I have to hear the entire history of the Dufferein-Chautels, mother and son . . . A masterful woman, it’s she who manages everything . . . sawmills in the Ardennes . . . acres of woodland . . . Maxime, a little lazy, is the youngest and the most spoiled of her sons . . . much more intelligent than he looks . . . thirty-three and a half years old . . . “Say!
Just like me!”
Hamond leans over to me across the little table, with the attention of a painter of miniatures:
“You’re thirty-three, Renee?” “Unfortunately.”
“Don’t tell anybody.
No one would know.”
“Oh, I’m well aware that onstage . . . ”
“Not in person, either.”
Hamond doesn’t dwell on this compliment; he continues the history of the Dufferein-Chautels.
Vexed, I suck grapes.
The Big Ninny is worming his way into my home more than I’ve allowed him to.
By this hour, Hamond and I would ordinarily be hashing over bad old memories, which revive every week in the bitter aroma of our steaming cups . . .
Poor Hamond!
It’s for my sake that he’s sacrificing the funereal habit so dear to him.
I’m well aware that he fears for my loneliness; if he dared, he’d say to me, like a fatherly go-between:
“This is the lover you need, dear!
He’s healthy, doesn’t gamble, doesn’t drink, he’s well-to-do . . . You’ll thank me for it!”
*** Only four more days and I’ll be leaving the Empyree-Clichy.
Every time I end a rather lengthy vaudeville run, in the final days I get the odd impression of a deliverance I haven’t wished for.
Happy to be free, to live at home nights, I nevertheless need time to enjoy it, and when I stretch to signify
“At last!” my gesture lacks spontaneity.
Yet, this time, I think I’m really pleased; sitting in Brague’s dressing room, I enumerate for my partner, who’s totally unconcerned, the urgent tasks that are going to occupy me on my vacation:
“You understand, I’m having all my couch cushions recovered. Then I’ll push the couch all the way into the corner and I’ll put an electric lamp over it . . . ”
“Nice! Sounds like a streetwalker’s den!” says Brague in a serious tone.
“How dumb you are! . . .
Well, anyway, I’ve got loads of things to do.
It’s been so long since I’ve been able to pay attention to my home.”
“Oh, sure!” Brague agrees, poker-faced. “And for whose benefit will all that be?”
“What do you mean, for whose benefit?
For mine, naturally!”
For a moment Brague turns away from his mirror, revealing a face whose right eye, the only one scrumbled with blue, seems to be sporting the ring left by a terrific punch:
“For yours?
Only for yours? . . .
Forgive me, but I find that pretty . . . brainless!
Besides, do you imagine I’m going to let Dominance rust?
Get prepared for one of those ‘departures for the first-class vaudeville houses in the provinces and abroad’ . . . Anyway, our agent Salomon told me to pass the word that he wants to see you.”
“Oh!
Already?”
Brague raises his shoulders peremptorily:
“Yes, yes, I know that old refrain! ‘Oh! Already?’
Besides, if I told you we have no prospects, you’d be buzzing around me like a mosquito:
‘When are we leaving?
When are we leaving?’
You broads are all the same!”
“And so say I!” are the words of approbation uttered by a melancholy voice behind us—Bouty’s.
He’s grown even thinner since last month, Bouty has, and his act is tiring him out more and more.
I look at him on the sly, so as not to hurt his feelings, but what can you detect beneath that red makeup with white-ringed eyes? . . .
Silent, we listen to Jadin’s voice above us:
Still in bed, my lazy Lil?
Please let in your loving Bill,