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front of Rosa Dacimiento, a scene I can’t rule out, would by the way have the advantage of giving me the chance to rally myself and I could throw her out right then and there. Do they suffer as much as we do? Dacimiento and her central-heating repairman? Without an imagination, you can’t suffer. What kind of suffering can someone experience if they only see the world at their own height, if they can’t look up or look down, if top shelves of bookcases and cornices and curtain rods and tops of wardrobes might as well be in the next world, because they’re not part of this one? Just as much as
we
do, is what I said. You’ve taken that in. I refuse to see you as suffering’s exile. Even if children don’t remain as warm as you think they will, they’re still your children and I refuse to lose you completely.
    Your sister wants to cultivate me. Odd the way women these days create missions for themselves. She maintains the only thing that interests me is music. True. What’s more, to be frank, I can’t see the point of the rest. When music takes possession of you, when music fills your life, will you please tell me what’s the point of words, even nice ones, what’s the point of stories, what’s the use of all that imitating life on paper that people are so wild about, and that shows the effort that went into it and the dexterity, and gives you so little sense of inevitability. Your sister told me I’d be less dense if I read. Word for word. I didn’t get angry. I’m not upset about being dense. Read what, my sweet? Get to know a little literature, you don’t know a thing, you’ve got the time for it now. Instead of saying the exact opposite, which would have been the only possible way to get me interested in the subject, but her ignorance of who I am is bottomless, you have the time now, she says, instead of saying now, Papa, now that you’ve no time anymore.
    Most of the people I meet, including my daughter, have only the most trivial grasp of time.
    Nancy has developed literary pretensions too. More precisely, since I do have to admit she’s a woman I’ve always seen with a book in her hand, pretty much, Nancy has suddenly been captivated by a writer: André Petit-Pautre (you can easily guess what temptations this name sets off in me). You don’t know him. Nobody knows him. Except for me, because she sometimes invites him to dinner with his wife. Petit-Pautre is her mentor. And our guest, from now on. I remarked that in a world where everyone writes, it’s no surprise that André Petit-Pautre writes too. The other day Lionel quoted me that wonderful thing Enesco said about Bach:
the soul of my soul.
I said to Lionel, who’s always loved both books and music, “Can you name a simple text that has been the soul of your soul?”
    “No. Words can’t reach that high. And the soul doesn’t read.”
    I went back to Chopin. I could almost say I took him up for the first time, because I had hated him so much for so many years. Aside from a few moments of Romantic absentmindedness in my youth, I’ve always loathed Chopin. And I went back to him thanks to Samson François, a guy I’ve never been able to listen to either before now, because of his name. Samson, okay, but François! Samson Apfelbaum, absolutely, but not Samson François. Stuck in traffic, I turn on classical radio: “Nocturne.” I leave it on. It’s beautiful. Here you are, sinking back down to Chopin in your old age, bravo, I say to myself. Who’s the pianist? Samson François. Yet another surrender. What do you want, I don’t care that much anymore.
    Your sister who is intent on my achieving cultivation asked me if I’d been to the Picasso museum. I told her that not only had I never gone to the Picasso museum but I never would go to the Picasso museum. There’s too much enthusiasm about him, I said. I hate the enthusiasm of the masses for
beauty.
Generally speaking, all these people who haunt exhibitions and plod around for hours on