Paris: The Novel

his move. He began kissing her. They rolled onto the straw mattress. Martine was only wearing a shift, but he was still dressed. Young Roland was aroused, and so was she. His hand moved between her legs. She gave a little gasp. Soon afterward, he was pulling down his hose, entering her.
    “Take off your shirt,” she said, pulling at it. Like most people, Roland wore his shirt for a week or more, and it smelled of sweat and the street. But she liked that he washed more than other men she knew. Admittedly, dashing oneself with cold water from a bowl wasn’t much of a bath, but it was as good as it usually got in the Paris of the Crusades. “Ah,” she whispered, “that feels good.” She could smell his sweat, and that faint scent of almonds on his skin. He was getting more and more excited, thrusting rapidly. She arched her back. He pressed himself close.
    And then she frowned. She smelled something else. She thought she must be mistaken. But no, there was no mistake. It was the smell of perfume, but not the kind that she might use. This was the sickly smell of the cheapest kind of perfume that the street girls used to try to hide the fact they hadn’t washed for a month.
    There was only one way that Roland could have got that smell on his skin. She understood in a flash. That’s what he’d been up to last night. Her body went rigid.
    He came. Early.
    Martine did not move. For a moment, a great sense of hurt engulfed her, like a wave. But it quickly receded. She wasn’t in love with him. Then she felt rage. How dare he? She’d offered herself, and he’d run around the corner with some whore he’d picked up God knows where. Had he no respect for her at all? Did he have any idea how lucky he was? She wantedto scream. She wanted to strike him with something, hard and heavy. She wanted to make him suffer.
    But still she lay quite still. He leaned over. She forced herself to smile. Then she put her head on his chest, and stroked it, closing her eyes as if she were drowsy. After a little time she felt his body relax. He was dozing. She pulled away and lay beside him, thinking.
    She gave a small smile of satisfaction. Revenge was a dish best served cold. She was glad, now, that she had kept silent. He would suspect nothing. She closed her eyes.

    It was dawn when she awoke. In the faint light from the shuttered window she could see that he was lying on his side, his head raised on one arm, watching her.
    “At last,” he said. He reached across.
    He kissed her neck and started to move down her body. She let him. It felt good. He wasn’t in a hurry, and nor was she.
    “I’m a little sleepy,” she said. He was hard, and that was what she wanted, too. She let him enter. He was moving slowly and rhythmically, taking his time.
    “You know,” she said softly, “about what you said last night.”
    “You talk when you’re making love?”
    “Sometimes. I mean about my uncle. You don’t have to worry. He has no idea.”
    “Good.”
    “I’d know at once if he did. He’d beat me.”
    “Oh.”
    “He wants me to make a good marriage. As for any man who slept with me … Aiee …”
    “What?”
    “He’d suffer the fate of Abelard.”
    He stopped.
    “You’re not serious.”
    “You don’t know him.”
    “He’d castrate me? Cut off my balls?”
    “Oh, he’d have some roughnecks do it. He has the power.”
    “But I’m a noble.”
    “So was Abelard.” It was true that the great philosopher came from a minor noble family.
    She felt him shrink inside her. She pulled him close.
    “Don’t worry,
mon amour
, he has no idea,” she coaxed. But Roland’s manhood was in full retreat. “Don’t leave me now,” she whispered. “Finish what you came to do.”
    He pulled away. He glanced at the sliver of light between the shutters.
    “I’d better go,” he said.
    “Will you come back tonight?” she asked.
    “I have to study tonight,” he said.
    “Tomorrow?”
    “If I can.”

    The day passed quietly, giving her time for further reflection. On the whole, she had to admit, it was probably just as well that things had worked out the way they had. She’d been a fool to run such risks. Her little interlude with Roland, such as it was, had made one thing very clear to her. She needed a man in her life again.
    It was time to get married. She could probably get a rich husband. Her uncle would see to that. There were plenty of good men in Paris, so she might as well marry a rich one.
    Roland had to go.