Free Incidents in the Rue Laugier by Anita Brookner Page A

supposed, until he thought to acquire a permanent home. Home! It was a concept, not yet a place. Something else was needed to bring it to life. He thought of his parents’ placid undemanding existence, undemanding because they demanded nothing beyond what they already possessed. He more than envied them; he respected them, although he had left them quite happily, thinking to prolong that precious and now legendary childhood by leaving lightheartedly, secure in the knowledge that he could always return. Now, for the first time, he felt cast out, expected to make his life as a man, divorced from the caprices and the velleities of childhood.
    He would seek companions, he told himself, for he was newly aware of a coldness which made the heat of the day, the gleam of the sun on his watch, the heaviness of the summertrees little more than devices for throwing this new conviction into sharper relief. He would have to settle down, since he did not have the courage to do otherwise. He felt an access of grief that all his proposed adventures had reduced themselves to this brief interlude, in the hot sun of an exceptional summer, taking the place of those wider wanderings that he had always promised himself. Or had those wanderings been the illusion, the sea on which he had thought to embark and which had so swiftly proved to him his own inadequacies? He knew now that he was not a hero, and the knowledge shamed him. Here, on the Place Saint-Sulpice, he was visited by shame and sadness. It did not comfort him to know that he had done no wrong, that he was innocent. To be guilty—but to be guilty of extravagance, of accomplishment, of a certain grand carelessness—would have been a relief.
    Perhaps later, he thought, when I have settled down, made my way in life. That is the time to go away. Perhaps it was always a dream of maturity, of retirement even. Then I shall be fully justified, and surely more experienced, more courageous. Perhaps I am merely too young.
    He paid for his coffee and took a taxi back to the rue Laugier. In the hall of the flat he switched on the light, consulted his diary, then telephoned the shop in Denbigh Street. He had no confidence that the call would be answered; for all he knew Thomas Cook had decamped as soon as his back was turned. The man’s slightly effeminate voice, so at odds with his incurious face, came through quite clearly, making him jump: his nerves were decidedly on edge this morning.
    ‘Cook? Harrison here. Everything all right?’
    ‘Yes. I’ve moved in, if that’s OK with you.’
    ‘Of course, of course. I’ve just thought, don’t get rid of any of those books. Someone must want them. I might do a catalogue when I get home.’
    ‘When’s that then?’
    ‘Oh, I don’t know. Soon. I’ll let you know, of course. Have you managed to clean up at all?’
    ‘It’s looking OK. Wants a few coats of paint though. Navy’d be nice.’
    ‘You’re right. I’ll have it refurbished when I get back. You could take a few days off if you wanted to. Just as long as you’re in the flat. I don’t particularly want the place to stand empty.’
    ‘I don’t mind. Perhaps I’ll take a week when you get back. Having a good time?’
    ‘Fine, thank you.’ He was amazed how easy it was to communicate with this man, whom, after all, he hardly knew. But then, he had not done much communicating recently, he told himself. And maybe the book business would not be too bad after all. This afternoon he would take a look at the secondhand boxes by the Seine to see what was on offer and how it was priced. He had, when he thought about it, a great deal to learn, and the process might take him some time.
    But in the event he went back to the Luxembourg Gardens, and merely sat in the sun, thinking back on the emotional changes that the last few days had brought about. Now that his future was, as he thought with a pang, more or less settled, he was in less of a hurry to move, to put himself out. It was as if