Hotel du Lac - Anita Brookner [66]
For a while Edith sat alone in the salon, remembering her first evening here. Too much had happened to make this process entirely comfortable. Looking back, she saw that on that occasion she had been braver, younger, more determined to sit out her banishment and to return home unchanged by it. It had seemed, at the time, almost a joke, or perhaps she had simply decided to see it in that light. Since then she felt as if she had acquired an adult’s seriousness for the first time in her life and that henceforth all decisions would have that prudent weightiness that she had never thought hers to exercise by right. She was about to enter a world which she had instinctively recognized as belonging to others, in which she had no claim, a world of, among other things, investments, roof repairs, visitors for the weekend. And shall we take your car or mine? That was one of the remarks that she had overheard David make to his wife, and it had come to possess an almost totemic significance. Behind it she had glimpsed a series of assumptions with which they had both, equally, grown up. Launched young into adult enjoyment, fearless, privileged, spoilt, they retained a similar impatience with anything serious or disheartening, were quick, charming, enthusiastic, and forgetful. Depths were not easily reached with them and their kind. But Edith, who had spent the years of her youth in silence and wariness, and who, in order to outwit disappointment, had learnt not to make claims, was acquainted with those depths, and was, at this solemn moment, lost in contemplation before she left them for ever.
When she raised her eyes she saw that the dark shadow by the far pillar had resolved itself into the shape of Mme de Bonneuil, who had presumably been there all the time. Hands clasped on her stick, her dusty veil shedding its last sequins on to the shoulders of her equally dusty black dress, Mme de Bonneuil too seemed to be contemplating her imminent removal. But for Mme de Bonneuil, thought Edith with a pang, it would not be removal to a world of enviable adult preoccupations. She imagined a dark little room in Lausanne, and less food, less service, less dignity. And what would she do all day? The absurd terrain of Lausanne would be too difficult for her to negotiate, even with a stick. And the winter would be long, very long. As the waiters appeared in the doorways of the salon, Edith got up, went over to Mme de Bonneuil, and offered her an arm. A pleased but puzzled smile flickered doubtfully across the latter’s face, but at that moment Monica, skittish and beautiful in a flame-coloured dress, her life and energy restored by the prospect of going home, strolled out of the bar and called, ‘Wait for me!’ Mme de Bonneuil, each arm securely tethered, her stick carried by Alain, proceeded, accompanied by Edith and Monica, into the dining room, her head held high, her expression worldly, her demeanour superior to her surroundings. As M. Huber hastened forward to greet her (‘And about time too,’ said Monica scornfully), Mme de Bonneuil pressed both the younger women’s hands warmly before acknowledging him with a minimal nod. Her chair adjusted by a solicitous waiter, Mme de Bonneuil turned her attention calmly to the menu, but throughout dinner her head remained high and from time to time her smile returned.
Dinner was half-way through before Mrs Pusey, in fine lilac wool, made her entrance. Once again Edith marvelled at her appearance. Her full figure, her shining blonde hair, her cloud of scent almost obscured the presence of Jennifer who, although equally well accoutred, signalled something cruder, less exquisite, less highly conscious, less ardently attached to these repeated pleasantries. As M. Huber rose, predictably, from his seat to welcome Mrs Pusey and to guide her to her table, Edith, watching as always with fascinated interest, found her attention drawn to the enigmatic Jennifer, who, indifferent to the chill of the evening, was wearing another of her oddly immodest outfits,