‘Ah, oui! C’est ça,’ he said, somewhat indifferently.
But he was dead, she confided.
He shrugged his shoulders.
‘Je regrette,’ he said.
Her watery old eyes looked at him tenderly. ‘The gentleman bears his age lightly,’ she said, by way of a compliment.
I translated this too.
It did not please him. It did not please him at all. Age! ‘Enfin,’ he said, ‘we cannot spend all our life standing here. Can madame give us a room?’
Yes, she would give him a room, one of the best rooms, to be sure. But her daughter had frank laughing brown eyes that pierced Uncle Emmanuel’s soul, as he was signing the register. We at once ascended to the second floor where a tall, lofty, blue-papered room was assigned to my uncle, on the walls of which hung framed mottoes in German: ‘Cleave unto the Lord’; ‘God is our Refuge’; and ‘Kept by the power of God’. She assigned for their exclusive use her private sitting-room, in which she sought to leave the newly-married couple, shielded from the glances of the curious, to their hearts’ desire, and she undercharged them quite ridiculously for the food they consumed.
But just because she was good-natured, my uncle, a poor enough psychologist at the best of times, concluded that her good nature knew no bounds; and two weeks had not elapsed when he appeared again before the same (now somewhat grave) God-fearing dame, a little blonde, this time, upon his gallant arm, a rakish, cheery air about his face, as if to say:
‘And here we are again!’
A veil over my uncle’s doings.
On Saturday night there was a ‘Gala Social-Democratic Ball’ at the late Officers’ Assembly building, and as Sylvia did not feel very well I had arranged to take my red-haired cousin. I was engaged to Sylvia — and this was as far as it went. The incredible tedium of our relation at this stationary point in our romance became intolerable. After a day spent side by side in Aunt Teresa’s drawing-room one longed to shoot oneself. To account for my impending absence in the evening, I told Sylvia that I was dining with a General. She said nothing — looked sad.
In the afternoon on our way home to tea I bought a box of chocolates for my red-haired cousin, and another box for Sylvia who had come into the shop with me. ‘This is for you.’
‘And who’s this other box for?’
‘This other? For the General,’ I said.
She said nothing, only looked wretchedly sad.
‘What’s the matter?’
‘Oh, nothing,’ she sighed.
(She already knew all about the red-haired cousin.) But she took the chocolates — and sadly, sorrowfully, went her way.
And as my red-haired cousin and I ensconced ourselves in the cab that evening, Sylvia, who had a sneezing cold, came out on to the balcony in her great coat — with the dark-brown curls dropping on her shoulder and the swollen upper lip she looked unkissable and unkempt — and watched us drive away.
The ‘Social-Democratic Soirée’ turned out a little ‘too democratic’ for the liking of my red-haired cousin. As we walked together in the ball-room, sunflower seed shells and orange peels were being dropped on us from the gallery, as a matter of course, and soldiers and sailors elbowed their way through the thronged space of the vast assembly-rooms.
‘Who’s that tall man with the long beard, who looks like Tirpitz, talking to the British Consul?’ asked my red-haired cousin.
‘That’s the famous General Horvat.’
‘What a beard!’ she exclaimed.
‘Yes. There is an anecdote attached to it. Some Allied diplomat had asked his wife: “How does your husband sleep: with his beard over or under the blanket?” “That depends upon the season,” she is said to have replied. “In the summer, when it’s warm, he likes to air his beard by keeping it above the blanket. But in winter, to keep himself warm, he tucks his beard under the blanket.” ’
She laughed at that, a little insincerely, as if mainly for my sake.
As the ‘soirée’ wore on, incidents occurred. Somebody had hit somebody else over the head with a beer bottle. Somebody had shot himself. Some officer had challenged some other to a duel — over nothing. To our surprise, we fell across Uncle Emmanuel — in somewhat doubtful company, I fear, comprising a notorious card-sharper, a secret service spy, and a young woman of the demi-monde.
‘May I introduce you to the mistress of my brother?’ said the card-sharper, as I approached. ‘But I must warn you — and our friend here (he pointed to the spy) will confirm it — General Pshemòvich-Pshevìtski is her lover.’
‘Nonsense!’ said the lady. ‘He only says this to ward you off. You don’t know him. He is madly jealous of me.’ She turned to Uncle Emmanuel and whacked him with her fan across the arm. ‘Why are you so serious? Look at me, I am so gay, I’m always laughing. Ha, ha, ha!’ Which sent a chill of gloom through our souls — and no one spoke.
‘I hope you don’t believe a word of it,’ she turned again to Uncle Emmanuel. ‘He’s always telling awful things about me because he wants to ward you off and keep me to himself. That’s why I do not love him. I can only love one who himself is pure. How I wish, Serge,’ she turned to the card-sharper, ‘that you were pure.’
‘You ought not to wish that, my dear.’
‘Why not?’
‘You ought to love your equals.’
‘What’s this?’ asked Uncle Emmanuel, and smiled sardonically when it was translated to him.
‘What!’ she turned on him. ‘How dare you! Oh! Oh! Oh!’
She raised a desperate, terrific hue and cry.
‘Madame, I assure you. I assure you, madame,’ blubbered my uncle. But she continued screaming; and people rushed towards us and surrounded us, while she shouted something incoherent about a medical certificate — and then fainted.
‘Come away,’ I whispered to my uncle. ‘For God’s sake come away!’ And having reclaimed my red-haired cousin from her dancing partner, we all left by a side entrance.
My red-haired cousin once escorted to the door-step, my uncle turned to me and timidly suggested going to the baths. I knew what these baths were like, and hesitated.
‘You’re married,’ I reproached him.
‘Well, and what of it? Can’t I dine once in a while at a restaurant just because I have a kitchen at home?’
The contention seemed too reasonable to be disputed.
Dawn was just breaking as we set out for the baths. My uncle looked elated and pleased with himself, and sang (as if by way of adding zest to our adventure): ‘Nach Frankreich zogen zwei Grenadier …’ He had been a German scholar in his day, which language he had studied with an eye on future military requirements, and he was fond of trotting out his knowledge on occasion. When I walked side by side with Uncle Emmanuel I took longer strides than I am accustomed to — in order as it were to humiliate my uncle. He was a little man — one-third my size — and ran beside me like a small fox-terrier, while I barged forward steadily like a big ship at the side of a tug endeavouring to puff up steam.
At the baths we were escorted into separate but adjacent ‘numbers’, each consisting of a dressing-room and bathroom, from where steam rose as if from the funnels of a railway engine.
Presently the Chink attendant came into the room.
‘Soap?’ be asked. And I translated for my uncle.
‘Yes.’
‘Loofa?’
‘Yes.’
‘Towels?’
‘Yes.’
‘Birch-twigs?’
My uncle considered.
‘Yes,’ he said.
‘Nothing else?’
My uncle nodded.
‘Japanese?’
My uncle shook his head.