CHAPTER VIII
LIANE was not fond of preliminaries. She considered that life was short and that love was infinitely shorter, and she thought that the best plan with both was to live in the present.
Jean perplexed and amused her; he adored her ardently and blindly, and yet he seemed reluctant to give himself up to the elements which drew him. He was caught off his feet, but he struggled and fought with the power that held him. He had scruples and he wanted time. Liane gave him no time and she laughed immoderately at his scruples.
“You do not deceive your friend,mon ami,†she said one night as they were returning from the theatre. “If there is any deception on hand, it is certainly my own. But, I assure you, your friend Maurice does not consider me a nun, as you appear to do. I do not know that I have given him, or you either, any reason to suppose that Ifind myself at home in a convent! He is a man of the world, the good Maurice, at least he wishes to be thought so.Bon!he must accept the world. It is doubtless as the good God made it, and he did not make it expressly for thejeune fille! In Paris we get out of it what we can. Maurice is the size of his income, neither larger nor smaller, and I give him his money’s worth, rest assured! Why should I give him more? He is not an object of charity! For myself I am an artist; I should bore myself prettily if I sat and pined all day for your little man of the world! I need a friend who is also an artist. It is you to-day; I remind you, though you do not like it, that there have been yesterdays, and that if you are not very good, there will be to-morrows.â€
Jean closed his eyes. He hated what Liane was saying, and he thought if he shut his eyes he might not see her words. He loved Liane best when he was away from her and she could not disfigure herself in his eyes; when he was in his dark and lonely little room, and could feel a passionate impatience and disgust with Maurice, his old hero—who had long ago ceased to be a hero in Paris, where young man at twenty-five, with moustaches, self-importance, and a sense of life were not particularly rare.
But when Jean found himself with Liane in Maurice’s motor, he was apt to feel the disgust and impatience with himself, instead of withMaurice, and he was far too proud to like to feel himself to blame. Liane saw this quite plainly, even though she did not understand it. To-night she had decided to cure it. She laid her hand on his arm.
“Alors,†she whispered, “is it for me to tell you to profit by to-day? I give you all that an artist should give an artist; but, Jean, that is not all I have to give!â€
Jean’s eyes were drawn to her face; she knew that was the way to make him forget all inconvenient ideas; and he forgot them. He looked at her and everything vanished, the cold of the night around them, the flashing lights, the swift, sharp cries of the streets, the softened whirr and buzz of the passing cars, the houses, those sheltered screens of human life, standing between them and the sky—all these outer things, and all the inner things too, Jean’s scruples and his struggles, his reluctance, and the safeguard of his pride, failed and fell away from him, under the spell of Liane’s eyes. A hard compulsion came upon him; at that moment he ceased to worship Liane, he wanted her. He ceased to reflect; he could not speak. He put out his hand and caught hers. He hurt her, but she did not wince; like the girl in the picture, she met his demand with serene, satisfied eyes, waiting for inevitable surrender.
“Maurice is away to-night,†she whispered. Jean followed her into the flat without a word.
The fortnight that followed Jean never cared greatly to recall. There was still the Bank in the daytime; sometimes he fell asleep over his work, but his fellow clerks were very kind; they woke him up and said to each other: “See how he has begun to live, this little one!â€
When he was roused, Jean used to shiver and feel horribly sad; at these times he wished that he had never seen Liane; a fierce thirst for loneliness, and freedom for his soul, possessed him; he hungered to shut out Liane’s face and get back to his piano, his empty room, and the liberty of his dreams. The long, dull day cramped and stiffened him, and the money that ran through his hands seemed to his nervous fancy to stain them like an unclean thing. It was as if in its monotonous reiteration it spelt Liane. It was for her that it came there, for her that it increased, and then ran back into the streets of Paris, a golden, sordid stream. The sound of the money made Jean yearn for the sound and smell of the earth at St. Jouin, for the clean air and sweet loneliness of the woods. But when evening fell and the lights came out, and Paris awoke, when the streets filled with the stir of a well-dressed, living throng, then Jean’s heart quickened, and the Bank and St. Jouin, and even the piano and its dreams, sank back into a hidden place in his soul, and he became the happiest and gayest young man in Paris, inconceivably loved by the most splendid woman in the world.
It was not possible that he could wholly succeed in hiding from Liane his intense separation of spirit. She knew, indeed, extremely little about spirit, but on the other hand she knew a great deal about lovers, and it did not escape her that Jean had, at moments, the power of estranging himself from her possession. At the end of the fortnight Maurice returned from the provinces, and Jean explained to Liane in her dressing-room at the Odéon that he had met Maurice.
“Well,†said Liane impatiently. “I do not see anything very extraordinary in that. I have also met him,mon cher; what then?â€
“But you must not meet him again, Liane, not now,†said Jean quietly. “You say the flat is your own, so I shall not ask you to leave it, but you must not allow Maurice to visit you there again.â€
Liane was silent a moment from sheer astonishment. It was true that with a desire to spare Jean’s feelings she had told him the flat was her own. It was equally true that it was not—not in the sense in which she had led Jean to believe it to be.
“Must not, Jean!†she repeated, laying down her powder-puff and regarding him with blank amazement. “Are you mad? What has this poor Maurice done, then, that I am not to receive him?â€
“Liane! Liane!†cried Jean, taking both her hands in his. “Why do you pretend that you donot understand me? You do! you do! you do!â€
Liane withdrew her hands and returned to her powder-puff.
“You are absurd,†she said coldly. “Do not enrage me with your virtues from the provinces. I will not be taught how to live by a chicken whose shell I have just broken. I shall receive whom I like when I like. One would think, Monsieur, that I was your wife. Let me hear no more of these impertinences!â€
Jean went to the window and opened it; something in his brain seemed to be burning to escape; he felt hot, savage, and reckless. No, she was not his wife; he supposed if she were he might have trusted her, he might have respected her. As it was, he did not, he hated her. All his heart seemed filled with a hard exasperation. When he turned to face her again, his eyes were fierce.
“I told him he could not come,†he said; “if you receive him you do it at your own risk.â€
“You told Maurice—told him he could not come?†Liane gasped.
“I told him you must choose between us,†Jean continued doggedly. “I know he has all the things I have not got. I have nothing to offer you—yes, that is true. You see me here, Liane; how much do you suppose I have in my pocket? I think I have three francs. Well, it is all I shall have till the end of the month. Maurice is, I believe, rich;but there is one thing I have which I will not give up, and that is my pride. Now which is it to be, tell me. If it is Maurice, I go!â€
Liane contrived to stare at him for a moment without speaking. She could say a good deal, but she was not going to say any of it at present. Jean with his ardent eyes full of fire and tears charmed her jaded senses. He was a new experience, she valued him. As for Maurice, that was another story. She could, she fancied, make some arrangement about Maurice. He would not cry for the moon, and she could manage for him to have something short of that commodity. As far as Jean was concerned, it was quite unnecessary that he should know anything about her arrangements. The blank look passed out of her eyes, she opened her arms to him and he knelt beside her, a child in her hands, trembling with distress at his own temerity.
“Only trust me, Jean,†she whispered. “You do trust me?â€
“You won’t see him, Liane?â€
“Selfish little boy, to please you then—no.â€
Jean gave a long sigh of relief. Where was his hatred now? His bitter antagonism? that feeling in his heart of remorseless hardness? It seemed impossible that they had ever existed and incredible that they should ever exist again; but even now they were only hidden, like the sharpteeth of rocks covered for the moment by the rush of the incoming tide.
Liane carried out a suitable arrangement, and Jean believed that she had obeyed him; it made him extraordinarily humble and tender with her; he could not do enough to show his gratitude; and Liane was not always easy to serve, she required so much and she had a most terrible temper. Jean set himself to please her with an almost feminine gentleness and tact. He did not ask from her refined sensibilities or quick perceptions. He called her to himself a great artist, and he made himself believe that this excused everything.
He was very young and he loved her, and the young cannot love without the divine fire. They must look for their vine to bring forth grapes, and when it brings forth wild grapes they shut their eyes.
They will believe in beauty though they must go blind to keep their vision; they would rather enter into the kingdom of heaven maimed than know it is not the kingdom of heaven.
Jean persisted in believing in Liane in spite of Liane, but sometimes she made it very hard for him.
“There is still an arrangement we must make,†she said to him one day. “I cannot have anyone going about with me who is dressed like a piano-tuner. You carry yourself well, it is true. You have the good little air which says: ‘I own myself,’but that is not enough when you are with me. It is necessary that you show a great deal more importance, you must, in short, look as if you owned me! and for that,mon cher, you will require clothes. I cannot put a placard on your back—‘I beseech you, here is a man who is about to become a great musician; refrain from regarding his cravat!’ And I will not be seen with a nobody! In Paris it is necessary to have a note, a tone, to express one’s self in such a way that the world cannot readily overlook you.â€
Jean looked dogged, he did not wish to say he was too poor. He had already been forced into this confession rather frequently by Liane, who never understood anything about money, except that you spent it—yours or any one else’s—like water, and that when it was finished you made yourself excessively agreeable or disagreeable (according to the requirements of the case) till you were given more. There is more than one way of paying for your fun, and since Jean’s pockets were empty, he had had to pay for it lately with his pride, and he had several times made a stand about the price. He did not like supping here and there and everywhere at enormous expense, for which Liane paid; he did not like the invariable use of the expensive motor, and Liane never walked a step and never used anything else. He did not like his position as the man who carried things, shared things, bought things, and for none ofwhich his whole salary (he had just been started on a hundred francs a month) would have covered the tips for one busy night. Cravats and tie-pins he had hardly seen his way to escape, but he drew the line at a silk hat for the Opera, and a new suit, and took the first opportunity during a short afternoon’s shopping to say so.
Liane stared at him.
“Pourquoi, mon ami?†she said, in a voice of toneless gentleness, which Jean had learned to dread as the preliminary of a rising fury.
“Pourquoi pas?†And she went out of the shop where she had turned over everything and bought nothing—she was a difficult shopper—with the air of a tragedy queen.
If she would only be angry, Jean thought he might manage to keep the little golden coin of his pride, but she wasn’t only angry. She was angry at first, splendidly, furiously angry, till she saw it was no use. Then she melted and entreated Jean with that flexible, dramatic tenderness which attacks all the weak places in a man’s heart and tyrannizes over them; but still Jean held out. She made him feel that he was a brute and know that he was a fool, but he clung to his pride and faced her with drawn lips and haggard eyes.
“Please, please don’t tempt me, Liane,†he pleaded. “I literally haven’t a penny except some money, a very small sum, my mother leftme, which I have promised to keep intact for an emergency. You don’t want me to use that? I don’t even know if I legally can, and you certainly can’t suppose that I will accept clothes from you. It’s just like you to be generous enough to offer anything you have, but it would be impossible for me to take it. I know I’m not very smart, my poor Liane, but try to put up with me as I am! Perhaps I shall make something by playing soon, and every bit of it shall go to a jeweller for you, and a tailor for me; only have patience.â€
Unfortunately Jean asked Liane for the quality she most despised and least possessed.
“So you will not even do this one little thing for me?†she said, gazing tragically in front of her.
“I would do anything in all the world for you, Liane,†said Jean, his voice trembling, “but I can’t take money!â€
Liane flung her pathos from her as if it were an old shoe.
“Bah!†she said. “That same old story, then! The things a man will do for you! How often have I not heard them!Hein!What are they,mon ami? First, die for me! You would naturally put this first, as it is the last thing I should ask of you! It is true you could die for me in any old suit, but how would it profit me? I am not a cannibal, nor am I a murderer. I do not desire the death of my friends! It would not contribute, this sacrifice of yours, anything to my safety, my comfortor my amusement! Anything! I again ask you—will you give up your Bank for me? No! You have already said that you cannot risk having no profession. I do not know what you call ten sous a month, but it appears that it may pass for a profession. You cannot offer me money—you have not got it. Talent? You will not use it. Beauty? Your friend Maurice with his ox eyes, his butcher’s moustache, his figure enlaced, presents something better to the eye than you. What then? Your wit? My poor Jean, you have just given me, it seems, a specimen. Pardon me if I prefer my own. You have not the sense to see that there are only two things worth having—money and life—and that one pays for the other! What can you do for me, then? I will tell you. You can take things when I want you to take them! But that, it seems at present, you can only do when you yourself want them! You are willing enough to take my time, for example, and also what you are so good as to call my charms? I introduce you into the artist world, I lift you here, I lift you there, I carry you about, I get myself even laughed at. They say: ‘The good Liane has turned nursemaid; behold how she trains her little one!’ I ask in return what? That you should not go about with me in rags from a country village. No, I do not care if the chauffeur hears or not—yes, rags! Yes! I say a suit left over from the year of your first Communion, and you say ‘No! thisI will not do; this goes too far; this risks too much!’——â€
“Liane,†entreated Jean. “The people on the pavement, everyone is staring at us!†Liane was enjoying herself. What if everyone was staring at them? She preferred an audience. She did not lower her tone at all as she continued:
“Mon ami, I am very reasonable. I am very calm, I am quite patient,moi! I say only this—†and she made a superb gesture with her hands which took in half the Bois de Boulogne, through which they were dashing at a magnificent pace, “which of us two is it, then, who asks too much?â€
Jean capitulated. He answered that he would try and draw out the sum his mother had left for the special emergency.
Liane became pacific; they would dismount, she said, and take a stroll in the Bois, where they would have tea—the whole world was out this afternoon.
She did not at all mind what money Jean used, the great thing was that they should both be well dressed and that she should have what she wanted without any dispute about it.
“Now,mon ami, are you happy?†she asked Jean, with the acquired sublimity of the Liane smile as she led the way under the sun-touched, wintry trees of the Bois. Jean could not honestly say that he was happy, but he was at least glad that Liane should be so. Lately, he was beginning torealize that the desire to appease her was taking the place of finding in her his own tremendous joy. Instead of rapture at the miracle of her presence he felt relief if they succeeded in spending a peaceful hour together; and once or twice he had not been quite sure that the relief was due to the peace so much as to the fact that the hour was over, and he could go back once more to his stolen moments at the piano, the only free ones of his life. He began to think, too, more good-naturedly of Maurice, and less—very much less—proudly of himself; but he still thought that he loved Liane. It takes a great deal to kill love, for after the glory of the individual has faded, there still remains the inmost unquenchable fire—the love of love. Perhaps it would not be true to say that Jean still loved Liane. She had very much disgusted and distressed him, but she could still make him love love, and while she could do that there was no real danger of his escaping her.