Outside, I found a bench and sat down to gather my thoughts. Again, I was struck by the idea that their marriage would not survive the events of tonight. Valérie would never forgive him. She was possibly even ashamed of him, the fact that he’d behaved that way in front of me. She’d already been thinking of leaving him, but now he’d shot himself in the foot. In fact, those two things were almost certainly connected. Once you feel the person you love distancing themselves from you, it’s not unusual to act in a way that further alienates them. Panic can bring out the uglier aspects of your personality. Love is often an act of selfsabotage.

Patrick had lost all perspective. His love for his wife had turned him into someone else. He could have greeted her with a smile, asking if she’d had a nice evening. Instead he acted like what he was: a wounded animal. Even so, I felt no urge to defend him. He was a drowning man, and he was trying to pull my project down with him. And, from my egotistical writer’s point of view, that was the true disaster of the evening. He’d been perfectly clear: I wasn’t welcome in his home any more. I found it hard to imagine him telling me anything else about his office ordeals. And he would stop the other family members from talking to me. Which meant that, after 37,779 words, I had now reached a dead end. There was only one thing left to write:

THE END

54

I sat there on the bench for a while. The night seemed to have hit the pause button too. Nobody walked past, and there were very few cars. Paris herself seemed short of inspiration. At last I stood up and started to walk home. After a few yards, I felt hope stir within me. Walking is always a source of comfort. I could invent the rest of the Martins’ story. Yes, that was what I thought. If all else failed, I could always turn it into a novel.

55

As soon as I got home, I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep.

I went to the bathroom and splashed some water on my face. But I wasn’t trying to sober up. The scene at the Martins’ apartment had already achieved that. Looking at myself in the mirror, I had to admit that I had never been very good at lighting. In the stark brightness of a strip light, my face had a sallow, pasty look. This was bad timing: already filled with doubt, I needed the reassurance of a more appealing reflection. The hope I’d felt on my walk back shrivelled and died: it now seemed ludicrous to think that I could invent an end to my characters’ real lives. I had to choose a side: reality or fiction. I didn’t believe that you could mix the two. Of course, I still had the trip with Madeleine. But would that be enough? And there was no guarantee that Yves Grimbert would turn out to be an interesting character. I felt a tide of pessimism rise over me. Nothing had the power to excite me now. I wanted to wallow in an orgy of Lagerfeld.