stance. He flickered a lazy tongue over his lower lip. I glanced away, my face crimson.

How I hated him at that instant. How I longed to pry his eyes out. How many men like him, on our streets, men of his kind who force themselves on women? How many women endure in silence because they feel guilty, because they are afraid? Men like him make silence their law. He knew I would never denounce him. He knew I would never tell you. He was right.

Wherever he is now, all these years later, I have not forgotten him. Thirty years have swept past, and although I have never laid eyes on him again, I would recognize him instantly. I wonder what he has become. What kind of old man he has turned into. I wonder if he has ever had any inkling of the havoc he wreaked in my life.

When you returned the following day, do you remember how I clasped you in my arms, how I kissed you? How I held on to you for dear life? That night you took me, and I felt it was the only way to erase the passage of the other man.

Monsieur Vincent disappeared from our neighborhood soon after. I have never slept soundly since.

THIS MORNING GILBERT IS
back with fresh warm bread and some roasted chicken wings. He keeps glancing at me as we eat. I ask him what the matter is.

“They are coming,” he finally utters. “The cold has broken.”

I remain silent.

“There is still time,” he whispers.

“No,” I say firmly. I wipe my greasy chin with my palm.

“Very well.”

He stands up awkwardly and holds out his hand.

“What are you doing?” I ask.

“I am not going to stay here and watch this,” he mutters.

To my dismay, tears spill out of his eyes. I cannot think of what to say. He pulls me to him, his arms wrapped around my back like two enormous gnarled branches. From very close, his stench is overwhelming. Then he steps away, embarrassed. He fumbles about in his pocket and hands me a withered flower. It is a small ivory rose.

“Should you change your mind…” he begins.

One last gaze down to me. I shake my head.

Then he is gone.

I am very calm, dearest. I am ready. I hear them now, the slow sure thunder of their approach, the voices, the clamor. I must hurry to tell you the end of my story. I believe you know now, I believe you have understood.

I have tucked Gilbert’s rose into my corsage. My hand trembles as I write this, and it is not the cold, it is not the fear of the workers making their way here. It is the heaviness of the moment, of what I must unburden myself with at last.

THE LITTLE BOY WAS
very small still. He could not yet walk. We were in the Luxembourg Gardens, with the nanny (I cannot recall her name, a sweet, placid creature) by the Medicis Fountain. It was a fine windy spring day, the garden was full of children, mothers, birds and flowers. You were not there, of that I am certain. I had a pretty hat, and the blue ribbon kept getting undone, streaming behind me in the blustery breeze. Oh, how Baptiste laughed.

When the wind tossed the hat right off my head, he fairly exploded with glee, his lips curled into a wide smile. There was a fleeting expression on his face. His mouth stretched out into a grin that I had already seen and that I had been unable to erase from my mind.

A hideous grin. It was a vision of awfulness that pierced through me like a dagger. I clutched a hand to my bosom and stifled a scream. Alarmed, the young nanny asked if I was all right. I steadied myself. My hat had gone, frolicking along the dusty path like a wild creature. Baptiste whimpered, pointing at it. I managed to get my composure back and staggered along to fetch it. But all along my heart thumped dreadfully. How could I not have expected such a tragedy? The extreme agitation I had experienced after the attack had forced me to expunge the event from my mind, as well as its loathsome consequences.

That smile. That grin. I was going to bring up my luncheon, then and there. I did. I do not know how I managed to walk home. The young girl helped me. I remember that when we arrived, I went directly up to our room and I spent the rest of the day in bed, with the curtains drawn.

For a very long span of time I felt trapped in a cell with no windows and no door. I could not find my way out. The place was dark and oppressive. For hours I tried to find the door, I was convinced it was hidden somewhere in the wallpaper’s design, and I slid my palms and fingers along the walls, trying to find the crack of the door, desperate. This was not a dream. It rolled on in my mind, it endured as I went about my daily chores, looked after my children, my house, looked after you. Again and again the cell without any openings stifled me mentally. Sometimes I had to hide in the little cabinet behind our bedroom in order to breathe normally.

I never put my foot on the exact place where the deed had taken place, not far from where Madame Odette drew her last breath. Little by little I was able to obliterate the memory of what had happened in that room. It took months, it took years. My shining love for my son, my deep love for you, triumphed over the stark monstrosity of the truth. I never told you. I never could. As I stepped over the spot on the carpet day after day, I stepped over the memory. I blanked it out. I wiped it away, like one would a stain. How did I manage? How could I have endured it? I simply did. I squared my shoulders, like a soldier facing battle. The years rolled by. The horror faded. The carpet where it had happened also faded, until one day it was finally replaced.

Even today, my love, I cannot write the words, I cannot form the sentences that spell out the truth. I cannot. But the guilt has never stopped bearing down on me. And when Baptiste died, can you see now that I was convinced the Lord was punishing me for my sins?

When our son died, I tried to turn to Violette. She was my only child, now. But she never let me love her. She remained aloof, distant, slightly supercilious, as if she considered me less of a fine person than you. Now, with the distance that old age gives one, I see that she may have suffered from my preferring her brother. I see now that this was my greatest fault as a mother, loving Baptiste more than Violette, and showing it. How unfair this must have seemed to her. I always gave him the shiniest apple, the sweetest pear. He must have the seat in the shade, the softest bed, the best view at the theater, the umbrella if it was raining. Did he ever make the most of these advantages? Did he taunt his sister? Perhaps he did, unbeknownst. Perhaps he made her feel even more unloved.

I am trying to reflect upon all this calmly. My love for Baptiste was the most powerful force in my life. Were you convinced I could love only him? Did you also feel left out? I remember that once you did say something about my being besotted with the boy. I was. Oh, my love, I was. And when the hideous reality became evident, I loved him all the more. I could have loathed him, I could have rejected him, but no, my love surged even stronger, as if I had to desperately protect him from his frightful origins.

Remember how, after he died, I could not discard any of his belongings. For many years his room became a sort of shrine, a love temple to my adored boy. I would sit there in a kind of daze, and cry. You were gentle and kind, but you did not understand. How could you? Violette, growing into a young girl, despised my grief. Yes, I felt I was being punished. My golden prince had been taken away from me, because I had sinned, because I had not been able to prevent that assault. Because it had been my fault.

It is only now, Armand, as I hear the demolition team coming up the street, their loud voices, their crude laughter, their belligerence kindled by their horrific mission, that it seems the assault on me will take place again. This time, you see, it is not Monsieur Vincent who will bend me to his will, using his manhood as a weapon, no, it is a colossal snake of stone and cement that will crush the house to nothingness, that will propel me into oblivion. And behind that hideous snake of stone there is the one man in control. My enemy. That bearded man, that House Man. Him.

THIS HOUSE IS LIKE
my body, it is like my own skin, my blood, my bones. It carries me like I have carried our children. It has been damaged, it has suffered, it has been violated, it has survived, but today, it will collapse. Today, nothing can save the house, nothing can save me. There is nothing out there, Armand, nothing or nobody that I wish to hold on to. I am an old lady now, it is time for me to take my leave.

After you died, a gentleman pursued me for a while. A respectable widower, Monsieur Gontrand, a jovial fellow with a paunch and long sideburns. He had taken quite a fancy to me. Once a week he paid his respects, with a small box of chocolates or a bunch of violets. I believe he also took a fancy to the house and to the income of the two shops. Ah, yes, your Rose is shrewd. His was a pleasurable company, I will concede. We played dominoes and cards, and I would offer him a glass of Madeira. He always left just before supper. After a while he became slightly more audacious. But he finally understood that I was not interested in becoming his wife. However, we remained friends over the years. I did not wish to remarry, like my mother did. Now that you are no longer here, I prefer being alone. I suppose only Alexandrine understands that. I must admit something more to you. She is the only person I will miss. I miss her now. I realize now that for all those years, after you left me, she gave me her friendship, and it was a priceless gift.

Oddly enough, in these final, awful moments, I find myself thinking about the Baronne de Vresse. Despite the age difference, the social one, I did feel we could have become friends. And I will readily confess that at one point I did ponder about using her connection with the Prefect to attract his attention, to save our house. Did she not attend his parties? Had he not once but twice come to the rue Taranne? But you see, I never did. I never dared. I respected her too much.