Джеймс Хилтон - Time And Time Again

‘Yes, he said you’d had this date for years—to take him to dinner when he was seventeen. I think that’s charming.’

‘It really began as a joke,’ said Charles, and he told of the incident with Mrs. Fuessli when Gerald was six.

‘FUESSLI, did you say?’

Charles nodded and spelt it.

‘It’s such an unusual name I wonder if they’re the same people I know. They live in Connecticut—’

‘Yes—a small place. Parson’s Corner.’

‘That’s it—they MUST be the same—Mr. Fuessli has a hardware business—’

‘—and Mrs. Fuessli’s very pretty.’

‘I’ll tell her you said so.’

‘They’re both well, I hope. Charming people. I haven’t heard from them lately.’

‘They’re fine and they’ll be so thrilled to know I’ve met you here like this.’

Palan suddenly banged his spoon on the table top like a child to whom enough attention has not been paid. ‘So you two both know the same people in America! Is that not wonderful? You will tell me now that it is a small world. But it is not. It is a big world… But I can pretend it is small too. LOOK… do you see that man out there—standing against the lamp-post pretending to read a newspaper?’ He pointed through the windows. ‘That man also is thrilled to know that I am meeting you here.’

This would never do; Charles was now convinced that Palan was drunk. He looked at his watch; thank goodness it was already past eleven. He said, calling for the bill: ‘We really mustn’t make you cut it too fine, Gerald —I’ll leave you to take care of Miss Raynor… Palan, if you’re going my way…’

To his relief Palan seemed ready enough to leave, though only after ceremonious farewells. Charles shook hands with Gerald and the girl; while he was doing this Palan grabbed the bill and tipped the waitress extravagantly and ostentatiously. Charles frowned at this climax of bad manners, but somehow, remembering his own on those several occasions at the Conference, he found that with barely a gesture of protest he could take Palan’s arm and marshal him into the street.

At the kerbside Palan said in French: ‘That ice cream is bad for the stomach. Let us go to my hotel and get some cognac.’

‘No, if you want a drink come to mine. And since you speak English why don’t we stick to that language?’

‘All right, but you come to MY hotel. It cannot be your everything— YOUR language—YOUR son’s birthday… how much more do you want? You come to MY hotel.’

Whatever reason Palan had for demanding this was a reason why Charles should not consent to it, so he said merely: ‘I think perhaps it’s too late for a drink anyhow. We both have work tomorrow.’ He hailed a taxi and gave the address of Palan’s hotel; he would drop him there on the way to the Crillon. Palan made no further mention of the drink and from this Charles concluded that his earlier insistence on having it at his hotel had been merely a whim. But of course one could never be sure. To such a level had social intercourse between accredited diplomats reached by the middle of the twentieth century.

Inside the taxi as they began the journey back to the more fashionable boulevards Palan remarked: ‘A very fine boy, M’sieur Anderson. I congratulate you.’

‘Thanks.’

‘And the girl too. She is HIS girl?’

‘Oh no—just someone he met in Switzerland. They played tennis together.’

‘But he is in love.’

‘I doubt that. Probably just a holiday acquaintance—’

‘The perfect structure for a love affair. A few days only, with goodbye at the end! It is in countless dramas, in epic poetry, in grand opera— ‘

‘I daresay, and most of them Gerald wouldn’t care for at all. He’s rather realistic, and so’s Miss Raynor, as far as I could judge.’

‘You like her?’

‘She seemed very nice.’

‘So that if your son really wanted to marry her—’

‘At SEVENTEEN?’

‘At seventeen, my friend, I was already a father… You find that hard to believe?’

‘By no means. You had also, so you say, fought in your first war. In England we try not to do things quite so early.’

‘And to balance that, you do many things late—perhaps too late.’

‘Possibly. And I’m glad to say that a great many things we don’t do at all.’ Charles shot that back as if to say: I too can bandy words, if you insist.

Palan continued: ‘I suppose you wish Gerald eventually to make un beau mariage dans le monde?’

‘I hope he’ll make a happy marriage, that’s all.’

‘You mean you would not object to an office girl as a daughter-in- law?’

‘Good heavens, no. What do you take me for—a snob?’

‘Of course—because it is one of the coefficients of power. Your country’s power is now in decline, so you are trying hard to diminish the snobbery. It will make you a very attractive people provided you do not succeed too well. I would like to discuss this further with you some day.’

‘If we had more time. I don’t recall how we got on to the subject, but —’

‘We were talking about Gerald and Miss Raynor.’

‘Since they’ll soon be catching their trains in different directions, there really isn’t much to talk about.’

‘If they DO catch those trains. My father did not catch his. He delayed too long, trying to persuade his mistress to leave the country with him —my mother, of course, had gone on ahead with the family jewels. She died at Monte Carlo twenty years later, whereas my father missed his train and—’

‘I know—you told us. But I assure you Gerald won’t miss his.’

‘How can you be sure?’

‘Well, for one reason, he has an appointment with his dentist in London tomorrow morning.’

Palan seized Charles’s hand and shook it amidst his loud guffaws. ‘My friend, it is the most perfect of all reasons. Credo quia impossibile est.’

‘Or because he said so—that’ll do for me.’ (But would it, after the lie about the boat-train?) Charles added, with extra conviction to mask his growing uncertainty: ‘They’ll catch their trains, don’t worry.’

‘And what will it prove?’

‘Does it have to prove anything?’

Palan guffawed again. ‘Anatole France put it well. “De toutes les aberrations sexuelles, la plus singuličre, c’est la chasteté”.’

Charles was amused in spite of himself. ‘You seem to have quite a range —Tertullian, Anatole France… what next, I wonder?’

‘An epigram of my own… tennis among the Alps, ice cream in Paris— bless their innocent little hearts… the Incorruptibles… whereas you and I —in our far different ways—we are the Incorrigibles.’

‘I’m not sure I know exactly what you mean.’

‘That is what makes it so funny—that in your own way you also should be so innocent. What has protected you? Are you a deeply religious man?’

Charles found this question too baffling either to be answered or resented. He said: ‘I wouldn’t say so, but if I were, I wouldn’t say so either.’

‘Then you are very rich?’

That was easy. ‘No… far from it. But I don’t see what all this has to do —’

‘Do you think the capitalist system will survive?’

‘WHAT?… Well, what a question!’

‘Yes, is it not? I should have thought you would have had your answer ready—as we would on our side. But perhaps you are not so confident.’

‘Perhaps also we’re not so interested. It’s you people who’ve made it the only question to be asked. We believe it’s only one—and not the most important—that has to be answered.’

‘That also I would like to discuss with you if there were time.’

Thank goodness there isn’t, Charles reflected, as the taxi came to a halt outside Palan’s hotel. ‘Here you are,’ he said, helping Palan to the pavement. ‘We shall meet again in a few hours and meanwhile I think we both need some sleep… Good night.’