"SIX MORAL TALES" "1st PROLOGUE" " HAYDEE" "2nd PROLOGUE" " DANIEL" "We must all realize our full potential." "Those who don't are like the people in Versailles, who surround those who do." "Those who do are inevitably surrounded and aggressive." "This, for instance, is perfect." "It couldn't be better." "It's painting." "It's thought encircled... by razor blades." "I'm bleeding." "That is to say, it's unique... taking nothing as its cause." "Encircled by its own thought, as if by razor blades." "Impossible to hold." "Here's proof." "It was done on purpose." "Not your cut." "But that was done on purpose." "I'd like other people to get cut, not you." "You like people to get cut on art?" "Other people, yes." "But not you." "You're sharp." "You shouldn't get cut." "That bothers me." "I don't mind getting cut." "Doesn't it hurt?" "I surround myself with dangerous people." "You remind me of elegant people in the 18th century who were very concerned with their appearance and the effect they had on others." "That was already a creation, the beginning of the Revolution." "The distance, established by elegance, from those who aren't elegant is crucial." "It creates a kind of void around the person, and it's that void around the person that you create, with your objects too." "But you could just as well do without your objects." "You yourself are the can of paint surrounded by razor blades, as was Saint-Just." "Razor blades are words." "They could be silence." "They could also be elegance... a certain yellow." "ADRIEN" "Perhaps style is more important than beauty." "But in love, the notion of beauty is essential." "We love someone because we find him handsome." "No, we find him handsome because we love him." "Yes, a man may be ugly yet have immense charm." "If he's loved, his ugliness is transformed into beauty." "For me an ugly man has no charm." "Nothing's possible." "It's over immediately." "What's over?" "Anything." "Even the most superficial relationship." "Even to have a drink for five minutes." "I can't." "If he's ugly, I leave." "Can you be friends with someone you find ugly?" "Ugliness and beauty don't enter into my friendships." "I don't see my friends as either ugly or handsome." "But friendship doesn't happen in five minutes." "It takes several encounters." "How do you manage that with someone you find ugly?" "I run." "It's impossible." "It's not a question of ugliness." "Among crowds of beautiful people, I'm only interested in those who possess something more than beauty." "Someone of absolute beauty would bore me." "I'm not talking about Greek beauty." "Absolute beauty doesn't exist." "To find someone handsome, sometimes the tiniest thing is enough." "Perhaps something between the nose and mouth." "So anyone has a chance of appealing to you." "At least a chance." "No, that's the problem." "I find very few people handsome." "And it really hampers my relationships terribly, because if I'm repelled, I never see that person again." "And since many people repel me " "You never change your mind?" "The first thing I say if I'm asked to dinner isn't "What does he do?" But "Is he handsome?"" "And ugly ones are always doomed?" "To the ovens." "They deserve it." "Ugliness is an insult to others." "One's responsible for one's looks." "For instance, a nose moves or ages according to how one thinks or speaks." "Besides, I'm not talking about static beauty." "One's movements, expressions, gait - all that counts, doesn't it?" "How long will you stay in London?" "At least five weeks." "Your modeling won't take up all that time." "No, but I have lots of friends to see." "And I love London in July." "Why not come to the Riviera?" "Rodolphe is lending me his villa." "I have lots of things to do." "Earlier you said you didn't." "Come for a few days at least." "It's not worth it." "Why don't you come to London?" "What would I do there?" "What will you do all alone on the Riviera?" "I have business meetings." "What business?" "I've never really believed in your so-called business." "I have to go to a sale, track down a silent partner, a collector of Chinese antiques." "He's financing a gallery for me." "Don't you think you'd make better contacts in London?" "I see only serious people and do only serious things." "Come along, you'll see." " No, I'm not coming." " Why not?" "Because from time to time, one of us has to do something serious." "But I am serious." "Why do you always dash off when we could be together?" "I'd like you to come." "I'd like it very much." "Why don't you come to London?" "I already told you:" "I can't." "Well, in that case " "END OF PROLOGUES" "No sooner had I arrived than Daniel told me the bad news.;" "A girl was staying here at Rodolphe's invitation." "She would surely disturb us." "Maite?" "Haydee." "Doesn't ring a bell." "Besides, all those girls leave me cold." "Well, it's only for 24 days." "What type?" "A dumb bunny." "Round face." "Close-cropped hair." "Charming." "She lives here?" "In principle, yes." "She panhandles here and there." "Brings guys here sometimes." "That's just like Rodolphe." "He surrounds himself with the plainest people." "Anyway, if they bother us, we'll kick them all out, including her." "I wanted to be by myself, but Daniel's presence was no problem." "Since I lived all year without fixed hours or dates," "I decided to set some rules for myself." "The monastic feel of my room helped." "First, I'd get up early." "I'd always backed into the dawn after having stayed up all night." "Now I'd live mornings in the right order, and associate them, as most people do," "with the idea of awakening and beginning." "The idea was both invigorating and oppressive." "I had to shift my schedule back a third of a day so that by evening I'd be too tired to be tempted to go out." "And what did I intend to do?" "Precisely nothing." "For once I'd take a real vacation, because my real work had always begun when others' stopped.;" "at parties, on weekends, at the beach, in the mountains." "But this year only one thing interested me.; my art gallery." "Nothing else mattered." "And since all preparations had been completed, all I could do was wait." "Having nothing to do for the first time in 10 years," "I undertook to really do nothing." "That is, to take inactivity to a level I'd never before reached." "I even tried not to think." "I was alone face to face with the sea, far from cruises and beaches, fulfilling a childhood dream put off year after year." "I wanted my gaze of the sea to be as empty as possible, void of any painterly or botanical curiosity." "For if I'd followed earlier inclinations," "I might have been an art collector or botanist." "I lost myself completely in the play of shadow and light, sinking into a lethargy heightened by the water." "That state of passivity, of complete availability, promised to last much longer than the euphoria of one's first summer dip in the ocean." "I could easily see myself spending a whole month this way." "That's why I couldn't bear the idea of seeing anyone but Daniel." "The only woman I would have liked to have with me was far away." "I'd resigned myself to it and dismissed without much difficulty - forever, I suspected- the thought of her." "But I wasn't ready to tolerate another, especially not one of Rodolphe's pathetic little protegees." "The world belongs to those who get up early." "I intend to swim every morning at sunrise." "And I at noon." "Are you reading this?" "No, you can take it." "In that quest for nothing, for emptiness," "Daniel had his own way, more direct and brutal than mine." "I almost considered him my mentor on the subject." " Nothing?" " Nothing." "Nothing at all?" "Absolutely, positively nothing." "I've done absolutely nothing since I arrived, and I actually do less every day." "I want to reach absolute zero." "It's very difficult." "It takes enormous effort and care." "It comes to me naturally." "It's my nature." "But it's more tiring to follow one's nature than to fight it." "Besides, you're reading." "That's doing something." "If I didn't read, I'd think, and thinking is the hardest, most demanding thing of all." "I think people think too much." "The main thing is to be absorbed, and a book forces me to think its way." "What I don't want is to think my own way." "I want to be led." "Like an Arab." "In a street, he feels the street, while we think about the goal." "It was an Arab who said, "One is the first figure of an endless number. "" "An idea is a flash." "We have just three or four original ideas in our lifetime." "People who are always thinking don't exist." "Look at Dali's "melted watches," for example." "It's true." "I'm looking for nothing." "If I come across Rousseau, I read Rousseau." "I could just as well read Don Quixote." "If a pretty girl fell in my arms, I'd take her, though at the moment I have no desire to get involved." "What if Haydee crawled into your bed?" "You mean that girl?" "Did she crawl into yours?" "No, she's always got someone." "But that's the strategist in her." "That doesn't matter." "She hasn't reached that point yet." "For 24 to 48 hours, she can even be remarkably faithful." "Three or four days after I arrived, at 2.;00 a." "M..." "Coming back from my swim, I saw her with a boy her age." "A little later, they came down into the yard." "From what Daniel had told me," "I'd expected another girl whom I'd seen at Rodolphe's, a repulsive pest." "Let's kill a chicken." "The only similarity was the haircut." "I couldn't make out her face at that distance, and I'm not very good at faces anyway." "Anyway, I could already tell I'd give this girl as well little chance of getting along with me." "She'd recognized me as the man who'd entered her room at Rodolphe's country place two weeks earlier." "Haydee, have you met Adrien?" "I think so." "We must have met at Rodolphe's." "Ah, right." "I see." "It's a pity Rodolphe isn't here this year." "I know he hates traveling." "Charlie." "I know boats." "My father's in the business." "He invented the first yacht made of plastic." "And what do you do?" "What?" "I mean for work." " I'm a doctor." " A regular doctor?" "No, an eye specialist." "And I see you can barely stand daylight." "Are you serious?" "My first impressions are always correct." "Let me see your glasses." "Prescription?" "No, just sunglasses I bought in a store." "It's dangerous to buy any old junk." "Junk!" "I paid 150 francs for them." "They're Polaroid." "Polarization is like extrapolation, an already obsolete theory." "Today we're coming back to the old idea:" "That the only protection from the sun is color, and vice versa." "Look at the ones I prescribed for Daniel." "Two colors:" "Blue and magenta." "Both are effective against harmful rays." "What's magenta?" "The racket started again the next night." "I decided it would be the last time." "Quiet, young lady!" "I'm afraid you have to leave, buddy." "Who are you?" "I don't know you." "You disturbed my rest, sir." "It's a pity." "Might is right." "Okay, I'll go." "My father won't be back for a week." "Come to my house?" "You're not staying with these jerks." " Yes, I am." "A newly docile Haydee brought no more guests to the house." "She settled for phone calls around 8.;00 p. m." "Take the path." "The house is 200 yards away." "Not the road, the path." "Tell me about it later." "Okay, see you later." "Kisses." "She usually came home at dawn, when I was getting up." "It wasn't always the same boy who'd picked her up the night before." "Since she spent her days sleeping, we saw very little of her." "Then one evening, in need of a ride, she asked me." "Is Werner there, please?" "Do you know when he'll be back?" "Tell him Haydee called." "H- a-y-d-e-e." "Can you give me a ride?" " What for?" " I have a date." " Who?" " You don't know him." "Make sure the next one has a car." " So you can't?" " I can, but I don't want to." "Darling, you lack any sense of propriety." "Look at Daniel and me." "We've found happiness in virtue and the simple life." "You find happiness where you can." "Come for a swim tomorrow at 7:00?" "Okay." "Haydee took me up on my offer, which, I must say, I rather liked." "The situation had been cleared up." "Like Daniel, she would be part of my solitude." "Since she was there, better to assimilate her." "I made our relationship clear at once.;" "simple friendship." "I knew she would have liked exactly the opposite.;" "a courtship of equal parts insolence and devotion." "That was my style." "With any other girl, that is." "In any case, for several days, we all got along quite pleasantly, each engrossed in his own pursuits, as well as chores around the house, to which we purposely attached exaggerated importance." "Haydee proved quite compatible and able to follow our lead, without imitating our quirks too much." "Nevertheless, I could sense a hitch somewhere, although Haydee very cleverly hid the game that, rightly or wrongly, I suspected she was playing." "It was precisely this reserved quality that bothered me." "So I decided to take a risk, afraid of settling for the easy way out, and force the issue." "Shall we sit here?" "Catch." "The worst thing around here is the wine." "It's disgusting." "I don't drink it anymore." "It's wrong to drink something one doesn't like, to accept things one dislikes, see people one dislikes... caress a girl one dislikes." "It's the height of immorality." "My greatest defect is to try to confirm my first impressions." "For example, I know if I don't like a girl's nose, her legs will leave me cold." "Then don't touch them." "Besides " "What?" "Listen, I don't like you running after me." "I'm not." "Yes, you are." "I can tell when a girl's interested." "Under other circumstances, you could have me." "I'm too weak and accommodating." "One must know when to be moral." "And when I think of you as a girl I might sleep with, all I see is your faults." "Though you must have some good qualities." "You think so?" "Why not go after Daniel?" "Of course, he's far superior to you as a person, but his morals are less rigid than mine." "You're not the only two men around, you know." "I know, Haydee." "You're too attractive." "We both carry the same cross." "My tactic apparently hadn't worked." "But the feeling left in both of us by my blundering poisoned our relationship." "But this little game of hide-and-seek, far from protecting my cherished solitude, introduced an element of drama and uncertainty into it." "It forced me to focus more and more on her." "And Daniel proved a bad counselor on this point, his own mysterious attitude adding to my concerns." "Haydee went looking for you at the beach." "Really?" "What for?" "I don't know." "I can't imagine what she wants with you." "Listen." "Do me a favor." "I'm ready to kick her out." "That's not it." "Daniel, take her." "Take her yourself and leave me alone." "I'm asking a favor of you." "No, my friend." "I don't do that kind of favor for anyone." "Sleep with her." "In fact, if I were you, I'd charge ahead." "Then go ahead and charge." "I've no desire to make the slightest effort." "And even if I wanted to," "I'm not sure I'd succeed." "You can't tell me you'd have trouble laying that tart." "Yes, I would." "I decided long ago not to run after any girl." "It tires me out." "But since she's after you, take her." "She's quite delightful." " That's just it." "I'm fed up with these silly girls everyone goes crazy over and passes around freely." "It depresses me." "Oh, perversity still holds it attractions, but not with that kind of ugly duckling." "Please!" "She wouldn't have me." "Be serious, Daniel." "I am serious." "The more girls a guy has, the more suspicious I am." "Better to turn them off than turn them on." "It feeds my ego." "I'm happy not to be part of her collection." "Her guys aren't so bad." "Maybe, but it doesn't matter." "I don't give a damn whether a girl likes me or not." "So you really won't do it for me?" "That's enough!" "Daniel, my friend, I just don't get you." "Screw her, old man!" "Despite my temporary status as a hermit," "I hadn't totally cut myself off from the world." "I accepted an invitation to dinner one night, well aware that this outing, though justified from a business viewpoint, sounded the death knell for my prior noble resolutions." "It clarified my thoughts immensely, and I began to grasp the enormity of my blunder." "The quarrel, if there was one, wasn't between the girl and me but me and Daniel, who was racking up points attacking our irony and our poses." "Coming home at dawn, I sensed the game had been rigged, that a crucial card was missing from the deck, a fact to be made only too clear that very moment." "In the morning, Daniel treated the girl sullenly, less to throw me off track, since he guessed that I knew, than to surprise me." "This new assault hurt her even more than my own recent attacks, which bothered me." "On the outs with both of us, she was forced to resume her nocturnal escapades." "I'm coming." "You're heading downhill." "No, uphill." "A period of open hostility ensued during which our respective talents - hers and ours - found their greatest expression." "I found a label for Haydee." "She's a collector." "Haydee, if you sleep around with no plan at all, you're on the lowest rung of the human ladder:" "The revolting ingenue." "Now, if you collected in some consistent way, putting your mind to it, plotting things out, that would change everything." "Yes, but she's a lousy collector." "I'm not a collector." "Don't say that." "It's all you've got going for you." "You're completely mistaken." "I'm searching." "I'm trying to find something." "I might make mistakes." "She doesn't collect." "She takes what she finds." "She doesn't know what "distance" means." "No, I make the most of things, maybe anything." "The main thing is that I get something from it." "No, you scrape the barrel, and you end up with nothing but a pile that collapses 'cause it has no substance." " You scrape the barrel too." " I'm a barbarian!" "If I slept with you, it was without the slightest thought." "You make no sense." "You criticize me for taking anything, but you brag about doing it yourself." "You're not a barbarian." "You've got no right to behave like one." "But I do!" "A barbarian must always be killing something." "Whether I slept with you or not changes nothing." "I slept with you the minute I saw you." "Where was that?" "She was dancing." "And you?" "She was making love." "Physically, that is." "In bed with some guy." "I thought the room was empty." "See that?" "You have slept with her." "Every man has, the slut." "The collector is such a miserable specimen, interested only in numbers." "He'll never be happy with one object." "In his search for a truly unique object, he inevitably ends up with a whole set." "A far cry from purity." "Elimination is crucial here." "The idea of collecting is the opposite of purity." "The feeling Haydee aroused in me those days was at least one of curiosity." "She became, in fact, the center of my interest." "That girl, finally accepted as part of the furnishings, became the focus as she slowly relegated Daniel to the background." "You're not going out tonight?" "No, as you can see." "Want to go out with me?" "You're going out?" "If you want to." "Shall we all go out?" "Come on, Daniel." "I'm high." "I'm staying here." "You two go out." "All right." "Let's go." "Okay." "After an uneventful night, in which the other girls I met only acted as foils to Haydee, prompted by insomnia and the lateness of the hour," "I decided to rush things a bit." "Young lady, they tell me your name is Fanchon." "That's right." "Pretty name." "You're from Paris?" " That's right." "So my information is correct." "Yes, it's true." "Nice harbor." "Yes, but I'm a bit cold." "But it's so warm." "Adrien, would you get my jacket?" "It's beautiful." "Very beautiful." " Very, very beautiful." "Shall we go?" "Yes, let's." "Since we weren't sleepy, I suggested a drive up the mountain." "If she was following a plan, she was doing a good job of it." "If she was trying to add me to her collection, she was handling things perfectly." "One might even argue that her entire behavior ever since we met, including her affair with Daniel, had been the surest way to arouse my interest in her." "If this was indeed true, she'd succeeded, a fact I readily admitted." "On the way back, we decided to swim at our usual spot." "I intended to test the soundness of my hypothesis, despite the risk." "You know, it would be easy to get Daniel back." "He doesn't interest me anymore." "He's far better than anyone else you've met." "Maybe." "For around here." "Anyway, that's my business." "But it bothers me that you're on bad terms." "This kind of situation amuses me." "Unmitigated happiness bores me." "For once you have a chance at an exceptional guy." "Mind your own business." "I came here for peace and quiet, and you're disturbing it." "If everyone minded his own business, I wouldn't disturb anybody." "Haydee, let's make peace." " We're not at war." " Yes, we are." "It's you who keeps stirring up trouble." "I think you're mistaking a friendly attitude for a hostile one." "I think you're doing the same." "Then there's no problem." "I don't see any." "You just love to get all worked up." "Maybe 'cause I can't fully bring myself to like you." "We're both indifferent, and that's fine." "It doesn't mean we can't live together." "I've often wondered what your smile meant." "Nothing." "That's what I thought." "She certainly wouldn't risk any moves in my direction now." "She was forcing me bit by bit to compromise my position." "How about a swim?" "I'm sleepy." "You coming?" "But she and Daniel as a couple made me uneasy." "Their complicity seemed artificial." "But was the game they were playing for their benefit or mine?" "If the latter, I was back to my first theory." "Why would such an easy girl waste time going after me in such a roundabout way, when my rashness had left her a direct route?" "But those were the least of my worries." "I had much bigger concerns." "I had to organize a meeting with my antique collector, who was also a likely backer for the gallery I wanted to open." "Preparations for all this went surprisingly quickly." "What do you think?" "It's a very rare Chinese vase." "I've been after it for three years." "It looks more Hindu or Siamese." "It's the elephants." "It's a Song vase from the tenth century." "Just before elephants disappeared from China, before the people rose up." "What about that one?" "It looks more Chinese." "That's 'cause it's Japanese." "Satsuma. 19th century." "Worthless." "I got it as a bonus." "It's yours." "Thanks." "I'll take it." "Things were deteriorating quickly between Daniel and Haydee." "Each wanted the upper hand in breaking up, which explained all the games." "Daniel took the lead and brought down the curtain in his inimitable style." "Stop it." "Stop it!" "That's enough." "Will this go on much longer?" "I've never seen a bigger jerk." "What in the world am I doing here?" "Shut up, you little bitch!" "You have no right to talk." "You were lucky to have both of us interested in you." "Adrien's right." "You're made for those stupid jerks who screw you." "For a moment I thought you had something inside that might counter your pitiful insignificance." "That's what fascinated me:" "Your insignificance." "I don't even think you're ugly, but what attracted me were flashes of ugliness in your face." "At least then you could move me a bit." "But when you're pretty, when you're lovely - what a laugh!" "You represent the lowest, most degraded and mindless type of beauty." "Listen to me." "Every ray of light has its strongest and weakest point." "You have to catch it just right." "You can't put it to use in a vacuum." "You can make it fall in a straight line, reflect or deflect it, gather it in or spread it out, make it round as a bubble, make it shine or block it out." "At its weakest point, it's darkness." "You're definitely beyond all hope." "Maybe an Impressionist could do something, but even then..." "Anyway, I haven't wasted that much time on you." "I can't afford to waste any." "End of speech." "Good night." "I'm leaving tomorrow." "I've been invited to the Seychelles." "Too bad." "My friend Sam, the collector I told you about, is coming tomorrow." "That guy's completely crazy." "I wasted enough time on him too." "I'm fed up with these phony nonconformists." "I'm not staying here another minute." "Is Felix there, please?" "That's all right." "I'll call later." "If you have somewhere to go, I can drive you." "I'm not leaving." "This house is as much mine as it is yours." "I'll write Rodolphe to get you to leave." "You think Rodolphe will care one whit what you say?" "You can be sure Daniel spent all afternoon planning his little speech." "Did you believe all that?" " True or not, it's all the same to me." "I detest that kind of scene." "Anyway, it's over." "I'm staying, but I'm not talking to either of you." "I'll take the front room." "As you wish." "Okay, we've been real bastards." "Your thing with Daniel is none of my business, but why are you mad at me?" "You put those stupid ideas in his head." "What ideas?" "I don't have any ideas." "I've said nothing but nice things about you." "I can do my own advertising." "The only thing I might criticize you for is having so little sense of humor." "I only criticize people I like." "If I really didn't like you, I wouldn't say a word." "Let's drink to our reconciliation." "Forgive me." "I've been a real bastard." "No, you haven't." "Yes, you bring out the worst in me, and I can't help but take the bait." "What bothers me about you isn't at all what you think." "I don't think anything." "You don't know what you want." "It took me a long time to see it." "Maybe I don't have what I want, but I do know what it is I want." "And what's that?" "To have normal relationships with people." "Somehow I always mess things up." "I seldom get what I want." "Actually, I've never had it." "Did you want Daniel?" "He was okay." "I don't really call that wanting." "I'd have liked to be his friend." "Maybe yours too." "You could be my friend." "I do like you in my own way." "A lot." "You keep picking on me, and Daniel follows your lead." "He's old enough to think for himself." "Besides, right from the start you brought those horrid guys here." " I never brought anyone here." " What about that first guy?" " Oh, that guy." " And the ones who come get you?" "If they're stupid enough to come get me, that's their problem." "I haven't gone out in two weeks." "And I've said nothing in two weeks." "I said nothing tonight." "You didn't stand up for me." "I'm just lazy." "You'd be glad if I left." "Not at all." "You're quite charming." " You think I'm ugly." " I never said that." "I just said you weren't my type." "But for your type, you're perfect." "Would that be an inferior type?" "Somewhere in between." "Besides, my taste isn't necessarily the best." "Hypocrite." "It's not hypocrisy." "It's charm." "Don't think I look down on you." "Far from it." "You're far superior to all your lovers." "They're not my lovers." "I have no lovers." "And if I did, it wouldn't be them." "Besides, I'm free to see whomever I wish." "No, you're not free." "Just like I'm not free to go after some ugly girl." "Me?" "Your case is entirely different." "Girls like you have generally been a waste of my time." "But you're an exception." "I sense that with you it might not be entirely a waste of time." "In short, you're a dangerous girl." "Don't you think?" "I can't understand how you believed for a moment... that I didn't like you." "Enough for tonight." "I'm sleepy." "Shall we go to bed?" "What a great feeling to be through with both of you." "You never started with me." "Yes, I did." "It was baked at a relatively low temperature:" "570 to 750 degrees." " You think so?" " I know so." "Everyone knows it's characteristic of vases of that era." "What I like is the ears." "I'd like a car at the Bertaud residence, Ramatuelle Road." "How long?" "Five minutes?" "Thanks." "I can drive you." "That's all right." "This is Sam." "This is your collector?" "I find collectors completely uninteresting." "Since I rarely meet one, let me tell you how ridiculous you are." "That's enough, Daniel." "I hate collectors." "I can't bear the sight of them." "I refuse to get mixed up in your schemes, Adrien." "I don't have to flatter people, especially not these types." "Come with me." "I have to talk to you." "He just wanted to make a scene." "Actually, he's angry at the girl." "She's lovely." "Is she his girlfriend?" "Yours?" " Not mine either." "She lives here, sleeps around a bit." "Actually, a lot." "She's a collector." "A collector?" "We have something in common." "Are you a part of her collection?" "You should be." "Do you want to be?" " Me?" " Why not?" "She's the easiest girl in the world." "I like them hard to get." "Sam, admit you like her." "That's not the question." "The question is, does she like me?" "Don't give it another thought." "She does everything I tell her to do." "There's always that Machiavellian side to you." "You only say that 'cause she left with the other guy." "No, she couldn't have." "Are you sure?" "Before leaving, I went to apprise Haydee of the situation." "May I?" "He insists we spend the night at his place." "I can't." "I have an important appointment in the morning." "But you could go." "I'll pick you up the day after tomorrow." "What exactly am I supposed to do with him?" "Whatever you like." "But he'll be offended if you refuse, especially after Daniel's scene." "In short, I'm the bonus for the vase." "It's not just the vase." "I'm involved in a big project with him, financing a gallery." "In business you have to create a certain climate." "A favorable climate." "I love doing those kinds of favor." "Especially for you." "Besides, I feel safer with him than with you." "That could be taken two ways." "I only see one." "Of course, this plot was all a bluff on my part, and on Sam's, who loved this kind of joke." "And also on Haydee's, whose readiness to obey delighted me and united us far better than our trumped-up secrets of the night before." "The evening was uneventful, and when the moment came, we all played our parts with great care." "It's time to go." "I have an important appointment this morning in Nice." "Stay." "I have a spare room." "Thanks, but I hate getting a couple hours' sleep." "I'd prefer to stay up." "Besides, I have to take our friend home." "Do as you like... but I'm keeping Haydee." "Do you mind?" "Not at all." "Okay, then." "What would you like for breakfast?" "Eggs or cornflakes?" "Fried eggs with grated cheese, and lots of cornflakes." "I slept all morning, after which an errand took me into town, where I decided to spend the rest of the afternoon." "For the first time since I'd arrived, I was bored, and I preferred to be bored in town." "I couldn't wait to see Sam and Haydee again, though I knew not to expect anything, since nothing was going to happen." "But the pleasure they'd both taken in their roles annoyed me." "They were now the center of the action, even if the action was nonexistent, and I was on the sidelines." "It made me jealous, and also aware of how ridiculous I was being." "I was certainly not ready to admit that I could possibly miss Haydee." "Yet I felt her presence close by, in stark contrast to the mass of other girls whom I'd certainly have rejected that night." "When the time came to set out for Sam's villa," "I was on edge, furious at myself and the rest of the world." "Do you speak English?" "What's the best way to get to the sea, please?" "That way." "But the sea's that way." "Sam and Haydee welcomed me with a scene meant to cheer me up, but their complicity irritated me." "Did you have a good time?" "Lovely." "Sam hammered away all evening at what he thought were my weak points." "He meant to humiliate me in front of the girl." "To do nothing, yet think while doing it, is exhausting." "Working's much easier." "You follow a well-trod path." "There's a kind of laziness to work." "Work is an escape, a clear conscience bought on the cheap." "Of course, that makes you the least lazy person I know." "I haven't taken a vacation in 10 years." "Sure." "You're on permanent vacation." "Well, yes and no." "Not exactly." "It amuses me how you're always trying to justify yourself." "On the contrary." "I don't have a guilty conscience." "You're a liar." "You feel guilty because you have no money." "Listen, Sam, I'm sure you've heard of the Tarahumara Indians." "When they enter a town, they beg from house to house." "They stop at a door, then stand in profile with an air of haughty contempt." "Whether given alms or not, they leave after a set period of time... without a thank you." "When I beg, I always turn in profile." "Besides, we're always someone else's slave." "I find less dishonor in living at a friend's house than in being on the government payroll." "Most people's work today is useless." "Three quarters of all activity is parasitic." "I'm not the parasite." "It's the bureaucrats and experts." "If I were 6'6" with an eagle's profile," "I'd feel nearer to the gods too." "You're nostalgic for the good old days, while I'm happy to live in this modern world." "I'm as modern as you are." "But what matters today isn't work but laziness." "Everyone says work is just a means to an end." "We speak of a leisure society." "But when it comes, we won't know what leisure is." "Some people work 40 years for their life of leisure, but when the time comes, they're lost, and they die." "In all sincerity," "I think I serve mankind better by taking it easy than by working." "It's true." "It takes courage to not work." "More courage than going to the moon?" "Of course you can go to the moon too." "But that's both fascinating and contemptible." "If I listen to any more of your little monologue," "I'll fall asleep right in this chair." "You're like a small child, happy as can be with his mediocre life." "Go to the moon, Adrien." "Jupiter too." "Hurry... and when you get there, send me a postcard, if you have the money to buy one." "I've always been sorry I wasn't rich." "But if I were, my dandyism, as you call it, would be too easy... lacking any heroism whatsoever." "And I can't imagine a dandy not being heroic." "Do you find his metaphysical monologue as interesting as Tarzan?" "Don't mind him." "He talks to hear himself talk." "She's right." "Careful!" "Very clever!" "She's impossible." "Your rooms are on the second floor." "Good night." "And you laugh!" "You don't just break a Song vase." "I break whatever I like." "Besides, you got your money." "Still, you don't just break a Song vase." "I didn't do it on purpose." "You think it's funny too." "A professional collector would've killed you." "You're impossible." "I should have known." "I knew I couldn't take you anywhere." "You shouldn't have left me with him for two days." " What did he do to you?" " Nothing." "Did he bother you?" "Not at all." "He took me boating." "Last night he took me to the casino." "It was lovely." "Are you upset 'cause he didn't try anything?" "Would you believe me if I said I slept with him?" "I'd believe anything, coming from you." "I know if you say yes, it probably means no but could just as well mean yes." "You're an immoral little slut." "Well, I certainly wouldn't espouse your moral code." "Neither would I." "Besides, I feel like giving my morals the slip tonight." "I'm sleepy." "Shall we go upstairs?" "No, let's go home." "The die was cast." "She'd shown she had the upper hand." "I was back to my pet theory once again." "For three weeks, it was as if she'd acted with the sole idea of possessing me." "Daniel, Sam, and now the broken vase were all just stations on the path to conquering precious me." "My protective moral fortress was tumbling down." "Since I'd come to Rodolphe's in search of pleasure, why not use my one week left to enjoy my interactions with Haydee to the utmost?" "An affair so clearly circumscribed in time and space met my definition of total adventure." "One week was the ideal length I'd have liked my casual affairs to last, and not the one-night stands or endless ordeals they'd been till now." "It's Haydee!" "Wait a minute." "Want to come with us?" " Where?" " Lorenzo's." "In Rome?" "No, his villa in San Felice." " I can't right now." " Take the address." "Wait." "San Felice." "I said I can't right now." "Drop him." "Give me the address." " Let's go." " I have nothing to wear." "When I started the engine, it was just to clear the road and perhaps put an end to Haydee's dallying." "But I quickly realized I wasn't going to stop and that I was making the right decision for the first time." "This is the story of my twists and turns." "The way was finally cleared for the decision of my first days here." "Now I could actually live my vacation dream." "Peace and solitude were at last mine for the taking." "They weren't just handed to me." "I'd gained the right to them by at last asserting my freedom." "I reveled in my victory and ascribed it to my actions alone, not chance." "I was overwhelmed by a feeling of exquisite freedom." "Now I could do whatever I wanted." "But once back in the emptiness and silence of the house," "I was seized with anxiety and unable to sleep." "Is this the airport?" "When's your next flight to London?" "Yes, today."