A Strange Country

by Muriel Barbery

  I have tried to describe Alejandro de Yepes through the three major figures of his youth, who shared the same aspirations in life. Why are some born to take responsibility for others, so that their lives become nothing but a succession of battles through which they learn to accept their burden? From that moment on, these battles, this burden, make them into guides whom their troops or brothers will follow to the gates of hell. However, this responsibility for other souls does not stop at the threshold to the cemetery, because the dead belong to the people entrusted to these singular men, and the terrible weight of the kingdom of the dead, the burning obligation to respond to the call, is what we refer to as the life of the dead: a silent, incandescent life, more intense and magnificent than any other, and a few individuals among the living have agreed to be its messengers.

  Sons! To the earth and the sky!

  Sons! Live for your dead!

  Brothers! Stand vulnerable before us!

  Brothers! Your noblesse will oblige us.

  Book of Battles

  BATTLE

  How did this war differ from the previous ones?

  There was the fact that the Western world no longer knew its dead: either because it had grown old and was approaching an end it did not want to see, or because it had reached the limits of its dream and had to construct another one. In any case, it lacked the whispering of the dead, without which none can live honorably—who can call an existence decent if it has not received a mandate?

  As for me, right from the start it seemed as if the battle would have to be resolved by radically rewriting the dream of history. Never had murder come closer to triumphing over poetry.

  MURDER

  The life of Alejandro de Yepes had begun with the murder of his family and continued with that of his protector, and he sensed, correctly, that he would endure other crimes. What he did not know, however, was that long before he came into the world, the source of his own story lay in a distant murder whose protagonists were strangers to him.

  Given the fact that it had been committed neither for gain nor for power, but because the murderer had an obscure premonition that his victim had been sent by the devil, this murder occupied an unusual spot in the sequence of major murders, a spot that yielded up the hope of something beneficial.

  Can one ever escape from the fatality of murder? Hope and horror—this shall all be told below. There is only fiction, there are only stories. It doesn’t matter to me whether I know them in advance.

  DARKER THAN NIGHT

  Now two hours have gone by and Alejandro de Yepes, from the tower of his castillo, is watching the snow fall in the night. He has just been woken, and he’s not sure he understands what’s happening.

  “How long has the snow been falling?” he asked.

  “For two hours,” Jesús replied. “In two hours, six feet of snow have fallen.”

  “Six feet,” said Alejandro. “And you say these men arrived without leaving footprints?”

  “Our watchmen are positioned so close together that even an ant could not get through. And besides, what sort of man can make his way through this snow? I don’t know how they got here but it was not by road.”

  “From the sky?”

  “I don’t know. Suddenly there they were in front of us, in the grand hall, and one of the redheads asked to speak to General de Yepes, adding that he was sorry about the snow.”

  He wiped his hand across his brow.

  “I know, sir, when I tell it like this, it all seems so strange. But I would stake my life on it that they are not enemies.”

  “Where are they now?” asked Alejandro.

  “In the cellar. It’s what the redhead requested. He seems very well informed, I must say.”

  They looked at each other for a moment.

  “Should I have them brought up?” asked Jesús.

  “No,” said Alejandro, “I’ll go down.”

  And turning in a circle on himself:

  “There’s something about this snow.”

  “It’s not falling the way it usually does,” said Jesús.

  The cellar extended beneath the entire area of the castillo. It was a gigantic place, lit by torches which the steward, back in his day, would hold aloft as he walked up and down the rows of bottles. On the floor of sand and hard dirt, Luis would trace figures with a rake, in keeping with his mood of the moment. When he walked on them the next day, they remained intact, and this was not, by a long shot, the only marvel in the place. You did not have to be an architect to realize that an entire castillo cannot stand on such a huge open space devoid of any pillars. You could walk along rows bordered by old copper chests that had been there for who knows how long, and the arrangement of the various wines was mysterious, too. Luis would lay the bottle he’d been given in a certain place, and the next day he would find it somewhere else. The only bottles that could be easily removed from their alcove were at the end of the last row at the very end of the cellar, where he had received the delivery of petrus for Alejandro’s sixteenth birthday. Finally, on certain occasions, the door to the place was kept closed, and when it was opened again everything had changed, although the beauty of it never disappointed. No matter which torch Luis lit, it would project an iridescent glow that glistened on the copper racks, and perpetuated its sparkle from one end of the cellar to the other; moving lines of luminous pearls traced a perfect, translucent architecture in the space; rows of earth and sand were interwoven, creating a feeling of peace. Luis had to show visitors the way out, otherwise they would have stayed there for the rest of their days.

  That night, the cellar was even more resplendent than usual. In the tilted bottles, the wine shimmered with flashes of pale gold, and a strange glow cloaked the floor with dull silver. In one gloomy corner, they found the three men grunting like pigs beneath their dark hooded capes. The one who was laughing loudest had a few flamboyant locks of hair; the second one, who had brown hair, was so massive in appearance that the others looked like imps in comparison.

  Motionless, arms crossed, six feet from the threesome, Alejandro cleared his throat. They paid no attention. The intruders had found a barrel somewhere, on which they had placed their glasses and an impressive row of fine vintages. Of course, all three were completely drunk, something Jesús summed up by exclaiming, “Oh, the bastards!”

  Alejandro cleared his throat again, with no more success than the first time, while the third thief caressed a bottle of rare champagne, saying:

  “What we need now is a bubble.”

  At the same time, his hat slipped back to reveal a similarly flamboyant head of hair; a bright reflection from one of the racks lit up his fine, squirrel-like features; then everything went dark again. The only light came from the crystal glasses where they had poured champagne while Alejandro and Jesús looked on in silence. There was something wrong, but devil take them if they could say what it was, other than that it had to do with the liquid itself, which the second redhead was pouring cautiously. The two other men, very focused, kept an eye on the operation. Finally, they all relaxed, and Jesús and Alejandro saw that the bubbles were hastening toward the bottom of the champagne glasses, where they dissolved in a tiny hissing maelstrom.

  “Santa Madre,” murmured Jesús.

  A singular irony: while exclamations and throat clearing had not sufficed to distract the drinkers, this faint murmur caused all three to turn around at once. The first redhead stood up straight, somewhat painfully, and reached for a torch. His head was wobbling, he was squinting slightly, and intermittently let out strange noises. However, he seemed to be the leader, for the others looked at him and waited for him to make the first move.

  “Well, well,” he muttered.

  Then he turned to his companions with an apologetic look. The tallest one pointed a finger toward his pocket and the redhead’s face lit up as he repeated, Ah, well, well! And the three men fl
ung their heads back to drink from flasks they pulled out from underneath their cloaks. Judging by the faces they were making, the liquid must have had a bitter taste, but the most remarkable thing was that they instantaneously sobered up, and stood solidly on their feet as if they had not just consumed half the cellar—all things which caused Alejandro and Jesús to raise an interested eyebrow, for they too were not averse to drinking.

  They all looked at one another again in silence.

  The leader of the group was a paunchy little man with a round face and round eyes, fair skin and countless freckles; accompanied by a fine double chin and an abundant mane of hair, sagging shoulders and an upturned nose; in a word, he was not particularly becoming. But no soldier can fail to discern the danger concealed by artless attire, and Alejandro and Jesús saw that the man’s gaze belied his bearing, that however inoffensive and good-natured he might seem, it would be dangerous to underestimate him, and that anyone who had made that mistake had probably not lived to brood over it; in short, they saw that this amiable inebriate was one of their own kind.

  “I owe you an explanation,” said the man.

  The tall, dark-haired man stepped forward, bowed briefly and said, “Marcus, at your service.”

  The other redhead did likewise and said, “Paulus.”

  To which their leader added, also bowing:

  “Petrus, your humble servant.”

  Then, somewhat brazenly:

  “May I tempt you with a little upside-down champagne?”

  A moment passed. Alejandro was still standing with his arms crossed, a stern expression on his face, rigid and silent as he confronted the strangers. Jesús . . . well, Jesús could not help but want to taste the champagne. There always comes a time when a man of reason discovers a penchant for extravagance, particularly when he has witnessed lakes evaporating without warning and mist writing sibylline messages on the sky. Moreover, in spite of the fantastical nature of the circumstances, he trusted these men.

  Alejandro, his face inscrutable, took a step forward.

  Another moment passed.

  He took another step, and smiled.

  “Alejandro de Yepes,” he said, holding his hand out to Petrus. “You are acquainted with my tutor, I believe? He just went by, behind you.”

  “Oh, we met earlier,” replied Petrus, shaking his hand. “I am glad he appears to you as well.”

  “Didn’t you see him?” Alejandro asked Jesús.

  “No, sir,” he replied. “You saw the steward’s ghost?”

  “Just behind that gentleman,” murmured Alejandro, “just behind him.”

  He gestured invitingly at the barrel.

  “If you would do us the honor of pouring some upside-down champagne.”

  Should we be surprised by such composure? Alejandro had been hearing the voices of the dead for so long that it didn’t strike him as incongruous in the least that it was also possible to see them. Luis’s apparition, strolling along the rows of bottles, had had its effect, and now it was with a certain interest that Alejandro awaited what might come next.

  They sat down around the makeshift table.

  “You just have to focus,” said Petrus, slowly pouring champagne into two clean glasses.

  “A nice little vintage,” Jesús pointed out, “it would be a mistake to deprive ourselves.”

  “You haven’t seen anything yet,” said Paulus. “Once you’ve tasted champagne upside down, you can’t possibly go back to right side up.”

  “Is that what you are doing with the snow, too?” asked Alejandro.

  Petrus seemed astonished.

  “It’s falling the right way, I believe.”

  “He’s referring to Maria,” said Paulus.

  “Ah,” said Petrus, “of course. Yes, yes, there is someone who makes the snow fall for us, hence its appearance which is, shall we say, rather personal, more meditative, blurring the perception of the enemy.”

  “Airplane radar can penetrate snow,” Jesús pointed out.

  “I’m not talking about that enemy,” said Petrus. “You will have observed that the climate has been somewhat changeable in recent years—storms, frost, floods.”

  “Is that your Maria, too?” asked Jesús.

  “No, no” said Petrus. “Maria only orders snow, the enemy alone is distorting the climate.”

  Setting the bottle back down, he added:

  “Champagne and ghosts, on the other hand—that only happens in this cellar.”

  Alejandro raised his glass and studied the pale liquid. The descending bubbles tickled his nose pleasantly, and he could imagine that it would cause a sort of little explosion on the tongue.

  He was wrong.

  There was even such a lack of explosion on the first sip, the taste was so flat, and the bubbles so devoid of any impact that Alejandro and Jesús, disappointed, looked at each other from under their brows.

  “Just wait a moment,” said Paulus, with the indulgence of the initiated for the erring ways of the layman.

  And indeed, the marvel began to work its magic, for the two men were overcome by a sensation of lying in the grass, their eyes riveted on the heavens on one of those days when fate is affable. The earthy taste in their mouth harmonized with the celestial lightness of the champagne until it released a euphoria whose substance they would have found difficult to describe.

  “This is the beneficial effect of the alliance between earth and sky,” said Petrus. “As the bubbles head toward the bottom they preserve the celestial value of the wine but multiply its earthy value.”

  After smiling at his glass, all tenderness, he added:

  “Although there is not much you can do if the substance you start with is mediocre.”

  When the first glass was empty, Alejandro and Petrus smiled at each other, and Jesús noticed the redhead’s beautiful, thoughtful gray eyes.

  “How did you get here?” he asked.

  “Over the bridge,” replied Petrus. “The bridge that joins our world to yours.”

  Then, after a moment’s silence:

  “To you, it’s invisible.”

  “Are you dead?” asked Jesús. “Are you ghosts?”

  Petrus looked at him, surprised.

  “I don’t think ghosts drink champagne,” he said.

  “If you haven’t come from the other life, where have you come from?” asked Jesús.

  “There is only one life, and it encompasses the living and the dead,” answered Petrus. “But there are several worlds, and our worlds have been communicating for a long time. In reality, the first crossing of the bridge took place here in Yepes, although we only found that out yesterday.”

  Picking up the champagne bottle, he added:

  “I have a long story to tell you, so it deserves another little drop.”

  “Can you tell us the name of your country?” asked Alejandro.

  “We call it the world of mists,” answered Petrus. “The world of mists, where the elves live.”

  There was a silence.

  “Elves?” said Jesús. “You come from the world of elves?”

  He began to laugh.

  “Or maybe you yourselves are elves?” asked Alejandro without irony.

  Jesús looked at his general as if he were a hen wearing a wig.

  “That doesn’t strike me as any more surprising than all the rest of it,” said Alejandro in response to his gaze.

  “We are elves,” Petrus confirmed, “yes, we are.” And to Jesús, tactfully: “I see you are somewhat surprised, so allow me to pour you another glass.”

  He filled his glass and, with a slight tilt of his chin, motioned to Paulus to fetch another bottle.

  “Another bubble?” asked Paulus.

  “Allow me to offer you one of my favorite vintages,” said Alejandro pleasantly, as if the previ
ous bottles had come from some unknown reserve.

  He headed toward the back of the cellar.

  “I thought elves lived in the far north,” said Jesús. “The far north of sagas and legends.”

  He looked at the glasses lined up in front of him and added:

  “And that they didn’t drink.”

  “You also believe that God the father lives in heaven and that he doesn’t drink,” answered Petrus.

  On seeing Jesús’s horrified expression, he added:

  “I’m not saying he drinks, I’m not saying he drinks. Simply, we all know that the spirit of the world doesn’t have a beard and isn’t ensconced on a throne on a huge pink cloud.”

  Jesús looked just as horrified, but Alejandro, coming back from the depths of the cellar, distracted them.

  “Interesting,” he murmured, setting a bottle on the barrel.

  Petrus leaned over to read the label and smiled.

  “Amarone,” he said. “The wine of stories.”

  Marcus frowned.

  “We’ve run out of tea,” he said.

  “Such improvidence,” said Petrus, still smiling.

  He looked up and seemed to be addressing someone invisible:

  “You will bring us some, won’t you?”

  “Was that tea in your little flask?” asked Alejandro.

  “Yes,” Marcos replied, “very concentrated gray tea.”

  “The tea of our world,” added Paulus. “It has . . . uh . . . special properties.”

  He fell silent and looked questioningly at Petrus.

  But Petrus didn’t care and was smiling gratefully at the amarone.

  “Elves,” said Jesús. “Do you have wine up there, too?”

  “No, alas,” reply Petrus, with a sorrowful face.

  He dismissed the distressing confession with the back of his hand.