Reasons of State Read Free Page B

get my legs out and hunt about with my feet for my slippers, which I have lost in the pattern of the Persian carpet. (
There
, always thoughtful for my moments of waking, the Mayorala Elmira, my housekeeper, would already have put on my shoes for me; she must be asleep in her camp bed—she has her fads too—with her breasts uncovered and petticoats over her thighs, in the darkness of the other hemisphere.)
    A few steps towards the light. Pull the cord on the right, and with a rattle of curtain rings above, the scenario of the window is revealed. But instead of a volcano—thesnow-covered majestic, remote, ancient Home of the Gods—in front of me stands the Arc de Triomphe, and behind it the house of my great friend Limantour, who was Don Porfirio’s minister, and with whom I have such profitable talks about economics and our problems. A slight sound at the door. And in comes Sylvestre in his striped jacket, carrying aloft the silver tray—thick, beautiful silver from my mines: “
À café de Monsieur. Bien fort comme il l’aime
.
À la façon de là-bas … Monsieur a bien dormi?
”
    The three brocade curtains have been pulled back, one after the other, showing a fine sunny day for the races, and Rude’s sculptures. The boy hero with his little balls exposed to view, being carried off to war by a tough, dishevelled chieftain, one of those—make no mistake—who utters yells of victory but will hurry from the van to the rear if things turn out badly. Now
Le Journal
. The
Excelsior
, with so many photos in its pages that it’s practically a cinema of real life.
L’Action Française
, with Pampille’s gastronomic recipes, which my daughter outlines in red pencil every day for the attention of our excellent cook, and Léon Daudet’s abusive editorial, whose inspired and apocalyptic insults—supreme expression of the liberty of the press—could promote duels, kidnapping, assassinations, and shooting daily in our countries.
Le Petit Parisien
: the rebellion in Ulster is still going on, with its concerto for machine guns and Irish harps; universal indignation has been aroused by the second round-up of dogs from Constantinople, condemned to eat one another on a desert island; more rioting in the Balkans, that eternal wasps’ nest and powder magazine, but very like our provinces in the Andes. I still remember—on my last journey—the ceremonious reception of the King of Bulgaria. He came on a visit here with President Fallières, exhibiting his plumed and braided majesty (for a moment he looked to me like Colonel Hoffmann) in asuperb state coach, while the band of the Republican Guard, stationed at the foot of Napoleon’s monument, played “Plat-cha Divitza, Chuma Maritza,” with a profusion of trumpets, clarinets, and tubas, enhanced by a zarzuela-like combination of flute and triangle. “
Vive le Roi! Vive le Roi!
” shouted the republican crowd, pining at heart for thrones, crowns, sceptres, and maces, very inadequately replaced as a spectacle by presidents in frock coats with red ribbons across their waistcoats, who moved their top hats from head to knee in a gesture of salutation very like that of blind men asking for alms after trying to extract the singsong tune of “La jambe en bois” from the black depths of an ocarina. Twenty to eleven.
    Happiness due to an empty agenda tray, on the night table beside the hammock, instead of a whole timetable of interviews, official visits, presentation of credentials, or ostentatious entry of soldiers, suddenly bursting in on one without warning, to the rhythm of boots and spurs. But I’ve slept longer than usual and that’s because last night, yes, last night—and very late—I fucked a nun of Saint Vincent de Paul, dressed in indigo blue, with a starched, winged headdress, a scapular between her tits, and a whip made of Russian leather at her belt. The cell was perfect, with its cardboard missal made to look like calf, lying on the rough wooden table beside