The Little Hotel (18 page)

‘After all I have a right to have my breakfast.’

She called again to the painter, the man. Silence. What was to happen? Mrs Trollope was torn. Should she go up and reason with the old lady, help her down? Or ask ‘Madame’? No. Two persons had returned, were standing arguing, whispering outside Mrs Trollope’s room; then they softly climbed the stairs and consoled, promised. Just then there was a sound like a not-yet-heard wind. It rattled a little like the beginning of a wind against the shutters at night, without snow or rain. It was the electric motor of the new lift. It glided down, came to a stop. The Admiral said ‘Ah-ah-ah,’ in a long sigh.

The painter took her down to the dining-room. Charlie the porter stopped next to Mrs Trollope on the stairs and said to Clara who was below:

‘I am this minute telephoning Le Bon Dieu to influence her to go.’ And indeed at this moment everyone, including Mrs Trollope, was hoping the poor old woman would go; but where? She had fled from the Labour Government; Mrs Trollope knew she had no reason for this, and the whole thing made her sad; she felt more homeless than before.

Mr Wilkins was having his breakfast and reading the paper. Mrs Trollope looked in the mirror and saw all that was happening. There was a gay high-coloured French-Swiss mother with her daughter, a good-looking nervous girl of about twenty-five. Before each meal they went shopping and brought to the table a shopping-bag of vegetables. Gennaro or another brought in a pail of water, which he placed beside the table, and a basin of water, which he put on a chair beside. At the beginning of each meal the couple arrived and, standing at the table, began vigorously scrubbing, washing, rinsing and grating carrots and celery, which they ate with various uncooked leaf vegetables. A screen was placed behind their table, and the mother, while at work, looked round the room at the diners with a smiling, inviting vanity, while the daughter, embarrassed, stood with her back to the room. With the flushed mother and daughter, the red screen, the strange emotions, the table, chairs, pail and basin, the heap of vegetables, it was like a play from a distant country, performed every lunch and dinner.

Mr Wilkins said: ‘There is a vegetarian pension in town; why doesn’t she go there?’

Mrs Trollope said: ‘But perhaps they did not agree with those vegetarians; possibly they had theories of their own.’

The mother was thin, flushed, pleased; they spoke to no one. Mr Wilkins was addressing Mrs Trollope:

‘One time in the Raffles Hotel I met a chap from Poona who had a wife, a delicious creature—’

‘Oh, yes, you mean Mrs Cibolles—’

‘Don’t interrupt, Lilia; yes, Cibolles. His brother owned property in Adelaide, Australia, and he swore it was going to develop amazingly; and you remember they introduced us to a man who used to be in French West Africa.’

‘Oh, I went to the races with that man and won three times on three horses called Jehosaphat, Hosea and Hosanna, all from the same stables; that is why I picked them. And he, his name was Vidal, he had the form sheets and did not win once.’

‘Lilia, I do wish you would not interrupt. As I was saying, they gave me an introduction to a fellow from Poona who had been in gunnies you know, in Calcutta. I knew him for years and years and he said to me, “I am through with India; all the business is passing into the hands of Indians.” That is where the British Empire is now. Time to quit and I quit in time.’

Their behaviour was marital. It was incomprehensible to everyone why Mr Wilkins pretended still that they were acquaintances, cousins, travelling together. Tears came into her eyes, but she did not let him see them.

‘I must bear my troubles alone and I am not alone. Nothing can break the bond between us; but he amuses himself pretending it is not there. I am not going to ask why. The Church does not tell me, my saint does not tell me; and the Princess is right, something must be done. But I can’t do it.’

She said aloud; ‘Robert, I am going upstairs. I don’t feel well.’

‘You need exercise.’

‘What exercise do you do but walk? And my legs are short; I cannot walk so far. Perhaps I won’t see you for lunch.’

‘You must do as you please. My mother always said, Those who do not wish to eat must not be forced to. Those who are hungry will eat.’

She had not done her crossword-puzzle last night and so had not slept as well. Sometimes, in the middle of the dark hours, about three-thirty or four, she would suddenly wake and think of a word she had not been able to find. It gave her pleasure. It was a fact that, since she had started this intellectual work at night, she had done better. But some nights it did not work. She would hear, on one side, Mr Wilkins deeply asleep, since eleven, and on the other, the sleep mutterings of that strange cocoon, Madame Blaise, wrapped in her stifling room, her blankets, dressing-jacket and all the rest. Where was there anyone slightly normal, jolly, busy, such as Lilia had known in the old days? Then she had had many real friends.

Lilia slipped out of the hotel and took a walk by herself.

‘I shall take something in that other tearoom where no one I know goes. I cannot go to lunch. I am to have tea at four o’clock with Bili. I am not going down to lunch to face some page of
The Times
or
Financial Times
and see all that is going on in the mirror.’

At lunch she heard Gliesli making the noises preparatory to going down and she was not surprised to see her coming through the intermediate door.

‘Liliali, come down, dear, for lunch; you know you are hungry.’

She was hungry, even for the thin potato soup the German cook had prepared; the new French cook had not come yet. Madame Blaise, as usual, was dressed for lunch, in her old brown hat, trimmed with a fur band, her fur coat, her brown wool dress, her gloves and handbag, with new fur boots, rather pretty, halfway up her calves.

‘Gliesli dear, I am not going; I am too unhappy. I am most unhappy. Go down. I cannot face another meal with Robert reading the paper and myself looking in that big mirror. I can see everything that everyone does; and it all has nothing to do with me. I can see Mrs Powell making a big half-circle to avoid saying good day to me.’

‘Why should she? Don’t be foolish, Lilia; I need you. I have promised to go back to Basel and I am very worried. I am going to die there.’

‘Gliesli, Mrs Powell avoids me because she is a selfish stiff-necked old woman. She knows I am not married to Robert. She knows because she asked the servants; or Madame Bonnard told her. We have no friends, Gliesli, do you realize that? You and I have no real friends in the world but each other. You have a son and daughter, I have three children; but they are leading their own lives, their love has turned away from us. We are on the shelf. It is not their fault. The world is hard: life has taught them to be hard. And apart from that, I cannot face Robert again. My heart has turned against him. I am not angry with him; there is something here’ she said, pressing her heart, ‘which would never allow me to do that. But now I must leave him. For so many years I depended upon him. My own children loved him. Now it is all in the open. My children say, Where is your honour? I never thought of honour when I thought of Robert. I thought only of Robert. But now I can see he does not think of me. I tell him, “I am suffering”, and he says: “What sufferings have you? I am looking after your money: our old age is taken care of.” I suppose I made a great mistake; but I know I would make the same mistake again. What can I do, Gliesli? He told me he loved me; he did love me. I loved him. I am glad, whatever happens, that I had that; it is real. It would have been hard if I had never had that love. Everything almost melts away, when I remember that. Often before this I meant to go away and I couldn’t. But now I cannot go down and face him reading the
Financial Times.
If he loves me, Gliesli, why must he say, “She is not my wife but my cousin?” When no one cares at all? Before, there was always the excuse that my husband would not allow us to marry; but my husband allowed it. Why is it? Is it for his own pride? Is it—no, no. He is not like Mrs Powell. He was a very good businessman. Everyone respected him; perhaps they didn’t all like him. But I was so glad of him, so infatuated, I thought they were wrong. I was so happy; but then it made me happy to be with him. When it is too late, you find out he has no heart at all: he is selfish, cold, lazy. I laid my head all these years on a stone. I cannot go down and hear him say, when he lays down the paper, “You see, Lilia, how right I am when I want you to transfer your money”; and Gliesli, because he can work on my feelings and I have no plans, he is slowly engulfing all my money. Ah, Gliesli—it has broken my heart. In the end, Mr Trollope was my only friend, but only when he left me. Oh, Gliesli, my heart is crumbling; there is nothing there. It would be more honest to die than to go through this; well, I won’t go through it. I don’t know what I will do. I am not going down, Gliesli, to see Robert taking his two soups behind his newspaper, while I watch this sad lot of scarecrows that we are, in the mirror.’

Madame Blaise said: ‘Well, my dear, I must go down. I am hungry. If I don’t go now, that detestable little peasant whore will find some excuse for bringing me cold soup with her thumb in it and I don’t feel like a scene today. The doctor gave me my medicine. Why don’t you take it too, Liliali? You would not have the blues.’

‘You know I will never take those things,’ said Mrs Trollope.

‘Why don’t you and Mr Wilkins come home with me to Basel and see what my husband is doing and what Basel is like, such a hell-spot of trolls, and my husband is one. I must go; my husband will not bring me any more medicine here; so he has got me back. I don’t know what he wants me for; to kill me, I suppose. If you were there, he would not dare; or else you could see what happened and be my witness. Oh, but never mind, I shall give him a nice chunk to swallow at the end. Oh—ho; for I’m sure he’s sleeping with that ugly old creature, my servant Ermyntrud.’

‘Oh, hush, Gliesli!’

She could hear Madame Blaise’s laughter all the way down the stairs.

Robert brought her up nothing from lunch; he did not inquire after her health. He merely mentioned that Mr Pallintost seemed anxious to know about the car, and before he went to sleep he said irritably (for she had demurred):

‘Lilia, do please go and see that woman who is knocking on the wall.’

Mrs Trollope went in. The previous afternoon, Miss Chillard had gone out for a short ride in a car brought by her friends, to La Tour de Peilz. During her absence, Roger had done an incorrect thing, but one which he was forced to by her debts. He had gone in, opened her cases and found a good deal of money in them; enough to pay her bills. When Miss Chillard returned, about seven, and asked for her supper, he took it to her himself and told her what he knew: that she had the money to pay. She was indignant that her room had been entered and that he had counted her money; she threatened to call the Consul and the police. She now explained again to Mrs Trollope, asking her to call the Consul.

‘Make him listen; I know he is easy-going and does not want trouble. Shake him up. That money is for the doctors. I am going to Zermatt if I can. That is the only place where I am happy and there is only one man who understands me and makes me want to live and he is a doctor there. If I cannot pay him I cannot go, and if I cannot go back to Zermatt why should I live? I am dying now; why do they grudge me a few more months?’

But Roger had said he would insist upon her paying, he had to live too: he had to pay ten per cent of the gross every day to the previous owner, those were the difficult conditions under which we had got the hotel; and it was hard to live in winter; few skiers came to the town. If Miss Chillard did not pay, he would send for the Consul and also for the police.

‘To a woman in my condition,’ said the unfortunate woman to Mrs Trollope.

Mrs Trollope said she had an appointment for the afternoon, but she would come back to see the invalid in the evening.

‘I shall be in jail by then. I did not know the Swiss could be so cruel. The English have always been their friends and kept them going: where would they be without our custom?’ asked the sick woman, from the depths of her pillows. She was more cadaverous than ever. She had not eaten anything since the day before. Mrs Trollope said she would bring her something appetizing to eat; but she must go now.

What she did was to go into Robert and say that she must have the money in the safe. ‘I am going to buy you that car, Robert, and I am not going to bring out any more money till you deliver that parcel to me. I need the money in the safe for the car. I cannot think what possessed you, an honourable man or so I have known you, to put my money in the safe in your name.’

‘You know it was to prevent your spending it foolishly. I am here to safeguard you.’

‘Very well. I accept that. But give it to me now. I am going to see the Princess, and she and I will go and look at cars. If you do not, Robert, I will not buy the car, for I will not believe any more in your bona fides.’

To his astonishment, she insisted; and he did in the end come downstairs with her; the safe was opened and he gave her the money. He asked her for a receipt, but she refused: ‘Why ever should I give a receipt for my own money?’

‘Well, I hope you will not be foolish, Lilia. It is my money too.’

At this she flushed, said, ‘I am late already,’ and went out. Mr Wilkins went upstairs, his lips moving slightly: he had begun to talk under his breath.

Mrs Trollope had some business to do. She rarely went out alone. Although she spoke French well enough and the shop people mostly spoke good English, she did not feel grand enough, she felt she was just an ordinary little woman. When she was with Bili she always called her ‘Princess’ before the shop people; when she was with Madame Blaise she felt confident, because Madame Blaise stood no nonsense. She went shopping sometimes with someone else, an Englishwoman whom she had known for a year, who stayed in the Pension Evian, a poor place. This woman, Mrs Elliott, spoke excellent French; she wore an old tweed coat and no hat on her greying hair. When out with Mrs Elliott, Mrs Trollope was able to pretend that she spoke no French and she would say grandly, ‘Mrs Elliott, ask them if it will shrink when washed.’ Women had done this to Mrs Trollope when she was waiting for her money to come from England. This afternoon, indeed, she had made an arrangement to meet Mrs Elliott in front of the Palace Splendide in the Place St François; but as she went up the street it occurred to her that it would not do to let Mrs Elliott see how rich she was. She intended, in fact, to buy Robert a gold cigarette case which she must leave to have engraved; and the Princess had asked her to get a small cut-glass scent bottle for her handbag. Mrs Trollope decided to go up by a side-street, not to meet her poor friend, and to let the Princess make her own purchase. But Mrs Elliott had extraordinarily good sight. She saw her from the other end of the Place St François and came hurrying to her, waving her hand. Mrs Trollope pretended not to see her and turned into a jeweller’s. Mrs Elliott was still quite distant, but marked where she turned in, and came into the shop too. It is true, Mrs Trollope had foolishly said, ‘I want you to help me choose a present.’