The Accident on the A35

by Graeme Macrae Burnet

  Some time later, Raymond returned to retrieve the knife from its hiding place. Crouching by the drainpipe, he slid it into its sheath. It fit snugly. He straightened up and resisted the temptation to look around to see if he was being watched. Doing so would only make him seem more suspicious than he must already appear. Instead he kept his eyes to the ground and passed through the passage that led back to the street. As he was about to step out, the door to No.13 opened. Raymond stepped back into the archway. A girl emerged. She was nineteen or twenty years old, wearing black jeans and boots laced halfway up her calves. Above, she sported a men’s tweed jacket with patches on the elbows. Despite the dull weather she was wearing a pair of round sunglasses with green lenses. A pork-pie hat perched on the back of her head. She headed towards the town centre. She had a long, loping stride, at once languid and purposeful. Raymond moved off in the same direction. He could not be accused of following her. It was mere coincidence that she had emerged from the building as he was about to leave. Nevertheless, he kept on the pavement on the opposite side of the street and regulated his pace so that he did not overtake her. His satchel knocked against his hip. The thought of the knife nestling there pleased him. The girl reached the junction at which Raymond had parted company from the pockmarked man who had given him directions. He hung back a little.

  The girl ambled through the traffic, appearing entirely indifferent to whether she was hit. A large truck obstructed Raymond’s view. When it pulled away, the girl was gone. Raymond felt a pang of disappointment. He skipped through the lines of cars. Then, above the vehicles, he spotted her hat bobbing along Rue de la Sinne. He trotted a few steps to catch up. He could no longer pretend that he wasn’t following her. The girl stopped to look in the window of a record store. Raymond ducked into a doorway. He was no more than twenty metres behind. Her profile was striking. She had a strong Roman nose and prominent cheekbones. She held her head tilted back, perhaps only to prevent her sunglasses slipping down her nose, but the posture gave her a haughty air. If she were to turn round now, she would certainly catch Raymond looking at her. Perhaps she had already noticed him when she left her apartment, or had seen him earlier from her window. Raymond could think of no reasonable explanation for his behaviour. But he could not bring himself to walk away. Part of him even wanted her to see him.

  The girl continued along Rue de la Sinne and entered the bar outside which his chaperon had paused to greet an acquaintance. Raymond waited a couple of minutes then followed her inside. The place was quite cavernous, with a high ceiling and ornate cornicing. Two men perched on stools at the bar, one slowly turning the pages of a newspaper, the other with his chin on his chest as if he was asleep. The bartender greeted Raymond with an unsmiling upward nod of his head. Raymond took a seat on the green banquette that ran the length of the wall to the right of the door. The girl was nowhere to be seen.

  High on the wall opposite was a large clock bearing the name of the bar: Le Convivial. The second hand ticked round at a stately pace. It was a few minutes before five o’clock. There were around twenty tables with mismatched wooden chairs arranged around the perimeter of the room. Roughly half of these were occupied by an assortment of old men, trousers hiked to their navels, arms folded over their bellies. They exchanged rounds of handshakes and greetings with each new arrival, but for the most part sat in silence. The walls were painted in a yellow wash and hung with framed Lautrec playbills. Two pillars were plastered with movie bills and photographs of Belmondo, Bardot, Gainsbourg and the like. On the far side of the room was a billiard table with two cues carelessly discarded on the baize. Near the centre of the table the cloth was ripped and had been repaired with a strip of black tape. Raymond had the impression that it was never used.

  No one so much as glanced at Raymond. He began to wonder if the bartender had actually seen him at all. He was a stocky guy of about thirty, with sand-coloured hair, combed back from his forehead. He was wearing a short-sleeved blue shirt with Le Convivial embroidered on the pocket. Various rudimentary tattoos were inked on his arms. He was leaning on the counter, gazing at a spot somewhere above the door and did not appear to have any intention of serving Raymond or anyone else. He had a little beard under his lower lip, which he absentmindedly stroked with his thumb and forefinger. Perhaps it was the sort of place where one ordered at the counter. In any case, if the girl was not here, there was no reason to stay. He would look foolish, however, if he were to suddenly stand up and leave without ordering anything. He imagined the bartender calling after him: ‘Hey, kid, what do you think this is? A waiting room?’ to a chorus of laughter from the men gathered around the tables.

  Then, at precisely five o’clock, the girl appeared through a door marked WC Femmes, a facility Raymond did not imagine was frequently used. She had changed into a white blouse and had an apron tied around her waist. She had taken off her hat, and her sunglasses were now propped on her head. Her thick brown hair was cut short above the nape of her neck and brushed forward into a quiff. Without a word to the bartender, she immediately set about clearing the empty cups and glasses from the tables, before vigorously wiping them down. The regulars had clearly been awaiting her arrival as they now barked their orders at her, none of which she wrote down. She dealt with them in an easy, familiar way, addressing the more elderly among them as oncle. One man patted her on the behind as she wiped his table, earning himself a stern reprimand that he clearly enjoyed. The tables cleared, she recited the orders mechanically to the bartender, who set to work. Only then did she turn her attention to Raymond, whom she had so far affected not to notice.

  She stood in front of his table, her right hand on her hip. Her left foot rested on its heel, swivelling back and forth as if she was grinding out a cigarette.

  ‘So, monsieur, what can I do for you?’ she said with an ironic emphasis on the word monsieur. She had a pleasant low voice. Her eyes were large and hooded and so widely spaced that they appeared to point in opposite directions. Raymond wondered if she wore her little glasses to correct some defect in her vision, or because she was self-conscious about her squint. But she did not seem to be the sort of person that would be discomfited by anything.

  ‘I’ll take a tea,’ he said.

  ‘A tea?’ the girl repeated. She tipped her head to one side as if his order amused or surprised her. He should, for appearance’s sake, have ordered a beer, but before he had the chance to change his mind, the girl had shouted his order over her shoulder: ‘Dédé, a tea for the young monsieur!’

  This caused several of the other customers to look in Raymond’s direction. He found himself blushing. The girl returned to the counter and began to distribute the drinks Dédé had been setting out. The orders were dispensed with a minimum of fuss. No money changed hands. The reckoning-up would no doubt come later. The girl placed Raymond’s tea wordlessly on the table and left the chit on a pewter saucer. Raymond emptied his customary three sachets of sugar into the glass and stirred it absent-mindedly. He took his cigarettes from his pocket and lit one.

  The girl, having completed her initial round of chores, was now leaning on the corner of the counter, exchanging a few words with Dédé. She tipped her head in Raymond’s direction and whispered a remark, causing him to give a snorted laugh. Raymond directed his eyes to the display of posters on the wall and then to the clock, which now read ten past five. He reached inside his satchel for his book. His hand rested for a moment on the sheath of the knife and he ran the tips of his fingers slowly along the worn leather, past the hilt and onto the handle. He glanced around to see if he was being watched. A couple of tables along the banquette, two men were absorbed in a game of chess on a linoleum board. Raymond took out his book and pressed it open on the table. The spine was broken and some of the pages were beginning to come away.

  An old man with a neck like a turkey’s pushed open the door and walked tentatively to the counter. His trousers were too short and he was not wearing any socks. There were stains around the crotc
h of his trousers. He exchanged a limp handshake with the bartender, who placed a small glass of dark liquor in front of him. The man contemplated it for a few moments, both hands resting on the counter, as if gathering courage. Then he took up his drink and knocked it back. He rummaged in his trouser pocket for a coin and left at the same unhurried pace as he had entered.

  A few minutes later, another man entered and nodded to the patrons sat around the tables by the door. He took a newspaper from the rack and sat down at an occupied table. It was the man who had given Raymond directions the previous day. He must have been a regular because, without having ordered, the waitress brought him an espresso and a glass of schnapps. As the man’s eyes followed her back across the bar, his gaze fell on Raymond, who immediately hunched over his book. But it was too late. A puzzled expression passed across the man’s face. When Raymond glanced up a few moments later, the man was still looking at him. He raised his hand in greeting.

  ‘Did you find it okay?’ he called across the bar.

  Raymond glanced towards the counter to see if the waitress was listening. She was looking at him inquisitively. At least the man had not mentioned Rue Saint-Fiacre by name.

  ‘Yes. Thank you,’ he replied. He pointedly returned his gaze to his book.

  Raymond did not know what, if anything, he wanted to happen. His instinct was to drink his tea and leave as quickly as possible. That was what the Raymond of a few days before would have done. But the Raymond of a few days before would not be here in the first place. The Raymond of a few days before would not have dared to steal 200 francs from Thérèse’s jar in the kitchen. He would certainly not have stolen the knife that now nestled in his satchel. Nor would he have followed a strange girl through the streets of Mulhouse. If he left the bar now, that would be the end of it. But he did not want it to end. He did not even know the girl’s name. Was it so out of the question simply to ask? It was true that he had gone into the philatelist’s shop and stolen the knife, but the act had been entirely impulsive. Had it been premeditated, he would never have had the courage to go through with it. In a similar way, had he hesitated, even for an instant, before following the girl into Le Convivial, he would have come up with a hundred reasons not to do so. But now, having failed to ask the girl’s name when she first came to take his order, the task was beyond him. It would lack all spontaneity. Aside from Yvette, whom—despite their sexual activities—he thought of as somewhat akin to a sister, Raymond never failed to become tongue-tied on the rare occasions when a girl spoke to him. And if the girl was attractive, he habitually found himself blushing. As a result, he avoided the gaze of girls at school, lest they take it as an invitation to address him.

  The only feasible course of action was to wait and see what transpired. Raymond found himself smiling at the thought that by thus trusting to chance, he was, in a sense, exercising a choice. The idea reassured him. It was now twenty past five. He still had to find his way to the railway station, take a train back to Saint-Louis and be home in time for the evening meal with his mother. He decided he could remain for another forty minutes without having to field awkward questions about his whereabouts.

  The chess players at the nearby table had reached the endgame. After each move, they struck the timer on the table between them with increasing haste. The older of the two men played at a more leisurely pace, but under the table his leg twitched nervously. He wore a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles on the very end of his nose. The younger man, playing black, continually ran the palm of his hand over his mouth and shook his head, as if resigned to defeat. His king was besieged in the corner of the board. White advanced a bishop to check. Black blocked with a pawn. The white bishop retreated, before the younger man advanced his rook to his opponent’s back row, where his king was hemmed in behind three pawns. The older man took off his spectacles and resigned the game. No words were exchanged as they packed the pieces into a wooden box. The younger man then rolled up the board and replaced it, along with the box of pieces, in the pigeonhole of a dresser in which the cutlery was kept. They left, parting company on the pavement outside the bar.

  Raymond had become quite engrossed in the game. It was clearly a daily or weekly ritual. Perhaps he and Stéphane would one day have their own table at the back of a bar in Saint-Louis.

  Another ten minutes had passed. The girl showed no interest in Raymond. If anything, she actively averted her eyes whenever she passed his table. He began to doubt the wisdom of his plan to trust to fate. Perhaps, after all, he would have to take the initiative. He gazed down at the book, which he still held open on the table in front of him. His eyes rested on the underlined words: The flesh was laid open from the ball of the thumb to the root of the little finger. Raymond pictured himself taking the knife from his satchel, standing up and drawing it across the palm of his hand. He imagined the men by the door pointing towards him, the girl running over with a cloth and binding his hand. This would afford the ideal opportunity—spontaneously, it would seem—to ask her name. He was pondering this when the girl appeared at his table.

  ‘Is there something wrong with your tea?’ She was holding a tray under her arm. Her left foot swivelled on its heel as before, giving the impression that she was annoyed or impatient.

  ‘My tea? No, it’s fine,’ Raymond replied. ‘I prefer to drink it cold.’

  Then, as if to prove his point, he raised it to his lips and drank with exaggerated relish. The girl rolled her eyes. Raymond cursed himself. There had been no real reason for the girl to come over. Her comment about the tea had been a mere pretext. And all he could think of to say was: I like to drink it cold. How idiotic! It wasn’t even true, and now if he were ever to see her again, he would be condemned to drink his tea cold. Still, the girl did not move off. She jutted her chin towards the book on the table and asked what he was reading.

  He raised the cover to show her.

  ‘Ah,’ she said in the manner of a doctor diagnosing a serious illness. ‘Well, don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll grow out if it.’

  Raymond gave a little laugh through his nose, but he could feel the colour beginning to rise to his cheeks as it always did. As a distraction, he lit a cigarette. To his surprise, the girl pulled out the chair opposite and sat down. The chair made an unpleasant grating sound on the floor. She took a cigarette from Raymond’s packet and lit it.

  She leaned in towards him. ‘You know, I saw you outside my apartment.’

  Raymond instinctively leant back on the banquette. His cheeks were by now quite crimson. Of course, it would be ridiculous to deny it, but that is what he did.

  ‘So you know where I live,’ the girl said.

  ‘Of course not. How could I?’

  ‘If you don’t know where I live, then how do you know you weren’t outside my apartment?’

  Raymond drew on his cigarette and puffed out the smoke without inhaling. ‘What I mean is that if I was outside your apartment, I didn’t know I was. Obviously, in the course of the day I’ve passed some apartments. If one of them was yours, then, yes, I was there, but only by chance.’ He was satisfied with this response. The heat in his face began to subside.

  The girl adopted a puzzled expression, as if she was weighing up what to make of him. ‘So do you admit you were there, or not?’ she said.

  ‘If you tell me where you live, then I can tell you if I was there.’

  The girl took a long draw on her cigarette. She let the ash fall to the floor at her feet.

  ‘This morning I saw you on Rue Saint-Fiacre looking up at the building. You had a notebook in your hand. Later I saw you hanging around in the archway next to the junk shop. Then, when I left this afternoon, you followed me.’ Her tone was matter-of-fact, as if it was the sort of thing that happened to her every day. She raised her eyebrows questioningly.

  Before Raymond could respond, Dédé called out in an exasperated fashion: ‘Hey, Delph, are you planning on doing any more work today, or are we just going to close the place up?’

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nbsp; And there it was: without having to do anything, Raymond had learned her name. She swivelled to face Dédé, who was standing by the hatch in the counter gesturing towards the customers by the door. She broke into a wide smile, tipped her head to one side and gave him the finger. She turned back to Raymond.

  ‘So?’ she said.

  ‘It’s true,’ he said. ‘I was there. But I didn’t follow you. We just happened to be leaving at the same time.’

  ‘And I suppose you “just happened” to follow me into this charming establishment?’

  Raymond looked at the table. ‘I wasn’t spying on you,’ he said quietly. He glanced up at her. Despite everything, she did not seem in the least put out. Raymond had the feeling that she rather liked the idea of being followed, of being spied on. He smiled at her.

  ‘So what were you doing?’ she asked.

  ‘That I can’t say, at least not now.’ He added the last words quite deliberately, to hint at the idea that they might see each other again.

  The girl—Delph—gave a little shake of her head and tutted to herself. She slid back her chair with the same grating noise as before and stood up. Raymond sensed his opportunity slipping away. His heart was beating quickly. He was going to have to take matters into his own hands. ‘Perhaps we could meet up again, somewhere else,’ he said. The colour returned to his cheeks.

  Delph laughed. Once, when he was six or seven years old, during a school trip to the Petite Camargue, a group of older boys had ambushed him from behind some trees and he had lost control of his bladder. As he waited for Delph to say something, Raymond now felt some of the same mortification. She shrugged, as if it was neither here nor there to her.