It is almost a sacrilege to speak in a raised voice as I do and bring in so much of the outside air. "Is dinner ready, Marie, is everything ready?" Since Marie never answers, I go straight into the kitchen. Goodness, nothing done. Well, I'll have to get at the supper myself. There's still a good half-hour left, I believe.
As I hastily remove my wraps, I feel the dull pang that assails you at the sight of disorder.
There, I have the water boiling now and the cooking is well under way. I didn't know I was so quick and capable. After all, Marie's only a child.
Marie bustles about. I see her two reddish, porous, spatulate hands pounce on things, I hear the clash of utensils. Her person becomes many persons, she jostles me, moves hither and thither like a distracted tortoise, bends almost double to pick up a strainer.... To be sure the kitchen is tiny.
I speak to her as one speaks to a child. "Do you understand me, Marie? Don't be afraid, I am not unkind." The lifeless fixity of her face suddenly comes undone, her features contract. Marie was dulled by the monotonous gloom of an asylum in a distant quarter of the city. She slightly raises the heavenly blue of her eyes without fastening them on anything. I see her tenacious hatred wake up and stir. A single flash. Then her red-rimmed eyes flutter and fall; she is in order again, in the vague sort of order characteristic of things inaccessible and forlorn.
I realize she cannot understand me. To her I mean constraint, uprooting, exile, that unusualness which throws simple people out of their orbits. And though she has never been accustomed to anything else than maltreatment, neglect, and beatings, I understand.... I try to be gentler, to smile when I turn toward her, for in the end visible kindness should make itself seen.... And it would be so good to reclaim this nature, to explain everything to her, beginning at the beginning.
I recall the scene of yesterday evening. We were at table. She brought in the smoking soup-tureen at arm's length. Her heavy tread rolled like a cannon-ball upon our delight in being together, then she retreated to the kitchen like a dog slinking to its kennel. A crash of china. I jumped up.
"Something broken?"
"No, madam."
"But, Marie...."