that troubled her. If all your life you endure the consequences of a single deed, then you cannot imagine life before it; it is almost as if the consequences precede the action. The deed itself meanwhile becomes harder to imagine as some isolated event which, by some easy twist of human will, might not have happened at all. It becomes the subject of faint memory, conjecture, insufficient detail.
All this was very hard to explain, however, and in her mind Anne saw Hartmann merely smile his well-mannered smile and tell her not to worry. When at last she fell asleep again she dreamed that she had known him as a child and had enlisted his help to stop her life from changing.
6
A NNE AWOKE THE next day with what looked like tiny blisters on the palms of her hands. Her fingers were swollen and coloured white in blotches; they throbbed and itched intensely. She went down to the bathroom and held them under the tap. At first the water was cold, but gradually it grew warmer and finally reached a temperature at which it became too hot for the skin to bear. She kept her hands there for a moment longer until a shudder went through her body, causing her neck and spine to tingle. Although this eased the itching for a time it was not enough, and she had to take her towel and scrape her hands on its rough pile until all the little blisters of the palms were raw and the white blotches bleeding.
Then she ran a basin of cold water and plunged both hands into it. By the time she returned to the bedroom the itching had gone, but there was a good deal of healing to be done. She took a blue glass jar from the chest of drawers and dipped her fingers into the whitish greasy ointment it contained. It had been given to her by a doctor in Paris, and although it never seemed to do much good at least it stopped the wounds from cracking as they dried out.
She had been half expecting an attack of eczema ever since she had been at the Lion d’Or. The man who had given her the ointment said it would come on if she was nervous or unhappy; she maintained it was caused by certain things she touched, like raw potatoes. He had merely shrugged, and said it was not impossible. Her life over the past two or three weeks could have supported either theory, and Anne was convinced that she had not been helped by the excessive amount of washing up Mme Bouin gave her to do in cold water with stinging powder. She dressed gingerly, to avoid transferring ointment to her clothes, and wondered if the condition of her hands might now give her some respite.
She was not very hopeful, but after breakfast went away to search out Mme Bouin in her nook beneath the hotel stairs.
‘Madame . . .’
‘What is it?’
‘Madame, I have this problem. My hands are very sore. I think perhaps it may be the powder for the pans. Or the potatoes, possibly.’
She held out her hands for inspection, the bleeding palms upward. The old woman lowered her face over them and peered; the widening of her left eye was magnified by the thickness of her spectacle lens. ‘I hope,’ she said, returning to an upright position, ‘that you haven’t been touching any food with those.’
‘No, I don’t think so. It only happened this morning and all I’ve touched was the crockery.’
‘I see.’
‘I’m not supposed to touch food anyway. It isn’t my job to –’
‘I am perfectly aware what your job is, mademoiselle. The first part of your job is to do what you are told by me and the second part is to do what is required of you by the head waiter and the chef, in that order.’
‘Yes, madame.’
‘Clearly we cannot have you waiting at a table with hands in that condition. It might put the clients off their food.’
‘But madame, I like waiting. I like meeting people.’
‘I am not interested in your social aspirations. You will have to do cleaning work only for the time being.’
‘I’m sorry, madame, I didn’t mean –’
‘That’s all. I will give the chef instructions
All this was very hard to explain, however, and in her mind Anne saw Hartmann merely smile his well-mannered smile and tell her not to worry. When at last she fell asleep again she dreamed that she had known him as a child and had enlisted his help to stop her life from changing.
6
A NNE AWOKE THE next day with what looked like tiny blisters on the palms of her hands. Her fingers were swollen and coloured white in blotches; they throbbed and itched intensely. She went down to the bathroom and held them under the tap. At first the water was cold, but gradually it grew warmer and finally reached a temperature at which it became too hot for the skin to bear. She kept her hands there for a moment longer until a shudder went through her body, causing her neck and spine to tingle. Although this eased the itching for a time it was not enough, and she had to take her towel and scrape her hands on its rough pile until all the little blisters of the palms were raw and the white blotches bleeding.
Then she ran a basin of cold water and plunged both hands into it. By the time she returned to the bedroom the itching had gone, but there was a good deal of healing to be done. She took a blue glass jar from the chest of drawers and dipped her fingers into the whitish greasy ointment it contained. It had been given to her by a doctor in Paris, and although it never seemed to do much good at least it stopped the wounds from cracking as they dried out.
She had been half expecting an attack of eczema ever since she had been at the Lion d’Or. The man who had given her the ointment said it would come on if she was nervous or unhappy; she maintained it was caused by certain things she touched, like raw potatoes. He had merely shrugged, and said it was not impossible. Her life over the past two or three weeks could have supported either theory, and Anne was convinced that she had not been helped by the excessive amount of washing up Mme Bouin gave her to do in cold water with stinging powder. She dressed gingerly, to avoid transferring ointment to her clothes, and wondered if the condition of her hands might now give her some respite.
She was not very hopeful, but after breakfast went away to search out Mme Bouin in her nook beneath the hotel stairs.
‘Madame . . .’
‘What is it?’
‘Madame, I have this problem. My hands are very sore. I think perhaps it may be the powder for the pans. Or the potatoes, possibly.’
She held out her hands for inspection, the bleeding palms upward. The old woman lowered her face over them and peered; the widening of her left eye was magnified by the thickness of her spectacle lens. ‘I hope,’ she said, returning to an upright position, ‘that you haven’t been touching any food with those.’
‘No, I don’t think so. It only happened this morning and all I’ve touched was the crockery.’
‘I see.’
‘I’m not supposed to touch food anyway. It isn’t my job to –’
‘I am perfectly aware what your job is, mademoiselle. The first part of your job is to do what you are told by me and the second part is to do what is required of you by the head waiter and the chef, in that order.’
‘Yes, madame.’
‘Clearly we cannot have you waiting at a table with hands in that condition. It might put the clients off their food.’
‘But madame, I like waiting. I like meeting people.’
‘I am not interested in your social aspirations. You will have to do cleaning work only for the time being.’
‘I’m sorry, madame, I didn’t mean –’
‘That’s all. I will give the chef instructions
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