The Summer of Katya

“I see. But what—” I stopped short and laughed. “I was going to indulge in one of those unnecessary questions.”

She laughed with me. “I’m sure you were. Ah! We have arrived. That lane to the right.”

The grassy, rutted condition of the tree-lined lane attested to its long period of disuse before the Trevilles occupied the house. As we approached the ancient stone heap called Etcheverria we passed along the crumbling wall of a derelict garden grown rank with weeds among which a few volunteer flowers struggled in stunted bloom, reminders of the passing hand of man. Twice the horse jerked aside nervously.

“It’s haunted, you know,” she said with a smile.

“And you don’t mind living in a haunted house?”

“No, not the house. The garden. Local tradition says the garden is haunted.” She cocked her head thoughtfully and added, “Well, perhaps the house is haunted as well. Most houses are… in one way or another.”

“That’s an interesting observation. But Dr. Freud would contend that it is most people, not most houses, that are haunted… in one way or another.”

She nodded. “Yes, I know.”

I was genuinely surprised. And fascinated. “You have read Dr. Freud?”

“Yes. After I had learned what I wanted to know about anatomy.” She laughed. “One leads to the other, I suppose. First you learn how the various bits function, then you wonder why they bother to.”

We turned in at the sagging gate. It was not necessary to tie up the horse, as she was an experienced doctor’s mare used to standing calmly in the traces. By the time I walked around to offer her a hand down, Katya had already begun to descend on her own. My clumsy attempt to give un-needed assistance and her last-minute effort to accept the titular support of my guiding hand created a moment of awkward grappling that made us both laugh.

“This is the stuff of low comedy,” she said.

“Or of high romance,” I added.

She smiled up at me. “No. Only low comedy, I think.”

“Well, perhaps you’re right. That’s the first time I ever danced with a woman who wasn’t—” I am sure I must have blushed to my ears as I realized that my hand still rested on her waist. I pulled it back quickly.

She lead the way towards the house. “A woman who wasn’t… what?” she asked over her shoulder.

How could I say: who wasn’t wearing stays? My palm still felt the indescribably exciting texture of soft flesh under firm fabric. “Who wasn’t…” I cleared my throat. “…a member of my family.”

She glanced at me sideways. “I don’t believe that.”

“Good. I often lie, you see. It’s the easiest thing to do, and sometimes the kindest.”

She chuckled. “All right.”

The faзade of the house was in poor repair; rising damp had rotted the plaster in places, revealing rough-cut stone beneath. As we stepped into the central hall I was aware of a dank chill that must have made the place most uncomfortable in winter.

“Katya?” a man’s voice called from a room off the principal hall.

“Yes, Paul,” she answered. “I have the doctor with me. Help is on its way, if you can manage to cling to life for a moment longer.”

The man laughed in full voice as she motioned me to follow her into the salon.

“Paul, this is Dr. Montjean. Dr. Montjean, my poor battered brother.”

As he rose from a chaise, his right arm bound against his chest by strips of linen, my astonishment was undisguised.

They were twins. Identical in every feature: the full mouths, the high foreheads, the prominent cheekbones, the firm chins, the thick chestnut hair. The features were identical, but the effect was startlingly different, as the same elements were interpreted in the context of their sexes. What in her was a handsome beauty appeared frail and almost effeminate in him. What in her movements was grace, in his seemed affectation. An unkind critic might have described her as having, in a way of speaking, a bit too much face; while he had too little. This difference-within-similarity was nowhere more evident than in their eyes. The same almond shape and slightly crooked set, the same clear pale grey made startling by dark lush lashes, but they created totally opposite impressions. She had a gentleness of glance that seemed to invite one to look into the springs of her being. His glance was metallic and impenetrable. Light glinted on the surface of his eyes, while it glowed from deep within hers. Her eyes were bridges; his barriers.

They laughed together at my frank surprise. “It’s a tired old prank, Doctor, not warning people in advance that we are twins,” the brother said as he pressed my hand in that awkward upside-down way of the left-handed handshake. “But we never weary of the effect it has on people the first time they see us together. Forgive us for amusing ourselves at your expense, but there is so little to divert one in this out-of-the-way bled.”

I sought to recover my aplomb by assuming a professional tone. “Your sister tells me you fell from your bicycle.”

He glanced at her and grinned. “Well, I suppose you could put it that way if you wanted to. Actually—”

“—I’ll see to a little refreshment,” she interposed quickly. “A cup of tisane, Doctor?”

“Please.”

As she left the room, the brother raised his voice, pursuing her with his words. “That’s one way of putting it, Doctor. Actually, my good sister knocked me from my machine!”

“Rubbish!” she called back from down the hall.

He laughed softly and shook his head as I began undoing the rather expertly wrapped bandage. He winced at first contact but spoke on as I made my examination. “It’s true, you know. She’s vicious in competition. We were having a little race to the bottom of the lane and back and— Argh! Jesus, Doctor! If you are going to ask if that hurt, the answer is yes!”

“Sorry.”

“I wonder if that’s enough? Well, I got ahead of her in the race by the mild subterfuge of starting before she was ready. I had reached the end of the lane and was on my way back, and what did she do? She— Ah! Damn it, man! Was your last post with the Inquisition? It’s broken, I assume?”

“Cracked surely.”

“Rotten luck. Well, as I passed her on the way back she kicked out at me and drove me into the garden wall. Just like that. The Jockey Club would certainly have disqualified her.”

“The Jockey Club? You are Parisian then?”

He lifted an eyebrow in surprise. “Why, yes. I’m amazed you’ve heard of it. From your accent, I assumed you were from hereabouts.”

“I was unaware that I had an accent.” Actually, I had been at great pains while studying in Paris to lose my singsong Basque accent, as its rustic implications had been a source of ridicule among my fellow students.

“Oh, it’s not much of an accent, I suppose. More a matter of rhythm than pronunciation. I am something of a student of accents, as nothing is so illustrative of breeding and class as customs of speech.”

Paul Treville himself had a tone of speech, a certain nasal laxity, that I recognized as upper-class Parisian, a sound I used to resent because it bespoke wealth and comfort while I had had to work and struggle for my education. It was a pattern of speech that I had always thought of not as an accent, but as an affectation.

“If I were called upon to describe your accent, Doctor, I would say it was the sound of a man who had worked on losing his southern chant and had very nearly succeeded.”

It was, of course, the accuracy of his evaluation that irritated me. We all desire to be understood, but no one enjoys being obvious. I am afraid my annoyance was not well concealed, for he smiled in a way that told me he took pleasure in baiting me.

“You’re rather young to be a doctor, aren’t you?”

“I’m only just out of training.”

“I see. I do hope I’m not your first patient.”

“You’d be better advised to hope you’re not my last. Don’t move about. I have to bind your arm to your chest to immobilize it. It may hurt a bit.”

“I’m sure it will. So you’ve heard of the Jockey Club, have you? I dare to assume you were not a member.”

“You assume correctly. My memories of Paris are those of the impoverished student—of that bohemian life that is more pleasant to talk about than to live. The cost of membership in your club—even assuming I had found a sponsor, which is most unlikely—would have paid for all of my education.”

“Yes, I daresay. But it may have been a better investment in the long run. You’d have met a better sort of people there.”

“The important people?”

He smiled at the archness of my tone, but I evaporated the smile with a firmer than necessary tug on the bandage.

“Ah! You do know that hurts, I suppose?”

“Hm-hm.”

“You appear to suffer under the delusion that the only important people are those who sweat in the vineyards, Doctor. The tinkers, the masons, the plowboys, the… leeches. You overlook the great social value of the aristocracy.”

“And what do you believe that to be?” I asked atonically as I busied myself with wrapping the gauze bandage around his smooth, hairless chest.

“Ever since the cultural suicide of the Revolution, it has been the role of my class to serve the bourgeoisie as object lessons against the evils of idle dissipation. I have approached my duties with admirable diligence, if I say so myself, devoting myself to gambling, target-shooting, listless promiscuity, vacuous badinage—all the traditional occupations of the young man of the world.”

“How boring that must be for you.”

“It is, rather.”

“And for your interlocutors.”

“Ah, the lad has fangs!”

“Do try to stand still.”

“Now, my father has gone about being useless in a more oblique way. He is something of a gentleman scholar. But I’m afraid his uselessness goes unnoticed and unappreciated, as uselessness is the norm in academics.”

“And your sister?”

“Katya? Ah, there you touch a sore point—do you enjoy puns?”

“Not overly.”

“Pity. Yes, Katya is something of a disgrace to her class. Given half a chance, I’m afraid she would involve herself in all sorts of uplifting activities. Fortunately, there are no opportunities for her to indulge herself in this forgotten hole, so our family tradition of uselessness goes unblemished. Well, Doctor? What’s the diagnosis? Am I to toil away the remainder of my life a hopeless cripple?”

“Not on a physical level. So long as your arm and shoulder are kept immobilized, nature will mend you. But it may be a month or so before you have full use of it.”

“A month!”

“Bones mend at their own pace, Monsieur Treville.”

He looked at me quizzically. “Treville? Did Katya tell you our name was Treville?”

“Why yes. Isn’t it?”

He thrust out his lower lip and waved his free hand carelessly. “Oh, of course. Treville. Hm-m-m. I rather like the sound of it, don’t you?”

I felt I was being made a figure of fun, and there are few things less supportable for a young man whose fragile dignity is not buttressed by accomplishments. My resentment was manifest in the brusque, silent way I finished binding him up and in the cold tone of, “There you are, Monsieur Treville. Now. Are there any other injuries? I’m a bit pressed for time.”

“Oh, are you really?” Paul Treville smiled and raised an eyebrow. “You know, Doctor, it has always amused me how people in your profession dare to assume a superior attitude on the basis of nothing more than having avoided going into trade by mucking about for a few years with chemicals and pus and fetal pigs in brine. You seem to forget that you make your money by selling your services to anybody who has the money.”

“The same could be said of many professionals.”

“Yes, indeed. Whores, for instance.”

I stared at him silently for a long moment. Then I repeated coldly, “Are there any other injuries? Dizziness? Nausea? Headache?”

“Only the odd scrape and bruise. But I am sure they will heal in time. The passage of time, it would appear, is your idea of a universal panacea. Have you ever considered sharing your fee with Father Time?”

I was on the verge of replying in kind when Katya returned bearing a silver tray with teapot and cups. “Shall we take it on the terrace?”

Still stung by her brother’s attitude, I considered saying that I had too busy a schedule to dawdle over tea, but two things prevented me. The first was the thought that my languid condition when Katya first found me in the park might make this sound ridiculous. The second was the fact that I was in love with Katya.

I did not realize this at the time, of course, but hindsight clarifies events by diminishing blurring details, and it is obvious to me now that I was already in the first stages of interest, affection, and excitement that would soon blossom into love. Nothing significant had yet passed between us—the look of her suntanned profile as I walked beside her in the park, the wisps of hair at her temples, the way her eyes had searched mine with a mixture of sincerity and amusement, the accidental touch of her hand and the feel of her waist when I had awkwardly attempted to help her down from the sulky—nothing of substance. But the particles from which love is built up are too fine to be subdivided and analyzed, just as the total of a love is too extensive to be perceived at one time and from one emotional coign of vantage. Beyond reason, beyond logic, and without knowing it, I was in love with her.

I expressed my love with admirable restraint: I told her I would be delighted to take tea on the terrace.

The brother rose and said that he would have to deny himself the pleasure and enlightenment of my company, as he really should go to his room and rest in hopes of inspiring Time to intercede on his behalf and cure him. He bowed to me with a slightly taunting deference as he said, “Above all, Doctor, avoid challenging my sister on any subject. If she fears she might lose a contest, she’s not above bashing you with the teapot. As for you, Katya, let me warn you that the good doctor seems to be in a rather contentious mood this afternoon. No doubt a little sensitive about his limitations as a healer of broken bodies. Well, I’m off. Do have a pleasant chat.”

The terrace on which we sat, overlooking the dank, neglected garden, was dappled with sunlight through branches of the trees. And when the slight breezes sketched patterns of shadow over Katya’s high-necked dress of white lawn trimmed with lace at the cuffs and throat, the light striking her bodice reflected up under her firm round chin and seemed to set her face aglow. I watched, absorbed, as she served the pale tisane with gestures as graceful as they were sure and nonchalant. That ease of habit, I assumed, was a matter of breeding, just as was her brother’s indolent superiority. I was again struck by the similarities, and blessed differences, between them.

“You live here alone… you and your brother?” I asked.

“There is a village woman who comes.”

“But not, presumably, a gardener.” I gestured towards the congested overgrowth before us.

She laughed. “That’s not fair. I have toiled long hours in an effort to create an artless, even wild effect. And you don’t seem to be impressed by it.”

“Oh, but I am impressed. You have achieved an effect that I might term… uniquely unstudied.”

“Thank you,” she said, bowing her head in modest acceptance of the praise.

“And your parents?” I asked. “Where are they?”

“My mother died in childbirth… our birth.”

“I’m sorry.”

“You’re not really, of course. How could you be? But I appreciate your conventional expression of sympathy.”

“And your father?”

She looked out over the garden and sipped her tisane. Then she replaced the cup in its saucer and said airily, “Oh, Father’s hale enough.”

“He lives here with you?”

“We live with him, actually.”

I was somewhat surprised. If there was a father living here, how did it come to pass that Katya was dispatched on a bicycle to fetch a doctor, all the way to Salies?

She smiled. “Well, to tell the truth, Father does not know about Paul’s little accident yet. The quotidian problems of life are quite beyond Father’s capacity to cope. No, let me say that more correctly. It’s not his capacity to cope that is in question, it’s his interest in coping. He devotes most of each day to his ‘studies.’ “ She accented the word comically in what I took to be an imitation of her father’s voice.

“Studies of what kind?”

“Goodness only knows. He pores over thick tomes and works at reducing them to scratchings in thin little notebooks, and every now and then he says ‘Hm-m-m’ or ‘Ah!’ or ‘I wonder?’ “ She laughed lightly. “I’m really not doing him justice. He’s a dear old thing with a passion for medieval village life and customs that absorbs his time and mind, leaving him with only the most vague interest in the here and now. I sometimes think Father believes us to be living in an era that is posthistoric and rather insignificant.”

“Is that where it comes from? Your interest in books and learning? Not many women concern themselves with such things as anatomy and Dr. Freud.”

“I’ve never cared much what other women do. Another cup?”

“Please.”

As she leaned forward to pour, she said quietly, as though it had been on her mind all along, “You don’t like my brother, do you?”

“What makes you think that?”

“Oh, there was a certain tension in the air when I returned with tea.”

“Yes. I suppose there was.”

“And? What do you think of him?”

“Shall I be frank?”

“That means you intend to say something unpleasant, doesn’t it?”

“I could not be both pleasant and honest.”

“My word!” she said with mock astonishment. “Now, that is frank.”

“I don’t mean to be offensive—”

“But?”

“But… well, don’t you find him a little supercilious and arrogant?”

“He’s just playful.”

“Perhaps. May I ask you, is your name really Treville?”

She looked up in surprise. “What an odd question!”

I began to explain that it wasn’t odd at all, considering her brother’s reaction to being called Monsieur Treville, but she interrupted me with, “Oh, I see. He lead you to believe Treville wasn’t our name.”

“He did in fact.”

She smiled and shook her head. “Isn’t that just like him.”

“I don’t know. But I assume it is.”

“Just a bit of his playfulness. He enjoys having people on… keeping them off balance. You must forgive him.”

“Must I?”

“I was rather hoping you two might hit it off. He knows no one here.”

“I’m afraid the possibility of our hitting it off is rather distant.”

“Too bad. The poor fellow has a quick, intelligent mind and nothing to exercise it on in this forgotten corner of the world. He’s bored to distraction.”

“Why doesn’t he go elsewhere?”

“He is not free to.”

The tone in which she said this prohibited me from pursuing the reasons he was not free, so I asked instead, “Why doesn’t he occupy himself with reading and study, as you do?”

“Other people’s ideas bore him. Shall we walk in the garden?”

So blatant was this change of subject that I had to smile. “Won’t we need a native boy to cut a trail for us?”

She laughed as she walked ahead of me. “No, there’s a well-worn path through the jungle. I spend much of the day at the bottom of the garden. There’s a summerhouse—well, what’s left of a summerhouse—where I enjoy hiding away with a book. Now, it is true that if you stray off the path we may have to muster a search party to find you, but you’re safe enough if you stay close to me.”

“I can imagine nothing less safe than staying close to you, Mlle Treville, and nothing more desirable.”

She frowned. “That is unworthy of you, Dr. Montjean. Men don’t seem to realize that automatic, boyish gallantry can be a terrible bore. A woman must either pretend that she did not hear it, or she must respond to it. And often, she’d rather do neither.”

I felt my ears redden. “I am sorry. You are quite right, of course. May I make a confession to you?”

“I don’t know. Will the confession be a burden? Will I be obligated to keep your secrets? Or to pretend at compassion?”

“No, it’s an altogether trivial confession.”

“Oh, then by all means confess to me. I’m quite comfortable with the altogether trivial.”

“It’s actually more an explanation than a confession. That ‘automatic, boyish gallantry’ you quite rightly objected to is a result of a terrible habit I’ve fallen into. When I’m alone and daydreaming, I practice at confecting clever lines of dialogue. But when I inflict them on people in real life, somehow the cleverness dissolves in my mouth, and only a stilted artificiality is left. I didn’t mean to be forward. I confess, however, to being maladroit. Can you forgive me?”

She turned to me and searched my eyes with hers. “What is your given name, Dr. Montjean?”

“Jean-Marc.”

“Jean-Marc Montjean. Sounds like a character in a nineteenth-century novel. No wonder you’re stricken with romanticism.”

I shrugged. “Didn’t I hear your brother call you Katya?”

“Yes.”

“Katya? Russian diminutive for Catherine? But you’re not Russian, are you?”

“No. And my name isn’t Catherine. With brutal disregard for the delicate feelings of a young woman, and with no ear for poetry at all, my father baptized me Hortense. As soon as I realized that one could do such things, I changed my name to Katya.”

“Changed your name? By legal process?”

“No. By simple force of will. I merely refused to respond to the name Hortense, and I did nothing I was bade unless I was called Katya.”

“And you accuse me of being a romantic?”

“It wasn’t an accusation. It was simply a description.”

“What a strong-minded child you must have been to force everyone to call you by a new name.”

“ ‘Little brat’ might be closer to the mark.” She turned and continued down the narrow path.

As the overgrowth pressed in on us, the acrid smell of damp weeds rose from the cold earth and I felt a sudden ripple of chill over my skin. “Well, well. The ghost must be nearby,” I said, seeking to pass off my discomfort with a joke.

She stopped and turned to me, her expression quite serious. “Ghost? I’ve never thought of it as a ghost.”

“Well… what haunts this place then, if not a ghost?”

“A spirit. I’m sure she’d rather be called a spirit than a ghost.”

“It’s a woman then, the gho—spirit?”

“Yes. A girl, actually. Ghost indeed! What a grim idea!”

“Perhaps, but there’s something inevitably grim about ghosts. Being grim is their mйtier.”

“That may be true of ghosts, but it is not true of spirits, which are an altogether higher order of beings. And that’s all I want to hear about the matter. Well, we have arrived. What do you think of my private library?”

I surveyed the ruin of what had once been a charming little summerhouse. “Ah… Oh, it’s… magnificent. Magnificent! Perhaps a touch of paint would not be inappropriate. And I don’t think the replacement of some of the broken lattice slats would harm the effect overmuch. But I do like that quaint touch of rot around the foundation. And that nonchalant sag of the beams! It’s an architectural wonder, your library, standing as it does in defiance of the laws of gravity.”

“It’s a light-hearted little building, and therefore doesn’t have to obey the laws of gravity. Why do you pull such a face?”

“What a wretched pun!”

“You don’t care for puns?”

“Not overly, as I told you before.”

“You never told me you were a sworn enemy of the noble pun.”

“Yes I did—ah, no. It was your brother I told. Is this addiction to puns a family trait—a genetic flaw?”

“We are willing to allow words to function irreverently, if that’s what you mean.”

“It’s not what I meant, but it will do.” I looked about. “You can’t see the house from here.”

“What’s more to the point, you can’t be seen from the house,” she said, smiling at me.

After a second of wondering if I could interpret this as an invitation to some kind of intimacy, I took her hand and held it in both of mine. She did not resist, but her hand was limp and there was no return of my affectionate pressure. She simply searched my eyes with a little frown of—not annoyance, really—of doubtful inquiry.

“Mlle Treville…” I said, with nothing further to add.

“Yes?”

“You are… very beautiful.”

She laughed at me. “That’s not really true, you know. I believe I am a handsome woman. Healthy. Pleasant to look at. But I am not beautiful, and it’s foolish of you to say so.”

I suffered in silent confusion. I wanted to explain that my gesture of affection implied no disrespect. It was simply that she seemed so free and fresh, so… modern, I guess… that I felt she would understand my frank— Ah! I couldn’t find the words to explain myself.

“Does it please you to hold my hand?” she asked with a tone of mild interest.

“Ah… yes. Of course.”

“Very well, then.” She stood quite patiently, her hand unresisting but mute in mine, until growing feelings of awkwardness caused me to release it with a last pressure of farewell.

I feared that my boldness had ruined our former effortless amicability, so I searched for anything to say. “Ah… your father, I take it, is unwell?”

I was surprised at the effect of this random observation. Her expression clouded and she stepped back from me. “Why on earth do you say such a thing?”

I stammered, “Well… you said your family was here for reasons of health. You are obviously… healthy.” I sought to make a little joke. “And, apart from his compulsion for leaping from moving bicycles, your brother seems fairly normal. So I naturally assumed that it was your father who was ill.” I shrugged.

“Oh. I see.” Her expression cleared and she smiled. Then, to my surprise, she slipped her hand into the crook of my arm and led me back up the path towards the house. “I’m afraid my bicycle is going to be a bit of a problem,” she said, with what I would soon come to recognize as a characteristic habit of shifting from topic to topic with a glissando of non sequiturs that made internal sense to her but to no one else.

“Problem of what sort?”

“Of a minor sort, I suppose. I don’t really feel like returning to Salies just now. I wonder if you would mind collecting my machine from the square and keeping it for me until tomorrow?”

“I should be delighted. But how will you get into town tomorrow?”

She shrugged. “I’ll walk of course. It’s only a short ways.”

“Ah yes. Exactly two and six-tenths kilometers, as I recall.”

A look of delighted wonder animated her eyes. “Wouldn’t it be amazing if it really were? I’ve never actually measured it, you know. I have noticed that people are impressed by exact measurements, so I provide them out of my imagination. But wouldn’t it be amazing if one of them were accidentally correct?”

I dared a slight pressure on her hand by flexing my arm. “You are a strange and exceptional person. Do you know that? May one say that much without being guilty of boring you with automatic, boyish gallantry?”

“One may.”

We passed around the terrace to the sulky, where the patient old mare stood stoically, occasionally fluttering a shoulder muscle to discomfit the flies.

“Until tomorrow then?” she said.

I smiled at her and nodded. “Until tomorrow.” And she returned to the house.

As I approached the trap I noticed a pebble of particularly interesting veining beside the wheel, and I automatically picked it up, following a senseless habit from boyhood, a habit that used to annoy the aunt I lived with after the death of my parents. She would throw away scores of pebbles whenever she came across them in her cleaning. The loss never disturbed me, as I was not interested in collecting stones, only in picking them up. And the reason I picked them up was one that made excellent sense to me, though I knew better than to expect anyone else to understand: If I didn’t pick them up… who would?

The sulky had not gone thirty meters down the rutted lane when I heard Katya’s voice calling after me. I reined in and turned to see her running towards me, one hand holding her skirt aside, and my doctor’s bag in the other. I had climbed down to meet her by the time she arrived, flushed and a bit out of breath. “What must you think of the doctor who forgets the tools of his trade?” I asked.

She laughed. “Our Dr. Freud would say you did it on purpose.”

“And he would be right, Mlle Treville. And I’m afraid I have left more behind here than my kit.”

She shook her head sadly and smiled as one might smile at a persistent, mischievous child not totally lacking in redeeming charm. Then, on an impulse, she rose to her tiptoes and kissed me on the cheek lightly.

I searched for words, but before I could speak she touched the place on my cheek with her fingertips, as though to seal it, and said, “Hush.” Her lucid grey eyes searched mine for a moment. “May I tell you something? You are the first man outside my family that I have ever kissed. Isn’t that remarkable?”

“Yes… remarkable. I…” But I could find no words. “Here,” I said, pressing something into her hand.

“What’s this?”

“A gift. A pebble.”

“A pebble?” She looked at the little stone in her palm; then she smiled up at me. “I believe this is the first time anyone has ever given me a pebble. In fact, I’m almost sure it is.” She searched my eyes with that amused curiosity of hers. “Thank you, Jean-Marc Montjean.” And she turned and walked back up the lane.