I'm going to read several sections
from a novel in progress.
It is a corrected novel, as Jon says.
They're still being corrected.
The title of the novel so far is Homesick
for the Land of Pictures.
There are two main characters, Stephen and Camilla.
Almost all of these little sections
are from the point of view of Camilla.
At the beginning she has just left her lover Stephen
after a several week affair.
Later on there's a reference to several year
affair with a man named Ingo G.
If I start reading too fast just yell gesundheit or something.
Camilla had two very practical concrete reasons when she--
excuse me.
Camilla had two very practical concrete missions when
she left the hotel and Stephen.
First, she must find a place to live.
And second, she must look for a job.
This is in Paris by the way.
She was not going to America.
That had been a lie.
She had not just come from Basel, Switzerland,
and she had not run out on a wealthy fiancee
on the brink of her wedding.
These were lies.
Nor was she a beautician, that too had been a lie.
Camilla often lied when she first met people.
She was by nature trusting but experience
had made her cautious.
Indeed, like most converts, she practiced her acquired
suspiciousness with a vengeance.
She had an Uncle Henry, her mother's youngest brother.
Henry was her favorite uncle because not
only did he listen to her with sympathy when she complained
about her mother, Henry shared her dislike for the woman.
But he always brought her a box of Swiss chocolates
each time he stayed with them in Brussels.
On one such visit he said to Camilla, mignonne,
I have a test for you.
If you answer correctly I'll give you
this box of chocolates.
Instead of protesting the way any sensible child would
the sudden change of rules, I come visit, you get candy,
she agreed by nodding her head.
Any game was better than the vast and dulling daily circle
of repetition.
She waited for the game to begin.
Her mouth began to water.
Now?
She asked.
Not now, he said, but in a while.
He put the box of chocolates into his suitcase,
which he placed in the closet on the floor
behind her mother's several pairs of shoes.
A few times, that day she requested that the game begin.
He put her off by saying in a while.
Each time her mouth watered.
On the second day alone in the apartment,
she took the chocolate box out of the suitcase
and stared at it.
She stroked the slightly raised picture of the half clad
reclining woman.
Finally, she could restrain herself no longer.
She opened the box and removed one chocolate.
She took it to the park and ate it.
Hardly anything tastes sweeter than a cherry out of season.
Before the weekend was done, she'd
eaten nine chocolates, a third of the box,
and each one tasted better than the previous ones.
But she kept up the pretense.
At least three times a day.
She would ask her Uncle Henry to start the game.
Each time he answered, in a while.
On Sunday evening just as he was about to leave,
while he was putting on his coat and hat
and looking around for his big umbrella,
she reminded him that he hadn't given her the test yet.
She reminded him because she felt it would seem suspicious
if she didn't.
After all she had wanted the candy.
She reminded him politely but with a little edge
to her voice, like a schoolteacher emphasizing
a delicate but obvious point.
She didn't want to appear either overly eager or overly
indifferent.
After all, she'd already consumed
nine of the chocolates.
He posed the question with great seriousness,
leaning down and smoothing out her dark red hair.
Which weighs more, mignonne?
A gram of feathers or a gram of gold?
Camilla knew the correct answer.
She was eight years old and no dummy.
She had a brother gone now to university, five uncles,
and a father, and a grandfather, and three boy playmates
at school.
They all had their games.
Every man had a game he played with mock seriousness.
The games of boys were different in one essential element,
boys didn't announce their games because they
didn't know that's what they were attempting.
She gave the question considerable thought
or she appeared to.
She closed her eyes and placed her hand on her forehead,
like a mother measuring a fever.
In reality, she was thinking about the consequences
of her answer.
If she gave the correct answer like the smart girl she was,
she would get the box of chocolates
but she would feel as though she'd been beaten.
Uncle Henry would have been successful
in his manipulation of her through her intense love
of chocolates.
Her mother did similar things to her all the time.
If she gave the wrong answer, either Uncle Henry
would keep the box of chocolates in the spirit
of the game, which she liked, the spirit of games that is.
And feel badly about it on his way back home,
which she didn't like because she loved her Uncle Henry.
Or he would accept the wrong answer
and give her the box of chocolates anyway.
Then he would feel magnanimous and she would feel manipulated.
She gave the right answer.
Uncle Henry clapped.
He handed over the box of chocolates
which she opened immediately.
Finding it one-third empty she began to cry
and screamed that Uncle Henry had cheated her.
Everyone felt bad, including Camilla.
Only her mother suspected the truth and beat her with a strap
after Uncle Henry left for the train station.
What had she learned from this early experience?
One, don't give yourself away.
Henry knew her too well, knew she liked chocolate,
knew he could manipulate her just for the fun of it
through this love.
Two, there are games and games within games, each of which
she enjoyed in the abstract way that born gangsters do.
The results don't matter.
Even playing the game itself doesn't matter.
What matters are the care and the elegant choices
that go into making up the rules.
Three, never give them what they want
and be prepared to pay the price.
What else?
There are some people you can't fool no matter
how much care you take.
Her mother wouldn't be fooled.
Her mother knew her as well as she
knew herself, which was well enough to make a difference.
For the rest of her life it was important to Camilla
to discover who fell into which camp.
Stephen could be fooled.
She knew that right away when she saw him in the Cafe de
Paulette, standing over, sending over his adoring looks.
He wanted something very badly, Camilla.
She wanted him too.
She wasn't sure why except that he looked
so vulnerable and so invisible.
Although she saw him as handsome,
that strong and stubborn face, and those mismatched eyes,
she knew instinctively that no other woman would notice him.
Also she liked the fact that he was older
and that he wore no wedding ring.
She liked older men, but she didn't like them married.
She waited and waited for Steven to come to her table.
She put on her most indifferent look,
sucking in her cheeks to accentuate her cheekbones.
At the same time she slumped her shoulders
to appear if not helpless, at least in need
of some assistance.
He didn't take the hint.
Such a child.
She felt sorry for him, she wanted to help him.
Camilla was always a sucker for the person
who needed her the most.
She began to cry.
It took great effort on her part and she could only
get two tears to fall at a time, like a doll's tears
when the doll is turned upside down
and squeezed in the appropriate place.
She couldn't dab at the tears with her handkerchief.
He might think she had the sniffles.
So she let them lie in her cheeks
like perfect pieces of crystal jewelry.