A broken sun, shining in shards.
Burning the capital with fresh cuts.
They walk along the Canal Saint-Martin, on Quai de Valmy. He has just received his test results from the hospital: aerobic bacilli present in the organism—tuberculosis, in other words. His doctor seemed confident, however, reassuring him that his condition was not serious (cough, very slight loss of weight, but no blood-filled expectorations) and that the treatment should deal with it fairly easily, if followed to term. How long will you stay in France? she asks. I don’t know yet, maybe a few months, it’ll depend on the disease. Do you miss Algeria? Not always, sometimes, he answers. Never when you’re here, in any case. She lights the cigarette she had been fiddling with. Fernand’s eyes are locked on her wrists. Her long fingers, thin and graceful. Flesh supple and white. A paper cylinder at her lips. The smoke meanders, almost vertically, then spreads out in blue knots. Her tongue remains unseen. Her teeth are bright. She breathes out her second puff through her nose, which is slightly arched in the middle, yes, as he had already noted privately. Her silence embarrasses him. You know, he says as she brings her cigarette to her mouth for the third time, I just thought of something while looking at the birds out there, on that tree. We played this game when I was a kid, a strange game, come to think of it: we’d try to catch sparrows with these sticks, coating them in glue and then chasing the birds or, sometimes, spying on them. We’d wait, gently, slowly, for the right time to bring our sticks close and catch them. Hélène makes a disgusted face. Yes, alright, it wasn’t very clever of us. Kids, you know, snot-nosed rascals. Then we’d put them in cages and give them names. Hélène maintains her silence. Something wrong, Hélène? Is it my story that’s …? No, not at all, don’t you worry about it, no, I was just thinking, and I hope you won’t be cross, I’ve kept something from you, or at least I didn’t tell you about it, I, I have a son, and, well, he’s thirteen, his name is Jean-Claude.
They’d stopped near a canal lock, in front of the Hôtel du Nord. The sky sieving through the leaves. Midges slipping within its folds of light. Green wavelets lapping on a mossy stone, the shapes of yellow snakes. The air is sharp, humid—almost putrid. The water flowing nearby muffles the surrounding sounds and seems suddenly to take them out of the city. They raise their voices. A son, yes. Fernand is more surprised by the secret than by its content. I don’t know, she continues, a single woman with a child isn’t looked upon too kindly, I think I was afraid you’d judge me like that, it’s a bit silly, I know … Fernand asks if he can have a drag of her cigarette. He’s only smoked three or four times in his whole life. To mark major events. He laughs. She divorced her husband—the Swiss, cuts in Fernand. Yes, Swiss—when Jean-Claude was only eight months old, I know it doesn’t improve my case … I’d only married him to get away from home, a long way away, but we weren’t really suited, we only had the child in common, that’s about it. That’s not nothing, Fernand says while handing her cigarette back, which she then takes to her lips. He never saw his son grow up, I don’t even know if we can call him his father. The separation was, let’s say, let’s say there was shouting and a saucepan thrown against a door … Fernand laughs again. The cigarette is spent. Hélène throws it down on the road, to their right. Fernand peers at her, narrows his eyes and pulls a serious face, exaggeratedly serious, something is bothering me a lot more than this business about a secret child: your cigarette. Sorry? My aerobic bacilli, my nasty little bacilli, they might be contagious, don’t you think? If I’ve just given you tuberculosis, I wouldn’t bet on your chances of survival, seeing the size of your wrists. Hélène guffaws. You idiot, you. She called me tu, Fernand thinks instantly. They stare at each other, a little foolishly. Let’s find a restaurant around here, he suggests, I’m starving!
Hélène leafs through today’s L’Humanité, lying on her stomach, legs crossed and encased in gray stockings. Fernand is sitting on the edge of the bed, shining his shoes. The bedroom smells of cold tobacco. Four cigarette butts in a cracked porcelain ashtray on the nightstand. Her skirt has horizontal stripes. When he turns his head slightly to the left all he can see of her is her lower back and her legs, bare-footed. Her flat-heeled shoes are by the door, placed neatly side by side, as per their last motion. He has no trouble divining the curve of her buttocks, stretching the pink stripes of the skirt. The firm volume of that skin. Ample, animal. He can discern the seams of her lingerie. An escape track, sacrilegious. She is motionless—her legs form a triangle, a perfect right angle. She turns a page of the newspaper. Is she really reading or pretending to?
Fernand puts down the shoe he was holding and the polish-coated rag, scrubs his hands on a handkerchief pulled from his pants pocket, then turns toward her. Or at least turns his body to sit against the wall, legs spread out before him. What are you reading? Nothing, well, yes, about a coup attempt in the GDR, that’s what it says. She sits up and shows him the article, a state of emergency has been declared, counterrevolutionaries in the pay of the West are spreading chaos in East Berlin. I don’t know much about it, says Fernand. Propaganda, just like in Poland, all bullshit, says Hélène decisively. Her back is now upright against the bedroom wall. She moves the pillow, for comfort, and unfolds her legs, an absolute insolence of calves and knees, parallel to Fernand’s. She is beautiful. Beautiful enough to make you wish you were blind sooner than see her go, disappear, run into another’s arms. The circle of her right cheek is fringed by lamplight. Rosette, silken scoop.
He moves his hand slowly and brushes it against her forearm.
She does not move.
She lets him.
The order is given that it is time to be silent. A scent in suspense. His middle finger caresses a little area of skin, inching closer to her wrist. A small peak of bone. Some fine blonde hairs. She moves her face toward his and presses her lips under Fernand’s thick mustache. Moist tangle of tongues. His hand goes through her hair, encircling her now with his heavy arms, his large back, his dry torso against hers, this siren from the East. Braid of legs on the rough cotton. His tongue is not done seeking hers, burrowing in her mouth, expecting her saliva. She unbuckles his belt without looking. Jingle-jangle of gray metal. Strokes her hand over the corduroy, presses the phallus she knows to be already blood-swollen. Squeezes again, more firmly. Grasps the whole member under the seams. Asks him if she may. This strange question and nothing else. Fernand nods. He realizes, then, that he is shaking. Not a slight oscillation, either, not the kind of vibration that only he could perceive, no: he is really trembling. Hélène unbuttons his pants and tries to lower them; Fernand has no choice but to help her. She takes him into her mouth. So fast he doubts the reality of what he is currently experiencing. Her face comes and goes, or at least what he can see of it, hidden behind the ruffled blonde of her hair. She seems to take the whole measure of the instant while Fernand is torn out of himself. Her tongue runs over its burning length. Then sinks in once again, swallowing, a boa.
He is inside her now.
Cleft warm and drenched. Sublime crevice in the wall of a woman who offers herself. She closes her eyes and breathes hard. Pants, moans. Lying on her back, thighs parted, flattened against him. He is still in his undershirt. Her bare shoulders, her shaken little breasts. A birthmark on one collarbone. He buries his head in her neck, crudely consuming her scent, madness, the madness of that neck, his hips slam harder and harder into the depths of so much beauty.
Not yet five p.m. The judges have returned to the courtroom. President Roynard takes the floor: Fernand Iveton is hereby sentenced to death. The verdict falls like the blade that is now promised to him. Fernand lowers his eyes as, from the four corners of the hall, clamor erupts among the European Algerians. Cheers and bravos. Intoxication, bared teeth. Justice wallows in its triumph. Hélène tries not to dissolve into tears, biting the inside of her cheeks, refusing to make a spectacle of their defeat. One does not throw this kind of meat to dogs. She grips her mother-in-law’s hand to enjoin her to do the same. Palms smacking to
gether, unanimous rejoicing like a single fat body. Fernand, for his part, does not feel like crying. Torture has dried him up—an empty soul, robbed of all emotion. His lawyers look at him without hiding their chagrin. The president calls for calm and orders the public to leave the court with discipline and restraint. She tries to catch her lover’s eye but he keeps his gaze down, glued to a floor that is now slipping away from under Hélène’s feet. It would be too painful to look at her, he knows it.
Two officers lead him away; he does not turn around.
The crowd disperses and Hélène lets herself be carried along on the edge of it, trying but failing to walk straight. Her legs are shaking, her head is spinning, she leans on the arms of Pascal and his wife. We’ll weep at home, she repeats, not here. They wait for about ten minutes on the sidewalk. A few people stare at Iveton’s wife. She ignores them. A prisoner transport van with grilled windows passes mere meters from them but does not stop, of course. Hélène and Pascal wave at it in the hope that Fernand will see them, in vain, since he continues, on a bench inside the vehicle, to look down. His lawyers inform him that he has one day to lodge his appeal—as he intends to do.
He is transferred to Barberousse prison, cell no. 1, first division. Alone. He is a CAM. Condamné à mort: death row convict. The room is gray, of course, what else could it have been? A straw mattress and a squat toilet. And a strange smell, impossible to define or describe, vaguely pungent and spongy. And yet you can’t deny the cell is clean. Humid, and that is probably what gives it its elusive odor, but clean. They left him his clothes. He sits down on the thin mattress. Away now from the shouting and the contorted faces, Fernand begins to grasp his predicament: the authorities intend to execute him. But he hasn’t killed anyone. It makes no sense. The powerful are just blowing their horn, that’s all, raising their voices to make an example of him. But they’ll never go through with it. Impossible. France is hardly some tyrant. Fernand must, at the heart of his being, come to terms with it: he tells himself that he isn’t all that worried. His lawyers will succeed in making his case, he can feel it. They will prevail. And who knows, won’t fair-minded souls mobilize on the mainland? His hand passes over the hair that is no longer there. Weird feeling, this nearly bare skull. He thinks of Henri. Henri Maillot, his brother. Two years his junior. A brother in childhood and in spirit—and what is blood, anyway? Nothing but the tangible result of chance. He has to stand upright for Henri, since after all his brother stood upright until the very end, until the gendarmes’ bullets mowed him down, and he yelled, he, the deserter, Long live the Communist Party of Algeria! … Fernand and Henri met as children. Their families lived close together in the neighborhood of Clos-Salembier; their mothers were both Spanish Catholics and their fathers communists: their friendship was thus fully deserving of the term fraternal. And yet they were far from alike—in fact, and it was certainly the view of their respective parents, they were symmetrical opposites: one, Fernand, was of medium height, the other was tall and slender; one had strong features, unrefined, whereas the other’s were fine and polished; one was mischievous, the other self-effacing; one loved dancing and singing while the other preferred calm and concentration. Henri thought more than he talked; he held others dear without letting them know it. In a way that was by no means entirely conscious, words were a rare commodity for him—no point wasting language on nothing. He always went straight to the nub, trimming excesses, cutting out the extra, eschewing bloat, and running sharp and straight between timeouts, blurs and detours: Henri could express in ten words what Fernand said in so many minutes.
Hélène collapses in the little front courtyard of their house. In floods of tears. Pascal helps her up. She howls, grabbing her father-in-law’s white shirt, and he, decorous to a fault, barely dares clasp her against him. He awkwardly pats her shoulder, whispering that it’s going to be alright, the lawyers will do something, we’re not going to leave our son like that, we’ll find a way, that’s right, it’s going to be fine. Hélène nervously claws her forearms, head buried in Pascal’s burly chest. Spasms overcome her. She is shaking, unable to stop. Her mother-in-law takes her hand and tenderly shepherds her indoors. Their neighbor, at the window, did not miss a thing.
Night, behind bars, does not show itself in the best light.
Gray broth with floating lumps of wearied stars.
Hélène hasn’t waited to obtain official visiting rights. In the parlor, some fifty people stand in line to speak to their loved ones. Many of them are Arabs. One of these, a young man, recognizes Madame Iveton, the woman in the papers, in the papers! and applause instantly breaks out. Two veiled women salute her with hands raised to the sky. Others urge her to go in front of them, out of the way, out of the way, it’s Iveton’s wife, , let her through! Fernand arrives. Handcuffed. Two barriers separate them in the room. A guard is posted a few feet behind him. Hélène is not the sort who has to try in order to look pretty, but she seems even prettier when Fernand realizes that, despite her sunken eyes and drawn face, she has made herself up for him. How are you? I’m fine, fine. Don’t worry. I asked them not to leave me alone in the cell, time passes too slowly otherwise, it’s hell being alone between four walls from morning to night … They were kind enough to listen, two guys joined me just now, called Bakri and Chikhi, I don’t know why they’re at Barberousse but anyway, they seem like nice guys. And how are you, then? I hear you’re a tigress! He laughs. Doesn’t surprise me … I’m proud, you know, very proud of my little Hélène. The guard, hearing him lower his voice, curtly asks him to speak up. I promise, I’m going to do all I can to be allowed to visit you every week: I think the prison director respects me, he received me in his office, you know, for the clothes, yes, the press was saying that you were dirty and shabby, what a bunch of bastards, forgive me for talking like that … Speaking of that, what are today’s papers saying? Everyone’s talking about the sentence. And in France? Your Huma is being extremely cautious, it looks like they’re reluctant to jump one way or the other. You’re an embarrassment. A few lines inside, that’s all. And Le Monde devoted a few sentences … The terrorist Fernand Iveton, etc. He says nothing. He longs to touch her, her face or her hands, but the skin of his beloved is striped with iron. Visiting time is over, announces the guard. She tells him she loves him, tells him again and blows him a kiss through barred hands.
The cell door opens while he is chatting with Bakri. A man in a dark suit comes in, escorted by two guards. Receding hairline, long face, glassy eyes. The door closes. He holds out his hand to Fernand: Joë Nordmann, then greets Fernand’s cellmates with a nod. I’ve just arrived in Algiers, the CGT sent me to plead your cause, because, they said, you were one of their union delegates. I’ve been tasked with assisting the two lawyers already handling your case. I admit I’m not familiar with the details of the brief yet, but you should know that I didn’t hesitate for a moment when I was told about your case. Fernand listens, silent. The atmosphere out there is appalling, I imagine you’ve had wind of it. It stinks of pogrom, if you’ll pardon the expression. Everyone wants your head. The appeal, he continues without moving, will be examined next Monday by the military tribunal. Bakri, sitting on the edge of his bunk, asks the lawyer what will happen to Fernand if it fails. Nordmann turns toward the prisoner and, with the oratorical ease which is apparently his forte, responds that from that moment on, one single, final resort remains: a presidential pardon from René Coty himself. Silence in the cell. Fernand asks if he’s met his two lawyers, Laînné and Smadja. Not yet, no, we’re meeting this afternoon. Trust us, we’ll do everything in our power to get you out of here. Everything is still possible, and besides, let me say that I have a personal stake in this affair: I am a communist, too. His face remains perfectly still as he says this; the lawyer knows full well that the very word is laden with immediate complicity.
Harangues of a muezzin, while the night descends and spoils itself on Barberousse.
Bakri and Chikhi pray on the floor, kneeling on shee
ts specially folded for the occasion. Fernand watches them from his mattress, skimming the newspaper Nordmann left him before leaving. Then he puts it down and takes the few sheets of paper he managed to obtain from management. My darling little wife … His fellow inmates get up and return to their mattresses. Today, I’m writing my first letter to you as a prisoner and I don’t think this should affect you too much, because I don’t want it to. So, today I received my first supplies from the canteen. There’s one here where we can get everything the regulations permit, since I don’t have the right to an allowance. But still, it’s alright; the food is passable and with the little money I still had on me I could spoil myself. As you can see, my morale is good and I think it should be the same for the whole family. Bakri and Chikhi, he specifies, will soon be released: they’re not CAMs. I go outside in the yard twice a day for an hour, except when it’s raining. I hope you were able to fetch my clothes from the factory and that they didn’t give you too much trouble. Darling little wife, I am very proud of your courage and my only wish is for you to stay very calm and not fall for provocations, that would be painful to me. And if it’s not asking too much, I’d also like you to send me a small money order for the canteen. Finally, I do believe the neighbors are not so nasty; if they say anything, greet them from me and tell them I’m holding up fine. Chikhi seems to be playing solitaire, cards spread out before him. He is a tall, bony figure, with a falcon’s profile. He has barely said a word since arriving. Chikhi is involuntarily mysterious: he doesn’t cultivate secrecy, he only shows very little. His manner is not a form of reticence, let alone shyness, but rather a visceral hermeticism—an instinct for concealment, the mistrust of the hunted prey. I will conclude this letter by kissing you with all my heart and telling you to be strong and we’ll meet soon. Kiss my parents for me and be sure to tell them to keep strong as well. Fernand.
Tomorrow They Won't Dare to Murder Us Page 6