Iain Pears - The Dream of Scipio

“So where have you been for the last year?”

“On a boat, and in various ports. I seem to have spent months in waiting rooms, waiting to plead my case. Which was listened to sympathetically until a decision had to be made. Then it was short and simple. No. I was in Havana, much of the time. Nice place. The boat docked there and the American authorities intervened. They were determined to stop us getting to the United States. Quite simple really: the politicians have promised that all refugees who ask for asylum in America will be given it, so they stop as many people as possible from getting close enough to pop the question.”

She poured some more brandy. “Then back to Lisbon, and was thrown out of there, then into Spain, which was also too dangerous. So I thought that if I was going to be arrested, I would like it to happen at home. I missed you,” she concluded simply.

“Being arrested will happen very soon,” Julien said. “Nearly all Jews have been already.”

She smiled, reached into her handbag, and tossed an identity card at him.

“Where did you get this?”

“Another one of my artistic creations. I forged my way out of the country, I forged my way back in again. I find I have quite a skill at these things. Identity cards are quite easy. I have a friend in Lisbon who is an artist, and he let me use his press. I’m quite proud of it.”

“Madame Juliette de Valois?” he queried with a smile on his face. “Unnecessarily grand, isn’t it?”

“Someone I knew when I was young. She died of tuberculosis when she was eight. Her father was a member of the Action Française and a great anti-Semite. It made me smile when I thought of becoming her. So, if necessary I can call on a birth certificate, you see. I also made myself a passport, showing I have been in Vietnam for the past eight years, hence no records of me in France. Residence permits for Hanoi, entry visa for Lisbon, and from then on everything is stamped and sealed quite legitimately. She had no siblings, her parents are dead. Very hard to prove I am not her. My only concern is that all these papers are too much in order.”

“What about the death certificate?”

“She died in Saint Quentin, and the town hall was destroyed in the last war. I mean, she’s perfect, don’t you think? On the other hand, I am penniless, homeless, with only one change of clothes, nowhere to live, and have given away any possible source of income with my old identity. I can hardly sell paintings. Not that anyone would want to buy them, I imagine.”

“And I am not the only person in Avignon who could recognize you.”

“No. I wasn’t sure it was the best idea. But—here I am, well fed, warm, and unmolested. Besides, when I look in the mirror I scarcely recognize myself. I’m surprised you did. It must be love. But I suppose I must go somewhere else.”

“You will go to Roaix. You’ll be safe there. And I will be able to keep an eye on you and make sure you don’t get into any more trouble. As for the question of money . . .”

“Ah, yes.”

“Do you have any at all?”

“No,” she said in a curiously light way, as if acknowledging the irony of it all. “God only knows what I would have done if I hadn’t found you. It’s a strange feeling, being penniless. I suppose I should feel liberated from the material things of this world. In fact, it’s very annoying. I do not like poverty. I do not see its appeal.”

“I can let you have a little. But I don’t earn much and my father’s assets are largely useless and you can’t sell anything anymore. So I am also without much in the way of resources.”

“Come and live with me, then,” she said lightly. “We can starve together and lead a life of Rousseauian simplicity. You can shoot rabbits, I will cook them for you. You can sit and read in the evening while I darn your socks.”

“You can’t darn socks, can you?”

There was just enough of a hint of suppressed desire for Julia to burst out laughing. Everybody in France, probably, had holes in their socks. It was one of the small humiliations of subjection.

“No,” she said with a giggle. “I have never darned a sock in my life. But it can’t be so difficult, can it?”

“And I know you can’t cook.”

“Julien, are you refusing me?”

And now he laughed. He felt the life surging back through him, like a house being occupied after a long absence.

“Officially, I suppose, you’re not even married anymore.”

“No. An odd situation to be in, I must say. But I can live with it.”

“So marry me then. Now you have the chance.”

The good humor and merriment were suspended the moment the words came out of his mouth. She put down her glass, then gazed at him carefully. “You’re not even saying this because you feel sorry for me, are you?”

“You know perfectly well I’m not.”

“That’s good. I would have hated that.”

“Well?”

“I will, kind sir. I will marry you,” she said with a faint smile. “And do so with the greatest pleasure. But properly. Not under a pseudonym. When I can marry you as me, then I will do so.”

Julien grinned in a way he had not managed, he thought, since the war broke out. “War is a strange thing,” he said. “It makes people cut corners. Can we, perhaps, skip the marriage and get straight onto the honeymoon?” He went and got blankets and pillows from the bed, and they slept by the fire, Julien waking up periodically through the night to put on some more of the rapidly diminished bucket of coal. By the time morning had come there was none left. He would be living in the cold until the next supplies came through. And who knew when that might be?

The next morning Julien went to the railway station and collected her battered old case, brought it back, and strapped it to his bicycle. Then they began the long trek out to Roaix—pleasant enough in summer, much less so in winter, above all with the suitcase. Once, about two hours on the road to Carpentras, they got themselves all tangled up and both fell over, the bike crashing to the ground and the suitcase bursting open. Julien hurried to pick up all the bits, the bedraggled pieces of clothing, a hairbrush. “It’s hardly worth it,” he said, then looked up and saw her lip was trembling as she fought back the tears. It was all she had in the world.

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” he said vehemently when he realized. “Don’t cry. I was stupid. Don’t cry.” And he reassured her like he would a child, with all the tenderness he had, comforting, gentle, and loving.

“Leave it,” she said. “You’re right. It’s not worth it.”

“Absolutely not. It’s coming.”

They started arguing, a healthy, restorative dispute, were still fighting about it when there was a rumble behind them. It was a German truck, lumbering along the road. “I thought you said they didn’t come over this side of the river?” Julia said. “Isn’t this meant to be an Italian zone?”

“In theory,” he replied shortly. “Not in practice.”

The truck slowed, then halted beside them. A fair head poked out of the window and looked at them somberly. A young man, so far untouched by the war or any hardship. He smiled. “Where are you going?” Heavily accented but good French.

“Vaison.”

He thought, then shrugged. “I’ll take you to Camaret, if you can tell me how to get there.”

Julia was nervous, but Julien accepted and bundled the bicycle into the back, among all the ammunition the man was transporting. Then they got in. The young man talked all the way and fortunately didn’t require much in reply. No, he shouldn’t have picked them up, but don’t tell anyone, eh? A couple arguing over a bike didn’t seem much of a threat to him. It was their own fault for sending him off without a map. How was he expected to find his way . . .