Free Ladivine by Marie NDiaye Page A

was unarmed, which might well be a lie, said his jeering eyes, because he had no fear of lies, and no sense of honor.
    A wolfhound came in with the parents, a big, healthy, powerful beast. Clarisse backed away.
    “Don’t be afraid,” said the father. “He’s with us, he’s very well behaved.”
    Richard had gone out for bread, and he came back just then. A surprised, vaguely irritated look crossed his face, as if he’d forgotten his parents were coming, which couldn’t be true, thought Clarisse, since he’d gone out specially to buy bread for four. His suddenly unhappy face settled into a guarded expression, just this side of rude.
    He murmured a greeting to his father, still keeping his distance.
    Filled with a compassion she’d never before felt for her husband, an almost disinterested sympathy, Clarisse sensed that he was shielding himself from the crushing physical authority, the simultaneously attractive and repellent omnipotence that had entered the house with his father. How strange to see Richard trembling, he who ordinarily showed no fear of anyone!
    She went and stood at his side, their arms touching.
    She could feel him quivering in turmoil and sterile distress, like a dog, she told herself. He seemed to be trying to fight off a will stronger than his own, and that will was serenely waiting for him to give in and bow down, and Richard was still clinging to his anger and pride, and the other will saw that and laughed, requiring neither anger nor pride to maintain itself.
    So Richard Rivière’s father laughed off his son, thought Clarisse, moved, because he knew Richard’s frail crutches would soon break, that his anger would tire and his pride falter, no longer at all sure of its reason for being.
    Stiff but trembling, Richard didn’t say a word, as if the energy he was burning to stand up to his father and keep up his dignity forbade any further exertion.
    Clarisse showed the parents into the living room, babbling, describing what they could plainly see, the simple, brightly colored furniture she and Richard had picked out, the pale-yellow wallpaper they’d hung. The parents nodded, never offering a compliment, the mother dubious and reserved, the father snide and uninterested.
    Richard stood off to one side, arms crossed, and Clarisse thought he looked exhausted and drained beneath his still fiercely tensed face, as if his sense of himself couldn’t quite keep up with his real nature, which, weak and helpless before the father, was, unbeknownst to him, already showing itself in his vacillating gaze, in his mouth’s drooping corners.
    “Let’s go see the baby,” said Clarisse, having heard a faint squeal.
    She started down the hallway, then stopped short at the room’s open door. Her hands instinctively sprang out toward the two sides of the jamb, as if to prevent anyone entering.
    The wolfhound was lying on Ladivine’s bed, a little crib whose bars were lowered on one side so the baby could be picked up more easily, and its outstretched head, lightly grazing the child’s, had a deathly stillness about it.
    Equally still, Clarisse saw in a single sweeping glance, were the baby’s body, her colorless face, her wide eyes looking deep into the dog’s staring gaze, as if she’d plunged into an abyss of sibylline knowledge and perhaps become lost.
    Yet Clarisse had the strong sense of a bond not to be rashly broken, a secret union with no immediate danger for the child. Not for a moment did she doubt the dog’s good intentions.
    She heard a horrified cry behind her and felt herself being violently shoved forward. Richard burst into the room, snatched up the baby, and clasped her to him, turning his back to the dog as a shield for the child.
    “Get that thing out of here!” he screamed toward the hallway, where his parents were standing.
    He backed toward the wall, scarlet with fear and indignation.
    The father calmly stepped in. Clarisse saw his eyes study the scene just as hers had a moment