Light poured through the high, stained-glass windows. The church of Saint-Pierre-et-Saint-Paul was crowded. There were a lot of soldiers in damp uniform. Some wore kepis, others wore flat berets pulled down on the side. The air smelled of flowers and wet clothes. A middle-aged woman knelt beside Anne Marie. Eyes firmly closed behind dark glasses, a dress that had been drenched by the rain. Water trickled down the closed umbrellas and formed meandering rivulets on the slabs of stone.
The organ was overhead, in the gallery of steel girders.
The light from the windows bleached the image on the color television sets. A set had been placed on a shelf at each pillar. As the priest moved down the aisle, a score of electronic images moved in eerie unison.
The bishop gave the sermon. He was a local man with a dark skin, a receding hairline, and a gentle, almost effeminate manner. Anne Marie had once met him at a garden party at the residence of the Sous-Préfet. He now went from the far side of the altar, genuflected, and climbed the winding stairs that led to the cast-iron pulpit. He placed his hands on the edge of the pulpit. The congregation sat down. Those people standing in the aisles shuffled their feet and crossed their arms.
“A wife has lost her husband. A mother has lost her son. Many of you have lost a comrade and a friend.” The bishop spoke into the microphone and the thin voice echoed round the church and off the high roof of steel. “The Church has lost a child.”
Anne Marie’s feet were damp.
The rain had worked its way through the leather. Her best pair. Distractedly, she scratched at her hand. She tried to concentrate on the sermon. At the front of the church, she recognized the Préfet in tropical uniform and black epaulettes, heavy with gold braid. His hair was as white as the uniform.
Beside the Préfet, their heads turned attentively toward the pulpit, sat the local dignitaries. The thin face of the mayor of Pointe-à-Pitre, mayors from the other towns, officials from the Chamber of Commerce. Anne Marie recognized a député. And in the row behind him, wearing a black suit, sat Jacques Calais, accompanied by his nephew, Armand.
The women wore black dresses.
The image moved on the television sets.
“He gave his life selflessly for his country, without any thought for himself.”
A woman stood in the front pew; a black veil covered her head. Her shoulders were bowed.
“Today we mourn the loss of a young soldier. He has left this world to go from here to a new, brighter and happier world.” The bishop raised his hands. “We are sad; we feel the emptiness of our loss. We miss the man—he was young, he was full of life, he was innocent. We miss our friend.”
The microphone picked up the soft sobbing of the widow in black.
“We miss the soldier who placed duty above self-interest, devotion above egotism, love of others and of his country before love of himself.”