Yes, he was a character. But if Thérèse’s view of him, at a distance, was rather highly coloured, as soon as he was with her, she took the measure of his mean soul. He seldom came to Saint Clair, but more often to Argelouse, as he did not like meeting the La Traves. In their presence, although politics were forbidden, the old stupid quarrel began the moment the soup was brought in and soon became embittered. Thérèse would have been ashamed to take part in it: she took a pride in never opening her mouth, except when they touched on the religious question. Then she rushed to Monsieur Larroque’s assistance. Everybody shouted, so much so that Aunt Clara caught a few scattered phrases, joined the mêlée and, in the raucous tones of the deaf, let loose all the fury of the hardened radical, “who knows all about what goes on in convents”; she was, Thérèse thought, really more of a believer than any of the La Traves, but she was in open war against the Almighty who had allowed her to be deaf and ugly, and to die without ever having known love nor passion. Since one day when Madame de la Trave had left the table, by common consent they avoided metaphysics. However, politics were quite enough to make them all lose their tempers; though they all, whether they belonged to the Right or the Left, were in full agreement on this essential principle: “Property is the only good thing in the world, and the ownership of land is the only thing worth living for. Must we give up anything and, if so, how much?”
Thérèse, “who had property in her blood,” was quite willing for the question to be put in that cynical way, but she hated the pretences under which the Larroques and the La Traves masked their common greed. When her father announced his “irrevocable devotion” to democracy, she would interrupt him, with “Oh, spare us that sort of thing; we are all friends here.” She said that lofty sentiments in politics made her feel sick: the horror of the class-war was not very obvious in a country where the poorest own property, and their only ambition is to own more: where the common love of land, sport, eating and drinking, draws every one together, middle-class and peasant, in the closest fellowship. Moreover, Bernard had some education: he was generally considered a very promising young man, and Thérèse even congratulated herself on the fact that he was a man one could talk to: “A good deal above the average in fact.” Such was the view she took of him until the day of her meeting with Jean Azévédo.
It was the time of year when the coolness of the night lasts through the morning: and by the early afternoon, hot as the sun had been, a faint mist foretold the dusk. The first pigeons were beginning to come over, and Bernard hardly ever came home before evening. On that day, however, after a bad night, he had gone straight off to Bordeaux to get himself examined.
“I was feeling at peace with the world,” thought Thérèse: “I was walking along the road, I forget at what time, because a woman who is going to have a baby ought to take a little exercise. I avoided the woods where shooting was going on because you have to stop every minute, whistle, and wait until you hear a shout for you to go on: but sometimes a long whistle answers yours: a flight of birds has settled among the oaks, and you must crouch down and wait. Then I came back: I was dozing in front of the fire in the drawing-room or the kitchen, and Aunt Clara was bringing me anything I wanted. I paid no more attention to the old creature, who was always droning out stories about the kitchen and the farm, than a goddess does to her serving-maid: she talked and talked so as not to have to try and listen: mostly depressing anecdotes about the peasants whom she looked after with a sort of cynical kindness: old men who could do no more than die of hunger, others condemned to work until they died, sick men with none to care for them, and women broken by toil and exhaustion. Aunt Clara quoted some of their most shocking remarks in the ingenuous rustic patois, with a sort of amusement. As a matter of fact, I was the only person she cared for, though I never even noticed her kneel down, unlace my shoes, take off my stockings, and warm my feet with her old hands.
“Balion came for orders when he was going in to Saint Clair on the following day. Aunt Clara drew up the list of commissions, and put together the prescriptions for the sick of Argelouse. ‘You will go to the chemist in the first place; Darquey will want quite the whole day to make them all up....’”
“My first meeting with Jean.... I must remember every detail: I had decided to go to that deserted shooting-hut where I used to eat my lunch with Anne and where I knew, since then, she had so loved to meet her Azévédo. No, I did not look upon it as a pilgrimage. But the pines in that neighbourhood have grown so tall that it is no longer possible to watch for pigeons there, so I ran no risk of disturbing the sportsmen. That shooting-hut was useless now, for the surrounding forest hid the horizon; the tree-tops were no longer far enough apart to reveal those broad vistas of sky against which the watcher sees the rising flights of birds. How well I remember: the October sun was still hot: I toiled along that sandy road, tormented by flies. And how heavy I felt! I longed to sit down on the mouldering bench inside the hut.”
As I opened the door a young man came out, bareheaded; at the first glance I recognised Jean Azévédo, and at first I thought I was intruding on a rendezvous, his expression looked so confused. I wanted to go away but he would not let me; it was strange that he was so intent on my remaining: ‘Not at all, please come in, Madame; I assure you that you are not disturbing me in the least.’ Why did he ask me if one could see from outside what was going on inside the hut? I was astonished that there was no one there when I went in, as he insisted. Perhaps the shepherdess had fled by another exit? But I had not heard the rustle of a single twig. He, too, had recognised me, and he was the first to mention Anne de la Trave’s name. I was sitting down; he standing up, just as in the photograph. I looked through his tussore shirt at the place where I had stuck the pin: mere curiosity, without any warmer feeling; I remembered without the slightest irritation what Anne had written to me: ‘I press my hand against the place where I can feel his heart beating ... what he calls the last caress allowed.’ Handsome? A high forehead, the velvet eyes of his race,—cheeks too large;—and, what I so dislike in young men of his age,—spots, the signs of overheated blood; a general unpleasant clamminess; and worst of all, moist palms,—which he had to wipe with a handkerchief before shaking hands. But he had fine burning eyes, and I liked his wide mouth, always a little open to display his pointed teeth, like a puppy panting with the heat.
And how did I behave? I was very strong on the family, I remember. I already tried to be very severe and accused him in grave tones, ‘of bringing distress and dissension into an honourable household.’ Heavens! how I remember his amazement, his boyish burst of laughter: ‘So you think I want to marry her? You think I aspire to that honour?’ I was astounded as I measured with a glance the abyss between Anne’s infatuation and the young man’s indifference. He defended himself vigorously: why on earth should he not yield to the charm of a delightful child? He was not aware that flirtations were forbidden, and just because there could not be the slightest question of marriage between them, this one had seemed to him quite innocuous. Of course, he had pretended to share Anne’s intentions.... And when I tried to wave all this haughtily aside, he vehemently burst out that Anne herself could bear him witness that he had been careful not to go too far; that in any case he was quite sure that Mademoiselle de la Trave owed him the only hours of true passion that she was likely to know in her dreary existence: ‘You tell me she is unhappy, Madame; but do you think that she has anything better to look forward to than this same unhappiness? I know you by reputation: I know you aren’t like the people round here, and I can talk to you frankly. Before she sets out on her dreadful voyage in one of those old houses of Saint Clair I have provided Anne with a stock of sensations and dreams,—enough to save her, perhaps, from despair and, in any case, from becoming brutalised.’ I forget if I was irritated by this shocking conceit and affectation, or even if I noticed it. As a matter of fact he spoke so quickly that at first I did not follow what he said; but my mind soon got used to his flow of speech: ‘Fancy thinking I could possibly want such a marriage; settle down in this sandy desert, or burden myself with a girl of her age in Paris? I shall always have the most delightful recollections of Anne; and at the moment, when you surprised me, I was indeed thinking of her.... But how can one tie oneself down, Madame? Each minute should bring its own joy,—and a different one.’