Hotel du Lac Read online

  She rather wished that she had not accepted his invitation, but, coming as it did after her fruitless day with Monica, it had seemed attractive. There was, moreover, a considerable force of will hidden behind Mr Neville’s correctly tailored persona, and Edith had found it difficult to dissuade him from his original purpose. This banal and inappropriate excursion seemed to her almost perverse in its lack of attractions; she had supposed that they might be going on another walk, a ruminative mode that suited her even when laced with the sort of anarchic suggestion for which Mr Neville had, in her eyes, become mildly precious. But no, he had forced her on to this terrible boat, this almost deserted and pilotless vessel, from which there was no hope of rescue; she saw them drifting, their aimlessness raised to almost mythological status, into ever thicker mists, while real people, on the shore, went on with their real lives, indifferent to this ghost ship which seemed, to Edith, almost to have passed out of normal existence. For this reason she clung rather tightly to Mr Neville’s arm, for, although himself a curiously mythological personage, he nevertheless managed to represent a most tangible reality.

  Yet slowly, and perhaps because Mr Neville obligingly remained silent, her nerves yielded to the prevailing mournful calm, and as the landing stage at Ouchy began to materialize, she was able to take a deep breath and to relax her tight hold on Mr Neville’s impeccable greenish sleeve.

  ‘There,’ he said, as they stepped out into a lakeside restaurant surrounded by potted hydrangeas. ‘That wasn’t too bad, was it?’

  ‘I am actually quite glad to be surrounded by all these waiters and bottles and millionaires,’ Edith confessed. ‘At least I assume they are millionaires?’

  ‘That is what they would like you to assume, certainly. And if money talks, as it is supposed to, then they are certainly making the right amount of noise.’

  He settled her at a table in the shade of a striped awning, picked up the menu which an attentive waiter had immediately placed before him, and said, ‘I should have the duck if I were you.’

  Edith ignored him. ‘I lost my bearings out there, I think. I felt as if we might not be allowed back.’

  ‘Is there so much to go back to?’ enquired Mr Neville. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry. Perhaps that was impertinent. Please forgive me. You may not be fascinating, Edith, but you certainly know how to make a man feel uncomfortable.’

  Edith smiled demurely. ‘Am I to take that as a compliment?’ she asked.

  Mr Neville rewarded her with a cold look. ‘That is the sort of remark I associate with a lesser woman. You are unsettling. Simply leave it at that. You don’t have to dimple and bridle, like an ingénue. Am I to take that as a compliment, indeed. I hope you are not going to turn into the kind of woman who leans across the table, props her chin in her hand, and says, “What are you thinking?” ’

  ‘All right, all right,’ said Edith, with a sudden return of joviality. ‘I am not here to pass tests, you know. I am supposed to be enjoying myself.’

  ‘You will find that the one does not preclude the other,’ said Mr Neville, his ambiguous smile hovering around his mouth. But he ordered a fine lunch, and as the duck was placed before her, he was glad to see her expression brighten and her colour return. His own duck despatched by means of a few expertly calculated incisions, he leaned back to light a cigar. A weak sun emerged. Edith sat still and lifted her face, idle now, and in no hurry.

  ‘Talking of going back,’ said Mr Neville, ‘what did you have in mind? I do not mean back to the hotel; that is inevitable. I mean back to your ordinary life. I only ask,’ he added, ‘because I myself must leave at the weekend.’

  Edith’s smile faded. The thought of going home, or rather, back, would have to be faced, but she found herself unwilling to contemplate taking so decisive an action. This curious interlude in her life, uncomfortable though it was, had relieved her of the necessity of thinking about what was to come. And this moment, becalmed on this stone-floored platform, at this agreeable open-air restaurant, with a companion of really unusual character and perception, had had the further result of enabling her successfully to postpone any deeper thoughts.

  Tilted back in his chair, Mr Neville watched her face. ‘Let me see,’ he said mildly. ‘Let me see if I can imagine what your life is like. You live in London. You have a comfortable income. You go to drinks parties and dinner parties and publishers’ parties. You do not really enjoy any of this. Although people are glad to see you, you lack companions of first resort. You come home alone. You are fussy about your house. You have had lovers but not half as many as your friends have had; they, of course, credit you with none at all and worry about you rather ostentatiously. You are aware of this. And yet you have a secret life, Edith. Although only too obviously incorruptible, you are not what you seem.’

  Edith sat very still.

  Mr Neville deposited the ash of his cigar carefully in the ashtray.

  ‘Of course, you will say that this is none of my business. I would say, simply, that it does not concern me. Any more than my diversions need concern you. Whatever arrangements we may come to must leave these considerations scrupulously unexamined.’

  ‘Arrangements?’ echoed Edith.

  Mr Neville sat forward and put his hands on the table. He seemed, suddenly, somewhat younger and less controlled than usual. It had been easy to think of him as a wealthy man in his fifties, fastidious, careful, leisured, attractive in a bloodless sort of way, the kind of man who gave great thought to his way of life, a man in whom appetite might turn to some anodyne hobby, the collecting of drypoint etchings or the tracing of his own family tree. The kind of man who would undoubtedly have a fine library but whom it was somehow difficult to imagine in any other room of a house.

  ‘I think you should marry me, Edith,’ he said.

  She stared at him, her eyes widening in disbelief.

  ‘Let me explain,’ he said, rather hurriedly, taking a firm grip on his composure. ‘I am not a romantic youth. I am in fact extremely discriminating. I have a small estate and a very fine house, Regency Gothic, a really beautiful example. And I have a rather well-known collection of famille rose dishes. I am sure you love beautiful things.’

  ‘You are wrong,’ she said, her voice cold. ‘I do not love things at all.’

  ‘I have a lot of business overseas,’ he went on, ignoring her. ‘And I like to entertain. I am away a certain amount of the time. But I dislike having to come back to a house only occupied by the couple who live in it when I am not there. You would fit perfectly into that setting.’

  A terrible silence installed itself between them. Edith concentrated her attention on the bill, fluttering unnoticed under an ashtray. When she spoke her voice was unsteady.

  ‘You make it sound like a job specification,’ she said. ‘And I have not applied for the job.’

  ‘Edith, what else will you do? Will you too go back to an empty house?’

  She shook her head, wordless.

  ‘You see,’ he went on, ‘I cannot afford another scandal. My wife’s adventure made me look a laughing stock. I thought I could sit it out with dignity, but dignity doesn’t help. Rather the opposite. People seem to want you to break down. However, that’s all in the past. I need a wife, and I need a wife whom I can trust. It has not been easy for me.’

  ‘And you are not making it easy for me,’ she said.

  ‘I am making it easier for you. I have watched you, trying to talk to those women. You are desolate. And without the sort of self-love which I have been urging on you, you are never going to learn the rules, or you are going to learn them too late and become bitter. And when you think you are alone, your expression is full of sorrow. You face a life of exile of one sort or another.’

  ‘But why should you think me such a hopeless case?’

  ‘You are a lady, Edith. They are rather out of fashion these days, as you may have noticed. As my wife, you will do very well. Unmarried, I’m afraid you will soon look a bit of a fool.’

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nbsp; She studied him sadly. ‘And what will I do in your fine house, when you are away?’ she asked. And when you are not away, she thought, but kept the thought to herself.

  ‘Whatever you do now, only better. You may write, if you want to. In fact, you may begin to write rather better than you ever thought you could. Edith Neville is a fine name for an author. You will have a social position, which you need. You will gain confidence, sophistication. And you will have the satisfaction of knowing that you are doing me credit. You are not the sort of woman of whom men are afraid, hysterics who behave as though they are the constant object of scandal or desire, who boast of their conquests and their performance, and who think they can do anything so long as they entertain their friends and keep a minimal bargain with their husbands.’

  ‘Women too are afraid of that sort of woman,’ murmured Edith.

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘Most women are that sort of woman.’

  She looked up at him. ‘But I thought that men preferred that kind of woman. I thought that they despised the sort of conjugal peace that you prescribe for me.’

  ‘In a sense, yes,’ he replied. ‘Men do like that kind of woman. They feel they are missing out if they get anything that is less than tricky and fantastic; they like the danger of that sort of attachment. They like the feeling that they have had to fight other men for possession. That is what it is all about, really. Knocking other men down. It is only when those other men get up and start fighting for possession all over again that they realize how fragile, how tiring, that particular kind of partnership is. One gets no work done.’

  ‘Again you are paying me the tremendous compli­ment of assuming that no one else will want me, ever.’

  ‘I am paying you the compliment of assuming that you know the difference between flirtation and fidelity. I am paying you the compliment of assuming that you will never indulge in the sort of gossipy indiscretions that so discredit a man. I am paying you the compliment of believing that you will not shame me, will not ridicule me, will not hurt my feelings. Do you realize how hard it is for a man to own up to being hurt in that way? I simply cannot afford to let it happen again.’

  ‘And yet the other day you were preaching a doctrine of selfishness. Centrality was your word. How is that to be shared?’

  ‘Much more easily than you think. I am not asking you to lose all for love. I am asking you to recognize your own true self-interest. I am simply telling you what you may already have begun to suspect: that modesty and merit are very poor cards to hold. I am proposing a partnership of the most enlightened kind. A partnership based on esteem, if you like. Also out of fashion, by the way. If you wish to take a lover, that is your concern, so long as you arrange it in a civilized manner.’

  ‘And if you …’

  ‘The same applies, of course. For me, now, that would always be a trivial matter. You would not hear of it nor need you care about it. The union between us would be one of shared interests, of truthful discourse. Of companionship. To me, now, these are the important things. And for you they should be important. Think, Edith. Have you not, at some time in your well-behaved life, desired vindication? Are you not tired of being polite to rude people?’

  Edith bowed her head.

  ‘You will be able to entertain your friends, of course. And you will find that they treat you quite differently. This comes back to what I was saying before. You will find that you can behave as badly as you like. As badly as everybody else likes, too. That is the way of the world. And you will be respected for it. People will at last feel comfortable with you. You are lonely, Edith.’

  After a long pause she looked up and said, ‘It’s getting cold. Shall we go back?’

  The lake steamer had taken on board a party of schoolchildren, very young, some of whose heads only reached to just above the guard rail. They were not given to excess or noise, and once the ship had left the shore they were summoned into the glassed-off observation lounge by their teacher for some sort of lesson. Obediently, they turned like swallows and left Edith and Mr Neville alone on deck.

  It was colder now and the afternoon was fading. A little wind had blown up, forerunner of colder winds to come, bringing with it the thought of winter. Edith seemed to see her house, shut up, no fires lit, dust settling, letters unopened on the mat, the windows dirty, the rooms airless, neglected, old smells of food clinging to the curtains. And herself forgotten, the telephone not ringing. Crossed off the lists of invitations to publishers’ parties by brisk young secretaries impatient at not getting any response. Her agent, kind Harold, writing her off with a shake of the head. And of David, what news? If she went back, could she bear to find out how he felt, whether he would welcome her return? And if he were not there? Where would she find him? Anything might have happened to him in her absence; perhaps he was on holiday, was ill, was dead. Or perhaps he was quite happy with things as they were. The wind tore at her hair and with a gesture of anguish she pulled it loose from its pins and let it stream across her face. Is it true? she thought. Was I the sort of placid faithful woman who could not keep his interest? Was I simply unusual and discreet, the sort who can be relied upon not to make a fuss, such a rest from his tricky and fantastic and provocative wife? Was I simply a rather touching interlude for him, or did he think me far more practised than I was? Did he assume that I was doing the same thing, with the same degree of selfishness, as he was?

  ‘Edith’, said Mr Neville. ‘Please don’t cry. I cannot bear to see a woman cry; it makes me want to hit her. Please, Edith. Here, take my handkerchief. Edith. Let me wipe your eyes. Your eyes are almost silver. Did you know that? Come.’

  For the first time she rested against him and cried herself into a state of weariness. She closed her eyes and stayed leaning on his shoulder, steadied by his arm.

  ‘You are very thin,’ he said. ‘I am afraid that I might break you in half. But there will be time to worry about that later.’

  When she straightened up and stood with her hands on the rail, she saw that it was already dusk, or rather an afternoon twilight that would deepen impercep­tibly into night. On the opposite shore she could make out lights, lights that seemed almost welcoming now: the lights of the Hotel du Lac.

  They leaned against the rail, not speaking. When the landing stage came into view, he turned to her, but she held up her hand for him to be silent. The children, once more marshalled on the deck by their teacher, must be untouched by the miasma of these adult considerations. As they trooped off, their shoes pattering on the wooden boards, Edith and Mr Ne­ville remained standing silently at the rail, facing the shore.

  ‘So,’ she said, after a long silence. ‘I am to live in your house – Regency Gothic; a fine example – along with your famille rose dishes. I am to be air-lifted out of my present life, as if a wand had been waved. I am to become sophisticated, relaxed, worldly, and dis­creet. I am to provide that conjugal calm that will ensure that your feelings will never be hurt again.’

  ‘And yours,’ he said. ‘And yours.’

  ‘I don’t love you. Does that bother you?’

  ‘No. It reassures me. I do not want the burden of your feelings. All this can be managed without ro­mantic expectations.’

  Edith turned to him. Her hair blew in eddies round her head, her eyes were grave, her mouth bitter.

  ‘And you don’t love me?’

  He smiled, this time sadly and without ambiguity.

  ‘No, I don’t love you. But you have got under my guard. You have moved and touched me, in a way in which I no longer care to be moved and touched. You are like a nerve that I had managed to deaden, and I am annoyed to find it coming to life. I shall do my utmost to kill it off again as soon as possible. After all, I am not in the business of losing my centrality. We must get off, Edith. Give me your hand.’

  They walked in silence, hand in hand, over the soft wooden boards of the landing stage and on to the gravel path. Now the mist was coming down again, with the dusk, blurring the street lamps, veiling
the everyday sounds. The modest evening traffic was almost over, and a chill spread from the untenanted lake behind them.

  ‘I may have to think about this,’ she said eventually.

  ‘Not too long, I hope. I do not intend to make a habit of proposing to you. You will have to get your skates on, if we are to leave by the weekend.’

  She glanced up at him, surprised by the new jocularity in his voice. It seemed to her that he had already effected such repairs to his self-esteem as he deemed necessary, and she was a little encouraged by the rapidity with which this had been achieved.

  ‘May I ask one more question?’ she said.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Why me?’

  This time his smile was ambiguous again, ironic, courteous.

  ‘Perhaps because you are harder to catch than the others,’ he replied.