September 17th 1892: Erik
I couldn't stop laughing. The situation was just ridiculous: Here we were, two adults, sneaking around like children and trying to deliver letters to each other. If I had known that before, I'd have simply given mine to Christine, and she could have handed me hers. It would have been much less stressful for both of us. Secretly I wondered whether her morning had been like mine, with all the hurry and the constant feeling of being too late. Yet looking at her I decided that was probably not the case. She was much too pretty and neat, just like always. She had probably been awake for hours.
In the end it was Antoinette who interrupted our laughter.
"What have you got in your hand, Maman?" she wanted to know, eyeing the piece of paper curiously. Was it a letter at all? Suddenly I wasn't sure about it anymore. Just because mine was a letter and hers looked similar, it didn't have to be a letter as well. It could be anything. But what was she doing with it at my door then?
Christine's answer made my doubts disappear.
"It's a letter for Uncle Erik," she admitted.
"Then why don't you give it to him?" her daughter asked. "He's standing right over there…"
"Yes… I, erm, know… but…" Christine stammered, throwing me a pleading glance.
I was always good at making up excuses. My talent didn't fail me this time either, even though it was early in the morning.
"It's a game," I explained quickly. "Your mother and I have both written a letter and have to deliver it without the other one noticing anything."
"And now we've spoilt your game. Are you very angry at us?" Of course it was Philippe who asked such a question, looking at me anxiously.
"No," I assured him. "It wasn't a very good game anyway." Christine nodded emphatically. "Why don't you help us make it better?" I suggested with a kind smile. "You take my letter…" I picked it up from the floor and handed it to the boy. "…and your sister takes your mother's…" They followed my instructions. "…and now you give it to the person who's supposed to receive it."
A moment later I held her letter in my hands. For a few seconds I was simply happy that I had solved the problem this elegantly and curious about what she had written. But then I realised I couldn't open it now, as much as I wanted to. The children would surely want to know what was in it, and if it was something surprising or upsetting, I might not be able to make up a lie quickly enough to satisfy their curiosity. This would mean that I'd violate my rule about not showing emotions in front of them not even twelve hours after inventing it.
Christine seemed to have noticed the problem about opening the letters as well, for she said:
"It's part of the game that the contents of the letters are secret. So you've got to go now, I'm afraid. Just go down to breakfast, and we'll join you in a minute.".
Antoinette and Philippe didn't look pleased about her suggestion, but they were old enough to know that the rules of a game were important, even if they didn't like them. So they made their way downstairs.
"Do you want us to open them in front of each other?" my beloved asked when they were gone.
"I don't know," I replied. "That depends on what is written in yours…" If it were bad news, I'd rather receive them alone. But if it were good news, I didn't mind her seeing me. "What about you? What would you prefer?" I wanted to know quickly.
"Well, that depends on what you've written," she muttered. We chuckled, an embarrassed, slightly helpless sound.
"Is yours… something good?" she asked after a moment.
"That depen – " I interrupted myself before I could use that word yet again. "Let's just read them in our bedrooms," I said. "And if there's something one of us wants to talk about, he or she just comes over and knocks."
"That sounds very good," she agreed. So we did what I had suggested.
As soon as I had closed the door behind me, I unfolded the piece of paper. I didn't want to wait for another moment. Whatever Christine had written, it had to be important, or she would have simply told me in person. Either that, or it was a very delicate matter and she didn't dare talk about it. Of course it could also be something both delicate and important.
When I was finished reading, I sank down onto the bed. Actually I should have been pleased that she accepted my opinion and even thought I were right. It was only logical that she drew the conclusion and asked me to stay away from her at night. Yes, I should have been pleased. But I wasn't. I was just sad. Secretly I had still been looking forward to sleeping in her bed. Just a few kisses and maybe an embrace would have been enough for me. They'd have kept the nightmares at bay.
I wondered whether my letter was just as devastating as hers. When I had written it, it had sounded just fine. But then, it had probably been the same with hers, and still it had saddened me greatly. What if it was even worse for her? Would she hate me for the request I had made? And come to think of it, how would I know whether she hated me? After all, I had asked her not to show emotions…
My pondering was leading nowhere. What I needed were answers, and only Christine herself could given them. So I left my room and went over to hers, knocking softly, just like we had arranged it.
"You can come in, Erik," she called. It was impossible to tell from her voice in what a mood she was, even for me, who was a master at that art. Cautiously I opened the door, brazing myself for the worst without having an exact idea what ´the worst´ might be.
Christine was standing at the other side of the room, looking out of the window. At least I assumed she was looking out of the window; her back was facing me. She was standing exceptionally upright, like a pupil being examined by a much stricter teacher that I'd ever be. Something in her posture made me come to a halt a few steps away from her.
"How did you know it was me standing outside?" I asked the first question that entered my mind.
"Who else should it have been?" she gave back. "The only other persons sleeping in rooms on this floor are Jacqueline and Gabriel. The latter either has already gone down to breakfast or is still too ill to get up, and Jacqueline is wherever the children are. So she's downstairs as well. This leaves you."
This lengthy explanation could have been accompanied by a wink, the way she sometimes did it, but it wasn't. I could hear that much in her voice. It was a cool enumeration of facts, not more and not less. I wasn't sure what to think about it. This was just not like Christine.
"What's wrong with you?" I asked. "Was it my letter? I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings."
"I can assure you that I'm perfectly fine, thank you very much," she stated. "I'm just practicing what you told me to."
Now everything fell into place.
"I didn't mean it like that," I hastened to say. "You don't have to hide your feelings when there's just the two of us in the room. I was referring to situations in which the children are around."
"So you think you have the right to decide when I'm allowed to show my emotions?" she wanted to know slowly. Her voice was losing its flatness as she grew angry. "And when will you inform me into which category a certain situation belongs? Will you tell me a moment before, she that I'll have time to adapt? And what about situations in which the children come in during a conversation? Will I have to stop having emotions in the middle of a sentence?"
At last she turned around, yet after taking one look at her face I almost wished she wouldn't have done so. It was contorted with anger, a striking contrast to the coldness she had shown before.
"I have no idea what's going on in your head, but I just can't do that with my feelings," she called. "They're not like… a candle that you can blow out and light again as often as you please. My feelings are always there, whether you like it or not."
"I know that," I told her gently. "I'm not trying to control you or tell you what to feel. It's just… just like your wish. You ask me to do something, and I do it. Why can't you do the same?"
"You canot compare those two things," she said. "My wish is completely different from yours. Unlike you, I'm not asking you to change your entire behaviour."
"That's true, but – "
My sentence was interrupted by a blood-curling scream that echoed through the house in that very moment. At once everything else was forgotten. Christine and I exchanged a brief glance, then we ran out of the room.