Dimanche and Other Stories Read Online Free Page B

and wearing jewelry that’s far too grown-up for them. Christiane is so different!”
    Christiane, surrounded by her friends, was about to leave. Her mother gestured to her to wait. But the girl was glancing around her with the hard, triumphant look of a young woman who views the world as a mirror in which she sees only her own image, made lovelier by the interest or desire of a man; in Christiane’s eyes Mme. Boehmer, standing among the other mothers, was simply a pale, calm shadow, surrounded by other shadows.
    Nevertheless, Mme. Boehmer touched her on the arm.
    “Are you going home, sweetheart?”
    “No, Mama, we’re finishing the evening at Marie-Claude’s.”
    Mme. Boehmer gave a faint sigh.
    “Oh? It’s two o’clock in the morning, Cri-Cri …”
    “I know,” Christiane said impatiently. She added in a mocking tone, “I’m not seven anymore, Mama, darling,” and she bent to kiss her mother’s head with a birdlike peck.
    Her friends treated Mme. Boehmer with the teasing condescension due to her age, her position as a mother, and her reputation as a simple soul, a good sort; although this was tempered by envious respect, for theglory of Boehmer Sewing Machines was reflected on the dull, breathless old woman in her plain black dress. One of the girls thought to herself, as she took Christiane’s arm, “The rich old bag!”
    Smiling, she asked, “Cri-Cri, are you going to meet Gerald? Do you want me to leave with you so your mother doesn’t notice anything?”
    Christiane shrugged her beautiful shoulders, still gilded from the sunny beach at the Lido. “What a silly idea! I’ve got mother well trained, you know. Anyway, my parents know I’m engaged to Jerry and I’m twenty-two, after all.”
    It was snowing outside. The trees in the Champ de Mars were hardly visible, dissolving into a white, icy mist, and every streetlight shone rosily through a halo of frost. Christiane started her car and drove off. She had rolled down the window; the wind blew snowflakes onto her hair and they melted into big, cold, heavy drops. She passed a group of men wearing pink paper hats. “How unspeakably vulgar these public holidays are,” Christiane thought. “This time next year, Gerald and I will be in Saint Moritz.”
    She would often plan six months ahead, saying in her cold, sharp young voice, “In September, I’ll be doing this; in March it’ll be that. In June I’ll be at the Cowes Regatta, then Cannes for the summer.” Mme. Boehmer would murmur, “As long as everything goes to plan between now and then, Cri-Cri. Nothing is certain inthis life, my poor child.” But Christiane would reply, “Your generation didn’t know how to want things, Mama. You just have to know what you want.” In English, she would add, “Make up your mind and stick to it. That’s all.”
    She crossed the Seine; a very faint lilac light appeared in the east. It was late. Gerald was waiting for her in the little bar in the Rue du Mont Thabor; they often met in this discreet and, at certain times, deserted spot.
    As she approached their meeting place, her heart pounded against her ribs as usual. When she thought about him, she sometimes muttered hesitantly to herself, “Love?” This was said in the same way that you might tentatively mouth the name of a passerby you think you have recognized. Gerald had been putting off the official announcement of their engagement for two years. For the first year he had cleverly given their relationship a tinge of anguish and uncertainty that both pleased and annoyed her—and added a secret stab of pain to her passion for him.
    She knew he was not ready to break off a long-standing affair. She accepted the situation with the clear-sightedness of her age, the clear-sightedness that some people mistakenly think is blindness, but it is only the young who can treat life and love like a game, because they have never been defeated or had to face cold reality.
    Gerald, Jerry, Gérard Dubouquet was a