章 9: Chapter IX
Mr Rousseau was a man sporting a most innocent and inoffensive air. No one, looking at his white hands, with their swollen veins and long fingers, so softly stroking the edges of his sleeves as he stood beside his wife, and the air of weariness with which he listened, would have suspected that he was capable of releasing torrents of gossip that could arouse a fearful storm. He was the very embodiment of the idiom: 'still waters run deep'.
Richard knew. Richard knew him very well. He intensely admired his great uncle and considered him a very content and accomplished man. He would never come to understand most of his metaphors and odd phrasings but he enjoyed listening to them. Immensely so. Perhaps it was the fact that Mr Rousseau was one of the few that treated Richard kindly, with respect and consideration.
"Oh hallo, Richard. I am delighted to see you!" Mr Rousseau said. "Are you having a good time?"
"Good evening, uncle. Fine party."
"It is, isn't it? All nice people— nice people indeed. All asking me how I am, damned friendly, as always, aren't they?"
Richard laughed. "Well, you're their host. People generally treat those who provide them with free food and entertainment quite well. It surprises me you find it ample for them to enquire how you are in exchange for," he made a non-spesific gesture, "all this."
"Ah, my dear fellow, when you are my age you will surely come to understand how nice it is to be asked how you are. And how more pleasing it is to tell them you are completely fine! What wonder they continue to display!" His shoulders did a sort of happy wiggle, "that a man, my age, has no maladies— one would think they expect me make some up! Most entertaining."
"I'm afraid I fail to see the enjoyable aspect."
Mr Rousseau studied him for a moment with gleeful mirth and amusement hiding behind his pale eyes. Then he said, hushed, as if revealing a great secret: "the richer you are, the quicker they want you dead. They are much like the vultures that a doomed man sees from the corner of his eyes when wandering the dessert. They are waiting. They have time. And the more the man weakens the more will come; waiting for their prey to perish."
Richard shook his head in unbelief. The old man would forever remain a mystery to him.
"But, look here, dear fellow. I don't know what to do about that friend you'll be bringing." Mr Rousseau was fiddling with his long-stemmed glass, and, on the face of it, sincerely troubled with the possibility.
"I won't be bringing him— Vale decided he would come over on his own accord on his way to Vienna this summer. He'll be here for a week by — let's say— June. But he is very pleasant company, I assure you. I met him at uni. Fine man. His parents are old school."
"Oh, I don't know. The missus told me she heard some things about him. And I've learned to trust her judgement. She spells out everyone. She even spelled out you: your aunt knows an extensive amount of things about you."
Richard had no idea what to do with that information; he let it pass without scrutinising it. "Ah," he said, in order to make some noise of assimilation.
"Now, do forgive me, my dear fellow, I believe I have to greet an old friend of mine." Mr Rousseau walked of in the direction of where his wife was beckoning him, in the company of a grave looking woman.
"Right." Richard said and let his gaze wander over the crowd, feeling rather lost with himself.
It was eleven o'clock when he left the residence. His aunt had offered to lend him a ride, and he had gratuitously accepted in the hope that it would mean a ride in the BeRliet. Unfortunately, an old but splendid coach stood waiting on him outside. Richard told the driver to take it slow. He was in no hurry to get back.
It was an ample, old-fashioned coach with enough room to seat four people. Richard sat in one corner, stretched his legs out on the bench opposite him and sank into reverie.
A sense of the ridicule with which the past weeks had passed came over him. A vague recollection of the mocking and detracting nature of men like Mr Magloire, who considered him a boy who was naive and idle; and most of all, the regret that they were right — all blended into a general, miserable sense of despondency. He really had not accomplished a thing in comparison with others of his age and background.
It was true he had come to mainland Europe in order to find his own fortune, but he found it slow in coming. Richard knew, of course, that it wouldn't be handed to him on a silver platter.
But he also knew he was idle. Knew he had to take initiative.
And yet Richard could not bring himself to it.
Outside, streets and vehicles passed by. Passerby were little more than moving shadows beneath caps and drizzle-diffused street lamps.
It was not that uncommon. People often fail to do something out of fear— or knowledge— that they will fail. The unanticipated factor was that Richard had not deemed himself capable of such cowardice, and he often berated himself for it.
He could return to England, of course. Lay down his pride. Admit that he could not accomplish something without his parents' influence and prestige. He may accept the quite excellent job his father had offered him— one he had been too proud to take.
How foolish he had been. How witless. How naive indeed.
A slight rain that saturated every tile of paving on the square preceding the hotel, ran down the windows of his coach as it halted. It was well past eleven. The sky was the pale, greyish black he had come to like and the raindrops on the damp street lanterns shone against the warm halos. Richard Crawford descended upon the pavement holding a hand to his hat to protect it from the evening breeze and threw a rough glance around the noisy square with its busy cafes and the close-shuttered windows of the apartments above. Behind them, faint lights loomed gently. On the porch of one of the cafes, with its bleached door and window-frames, loitered a troop of children. The restaurants next door were crowded.
Melancholy made him smile.
He took a deep breath and crossed the square. The bar of the hotel was still open and its windows were wide and inviting as laughter and music discordantly mingled together. Richard hesitated in his step as he was to ascend the staircase in the vestibule; to his left, cheers and clinks of glasses were heard among the playful sounds of the string quartet and the trod of heels. The sounds of a Parisian evening. Richard decided he would have another drink; he didn't want it, but he would have it. It would have his sleep better
But not at the bar.
Richard's hotel room was a three-room suite existing of a bedroom, a bathroom and a modest dress room. With the bedroom serving as a salon. He opened a window first thing as he entered and found he was within the sound of the quartet. He set about the two sofas, throwing his hat and gloves indifferently aside and draping his coat over the back as he passed, bringing out brandy and bourbon decanters from the small liquor cabinet prepared by the hotel personnel. It was bad and cheap. But Richard couldn't bring himself to care for it. He set the bottles on the low table, unbuttoned his waistcoat, poured himself a glass and tasted the brandy. He coughed. Tipping out his shoes from the heel, he shoved himself against the upholstered back.
What now, the young man thought. Another night spent in doubt?
Attending the ball had only unnerved him. Encountering James had distracted him, surely, and the acquaintance of Miss Aldouin had pleased him, but a nagging restlessness had settled in at the back of his mind. Richard grasped his glass and held it tightly, trying to find a suitable reaction to the way he was feeling.
I know what to do,— he thought. Know what steps to take. I have the means for it, the opportunity, the encouragement, even.
And yet I cannot bring myself to do any of it.
Richard regarded the droplets caught on the inner walls of the glass. His tump traced the bottom round and round in a perpetual motion that added to his jitteriness.
"Of course," Richard grated out, thankful that no one could hear how wrecked his voice sounded. "You humiliated yourself, you realise that, don't you? You are a complete and utter humiliation."
He reached for the decanter and poured some straight brandy from the bottle down his throat. It didn't go down very well. Most of it went onto his chin and shirt, but Richard didn't realise it would actually stain. His stomach contracted sickeningly. He mustn't do that again.
Get up, Richard told himself. Get up and phone your father, tell him you are willing to work for him. No. It's evening— I don't want to bother him. He'll be pleased to hear you say it. I know. I goddamn know.
Richard regarded the nightly sky. He was seated yet felt as if the floor was swaying beneath him. He used to spend hours like this. Leaving for the mainland hadn't solved anything and he had been foolish to think it would have. He was the problem. Not London. Not Paris. Not his parents nor the accomplishments of his siblings.
Richard had always known he did not share the same ambition and work ethic as Allie and Mady.
I know I'm the problem. I know my attitude is — Then get up and do something about it. Quit complaining! You don't want to do, you just want to have done! Get up! — I can't. And I don't know why. I just can't bring myself to do anything about it.
You're just lazy.
Yes, I must be.
Regarding the liquid in the decanters, Richard exhaled slowly. They were beautiful things: flower-shaped stoppers Richard deemed to be hand blown with ground pontil marks on the bottoms and painted coloured enamel scenes around all four sides; the boats suggested Dutch origin.
He was exhausted but would not cry; he forbid it.
Grow up, Richard said to himself. Grow up. Be sensible and grow up. Look at yourself, you're a mess, you could've been at home, been a mess there. — For everyone to see? At least there are less people I know here; less people to judge me. — They'll always judge you. — Not my fault I'm a mess. — Yes, it is.
Richard refilled his glass. His head had begun ringing as if he were going to faint.
You could have done more. If you stopped expecting everything to be handed to you, without having to work to achieve it. —Everything 'is' handed to me. Always has been that way. —And now you're sad because people expect nothing else from you? Pathetic. You sought it yourself. It's not like you didn't have opportunities. — I know I had opportunities. I know that very well. I know why I didn't take them. —You were stupid. —I was young, a child.
You are still a child. You think you deserve everything in the world without actually doing anything for it.
Yeah, I know.
Richard remained where he was and when the kingwood veneer pendulum clock by the door sounded half-past twelve, a bunch of cigars lay burnt down and stabbed out in the colourful Venetian ash-tray and a decanter lay tipped; its contents only half cleaned up from the table. The bourbon was empty.
Richard's breath was slow and steady. His eyes were lidded. He was not yet asleep but resided in that tranquil moment where sleep is almost inevitable. It was calm. Peaceful. The musicians had gone home and only the clopping of horses upon the cobbles was distinguishable in the nightly calm. Richard had refrained from closing the curtains as he enjoyed the light-play of the street lanterns on the plaster leaf-detailing of the ceiling. The carpet is quite soft, he thought. It feels almost comforting. A small giggle escaped him and he turned on his side, burying half his face in the short, thick strings.
It smelled surprisingly good. His fingers raked the yarn and he followed the lines before his eyes. Dancing, Richard thought. I am dancing on weirdly fragrant carpet.
Another snigger. He turned to lay on his back again, his legs laying about:
"Oh, Paix du l'Époque, heal this man."
He didn't know why he was smiling; he wasn't happy. Perhaps it was the stupidity of it all.
The aggressive screech of an alley cat split through the darkness and made him look up with a start. The evening breeze seeped from the window and Richard deemed himself unintelligible for leaving it open in this time of year. He lay an arm over his eyes and shut it all out. Wishing he might shut out all vicious thoughts likewise.
He should clean up the room. Change. Go to bed.
Just get up already, a voice said.
Not yet, Richard pleaded. Perhaps in five.
"Where are you now, my dear romantics? My dear idealists? Your glorifications? Your heroic individuals? My dear Isabella di Morra, is this what you felt?"
You read to much of that nonsense, Richard told himself. You've begun living in your own world of self-pity.
"I should have stayed in reality," he curled up, "definitely should have. Definitely, definitely. Definitely should have— should this; should that; should have. Should have done all they said. They said and thought; it was better. They knew better. Knew they knew better; old man knew better. Allie knew better; she damn did. Mady did too..." A sigh escaped him: "better than me."
Always better than me.
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