She had forgotten her invitation when, on the following Sunday, he came to recall it to her; and the joyous surprise with which she greeted him was not assumed. But Julien who, for a week, had been thinking of nothing but this moment, did not see the surprise and saw only the joy. And his own increased. The weather was very bad. Annette had not thought of going out this afternoon. As she was not expecting anybody; she was in négligé, and so was the apartment. The baby had been playing there. It is useless to have, as Annette had, a love of order; children oblige one to give it up, along with so many fine plans that one has formed without considering them. But Julien, referring everything to himself, saw in this disorder no artistic effect, but a sign of some intimacy that Annette wished to accord him. He came in with a beating heart, but with his mind made up to appear this time in an advantageous light; he assumed an air of assurance. It was not becoming to him, and Annette, who was annoyed at being surprised in this confusion, was angry because the intruder was so unceremonious. She at once became cold, and in an instant Julien's pride was broken. So they remained, each as stiff as the other, the one not daring to utter another word, the other waiting with an air of malicious hauteur.
"If you imagine, my dear boy, that I am going to help you to-day!"
And then she saw the ridiculous side of the situation. She saw with the corner of her eye the piteous look of the conqueror, and she laughed out loud. Suddenly relaxed, she resumed the comradely tone. Julien did not understand it at all: disconcerted but relieved, he too became natural again, and at last a friendly conversation sprang up between them.
Annette told him about her working life, and they confessed to one another that they were not made for their occupations. Julien was passionately interested in the science which he taught, but . . .
"They can't follow me! They look at me with their dull eyes blinking with sleep; there are hardly two or three who have a glimmer of understanding; the rest are a heavy mass of boredom. If you sweat blood and water, you can sometimes (not always) stir it for a moment, but it always falls back into the pond. Try to fish it out again! It's work for a well-digger. But it isn't their fault, the unhappy brats. They are just like ourselves; they are victims of the democratic mania according to which all minds absorb equally the same sum of knowledge—before the normal age when they might begin to understand! Then come the examinations, the agricultural matches, when they weigh these products of ours who are crammed with a mixture of lame words and formless notions. Most of these they hastily disgorge immediately afterwards, and they are disgusted with learning for the rest of their lives."
"Now I," said Annette, laughing, "like children very much, yes, even the most unattractive ones. I am not indifferent to any of them. I should like to have them all, I should like to hug them all. But one has to limit oneself. Isn't that so? It's enough to have one. . . ."
(She pointed to the disorderly room, but he did not understand and smiled stupidly.)
"It's a pity! When I see one who pleases me, I would like to steal him. And they all give me pleasure. There is something fresh, an infinite hope, even in the ugliest. . . . But what can I do with them? And what can they do with me? I see so little of them. They are only in my hands for an hour. And then I run to the others. And my little ones also run from hand to hand. What one hand has done the other undoes. Nothing sticks. These little formless souls, these little soulless forms, who dance the Boston and the two-step. We run about. Everyone runs about. This life is a race-course. No one ever stops. People die, they join the dead. Ah, what unhappy souls, never granting themselves a day to collect their thoughts! And they don't grant us one either, we who would so like to have it!"
Julien understood her. He had no need to learn the value of a retreat, the horror of the tumultuous world. And their understanding increased when Annette said that fortunately, in the midst of the flood, there were still a few islets where one could take refuge, the beautiful books of the poets and especially music. The poets had little attraction for Julien; their language was beyond him. He had the strange distrust of it which is common in minds that love thought and often have their own poetry, but do not perceive the deep vibrations of the music of words. The other music, the language of sounds, is more accessible to them. Julien loved it. Unfortunately, he lacked the time and the means to go and hear it.
"I lack them too," said Annette. "But I go just the same."