Early Stories of Marcel Proust
Contents
Early Stories
Norman Things
Memory
Portrait of Madame X.
Before the Night
Another Memory
The Indifferent Man
Early Stories
Norman Things
Trouville, the capital of the canton, with a population of 6,808, can lodge 15,000 guests in the summer.
—GUIDE JOANNE
For Paul Grünebaum
For several days now we have been able to contemplate the calm of the sea in the sky, which has become pure again—contemplate it as one contemplates a soul in a gaze. No one, however, is left to enjoy the follies and serenities of the September sea, for it is fashionable to desert the beaches at the end of August and head for the country. But I envy and, if acquainted with them, I often visit people whose countryside lies by the sea, is located, for example, above Trouville. I envy the person who can spend the autumn in Normandy, however little he knows how to think and feel.
The terrain, never very cold even in winter, is the greenest there is, grassy by nature, without the slightest gap, and even on the other sides of the hillocks, in the amiable arrangements called “woodlands.” Often, when on a terrace, where the blond tea is steaming on the set table, you can, as Baudelaire puts it, watch “the sunshine radiating on the sea” and sails that come, “all those movements of people departing, people who still have the strength to desire and to wish.”
In the so sweet and peaceful midst of all that greenery, you can look at the peace of the seas, or the tempestuous sea, and the waves crowned with foam and gulls, charging like lions, their white manes rippling in the wind.
However, the moon, invisible to all the waves by day, though still troubling them with its magnetic gaze, tames them, suddenly crushes their assault, and excites them again before repelling them, no doubt to charm the melancholy leisures of the gathering of stars, the mysterious princes of the maritime skies.
A person who lives in Normandy sees all that; and if he goes down to the shore in the daytime, he can hear the sea sobbing to the beat of the surges of the human soul, the sea, which corresponds to music in the created world, because, showing us no material thing and not being descriptive in its way, the sea sounds like the monotonous chant of an ambitious and faltering will. In the evening, the Normandy dweller goes back to the countryside, and in his gardens he cannot distinguish between sky and sea, which blend together. Yet they appear to be separated by that brilliant line; above it that must be the sky.
That must be the sky, that airy sash of pale azure, and the sea drenches only the golden fringes. But now a vessel puts a graft upon it while seeming to navigate in the midst of the sky. In the evening, the moon, if shining, whitens the very dense vapors rising from the grasslands, and, gracefully bewitched, the field looks like a lake or a snow-covered meadow.
Thus, this rustic area, which is the richest in France, which, with its inexhaustible abundance of farms, cows, cream, apple trees for cider, thick grass, invites you solely to eat and sleep—at night this countryside decks itself out with mystery, and its melancholy rivals that of the vast plain of the sea.
Finally, there are several utterly desirable abodes, a few assailed by the sea and protected against it, others perched on the cliff, in the middle of the woods, or amply stretched out on grassy plateaus.
I am not talking about the “Oriental” or “Persian” houses, which would be more agreeable in Teheran; I mean, above all, the Norman homes—in reality half-Norman, half-English—in which the profusion of the finials of roof timbers multiplies the points of view and complicates a silhouette, in which the windows, though broad, are so tender and intimate, in which, from the flower boxes in the wall under each window, the flowers cascade inexhaustibly upon the outside stairs and the glassed-in entrance halls. It is to one of those houses that I go home, for night is falling, and I will reread, for the hundredth time, Confiteor by the poet Gabriel Trarieux. . . .
Memory
A servant in brown livery and gold buttons opened the door quite promptly and showed me to a small drawing room that had pine paneling, walls hung with cretonne, and a view of the sea. When I entered, a young man, rather handsome indeed, stood up, greeted me coldly, then sat back down in his easy chair and continued reading his newspaper while smoking his pipe. I remained standing, a bit embarrassed, I might say even preoccupied with the reception I would be given here. Was I doing the right thing after so many years, coming to this house, where they might have forgotten me long ago?—this once hospitable house, where I had spent profoundly tender hours, the happiest of my life?
The garden surrounding the house and forming a terrace at one end, the house itself with its two red-brick turrets encrusted with diversely colored faiences, the long, rectangular vestibule, where we had spent our rainy days, and even the furnishings of the small drawing room to which I had just been led—nothing had changed.
Several moments later an old man with a white beard shuffled in; he was short and very bent. His indecisive gaze lent him a highly indifferent expression. I instantly recognized Monsieur de N. But he could not place me. I repeated my name several times: it evoked no memory in him. I felt more and more embarrassed. Our eyes locked without our really knowing what to say.
I vainly struggled to give him clues: he had totally forgotten me. I was a stranger to him. Just as I was about to leave, the door flew open: “My sister Odette,” said a pretty girl of ten or twelve in a soft, melodious voice, “my sister has just found out that you’re here. Would you like to come and see her? It would make her so happy!” I followed the little girl, and we went down into the garden. And there, indeed, I found Odette reclining on a chaise longue and wrapped in a large plaid blanket.
She had changed so greatly that I would not, as it were, have recognized her. Her features had lengthened, and her dark-ringed eyes seemed to perforate her wan face. She had once been so pretty, but this was no longer the case at all. In a somewhat constrained manner she asked me to sit at her side.
We were alone. “You must be quite surprised to find me in this state,” she said after several moments. “Well, since my terrible illness I’ve been condemned, as you can see, to remain lying without budging. I live on feelings and sufferings. I stare deep into that blue sea, whose apparently infinite grandeur is so enchanting for me. The waves, breaking on the beach, are so many sad thoughts that cross my mind, so many hopes that I have to abandon. I read, I even read a lot.
The music of poetry evokes my sweetest memories and makes my entire being vibrate. How nice of you not to have forgotten me after so many years and to come and see me! It does me good! I already feel much better. I can say so—can’t I?—since we were such good friends.
Do you remember the tennis games we used to play here, on this very spot? I was agile back then; I was merry. Today I can no longer be agile; I can no longer be merry. When I watch the sea ebbing far out, very far, I often think of our solitary strolls at low tide. My enchanting memory of them could suffice to keep me happy, if I were not so selfish, so wicked.
But, you know, I can hardly resign myself, and, from time to time, in spite of myself, I rebel against my fate. I’m bored all alone, for I’ve been alone since Mama died.
As for Papa, he’s too sick and too old to concern himself with me. My brother suffered a terrible blow from a woman who deceived him horrendously. Since then, he’s been living alone; nothing can console him or even distract him. My little sister is so young, and besides, we have to let her live happily, to the extent that she can.”
As she spoke to me, her eyes livened up; her cadaverous pallor disappeared. She resumed her sweet expression of long ago. She was pretty again. My goodness, how beautiful she was! I would have liked to clasp her in my arms: I would have liked to tell her that I loved her. . . . We remained together for a long time. Then she was moved indoors, since the evening was growing cool. I now had to say goodbye to her.
My tears choked me. I walked through that long vestibule, that delightful garden, where the graveled paths would never, alas, grind under my feet again. I went down to the beach; it was deserted.
Thinking about Odette, I strolled, pensive, along the water, which was ebbing, tranquil and indifferent. The sun had disappeared behind the horizon; but its purple rays still splattered the sky.
Pierre de Touche
Portrait of Madame X.
Nicole combines Italian grace with the mystery of northern women. She has their blond hair, their eyes as clear as the transparency of the sky in a lake, their lofty bearing. However, she breathes a knowing softness that has virtually ripened in that Tuscan sun, which inundates the eyes of women, lengthens their arms,
