The Reinvention of Love

have had to take up various projects to keep us occupied during the exile. Charles claims to be learning to be a photographer. François-Victor busies himself translating the complete works of Shakespeare into French. Adèle is working at her embroidery, and playing the piano and composing music for it. I am writing a biography of Victor. Well, I am writing the biography, but Victor is helping.
    “Of course,” I say.
    “Can you begin right after supper?”
    “I can.”
    “But, Maman,” says Adèle, “you promised that you would listen to my new piece of music tonight.”
    “Can I not do both?”
    “No,” says Victor, waving his soup spoon in the air. “I will not have my thoughts interrupted by that great wooden beast.” He furrows his brow, puts the spoon down again beside his soup plate and fishes in his breast pocket for a small notebook. He swivels in his chair so that his back is to his family, and writes down what he has just said. He is so clever, my husband! He says so many witty remarks, and all of them will end up on the pages of his novels.
    Adèle has her head bowed. I pat her arm, but she jerks it away from me.
    “No matter, Dédé,” says Charles from across the table. “Youcan help me in my darkroom tonight. I think I have taken some good photographs of the garden this afternoon.”
    The biography is massive, and we’re not even up to the production of
Hernani
yet.
    Victor likes us to work on the dining-room table, after all the supper dishes have been cleared. He spreads out the pages of the biography and walks the perimeter of the table, surveying them. Sometimes he moves the pages into a different order. Sometimes he dictates a phrase or series of phrases, which I, seated at one end of the table, copy down. After we have finished working for the evening, Victor will gather up the pages and hide them behind the wood panelling in one of the secret cubbyholes that he had built when he renovated the house.
    There is a restlessness to him tonight that makes me wonder if he really did go for his usual walk today. He moves quickly round the table, not settling on anything, his movements bending the light of the candle first one way, and then another.
    “We will write a single day,” he finally says, stopping just behind me. I can feel the heat from his body at my back.
    “The day of the
Hernani
battle?” I say, eager to move the narrative along. At this rate we will have to do six volumes just to get to this present moment.
    “No,” he says, and he bends close so that his mouth is right next to my ear. “We will write about the first time we met Sainte-Beuve, that night he came to our apartment on rue de Vaugirard. You must remember that night, Adèle?”
    “No,” I say. “I don’t. Not at all.”
    “Come now.” His breath is in my hair. My hand tightens on the quill pen. “You must have a perfect recollection of the first time you caught a glimpse of our dear friend.”
    “No. I don’t remember anything.”
    There is silence, and in that silence I can hear the growl of the ocean against the rocks and the tick of the clock in the hall. I can hear the quickened breathing of my husband, and the slick beating of my own heart in my chest.
    “We were young and happy,” I say. “That is what I remember. We were young and happy, and I wanted more than anything to be mother to your children.”
    This is true and we both know it.
    Victor exhales and the candle flame leans away from us.
    “The battle of
Hernani
?” I say. “We could work at documenting that day.”
    “Wasn’t Sainte-Beuve there for that?” says Victor, but he moves away from me, continues down the table, and I know he has lost interest, so I can lie without being caught.
    “No,” I say, with conviction. “I don’t believe he was.”
    That night I cannot sleep. I lie awake in my room, listening to Victor prowling around the darkened house. Usually he sleeps in his room upstairs, right next door to where he works so that he can rise in the night when inspiration strikes. For him to still be downstairs means that he has decided to redecorate something, or that he is going to burn another saying into the rafters of Hauteville House. I listen for the sounds of furniture moving. I sniff the air for the smell of scorched wood. But there is nothing. Perhaps it is the same restlessness that Victor displayed earlier this evening and he is trying to calm it by pacing. There must be something troubling occupying his