Human Traces

by Sebastian Faulks

  ‘My . . .’

  ‘Exploration. You may find what you are searching for.’

  Jacques wanted to say nothing, in case by speaking he might destroy the fragile suggestion that hung between them. He raised an eyebrow, but she did not look away.

  When he had let the idea hang long enough, he said, ‘Indeed. The “unifying theory”. The Holy Grail. Or what we scientists might more honestly call the great chimera.’

  ‘As you wish, Doctor. Dinner is in ten minutes.’

  Jacques walked down to the lake on his own, not wanting to join the professional banter of the guests. He thought of Daniel, who would be fifteen in October. They still sometimes called him Herr Frage, abbreviated from Fragezeichen, after his mysterious valentine; but he had suddenly grown tall, with a jaw-line forcing its way through his soft boy’s features. Then he thought of his beloved Sonia, the only person in the world who had never disappointed him. He felt the anguish of his human love for them; it was the shape of himself, it made him who he was; yet both seemed absent, and he could not quite bring them into his living thoughts.

  At dinner, he drank all the wine the butler offered and made reluctant conversation with those on either side, replying to enquiries about his work with a brevity that barely qualified as civil. There was an ‘informal gathering’ in the main sitting room afterwards in which one of the politicians was to ‘lead a conversation’ about the rumbling Serbian quarrel with Austria-Hungary over the ownership of Bosnia-Herzegovina.

  Of what possible interest could that be to anyone, thought Jacques as he went out on the terrace once more, stumbling for a moment as he caught his foot on the step. He took off his jacket and threw it over his shoulder; he still had a glass of wine in his hand as he walked alone over the lawn and down to the lake. There were stars all over the woods and the hills beyond. He sat on the jetty and leaned back against the wall of the boathouse, looking up to them, hearing the occasional lap of the tired water beneath him. There was depth in the heavens, there was the comfort of distance, yet looking at the sky always made him feel more than ever ignorant and boyish, as though he had never grown up since he first ran beneath the cold moon at Sainte Agnès.

  When there was a footfall behind him, a light step transferred to wooden boarding, he sighed and resigned himself. ‘Roya,’ he said, without turning round.

  She came and sat beside him.

  ‘I am going to put my feet in the water,’ she said. She raised her feet and pulled off her slippers, then lifted her skirt and rolled down her stockings. She leaned for balance on Jacques’s shoulder as she did so. She kicked her bare feet in the water. Without speaking, he lifted her skirt, as she had herself done, and ran the palm of his hand up over her knee and onto her thigh. He left it there in case she should protest, but she said nothing. Instead, she kissed him, letting her tongue touch his lips, squeezing his ribcage with the force of her embrace. She remained with her mouth against his for a long time, while he ran his hand further up her thigh till he felt the risen junction of her legs beneath silk.

  ‘I have thought about this for so many years,’ he said. ‘Just this part of you. I have pictured it so often.’ He was surprised by his own directness. His voice sounded rough; he could not force any tenderness into it.

  ‘I love you so much,’ she said. ‘I love your voice, I love the way you talk to me, the quizzical way you look at me. I love your hands, your beautiful hands, I love your kindness, I love—’

  He did not want to hear her protestations of love, so put his lips against her mouth to silence her. When he had finished, he whispered in her ear what he had imagined doing to her. He said things he had never said before, as though someone else were speaking through him. He could feel her breathing hard against his face, but she did not tell him to stop.

  The next morning at ten, the ‘colloquium’ began in earnest with a paper on ‘Sutton, Boveri and the Function of the Chromosome’. The theme of this was interesting to Jacques, though he found it hard to concentrate.

  The weather was still fine, but the air had grown heavy, he noticed, when they went into the dining room for lunch. A cold collation had been set out on the main table, and they were invited to help themselves and take their plates outside or find seats with the neighbours of their choice.

  Jacques took some cold meats and salad outside onto the terrace. He saw Roya standing on the grass, pouring wine for a couple sitting at one of the small white wrought-iron tables that had been set in the shade. She was wearing a long cream skirt and high-necked blouse, with a string of purple beads, he noticed, as she leaned forward to pour from the green bottle.

  ‘Ah, Dr Rebière. Why don’t you come and sit here, at my table? I can tell Florian to take over my wine-pouring duties. Florian, ask Maria to bring me some salads, will you?’

  She seemed to be in high spirits, he thought, unabashed by anything that might have taken place between them. For a few moments they were alone. He raised his glass to her and drank some cold hock. Then Hofrat Drobesch came to join them, bringing with him the diplomat who had spoken the night before.

  The Hofrat settled him at the table with a good deal of insistence on how informal he was being; then he sat with his fingertips touching in a pensive steeple before his lips and asked Jacques’s opinion of what he had heard that morning. Jacques shot a rapid glance at Roya, who raised her eyebrows, all attention.

  ‘I . . . Well, we have known about the chromosome for ages, since before I was born. Sutton and Boveri seem to have established that each species has a set number of chromosomes and that when they split to form the sex cells you have a basis for a law of inheritance not by “blending” but by a choice of units, as was argued by a Moravian monk called Mendel. Though he confined his researches to peas.’

  The diplomat laughed. ‘It sounds very old hat to me, suggesting all this stuff is predetermined. It sounds just like the idea of “preformationism”, that every being carries all its descendants ready-made in a little bag! We had stopped believing in that when I was a schoolboy.’

  Jacques shrugged. ‘Perhaps.’ He looked at Roya, to see if she had followed.

  ‘Come, come, dear doctor!’ said Drobesch. ‘Do not be put off so easily. Defend your man – your Moravian kitchen-gardener!’

  Jacques looked at Drobesch for a moment or two. The days when such men intimidated him had long gone. ‘He is not really my man,’ he said eventually, stirring himself. ‘What your lecturer seemed unaware of is the existence of something called a “gene”, which is a tiny particle contained on the chromosome, like a pearl threaded on a string, that instructs the cell how to grow.’

  ‘Go on, Doctor.’

  ‘I suppose that in the course of division, errors can occur. After all, these are living, moving particles, not mathematical constants – or bricks.’

  He felt a stockinged foot run up the skin of his calf, beneath the leg of his trousers. ‘And what happens next?’ said Roya, her head on one side, a schoolgirl attentive to the teacher.

  ‘I . . . Well, I suppose a variant creature is born. A mutant, if you will.’

  ‘And does it then die out?’

  ‘Yes. Unless its mutation gives it an advantage, in which case it will successfully breed and pass its variation on – and on and on. Till almost all the species has it.’

  ‘And what is that process called, Doctor?’

  ‘Evolution by natural selection.’

  ‘Good heavens!’ Drobesch smacked the table. ‘I knew we should return to dear old Monsieur Lamarck!’

  ‘Mr Darwin, in fact,’ said Jacques. ‘I regret to take the credit from my fellow-countryman, of course. He, among others, wrote about evolution before Darwin, but the discovery of the mechanism of natural selection and the beautiful description of its intricacy was Darwin’s own.’

  The foot was removed from Jacques’s leg. He felt a trickle of sweat at his temple. The conversation moved on to other matters, and when he shifted in his seat he found the shirt was damp
on his back.

  Fruit and coffee were brought out to them, and Drobesch eventually stood up to go inside. ‘I must make sure everything is set up for this afternoon,’ he said. ‘We have a fascinating programme. Then time off till dinner at seven.’

  The diplomat excused himself and followed Drobesch into the house.

  ‘It is very close, is it not?’ said Roya, peeling a piece of apple. ‘I feel a slight headache coming on. I shall need to retire to my bedroom.’

  ‘You will be sorry to miss the lecture.’

  ‘It is my husband speaking. I can always catch up. Do you feel quite well, Doctor?’

  Jacques paused. He recognised the moment. He had waited many years for it. ‘No, I also have a slight headache. It is probably only the heat.’

  ‘But you ought perhaps to take no chances.’

  ‘Yes. You may be right.’

  ‘Do knock on my door if you should need anything. I think you know which one it is.’

  He watched her go back over the grass onto the terrace and hold the doors open for the last of the guests as they returned to the main room. Then he walked down to the lake and gazed at the water for a long time. He kept looking at his watch, but the hand seemed not to move; he looked over the water and counted off the seconds. He could think of nothing – except what he had felt beneath his hand the night before. No other image could make itself present in his mind; his thoughts had stuck. When ten minutes had elapsed, he walked round to the far side of the house and let himself in at the side door, as he had done the previous afternoon. He went quietly up the servants’ staircase and doubled back along the upstairs corridor to the front of the house. He paused outside Roya’s room, looked both ways down the empty passage, and knocked. He heard her footfall inside.

  ‘I thought you wouldn’t come.’ She stood back to let him in, her face at first distraught, then loosening with relief.

  ‘I didn’t mean to, but I couldn’t stop myself. I didn’t know what I was doing.’

  ‘Kiss me. Touch me where you did last night.’

  ‘Oh, Roya, I have thought about it for so long.’

  ‘So have I. I have been obsessed.’

  ‘But what do we do if your husband comes back?’

  ‘He won’t. Nothing will tear him from his own lecture. But I shall lock the door. There. Tell me, Jacques, did you come here yesterday?’

  He thought about denying it, but everything in her eyes suggested forgiveness and excitement. He said, ‘Yes. I am sorry, I—’

  ‘What did you do?’

  ‘I went over here, to the wardrobe. And I pulled out this skirt. And I held it like this. And I inhaled it. Like this.’

  ‘Did it make you feel excited?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Is that all?’

  ‘Yes.’ Surely she could not want to know more.

  ‘Are you certain? Did you not come to this drawer here?’

  ‘I . . . Yes. I am afraid I did.’

  ‘And what did you do?’

  ‘I took out these things and I kissed them.’

  ‘Show me.’

  ‘Like this.’

  ‘And what else?’

  ‘I . . . Touched . . .’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Here.’

  ‘With my things?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Show me.’

  ‘Just here.’

  ‘No, actually show me.’

  ‘Like . . . Wait a minute . . . Like this. I felt I was going to burst.’

  ‘And did you rub them on yourself?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Show me.’

  ‘Like this.’

  ‘Now let me do it. Was it like this?’

  ‘Yes. Like that. And with the skirt.’

  ‘This one? The one with the purple flowers?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Is this what you did?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘The cream blouse.’

  ‘This ruched one?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Like this? Faster?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And what were you thinking?’

  ‘I was thinking of you. Of a particular part of you.’

  ‘And would you like to see it? Not just imagine it?’

  ‘Yes. Lift up your skirt. Will you take these off? Now hold your skirt up so I can . . . This part . . . Here.’

  ‘Does it feel as you imagined?’

  He could not answer.

  ‘And now?’ Roya still seemed exhilaratingly detached.

  ‘Now I want to . . . I can’t allow myself to say it.’

  ‘Whisper it, Jacques. Lie on top of me and whisper in my ear what you would like to do to me.’

  He did as he was told.

  ‘There. You said it. It was not so bad.’

  ‘And do you want me to do it?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘I want you to do it now.’

  ‘Are you ready?’

  ‘Yes. Now.’

  ‘Then ask me.’

  ‘Please, Jacques.’

  ‘No. Beg me.’

  ‘I am begging you.’

  ‘Say what you want me to do. Whisper it in my ear. Say that word.’

  He lifted her up and moved her further back on to the bed and positioned himself so that he was ready to make love to her. His face was against the smooth skin of her cheek; his head was full of the smell of her hair and her skin. His whole body ached.

  ‘Now,’ she said.

  ‘Not until you ask me. Say it.’

  She put her arms round his neck and whispered the rough invitation he had craved, and when she said the word, he drove himself completely into her.

  Later, she said, ‘I have never behaved like this before.’

  ‘Neither have I.’

  ‘Did you like it?’

  ‘Yes. But I feel ashamed. I did not know I was so coarse a man. And you?’

  Roya sat up on the bed, her hair dishevelled, her throat and cheeks flushed. ‘It was not me, it was some other girl.’

  ‘You are perfect. Your skin is so soft, and this part here. And here. You are unique.’

  Roya laughed and stood up, the skirt still caught up round her waist; then she took off all her clothes and stood naked in the slight breeze that came in from the window.

  ‘Turn round,’ he said.

  She twisted slowly, still smiling, shaking loose her black hair, allowing her lover to see every part of what he had taken.

  ‘You are perfect,’ he said again.

  Roya smiled.

  ‘You look happy,’ he said.

  ‘I feel happy. I feel free. As though from a long imprisonment. Now kiss me goodbye.’

  ‘Can I kiss you . . . There?’

  ‘Yes.’ She closed her eyes. ‘Now goodbye. Go quickly.’

  Jacques went as if in a dream.

  ‘Will I see you—’

  ‘Go quickly!’

  ‘I hope your headache improves,’ he remembered to say as he closed the door.

  He stumbled down the back stairs in a panic of remorse and exhilaration; it was as though every part of him were both applauding and lamenting. He found a door into the garden and ran until he was in an orchard beneath some apple trees. He felt himself losing control of his bladder, fumbled at his buttons and released a stream onto the grass amid some prematurely fallen fruit. Such a thing had not happened to him since the age of three or four. Tears erupted from his eyes as he thought of Sonia; anguish and fear squeezed his belly when he pictured what might happen if his awful act was discovered. He walked up and down the orchard, twisting and turning as the waves of remorse and exultation alternated; but somewhere in the confusion he felt he could discern a hard, small voice that told him not to repine, to recognise what kind of being he was and to survive.

  ‘Do you think,’ said Kitty one day, ‘that your brother is growing a little . . . How can I p
ut it? Eccentric?’

  ‘Thomas?’ said Sonia. ‘Well, he has always been inclined that way. Why do you ask?’

  ‘He seems a little forgetful at times. Distracted. When he shaves, he sometimes misses a patch on one cheek, but he doesn’t seem to notice.’

  Sonia smiled. They were sitting in her office and both were tired of filing patients’ reports. ‘As a boy he was very unpredictable, moody, rash, peculiar. But he had charm and he could be sensible if it was truly necessary. He was clever. He seemed to have his rashness under control.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Kitty. ‘I remember watching him once at dinner in the schloss, making himself pleasant to some of the patients. He was joining in their conversation and the two young women seemed rather flattered. Then I suddenly heard something in his voice which made me see he thought the whole thing was the most tremendous joke. He was playing with them.’

  ‘Oh dear, I know that feeling,’ said Sonia. ‘I remember when we were children. Sometimes when I had put my most heartfelt feelings into words I used to look in his eyes and see that all along he had been miles ahead of me and had just lingered, as it were, to humour me. It used to make me very cross.’

  ‘But he never said anything unkind?’

  ‘No. No. Thomas has never been unkind. It was just that I felt a fool. And to be honest, I think I felt a little sorry for him. I wondered what he was finding so far out ahead there. I thought he must be lonely.’

  ‘Yet when I first met him,’ said Kitty, ‘he was not like that at all. He was very earnest.’

  ‘He changed,’ said Sonia. ‘It is as simple as that. People do change. I think that in mad-doctoring he found something commensurate with his capacity to keep ahead. Rather too much so, in a way.’

  ‘So he stopped playing with people.’

  ‘Yes. I mean, he would still tease Fräulein Fuchs or Fräulein Haas without them noticing it. Or me, sometimes. But I think that his sense of being superior or one step ahead was something he lost after being an undergraduate. It is the besetting sin of studenthood, after all. I think he left it in the county asylum. What he saw there changed him.’

  ‘You see,’ said Kitty, ‘what I so loved about him, what I love still, was that passion he had. There was no compromise. On the question of what makes us mad or how to cure these illnesses he was so earnest. He wanted to be the saviour and believed he would be. He sincerely thought he would discover things that would change the way we see ourselves. And he saw nothing funny in that belief – that self-belief. Everything else was funny to him, though. Hans, Josef, Daisy. You and me. His world was quite divided.’