by Bel Mooney
She shook her head, and began to climb the stairs.
‘Attendez!’ he called, and when she turned, explained in his fast, accented French that the hotel did not serve food except at breakfast, but that he would try to find her something. She understood the gist, but listened only to his negatives, and so her whispered ‘Merci’ was barely audible. He shrugged cheerfully, and she misunderstood the gesture, assuming offence at her unfriendliness.
Twenty minutes later she was lying on the red bedspread in a small room overlooking the road, listening to the whine of motorbikes in the distance. She had inspected the cubicle containing the bidet and basin with something approaching excitement, and folded and refolded the white towel that lay on the bed. The plain room seemed luxurious to her; she had hastily removed her small bag from the bed because it looked dirty against the coverlet. She wondered if she had the strength to go out into the street once more, and search for a cheap café. But filling in the Fiche d’Étranger had drained her last resources. It was not that she was afraid of discovery; clearly this was a casual formality and he would not seek even to look at her passport in the morning. So she had written ‘Romania’ as her country with no qualms, merely a sense of unfathomable strangeness. And then, at the bottom of the small white card, she had seen the section which had taken the remaining strength from her legs. It said, simply: Nombre d’enfants de moins de 15 ans accompagnant le voyageur. There was something terrible about the short line she had drawn in the space.
Hearing the knock, her first instinct was to jump up in fear, standing tensely to listen behind the door.
‘Quelque chose à manger, Madame!’
Ana opened the door and the man stood there in the murky light, holding out a tray, his bad hand supporting it with the palm while the bent useless fingers curled in the air like a petrified plant. She stared at him; he smiled the yellow, wolfish smile and pushed the tray towards her. Taking it from him, she saw half a baguette, some salami, a green salad, a piece of camembert wrapped in silver foil, and a tumbler of red wine.
‘Oh, monsieur, vous êtes … Merci, merci! Et dîtes-moi combien …?’
He waved his hands in the air as if to disperse a cloud of flies, and frowned. ‘Rien, rien … Alors, bon appetit, Madame,’ he said, shaking his head, and retreating down the narrow, winding staircase.
Ana had no idea why she should merit such generosity, but as she sat at the small table in the corner of the room and ate her meal, she decided that in the scales of judgement this must certainly weigh as heavily as the episode in Antoine Perrin’s car. Strengthened by the thought, and the food and wine, she was even able to smile wryly and reflect that even that had been worth it – for the hamburger, and then the unexpected conscience-money which had brought her here.
Thirty-Eight
‘Madame – please – there are … about twenty-five thousand Tamil people in Paris.’ He spread his hands. The palms were paler, Ana noticed, and very lined.
They were sitting in a small office in an apartment building on the Rue des Pyrenees, in the 20th arrondissement. The room was barely furnished: a desk, some filing cabinets, and one wall covered with bookshelves containing books in Tamil, each one numbered for ease of borrowing. The man was about thirty, and slightly built, with a thick moustache.
‘So many?’ she said.
He nodded, leaning forward eagerly as people do when a favourite subject is broached. ‘It has not been difficult for Tamils to enter France. The French know our situation – they are not bad to us here. With the British – it is a different story. Some people say we are not really refugees. And in Germany it is becoming more difficult; the German people do not like foreigners. Something happened – I heard of it last week. Some men – like Nazis, you understand my meaning? – took a Tamil man and threw him under a train. But they were too strong for their purpose, and threw him too far. So he did not die. His leg was cut off. Maybe he was not so lucky … I think perhaps in India it is better. My family is in India now – for their own safety …’ His voice tailed off.
Dazed by the information thrown at her so matter-of-factly, Ana said nothing, imagining suddenly that all over this capital city, and the others of Europe, there were men in rooms like this one, waiting for an opportunity – the arrival of a chance visitor – to talk. Absorbed as she was by the urgency of her own task, she could hear the pain in his voice and it overwhelmed her.
‘There are eighty million of us around the world,’ he said waving his fingers at the world map pinned up on the wall beside him, as if sprinkling his own people in a new diaspora. He waited for Ana to speak, but the number sat between her brain and her lips like a dam.
And I walked for a long time to find this place, with no expectation that, on Sunday, there would be anyone here. There was a street market in the road, and I passed stalls selling clothes and food and things for the kitchen: pans and spoons and cups. That man at the hotel had barely looked at my registration card, but I saw as I paid that he noticed my country and looked at me sharply as if he wanted to speak. But he said nothing, and I left – thinking again of his tray of food, held with difficulty by the hand which took my money. And I wanted to tell him – this terrible urge to grasp people, to seize their attention, interrupting the placidity of their existence {here, where nobody can possibly know) with the evidence of the other, which, since it is of the unspeakable, approximates in this world to ignorance. Or, I suppose, to blind innocence. Yet I said nothing too, and went on my way.
Maybe I should have told him. But why? Hoping he might help? Yet now I look at this man across the desk and know how much we are alike. And that he cannot help. To be beyond help …
Nobody was here. I stood and watched somebody enter the building and saw that you had to press a button and the door would open. But then I was in a dark hall, with postboxes like at home, and one said ‘Comité de Coordination Tamoule France’, and somewhere, on the first floor, a woman was singing in French behind a closed door. I rang her bell, and the singing stopped. The hall was dark and I waited. At last a voice asked who was there, and I said that I was a tourist and I was lost. To be a tourist…! The woman opened the door; she was wearing a dressing gown, but she was not afraid because she had heard another woman’s voice. When I told her I was looking for the Tamils she frowned and stared at me. Then she pointed across the dark landing and closed the door. She did not sing again.
The man who opened the door looked suspicious, and that, too, reminded me of home. When I told him in French I wanted some information about a Tamil boy in Paris he let me in:
‘Where are you from?’
‘Romania.’
‘So you are content to speak French?’
‘My English is better.’
‘I did all my studies in English. For fifteen years I have lived in France, and I like to practise my English. But maybe it is not very good.’ He shrugged – the gesture that said so much. And I thought – fifteen years an exile.
The sky falls in on Europe, blanketing down: millions of us imprisoned out of context, searching. The trains pull in, the planes land, and cars or vans cross borders; the people grope through the landed cloud, knowing that somewhere the other side of the mist, maybe, is the ultimate destination, in a form unrecognisable, talking to itself in a language unintelligible. But – they have to reach it.
No – we. We have to. Even if we are lost then, forever.
What words are you speaking now—you?
‘I did not think,’ she stammered, ‘that there were so many.’
He inclined his head. ‘Once we had our kingdoms, Madame.’
Ana did not understand. And she could see this man was puzzled too, wondering why she had rung on his door on Sunday morning. ‘My son – is with the Tamil boy,’ she explained, hesitantly.
‘Why? I do not see …’
‘I sent my son away from Romania,’ she said, ‘because …’
‘Of course. These things are necessary.’
�
��And he is in Paris, with the other boy, the Tamil boy. I hope. Here is his photograph – perhaps you have seen him?’
She held out Ion’s picture. The man studied it carefully, but shook his head, handing it back with a grimace of regret. There was a silence. Ana could hear men’s voices raised in the next room. The man behind the desk shouted something, and they stopped. Then he looked at her again, knowing what she wanted.
‘All I can say, Madame, is I will ask everyone – a Romanian boy travelling with a Tamil is very unusual. My people usually stay together. So maybe someone will know. Here – write down both names for me. Do you have any more information?’
‘Yes – he came to Paris to meet a relative …’
‘That is normal.’
‘… and I was told he worked in a restaurant, near a station.’
‘Maybe near the Gare du Nord. There is a street, the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Denis, where you will find restaurants – and shops selling spices. I know many of our people work there, so perhaps … Give me your map and I will show you.’
‘Somewhere to begin,’ she said.
‘Yes, I think so. And you can telephone here in two days, maybe. Perhaps I will have some news.’
‘I don’t know your name.’
‘Skandarajah.’
‘Mine is Popescu.’
‘It is on the paper … Ion Popescu.’
‘Of course.’
‘Ion?’
‘In English it is John.’
‘A very popular name in Sri Lanka.’
‘Oh.’
‘I am very sorry I do not know your son – or his friend. But you know, I think people can be found.’
‘I will find him.’
‘Yes – of course.’
They looked at each other for a few seconds, not knowing what to say. Then she rose to leave – pausing by a small poster pinned up, which advertised a volleyball tournament. Pleased by her interest he grinned. ‘We arrange these things for our people. We have music concerts too – many things. It helps to preserve our culture, here.’
‘Do you like Paris?’ she asked, less from curiosity than the need to postpone the moment when she would find herself on the street, having to begin.
‘I have been here fifteen years, I have a good job, many friends … Yes. But it is too cold here – and noisy. Very different for us. So different. And one day I will return, when we have our own homeland.’ He paused, then frowned. ‘But my daughter … it may be difficult. She is four now, and is starting school. When she is older she will never know anywhere else but Paris …’
‘So she may not want to go home?’
He shrugged, and once again Ana recognized the passive resignation which draws close to renunciation. She understood it – but knew too that if she were to submit, if she would lower her head for the sword, she might never find Ion. She suddenly remembered yelling at Doina across the prison yard, and knew that in such defiance lay the only possibility of survival.
‘It is sometimes difficult,’ he sighed, shaking her hand at the door. ‘Good luck, Madame. And you will telephone?’ She nodded.
Out in the street Ana stood irresolute, watching people walk by carrying bags of food. The babble of voices was intimidating; people seemed to be shouting at each other, and yet she saw no anger in their faces. She relived the quiescence of queues, a hush on the trolleybus, instinctive lowering of voices even indoors, the implacable stillness of night – and identified a contrast far more significant than the availability of food or newspapers. It was the confident assertion of self that animated those faces at the market stalls: buying, selling and compulsively communicating – with no sense that there was any other way of being.
Desperate for coffee she went into a café, and spread out the full map of Paris. Her finger traced the street Skandarajah had mentioned; it was hard to gauge distance but she realized it would be a long walk. Staring at the metro plan she attempted to work out a route from Pyrénées to Gare du Nord, but it was too complicated and she gave up. In any case, she was daunted by the prospect of going underground, as if only by remaining out on the street might she avail herself of every opportunity to spot Ion in the crowds. Then there was the problem of money. Today she would change Lucien’s Swiss francs, and her remaining fifty dollars, and that would have to last until she found Ion. The madness of last night’s indulgence of a room already irritated her; she would not be so weak again.
For a second she allowed herself to ask the question: what if I fail to find Ion? She knew she could either request political asylum herself (although she was not sure how), or else go to the Romanian Embassy and explain her situation. As soon as the alternatives presented themselves, she pushed them away, already adopting the imperative faith of the refugee: that something will happen to make things work – and to justify all that has gone before.
The sun had emerged from behind fluffy grey cloud, illuminating the indifferent bustle of Sunday morning Paris. When Ana turned, at the top of Rue des Pyrenees into the Rue de Belleville, and walked westwards, there was a sudden glimpse of the Eiffel Tower, shimmering pink and silver across the city. Ana stopped. The road fell away before her, lined with shops; it was as if she was standing high on an island, looking out across at a distant totem on a neighbouring island, symbolising the faith of its people. The Eiffel Tower… Ana had seen pictures of it but was not prepared for the grace, the fragility, the magnificent spurious-ness of the construction: a filigree minaret which reminded her of Geneva’s Jet d’Eau. It spoke of individual confidence – just as much as the clothes of the women, and the voices raised in conversation on this street.
She began to cut through side streets, crossing the Canal Saint-Martin – and thinking, for a moment, that it was the Seine. Every so often she would lose her bearings and stop to consult the city plan again. Then, sometimes, a man would approach her, murmuring offers of help, she assumed, although sometimes the language was not even French. She shook her head quickly, and walked on, unused to such stares, and the insinuating intimacy of strangers. People stood on street corners to talk, stalls spilled cheap clothes and shoes, music floated from upstairs windows, opened to air rooms after smoky Saturday nights. The smell of food from cafés and restaurants – sharp seafood and sweet onions – made her salivate. At last she stopped to buy a small slice of pizza for ten francs, and crammed it into her mouth – too quickly, so that it had disappeared before she had time to savour the taste of tomato and cheese.
When she reached the Gare de l’Est she needed to rest. The bag was weighing her down; the short handles dug into her flesh. She had been walking for about an hour, and her calves ached. The huge, monolithic station building towered over her, chilly and unwelcoming out of the spring sunlight. Unwilling to enter, even to find a seat, she hesitated not far from the taxi rank, with its queue of people with suitcases. There were five or six men crouched against the wall of the Arrival Hall, their clothes dark and stiff with dirt. There was a rank smell of unwashed skin and urine. Wine bottles and beer cans were littered around; the men’s faces were red and raw, and they shouted to each other with slurred, rough voices. Somebody kicked a can, which skittered hollowly towards Ana’s feet, spraying unfinished beer over her shoes. There was loud laughter, and a belch.
In truth, none of this was directed at her at all; drunk and homeless the men – all of them in their thirties and forties – had sunk into their habitual miasma and barely noticed the woman who stood looking nervously around, as if unsure of her timetable. Yet to Ana the sounds they made were mocking; she expected any minute to be accosted, pursued. And there was something obscene in the sight of these hopeless examples of humanity which aroused the purest horror and fear. It loomed in her imagination to blot out the silvery vision of the Eiffel Tower – lovely, frivolous symbol of Paris in all the books she had read.
She turned and walked quickly away, not noticing it was the way she had come – so that she reached the canal again, and threw herself down on a seat in
frustration. It was nearly three o’clock; families walked by the side of the canal, children ran about or called to their parents, ‘Regarde, Maman! Regarde, papa!’ as they jumped off a couple of steps, or balanced on one leg, or threw a stone into the still water. The attention was lazy and loving; Ana watched, consumed by an envy as intense as her earlier horror.
A man and a woman and a child in a boat, oars dipping into water as
smooth as the surface of this canal. And she turned the boat in circles at Mamaia, while I gazed out across the lake, until she called, ‘Look at me, Ana!’, and I said, ‘Mamă, you can’t row – let Tata do it!’ It seemed to me then that we were normal, just like these people here … And Michael Edwards believed that was true, he thought we were the same under the skin: loving in the same way, wanting the same things. Is it true? Can it be true? But what if you are scarred right through to your bones?
He allowed Ion to row; their hands grasped the oars, side by side; the man let the child think he was rowing, while his stronger hands guided, and water sloshed over my feet. We had to go back to the shore, there was no choice. A man and a woman and a child in a boat: somewhere the same, even at this moment, in a park in this city.
Where are you? Please help me to find you …
Ana saw no Sri Lankan shops when she turned into the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Denis. She stood at the junction with Magenta, unsure which way to walk, then, consulting her cityplan, turned north towards the station. The road was not what she had expected, not the crowded Asian bazaar of her imaginings, full of Tamil people who would recognize her photograph. This was relatively quiet, with the usual mixture of brasseries and small, conventional shops, with one or two travel agents. Few people were about. The afternoon had settled into a Sabbath slowness, almost boredom. It echoed off the tall buildings and glanced from the windows of shops: a shuttering-down, ready for evening. She had stayed by the canal much longer than she intended. Yet she was appalled suddenly by the realization that time was like a vacuum in which she floated, arms and legs flailing in search of a grip. There was nowhere to go. The ultimate destination was a vacancy that yawned before her, offering nothing but a search which, she suspected, would probably be fruitless. Don’t think of that don’t think of that don’t think of that…