The plane to New York was a little of a thing, but the plane to Paris was huge, more like a building. Inside, great crowds were taking off their coats, pushing bags under seats. Babies were crying, mothers were speaking sharply to children.
Macon took his seat and was joined by an old couple speaking French. They nodded to Macon, but did not smile. He looked up at the passengers still coming in. A Japanese man carrying several cameras, a young girl in a sun hat. A woman in a white suit, with a little red case, her hair a dark tent, her face a thin triangle.
Muriel.
First he had that warm feeling you get when you recognize a face among strangers. And then: Oh, my God, he thought.
When she passed him, she looked at him and he saw that she’d known he was there. “ I’m going to France, ” she told him.
‘But you can’t!’ he said.
The French couple looked at him curiously. More passengers arrived behind Muriel, and she had to move on.
Sarah would find out about this, Macon thought. Somehow she would know. She always said he had no feeling and this would know. She had always said he had no feeling and this would prove it. That he could say goodbye so lovingly and then fly off to Paris with Muriel. Well, it was none of his doing and he wasn’t going to take the blame.
When the plane was in the air, he tried to study Julian’s notes, but he could not concentrate. A few hours later he got out his shaving things and went to back of the plane. Unfortunately, there was a line of people and he had to wait. He felt someone arrive at his side. He looked and there was Muriel.
He said, “Muriel, what are you doing? You can’t afford the fare. And anyway, how did you know which flight I was on?”
“I called your travel agent. I borrowed from Bernice and a bit from my sister. And I’m going to Paris!”
“But why, Muriel? Why are you doing this?”
She lifted her pointed little chin. “Because I felt like it.”
“You felt like spending five days alone in a Paris hotel?”
“You need to have me around,” she said. “You were falling to pieces before you had me.”
A door opened and a man came out of one of the toilets. Macon stepped inside and locked the door behind him. He wished he could disappear, or at least go back and undo all the untidy, unthinking things he’ d been responsible for in his life.
If she had read even one of his guidebooks, she’d have known not to travel in white.
When he came out, she had gone. For the rest of the flight he did not go near the back of the plane, and on arrival in Paris he hurried through the airport, and into a taxi to his hotel. It was one of those old Parisian hotels where mechanical things often went wrong. One of the two elevators was out of order and the phone in his room did not work. He unpacked, then went to the window and looked out over the rooftops.
How would she manage alone in such an unknown city?
He thought of how she was at home, knowing everything and everybody, wise and clever in the ways of her neighborhood. But she didn’t know Paris. She might not have any money, she did not speak a word of the language.
By the time he heard her knock, he was so anxious that he almost ran to open the door.