A party was the decorous thing, it was decided. Frances and Joan went out after breakfast for supplies, having received a list from Mme Reynard, who to her credit did not ask to come along but stayed behind to ready the kitchen for cooking, and the apartment for entertaining. Frances had two thousand euros left and was intent on spending every cent at La Grande Épicerie. This was apparent to Joan, and she became suspicious. “Saffron isn’t on the list.”
“Saffron is a necessity.”
“Three bottles of saffron.”
“We’ll use it later or sooner.”
Frances began loading caviar into the cart. Joan volunteered to pay the bill but Frances said it wasn’t necessary, it was all budgeted out.
“Dutch,” Joan said.
“No, I have to spend it all.”
“Why?”
“You’re supposed to spend it all. That’s the object of the game.” She sent Joan away to seek out the cheese; after she’d gone, Frances called over the wine clerk. “Give me something worth five hundred.”
“Case or a bottle?”
“Bottle.”
She had a moment of dread at the checkout when she realized there were twenty euros left over. But then she saw a sign beside the cashier explaining that all groceries could be delivered for just that amount, and so she wrote down Joan’s address and handed over the last of the money and she felt greatly unburdened, even proud in some way. She took Joan by the arm and proposed they walk home. Passing through a park, they saw a man and woman lying in the grass, kissing passionately. Frances asked, “Do you and Don still make love?”
“Every year on his birthday.”
“But not your birthday.”
“Just a nice dinner for me, thank you. Sometimes we go again around Easter.”
Frances lit a cigarette. “Do you regret not having children?”
“Never once. Never for a day. Do you regret having one?”
Frances laughed.
“I’m being serious,” said Joan.
“Oh. Well, sometimes I do, to be honest.”
“But you wouldn’t change him.”
“Yes, I would.”
“But you wouldn’t change him much.”
“I’d change him quite a bit.”
“But you love him.”
“So much that it pains me.”
Joan reached for Frances’s cigarette, took a drag, and handed it back. “What do you make of this Susan?” she asked.
Frances made a grim face. “No tactical intelligence whatsoever.”
“I’m sympathetic. I don’t think it would be very easy to love Malcolm.”
“It’s easy enough.”
“Don’t be such a hard case. She’s sweet.”
“What’s that worth?”
“Something, I think.”
Frances said, “I don’t want to talk about her.”
Joan held up her hands in truce. “Moving right along,” she said. “When was the last time you made love?”
“You know perfectly well that it’s been years. I had a close call on the way over.” Here Frances told the story of the ship’s captain; by the end of it, Joan was laughing her loud American laugh.
She asked, “How do you feel when you look back on your romantic exploits?”
“A little bit embarrassed, actually,” Frances said.
“Really?”
“I blew half the ambulatory men in Manhattan.”
“I hope you don’t regret it?”
“There’s very little I regret.”
“Such as what?”
“You want me to tell you what I regret?”
“Yes.”
“Well, I’m not going to.”
They crossed the Seine. Joan was smiling to herself about something. She said, “I told Don I had to run to Paris because I thought you were going to kill yourself. He was fiddling with the television remote and he told me, ‘Tell her hello, if you get there in time.’”
This amused rather than offended Frances. “Don never was a deep feeler.”
“That’s true. But I’m not even criticizing him. To be honest, I’ve come to appreciate the way he is. I had a moment earlier this year where I realized that I am, at the base of it, happy, and that Don and I have fulfilled what we set out to fulfill for each other. Can you understand how shocking this was for me?”
“Shocking because you shouldn’t be satisfied with what you’ve got?”
She shook her head. “You get older and you don’t even want love. Not the love we believed in when we were young. Who has the energy for that? I mean, when I think of the way we used to carry on about it.”
“I know.”
“Men and women throwing themselves out of windows.” She paused. “What you want is to know someone’s there; you also want them to leave you alone. I’ve got that with Don. But, I was shocked because I suddenly understood that the heart takes care of itself. We allow ourselves contentment; our heart brings us ease in its good time.”
“It’s a nice thought,” said Frances.
“You don’t agree?”
Frances flicked her cigarette away. “It hasn’t been my experience.”