Bestial

Immediately afterWW2 a mysterious animal attacks children in Brittant (France).

Donatien Moisdon

 

 

 

Bestial

 

 

 

“I have lost the immortal part of myself, and what remains is bestial.”

(Shakespeare, Othello)

 

 

 

 

 

I finally arrived in Rennes during a suffocating mid-afternoon in June 1945 ; one year, almost to the day, after the allied landing in Normandy. Exhausted, dehydrated, I had been occasionally dozing off ever since we’d left Paris, trying not to pay too much attention to a headache that was threatening to turn into a migraine, a headache made worse by the pervasive smell of coal dust. The compartment was full of soldiers who, like myself, had not been able to wash, shave or change for a couple of weeks. As for uniforms, they had lasted several years. I’m sure that I was just as nauseating as my companions. At each stop, well-intentioned people had handed us bottles of wine through the windows. Whiffs of red plonk had then been mixing with the other whiffs. They were only superseded by the powerful stink from those who, their feet in agony, had removed their boots. Nevertheless, the idea that we were travelling on French soil was exhilarating.

Through power lines seemingly going up and down from pole to pole, we couldn’t get enough of the countryside. Some of my fellow travellers had been taken prisoners in Belgium and had spent five years behind barbed wire. Shot down in December 1943 above Friedrichshafen, I was a greenhorn by comparison. What would France look like ? we had wondered. We were torn between elation and apprehension. As always, children were straddling level crossing barriers and waving at us, but we couldn’t help noticing the small number of animals in the fields, the meadows overrun by weeds, and from time to time �" especially in towns �" ruins, shell impacts, bomb craters and walls riddled with bullet holes. Very few cars.

Once in Rennes, I waited until most of my fellow passengers had left the compartment. There was no rush. We had stopped for at least fifteen minutes at each station. Soldiers who still had to go all the way to Brest were bracing themselves for many more hours of suffering on this puffing, wheezing train and its rickety carriages. I got up slowly and took down my rucksack from the luggage net. It was light. I wondered what some of us had carted back from Germany. I could see some of them straining under the weight of enormous bundles. Weak as I was then, my own bag felt heavy enough. The platform, made of wood, was level with the rails, and you needed someone’s help to load or unload pieces of luggage. Fortunately, in this end-of-war atmosphere, there was no shortage of good will.

I was dying of thirst. Last one to jump off the train, I took my time looking for a water tap. There was a pump at the other end of the platform : one of those bronze contraptions shaped like a miniature lighthouse. Its round top had a handle and you turned that top in order to start the water flowing. It had been immediately spotted, and there was a queue. When my turn came, I drank and splashed water on my face and neck, then stayed for a while to turn the handle for the next guy.

Refreshed, breathing a less polluted air, I was relieved to notice that my headache was going away. I headed for the exit where I was surprised to see that I had to run the gauntlet of some American Military Police. They looked bored while nonchalantly chewing gum, but remained very alert. They checked everything : papers, rucksacks… Apparently, they were looking for collaborators, members of the pro-German French Militia or even the Gestapo. I didn’t know it at the time, but out of the 36,000 Gestapo members who had terrorised people during the war, 33,000 were French. They were jailed criminals who, almost to a man, had negotiated their freedom by joining the dreaded organisation. It had allowed them to rape and pillage to their hearts’ content. The MPs were also looking for French speaking Nazis and concentration camp guards trying to pass themselves off as liberated POWs. I was struck by the healthy, well-fed appearance of these Americans, their cleanliness, their impeccable uniforms with beautifully ironed shirts, and the light smell of after-shave lotion wafting from their bodies. Compared to the stinking, ragged hordes we embodied, they seemed to have landed from another planet. They had a tendency to behave towards us like representatives of yet another master race. Still, the names printed on their shirt pockets went from Duval, Ory, Neufeld and Andreotti to Tullwood, Innocenti, Erfurter and Noland. Europeans ! Some, undoubtedly of German descent. They had mixed, over there, thousands of miles away from Europe, and instead of fighting each other, (well, maybe they did for a while) they had, in the end, united into one powerful nation.

After I had been checked and rechecked by the MPs, I came out of the station, and dropping my bag on the sidewalk, leant against the gaudy yellow fence surrounding the railway yard. It had been erected to replace an old wall, remnants of which still showed up here and there through tall weeds and dog stools. Behind this exuberant fence, you could spot the grey, menacing domes of an armoured train. Every single French railway station had been bombed several times, when it hadn’t been blown to bits by the Resistance. Everything was temporary.

A crowd of idle onlookers were pacing back and forth or daydreaming in front of the station ; mostly women. Just a minute… they were not idle onlookers. They were people who had gathered, as they did regularly, in the hope that a former POW, a husband, a son, a lover would be back on that day. I scanned these faces : tense, discouraged faces. There were only a few soldiers left behind the gates.

No one would be waiting for me. Mother would have never entertained the thought of showing up, or sending one of our servants. When you are starving, tired, weakened as I was then, it takes very little to turn a great joy into a great sadness. The deep, slow chugging of idling steam engines, voices calling from one side of the road to the other, whistle blowing from the stationmaster, everything echoed in my head as if under the dome of a gigantic swimming pool. A woman ran across the street and threw herself in the arms of a soldier who, clearly surprised, almost lost his balance. She burst into tears while he was trying to disentangle himself from his rucksack straps, so as to better give her a hug. There was a smile on his face, but his eyes remained dead, the instant he had so looked forward to having lost its magic as it materialised.

I no longer knew anybody in town. As I scanned those blackened remnants of walls, those gutted buildings and those boarded up windows, I started wondering if I was really in Rennes. I could have been anywhere. I yanked my rucksack back on my shoulders and started walking aimlessly, just guided by instinct. As soon as I had left the gutted area by the station, I found my way again : nothing had changed, even if streets were more silent and deserted than they had been before the war.

I walked past a small apartment building where my best friend had lived. We had met in 1938 when both enlisting in the Air Force. I couldn’t help gazing at the windows. Like myself, Roger had been single and, like myself, living with his mother. He had a tiny white dog that jumped in his arms and tried to lick his nostrils whenever he came home on leave. He also had a girlfriend with whom he made love in the living room. It was the only decently heated room in the apartment. Anyway, his bed, he used to say, was hardly wider than a stretcher.

Masquerading as fishermen, Roger and I had rallied to de Gaulle in England. Sailing from Erquy, our boat had a rendezvous with a Welsh trawler, then had headed back to the French coastline with a harmless catch of soles and mullets. As soon as we had enlisted in the Free French Forces, quickly renamed Fighting French Forces, we were propelled to the rank of lieutenant. Three weeks later, we had become pilots : Roger on Hurricanes and myself on Blenheims.

The way Roger died affected me almost as much as did his death itself. He never went into combat. His plane exploded during training, and crashed in flames not five hundred yards from the runway. Having witnessed the accident, I rushed over with the medics and firemen. After they had extinguished the fire, Roger appeared, still strapped in, his face jet black, his eye sockets empty, his lips gone, outlining a gruesome smile. In spite of their helmets and asbestos suits and gloves, rescuers had trouble touching the edges of the cockpit or the metal rings of Roger’s safety belt. Yanking him out was not easy. What was left of his flight suit had stuck to the skin, but the skin itself would come off as it slid on melted fat. The smell was traumatic : burnt clothing, but also leather, plastic, skin and excrement, for the poor boy had, of course, emptied his bowels on the seat. When Roger was laid out on the stretcher, one of the medics fainted. I stepped in and grabbed the handles. As I lifted them, Roger’s helmet fell off and his skull split in two. Part of the whitish, bloodstained brain, still steaming, landed on my shoes.

 

Looking up from the sidewalk, I could see one of the new tenants : a woman in her late twenties, perhaps, but prematurely aged by poverty and repeated pregnancies. Somewhere from the other side of the apartment, boomed the angry voice of your typical control-freak bully. Roger’s mother must have gone back to her village, unless she too had died. What about the dog ? And the girlfriend ?

Cars, as I said, were rare. That’s why the one parked at the end of the street attracted my attention : a silver and blue 1935 J12 Hispano-Suiza, exactly like mine. As I got closer, I recognised the licence plate : it was mine ! I slowly walked around the vehicle, trying to solve that mystery. She had been impeccably maintained. Paint and chrome were shining like new. I peeked in. The dark blue leather upholstery was as neat as the outside.

“You didn’t think you’d ever see her again, did you ?”

Marjeval’s voice made me jump. It was him, all right : as fat as he had always been, as breathless and looking about to collapse from a heart attack. Over his huge skull, his sparse white hair had become even sparser and whiter. He was the first Frenchman I’d met who didn’t look like a tramp. Thinly striped pearl-grey suit, white shirt, rusty-red tie with a golden tie clip ; new, comfortable brown shoes, shining as for a military parade. Questions tumbled into my mind : why was he driving my car ? What was he doing in a deserted street, in Rennes, on a late afternoon in June ? He answered my first question as if he’d read my mind. “I just came out of a brothel.” Silence. “Does that bother you ?”

I shook my head “No”, and it was true. I didn’t give a fig if he went to a brothel or not. I surveyed the grey, mangy front of the houses, wondering which one Marjeval had come out of. He looked slightly bemused. “It’s not written on the door, you know.”

“I guess not.”

“I’ll introduce you if you want. Mid-week, mid-afternoon, it’s terrific : no drunks, no music, no rush and a great choice of ladies. I’m a regular. When it’s slack, they give me two or three for the price of one. They don’t want me to go somewhere else, you see. They are cute, like that. Shall I drive you home ?” He noticed my reluctance. “Ah, yes, the car, of course. The Germans had taken it, as you can guess. I managed to get it back when they fled, and then your mother gave it to me.”

I knew full well that Mother hated Marjeval with every fibre in her body, and I didn’t understand how she could have given him this magnificent vehicle. As far as I remembered, Marjeval had never said or done anything that might have antagonised Mother in any way, but people hated him without knowing why. His wealthy appearance, the luxury car he now seemed to own, everything hinted, even if you were of a tolerant nature, and gave him the benefit of the doubt, at black market activities. Perhaps he still indulged in them, as rationing was still going on. More likely, he had supported Pétain, and with great profit to himself, collaborated with the Germans. He had probably acted with enough discretion not to become a victim of those anti-collaborator purges that followed the Allied victory. Hard to imagine him as a member of the pro-German Militia, for example. It is true, as we understood later, i.e. when historians had dissected these troubled times, that collaboration purges, often encouraged by dubious characters, had singularly lacked impartiality and logic, many innocent citizens ending up as victims of personal or political grudges while an even greater number of guilty parties had escaped retribution. One way or the other, Marjeval may have been lucky. We’ll never know the truth.

My family and I are no angels, but at least we couldn’t possibly have been accused of collaboration. We had not made money out of the war, but we hadn’t lost much either. In excruciating pain, barely able to walk, as he was dying of a stomach cancer, and only weeks before the communist-socialist election victory of 1936, Father had managed to flee to the States, transfer our money to an American bank, then use it to buy gold. While in New York, he had collapsed in a Plaza Hotel elevator and was rushed to Lennox Hill Hospital where he was declared dead on arrival : an amazing show of determination and courage. When the Germans showed up at the château, Mother, drawing on a mixture of heroism and stupidity, had refused to go away and had been allowed to use one of the second-floor rooms.

Yes, I know, I know, the word château may seem pretentious, but how else would you describe this charming XVIIIth century structure, bigger than a middle class country house and smaller than an English pile ? If you sail down the river Vilaine, and you suddenly come face to face with this elegant architectural masterpiece, its park, its lawns, its double flight of steps and its terraces dotted with Corinthian planted urns, you wonder for a while if you are not on the wrong watercourse, and cruising on the river Loire instead. It’s the château of Toucouleur, thus named after a truce during the Hundred Years’ War. French and English had feasted together, mixing their battle flags, in other words, their colours.

My family has been living here for a few hundred years. Before the XVIIIth century, and therefore during the Hundred Years’ War, they were holed up in a much more massive and severe building : a castle, the ruins of which are still visible two or three hundred yards further up on the site of what is now Marjeval’s farm. An unfortunate marriage and its no less unfortunate dowry meant that, by 1925, we no longer owned that land. Built with the black stones from the former castle, the main body of the farm was surrounded by a scatter of equally sinister outbuildings.

My family history is not very interesting. We are country squires, busy with tending our fields and forests, but above all careful not to meddle in other people’s business. No great writers, heroic soldiers, conspirators, traitors or cardinals on the long list of my ancestors. The most famous �" inasmuch as the word famous could apply here, had shot dead a man found in bed with his wife. A second or two later, he realised that he had killed the vicar. Local farmers found the incident hilarious. My ancestor got away with a telling off from the bishop.

We’ve always been happy with this sort of obscure wealth : picnics by the shores of the Vilaine, wild boar culls and dozens of bucolic activities partaking a unique flavour to the condition of gentleman farmer. We worked hard sometimes, but it was only because we wanted to. Making sure we had enough wood for the winter, ordering seeds from the Vilmorin catalogue, visiting farms and making sure maintenance and repairs were being done, inspecting forest footpaths, deciding that the dining room needed a new ceiling, acquiring a huge painting, dark and dull, full of horses and coats of armour for the landing at the top of the main staircase, driving the truck all the way to Ambarès in order to fetch a few barrels of wine, all activities that Horace and Virgil would have understood perfectly and appreciated. My ancestors were probably arrogant, no more, no less than the other country squires of the region, but nowadays we have a more egalitarian attitude towards our fellow men. Father was a very approachable man. So am I.

 

“So, are you getting in or not ?”

“It’s tempting, but I won’t. It would make you feel uncomfortable. I’m so dirty !”

“So you are. Don’t worry about it. It’s a beautiful day. We’ll open the windows. Go on : throw your gear in the trunk.”

The idea of being home in a little less than an hour instead of trekking for twenty-five kilometres was very tempting. I was bushed. I had fought the Germans. Was I then going to accept a favour from someone who had become wealthy kowtowing to them ? I felt a little guilty. On the other hand, I kept telling myself that the war, around here at least, had been over for a year, whereas I was still feeling it on my skin and inhaling its whiffs of death and terror. Suddenly, and for a few disturbing seconds, I felt very empty. We had not waged war against the Krauts, we had fought Evil, Evil with a capital E, Evil at government level, Evil of a type that had, throughout History reared its ugly head in every nation, Evil which, like a weed, will always keep growing here and there. In the Bible, doesn’t King David boast that all the inhabitants of a town he had taken, women and children included, were put to the sword ? David and Hitler would have hated each other, but would also have admired each other’s strategies. Our victory over Evil is never a victory : only a truce.

I threw my gear in the trunk of my car. I must be fair : that puffy collaborator had looked after her very well. The polished chrome slid voluptuously under my fingers, and the door shut with a muted, velvety sound. The comfort of the seat seemed almost indecent. With renewed optimism, it made me feel like coming to terms with a changed civilisation and a changed life.

The smell of leather, mingled with the slight whiffs of gasoline emanating from all cars of that vintage, was a powerful reminder of past glories. The metallic finish of the deep blue hood gleamed in front of us as it always used to in the good old days ; days that now seemed as unreal as time warp.

I knew that pre-war life would be idealised : a sort of golden age that had never been, but seemed golden indeed when set against the devastation,  deprivation and massacres of the last five years. Already, on the train, soldiers were talking about the pre-war quality of food and manufactured goods. In spite of the insidious charm of the Hispano-Suiza, I was determined not to cling to a bygone era. Marjeval started the engine and the twelve cylinders produced their familiar, powerful, muffled burr.

Roads, like France herself, had been raped, gutted, left to decay. The comfort of the car, Marjeval’s careful driving �" he was doing his best to avoid the biggest potholes �" did not keep us from being roughly bounced about. Caterpillar tracks left by hundreds of tanks had not helped the degradation spread over four years of wartime neglect.

Marjeval didn’t say much, and I didn’t encourage small talk. Rather, I gave myself to the contemplation of a landscape that filled me with both painful and delightful emotions, a landscape that I was really seeing clearly for the first time. We remain blind to our surroundings when we have never left, when we have never suffered, and above all when the vigour of youth keeps us from thinking that one day we must die. It was in POW barracks that many sensitivities had been awakened, that more than one boy from Northern France had discovered the wide-open, seashores where gusts of wind ruffle the feathers of small wading birds, and where a pale sunshine caresses the undulations of mudflats. Parisians had understood Paris. Prisoners from the Auvergne had discovered the golden rays of September evenings over the light green curves of their extinct volcanoes.

We were now crossing an area of soft, rounded hills covered with gorse or broom, whence here and there emerged a grove of chestnut trees or a line of poplar trees ; fields that spoke of poor agriculture, made even poorer by war and occupation. Over meadows invaded by thorn bushes and shrub, I could still notice the regular lines of ancient furrows. Very few animals around : only the odd she-goat, tethered by a hedge, raising her head to watch the car go by.

But for the Hispano-Suiza, I could have been transported in time to the 18th century, an impression reinforced by the sorry sight of the farm buildings I would catch sight of, with their half-collapsed thatched roofs sinking amidst low, jagged granite walls. In spite of my physical exhaustion, I now almost regretted not to have walked the whole distance. I would have liked to tread slowly through this half-wild landscape, in order to feel it under the sole of my feet, and also on my palms and face… On their return journey, a few POWs, dismissing the sniggering from their mates, had kissed the ground when crossing the border back to France. As for myself, I had only felt the weight of fatality. In this war, the gods had been on our side, nothing more.

There was no question of asking Marjeval to stop, even for a few minutes. Squeezed behind the wheel as if he’d become part of the car itself, or like the immovable driver of a wooden toy, he reminded me of a hybrid between a pig and a rhinoceros : a nightmarish creature. He startled me when he talked suddenly. “Surely, you will stop at the house for a drink, won’t you ?”

“No, thanks. I can’t wait to see my mother again.”

I was relieved that he did not insist. After several minutes of silence, he spoke again : “Would you mind very much walking across fields from my property to yours ? Must be less than three hundred metres.”

I didn’t mind at all, even if I found his request a bit strange. I must have looked puzzled. He cleared his throat. “Well, here’s the thing : on the one hand, your mother hates me, and on the other hand, it might be better if you approached the château slowly. Have you been informed of what to expect ?”

“I haven't received letters for more than a year.”

More throat clearing. “Well… let’s say that the ground floor has suffered. You’ll see for yourself. Your mother was upstairs. She’s fine.”

To my own surprise, I didn’t feel anything. “The Germans ?” I asked.

He couldn’t repress a malicious smile : “No, the phony patriots, those who joined the Resistance after the Germans had left, if you see what I mean. They showed up one evening to protect your mother, went straight to the wine cellar, got drunk and started breaking the furniture. All the Germans ever did was steal the silverware. As for the initials carved on the table of the main dining-room, you can send the bill to the Americans.”

“How do you know all that ?”

“Your servants are not very discreet. They talk too much.”

I couldn’t help a hint of sarcasm : “And did those phony patriots, as you call them, pay you a visit as well ?”

Marjeval’s body was shaken by waves of silent laughter : “Oh, they did, they did. I was expecting them. You’ll understand in a minute.”

By then, we were on the long drive leading to his farm. Of the former medieval castle, shapeless heaps of black stones were all that could be seen. The best-preserved remnants being the base of a tower, crumbling a little more each year under the pressure of ivy and neighbouring roots. Through its gutted side, you could see a tall chestnut tree that had grown right in the centre. If you knew where to look, you could also spot the curving hollows that had once been flooded ditches circling the battlements. No castle has ever, to my knowledge, led a completely peaceful existence. It made me wonder if some archaeological dig might have unearthed arrowheads, cannon balls or even (why not ?) a sarcophagus brimming with gold and diamonds.

We were closing in very slowly on the farm. The path was narrow and in bad condition. Thorny bushes threatened to scratch the paint of the car. Through the open window, I could inhale the intoxicating smells so familiar to my childhood.  This part of France had been liberated ten months earlier. Even among those woods, hedges and meadows, my tattered uniform clashed against the idea of peace.

Without any logic, the way we, the POWs, had been liberated, came back to me with great intensity. Had I been with anyone but Marjeval, I would not have refrained from sharing the reminiscence. We had woken up, not at the sound of a rail repeatedly struck by a kapo, but on the contrary, by an eerie silence. The Germans had gone, leaving the  gates wide open.

Emaciated, riddled with dysentery (our only food for the previous week had been rotten carrots) we crept gingerly towards the exit, looking around us, wary of a trap, and half-expecting machine-guns to start barking any second. We decided to spread out in small groups of no more than a dozen men each. From a distance, we must have looked like those ragged bands that used to scour the countryside in the Middle Ages ; bands of old men, since we stooped and dragged our feet. Even though most of us had not yet turned thirty, our hair was often grey or white. Once outside the oflag, we instinctively headed west. 

A few minutes later, as we were crossing a field, we spotted a German platoon running towards us. What were they going to do ? Would they avenge their defeat by killing a bunch of unsteady, unarmed foreigners ? That’s when a potential tragedy turned into a farce. “Schnell, schnell !” They shouted. “Go back : the Americans are right behind us.”

We looked at each other, not knowing whether we should laugh or cry. Weak as we were, some of us did both. The Germans looked puzzled. Then, little by little, they realised that we were POWs anxious to make contact with the Allies. To show that they had got it, some of them started sniggering. Their sergeant pushed them on their way again. We even heard a voice wishing us good luck. That’s when one of ours, a cheeky Parisian, found nothing better to do than shout in German : “Kiss Stalin’s arse for us !” (“Stalin kann mich am Arsch lecken.”)

The platoon stopped in their tracks. We could see them, heads together as in a rugby scrum, muttering and nodding vigorously. We cursed our Parisian between our teeth, especially when we realised that the Germans had turned round and were coming back… but as they caught up with us, they handed in their weapons. Without a word, they placed their hands behind their necks and started walking west in front of us. No doubt some of them ended up as carpenters in Pittsburgh or electricians in Miami. We had started this horrible war as toy soldiers. Its finishing touch felt like a scene from a Broadway musical.

 

Furious barking yanked me out of my daydream. Farms always have dogs, but I hadn’t expected to see a whole pack. There must have been at least twenty, all pure breed, all magnificent Alsatian shepherd dogs.

“My bodyguards.” Marjeval explained. “They’ve detected your presence in the car. You can understand now, why the so-called Resistance let me be. Some tried, of course, but they left chunks of their behinds behind.” He leaned out of the window and said something. The dogs calmed down. A young woman came out of the farmhouse and headed towards the car.

“You can leave, now. They won’t bite.”

I eased the door open, and tentatively put one foot on the ground. Three or four snouts came to sniff the space between my shoe and the rim of my trouser leg. I could feel the warmth of their breathing on my goose pimples ; then other dogs took their places until they had all registered my olfactory signature in their brains. When this ritual was over, they scattered. A few remained however, sitting next to me, asking to be petted, which I didn’t have the heart to refuse. Jealous, the others came back to me in order to claim their share of affection, all this under the smirking gaze of Marjeval and the young woman.

She was by the trunk and opened it as soon as I was able to emerge from a sea of heads and wagging tails. “Hello !” She said, shaking my hand. I held her cool, delicate, smooth fingers ; not the fingers of a farm worker. You couldn’t say that she was a stunning beauty, but she was very pretty. I found her fascinating. I answered “Hello !” while cursing myself for not finding anything more clever to say. My mind was numb. There was nothing artificial or ridiculous about her. I had kept the memory of the days when many women were often vulgar while trying to be elegant. With their black pencil dresses split on one side, high heel shoes, too much make-up, heavy eyelids, hair rolled to the left and a cigarette holder between their teeth, they tried to ape their favourite movie stars.

War shortages had apparently cleaned up their act. The girl standing in front of me was a good example. She exuded the sort of direct and powerful sensuality that owed nothing to the whims of fashion, but I was as overwhelmed as if she had taken me in her arms, kissed me on the mouth and undone my fly. 

She had short, blond hair, a round face and large, innocent brown eyes that also managed to appear shameless and brazen. On her slim body, radiating youthful energy and cleanliness, she wore a simple, short-sleeve, cream-coloured dress. On her feet, black sandals and white socks straight out of a boarding school uniform. Never had such an unremarkably dressed woman seemed so magically naked.

“You do remember Véronique, don’t you ?” Marjeval gasped while extricating himself from behind the wheel. Delighted with my awkwardness, he wobbled over to the open trunk. It was all coming back to me now : Véronique… little Véronique. “I… yes, of course.” I mumbled.

Véronique had acquired the reputation of an unruly child, hunting rabbits and wild boar from the age of twelve. She would mysteriously roam the forest for days on end, going to school only when she felt like it ; but people were saying that it wasn’t her fault. Her mother had died while giving birth, and her father had never seriously taken care of her.

“Véronique will walk with you with part of the way” Marjeval continued “just to make sure the dogs don’t get the wrong idea. Are you certain you won’t come inside for a drink ?”

“Quite. It was very nice of you to give me a lift, but I’d rather go home.”

He shrugged, turned round and headed for the house without saying goodbye. I grabbed my bag and slammed the trunk shut. Véronique was already leaving the farmyard. I almost had to run in order to catch up with her. Two of the dogs decided to come along. We walked briskly for a few minutes. The only sound was coming from the Alsatians’ heavy breathing.

I was both irritated and amused by what I now felt so intensely and so suddenly for Véronique. I tried to see the logic in it. I had just spent nearly four years without women, and naturally, the first time I found myself near one of them, I overreacted and forgot that, in other circumstances, walking across a meadow in the company of a young woman would have been an ordinary and uninteresting occurrence. I kept telling myself that everything would soon be normal again. Once or twice a month, I would go to Paris and spend my weekends with Athaliah.

I did…and did not love Athaliah. When fleeing to England, I hadn’t taken with me a photograph of her, and while in Germany I hadn’t cried when thinking of her as, in those moments of so-called weakness, some of my fellow prisoners had done at the mention of their wives or girlfriends. Athaliah was a wonderful, elegant and charming woman, but she had never triggered in me the sort of insane, overwhelming need I now felt : i.e. to fall at Véronique’s feet, kiss her thighs and disappear under her dress.

My dreams were all the more unrealistic that, from Véronique’s standpoint, I must have been a visual and olfactory disaster. To get my mind off her, I tried to think of something else : a prolonged, hot, foamy bath, for example. However if, as Marjeval had mentioned, the château had been damaged, it wasn’t likely that the furnace and the bathrooms would still be in working order. I would have to settle for strip washing and clean clothes, but even that prospect seemed like paradise.

We reached the top of a long meadow sloping gently towards the château. Its roofs could already be spotted behind a row of poplar trees. The sight of their bluish, greyish tones, striped with streaks of dull green moss, started a lump in my throat. It almost made me forget Véronique’s presence. She brushed my forearm, bringing me down to earth, then without a word she pointed at the footpath I was to take. I muttered “Thank you” and started on my way.

A moment later, judging that I had acted boorishly with this delightful young lady, I turned round. Véronique was sitting on an old tree stump, and thanks to the unevenness of the field, it so happened that I could see up her skirt and between her half-open legs. She was wearing white knickers, the gusset outlining perfectly the cleft of her inner lips. She and I froze. Second followed second. I was enchanted, as one might have been in the Middle Ages ; enchanted and paralysed. I could hear in my soul a long cry of anguish, similar to that of a man plunging from a cliff top, and I understood what people meant when they said that they are falling in love, the fear of that fall being as real as that experienced by a mountain climber whose foot loses its grip.

I looked at Véronique’s face, and it cost me as much of an effort as lifting a barbell. She was watching me watching her, her deep brown eyes expressing nothing but the peace and contentment of a Buddhist monk. Even her trace of a smile possessed that enigmatic, Eastern quality. A steel vice was crushing my stomach. I heard myself moaning with pain and frustration, but force of habit and common sense prevailed. I shooed the prehistoric hunter out of my mind and reinstated the civilised person. I waved her “goodbye”, but couldn’t help lowering my gaze to her thighs once again. Like a fox chewing his leg off in order to escape from a trap, I tore myself away from this lovely sight. I turned my back to her and resumed walking down the meadow. A few seconds later, I couldn’t stand it anymore : I turned round, but she had gone. All I could see was the tail of a dog swaying behind a hummock.

I finished the last hundred yards as in a dream, shattered by an uncomfortable mixture of emotions : the mysterious attraction I had so suddenly felt for Véronique, mixed with impatience at getting to the house. I also had to contend with the embarrassment of an almost painful erection sliding right and left on my stomach with each step.

Coming out of the line of poplar trees and finding myself in front of the château sobered me up instantly. Surrounded by high grass, the building looked like a wounded animal. Almost all the ground floor windowpanes had been smashed. Behind the wooden surrounds, remnants of curtains were waving in the draft. Copper rods, often fallen on one side only, divided the frames like gilded diagonals on face cards.

I crossed what should have been a lawn and climbed the front steps leading to the terrace and the main door. The lock had been shattered. On such a heavy latch and on such thick wood, only a sledgehammer or even a proper battering ram could have done the job, which clearly indicated that it hadn’t been decided on the spur of the moment. When I pushed the right-hand side of the door, it opened easily, but soon jammed with a screeching sound. As I walked in, my boots crunched on splinters and rubble. In the hallway, gutted and dislocated furniture greeted me with a hollow, dusty silence. Its wood had already started to acquire the dull, earthy tint of neglected antiques, but all could still be restored. Without any idea of their commercial value, our vandals had vented their anger on priceless tables and chests rather than stealing them.

I dropped my rucksack on the tiled floor and headed slowly towards a harpsichord that had been dragged to the centre of the room. I pressed one of the keys : not a sound. I tried another, and got a faint moan.

“They danced on it, you know.” I jumped and turned round. Like a black, emaciated ghost crowned with a mop of tousled hair outlined by the daylight from the terrace, Nanon’s figure had appeared in the doorway. I whispered her name and ran to take her in my arms. She started to cry. When I had a proper look at her face, my heart stopped : she had a black eye, her lips were puffed and bleeding, and her left cheek had been slashed. “Oh, my God ! Who did that to you ?” I asked while conscious of tears welling in my own eyes and a painful wave of anger in my chest.

“Three of them came back last night. I found them here, in the great hall. They were dancing on the piano.” She was speaking so softly through that swollen face of hers, that I had to strain my ears in order to understand what she was saying.

“Three what ?”

“Three good-for-nothing scoundrels who live around here. I recognised one of them : he was part of the mob who sacked the ground floor last year. Makes you wonder what they did during the war and how they managed not to be taken away to forced-labour camps.”

“They probably worked for the Gestapo, I shouldn’t be surprised. But why did they hit you like that ?”

A painful smile appeared on her lips. “I’m the one who started it. We fought like wild cats. I crushed the balls of the first one with my knee, then I managed to catch another one in an arm lock. I backed with him into a corner and threatened to break his elbow if his friends didn’t leave. You know that my father was a policeman. He taught me how to defend myself. The two other boys decided that they’d had enough, and ran out. I didn’t know what to do with my hostage, so I broke his elbow after all. Lovely crunching noise. You should have heard him wail. When I finally let him go, I literally kicked him out of the door. I thought he was going to call his mother. Émile, I have a confession to make : I wouldn’t have missed this for the world.”

“You should have called René and André.”

“The days are long. They must have been in the orchard. I don’t know… I didn’t think.”

I took her in my arms again. She was now sobbing. I felt emotionally drained, though very proud of my old nanny who, in my heart, would always be my real mother, the woman who had fed me, washed me, told me stories at night, looked after me when I was ill, daubed my grazed knees with mercurochrome, painted the back of my throat with methylene blue, slapped my face when I was rude and sent me to bed early without a dessert... the only person who, throughout my childhood, had told me that I was handsome and clever ; above all, the only one who had ever held me tight against her chest and said that she loved me. As I patted her back, I could feel under my palms the shaking rigidity of her spine and shoulder blades.

My legal, biological mother had certainly heard us, but I knew that she would remain on the second floor. She was possessed by a tormented and often self-destructive idea of her social position and dignity. Running downstairs in order to hug a son she hadn't seen since 1940 would have seemed to her like the last thing to do. As in a play, where she would have been both the only actress and the only spectator, she would act to perfection the part of the lady of the manor, the chatelaine as described in children’s tales, and I had no difficulty imagining her looking around for some work of embroidery or knitting, in order to give herself an appearance worthy of her station in life.

When I enter her room, she would raise her eyes. Her gaze and her quivering body would have been carefully rehearsed in order to give an impression of surprise, immediately followed by that of tearful emotion. Her knitting and her ball of wool would fall on the floor. With an aristocratic and theatrical effort, she would try to get up, but weak and defeated, she would sit down again, one hand on her heart, the other on her forehead. I would pick up her work and place a light kiss on her cheek. She would take my hand in hers and squeeze it for several seconds while nodding like a puppet doll, and adding, in a tremulous tone of voice, that she couldn’t believe I was really back. Five minutes later, she would treat me as if I had never left.

Like those children who crank out a toy film in a viewer, she would recreate the scene in her mind dozens of times, wondering how she could have improved on it.

It all happened more or less along those lines. I had expected her to look older, yet was shocked to find out it was so. Dressed all in black, in the style favoured by older women in the region, only with better material, my mother seemed even smaller and rounder than I remembered. She bore an uncanny resemblance to Queen Victoria. Set in the unhealthy pallor of her face, her round, porcine little eyes drilled into your soul as if you had done something wrong.

I had barely taken my hand out of hers when she pronounced in a firm, almost mechanical voice : “And now, to work. After a war, we have twenty years to get back on our feet. After that, it’s too late.” She was right, of course. Twenty-three years later would appear the France of the bureaucrats, by the bureaucrats and, above all, for the bureaucrats �" all other social classes being only allowed to do their masters’ bidding �" but it was strange to hear her talk as if she’d been around for hundreds of years. She may have been repeating what her grandparents were saying when they mentioned the Franco-Prussian war followed by “La Belle Époque”. She may also have remembered the Roaring Twenties just after the First War, but these had only lasted ten years.

In many ways, Mother was an eccentric. Most eccentrics trigger in normal people a certain amount of affection, albeit tempered with humour or caution. My mother’s eccentricities left you ice cold. No human warmth came out of her. Indeed, I was disappointed that, instead of asking how I was, she first wished to mention money, but I wasn’t overly surprised. I tried to steer her back to family matters by asking HER how she was, and sympathising with all that she’d had to suffer during the war, but she brushed it all aside.

I did much better when I mentioned the attack on the ground floor the year before, and wondered why the vandals had not charged up. She shook her head like a baby who doesn’t want to eat, then exploded : “We were very lucky that they did not set the place on fire.” She hesitated then spat out as if she had swallowed a disgusting medicine : “If we are still alive, we owe it to Marjeval.”

“That’s funny. He didn’t say anything.”

She skewered me with a suspicious glance : “You’ve seen him already ?”

Slightly ashamed, I had to admit that yes, I had come across him in Rennes and he had given me a lift.

We both remained silent for a long time. She then cleared her throat and went on : “At any rate, we owe him our lives, I suppose. About a year ago, some so-called members of the Resistance broke in and were about to set the house alight. From the landing, flat on our stomachs, Nanon and I tried to listen to what they were saying. If we thought it was safe, we even peeked between the bars of the handrail. They had overcome René and André, and had tied them up in the basement. One of the thugs kept saying that I had a shotgun, which was hardly the case, but none of his mates felt like running up the stairs and ending up with a chest full of buckshot. That’s when another one suggested smoking us out ; “like a fox”, he added. They started dragging light furniture and curtains to the centre of the room in order to start a bonfire. I’m sure they would have done it too, when all of a sudden, their luck turned : a dozen or so big dogs, snarling and biting, poured in from the terrace and spread out among those b******s. It didn’t take them long to clear the way.

When we felt safe enough to look down the hall, there was Marjeval, standing in his Gestapo-style boots. He had a horse whip in his hand. He was laughing, laughing... as if he’d gone mad, laughing like Mephistopheles in Faust. The day after, his daughter came over to see if we were all right and needed anything.”

“Véronique ?”

“Yes, she often came back after that. She’s very nice. What gets on my nerves is that she is always escorted by two or three enormous dogs. You know how I hate dogs.”

“Just the same, if you’d had dogs of your own, you might not have been attacked.”

“René’s dogs are already more than I can take. I’m sure they bring us fleas.”

“Are they still alive ?”

“Yes. René has even taught them new tricks.”

Indeed, René’s dogs would not have been able to protect anyone. They were hardly bigger than cats. The older, Dac, looked somewhat like a miniature dachshund, and the younger was a restless, fat little ball of fur with white and russet camouflage blotches. René had turned them into circus animals. They jumped through hoops, barked up to five times according to the number of fingers René showed them, walked on their hind legs… When they were not performing, they stayed with their master all day, running in figures of eight in front of him, yapping, chasing each other and sticking their noses in other people’s business. Mother adored them, but would have died rather than admit to it.

I had known René for a long time. He was only two years older than me. My father had hired him when everyone, from René’s own parents to the teachers at his country school, had given up on him, saying that he would never pass an exam. The Armed Forces had turned him down for National Service because he was cross-eyed, and even the Vichy government’s henchmen had not taken him in as forced labour in Germany on the ground that he was a simpleton. With his bulging eyes, beatific smile, head leaning on one side and tongue sticking out a little, like that of a senile cat, René, was far from stupid, and knew how to make good use of his disability. Among the little boys of the region, he had acquired a reputation as a man of mystery. He would tell them, without ever being able to explain why he didn’t go and dig it out himself, that he knew where a treasure was buried.

Before the war, René had been responsible for the vegetable garden and the orchard which he both tended lovingly, and where he would drive our panel van with as much solemnity as if it had been a limousine. He couldn’t take it on the road, since he had never tried to get a driver’s licence. That humble-looking vehicle must have been, like so many others, requisitioned by the enemy. I hadn’t seen it when I arrived. René confirmed my doubts the next day.

The armed forces and the Germans had also turned down our other servant. André was not cross-eyed, and did not look stupid, but he was a hunchback. Older than René, he was also less inclined to chatter. Nanon called him Buster Keaton, and indeed, he presented the same type of sad, elongated face. André worked slowly, conscientiously and quietly. He crushed and pressed our apples to make cider. He cut the lawns, cleared the undergrowth around the château, and was also responsible for the beehives, the chicken coop and rabbit hutches. In fact, the two men did not have rigorously defined tasks, and since they got along fine, they were often seen helping each other.

I left Mother, and went out again through the hall. Outside, René was waiting for me at the bottom of the flight of stairs. He greeted me with enthusiasm and tears in his eyes. I half opened my arms as if to hug him and he did the same, but at the last moment we just shook hands. What stopped us ? I wondered later. Had it been the traditional distance splitting master and servant, or more simply the fact that, between men, such warm demonstrations of friendship are not expected. Why do we allow rigid conventions to spoil the most important moments of our lives ? I grumbled inwardly against this kind of reticence, but having missed the opportunity to break the mould, I couldn’t go back in time.

Yet, I had changed. We all had in POW camps. Well, not all, perhaps. Urban yobs and superficial, noisy, vulgar, selfish individuals had, when set free, behaved exactly as they had before. Bullies, criminals and delinquents had fully collaborated with the Germans, becoming Kapos, snitching, threatening, beating their fellow prisoners and, at times, killing them.

A few POWs had changed for the worse. I kept thinking of this educated, refined young man, former first violin in the Rennes orchestra, who had turned against classical music, literature, art, architecture… “It’s all bullshit,” he had declared. “One thing, and one thing only is important : survival.” He’d been transformed into a hard, aggressive, self-centred loser… Or perhaps, come to think of it, he may have discovered his true nature.

The vast majority had changed for the better. Illiterate, unskilled farmhands or construction site labourers had learned how to read or play a musical instrument. Others had discovered the deep-seated meanings of words such as “solidarity” or “brotherhood”. Most had acquired the habit of putting problems into perspective : sorting out important things from trivial ones. Rich people who, as Ibsen used to say “know how to have fun, but don’t know how to be happy”, had discovered the joys of giving ; not their money, but their time, their capacity for listening to others without  feeling superior, the offering of smiles and compassion. Poor people, long despised and humiliated before the war, had started to walk with their heads held high, now fully aware that they were genuine members of the human race. Agnostics had become Catholics. Devout church goers, priests even, had been turned into atheists. Same things in both cases, really : an inner liberation, the discovery of who they truly were, a major shift which, in normal circumstances, life’s daily pettiness would have obliterated for ever.

Like the child that he still was in many ways, René insisted right away to show me the tricks he’d taught his dogs during the war. I cheered with sincere enthusiasm. During the performance, Nanon showed up on the terrace. I asked if she could make me a pot of tea. She sniggered. I wanted tea ? Had I ever heard of a trivial little thing called rationing ? I’d have to bring some back, next time I went to Paris. She suggested a bowl of cider. Sitting on the flight of steps, and thanks to the fresh, tingly taste of that beverage, I became conscious, not just in my mind, but deep through my flesh, that the war was truly over. I wasn’t dreaming : I’d come home.

I found André behind the orchard. With a sad look on his face, he was throwing empty bottles in a trench that he had dug for just that purpose. Instead of pushing in several bottles at a time, he would pick them one by one and lose himself in the contemplation of each fall. The projectile shattered into dozens of transparent, coloured splinters. I noticed that, in fact, it was often the receiving bottle that broke, while its attacker remained intact. Champagne bottles made the best weapons.

André watched my approach without apparent surprise or emotion, then shook my hand silently for several seconds. He took a bottle out of a cardboard box and explained reluctantly : “They drank so much ! First the Germans, then the Americans, and finally the communists.”

“The communists ?”

“Yes. Those who attacked the house. They mentioned the Saint-Nazaire shipbuilding yards.”

“So, there’s no wine left ?”

André’s body was shaken by silent laughter. “Oh yes there is, and the very best. Me and René, we built a fake partition wall in the basement. We used old bricks, dirty bricks. The good stuff is still behind. The enemy drank all the plonk… not that many of them could have told the difference, I don’t think.”

As with René, I wanted to hug him and quote Matthew 25 : 21 : “Well done, thou good and faithful servant…” But he was handing a bottle, and the little boy within me took over. I accepted the gift and threw it in the trench. With his foot, André pushed a case of bottles in my direction. He was glad to see me again. For a few minutes, I indulged in a frenzied massacre. Then André signalled that I should follow him.

We crossed the orchard. André pointed at an old pear tree. Two of its branches, that had formed a narrow “V”, had been pulled apart further, and now formed a wider “V”. At the base, one could observe the yellowish whiteness of freshly splintered wood. André explained that it had been made by an 88mm panzer shell that had gone through the south wall of the orchard and lost itself in the woods, all without exploding. I made a mental note to bring it to the attention of the forest ranger. I didn’t want it found by some village boys who might start playing with it.

I left André to his bottles and walked back slowly to the château. Lack of maintenance and deliberate vandalism had taken their toll. Former flower beds had been invaded by bramble and gorse, out of which would, here and there, emerge a yucca or a bay-leaf tree riddled with parasites. What had formerly been lawns looked like miniature hay fields. At the edge of the roof, lengths of guttering were bending under the weight of moss and dead leaves.

Other guttering, having collapsed, was hanging along the walls, creating long, black or dark green smears. In spite of all that, the building itself retained an admirable level of elegance.

I should have been boiling with indignation at this sight, but I felt strangely calm, almost indifferent. I was alive and in one piece. I had learned to distance myself from material things, however beautiful they might be. My mother, Nanon, René and André were in good health. The rest was not all that important. So many liberated prisoners had found neither homes nor families upon their returns ! In a weird sort of way, I was lucky.

Thinking of my staff, I still had to find and greet one : Raffray, the cook, who was more than a mere cook : a genuine chef. I walked behind the château and pushed a small but heavy grey door in dire need of a coat of paint. It opened on to a stone staircase which itself led to the kitchen. One side of the room directly overlooked the river. Raffray used to throw out of the widow the high protein cooking waste and leftovers. It didn’t take long before they were recycled. The fish knew the spot. They rushed forward in such numbers that they made the water foam. We could have been on the Amazon River, and our tench, pike, gudgeon or carp, could have been masquerading as so many piranhas. Vegetable peels went to the rabbits, and vegetable waste to the compost pile.

Charmed by the smell of a pork and cabbage stew, I pushed the kitchen door. When Raffray heard the squeak of the hinges, her massive figure gyrated slowly. It took a few seconds for her short-sighted eyes to adjust, but then she dropped the ladle she’d been holding, and she collapsed on a chair. I placed my hands over her shoulders and kissed her forehead. She started sobbing : “Thank God you’re here ! They won’t be back.”

I admired her optimism, but she was right. By itself, my presence could not keep vandals from trying again, but it was psychological : the master was home ; we would no longer be bothered.

I went up to my bathroom, and was pleasantly surprised to find that the plumbing and hot water were still operational. I undressed slowly, peeling off my sweat-encrusted underwear. My socks felt as if they’d been glued to my skin. I placed all this in a laundry bag, with the firm intention of burning the lot. I looked at myself in the mirror : I’d seen more attractive scarecrows. Sticky, almost rigid tufts of hair crowned a bony skull. On my scrawny chest, the yellowish skin was soiled with black streaks of dirt.

I filled the tub with deliciously hot water, and kneeling next to it on the sandstone paving, I undertook to wash my hair. Shampoos, in those days, were in powder form, and came in small paper sachets about the size of teabags. I needed two before I achieved acceptable results. I emptied the bathtub and washed its edges, already stained with black flotsam, then filled it again. I stepped in, scrubbed, and with indescribable pleasure, lowered myself in the hot water. If my hair had left dark smudges around the bathtub, the whole body provided a veritable ribbon of dirt. I would have been ashamed to let Nanon see it. I cleaned it myself and ran another bath. I started to feel a whole lot better.

Finally, standing in front of the washstand, I started to wash my face, and shave. Brushing my teeth was a challenge. My poor gums, hadn’t felt the contact of a toothbrush for nearly four years, and they started to bleed. I insisted. At any rate, I would have to make an appointment with the dentist, if only to get a good descaling and stop the risk of developing cavities.

Back in my bedroom, I experienced another delightful moment : the soft caress of clean underwear on the skin, followed by the gentle floating of shirt and trousers ; the sort of pleasure we ordinarily overlook. No longer smelling like a pile of manure, I started appreciating the smells of everyday life : shaving soap, Cologne, polished furniture, freshly ironed cotton, clean linen stacked in cupboards with pockets of lavender. Every wardrobe, every drawer gave out its discrete fragrance of wood and material, subtly different from one receptacle to the next. Feeling all clean and light, I went down to the main floor. For the first time since I’d arrived, I also realised that I was ravenous. On my way, I stroked the shoulder of the stuffed brown bear that had been reigning on the landing for several generations. Standing on its hind legs, it had always delighted children with its coarse hair, impressive yellow nails, and shiny buttons stuck in its orbits. I used to talk to that bear when I was a child. I couldn’t help doing so again : “You just wait, old friend : everything will be fine.”

 

Repairing and restoring the château was a huge task which absorbed my energy for several weeks. René had asked if he could start with fixing some plinths. In spite of his pumpkin-like face and cross-eyes, he possessed hidden talents. Surprised by his request, I had agreed, while thinking that I could always stop him if he messed things up too much. More likely, I hoped that he would get discouraged and give up by himself. He’d never had any training in carpentry or cabinet-making ; yet, he chose the proper type of wood and the proper tools. He replaced the lengths of plinth that needed it, and even re-carved damaged bas-reliefs with the unshakeable faith of a cathedral builder. Under the critical appreciation of his dogs, he worked for hours on each ground floor room. He would grunt with pleasure, his reddish face shining with perspiration, his enormous lips twisted in an ecstatic smile.

As for myself, I would rush from builder to builder, but they were not interested. Post-war reconstruction was in full swing, and what those builders looked for, and what they got, was working on ugly blocks of flats that could be erected quickly and cheaply. Spending time on door jambs, repairing guttering or partitions, redecorating or sprucing up old walls was not their cup of tea. Even small workshops turned me down : “Yes, Mr D’Astell, we’ll stop by and give you an estimate.” But nine times out of ten, they wouldn’t show up, and when they did, they never sent estimates. It took years to get the job done. I had to rely on retired masons, carpenters or roofers who would work for a few bob now and then, and always for cash, of course. André and René had been put in charge of lawns and flower beds.

And I wanted these tasks and these worries to be all-absorbing. They were providing an excuse, a feeble excuse indeed, not to go to Paris. Of course, I wasn’t avoiding Paris per se : I was avoiding Athaliah. The more I put off my visit, the harder it became to reach a decision. “Has Athaliah phoned ?” I had asked Nanon the day after my return.

“Of course not, that’s up to you.”

“Do you think she’s still at the same address, that she still has the same telephone number, or even that she’s still alive ?”

“How would I know ? Try her number. I can’t do it for you.”

I was paralysed, frozen by my own inaction. The war being well and truly over, Athaliah probably thought that I had forgotten her or that, along with so many others, I had been killed. In Germany, and even if I had wanted to, I would not have been allowed to write to her, as only letters to and from the immediate family were authorised. Taking six weeks to travel one thousand miles, they arrived open and smeared with blacked out sentences. At any rate, and for her sake, I would never have taken such a risk : she was Jewish. It could have led to her arrest and deportation to a death camp by our overzealous French police.

A few things, however, worked in her favour : she was very independent, and had left her parents at the age of sixteen. This might have saved her from neighbourhood roundups. Her first name, although clearly biblical, wasn’t exactly Jewish either, Queen Athaliah having cheerfully dispatched the whole of the reigning Juda family to an early grave. Finally, her last name, Vincent, didn’t sound Jewish at all, and I felt confident that she was capable of acquiring a false identity. And then of course, she was a woman, and could not be identified as Jewish through the sort of sexual mutilation her men folks underwent.

I had met Athaliah in 1937. I used to spend almost all my weekends in Paris, in those days. If I went by myself, I stayed at the Ritz, just to be contrary, as my father favoured the George V.

 

 

PART II

 

Chapter I

 

Spending most weekends in Paris was a habit I had acquired from my father. He did not look down upon Rennes or Brittany. As absent-minded as a cartoon professor, and displaying a disarming kindness, he never looked down on anything or anybody ; but he liked beautiful things and possessed a keen awareness of how short life could be, which gave him a reliable instinct for spotting what was essential, and for choosing nothing but the best, be it in matters of wines, clothing, women, cars or an ideal setting for spending a weekend.

We would leave on the Friday morning. André drove us to Rennes. We had booked our tickets in advance. We would collect them and settle in a compartment. The train took six hours to go from Rennes to Paris, but thanks to the comfort of first class seats, plus the time spent in the dining car and the company of a good book, it went all the more quickly that familiarity with the trip made it feel shorter. We came back on the Monday.

Before the war, Father had belonged to a couple of clubs : a geography club and a pilots’ club. Once a month at the “Cercle du Pacifique”, geographers met seriously, i.e. to discuss topics of geography, geology and explorations, then show slides of remote places. It was in a long building dating back to the 1920s, with cream-coloured walls, light brown outside wooden frame and a low, streamlined slate roof like those some people build in Florida in order to survive hurricanes. On meeting days, the front yard of the club was not big enough for all the cars, and they spilled over into neighbouring streets. Our geographers would then recreate with glee the atmosphere of 19th century scientific societies with lectures, accounts of journeys in exotic countries, agendas and minutes. When inevitably, it was time for a slide show, blinds were pulled down behind the windows which, especially in the summer, when it was still broad daylight, would deeply worry the local church mice, encouraging them to spread rumours of naked dancers, child pornography and assorted orgies.

Apart from those scientific sessions, the club opened for entertainment every Friday and Saturday night. Club members, their families, friends and guests could come over for a chat, a drink or a game of billiard, but mostly for a nice dinner served in the soft light of a huge dining room and its mahogany wood-panels. A generous surface had been left out in the middle of the room and was used as a dance floor. The music from a small orchestra, always the same one, was muted, velvety and sensuous. Like all good clubs, that particular one would nurse you, love you, cuddle you and give you the feeling that the waves from the outside world, with their scum of silliness and horror, would crash against its walls without doing any damage. In short, it made you happy.

Aviators, on the other hand, would meet near Le Bourget Airport in a gaudy and modern building that my father described as “early Mussolini”. Being an active member, he owned a small biplane that he flew himself. He adored planes of all sizes and descriptions. He had quite naturally passed on his flying passion to me. That club also ran evening dances on Fridays and Saturdays, but the restaurant area was brightly lit, and the food rather basic. As for the music, produced by something of an oompah fanfare rather than a dance orchestra, it veered towards vulgarity and an immoderate love of polkas. It was only towards the wee hours of the morning that the musicians calmed down a bit and switched to slow waltzes and rhythms conducive to sentimental conversations.

This, of course, was exactly why my father and I went to such places. Like most gentlemen farmers of his and previous generations, he had been railroaded into a marriage of convenience : a widespread custom found in castles, châteaux and country piles, including big houses owned by solicitors, bankers, chemists, doctors or successful businessmen. A sexually experienced young man, would, in order to conform to the diktats of his tribe, marry a silly goose freshly released from an expensive boarding school. Irritated by the reluctance, airs and graces, religious brainwashing, soul searching and second thoughts of a woman he wasn’t in love with, he hastily made her pregnant, then looked somewhere else for  sex. There must have been exceptions, but I didn’t know of any.

I had met Athaliah at the geographers’ club. As was also happening at the aviator’s club, where girls were admitted without having to show any interest in aviation, the geographers opened their doors to good-looking single, divorced and widowed females. The occasional presence of women married to professionally absent husbands was not unusual either. I had immediately caught sight of Athaliah’s noble profile, her exceptionally white skin and her long auburn hair pulled back into a ponytail like that of dancers. In her almond-shaped eyes, came and went flashes of gold and chocolate specks. Her lips were thin, yet exuded sensuality. On that particular evening, she was wearing a rust-coloured short-sleeve blouse and dark brown corduroy trousers. Few women wore trousers in those days. It had started in the roaring twenties, and most of all under Elsa Schiaparelli’s influence. She had made this fashion not only acceptable but clearly elegant.

I asked Athaliah for a dance. Of course, I didn’t know her name, then. When I heard it for the first time, I was delighted by its poetic power of evocation. At the same time, I was impressed by the innate elegance of her moves and posture. She was delightfully thin, with small, firm breasts, a flat stomach and long legs that made me wish she wore a skirt. To me, she represented such an ideal of feminine beauty that I shivered when I took her in my arms. Nevertheless, I worried for a minute when I discovered that she was slightly taller than me. Personally, I couldn’t care less ; I would even go as far as saying that, hidden in a remote corner of my subconscious brain, I found the situation mildly exciting. However I had so often heard young women declare defiantly : “I’ll never go out with a man who’s shorter than me” that I thought, for a minute I could be out of luck.

I wasn’t. We danced together the whole evening. I learnt little about her. Athaliah, I realised later, was a woman who savoured silence. She didn’t enjoy small talk and chatter. I drove her back to her flat, and like the most natural thing in the world, I spent the night with her. Naked, she was perfect, with a skin that made me appreciate the extravagant praise levelled on white, milky skin by medieval poets ; and it was like a miniature religious conversion on my part : so far, I had always had a weakness for lightly tanned skin.

If I had to choose just one word to describe Athaliah, it would be elegance. The way she moved, the way she dressed, her perfume, the furniture in her flat, everything was elegant, but it wasn’t the sort of elegance slavishly tuned to the latest fashion ; it wasn’t obsessive. One of the first women to become a lawyer in France, Athaliah had a good standard of living, but it didn’t go as far as allowing her to drive a car. Besides, would she have needed one in Paris ? On the other hand, she had a telephone. Her elegance did not stem from the amount of money she enjoyed. She dressed to please herself, not to impress others. Same method for her apartment. In both areas, she showed excellent taste.

When I tried to find out what her philosophy on life could be, I didn’t have much success. To this day, I don’t know, and have to rely on guesses. I still have a photo of her opening a Christmas present. Although from a Jewish family, she had, almost from the start, cut herself off from Jewish customs and religion. She joined the rest of the world in celebrating Christmas. On the photograph, she displays a wide smile. While looking at it I realised for the first time that in normal circumstances Athaliah almost never smiled ; nor did she look sad. She went through life conscientiously, like a good little bee in a good little hive. She lived every day for itself.

When a person is described in those terms, it makes one think either of an indigent surviving on a day-to-day basis, or on the contrary, of an extrovert who really knows how to take advantage of all the good moments in life. Athaliah was neither. She was like a chess pawn, progressing one square at a time without enthusiasm, but also without regret. She often went out at night : theatre, concerts, yet never claiming upon her return that such a play or such a cultural event was exceptional and that we should all go and see it. In her flat, very few books on the shelves. In everything, she was permeated by a sort of calm indifference which she only set aside when making love.

Was she empty-headed ? Not in the least, but she understood and accepted with great simplicity that life leads only to death, that (vanitas vanitatum, et omnia vanitas) we only exist by the most incredible set of lucky circumstances, and that making a fuss of it, or despairing when reflecting upon it, is totally useless, since nothing can be changed. It was her form of wisdom.

After our first night together, I went back to see her every week, which greatly amused my father. “Are you in love ?” he asked as we were inspecting a fire lane in the forest.

I had to think before I could answer, which clearly showed me that I wasn’t in love. Athaliah was an enchantment. I missed her the minute I was no longer with her ; yet I was only in love with her body. She was indeed easy to live with, but she was also dreamy without poetry and enigmatic without mystery. What I missed most when I was back in Ploerdon, was her beauty, the softness of her skin, her vulva, so pretty, so pink, so easily excited, the sides of which she had carefully depilated, so as to bring out its splendor ; also, of course, the way she made love, slowly, delicately, yet passionately, without any restraint, modesty or taboo. Neither of us had ever said “I love you”.

“No, Father, I am not in love with Athaliah. Well, I am a little, in a way, but not enough to marry her.” We kept walking for several minutes, our boots making whistling sounds against the rough vegetation of the fire lane. I was beginning to think that my attitude was somewhat weird or reprehensible in my father’s eyes. I was amazed when he suddenly replied : “You are lucky to be in love, even if it’s only ‘in a way’. I’ve never been in love with anyone… not even a little.” It was the first time that he’d shared such private thoughts with me. It was also the last. I was embarrassed, and didn’t say anything. We turned round and walked back to the château. 

 

 

Chapter two

 

If, on the one hand, I hesitated going back to Paris in order to look for Athaliah, I couldn’t, on the other hand, get Véronique out of my mind. To forget all this confusion, I became hyperactive and restless. In order to sort out my late father’s financial situation, I went to New York, for example. I had to go through Paris, of course, but once again found an excuse not to find out if Athaliah still lived there, or even still lived at all. “One thing at a time, let’s not mix business and pleasure” I kept telling myself, when it would have been so easy to leave for Paris a couple of days earlier.

In POW barracks, one of my fellow inmates had been a psychiatrist. “When you get back, watch out for the hero syndrome.” He had warned.

“What hero ?” I’d asked stupidly.

“You, of course.”

“But I’m no hero.”

“I know that, and you know that, but some will see you as a hero. Bomber pilot, shot down over Germany, prisoner of war… At any rate, whether you like it or not, it’s called the hero syndrome.”

“So ?”

He had then delivered a whole lecture on what would probably happen to me : a feeling of guilt when thinking of all the people I had killed, mixed with another feeling : that of having done my duty, and fought for our civilization. I would, he had said, experience extreme shyness in certain situations, even if I had always displayed a healthy demeanor of self-confidence in the past, and above all, I would experience sudden and unexpected difficulties when faced with important decisions.

That conversation was coming back to me now, while riding in the taxi that took me from Montparnasse Station to Le Bourget Airport. Indeed, my attitude towards Athaliah was totally illogical, and I had the vague, uncomfortable feeling that the longer I’d wait before looking for her, the harder it would be to do so.

Travelling from Paris to New York was not an easy undertaking in those days. You first had to stop and refuel in Shannon, then Gander, and it was only after eighteen to twenty-four exhausting and noisy hours that (weather permitting) you landed at La Guardia. The normal way would have been by transatlantic liner, but I’ve always liked flying : it’s in my bones.

I was fascinated by New York. I had expected a concrete jungle dotted with sinister-looking skyscrapers. The skyscrapers were there, all right, but the streets were wide enough and therefore had not been transformed into dark canyons. Above all, I was amazed to discover that residential, and even, in some cases, office buildings, often displayed an exuberant array of vegetation on their balconies and terraces. They had hairdos and whiskers. New York was not that depressing city I had been afraid to discover. Like so many in France, I had unconsciously fallen victim to a persistent an insidious anti-American propaganda, lazily perpetuated from one generation to the next by the left-wing press (and 90% of the newspapers were, and still are left wing).

The return journey from New York took place, in reverse, in the same conditions as the forward trip. Once more, I had to go through Paris. Once more I, a man who had been a bomber pilot, had trained with a parachute regiment, had brought down three enemy fighter planes, had destroyed bridges and railway stations, and survived for two years in a POW camp, I was afraid of looking for Athaliah. Of course, it wasn’t just because of the famous hero syndrome my psychiatrist friend had warned me against. I also had to be honest : I had become obsessed with Véronique, and I hated myself for it. Nothing, absolutely nothing could lead me to believe that the intense desire I felt to get to know her better and make love to her, was in any way reciprocal. A bird in hand is worth two in the bush. Why leave a certainty for a probability ? …assuming, of course, that Athaliah was a certainty, which, after four years, seemed far from being likely. I should rephrase my thought : why leave even a faint possibility of pleasure with Athaliah for a complete shot in the dark in the person of Véronique ? Love is both wonderful and stupid. As a child, I had watched a big dog break through a fence, scratching his nose and lacerating his shoulders in the process, and all in order to get to a b***h in heat. Are we, humans, any better ?

I couldn’t see myself ‘courting’ Véronique, as they used to say before the war. I would have had to deal with her attack dogs, the sneering smiles of her father and farm hands, not to mention the uncertainty of the young lady’s own welcome. Her reaction might go from amazement to laughter, and finally degenerate into contempt. I would run the risk of becoming the joke of the whole county. I wonder if women who complain that they are lonely, ever reflect upon the scathing rebuttals they have enjoyed throwing at men who were no better and no worse than themselves. The best thing to do, in order to stop thinking about all this, was to immerse myself in work, i.e. the restoration of the château and the sorting out of my assets, income and finances.

I got a Jeep from American Army surplus, and made the rounds of my farms more often than necessary, which only resulted in irritating the farmers. I went for long walks in the forest, supposedly to inspect fire lanes. In a move that was new to me, I even started hunting for rabbits. André went into a sulk, as he was the one who would normally supply us with cottontail rabbits. When I finally noticed his disappointment, I invited him along, saying that I needed his advice. He enjoyed playing the part of the teacher, as indeed he knew a lot more than I ever did about rabbits.

One day, as I was alone in the forest, my rifle resting on my shoulder, I sat next to a mossy promontory, and decided that I had to reach a decision. When my plane was shot down over Germany, and I was taken prisoner, I was dispatched to a military hospital for POWs. After parachuting and landing in a junkyard full of sharp and twisted scrap metal, I suffered from a skull fracture and a broken collarbone. I had never been ill or hurt before. I was suddenly faced with persistent and severe physical pain, laced with high fever and probably nasty side effects from medication. For a long time, I was incapable of taking the slightest decision. Should I go to the toilet ? I didn’t know. I would then fall asleep for what I believed was only a few minutes, but often stretched to half an hour. Upon waking up, I would experience a worse than ever need to pee, but I felt as if the decision to go to the restroom didn’t belong to me. It had become an abstract notion, a sort of tyrannical goddess, a grey ghost standing by my bed whose permission I needed before I could make a move. Then, all of a sudden, I would get up, but the decision had not been mine, by that I mean that it had been taken only by my body, not my brains. It had responded to an electrical impulse, like those inflicted on the quadriceps of a frog by biology students. A few seconds later, as I urinated with intense relief, my mind would clear, and I would wonder why I had been so silly as to let my own bladder torture me, when nothing and no one would have prevented me from acting sooner.

I had, it seemed, reached that crucial stage when one is no longer master of one’s own decisions : the body takes over. Yes, I would go to Paris, I would take the morning train the very next day. If I didn’t find Athaliah, I would mosey over to my pre-war clubs to find out if they were still open. And if they were not, I would go and see a vaudeville or an opera, but I would go to Paris.

At that precise moment, I heard, not far behind me, a series of shrill yelps, half guffaws, half coughing which made my blood curl. I buried my face in my hands. Was the hero syndrome leading to hearing voices ? Time to exorcise the whole thing.

Time also, for the sake of honesty, to let Athaliah know that I would not marry her ; I would not marry her because she was essentially a townie, and I was a country boy. Here, in what would seem to her the middle of nowhere, she would die of boredom. Of course, the first thing to do was to find her again, and if I did, to make sure that she was not married and that she would still want me. A lot of maybes. That’s why I didn’t want to try and phone her from the château. Too many things to explain… I truly needed a tête-à-tête. Besides, it seemed to me that if her telephone number had changed, or if she had moved, and someone else answered, I would stand a better chance of finding her by being physically in Paris. The logic of this line of reasoning was pretty shaky, and I was conscious of that. It may all have been because of that wretched “hero syndrome”. I was again reasoning with my body, not my brains.

I walked briskly back to the château, and asked Nanon to pack my small suitcase. I was greeted with baleful looks and muted grumblings. Nanon called that small suitcase my “sin bag”… all the while wishing that I would find someone and settle down. This apparent contradiction didn’t seem to bother her.

It was drizzling in the morning. From my bedroom, I could see poor André trying to get the soft top over the Jeep, then giving up and going back indoors. It meant going to Rennes in the rain. While donning a hooded oilskin and boots, I resolved to take advantage of my stay in Paris in order to buy a car. At the railway station in Rennes, I’d get a one-way ticket instead of the usual return ticket.

Pre-1940 car makers were desperately attempting comebacks. Most were failing. Hispano-Suiza had disappeared. Rosengard and Salmson were in the throes of financial death. You could still find Delahaye and Hotchkiss… just !  As for brands geared to the mass market, there was Renault, of course, but I would not touch their cars with a barge pole. I found both their collaboration with the Germans, and the post-war nationalization that followed, fairly repulsive. Peugeot used to turn out hopelessly underpowered cars. Only Citroën, with its remarkable 15/6 had something interesting to offer. How about foreign makes ? For those who could afford them, American cars were fashionable. Their brakes and steering were both mushy and unreliable. If you suddenly had to avoid an obstacle, or if you took even the gentlest of curves a little too fast, they would skid out of control before you knew it, and end up in the ditch, or worse. This being said, I loved their comfort and silence, as well as their style and colors. However, I couldn’t quite see myself driving through our sad, war-torn little towns, in a white and pale-blue De Soto. I would have felt like one of our young movie actors with slicked hair and toothpaste-advertising smiles. Clothes and cars make a statement about who you are, or who you think you are, or who you’d like to be. At the end of the thirties, the Hispano-Suiza’s deep blue steel, her imposing presence, her soft and powerful growl and her shiny spoked wheels, fitted well with my image as a country squire. In 1946, I wasn’t so sure.

I threw my suitcase at the back of the Jeep, and sat at the wheel. I would drive to Rennes, and André would bring the car back. He ambled over silently and got in the car without saying a word, not even a greeting.

“What’s the matter André ?”

“It’s la Denise. You know la Denise, don’t you ?”

In the provinces �" and in those days �" young ladies were graced with the definite article la, as was the rule with great opera singers such as Renata Tebaldi : la Tebaldi. Of course, I knew la Denise. She was a few years older than me. As a child, I had roamed the countryside with her naughty young brother. Denise was sometimes sent out to look for us when we were late coming home. He had whispered to me (we must have been around ten) that one day he had spied on his sister while she was crouching for a pee. Hidden behind a bush, he had been able to observe “masses and masses” of black hair between his sister’s thighs. Somewhat uncomfortable, not to say clearly disgusted, we couldn’t help sniggering whenever she came to fetch us. “Do you think we’ll have hair like that when we grow up ?” he would invariably ask after he’d told his story for the Nth time. No less invariably, I would reply : “I hope not, and if it happens, I’ll shave.”

“Could be like beards. They say that the more you shave, the quicker they grow.”

While imagining an enormous accumulation of hair on our lower abdomens, we would dissolve into irrepressible laughter. We were approaching the silly stage of adolescence. 

In our defense, we had no way of knowing anything regarding adult nudity. Mentioning such things to our parents or other members of the family, was unthinkable. As for magazines showing pretty girls in the nude, there weren’t any ; or if there were, they remained the privilege of a small number of Parisians. We still had a long time to wait. It wasn’t before the seventies that such publications became available at newstands.

I must have been well over sixteen when I saw my first photograph of a naked woman. In black and white, it showed the fuzzy (no pun intended) figure of an enormous prostitute sitting, legs wide open, on a mangy sofa. Her public hair, even fuzzier than the rest, covered completely anything that could have been construed as resembling an anatomical detail. I had been shown the photo by a sailor who was on leave in Ploerdon. He was very proud of it. If I’d had better manners at the time, I would have told him that his pathetic photograph was beautiful. Instead, like a young toff, I needlessly hurt his feeling by saying that his masterpiece was both ugly and vulgar. He called me a pansy.

 

“So what happened to la Denise ?” I asked.

“She was attacked while fetching the cows for their evening milking.”

“Attacked ? By whom ?”

“By an animal, Sir : a beast.”

I started the Jeep, and headed for the former towpath that is now used to reach the château. No more grand alleyway lined with ancestral linden trees. Father had seen to it. He’d wanted a more discreet approach.

The rain had stopped, but our oilskins were already wet, and mine would utter disapproving groans whenever I turned the wheel. From the sleeves an odd mixture of smells, half wet dog, half gasoline, would be wafting out. The wind created by the speed of the vehicle, even if we were driving slowly, kept biting the exposed and damp areas of our faces. I really did need a more conventional type of transport, one that did not also punish my rear end and spine as if I’d been riding a wild colt.

“What sort of beast ?”

“A wolf, Sir, but bigger and stronger.”

“A wolf ? What are you talking about ? You mean a stray dog, surely.”

“Oh no, Sir ! La Denise had two large dogs with her, and they fled, squeaking like puppies. They would surely have put another dog to flight. I’m more inclined to think it was a wolf.”

“But think, André : there haven’t been any wolves around here for more than a hundred years.”

“I know, Sir, but what about the war ? There have been so many upheavals ! They could be back.”

“I don’t know. At any rate, European wolves are no bigger than foxes.”

“That one was big : bigger than a German shepherd. And when I say German, I don’t mean to be funny.”

I knew by experience that fear can distort the size of a threat in people’s minds. Big bullies rule over primary school playgrounds, but they are not always big. Sentries, frozen in their boxes, experience apocalyptic night visions. I didn’t answer, but kept thinking that it must have been a particularly aggressive dog.

“So, what did that horrible beast do ?”

“The cows faced outwards, and formed a protective circle around la Denise. She found herself in the middle of a ring of huge rear ends. Pretty funny, really. But the beast fled without doing any harm.”

I couldn’t believe my ears. Like everyone else, I had read somewhere that in the Yukon or Alaska, musk oxen will form a tight circle around their calves, thus protecting them against predators. But expecting peaceful Breton cows to do the same, and what’s more to a human being, seemed so extraordinary ! People like la Denise and André, who hadn’t read ten books between themselves in all their lives, could hardly have made up such a story. Something, deeply buried in the cattle’s genes, must have triggered a sort of reincarnation. I made a mental note to go and pay Denise a visit on my return from Paris. She had told her story to the cops and the forest ranger, but they had laughed at her. A mark of sympathy on my part would not be amiss.

 

Chapter Three

 

Had I been asked for Athaliah’s telephone number, I would have been quite incapable to answer. It was so long ago !... Yet, at the Montparnasse station restaurant, I inserted a token in the wall-mounted public telephone box, and without consulting my diary and its list of numbers, I found myself dialing as easily as I had a few years before. My fingers had taken over from the process of conscious memory. Athaliah’s fresh and calm voice pronounced a clear “hello !” that, in a second, swept away five years of separation. Paralyzed with shyness, I barely managed to enunciate a weak and stupid “Athaliah, it’s me.”

“Oh, my God ! Where are you calling from ?”

“Montparnasse Station.”

“How long have you been back ?”

“I’ll explain.”

“What are you doing in Paris ?”

“I came to buy a car. Am I still worth a cup of coffee ?”

“Of course. Hurry up ! We have so much to say !”

“Give me about an hour.”

I first went to the Ritz in order to book a room, shower, change and leave my suitcase. I then called a taxi, and gave Athaliah’s address to the driver. I also asked him to stop about two hundred yards before my destination. I wanted to arrive on foot. I was feeling the need for some sort of ambulatory meditation.

Athaliah lived in a quiet street lined with plane trees, each one in its modest circle of earth surrounded by a smooth cement ledge. The actual trunk was protected against dog piss by a cylindrical wire mesh, but it did not prevent the mini-gardens to be dotted with large, nightmarish turds which, through lack of urban dung insects, developed a grey fuzz, not unlike that of old caskets. Pedestrians could consider themselves lucky that the s**t had been confined to the plane trees. In other streets, huge mongrels had relieved themselves on sidewalks, and left artistic circumvolutions which, in some cases, were still steaming. If a human being did the same, he’d be arrested… and yet the result would be exactly the same.

I didn’t try to avoid the janitor, but he wasn’t in his cubicle. He certainly hadn’t been replaced these last five years because the lobby was pulsating with the powerful chords of La Traviata. At a time when classical music was appreciated by only a handful of people, and when operas were often labelled as silly vocalizing, a music-lover janitor was bound to be a rarity.

Haunted by Violeta’s desperate accents, which faded gradually, then became almost inaudible, I slowly went up to the third floor. The walls were covered with anti-Nazi graffiti that had certainly appeared after the Germans had left, and that the janitor had tried to whitewash away ; but they resurfaced, pale tattoos of an era, the shame of which �" not of the military defeat, but of collaboration �" would never completely disappear. As they did before the war, the wide, shiny, cement steps gave off a nice smell of disinfectant. As before, each apartment’s heavy oak door was hiding the pitiless variety of so many lives while muffling their noises. I had always been tempted to open these doors as in a game of secret drawers : here, a woman rejected by her lover ; over there, a terminally ill cancer victim ; further along, a couple bitterly fighting all the time… Why was I finding it so hard to visualize, behind those doors, an example of true and simple happiness ?

I knocked at Athaliah’s flat. She opened immediately. I slipped in, closed the door behind me, and stood on the doormat like a rigid idiot, not knowing what to do or say. She hadn’t changed… or rather, she had : she was even more beautiful than I remembered. She was wearing a fairly short, sleeveless dress with big, white buttons on the side. It was a denim dress, a material the Americans had made fashionable after they had liberated the country. Even if clad only in a burlap sack, Athaliah, the epitome of discreet elegance, could have graced the catwalk of any fashion show. In that young-looking and fresh little dress, she looked like a teenager. She had pulled her long, chestnut hair to the back of her head, as do dancers, and turned it into a pony tail. I was paralyzed with admiration.

I took her gently in my arms, but without attempting to kiss her. I was fully aware of the fact that she might no longer wish to make love to me, that she could have found someone else, and even �" why not ? �" a husband. I was stammering something to that effect when she placed a finger on my lips. She squeezed me in her arms, and whispered in my ear : “Don’t talk now. There’ll be plenty of time for that. Just undress me slowly, the way you used to do.”

I spent an unforgettable afternoon. It was as if, in spite of a long experience of love, I had never made love before. After three years of abstinence, my skin had gone back to the sensitivity and innocence of childhood. Each movement, each touch, was bathed in the freshness of virginity. Like a time-traveler, I was rediscovering the surprises and delights of the first kiss, the first fleeting touch of a tongue against mine, the first gentle cupping of a firm breast under my palm, the first exploration of a vulva flooded with liquid happiness, the first heart-stopping taste of female genitals, the first orgasm ; our bodies still shaking in disbelief afterwards. It was all sheer ecstasy, sheer reincarnation of ourselves into ourselves. I knew without a shade of a doubt that I would never again experience such moments. 

On a bed that we had not bothered to open, evening found us naked, exhausted, half asleep and still clinging to each other. We simply could not pull apart. We had to, of course, eventually. We were both starting to shiver. Athaliah sat on the side of the bed and lit a cigarette. I had forgotten she smoked. I too used to smoke before the war, but having to do without tobacco for so long meant that I had lost the habit, and felt better for it. I had become an exception. Almost all men smoked, and so did more and more women. Athaliah and I had not uttered ten words the whole afternoon. She blew a puff of smoke to my face and asked, half way between a statement and a question : “Warrior’s rest ?” I sat up as well and gave her left n****e a gentle lick.

“I hope” she went on “that you didn’t catch some nasty disease. Soldiers are well known for this kind of thing.”

“What if I told you that there hasn’t been anyone ? The choice, for a soldier, especially in wartime, is often limited to prostitutes, and that’s really not my style. Then as a POW, the choice is even more restricted : it’s ‘A’ other prisoners or ‘B’ nothing. I had no problem choosing ‘B’. What about yourself ?”

She shrugged : “There were very few attractive men around. A woman had the choice between old men and teenagers… not counting Germans and collaborators. With my back against the wall, I think I would rather have slept with a German than with a collaborator. Tell you the truth : I ended up with teenagers, boys and girls. I wasn’t alone. I suppose that today’s generation of kids must be the most sexually enlightened in History.” She laughed softly and gave me a sidelong look. “Are you shocked ?”

“How could anyone possibly be shocked by anything after a war ? I’ve watched people going mad with fear or pain. I’ve come across all sorts of corpses : gunners reduced to a bloody mess in their glass cages at the back of Lancaster bombers, pilots and crew shot down over the English Channel, and washed on a beach by the tide, their bodies bloated like balloons, their faces eaten up to the bone by crabs. In London, while on leave, I witnessed children burning like torches as they were fleeing bombed out buildings. In Germany… Anyway, you can see what I mean. I wish every bishop and every vicar of France had seen what I saw. They would be less obsessed with their condemnation of sex. One day, if you feel like it, you can tell me all about your charming little war-time partners of both genders. I’m sure I’ll find it very erotic, like a clean, fresh breeze after five years of sheer horror.”  

“All right, but now, I’m starving. Shall we find a restaurant ?”

“Excellent idea. How about the Chat Bleu ? I can still taste their sea-bream in a Bercy sauce : a masterpiece.”

“The Chat Bleu belonged to a Jewish family. They were hacked to death in Drancy. The restaurant is no longer there.”

“So sorry… !”

“And the French policemen who arrested them will retire comfortably when they turn fifty. Only following orders, and all that !”

“So, what do you suggest ?”

“You are at the Ritz, I suppose. Why don’t we just go back ?”

“Fine with me.”

She stubbed her cigarette. We got dressed, and I called a taxi. We remained silent on the way, as we were both reconnecting with the harsh reality of man’s unspeakable cruelty to man.

When back at the hotel, I led Athaliah to one of the bars, and suggested a drink before dinner. Sitting in those deep and comfortable armchairs that keep people well apart, I could feel that we were both starting to relax. As I lost myself in the contemplation of Athaliah’s long legs disappearing under a skirt that the leather of the chair had obligingly pulled up, I could feel a renewed wave of lust washing over me. To go out, she had again chosen denim, but this time it was for a skirt rather than a dress. Above the waist, she wore a dark red, long-sleeve blouse tucked in a wide brown belt. The red of the shoes matched that of the blouse. Top quality stockings gave the impression that her skin was lightly tanned.

A waiter came towards us so smoothly that he could have been levitating. He let me know in a whisper that they had tried to ‘phone me from Toucouleur. They would like me to call back. “Do you think it’s serious ?” asked Athaliah while placing her Manhattan cocktail back on the coffee table.

“I shouldn’t think so. If it had been serious, they would have left a short message of explanation. By the way, would you help me choose a new car tomorrow ?”

“Be glad to.”

I headed for the bar where a telephone had been placed for me. As expected, Nanon was on the line : “Ah, my poor Mimile !”

It had to be serious : she’d stopped saying Mimile when I was twelve.

“What’s going on, Nanon ?”

“That’s what I’d like to know. Can you remember little Jeanne from the Besson farm ?”

“Vaguely. She’s in a boarding school in Rennes, isn’t she ?”

“Used to be. She’s sixteen now… or was. She was attacked in exactly the same way as happened to Denise. Only this time, the cows did not protect her. I don’t know how to say it, Mimile. She was… eaten. They only found a few bones and some torn out strips of clothing. What are we going to do ?”

“It’s not for us to do anything. It’s up to the cops.”

The same cops who had laughed Denise out of their precinct. I just hoped they were no longer amused. I said goodbye to Nanon, and gently placed the receiver back on its hooks. Denise was a tall and strong young woman from a rough and ready family, whereas Jeanne �" at any rate when I last saw her �" had been a slim and willowy child, terribly short-sighted, and wearing thick glasses. Her frequent laughter was crystal clear and communicative. She was affectionate towards people and animals. To think that such a charming teenager had been reduced to the state of a few broken bones scattered on a patch of trampled grass soaked in blood, was twisting my guts with deep-seated anger, even more than sadness.

“What’s wrong ?” Asked Athaliah.

“A girl I knew. She’s dead.”

Athaliah did not reply, and I didn’t feel like feeding her the details. Like myself, like most of us, she’d been vaccinated against bad news. Her two brothers had been killed during General Juin’s Italian campaign. Her father had been tortured by the Gestapo, then sent to Birkenau. He never came back.

We were living through bitter and hopeless years. It is sometimes said that misfortune brings people together, makes them cooperate, as in a sort of golden age, makes them rediscover the virtues of charity and solidarity. In small doses, i.e. when the enemy is in “B” and you are in “A”, when the situation is unmistakable, or when there is a clear “them” and a clear “us”, it can happen. It had worked pretty well in England. However, when we are in “A”, and the enemy is also in “A”, when the armed forces who were supposed to protect us have vanished, and the government has placed itself under the authority of the invader, there is an economic collapse followed by a moral and psychological breakdown of society, as all nations that have ever been invaded can vouch for.

Betrayed by the unfathomable stupidity of State officials who had chosen to ignore warnings from generals Estienne and de Gaulle, betrayed a second time by those who had wanted to turn France into a German province, and a third time by those who had tried to replace one form of tyranny with another by turning us into a Russian satellite, we still bore the scars of our invaders’ contempt and the even deeper scars, of our allies’ contempt. Our nerves were raw.     

The feeling of shame we experienced consciously or unconsciously would lead many of us to adopt childish, irresponsible and brutal attitudes. If, for example, a car went by during the day with its headlights on, everyone would boil with righteous indignation. Other drivers would angrily turn their own headlights on and off ; they would shower the poor man with insults, and would probably have welcome the opportunity of beating him up. Most human interactions were infected with the same mental illness. Customers, shopkeepers, civil servants, union leaders would crouch in wait until they had the opportunity to jump on a chosen victim, and figuratively speaking, claw and bite him to death. From the whole country there arose a painful howl of frustration and anger, and I often wondered how this mass hysteria would affect the next generation. The answer came to us in 1968.

 

Athaliah and I ate in near silence. Renewing instinctively with our pre-war habits, we had ordered à la carte, and then only a main dish, avoiding first courses, cheeses and deserts. Athaliah had plumbed for a duck Montmorency, and I had opted for filets of sole meuniere with courgette puree.

“What shall we do now ?” She asked, while poking a cherry which, for some reason, had not found favour with her. She then spoiled the delicate aromas of both the sole and the 1938 Auxey-Duresse by lighting another of her disgusting cigarettes. I stood up. “Let’s go to my room.”

Once seated on either side of a low table, and after the waiter had left us with a coffee set on a tray, we looked at each other in complete silence… the kind of silence that becomes heavier and more stressful by the second. When, in the dining-room, Athaliah had asked “What shall we do now ?” she had not meant “What shall we do in the next few minutes ?” or even “What shall we do for the next few days ?” No : she was wondering what had to be decided about us, about her and me, about life ; how we should live it… life and its inexorable entropy. We had often had heated discussions in the past : she, wanting to get married, and I… not so much. It wasn’t that I rejected married life with her ; it was simply that I couldn’t see it. I felt like a poverty-stricken child whose jaw drops at the sight of a mansion, or a yacht or a Bentley ; but if someone says to him : “All right, I’m giving it to you. You can have it”, he will go into panic mode.

“What are we going to do?” I repeated as if she had just asked. “It’s up to you, I’d say”.

“Very funny. It means that you’ll never marry me. We are back to where we started before the war”.

“We could compromise. We could see each other from time to time. There would be no harm in it.” I had barely finished my sentence when I realised how insensitive I had been. I saw her cheeks reddening briefly with anger, like a passing cloud, but she controlled herself. “We could see each other !” she hissed. “Yes, we could see each other. Do you realise how easy it could be for me to ‘see’ someone else, especially in Paris ? In our law office alone, there are now enough men to keep me busy till the end of my life.”

If she had tried to make me feel ashamed, she had fully managed to do so. Her very resentment was proof enough that she loved me. Would I ever again encounter such devotion on the part of a beautiful woman ? She poured our coffees, and went on in a more conversational tone of voice : “We could compromise, you say ? All right : here is my suggestion for a compromise ; but first, let me tell you one thing : I love you, and I lust for you. I need you. When you left, I went out of my mind. I realised that your visits were the only thing that helped me lead a meaningful existence. There : satisfied ?”  

Throughout her tirade, I kept sinking deeper and deeper into the leathered softness of my armchair, wishing I could shrivel and disappear. Athaliah’s voice had remained calm and soft, and yet I felt like a grass hut hit by a cyclone. I had always admitted that her beauty was unequalled, perhaps even impossible to match. I now admitted to myself that losing her would also tear me apart. I felt like saying that my own life was once again, and after all these years, made possible only because of her, but I kept my mouth shut.

“A few years ago” Athaliah went on “I deluded myself into thinking that one day, perhaps, you would ask me to be your wife. Now, all you are proposing is a compromise. All right, then. Why not ? We shall ‘see’ each other, as you say. Only, I’m warning you : I’m not getting any younger. Like most women, right or wrong, I need stability in my life. I am very aware that what we see as permanence is often an illusion, and that it can lead to untold suffering and frustration, but just like sex or motherhood, it’s an instinct. Call it the stability instinct. We can argue for ever about its worth, its pros and cons, but we can’t deny its existence. If I should find a man who offers a reliable social status coupled with financial security, I will accept his offer ; and afterwards, I shall never see you again. I will break all ties with my past. I will leave my apartment without a forwarding address. My surname will have changed. You’ll never see me again.”

“Unless” I quipped “you marry someone so wealthy and so famous that journalists will follow you and report your every move in glossy magazines. So, one day I will see a photo of you taken at Longchamps, or read that the millionaire inventor of the heated gusset is vacationing on his yacht in the Cyclades, and I’ll know where you are.”

Athaliah deigned grant me a faint smile. She knew I was torturing myself, and that I had a tendency to mask my emotions with a dubious sense of humour. Above all, she knew that she was my drug and my addiction ; yet she now accepted that I was ready to live without this craving rather than face the realities of marriage.

I realised that, from now on, each of my visits could be the last. It gave our relationship a whiff of masochism that I found strangely attractive. I fantasised being a king or a dictator meditating as he looks out of a window. He knows that his country is being torn apart. Yet, in the soft luxury of his palace, all is quiet. Giant trees, in the park, seem to be dozing under the autumnal sunlight. Servants come and go as silently as Buddhist lamas. Cooks are cooking, gardeners gardening. It seems impossible to believe that in a few days, or even in a few hours, the whole place will be invaded by a mob bent on murder and arson. Every second acquires the density of a white dwarf star : never had the fluid of life felt more intoxicating.

 

The next day, we started looking for a car. I had childishly thought that it would be a simple task. Car dealers proudly displayed their latest models, each one more tempting than the next, but they were not for sale. You, along with hundreds of other potential customers, had to put your name down, fork out a deposit, and depending on brand and model, wait anywhere between ten months and two years.

Determined never to exhibit again a form of insensitive wealth, I ordered a Citroën 15/6. She didn’t exactly shout poverty, but it was the kind of car driven by doctors, pharmacists, lawyers and local bigwigs in every town and village of France. As an added bonus, it was discreet and black. 

This being said, I still needed a car, and therefore had to find a second-hand vehicle. After a few unsuccessful visits to used car lots, it was love at first sight for a convertible1938 Renault Nerva in perfect condition. Even the soft top was taut and unmarked. She was grey and blue, with enormous seats and a carpet as thick as forest moss. She had hardly ever been used, and must have been cleverly hidden during the occupation. My dislike of Renault did not extend to their pre-war, second-hand vehicles. I kept her for a long time, even after I had taken possession of the Citroën. When spare parts became hard to find, I sold her to a collector of classic automobiles.

The next day, Athaliah who knew Paris a lot better than I did, took me to the workshop of a round, cheerful little man who restored furniture. I described the situation on the ground floor at the château. He gave me the address of his brother, an antique furniture specialist like himself, who lived in Basse-Goulaine, a village much closer to me than Paris.

It was therefore with the inner satisfaction of a job well done and the promise of a restored (if uncertain and temporary) relationship, that I headed home at the wheel of my “new” car. Her comfort and the powerful purr of her engine were extremely reassuring. Leaving in late afternoon, I had planned to stop at a hotel in plenty of time for a nice meal and a good night sleep, but I was in such great mood, and I felt so much on top of the world that it was as if I had been injected with amphetamine. I just stopped to buy a couple of apple turnovers minutes before a baker’s shop closed, and kept driving all night. With hindsight, I realised it was silly. I had no pressing agenda. The car could have broken down in open country, or simply run out of gas (her five-litre, eight-cylinder engine was rather on the thirsty side). As it turned out, she behaved like the reliable old girl that she was meant to be.   

I got lost. Road signs were few and far between. Besides, they were not road signs as we know them now : they were ceramic cubes mounted on cement poles, but the dark-blue writing on them was quite small, which made it difficult to read, especially at night. Many of those cubes were still pockmarked with bullets. They seemed to bear little affinity with road maps. To cut a long story short, I ended up south of the Loire river, when I should have been north. By 5 a.m. I was approaching Chinon. Dawn was slithering between hedges and trees. I was tired. Craning my neck to look at myself in the rear-view mirror, I noticed that my eyes were bloodshot. Nevertheless, in the weird mixture of the car’s headlights and the first slanting rays of the sun, I couldn’t help being in awe of the wonderful (mostly sixteenth century) architecture of chapels, bridges and farm buildings gyrating slowly in front of me with every turn and twist of the road. The more I tried to find my way, the more I got lost. In a place called Ligré, I stopped next to the banks of a fast-flowing brook, almost a river. I got out of the car, and urinated on a patch of stinging nettle. The village was still asleep, ensconced in a comfortable peace. All I could hear was a faint lapping of water flowing between boulders, and the tiny clicks of the engine as it cooled off. I filled my lungs with the combined scents of wet grass and rowan trees.  

Breaking the stillness of the air, some rhythmic scraping on gravel by the side of the road yanked me out of my reverie. The man was wearing clogs, their very shape acting like small loudspeakers. He displayed a mop of white hair, was dressed in blue overalls, and carried a fork over his shoulder.

“Broken down ?” he asked.

“No. Just tired. Is there a café or a hotel that might be open in the village ?”

We shook hands. “Nope !”

“How about a fountain where I could splash water on my face and drink ?”

“Nothing of the kind.”

“In that case, I’ll push on to Chinon. Could you point me in the right direction ?”

“I will, but first you’ll follow me home, and my wife will prepare a nice breakfast for you.”

“But… but you don’t know me !”

He smiled. “I’m a pretty good judge of human nature. Come on, don’t make a fuss.”

I was tempted. “I don’t want to impose.”

“Scroungers impose. Guests don’t. My wife and I always get up very early. By the way, I am the village road-mender… and also the mayor.”

I followed him. We stopped by one of these tuffeau stone houses set back from the street by such a narrow sidewalk that two persons cannot pass each other. The mayor’s wife looked a bit like him : white hair, round smiling face and very clean, neat clothing. She wore a black apron over a dark blue top, an ample grey skirt and black stockings, her feet in rabbit skin slippers. Her husband explained why he was bringing in a “stranger”, and she accepted it as a perfectly natural thing to do.

I had the most delightful breakfast of all. Hearty country bread, farmhouse butter, both made in the village itself ; freshly ground coffee with a hint of chicory, home-made jam and full-cream local milk.

The old couple started to talk about their children. They showed me the already yellowing photo of a French Air Force lieutenant, shot down over Amiens in 1942 in his RAF Hurricane, then the face of a very pretty young woman who, after obtaining her PhD in biology, had met an American, had followed him to Portland Oregon, and died a few days later in an automobile accident. I understood better their need to talk to a “stranger”. I could feel tears forming in my eyes. It came from the contemplation of such calm and noble acceptance in the face of so much grief. 

The conversation stopped, and silence took over, but it wasn’t an embarrassing or oppressive silence : it was soft and suffused with human warmth. With my forearm on the table, I put my head down, just for a minute, and… woke up at ten o’clock with a stiff back, eyes full of grit, and a mouth full of clay. My benefactors were smiling. They wanted me to stay and share their lunch, but I declined. They did not insist. I may have a tendency to read more than I should in other people’s souls, but I felt that the time I had spent with these excellent folks may have given them the fleeting illusion that they still had a son. Could they ever have guessed that I wished it had been the case ?

 

The childish pleasure of showing off my “new” car to Nanon, André and René (my mother would not have been interested) was spoiled by the bad news I heard as I arrived at Toucouleur : another attack against children in the region.

Taking cows to graze in the fields and keeping them from straying was still, for some children, a full-time occupation. Whereas in Manche County, for instance, cattle were restricted, each animal tied to a small spot, so as to be able to graze only over a limited area, thus feeding without trampling the rich, thick Norman grass, Breton cows were allowed to wander over large tracts of poor pasture snaking among boulders and gorse bushes. Kids were good at that job.

Ever since little Jeanne’s death, children were not allowed to go out alone, even with their dogs. They had to be in groups of at least three, and armed with forks or billhooks, some of which had been hafted like halberds. As I got out of the car, André and René were telling me all that, while taking my luggage. They added, both talking at the same time, so that I had difficulty understanding, that some young shepherds had been attacked by an animal as big as a calf but looking like a wolf. It had turned several times around the terrified group of kids, then dived in and grabbed a skinny eight-year old boy by the head. The others had courageously counter-attacked, trying to slash the beast, but it had trotted away casually. Then, sitting at a reasonable distance, it had calmly proceeded to eat one of the little boy’s cheeks. Fortunately for him, he had fainted by then. The beast was about to start on the other cheek when the children charged together while yelling at the top of their voices. 

Shouts, apparently, were more successful than forks. The monster withdrew. The children took their little friend home, where he came to. The doctor sent him to a hospital in Rennes. He would remain disfigured, but he would live. I asked André to drive the car to one of our garages, all former outhouses for horse-drawn carriages, while René was taking the suitcase to my room.

The last thing I expected as I entered the main hall, was the sight of Véronique sitting, rigid and sad on one of the high-back chairs. She’d been crying. When she saw me, she stood up. She was wearing a simple, straight, short-sleeve white dress, daringly cut above the knees. Had it been lit from behind, it would probably have revealed the contours of the body and its underwear. It was the latest fashion, a liberation fashion in more ways than one, and church mice choked on it. I immediately felt overwhelmed by the same wave of desire I had experienced when I had first met her.

“They are harassing my father,” she announced in a shaky voice. “He would like to know if he could, well… count on your support… if, that is, the opportunity presents itself.”

Frankly, the idea of helping Marjeval made me nauseous, but after what he had done to save my mother’s life, and also, of course, the lives of my servants, not to mention saving the château itself which would have been burned to the ground, I truly was in his debt. “He is being harassed ? By whom ? And for what reason ?”

“People around here. They say that our dogs have killed little Jeanne and attacked those children, the other day.”

“And have they ?”

“Of course not. I’m sure our dogs are quite capable of killing, but only if we… my father, myself and the farmhands were being attacked. They never leave the farm. They don’t roam the countryside. These accusations are ridiculous.”

“And where do I fit in all this ?”

“You don’t at the moment. Father just wanted to know if, given the opportunity, you’d be willing to help.”

I placed a hand on Véronique’s shoulder, a gesture that I wanted to appear comforting, friendly and almost brotherly, but which, in fact, was nothing more than a pretend gesture. I had been dying to touch her ever since we had first met. “All right, Véronique, if the opportunity presents itself, and if your father hasn’t done anything wrong, I’ll do everything I can to save him from becoming a scapegoat.” Under the thin, white material, I could feel the warm and firm youth of her skin, as well as the tiniest shifts of the clavicle. I removed my hand. She headed for the front door, but before she opened it, she turned round. “Have you read the papers ?”

“No, I just got here.”

“You could have read them in Paris. We made the national press, don’t you know ? You were lucky they didn’t spot the fact that you came from Ploerdon. Journalists would not have missed the opportunity to pester a prominent member of our region.”

I went to the small mahogany table by the door where Nanon usually left the post. As expected, the beast had indeed made the headlines of the local paper. In the Parisian press, we rated only half a column in something like page four. I was shocked by the fact that without mentioning any name both articles managed to allude to a pack of German wolfhounds and a big farmer. The double meaning was obvious, and quite likely to trigger hysterical reactions in the population.

Local tenants had not ganged up on Marjeval at the end of the war. Too many of them had been less than perfectly… loyal to their own country. Accusing Marjeval of collaboration with the enemy could have boomeranged on too many of them. However, killing children was another matter altogether. Civilisation is only as thin as a varnish. If you scratch it, you discover human nature in all its naked truth, i.e. in all its horror, with its irrational thirst for intolerance, massacres and tortures. The craving to compensate for every-day frustrations and misfortunes by hounding a prominent member of the tribe is overwhelming in every country and every century.

That Marjeval should suffer for a crime he did not commit while, as a former German collaborator, he had wriggled out of the usual post-war reprisals, was one of these bitter ironies of History that could have made me laugh ; or at least snigger… but I had to take Véronique into consideration, and already it made all the difference. “Didn’t you bring a dog ?” I asked. “Or is that question uncalled for ?”

“Very much uncalled for. We don’t want to give people the opportunity to complain. All our dogs are confined to a stable. I only hope that someone will be attacked during that time : it would teach them a lesson.”

“How can you say such a thing ?”

“I say what I think.”

“It wouldn’t work anyway. People would just say that you’ve let them go for a few hours. The best thing would be to have them put down.” I must admit that I had said that to punish her for her previous remark. I was wasting my time : she took everything literally.

“Putting them down would only confirm our guilt. After that, when all the dogs have been killed, there would inevitably be another attack somewhere. My father and I would look like a couple of idiots.”

“To tell the truth, I’d rather look like an idiot than be accused of murder. Why not instead get all the dogs in a truck, then cart them to a hunting kennel, hundreds of miles away ?” I was well aware that I had taken the bait, and that, in order not to look like an idiot myself, I had tried very hard to find a solution. Véronique’s face lit up. “Of course ! We have friends in Lozère who had huge hunting kennels before the war… all empty now, of course. They would help us, I’m sure.”

“And then” I went on, getting in deeper, “better to have the press on your side. Ask a couple of journalists over at the farm. Let them take photographs of the loading and, in Lozère, the unloading of the dogs. Give them leave to go anywhere they want, and inspect anything. The longer they spend with you, the safer you will be.”

This time, she rushed towards me, locked herself in my arms, and gave me a big kiss on the cheek. “Come on, follow me !” She was pulling me to the door along the hall. I freed myself. “What’s the rush, Véronique ? What’s going on ? I will go with you if you wish, but first I want to have a cup of tea, then shave, shower and change. It’s been a long trip.”

“Tea ? You’ve got tea ?”

“I do now. I stopped at Fauchon’s yesterday.”

I ran to my room, two steps at a time, pulled a large box of loose tea out of my suitcase, and ran back to hand it to Nanon. It was my favourite mix : two thirds Assam, one third Earl Grey. “Nanon, could you please make us a cup of tea ? I’m going upstairs to let mother know I’m back.” I turned to Véronique : “Give me a little half hour to get ready. Go and sit down in the main living-room. There is plenty to read there if you want. I won’t be long, I promise. By the way, where did you want to take me ?”

“State secret.”

I had a quick shower and change, but sensing how impatient and unpredictable Véronique could be, I didn’t take the time to shave. When I got back, I insisted that she should have a cup of tea, a brew she had never had a chance to taste. She tried several combinations, then like myself, decided for milk, no sugar. As she wriggled and squirmed on her chair, I could sense her impatience to go and show me her surprise. When we left the room, she was almost running. I followed. By the time we crossed the forecourt, we were practically racing each other. René and André watched us as if we had been a couple of mental cases. She jumped in the Jeep. I sat at the wheel. “Home, Miss ?”

“No : forest.”

“Really ?”

Happy to be alone with her, I started to enjoy her eccentricity, and I drove to the nearest fire lane. Two hundred yards from the château, she waved her hand for me to stop. “And now” she announced with all the authority of a young headmistress, “we keep going on foot.”

She jumped out of the Jeep. Her skirt flew up to her hips, displaying a simple yet adorable pair of white panties. In those days, most women liked pink underwear. Going from white to pink was, for a girl, a sort of rite of passage symbolising her admission into the world of adults. Irrationally, I was glad that Véronique had stuck to white. Once again, I reflected that her legs were neither as long nor as elegant as Athaliah’s, but their youthful energy gave them an irresistible sex appeal.

I also got out of the Jeep and caught up with Véronique. She was already deep in the undergrowth. She stopped, turned round, took my hands in hers and smiled. I looked her in the eyes. “What if the beast should attack us ?” She laughed : “Not a chance.”

She seemed so sure of herself that I felt a shiver down my spine. Has I been wrong about her and her father ? Did she know something I didn’t ? She detected my uneasiness, and added quickly : “I feel so happy today, here, with you ! Don’t spoil it. I’m sure we won’t be attacked. Beside, so far they have only pounced on children… and we are not children.”

“They ? You said ‘they’. Do you think there are several ?”

“Course not. What am I saying ? There is only one… obviously.” She took me in her arms, and kissed me on the mouth. It was a hungry, robust, enthusiastic, primitive kiss, yet incredibly exciting at the same time. She pushed her tongue between my lips and rubbed her pelvis against mine. Within a few seconds, I had an erection, something Véronique became immediately aware of, and which she grabbed through my trousers. The wave of pleasure made me forget where we were, who we were and what we had been talking about. Sinking under such an impetuous and tender assault, I was abdicating. My whole self was dissolving in the emollient nectar of her young saliva and also in the smell of her skin, exempt of perfume, but where I could detect talcum powder and soap. Like a glider in the skies of a September dawn, my heart was lifted by the scent of freshly pressed cotton and, through the collar of her dress, the intoxicating warmth of her body. 

She let me go, and started to undress. But for her socks, she was naked in a few seconds. No bra. Her streamlined chest was hardly in need of one. She rolled her panties in a ball and threw them as far as she could in the bushes with the obvious intention of not putting them on again. There they hung from a twig, incongruous, soft and fragile. She then spread her dress at the foot of a tree. This improvised blanket, thin, narrow and lumpy on the ground, was far from ideal. Still, she lay on it, arms and legs wide open. She laughed at the mixture of surprise and admiration she could read on my face. “You like ?”

My throat was tight. I could barely manage a rather dull “Oh, yes !” She was offering me the body of a beautiful and slim teenager, which is exactly was she was, as she could not have been more than eighteen or nineteen. Her stomach was perfectly flat, and her legs more slender than I had first believed. Her pubic hair was light and sparse, allowing her inner lips, pink and generous, to protrude with daring pride.

Yes, I did have an erection, and yes I did want to make love to her, but at that precise moment, my overwhelming feeling was one of immense tenderness when faced with such a display of fragile yet robust and fearless beauty. Hypnotised and breathless, I undressed, and knelt on my clothes, next to her. I leaned over as if to kiss her n*****s, but she pushed me back. “Come inside me,” she said in a hoarse and strong voice. Unused to acting so fast, I was quite surprised. However, not wanting to go against her wishes �" or perhaps I should say her orders �" I positioned myself above her and gently slid my penis into her vagina. It was tight but well lubricated, and she certainly was not a virgin. Her school truancy days had obviously been anything but dull. Second surprise : she immediately started to move her pelvis up and down so fast that it was almost like a vibration. She jerked her head backwards, and uttered three long, shrill wails. That was it : she had climaxed. “My god,” I thought, “she f***s like a rabbit !” Oddly enough, I did not resent it. I was amazed, flabbergasted even, but not disappointed. She illustrated to what extent two women can be different. Two women ? But of course, every woman being unique, behaves differently from all others. It also goes for every man, which often makes it hard for lovers to get their act together and reach a level of complicity leading to cloud nine.

Still above her, propped on my arms, I must have looked nonplussed, even a bit silly. I withdrew. She grabbed me with both hands and proceeded to milk me firmly as she would have a cow’s udder. Within a few seconds, I had, howling with surprise, delight and even a touch of pain, sent two or three long spurts on her chest. She burst out laughing and smeared herself with the sperm. I closed my eyes. When I opened them again, she was looking at me, smiling. Her teeth were sparkling, her cheeks bright red, her breasts wet and shiny under splotches of sunlight falling through the foliage. I closed my eyes again. I was hurting everywhere, throughout my body and my soul. An inner voice was yelling silently : “No, I don’t want to, I can’t, I don’t want to fall in love with this wild youngster.”

Too late !

 

During the night, René committed suicide. Such desperate measures are fairly common in rural France… more common than in towns, at any rate. When it happens, people are sad, but not overly surprised. One could easily believe that greenery, the peace of the countryside and, of course, fresh air would scatter the black clouds of despair. Not in the least. You can feel as trapped in a village as you would in a busy town centre. Urban suicides are often triggered by philosophical considerations on the emptiness and futility of life, leading to complete pessimism. Rural suicides are usually more straightforward, more direct : sexual rejection or inability to attract the love of a nice woman. In both environments, and in spite of minor differences, people are faced with the same reason : the brutal and honest recognition of their own unimportance and loneliness. René had hanged himself.

What made me sick, what spoiled his death, so to speak, was the way he had treated his dogs before doing away with himself : he had hanged them from a branch, then shot them with a German Luger the Police found on him. On his bed, he had left a letter addressed to me.

Dear Monsieur D’Astell,

I followed you and Véronique in the woods, and I saw everything. I love her. During the war, she had a German boyfriend. I kept thinking : when he goes, either she marries me, or I’ll commit suicide. I knew she would not marry me, so I knew I was going to die. No hard feelings Sir, but I won’t tell you where the treasure is hidden.

René

P.S. : Nor will I tell you who the beast is.

 

The Police showed me that letter as I was gloomily walking back and forth in front of the château. When I say ‘the Police’, I mean just one of them. “Lots going on around here, wouldn’t you say, Monsieur d’Astell ? By the way, I’m inspector Ronan.” We shook hands. I had (force of habit or prejudice ?) expected the visit of a uniformed, overweight, alcoholic, breathless and smelly cop with the brain capacity of a woodlouse ; one of those cartoon characters who, along with the lazy, oversexed postman or the drunk bus driver, had sadly become the perfect example of a Frenchman in English-speaking countries. I was relieved to be dealing with a young man (thirty years’ old at the most) in civilian clothes. He had an extraordinarily ordinary face ; the kind of face that blends in a crowd, and that a witness would be at pains to describe. He had moved towards me with the suppleness of a dangerous dancer. Here is someone who can fight, I thought. Martial arts did not yet exist in the West, but Special Forces had been trained in what they called close combat.

We started talking. I was happy to be with someone my own age, someone who was obviously clever, but also educated and even refined. I felt that we could easily become friends. I was keenly aware that I missed, and had missed the simple pleasures of male companionship, and I had to exercise self-control, so as not to seem too eager. Friendship was something I had discovered during my short stay in the RAF, and later at the oflag, (POW camp for officers). There had been Martinet the African missionary, Poitou the aristocrat whose father had been running a pharmaceutical company before the war, Macouge the disillusioned philosophy professor who had given up his career to become a farmhand, Kurelski the sculptor who eked a living engraving tombstones. There had been many others… We kept saying there would be a reunion after the war, but we did not really think it would happen, and of course, it didn’t.  

I invited the inspector inside and took him to the small living-room leading to my office, where I offered an Armagnac. To my surprise, he accepted. I had expected the classic reply “not while on duty” heard so many times in movies. An unusual man, I thought. Ronan would also utter a little sigh before saying something. It seemed to suggest that he would rather have been busy doing something else, trout fishing for instance. To his first question I replied that indeed a lot of things were happening in the region.

“Have you heard about the latest attack of the beast ?” he asked casually. I felt the blood leaving my face. I thought : Véronique ? Then immediately : Is it possible that I could already be loving her so much ? I am sure that Ronan noticed the strength of my emotions. “Who was it, this time ?” I asked in a shaky voice.

“A young woman who is not from these parts, as they say around here. She’d been looking for work in Ploerdon, and had found a job in a dairy. She wore short skirts, and never went to church, which the old biddies found unforgiveable, actively spreading the rumour that the poor girl was nothing but a depraved prostitute and a dangerous influence on the local youth. Clémentine Cherson, she was called. She’d gone for a walk around Le Coudray chapel, that day. At least, that’s where her body was found… and I do mean her body, minus the head.”

“The beast had eaten the head, but not the body ?”

“Exactly : only the head. The body revealed only fresh bruises. Don’t you find this odd ?”

“Very much so.”

“So do I. How well do you know Le Coudray, Monsieur d’Astell ?”

“I know it very well. I loved going there when I was a child. Not so much nowadays.”

“Allow me to go back to René’s suicide note. I will not tell you who the beast is. What do you make of this who ?”

“It could lead us to think that there is no beast, only a sadist hiding under a bear skin, for instance.”

“Yes, well… unfortunately, our experts are positive : for little Jeanne, the marks on the bones could not have been left by a human being… or a dog, or a wolf. According to them, it had to be a hyena.”

“A hyena, here, in Brittany ? Could it have escaped from a zoo during the war ? Besides, if my memory serves me right, hyenas do not kill, they scavenge.” 

“I thought so too, but apparently they do kill when given a chance. In fact, our zoology specialist tells us that they kill more often than big cats do. He’s seen them bring down an impala. Lions show up afterwards and chase the hyenas away.”

“It’s the world upside down !”

“Isn’t that often the case ?”

“You said in packs” I added. “Does that mean there are several hyenas ?”

“It doesn’t look like it right now. I’m far from suggesting that we have solved the case.” And he added with a little smile : “I love your idea of a man in a bear skin.”

I decided to bring him up to date about René : “Inspector… do we call you Inspector ?”

“That’s not important.”

I did not want to speak ill of the dead, but thinking of the suicide note, I made sure that Ronan was aware of René’s mental condition. “There is this rumour about a treasure, you know. For years René told whoever would listen that he knew where to find a medieval treasure. No one believed him, of course. They usually told him to go and dig it up himself. You see, René was a bit… simple.”

“I know, but I always take suicide notes seriously, especially in cases of successful attempts. It’s like the idea of being hanged in the morning : it concentrates the mind wonderfully. Please give me a buzz at the police station if you should learn something.”

“Where are you staying ?”

“At the police station itself. They have living quarters for all sorts of weird and wonderful people, including inspectors.”

The next day, I woke up with a painful desire to see Véronique again. I wanted to know if, in her mind, our recent encounter had only been a one-night stand (or one-afternoon in that particular case), or if she had seen it as the start of a long-term relationship or even (why not ?) marriage. I knew perfectly well that I could not discuss the matter with Mother, or even Nanon. In spite of her youth, Véronique had suddenly become the person I wished to turn to for serious conversations.

Had I been seeking my mother’s advice, she would have simply condemned all my ideas out of hand. She was contrary to a pathological degree. Of course, I far from her only target. If Nanon suggested a certain dish for lunch or dinner, Mother would reject it immediately. With the diplomacy of a Talleyrand and the patience of an angel, Nanon knew how to solve the problem. If, for instance, André had shot a wild rabbit, Nanon would say : “Would you like some roast beef today, Madam ?” 

“No, I don’t feel like it.”

“I could have mentioned rabbit, but André says that they are not very plump at this time of year.”

“Not very plump ? What does he know about rabbits ? He’s only a gardener, for goodness sake ! We’ll have rabbit, Nanon. You’ll see : it’ll be delicious.”

In order to make a decision, she needed to oppose someone else’s. Her systematically antagonistic mentality was perhaps the result of indecisiveness. When no one else voiced an opinion, she was at a loss. She would agonise before deciding if it would not be too cold, too hot, too dry or too damp before setting foot on the terrace. In doubt, she would disappear under scarves, gloves, shawls and coats of all kinds. She was obsessed with drafts. An open window was a threat to her health ; a stream of cool wind conveyed mortal danger. At meal times, she would mutter on and on, wondering if the lamb cutlet on her plate might not, in fact, be too ‘heavy’ for her, and if she should not ring Nanon and ask for a pear, instead. In that case, should she finish her glass of wine before the pear or after ? Should she have a slice of bread with the fruit, and if so, with or without butter ?

She lived in what she saw as a hostile world. A glass of cold water drunk on a hot summer day meant a stroke for sure. She never took a bath without picturing herself with an open skull after sliding and falling in the tub. And yet, such is the complexity of human nature that she had not left the château during the German invasion. With dignity she had put up with the billeting of German officers in a number of rooms ; nor had she realised how lucky she had been that they had not kicked her out altogether. I can only guess that they needed the services of Nanon as an all-round maid, and also the cooperation of René and André for their supply of food.

Father had been a good judge of his wife’s character when he had said to me, one day : “She is very petty with little things, but she can be dignified when it’s important.” And he had added with his charming crooked smile : “Unfortunately, life is mostly made up of little things.”

Living with Mother was made even more difficult by the fact that she seemed (but only seemed) incapable of concentrating on any one issue for very long. She would ask you to explain something to her ; then, in the middle of your explanation, would interrupt and change the subject, showing clearly that she never had the slightest interest in your point of view. I realised this at a very tender age, in the days when parents often ask : “What did you do in school today ?” Most children, sensing that the question was only meant to make conversation, and that no one was interested in the answer, have the good sense to reply : “Nothing” or “Not much”. I, on the other hand, used to fall for it every time. I was probably a slow developer. It took me a long time to realise that “What did you do at school today ?” was on the same level as “How are you ?” between two people who meet almost every day. The answer is : “Fine !” even if they are about to give up the ghost. They don’t launch into a detailed inventory of all that is good and bad in their lives.

I love poetry. I have for great poets a quasi-religious respect. On two occasions (I managed not to get caught a third time) I recited for my mother a poem I had learned by heart at school. She interrupted me half-way through in order to mention some trivial thought that had crossed her mind, and of course had nothing to do with Verlaine or Victor Hugo. It hurt me even more than if she had slapped my face, or accused me of something I had not done.

Mother and I lived in two different worlds, both psychologically and physically for she had, in fact, retreated to her second-floor living accommodation. Even before I joined the RAF, she and I had not partaken of any meal together for years. One could have easily believed that she was not living in the house at all. With the exception of my bedroom and bathroom, I had more or less commandeered the ground floor. I loved the study, which I had set up facing the huge windows of the terrace. In the back, it led to a library and a cosy, comfortable drawing room, followed by a morning room and an intimate dining-room. The main drawing room, which could, if needed, be used as a ballroom, and the grand dining-room belonged to the ostentatious splendour of another age. To this day, and particularly in mild weather, I enjoy working at my desk in front of the open french doors, letting my looks wander over the repeated patterns of the balustrade, then beyond to the gravelled courtyard, then to the edge of the forest with its gradation of many shades of green, and finally to the sky. In the Fall, I love watching the slow landing of a dry leaf on the terrace or, when everything is absolutely still, the visit of a squirrel who, his head cocked to one side and his tail aquiver, creeps forward until he can have a good look at the room. Above all, I like the scent of the forest, its freshness in the spring, its powdery musk in summer, the noble rot of autumns and the harsh cleanliness of winters. During a storm, I am in tune with the laments and moans from the trees.

Socially, I felt more alone than if I had really been alone. When you live with someone else, and when that someone else happens to be your mother, you are tempted to share your thoughts, your emotions and your problems with her, but if, through weakness or absentmindedness, you should fall in the trap, you end up bruised by her indifference and criticisms. And then, you blame yourself for being so naïve. 

 

I had to attend René’s funerals… a civil ceremony, of course. In 1945, the clergy, overwhelmingly did not worry about little things like compassion, tolerance or charity ; a suicide was a suicide, and it led you straight to hell. Not only did the Catholic church wash their hands of it, but they underlined the high opinion they had of themselves by refusing to perform any religious ritual during the burial.

I would have liked to telephone Véronique, but I did not want to give Marjeval the satisfaction of knowing that I was courting his daughter, this sort of news would have spread like wildfire through the whole county. 

As I was getting dressed for the ceremony in the cool and peaceful hours of a beautiful morning, a time when the brain is perhaps less inclined to dramatize, I was trying to sort out my feelings towards Véronique. Did I love her enough to marry her ? I knew nothing of her likes and dislikes ; nor did she know anything of mine. Why, in that case, did I feel that she and I could live together without serious disagreement whereas life with Athaliah, remarkable and adorable woman that she was, and whom I undoubtedly adored, would have been doomed to failure ? Like everyone (or almost everyone) I strongly wished to share my every-day life with a loved and loving partner.

Oddly enough, whenever I was unhappy, I did not feel the need to confide in someone else, or figuratively speaking to rest my head against a sympathetic shoulder. If, on the other hand, there was something to enjoy such as a book I liked, a movie that lifted my spirit ; or if I was immersed in beauty, be it that of Nature, classical music or other forms of human genius, I felt an almost sickening need to share this happiness. Besides, could it really be called happiness if it wasn’t shared ?

I was pleasantly surprised when I saw that Véronique had shown up at René’s funeral. She was wearing a long-sleeve black dress, a very simple dress with a wide black belt. Defying accepted wisdom, she did not wear a hat or a headscarf. The only other person in attendance was René’s mother. A tiny, stooped-shouldered figure, she was, as René had been, horribly cross-eyed. Like a black insect with broken wings, she had followed the horse-drawn hearse on foot, enduring the heavy silence of the little town, and slinking under the hypocritical gauntlet of accusing and triumphant looks from old women hiding behind their heavy net curtains.

The simplicity of the burial rites, or rather the absence of any rite, cloaked the ceremony in a veil of dignity that I found pleasantly surprising : no ecclesiastic mumbo-jumbo, no aspergillum or holy water, no censer tinkling against its chain, no snotty-nose choirboy sniffing every ten seconds… and above all, no hollow and cliché-ridden speech. Two efficient and discreet municipal workers managed the whole thing in silence.

The weather was lovely : sunny and warm with just a touch of morning coolness. René was buried in a far-flung corner of the cemetery, well away from nice people. There would be no cross over his tomb. As the casket was lowered in the grave, all we could hear was a couple of thrushes fighting at the top of a tree.

René’s mother touched my forearm and disappeared slowly between the tombs. Véronique and I ambled back to my car. I opened the soft top. “How did you get here, Véronique ?”

“I took a taxi. Will you take me back ?”

“Did you know” I asked softly when we were seated side by side, “that René committed suicide because of us ?” Clearly puzzled, she gave me a vacant look. I went on : “I can’t show you the note he left behind. The Police have it. He had followed us when we made love in the forest. He’d watched us.”

“That’s hardly a reason to commit suicide.”

Since Véronique would never see the letter in question, there was no need to mention the German boyfriend. I cleared my throat. “He wrote that he was in love with you, but that he knew you’d never marry him. So, when he saw us, he decided to end his life.”

“But he knew I’d had other lovers.”

“In that case, why didn’t he kill himself sooner ?”

“Honestly, Émile : you can be so thick, at times !”

“How do you mean ?

“It’s rather obvious, isn’t it ? Of course, there’ve been others, but René must have known somehow that I was only having fun. I wasn’t in love.”

“Do you realise what you’ve just said ?”

“So what ? You know I always say what I think, even if it’s not proper. For goodness sake, don’t look at me like that. I’m not going to eat you alive. If you don’t feel like spending time with someone who loves you, let’s never meet again. I’ve long suspected that something like that would happen to me one day. It probably happens to everyone. No one is ever happy, in fact. As far as I can tell… no one !”

Her voice was starting to break, but she did not start crying. She regained her composure, and I could see her taut little body stiffen and sit straight again. What a tomboy ! Real men do not cry, as children were told in those days, and so a real Véronique does not cry either. She looked me in the eyes and managed a wry smile : “And above all, don’t be worried that I should mention marriage. I don’t want to give you a heart attack.”

“Good, because I’m not ready for marriage.”

“That’s hardly a scoop. Athaliah knows it, all too well. Since before the war, she’s been expecting you to ask for her hand.”

“Athaliah ? Who told you about Athaliah ?”

“No one… everyone. There isn’t a lot to do around here. Gossips and rumours are the main form of entertainment.”

We kept silent for several minutes, staring at the hood as if expecting it to do something. I ventured to whisper : “We came here because of René, not to have an argument.”

“Ah yes, René ! He wasn’t the only one, you know. Every dimwit around here thinks he’s in love with me.”

“Maybe they are.”

“Don’t be silly. They only want a good f**k. It would be a nice change from their usual chubby slobs.”

I lost myself in the contemplation of her slim figure. A wave of desire washed over me and gave me a husky voice. “You are probably right. Still, you are hard on them. It’s not their fault.”

Another long silence ; then she whispered : “We possibly had a narrow escape, you know. René owned a gun. He could have killed us both.”

“Or the beast could have attacked us.”

“I already told you : we are not on the menu.”

“How would you know ?”

“Female intuition. If you are so worried about the beast, we could try a proper bed, next time. We’ve been seen together. No need to hide anymore. Tongues are going to wag. Every well-intentioned, charitable soul in the region will try to find out Athaliah’s address, so they can send anonymous letters saying that you are cheating on her.” All sadness now gone, Véronique burst out laughing. I was dying to say that I loved her, but felt paralysed. No word came out. All I could croak was : “Where to, young lady ?”

“Would René’s death keep you from making love ?”

“It certainly would… with anyone but you.”

“Then what are you waiting for ? Home James ! Your home, of course.”

“James ?”

“I’ve always fancied being the lady of the manor house, and having a chauffeur called James. So, when you are at the wheel, I’ll call you James.”

With Véronique, I was entering a world that was foreign to me, a pitiless, down-to-earth world where one called a spade a spade ; but also a freer world, full of daring aspirations and fantasies. True, she was very young, almost a child. Yet I didn’t feel that I was talking to a child. There was an adult hiding somewhere in that young body. Hypnotised, I dreamily started the engine and engaged first gear.

From that day onwards, Véronique and I met at the château ; less romantic perhaps than under the trees and on a bed of moss, but infinitely more comfortable, and above all next to a good old bathroom ; nor would we be performing for a voyeur.

Our affair did retain a measure of suspense after all. Véronique had been adamant : no telephone calls. We were agreed to do so only in an emergency. She would show up as if by magic (and I use the term wisely). Sometimes, she was disappointed, as I could be out shopping in Rennes or visiting a farm whose sharecropper had problems. She would then go up to pay Mother a visit. Oddly enough, the two women seemed to like each other. “What can you possibly talk about ?” I asked.

“Nothing much. I listen to her moaning and complaining about this or that… about you, mostly. She doesn’t think you have any redeeming feature. Then, after she’s had a good grumble, she starts talking about her childhood, her mother and all her family. It goes back to the Franco-Prussian war. It’s  really fab.”

“Really fab ? When did you start talking like a schoolgirl ?”

“I don’t believe this : you’ve been trying your luck with schoolgirls !”

I could never have the last word, and in truth wasn’t even trying. Véronique was a fresh tornado whooshing through the house. She would, like a cat who thinks he owns the place, go anywhere and do anything she wanted, and I was delighted to let her. I would put up with all her whims, which was easy as they were not the whims of a kept mistress. She never suggested that I should buy her a jewel or a dress, or that I should throw a party or take her to a casino. On the other hand, she would, with total disregard for her safety (or mine), insist on driving the Jeep at terrifying speed in the fire lanes. She would stick her arm deep into badger nests “to find out if there were babies” at the risk of losing a finger. She refused all forms of contraception. “Don’t worry : I’ll get an abortion if it happens. There’s a doctor around here who will never ask questions. What he will ask is just a lot of money… Don’t look so horrified. Honestly, you can be such a wimp at times !”

Trying to improve Véronique’s approach to sex was no easy task either. I didn’t have much success. My main ambition was simply to slow her down. She made love exactly the way she did everything else : as if she’d been late for an appointment.

At mealtimes, she would clean her plate like a hungry dog when he does not want other dogs to steal his food. Whenever she came to see me, she barely took time to close the door before holding me in her arms and squeezing so hard that I could hear my bones crack. She would kiss hungrily. She would rub her stomach against mine while squeaking like (once again) a dog who greets his master after a long absence. She was always the first to climax, which might have explained why she never got pregnant. She enjoyed finishing me by hand. She had no patience. She didn’t know the meanings of words like refinement, subtlety or eroticism.

I tried to explain that women (depending on their individual makeup) can have more than one orgasm. While at university, I had met a girl who seemed to have as many as she wished. Using a d***o, she had managed to climax twelve times in a row. She was quite sore by the end of it �" and determined not to try such a performance again �" but very proud of her record. Véronique was not interested. Was that another side to her tomboy nature ? If she felt like having a climax, she had one, and that was it : no more questions. When I asked her to show me how she masturbated, she burst out laughing. As a gesture of good will, she tried but, shaken with laughter, she stopped and gave up. Later, having realised to what extent I genuinely enjoyed watching it, she managed to do it successfully. Of course, it was all over in a couple of minutes. I had never seen anything like it. Life, for her, was like a chariot race on a Roman hippodrome. She was the driver, pushing her team of horses to the limit under the shouts of the crowd and the dust of the track, wheels sliding through hairpin turns, danger making her drunk with excitement, and giving her the sensation of existing truly.

Yet, I did not complain. I was even beginning to like it. Whenever I felt like criticising Véronique, I reminded myself of all those men with ugly female companions, or whose partners had little enthusiasm for the thing, as they used to say in the countryside. I, at least, had a young (very young) and very pretty lover. Every time I could hear her castanet-like steps on the terrace, or when I could see her, coming out of the forest, the certainty that I would soon experience a brief but intense pleasure gave me, just before she rushed in, a moment of such deliciously painful emotion, that I often wondered if I wasn’t going to faint. Often, she would rush out again within minutes of our embrace, leaving me incredulous, enthralled, bewitched and even more in love with her than ever. I really wanted to keep this bird of paradise in my golden cage, but she always escaped in a peel of laughter. I never knew when I would see her again, or if I ever would. 

 

I was really missing René. I am not talking about the tasks and chores that used to be his, even if his absence could indeed be felt in those areas. I am talking about his  kindness, his subdued sense of humour, his dogs and his fantasising about some buried treasure ; not am I talking about his just being around, about his presence. Had someone asked me if we had been friends, I would have answered with complete honesty that it had not been the case. A friend is someone you can spend time with, chatting about this and that while putting the world to rights. At least, that’s the usual definition. I could be wrong. However, knowing that, day after day, a kind soul is never far from you, around the house or on the estate… Maybe such a reassuring presence could also be seen as a form of friendship.

One morning, as I was having breakfast in the small dining-room, I spotted two unsteady ginger kittens, no more than three months’ old, peeking through the french doors. With their matted coats, they were only skin and bones. In spite of Nanon’s vigorous objections, I went to fetch a saucer of milk which they lapped up in record time. I was adopted on the spot. Upon closer inspection, I noticed that they suffered from scabies, and that fleas were rushing through their sticky furs like cars on the Place de la Concorde. I placed the two delinquents in a cardboard box and took then straight to a vet In Rennes. I let him and his staff deal with them for a few days. When I saw them again, they looked much more civilised. Also, they had been vaccinated and neutered.

Winter-born cats never reach normal adult size, or so people say. Those two certainly followed the rule : they remained quite small all their lives. When I was in residence (like royalty), they would follow me everywhere. When I was out, they roamed the house. They used their feline charm to tame Nanon’s ingrained dislike of cats. Raffray, on the other hand, adored them. From the moment they moved in, she never saw another mouse. I had christened them Parmenides and Xenophon (Parmy and Xeno for the initiated). Day after day, they demanded to enjoy new privileges until finally they managed to sleep on my bed. Véronique’s visits always put them in a bad mood, their little tails whipping angrily back and forth while they pretended not to be interested. It got worse on those rare occasions when Véronique spent the night with me, and they had to sleep on the landing.

I had never had cats, and I realised that they offered a constantly renewed stage show, ending up in impossibly acrobatic situations, sometimes sleeping on their backs, with their folded legs in the air ; other times pretending to fight, but never with their claws out.

Still, I also really wanted to have a dog or two. Living in the country without a dog didn’t seem right. Farmers always had a mastiff tied to a kennel during the day, and free to enjoy the fleshy parts of intruders during the night. And what about this supreme flesh eater, this hyena who, according to Ronan, even managed to decapitate its victims ? The beast, apparently, did not give a damn about dogs. Like all the others, mine would not be able to fight a hyena, but at least they would bark, giving me time to fetch one of my rifles. No one had been allowed to own firearms during the war. Sanctions were immediate : a firing squad ; yet, André showed up one day with my father’s rifles. He would not say what he had done with them.

Marjeval and I were probably the only two land owners without dogs. As Ronan had stated one day in his poker-face delivery : “This house is now seriously under-dogged.” The situation never seemed to bother Véronique in the least. From her father’s farm, she would often walk down without a dog (obviously) or a shotgun or… panties.

One day, I just gave up : I drove to Rennes and headed for the sort of kennel that could import dogs from England. I knew exactly what I wanted. If big dogs were afraid of the beast, I would get small ones… Well, not that small : Welsh corgis, those russet-coated barrels looking like short-legged foxes. Intrepid fighters and hunters, they had been used, long ago, to bring down wolves. They would circle a wolf at full speed and make him lose his balance. They would then bite his ankles and start the whole process again until the wolf collapsed and sat down. From then on, it was only a matter of minutes before one of the corgis caught his prey by the throat. End of the wolf. If those smallish dogs could tackle a wolf �" or apparently, even a bear �" they might not be intimidated by a hyena. They showed up a month later, two darling balls of fluff, squeaking like kittens, something Xeno and Parmy noticed immediately, asserting their authority, and not putting up with any nonsense. Peace in the house… I had no use for the snobbishness of pedigrees or the tradition of first letter for names according to the dog’s birthdate. And so, I christened the puppies Charlie and Winston, in honour of the two great leaders of WW2. I always had corgis afterwards. The next batch were Queenie and Phil.

Two weeks went by without hearing from the beast. We were even starting to wonder if it could have been just a bad dream. I was thoroughly enjoying the spring of 1946, an exceptionally mild one, sometimes as hot as summer, and prematurely turning grass yellow on roadsides and ditches. The air smelled of hay and honey.

We were lucky, in those days, to live in a world without pollution, but we did not know it. Fast-running rivers were full of brown trout, lakes were teeming with pike, tench, zander and frogs, the willows on the banks bristled with moorhens. You could spot blue jays nesting in high hedges. Bees, bumble bees and butterflies dived in and out of flower beds. Birds chased midges.

The forest undergrowth rustled with hidden life that scampered as we went by. Nights were underscored with ghostly laments, far-away yelps from unidentified sources, and in the summer, mysterious, obsessive squeaks. Oddly enough, these noises didn’t in any way shatter the peace of the countryside. On the contrary, they would emphasise its depth and its enigma. We could feel Nature breathing and palpitating around us, but we only became aware of this blessing after it was buried in the deadly silence created by pesticides, insecticides, fungicides and all the other ‘cides’ of our brave new world.

 

I have a confession to make : I went back to see Athaliah ; not just once, but several times, then regularly, every other week or so. The two women were so different that each seemed the embodiment of what the other one lacked. I genuinely loved Véronique. If my father had still been alive, and if he had, again asked the question “Are you in love ?” I would not have hesitated, as I had done when Athaliah was concerned.

I admired Athaliah. I could not imagine that I would ever be loved again by a woman like her. I did not want to contemplate the possibility of no longer making love with the subtlety, the leisurely approach, yet also the complicity, the audacity, the uninhibited eroticism Athaliah was so gifted for. I would fantasise watching the two women, naked on my bed ; Athaliah teaching Véronique those rudiments of patience and refinement the latter so blatantly lacked. There was also the fact that if I went to Paris, I could count on a night in heaven with Athaliah, whereas I never knew in advance if and when Véronique would show up. She could appear two days in a row, then let me agonise for a month. I was terrified at the idea that, one day, she would decide never to come back. As I got to know her better, I also knew that if she decided to leave me, there would be no long conversations and no goodbyes. She would just go. Full stop. A better way, perhaps.

During my weekends with Athaliah, I never thought about Véronique. It was like listening to classical music. When immersed in Mozart, it’s impossible to imagine more beautiful compositions ; then we go on to Bach, Berlioz or Gluck, and while it lasts, we cannot imagine anything more beautiful either. Yet, the rest of the time, we know whom we like best. Athaliah symbolised the perfect woman… urban, elegant… the perfect lover also. I would have been terribly sad if forced to leave her. Véronique, on the other hand, was the epitome of raw, naked passion. She oozed enthusiasm, youthful lust and ‘joie de vivre’. Her absence also would have left me torn apart. It would have wounded me, disabled me and turned me into a psychological invalid for the rest of my life.

 

My conversation with Ronan about the young woman found decapitated next to an isolated sanctuary kept whirling in my mind. I decided to visit the place. Le Coudray could have been a hamlet in the Middle-Ages. Many villages had completely disappeared during times of plague, cholera or typhus. In the 1940s, only the chapel was left standing. Nowadays, a suburb of white, monotonous, rectangular houses is slowly creeping towards that sanctuary. There are plans for a supermarket next to it.

When I was a child, Nanon had often taken me to Le Coudray chapel and its surrounding countryside. I was hardly short of places to run and frolic around the château, but Le Coudray made a change. With a wooden sword, I defended the old walls and buttresses against hordes of Saracens until, like Bayard at Garigliano Bridge, the forces of the enemy were thoroughly thrashed and routed. In the chapel itself, I would follow the tradition, and insert my foot in a hole by the altar. It was supposed to keep you from ever getting a sprained ankle.

Our Lady of Le Coudray, not to be confused with our Lady of Lourdes or our Lady of Fatima (a nice example of crypto-polytheism) possessed her own legend, a legend probably derived from pagan Celtic lore. And what a load of contempt for the word ‘pagan’ in the mouth of our saintly priests ! They would spit it out like a gob of phlegm in their unforgiving condemnation of the thousands of generations that had preceded Christianity.

It was said that a child who had fallen in the pond of a washing-place, had miraculously been propped to the surface by the arm of the Virgin Mary. The villagers explored the bottom of the pond ; well, you would have the same, wouldn’t you ? And, guess what ? They found a painted wooden statue of Our Lady. Processions ensued. Every year the statue was solemnly carried to the famous pond, and carried back to the chapel.   

This pilgrimage created a quite a tableau : brilliantly coloured banners, shiny crosses, gleaming incense burners, clergy and choirboys in their ceremonial garbs, flower arrangements tied to telephone poles… Among the faithful, the tall, white, starched headgear of traditional Brittany oscillated like fishing boat masts at harbour. At close range, reality took over. Vigorous whiffs of badly washed �" or never washed �" bodies floated freely over the surrounding landscape. The line of people, like a meandering river, sang their familiar hymns, in shrill, nasal tones, their hypnotic repetition reinforcing the certainties of the faithful. From time to time, the stretched out caterpillar would stop. A priest, in a screechy voice pushed to the limit of his vocal cord capacities, would intone a Hail Mary. The crowd responded with a deep rumble that seemed to make the ground vibrate. At the end of the prayer, and before the next hymn, an impressive silence would fall on the procession. One could then hear the soft hissing of the wind in the bushes or the spluttering of an invisible lark. Exhausted, mesmerised, children would sink on the roadside grass, and lie down, in the hope of going to sleep. That hope was soon shattered by their mothers who would yank them back firmly to their feet. 

The next hymn would start with those who were closest to the vicar. It would creep along, but never fast enough to avoid a gap of several seconds between both ends of the procession. When the head of the column stopped singing, one could hear the last measures of the hymn dying away several times along its length.

During the occupation, the Germans, though suspicious of any form of gathering, had allowed these processions to take place. They may have considered them as a harmless form of release for the population.

 

I got to Le Coudray in less than ten minutes. The pale blue sky was striated with thin, white veins. Dried up by lack of rain, and crackling under my boots, the sward had turned russet and coarse. Without the constraint of a nine-to-five job, I often lose the notion of time. This must be a school day I thought, since there were no children about. They love this place, usually. That’s when I realised that school or no school, local kids had long stopped going out by themselves.

Charlie and Winston started chasing each other, and soon got lost in a patch of long grass, their coats acting as camouflage in the desiccated vegetation. I just hoped that they would act sensibly when faced with adders, of which there were plenty if you strayed a bit far.

Having opened my shotgun, I started to skirt the chapel when I spotted the dogs rushing towards an old, crumbling gate half hidden under bramble and ferns, and held together with some rusty wires. At the same time I detected the unmistakable stench of rotten meat, something I had hoped never to experience again after the war ; probably a dead sheep, a bird or a cat killed by foxes. The dogs came back, playing with a round, black object they passed back and forth like a football. As they got near, I realised that the smell came from their toy. “Stop !” I yelled “you’ll make yourselves sick !”

In the end, I was the one who didn’t feel well. Before I realised quite was going on, my breakfast had ended up on the ground. I had, of course, seen (and smelt) a lot of horrible things during the war, but that morning I was caught by surprise. Next to me lay a rotten head that had lost its eyes and lips, and whose mud-stained teeth and wide open jaws seemed to be laughing uncontrollably, I felt my legs grow weak, and I had to lean against the hood of the Jeep. Long strands of blondish hair mixed with herbal stalks, reminiscent of silent, heat-storm flashes in a summer’s night, had draped a transparent veil upon the disintegrating flesh of that face.

By then, the dogs were eating grass. They would be sick, for sure. I got in the Jeep and sat at the wheel. Charlie and Winston hopped on the back seat, and I kept elbowing them away, as they insisted on licking my neck. I started the engine and drove slowly to the police station. Ronan was there. With calm and cool efficiency, he sent a few men to make sure that no one would get near the crime scene. He insisted that the dogs should remain in the precinct. We didn’t want them to start playing with the head again. By then, having figuratively speaking, removed my civilian hat and donned my military cap, I had got hold of myself again. 

We went back to Le Coudray in a police car. I showed Ronan where the head was and where it had appeared from. I caught sight of a young cop who was setting up a safety perimeter, and copiously throwing up at the same time. It made me feel better.

“Get back to the station on foot,” said Ronan. “It will do you good. You look a bit pale. Ask someone to make you a cup of coffee. I’ll be back in about an hour’s time and I will take down your statement.”

I don’t know if alcoholic beverages are allowed in police stations, but on that day I was glad they broke the rules. A male secretary who didn’t look more than fifteen (I must be getting old) poured a generous portion of Calvados in my coffee. Instantly popular, Charlie and Winston made friends with everyone. Cup in hand, I walked over to a board on which notices had been pinned : missing children, a warning against foot-and-mouth disease and an ordnance survey map. Ronan had stuck black dots on it, indicating where the four beastly attacks  had taken place ; and also a fifth dot, of a different colour, showing the unsuccessful assault on La Denise. He had linked the dots with red thread, and to my horror, I realised that my château sat right at the centre of this geometric figure.

 

At Le Coudray, Ronan doubled the size of the security area around the chapel. The next day, after much bureaucratic, time-wasting and haggling, he persuaded the authorities to send in the Army. As during the German occupation, we were treated to the sight of gun turrets mounted on armoured cars drifting slowly behind walls and hedges ; also covered trucks unloading their platoons in strategic places. Some of these places, like the extinct volcano in Pobocé were declared off limits after soldiers had set up observations posts.

I was accused of lacking in patriotism when I refused to host the officers and their staff. I thought my poor château had seen enough these past few years. Ronan took my side and pointed out that I had been a bomber pilot and a POW. The local farmers were also on my side.

Donkeys were shot by city boys who had never heard one of these animals vocalising with abandon, especially in the middle of the night. The blood-curdling braying had made these raw recruits believe that their last hour had arrived. Wandering calves or goats met with the same fate, but not before crops had been damaged. Harmless dogs, out for a walk, were riddled with bullets. Deer and foxes endured the misfortune of being mistaken for monsters. Finally, our intrepid townie soldiers showed up at the police station, triumphantly carrying a wild boar on a stretcher. They were quite convinced that they had rid the countryside of the beast. Ronan told the Home Office that it was only a matter of time before a human being became the victim of such intrepid fighters. The platoon beat a hasty retreat under the booing and jeering of the population.

 

 

 

 

Chapter IV

 

It was at about that time, that I received a letter from a vague English cousin of mine. As a teenager, he had sometimes gone to East Africa with my father, who was an excellent photographer, and always keen to bring back spectacular slides to the Geographers’ Club. Rutherford Chester-Smythe, as this young man was called, also belonged to a Natural History Club in London. He would show up with a Leica II, when Father would not have been seen with anything but a Rollei. They had endless discussions about the relative superiorities of their cameras. They were also pretty good shots, and never ventured in the bush without the protection of a couple of Spanish-made Bergman, 9mm rifles.

Rutherford had heard of our little problem, he had written. He was keen to help, though not overly surprised that the French had not managed to kill the beast. After all, they had lost the war, hadn’t they ? (Ha, ha !) He was quite sure of succeeding where the Frogs had failed. He would slaughter the monster, if there really was such a thing as a monster (ha, ha !). To cut to the chase : could he come over for a while, and show us what a real marksman could do ?

I often invited Ronan. As time went by, I had come to appreciate his presence more and more. On that particular evening, we were sharing a Guinea hen and a bottle of 1929 Cheval Blanc. Ronan had become a fan of Raffray’s cooking. By contrast, Véronique would rather grab a roast chicken drumstick from the icebox. Talking her into sitting at a table for a meal was a challenge. Her wine appreciation was non-existent, even if she never turned down a bottle of champagne.

Most of the time, I ate alone. Sharing a culinary delight and a great Bordeaux with Ronan while chatting about this and that, was a rare pleasure. He told me that Paris had sent a few undercover agents in the region in order to blend with the population and listen to conversations in cafés and shops and also around stalls on market days. I pointed out to him that we were in Britany, not Sicily. This was not omerta country. Yes, people were afraid of the beast, but they were not afraid to talk about it. They wished only for one thing : to be rid of it as soon as possible. Yes, but Paris did not see it that way, and anyway, the presence of a few undercover cops could do no harm. Ronan would say ‘Paris’ as one whispered ‘the church’ or ‘the court’ in the 17^th century. I showed him Rutherford’s letter. He read it and sniggered : “Are all your cousins like him ?”

“Some.”

“I know the type. We had one like that in our squadron.”

“RAF ?”

“Yes. FFC in England.”

“I say ! So was I. We could have met. Bombers ?”

“No : fighters.”

“That explains it. Tell me more about this bragging hero of yours.”

“His name was Fraichard : an incredibly vain and stupid fellow, always persuaded, before he even tried, to be the best at anything. When he occasionally was the best, he became insufferable. Of course, whenever he turned out to be no good, which was most of the time, he would blame his failure on something or someone. The Germans got him before we did, and oddly enough, we all felt incredible sad when he was shot down ; almost as if human society had a need for these extravagant characters.”

“He sounds very much like my cousin. So, in the end, do I invite him over or not ?”

“Please do. We are in urgent need of a good laugh around here.”

We drifted to the small living-room where I poured us some Calvados. Ronan and I were comfortably ensconced in armchairs when the door flew open. Nanon started to say something, but Véronique almost pushed her aside and rushed in the room. She twirled across the carpet and gave me a kiss. She was wearing a pale blue, short-sleeve blouse tucked in a skirt with multi-coloured vertical stripes. She sent her moccasins flying to the centre of the room, and threw herself on the couch, her legs folded to one side, offering Ronan and I a white, crescent-shaped view of her underwear. “Good evening mister Ronan !” she almost yelled.

“Good evening, Véronique.”

Ronan, I could feel, was getting uneasy. He finished his glass in one gulp and pretended to have tons of work waiting for him at the police station, which was highly unlikely. I was sorry to watch him go, but since Véronique and I had agreed never to phone each other, I could not possibly be cross with her. I saw Ronan to his car. The warmth of the handshake we exchanged showed clearly that we were now considering each other as genuine friends. When I went back to the drawing room, Véronique had taken her panties off. Standing in the middle of the carpet, she was stretching them with both hands and shaking them up and down on one side as would a toreador in front of a bull. “Olé, toro, olé !” she cried while choking with laughter. Carried away by her enthusiasm, I placed my hands on my forehead, stuck out my index fingers like a couple of horns, bent over and rushed to the underwear.

Yes, Véronique did make love as if she had been running the 100-meter dash, but if she stayed the night, I could let myself sink in the more tranquil pleasure of holding her body against mine, watching her go to sleep, and even listening to her very soft snoring, almost like a cat’s purr. On the face of it, she loved sex, but painfully lacked any notion of eroticism. One afternoon, however, after a rushed (as usual)  mutual masturbation on my office couch, she wiped the sperm from my chest with her panties, and put them back on. “I want your smell on me for a few more hours” she whispered with a kiss before running back to her father’s farm. Do we ever really know the souls of the people we love ?

 

Two weeks later, Viscount Rutherford Chester-Smythe stopped his bright-red sports car in front of the château in a rasping volley of gravel. I was on the phone in my study. Ronan was telling me about two very young children who had been killed by the beast, less than one hundred yards from their home. All that was found were half eaten pieces of limbs and trunks. “But surely, their shouts must have been heard.” I yelled as if I was blaming Ronan for it all.

“They were, but the parents thought their kids were just mucking about.”

I slowly placed the handset back on its base without realising that I hadn’t even had the courtesy of saying goodbye. As I turned round, I came face to face with Rutherford who had walked in as if he owned the place. Behind him, Nanon was waving her arms to signal that she had tried unsuccessfully to stop him. He stepped forward, his hand extended rigidly. When he realised that I wasn’t going to shake it, he gave a military salute and clicked his heels like a Nazi. “Rutherford Chester-Smythe, at your service, old bean !” he yelled. “Did you see my car ? Nothing less than a Morgan, my dear fellow. Should stun the local bumpkins, and show them what a real car looks like, eh what ?” He sat down without being invited, propped his boots on the coffee table, and went on : “I suppose a cup of tea would be too much to ask for in your forsaken neck of the woods ?”

“Far too much. In this neck of the woods, we drink Calvados all day long, wouldn’t you know ?”

“Oh well : when in Rome…”

Like a sudden gale ending a heat wave or dispersing a thick fog, anger managed to sweep aside the sadness that Ronan’s telephone call had created.  I went to the bar and poured Rutherford a double Calvados. Dehydrated as he must have been after his long drive, it would, I hoped, knock him out. I poured a more reasonable gulp for myself.

Conversation was not a problem with Rutherford. All one had to do was listen to him prattling on about his favourite subject : himself. At supper time, he regaled me with stories of his exploits as a pilot. He had forgotten (if he ever knew) that I had captained a Wellington during the war. For my benefit, he undertook to describe the anguish and delight of being a pilot. He said a lot of stupid things which, mixed with a few authentic details, led me to believe that he probably could manage something like a Caudron Luciole. No, he didn’t have a plane in England, but rented a Curtis Robin for a week whenever he ventured into Kenya. I let him talk and talk. He had a strikingly beautiful face with tanned skin, pale blue eyes and a Clark Gable style moustache. His black hair was carefully groomed. He was wealthy, in top physical condition, supremely confident and quite elegant ; even if this elegance was, to my mind, something of a caricature, especially the dark red scarf tucked into the open collar of his white shirt. He must have attracted a certain type of young woman, and would probably fall prey to a splendid-looking b***h who would waste all his money.

Very early, the next day, a black 15/6 Citroën (they were all black, anyway) parked next to the Morgan. A young mechanic, with a smile from ear to ear, got out and ran up the steps to the terrace. A tow truck was showing up in a loud concert of metallic clangs. The young man handed me a set of keys and the Citroën’s registration document, then hopping into the truck’s cabin, drove away. My new car had arrived.

I had to put up with Rutherford’s sarcastic remarks. He had appeared behind me, wearing a superb grey and purple dressing gown, and smoking a Cohiba Mini. He thought that a young man like myself should not have bought an old man’s car. Ah ! If, like himself, I had known what it was like to fly a plane, I would have insisted on driving a more stimulating vehicle. I could have explained patiently that his little red toy, which I knew very well, and had driven in England �" and fully appreciated �" could never be compared to the astonishing performance of a 15/6, especially if driving fast on winding roads, but I would have wasted my breath. I might even have been tempted to give him a demonstration. However, I was firmly determined not to fall for that sort of teenage weakness. At any rate, even if I had wanted to, it would have been impossible. In those days, car engines had to be broken in gradually. You drove very slowly for the first 1,000 kilometres, then, step by step, you would increase your speed until you could really open up, which should not be done until you had about 3,000 Km on the odometer. To ignore this procedure would have damaged the engine irreparably.

So, instead of talking about cars, and as soon as I could place a word in, I mentioned the two children who had died the day before. Rutherford was very confident and reassuring : within a few days, he assured me, everything would be back to normal, and kids would be able to go anywhere, anytime, in complete safety.

At breakfast, the day after, he reiterated that his car was more fun than mine, and added for my benefit that his cognac was older, his clothes of a better cut, his mansion bigger, his rifles more powerful, and also that he had more servants. He was wrong on all scores but one : I really had to find a replacement for René, if only to be fair to the other three members of my staff.

 

The next few days were rather extraordinary. It was almost as if the beast had known that Rutherford was around. It had decided to take up the challenge. There were lots of sightings, but worst of all, the hyena (if it was a hyena) started to kill again. If Rutherford and his late-model, state of the art telescopic rifle were in Le Coudray, the beast was spotted near Sallines. If he rushed to Sallines, a little boy was killed in Panycé. Once in Panycé, Rutherford would learn that a teenage girl had been decapitated in Erclé.

On two occasions the victims had been children of some of my tenant farmers. I had, of course, been present at the funerals. I felt so powerless when facing the grief of people I had known from early childhood ! It made me feel, at times, as if I couldn’t breathe. I wasn’t the only one. The mayor of Ploerdon admitted to me that he was now almost scared to show up at these funerals. He could feel the silent hostility of a population who thought that he had not done enough. “People expect me to solve all their problems” he complained one day as we were walking slowly out of the cemetery. “I’ve even had a tearful man complaining to me that his wife had wasted their savings at the races. As for the beast, I’ve organised hunting drives.” he went on. “I never thought we’d find anything, and we haven’t.”

The beast was playing with Rutherford like a cat with a mouse. It was spotted, or worse, it killed a child ten kilometres  from the place where Rutherford lay in ambush. If circumstances had not been so tragic, I could have said that the animal had a sense of humour. What drove Rutherford to despair, as it had all those who had tried before him, was the absence of footprints or traces. There were some, of course, but they were confined to a very narrow space, with nothing noticeable beyond. Hunting dogs were confused. They went round and round as if the beast had arrived and gone by hot air balloon. 

At night, Rutherford had calmed down somewhat. Frustrated, exhausted, he would go to his room, take a shower, change and, with a lugubrious look on his face, come down to have dinner with me. After dessert, we would have cups of tea, but also cognac, even if it wasn’t old enough in some people’s view. Occasionally, we’d play chess. Rutherford was so certain of my inferior status in every walk of life that, for our first game, I made him check mate in five minutes. His jaw dropped, but I must do him justice : less confident, he played better, and I didn’t win a single game after that. It improved his mood. One day, he sat back, looked at the chess board without seeing it, and whispered, then shouted : “There is more than one. There are at least three !”

I was sure that he would try to justify his fiasco by blaming someone or something else, but suddenly, I saw that he was right. He was indeed the best shot I had ever met. He could be boastful, mythomaniac even, but at the same time experienced and clever. I felt a vague gush of sympathy for him, something which, I knew, could never turn into friendship, so deep were his psychological problems. I also started to understand why some women had been attracted to him. Having penetrated his shell, they had found a vulnerable, uncertain, suspicious human being who, like all of us, was eager for love. He was still single, and could not, like me, mutter the excuse of a three-year detention in Germany. He had spent the war in a British embassy on some tiny Indian Ocean colony. I could only imagine that whatever attraction women could have felt for him had been promptly shattered by his pomposity. On that particular evening, he went to bed without finishing the chess game.

The light was fading. Soft and silent rain had finally started to bring relief to the vegetation. Fresh, wet smells from the forest and the lawn were intoxicating. Thrushes and blackbirds were singing wistfully through this long-awaited dampness, and from a faraway church came the haunting rhythm of a muffled death knell. A more peaceful and bucolic moment would have been hard to imagine. Yet, at the same time, the beast, or one of the beasts if Rutherford was correct, could have been stalking its next victim.

I kept wondering if it wasn’t very much the way people lived in communist countries : savouring the moment while refusing to admit that, without rhyme or reason, it could be destroyed… always conscious of being in danger… their peace as tenuous as a dream, and liable to crumble into the nightmare of gulag incarceration and torture.

 

Rutherford left the next day. He had been here for a fortnight. He asked André to load up his luggage. The rain had stopped and a gentle sunlight was creeping forward again. Rutherford took off with a certain panache : the Morgan top folded down, a loose white scarf around his neck, blue and white cap firmly stuck on his forehead, butter-colour driving gloves and gold-framed sunglasses. As he left the gravelled yard, he gratified us with a royal wave of his right hand. I never saw him again. I was relieved to watch him go, especially as it had meant two weeks without Véronique ! And yet…

 

 

 

Chapter V

 

A few days later, I found a replacement for René. I had placed an advert in the newspaper Ouest-France. A young man, very tall and very slim showed up. We had not reached the years when job seekers would send a CV, then wait to be put in touch. Without a telephone, and even if it meant travelling for nothing, they answered the adverts in person. I thought at first that my visitor was about nineteen years old. He was twenty-nine.

Local males were starting to look more and more like normal human beings, and less and less like scarecrows with missing teeth, greasy hair, inane smiles and the permanent stench of unwashed clothes and bodies. Alain Georgeais exuded cleanliness, real cleanliness, and not just that which consisted in changing shirts when looking for employment. Under his dark brown hair, two dark brown eyes measured you with an unmistakable look of frankness and honesty. He had a long, straight nose, a pointed chin and thin lips always ready for a smile. He walked in a supple, silent way, like a cat, and with the sort of elegance that most people (including myself) cruelly lacked.

Alain told me that he could turn his hand at most things. He had been a mechanic during his national service. Like myself, he’d been a POW. He was sent to work on a farm, somewhere in Bavaria, then on to a small building firm in Tittmoning where, because he had tried to attend mass on Sundays, he was treated well by the mainly catholic population. There, Alain hesitated, and warned me that what he was going to say had meant that many doors had already been slammed in his face. So… “Here it goes…” he said : he had married the daughter of a carpenter. Well… yes, his wife was German, a widow in fact, with an eight-year old daughter. Her first husband had died fighting Montgomery in Lybia.

At this point, Alain had turned as red as a tomato. His features betrayed a mixture of shyness, frustration, despair and anger. Most French people, especially those who had lost family or property during the war, just could not bring themselves to hire a man with a German wife. It had reached the point, he told me later, when he seriously considered going back to Bavaria, and trying to rebuild his life over there.

Viktoria, the wife in question was a slim, delicate and ravishing blonde who was even taller than Alain, or myself or probably anyone I knew. I never dared to ask, but I estimated that she must have been about 1m90 at a time when the average French male was only 1m70, and the average female 1m60. Oddly enough, she was far less traumatised than Alain by the anti-German discrimination, or by insults muttered behind her back when she went shopping. Yes, of course, she did find it painful and humiliating, but she would put herself in other people’s shoes and conclude that it was almost normal. She banked on the benefits of time, but also on her own politeness and kindness, and in that she proved absolutely right. As with Alain in Tittmoning, her attending mass every Sunday also worked to her advantage in Ploerdon. After only a few weeks, her towering silhouette was more of a conversation piece than the fact that she was German. As for Marie-Louise, their daughter, she already spoke French fluently, and with a surname like Georgeais, had not encountered any problem.

I told Alan that he could settle in René’s old apartment above what had been horse stables. It had only one bedroom. Too small for a family of three. Since Alain had said that he could turn his hand at anything : plastering, masonry, electricity, plumbing and God knows what else, I also mentioned that he could add a few other rooms. The upper part of the stables was huge, and he could expand as much as he liked. He would do it himself, of course, and I would supply the building materials.

I am so glad I hired him ! Alain turned out to be a practical and mechanical genius. He not only enlarged his apartment, he also made it really nice-looking, with a balcony and window boxes. Earthenware pots began to line the front of the building. Soon, dwarf rose-bushes, geraniums and oleander plants were festooning the rim of the former stables. 

As a certified mechanic, he lubricated the cars, adjusted carburettors and radiator thermostats, changed the oil, spark plugs, timing chains, batteries, etc. He could also repair them. He got an old 1939 radio going again. He ran over the rooftops to set up a short-wave antenna. There seemed to be no end to his abilities. When I got to know him better, and felt that I could risk a personal question, I asked him why, with so many talents, he had chosen to become a servant. He smiled : “I only have you to please, Sir. Can you think of another trade when you have to please only one person ?” Like Aesop, he was a wise man.

 

Three weeks without Véronique ! One month without Athaliah ! There are limits to human endurance. I had just placed a suitcase in the trunk of my new car when, pestering against fate, I spotted Véronique walking out of the forest. I could not change my mind. André was waiting to drive me to the railway station in Rennes, I had made reservations for a first-class ticket to Paris, but above all Athaliah was expecting me. I may not have outstanding qualities ; I certainly harbour many weaknesses and failings, but I can say with confidence that, regardless of circumstances, I have never gone back on my word.

“Can I go with you ?” Asked Varonique, who had obviously caught sight of the suitcase. She was ravishing in a pearl grey, long-sleeve blouse, a short beige skirt with a wide golden waistband, and her usual boarding school- style white socks and black sandals.

“No”, I answered. “It’s a business trip.”

She burst out laughing. “What a load of rubbish ! I’m not jealous, you know.”

I could not help wondering what my own attitude would have been if she had calmly stated that she was going to spend the weekend with someone else. It would have hurt, but (I am ashamed to admit) I would also have found the situation strangely erotic. “I’m not the jealous type either.” I snapped, then immediately regretted it. She stamped her feet : “If I find someone to f**k while you are away, I will not hesitate.”

“You could ask Ronan.”

“I thought about it, I’ll let you know. Only he’s already got a girlfriend. Pity !”

“Ronan’s got a girlfriend ? Who is she ?”

“Doctor Cotte’s daughter.”

“Any more gossips ?”

“No gossip. The beast made another victim.”

“Oh !”

“Early yesterday morning, it entered a dairy barn while a farm girl was milking. It was still pitch dark, of course. The cows panicked and trampled the girl to death. The beast just ran out without attacking anyone.”

Alain got behind the wheel. I sat down next to him. I certainly did not feel like arguing. Nor did Véronique, apparently. I lowered the window : “You know, I’m starting to get seriously fed up with all this.” She leaned over and gave me a peck on the cheek. I could feel the freshness of her toothpaste through the warmth of her breath, my whole body aching with love for her. She placed her lips close to my ear : “Fed up ? I feel the same. That’s why I would have welcome a change of scenery but going to Paris with you is unthinkable. My father would never let me. As soon as I turn twenty-one, I’ll leave him.”

“And go where ?”

“Here, with you, of course.”

“Is that a promise or a threat ?”

She stepped back, gave me a big smile, hit the roof of the car with the flat of her hand, turned round and started back to the forest. I could have moaned with frustration.

The nightmarish presence of the beast followed me all the way to Paris. The Ploerdon Chamber of Commerce had sent a delegation to the Agriculture Minister. Athaliah insisted on buying the newspaper France-Soir. If the Army had failed, said the minister, he would send a commando of special forces : just a few discreet, highly mobile men who had fought in the bush or in jungles ; men who would not mistake domestic animals for monsters, and who would not trample crops.

 

Forty-eight hours later, fifteen men in crew cuts and dark-blue tracksuits showed up in a small bus, followed by a Jeep and motorcycles, then walked briskly into the Ploerdon police station. They immediately changed into combat fatigues. By mid-morning, they had vanished, and no one could tell where they happened to be, or what they were doing. 

By noon, they had spotted the beast. It was quietly lapping water from one of these tiny lakes, just a duck pond really, of which there were thousands in the countryside, and where cattle used to go and drink before the European Commission decided it was unhygienic. Half a clip from a sub-machine-gun, and the animal was dead. Didn’t take more than a couple of second.

When interviewed by the press, the officer in charge of the commando could not hide his surprise, his irritation and indeed his contempt for the local population. According to him, any farmer with a shotgun could have rid the countryside of the beast a long time ago. Parisian newspapers made a big thing out of it. Cartoonists had a field day.

With the exception of Ploerdon, the whole nation had viewed the incident as a big joke.

The beast was indeed a hyena of imposing girth, a Sahel hyena, much more impressive than those from East Africa. It was as well fed as a pampered cat. No harsh living conditions in barren areas for that one ! The size of its jaws and teeth left you speechless. It was a reminder that these animals can section and crush bones as easily as we can munch on a stick of celery.

The beast was a male, journalists claimed. When autopsied, the male turned out to be pregnant with triplets. A zoologist had to explain that female hyenas display a pair of false testicles and also what looks like a penis, but is, in fact, a distorted vulva. So, not only did we come close to having three more hyenas in the region, but it was also obvious that in order for this female to become pregnant, the presence of a male had been inevitable.

Too late ! The Special Forces had vanished. The people of Ploerdon, humiliated by the remarks of the commando and the guffaws of the national press, did not ask for any more help. If, as had been said, all you had to do was grab a good shotgun, then that’s exactly what would happen. From that day onwards, farmers (and not just farmers) never went anywhere unless they were armed to the teeth. No one dared mention things like hunting season, hunting quotas or firearm permits. The Police, with Ronan’s tacit approval, decided to look the other way. On market days, you would have thought that you had travelled back in time to another continent, and that you were in one of the Wild, Wild West pioneer towns.

The mangled dead hyena was sent to Paris where a taxidermist managed to give it back an almost “human look” as an evening paper journalist put it. Press photographers were rushed to the steps of Matignon Palace, where it was exhibited next to a Prime Minister who gently patted its head, as he would have done to a nice doggy. It was then taken back to Nantes, more precisely to the Natural History Museum where it still looks down on visitors from its pedestal number 2300-T-59.

 

Never short of ideas, Alain suggested that we should protect the château with an alarm system. He was obviously worried about Marie-Louise who was so often in the château that I was in danger of tripping over her. She insisted to go out with me whenever I took the car. I could never say no. I was putty in her hands. In town, those who did not know me thought she was my daughter. In the car she chatted away like a budgie. I was amazed at how clever she sounded. We had become great friends, and I had allowed her to chalk up a “road to paradise” on the terrace, so that she could play hopscotch. While working at my desk, I could hear her, skipping and talking to herself. Sometimes, lulled by her chirping, I really felt as if she was my daughter.

With my fountain pen in mid-air, I would catch myself daydreaming, wondering what it would be like to have a child who would really be mine. It would be a girl, I felt it in my bones… unless it was a boy, of course… or may be twins… two boys or two girls ? One of each ? I wished for a girl because Marie-Louise surrounded me with her naïve charm, but down deep, I knew that I could love whatever Mother Nature would choose to throw at me.

Would Véronique make a good mother ? I suddenly realised that marrying her was inevitable, and that I wished for no one else to become my wife. It hit me with such force that I thought I was living a “road to Damascus” moment. Athaliah seemed too urbanised to ever want children. At the same time, a little voice was telling me that such conclusion was absurd. It’s not because you have good taste, or because you are elegant and highly educated that you cannot become a good mother. All it really meant was that I didn’t feel like having children with Athaliah, whereas Véronique was so alive, so vibrant, so different and so refreshing that even after messing up with fifty per cent of her genes, I wanted to recreate another human being just like her.

 

I had to tell Alain that his proposed system of electrical alarms would never leave us in peace. Indeed, if the beast could trigger it, so could deer, wild boars, foxes et al. Large birds, such as owls, ducks and geese could do the same. We would not have spent a single night without being disturbed a dozen times.

One evening, Véronique rushed in my study, which was both very pleasant and normal behaviour. It was pouring with rain. She had left her beret, raincoat and shoes in the hall. I had never seen her in trousers before ; those black slacks were very elegant. On top, she was wearing a pale-blue turtle-neck sweater. Considering the general shortage of just about anything, including clothing, I could only conclude that, like most middle-class and wealthy people outside Paris, she paid for the services of a good seamstress. A lot of women could cut and sew their own garments �" manufacturers of paper patterns were flourishing �" but I found it hard to picture my little tomboy threading a needle. “Guess what ?” She yelled.

“The Americans have landed a man on the Moon.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. Ronan is getting married.”

“The sneak ! He could have mentioned it.” I had rolled my chair away from the desk. Véronique sat astride my knees, squeezed me in her arms and kissed me. “I know why he didn’t mention it. He is ashamed.”

“Ashamed of what ?”

“She is six years older than he is.” I wanted to say : “So what ?” But I could also understand what most people would think. Supposing that Ronan and I were of the same age, which was more than likely, if Géraldine (as Doctor Cotte’s daughter was called) was six years older than us, she would then be close to thirty-five. At that stage, it didn’t matter, but when he reached sixty, she would be sixty-six. What then ? How would Ronan react ? I remained dreamily silent. Véronique shook me “You look sad.”

“No, not really. I just wondering how they met.”

“At the morgue, of course.”

“What do you mean ?”

“What am I going to do with you ? Don’t you know anything ? Every time the beast makes a new victim, the remains are taken to the morgue. Dr Cotte conducts the preliminary autopsy, then wraps up the stinking bit, and sends them to some experts in Paris. Géraldine is a registered nurse. She helps out. Ronan, as a representative of the Police, must attend the dissections and sign a report. That’s how they met.”

“How romantic !”

“I want to come.”

Véronique was the champion of non sequitur. I felt like saying : “Have you ever heard of foreplay ? How about getting there slowly, and taking the time to enjoy it ?” On the one hand I didn’t want to dampen her enthusiasm with criticism, and on the other hand I sensed that she probably would not have known what I was talking about. Every time I had attempted to be more subtle with a variety of kisses and caresses, I had only managed to make her yell, not with pleasure but with frustration. This time, I didn’t even try. “Keep your sweater on and lower yourself on me,” I said as I opened my fly and freed my penis. She stood up, took off her trousers and panties in one fell swoop and came back to straddle me. As usual, she kept uttering deep, throaty gasps, half laughter, half big cat growls which, I must admit, I found terribly exciting. Burning hot, smooth and generously lubricated, she sank on me easily, and climaxed in no time at all. She then fell on her knees between my legs and gratified me with a blow job that left me dazed, breathless, and with shivers running through my whole body long afterwards.

When we were both normally dressed again, I said : “Tell me about Géraldine.”

“Well, she’s nice. She is slim. She doesn’t look old.”

“Thirty-five is not a canonical age.”

“Canonical ? What does that mean ?”

“It means old.”

“That’s what I said. Are you jealous ?”

“Jealous ? Jealous of what ? Jealous of whom ?”

“Jealous of Ronan because he’s found someone he loves and is going to marry her, even though she’s old.”

I must admit that, right then and there, I felt like a landscape suddenly darkened by a cloud. You don’t have to be a psychiatrist to know what deep-seated wounds can fester in the souls of those who have not been loved by their mothers. Will they ever be loved by anyone ? Are they, in turn, capable of loving someone else ?

I got hold of myself, and symbolically shook my soul like a dog shaking his rain-soaked fur. “I erm… just curious. He never mentioned it to me, you know. And yes, I’m a bit hurt, that’s all. Between men, we normally talk about these things.”

“Do you tell him what we do ?”

“You are kidding me, aren’t you ?”

“I’m not kidding at all. Right now, I want to spend the night with you, but you must promise not to snore.”

“Snore ? Me ? Snore ?”

She shrugged.

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter VI

 

The second beast was killed by children. They were minding cattle, one Saturday afternoon, and had taken with them an impressive arsenal of makeshift weapons : scythes, forks and javelins, the latter being made on the spot. The boys always carried on their persons a sturdy folding knife, an Opinel N°12 which they used for cutting off twigs and small branches, as well as slicing bread, ham or pâté for their picnics. There were ten children, on that day, between the ages of seven and thirteen. At fourteen, they would leave school and be hired on a farm or in a workshop. Some would stay with their parents and help with crops or cattle until they were could take over.

Barefoot, or in clogs, and wearing dirty clothes, they looked, with their unwashed faces and matted hair, like a medieval troop of young vagrants. The boys wore brown or grey short trousers and a white shirt that didn’t stay white for very long, as it was only changed once a week (and even then…). The girls, with braided hair and faded dresses, didn’t look much better. Like the boys, they would run through cattle, yelling at cows that were twenty times heavier than themselves, and hitting the huge rumps with sticks when there was a problem.

Once in the field or the patch of land where the grown-ups had told the kids to take the cows, things calmed down, and boredom set in. Boys played with “tanks”, i.e. crenelated bobbins equipped with an elastic band and a rocker arm. You wind up the arm like a spring, and the tank surges for a couple of meters over minor obstacles, such as shallow pools or gravel. If there were willows about, the boys would make flutes, just as shepherds must have done since prehistoric times. Girls preferred a game of jacks. There were arguments, of course, but never amounting to very much. It was a ritual, like that of puppies pretending to fight.

The dogs, suddenly, started to growl, hair standing straight on their backs. Unsettled, the cows began to moo and panic while going round and round, and bumping into each other. Soon, followed by the dogs, they stampeded out, leaving the children face to face with a hyena. Paralysed by fear, they let the animal leap forward and get hold of the smallest of the boys, a skinny little thing who could not have been more than eight years’ old. Deep silence. The hyena turned round, and walked away slowly and calmly, carrying its now fainted prey, the arms and legs of the little urchin sticking out like the wings of a grasshopper in the beak of a stork.

It took the kids several seconds to come out of their collective trance, but when they did, there was no panic. They collected their strange assortment of weapons and rushed towards the beast. Fate, that day, was on the side of the good guys. It had been raining a lot for several days, and the meadow had partially flooded. The hyena’s hind legs started to sink in the clay, and trying to pull  out only made things worse.

Not knowing what to do, the young hunters stopped and surrounded the animal at a safe distance. It opened its jaws. The little boy fell face down, his head in a puddle of water that quickly turned red while the beast was attempting to free itself. The hyena was now growling and baring its fangs. It also wanted, to turn round to see who was behind its back. The head swivelled left and right, eyes bulging with fear. 

The children opted for a mass attack. Lighter than the beast, and on bare feet, which offered wider support than paws, they did not sink in the mud, or at least very little. On a sign shouted by the oldest boy, they rushed towards the hyena. Those who found themselves in front of the animal’s head froze at the last moment, and stopped, but those who were behind kept going and struck the skin, which they found far tougher than they had anticipated. They only inflicted minor damage, but enough to generate a great deal of pain. The monster uttered a mixture of squeaks and yells which, if it had not been for the sight of their friend lying in blood-stained mud, might have scared the kids to the point of stopping their assaults. Spurred by its wounds, the animal almost managed to free itself from the sludge. The children screeched and backed off, but the suction of dirt and clay won out : the hyena fell back and sank even deeper.

New council of war. The mini-soldiers decided to concentrate their efforts on the eyes and the flanks of the beast : two areas deemed to be more vulnerable than its backside. So, they attacked again. With every charge the children became more daring, more coordinated and more efficient.

Sweating, shaking, their throats on fire, hypnotised by their determination, and torn between enthusiasm and horror, they launched wave after wave against the beast with their forks and billhooks. The hyena was losing blood. It still tried to jump out of the mud, but its efforts were more and more useless. Its cries became less threatening and more begging, more imploring. “It was as if it tried to call its mother” one of the kids later told a regional newspaper. The animal uttered one last howl, a shrill and prolonged howl of pain, fear, revolt and also perhaps, of ultimate capitulation in the face of death.

T’was a silent band of kids that walked back into the village of Ercée, without cattle, without dogs, but carrying the body of their comrade. The episode left its mark on them for a long time. In 1946, no one talked about psychological trauma, but many of those children lost their happy chatter and insouciance on that day. Their eyes looked at you through a screen of sadness, indifference and at times cruelty. Childhood was over. 

 

Marie-Louise rushed in my office through the french windows. It crossed my mind that young ladies from the ages of eight to nineteen could waltz in and out of my house as if they owned the place, and that there wasn’t much I could do about it. Of course, if I wanted to be honest, I loved it. “Doctor Cotte will dissect the beast !” she shouted several times.

She spoke impeccable French, but since she had to learn it after her mother tongue, she also pronounced it with the perfection of a good actress, articulating each syllable more slowly than most children would have done, and adding a touch of exaggeration, as if without raising her voice, she had been addressing, a slightly deaf person. I never tired listening to her, and I would sometimes ask questions for the sheer pleasure of savouring in her answers the sound of my native tongue polished with a precision and a poetic dimension sadly lacking in the local population.

Like everyone else, I wanted to see the beast, but mostly, I was keen to meet that famous Géraldine that Ronan had found so attractive, even if she was six years older than him. So, I ‘phoned, asking if I could witness the autopsy. No problem, he replied. He would drive over and pick me up when everything was ready.

A few hours later, we both got out of his brand new, pale blue Delahaye 135 (the man must have been independently wealthy) that he had parked next to an Army-green garage door hidden behind the Police station. There was no indication that it was the morgue, and I did not even know that Ploerdon had a morgue. We went in through a security gate �" also Army-green �" inserted into the garage door.

Only in movies, especially American movies, had I ever seen a morgue. I was expecting huge, gleaming, stainless steel panelling, dissection tables with their gruesome instruments ; drawers that a policeman would pull before asking a pretty woman or a weepy couple if they recognised the corpse. Shocked, visitors would step back, hide their faces in their hands, then try to look at something else while mumbling : “Yes, that’s him (or her).” Here, in Ploerdon, the morgue consisted of three sections : a minute office, a refrigerated room and a dissection area. The lighting was harsh, and the walls dark brown. The smell of formaldehyde made you choke.

In the cold room, I could, through a glass door, see a gurney covered with a horse blanket. Under the blanket, one could make out the outline of a body : that of the little boy killed by the beast. On the dissection table, the hyena had been thrown carelessly, with blood and mud still clinging to its fur. Its flanks and eyes (one was missing) deeply striated with dark-red cuts. I looked at the paws and wondered once again why their traces could only be found in close vicinity to the attacks.

Two male voices were approaching. A tunnel linked the morgue to the main building of the Police station. Doctor Cotte appeared, followed by a young man, a shy-looking red-hair fellow with awkward, mechanical movements of his arms and legs. The two men had donned white smocks. Cotte, fifty years’ old or so, grey hair and grey whiskers, came towards me with the elegance and confidence of a keep-fit enthusiast. I knew him, of course. I had often seen him in Ploerdon, but since he had not been my physician, I had never been able to put a name on the face.

I had often been criticised �" as had my father before me �" for not taking enough of an interest in the goings-on and problems of our small town. Once, yielding to flattery and pressure, Father had been talked into running for the town council. He never ran a second time, so disgusted was he by the secret deals, the pettiness, the score settlings by means of well-targeted local bylaws, and above all the general avidity of elected officials wrapped in both their greed and their indifference towards the real problems of the population. 

There were other ways of belonging to the region, of course. One could join the circle of church mice, and kowtow to the vicar. There must also have been local Free-Masson or political circles, but my father and I were blissfully unaware of their existence. Some people were accusing us of being too proud ; others thought we were too naïve. May be we were just lazy, but certainly not naïve. We were perfectly conscious that those who wanted us to run for office did so only as a sort of investment, and in the hope of obtaining favours in the future. We knew of large estate owners who enjoyed this sort of thing and felt at home in local politics.

“Evening gentlemen !” trumpeted Doctor Cotte who seemed quite excited at the idea of dissecting the beast. He introduced his red-head sidekick : “Frévin, my right arm.” Noticing my lack of enthusiasm, he went on : “Dr. Frévin is very capable. In fact he is a professor of veterinary science in Maison-Alfort, and he certainly knows more than I’ll ever do about hyenas.”

Cotte was apparently used to a certain amount of reticence on the part of those who met Frévin for the first time, and it’s true that with his jerky moves, elongated neck, badly fitting clothes, bushy red hair and bright yellow socks, the professor looked more like a clown. Cotte could not have known that I was simply disappointed at not making Géraldine’s acquaintance. My involuntary rudeness made me feel guilty, and I shook Frévin’s hand with more warmth than was probably necessary. From that moment, I also lost interest in the autopsy. A heavy coat of lassitude wrapped itself around my shoulders.

For no reason at all, I started thinking of Martinet, my missionary friend. In POW barracks, we had spent hours… or rather days, talking about literature, classical music, philosophy and History. We certainly must have looked like an odd couple : he was a priest, and I, an agnostic ; yet, we were inseparable. Martinet could listen to others, but never did he try to talk me or anyone else into accepting his beliefs… if beliefs there  were. It did not take me long to realise that in his case, religion in general, and priesthood in particular, represented a set of ethical values rather than a collection of certainties. I could see that the shaky historical basis of his religion, as well as its mythological drifting and the creative imagination of its hierarchy excluded the existence of blind faith.

Another reason why Martinet did not fit in with the rest of the clergy, was that he had been a late vocation. He started life as a maths teacher. One day, as he was looking out of his bedroom window, he had seen a priest cross the deserted square stretching in front of his apartment, and he had heard a voice enunciating clearly : “Look : this will be you, in a few years’ time.” 

“Did you really hear that voice ?” I had asked, slightly worried about the mental balance of people who hear voices.

“Yes, really, but not in French, not with words. It was a sort of abstract and universal language, like classical music, but crystal clear.”

Another time, he had confided in me (could I say “confessed” ?) : “At my Niger mission, in Maradi, I only managed to convert three Muslims to Catholicism… three in ten years ! From the church’s point of view, I am a bad investment. I am a failure.”

“And in your own eyes, are you a failure ?” He shrugged. “Truth is : I never really tried to convert anyone. You change when you live in Africa, or to put it another way, Africa changes you.”

I was yanked out of my day-dream when Dr. Cotte and his assistant opened the belly of the beast. A powerful extractor was supposed to eliminate bad smells but was not doing a very good job. Instinctively, Ronan and I placed handkerchiefs over our nostrils. More familiar with the stench, Cotte and Frévin kept going as if nothing mattered. Looking at those two, I started wondering if this kind of waft induced the same interest and the same nostalgic response in them as would horse dung for a jockey, ink for a printer or wood shavings for a carpenter.

Instinctively, Ronan and I had backed away from the dissection table. The physicians were cropping, cutting, extracting things with surgical pliers, then placing them in glass containers or pipettes before labelling them carefully. Every five minutes or so, Frévin would remove his gloves, slip on a new pair, grab a camera and take a photo. I leaned over to Ronan and, out of the corner of my mouth, whispered : “I thought Dr. Cotte’s assistant was Géraldine.”

He whispered back : “Used to be, but Paris insisted on sending an expert.” He grabbed my elbow, made me turn round towards the wall and, in conspiracy tones, went on: “Géraldine and I are getting married.” I stepped back, pretended to look surprised, and shook his hand : “Congratulations. When is it for ?” He shrugged : “When all this hyena business is over, I suppose. What bothers me, though, is the fact that Géraldine adores Rennes. It’s her childhood environment, that’s where all her former school friends are, as well as her favourite shops. It’s where she has an apartment, it’s where she became an independent adult. Supposed I was assigned to Dax or Orange, one day. It would be hard on her.”

“Not if she loves you. Besides, does she own her apartment or is she renting ?”

“It’s a condo, but in fact, it belongs to Dr. Cotte. He bought it for her.”

“So, what could possibly prevent you from keeping it, and then use it as a place for vacation, or even retirement ? It would be your refuge, your symbol of stability, the town where Géraldine has friends and memories. You would always be glad to go back.”

At that moment we heard a strangled howl from Frévin. Cotte started swearing like a trooper. Ronan and I walked slowly back to the dissection table. In his surgical pliers, Frévin, shaking and about to faint, was holding a forearm glistening and dripping with gastric juice, the forearm of a baby. The two doctors managed to calm down. They breathed deeply. Delicately, Frévin placed the arm on a weighing scale, and went back to exploring the stomach of the beast. Every few seconds, he would start shaking again, and had to stop. Slowly, carefully, he extracted a foot, a jaw, shapeless bits of flesh, and cartilage.

Ronan rushed out of the room, and I, for no particular reason, burst into tears. He came back within a couple of minutes. “No one reported the disappearance of a baby. The new-born child must have been left for adoption at the foot of a countryside cross, as is still the tradition for pregnant teenagers… Keeps them from being ostracized by our good Catholics around here. Next time a priest talks to me about charity, I’ll punch him on the nose.” I dried my eyes : “I’ve had it, Ronan. Please drive me home.”

“Of course”. Then addressing the others : “Gentlemen, let’s push the dissection table back in the refrigerated room. We’ll see to it later. From now on, it’s a police enquiry… another one !”

Ronan dropped me at Toucouleur but did not even get out of his car. As I slowly walked up the terrace steps, I absentmindedly brushed my face, and recognised, wafting from the sleeve of my coat, the tell-tale odour of formaldehyde, but also (did I really smell it, or just imagine it ?) the stench of the hyena’s insides. I took all my clothes off before opening the front door. Nanon, with wide-open eyes, watched me cross the hallway in my birthday suit.

“Ask André to burn all the clothes I left outside.” I told her.  

“Even your shoes ?”

“Even the shoes.”

As I was going up the staircase, I could hear Nanon mutter : “This place is turning into a madhouse !”

The next day, a little more relaxed by then, I spotted Marie-Louise on the terrace. Her mother was a wizard at cutting and sewing clothes. She had made Marie-Louise a lovely, light brown dress with dark brown square patterns. I sat next to the child I now considered as my God-daughter. Yes, I did wish to have a little girl like her, one day, but I wouldn’t let my fantasies drift too far. Marie-Louise had real parents, or at least a real mother, and she was very much part of their lives. As always, when observing true love between parents and children, I felt a painful pinch of jealousy. When I was a child, I had only been truly loved by Nanon. I still was.

Marie-Louise proudly showed me an old champagne cork that she had found God knows where, then stuck a finger in front of my face. She had cut it while trying to open a can of corned beef all by herself. I launched into a theatrical display of sympathy, but the smirk on her lips showed that I had gone too far. It was a game, and the devious little tyke had won. Time to talk about something else. “Yesterday, I got the best grade in my form for drawing a map of France. It was a test, you know. We only had twenty minutes, and it wasn’t a copy either. The teacher had removed the map from the wall. We had to remember.”

“Great ! Did you feel stressed ?”

“No.”

She got up and stood at attention two steps down, so that our eyes were level. “Dad says that when we are stressed, adrenalin starts flowing in our bloodstream. So I said to myself : don’t worry, adrenalin with start flowing, and you’ll be fine. That’s how I got the best grade.”

“Good old adrenalin !”

I was getting slightly drunk on the smell of her young body, that very smell which sometimes anesthetises the predatory instinct of some wild animals, and turns packs of wolves into loving families, their adopted human children becoming wild, feral creatures. I also started to understand why some unbalanced women would steal children. I got up. I didn’t want to yield to the temptation of hugging this little human marvel and saying how much I loved her. She probably would not have minded, but it would have hurt deeply, giving me the feeling that I was betraying my own childhood by aping something that had never happened to me.

 

 

 

Chapter VII

 

 

“Nanon, would you pack my suitcase, please ? I need a change of air. I’ll be away for a week.”

“A whole week in Paris ? Dear God ! Did you finally decide to marry Athaliah ?”

“Nope ! But I’ll just phone her to ask if it’s all right to spend a week with her. I’ve never done that before.”

 

Athaliah was surprised to see me on a Wednesday. We had arranged to meet late afternoon outside her apartment, as she was just back from her law office. She was wearing a dark-blue trouser suit, very executive, very strict, but she had softened the general impression by choosing under the jacket a pink turtleneck sweater in fine wool. “Were you expecting to catch me with my Wednesday lover ?” she asked as she unlocked the door to her apartment.

“I must admit : I never thought you’d have one. Very arrogant, of me, isn’t it ?”

“Not arrogant. Just a bit naïve.”

Once inside, I couldn’t help looking around for signs of another male. She smirked : “Stop it ! I don’t have a Wednesday lover, or a Tuesday lover, or any other day, for that matter. On the other hand… I told you that I’ve had young female lovers during the war.” I remained silent. She went on : “I did mention it, didn’t I ?”

“You did. I haven’t forgotten.”

“I still have one. She was barely fourteen in 1941. Nineteen, nowadays. She’s a ravishing young creature, and very much in love with me. Since, for the sake of conventions, we can’t live together, she would like her father to marry me. He’s been a widower for decades. He is also quite wealthy. Who’s to say that I won’t leave you for those two, one day ?”

I swallowed painfully and took her in my arms. “I have never found you more desirable.”

“Ever wondered if you are not also a masochist ?”

“May be. After all, a woman like you could do anything she wants with me.”

“Except marrying you, of course. Come to think of it, I am probably the more masochistic. I’ve made up my mind : tonight, I’m taking you to a rather special club.”

“Special in what way ?”

“It’s very exclusive : only a dozen or so members. I know what you fancy. You’ll love it. My little friend will be there too.”

“What’s her name ?” Athaliah placed a finger on her lips : “State secret ! How long are you here for ?”

“A few days. I was dying to see you again. I also needed to get away from it all. Toucouleur and Ploerdon give me the creeps.”

I told Athaliah the latest news, including my evening with the dissection of the beast. Athaliah took a long bath and changed into a very short pale blue dress with, printed green and yellow Paisley motifs. Before leaving the apartment, she threw on a dark blue coat. In the taxi taking us to this famous club, I played a little game in my mind, trying to guess the name of Athaliah’s lesbian friend. Danielle ? No : with its masculine connotation, it was all too obvious. Odile ? Yes, why not ? I could imagine Athaliah calling her affectionately my little crocodile. Hold on ! That was too reminiscent of a ferocious predator, such as a hyena. Christine ? I had known a Christine when I was a student. Half French, half Birman, she was the most beautiful girl I had ever seen. Like a gust of wind catching the foliage of a tree, and making its branches moan, she calmly walked through the countless frustrated sighs of male students. A Chinese scholar who looked about twelve years’ old, but was much older obviously, as he was preparing a PhD, had the rare privilege of being loved by her.

Our taxi stopped at the end of a small, cobble-stoned cul-de-sac protected from traffic by bollards. More stone pillars lined the street. They still had iron rings for tying horses. There were no sidewalks in front of the wealthy-looking houses. Geraniums abounded on window ledges. You could easily pretend that you were lost in the recesses of a medieval village in Normandy or Burgundy.

Athaliah led me to the last house on the right. She knocked : a light knock and a strong one. Gap. A strong one. Gap. Light, strong, light, light. A, T, L in Morse code : for Athaliah, of course. The peephole flickered. We were observed for several seconds. Finally, the heavy steel door (made to look like oak) was opened by a pale and slim young lady who didn’t say anything and didn’t smile. She simply waved us in. She closed the door behind us and signalled that we should follow her. She was wearing a long-sleeve Prussian-blue silk top tucked in a denim skirt so short that, as we went up a steep staircase, I could occasionally catch sight of her white panties. 

What a convoluted building ! We followed a narrow corridor lined with lugubrious dark brown wallpaper. We then turned left and went up a few steps. Left again, then up another flight of stairs, and we finally found ourselves in a vast living-room decorated in the Art Déco style of the nineteen thirties. “Don’t say anything” Athaliah whispered in my ear. “No hello, no introductions, no handshakes.” There were already two couples on the couches. They were sipping sweet white wine. Athaliah and I sat down on yet another sofa. The three settees were arranged in a rough semi-circle. Facing them was a dark green armchair. Intimidated by Athaliah’s warnings, I hardly dared look at the other couples. They were elegant, good-looking people, a little older than me, perhaps. The young lady came back and handed us two glasses of sauternes. She then sat in the armchair. Even with her legs firmly set together, it was possible to spot a tiny white triangle of underwear. With her forearms resting on the sides of the chair, she closed her eyes and leaned backwards. Athaliah grabbed my hand. The girl’s blouse was heaving slowly and deeply as if she had been running and was now catching her breath. The silence was unbearable. There was tension in the room, and I could feel my own chest yearning for air. Athaliah was squeezing my hand so hard that it almost hurt. At one point, she uttered a faint moan.

The girl got up slowly, and for the first time, gave us a little smile. I naïvely and stupidly thought that she was going to offer a refill of sweet wine. Instead, she lifted her skirt. Athaliah was pressing my hand against my thigh, as if to emphasise her warning : don’t do anything, don’t say anything. Always in slow motion, but without the vulgar twists and turns of professional strippers, she lowered the panties, let them fall to her ankles and nimbly stepped out of them. She then sat down again, legs wide open this time. I was so surprised, and felt so outside my everyday cultural background, that I did not experience the slightest sexual excitement, and certainly no erection. It did not keep me from admiring the magnificence of her thighs and a vulva whose pink inner lips were all the more exposed that her pubis was totally and perfectly depilated. However, when a drop of white liquid started seeping out her vagina, it suddenly brought me back to the world of here and now.  Realising that the girl was actually on a sensual, erotic high of her own, helped me imagine what she must experience. I threw a quick glance at the other spectators, but their eyes were riveted on the young lady. I felt like some rough-hewed boor dropped by accident in refined surroundings. I made a conscious decision to relax and accept things as they were, enjoying the moment without spoiling it with some inner form of questioning.

As in a languorous dream, the girl lowered her hands and half opened her labia. She remained thus for several seconds, then started, very gently, to move the index of her right hand over the clitoris. I started to relax. The other persons in the room had ceased to exist ; so had the rest of the world. Anything surrounding this masturbating youngster appeared like one of those soft-focus backgrounds that are meant by photographers to enhance the clarity of the main subject. If someone had patted my shoulder, I would have lurched and yelled like a sleepwalker waking up in a strange place.

The ceremony, as indeed it was a ceremony, went on at a wonderfully, but also unbearably slow pace. I now understood how and why some civilisations had ritualised and sacralised erotic exhibitions. They were both a symbol of our human nature and a way of surpassing it, a way of tentatively approaching the mysteries of the universe. The young lady let her labia close again. They were now swollen, and looked like petals of tulip pushing their ways through a spring bud. The girl had closed her eyes, and tilted her head back. Her fingers started moving faster, sometimes up and down, sometimes from side to side. Her chest, which was almost flat, heaved in and out with slow, ample breathing under her blouse. I can’t tell how long it lasted. Time stood still through this mixture of torture and delight.

When the girls’ stomach started to quiver, we could see that she was close to an orgasm. Her cheeks had gone bright pink. She opened her mouth, and inhaled noisily as if she was suffocating, but she did not utter a single moan. She closed her thighs on her hand. Her whole body shook two or three times. She smiled and got up, signalling that the evening was over. We all got up as well. Like a white magnolia flower fallen on a lawn, she left her panties on the green carpet of the room. I was gazing at them dreamily, when Athaliah yanked me out of my contemplation. 

Without saying a word, we all got down to the ground floor, and out in the mews ; all of us except the girl, who locked the door behind us. The other two couples slithered out of the narrow street. Athaliah and I were left alone on the cobbled pavement.

“So ?” she asked.

I was completely destabilised. “I don’t understand…” I whispered. “I… What exactly is going on ? Is this really a club ? What is it called ?”

“It’s really a club, and members are all very nice people.”

“That young lady… Does she… how shall I say… does she perform every time ?”

“No : we take turns.”

“What ?” I looked Athaliah in the eyes. She was obviously quite amused, then her face turned serious again. “Listen” she snapped “I wanted to do you a favour, a sort of good… a sort of gift. Don’t spoil it.”

It seemed to me that she had almost said “a sort of goodbye” but had stopped at the last second. “No” I humbly admitted “I don’t want to spoil it.” I was suddenly overcome with feelings of immense tiredness and sadness. I was not shocked by what I had just witnessed. In fact, I admired those who had conceived and organised the club. I also admired the freedom and audacity of the women �" including my wonderful Athaliah �" who displayed themselves in such a way. I could only imagine the thrill they must experience, particularly the first time, when breaking this taboo of our society, and while performing with the certainty that they were in a civilised environment, and that nothing unpleasant or vulgar was going to happen. In truth, I was more envious of the frisson these women experienced than I was of the pleasure they gave their audience. A taxi stopped at the end of the lane. Our young hostess must have called for one.

The morning found me wrapped in the dressing gown I always left at Athaliah’s place. Sitting at the table of her tiny kitchen/dining-room, I was nibbling on a croissant while Athaliah, also wearing a dressing gown, was grounding coffee beans : a scene of perfect domestic bliss. Is that what happiness looks like ? A voice whispered as if coming through a thick, bushy hedge : “Yes, that’s it. Don’t squander this inheritance, as would the prodigal son. Savour the moment. You are quite mistaken about Véronique. She will never provide such serenity. Since we are all programmed to die, then what is happiness, if not simply waiting for death with someone you love, and who loves you back ? Asking for more is self-destructive.”

The grounded beans were now powder, and safely encased in the filter of a coffee maker. An intoxicating smell of delicious gustative anticipation wafted through the apartment. I was allowing myself to be hypnotised by the woolly quality of the moment, while letting my eyes roam over the blue and grey chaos of the neighbouring roofs, the palette of their nuances blending with that of morning mist.

Athaliah thought she was ugly ; it is often the case with splendid women, or so I am told. In the morning, as she got out of bed, she was firmly convinced that she was repulsive. She sat in front of me, poured us some coffee, and I lost myself in the contemplation of her face while trying to understand why she could be so wrong about herself. Shrinking in my daydream to the size of ladybird, I savoured the pleasure of travelling on a skin that had never been spoiled by sunbathing. I skirted the pale blush of lips that reminded me of those on Eve’s face in Jerome Bosch’s The Creation of Adam and Eve. I dived in the light chocolate tint of her eyes, a shade I had not seen in any other woman. The absence of eyeshade and mascara gave her pupils a mysterious and sensual, but also tender and vulnerable appearance. Within an hour, Athaliah would be made up, and would have recreated, without even wishing to do so, what my father had called the “get lost” look, a coat of armour hiding the love-thirsty child curled up in all of us. I took her hand above the table, and gently stroked her wrist with my thumb : “Let’s spend the whole day together.” She laughed softly : “Some people are kept back by a little thing called a job. They are usually those who need it.” I smiled without trying to hide the feeling of sadness that the contemplation of her beauty always created in me. I had never been so close to propose. Would she survive in my château, or like those indoor plants that can’t cope with fresh air, would she shrivel and die ? The main hallway was bigger than her whole apartment. I lowered my head, as would a defendant found guilty. Was I guilty ? Ignoring whether or not I was guilty became harder to bear than a certainty of guilt. I let go of her hand and finished my cup of coffee.

Athaliah got up. Time for her to go to work. She spent half an hour in the bathroom, then went to get dressed in the bedroom. She soon reappeared wearing a dark brown, long-sleeve silk top with open collar and large, light brown buttons ; grey trousers held with a wide belt the same colour. As she was about to leave the apartment, she grabbed a raincoat and a handbag, then turned round to send me a little kiss. Once on the landing, she slammed the door.

I was now alone in Athaliah’s silent domain, a world impregnated with her perfume and the assorted smells of fresh coffee, warm croissants, Athaliah’s brand of cigarettes and, entering through the open window, the faint, coal-scented dust of the big city ; above all, but perhaps only in my imagination, the warm fragrance of our unmade bed. I went back to the bedroom, lay down and pressed my face in Athaliah’s pillow. I wished I could burst into tears. I knew, however, that it would remain only that : a wish. I did not want to die : just perhaps close my eyes and never wake up. 

Sticking out from her bedside table, I spotted the corner of a telephone directory. I sat on the edge of the bed, grabbed it, and absentmindedly leafed through it. Not for the first time, I regretted that I did not know anyone in Paris. I had a painful need to talk to someone other than Athaliah, someone who would act as a mature and reliable third party. I no longer laughed at those who, as a last resort, rushed to a vicarage to talk to a priest.

At the Oflag, Martinet had told me about a cousin of his who had emigrated to Canada in the 1930s. In spite of the depression, he had easily found a job in a factory making chain saws, but felt terribly lonely, with no one to talk to. In desperation, he had made an appointment with a parish priest. He found himself facing a plump little man, barely older than himself, enjoying a cigar in a comfortable, well-heated room. In front of the vicarage, Martinet’s cousin had walked past half a dozen or so American automobiles. Coming from France, where vicars were lucky if they could afford a bicycle, he had lost what little confidence he still possessed. When faced with the benevolent-looking, but silent curate, he stammered, became incoherent, and finally ran away, followed by the puzzled looks of the young priest who had clearly seen him as a harmless nutcase. “What happened to your cousin afterwards ?” I asked.

“He got hold of himself and founded a local advertising agency. He is married, and father of two adorable little girls. He is doing well, and now laughs about his early days in Canada.”

“Does he really ?”

 

I stood up, and decided to shave and shower. I also packed my suitcase and called a taxi. As I was leaving the building, I had an inspiration : Martinet… He belonged to a missionary order called ‘Missions de Lyon’. Historically, they had probably started in Lyon, but I suddenly remembered Martinet telling me that their HQ was now in Paris.

Along with my apologies, I gave the taxi driver a generous selection of banknotes, and went back to Athaliah’s apartment. Fortunately, she had trusted me with a key. I opened the telephone book. And there it was… ‘Missions de Lyon’. So, I too could try talking to a priest, but not just any priest : Martinet, my companion in captivity, my friend. That’s as long as they had not yet sent him back to Africa.

I dialled the number shown in the book. Yes, they said, Father Martinet was still in Paris, but I would have to hurry if I wished to catch him because he was leaving on the train for Marseille that very afternoon whence he would board the liner Ville d’Oran to… Oran, then fly to Cotonou where a generous donator had left a Jeep for him to drive north the length of Dahomey and into Niger. He was going back to his old mission in Maradi. Phew ! I left my name and a message saying that I would be popping in as soon as I could. Martinet would be amazed to see me again, but I could not help feeling that his very presence would bring me some comfort. Why had I not thought of that sooner ? Martinet and I could have spent a lot of time together over the past few months, unless… POW barracks lost in the middle of a German forest are one thing. Our souls were bare, then. Paris in peacetime was another thing altogether, a very different environment ; so, maybe he would feel wrong-footed, and maybe he would look at me with the same round-eyed puzzlement as shown by the little Canadian priest. Like so many others, we were probably back to our pre-war personae : dentist, chicken farmer, naval attaché or street cleaner. Martinet ? An African missionary, and me ? An indecisive, confused land owner.

Finding myself on the landing for the second time in less than half an hour, I turned round to cast a long look at this apartment where I had loved so much, and where I had been loved so much. As at the end of each visit, I wondered if I would ever see it again. I lumbered down to the lobby.

Finding Martinet would certainly revive memories, some painful, some unusual. We might talk about the day when Ligouro, a former circus-performing strong man assigned to the kitchen, had with just one hand, picked a German soldier who was pestering him, and had held him over a vat of boiling water. The prison guard had tried to draw his Luger but was shaking so much that he had dropped it in the water. Ligouro put him back on his feet. The soldier dashed out of the kitchen and came back two minutes later with a couple of guards waving submachine guns. Ligouro went with them peacefully. We all thought that the Kommandant would make an example of him, and that we would have to line up and watch the execution. In fact, Ligouro returned a few hours later, and went back to work as if nothing had happened. It turned out that the Kommandant had spent four years in Paris as a university student, spoke perfect French, and was a circus enthusiast. At the Winter Circus, he had watched Ligouro pull a train carriage with his teeth and perform other spectacular feats of the kind. The guard who had persecuted Ligouro was never seen again.

Not all memories were so entertaining. In 1944, the Germans brought in a few dozen Russian prisoners, a mixed bunch of soldiers and civilians, a ragged assortment of men and women. They had been parked in a meadow surrounded by barbed wires, and simply left to die of thirst and hunger under the icy November rain. A few well-intentioned, but naïve French prisoners, started lobbing cooked potatoes over the fence, but they soon had to stop. The sight of these emaciated human beings fighting to the death over a mud-covered potato soon became unbearable. Every morning, some of us were requisitioned to go and remove the dead.

In the barracks, we had stopped talking ; we just whispered. We had also stopped playing cards. We felt guilty of being alive. The end came as a sort of selfish relief. The last survivor was a young woman. She could not have been more than fifteen years’ old. Kneeling in the mud, her hands bleeding as she clutched the barbed wire, she kept staring at us with wild, haunted looks, while breathing faintly ; then at dawn (but which dawn ?) there she was, reduced to the state of an emaciated corpse. With her half-closed eyelids and her jaws wide open, she looked like a crow caught in electrical wires. No one cried. I didn’t either ; but nowadays, when I see her in my dreams, and when my eyes look deep into her eyes, I wake up with a jolt, tears running down my cheeks.

If we had been in a monastery, Martinet would have received me in a parlour, but missionaries are not monks, and so, we met in a dark, large, comfortable living-room with magazines, a big radio set and a well-stocked bar. From the nearby kitchen came the stomach twisting smells of a dish of lentils. Leather couches and armchairs lined the walls. When Martinet appeared, I burst out laughing. I had never seen him in a light brown cassock and a black belt. He laughed as well. This time, I did not repeat the mistake I had made when deciding not to hug René : I took Martinet in my arms and we embraced for several seconds. He then went to fetch two balloon glasses and a bottle of single malt whisky. “I say, you guys live rather well in religious orders.” I quipped.

“We accept what people give us, which is not always what we need.”

“What do you need, for instance ?”

“An electric generator for my mission. Of course, that’s a little more expensive than a bottle of whisky.”

“I’ll ‘phone some people I know, and you will find a generator waiting for you in Marseille. You can add it to your luggage.”

“That’s great ! Thank you. I don’t like to pester my friends, you know.”

“You don’t want the generator ?”

“Of course, I do. Don’t be silly. By the way, how did you find me ?”

“Well, there we go…” I poured my heart out. It almost felt as if I was in a confessional, and as if I had been seriously guilty of something. It was the first time I could relate all the recent happenings at Toucouleur. It was also my first opportunity to describe my own feelings and reactions. With Ronan, it had been different. I had been living through all this, I was in the middle of it. Here, I could survey the situation from a distance : it was like the difference between a war and how historians describe it. The children’s fate had touched me far more than I had realised, especially the death of little Jeanne. I could clearly recall the thickness of her glasses, as she raised her myopic eyes to greet me with affection whenever I visited Besson Farm. At a deeper, less easily admissible level, remained the feeling that most of these children had never really been loved. I know that the love parents bestow on their children is universal. You also see it in animals. Yet, I had never seen parents play with their children around Le Coudray Chapel, for instance, be it before or after the war. I didn’t know of any who had been taken for walks in the forest or the countryside, so as to awaken their sense of wonderment at the contemplation of Nature. On the other hand, it seems that almost every time I had witnessed some form or interaction between adults and kids, the latter had been told off. It was as true in town, in shops or on market days, as it had been in farms. Even when they were not openly criticised, it was always : “Do this, do that. No, not like that, you idiot.” The voices were harsh and authoritarian, like those used to scold an unruly dog. Ironically, the only persons I had ever heard talking to dogs in an affectionate tone, were Marjeval and his daughter ; also poor René, of course. Horses fared a bit better from country folks. Wives and children must have been jealous.

I talked, and talked, at times blowing my nose when tears threatened. I became aware of it and, slightly ashamed, came to an abrupt trop. Martinet kept looking at me with a patient expression on his face. I was suddenly scared that, bad ecclesiastical habits coming back to the surface, he should launch into a discourse on prayers, grace and what not. Martinet was too clever to fall for it. He should be elected Pope, I thought. This concept made me laugh. “Sorry, old chap, you must be bored stiff by now.”

He never bothered to answer, but instead changed the conversation : “I’m very familiar with hyenas. Marouf, my sacristan, is a Muslim. Go figure ! I do hope he’s still alive because he was quite old in 1940. In the evening, he used to sit just outside the town limits, with an assortment of bones. Hyenas would gather around him, act as if they were discussing the matter between themselves, and finally convince one of them to approach Marouf and delicately take with her teeth the bones that he was handing out. He even managed to get them to collect some from his own jaws. They’ve never done him any harm.”

“They are not so considerate in Ploerdon. They kill children.”

“Oh, they also kill children in Maradi.” He stood up. “Sorry, Émile, I have to go. My train leaves in less than an hour. Thanks again for the generator. We’ll meet again shan’t we ?”

“We will indeed. When I’m married, I’ll take my bride on a honeymoon trip to Niger. Better still : you’ll marry us.”

Then it will have to be Véronique, I suddenly though with a burst of inner laughter. I can’t imagine Athaliah in the Sahel. “Thanks” I added. “Thank you for your support.”

“But I didn’t say anything.”

“That’s what I mean.” And we hugged for the second time.

CHAPTER VIII

 

Once again, I was finding myself in front of Rennes railway station, but the vista had changed considerably over the last few months, almost a year now. Repairs were everywhere, houses being rebuilt.

Passers-by were passing by… left and right, back and forth, as is normal for people in peacetime. For as long as I am alive, this sense of wonderment will never leave me.

Alain had told me about his brother, a very active resistant during the war. He had been captured, beaten up and tied to a post. The firing squad was being assembled, when all of a sudden, the German soldiers dispersed and ran out of the village.

Friends rushed to untie him and help him walk on wobbly legs. Seconds later, General Patton’s tanks were roaring in… ;  hysterical shouts of joy and many happy tears from the population while shady characters were hastily shredding documents in the town hall basement. Alain’s brother was dragged to the nearest café and almost made to gulp a sizeable glass of cognac. He went to live by himself with a dog and two cats in a poky wooden chalet lost somewhere in the countryside. He would spend his time looking after his vegetable garden, his chickens, rabbits, a goat and a couple of beehives. He had also started an orchard. He was almost self-sufficient and didn’t seem to have need of company. His rare visitors often asked : “Don’t you get bored here, all by yourself  ?” He would reply : “How can you get bored with being alive ?”

 

Alain should have been here, waiting for me in the Citroën, but he was nowhere to be seen. I found it odd. He was a perfectionist. Railway stations didn’t have public phones, yet. You had to go and have a drink in a café, then humbly request permission to use the phone, which the barman then dialled for you. At the end of your conversation, he talked to the telephone company (which belonged to, and was in the sole control of the Post Office), and asked how much the call came to : a real obstacle course.

To avoid of all this kerfuffle, I decided to give Alain another half hour before I used the phone, and I went to sit on the sidewalk terrace. It was still very pleasant in those days. Traffic was not heavy enough to smother you in a cloud of diesel particles, and if you wanted to have a nice little chat with the person sitting next to you, there was no need to shout.

Meeting Martinet had cleansed my mind. I felt like someone arriving from a long journey, from Niger perhaps, why not ? I was rediscovering the smells of pastis aperitifs wafting from the bar, but also those of traditional every-day cooking : sole meuniere, veal blanquette, grilled sausages or onion soup, to which you inevitably had to add whiffs of dark tobacco.

I never ceased to be charmed by the elegance of young women, such as those who were then going in and out of the railway station. War rationing had done wonders to female figures : they were light on their feet and slim.

If you could only dismiss from your mind the amount of stupidity poisoning her military, her government and her administration, France remained indeed a beautiful and lovable country. She was awash with examples of scientific, engineering, artistic, literary and cultural geniuses, none of whom wished to go into politics. In the end, it makes you wonder if governing a nation is not, in fact, left to third grade minds and their undignified scrummage for influence and power.

One last look at my watch, and I reluctantly decided that it was time to phone Toucouleur. I was saved the bother by the sight of my car stopping along the sidewalk in front of the café. Alain must have been kept behind by something unforeseen, may be some roadwork. Traffic jams were unheard of. I was surprised to see André coming out of the Citroën, and not Alain as expected. Had something nasty happened to Alain ? A sudden illness ? Had he hurt himself while working with tools ? Had he scampered and left us in the lurch after quarrelling with my mother (who didn’t like him) ?

I stood up, paid for my coffee and grabbed my suitcase. André was coming towards me, looking lugubrious, which did not surprise me since he always looked like that. Without saying ‘hello’, without saying a word, he took the suitcase from me, and threw it in the trunk as if he wanted to break it. I was about to object, but bit my tongue : obviously, something was very wrong. I went around the car : “I’ll drive.”

He shrugged and plonked himself on the passenger seat. I sat at the wheel and got us out of Rennes. The engine was well broken in by then, and I indulged in the pleasure of driving a machine that was twenty years ahead of its time, including American, British and German cars.

Once on open country, I heard a sort of painful moan on my right. I looked at André : hands on his face, he was sobbing. I spotted one of those gravel areas that highway maintenance workers carve by the side of the road ; popular stopping places, night and day, judging by the number of cigarette butts, greasy papers, condoms and whiffs of s**t. I slowed down and stopped next to a pyramid of pale blue gravel. André wiped his eyes and looked at me with such a mixture of despair and anger on his face, that he almost scared me. “I’m sorry, Sir” he gurgled “but this morning the beast killed Marie-Louise.”

Chapter IX

 

To this day, I still don’t know how I managed to get back to the château. I must have been on autopilot. In fact, what remains fuzzy in my mind is not just the drive from Rennes to Ploerdon and Toucouleur : I must include the days, and even the weeks following Marie-Louise’s death.

She did not really have called a burial. Of their daughter, my daughter, our daughter, so little had been left : half a skull, two white sandals, blood-dripping shreds of material from what had been a dress or some underwear, shards of bones, a length of entrails… When Dr Cotte had finished the autopsy (if could call it that), Viktoria and Alain asked for, and obtained from the mayor, permission to bury those pathetic remains behind the former stables. No tomb, no cross. They planted an oleander which soon acquired gigantic proportions, and which they both dreamily contemplated from their bedroom window. Within a few months, they had aged ten years. I urged them to take some time off, but they would have none of it. They chose instead to drown themselves in work. They would accomplish their tasks silently and conscientiously.

I, on the other hand, succumbed to a sort of  madness : a calm, cold, determined madness, a deranged, dangerous obsession. I had to kill the beast. Balancing my budget, managing the farms might suffer, but I was past caring. I had no strength left for anything but revenge. On the other hand, and much to my surprise, I found myself able to spend hours and hours on horseback.

I had never been fond of horses. A few unfortunate encounters during my teenage years had told me that they had a perverted tendency to ditch you none too gently or try to crush your knees against tree trunks. However, in this case, I could see that normal means of transportation, even the Jeep and its ability to drive over rough terrain, would not be what I needed. Like forest rangers looking for moonshine stills, I wanted to be able to progress on snaky, narrow paths of the kind followed by wild boars, deer and foxes : I needed a horse. Being essentially a bad rider, I looked for a placid, good-natured animal. In the end, I bought a 15-year old mare from one of my farmers. She was completely black, but thanks to countryside humour, she had ended up with the name of Snow White.

I soon became very fond of her. Every morning, I would wake up, wash, have breakfast without being conscious of what I was doing or eating. Then, grabbing my best rifle (though not as accurate or powerful as Rutherford’s, obviously), I would head for Snow White’s field. Alain had built her a mini-stable, and also a sort or granary for hay and knick-knacks. He would also regularly rake in the dung into a neat pile which he then used as part fertiliser for bedding flowers and window boxes. Snow White and I would walk, never trot or gallop. However, followed by the corgis, we could go anywhere. My tactic was very different from Rutherford’s. Instead of waiting until a farmer or a child had spotted the beast, then rushing there and, like the Police, arriving too late, I would more or less let the mare wander where she pleased, hoping that her powerful smell would reach the beast and wake its predatory instinct. Of course, Snow White was rather too big a prey for a hyena, especially a hyena without the support of its pack, but it wasn’t impossible that her horsey pong could act as bait.

These were mostly daydreams, almost fantasies. I had others, like tearing apart the owner of the hyena… very slowly. Indeed, it seemed to me that, left to its own device, the animal would have inevitably wandered in a courtyard or a chicken coop, something which apparently had never happened. The beast had to have a master.

I always took with me a rucksack with a Thermos bottle and a packed lunch, which allowed me to come back to the château fairly late in the afternoon. Ronan, my mother and Nanon were taking pity on me. Véronique thought that I was completely off my rocker. At least, they were honest enough to say so. Local people were probably of the same opinion. In the end, no one found it very amusing. Children looking after cows, especially those who had participated in killing the second beast, were the only ones to take me seriously. They would wave when they saw me, asked me to stop, pet Snow White’s powerful neck, fuss with the dogs, and insisted on sharing their own packed lunches. I always accepted, while reciprocating with a gift of oranges. So soon after the end of the war, this fruit was still horribly expensive.

These kids were so thin ! Local farmers were not poor, far from it, but they lived as if they didn’t have a penny to their names : old habits harking back to the Middle Ages when bands of mercenaries and deserters roamed the countryside, pillaging farmhouses, as well as raping anyone in a skirt.

Children were raised without affection or human warmth. I watched them grow up with sadness in my heart. I knew that when they reached puberty, they would start swearing, spitting and smoking ; also drinking themselves legless, just to “be a man” according to the diktats of their tribe. After that, those who managed not to kill themselves on a motorbike, would marry the first girl they got pregnant after half-raping her on a haystack. Their children would, of course, be treated exactly as they had been themselves.

 

While at home, I didn’t feel like reading, eating or doing anything. Raffray and Nanon could have cooked and served the exact same meal three days in a row, I would not have noticed. Véronique kept popping in, but I was unable to please her. What I really wanted was hold her in my arms. She wanted more and was not very diplomatic at hiding her frustration.

Like a twentieth century Don Quixote, I roamed the countryside. My quarry eluded me as would a monster in a bad dream. I was wearing on my heart the colours of my Dulcinea, but she wasn’t an ugly scullery maid transformed into a goddess through the overheated imagination of an idealistic old man ; she was… she had been a real, lively, intelligent, adorable little girl. Like those medieval cavalrymen who hurled themselves at enemy spears while shouting : “Montjoie Saint Denis”, I walked on and on relentlessly and aimlessly, all the while thinking “Vengeance, vengeance !” This kind of battle cry was underlined by the rhythm of Snow White’s powerful shoulder muscles moving me gently up and down while the sound of her hoofs acted as that of an intimidating drumbeat.

Like a jingle stuck in my mind, I kept hearing the conversation I’d had with Marie-Louise about adrenalin. I would torture myself imagining how adrenalin must have rushed into her veins and made her heart panic in the seconds preceding her death, the seconds when she would have clearly understood what was happening. During those recreated few seconds, I became blind and deaf.

“And what about Athaliah ?” Nanon asked me one evening while I was feeding the cats and trying to keep the dogs from stealing their food.

“You’re right : it’s not fair to her.”

I walked to the telephone but didn’t make the call. I decided instead to write a long letter, something I had never done before ; a letter in which I would explain what was going on. It took me the whole evening : I would cross out whole sentences and start all over again. After a dozen attempts and a half-full wastepaper bin, I managed to come up with an acceptable message. It turned out to be a therapeutic exercise. We had never written to each other. I used the telephone as rarely as possible. So did everyone else. Most people were put off by the inefficiency of a nationalised company with no competition and exorbitant prices, but also by the fact that you had to go through a switchboard, and that any gossip-minded operator could listen in.

On the twenty-seventh of June 1946, the sky was pregnant with storm clouds. They sieved the sunlight and turned it into sickly yellow tones. Insects were both irritating and irritated. Swallows were flying close to the ground. The air was warm, tired and sleepy ; humidity hovered around 90%. Snow White and I had reached a little-known neck of the woods called Burnt Farm ; but it wasn’t a farm. As for “burnt”, no one knew the reason for the name. It had to go back hundreds of years. In fact, it was a hilltop surrounded by woodland, and also the site of a former Roman garrison, itself probably erected above prehistoric remains.

I had been there only once before, when I was perhaps no older than thirteen or fourteen. I was treated to an unforgettable scene. Two young and pretty women “from the city” as people say around here, had left their automobile at the foot of the hill and climbed to the top with a picnic basket. Above some black trousers, one of them was wearing a dark-red turtleneck sweater. The other one had on a gray short-sleeve blouse with printed dull-pink butterflies chasing each other, and a skirt of the same colour, but without the butterflies.

Hidden behind trees, I was holding my breath. Their picnic lunch was over. Bits and pieces littered the grass. The girls were standing. Red Sweater was holding a bottle of white wine, while Gray Blouse handed a glass over to her, but the closer she got to the bottle, the higher her friend would lift it. They were laughing. They were also tipsy. I could not get over it. I had often seen drunks, of course. There is no shortage of those around here, and they had always been men. But women ! Especially such elegant, good-looking women !  And yet, their drunkenness was not in the least spoiled by vulgarity. The girl holding the glass stuck her tongue out, and the other one pecked the tip of that tongue with her lips, then stopped teasing, and poured some wine. Now calmer, but still unsteady, they went back to their picnic basket, and started cleaning up the grass around it. Every once in a while, one of them would say something that I could not hear, and they would both be shaken by silly, uncontrollable laughter. It got worse if they dropped something by mistake. My head was on fire. I was at a loss. My boarding-school friends had sometimes mentioned words like “poofs” or “queens” when referring to homosexuals, and then sniggered, but they were talking about men, of course. I must admit that the idea of women in love with other women had never crossed my mind. On that day, the partial discovery of a new and wonderful female world offered something magic. My little universe exploded. Our sexual education was… well, there wasn’t any. When I also learned that women could masturbate, it came to me as another shock. How could they masturbate if they didn’t have a penis ?

The “good old days” were not that good.

 

Amazed at how clearly I remembered the scene, I dismounted. On that far-away day, I had not waited for the young ladies to go back to their car. I had slunk back as silently as I could. I was now walking to the spot where they had been standing, and I caught myself stretching my arm forward as if trying to touch their ghosts. Within a few inches, I could have found again the spot where they had opened their picnic baskets. I let go of Snow White. I no longer bothered to tie her to a tree or a post. When I stopped somewhere, she would drift away and graze, then trot back like a dog if I called her. But for the grazing, the corgis did the same.

I sat where the two lovely ladies had been sitting. With my back against a soft, grassy ditch, I was very comfortable. I got a sandwich and the thermos bottle out of my rucksack. I also got the book I was reading at the time : Benjamin Constant’s Adolphe. While munching on the bread Nanon had prepared for me, I let my eyes wander over the canopy of evergreen and deciduous trees stretching out below me. The region was thickly settled, yet from my vantage point, you couldn’t see any house or church spire. Row after row of treetops extended from my feet all the way to a woolly, hazy horizon. I had no problem imagining the feelings of loneliness, or even anguish that must have overwhelmed a Roman sentry, especially at dusk. “What the hell am I doing in this God-forsaken place ?” the poor bugger must have thought.

I had propped my rifle against the side of the ditch. From time to time, in order to keep the corgis from pestering me, I would throw them a bit of crust or boiled ham rind. After finishing the sandwich, I dug into the rucksack again and found a jar of strawberries. Lovely ! I grabbed my book, and started to read, letting myself be hypnotised by Benjamin Constant’s magnificent, poetic prose without even trying to analyse its meaning, just I could have let myself float over the recording of a Gregorian chant. Less interested in Adolphe than they had been by my lunch, the dogs decided to take themselves for a walk. Snow White was nowhere to be seen, but I wasn’t worried. There I was, alone in these wild, magnificent surroundings of which I could, either in reality or through the power of imagination, savour the mysticism, just as prehistoric men must have. For the first time in weeks, I had freed myself from my mission and my obsession. I was sinking in the comforting softness of the moment…

A sneeze woke me up. Slowly, I opened my eyes, and it took me a few long and heavy seconds to realise that the figure sitting in front of me was not that of a dog. Stultified, we kept looking at each other like two pillars of salt. Animals stared at by a human being usually end up lowering their gaze. To save face, the hyena decided to lick one of its paws. It then raised its eyes again, and with its head cocked to one side, seemed to be saying : come on, do something, throw a stick, let’s play ! I realised that, on the one hand, I should have been scared to death, and that on the other hand, I was not.

Slowly, very slowly, I stretched my arm towards the rifle, grabbed it, and pulled it back to me. The hyena followed my move with interest, but nothing in its attitude indicated that it was getting worried. Still very slowly, I took two cartridges out of my belt, and inserted them in the firing chamber. The noise, when I snapped the gun back together, briefly worried me. It was not a loud sound in itself but given the silence around us (and by us, I mean the beast and I), it boomed like a clap of thunder. The animal’s tiny ears swivelled towards me, and it stood on all four. Was it about to attack ? I’ll never know. At any rate I did not give either of us a chance to find out. I one fell swoop, I raised the gun, aimed and fired. A light gust of wind blinded me by bringing the white smoke of the shot back to my face, and in that short moment, fear, real fear overtook me, underlined by the soundtrack of an angry flock of crows. 

I sprang up, and my fingers instinctively started searching around my belt for a new round, but there was no need. Thrown brutally onto one side, its chest mangled into a dark red mess, the hyena was dying with uncontrollable jerking of its paws, while exuding an acrid smell of burnt hair, exposed flesh and gun powder. Paralysed, hypnotised, I kept staring at what I had done while a rivulet of blood was winding its way towards my boots. I suddenly felt very cold. I shivered. In this flesh, I kept thinking, there is a little of Marie-Louise’s flesh, and in this blood, a little of her blood. The thin red streak finally reached my shoe as if to seal a deadly pact between the beast and me.

I shuddered with disgust, and walked away briskly, then started to run. I could feel my heart beating painfully. I could hear its pounding. Behind me, there came another pounding, a drum roll, a hammering, a powerful breathing. I was about to yield to a sense of panic, when I realised that it was only Snow White trying to catch up with me. Seized with hysterical laughter, I collapsed on the grass while the corgis licked my face.

After I managed to calm down, the four of us walked back slowly and pensively to the house. It was only when I got in the hall that I realised that I had left my rucksack and my gun behind. I immediately went to the phone. With slightly trembling fingers, I dialled the police station and asked in a strained voice to talk to Ronan. No, thank you, I didn’t wish to go back to the ‘scene of the crime’ with him, or witness the autopsy. However, if he would be good enough to bring back my gear…

I had been drunk only once in my life, and then only by accident, so to speak : one drink after another during a lively conversation with friends. The ensuing hangover was enough to keep me from doing so again. Still, on that day, I really felt like getting drunk. I helped myself to something like a triple cognac but did not pursue beyond that.

What I found depressing was the realisation that ‘avenging’ Marie-Louise had not brought me any pleasure, or even satisfaction. My only comforting thought was the certainty that this particular hyena would not kill children anymore ; the satisfaction of a job well done, perhaps. And yet, it was a sad, disillusioned sort of satisfaction, the sort that created the heaviest feeling of loneliness I had ever experienced. I was beginning to understand the process of psychological disintegration affecting those who go amok in Malaya, or makes Scandinavians howl like wolves on a deserted road at two in the morning, or again indulge in what Martinet had described as ‘that mad half hour in the tropics’ when you find yourself the only Westerner for miles in the middle of Africa : a temporary bout of madness, and a necessary solution to intense stress.

 

 

PART THREE : AFTER THE BEAST

 

 

 

CHAPTER I

 

As life took on a normal turn again, I started to wonder if the idea of getting married did not start to make sense. Nanon and Mother were all for it, naturally. My male ancestors, including my father, had married when their own parents had found a suitable match, i.e. a girl with money or land (preferably both). Love had nothing to do with it. The bride’s only duty was to provide a male heir to the throne, preferably two, should the first one meet with untimely death or prove mentally deficient. She was also required to be faithful, a constraint that did not even enter the mind of the husband. He enjoyed a constantly renewed supply of housemaids and farm girls. The legitimate wife, brought up in the most complete ignorance of anything sexual, would shrivel into a world of religious melancholy, unless of course she decided to ignore the rules, and imitating her husband, adopt a libertine way of life.

I did not want that sort of marriage. Breaking with tradition, I wanted someone with whom I could share more than a bed, and in Véronique I thought for a long time that I had found her.

Following the death of the third hyena, I soon discovered that I was eager to have sex again. Unfortunately, while I was trying to get closer to Véronique, and offer her what I thought had been her lifelong ambition, she was getting more and more distant, and came to see me less and less often.

She had always made love with disconcerting speed, but also with cheerful enthusiasm and vivaciousness : bear hugs, purring with happiness, passionate kisses… After the death of the last hyena, Véronique showed up strictly to seek an orgasm. She was as frenetic as ever, but without any tenderness. Nor could she be bothered to make me come afterwards. Intercourse had evolved into something as mechanical as if we had used a d***o. I could see that she was both depressed and distraught.

“Come on, Véronique, what’s going on ?” I repeatedly asked. No answer. In those conditions, I refrained from mentioning marriage. I had been mistaken. Vanity on my part, no doubt. I was not offering what Véronique had aimed for all her life. After René’s funeral, she had stated that she loved me. I had not been dreaming, but it seemed that she had changed her mind. I was no longer her future husband : just a toy that she used when she felt like it. She acted as if the rest of the world did not exist. More than once, Nanon had to turn round and walk away when she found us intertwined on my office couch in ways reminiscent of a wrestling match. Looking in Véronique’s gray, dull-shielded eyes, I kept asking what the problem was.

“No problem. Everything is just fine.”

 

At this stage, I must skip over a few unimportant weeks. On second thought, they were very important, for they allowed me, along with the local population, to recover from a nightmare and start living normally again. Fear of the beast had gone. People started to relax. And yet, I will always wonder if this relaxation was not tinged with regret. Peace… peacetime, as after the Germans had left, could seem rather bland after so much fear and excitement.

In order to add some spice to everyday routine, people started to complain about their neighbours. Someone else’s fruit tree was protruding over a fence, old ladies grumbled about short skirts on teenagers, a dog had chased a farmer’s sheep. And, talking about sheep, why hadn’t at least one of them, or a goat, or even a chicken or a duck, ever been snatched by the beast ? It did not make sense. Ronan and I had often mentioned the oddity of this situation. Another oddity, of course, was the lack of tracks where attacks on children had taken place. I could see that Ronan, like myself, harboured the nagging feeling that it wasn’t over yet.

Ronan had not left Ploerdon, which people found rather odd. “He likes it around here”, they would joke. “Especially Raffray’s cooking” others added with a smirk. He and I spent more and more evenings together, for which I was very grateful. We could confide in each other. I used to whine about problems between Véronique and me. He waxed about the days when he would enjoy married life with Géraldine. We had become each other’s psychological support : as good a definition of friendship as any.

Encouraged by my father, I had kept the habit of showering, shaving and changing for dinner. I am not talking about tails, silk cravat or bow ties, but proper shoes, clean trousers and white shirt with cufflinks and an ordinary tie. No jacket, but a tie clip, so as to keep the tie from inspecting my plate and tasting the soup or the sauce. Ronan did the same. I admired his slim, supple, elegant figure. Clothes fitted him so well ! He had narrow hips, was very strong, and moved like a gymnast. I could never equal his willpower : every morning, a twenty-minute jogging run, followed by push-ups and other forms of torture, a cold shower and, to top it all, controlled breathing and meditation in the lotus position ; then, twice a week, close-combat training in the police station gym. When invited to the château (which was more and more often) he would arrive around seven p.m., always dressed in one of those pairs of cream-coloured trousers he seemed to favour. His brown shoes were always impeccably shiny. Like me, he wore white shirts, but no tie. He would just let loosen the collar button.

With the exception of Ronan’s frequent visits, I had resumed previous habits ; not the pre-war habits, only the pre-beast ones. Given Véronique’s decreasing level of interest, I started seeing Athaliah again, twice a month, roughly. Managing my farms and the resources of the forest also kept me busy, not forgetting the resupplying of the wine cellar. The year 1946 turned out to be an exceptional vintage. I was young enough to envisage being still alive when my purchases would be fifteen years old or more and would then have reached their peak. Meanwhile, I occasionally treated myself and Ronan to a bottle of Château Cheval Blanc 1928 miraculously saved from the Germans and the Americans by the cunning initiative of André and René.

Above all, I basked in the fluid pleasure of knowing that the telephone would no longer ring to tell me about the mangled remains of a child, somewhere around Ploerdon. With the french doors wide open, I would often daydream and occasionally doze off. An unread book on my knees, I would let my eyes wander over the terrace, then through to the leafy branches of the forest, and beyond, to the sky, to the clouds. My dogs asleep at my feet, the cats curled up on a couple of cushions… Who could have asked for more ?

I had kept Snow White, giving her a decent form of retirement. Alain took care of her. Like the rest of us, he was bobbing up to the surface. I even heard him whistle once or twice. Viktoria’s demeanour was harder to determine. She rarely left their apartment. I had, of course, started making the rounds of my farmers again, and inspecting the fire lanes in the forest. Although I sometimes took the Jeep, I usually turned to Snow White for these visits. Besides, they both had their specific uses. The Jeep was more adapted to entering farm yards where big dogs, trained to be mean, would make the mare nervous, whereas she was ideal for small country lanes, some no wider than a footpath, and also the steepest and roughest parts of the forest. Snow White was always pleased to see me, or she would not have trotted over to the gate when I showed up.

Like a smoker who stops, and rediscovers smells and tastes, or like someone emerging from a long illness and enjoying his convalescence, I was often surprised by life’s humblest features : the smell of freshly polished furniture, Raffray’s wonderful cooking and the soft contact of my pets’ furs ; also, though less and less often, the fresh and sensuous fragrance of Véronique’s body which I appreciated all the more, since I had convinced myself that she was about to leave me. She never used perfume. All she had to do was stand in front of me, and I was overwhelmed. I would breathe in her intoxicating mixture of smooth, warm skin, soap, talcum powder, freshly pressed cotton plus �" imagination or reality ? �" some subtle emanations from her pubis.

Occasionally, I liked to go shopping with Raffray, and I am glad of it. I didn’t know it at the time, but I was storing up memories from the displays of non-industrialised food. Supermarkets, outrageous taxation and bureaucratic harassment had not yet eliminated small shops. You could still find something called a grocery with its smells of spices, salt-cured sardines, codfish and a whole array of mysterious products. In charcuterie shops, pâtés, rillettes and all kinds of fresh and dry sausages formed a veritable olfactory symphony. Meat had taste. We had not yet reached the stage when you can see fifty cows, knee-deep in mud, on a field that could only feed a dozen. Intensive farming of pigs and chickens was still a thing of the future.

The summer of 1947 showed promises. The beast was dead, truly dead. We all kept referring to the beast as if there had been only one, not three. I our minds, they were all the same, and formed a sort of evil trinity.

Happiness is not the light at the end of the tunnel, it is only the light between two tunnels. We were fast approaching the next one.

 

 

 

Chapter II

 

Telephone call. In a sober, almost robotic voice, Ronan informed me that Marjeval had died. I was not surprised. Surrounded by all that fat, his heart had probably given up. Ronan was still on the line. I had a feeling that he had more to say. “What did he die of ?” I asked.

“He died in his bed, but it’s a murder. I’ll see you tonight.”

“A murder ?”

“Yes. See you tonight, all right ?”

Puzzled, I hung up. No doubt in my mind : we were faced with a case of score-settling between resistance fighters and a collaborator. So, he had died in his bed… Poisoned ? Strangled ? You can also shoot someone who is lying in his bed, of course.

Now that Marjeval was dead, I felt free to call Véronique, if only to offer my condolences. As she answered the phone, I could hear her breathing deeply. She was not crying. A tomboy like her never cries, of course �" I knew that �" but her voice had turned thin and white, and in strangled tones that I had never heard before.

My gut feelings were that I didn’t want to go to Marjeval’s funerals, but I would have if Véronique had asked me. It would not happen for a while, anyway. Autopsy, police enquiries… It would all take time. At any rate, Véronique had been adamant : she did not want me there. I had no idea how long it would take her to recover, assuming she needed recovering. The only times she had mentioned her father to me was when she had asked for my help, and also when she said that he would not let her go to Paris by herself. Psychologically, I was quite prepared to stay away from her, or if she wished to do so, to see her only as a friend. I would talk to her, I thought, and tactfully find out where she stood.

The way we deal with a person’s death is a very private experience, and each of us has a different story to tell. Age or illness are irrelevant. If my mother died, I thought, what would I feel ? They say that we are often sorry not to have shown more warmth and love to the dear departed while he or she was still alive. I could not say that I had not tried. There was no way I would ever feel guilty on that score. And what if I died first ? Would my mother harbour any regrets concerning her attitude towards me ? I would never know, of course, and at any rate I was not keen to conduct the experiment.

Ronan rang the bell at seven. Nanon opened the door. She told me later that he looked like a chastened dog. “Ask Émile to come out.” He had whispered. “We were to have dinner together, but after what I have to say, he may not want my company anymore.”

“What’s all the fuss about ?” I grumbled. I had followed Nanon and reached the door. Ronan lowered his head. He would not look at me. “Véronique has been arrested.” He painfully managed to say between clenched teeth. “She’s been remanded in custody. If you don’t want me to come in, I’ll understand.”

“Don’t be silly ! Come in and let’s talk.” I must admit that while we were making our way to the small drawing-room, I kept wondering what could possibly have led to Véronique’s arrest. Idiotic reasons crossed my mind : could she have nicked something from a shop ? Had she hurled insults at a policeman ? Was she caught hunting out of season ? Ronan finally looked at me, and I could see that what he was about to say would be serious. I stopped him before he could start : “A drink first. Then we’ll sit down and you can explain. What will you have ?”

“A cream sherry if you have any.”

“Course, I have.” I poured two and sat facing Ronan. “Well then ?”

“Véronique has killed her father.”

“What ? Are you sure ? If it’s a joke, it’s not funny. How… how do you know ? How did she do it ? Did she confess ?” In lighter circumstances, I would have fully expected him to reply : “Which question would you like me to answer first ?” But obviously, he was as stunned as I was. Good job I was sitting down. Had I been standing, my legs would have turned to mush. Ronan and I remained silent for a long time. I was slowly digesting the news. “During the autopsy” he went on “we found bleach in Marjeval’s bloodstream… bleach and air bubbles, both awkwardly injected with a big veterinary syringe. We found the needle and nozzle in Marjeval’s bedside table. There was bleach in them and Véronique’s fingerprints all over.”

“It doesn’t make sense. Are you telling me that he stretched his arm out and said : Go on darling, kill me !”

“He was as drunk as a lord. Probably didn’t feel anything. That’s what’s so sad about it : she’ll never be able to claim that it was self-defense.”

I felt like throwing up. I reached for my drink with trembling fingers. “Why did she do it ?”

“She didn’t say. We’ll know more after the investigation and during the enquiry.”

“I’ve lost my appetite.”

“So have I.”

And yet, force of habit, we both headed for the dining room where an onion soup was waiting for us, followed by an absolutely delicious mutton stew. I felt ashamed to be enjoying the food. So did Ronan, I suppose, as we did not exchange ten words the whole meal. As he was putting back his coat before going out, I asked : “Can I go and see her ?”

“No. No one can go and see her while interrogations last.”

“Do you conduct these interrogations ?”

“Of course not. I’m a detective, not a prosecutor. I just sit with him in case he needs details or precisions about the enquiry.”

“Please, keep me informed.” He nodded and plunged in the darkness of the courtyard. Intrusion-detecting spotlights did not yet exist, of course. I just heard his steps on the gravel and the slamming of the car door.

Véronique would soon be in remand custody while waiting for her trial, and that would be my opportunity to go and visit her. She would be in Rennes, at the women’s penitentiary, the largest of its kind in France, and it was less than 100km from Ploerdon. How would I know about visiting hours, or even visiting days ? Was I going to end up in a filthy waiting room with cigarette butts on the floor ? While sitting on a hard bench, would there be, next to me, sinister-looking husbands and brothers ? How about sisters and mothers with harsh facial expressions, gaudy makeup and cigarettes dangling from their lips ? Should I bring Véronique flowers or chocolates as if she’d been hospitalized ? How should I dress ? Would people in the queue or the waiting room find me too posh ? Would they resent me, insult me, hit me, even ?

And what about Véronique ? She would find herself in the company of irrational, violent characters. Fortunately, in those days, prisoners did not roam the place as they do nowadays, and inmates were reasonably safe in their cells. Also, Véronique, slim and petite as she may have been, was energetic and willful. She was a hunter and a wild child, not easily intimidated.

In the end, I was torturing myself for nothing. Ronan let me know that Véronique did not want visitors : no one, not even her state-appointed lawyer, and not me… I felt tears prickling my eyelids. I had long been wondering : does she or does she not love me ? I had my answer, and it was painful. She was not in love with me. For her, I had been nothing more than a fling.

 

 

Chapter III

 

June 1947, three years after D-Day, two years after leaving the Friedrichafen prison camp. The suffocating heat of the Rennes courtroom smelt of wax, dust and sweat. Without Ronan’s influence, Alain and I would never have been able to secure a seat, especially one so close to the defendant. Spectators had started lining up as early as 4 a.m. In the days that followed, it got worse.

It was a very small tribunal. Most people had to be turned back. There were fistfights. At the gate, photographers feverishly changing flashlights on their enormous, semi-spherical flash-holders, jostled none too gently to get snapshots of the prosecutor, the defense attorney, the witnesses, the jury, and if they were very lucky, of Véronique herself as she was being whisked in or out in a Black Maria. 

Inside, the judge had quite a job coping with spectators. He threatened several times to have the room cleared. Véronique was called to the witness stand. A few of her answers made the crowd low like a herd of cattle. Some were shouting abuse. There were moans of despair. Alain fainted. He was carried outside. When he came to, on the courthouse steps, he said he never wanted to step foot in that courthouse again, and frankly, nor did I.

Not once had Véronique turned her head to see if she could spot someone she knew. There was no use, I suppose. The only woman among all these men, she had appeared in a stark, yet elegant black dress that I had never seen on her before, not even at René’s funerals. Whether sitting or standing, she had remained straight and stiff as a rod. Journalists kept using the cliché : ‘Her face showed no emotion’.

Questions, answers, lawyers’ histrionics, ham acting, fake bouts of indignation, be they from the defense or the prosecution… I felt like throwing up. Everything had widened the chasm opening between myself and this slip of a girl, full of laughter and defiance whom I had kissed intimately, stroked intimately and known intimately ; whom I still adored, and had meant to marry at some point, but who now seemed to be rejecting me.

She had admitted everything, accepted all the accusations. At the risk of jeopardizing his career, Ronan managed to get me a carbon copy of her full confession and final statement. Through the sentences of this stark written account, I was left to imagine for myself all the silences, hesitations, interruptions, tears perhaps… No, not tears, not Véronique, not ever.

 

Véronique’s final written statement, with occasional interruptions from lawyers :

 

During the war, my father had become friends with general Otto von Neigemen, a Wehrmacht officer who had been billeted in our farmhouse. He had a young aide-de-camp called Hermann who was good-looking, and always clean, courteous and charming. We became lovers. Hermann spoke fluent French. Before the war the general had been a vet. From the bombed-out zoo in Rennes, he had rescued three baby hyenas, no bigger than rabbits. He had bottle-fed them. It was quite touching, really. When you watched this, you could easily forget what they were and who he was. He had called them Karl, Rudolf and Hjalmar, three male names because, he said, all hyenas are male at heart.

They quite naturally grew up with the dogs. They had the same behavior : playful, affectionate and very clever. One day the general gathered all of us in the living-room ; by ‘us’, I mean my father, myself and Loïc, Julian and Laurent, our three farmhands.

“I go now. Please be careful. Soldaten arrifink behind us are SS. Ferry tifferent, ferry, ferry tifferent. Zo, no with SS talk, no laugh, no telling chokes apout Chermans. Hide little tarlings. If Gott vants, I fetch them come when peace vill have.”

He shook our hands with tears in his eyes. Hermann gave me a long hug. He too was crying. He would write, he said, but we never heard again from either of them.

“Did you love Hermann ?”

Yes and no. I knew he was the enemy, and I knew he was married, but he was the most civilized man I had ever met. Like the general, he had a shower or a bath, and changed his underwear every day. He brushed his teeth after every meal, was always impeccably shaven, with splashes of Cologne afterwards. I wasn’t used to any of that. He also read a lot. I never saw a man read so much. He must have gone through all the books in our library, books my father and I had never touched. He insisted that I should read them too. At first, I did so to humor him, but then, quite unexpectedly, I got hooked on Homer’s The Odyssey, would you believe ? Also Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Henri Barbusse, Maurice Genevoix... We would talk about these books afterwards.

Hermann also gave me a taste for cleanliness. I shudder when I think that before he came along, I only had one bath and one change of underwear a week. He made me proud of being clean. Trouble is : I started to resent the presence of unwashed people. I had not smelled them before.

Hermann tuned up the piano. It hadn’t been touched since my mother’s death. He played and sang some of Schubert’s lieder. Wonderful. I didn’t understand a word of it, but sometimes, inexplicably, they made me very sad. I felt that he had burst the bubble in which I lived. God knows that I love inland Brittany, country life, hunting, fishing, the forest, Nature, dogs… but Herman made me aware that there was another world beyond all that.

When the soldiers had left, Father kept looking after the hyenas. We were amazed at the way they started crushing bones. The older they got, the bigger the bones that they could tackle. If you give part of a cow’s femur to an Alsatian shepherd, he will gnaw at it for hours, then possibly go and bury it, whereas a hyena will crunch it and actually eat it.

And after the war, they started killing children, is that it ?

Not exactly. I mean yes… and no. Father had trained them to attack, but no more, no less than what we had done with the dogs. It’s important that they should obey, important that you should be able to control them.

Did he train them to attack children ?

He did.

But for what purpose ?

Well, you know, it’s not easy to say. Father was deteriorating. He often went to the brothel in Rennes, and he would bring back a couple of girls. When he was finished with them, he would lend them to the farmhands. As time went by, he wanted the girls to be younger and younger. One day, apparently, he asked Loïc to take a hyena with him, and attack la Denise. I don’t know why : a sort of dress rehearsal, I suppose. I didn’t know anything about it.

Was he planning to rape la Denise ?

I shouldn’t think so.

I’m getting confused. What do Loïc and that hyena have to do in all this ?

Loïc is one of our three farmhands. They had helped Father train the hyenas, just as they had helped him train the dogs. Loïc was the most forceful of the three. The other two were scared of him. It took me a long time to understand what was going on, but little by little, the farmhands started talking about it, especially when they were drunk. After little Jeanne’s death, we got rid of the dogs, but we kept the hyenas. Our farm is built on the remains of a medieval castle and a whole network of tunnels. Some are several kilometers long.

Medieval castle ? Tunnels ? Do you think I’m an idiot ?

I’d rather not answer that question… Sir ! If you ask historians, they’ll tell you that it was common practice. Clisson Castle, for instance, was linked to Nantes Castle by a 25-kilometer tunnel.

Impossible ! They would not have had the technology.

Of course, they had. I’ll show you where they are. I’ll show you. They were not very deep, so that when these tunnels went through forests or bushes, their architects had planned for  well-camouflaged holes in the roof, allowing people to breathe.

All right, all right ! So, you are telling me that your hyenas lived in the tunnels ?

In sections that were still practicable, yes. Sometimes Loïc took them in his van. He would let them go, hide behind some vegetation and watch them kill a child. They would eat most of it. They gorge themselves to bursting point, you know. In the evening, Father and Loïc would drink, laugh and yell like madmen, knowing that the police would never find traces. You see, they drove the van with perfectly smooth tires, then slap on another set of wheels when they got back.

So, you knew what was going on ?

Took me a long time, but little by little, I realized what was going on.

But why ? Why all these killings ?

They were diversions. I heard Loïc tell the other two farmhands, that on the day Little Jeanne died, Father had first kidnapped her, brought her here, and raped her. He then dismembered her, gave most of it to the hyenas, then told Loïc to go and dump the rest not far from her farm.

That would explain why we found so few remains. You said that hyenas stuff themselves silly, but surely they could not have eaten a whole human being.

True. One day, Father and Loïc followed a young lady who had just arrived in the region. She had found a job in the biggest dairy around here. They knocked her unconscious with a truncheon and shoved her in the back of the van. When she came to, in one of our basements, Father let the tree farmhands have their way with her. “They deserve a good time.” He said. I think he mainly wanted to implicate them so totally that they would never be tempted to accuse him of anything. Loïc told me that the day after, Father tied her up to a workbench, and raped her while cutting off her head. You can probably still find traces of blood on that workbench. He then asked Loïc to go and dump her somewhere, and take a hyena with him, so that she would eat at least some of the body. But he only had time to get rid of the head. He could hear people talking and laughing, so he drove away. I don’t know what he did with the body.

Did this kind of thing happen several times ?

I suppose so, especially at the time when Mr. d’Astell had hired one of his cousins to track the beast. Father thought it was hilarious.

And what about little Marie-Louise ? Did your father have something against Mr. d’Astell or the Georgeais couple ?

No, it was an accident. The hyena had escaped and taken itself down to the château.

Why didn’t you tell the police about all this ?

Are you serious ? Me ? A minor and a female ? No one would have taken me seriously, and Father would have killed me.

We would have protected you.

You never would’ve, you filthy hypocrite !

Mind your tongue, young lady, insulting a magistrate is a serious offense.

Oh, really ? I’m facing the death penalty. So, what are you going to do : kill me twice ? Your kind is well known for its contempt for women, what women say and what they think. You would have said I was crazy, good for the loony bin, and Father would still have killed me. So, I’m saying it again, I’m shouting it again : you are all a bunch of pompous, disgusting hypocrites. Now stick that in your a******s, and stuff a cork on it !

All right, all right, let’s not get carried away.

Good Lord, no : let’s not. Shall we all sit down and have a nice cup of tea ?

Miss Marjeval, if you wanted to get rid of your father, why did you wait until all three hyenas had been killed ? If you had done it sooner, you would at least be able to say in your defense that you had wanted to spare some human lives.

I made up my mind when I saw the way Father and the farmhands were beginning to look at me. I just knew I’d be their next victim.

Were you not concerned about the reactions of the farmhands after your father’s death ? They could easily have turned against you.

No. I didn’t think they would ever know I had killed him. I didn’t think there would be an autopsy. After all, he died in his bed. And then, I became their boss. They couldn’t run the farm without me. They can barely read and write. If it hadn’t been for Father, I’m quite sure that they would not have behaved as they did. But maybe they would have turned against me. We’ll never know.

When Mr. d’Astell shot the third hyena, what was it doing over at Burnt Farm’s ?

I don’t know, and no one ever asked me about these things.

Did your father harbor any ill feelings towards Mr. d’Astelll ?

No. He saved the lives of his mother and her staff. It’s also thanks to him that Mr. d’Astelll’s house did not go up in flames.

 

 

Chapter IV

 

Véronique got life without possibility of parole. Whatever the reasons, they did not take kindly to parricide in those days. Had she been an adult, i.e. if she’d been over twenty-one at the time, she would have been taken to the guillotine. As for Loïc, he was indeed discretely executed on a hazy morning, in Paris. The other two farmhands got life. They were lucky to avoid the Cayenne Penal Colony, which was closed that year. I suppose they were released some twenty years later, but “frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.”

Without an heir, Marjeval’s farm went to the State. It was sold by candle auction, and I got it for a song. Local farmers, estate owners or businessmen saw the place as being evil and harbinger of bad luck. It also meant that I got back my 1935 Hispano-Suiza. I don’t use it, and not just because it only does ten miles to the gallon, but I do lend it free of charge to all my farmers when they have weddings in their families. And talking of farmers, I had quite a job finding a tenant for Marjeval Farm. I lost count of the number of times when I heard : “I’m not superstitious but…” In the end, I recruited a young English couple who wanted to come and live in France. They adapted quickly while bringing with them a few ideas of their own. The move was a success.

As in the days when Véronique was remanded in custody, I tried to go and visit. I was wasting my time. She would not see me. My only comfort �" relatively speaking �" was that she would not see anyone else either, not even Ronan or some well-intentioned social visitor. A prison chaplain was rudely told what he could do with his offer of spiritual help. Same attitude regarding letters : they were all sent back. After a while, I got tired of trying.

At the end of the war and occupation, and after two nightmarish years, everyone had changed. I had, of course, but so had Alain and Viktoria and all the other couples and families who had lost a child. I also thought of the kids who had killed the second hyena. The vast majority of the population had not been directly concerned, yet it had left a mark upon their hearts and souls.

Ronan had left. He still showed up now and then, but his work was in Rennes. On the other hand, I did make the acquaintance of his fiancée. She was a small and slim woman with short, straight, black hair. As I had already heard people say, she looked much younger than she really was. The first time she and Ronan showed up together at the château, she displayed her enthusiasm with childish abandon. She immediately fell in love with the library and the stuffed bear on the landing, but kept her highest praise for the great Bordeaux, Burgundy and Rhône wines she spotted in the cellar. I then knew exactly what my wedding present would be.

Géraldine and Ronan tied the knot some eight months later. I gave them a case of 1927 Château Haut-Brion and another one of 1945 Aloxe-Corton, the latter to be kept for a few more years before drinking.

I was, of course, invited to the wedding. No religious ceremony, but designer frocks for the bride and bridesmaids, tuxedos for the men, mountains of flowers and a wedding cake that wasn’t just for show : it was also delicious. The town was inaugurating a spanking new town hall. The mayor, hopping with delight, was saying to anyone with a camera : “Take a photo of me : this is my first wedding in our new municipal building. I want some memories !”

Back at the château, I then made up my mind : I would go and ask for Athaliah’s hand. There is nothing like a lovely wedding ceremony to urge a bachelor to tie the knot. Athaliah… Did I want to marry her because there was no one else ? Possibly… somewhat. I knew I had been too demanding. As Lorenzo da Ponte wrote in the libretto for Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro : “Don’t expect Mother Nature to assemble a woman who will fit in with all your criteria.” He said it in Italian, of course, which sounded even nicer. I also have in mind Guy de Maupassant who said that love was the most beautiful thing in the word, but that we often spoil it with unreasonable demands.

I knew that Athaliah could (or would) easily get bored at Toucouleur, but I was determined to reach a compromise, and let her spend as much time as she liked in Paris, and that included evenings at her erotic club, as well as her affair with the young woman who ran it. I would even, if she so wished, buy her a more spacious apartment where she and I would not be too much in each other’s way. Besides : how did I know that she would not adapt to life in the country ? I only assumed so. I may have underestimated her. The more I churned these thoughts in my mind, the more determined I was to propose.

My decision was taken : I would go to Paris as if I had planned to spend an ordinary weekend with Athaliah. Nothing special. I would then take her to Cartier to choose a wedding ring, and to hell with engagement and all that it implies. I was really looking forward to watch the smile on her face when she would understand that I meant business, this time. I was going to settle down in just the way Ronan and Géraldine had done.  Mother and Nanon, who had nagged me for years, would be delighted. I was surprised to find out how relieved I felt. Suddenly, I was walking on air.

On the Friday following Ronan’s wedding, I took the train to Paris. The air was unusually cool for the season, the sky clear and deep blue. First, I went to the Ritz, as usual, then in late afternoon, I asked for a taxi and gave the driver the address of my future wife. “My wife !” It sounded great. It felt soft, permanent, stable… even if I knew full well that for a lot of couples, this was not the case.

As I slowly climbed the dark staircase of Athaliah’s ancient apartment building, I could not help feeling uneasy, with a heavy pressure in the pit of my stomach. Something was not right. Got it ! The smell of boiled cabbage. I have nothing against that smell : it entices you to tuck into a good old, satisfying country meal with pork ribs and sausages. In fact, I love it, but somehow, it did not fit in with the style of the condo. It also reminded me of my first day back in Brittany when, outside my late friend Roger’s building, I had been assailed by the same smell. I knew that it did not necessarily come out of his former apartment. It was, nevertheless, a whiff of broken dreams.

I stood by Athaliah’s door. The smell did come from that place. I checked the number on the door in case I had absentmindedly climbed to the wrong floor. I was startled by the sudden opening of the door before I had time to knock. A short, slightly overweight woman, hair in curlers, was staring at me with a frightened expression on her face while tying the belt of her dressing-gown. She recovered and snapped : “What do you want ?” I lost all confidence, and began to stammer : “I… Maybe I got the… the wrong apartment.”

“Were you looking for Athaliah Vincent ?” There was no warmth in her tone of voice, only a little less animosity.

“Well yes… yes, I was looking for her.”

“Then, if one day you learn where she’s hiding, please let me know. I get mail for her, see ? I take it back to the Post Office, but they don’t know where she is either. She should have thought of that before leaving, shouldn’t she ?”

“I…”

“Are you not feeling well ?” Then more gently : “If my boyfriend was as handsome as you, I would never leave without a forwarding address.”

This awkward and unexpected compliment brought me back to earth, and I even managed a weak smile. I apologized for disturbing her. As she stepped back, I leant sideways to catch a glimpse of the apartment. I saw the woman’s look harden. She slammed the door in my face. Slowly, I turned round and faced the landing. I was strongly tempted to sit on the top step of the staircase, lean my head against the wall and sink into a deep sleep. I did not, of course. Back on the ground floor, I stopped in front of the concierge’s frosted glass window. He must have been asked dozens of times where Athaliah had gone. He would not know more today than he did yesterday. And how about that erotic club we had gone to not so long ago ? I had let her take me there without giving it much thought. I might as well have been blindfolded. Even the general area had not registered, and of course, not a single surname or first name had ever been heard. I also knew, down deep, that if I had been able to trace her new address with or without the help of a private detective, she would not have agreed to see me.

I walked for a long time without paying attention to my whereabouts. I walked till my feet hurt, and I found myself on the banks of the Seine. The day was dying, the air cool without a whiff of wind. My mind was as numb as that of a man who suddenly learns that he is ruined and utterly broke. He keeps wondering how it is possible that he should not be dead, or at least very ill ; wondering how he can still be breathing and wearing the same clothes he had on before hearing the terrible news ; why things around him have not changed, and why they keep looking so perfectly, so cruelly, so sadistically normal.

I sat on a mooring bollard. Eventually, like a flat wave lazily stretching out on a beach, I was invaded by the strange sensation that I had lived through a long dream, and that I was only now waking up. The war, the POW barracks, the beast, Rutherford, Véronique, Marjeval, even Ronan, none of it had been real. Athaliah had also been a dream : she was too beautiful, too perfect. She was not of this world. Would I meet her again one day ? Possibly… and, of course, at the least expected moment. Ten years from now, twenty years from now, sitting in a restaurant, or watching an international air show, I would feel that someone was looking at me. I would turn round and spot an elegant woman showing some early signs of old age brought about by too much money, too much makeup and too many boring days with a husband who would no longer love her. Would she ignore me, or on the contrary, would she, her cheeks on fire, drift towards me, engage in conversation and suggest we resume our affair ?

A horrible thought assailed my mind : could she have committed suicide ? I caught myself scrutinizing the flow of the Seine. Was I going to watch a modern Ophelia floating down the current, her face like wax, her wedding dress dotted with orange blossoms, the soggy material gently dragging her down ? What sort of future had I prepared for myself ? It felt as if my only reason for being born and living in Ploerdon had been to kill a hyena. Will it be all I would have to show for at the end of my life ? That, and the uncomfortable thought that the bombs dropped from my Wellington had probably killed hundreds of people. How can doing the right thing weigh so much on your shoulders ?   

I started drifting towards another dream : the appeal of an ordinary life of a kind that would appear boring on the outside, but a life enriched by two orchestras and two gods : Peace and Quiet. What is a normal life ? I suspect it does not exist. Is there a single person, picked at random, who has not witnessed or endured some form of tragedy ?

Maybe I would find a beautiful and interesting woman at a garden party. That would imply my throwing such parties or being invited to them. It made me feel like the guy who says : “If I won the National Lottery, I would…” but he never buys a ticket. All right then, let’s fantasize : I am meeting a beautiful and interesting woman at a dinner party. We are seated facing each other. We exchange looks. I can hear a little voice in my head whispering : “Don’t confuse wishful thinking and reality.” Still, I find the nerves to tell her that I would like to see her again. The next day, I give her a telephone call. She agrees to meet in ‘neutral territory’, not too far from her place, but not at her place. We would then take a stroll along a tow path by the canal or on a country lane before drifting on to a tea-room. A week later, I would invite her to lunch at the Château. Raffray would surpass herself and come up with dishes worthy of a Michelin restaurant. The unknown guest �" who would not be so unknown by then �" would modestly ask to be driven back to her house. One month later, we would be lovers, having discovered a correspondence of tastes between us, as well as a delightful, tender and erotic complicity. What next ? Why not marriage ? And because nothing can stop us when we drift into the world of fantasy, why not twin daughters, two adorable little girls to compensate (but could they ever replace ?) that one little girl whose loss had broken my heart. 

Love, deep love, is not a frequent occurrence. I had deeply loved twice, so far. As a child, I had loved Nanon. I still did. As an adult, I had loved Marie-Louise. That’s all. What about Véronique ? Yes, I could say that I had loved three times, but I also wanted to pretend that it had not happened. It also became clear to me that the indifference Véronique had shown towards me was my Nemesis, the Greek gods’ response to the indifference I had shown towards Athaliah. I bent over, took my head in my hands and uttered a long moan of despair and shame.

I was startled by the sudden appearance of a dark shape in front of me. Was I about to be set upon by a violent scumbag ? No, the shape did not move. Besides, scumbags are cowards : they do not attack alone.

“Are you all right ?”

Just then streetlights were switched on along the docks. The man standing in front of me looked as if he was in his seventies. Good quality clothing, but not tailor made. I noticed his ample camel hair coat, black shoes, as shiny as those of an American Marine, and his red and white tie on a cream-colored shirt. Under a bald cranium, he presented a round, smiling, friendly face with refined features such as a small, straight nose and elegant lips.

“Yes” I mumbled. “I’m all right, thank you.”

“You know,” he added, “One of my friends went for a walk along the docks, the other day. He slipped on an enormous pigeon dropping, lost his balance, fell backwards and shattered his skull on a cobblestone. It was hours before anyone spotted him.”

“No bird dropping.”

“In fact, I wondered if you were not planning to commit suicide.”

“No, but I was thinking that someone very close to my heart had, perhaps, done so.”

“Because of you ?”

“Not impossible. Very pretentious on my part, isn’t it ?”

He shrugged : “There is no logic in suicide, only a tidal wave of emotions, so…” He turned round as if to leave, then changed his mind : “Come along, let’s have coffees or something stronger. You do look as if you need a stiff drink.”

Hell, I thought, I’m being picked up ! I blurted : “Are you homosexual ?”

“Dear me, you don’t beat around the bush, do you ?”

“So, are you or are you not ?”

“I’m not. And you ?”

“No way !”

“Phew ! That was close ! How about that coffee, then ?”

His name was Antoine Mesurier. We became friends. He would describe himself as an insignificant retired schoolteacher, but there was nothing insignificant about him. He loved literature ; French literature of course, but also Italian, English, American… He would have made a wonderful conman, as he inspired instant confidence and trust. I learned that he lived in a small Paris apartment, and spent most of his weekends with his lady friend Valérie. I had painfully reflected on what it was like to be normal. Well, there he was : normal and happy.

 

In time, I calmed down, and resigned myself to a new stage in my life : a problematic youth, the war, the beast, Véronique’s prison sentence and the missed opportunity of marriage, all this was now followed by the routine of managing my estate with occasional visits from my new set of friends : Ronan and Géraldine, Antoine and Valérie. The latter turned out to be a perky, vivacious young lady… young in spirit and young for Antoine (i.e. close to fifty).

Antoine clearly adored Valérie. He really did, but managed to do so without stupidity and without oversentimentality. He would highly approve her choice of clothes, underwear (although he admitted to me that, on that score, he could not have cared less), perfumes, books, magazines, indoor decoration, holiday destinations… In short, he let her be who she was and wanted to be, something so many men never manage to do.

I did not have the impression that I had acted other than lovingly and liberally with Véronique, but I could not help wondering if I had treated her as she fully deserved. This kind of self-flagellation remained rather abstract in the sense that I would never see her again. I did not experience in the pit of my stomach the uncertainty, the suspense, the torture of waiting for her liberation, scratching a notch every day on a bedroom wall as I knew some women had done during the war while waiting for the return of their husbands, sons, brothers... Véronique’s fate was sealed. By her own rejection of visits and letters, she might as well be dead. I was left with a heavy weight on my shoulders : the simple realization that I had fucked up my entire life.

 

 

Chapter V

 

We were now wallowing in the thick fog of existentialist novels and poetry. “Que dois-je faire avec ma vie quand toute la terre est en folie ?” (What should I now do with my life when the whole world is going mad ?), a song that people like Cora Vaucaire and Juliette Gréco were singing in literary cafés.

We are all more selfish than we think we are. Back at Toucouleur I decided that I would not let my feelings for a woman get the better of me : too painful ; which, of course, was a very selfish decision. If I find someone, I thought, it will be purely for pleasure. No more sentimentality, no more merging of souls. Whoever she is, I will never invite her over to the house, which I immediately and painfully realized, like stab in the heart, was exactly  how I had behaved with Athaliah. If only the year before, someone had told me that my love for her had been purely physical, I would have laughed it off. Hanging my head in shame, I now admitted to myself that it must have been so. On the other hand, if someone had accused me of the same hypocrisy towards Véronique, I would have reacted sharply, and then would have had to hold my tears. Two different women, two different worlds. Nanon and Mother were losing hope of watching someone make an honest man out of me. They both kept nagging me : “Who will inherit the château ?” And Nanon would grumble : “The Cat Protection League, I shouldn’t be surprised.” In the mood I experienced at the time, I didn’t think it was such a bad idea.

I bought an apartment in Rennes with the firm intention of using it as a din of iniquity, and sure enough, I found what I was looking for. Ironically, Ronan turned out to be my main (and only) purveyor. In fact, he was trying to rescue battered wives, jobless war widows, or young unmarried mothers that Christian compassion had kicked out of their homes or their village. They stayed at my place, one at the time, until Ronan, who worked in coordination with charities, found a way to kit them up with a new start in life.

Thus I got to know biblically Yvette, a tall, slim, willowy beauty with a pensive, melancholy face. She disappeared one day, and neither Ronan nor I ever knew what happened. She was followed by Célestine, a likeable and intelligent girl. Then came Bernardine, a remarkable woman who could speak two languages fluently beside French. She was followed by Constantine who was energetic, pretty and effusive ; she found a job in a bank. I learned much later that she had gone up the organization and become an executive. I am finally thinking of Amélie, a tiny, slim achingly beautiful young lady with no schooling whatsoever, but whose intelligence and judgment far exceeded what one would have normally expected of her. I could feel myself teetering on the verge of falling in love with her, and I had to resist with the desperation of an alcoholic contemplating a 30-year old single-malt whisky.

These women were easy to live with. I spent many long weekends in Rennes, and I can state in all honesty that I never had the slightest unpleasant argument with any of them. If they did not have Athaliah’s class or education, it was mostly because they never opened a book. Their level of general knowledge was almost nil. Often, they liked night clubs and noisy music. They all made love better than Véronique. They did not act as if they were trying to reach an orgasm between two urgent appointments. And yet, compared to them, if I thought about it, and even when I tried not to think about it, I would have decided every time in favor of Véronique’s fresh, impertinent, unusual and mysterious personality. By the time I had admitted to myself how much I loved her, it had obviously been too late.

According to the ancient Chinese philosopher Siun Tseu, “When you don’t have what you like, you must like what you have.” Did that mean that I should be entirely satisfied with Ronan’s flock of lost sheep ? Couldn’t I try to mingle with the region’s influential families ? I would at least stand a chance of finding university-educated young ladies with a variety of interests and a facility for interesting conversation, but I don’t need a shrink to tell me that if never tried that approach, it was a result of an unconscious fear that I might find someone I liked more than Véronique. I was also painfully aware that there was no logic in this attitude.  

When I thought about the two couples I was close to : Ronan and Géraldine on the one hand, Antoine and Valérie on the other, I could see that they were basically happy. The other couples I had known through the necessities and vagaries of life had not exactly displayed a picture of happiness. When husbands talked about their wives, and vice-versa, I could often detect an underlying tone of irritation, disappointment and even contempt. Unbeknownst to them it said quite a lot about the way they gauged life and each other.

Right now, I felt no disappointment or contempt towards anyone ; not even  Véronique. I had always known she was a free spirit, and I was amazed at how calmly and philosophically I had come to accept it. She was who she was. I had loved her, and I still loved her the way she was. Thanks to that attitude, I was not nearly as miserable as I could have been. Besides, I was experiencing the sort of unexpected and pleasantly renewed sexual encounters that most men can only dream of.

Before the war, Father had taught me how to play bridge. I took it up again, even if I was quite rusty at first. Antoine and Valérie or Ronan and Géraldine always made for pleasant guests and pleasant evenings. As we needed a fourth player, I would also invite Didier, a retired biology professor whom Ronan had met in Rennes, or Roxane, a charming woman, also retired, who had been a nurse. After 1956, we also had Markus, a young Hungarian refugee doing odd jobs in Ploerdon. He was clever, immoderate, macho and boastful. He was convinced, for instance, that wearing out shaving blades quickly on steel-hard stubble was a sign of virility, and therefore of superiority. Men who made their blades last a long time were girlish and sissies. He made us laugh, but he never figured out that we were laughing at him.

When Antoine and Valérie stayed over for a weekend or even a whole week, they created in the château an air of normality and well-being. Very soon however, they would become homesick for Paris, which is just what Athaliah would have felt, I am sure.

 

Chapter VI

 

1959

Antoine is dead. Valérie has found someone else. Mother and Nanon have also passed. For Mother, I did everything a dutiful son is expected to do : mountains of flowers, dozens of invitations, organ music and marble tomb. For Nanon, I simply cried like a baby.

Raffray, getting old and feeble, retired a few years ago. Her departure was spoiled by a visit from an Internal Revenue detective who informed me that, following a Tax Office enquiry, it was found that she had, for decades, been stealing, first from my father, then from me. She was facing a prison sentence. She had bought herself an expensive camera and been on a luxury cruise to Egypt. It left a bad taste in my mouth. Still, I told the detective that I didn’t want to press charges. 

She was replaced with a set of twins : Yvette and Raymonde, two church mice in their forties who keep praying for the salvation of my soul. They are very loyal, and I might even say loving, even if they don’t approve of my frequent visits to the apartment in Rennes or the fact that I never go to Mass. They work diligently and are very efficient and capable, Yvette is the cook, Raymonde the cleaning lady. They are both plain looking but far for from ugly. Gossip addicts say that I sleep with them. Not only am I not finding them enticing, but I would never dream of mixing work and pleasure : a sure recipe for spoiling both. Virgins they are, and virgins they will probably remain till the end of their lives, and bully for them if that’s what they want.

Alain and André are still around, doing a good job. We all keep going, edging a little closer to death every day.

 

February 15, 1959 : it turned out to be the coldest day of the year. Fifteenth of February and minus 15 Celsius. Unforgettable coincidence. It’s four o’clock in the afternoon, and already getting dark. I am in the study. Between two windows, there is now an enormous television set. The 819-line screen offers a beautiful, sharp, black and white picture, miles better, or so Ronan tells me, than the fuzzy 416-line sets of England and North America.

Inspired by the cold, I wanted to re-read the passage in Le Roman de Renard when Isengrin is caught in a frozen pond. I’ve always had a weakness for Isengrin, that 13^th century ancestor of the unfortunate coyote who keeps chasing the road-runner. Medieval laughter consisted essentially in making fun of someone else : the saddest, most primitive form of humor one can ever conceive. Its only redeeming feature being that it is usually tinged with a sense of tragedy.

If I am to believe the anonymous author of this novel, winter in the 13^th century and in the province of Limousin, was even harsher than winter on this 15^th of February in Brittany. Our winters are often fairly mild, wet and windy. During the occasional cold wave, they are orchestrated by deep-blue skies and brilliant sunshine, which calls for walks in the woods among white trees and clearings, with dogs excitedly running around, sniffing for rabbits. In my mind, I picture the 13^th century winters as being pitiless and incredibly harsh. Very little sunshine during the day. Icy wind under a leaden blanket of clouds. By contrast, during the night, I picture clear skies, a moon turning tree trunks and farm roofs into bluish steel, while in the distance, from the shadowy recesses of this static, frozen world, arise, as in a dream, the disembodied and melancholy ululations of a wolf.

My reverie is interrupted by the sound of a cough. No…it’s not a cough : it’s a car door being slammed. In spite of the weather, it must be Alain or André back from some errand, I suppose. I go on reading, and yet I feel uncomfortable, ill at ease. I raise my eyes. There is a dark shape on the terrace, on the other side of the french doors : a woman wrapped in an ample black coat. She is looking at me. She is carrying a small suitcase. A vagrant ? A beggar ? I catch sight of a taxi leaving the courtyard. A homeless person would not hire a taxi. Why aren’t the dogs creating a racket ? Could it be someone they know ?

Raymonde is hurriedly crossing the entrance hall. I run ahead of her and turn the key, but before I open the door, I grab a beret and a scarf. I go out to the terrace. The woman turns slowly and pronounces softly and distinctly : “You bought my farm. I don’t know where to go.”

“Véronique ?”

She laughs, just as she used to all those years ago, then bursts into tears. We remain, stiff and standing, a few feet from each other, rigid. I manage to shake this paralysis and walk sluggishly towards her. She throws herself in my arms. She reminds me of these women greeting their husbands, boyfriends or brothers when they came back from POW camps. Only, this time, she is the liberated prisoner, and I am the one to welcome her. She is shaking against me. I whisper : “Let’s go inside or we’ll both catch our deaths.”

In the great hall, I remove her hood. “You’ve changed.”

“Am I ugly ?”

“No, no. You are more beautiful than ever. You look like the lady of the manor, now.”

“Meaning ?”

“Meaning that you can really be the lady of the manor… if you want that is, and stay here for the rest of your life.”

We look at each other. She can’t believe that I have actually asked her to marry me, and I find it hard to believe that she is really here, in flesh and blood, in front of me. Should I kiss her ? I feel strangely shy. I take her elbow, and guide her to the morning room, then ask Raymonde to bring us some tea. I learn that she has been freed by General de Gaulle. When he was elected as President, a year earlier, he asked to look at a list of former members of the Resistance who were in trouble for turning against collaborators. He then pardoned about fifty of them, including Véronique. Bureaucrats being what they are, they had managed, between days off and cups of coffee, to apply the presidential decree some twelve months later.

“But why didn’t you want me to visit you ? Why could I not at least write to you ?”

“Because of the dogs, of course.”

“??????”

“You see : when you leave a dog in a kennel, you must never visit. He thinks you’ve come to fetch him. And then, when you leave, you break his heart once again. In jail, you must abolish the notion of time. My cellmate had a calendar on which she ticked every day off. I talked her into getting rid of it… showed her that it was self-inflicted torture. Days, meals, walks in the courtyard, Sundays with their special treatment, they all blend together in the end, and don’t mean a thing. It’s easier that way. You too were a prisoner. Surely, you can understand.”

I do understand, but I also feel that it requires a will of steel. I am full of admiration. This time, I do not ask myself whether or not I should kiss her : I do it gently, tenderly. I can feel her lips getting warm under mine. I am also pleasantly surprised by the fact that Véronique no longer seems to rush things as if she had a train to catch. We have all the time in the world. We have the rest of our lives ahead of us. It would appear that we have both understood so many things about ourselves during those twelve years of limbo and purgatory ! The kiss goes on and on, much to the dismay of Raymonde who has popped in with our tea. Véronique whispers in my ear : “I’d like to take a bath. We only had showers. Cold showers during the week, and hot on Sundays. I’m dying for a nice, long bath.”

“I’ll rub your back.”

“You’ll do better than that : I want you to wash me from head to toes as if I were a little girl.”

“Including the naughty bits ?”

“Especially the naughty bits. They demand special treatment.”

I am amazed. The wild child I have known and loved has turned into a sophisticated woman who has obviously learned a lot about subtlety and eroticism. But how, and from whom ? Her former cellmate was the obvious answer. Interesting… fascinating even. Obviously, both Athaliah and Véronique had learned how to make love from another woman.

She takes off her coat, and I have to steel myself not to burst out laughing. She is still dressed in the 1947 fashion, and is, in fact, wearing the same dress she had on during her trial. Véronique laughs without restraint. She places her hands over her head and saunters back and forth, swaying as if she was on the walkway of a fashion show. “You like ?”

“Yes, but it reeks of mothballs.” Renewed laughter. “Were you not afraid I’d be married ?” I asked as we start up the main staircase under Raymonde’s horrified gaze. We leave her, eyes and mouth wide open on the marble paving of the hall.

“I wasn’t worried.”

“How could you be so sure ?”

“I don’t know, I just wasn’t worried, that’s all.”

 

 

 

Chapter VI

 

“Let’s go for a walk,” she declares after breakfast… served in icy silence by Raymonde with lips curling like a parson’s nose, and eyes like the slit visors of an armored car.

Followed and preceded by the now fourteen-year old corgis, we instinctively go through the fields and up to Véronique’s former estate. We stop, and I look dreamily at the tree trunk, now seriously decaying, where she purposely (I’m sure of it now) positioned herself so that I could look up her skirt. She is smiling. No comments. We both know…

Fields have been ploughed. Frost adorns the crests of their furrows like white caps on a wavy sea. A pallid sun spreads a shadow-free light on a landscape that is perfectly suited to the steely sculptures of bare branches. A few ravens…

During the night, I had told Véronique  that she could more than stay with me if she wanted to  ; I actually asked for her hand. It was both a calm and passionate night, with slow, tender, subtle lovemaking such as I had never experienced with her before. It was also confession time, each of us sorry to have been so stupid in the past. I had been stupid not to realize to what extent I loved her, and to what extent I had failed to love her. She had been stupid not to seek refuge with me or Ronan rather than kill her father. Our worst enemy is often ourselves. After unloading all this baggage, we decided never to mention it again. The world had changed. We would start all over again, only this time, on the right foot.

“How would you like a long, protracted voyage : two or three months ?”

“I’d love it. Twelve years in the clink makes you want to see something else and that’s an understatement.”

“How about Africa ? More precisely a visit to a friend of mine who is a missionary in Niger.”

“You never set foot in a church, and you have a missionary friend ?”

“Nanon used to say the same. I will explain, in time. Way back in 1946 he agreed to marry us.”

“Us ? You knew we’d get married, way back in 1946 ?”

“Call it male intuition.”

We are now getting close to what is still called Marjeval Farm. My English couple has improved it considerably. It is now a prosperous estate. There they are, both of them, around a grumbling tractor. They seem to be looking at something on the ground. They have moved a set of heavy, cubic stones of the type used for medieval castles. “Come and see what we found.” They yell over the engine thuds.

They have unearthed some sort of lintel. Underneath, one can make out a broken, soiled panel looking like the sculptured front of an altar. The tractor must have caught the rubble from an ancient chapel. The young farmer hops on the driver’s seat and gently engages the forward gear. The plowshare pulls the altar which suddenly cracks open revealing a gentle flow of chalices, gold coins, diamonds and necklaces… a real-life, fairytale treasure. The man turns the engine off. A heavy silence falls on all of us. A lonely dog barks, far away.

“That poor René had been right all the time !” Whispers Véronique.