XIII

 

 

 

There were three of them: Madeleine, Marie and Hortense; there were three girls with two baskets.

They were going up above the ravine of the Bourdonnette beneath the big pine trees, and from time to time, getting down on their knees, they pulled at the moss that then came away in sheets. It was Friday night. They were pulling at the sheets of moss, then arranging the sheets flat into the bottom of the baskets which they picked up by the handle; but sometimes the tree trunks were too close together and forced them walk one after another, while elsewhere it was not so and they grew at a great distance from each other with their enormous columns on which a white bead dripped like a candle that is burning badly. We are gathering moss for the garlands and we are only three girls and no boys, because the boys were all kept back at the Fleur-de-Lys with nails to hammer and metal wires to stretch out.

Below the girls was the sound of the water. Just beside them began the lovely green and red hillside, with its carpet of needles on the ledges, its little rock walls; and hanging here and there is more moss, but it hangs and so isn’t the right kind. It’s moss like a man’s beard, sometimes white, sometimes yellow, not the green moss we’re looking for. So they walked along the edge of the ravine without going down it, leaning over and then straightening, and all three together and then one by one, then they call out to each other laughing.

Abruptly, they quieted.

It was just as they came back to their baskets which were nearly full; Marie said, “Did you hear that?”

At the base of the ravine, from amidst the sound of the water, came another sound; it was like someone walking on a dry branch, and the branch breaks, then a stone moves across another stone with a scratching sound.

“Did you hear that?”

People say these woods are filled with bandits. People tell about the story of the Savoyard and Juliette (you know, Milliquet’s niece who is now at Rouge’s house because Milliquet threw her out); and it seems she’s got to come to the party Sunday…

“It can’t be!”

“Yes, she’s invited…”

Then Marie said again, “Did you hear that?” and then all three of them moved backward so they were hidden by the edge of the hillside.

It was below them, they stretched their necks: we saw the leaves shake on the alders that grew like a curtain on the other side of the river; and suddenly Marie said, “Look!”

She points at a straw hat that has appeared between the leaves, appeared then disappeared; but then she says in a different voice:

“Hey! Mister…”

She steps forward, she leans over the hill, she calls, “Hey, Mister!”

She yells louder and the two others join in.

“Hey, Mister! Mister!”

They get no answer. The alder leaves hang still.

The hat can no longer be seen.

She laughed.

“Maybe he’s German?”

And while the other two pull her back, she yells, “Hey! Mein Herr…”

And nothing. So, “He’s English. Hey! Sir!”

We speak three languages when we want, but it seems none of the three was understood. So we leave again, heads down beside the alders, beneath their shade; and the hat can no longer be seen; so now Marie turns to us and says:

“You didn’t see who it was? Well! You didn’t recognize him? … It was Maurice, Maurice Busset. He’s the only one with…”

“Where is he going like that?”

“Well, where he goes!”

“And Emilie?”

“Oh, Emilie…”

So they all three look at each other, then Marie shrugged her shoulders.

They were talking a great deal. The three girls were talking in low voices and very quickly.

“Well, yes, it’s like that… and Maurice told her via Décosterd that they were waiting for her… it’s the hunchback who has to bring her, Juliette… the little Italian worker, you know, because he goes often to Rouge’s and he plays the accordion…”

“For who?”

“For her.”

“So they’re coming?”

“Yes, they’re coming. They’re both coming and the boys came to some agreement.”

“My God! What are they going to do?”

“No one knows exactly, but you just have to ask Maurice or big Alexis.”

“Oh, sure, that’d be a welcome question…”

They were speaking a great deal, their teeth were shining. They were walking along with their baskets and which they placed on the ground every once in a while; then they left again with their baskets. And little by little, we were returning to the world that comes toward you through a kind of great arch beneath which the white daylight comes to meet you with its flies, its horseflies, its bumblebees. We could already hear the hammering of the nails. We arrive in a small grove. It’s an old meadow. We saw the high electric posts with their red-painted rings and the sign: Risk of Death, which makes you laugh. A blackbird flew straight out in front of them, beating its wings with loud cries, and they walked a short while between two hedges that blocked the view. Then, suddenly, we’ve arrived. Suddenly, these great buildings stand up unevenly beneath their large patched roofs; there is a name on the biggest of these, written out in new tiles: La Fleur-de-Lys; and below the name there is a drawing of a fleur-de-lys. This is the town inn; in front of it stood two large linden trees; beneath the lindens were benches and tables. The girls came with their baskets. We saw them coming. The boys up on their ladders were hitting nails with their hammers; we call down to them, we say: “Oh, it’s you three. Well, come on then…” The party is beginning. We saw that it was a little bit farther than the inn itself, and a little bit behind the other buildings: it was a roof held up in the air by nothing, while all around it, instead of walls, was the lovely Friday evening and the beautiful party. A landscape acting as one of the walls sits beneath each side of the roof and each side shows a different terrain. The boys were still perched up on their ladders; the girls were around the tables busy unfolding flags, sorting cardboard coats-of-arms and tissue paper roses out of their boxes. We saw that, in fact, Maurice wasn’t there, and that Emilie wasn’t there either. As for him, we know now where he is, but what about her? They continued to hit their nails up on their ladders, and the three girls—Marie, Hortense, Madeleine—had arrived with the baskets, then they sat down around the baskets, meaning they were seated on the table, their legs hanging down in their brown or white stockings, and even a pair of fashionable, skin-colored stockings,—holding a length of string between their fingers, then you pull a piece of moss toward you to make a bouquet. The party is being prepared. They had just turned on the electric lights. It is silent work that we do, at least for us girls (if you don’t count our tongues), but the hammer blows were loud and bothered us; which is why we have to bother those above from time to time. We were calling up to them. The lovely walls of countryside on the four sides of the dance floor were now gone; four black walls had come to take their place. And, inside the walls, we had even eaten. It’s the Youth Club that invited the young ladies. They had brought bread, cheese, cold sausage, salad, and a lot of white wine in a number of glass liter bottles. We drank, ate, gave cheers. Then the boys had climbed back up on their ladders, and two or three girls had lifted the sweet-smelling green snake up to them, which was cool to the touch, still heavy with dew and whose weight made it drop down to the floor in places. The boys up above pulled on the rope; the girls raised their arms. One after another they moved closer, holding the garland out to them: so beneath the thin fabric of a white linen bodice we saw a bosom rise up, a large one, then a flatter one, followed by round arms, slender ones. It smelled like pine boughs, it smelled bitter and wet. We drank again, we gave cheers. In the great green rope hanging between the wooden pillars, we saw the little pink and yellow and white and red circles, the paper roses. We knocked our glasses together, “To your health!” — “To yours!” It made a little noise like when the goat pulls on a clump of grass and rings his own bell. And then again we land another nail. There is one that doesn’t hold, we have to replace it. About ten boys, the same amount of girls. And until after eleven o’clock. We heard eleven ring out, the village clock rang each hour so slowly; this is how it rings because it’s so old. It rings the hours so slowly that you cannot help hearing them, and, so steadily is the noise that, without seeming to, it finds a space between two rings to tell you, “It’s time.” No way not to hear the clock. It was time to go home.

They gave each other their arms, boys and girls. They went home on each other’s arms. They walked along the road. They were singing. We sing a song, then we sing another; we sing all the songs that we know. Only, when one is finished, and before we move to the next, there is always a short moment of silence, and it happened during one of those silences. One of the boys said, “Do you hear that?” Everyone was silent. We heard the accordion.

Way over there down by the lake, behind the trees and the night, and weak at first amidst the sound of the water, but it managed to come through; so they laughed:

“It’s the hunchback… it’s Rouge that has him come to entertain her…”

“But,” they said, “She’d be better off with us…”

“If the hunchback brings her, he’s going to be upstaged… we’ll have Gavillet and his band, eight first-rate musicians… and he’ll have to keep up his courage if he wants to compete…”

“And didn’t the mayor himself,” we were saying, “didn’t Mr. Bussigny call the policemen after those two shots fired; only it seems that Rouge just shot into the air. The man in the dinghy, anyway, was in the wrong. Nothing else happened. Still our mayor started to get worried; he told us, ‘It’s about time this mess is finished.’ He went to see the judge. The verdict should be ready three days after the party. Rouge and Milliquet should be heard out against each other (if they attend together, which seems unlikely) —after which, they’ll tell them what decision’s been made. It seems like neither will be in the right. No one thinks the girl will be returned to Milliquet because he’s the one who kicked her out in the first place; and we don’t think Rouge will be allowed to keep her. The only solution is to put her in an institution until she becomes an adult. Only, Rouge has said, ‘If the policemen come, I’ll bang it all up.’ Which is why the mayor is so worried and why everyone is so curious, even more curious now that the verdict will come down soon. It’s too bad the situation was allowed to get to this point, but it’s just the authorities would have preferred not to have to deal with it and would have done something if they could have, which would have spared them the trouble, the letters to write, the proceedings, and God knows what other complications;—and anyway, Rouge has never done anyone wrong, and not the girl either, quite the opposite, because what would have happened to her without him? And it seems that the rumors that were racing around about them weren’t true. Only, it can’t really be helped, Milliquet lodged a complaint…”

 

We were watching this empty café, this terrace with its decidedly oversized tables that were the wrong color green; we were watching Milliquet wander around. And that Saturday we also see that a storm is gathering (it hit during the party). The men spoke a little in front of the doors where they were pushing a broom back and forth, as usual, while, if they had girls, the girls were getting ready, and if they had boys, the boys were doing the same. These are parties that last more or less officially from Saturday to Monday evening; so, in terms of taking care of the animals, the sons make arrangements with their fathers; and in terms of housekeeping, the girls work something out with their mothers. Then they can go into their rooms and make themselves pretty, having first gone to the fountain for a full bucket of water for their bath. And the boys take their razors and some soap powder out of a drawer. The heavy weather made it feel good to put aside one’s dirty clothes in exchange for clean ones, a white shirt; or one of those barely-there muslin dresses with no blouse (or as little blouse as possible). We put on a white or pink dress, a muslin or light silk dress. So the girls were getting themselves ready; the boys were getting themselves ready.

And so was this other one getting himself ready, but without anyone aware of the fact. Behind the sheds, at the end of the passage, having locked his door, he packed up a first bag. It’s Saturday night; he takes a cloth bag and fills it to the brim, then he closes it with a double knot. He goes to place it in a corner. The other bag, he keeps it close to him: it’s a bag we know well, and recognize easily because the waxed cloth covering which buttons along the side hides nothing of its shape. This bag he keeps close at hand, in order to slip the strap over his body when the time comes. He had returned all the different shoes he’d been given to repair: the ones remaining were lined up on their plank. Just then the Gavillet musicians were starting to be heard. Over the rooftops, we saw the woods up high on the other side of the ravine, and it was exactly at the tip of the woods where the sawtooth line of pine trees began to tremble along a strip of blue sky. We didn’t notice the hunchback go out with his two bags. Now he had three humps. It was easy to see his three humps; it wasn’t dark enough yet not to see them. There wasn’t enough space for all three on his back so they stuck out on each side of his body, one to the right, the other to the left: the third couldn’t move about. He went up the little street, because this isn’t where we belong. He passed near the train station. All he had to do then was walk along the train tracks and follow the big road, which begins to descend, something which forces a series of hairpin turns, but there the hunchback steps off the road. He turned to the left. Here we were very close to the music; there was nothing more between it and us except the distance running flat between one side of the ravine and the other: the music was turning behind his humps, it was dancing along his sides; it made him go faster, even if he was sliding along the grass. We saw the viaduct move like it was covered in smoke. The hunchback heads for the side of the viaduct, there where the arches are pushed farther and farther into the hillside, and which cuts it obliquely, becoming lower and lower; he went toward the lowest of the arches, beneath which there is just enough space to slide along. He enters the space. He went back out. It’s done.

Because now he only had two humps; he was just as he always was when Décosterd went to get him; he no longer had his bag but only his two usual loads, like when it was his job (and it was his job again this evening – this Saturday) to go to Rouge’s; only he saw that today he was going to be late, and so he speeds up his steps. In fact, Décosterd is waiting for him. As he arrives in the little street, he saw that Décosterd is there and must have been there for quite some time, because Décosterd said to him, “Where are you coming from? Luckily, you’re here. I was about to go back alone and what would Rouge have said?” The hunchback followed Décosterd.

Décosterd was saying, “It’s understood. We’ll unhook the boat… And you, you bring Miss Juliette to the party. The boys know what they’ve got to do. And you’ve got nothing to be afraid of, because you’ll be well-guarded on the road. Bolomey will make his rounds…”

The hunchback nodded.

That night, they watched a first storm. It happened as all four of them were seated in front of the house, and Rouge said to Urbain, “Louder.”

It was because of the music from the Fleur-de-Lys that was carried down to us on a little wind along the Bourdonnette; it was making Rouge irritated, “Won’t they ever be quiet? Louder, Mr. Urbain.” They were seated on the bench. Suddenly, there was an abrupt change in the direction of the air, the wind began to blow from the southwest.

We saw the entire cavalry of waves jump into their saddles. We watched the horsemen come with their white flags.

The storm hung behind the mountains of the Savoy in a kind of curtain onto which the lightning made pink flashes; the cavalry began to gallop. We watched them—in the bottom of our bay, on our bench,—we watched them pass along the middle of the lake in long, straight lines and deep beneath the white flags they were bearing; in deep rows furrowed with lightning, then left again alone to the night.

The wind lifted up the little stones to our right and hurled them at our cheeks with other objects, making a strange noise like paper, or dry sticks, a sheet of aluminum, we weren’t sure what, then it was the topside of a box. It wasn’t raining.

Rouge was saying, “The storm won’t be for us.”

We see his face and his entire mustache, then that he brings his pipe to his mouth.

We see his entire face with its cotton ball mustache beneath which he had the time to bring up the tube of his pipe and it had time to be raised; then his face disappears, he has no more face; but the storm was already moving away.

The hunchback left fairly early; it’s this Saturday night; as usual, Décosterd went with him.

And Rouge waited until he left, then he said to Juliette, “So, your things?... Juliette, it’s tomorrow night… Juliette, you won’t forget?”

 

As the story goes, several stands had arrived at the Fleur-de-Lys, including one that was selling gingerbread, another selling ice creams, and a third selling all kinds of little souvenirs for both adults and children. First, we make the rounds of the stands. The gingerbread stand was draped in a red Hadrianopolis cloth. The ice cream vendor’s was painted in fake marble. The wooden horse carrousel had been nothing but a green carriage with windows, beneath which a dog whimpered and with a white horse attached to a stake; now, two men in khaki shirts and American suspenders each carried one horse in their arms or both of them a white buggy with the neck of a swan; then there were also these paintings and on the front of the orchestrion four rows of copper pipes. It was shining, it was lovely to look at. The young people arrived early in the morning in order to be there when the dancing started, the older people would come later because it’s a custom for the men to sleep late on Sundays, even as late as three o’clock. In the village, Milliquet had seen a few customers that morning, and there had even been more than usual, something which was a welcome surprise; but, alas, everyone had left before noon. Even though now it was close to three o’clock, the terrace remained empty, the café as well; and Milliquet, standing on the doorstep, in his Sunday clothes with a collar and a tie, sometimes facing the water where there wasn’t even a hint of someone coming, sometimes facing the top of the street which he could see in its full length;—only nothing was there that didn’t turn its back to him right away. People were coming out of their houses, but they were all heading toward the music and the promise of pleasure in the sound of the trombone, coming over the roofs from time to time with one or two of its notes. Until Chauvy heads in this direction, with his little cane, his bowler hat, his jacket; so Milliquet shouts to him, “Hey you, where you going?” But Chauvy raises his little cane.

“Hey now,” Milliquet said, “hey now, you! Chauvy!”

But Chauvy can’t hear anymore and Milliquet thrusts his hands deep into his pockets and shrugs his shoulders, until he saw Perrin come out from his house just opposite.

“Say, Perrin, I think you’d better hurry. It’ll only be two or three more days, this affair…”

Perrin looks at him without understanding.

“Yes, two or three days at the most… And then we’ll see who gets the upper hand, honest folk or cheats…”

The other understood, but didn’t answer. He also walks up the street. And then (but this was something Milliquet so little expected that it was his turn not to understand right away) there came little Marguerite; she comes, she’s made herself beautiful.

“I’ve come to ask you for permission to go to the party for a bit.”

“Huh?”

Milliquet looked at the dress she’d put on, a pink muslin dress with a white sash, and she was wearing little black boots and a woven paper hat.

“You…. you’re crazy!” He was just starting to find his words when she interrupted.

“Oh!” she said, “It’s just that I must go… and since there’s nothing to do here.”

“What? You must… must, she says…”

Just then, we heard a door open; a voice comes down the stairs.

“Say now, you old fool, are you going to let yourself be cheated yet again… let yourself be cheated by this little girl? Grab her, I tell you, grab her arm. And then lock the door…”

But it was too late. Marguerite had already dashed off.

And Mrs. Milliquet comes down, bent in half, a hand on her back, her skirt sideways, dragging her feet in her slippers; she was yelling, “You’re going to hold back her wages… you keep her things… she won’t come back here again. You hear me, I’m the boss here… You, you’re finished, you’re a failure… go lie down, you old fool, that’s the best thing for you to do.”

The slam of the door. This is how things happen on this earth.

At one o’clock, the musicians had arrived. There were eight of them. It’s the Gavillet band. It’s the most beautiful and the best of the music from around here. They were wearing dark gray suits, black felt hats, black silk ties, white shirts with broad, turned-down collars; they first went to drink something in the bar. They drank standing at the counter, as they were in a hurry, and were each holding his instrument (carefully polished with Brillant Belge) under his arm. They go out. The bugle gave the order with a solo melody like at a military service. Then everything began to quake and quiver softly all the way to the village; it was quaking softly against the wood, it was quivering softly in everyone’s hearts.

She had come, she had come all alone; she had come along the back paths. There were too many people around for anyone to notice her, especially between the dance numbers. She walked along the line of stands, looking for him everywhere without finding him. She stops, turns to the right, to the left: all she sees is a big hand go into a white iron trunk and come out with a puppet with two feathers on its head, a red one and a black one; then the hand stands it up with other puppets also having white sugar for their eyes, red sugar for their lips, an embroidered collar and frog fastenings. It seems people are speaking to her. Automobiles arrive. All the youth from another village arrive as well, all dressed up, and they’ve come on their bicycles, on bicycles now gray with dust but whose handlebars are decorated with flowers and garlands. This is how things happen on this earth. A girl is alone on this earth. People say hello to her, she hasn’t heard. The ball has just begun. She goes to stand behind the plank wall adorned with sweet-smelling pine boughs; this is where the women and the children stand, and those who are too old to dance. We see the eight musicians on the stage, seated beside one another behind their music notebooks; behind their music they were puffing out their cheeks. She was watching without seeing anything or she was seeing only one thing: that he wasn’t there, he still wasn’t there. There was a great mass of backs, heads, hands held into the air, hands resting on white shoulders, on pink shoulders, hatless heads, heads with hats, faces with mustaches, faces without mustaches;—the dance ended. Emilie went to sit down near the exit door, where the couples, one after the other, walked past holding each other’s arms. And Maurice isn’t there. We are on this earth. The musicians had taken the mouthpieces off their instruments; they were blowing inside, then they were shaking the instruments to let the saliva fall out, beneath the flags, beneath the garlands. And you see that we’ve made ourselves beautiful. You think maybe we’ll stay this way all week! It’s a party, we’ve changed our dresses, we’ve changed our eyes, we’ve changed our faces; you see, we’re wearing white gloves:—they’ve been brought by the men on their horses, but, me, what am I doing here? While the men lead them into the garden and get them a drink of lemon soda around the green-painted iron tables, on the folding chairs. Me, where am I going to go? A great shadow falls across the light on the white path which becomes gray, a shadow over the sun in the sky that now covers, on the grass, on the tables, there where everyone is drinking, there where everyone is having fun, there where everyone is laughing. The wooden horses were static and turning; the children blow silently into the paper trumpets. The crowd was pushing her again between the stands where the little men with their sugar eyes watch her beneath their feathers. Then she sees a cage set down on a folding table next to a car for a cripple. A legless man says, “Your future, Ladies and Gentlemen!” She sees a platter in front of the cage with many slips of colored paper, folded into squares.

“It’s two cents,” the man is saying. “Two cents for a turn.”

This is how it goes, this is on earth.

“Your future, ladies and gentlemen; two cents, only two cents…”

On earth, one afternoon, this last Sunday;—she is only a poor little girl, which is why she gives her two coins.

We see the cage grow larger for your two coins. The cage comes to meet you, becomes enormous, everything around you does the same. Nothing but the cage and the end of a wand that she watches, that taps three times; then: “Attention! Mr. Know-it-all, are you ready?”

The bird has come to sit on the perch behind the door of the cage. He isn’t moving anymore. Again three taps. The wand goes forward, the wand opens the door. People are pushing behind Emilie to try to see what’s happening and a little girl’s voice says, “You see, Mommy, the little bird! Oh, he’s so funny! Oh, what is he doing, Mommy? Why is he taking the papers like that with his beak?” Then a fat woman: “It sure looks like he knows something.” And it’s true, because he is still looking at Emilie, he is looking at her from the side with his little shiny round eye, then with a quick movement of his beak, he picked up one of the notes, it’s a pink one, but it must not be the good one because he throws it into the air with an abrupt jerk of his head, then it’s a white one. But this isn’t the good one either.

“Won’t he make up his mind?”

“Oh, these animals are clever!”

“Is this the one? No…”

Who is speaking? Where are they speaking? While the bird is now holding a gray paper in its beak and we saw that this one is finally the one because he hopped over and landed on his master’s hand.

“Let’s see, Mr. Know-it-all, is this the good one this time?”

The bird nods.

“You’re sure you’re not making a mistake?”

The bird nods.

“Well now, Mr. Know-it-all, you know what you’ve got to do now.”

The bird comes to her, the bird bowed to her three times and the man says, “Miss, it’s for you…”

Emilie holds out her hand.

“Ladies and gentlemen, who’s next?”

And all around her everyone was curious, but she shoves the square of paper into her cotton glove, turns around and leaves.

The air is filled with music, noises, voices, the air is filled with things that shine, move, turn; there are too many things everywhere, she feels the paper against her skin, she doesn’t dare yet, she leaves the path.

Now she is in the orchard, she is in the grass beneath the trees.

She saw that the cherry trees had already changed color without their cherries, but she saw in the apple and the pear trees a future promise of good fruit. My God! Maybe… Does a person know? Does a person ever know? She went beneath the low branches; when she closed her hand she felt the angles of the paper prick into her skin. We saw that one of the slanted roofs was shiny like it’d been polished with egg white while another was matt, colorless. It’s like us, it’s like me. Alas, a girl is only ever lit up on one side, no matter what we do. There is only ever one side of us that receives the light… one has to dare… maybe…

And there, behind a tree trunk, she slips the ends of her fingers to get the paper from her glove.

A tender heart…

We see there are four printed lines: this is the first of the four lines, they all rhyme, it’s a poem. Each phrase begins with a capital letter. She reads the first line.

And then comes the rest, and the paper says:

The hunchback arrived at Rouge’s close to four o’clock; Décosterd had gone to get him as usual. Rouge had taken advantage of the time that Décosterd wasn’t there and hadn’t come back yet to call Juliette. Again, he speaks to her through the door of her room, through the pinewood panel with its veins and knots:

“Juliette, did you think to put your things together?”

There was no immediate response.

“Urbain is coming,” Rouge said, “so I thought we should agree together once more before he gets here… Juliette.”

She hadn’t replied, but she did open the door and Rouge could see that all was ready.

He sees that on the bed is a bundle wrapped in cloth and closed with a strap; he sees it, he sees everything, at first he is surprised:

“Oh, you’re not taking your suitcase? We’d have had room for it in the boat. It’s practical, a boat, we could put all the furniture in it… well, maybe you’re right.”

He started again, “Anyway, we’ll find what we need over there… not worth weighing ourselves down with luggage, especially if we’re arriving in the middle of the night… I’ll write a card immediately to Décosterd. All I need to do is hide the key; Décosterd knows where I hide it… and I’ll tell him… what do you think if I tell him he can stay here while we’re away?”

She still doesn’t answer; he doesn’t seem to notice:

“Anyway, I can always write him… the only thing that’s worrying me…”

He turned toward the front door, he was still being very calm. “The only thing that’s worrying me is that we’re going to have a storm. The one from last night didn’t finish itself out…”

He went forward to the front step. “Well,” he said, “it won’t be long now. But anyway (and then he went back to it) the storm… you’re not afraid of the storm, are you, Juliette? And you’re not afraid of waves either? It’s just that. I’ll worry about the rest. Anyway, the boat is good. We repaired it for you, remember? And it’s got your name on it… three short hours and we’ll be there… you’ll help me row, won’t you... it’s just that… Oh, Juliette!”

Then something stopped inside him, knotted up in the back of his throat, “We can tell… yes, we can really tell that… blood-relation…”

He had trouble speaking.

“When someone’s related, as if we were… father and… Juliette…”

And then we see him move forward, but at the same time the sound of footsteps made him move backward; and he said quickly, “Close your door, Juliette. Hide your bundle…”

He was in front of the house when Décosterd and the hunchback arrived. Outside the house the sun was scorching as if someone was bringing a red hot poker toward your face, like the blacksmith making a joke, or to get the kids to run off away he shoves the hot iron at them that he’s just pulled from the fire. If we turned around, we immediately felt the scorch of the sun at the edge of our collars; below the line it remained cool. Décosterd moved his head over his shoulder, gestured with his head in its everyday cap toward the lake bottom and, in the still air, he half closes his eye, without saying a word; so Rouge nods his head. Before the water, Décosterd was all black, while the water was like a sheet of tin-plated iron.

“Yes, yes,” said Rouge. “Well, Mr. Urbain,” he continues, “I think it’s going to be too hot to stay outside… and, anyway, you’ve got some competition.”

He makes a movement with his head backward and behind him.

“And they won’t be stopping soon, because today’s the big day… they’ve got permission from the police… until two o’clock in the morning, that makes for a while. And those guys over there, they can alternate with each other, the music, I mean. Sometimes there are two of them… And sometimes there are three of them. And well, you…”

He starts to laugh. Urbain set his accordion on the bench.

And, in fact, while they were speaking, the sky over by the Bourdonnette continued to raise itself up slowly, then fell again in little steps; it was white like cloth over the black hedge of pine trees. The lowest notes were the only ones that managed to come to us distinctly, more or less muted and more or less held long, sometimes lasting until a breath finished, sometimes pushed against each other in short bursts like soap bubbles. And no one anywhere, no one on the water, no one on the shoreline; no one beneath the white sky, nor at the quarry, nor on the cliff, nor among the water-worn stones that rubbed off the leather of your shoes, nor on this water a person couldn’t look at without ruining his eyes.

And Rouge said, “Finally, today there’s a chance we won’t be bothered. Come on, Mr. Urbain, you’ve got to come into the kitchen. We’ll be better here… and I’ve still got one or two bottles… it’s now or never…”

We go inside. Rouge goes to get the bottles. He goes himself to lay them down in the water on the sand which he scoops out so that the water covers them entirely; it appeared he had nothing to fear for them today as the water was so still, beneath its tin cover. Rouge is in a good mood. Too bad if the wine isn’t as fresh as chilled champagne. “What do you say, Décosterd? And you, Mr. Urbain?”

Then he calls, “Hey, Juliette!”

While the three of them sit down, one last time around the Battle of the Bourget, in the kitchen; and we hear the party, while the marine rifleman raises his boarding axe. We hear the party, a shell explodes, making a black-rimmed white circle in one part of the waxed cloth where the weft is visible. The sky over the lake was becoming ever more impenetrable.

She came in just then or a bit after; she came out of her room just then, or a little later. And, as she’d just opened her door and hadn’t yet shut it, suddenly, in the great stillness of the air, a gust of wind came in and held aloft a woodchip halfway between the ceiling and the floor, while the door rattled.

It was a chip from the Coquette, from when we’d resanded it and before we changed its name; a little bit of green could still be seen, a little bit of the oil paint was still caught in its fibers.

My bottles!

Rouge runs outside. It was just as she’d come in. She lets go of the door that closes by itself with a slam; Rouge had just enough time to grab the bottles by their neck. The lake had begun to brew (this is how we call it), at the same time it had darkened, and its lovely shine was like a metal turning rusty. The lake was brewing, meaning that everywhere it was raising itself up, but the waves had no direction, they were rising and falling in one place, like water being heated on a fire. Rouge quickly grabs the bottles by their necks, he came back with the bottles; he placed them on the table, but again the wind had stopped; Rouge wipes his sleeve across his forehead. He’d taken his knife from his pocket, and while shoving the bottle opener into the cork, the bottle between his knees, he’d turned to Juliette:

“Well, what do you say, Juliette?”

He was in a good mood, and gay.

“It’s nearly as hot as those countries where you come from.”

“Oh, not quite.”

“Not yet? It’ll come…”

Then he says, “In any case, this is weather that makes you thirsty, but you see that here we’ve got what a person needs to cure a thirst, while you, over there, you’ve got no wine… there isn’t any wine in those countries…”

She shook her head. And, now, outside it was like when a lot of people are speaking at once, like when a fairground is filled with men in discussion; we could no longer hear the music. There was only the sound of the cork.

Rouge filled the glasses.

He was saying, “It’s our little wine, wine we’ve made… and it’s not so bad as all that, not bad to look at, not so bad to the taste…”

He was saying, bringing the glass to his nose, “Oh, she doesn’t know about it, but you, Mr. Urbain, because, in your country, people know their wine…”

He was saying, “Cheers! …Cheers! Juliette!... Cheers, Mr. Urbain… and to you, my old friend Décosterd.”

We remember that just then, she (Juliette) was seated on the table, and Rouge was near her on the bench.

The hunchback was seated a little further away, against the wall, on a chair.

Again a gust of wind came in, and the Battle of the Bourget was lifted up at one corner and flipped upside down, showing its fuzzy underside. Several minutes passed. Rouge was still speaking, he had to raise his voice louder and louder. That afternoon the accordion remained in its waxed cloth case. The girl, she holds her knee in her hands, in such a way that her little foot stuck out from her leg, the ankle so slender one could encircle it with one’s fingers; she was wearing silk stockings (they were stockings she had found in the package Rouge had brought back from the city) — and far away, meaning off to the southwest, we hear a first roll of thunder. Oh! This time it wouldn’t be long (which we could also see by the complete change of the light); so you have to imagine that the door had stayed open. And Décosterd was no longer there. You have to imagine how Rouge goes to this door and how he blocks about two-thirds of the view, and we saw running on Rouge’s shoulders the first white crests moving regularly from west to east. Rouge goes to the doorstep, then goes forward a little further onto the sand; we see him turn his head. He turns his head suddenly toward the cliff; someone was calling him.

He yelled, “What is it?”

The hunchback looked at Juliette; she jumped down from the table.

She was standing up on both feet, then it is her turn to go out of the house where she sees Rouge who has headed toward where the calling was coming from. It was Décosterd calling him. Over where he’s standing, Décosterd raises one of his arms, then both. Rouge hurries even more.

The hunchback hadn’t moved. The girl, she’d moved forward to just about halfway between the house and the water; once there, she stops in the wind that rolls her skirt around her legs like the string of a whip around a spinning top. She sees Rouge about to meet Décosterd. Again, Décosterd is making signs with his arms. Rouge was listening. Then we saw him shrug his shoulders. Suddenly, Rouge turned around, he saw Juliette. He hesitated just a moment, then he quickly turned around.

Now he is the one calling. “Juliette, hey, Juliette!”

So he came straight toward her, while she goes to meet him, because we can no longer hear each other unless standing close.

“Juliette, one of the boats has come undone: it’s yours… the one we needed…”

So she says, “Can’t I go with you?”

“Out of the question…”

And, as if the request reassured him, “We’ll go after it quickly, Décosterd and me, before the waves chase it out too far… Listen, Juliette, we won’t be gone long… and there’s Mr. Urbain here… all you need to do is close the door.”

He turned his back to her, he walked away quickly, then, turning one last time, he said, “Juliette! You understand? Close and lock the door.”

 

As for the boys, they had set themselves up in different places from which we could best see her coming. Bolomey was standing at the top of the cliff, Maurice was on the other side of the ravine near the quarry, Alexis had positioned himself a little ways in front of the dance floor (and where the two mortars were as well). The three of them had gotten together, then had asked some of their friends to help; and the friends had said, “Of course she should come… will she be wearing her costume? Oh, what a party it’s going to be! And for the mortars, we’re agreed. It’s been a while we haven’t used them. It’s the perfect time… Yes, we’ll hide them in the bushes.” They had quickly agreed on all points and we’d explained to them that we’d found a way that Rouge was obliged to let her come and Décosterd was taking care of it… Everything had been set up with the greatest care by the three of them, Alexis, Bolomey and Maurice; now they were at their posts, while the party was in full swing. We weren’t worried about the storm, especially because the dance floor was covered. Only women who’d come with children, mothers, some older women, had decided it best to head home. And, while this was happening, Bolomey, up on the cliff, had seen Décosterd call Rouge, then seen that Rouge was coming, then that they’d gone together into the second of the boats, the first had just this second been hit on the side by the waves just above the opening of the Bourdonnette. While the women on the road were pushing their little carriages or holding hands with the children old enough to walk, Bolomey slides down the ravine to go join up with Maurice below the quarry. And Maurice was watching the spot where, between two bushes, the road opens up from off the ravine. Bolomey was coming down, then Bolomey meets up with Maurice, then the two of them join Alexis.

It was just in front of the dance floor, a little below it, and an entire row of hedges provided a hiding place for us. Behind the shrubs were the two mortars. They waited there, the three of them. We were facing the road that came straight toward us, along the river between the alders, and then between two wide banks beneath the sky which we could see to the southwest. And, there, it becomes another color; and a dark blue like glazed pottery made it look like a hillside that rises always more steeply, then begins to rise forward into an overhang: at the same time the wind rises, at the same time the light changes…

And the girl also changed the light, the light around her becomes all white. There was this great black sky, but everything around her was lit up (or she was the one lighting it). They were watching her come, and she was still in the bottom of the valley, still fairly far away; she was red against the night. Behind her was the hunchback, the hunchback was also in the shadow. He was at the limit of the darkness where we see the pine trees leaning off together in one large group. He was holding his instrument in front of him, tilting his head to the side, pulling on the bellows; then he presses his two hands upon them, making it twist. He has two humps; we can only see one, the one in front of him. He is just in the line of the shadow creating the night; every time he leaves it, the line comes farther forward. And farther forward is the girl; and there on her is two times the light because she calls it to her, and adds to it at the same time; she is lit up and she lights up. And now it seems nothing is in proportion and she is no longer her usual size; the wind has taken her, the wind pushes her, she is lifted up; she stands on one foot, then on the other; she turns, she turns again, all the light turns with her;—and the men up above, only the three men see her approaching, they see that it will be too late; so Alexis yells, “Hey! Ready?... Fire!”

We see two flames as long as canes, two white flames in the white day. Fire! Fire! Two flames, each a full meter long; then the two lines of short grass tumble down the hillside, hit against one another.

We see the hunchback has stopped.

The accordion has quieted, we can no longer hear the accordion; what we hear is a first echo in the ravine make its noise like a sailcloth stretching out, like when the wind smacks hard into the great sail. And the sound of the second echo. Then the third. Like a sailcloth taking on water or like when the wind slackens. The music from the party quieted behind them; the eight musicians on the bandstand dropped their instruments from their mouths, their cheeks still puffed with air that wasn’t used; and now this is truly where she belongs, because everyone is coming. She is still shining with her red shawl, she is shining with her naked arms, she shined with her teeth; —everyone is coming, Maurice, Bolomey, Alexis; we see Chauvy coming, we see little Marguerite coming; they’re holding paper roses, they stand in a line, they give her the roses. She slides along before us, while the hunchback follows her. Again, he leaned his head to the side; his fingers raced along the keys…

 

Over on the cliff, no one had seen the Savoyard. The girl had stepped onto the dance floor, passing beneath a garland holding a sign covered in words of welcome; —him, over there, even Bolomey hadn’t been able to detect him. She has just stepped onto the dance floor, we moved out of her way, we were standing in a circle; —and the Savoyard was sniggering over there beneath his little oak tree with its hanging branches, happy to see that Bolomey hadn’t seen him even though he was only a few steps away. We told Gavillet he could let his musicians rest, because we were saying to the hunchback at the same time: “And now it’ll be your turn…” And we were also saying, “Time to turn the lights on,” because it was so dark now. She was now beneath the roof of the dance floor, but this night having come early was a problem; the boys yell, “Go on and tell the inn to give us some electricity,” — the man over on the cliff sniggers. He sees directly below him how the battle has started, the two men are there in the boat and the boat moves toward him against the movement of the waves. He feels in his pocket if the box of matches is still there, if the two boxes that he took, just to be sure, are still there; they’re there. There is plenty of time. And maybe the men in their boat won’t be done as quickly as they’d believed; all the better. He watches how they fight and struggle against the waves. Ravinet was looking at Rouge, he was looking at Décosterd. The boat was moving to the side, while they were showing you their full selves including their feet planted flat onto the boards of the boat bottom. They were rising quickly, leaning toward you, then they made it over the crest of the wave; then suddenly their legs were gone, and their bodies, and their arms, finally their heads: they had gone down the other side. There was nothing left to do, the boat was sunk. No. We see it rise up again, surging with the rising wave; we see the two men turn themselves around with the oars, with all their might, trying to grab it… Oh!... he sneers. Well, they’ll have enough to keep them busy even just to get themselves back in to shore! We’ve got time, we’ve got plenty of time! … And now the eight musicians have gotten down off the bandstand behind Gavillet who’d said, “Don’t mind, do we…” even if his pride was a little hurt, but he hid this and he was saying, “We’ve been playing for two hours straight.” We said to him, “There’s some wine waiting for you.” The musicians go behind the paper roses and down the steps (it’s more like a ladder) of the bandstand, and this was while Ravinet over on the cliff was going down the other steps, even steeper still, sandstone steps behind tufts of sweet clover, high stalks of soapwort, and amidst the low shrubs to which he holds onto over the difficult parts of the path; then he feels that he still has a box of matches in the pocket of his vest; that makes three in all; he’s taken his precautions. And now we’ll see exactly who I am. Ravinet… Cyprien Ravinet, from Saint-Dolloires. And we’ll see if they’ll make fun of me anymore. He finds the door to Rouge’s house wide open. The wind going in freely, the same for the lightning and the first rolls of thunder. He goes in. When one cannot have, one destroys. At least they will see that I’ve been here; I’ll leave my signature. He enters with the wind, with the pink and yellow lightning, while we can see that the waxed oilcloth has already been pushed by the wind into a corner. The stone floor is all covered with debris twisting about the table legs: wood chips, pieces of paper, dry leaves, cork floaters: all this kept spinning around, while he grabs a chair and throws it hard against the hanging oil lamp that tumbles down, spraying the walls. What remains of the liquid spreads across the table and from there runs onto the ground. He watches, pleased. He goes to the cupboard, he finds the jug of gasoline; he checks that the jug is full. He knocks his shoulder against this other door that is closed and laughs again, because the door jumps on the first hit. Here, we are in her space. The big mirror that had her so often will have her no more: one thing gained. When one cannot have, one destroys. Now he picks up one of the new and white-painted chairs that are there… we were saying to the musicians, “Go have a drink…. you can see, we’ve laid it all out for you, and there’s something to eat, if you’re hungry, there is bread and cheese”;—but a star is made in the glass and his view of us vanishes. Crash against the mirror, and crash on the table: it’s a lightly built object; it breaks in half. He poured gasoline over it, he pours over the bed; he throws all he can find on the bed along with her things, then he goes to the shed. The shed is made of wood. It is filled with the hanging nets: well, they’re all dry and have been for awhile now, they’ve had plenty of time to dry these last fifteen days, three weeks they haven’t been used: newspapers, gasoline, a match… here it goes. Luckily, we’ve got three boxes of matches. He goes back into her room, he puts these newspapers under the bed. He stacks the chairs, he strikes a match. He passes into the kitchen; there, he throws the waxed cloth onto the bench, and atop the straw-backed chairs. His last plan is to go into Rouge’s room, but a great flame with a hot tip rose up between him and the door: he had just enough time to jump backward.

 

“And well, for the rest of us,” we were saying, “we invited her mostly for a little amusement and a little variety; because we were thinking to ask the hunchback to play, and, and it seems she dances; we didn’t know anything else. Gavillet wasn’t very happy, but he wasn’t showing it. He went down off the bandstand with his musicians. The girl, they had mussed her hair with a crown they’d wanted to put on her head. We see her hair is filled with little bits of moss, and we’re laughing and they hand her a paper rose, then we see that she loses her shawl. Now she was standing in the middle of the dance platform: night had come even before six o’clock, in the middle of August, just like one of the darkest nights of winter. We could only still see her shoulders and her arms, once the shawl had fallen, but we pick it up for her. She takes the rose. ‘The lights! The lights! Hey, over there, the lights!’ because the switches were inside the inn… she slid the paper rose into her hair behind her ear… ‘The lights!’ A boom of thunder. We could no longer see, we could no longer hear one another. We made a loudspeaker with both hands… ‘The lights! Hey…!’ We were pushing toward her. And the thunder kept booming. The flashes of lightning were bright despite the lamps; then everything went black while the boom hit against our faces, behind our heads, against our shoulders. We couldn’t tell where we were at. And as for me, I pushed further, but I was taken behind the first row, and between the first row and the second; so we couldn’t see the hunchback, because he must have been seated. We couldn’t see him; not a tall man even when standing, he was so short and now he was entirely hidden on his bench by people standing before him. And the girl, she could be seen between people’s heads. We see her in snatches. She is given to you, she is taken away. A flash of lightning; then it seemed that the roof of the dance platform came down; the girl, she can be seen between people’s heads, then she can no longer be seen. As people tell it now, just then the hunchback doffed his hat and placed it beside him; he gestured to it, he wasn’t yet playing. He seemed to be waiting. It was those in the first row who understood first, having been able to see the whole thing. They understood, they were laughing. The girl, she seemed to be waiting as well, then she also gestures to the hat: and so a first coin falls into the hat. But the people in the other rows, having now understood, yelled, ‘And what about us?’ They got their money ready, they couldn’t reach the hat. They held their coins in their hands, but they had to stand up on the tips of their toes, the hat was placed too low. So they yell, ‘Pass it to us!’ We were having fun. We were yelling, ‘Pass the hat!’ It seems the accordion began to play; we couldn’t hear it. She began to go around the circle, while we were continuing to push toward her, and at the same time we split away from her when she moved toward you; in this way some were going forward, others were going backward. She was holding her arms out; bits of moss were still hanging in her hair. We were throwing one franc coins, two franc coins at her. Suddenly, a crack of lightning. Another crack. Everyone was digging in their pockets. But now the lights are flickering and weakening in the bulbs, inside which we can see the filaments; and now… now we are looking at the lake, someone turns around… and over there, amidst the flashes of lightning is one flash that held steady. In the dip of the valley, there was one that didn’t want to go out. It remains fixed at the base of the sky; we heard the fire bell ring out…”

 

Some ran to the village to get the fire pump wagon; others took the path that descends along the Bourdonnette. Those on the path saw it lit up in front of them by a flash of lightning; then the ground was taken away so they were placing their steps into a void. Then the ground was lit again; they move faster, but they slip, they fall forward. They were no longer feeling the rain except for the water that ran along their sides and when they opened their mouths, they get a full mouthful. They slide, they fall forward, smashing against the night that has returned across the path as if there was a mudslide on the hill, but they call to one another or they hold hands; and, at the same time, behind the curtains of water was this great steady flame that made shine the strings of water and which they had only to fix their eyes upon and their bodies moved forward as if pulled by a long rope. They arrive at the ravine, they tumble about in the bushes. And they spill out finally onto the shoreline, while we could still hear the fire bell ringing, between two booms of thunder. The pump hadn’t yet arrived; and anyway they saw that they had arrived too late.

And, in fact, when the fire wagon finally arrived, they didn’t even get it working, even though there was plenty of water. There was already nothing left of the shed; as for the rest of the building, only the four brick walls were still standing and from a pile of fallen wooden beams a black smoke was rising, replacing the light of the flames. We were arriving from everywhere now, but there was nothing to do: we could only watch. And those who came from the village like those who came from the Fleur-de-Lys just stood there, without moving (the wind had lost much of its power, the waves too, and the thunder was moving away).

We were now in the gray air, on a gray water, in a fine gray rain; and amidst all this was the black smoke. They were standing there, they were standing around all that remained of the buildings; at first they said nothing, then we hear Milliquet’s voice:

“This is the way it had to end!”

He had arrived behind the pump; he speaks loudly and is one of the first to speak. He had his hands in his pockets, he had a cloth bag on his head that gave him a pointed cap.

“And Rouge, where is he? Where’s the girl?”

This is when Rouge appeared, but not the girl. Rouge appeared but she wasn’t with him.

He was with Décosterd; the two men had just gotten back to shore. Their whole bodies dripped with water, their hair plastered to their foreheads, no hats, trousers stuck to their thighs; then they are standing there in the fine rain, and Rouge went forward and Décosterd followed him.

Rouge didn’t seem to understand. Rouge was saying nothing, neither was Décosterd. It’s Milliquet who starts again, “Oh, so there you are, you; And so what? Are you surprised?”

Everyone was quiet.

“No, I see that you’re not surprised; only, her, where’ve you put her?”

Rouge didn’t answer.

“Oh, well that’s the top! So…you old fox, you let her get away?”

We saw Rouge lower his head. First he looks at Milliquet like he might jump on him; then his arms fall down next to his body. Something unknots in his neck, his head falls forward.

“It seems that she wasn’t so happy with you, and this…”

Milliquet sneers, “Ok, that’s good, now I’m avenged.”

We had surrounded Rouge, because first we were afraid he would do something bad; we saw quickly that he wasn’t even thinking of it.

We saw quickly that even if he’d thought of it he wouldn’t have had the strength; and this is when that other voice came, this other voice rising over the water, fighting hard against the noise.

“Hey over there! Hey, old man…”

Someone was laughing on the waves; they were already much smaller and less powerful.

“Hey old man! Recognize me?”

It was the Savoyard. He had waited for Rouge to get to land; he had taken his boat.

And we understand one last thing that he yells: “In the mail… I’ll send it back to you in the mail…”

A burst of laughter; Rouge doesn’t move. It seems he will never move again and he’ll stay standing there until the end of the world, while the rest of us grew quiet; we were standing in a circle around the smoking wooden beams.

The smoke from the beams had been black; now it was white.

 

And is she still here, still for a little while?

There were only a few who had stayed on the dance floor: Maurice, Alexis, Bolomey, little Marguerite, Chauvy; everyone else who’d been watching had run to the fire or gone for shelter in the inn. The electricity had gone out completely. Here, we were in the wind, in the lightning, in the thunder, and the thunder was continually growling. At the very most, every few moments and at great intervals, a note or two or even a chord came to you, then we hear nothing. We can no longer see the hunchback; we can no longer see Juliette. The night falls upon your head and around your shoulders like a photographer’s black hood; then she appears, she is pink; she has gotten up onto a table. We see her, we no longer see her. There are only five or six of us. And so Alexis thought that it was definitely time, he leans toward Maurice, Maurice isn’t there. He looks for him, holding his hand out but doesn’t find him. Then Maurice is there again; Alexis has time to reach for his shoulder, he puts his hand on the shoulder, just when Maurice disappears again.

“Listen, Maurice, you’ve got to tell her it’s time to get going, it’s now, the storm is going to pass… it’s time to take her, Maurice, before everyone comes back…”

But Maurice doesn’t seem to hear, he is watching. She is there, she is no longer there.

“Maurice!”

Maurice doesn’t answer, he hasn’t moved. The wind comes, it slaps beneath the roof structure. The night grows longer, the flashes of lightning less frequent; they are now over the roof. Night—no, because she is there, she is there again; she holds her two arms up, the rose falls from her ear.

“Maurice!”

Then we hear a few shrill little notes that seem to grow distant, then come back, grow distant again; and where is he, the hunchback? We can’t see him, nor his instrument, nor where the sound is coming from, because he’s moved;—but she was raised up again into the air. The lightning paints her, she raises her arms. She raises her arms again; then she has no arms, then she has no body, then she is no more; and a last clap of thunder made it so everything ceased to exist; she ceased to exist as well, and, when the lightning came again, she was no longer there…

“Go quickly, Maurice, no one will see us… hurry!”

But Alexis stopped suddenly.

A little gray light had begun to slide itself between the wooden beams beneath the garlands; we see the garlands, and look at that, it’s true, we’re on the dance floor. We see between the floor and the ceiling all the things that are coming back to their places: the wet grass, the trees, their trunks; vaguely, not yet well-defined, like at the dawn of the world. It’s as if the world is coming into existence and it isn’t the same as before. Maurice then looks around him slowly, astonished, then he looks for her, for Juliette; he sees that she is in fact no longer there. We see the bench where the hunchback was seated, he is no longer there. And we see the table where she had been (or was it a dream we had, because she is no longer on the table). Not next to it, not anywhere. And Maurice looks, then he takes off running.

“Maurice, where’re you going, hey, Maurice…”

He doesn’t hear. He is in the fine gray rain which is hanging everywhere between you and the sky. There is fog, the trees are dripping. He goes toward the road; he gets to the road, he doesn’t see her on the road. It’s just that we can’t see more than fifteen meters ahead, but maybe we’ve gone in the wrong direction, and now the fire bell has quieted, the wind has also stopped, the now far away thunder can barely be heard. And what a strange silence there is all around! And there amidst the dripping of the trees, while he turns around, because it’s as if we’ve come up behind him; —and, in fact, someone has come, but it isn’t the one he is looking for…

He shook his head.

We continue to call out to Maurice from beneath the dance platform, where now the boys are whistling as loud as they can with their fingers, not being able to see him, not able to be seen by him;—and her, he’s seen her perfectly, little Emilie, he wasn’t able not to see her because she came so close, her dress sodden against her shoulders, her large straw hat with the brim drooping down against the sides of her face.

He wasn’t able not to hear her, “Maurice, it’s me…”

She lowers her head; she stands there, hands together; over her skirt she holds her little brown hands that are soaking wet; but she isn’t the one he’s looking for.

She waits, she waits some more; we have turned our back to her.

And the footsteps move away, move always further away.

 

Ω