"It was The Wild Palms by Faulkner, and fate was such that she quickly hit upon this monologue by Harry:
'...Respectability. That was what did it. I found out some time back that it's idleness breeds all our virtues, our most bearable qualities-- contemplation, equableness, laziness, letting other people alone; good digestion mental and physical: the wisdom to concentrate on fleshy pleasures-- eating and evacuating and fornication and sitting in the sun-- than which there is nothing better, nothing to match, nothing else in this world but to live for the short time you are loaned breath, to be alive and to now it...'
Lucile stopped right there, shut her book, paid the waiter and walked out. She headed straight back to the newspaper, told Sirer that she was quitting, and asked him not to say anything to Antoine about it, all without offering a word of explanation. She stood there before him, straight and stubborn and smiling, and he simply looked at her with bewilderment. She took off immediately hailed a taxi, told the driver to take her to the Place de Vendome, and got out at a jeweler's where she promptly sold, at half-price, the pearl necklace that Charles had bought her that year for Christmas. She ordered a replica made of it in fake pearls, snubbed the knowing smile that the saleslady flashed at her, and walked out feeling as a free woman. She spent a half hour looking at impressionist paintings in Jeu de Paume, another two hours watching a movie, and then, when she got home, she breezily announced to Antoine that she was coming to feel quite at home at
Le Reveil. This way, he wouldn't be worried anymore, and she'd feel at ease for a while. All in all, she felt better lying to him than lying to herself.
And thus she spent a marvelous two weeks. Paris had been given back to her, along with her status of loafer-- and also the money she needed to enjoy that status. She quickly returned to the lifestyle she'd gotten so used to, bu now as an impostor-- and naturally, the feeling of playing hooky greatly enhanced her pleasure, even in simple things."
Francoise Sagan, La Chamade
