Claudine and Annie

by Colette

  Utterly broken with misery, utterly melted with tenderness, I laid my head on her shoulder and raised my still-wet lashes towards her. She bent down her face and dazzled me with her eyes, bright as a wild animal’s and suddenly so dominating that I closed my own, overwhelmed . . .

  But the affectionate arm was suddenly withdrawn, leaving me tottering . . . Claudine had leapt to her feet. She had stretched herself taut as a bow and was harshly rubbing her temples.

  ‘Too bad!’ she muttered. ‘Another minute and . . . After I’d absolutely promised Renaud . . .’

  ‘Promised what?’ I asked, still at sea.

  Claudine laughed in my face, with an odd expression, displaying her short teeth.

  ‘To . . . to . . . be back at eleven, my child. I’ve cut it a bit fine . . . Buck up, we might just make it if we hurry . . .’

  EIGHT

  THE FIRST ACT of Parisifal had just finished and sent us out into the disenchantment of broad daylight. During the three days that followed Rheingold, these long intervals which were Marthe’s and Léon’s delight have always interrupted my illusion or my intoxication in the most inopportune way. To have to leave Brünhilde, abandoned and menacing, to return to my beflounced sister-in-law, to Léon’s finical niggling, to Maugis’ inextinguishable thirst, to Valentine Chessenet’s washed-out fairness was intolerable. Not to mention the Achs and the Kolossals and the Sublimes and the whole stream of polyglot exclamations poured out by these undiscriminating fanatics! No, no, no.

  ‘I’d like to have a theatre entirely to myself,’ I declared to Maugis.

  ‘In which you resemble Ludwig of Bavaria,’ he replied, taking his lips for a moment from the straw of his hot grog. ‘Look where his morbid fancy led him. He died after building residences in a style which is only esteemed by the most provincial of pastry-cooks. Meditate on the sad result of solitary self-indulgence.’

  I started violently. Leaving that drunkard sitting there and refusing the enormous glass of lemonade Claudine was holding out to me, I went and stood with my back against a pillar, facing the declining sun. Swift clouds were hurrying towards the east and their shadow was all at once chill. Over Bayreuth, the black smoke from the factory chimneys swayed over heavily till a stronger wind swallowed it up in one breath.

  A group of Frenchwomen, in straight corsets that flattened their hips and exaggeratedly long skirts that fitted closely in front and swept out in folds behind them, were talking in high, shrill voices. Their conversation was extremely uninhibited and had nothing to do with the magnificent music. They were talking with that cold animation that is attractive for a minute but becomes exasperating after a quarter of an hour. They were pretty creatures and, even without hearing what they were saying, one could have guessed they belonged to a frail, nervous race, contemptuous and lacking will-power – a race very different, for example, from that calm, red-haired Englishwoman whom they were taking to pieces from top to toe. The latter completely ignored them from where she sat on one of the steps of the porch, displaying her large, ill-shod feet with chaste tranquillity . . . Then it was my turn to be stared at and whispered about.

  The one who seemed to know everything declared: ‘I think she’s a young widow who comes every year to the festival on account of one of the tenors . . .’ I smiled at this ingenious calumny and moved away towards Marthe. Marthe was in her element. Wearing white and mauve and leaning on a tall parasol, she was parading about in her most gracious Marie-Antoinette manner, acknowledging friends from Paris, distributing greetings, making inventories of hats . . . But there was that odious Maugis, brushing her skirts as usual! I preferred to retrace my steps and go back to Claudine.

  But Claudine was deep in conversation – clasping a huge cream-stuffed cake in her ungloved hand – with a most strange little creature . . . That brown Egyptian face, in which the mouth and eyes seemed to be drawn with two parallel strokes of the brush, framed in dancing ringlets like those of a little girl of 1828 . . . could it belong to anyone but Mademoiselle Polaire? All the same, Polaire in Bayreuth seemed so wildly improbable that I could hardly believe my eyes!

  Both were supple and slender, both intensely lively, each wore a little bow on her forehead at the edge of her parting – Polaire’s white, Claudine’s black. The people who were avidly staring at them declared they looked like twins. I did not agree. Claudine’s hair was more boyish and rebellious and her eyes did not evoke the east as Polaire’s did. Those admirable Egyptian eyes of Polaire’s have more gloom, more defiance – and more subservience – in their expression. All the same, there was a resemblance. Passing behind them, Renaud gave their two short manes a quick, affectionate tweak; then, laughing at my stupefied face, he said:

  ‘Yes, Annie, it positively is Polaire, our little lily.’

  ‘Their Tiger-Lily,’ added Maugis, who was mimicking a cake-walk with extravagant nigger-minstrel’s hip wrigglings. I was ashamed to find myself laughing at his contortions as he sang with a nasal twang:

  ‘She draws niggers like a crowd of flies

  She is my sweetest one, my baby Tiger-Lily!’

  So now I had all the information I needed!

  Insensibly, I had drawn closer to the two friends in my curiosity . . . Claudine caught sight of me and beckoned me with an imperious gesture. Feeling very self-conscious, I found myself confronting this little actress who barely glanced at me, being far too busy standing on one foot, tossing back her dark hair that had tawny glints in it, and feverishly explaining something or other in a throaty, twanging voice.

  ‘You see, Claudine, if I mean to do serious drama, I’ve got to know all the serious drama before my time. So I’ve come to Bayroot to get educated.’

  ‘It was your duty,’ said Claudine with grave approval – though her tobacco-brown eyes were dancing with jubilant mischief.

  ‘They’ve put me up right at the other end of the town, at the back of beyond – over there, at the Bamboo Cabin . . .’

  Claudine saw my astonishment at the peculiar name of the hotel and informed me, with angelic kindness:

  ‘It’s the Margravine’s bamboo.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ went on Polaire. ‘I don’t regret coming all this way, although! . . . You know, at Madame Marchand’s, they produced it quite differently from here, and besides, their Wagner isn’t anything to make you fall flat on your fanny! . . . As to his music, why, it’s just like a band! Makes me want to salute and slap my right thigh.’

  ‘Just the way Annie expresses it,’ slipped in Claudine, with a glance at me.

  ‘Ah, Madame says that too? Pleased to meet you . . . What was I saying? Oh, yes . . . That makes it twice I’ve been to Parsifal to make sure, wherever you go, you find lousy people. You saw Kundry, that bandeau she had round her forehead, and then those flowers, and that veil hanging down? Well, that’s exactly the head-dress Landorff designed for me for the Winter-garten in Berlin, that year I bored myself stiff singing Little Cohn!’

  Polaire exulted for a moment, then paused for breath, oscillating on her high heels and wriggling her abnormally small waist which she could have belted with a man’s collar.

  ‘You ought to sue,’ Claudine advised fervently.

  Polaire started like a fawn and launched forth again:

  ‘Never, it’s beneath me . . .’ (her beautiful eyes darkened). ‘I’m not like other women. Anyway, what’s the good? Sue these Boches? Oh, bother . . . where’s my nail buffer got to? . . . Besides there’d be no end to it . . . Actually again in their Parsifal . . . Just listen . . . in act three when the fat man’s dipping in the water and that hairy bloke’s sprinkling him, well that chap’s attitude, with his hands folded flat and his body turned at that three-quarter angle is absolutely my gesture in Berber Song, that he’s pinched from me. Just imagine my agony! And all my side, Claudine, the right of my corsets, all the bones are broken!’

  I studied her fascinating face, so mobile that it was like watching a cinema film as it swiftly registered in turn exc
itement, rebellion, a Negro ferocity, an enigmatic melancholy whose shadow was dispersed by an abrupt, jerky laugh as Polaire flung up her pointed chin like a dog baying at the moon. Then all at once, she simply left us standing, with a grave childish good-bye, like a well-brought-up little girl’s.

  For a moment, I followed her with my eyes, watching her swift walk, the deft way she threaded her way through the groups, with a quick swing of her hips and broken gestures that reminded one of her broken syntax, her whole body leaning slightly forward, like a clever animal walking on its hind legs.

  ‘A sixteen-inch waist!’ said Claudine reflectively.

  ‘It’s a size in shoes, not in belts.’

  ‘Annie? . . . Annie, I’m talking to you!’

  ‘Yes, yes, I’m listening!’ I said, coming to with a start.

  ‘What have I just been talking about?’

  Under my sister-in-law’s inquisitorial eye, I became confused and averted my head.

  ‘I don’t know, Marthe.’

  She shrugged her shoulders which one could almost see showing pink under a white lace bodice with deep-cut armholes. A wildly indecent bodice . . . but since it is highnecked, Marthe displays herself like that in the street and remains perfectly cool and collected under the gaze of the men. I am the one who is embarrassed.

  Armed with a spray, she was over-lavishly scenting her pinkish-red hair – her beautiful hair that is as vital and rebellious as she is.

  ‘That’s enough, Marthe, that’s enough, you smell too good as it is.’

  ‘Never too good. For one thing, I’m always afraid of people saying I smell like a red-head! Now that you’ve come down from your cloud, I’ll start all over again. We’re dining tonight at the Berlin . . . Maugis is standing treats.’

  ‘Again!’

  The word had slipped out in spite of me and Marthe spiked it in mid-air with a glance as sharp as a dagger.

  ‘What d’you mean – “again”? Anyone would think we were sponging on Maugis. It’s his turn, we invited him the day before yesterday.’

  ‘And last night?’

  ‘Last night? That was entirely different – he wanted to show us that Sammet place – it’s supposed to be a historic eating house. Anyway, the food was revolting in that hole – tough meat and flabby fish. He definitely owes us a decent meal to make up for it.’

  ‘Owes you and Léon, maybe, but not me.’

  ‘It shows his good manners, always including you too.’

  ‘Good manners . . . how much I wish that just for tonight he’d revert to his normal ones!’

  Marthe combed her black hair with savage little tugs.

  ‘Charming! Quite a neat sarcasm! You’re definitely coming on. Is it seeing so much of Claudine?’

  She put so much acidity into the question that I shivered as if she had scratched me with the tip of her nails.

  ‘I’ve less to lose by seeing so much of Claudine than you have by seeing so much of Maugis.’

  She turned on me; her piled-up hair was like a helmet of writhing flames.

  ‘Advice? You’ve got a ruddy cheek! Yes, a ruddy cheek to meddle in my affairs and take it on yourself to tell me how to behave. I’ve got a husband to do that, you know! And I’m amazed you dare to find anything improper in something Léon accepts as perfectly all right!’

  ‘Please, Marthe . . .’

  ‘Had enough, eh? Well, mind you don’t let it happen again! Monsieur Maugis is simply a very devoted friend.’

  ‘Marthe, I implore you not to go on. Insult me as much as you like but don’t try and set up “Monsieur Maugis” as a perfectly blameless, devoted friend and Léon as a despotic husband . . . You can’t think me quite such a fool!’

  She had not expected this. She held her breath, with an effort, for she was panting with fury. She struggled hard with herself for a long minute, and finally mastered herself with a power that proved to me how frequent these rages were.

  ‘Now, now, Annie . . . don’t take advantage of me. You know how easily I flare up. I believe you’re teasing me on purpose . . .’

  She smiled, the corners of her mouth still quivering.

  ‘You’re coming to dinner with us, aren’t you?’

  I still hesitated. She put her arm round my waist, clever and coaxing as when she wanted to smooth down Alain.

  ‘You owe that to my reputation! Just think if people see all four of us together, they may think it’s you that Maugis is running after!’

  We were all good friends again, but I could feel our friendship cracking like a white frost in the sun. I was very tired. Ever since yesterday a migraine had been dully threatening me; this little scene had brought it on in full force. Nevertheless, I felt it was almost worth it. Only a month ago, I would not have had the courage to tell Marthe even half of what I was thinking . . .

  As we drove to the Flying Dutchman, I sat perfectly mute in the carriage, with my finger pressed to my temple, too stupefied to utter a word. Léon asked compassionately:

  ‘Migraine, Annie?’

  ‘Yes, unfortunately.’

  He nodded his head and gazed at me sympathetically with his gentle, spaniel-like eyes. For some time, I too have felt extremely sorry for him. If Marthe wears the trousers, he may well be wearing . . . Claudine would have brought out the word without the slightest hesitation. My sister-in-law, sitting tranquilly beside me, was flouring her cheeks in an effort to overcome the heat.

  ‘We shan’t see Maugis up there,’ observed my brother-in-law, ‘he’s keeping to his room.’

  ‘Ah!’ ejaculated Marthe indifferently.

  Her lips had tightened as if to suppress a smile.

  ‘Is he ill?’ I asked. ‘Perhaps slightly too many grogs last night?’

  ‘No. But he says the Flying Dutchman is a piece of sentimental filth, the dregs of Italian-German opera and all the performers lousy. I assure you, Annie, those were his exact words. He also added that the mere thought of Daland the fisherman, Senta’s father, gives him a violent pain in his guts.’

  ‘It’s a somewhat personal type of criticism,’ I said ungraciously.

  Marthe looked away and did not seem anxious to pursue the conversation. On our left, the empty carriages were returning at a faster trot, raising clouds of dust, whereas we were climbing the hill almost at a walk, jammed in the file of traffic . . . I have only seen it four times, that brick theatre (Claudine is perfectly right, it does look like a gasometer), the brightly dressed crowd surrounding it, the row of local inhabitants stupidly sneering at the visitors, yet every time I look at that scene again, I feel the same almost physical impatience that used to come over me sometimes in Paris when I stared at the restricted, intolerably well-known view from my bedroom window. But in those days I had less sensitive nerves and a master who made it his business to keep me dull-witted. I was almost afraid to think and to look about me.

  I would not admit to anyone but myself, and to these useless pages of my diary, how disillusioned I am with Bayreuth. There is nothing much to choose between an interval during Parsifal and a Paris tea-party – a ‘five o’clock’ at my sister-in-law Marthe’s or at that loathsome Valentine Chessenet’s. The same ill-natured tittle-tattle; the same passion for gossip and scandal, even for out-and-out slander; the same trivial small talk in which the latest fashions, the latest composers, greed, and indecency are all equally entertaining topics.

  Once again I longed to get away. At Arriège, I used to gaze at the rift of light between two mountain peaks: here my eyes follow the trails of smoke as they stream away to the east . . . Where could I escape from monotonous sameness, from the all too well-known, from mediocrity and malice? Perhaps I ought to have done what Claudine said . . . accompanied Alain in spite of himself? No, for with Alain – and in him – I should only have found once again the very things I want to escape from . . . Migraine, alas, is a depressing and realistic adviser and I listened to it more attentively than I did to the Flying Dutchman . . . Ether, oblivion, cool unconsciousn
ess . . . those were the only things that attracted me . . . A mark in the hand of the old man who showed us into our seats bought me my liberty and authorized my silent escape . . . ‘This lady is ill . . .’

  I ran, I jumped into a carriage, and soon I was in my room where Toby, who was sleeping sentimentally on my slippers, barked affectionately to see me back so soon. He loves me! And someone else loves me – I do! I take more pleasure in looking at myself nowadays. Away from that white man whose gleaming skin made me seem so black, I find myself prettier and exactly, as Marthe said, like a slender fine brownstone jar, with two wild chicory flowers in it. Claudine talked as if she were thinking aloud: ‘Blue flowers, look at me – eyes fringed like a pool among black rushes . . .’ But her friendly arm had withdrawn . . .

  At last, at last, I was lying half-undressed face down on the bed with the heavenly bottle under my nostrils. Suddenly, I could feel myself flying; I could feel the cool sting of imaginary drops of water all over my body; the cruel blacksmith’s arm grew slacker and slacker . . . But I was still awake under my semi-drunken stupor; I did not want that heavy sleep, that swoon from which one emerges nauseated. All I wanted from the little Genie of ether, that crafty comforter with the sweet ambiguous smile, was the fanning of wings and the gentle rocking that turned my bed into a swing . . .

  The brief, furious barking of the little dog awakened me. Frozen with terror, I groped for my watch. Nonsense, they wouldn’t search for me up there, by the ‘gasometer’ . . . They were far too concerned with their own affairs to be concerned about me . . . All told, my escape and my brief drunken stupor had taken up only an hour. I thought it had been far longer. ‘Oh, be quiet,’ I implored Toby, ‘for goodness’ sake be quiet . . . my ears cannot bear noise just now . . .’

  He obeyed regretfully, laid his square nose on his paws and blew out his long dewlaps, still barking internally. My good little watch-dog, my little black friend, I shall take you wherever I go . . . He listened and I listened too; a door shut in the room next to mine – Marthe’s room. No doubt it was the ever-obliging Madame Meider who had gone in to ‘tidy things’ – to open the little silver boxes and straighten out the illustrated Paris papers scrunched up into balls in the waste-paper basket.