The Age of Reason Read online

  Lola paused to get her breath. ‘She has got a down on him,’ thought Boris. But he remained unruffled. The people who liked him were not obliged to like each other, and Boris thought it quite natural that each of them should try to get across the others.

  ‘I understand you quite well,’ said Lola with a conciliatory air: ‘You don’t see him with the same eyes as mine, because he has been your master and you’re prejudiced: I can see that from all sorts of little tricks: for instance, you’re always so critical of the way people dress, you never think them smart enough, whereas he is always got up like a scarecrow, he wears ties that my hotel waiter wouldn’t look at — but you don’t mind.’

  But Boris was not to be roused: ‘It doesn’t matter,’ he explained, ‘if a man is badly dressed when he doesn’t bother about his clothes at all. What is rotten is to try to make a splash, and not pull it off.’

  ‘Well, you don’t do that, my little tyke.’

  ‘I know what suits me,’ said Boris modestly. He reflected that he was wearing a blue-ribbed sweater, and was glad: it was a handsome sweater. Lola had taken his hand and was tossing it up and down between her own. Boris watched his hand rise and fall, and he thought: ‘It doesn’t belong to me, it’s a sort of pancake.’ It had in fact grown numb: this amused him, and he twitched a finger to bring it back to life. The finger touched the palm of Lola’s hand, and Lola flung him a grateful look. ‘That’s what makes me nervous,’ thought Boris irritably. He told himself that he would certainly have found it easier to show affection if Lola hadn’t fallen so often into these appealing, melting moods. He didn’t in the least mind letting his hands be played with in public by an ageing woman. He had long thought that this was rather in his line: even when he was alone, in the metro, people looked at him rather quizzically, and the little shop girls on their way home laughed in his face.

  ‘You still haven’t told me why you think him such a fine fellow.’

  She was like that, she could never stop once she had begun. Boris was sure that she was hurting her own feelings, but she enjoyed that. He looked at her: the air around her was blue, and her face was whitish blue. But the eyes were feverish and hard. ‘Why? — tell me.’

  ‘Because he is a fine fellow,’ groaned Boris. ‘Oh, dear, how you do pester me. He doesn’t care about anything.’

  ‘Well, does that make a fine fellow? You don’t care about anything, do you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘But you do care a little about me, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes, I care about you.’

  Lola looked unhappy, and Boris turned his head away. Anyhow, he didn’t much like looking at Lola when she put on that expression. She was upset: he thought it silly of her, but he couldn’t do anything about it. He did everything expected of him. He was faithful to Lola, he telephoned to her often, he went to call for her three times a week when she came out of the Sumatra, and on those evenings he slept in her flat. For the rest, it was a question of character, probably. A question of age, too — older people grow embittered, and behave as though their lives were at stake. Once, when Boris was a little boy, he had dropped his spoon: on being told to pick it up, he had refused, and flown into a passion. Then his father had said, in an unforgettably majestic tone: ‘Very well, then, I will pick it up.’ Boris had seen a tall body stiffly bending down, and a bald cranium, he heard sundry creaking sounds — the whole thing was an intolerable sacrilege, and he burst out sobbing. Since then Boris had regarded grown-ups as bulky and impotent divinities. If they bent down, they looked as though they were going to break: if they slipped and fell, the effect they produced in the onlooker was a desire to laugh and a sense of awe-stricken abhorrence. And if the tears came into their eyes, as into Lola’s at that moment, one was simply at a loss. Grown-up people’s tears were a mystical catastrophe, the sort of tears God sheds over the wickedness of mankind. From another point of view, of course, he respected Lola for being so passionate. Mathieu had explained to him that a human being ought to have passions, and Descartes had said so too.

  ‘Delarue has his passions,’ he said, pursuing his reflections aloud: ‘but that doesn’t prevent him caring for nothing. He is free.’

  ‘By that token I’m free too. I care for nothing but you.’

  Boris did not answer.

  ‘Aren’t I free?’ asked Lola.

  ‘That’s not the same thing.’

  Too difficult to explain. Lola was a victim, she had no luck, and she appealed too much to the emotions. Which was not in her favour. Besides, she took heroin. That wasn’t a bad thing, in one sense: indeed it was quite a good thing, in principle: Boris had talked to Ivich about it, and they had both agreed that it was a good thing. But there were ways of doing it: if one took it to destroy oneself, either in despair or by way of emphasizing one’s freedom, that was entirely commendable. But Lola took it with greedy abandonment, it was her form of relaxation. It didn’t even intoxicate her.

  ‘You make me laugh,’ said Lola in a dry voice. ‘It’s a habit of yours to put Delarue above everybody else, as a matter of principle. Because you know, between ourselves, which is the freer, he or I: he has a home of his own, a fixed salary, and a definite pension: he lives like a petty official. And then, into the bargain, there’s that affair of his you told me about, that female who never goes out — what more does he want? No one could be freer than that. As for me, I’ve just a few old frocks, I’m alone, I live in an hotel, and I don’t even know whether I shall have a job for the summer.’

  ‘That’s different,’ repeated Boris.

  He was annoyed. Lola didn’t bother about freedom. She was getting excited about it that evening because she wanted to defeat Mathieu on his own ground.

  ‘I could skin you, you little beast, when you’re like that. What’s different, eh?’

  ‘Well, you’re free without wanting to be,’ he explained, ‘it just happens so, that’s all. But Mathieu’s freedom is based on reason.’

  ‘I still don’t understand,’ said Lola, shaking her head.

  ‘Well, he doesn’t care a curse about his apartment: he lives there just as he would live anywhere else, and I’ve got the feeling that he doesn’t care much about his girl. He stays with her because he must sleep with someone. His freedom isn’t visible, it’s inside him.’

  Lola had an absent air, he felt he must hurt her a bit just to jostle her around, and he went on: ‘Look here, you’re too fond of me: he would never let himself get caught like that’

  ‘Oho!’ cried Lola indignantly. ‘I’m too fond of you, am I? — you little toad. And don’t you think he’s a bit too fond of your sister, eh? You’d only got to watch him the other night at the Sumatra.’

  ‘Of Ivich? You make me sick.’

  Lola flung him a sneering grin, and the smoke suddenly went to Boris’s head. A moment passed, and then the band happened to launch into the St James’s Infirmary, and Boris wanted to dance.

  ‘Shall we dance this?’

  They danced. Lola had closed her eyes, and he could hear her quick breathing. The little pansy had got up and went across to ask the dancer from the Java for a dance. Boris reflected that he would soon see him from near-by and was pleased. Lola was heavy in his arms: she danced well, and she smelt nice, but she was too heavy. Boris thought that he would sooner dance with Ivich. Ivich danced magnificently: and he told himself that Ivich ought to learn the castanets. After which, Lola’s scent and smell banished all further thought. He pressed her to him, and breathed hard. She opened her eyes, and looked at him intently.

  ‘Do you love me?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Boris, making a face.

  ‘Why do you make a face like that?’

  ‘Because — Oh, you annoy me.’

  ‘Why? It isn’t true that you love me?’

  ‘Yes it is.’

  ‘Why don’t you ever tell me so yourself? I always have to ask you.’

  ‘Because I don’t feel like it. It’s all rot: it’s the sort of thing t
hat people don’t say.’

  ‘Does it annoy you when I say I love you?’

  ‘No, you can say it if you like. But you oughtn’t to ask me if I love you.’

  ‘It’s very seldom I ask you anything, darling. It’s usually enough for me to look at you and feel I love you. But there are moments when I wish I could get at your own real feelings.’

  ‘I understand,’ said Boris seriously, ‘but you ought to wait till I feel like it. If it doesn’t come naturally, there’s no sense in it.’

  ‘But, you little fool, you yourself say you never do feel that way unless somebody asks you.’

  Boris began to laugh.

  ‘It’s true,’ he said, ‘you put me off. But one can feel affection for somebody, and not want to say so.’

  Lola did not answer. They stopped, applauded, and the band began again. Boris was glad to observe that the pansy-lad was dancing towards them: but when he eyed him from near-by, he got a nasty shock: the creature was quite forty years old. His face retained the sheen of youth, but underneath it he had aged. He had large doll-like blue eyes, and a boyish mouth, but there were pouches under his porcelain eyes, and wrinkles round his mouth, his nostrils were pinched like those of a dying man, and his hair, which looked from a distance like a golden haze, scarcely covered his cranium. Boris looked with horror at this elderly, shaven child. ‘He was once young,’ thought he. There were fellows who seemed created to be thirty-five — Mathieu, for instance — because they had never known youth. But when a chap had really been young, he bore the marks of it for the rest of his life. It might last till twenty-five. After that — it was horrible. He set himself to look at Lola and said abruptly: ‘Lola, look at me, I love you.’

  Lola’s eyes grew pink, and she stepped on Boris’s foot. She merely said: ‘Darling!’

  He felt like exclaiming — Clasp me tighter, make me feel I love you. But Lola said nothing, she in her turn was alone, the moment had indeed come. There was a vague smile on her face, her eyelids were drooping, her face had again shut down upon her happiness. It was a calm, forlorn face. Boris felt desolate, and the thought — the grinding thought, suddenly came upon him: I won’t, I won’t grow old. Last year he had been quite unperturbed, he had never thought about that sort of thing: and now — it was rather ominous that he should so constantly feel that his youth was slipping between his fingers. Until twenty-five. ‘I’ve got five years yet,’ thought Boris; ‘and after that I’ll blow my brains out.’ He could no longer endure the noise of the band, and the sense of all these people around him.

  ‘Shall we go?’ said he.

  ‘At once, my lovely!’

  They returned to their table. Lola called the waiter, paid the bill, and flung her velvet cloak over her shoulders.

  ‘Come along,’ she said.

  They went out. Boris was no longer thinking of anything very definite, but there was a sense of something fateful in his mind. The Rue Blanche was crowded with random people, all looking harsh and old. They met the Maestro Piranese from the Puss in Boots, and greeted him: his little legs pattered along beneath his enormous belly. ‘Perhaps,’ thought Boris, ‘I too shall grow a paunch.’ What would it be like never to be able to look at oneself in a glass, nor to feel the crisp, wooden snap of one’s joints...And every instant that passed, every instant, consumed a little more of his youth. ‘If only I could save myself up, live very quietly, at a slower pace, I should perhaps gain a few years. But to do that, I oughtn’t to make a habit of going to bed at 2.0 a.m.’ He eyed Lola with detestation. ‘She’s killing me.’

  ‘What’s the matter?’ asked Lola.

  ‘Nothing.’

  Lola lived in a hotel in the Rue Navarin. She took her key off the board, and they walked silently upstairs. The room was bare, there was a trunk covered with labels in one corner, and on the farther wall a photograph of Boris stuck on it with drawing-pins. It was an identity-photograph which Lola had had enlarged. ‘Ah,’ thought Boris, ‘that will remain when I’m a wreck; in that I shall always look young.’ He felt an impulse to tear it up.

  ‘There’s something odd about you,’ said Lola: ‘what’s the matter?’

  ‘I’m all in,’ said Boris. ‘I’ve got a pain in the top of my head.’

  Lola looked anxious. ‘You aren’t ill, dear? Would like a cachet?’

  ‘No, it’s nothing, I shall soon feel better.’

  Lola took his chin and raised his head.

  ‘You look as if you were angry with me. You aren’t, are you? Yes, you are. What have I done?’

  She looked distraught.

  ‘I’m not angry with you — don’t be silly,’ protested Boris feebly.

  ‘You are, but what have I done to you? You’d much better tell me, because then I shall be able to explain. It’s sure to be some misunderstanding. It can’t be anything serious. Boris, I do implore you, tell me what’s the matter.’

  ‘But there’s nothing.’

  He put his arms round Lola’s neck and kissed her on the lips. Lola quivered. Boris inhaled a perfumed breath, and felt against his mouth the moist nakedness of her lips. His senses thrilled. Lola covered his face with kisses: she began to pant a little.

  Boris realized that he desired Lola, and was glad: desire absorbed his black ideas, as it did ideas of any other kind. His head began to whirl, its contents sped upwards and were scattered. He had laid his hand on Lola’s hip, he touched her flesh through the silken dress: he was, indeed, no more than a hand outstretched upon that silken flesh. He curved his hand slightly, and the stuff slipped between his fingers, like an exquisite skin, delicate and dead: below lay the real skin, resistant, elastic, and glossy as a kid glove. Lola tipped her cloak on to the bed, flung out two bare arms and clasped them round Boris’s neck; she smelt delicious. Boris could see her shaven arm-pits, powdered with bluish black dots, minute but clearly visible, like the heads of splinters thrust deep into the skin. Boris and Lola remained standing, on the very spot where desire had come upon them, because they had no longer strength to move. Lola’s legs began to tremble, and Boris wondered whether they would not both just sink down on to the carpet. He pressed Lola to him, and felt the rich softness of her breasts.

  ‘Ah,’ murmured Lola.

  She was leaning backwards, and he was fascinated by that pale head and swollen lips, a veritable Medusa’s head. And he thought to himself: ‘These are her last good days.’ And he held her yet more tightly. ‘One of these mornings she will suddenly collapse.’ He detested her: he felt his body against hers, hard and gaunt and muscular, he clasped her in his arms and defended her against the years. Then there came upon him a moment of bewilderment and drowsiness: he looked at Lola’s arms, white as an old woman’s hair, it seemed to him that he held old age between his hands, and that he must clasp it close and strangle it.

  ‘Don’t hold me so tight,’ murmured Lola happily. ‘You’re hurting me. I want you.’

  Boris released her; he was a little shocked.

  ‘Give me my pyjamas: I’ll go and undress in the bathroom.’

  He went into the bathroom, and locked the door: he hated Lola to come in while he was undressing. He washed his face and his feet, and amused himself by dusting talcum powder on his legs. He had quite recovered his composure, and he thought to himself: ‘It’s fantastic.’ His head was vague and heavy, and he hardly knew what he was thinking about. ‘I must talk to Delarue about it,’ he decided. Beyond the door she awaited him, she was certain to be undressed by now. But he did not feel inclined to hurry. A naked body, full of naked odours, was something rather overwhelming, which was what Lola would not understand. He was now about to be engulfed into an enveloping and strong-savoured sensuality. Once in it, all would be well, but before — well, a fellow couldn’t help feeling a bit nervous. ‘In any case,’ he reflected with annoyance, ‘I don’t intend to get involved like I did the other time.’ He combed his hair carefully over the basin, to see whether it was falling out. But not one hair dropped on to the wh
ite porcelain. When he had put on his pyjamas, he opened the door and went back into the bedroom.

  Lola was outstretched on the bed, completely naked. It was another Lola, sluggish and menacing, watching him from beneath her eyelids. Her body, on the blue counterpane, was silvery-white, like the belly of a fish, and on it a triangular tuft of reddish hair. She was beautiful. Boris approached the bed, and eyed her with an eagerness not unmingled with disgust. She stretched out her arms.

  ‘Wait,’ said Boris.

  He switched off the light and the room was promptly filled with a red glow: at the third storey of the building opposite, an illuminated sign had been recently installed. Boris lay down beside Lola, and began to stroke her shoulders and her breasts. Her skin was so soft that it felt exactly as though she had kept her silk wrap on. Her breasts were slackening, but Boris liked that; they were the breasts of a woman who has lived. It was in vain that he had turned out the light, he could still see, in the glare from the electric wall sign, Lola’s face, pale in the red glow, and black-lipped: she looked as though she was in pain, and her eyes were hard. Boris felt oppressed with the sense of tragedy to come, just as he had done at Nîmes, when the first bull bounded into the arena: something was going to happen, something inevitable, awesome, and yet rather tedious, like the bull’s ensanguined death.

  ‘Take off your pyjamas,’ pleaded Lola.

  ‘No,’ said Boris.

  This was a ritual. Every time Lola asked him to take off his pyjamas, and Boris was obliged to refuse, Lola’s hands slipped under his jacket, and caressed him gently. Boris began to laugh.