The Secret History - Donna Tartt [251]
It’s funny. In retelling these events, I have fought against a tendency to sentimentalize Julian, to make him seem very saintly—basically to falsify him—in order to make our veneration of him seem more explicable; to make it seem something more, in short, than my own fatal tendency to try to make interesting people good. And I know I said earlier that he was perfect but he wasn’t perfect, far from it; he could be silly and vain and remote and often cruel and still we loved him, in spite of, because.
Charles was released from the hospital the following day. Despite Francis’s insistence that he come to his house for a while, he insisted on going home to his own apartment. His cheeks were sunken; he’d lost a lot of weight and he needed a haircut. He was sullen and depressed. We didn’t tell him what had happened.
I felt sorry for Francis. I could tell he was worried about Charles, and upset that he was so hostile and uncommunicative. “Would you like some lunch?” he asked him.
“No.”
“Come on. Let’s go to the Brasserie.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“It’ll be good. I’ll buy you one of those roulage things you like for dessert.”
We went to the Brasserie. It was eleven o’clock in the morning. By an unfortunate coincidence, the waiter sat us at the table by the window where Francis and I had sat with Julian less than twenty-four hours before. Charles wouldn’t look at a menu. He ordered two Bloody Marys and drank them in quick succession. Then he ordered a third.
Francis and I put down our forks and exchanged an uneasy glance.
“Charles,” Francis said, “why don’t you get an omelet or something?”
“I told you I’m not hungry.”
Francis picked up a menu and gave it a quick once-over. Then he motioned to the waiter.
“I said I’m not fucking hungry,” said Charles without looking up. He was having a hard time keeping his cigarette balanced between his first and middle fingers.
Nobody had much to say after that. We finished eating and got the check, not before Charles had time to finish his third Bloody Mary and order a fourth. We had to help him to the car.
I was not much looking forward to going to Greek class, but when Monday rolled around I got up and went anyway. Henry and Camilla arrived separately—in case Charles decided to show up, I think—which, thank God, he didn’t. Henry, I noticed, was puffy and very pale. He stared out the window and ignored Francis and me.
Camilla was nervous—embarrassed, maybe, by the way Henry was acting. She was anxious to hear about Charles and asked a number of questions, to most of which she didn’t receive any response at all. Soon it was ten after; then fifteen.
“I’ve never known Julian to be this late,” said Camilla, looking at her watch.
Suddenly, Henry cleared his throat. His voice was strange and rusty, as if fallen into disuse. “He’s not coming,” he said.
We turned to look at him.
“What?” said Francis.
“I don’t think he’s going to come today.”
Just then we heard footsteps, and a knock at the door. It wasn’t Julian, but the Dean of Studies. He creaked open the door and looked inside.
“Well, well,” he said. He was a sly, balding man in his early fifties who had a reputation for being kind of a smart-aleck. “So this is what the Inner Sanctum looks like. The Holy of Holies. I’ve never once been allowed up here.”
We looked at him.
“Not bad,” he said ruminatively. “I remember about fifteen years ago, before they built the new Science Building, they had to stick some of the counselors up here. This one psychologist liked to leave her door open, thought it gave things a friendly feeling. ‘Good morning,’ she’d say to Julian whenever he walked past her door, ‘have a nice day.’ Can you believe that Julian phoned