Céleste winds up the clock and looks round the room.

She becomes aware of Odilon.

He is standing in the bedroom doorway, shirt open, waiting.

INT. PROUST’S APARTMENT. SALON/HALL/KITCHEN CORRIDOR. NIGHT.

Céleste gives a stifled cry.

Proust comes out of the salon, crosses the hall and starts to walk along the kitchen corridor towards Céleste’s bedroom.

Céleste cries out again.

Proust looks back towards his bedroom.

INT. PROUST’S APARTMENT. KITCHEN. NIGHT.

The bell rings.

INT. PROUST’S BEDROOM. NIGHT.

Céleste comes in.

PROUST   I can’t seem to get comfortable.

CÉLESTE   Shall I straighten the bed?

PROUST   Mm.
She does so.
Proust takes her hand in his.

PROUST   Dear Céleste.

INT. PROUST’S APARTMENT. KITCHEN CORRIDOR/CÉLESTE’S BEDROOM/KITCHEN. DAY.

Céleste goes back into her bedroom. She sees that Odilon is not there and goes into the kitchen.

Odilon is back in uniform, waiting to go. He shrugs.

The curtains are open, letting in the morning light.

Mix to:

INT. PROUST’S APARTMENT. HALL/LANDING. NIGHT.

Paul Morand, a young diplomat, and Princess Helene Soutzo enter the apartment.

MORAND   Céleste.

CÉLESTE   Monsieur.
She takes his coat, and the Princess is about to give her hers.
Perhaps Madame la Princesse should keep her wrap.

MORAND   That’s right. There won’t be a fire.

PRINCESS   No fire? How quaint.

CÉLESTE   I’ll see if monsieur is ready.

INT. PROUST’S BEDROOM. NIGHT.

Proust is waiting by his bedroom door.

PROUST   (whispering) What does she look like?

CÉLESTE   Rather small with a very straight neck.

PROUST   A straight neck?

CÉLESTE   A bit like a doll. I think she’s older than Monsieur Morand.

PROUST   No! Let’s see!
Céleste goes out, closing the door behind her.

INT. PROUST’S BEDROOM. NIGHT.

MORAND   The Princess is thinking of closing down her house and moving into the Ritz. With the air raids it’ll be safer.

PRINCESS   What’s more to the point, it will be cheaper. The war has made everything so expensive.

PROUST   The war, the war. I cannot think of it objectively. It permeates everything. As saints used to live in God so one now lives in the war. Has Paul told you that when hostilities began I was called for a medical examination?

PRINCESS   But that’s absurd.

PROUST   Well, not so absurd, surely. I am on the reserve.

MORAND   The joke was that they called Marcel for 3.30 in the morning.

PROUST   I thought someone had tipped off the authorities about my topsy-turvy regime. That they were being considerate. Alas, it was only a printer’s error. One has lost so many friends, and that one feels, of course. But the deaths of tens of thousands happening every day is the most insignificant of sensations, hardly as disagreeable as a draught.

CÉLESTE   Do you feel a draught, monsieur?