“Why, I think that would be very nice, a little later on. But just now—After all, I’ve had a dreadfully rustic summer—and of course you have, you poor thing! I think we both deserve a little gaiety here in Paris before we leave. After all, when you go traveling around to assorted places, you’re frightfully detached from people.”
Then, very blandly, as though it wasn’t at all necessary to have his agreement, “I think we might stay here three months or so, and we might take a nice apartment up near the Etoile. I’m so sick of hotels.”
“Well—” He stopped; then it came in a slow tidal wave. “I don’t blame you for being sick of hotels. So am I! But I certainly don’t intend to spend all fall, as I spent all spring, sitting on my rear in Paris—”
“Need you be vulgar?”
“Yes, I guess I need to. I don’t intend to sit around here all fall, waiting for you to go. When we first started out, I was willing either to go on living in Zenith or travel, but if I’m going to travel, I want to travel—to see things, see different kinds of people and towns. I’d like to see Venice and Madrid; I’d like to have some German beer. I don’t propose to go on being sacrificed to your ambition as a social climber—”
She flared, “That is a lie, and you know it’s a lie! Do you think I have to climb to meet people like Renée de Pénable? Climb down, if anything! But I do find it rather more amusing to play with civilized people than to sit and soak at the New York Bar—yes, or go around gaping at ruins with a Baedeker! It’s all very well for you, but I have to do the packing, I have to interpret for you. I have to plan the trip. Heavens, we’ll go to Venice! But is there any need of our galumphing off like a Cook’s tour when we could have a charming autumn here, with our own flat and servants, and all the friends that I have here now—quite independent of the De Pénable person? I’m sorry, Sam, but if you could just occasionally try to catch somebody else’s point of view—I should prefer to remain right here in Paris for—”
“Fran!”
“Well?”
He hesitated. While they talked, round them flowed the amenity of good service, and if they were two volcanoes, they kept their rumblings low, and to any observer they seemed merely a large and impassive man, probably English, and a woman with a quick-changing face who was a little angry but very much in control of her anger.
“Fran! You really would sacrifice me, to stay here?”
“Don’t be so melodramatic! I can’t see that it’s any sacrifice to remain in the loveliest city—”
“Is Arnold Israel here in Paris?”
“Yes, he is! What of it?”
“When did you see him last?”
“This noon.”
“He going to stay here in Paris some time?”
“I don’t know. How should I know? Yes, I suppose he is.”
“He give you any ideas about a flat near the Etoile?”
“See here, my dear Samuel! Have you been reading novels? Just what is the idea of this comic returned-husband-sternly-cross-examining-loose-wife pose—”
“Fran! How far did you go with this Israel?”
“Have you any idea how insulting you are?”
“Have you any idea how insulting I’m going to be, if you don’t stop this injured-innocent business?”
“And have you any idea of how angry I’m going to be if you continue to act like a barroom bully—which is what you are, essentially! I’ve concealed it from myself, for years, but I knew all the time—The great Sam Dodsworth, the football player, the celebrated bruiser, the renowned bully! Why, you belong in the kitchen, with the corner policeman, not among civilized—”
“You haven’t answered! How far did you go with this Israel? I’m doing you the honor of asking you, not of snooping. And you haven’t answered.”
“And I most certainly do not intend to answer! It’s an insult to be expected—And it’s an insult to Mr. Israel! He is a gentleman! I wish he were here! You wouldn’t dare to talk to me as you’ve been talking, if he were here. He’s quite as powerful as you are, my dear Samuel—and he has brains and breeding and manners as well. Aah! ‘How far did you go in sin with your hellish lover!’ After all the years I’ve tried to do something for you, you still have the vocabulary of a Laura Jean Libbey novel! Arnold, you will be shocked to learn, is so unregenerate that he prefers André Gide and Paul Morand to Laura Jean Libbey, and of course it’s Black Guilt for me to have found a little pleasure in talking to him instead of discussing poker with your lovely friend Mr. Tub Pearson—”
While she raced on, quietly hysterical, he knew the answer to his question, and he was astonished that he was not more astonished, shocked that he was not more shocked. He did not greatly press her. When she stopped, shaking with muted sobs which he pitied, he said, gently:
“You found him very romantic?”
“Of course! He is!”
“Perhaps I can understand that—more or less.”
“Oh, Sam, please do be human and understand! You do it so well, when you forget your Stern Man of Granite role and let yourself be sweet. Of course there was nothing wrong between Arnold and me—Isn’t it funny how—I’m just as bad as I accused you of being! Using old cant phrases like that! ‘Nothing wrong between Arnold and me!’ After all, though, perhaps I was unjust to you; perhaps you didn’t mean anything of the kind but merely—You are kind, Sam, but if you don’t mind my saying so, you’re just the least little bit clumsy, now and then—”
She had checked her hysteria, had become amiable and prattling and self-confident again,
