Josep Pla - Life Embitters

How then does one explain the peculiar way he mentally adapted to Paris, his tendency to stay put, his really strange withdrawal, one might almost say, his indifference? I think not even he could shed any light. It was a situation that worried him, the roots of which he couldn’t have explained at all coherently. And now he was in that frame of mind, his mood simply deepened as the days passed. Mascarell befriended the hotel owner. This gentleman soon noticed that this client was relaxed, peaceful, and not at all tapageur , and considered him to be a model customer. When he went in or out, retrieved or deposited his key in his pigeon hole, they exchanged pleasantries. Then one day they started to talk and at length. They finally became good friends. When Mascarell couldn’t think what to do — that was almost all the time — and he felt it wasn’t inopportune, he spent time in the hotel reception area. He sat in the comfy chair and when he wasn’t talking to Monsieur Paul — that being the owner’s name — he was distracted by movements in and out of the door.

Monsieur Paul was a tall, stout man with splendid bones, aged by arthritis and the sedentary life, just like his establishment. The Hotel Niort, however, was a small furnished hotel like hundreds more in Paris, and Monsieur Paul’s corpulent frame was too much for the modest size of the establishment. He’d have been better off in the generous spaces of a large hotel than in the minute area of his own tiny reception where he hardly fit. Blue-eyed and ashen-haired with a sulfur-colored mustache, he dressed like an hotelier — black jacket and pin-striped trousers. He was very given to outbursts of patriotic sentiment and speechifying, his fulsome eloquence flowed easily.

He was a man who lived in a constant bad temper. He had already once retired from business — retired to Normandy — but the war had shot down all his projects: his lack of sufficient funds had forced him to resume work for a second time, something that visibly made him indignant. He let off steam denigrating the government of the Republic and, generally, politics throughout the world. At first Mascarell listened with interest and then, as he began to grasp the drift of his sarcastic remarks, he became enthralled.

In a private, completely hidden way, Mascarell reveled in the harangues of Monsieur Paul. This gentleman was forever complaining: poor business, the growing demands of the taxman, lack of activity, and wretched profits. Monsieur Paul talked about this obsessive situation in a monotonous, bitter tone. In fact, it was precisely this pessimistic litany that most pleased Mascarell — he received a physical boost because it so contrasted with his own individual fortunes. He had come to Paris, having done his sums, that is, he knew he could spend a (considerable) amount weekly, an amount he intended to withdraw in successive tranches from the big bank on the boulevard. In fact, his sums hadn’t worked out in a quite admirable way. Mascarell spent, had spent much less — less than half — what he had budgeted for. This filled him with ineffable joy that he kept under wraps. He was in Paris and was saving money! It was an impressive outcome. He would sometimes while away his time wondering whether this astonishing situation had entailed sacrifices, hardships, or the curbing of one desire or another and was forced to admit that the life he was leading was exactly the one he liked. He wouldn’t have aspired to anything else or wanted it otherwise. So, Monsieur Paul’s somber, funereal harangues delighted him because they made him realize the excellent, positive path his own private affairs had taken. The longer Monsieur Paul’s face, the greater was Mascarell’s secret delight. One of the most naked sides to cruelty in this world is the value things assume only by virtue of such contrasts. Mascarell summed up his state of mind with a line that barely did him any credit: “I’d never have thought that I was so intelligent …”

Fortunately, his observation never reached the outside world.

It was Monsieur Paul who introduced him to Fanny.

Fanny was Catalan. She lived in the hotel by herself and had been in Paris for many years. Monsieur Paul thought Mascarell would like to meet a compatriot, who was a good customer and someone else who barely made any tapage . Mascarell was intrigued by Fanny. Via a strange process, the fact she was a compatriot led him to think that Fanny, like himself, belonged to the quartier . Fanny was in her early thirties — maybe thirty-three — short, plump, with black hair, bright eyes, a pale complexion and a freckle on her left cheek, and perhaps an overly showy sense of dress. She gave off a wonderful smell of scented soap and was good company. Fanny worked in an office on the Rue Richelieu, but Monsieur Paul told Mascarell that her earnings had been running her short for months.

In Paris romances of the time, Fanny’s physical type was much in demand. Years later, taller, willowy women, with more elongated behinds, were in vogue. Fanny’s name was really Eulàlia. She had made the switch to make pronunciation easier. And this was one of the first things she confessed to Mascarell. Her confession led Mascarell to raise an eyebrow: he thought it was her way of opening the path to friendship, even to intimacy.

What most struck him was the way she acted like young girls in his country fifteen years ago: she could play the piano just a little, excelled at sewing and knitting, particularly in the use of sequins; she spoke lovingly about her mother, was fond of things fried in bread crumbs with the white of an egg, and enthused about cheap prints; her handwriting was full of curlicues and she could quote two dozen pretty little poems. On the other hand, she hated anything connected with cooking. As far as she was concerned, cooking was a most vulgar occupation. She believed that the French obsession with cooking was vulgar.

Mascarell found Eulàlia’s company very agreeable. He made the most of every opportunity to accost her. Fresh information about her way of life didn’t make him at all critical. Quite the opposite. The moment came — very soon — when he decided that she was totally good news.

Eulàlia could be very up and down. She sometimes seemed tired and despondent and then her attitude might be rather curt and off-putting. On the other hand, she had days when she was wonderfully animated, with a frivolous allure. Mascarell preferred her when he could see she was depressed and tense — even though he had to suffer the consequences — to when she was smiling and laughing. Like all serious people — and Mascarell was a terribly serious fellow — he believed that other people should be equally serious.

“Do you see this?” Eulàlia laughed, with a sparkle in her eyes and moist lips, pointing to the freckle on her left cheek.

“Yes.”

“It brings bad luck.”

“Why so?”

“Because it just does.”

“Who told you that?”

“The cards.”

“But do you read the cards?”

“Yes, I do.”

“My lord!”

“Don’t be so solemn, you boor!”

And she burst out laughing, and that prevented Mascarell from putting his foot into it a second time. He had been about to spell out the reasons why one shouldn’t read the cards, or believe in them. If he’d done that, he’d only have proved that this world is a vale of tears. That would have pleased Mascarell much more than seeing Eulàlia look happy and vivacious.

That day they’d met by the hotel entrance when the streetlights were being switched on. It had been a warm, silken April day. The early blossom on the trees augured delicious bliss.

“Mascarell,” said the young lady. “You should invite me to dinner …”

“What do you mean?” replied an astonished Mascarell, sounding unfortunately tetchy.