“I don’t know,” said Chirac. He was weeping like a child. And he sang out: “Victory! To Berlin! Victory!”
V
Sophia walked alone, with tired limbs, up the damaged oak stairs to the flat. Chirac had decided that, in the circumstances of the victory, he would do well to go to the offices of his paper rather earlier than usual. He had brought her back to the Rue Breda. They had taken leave of each other in a sort of dream or general enchantment due to their participation in the vast national delirium which somehow dominated individual feelings. They did not define their relations. They had been conscious only of emotion.
The stairs, which smelt of damp even in summer, disgusted Sophia. She thought of the flat with horror and longed for green places and luxury. On the landing were two stoutish, ill-dressed men, of middle age, apparently waiting. Sophia found her key and opened the door.
“Pardon, madame!” said one of the men, raising his hat, and they both pushed into the flat after her. They stared, puzzled, at the strips of paper pasted on the doors.
“What do you want?” she asked haughtily. She was very frightened. The extraordinary interruption brought her down with a shock to the scale of the individual.
“I am the concierge,” said the man who had addressed her. He had the air of a superior artisan. “It was my wife who spoke to you this afternoon. This,” pointing to his companion, “this is the law. I regret it, but ...”
The law saluted and shut the front door. Like the concierge, the law emitted an odour—the odour of uncleanliness on a hot August day.
“The rent?” exclaimed Sophia.
“No, madame, not the rent: the furniture!”