Villa Triste (2 page)

With his hands thrust into his jacket pockets, he heads for the restaurant in the station. The two waiters are clearing the tables and sweeping up around them with broad, languid gestures. Behind the bar, a man in a raincoat is putting up the last glasses. Meinthe orders a cognac. The barman curtly informs him that the bar is closed. Meinthe again orders a cognac.

“In this place,” the man replies, lingering on each syllable, “in this place, we don’t serve fairies.”

And the two waiters behind him burst into laughter. Meinthe doesn’t move; he stares at a point somewhere before his eyes and looks exhausted. One of the waiters has switched off the lights on the left-hand wall. The yellowish glow around the bar is the only remaining illumination. They’re waiting with folded arms. Are they going to bust his face? Or, I don’t know, maybe Meinthe’s going to slam his hand down on the grimy counter and declare, “I am Astrid, QUEEN OF THE BELGIANS!” posing and laughing in his old insolent way.

What was I doing, at the age of eighteen, on the shore of that lake, in that fashionable spa resort? Nothing. I was living in a boardinghouse, the Lindens, on Boulevard Carabacel. I could have opted for a room in town, but I preferred to be on the high ground, steps away from the Windsor, the Hermitage, and the Alhambra, whose luxury and dense gardens reassured me.

Because I was scared to death, a sensation I’ve never been without; but in those days it was much more vehement, and much more irrational. I had fled Paris, convinced that the city was becoming dangerous for people like me. A disagreeable, police-heavy atmosphere prevailed there. Far too many roundups for my taste. Exploding bombs. I’d like to be precise in my chronology, and since the best reference points are provided by wars, the question is, Which war was going on then? It was the one known as the Algerian War, at the very beginning of the 1960s, a period when people drove around in Floride convertibles and women dressed badly. So did men. As for me, I was afraid, even more than I am today, and I’d chosen that place of refuge because it was five kilometers from the Swiss border. At the first sign of danger, all I had to do was cross the lake. Naïve as I was, I thought the closer you got to Switzerland, the better your
chances of coming out all right. I didn’t yet know that Switzerland doesn’t exist.

The “season” had started on June 15. Galas and festivities would follow hard on one another. The “Ambassadors’ ” dinner at the Casino. Appearances by the singer Georges Ulmer. Three performances of
Listen Up, Gentlemen
. The Chavoires golf club’s July 14 fireworks display, the Marquis de Cuevas ballet, and other events I’d be able to recall if I had the tourist office’s printed program in my hands. I kept it, and I’m sure it’s stuck in the pages of one of the books I was reading that year. But which one? The weather was “magnificent,” and the regular visitors predicted sunny days all the way until October.

I very seldom went swimming. In general, I spent my days in the lobby and gardens of the Windsor, and in the end I persuaded myself that there, at least, I was safe. When I was overcome by panic — a flower that opened its petals slowly, just above my navel — I would stare out across the lake. You could see a village from the Windsor’s gardens. Barely five kilometers away, straight ahead. You could swim that far. At night, in a small motorboat, the trip would take about twenty minutes. For sure. I tried to calm down. I whispered to myself, articulating each syllable: “At night, in a little motorboat …” That made everything better, and I went back to reading my novel or some innocuous magazine. (I’d forbidden myself to read newspapers or listen to radio bulletins. Every time I went to the movies, I took care to arrive after the newsreel.) No, it was best to avoid knowing anything about the fate of the world. Best not to
aggravate that fear, that feeling of imminent disaster. Concentrate on trivialities: fashion, literature, cinema, variety shows. Stretch out on the long deck chairs, close your eyes, and relax. Above all, relax. Forget. Right?

Toward the end of the afternoon, I’d go down into the town. I’d sit on a bench on Avenue d’Albigny and observe all the lakeshore activity, the traffic of sailboats and paddleboats. It was comforting. The foliage of the plane trees overhead protected me. Then I’d proceed on my way, stepping slowly and cautiously. In the Taverne on Place du Pâquier, I’d always choose a table at the back of the terrace and always order a Campari and soda. And I’d contemplate all the young people around me, seeing that I was, after all, one myself. They became more and more numerous as the night went on. I can still hear their laughter, and I remember how their hair fell over their eyes. The girls wore pirate pants and gingham shorts. The boys affected blazers with crests, open-necked shirts, and scarves. Their hair was cut short in the style called
rond-point
. They were making plans for their parties. The girls attended them in tight-waisted dresses with loose, baggy skirts and ballet shoes. The young men, well behaved and romantic, would be sent to Algeria. Not me.

At eight o’clock, I went back to the Lindens for dinner. The boardinghouse, whose exterior reminded me of a hunting lodge, welcomed about a dozen regular customers each summer. They were all over sixty, and my presence irritated them at first. But I breathed with great discretion. By means of scanty gestures, deliberately lifeless eyes, and
a set face — blinking as little as possible — I strove to avoid aggravating an already precarious situation. They recognized my goodwill, and I think that in the end they looked on me more favorably.

We took our meals in a rustic Savoy-style dining room. I could have conversed with my nearest neighbors, a dapper elderly couple from Paris, but certain hints suggested that the man was a former police inspector. The other tables were also occupied by couples, except for a gentleman with a thin mustache and a spaniel face who gave the impression of having been abandoned there. From time to time, through the hubbub of conversations, I could hear his hiccups, brief outbursts like barks. The guests would move into the lounge and sigh as they sat down on the cretonne-covered armchairs. Madame Buffaz, the proprietress of the Lindens, would serve herbal tea or some after-dinner drink. The women would talk among themselves. The dog-faced gentleman, sitting off to one side, would sadly light a Havana cigar and observe the game.

I would have gladly remained among them, in the soft, soothing light of lamps with salmon-pink silk shades, but I would have had to talk to them or play canasta. Would they have allowed me to stay, I wonder, if I had just sat there unspeaking and watched them? I went back down into the town. At exactly nine fifteen — right after the newsreel — I entered the Regent cinema, or sometimes I chose the Casino, where the theater was more elegant and more comfortable. I’ve found one of the Regent’s old schedules for that summer:

I’d really love to see some reels from those old films.

After the movie, I’d go back to the Taverne and drink another Campari. By that time, midnight, the young people had deserted it. They must have been dancing somewhere else. I contemplated all those chairs, those empty tables, and the waiters who were taking in the umbrellas. I stared at the big illuminated fountain on the other side of the square, in front of the entrance to the Casino. It changed color constantly. I amused myself by counting how many times it turned green. As good a pastime as any, don’t you think? Once, twice, three times. When my count reached fifty-three, I’d get up, but mostly I didn’t even bother to play that game. I’d go off into a dream, taking mechanical sips of my drink. Do you remember Lisbon during the war? All those guys slumping in the bars and lobby of the Aviz Hotel, with their suitcases and their steamer trunks, waiting for an ocean liner that never came? Well, twenty years later, I had a feeling I was one of those guys.

On the rare occasions when I wore my flannel suit and my only tie (an American had given it to me; it was navy blue, decorated with fleurs-de-lis, and sewn on the back was a label with the words “International Bar Fly.” I would later learn that this was a secret society for alcoholics. Thanks to that tie, they could recognize one another and perform small services if needed), I might step into the Casino and stand on the threshold of the Brummel Lounge, watching the people dance. They were generally between thirty and sixty years old, but sometimes a younger girl could be seen among them, in the company of a tall, slim fiftyish man. The clientele was international and rather stylish, and they’d be swaying to popular Italian hits or Jamaican calypso tunes. Later I’d go upstairs to the gaming rooms. Often enough, someone would win a serious jackpot. The most extravagant players came from quite nearby in Switzerland. I remember a very stiff Egyptian with glossy red hair and gazelle eyes who would pensively stroke his English officer’s mustache with one forefinger. He played with five-million-franc gaming plaques and was said to be King Farouk’s cousin.

I’d be relieved to find myself in the open air. I would go back to Carabacel, walking slowly along Avenue d’Albigny. I’ve never known nights so lovely, so crystal clear as those were. The sparkling lights of the lakeside villas dazzled me, and I sensed something musical in them, like a saxophone or trumpet solo. I could also perceive the very soft, immaterial rustling of the plane trees on the avenue. I’d wait for the last cable car, sitting on the iron bench in the chalet. The room was lit only by a night-light, and I’d let myself slip into that purplish semidarkness with a feeling of total
confidence. What was there for me to fear? The noise of war, the din of the world would have had to pass through a wall of cotton wool to reach this holiday oasis. And who would have ever thought of coming to look for me among these distinguished summer vacationers?

I got off at the first stop, Saint-Charles-Carabacel, and the now empty cable car continued its climb. It looked like a big, shiny worm.

Back at the Lindens, I’d take off my moccasins and tiptoe down the hall, because old folks are light sleepers.

She was sitting in the lobby of the Hermitage, settled on one of the big sofas in the back and not taking her eyes off the revolving door, as if waiting for someone. My armchair was only two or three meters away, and I could see her profile.

Auburn hair. Green shantung dress. And the stiletto-heeled shoes women wore. White.

A dog lay at her feet. From time to time, he yawned and stretched. He was a huge, lethargic Great Dane. He had a white coat with black patches. Green, red, white, black. The combination of colors affected me with a kind of numbness. How did I wind up next to her on the sofa? Did the Great Dane perhaps serve as a go-between, lumbering up to me lazily so he could sniff me?

I noticed that she had green eyes and very light freckles, and that she was a little older than me.

That same morning, we walked in the hotel gardens. The dog led the way. We followed him along a path that ran under a canopy of clematis with big blue and purple flowers. I pushed aside hanging clusters of laburnum; we skirted lawns and privet hedges. There were, if I recall correctly, some rock plants of various frosty hues, some pink hawthorn blossoms, a flight of steps bordered with empty basins. And the immense bed of yellow, red, and white
dahlias. We leaned on the balustrade and looked at the lake below us.

I’ve never been given to know exactly what she thought of me in the course of that first encounter. Maybe she took me for a bored rich boy, some millionaire’s son. In any case, what amused her was the monocle I wore on my left eye to read, not out of foppishness or affectation but because my vision was very much worse in that eye than in the other.

We’re not talking. I can hear the whisper of water from a sprinkler in the middle of the nearest lawn. Someone’s coming toward us down the stairs, a man whose pale yellow suit I spotted from some distance away. He waves to us. He’s wearing sunglasses and wiping his brow. She introduces him to me as René Meinthe. He corrects her at once: “Doctor Meinthe,” stressing both syllables of the word “doctor.” And he smiles, but with a grimace. It’s my turn to introduce myself: Victor Chmara. That’s the name I used on the registration form at the Lindens.

“You’re a friend of Yvonne’s?”

She answers that she’s just met me in the lobby of the Hermitage, and that I use a monocle to read. This obviously amuses her no end. She asks me to put on my monocle to show Dr. Meinthe. I comply. “Very good,” says Meinthe, nodding and looking pensive.

So her name was Yvonne. And her family name? I’ve forgotten it. I conclude that twelve years suffice for you to forget the legal name of people who have mattered in your life. It was a pleasant name, very French, something like: Coudreuse, Jacquet, Lebon, Mouraille, Vincent, Gerbault … 

At first sight, René Meinthe seemed older than we were. Around thirty. Medium height. He had a round, nervous face and wore his blond hair combed back.

We returned to the hotel through a part of the garden I wasn’t familiar with. The gravel paths were rectilinear, the lawns symmetrical and laid out in picturesque English style. Around each of them were flamboyant beds of begonias or geraniums. And here as well, there was the soft, reassuring whisper of the sprinklers. I thought about the Tuileries of my childhood. Meinthe proposed that we have a drink and then go to lunch at the Sporting Club.