Writer 1879: Solitary Journey in France

Chapter 101 In the still of the night, a man and a woman... (Seeking monthly votes)

In the stillness of the night, in the study of his apartment at 64 Lafitte Street, Lionel put down "A Decade of History" and fell into deep thought.

Today I decided to write "Benjamin Button"—which is actually the French equivalent of "Benjamin Button"—partly because I was provoked by Paul Pigut, but not entirely on impulse.

The movie "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" left a deep impression on him back then. He not only watched it many times, but also specially sought out the original novel of the same name to read.

However, the novel version of "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" was just a short story written by Fitzgerald, and it did not cause much of a stir when it was published in 1922.

After David Fincher bought the rights, he made sweeping changes and enrichments to the story, ultimately creating the film's delicate yet epic style.

The original story begins in 1860; the film's story begins in 1918.

When Lionel recounted this story to a crowd at Charpentier Bookstore today, he only gave a general starting point: "the period of the French Revolution."

This statement is very vague, because the "French Revolution" in the strict sense lasted from 1789 to 1794, but the Bourbon dynasty was overthrown as early as 1792, and what followed was a period of infighting among various factions.

However, the French Revolutionary Wars lasted from 1792 to 1802, a full 10 years.
Lionel wasn't sure which time to place it at the time, so he could only leave it vague and, on his way home, he made a special detour to the Great Library to borrow these historical works.

It wasn't until he roughly figured out the historical timeline and major events of late 18th-century France that he finally made a decision.

The next step is to determine which narrative techniques from the film can be retained in the novel, and which cannot be replicated in 19th-century novels.

It wasn't until late at night that Lionel put the first paragraph down on the manuscript:
The sky above the Left Bank of the Seine outside the window wasn't the inky black of night, but a murky, restless orange-red. It wasn't a sunset; it was the flames spewing from countless burning barricades and buildings. Thick smoke billowed, and the smell of burning and blood seeped through the cracks in the window frame, filling the small hospital room. Daphne Villeneuve, lying on the bed, breathed laboredly, each breath pulling at her sunken chest and triggering a cough. The coughing seemed to be squeezing out the last vestiges of her life.

"Mother!" Caroline rushed to the bedside in a panic, one hand supporting her mother's bony shoulder, the other frantically trying to cover the window, which was rattling and covered with spiderweb-like cracks. "Please! We can't delay any longer! The Versailles army is advancing just a few blocks away, and the Commune people are still fighting in the streets... This place could become a real shooting range at any moment! The Notre Dame ambulance is downstairs; they said they can take us across the river, to Île Saint-Louis, for now..."

“No.” Daphne’s voice was weak, but resolute: “Caroline,” Daphne struggled to move her thin fingers, pointing to a package on the bedside table, her breath coming in short gasps, “take it…and open it.”

Caroline choked back a sob. She knew all too well the stubbornness in her mother's bones, the kind of unwavering resolve that once a direction was set, there was no turning back. Obediently and carefully, she picked up the heavy bundle. As she unbuckled the belt, her fingertips could clearly feel the hard edges beneath the canvas. The canvas was lifted, revealing a booklet inside: the cover was worn so badly the texture was almost invisible, the four corners were bound with dull brass corner protectors, and the spine was clumsily reinforced multiple times with coarse hemp thread. There was no gilded title, only stains and countless tiny scratches from the passage of time; it was practically falling apart.

“Open it,” Daphne’s voice held a strange, almost urgent force. “Read. Start from the first page…read it aloud. Now. Right here.” Her cloudy eyes were fixed on Caroline with an undeniable yearning.

Caroline's fingers traced the cold, rough surface of the cover, finally digging into the edge of the pages and opening the cover, a weight heavier than fate itself. The title page was devoid of any decoration, except for a single faded word, the ink deeply embedded in the paper:
Benjamin Bouton

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

Late at night, on the outskirts of Paris, in Montmartre, Baroness Balf Alexievna Durova-Sherbatova smashed a set of precious Chinese antique porcelain worth over 1000 francs.

I don't know how many sets this is in the past few days, but the Baroness has plenty of money and doesn't care.

The servants, trembling with fear, gathered up the broken pieces, not daring to utter a single word, not even daring to breathe, for fear of being slapped by the Baroness, whose arms were thicker than their legs. Baroness Alexievna had just experienced the most humiliating day of her life, becoming the laughingstock of all Paris, all of France, and even the entire European aristocratic circle.

She could already imagine how that mean banker's wife, Mrs. Rothschild, would mock her in the salon.

She could imagine how many times her old rivals in her hometown of Moscow and St. Petersburg would repeat that joke from that night.

Even when she sleeps, she sometimes dreams about the scene from that night—

How she got that conman to the center of attention, how she used the most cheesy and exaggerated words to describe him, how she felt ecstatic amidst the praise of the party guests…

Until those two unanimous voices shattered all illusions.

The perfect literary genius in his mind, a handsome man like the shepherd Endymion, who disdained money and material desires and was forever immersed in noble thoughts, "the poor Lionel," was like a wild dog being chased by the police all over the castle.

He knocked over chairs, smashed countless pieces of porcelain on the dining table, and crawled around under the women's long skirts, more comical than a circus clown.

Poverty, arrogance, talent, contempt for the powerful... it was all an act for her, all tricks of a conman, just like those pretty boys with powdered faces, all they wanted was her money!

But those pretty boys are just scammers; they have plenty of their own!

That "poor Lionel" only stole his own heart!
She had never easily given her heart to anyone, not even her husband, in the more than forty years she had given it away!

Unforgivable!

Baroness Alexievna thought of the swindler's pretty face, but her mind was instantly replaced by another "poor Lionel," the real Lionel's face.

This is the real root of all evil! The culprit that has brought shame upon himself throughout Europe!
If it weren't for him, if it weren't for his incredible rumors, I wouldn't have fallen for that liar so easily.

Baroness Alexievna shouted, "Yevsey, get your ass in here, you stupid pig!"

Soon, a man with slicked-back hair and fawning eyes stood in front of her.

Baroness Alexievna looked down at him, her voice no longer angry, but with a peculiar calm before the storm:

“Go back to Moscow and tell my dear daughter, Sofia, everything—tell her to come to Paris immediately!”

Yevshey trembled slightly, then bowed his head respectfully: "Yes, madam!"

(End of this chapter)