The Counterfeiters by André Gide Read Free Book Online Page B

it, but the whole body moves with it. He seizes the other arm, which seems a little less rigid. Gontran almost succeeds in putting the hand in the proper place. He takes the crucifix and tries to slip it between the fingers and the thumb, but the contact of the cold flesh turns him sick. He thinks he is going to faint. He has a mind to call Séraphine back. He gives up everything—the crucifix, which drops aslant on the tumbled sheet, andthe lifeless arm, which falls back again into its first position; then, through the depths of the funereal silence, he suddenly hears a rough and brutal “God damn!” which fills him with terror, as if someone else … He turns round—but no! he is alone. It was from his own lips, from his own heart, that that resounding curse broke forth—his, who until to-day has never uttered an oath! Then he sits down and plunges again into his reading.

V :
Vincent Meets Passavant at Lady Griffith’s
    C’était une âme et un corps où n’entrait jamais l’aiguillon
.
    S AINTE -B EUVE .
    Lilian half sat up and put the tips of her fingers on Robert’s chestnut hair. “Take care, my dear. You are hardly thirty yet and you’re beginning to get thin on the top. Baldness wouldn’t be at all becoming to you. You take life too seriously.”
    Robert raised his face and looked at her, smiling. “Not when I am with you, I assure you.”
    “Did you tell Molinier to come?”
    “Yes, as you asked me to.”
    “And … you lent him money?”
    “Five thousand francs, as I told you … and he’ll lose it, like the rest.”
    “Why should he lose it?”
    “He’s bound to. I saw him the first evening. He plays anyhow.”
    “He’s had time to learn.… Will you make a bet that to-night he’ll win?”
    “If you like.”
    “Oh, please don’t take it as a penance. I like people to do what they do willingly.”
    “Don’t be cross. Agreed then. If he wins, he’ll pay the money back to you. But if he loses, it’s you who’ll pay me. Is that all right?”
    She pressed a bell.
    “Bring a bottle of Tokay and three glasses, please.… And if he comes back with the five thousand and no more—he shall keep it, eh? If he neither loses nor wins.… ”
    “That’s unheard of. It’s odd what an interest you take in him.”
    “It’s odd that you don’t think him interesting.”
    “You think him interesting because you’re in love with him.”
    “Yes, my dear boy, that’s true. One doesn’t mind admitting that to
you
. But that’s not the reason he interests me. On the contrary—as a rule, when my head’s attracted, the rest of me turns cold.”
    A servant came in with wine and glasses on a tray.
    “First of all let’s seal our bet, and afterwards we’ll have another glass in honour of the winner.”
    The servant poured out the wine and they drank to each other.
    “Personally, I think your Vincent a bore.”
    “Oh, ‘my Vincent’!… As if it hadn’t been you who brought him here! And then, I advise you not to go repeating everywhere that you think him a bore. Your reason for frequenting him would be too obvious.”
    Robert turned a little to put his lips on Lilian’s bare foot; she drew it away quickly and covered it with her fan.
    “Must I blush?” said he.
    “It’s not worthwhile trying as far as I am concerned. You couldn’t succeed.”
    She emptied her glass, and then:
    “D’you know what, my dear friend? You have all the qualities of a man of letters—you are vain, hypocritical, fickle, selfish.… ”
    “You are too flattering!”
    “Yes; that’s all very charming—but you’ll never be a good novelist.”
    “Because?”
    “Because you don’t know how to listen.”
    “It seems to me I’m listening admirably.”
    “Pooh!
He
isn’t a writer and he listens a great deal better. But when we are together,
I
am the one to listen.”
    “He hardly knows how to speak.”
    “That’s because you never stop talking yourself.”
    “I know everything he’s going