“Hey! Here they are.”
The man took the scissors without a word. A large cut in the shirt revealed the tiny wound where a little stain of blood had leaked, barely larger than a hundred-sou coin, Maïa thought, a blackish stain that didn’t really seem like blood, which resembled a bruise on Cripure’s white flesh, the pale, greasy flesh of an old woman.
The curious approached. They bent down, looked on without saying anything.
“Better wash it. With alcohol,” said the nurse.
“Rum?”
“No, of course not, with pure alcohol. With ninety proof alcohol.”
“But I don’t have any, I don’t have any!”
“Ok, with boiled water.”
With boiled water . . . how long would she have to wait for it, and during that time . . .
“But look at him, just look at him,” she said, bending down. She took his hand: “My little cat?”
Cripure’s eyes weren’t totally closed. Between his lids there was a little space like a bluish slit. But the contortion of his face, that twisted mouth, the absence of his pince-nez . . .
“You can’t hear me?”
No response.
“He can’t hear me! Oh my God, he can’t hear me!” She stuck both hands in her mane and rubbed her head.
“Go boil some water,” said the nurse, putting a hand on her shoulder.
She went into the kitchen and found that there was boiled water ready, left over, since the coffee was finished. She’d forgotten about it. She brought the water. The man dipped the end of a napkin and washed Cripure’s wound.
Basquin came in.
He’d been getting ready to go down to the camp as he did every morning, dreaming up new commercial possibilities, when a neighbor had come running up to him in the street to tell him the news: Merlin had just put a bullet in himself.
He’d jumped. “God’s good name! As long as he didn’t miss!”
It didn’t seem like it.
He came closer, bending down over Cripure. His big dirty hand wandered for a moment over the face of the dying man. With his thumb, he lifted an eyelid, looked for the already glassy stare, and made a face.
“Done for!” he muttered. And turning to Maïa who waited next to him. “He doesn’t look good. He shot straight, didn’t he!”
Maïa didn’t reply, but her round eyes examined Basquin with such contempt, that he became uneasy, and stammered:
“How did this happen?”
He felt that this was the better thing to say, and Maïa seemed to soften.
“But everything was settled,” she cried in despair. “I don’t know why he did that!”
What was settled? Basquin wasn’t up on that. “Settled, eh?”
“Oh! This isn’t the time,” Maïa replied. “Look at him! Just look at him!”
“I see him,” said Basquin. “But people who do things like this sometimes leave notes. He didn’t write a little letter or something?”
“How should I know?”
“Let me see . . .”
He looked at the table, the mantelpiece, and found nothing but an envelope on which was written: Last will and testament. But the envelope was empty. And it was an old envelope anyway. That had nothing to do with . . .
“Nothing,” he said. “So this came on all of a sudden, like that?”
“Me, I don’t know. It was all finished,” she said. “They’d signed and everything. Then there he goes out to take a walk in the fields and me, I’m warming the coffee. Well, then he came back. He looks, he says nothing. The little dogs they messed everything around in his study and chewed up his bits of paper. He sees that, he gets down . . . who’d have thought . . .”
She shook her head, stuck her lip out to keep from crying and went on: “Why was that revolver left under the table anyway? Whatever he did in there last night, nobody’ll ever know. He was still there, then he got down, he grabs the gun . . . I didn’t even have the time to see it.” This time the lip stuck out further, and the tears spurted. “Without saying a word to me,” she said.
“People who’ve decided that, they never say so beforehand,” said Basquin.
The sententious and cold tone of this remark roused Maïa’s anger against him. “You’d do better to shut your evil trap and help me. He’s not dead, you hear. You’d do better to go find a doctor, maybe, since no one’s doing anything,” she added, turning to the crowd for help.
They drew back, offended. Someone left to find a doctor.
“That’s right,” said Basquin, “give him some air. Can’t you see you’re crowding him?”
Cripure was still moaning. It was a low groan, like a feverish child asleep in the depths of his cradle.
“It’s not the doctor you need,” said Basquin, “it’s—”
What was he going to say? She’d just seen the joy on his hideous face. He hadn’t been able to hide it!
“It’s the surgeon.”
And in the superior tone that was natural to him, with the pretension of a know-it-all, typical of ignorance and stupidity, he reached his hand toward Cripure and added, “That man needs to be operated on immediately.”
To himself he said, he won’t wake up. Nothing but a little chloroform and . . .
“Op . . . operate!” cried Maïa, “op . . .”
An operation, that meant death, that was certain. And for the second time she fell to her knees at Cripure’s side, and took his hand, and held it to her face.
“Monsieur is right,” said the nurse, who, moved with pity for Maïa, gently pulled her away, trying to get her to understand that she mustn’t let him see that.
“You understand . . . for his sake. If he can see, if he can hear you . . .” She rubbed her eyes and stood up, sniffling. He mustn’t die like that all the same. Was he going to go like that, and they wouldn’t have the time to explain themselves, to patch up what they’d said yesterday? It was hard to part like that, still angry . . .
“Let me take his pulse,” said the nurse.
Taking Cripure’s hand out of Maïa’s, he pressed his wrist.
“And the doctor who hasn’t come . . .”
“Don’t worry, Madame, the doctor is less useful to us at the moment than, say, some kind of vehicle.”
“That’s what I said,” Basquin chimed in, without having said anything like that, but he didn’t shrug his shoulders less because of it—a gesture of global scorn for everyone present, without exception, all the poor chumps who couldn’t think of anything.
“A car to take him to the hospital.”
“But where?”
“Oh! But Madame . . . that won’t be difficult. Aren’t there hospitals everywhere? At the lycée for example. Bacchiochi will surely agree to operate . . .”
Basquin thought it over. All this, it could be good, it could be bad. Mustn’t get carried away. If the dough was smuggled away, if that other sausage-brain hadn’t made a will, or if he’d made one, but not in Maïa’s favor—for someone else, he couldn’t guess who, some kid like that Amédée—he’d have to stay sharp and keep his eyes open! He’d got to find out first if there was anything done to get back the sous. After that, he would see. In life, you had to know how to react. And if Maïa was left without a sou, she could see to herself. Jokes aside, she surely didn’t think he was going to marry her for her beauty? The annoying part was that people could make up stories, since that other idiot hadn’t even taken the precaution of writing a little scrap of a note saying that he killed himself and why. So that he’d give someone the idea that it was Maïa who killed him, and they wouldn’t fail to add that he, Basquin, had pushed her to do it, and then you had a conspiracy on your hands! And all that just for the fleece!
He poked Maïa with an elbow, winking his eye.
“Come this way, you,” he whispered in her ear, taking her over to the kitchen. “Close the door . . . softly. You’ve got to pay attention,” he said to her, his voice low. “You’ve got to be on your guard.”
He took care to say “you” and not “we.” His tone emphasized his intentions.
Her arms dangling at her sides, she looked at him without understanding.
“What’re you babbling about?”
“Listen . . .be reasonable . . .”
“What’s it you’re trying to say, get to it,” she replied, with a violent jerk of her shoulders. He wouldn’t have the balls, at this moment, to talk to her about the dough? What was he thinking? That she’d already stuck it in some drawer somewhere, tucked away most of it?
“Ok, what, talk!”
“Don’t get upset, Maïa, when someone’s trying to do you a big favor. He fired a shot from his revolver, eh?”
She squinted her eyes. What was he getting at? He told her:
“Be careful: they could say you did it.”
“Me!” she had screamed it.
“Don’t howl so loud,” Basquin replied, shooting a suspicious glance toward the glass door. You were the only one in the house when it happened, eh? So be careful. That’s enough,” he finished, “now you’ve been warned.”
For a long moment no words passed Maïa’s lips, even though from the contractions of her throat, the twitches agitating her cheeks, the way she lifted a hand to her mouth like someone strangling, it was clear that she wanted to say something. Finally: “Oh, the bastard!” she cried.
Basquin turned. He’d already taken a step towards the study, judging that Maïa had been adequately warned.
“Me?”
“You deserve . . .”
“Don’t howl like that, come on . . . They’ll think we’re plotting God knows what. Do you think they’re so stupid?” he asked, pointing with his hand, to the shadows of the curious. “They know.”
“What do they know?”
“That we’re sleeping together,” he whispered in her ear.
She almost replied that it wouldn’t happen again. Yes, they knew. And so what? Her shoulders jerked again like a huge hiccup.
“You have the balls to talk about that now, while . . .while . . .”
He smiled a wicked smile, of a hunted man who’s just managed to escape, seeing that she didn’t dare to pronounce Cripure’s name in front of him. That she didn’t dare? No, she was unable. Furious at the thought that everything was undoubtedly lost to him, both the woman and the money, he didn’t hesitate anymore, saying with a smirk, “If you’re going to get sentimental about it . . .”
“Get the hell out of here!”
She said it in a low voice, but it wasn’t the fear of being overheard that made her quiet. Basquin recognized that tone of fury and hate. That voice didn’t come from the throat but from the depths of her being.
He approached her slowly. In the mahogany of her face, her eyes creased, becoming little slits.
“What did you say? Repeat it.”
He spoke in almost a whisper too. She cranked out the syllables:
“Get the hell out.”
Ah! If only the others hadn’t been there, behind that door! He bared his teeth, slowly.
“No.”
“Bastard! You come here, I know exactly why. Keeping an eye on the dough, eh? You’re pretty happy with what’s happened. Are you happy? Say it then!”
She was scarlet with fury, with hate, with helplessness to throw him out the door. If she hadn’t been the prisoner of all those people in there . . . oh, yes. He could have said whatever he pleased, and she would have sent him begging, and how fast!
She repeated, “Get out of my house, right now.”
He turned his back to her, seeming to look for something on a placard and continued to talk to her:
“Listen . . . be reasonable. Listen to me.”
She was steady as a milestone, right in the middle of the kitchen, confused to hear him speak that way still, in a calm voice, and since it wasn’t possible to put him outside by force, it wasn’t possible to shout, she listened.
“Shame on you. Now it’s been too long that we’ve been all on our own in the kitchen. I’m telling you they know. Well then . . .we’ve been looking for medicine. Tincture of iodine. Ok? Fine. As for what I said a moment ago—think about it. There was only you and him. In the study, everything’s messed around. They’ll say you two had a fight. From there to saying you were the one who killed him is easy. Are you listening to me?”
She’d had to approach him to hear—he’d lowered his voice gradually as he spoke. Had she understood? Was she finally convinced that what he was saying was good sense? She’d done a good job of crying in front of Cripure, and for the moment she could tell Basquin in every tone of voice to get the hell out of her house, but had she understood, yes or no?
It seemed she had. Her anger hadn’t come back, it couldn’t, but all the same, a gleam was there. She saw the case . . .
“Do you hear me?”
“Yes.”
“This is serious. And not only for you. For me too. They’ll say I’m the one who put it in your head.”
Right away, Basquin regretted saying that. Even to Maïa, that wasn’t the thing to say. He mustn’t be so stupid as to stick that thought in people’s heads. What? What did she look at him like that for?
There we are, she thought, he’s afraid for his own skin above all. Oh that . . .
How well she knew him! With another jerk of anger, she replied, “I don’t care three fucks about what they’ll say.”
He turned his head slowly, and his eyes uncrinkled, opened wide, and then his eyelids lowered, almost closing.
“Not me,” he said, “that would seem too . . . too . . .”
Was she hearing or did she imagine herself to hear him saying that this would seem too real? She understood in any case that he’d thought about it, that he’d dreamed of this murder, finding no doubt that Cripure was taking too long getting to his final rest. But there: the task was done. And now he was afraid.
“Carrion! Me, I don’t even know how to use a . . . a . . .”
She meant that she didn’t know how to shoot a revolver. He interrupted her harshly:
“It’s not about that. This isn’t the time to discuss it. If you’ve understood, that’s all I need.”
She had understood. She’d understood many things today. Her head had never worked so hard. She thought about the harshness of the tie connecting her and Basquin—she who had always thought herself so free, who’d thought that kind of connection was so easy to break. But they weren’t simply lovers: they were accomplices, caught, one in the other, forced, both of them, to play out the comedy in a moment when Maïa wanted to sink wholly into her sorrow. But there was nothing for it. She would have to deal with this. Despite love and grief, she’d have to watch herself and play a role.
“That’s disgusting.”
“It’s not about that, once again. Have you understood?”
“Yes.” She was devastated.
“Good. So, pull yourself together. And now let’s go back. What we’re doing here isn’t very wise. Too bad, it’s done.” And pushing the glass door, “Go find some iodine,” he said to a boy. “We’ve looked everywhere; it’s not in the house.”
•
The boy left at a run, pushing aside the gawkers gathered in the room and in front of the door.
Maïa crouched down beside Cripure. She took his hand; he was still groaning. Outside people were talking. They probably thought they couldn’t be heard. A few among them were remembering the commotion the day before when Léo’s car had almost crushed Cripure and his grocery bag had fallen on the ground. He certainly wasn’t an ordinary man. He had some reason for destroying himself, he must have been thinking about it for a long time. It was books, maybe, that had made him lose it.
“Do you remember yesterday, what a mean look he had?”
“He wanted to kill all of us. If I didn’t know him, I’d think he was crazy sometimes.”
“Leave him alone, eh,” said a woman. “He’s not crazy at all, no, he’s a man of ideas. I’m sure of it! But he’s had
troubles. You don’t have the whole picture,” she said.
Another one who’d heard about Toinette!
“Is he dead?”
“Why no! Come on!”
“Where’d he get himself?”
“In the head.”
“No. In the heart.”
“If it’s in the heart, he’s done for. If it’s the head, he could pull through.”
“He might not want to.”
“Oh!”
“He was funny, too. Always humming all alone, like a maniac.”
“He had too many ideas in his head.”
“But there was something else going on, a big something else! They said he had to fight a duel?”
Maïa straightened up all of a sudden, letting go of Cripure’s hand and, shoving aside the closest neighbors, she rushed toward the door, crying: “Aren’t you done yet? Won’t you go on and shut your traps, you band of filthy gossipers? This isn’t right at all! Wouldn’t this be better at your place, you fakers?”
They went silent, lowering their heads. Someone tried a reply, wanting Maïa to understand that they hadn’t meant anything mean.
“You’d better be quiet!” Maïa shot back.
And she quieted herself, sharply changing her expression as she listened. Was she mistaken? A cab was arriving at a slow pace. The hoofbeats made a joyful clattering in the stony mud, and the harness jangled.
“Père Yves! It’s Père Yves!”
She’d recognized the bells on the carriage.
Bursting back into the room like a gust of wind, she untied her apron while walking and threw it on the ground, where it seemed to complete the chaos, and arranging her hair with a wipe of her thumb: “Off with you!” she said. “We’re going to take him to the hospital.”
Père Yves was in fact arriving, a man of his word, sitting straight up on the seat of his cab, with Pompon’s little trot. He slowed his horse to a walk and very slowly entered the crowd gathered around Cripure’s door.
“What’s going on?” he asked, from the height of his seat.
“They’ll tell you.”
He leaned back, pulled on the reins, saying “Whoa!” to Pompon, who stopped. Then he got down heavily, and asked again, “What’s going on?”
Instead of answering, they let him inside.
Blood Dark Page 52