Amazir

by Tom Gamble

  ‘Oh, Philippe-Charles—it’s so nice to have company!’

  ‘No, sorry. Can’t,’ replied Lefèvre, shooting a glance at his wife. ‘I really am too busy and Jeanne has to study. Remember—the exam is only three weeks off.’

  ‘Please, papa. I can practise my English with Mr Summerfield.’

  ‘Mr Summerfield also has work to do,’ said Lefèvre, avoiding his daughter’s plea. He stooped down and picked up the envelope. ‘Mr Wilding’s translation.’ He stepped forward and, without looking Summerfield in the face, handed it back. An uneasy silence filled the room. Lefèvre began to pace and then he came to a halt, his voice irritated then softening as he looked at his wife and daughter. ‘Well, what about Sunday, then? How’s that? You can bring the translation.’

  Again a silence, saved by Mme Lefèvre. ‘Sunday is a good idea. We can prepare something special to eat. Much better than what we were to eat this evening.’

  ‘Good!’ growled Lefèvre. ‘That’s settled. Now, you will excuse me—I have to work.’

  Summerfield leant forwards, shook Lefèvre’s hand and let himself be ushered out. It all seemed so completely unfair. He’d only said ten or so words to Jeanne. He tried desperately to find some way of lingering a little longer and hit upon the magnolias.

  ‘What about the flower garden, then? How are they?’

  ‘How are what?’ said Jeanne and her mother in unison.

  ‘The magnolias, of course.’

  ‘Oh!’ Jeanne suddenly realised and was about to continue when her mother butted in.

  ‘Dead!’

  ‘Oh, God.’

  ‘Dormant, in fact,’ added Mme Lefèvre. ‘Now, say goodbye to Mr Summerfield, Jeanne. She must do her homework,’ she added as an aside. ‘You’ll see him on Sunday. Let’s say seven-thirty.’

  ‘Seven-thirty,’ repeated Summerfield, hesitantly. ‘Thank you, Mme…’ He turned as Jeanne approached him and held out her hand. Her face wore the deepest look of sadness he’d ever seen—sadness mixed with anger.

  ‘A pleasure, Jeanne…’ he managed to utter and then Mohammed appeared to show him out. ‘Goodbye.’

  ‘Goodbye, Harry…Summerfield.’

  Once outside, the evening swallowed him. He found himself feeling the loneliest of poor mortals in the world and despite the warm June air, he shivered. He gave the Lefèvre house one last glance and began to walk. It was anger more than anything else. Anger and frustration. Those silly old fools. He felt like a sinking ship, its keel ripped off—plunging down, down into the cold black waters. But then, for some reason, he felt his pace slowing and he came to a halt at the second lamp post in the leafy avenue. He gave it a soft punch with his fist. It was strange, for it wasn’t the idea that first came to him, but his body that acted before his mind had time to form a thought. He swung slowly round, his hand pivoting on the lamp post, a full circle and a half and found himself facing back down the avenue. Slowly, surely, he began to walk back towards the Lefèvre house.

  Thank God there wasn’t a dog, he found himself thinking, as he stole around the edge of the garden, past the tool shed and its litter of awaiting forks and spades to the back of the house. He had waited until the last particles of clarity in the evening sky had gone before climbing over the fence. It was almost pitch black now.

  Standing behind the magnolias—not as ‘dead’ as Mme Lefèvre had said them to be—he spied the upper floor. There were several soft lights on in the bedrooms and one of them was Jeanne’s. But which one? Jesus, you must be barmy, he heard a voice say to himself. What if Mohammed found him out—he’d be after him with a pitchfork or worse—a scimitar or something! Don’t be ridiculous said another, more composed voice—he hadn’t set eyes upon a single scimitar since arriving in Morocco. Perhaps they didn’t use them here. He ended the conversation with himself abruptly, choosing instead to study how to get up to the first floor windows without breaking his neck.

  There seemed plenty of holds, the house was not overly high— he had a natural fear of heights—and there was, of all things, Mohammed’s ladder lying in the grass beside the conservatory. It wasn’t very romantic, he thought, climbing up a ladder. Hardly Shakespeare. Still, it was safer. After a few moments of self-encouragement, he moved forwards, crossed a short patch of open lawn and came to a crouch beside the ladder. Carefully, silently, he put it into place beneath the first window and began to climb. Halfway up, he froze—the scree of a night hawk, terribly close, almost made him lose his footing. Heart pounding, he stepped softly up the last eight rungs, craned his body and peered over into the dimly lit room. Jesus fucking Christ! It was Mme Lefèvre, in a lemon yellow bed robe, putting some sort of ghastly night cream onto her face. Immediately, Summerfield ducked down and scampered silently back to the foot of the ladder. Once more on the ground, regaining his breath, the next question was what other window? He desperately hoped Jeanne’s parents were still sharing a bedroom—imagine if he were to fall face to face with old Napoleon, Jeanne’s father! It would put a fatal end to any translation of Wilding’s document. Be logical, he told himself. What sort of wallpaper, what sort of curtains would a young woman and a miserable old pen pusher have? His doubt got the better of his confidence. No ladder climbing, he concluded, weighing the risks—he’d have no chance of escape if he got it wrong. Instead, keeping to the shadows, he picked up a handful of earth and sifted out the pellets. Returning once again to the wallpaper theorem, he chose the third window and threw. The pellet clicked against the window pane. He threw another, missed, and another, tensing, ready to merge into the bushes.

  As if a prayer had been answered, Jeanne’s face appeared momentarily at the window. One last throw. A pause. Jeanne reappeared, her fine features looking anxious, searching beyond the window into the night. And then she looked down, saw him, frowned, brought a hand to her mouth and then smiled. The window slid up with a little sigh and Summerfield, stepping rashly out onto the lawn, beckoned for her to come. She nodded, held up two fingers and then disappeared again. Two minutes stretched into what Summerfield imagined were five—among the longest five of his life. And then, sliding carefully through the rear door onto the veranda, Jeanne appeared and came silently to him.

  ‘Well,’ said Summerfield, softly.

  ‘Well,’ whispered Jeanne, putting a finger to her lips. ‘You’re mad!’ They stood for some seconds, exposed in the light from the moon, their eyes discovering themselves—he in his crumpled suit and shirt, the collar of which had come loose from the initial climb and she, in a light summer dress, bluish in the night light but probably a shade of green. They moved consciously towards the shadows, their eyes drawn to each other—she, the shape of his jaw and the shadow under his lips, he her left ear, the way a strand of hair curled behind it to a point on her neck—focusing, unfocusing—skin, nose, lips, eyebrows—coming together, she on his eyes and he on hers. It was like some tremendous swell in the sea, a deliciously warm coaster that made them simultaneously rise to a smile. A moment was lost forever, inexplicable how it passed, and suddenly they were in each other’s arms, their lips pressing gently, nudging like two cats meeting in the night.

  Slowly, still clasped, they edged towards the farthest corner of the garden by the great magnolia and stood there, breathing in each other’s scent, nudging each other, rubbing skin against skin. They did not move. They were the quietest words either of them had ever said, sometimes silent, sometimes just a murmur of a murmur, a millimetre away from each other’s skin.

  ‘I have dreamt of this moment.’

  ‘I have written books about it in my head.’

  ‘Your skin smells of lemon and pepper all mixed into one.’

  ‘Your lips are soft and giving.’

  ‘Generous to one who is herself generous.’

  ‘Night stay longer than you did yesterday.’

  ‘Keep the stars aloft and the moon burning bright.’

  ‘Like a tiger’s eyes in the night.’

  Soft laughter.
>
  ‘Did you receive the message, my love?’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘He was a good man and now it is finished.’

  ‘Does he know of us?’

  ‘No-one knows. One day I shall tell him.’

  ‘When it is time. Will he suffer?’

  ‘Greatly, my love.’

  ‘And will you suffer?’

  ‘Not as much as he, I fear.’

  ‘And so suffer. Such is the price of truth.’

  ‘This is the truth.’

  ‘It is.’

  24

  His heart was at the centre of the world. It babbled to him, trickled, radiated and danced in a language so illogical from that which came out of his head, but which seemed a thousand times truer and more meaningful. It connected to portentous things, so important and obvious like the stars, the night air, Jeanne and just simply being alive.

  As he left the Lefèvre house behind him, he passed under the soft yellow glow of the single electric street lamp that lit the avenue and turned back, one last time, to send a smile in Jeanne’s direction. Lights shone from behind the shutters of the upstairs windows and he wondered, hoped, that she had returned uncaught to her room. Turning again to his path home, the darkness turning silvery blue from the demi-lune, he wondered what she was doing then. Was she feeling so whole that her heart spilled over into a private chuckle of joy? Was she re-reading his message or simply remembering the perfection of that moment when their lips touched? Was she, like him, just astonished by the weightlessness that seemed to lift him by the collar and carry him over the ground? He laughed, felt a wave of warmth ebb through him and whispered ‘I love you’ into the night air.

  The warm glow stayed with him as he walked past the rich, well-kept houses of the expatriate French. It stayed with him as the air grew colder and the distant ranges of the Atlas turned black and merged with the sky. It stayed with him as, nearly four hundred yards away and crossing a small plot of unbuilt land, where a track led off left onto the plain that stretched until the mountains, he noticed a squat-looking shape among the weeds and thorn bushes: a car. There were people in it. Lightless, the car looked too small for the shapes inside. Unconsciously he looked away and his feet changed direction, his body turning slightly right, back towards the road and the avenue. No sooner had he begun when the tinny opening squeak of a door reached him. He glanced back. A shape had appeared. Summerfield halted. The shape beckoned for him to come over.

  ‘Harry,’ came a soft, low voice. ‘It is I, Abrach. Come.’

  Summerfield frowned, his heart now emptied of love and taken by what he could only identify as a clear sense of uneasiness.

  ‘Abrach?’ he called back, hesitantly, his voice, almost forced by the night hour into a murmur. ‘Is it you?’

  ‘Come, Harry,’ said the shape and moved closer into the moonlight. ‘I would like to talk to you.’

  Summerfield gave a shrug, glanced behind him, and walked towards Abrach. They shook hands and Summerfield saw the merchant’s face and the smile. As they trod carefully towards the car, two other shapes left it to wander off among the bushes—Abrach’s men, Badr perhaps, though Summerfield could not be sure.

  ‘Please,’ said Abrach, inviting Summerfield to get in. They sat down on the back seat and Abrach closed the door. It smelt slightly of mildew, the scent of men cramped for a long time in a small space and Abrach, noticing it too, leant his large frame forwards and rolled down the window a couple of inches.

  ‘So?’ said Summerfield. ‘Please tell me, Abrach—were you following me?’

  The merchant sighed and rubbed his face in his hands in a gesture of weariness before looking up.

  ‘Not exactly, Harry.’

  ‘I suppose—’ began Summerfield, becoming increasingly aware that he was trapped, ‘that you…’

  Abrach let out a soft laugh and looked empathetic.

  ‘Poor Harry. Let me save you the ordeal. Yes—yes, I know for certain that you were in the Lefèvre house this evening. I cannot for sure guess the reason why you returned there, but I have a very sharp feeling that it was not for the company of our Administrator, Monsieur Lefèvre.’

  Summerfield nodded and a fleeting grin came to his lips. Abrach continued, his generous face earnest and somehow odd.

  ‘I will not keep you long, Harry. And forgive me if I scared you a few minutes ago. You must have been surprised to see me.’

  Summerfield gave a groan for confirmation.

  ‘I must tell you something important. I beg you to listen carefully,’ continued Abrach.

  Summerfield weighed up the situation. An urge to just leave the car gave way to resignation. He’d have to face his sentence sometime.

  ‘Go ahead,’ he said, wondering if the merchant would refuse to pay for the work he’d recently completed.

  Abrach nodded, business-like and clasped his hands, the earnestness removed from his eyes and replaced by a steady calm.

  ‘The story of Abslem El Rifni was a true story, Harry. And I think you concluded that Abslem was I. You see,’ he added apologetically, ‘I’m not one to make a good story-teller, which is why I needed your services to win the young lady’s heart.’

  ‘You said it was a question of race,’ said Summerfield.

  ‘Among other factors, yes,’ replied Abrach. ‘Nonetheless, love was the arm I chose. Do you understand?’

  ‘I suppose you mean that it was better than choosing guns and bombs,’ nodded Summerfield.

  ‘But the effect could have been devastating,’ resumed Abrach. ‘If things hadn’t…become complicated.’

  ‘The real goal was her father, then? Right from the start,’ said Summerfield, avoiding the insinuation.

  Abrach’s mile was fleeting, wiped away by something distant, something cold.

  ‘Yes. That man—that young captain, so bloated by ambition and belief that it poisoned his sense of humanity—was Lefèvre. Lefèvre who ordered the burning which gave rise to the killing. Lefèvre who even these days—no doubt almost every day—signs his name at the bottom of orders of arrest, of imprisonment and even execution.’

  Summerfield gave a shake of his head.

  ‘He is—what’s the word—rather emotionless. At least, he gives the impression he couldn’t give a damn for anything other than his duties to the Republic. But actually putting hatred into his work—I find that hard to believe.’

  ‘Not hatred, Harry. He doesn’t need any hatred. Lefèvre is a committed servitor of the French State. He is one of the élite. From birth, he has moved through circles that call for a certain obedience, a certain blindness—schools that manufacture the engineers, soldiers, functionaries and politicians of France. Nothing must stand in the way of the République—neither the Boches, neither the English and certainly not the poor, indigenous and uncivilised peoples of its colonies. Their revolution was founded on blood and massacre, on the elimination of whole classes and the destruction of opposing ideas. Do not forget, Harry—that it is still a young republic. Barely a hundred and fifty years separate France from its bloody change.’

  Summerfield remained silent and eventually sighed.

  ‘You know about Jeanne and I.’

  Abrach nodded.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did you have your men follow us?’

  ‘No. At least, not so closely as to interfere with your privacy. No, I understood, Harry. Your eyes and your voice gave me the clues. The way the light danced in them whenever you thought of her while we talked. The way your voice grew soft, the way the words you wrote became full of so many other hidden hopes.’

  Summerfield dropped his gaze.

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  Abrach shook his head.

  ‘I think you understood from our previous conversations thatI would not blame you. It is so, that’s all.’

  ‘And your plan? Why not place a bomb under Lefèvre’s car? Why not lay in wait with your men and ambush him? Why not a bullet?’

  Abrach sat
back and looked genuinely shocked.

  ‘Me? Do you think I am such a man to want to kill in cold blood, Harry? I gather that you have not understood me—not at all. The question did enter my mind—a long time ago—and I even tried to get near to him to pull out a gun. But I couldn’t. It is not what I, as a good man, can do. And in any case, he is very diligent, very prudent. Mistrustful. He would have smelt that something was coming.’

  ‘But Jeanne? You wanted to get at him through her? Kidnap her.’

  ‘I wanted—want—to meet her. To explain. How else could I get so close? Every letter that arrives is checked by Lefèvre—personally. She has to know the truth, Harry.’

  ‘No—no, I don’t believe you. There were other ways.’

  ‘Have her before me, that young, lively, lovely young woman and just tell her of the crimes her father has committed—that she is the daughter of such a man. For me, there is little more agonising than knowing that you have failed in the eyes of your children. That the love in their eyes has been replaced by reproach and by disgust.’

  ‘You’re right—I don’t understand you, Abrach,’ frowned Summerfield.

  ‘I try,’ said Abrach, softly. ‘But what does it matter. You—the complication that has suddenly arisen—means that I have to act now before your heart forces your tongue to talk about things you shouldn’t; before she talks. Before Lefèvre hears of it. And before he surrounds himself with guards and sends out the dogs to find me.’

  ‘Is this why you’re here? Not so much for me, but for her?’ Abrach remained silent. ‘You’re planning on doing something this night?’ pressed Summerfield, his voice becoming urgent. ‘I beg you, Abrach—don’t.’

  ‘I must. I will talk with her. And when this is over, you will be there in the morning to explain and soothe her.’

  ‘You can’t,’ urged Summerfield. ‘She’ll be hurt.’

  ‘Trust me—it is unwise to use such a word, I know—but it is all I have. Trust me. My intention is not to harm her.’