Girl at the Lion D'Or by Sebastian Faulks Read Free Book Online Page A

lowered his head and raised his eyebrows. By his standards this was a rebuke. ‘Especially,’ he added, ‘when the gentleman still has a full glass.’
    He had gone before she could think of a reply.
    Anne was polishing glasses when the door from the street opened and Mattlin’s curly head was revealed from beneath his trilby. Hartmann went to join him at the bar and, as she ferried drinks to and from the tables, she heard only parts of their conversation. It concerned Mattlin’s reason for leaving his job in Paris and returning to live in Janvilliers. He seemed evasive.
    Anne was installed again behind the bar when the jaunty figure of Roussel came in and made his way over to join them.
    ‘My benefactors!’ he said. ‘Let me buy you a drink.’
    ‘Benefactors?’ said Hartmann.
    ‘Anyone who gives me work these days is a benefactor. I appreciate it, gentlemen.’
    ‘Has Mattlin given you work too?’
    Roussel looked puzzled. ‘But I thought –’
    Mattlin interrupted. ‘Have a drink.’
    ‘Ah, I see,’ said Roussel, tapping the side of his nose. ‘Shan’t say another word. Not the done thing, eh?’
    ‘Quite.’
    Hartmann looked quizzically at both men, wondering what they meant. He knew Mattlin well enough to be aware that his versions of events were, to put it kindly, individual, and his curiosity was therefore aroused. Both men, however, seemed to want the conversation closed and Hartmann thought it would seem churlish to press them. Mattlin quickly raised the topic of the German intrusion into the Rhineland, a subject of which the newspapers were full.
    ‘They have broken their promise!’ Roussel exclaimed. ‘Did all our men die for nothing at Verdun?’
    Mattlin fuelled his indignation with deft promptings and Hartmann turned once more to the bar.
    Anne, meanwhile, had had some moments to regain her composure. All she really wanted now was to limit her embarrassment by doing her job unobtrusively and not making a fool of herself again. But a more powerful desire impelled her to engage Hartmann once more in conversation, forcing her to adopt a brittle enthusiasm and an insouciance she didn’t feel.
    As Mattlin and Roussel moved further down the bar, she said to Hartmann, ‘Is the work going well on your house?’
    ‘I think so. It’s hard to tell. The men make a lot of noise and dust, so I suppose they must be doing something down there.’
    ‘And how does Madame your wife enjoy it?’ said Anne, this time confronting the name early in the proceedings.
    ‘She’s driven half mad by it, I’m afraid. She doesn’t like mess and noise. But she’s very long-suffering, and she keeps them on their toes. I think.’ He looked suddenly guilty. ‘I don’t know. I’ve not been very good about it, I’ve left it all to her. I play records on the gramophone to try to distract her.’
    ‘Do you? I used to have a gramophone, but I had to leave it in Paris when I came down here. I love music, don’t you? And dancing.’
    ‘I can hardly dance at all, I’m afraid. But I like music.’
    ‘And what do you play for her?’
    ‘Oh, anything. She likes Chopin. And Brahms, I think. And sometimes I try to make her listen to Mozart, but she hates that.’
    ‘She doesn’t like . . . well, dance music?’
    ‘You mean jazz?’
    ‘That sort of thing . . .’
    ‘Christine? Oh, I wouldn’t imagine so. Too raucous for her, I think. But is that what you like? Jazz?’
    ‘Yes, I adore it. I’ve got some records upstairs in my room. It’s silly, isn’t it? I sold the gramophone but I couldn’t bear to part with my records. And now they just sit in my drawer.’
    Anne laughed, then looked down to the glasses in her hands as a small silence came between them. Hartmann watched as her hair fell forward over her cheek.
    ‘Cheerio, then, M. Hartmann.’ It was Roussel from the door of the bar. ‘I must be going now. Got to make an early start tomorrow. Important job, don’t you know?’ He