Lovers (9781609459192) Read Free Page B

come, like the rest. And what will the rest be? And the rest of what?
    Nothing. Not really, Sébastien tells himself. There is Balt­hazar. And there is love.
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    They stop in Roanne, at the Valences mansion, where some distant cousins of the Créons live. There are Créon cousins everywhere in the kingdom of France. Those in Roanne are no more like the Créons than a goose is like a swan. They sleep there one night, one night only. Versailles awaits.
    What awaits? Sébastien finds it difficult to imagine his future in the capital.
    A nocturnal world, says Balthazar. And darker than this mansion and its paved courtyard, its box trees, its lantern.
    Créon’s cousins have not expressed any reservation about the obligation to dine with Bathazar’s protégé. But once the evening is over, they will gather in alcoves and fume.
    At dawn, they set off once more.
    They halt here, they halt there: but slowly and surely they are getting closer to Paris.
    At the inn of the Green Capon in Melun, Sébastien only has eyes for a kitchen boy with nice buttocks. He will not sleep with him, he will not take the plunge. He loves Balthazar, oh yes, it is love, but his fidelity hangs by a thread. One love, but so many bodies, so many invitations, so many opportunities. Distractions from love. Deep down, he feels alone, and the strange thing is that this solitude does not weigh on him too much. It is acceptable.
    Let us never part, Balthazar keeps repeating.

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    T he tavern is flea-ridden.
They are lovers, and the vermin are attracted to their bodies. It is a sign of the times.
    They have just finished making love, and now Sébastien confesses to Balthazar that he has committed a sacrilege. From the casket, he extracts one of Louis de Créon’s miniatures. He has made a corner of it black, soot black. Night appears in broad daylight, through the branches.
    Why?
    It proves difficult for Balthazar to forgive. Why soil this idyllic landscape? Why darken it? Why? Unless he was trying to emphasize the tormented side of his father’s inspiration. And why lose his temper for so little? So little? Sébastien’s small sacrilege reveals the kind of man Louis de Créon was, a morose, secretive man, at the mercy of visions. My feelings for him, Balthazar tells himself, my feelings for him, but how to continue, how to describe what I feel for him?
    They mistrusted one another, sometimes forgot that they were father and son. And yet, he was his father, a name means something all the same. He has never felt so close to him, which is not much use now.
    He will forgive Sébastien his crime, for that is what it was.
    My father, the hermit of Créon, he says to Sébastien. And then he kisses his eyes, his mouth, his neck. My beautiful love.

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    C oach, inn, clearing, everywhere they offer themselves, they take and give, without a word, they tune their bodies to one another, after they come they move apart and lie side by side, magnificent lovers, or commonplace lovers, according to preference, and then they start all over again, offering themselves, taking and giving, until the end of time.

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    H ills, plains, mountains, woods, fields, a knoll covered with thickets, herds, farms, then more and more dwellings, a hamlet, a village, dogs, many dogs, in packs or alone, open country right up to the gates of the capital, people, streets, and mud, even more mud than on the roads.
    Sébastien leans out the window of the coach.
    Will he paint what he sees?
    Then he throws himself back on the cushions.
    I shall be his patron, Balthazar thinks, I shall confine him to my mansion, he will be mine, just as he was at Créon.

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    H e familiarizes himself with the city, sometimes in Balthazar’s company, sometimes alone.
Balthazar has not kept the vow he made to keep him prisoner. How could he contemplate such madness? How could he dare deprive this boy of his freedom?
    They lunch at the mansion,