"But there's no one here but us. And if we never do it again you'll never teach me.' "You know enough already you little rabbit.' "What have you done with men Bella.' "And what have you done with girls Balthazar."
"Please Bella, what have you done."
"You mustn't ask me questions like that."
"I must know."
"Why must you know."
"Because if you did I may never speak to you again."
"O dear. Turn around your head. Come on. Turn around.
You're quite spoiled you know. Look at me. Are you jealous.
A little aren't you."
"I'm not discussing it. Do you do this. Without your clothes and be in bed with other men."
"And I'm not discussing it."
"If you've been like this with other men I will kill myself.
With arsenic."
"O Lord."
"I will."
"Snuggle up close and comfy to me. Don't let me hear you say that again. Or I will be off to Bristol or something like that and go on a ship. To the south seas."
"Bella I love you so much. So awfully awfully much."
"There you mustn't cry. You really mustn't."
"And I never want you to go away for ever and ever."
"I'm here now. You crazy little rabbit. I'm here."
"If you don't stay with me I don't want to grow up at all."
"But you little rabbit you can't stop growing up. You'll know all sorts of girls. Through a whole bunch of years. Innocent and smiling ones who would make you think butter would not melt in their mouths."
"I don't care, if there isn't you I don't want anybody. No one could ever take your place."
"O God."
"Are you cross."
"No no I'm not cross. Just crosseyed. How are you to understand. I just feel I'm somehow sitting on my backside.
In the middle of some very grand ball. And I can't get up off the floor. For months and months. I've wanted to just seize and hug you and hold you to me. And I knew, I knew this would happen. That we never should have been left alone.
That all it needed was bumping into you at night in the hall or just the nosey moments in the evening when you get long faced when I tell you not to read my letters. And each time you sulked I had to do everything I could to stop myself hugging and kissing you. Don't you see how it's been for me.
O but don't you get cross now."
"I'm not cross."
"You are."
"I'm not."
"O Balthazar. Don't you see. To you the world is just as you find it. Just as each day it's time to get up, to dress, to eat, to sleep. The trip to school. And to Paris. And here we kind of live in a little estate all of our own. Larking about in each other's hair. But the world is not like that. Like we are now.
And if we were ever found. Really like we are now. God if we ever were. Did I lock the door."
"Yes. And you hung up the keys under the telephone."
"O God. I don't even know that I may be doing something criminal. I don't know but I might be."
"I am a criminal then too and we are still together."
"Yes. Till they cart us off to prison. And sling us into cells."
"Uncle Edouard would see that we were freed."
"Uncle Edouard, I wonder. Don't depend upon him."
"Why do you say that."
"I just do. He's nice. But don't depend upon anybody Balthazar."
"Did he attempt to entice you."
"O nothing. Three years ago."
"What did he do."
"Jealous jealous."
"I'm not. What did he try."
"Nothing. He invited me to the Bois. And so you came too.
That's all. And once to Biarritz. And I said I went nowhere without my boyfriend. And he laughed and was quite nice.
And probably he did want to take me to bed. You see how difficult you have made me for other men. And then one day you'll see a creature without whom you think you cannot live.
And she'll throw her arms up and spin about and raise her skirt on her legs. And you'll like what you see. And she'll look beautiful and flutter her eyes. Put rouge on her cheeks. And tell you nice little lies. And squeal when you feel her breast.
And as she shrinks away she'll say come hither come thither and do not dither dear blond beautiful Balthazar. O God she'll get her bloody hands into your hair. And you'll marry her. And she will be up to her elbows rummaging in your fortune when she isn't skipping down the Faubourg St. Hon-ore. For soap and saddles and suits and rose bouquets."
"I would never marry a girl like that. And who would put rouge on her cheeks."
"I hope when all the years have gone by. And I'm retired in my little country cottage somewhere in Devon. With all, I hope, my many emoluments. That you'll come and see me.
And put your hat on a hook and a cane against the wall. You may even be tall and straight and grey. And bow as I sit in black and lace near my fire. With probably the same old embroidery frame. And you'll take up and kiss my hand. O God let me kiss you, kiss you. While you're still here here here."
The night hushed and still. Faint breeze out on the garden tree leaves. Paris cools in darkness. The slow slow sounds that transport over the city. A shout. And listen, a strange answer.
Some night time philosopher advising himself. To avoid hunger perhaps and a treadmill day. Like the shadowy men standing inside the cathedral doors in all their silent poverty.
Where do they go at night. And Bella said there they are on the benches and in winter they will lie on the Metro grating.
To curl up in wait for another day. And the day Bella said let's, when I said why don't we go on a train. As we stood outside the building of the Legion d'Honneur as the sun 85 shone down the Rue de Bellechasse. She made big eyes on the street and made me laugh. And said maybe we should take a picnic and never come back again. We two. Go in search of the holy grail. And we go. Don't we go. Into the great Gare d'Orsay. And I looked up at her flowing hair as all the eyes watched her trotting by. Searching wide eyed between the wondering citizens. Under the darkened glass roof and monstrous tiled walls. First stop St. Michel and through Gare d'Austerlitz. And when we got off the train at a town, any town. Bretigny. There were kids with a flag marching through the street. Blowing bugles and workmen putting up coloured lights for a fete. When it started to rain. Houses shuttered up.
And curtains elsewhere twitching. As we walked hand in hand down the street. And Bella said no holy grail Pm sure will be found, we are Balthazar in a most uninviting town. Would we ever live here. Yes with you. With you I would too. And back on the train in a carriage with three. Of gentlemen. Who stood and turned and sat and sniffed as Bella crossed her legs.
And they said ah we are well fixed, I have just come out of the hospital and I am very well placed, to live just far enough outside Paris where it is country and close enough too. Each of them their eyes dropping on Bella's knees and looking when they could at her face. And when they left the carriage and in the corridor, one said my God if I were a young man what I wouldn't give to do what I could do to that one, and I Monsieur would not need to be young to do what I would do to that one. And we came back through the station and the urine smell. A man passed and said to Bella ah up there the unmarried employees live. And she said why tell me. Ah Mademoiselle because to have such beauty passing so close by I feel somehow that it is justice you should know. And we went to a restaurant up through the streets. Where she sat and I thought and thought of the men on the train what did they mean what they would do to that one. What would they do. And Bella let me have a full glass of wine. What would they do to you those men. O it's just talk, men never grow tired of flattering themselves. We raced and ran all the way back up the stairs and into her room. And Bella is this what they do. When I put my hand here and feel your breast the way it swells up from the rest of you. And I don't know yet what you've got down there in your secret hair. Yes dearest it's what they would do. They would kiss me only I'm kissing you. They would grab me tight only I'm grabbing you. And they would do what I'm telling you. Come Balthazar on top of me. On top. Like that. And never would I want you to be them. You're sweet and sweet. And my own loveliest little man of mine. Get in between my legs. There. God it's so hard. I'll guide you in. Don't worry don't worry. O God there you are, there you are. O God Balthazar. You have it up in me. And all the thoughts you never knew you'd know. Of some strange miracle happening to it there. In that part of her. Was it her. Like her face and teeth and hair. These speaking lips so close. Just step out of my brain and into hers.