She nodded at Scarlet before she picked up her knitting needles once again.
“My first impulse was to go immediately to Claude. At this time of the morning he would be teaching, and I got up quickly to dress and meet him at his classroom with the news. The happy news. On the bus to the university I made a plan in which we went together to the south, and we lived in that small town near Marseille, and I baked cannelles and madeleines, and Claude wrote the book he always talked about writing, and there in the plan was a little girl, not unlike Bébé. And a small house near the sea. And almond trees, and olive trees, and wild fennel.
“But as I raced up the stairs to the building where he taught, something struck me and sent a shiver through me even on such a relentlessly hot day. I remembered clearly when I’d had my last period, and it was back in June on an evening when Denis and I were still lovers. I sat hard on the steps, feeling the heat of the sunbaked stone through my thin dress, forcing myself to think. But I knew that had been my last period, and that two weeks later I had slept with both Denis and then, in that first weekend together, Claude.
“That flutter rose in me again, this time filling my throat with bile. Around me, students rushed, carrying armloads of books, speaking French and German and Spanish. I could smell their sweat and their cigarettes, and again I tasted vomit.
“I don’t know how long I sat there before a cool hand touched my bare arm. I looked up into Claude’s face. He was wearing his glasses, those funny rimless half-glasses, and his blond hair was matted across his forehead.
“ ‘Rouge,’ he said softly, ‘did I forget that we were going to meet?’
“I shook my head.
“ ‘You look so pale,’ he said, and touched my cheeks with the backs of both his hands. ‘Are you feverish?’
“I shook my head again. ‘It’s just so hot,’ I said.
“He helped me to my feet and held my elbow firmly for support. ‘Let’s get you some water, yes?’
“I let him lead me to his office. I had never been there in the morning, and I thought the Persian rug looked faded and worn in this light, that the color of the walls seemed dingy. I drank down the water he brought me without stopping, and then I immediately threw it up. Once I began vomiting I couldn’t stop. Claude grabbed the wastebasket and held it under my chin.
“A secretary appeared in the open doorway, wearing a concerned face. ‘Professor?’ she asked.
“ ‘This young girl is ill from the heat,’ Claude said. ‘She’ll be fine.’
“ ‘You have class now,’ the secretary said. ‘Shall I take her?’
“ ‘Call maintenance,’ Claude said, ‘to clean up here.’
“The secretary hesitated a moment before leaving.
“ ‘I was in the neighborhood,’ I said. ‘Silly of me. No breakfast. I just wanted to see your face.’
“Claude grinned at me. ‘Go and eat some eggs and a big café au lait in a cool café and you will be your old self again in no time.’
“I stared at him, puzzled.
“ ‘And we will meet here as usual at two o’clock,’ he said, straightening his shirt and tie, gathering his books and briefcase.
“ ‘Au revoir,’ he said.
“I nodded because that was all I could manage. This was the first time we had been together and Claude had spoken to me entirely in French.
“I almost didn’t go back that afternoon. But I could not stay away. In the hours in between seeing him, I took his advice and sat in a cool café and ate eggs and toast, and I thought about this baby. I would never know for sure if it belonged to Denis or Claude. For some women, perhaps, that would not matter. They could convince themselves that the father was of course the man they loved.
“But for me, I only wanted this baby if it was Claude’s. Denis meant nothing to me. What if I had the baby and it was like Denis, distracted and lazy? Then I would know that it wasn’t Claude’s and I would have to live a charade with Claude. No, this little one would never be born.
“By the time I arrived back at Claude’s office, the secretary away at her lunch, the outer office empty, I had decided not to tell Claude anything. I would get the name of a doctor and get this done quickly, pretending that it never happened. It seemed so simple that when Claude came in I threw myself at him, tearing at his tie and the buttons on his shirt, wanting only to fill myself with him.
“He laughed softly. ‘You are revived,’ he whispered in English.
“Of course, these things are never so simple, are they? That very evening I told Denis about my situation. Not the details of it, just that I was pregnant and needed an abortion. He studied my face, as if he could find there some evidence of his own involvement in this predicament. But I remained unreadable.
“ ‘I can arrange this,’ he said finally.
“He took longer than I had hoped and it was several weeks later before he handed me a name and address on a slip of paper right before we began to make the morning’s baguettes. I took it and thanked him, but he waved away my gratitude with his hands.
“ ‘Let’s not talk about this again,’ he said.
“I was happy to oblige.
“That week, Claude and his family were away in Spain. How perfect, I thought. I had begun to read everything as a sign about who the father was. Claude’s absence during the abortion made it clear that Denis was the father. But on the very day it was to be done, as I combed my hair in preparation to leave, the phone rang and it was Claude—a sign that the baby must be his. My heart beat fast as I listened to him speak into a pay phone in a café at the beach.
“ ‘Rouge,’ he said, ‘I am miserable without you. I will never be away from you like this again. I’ll figure out a way for us to be together. Do you believe me?’
“ ‘Yes,’ I said.
“ ‘I love you,’ Claude was saying, over and over again.
“He did not stop until I said it to him.
“ ‘I love you too, Claude,’ I said, the words burning my throat.
“When it was done, I was made empty. The weight stayed on me. My hips and waist were thick, my breasts larger. But beneath that, was stone. Or worse, nothing at all. As soon as I woke from the anesthesia, I knew in my heart that it had been Claude’s child after all. The nurse gave me something to calm me, but I couldn’t stop crying.
“This new me, empty, overweight, unhappy, tried to continue life as it had been before. Denis and I baked bread in the early morning. I met Claude in the afternoons, and could hardly appreciate the changes in him. The declarations of love, the promises of a future together. One day he pinched my waist, and teased me that I was growing too fat and too happy.
“ ‘You look the way you did when I first saw you,’ he said when I pulled away from him. He made me turn back to face him. ‘That day I knew,’ he said, serious now. ‘I knew you were going to change my life.’
“ ‘I knew too,’ I said.
“Soon afterwards, after the weather had turned crisp and cool, Denis once again asked me about Frère Michel. ‘He will take you on,’ he said. ‘But I wouldn’t waste time if I were you. He’s very old. He won’t be around forever.’
“I looked into Denis’s face. He had flour across one cheek, and flecks of sticky dough on his apron.
“ ‘I’ll go,’ I said. ‘I’m ready.’
“Can you believe