Sylvia received two more letters from Jacques, neither satisfactory. She crumpled up the second letter and threw it on the ground. Both had been written before her meeting with Madame Gaston. Sylvia didn’t want letters; she wanted Jacques to come back. She wanted to know what was happening. She hated the feeling that he had simply disappeared, that he might have lied to her.
She considered booking her ticket to New York, but, after the heat of summer, Paris regained its old charm. The light became deeper and softer. In the mornings and evenings, a delicious chill crept into the air, the first intimation of autumn. Shops and cafés were opening, women appearing in their new outfits for the season. She was returning from an art gallery when she walked into her hotel and noticed Jacques sitting in a wing-back chair, the cigarette in his left hand, the horn-rim glasses, the elegant tweed jacket, a ribbon of smoke spiraling toward the ceiling. She hesitated when he rose to embrace her.
“Sylvia! Sylvia?” he said, coming toward her.
She shook her head.
“Sylvia?”
She turned and walked out of the hotel. She started down the street. Without thought, she walked to the Seine with Jacques at her side. He had the grace not to speak, to wait until she was ready. The chestnut and plane trees had started to turn shades of yellow and red. The river gleamed silver, etched with sinuous lines of currents beneath the surface. Beyond the booksellers’ kiosks, with Notre Dame rising on the far bank, she finally stopped and asked for his handkerchief. She removed her glasses to blot her eyes, then sniffed soundly. “I felt frightened when I saw you. I don’t understand but it was a sensation going up my spine.”
“A fright?” His eyes stood still behind his lenses, moving only to search her face.
“Jacques, what happened? I went to Brussels. I saw that woman, Madame Gaston.”
He nodded slightly, an all but imperceptible sign of assent.
“She said you had gone to England.”
“No, I’m sorry. She didn’t tell you the truth.”
“What is the truth?”
“Sylvia, I can’t explain my family to you, and I can’t explain what happened. It’s too complicated, too strange. It’s so strange, I just can’t tell you. But you have to know that you’re very important to me, unlike anyone I’ve ever known. Being away from you, I missed you so much. I don’t want to think about a future without you.”
“What about your family?”
“They know about you.”
“How?”
“They have their spies.”
“And your wife?”
He winced a bit. “Yes, that came as a surprise, painful. She’s interested in another man. She’s decided not to wait for me.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.”
He shook his head. “It’s for the best. I want to make some changes. I can’t get away from my family altogether, but I’m going to get a job. A friend says he can get me started as a correspondent for L’ Auto, a Belgian sports journal.”
“Jacques, that’s wonderful.”
“I won’t make much money. We’ll be poor like everyone else.”
“But it’s a start.”
“But now, Sylvia, I’m back and you have to trust me.” He opened his arms, and she allowed him to fold her in. Her tears came freely, wetting the breast of his shirt. “Oh my God!” She laughed, pulling away, wiping her eyes with her fingers. “I imagined the most terrible things.”
“Sylvia, I’m in love with you,” he said, feeling the truth of the words as he said them. “I want to marry you.”
She laughed again. “Marxists don’t believe in marriage.”
“If you don’t believe in marriage, what do you do when you feel this way?”
“You tell your friends and the world that you are husband and wife. We don’t need a judge or a rabbi to say that we are married. That’s between the man and woman.”
“But I’m not a Marxist.”
“And now you tell me,” she said with a smile. “I’m proud of you. And don’t worry, you’ll like having a job.”
“I don’t know about that, but come, let’s get you something to drink. You’re trembling. I think a marc would be appropriate.”