The Only Girl in the World

by Maude Julien

  ‘You’re going to stay here without moving,’ my father says. ‘You’re going to meditate on death. Open up your brain.’ I have no idea what that means, but I don’t even try to understand. What more will he demand of me? What will happen to me? They’re not going to leave me here, are they? And my worst fear is realized: I hear them walking away behind me, and then the cellar light goes out. There’s still a faint glow coming from the stairs. Then, suddenly, darkness.

  They’ve left, and turned off the lights.

  My eyes frantically probe the darkness. Only my ears can make anything out, and what they hear propels me into an abyss of terror. A host of sinister noises, little animals moving around in the dark, scurrying, running, stopping, rummaging and scuttling off again. I’m screaming inside, but no sound comes out because my lips are clamped shut and quivering. My father told me that if I open my mouth, mice or even rats will sense it and will climb up me, get into my mouth and eat me from the inside. He’s seen several people die like that in cellars when he was taking shelter from air raids in World War I. I worry that the mice might be able to get in through my ears. But if I cover them with my hands I won’t hear anything, I’ll be blind and deaf.

  I’m a pathetic puddle of fear. I move and breathe as little as possible, I stifle my shaking and chew the insides of my cheeks to stop my teeth from chattering, I try to disappear, make myself transparent, nonexistent. Maybe the rodents will forget I’m here. But I’m sick to my stomach. I’m afraid that my bladder’s going to give way; that is bound to be the sort of smell to immediately attract a whole family of rats. I can hear their busy little feet around me. Sometimes their pattering comes closer. Sometimes I hear one of them stop and feel a leg of my chair. It makes my insides liquefy. My feet fly off the ground reflexively. I hold them up, but it’s painful. Every now and then I have to lower them. I do it infinitely carefully, to avoid putting them down directly onto some rodent’s back or teeth.

  At last the light comes back on; my mother has come to get me. I don’t so much walk as fly towards the stairs and practically go up them on all fours, as fast as I can, towards that open door that I simply must reach before it closes again. I know there’s no reason why it should close now. But a voice inside me is screaming, ‘Hurry up, get out quick, or you’ll be locked in here forever.’ I can hear my mother behind me: ‘Look at this chicken!’ I couldn’t care less. I have to get out.

  I went to such a faraway place inside my head that night, fear was so deeply imprinted on my body, that I don’t remember feeling relieved when it ended. I don’t recall the rest of the night, how I slept, or what state I was in when I woke. The next day was the same as usual. There was no compensation for the hours of sleep missed or the emotional torture during my test. ‘Otherwise, how would it be a test?’ my father said.

  A month later, my parents wake me in the middle of the night again, and I know in a flash: it wasn’t a one-off test, it was the first in a series of monthly training sessions they’re going to inflict on me. I don’t know how I manage to put one foot in front of the other. I go down those stairs like an automaton, not even trying to escape. As if I’m chained to a conveyor belt trundling me towards a cleaver which will slice me up. I’m soon overwhelmed by the nauseating smell of the cellar. I’m suffocating all over again in the horror of absolute darkness and silence. I pray with all my might for it to end, for me to disappear. I ask for death, I beg it to come and take me. Is that what ‘meditating on death’ means?

  One night, when the three of us are going down the cellar stairs, my very tall father forgets to bend down and smacks his forehead violently into a metal beam. The test is immediately aborted. When my father is injured or sick everything stops straightaway until he has recovered. So we hurry back upstairs to tend to his wound. I’m secretly relieved, but I also feel guilty. I’m a bad daughter to be delighting in my father’s injury. A bad daughter who will have to pay for her bad thoughts.

  I don’t have to wait very long. The following month my father doesn’t come with me when I go down to the cellar. On my way down, I notice that a piece of yellow foam has been secured to the place where he hit his head last time. In a flash of nostalgia, I remember the unexpected happiness I felt then. So I really am a bad person. And here’s my punishment: before making me sit on a stool, my mother makes me put on a vest with little bells stitched onto it. I no longer have the option of leaning against a backrest, which means I no longer have the option of holding my feet up. If I move, my parents will hear the little bells ring. I decide it doesn’t matter, nothing matters anymore.

  But I can feel my heart accelerate in direct proportion to how far up the stairs my mother has climbed. The light goes out; I hear the key turn in the lock. Once again, darkness engulfs me. Once again, I’m a slave to those sounds. I have shoes on this time. Every now and then I clack them together, taking great care not to let the bells on my vest ring. It must work because just after I’ve smacked my shoes together, I hear little paws scurrying away.

  *

  My father tells me why I need to meditate on death: it’s so that I get used to the kingdom of the dead, so I feel at ease with the dead and they with me. Darkness allows us to communicate with them. Later I’ll have to travel between the kingdom of the living and the kingdom of the dead. I don’t think he knows it’s not the dead I’m terrified of, but the rats. I don’t say anything because I’m convinced that, if he knew, he’d think of some horrible way to cure me of my fear.

  Arthur

  After learning to ride a bike and to swim, I now have to learn to ride a horse. My father insists I be as accomplished a horsewoman as Will Scarlet’s Maude. He also has more practical motives. First, just like swimming, riding will be very useful if I need to escape. Secondly, it will be a prerequisite when, like my father, I’m initiated into a chivalric order—passing myself off as a man, it goes without saying. However much I turn this idea over in my mind, I still find it puzzling. Yes, my father is a knight, but he has never ridden a horse…

  There is a third and still more indisputable reason: I need to be able to get a job with a circus in case I have to hide or go undercover at some point. No one asks for your papers in a circus, they ask you to ride well, to walk on your hands and do somersaults. ‘You’re going to learn all of these skills,’ my father tells me. ‘We’re starting with horseback riding.’

  Of course, there’s no question of my joining a riding club. I’ll learn under my mother’s instruction on the estate, where there is already a small stable near the duck pond. My father has just bought a horse from a man in the village. He’s a darling piebald pony named Arthur. For Arthur and me, it’s love at first sight. When he sees me, his eyes light up. He nudges me, then drops his head so I can get onto his back. I climb up his neck by holding on to his mane, and end up facing the wrong way. He waits for me to turn around, and then off we go along the pathways on the grounds.

  I ride him bareback, grasping his mane in my hands. I couldn’t be happier. I love the way Arthur smells; I love the sound of his hooves clopping on the red gravel. When we get to the lawn he goes faster, but not too fast: he is careful not to make me fall. I bounce on his back in time to his little trot, and my heart leaps for joy.

  Sometime later a package arrives in the mail: a glossy brown saddle that gives off a strong smell of leather and cost 20,000 francs. My parents keep reminding me how expensive it was. All I can think is that it’s a bit heavy for a pint-sized mount like Arthur. My mother wants to show me how to tack up. She slips on a bridle, then puts the saddle on his back and starts fastening the girth, without realizing that Arthur is puffing out his stomach. Next she puts one foot in the stirrup and pushes herself off the ground to swing her other leg over his hindquarters. That’s when the cheeky pony quickly sucks in his stomach, which makes the saddle slip and…Crash! Now she is sprawled on the ground between Arthur’s legs, looking very put out. Her hair has come undone and there are bobby pins scattered all over the gravel. Meanwh
ile, Arthur is looking very regal, holding his head high as if the episode doesn’t warrant any attention at all.

  My mother gets to her feet and kicks Arthur in the stomach. His unshakeable composure, his refusal to be annoyed, to rear up or bite, makes me throw my head back and laugh uncontrollably. She storms off, leaving us to it. Even the slap she gives me on her way past only makes me laugh harder. I’m hiccupping by the time I release the girth and take off the saddle, which is so heavy I stumble under its weight. Then I undo the noseband and take out the bit. My father watches this scene without a word. I can feel his disapproving eyes on my back, but I try not to think about it—I might burst out laughing again.

  Two weeks later a whip arrives in another parcel. My mother saddles up Arthur again. But this time a few cracks of the whip persuade him to hold in his stomach, so she manages to tighten the girth properly and mount him. Arthur sets off, but at a slow walk, his head held low, refusing to break into a trot. ‘Watch closely,’ my mother says. ‘This is how to ride, not the way you do, like a little feral child.’ I don’t know exactly what ‘feral’ means, but it sounds quite nice. I’m happy to be feral, especially if it includes all the fun Arthur and I have together.

  Arthur has another love: Linda. At various times during the day I see him standing right outside her metal gate. When I have to shut her in at ten to eight in the morning, Arthur tries to get into the kennel too. It’s impossible, of course. But I know they catch up with each other during the night: Linda goes to join him in his stable. Before I go to sleep I picture them curled up together. I imagine myself snuggled in their warmth.

  Can an animal teach a person about happiness? In the depth of my despair, I am fortunate to have this incredible source of joy. My heart swells with affection at the thought of spending time with Arthur. Or just the thought of walking past him, of catching the adoring look he gives me as I pass. At night I remember the way he looked, unperturbed, patiently taking those kicks. And I laugh quietly under the covers. I love Arthur. I love Linda. Linda loves Arthur, Arthur loves Linda. Together we’re strong and beautiful, even if things are difficult. If only for our fleeting moments of love, everything else is worth putting up with.

  And there’s more and more to bear. ‘Tough pedagogy’ means I have to get used to Spartan living conditions. Of course, all distractions must be eliminated. I have to learn to sleep as little as possible, because sleep is a waste of time. I also have to cope without any of life’s pleasures, starting with delights for the tastebuds, which are the surest route to weakness. My mother arranges for butter, flour, sugar, oil, yeast, et cetera to be delivered in bulk. But we are never allowed fruit, yoghurt, chocolate, or any other kind of treat. For the sake of my training, I also have to respect special rules, like never eating fresh bread. My portion of the bread we bake every two weeks is systematically set aside to go stale.

  Indulging oneself is a serious sin. My father is determined to take the magic out of any kind of celebration, particularly the holiday season, the worst of all, with all the forced cheerfulness it creates around the world. I have to train myself not to fall for these misguided celebrations. For us, Christmas and New Year’s mean an increased workload. After dinner my mother and I have to go back up to the classroom and study for six more hours, until two in the morning. And the curriculum consists of the most daunting subjects like Latin, German and maths…The next day, despite my missing hours of sleep, my father won’t allow any changes to the usual schedule.

  At Christmas last year, the postman came and offered us some calendars being sold by the post office. My father invited him in and poured him a glass of cognac. Then he said, ‘Go ahead, Maude, choose a calendar.’ I studied them one at a time; they were all so beautiful! I eventually chose one with a picture of an adorable litter of puppies. When I looked up, I caught my father’s eye; he was glowering at me furiously.

  Eventually my mother slipped a banknote to the postman and showed him out. My father turned towards me. His voice boomed like a clap of thunder: ‘When I tell you to choose, Maude, that doesn’t mean “choose”. It means take what’s in front of you decisively so no one can detect the slightest hesitation on your part. Choosing has nothing to do with pleasure. Only the weak hesitate and take pleasure in choosing. Life isn’t about pleasure, it’s a merciless struggle. If you show someone what gives you pleasure, you’re revealing your vulnerability, and that person will take advantage of them to crush you. When you behave the way you just have, you put us all in danger.’

  I’m sure my father’s right. But still, how can he accuse me of being obsessed with pleasure? I know what pleasure is, it’s mentioned in books: ice-cream, cakes, parties, dances, Christmas trees…These are all things I’ve never seen or experienced, and to be honest I don’t miss them. My father need not worry, I’ve never dreamed of or longed for a Christmas tree.

  What I do dream of are butterflies and beetles and clover leaves. Snapdragons that look like little mouths when you pinch them open, and I imagine I’m chatting to them, regretting that I’m not a ventriloquist to give them words to match their moving lips. Gooseberries that Arthur and I pick in secret to feast on their bitter taste. Birds flying in the sky, unhindered by the fences of the house. And turtledoves, especially when they smooch with each other.

  Since the incident with the calendar, I’ve grasped that I have to disguise my delight and enthusiasm for things. Now, when I see something wonderful, I act completely indifferent to it.

  The Killer

  In my father’s view, comfort is one of the pernicious ‘pleasures’ that must be suppressed. Beds must not be cosy, sheets must not be soft to the touch, nor chairs relaxing. Given the long hours I spend at the piano, Madame Descombes had suggested many times that my stool be swapped for a Beethoven chair with a backrest. To no avail, of course.

  By the same token, despite the icy winters in the north of France, the vast house is barely heated. My bedroom must not be heated at all in order to conform to the precepts of a ‘tough’ upbringing. Sometimes it’s so cold that my windows freeze over on the inside. For half the year, going to bed and getting up in the morning are torture, so I try to undress and dress as fast as I can.

  For the same reasons, I have to wash in cold water. ‘Hot water is for wimps. If you’re ever in prison later in life, you need to show that you’re not afraid of ice-cold water. You should even be able to wash using snow, and without a second thought.’ My parents, on the other hand, are allowed hot water, especially my father, who—because he’s ‘the very picture of strong will’—has nothing left to prove.

  We bathe once a week. My father doesn’t believe in the virtues of daily bathing: ‘Your body secretes a layer of antibodies to protect you from germs. When you take a bath, you lose your immunity and expose yourself to diseases,’ he tells me, and then adds, ‘unless you bathe in the same water as me: I protect you from outside pollutants.’ That’s why I have to wait until my parents have taken their baths before I can get into the tub, without changing the water. ‘Leaving my water for you is an honour I grant you,’ my father often says. ‘It allows you to benefit from my energies when they enter your body.’ Not only has the water had more than enough time to cool, but it’s covered in a nasty grey scum mixed in with the Lux soap flakes. I wash in haste, keeping my eyes and mouth tightly shut, trying to breathe as little as possible.

  In the interest of ‘toughening me up’, I now have to join my mother and watch the butcher, who comes every four or five months to slaughter animals that my father has had delivered to the house. The butchering lasts two or three exhausting days, each starting with a 3:30 a.m. wake-up call. The man we call ‘The Killer’, an employee at the slaughterhouse in Wormhout, arrives at four o’clock in the morning. While we wait for the delivery truck, we give him a glass of white wine in the kitchen. He makes such stupid conversation that my mother and I exchange looks of wide-eyed amazement. I stare, fascinated, at his one remaining tooth, a brown stump dangling from his upp
er jaw, which he constantly wiggles with his tongue.

  I have to go with him when he takes the animal from the truck. If it’s a steer, we go into the stables. He takes a kind of punch pistol from his bag and puts it between the animal’s eyes. And shoots. The steer falls to the ground instantly with a dull thud. He hangs it head-down on a hook. If it’s a sheep or a pig, we take it outside, by the henhouse, and the Killer slits its throat with a big knife. Then he drags the carcass into the stable to hang it up. It’s harder with pigs. They understand what’s in store and fight for their lives. Their screams make my blood run cold.

  The Killer doesn’t let that stop him. He carries on with his task as if he were chopping wood. He tells me the animals need to hang for twenty-four hours to ensure the meat’s not tough. So off he goes and doesn’t come back until the following morning, still just as early, this time to cut up the carcasses. First he cuts them into quarters and carries a quarter at a time down to the cellar, where we wait for the next step of the process. As he butchers the meat, my mother and I wrap up the cuts. The name of each joint has to be written on a label before it’s put into the freezer. With a steer or a sheep there are hundreds of cuts, which gradually fill up the three freezers that stand side by side, connected to a generator. Then we get to the lesser cuts: the Killer empties out the intestines and makes blood pudding. We work through the evening, surrounded by the awful smell of blood and raw meat. Sometimes the job isn’t finished and the Killer has to come back again the next day.

  I loathe being shut up in that cellar, submerged in the smell of death. My back hurts and I feel sick. These packets of meat seem to go on forever. But the worst thing of all is when the Killer kills a veal calf. The calf has to stay calm and relaxed so its delicate meat doesn’t ‘spoil’. It’s my job to spend time with it and soothe it. With his wide, toothless grin, the Killer says, ‘Ah, there’s nothing like a child and, even better, a little girl, to keep animals calm.’