It didn’t light his fire… He sat in his deep funk, letting out long-winded sighs… a beaten dog…
“Ah! Shit!… You’re hopeless!…”
He was bringing me down!… I didn’t need this… blubbering hard enough to break your heart in two!… I was sick and tired of the guy… What could I do?… I grab him again by the shoulders, give him a little shake…
“Well?… Well?… You through yet?…”
My shaking lulls him, rock-a-bye baby… He keels over, plops back on the sack, conks out… like a log… tenderly… Right off he starts snoring! Will my luck ever end?
I sit down opposite… stare at him… Fatigue’s catching up with me too… torpor… Feel my eyelids growing heavy… the bedroom’s just too comfortable… we’ve been barrelling around for days!… Running and running!…
Ah! The old fart! Really, come on! He’d better hold out!… This is our once-in-a-lifetime shot!… He’d better not alienate the Colonel! Ah! I’m going to give him a lecture! He’s just got to listen to me, goddamn it! I sit up, get to my feet, go wobbly… I’ve lost the strength too… First off, my arm’s killing me!… Then there’s my head, twice its size, enormous… Made of lead it’s so heavy… Plus there’s the bed, it’s just too soft, too treacherous even to sit on… overpowering… over-padded… I count the flowers on the wallpaper, the cretonne… on the ceiling… I sprawl out like this other guy!… In the end I flop back, stop fighting, I surrender… my eyes’re killing me… my eyelids… my head… yes! My headgear! My mask!… The whole damn mess!… Everything!… Doing the beddy-bye jig!… All over the cretonne, dancing all over the walls… shepherds and shepherdesses… loads of sheep everywhere… sheep dancing away… little boats… little lambs… their fleece so soft… the surf… waves and surf! The other jerk snoring away beside me, ah! I can hear him all the same!… This bed’s all feathery… a cloud!… A cloud for my bones!… Shepherdesses… my eyes turning red!… There’s music for sure… our eyes like burning coals… a pair of solid blue, Virginia’s… shepherdesses and reclining ladies… close your eyes, beddy-bye… won’t work…
*
The next day’s a whole lot worse… he didn’t want to get out of bed at all… He was on strike… He didn’t want to go up into the gadget room under the rafters… He didn’t want ever to set eyes on it again, not the masks, not the Colonel, not anything… total panic… I reasoned with him, met him head on… We had the nicest chat… Naturally he didn’t want to die! Everybody feels the same on that score!… Especially not by being gassed to death… “It’s not humane…” His very words… Wouldn’t exactly have been my cup of tea either!… Battle wounds’re bad enough, no fun and games, but at least you’re out in the open!… You’re not exposed to shameful stenches, racked by rat-poisonous fumes… Gave you something to think about… no argument there!… And even a man whose mind was made up could keep weighing the pros and cons just a little… I understood his reluctance… A person could be totally brainless and still prefer to do some things rather than others, be put off by certain daredevil stunts… He wasn’t too hot about this business of swallowing gas… Plus the Colonel’s masks didn’t strike him as up to snuff… an additional risk… It all added up… I know that even I, who was pretty savvy about the dangers of war, who had gone headfirst into the slaughter, and still was in a bad way, a gimp with a limp, who had suffered his share when it came to gases – despite everything, the mere thought made my skin crawl!… I could understand him hemming and hawing… You’d never catch me trying to pull off something like this!… I’m no yellow-belly, mind you! It’s just that I was staying away from O’Collogham’s crapola… I’d warned Sosthène! I wasn’t squealing on anybody! I knew all about inventors!… They usually started out not asking anything of me! All I’d have to do is carry out their procedures, run their errands, do business in town… I wouldn’t see any cash in hand either!… He’s the one who’d be rolling in dough when it was all over!… If he survived!… Those were the cold hard facts!… If he came through safe and sound! I’d be showing up for Act Two, for the caravan to Tibet!… The hunt for the flower he’d mentioned, the Tara-Tohé magic deal!… Think through what’s at stake… He can’t go screwing up, for crying out loud!… He had to keep his claws on our little rascal… Meanwhile I could see what was coming… I’d be lying low for a little… I had a turn coming to me!…
“You’ve charged the front lines, dear Sosthène,” I pointed out to him… “The feats of bravery are all yours now, my dear professor! Now it’s up to you to save England! France! The United States! So make your colonel happy! He treats you nice… like an equal!…”
I was talking about mine, about my own version of the Colonel… the incredible centaur General des Entrayes… You better believe I made my fellow happy!… In the Fourteenth Cuirassiers heart and soul!… You’d better believe I followed him everywhere!… Right into the cannon’s mouth!… Without a second’s hesitation!… And he only had to do just like me… wars need heroes… in short he’d re-enlisted in the special gas-mask brigade of research scientists! This was news to him! I was opening his eyes to the fine points of the situation…
But my horsing around didn’t particularly crack him up, his face froze in a sly, gloomy scowl, he was giving me this funny look, nasty, pig-headed, mumbling under his breath… He wanted an end to all this commotion… wanted everything around him to stop dead… His situation was going from bad to worse… What if he really went out on strike!… I was getting jittery!… I looked back at him sitting beside me on the bed, I’d nestled right up close… Maybe I had come on a little too strong?… Especially right after waking up!… The guy was still all sticky-eyed… maybe I’d got him up out of the wrong side of the bed… I was laying the blame on myself… There’s a knock… the butler… full-course breakfast… Come in, my friend!… Heaps of pastries, whole platefuls, sponge cakes, éclairs, jams, sandwiches, soft-boiled eggs… Ah! This perks my man up, presto! His eyes are twinkling!… His mouth starts watering… drooling, gurgling at the sheer sight!… Such a lavish spread of goodies!… All his sorrow’s a thing of the past!… He wants the whole tray on his bed… He snaps into action with the slices of bread… You’d think he missed dinner… He whips up marvellous concoctions, triple-deckers of butter and jam… Of course he slops up everything, covers his chops and the sheets, acting like the crudball he is!… I mention this to him… He’ll have the servants turning up their noses at us… That makes old pork-face laugh… He’s on top of the world stuffing his face just like he’s doing… he’s getting off… hopping, wriggling, because it’s just so awfully good!… Scrumptious!… This sets his mind back bubbling with ideas!… A whole slew popping up at the same time… Ah! He scratches his head… He’s got it!
“Hear ye! Young man!… Young man!…” he calls me… “A brainstorm!… A brainstorm!… A bolt of inspiration! Give me your hand… Here! Here!… I can see where it is!…”
“Where, what’s where?”
Damn it! Ah! Fuck! Ah! It’s slipped away!… The idea’s gone… Hell!… “No! No! No! Wait! Yes, I know! Yes!… In the big trunk!… No! In the chest of drawers! No, under my wife’s dressing table!…”
He changes his mind again… Ah! His receptors are on the blink… Sort of fuzzy as visions go… He’s still discombobulated… panting, huffing and puffing… an incredibly wrenching ordeal, heartbreaking, the sheer hell he’s putting himself through… the strain… He tries for a repeat vision, a revision… Squeezing his head harder than ever!… Genuine self-torture… I didn’t have a clue what he was after…
“The Vega, for Heaven’s sake!… The Vega in Verse…” Ah! He’d lost me there!… “Come on now, you rascal!… It was left behind in Rotherhithe!… Don’t you remember? At Pépé’s, where else! The big book!… Don’t you understand anything?… Didn’t you see it?…”
Ah! So that was the big deal?… I’ll be damned!… He was back to his bullshit!… All fired back up over the Vega… of the Hindus… the opportuni
ties it opened up for you… an unforgivable oversight… he was spluttering right into my face, whipped up into such a lather… seething to set eyes on his Vega again…
“Come on now!… Honestly! Wake up!…” Now he was the one on my case… “The Book of Signs! The Vega, young man!…”
His insults started flying the more excited he grew.
“You birdbrain! You idiot! Can’t you get it through your thick skull!… we wouldn’t last two minutes in the poison gases!…”
What’s this “we” business?… Why wouldn’t “we” last?… The gas is all for him!…
“Don’t include me! Not for one second! Can you hear me: not for one single second – got that, pops?”
I see him turn white… at the mere mention of the gas, fear grips him…
“You’re scared shitless, Sosthène!…”
That’s one thing I’d bet my life on!
Ah! Shitless!… Ah! Poor devil!… What did I just say?… He’s fit to be tied!…
“And what about the cyanide, what do you think about that?… And the arsines?… And the arsoles?…”
In a raging fury, and how, just look at him go… over my harmless little comment!… Ah! He knows every variety… all the terrors of the atmosphere… the gasmares…
“And don’t forget about the peroles!…” he goes on… “And the xylenes!…”
He carries on this way for a quarter of an hour!… He lists the thousand and one painful deaths… every single thing a person can drop dead from after sniffing… Actually, the choice is frightening. I laugh, can’t help myself, I feel like a total jerk… He keeps heaping it on… I hit a raw nerve, and he’s going to work me over good…
“Your guts just like that, down there, look!…” He points to them… “Look! Your confounded guts!…”
He’s got it in for me, something personal!… Little rat!… Dirty cockroach!… He squashes hunks of meat pie in the serving tray…
“Your eyes!… Your sweet, pretty eyes!…”
He shows me what they’d look like infected… two shrivelled prunes… turdified by the gas…
“And you’ll croak along with them… smoked!…”
He wants to kill my appetite… Ah I’m still having a good time… He’ll never scare me…
“So, you finished, Sosthène?… Kaput? Kaput?…”
I’m screwing around with him.
“Finished? Finished?”
Ah! He’s getting a second wind… Just what do I take him for, huh? Some lily-liver, do I?… Ah! the last thing on my mind! What an idea!… His dander’s up, he’s fighting back… Enough tears!… Enough ranting and raving!… I’m the sorry sight now, scared shitless!… I’m the pitiful wreck!… He refuses to accept the situation, jibbing at my remarks… He’s going to give me a pep talk!…
“Ah! Damn stupid bugger! Do you have faith?” he asks.
“Faith in what?”
What’s he getting at? He sighs, and with that he shrugs…
“Ah! If only you’d come sooner!…” Ah! How sorry he feels… “You’d have had time to learn!… to do a little spelling… S. P!… Ell!…”
“To spell?… To spell?…” Another of his bright ideas? What will he think up next?…
“Before, I was in the hospital, Monsieur Sosthène!… Having my poor wounds tended to! Before the war I was still wet behind the ears!… Maybe that doesn’t mean anything to you!… In the silk trade… earning twenty-five, thirty-five francs a month… and after that, a brigadier in the sixteenth regiment, at your good service!… Monsieur Rub-a-Dub-Dub!… I never had any call for spelling!…”
“Come, come now!… Show some get-up-and-go!”
I’m irritating him again… He thinks I’m ill-mannered… He pouts… Ah! Not so fast with the pout!… Sweetie!… Ah! Do I ever hate that damn pouting puss of his! That crummy scarecrow!…
“Go on and make a face!… Be my guest!… I’m going to tell you again!… You’ve got to get one thing absolutely straight!… You’re the one involved in the experiments, Mr Marmalade!… Not me!… Let me repeat!… Not me!… I’m not in the running, and don’t you forget it!… End of discussion!… I’ve told you a thousand times!… Vega or no Vega, faith or no faith… Turd! You listen to me good! I don’t lie to anybody!… Make sure you’re crystal clear on that point!…”
Blunt and up front!…
“You’re impossible!” he answers. “You’re in love!”
Just throws it into my face, wham, just like that!
“Ah! You stupid old bastard! And so what of it?”
“Passion makes a man impossible!”
“In love, bull! You old fool!… Mind your own business!”
I bring him back to the subject in no time flat!
“I’ve signed on for the trip, the Chinese treasure hunt! And that’s it! Nothing else included! And not for any of your hare-brained whims!… I’ll gladly climb onto your nags, slap your junk together, trot along, run all sorts of risks… but I’m not sniffing any of your crap!… I’ve had four operations, and nobody’s going to put me under again!… I’m no good for experiments…”
He looks me up and down… really I break the guy’s heart!… I tell it to him straight… I sort of egg him on in his lies…
“And so what about your Vega? As if somebody gives a damn…”
He grabs my hands…
“Are you my friend?…”
It’s got him going again…
“Why, of course, how could you even ask, Sosthène!…”
“Can I really place my trust in you?…”
“Ah! When it comes to that, go right ahead!…”
He squeezes my paws even harder, grinding away, he’s taken them over, trembling along with…
“My child!… Not a minute to waste!… Hurry up! Hop to it!”
He did it now… he pulled one over on me! He’s going to have me running around!
“Go back to Rotherhithe, I beseech you! I beg you! Rummage in every corner! Give Pépé a good shake so she’ll find it!… Turn the whole place upside down if you have to!… Don’t come back without the Vega! Without the Vega we’re sunk!”
This knocks the wind out of him so badly he’s panting… it’s the end of the world!… He sends me off… The Vega or death! Or it all comes crashing down!
“I won’t be coming along,” he bows out, “can’t leave the Colonel!… You do understand, right?”
“Oh! Certainly, goes without saying…”
He looks me deep in the eyes… throws some sort of hypnotic spell over me to send me on my errand!… Ah! The slick greaseball! He enunciates each word clearly…
“Look hard for the Vega!… You! Will! Find! It!… The Vega in Verse… Don’t forget the Verse part!”
Ah! And then right away he bursts out laughing! Poking fun at himself! Man, oh man! He thumps his chest, his head, that poor head of his!… “Where was my mind at, my boy?”
Ah! He just can’t forgive himself!
“Go on! Be quick! Hurry up!”
Wheezing like mad he starts whispering again…
“No dawdling!… Give my love to Pépé! I love her!… I adore her!… She knows it… Ah! But no address! Don’t forget, no address!… She’d be at the door in five minutes flat!”
“And what about Nelson? Nelson?…”
Ah! I was a pain in the neck with my Nelson…
“Just handle him, for Christ’s sake! You’re making my head spin with this Nelson of yours!… We’ve all got our own worries!…”
Easy for him to talk, the fathead, he didn’t know Tuhwheep! Tuhwheep! It was a piece of cake for him! In the first place, the whole thing was a crock!… Mr Marmalade was setting me up for a swindle!… I could see his con coming a mile away… Keep right on talking, dear old pops!… I’m not any dumber than you, you bullshit artist! You’ll get yours! I didn’t bat an eye, I kept a straight face… was even raring to go…
“Very good! Very good! I’m off and running! Jumping!… I’ll do everything t
o a T, Monsieur de la Chine!”
I throw some clothes on my back! Presto! He thinks I’m one hell of an eager beaver all of a sudden! Wouldn’t know it was the same man! We’ve got to get a move on, fast… I drag him along… We run smack into the Colonel, he’d just finished his breakfast, cheery, whistling, a happy bird… he’s all soft and cosy, bundled up, wearing a dressing gown covered with large checks and leaf designs, a genuine chickadee… roly-poly, perfumed, his beady pig eyes darting around… He looks us up and down sardonically… still finds us funny… He’s all scrubbed, pink, smiling… With gleaming dome…
“Hello! Hello! Gentlemen! Good day! Glorious weather!”
In excellent spirits… It’s true the weather was glorious. With that he turns on his heels… leaves us… ascends with dignity one step at a time…
Right then Sosthène feels real awful.
“Go on! Go on! My dear child!… Hurry up! Please!…”
“I’m going! I’m going! My dear master!…”
Ah! My mind’s on the girl… I wish I could have said something to her… even a short goodbye… Nothing doing! Ah! He won’t have it!… He shoves me… insults me, here we go again! Don’t forget, no dawdling along the way!… Got to be back with the book in a flash! Ah! The damned Vega!
“All right already! All right! Monsieur Sosthène!”
Just so he stops bugging me! I zip off! Catch the tram, passing just that second!… Plock! Plock! Plock! Shaking!… Rattling along!… Here’s my stop! Rotherhithe! Everybody off!… The house… up the stairs! Ding-dong! Is this going to be another big production? And here’s my gal…
“Ah! Hello there, young man! Ah! So it’s you again?…”
I was already in hot water.
“Sure, it’s me, Madame Sosthène. Your husband has an important message for you, he sends you lots and lots of love… and says not to worry your head over anything!… Here’s fifteen shillings to cover your week… Try to make it last!… And use your head before you do anything!… So there’s his advice… plus, he says not to diddle around with Achille, the fellow in the box… One of these days your husband will be by!… He’ll come and pick him up… He’s never been busier in his life… Ah! Plus the Vega, the Vega in Verse! That’s the real reason I came! I’ve got to bring it back with me pronto!”
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