Charming Young Man by Eliot Schrefer

Author:Eliot Schrefer
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2023-10-10T00:00:00+00:00

13.

Robert’s excited reply came in the evening mail, and when Léon woke up the next morning, he found the count in the dawn street below his window, leaning serenely against a lamppost, reading a slim, clothbound book.

“This is really too grand,” Robert said as he followed Léon up the stairs. “I hadn’t realized how tired I was of my own life until you offered me a different one. I’ll love being here. It’s so delightfully plain!”

Léon was worried they wouldn’t know how to be in his apartment together, but Robert had brought his favorite pens and papers and a tin box of tea leaves, and soon got to writing. He worked through the day, occasionally trying out a word or a phrase on Léon. He stayed in the Delafosse apartment while Léon went to the conservatory for his tutorials and was there waiting when he returned. They had dinner at the brasserie on the corner to finish the day, after which Robert headed home, whistling. “Tomorrow morning, get some croissants for us before I arrive, I left some money on the counter,” he called over his shoulder.

He’d left twenty francs on the counter—enough for a thousand croissants.

They spent a week that way, each day the same. Léon enjoyed the daily trip out for pastries, the morning sunshine on his face, fresh air in place of the stale cigar scent Robert left behind in the Delafosse apartment. He’d walk to the good boulangerie—not the one right at the bottom of his building but the one two blocks over, that made its croissants with real butter and not shortening. Then, with the delicate pastries adding barely any weight at all to his knitted sack, he returned home.

Even though Léon’s croissant run took only ten minutes, Robert somehow always timed his arrival so that he would appear before Léon got back, the long line of his body leaning against the front door. They would embrace, then head upstairs to get to work—Robert on his poems, Léon on finishing his sonata and preparing for his music history exam.

Today Robert lingered behind Léon on the stairs, letting the metal coffee canteen Céleste had prepared ring out against the bars of the twisting banister. The pitch was low from the heaviness of the liquid inside. They didn’t say a word to each other as Léon unlocked the door and opened it, Robert slipping in first. The reedy count adventured through the Delafosse apartment like he was in some fabulous underground cave, feet light, eyes attentive, delicate gloved fingers running over the grime between the kitchen tiles, breathing against the dusty window as he glanced out at the mortals going about their business in the street below.

Energized, Robert lay on Léon’s bed, took out his leather book, and began to scribble.

Léon followed behind, heating the cups on a ceramic tile he’d placed over the gas flame, pouring in coffee and adding some of the frothy milk that had arrived that morning, the bottles lining the wooden crates in the building entranceway.

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