บท 11: Chapter XI

❧ 11th August 1904, five days ere Mathilda Aldouin's passing — France, Paris.

Four months elapsed. It was mid-August, and the afternoon had smoothly faded into the evening. James Guillory lay reclined in the armchair in the modest library of Richard's new apartment on Rue de Richelieu. It was a very charming room, with high-panelled bookcases of stained oak and friezes of high plasterwork. On a low rosewood table by his left hand stood a Burgundy phone and a bronze ornament depicting two dancing nymphs. Beside it lay a copy of "Le Temps" and "Courrier International". His empty teacup had left several overlapping wet rings upon the frail pages. A large eggshell-white vase with pink Paeonia stood arranged on the mantle in the next room, courtesy of Mathi, and through the open balcony doors of the terrace streamed the sun, depicting its light-play on the thick-stringed Saxony carpet of the salon as a soft breeze played with the crochet on the outdoor table.

Smoking, and reposed against said table was Richard Crawford. His sleeves, tie and waistcoat were partly undone, and although he was glad for his choice of dress, the afternoon temperatures had been the first durable of the day. He allowed the smoke to drift and dance in the air and wafted whenever it obstructed his view of the busy street below. Richard had just come to the realisation that there had been a sudden rise in cars these past months and was ruminating the reason behind the sudden phenomenon. He knew his aunt to own a BeRliet. She had a garage built for it, and upon delivery the car had never left it.

It was when James sought his attention by remarking loudly that the phone was ringing that he looked up and left the street for what it was. As he passed the salon and entered the library with long, idle strikes, Richard said:

"Pick it up then."

"Why?"

"You're closest to it."

"It's your phone." Guillory said, languidly turning the page of the heavy volume in his lap.

"It's my phone," Richard mimicked him. He took the receiver of the Burgundy. "Yes, Crawford's."

Mathi's displeased voice was heard on the other end. Sliding his pocket watch from his open-hanging waistcoat, careful not to let his cigar fall as he clamped it in the same hand, Richard noted that her anger was painfully justified.

"Mathi?" The armchair occupant mouthed.

"Yes." Richard mouthed back, pocketing the watch, and putting out the cigar in the empty teacup, "Hamlet."

James crunched his nose at the mistreatment of the fine China. Over the phone, Mathilda was heard in a sustained tirade.

"Apologise." The silent answer came.

"I didn't forget." Richard said into the receiver and James nicked his back with the book to emphasise that was most certainly not what he had meant. Richard glared at him over his shoulder, flinging his arm out in an attempt to get him back. "I was just going to show up fashionably late, dear. All people of importance do it."

He bid her goodbye and returned the receiver. Then he ventured to button himself up and went for the hall, looking about for his coat.

"We're still going?" James called after him. Richard reappeared in the doorway.

"Yes. You're driving."

Catching his coat mid-air, James followed him downstairs.

❧

The opera house was crowded that night. It was a magnificent theatre and quite eclectic, borrowing influences from the classicism of Palladio and Renaissance architecture.

A retainer escorted them to their box with a sort of over-the-top humbleness. Richard didn't pay much attention to him, and simply put a few francs in the man's fat, patched hands as they arrived. Mathilda, on the other hand, seemed to be in a talkative mood. She insisted on James to offer her his arm, assuring him that she had met an absolutely fascinating figure yesterday, of whom she must tell him. Richard leaned himself upon the balustrade and amused himself by watching the faces of the musicians in the pit. Above them, some youths of their age in the gallery had taken off their coats. They talked to each other and shared their views on the coming show. Some women were laughing.

James appeared to be slightly bored prior to the performance. Mathilda assured him off the beauty of this particular production of 'Hamlet', and the young man sat patiently and smiling, with his head resting upon his hand, regarding the bright woman. Somnolence clothed to his person.

"You are just as listless as last night at the academy, James." Richard remarked. James looked up:

"What did I do?"

"Nothing. Which bored me."

"Is it my duty to entertain you—?"

"Certainly! You left me alone with Mrs Deslys and Mr Lachaud. I was bored out of my mind while you were sitting by yourself in the gallery. People will start talking when you act so detached."

"I don't care what they think of me."

Richard's eyebrows rose. That was a lie. "You don't? You don't want to be taken seriously, then?"

"Nobody who has something to say ever gets taken seriously. People seldom like what intelligent people have to say."

"I disagree. I enjoy listening to you a great deal."

"I would be very sorry not to be taken serious by you. But what makes you think I am intelligent?"

"What makes you so pessimistic?" Richard countered.

"I—" James faltered. He threw a pleading look between him and Mathi, who loured as if greatly concerned with James and greatly annoyed with Richard. Then the orchestra in the pit below thundered the first notes of the prelude and all that was left unsaid was lost. While Richard had no means to expound James's sudden wave of disheartenment, he did not pay it as much heed had he been in a fowler mood himself.

Music excited Richard Crawford, but to him it was not the magnificent world others claimed it to be. Nevertheless, at the moment he felt perfectly content and tonight the music seemed keenly stimulating. Today had been one of the good days. A day without vacillation and self-doubt. A day where his laughs had been genuine; and he promised himself it would be a good evening as well.

A faint voice rose the notion not to be so proud of it. Told him to downplay it— but he quickly silenced it.

He was content. At peace and gratified. Perhaps not tomorrow — and that was venial, but now he felt content, and Richard told himself he deserved at least that much. He had not often before had this sense of physical joy, but Richard had not felt so fond of himself for a long time, of his own body, his character — as at that moment. And so he enjoyed the sensation it brought, breathing deeply. And the cords round Richard's neck that had been wound tight for the past months, eased.

The prelude faded and gave way for the first notes of 'Que nos chants montent jusqu'aux cieux!', and the curtains were drawn. While on stage, Polonius, surrounded by lords and ladies and pages and guards, regarded Claudius standing on the royal platform, Richard's mind wandered off towards his very first evening in Paris.

It had been past midnight. He'd been leaving his aunt and her guests, claiming fatigue. The evening had faded into true nighttime outside, the indigo-hued hours when balls and parties might finally end, genteel society rattling home in gilded carriages and starched taffeta, yawning and tipsy and dizzy from sparkling wine or too much brandy or too many dances under glittering chandeliers. And James had crashed into him outside on the patio. Simple as that.

"Are you alright?" Richard had asked.

"I am entirely in control of the situation," James had said, and Richard was quiet for a moment before answering:

"I never doubted it, my good man."

Then Richard stood and offered James his hand, setting him on his feet again. James swayed, a poor tree in a storm. He bade Richard good night and attempted a clumsy bow that tugged the corner of Richard's mouth into a smirk. Then James stumbled down the narrow steps and fell face first into a bird bath, asleep in his coat and hat and all.

After that night, matters had progressed rather rapidly. For one thing, they began to drink together, the fastest way Richard knew to a sound friendship.

It helped that James was as remarkable sober as he was drunk. He spoke in great unwieldy paragraphs, let his hands fly like maddened birds. He started leaning close with brandy dense on his breath, his eyebrows urging Richard to make some comment or counter argument. James liked to talk, and all the better if what he said was factually slightly untrue and concerning some greater moral— something. Richard, as it turned out, liked to listen.

Nowadays, they took to spending most of their time in each other's company. On the best days, Richard's moring began seated across from his friend at the breakfast table, enjoying James's comments on the headlines as Richard poured the tea. He got to sleep having heard James say, "Until the morn, Richard."

Then there was Mathi. Vicious. Strong-willed, beautiful Mathi. Richard would have been enamoured with her, in another life. Perhaps a life where he sought after domesticity. And perhaps that would be this life. Far in the future.

But not now.

Not now that he had the world at his feet. Not now that he had people around him adoring him and friends rational enough to pull him back to the ground when he got his head in the clouds. Not now that he was finally… finally content.

Or at least something that bore a close enough resemblance to contentment.

Richard felt that there were several things amiss with how entirely they both had overtaken his every waking moment. But of greater magnitude than this substantial dislocation was the plain fact that Richard didn't care about it. He hadn't much liked the person he'd been before he met James Guilory and Mathilda Aldouin. It was no sacrifice to see that man— child?— gone.

Often enough, the three of them had lunch for breakfast in their dressing gowns, eating toast off the same plate, trading newspapers back and forth. Either at James's, or installed in their customary places in Richard's sitting room: Mathi on the terrace, tea-cups at hand and well-used already. The bottle of brandy on the sideboard gleaming, clear glass down to the shallow remains. Outside the windows, the standard afternoon traffic filling the world with a calming susurrus.

Naturally they had rows amongst each-other, and on one such occasion Richard had found Mathi supine on the sofa, and told her to move her feet. And it took the removal of a book to properly seat himself.

"You broke a vase," Mathi told him. "When you slammed the door earlier."

"Ah." Richard turned the book over. Something about the reformation. "Did we like the vase?"

"Not particularly," Mathi replied. "It was that one with badly-painted begonias on it that was a present from your aunt."

Richard felt amusement curling his mouth, in spite of it all. "Well, we'd better hope it was."

They exchanged smiles at the thought and then Richard reached to balance the book on the armrest.

"Have you forgiven me now?" Mathi asked after a few minutes. She pushed herself into a sitting position, feet braced against his thigh.

Richard sighed. "No, Mathi. But nor would I like to continue our argument."

Mathi nodded and let herself fall down again. "I think we have sufficiently injured each other's feelings for one day." When Richard said nothing, she added: "of course, you could say something like 'I did not know you had feelings to be injured in the first place' and we can continue from there."

"No," Richard had murmured, "no, dear, I'm not going to say that."

A great bellow went through the expanse of the opera hall and startled Richard from his musing. Fanfares. Bells were ringing. The court was retiring, and Hamlet appeared at the border and slowly descended on stage. He was utterly lonesome.

"Vains regrets!" the performer sang, "tendresse éphémère! ...!"

❧

"I enjoyed 'Pelléas et Mélisande' better," Mathi said as Richard took over her shawl for a moment. The evening air was not as bitter as he had expected; a damp heat still clung to the streets and embosomed all passer-by.

Surprise laced James's voice. "It was you who wanted to see it."

"I did see it, earlier this week; I wanted you two to see it. What else are we going to talk about?" Mathilda threw her head back and reached for her shawl, which Richard draped round her. James heaved his shoulders in a noncommittal way and smiled at her:

"Can I drop you of at home?"

"No. But you can give me a lift."

"Where to, my lady?" Teasing, James made an elegant bow as Mathi waited for him to open the passenger-door of the Rouxel.

"Rue d'Orsel."

Richard halted in his step but once he recovered from his initial surprise, a broad grin split his features. Marhi was smiling as well, and she chuckled at his James's strayed expression.

"Will you induce him, or shall I?" She asked of Richard as he took a seat in the back. James was pouting:

"I really hate it when you two get like that. It makes my skin crawl. It always ends bad; I'm calling it, tonight's going to end bad."

At Rue d'Orsel there was a cabaret not famed for its performances — although they were splendid— but it's eccentricities. The unconventional food, music and the owner's queerness were only a few of the things that spoke to the younger public. L'idylle Pourpre had gotten its name from its proprietor's fondness of violet-coloured glass screens he had imported from Murano. The cabaret was almost like an exotic garden; enticing its patrons with all kinds of unseen and unwonted indulgences.

"And colourful gas light is so romantic," the proprietor, Mr Artino explained to guests who enquired how it was that such a wealthy establishment had not yet gone electric. It was all the new rage after all — was it not? But electric light pained his eyes, Mr Artino told them. And terribly sensitive his eyes surely were. So much that he wore shades even at night; although many of his costumers imagined him to wear them because Mr Artino enjoyed being aberrant. The bohemian spectacles he threw for his bourgeoisie clientele did substantiate such notions.

"It's a pity he wishes to be eccentric but refuses to admit it. Why make up a lie? Just wear the shades. He's not really hiding it. I mean, look at this place. It makes all the effort go to waste— don't you think so? I know you do. Why would one paint the image of themselves as an eccentric when one cannot pester his peers with their eccentric ideas? —ah! You say, he isn't eccentric in his ideas! Well, why would one—!" James Henry Guillory lost his train of thought as he realised his glass was empty once again. Not that his spectator minded. Walls are especially known for their adeptness as patient listeners; and are proven to be utterly unconcerned if the speaker's soliloquies remain unfinished. Several high-booted entertainers had come up to Guillory throughout the night, and yet none had grasped his interest; causing them to flaunt off towards the seats occupied by wealthy philanderers who bayed at their feet like lustful hounds. Sweet, beguiling tunes were played with overbearing intensity by a uniformed band and intermingled with all the noises emanating from the guests.

A few steps from James and Mr Artino's unfortunate apathetic wall, Mathilda and Richard were occupied in the most focused battle of Pigs in Clover ever witnessed. The game was held onto by the both of them and consisted of a wooden labyrinth through which players drove marbles — the pigs — through the outer rings and into a pen at the centre of the playfield without being allowed to touch the marbles.

Almost all pigs had perished, catapulted out of the game by the fervid pushing and pulling of both Mathi and Richard. One remained. One pig had still hope of reaching the pen without disappearing between the cushions of the kitsch red-velvet divan on which both intoxicated youngsters were seated. Carefully— as careful one might be after hours of heavy drinking— they attempted to accomplish three definite goals: to get the last pig into the pen without either the pig, the board or themselves falling of the sofa; to withhold from simultaneously attempting to drink and hold the board; and to think of a way to have James pay for the lost marbles were they to remain lost.

They succeeded magnificently in two of these and magnificently failed in one. The celebration around them continued in all its debouching as a parade of provocative figures paraded the floor while they were perused by lust-filled gazes. Then, as marbles had become inadequate entertainment, the trio became distracted by a platter containing various confections. Richard eyed the dish with a chariness that the sweets were very likely undeserving off.

"Poke it," he told Mathi.

She took a breath and then huffed it out in annoyance. "I'm not going to poke it, Richard."

"But what's it?" Richard said.

"Chocolate." Mathilda said.

"But why'sit filled?"

"Ask the probrat— probriet— manager."

"It's Belgian," James decided. He dropped himself down between the both of them. A pearl-pinkish liquid nigh seeped over the brim of his shot; Mr Artino had claimed it to be from a particular batch of ouzo he had produced himself.

"Ha?"

Guillory nodded for a full ten seconds. "Did you— did you know— you don't have to make it in Belgium in order to have it labelled," he made a broad gesture in the air, "Belgian Chocolate?"

"That's stupid!" Richard said.

"No. I'm for real. It's not like Champagne. As long as you respect the guidelines, you can make chocolate in—" he paused, "Poland," another pause, "India, Austria, Cuba. And still call it: 'Belgian Chocolate'."

James nodded, incredibly content with himself. Richard simultaneously squinted his eyes and raised his eyebrows. "So we could make it..."

"Yes!" Mathi stood up. Looked at the both of them, expecting some kind of congratulations and decided she had to sit down again. As she did, James toppled over with a bouncy cheer, and she allowed him to rest his head in her lap, stroking the hairs out of James's face. The young man hummed in delight at the tender treatment.

Two bottles thereafter, James was nigh asleep. Richard only perceived it when he reached the bottom of his glass and looked up to see whether his companions would need refills as well, only to see the young man's eyes closed; the colourful light from the Murano shades highlighting his features. Mathilda was ordering another round as the tumultuous cords of the brass band in the background became all the more chaotic.

"James!" Said she.

"Why? What?" James started. Mathilda gestured at the coquettish damsel that stood at attention by the valence.

"Wine?"

"Anything red." Guillory said.

Mathilda angled her chin towards Richard in question. He nodded vaguely. Allowing himself to fall onto his back with a relieving crash, Richard regarded the ceiling. He should get a room, he decided, doubtful of James's capacity to drive them back.