An escape for what? That was the whole problem…
Ravinel started. Half past nine. For three quarters of an hour he had been turning over the events of the previous day.
‘Waiter. A brandy.’
After that talk in the café, what had happened next? He had called on Le Flem, near the Pont de Pirmil. Le Flem had given him an order for three punt guns. They had been joined by a hairdresser who went fishing every Monday and never failed to come home with a huge pike. A lot of heavy fishermen’s talk. The hairdresser didn’t believe in artificial flies, and he wasn’t won over until Ravinel had tied a Hitchcock then and there before his eyes, using bits of partridge feather for the wings. Ravinel had the knack. For tying flies, there was no one to touch him in France, possibly in the whole of Europe. It takes some doing, particularly if you haven’t got a vise to hold the hook. The body and the hackle are comparatively easy, but tying on the wings—that really is tricky. It’s certainly a knack, tying flies. An art, rather. For even when the fly doesn’t imitate any known insect, the illusion is so perfect that it is difficult to believe it isn’t real.
‘My word!’ said the hairdresser.
Brandishing an imaginary rod, Le Flem went through the motions of casting. Then his arms quivered as though he really had a fish at the end of his line.
‘You see! That’s the way to do it. Come here, little fellow…’
And he thrust an imaginary landing net under his victim. His movements were expressive. Ravinel could see at once that the hairdresser had fishing in his blood.
The hours had dragged on. In the afternoon he had gone to the moving pictures. Ditto in the evening. That night he had stayed at a different hotel. This time it was too quiet, and his mind had been obstinately haunted by Mireille. Not the Mireille in the bath. The one at Enghien, very much alive. It would have been nice if he could have talked things over with her.
‘Look here, Mireille. What would you have done in my place?’
It was impossible to get away from the fact that he still loved her. Or rather that he was beginning to. Shyly. It was fantastic, monstrous if you like, and yet…
‘Why! If it isn’t Ravinel!’
Two men had stopped in front of him. One of them was Cadiou, the other a tall, spare man in a fur-lined jacket, who looked hard at him as though…
‘Larmingeat,’ said Cadiou, introducing his friend.
Larmingeat! That’s who it was! Ravinel had known him as a schoolboy in a black smock who had helped him with his sums. For a second they stared at each other, then Larmingeat held out his hand.
‘Fernand. Fancy meeting you again! It must be quite twenty-five years since we last saw each other.’
Cadiou clapped his hands.
‘Three brandies.’
There was a moment of embarrassment all the same. To think that this was Larmingeat! This tall fellow with a beaky nose and cold eyes!
‘What are you doing now?’ asked Ravinel.
‘I’m an architect. And you?’
‘Oh, just a salesman.’
That was slightly embarrassing too. It established a certain distance between them. Larmingeat turned quickly to Cadiou.
‘Yes. We were at school together. In Brest. And if I remember rightly we graduated at the same time. But what a long time ago!’
He warmed his brandy in the hollow of his hand.
‘What about your parents?’ he asked, turning back to Ravinel.
‘They are both dead.’
Larmingeat sighed.
‘His father was a master at the Lycée,’ he explained to Cadiou. ‘I can see him still, with his briefcase and his umbrella. He rarely smiled.’
That was quite true. He hardly ever smiled. For one thing, he had T.B. But there was no need for Larmingeat to know that. In fact Ravinel had much rather they talked of something else than his father, a dull stick of a man, always in black. It was really because of him that Ravinel had become fed up with his studies. Always saying: ‘When I’m no longer with you,’ and enjoining his son to work harder and harder. Sometimes at meals he would stop eating and contemplate him from under his enormous Ravinel eyebrows. Then a volley of questions would be fired at him. What was the date of the Treaty of Campo Formio, the formula for butane gas, the sequence of tenses in Latin. A precise, meticulous man, in whose brain all information was neatly classified. For him geography consisted of lists. Towns, mountains, rivers. History was a list of dates. Man himself was a list of bones, muscles, and organs.
When Ravinel took his examinations—that was the worst of all. To think of it was enough to make him break out into a cold sweat. And even now strange words would suddenly jump up at him out of the past, menacing as in a nightmare. Words like cretaceous or monocotyledonous. It’s not with impunity that you’re the son of a schoolmaster—at any rate of one like that.
What would Larmingeat say if Ravinel told him he had actually prayed for his father’s death? He had. And he had watched intently for every sign of the approaching end. He had known enough about the symptoms. He knew the meaning of a little froth at the corner of the mouth, or that peculiar hollow cough in the evenings. And all his life he had known what it meant to be the son of an invalid. Always thinking of one’s own health, conscious of one’s temperature and of the least change in the weather.
‘We don’t live long in our family.’
That’s what his mother used to say. And she backed it up by dying a few months after her husband, just fading away, worn out by years of worry and scraping.
He was an only child, Ravinel, and, though he was well in his teens when his parents died, it seemed to him ever after that he had always been an orphan. And he had remained rather like one. Something in him seemed to have been nipped in the bud. He always started if a door slammed or his name was called out and became nervous if a question was fired at him suddenly. Of course nobody asked him the date of the Treaty of Campo Formio nowadays. But that didn’t make any difference: he was afraid of being caught on the wrong foot. Another thing: he was apt to forget his own telephone number or the number of his car. One day, perhaps, he’d forget his own name! An awful thought! He’d no longer be a son or a husband or anything else. Just a man among millions of others…
As a matter of fact, on second thoughts, it might be rather nice. Only, it would be one of those forbidden pleasures.
‘Do you remember those outings to the Pointe des Espagnols?’
That was Larmingeat. Ravinel came slowly up to the surface.
‘I’d like to have known Ravinel in those days,’ said Cadiou. ‘What they call a tough guy, I bet.’
‘A tough guy?’
Larmingeat and Ravinel exchanged glances. They smiled at one another, and it was like sealing a pact. Because Cadiou couldn’t possibly understand.
‘Tough enough. In his way,’ answered Larmingeat. Then he asked:
‘Married?’
Ravinel caught sight of his wedding ring. He blushed.
‘Yes. We live near Paris. At Enghien.’
‘I know the place.’
There were pauses in the conversation. They had plenty of time to study each other. Larmingeat too wore a wedding ring. Occasionally he wiped his eyes, for he wasn’t in the habit of drinking spirits. There were any number of questions Ravinel might have asked him. But what was the use? Other people’s lives had never interested him.
‘How’s the housing programme getting on?’ asked Cadiou.
‘Not too badly.’
‘What does it cost nowadays to build a bungalow? A decent one, but nothing out of the way.’
‘It depends. Four rooms and a bathroom—a really well-fitted bathroom, mind you—it’d run you into a couple of million francs, I dare say.’
Ravinel called the waiter.
‘Shall we make it the same again?’ suggested Cadiou.
‘Afraid I can’t stop,’ said Ravinel. ‘Got an appointment. You’ll excuse me, won’t you, Larmingeat.’
They shook h
ands with him limply. Larmingeat looked a trifle put out, but he was too discreet to ask any questions.
‘You might just as well stop and have lunch with us,’ grumbled Cadiou.
‘Another time.’
‘That’s a deal. And I’ll take you to see the bit of land I’ve bought at the Pont de Cens.’
Ravinel hurried away. He had behaved awkwardly and he cursed himself for having lost his nerve. But he had always been sensitive. Was that his fault? Besides, under the circumstances… Would anyone else in his place?…
The hours dragged on. Darkness fell. In the evening he drove to a garage. Oil and grease. Gas. To be on the safe side, he had two cans filled up as well. That done, he drove slowly to the Place du Commerce, past the Bourse, and crossed the esplanade of the Île Gloriette. On his left was the port, the lights trembling on the broken surface of the Loire. A Liberty ship was moving downstream. He had never felt so close to things, so detached from himself. All the same his nerves were stretched taut and his chest contracted at the thought of the ordeal that lay ahead.
An interminable freight train rumbled past. Ravinel counted the cars. Thirty-one. Lucienne must have left the hospital by now. He would leave it to her to finish the work. After all, it was her idea, the whole thing… The canvas. He suddenly thought of the canvas. He knew very well it was in the back of the car, yet he couldn’t keep turning round to make sure. A ‘California’ canvas sheet which he carried round as a sample, for he dealt in all kinds of camping equipment too. When he turned back, there was Lucienne, coming up noiselessly on her crêpe soles.
‘Hallo, Fernand! All right? Not too tired?’
Before even opening the door, she took off a glove to feel his hand. Having done so, she made a face.
‘You seem pretty jumpy to me. And your breath smells of drink.’
‘I had to. I had to be seen by plenty of people—you said so yourself.’
He started up the car and they went along the Quai de la Fosse. It was the rush hour. Dozens of little white lights zigzagged about, crossing each other and recrossing. Cyclists. Ravinel had to keep a sharp lookout. If he knew next to nothing about the inside of a car, that didn’t alter the fact that he was an excellent driver. For a while he had to drive very cautiously, but after the transporter bridge the traffic thinned out and it was quite easy going.
‘Give me the keys,’ said Lucienne.
He backed the car into the garage and she shut the door. He would have liked a stiff brandy.
‘The canvas,’ said Lucienne.
She went up two steps and in through the door between the garage and the house. Ravinel pulled the canvas sheet out, then rolled it up. Suddenly he heard the sound he dreaded. A gurgling sound—the bathwater being run away. The waste pipe passed through the garage.
Driving along beside rivers, he had more than once seen a body fished out. An ugly sight, a drowned person. Black and swollen. A prod with a boathook goes right into the flesh.
The gurgling went on. He in turn entered the house. In the doorway of the bedroom, he stopped. The bathroom door was open and through it he could see Lucienne bending over. A final gurgle in the waste pipe. What was she looking at? She seemed to be examining something. The canvas fell on the floor. It had slipped from under his arm. Or perhaps he had simply dropped it. He really didn’t know. He turned on his heel and went into the dining room. The bottle of wine was still standing there beside the carafe. He drank direct from the bottle. Gulp after gulp, until he was out of breath.
That was better! Now for it! He’d have to face it sooner or later. He retraced his steps and picked up the canvas sheet.
‘Spread it out flat.’
‘What?’
‘The canvas, of course.’
Her face was hard, implacably hard. He had never seen it like that before. Going into the bathroom he spread the green canvas out on the floor, which was not big enough for it.
‘Well?’ he whispered.
Lucienne had taken off her coat and rolled up her sleeves.
‘What can you expect? After forty-eight hours…’
The strange power of words! Ravinel suddenly felt cold. He felt cold for Mireille. But he felt he had to see, and he glanced into the bath.
A wet skirt clinging to the legs. The arms bent, the hands pressed to the neck…
He drew back sharply uttering a cry. He had caught a glimpse of Mireille’s face, her hair, darkened by the water, plastered across her forehead and her eyes, looking like seaweed. He had seen her teeth, her gaping mouth.
‘Help me,’ said Lucienne.
He leaned over the washbasin, feeling sick.
‘Wait—a moment…’
It was ghastly. Though he had to admit that it was less so than he imagined. The bodies he had seen fished out of the water had been much worse. They must have been immersed much longer, a week perhaps.
He straightened himself, removed his overcoat, then his jacket.
‘You take the legs.’
It was Lucienne who gave the orders. It was difficult to lift, bending down over the tub. Mireille’s legs were stiff and icy cold. Water splashed down noisily as the body was dragged over the edge of the bath and lowered onto the canvas sheet. Lucienne promptly covered it, rolled it up. It was rather like doing up a parcel. Soon there was nothing visible but a cylinder of green canvas from which oozed a little water. The two ends were twisted to give them something to hold on to, and like that they carried the body down to the garage.
‘You ought to have left the car door open,’ said Lucienne.
They managed to haul the bundle in and stow it diagonally in the back of the car, from which the rear seat had been removed. For that matter it always was, to make room for all the gear he had to carry round.
‘It would have been better to have tied her up with string.’
Like a parcel!
He regretted the remark at once. The words were those of a traveling salesman, not a husband.
‘It’s all right as it is, and we haven’t any time to waste.’
Ravinel got out of the car and straightened himself. There! Another hurdle had been taken. It hadn’t used up all his nervous energy, which expended itself in tics and jerks. He rubbed his head, blew his nose, scratched himself and clenched and unclenched his fists.
‘Wait here for me. I’m going back to tidy up.’
‘Not on your life!’
Nothing would have induced him to wait all by himself in that dimly lit garage. So they went back into the house together. Lucienne cleared the dining-room table, emptied the carafe, and rinsed it thoroughly. She mopped up the water on the bathroom floor. Then she put her things on. Meanwhile he had tidied up the bed and put back the counterpane, after which, finding nothing else to do, he had brushed his jacket. At last, when all was in order, they had a final look round, Ravinel in his overcoat, hat in hand, Lucienne carrying Mireille’s bag, coat and hat. Satisfied, she turned toward him.
‘Well?… Pleased?… Give me a kiss then.’
Heavens, no! Not there! Really that was a heartless thing to suggest. There were moments like that when he couldn’t make her out at all, she seemed so utterly inhuman. He pushed her out into the hall, shut and locked the door. Then back to the garage. Before getting into the car he glanced at each of the tires. He drove out, then came back to shut the garage door. A moment’s panic seized him at the thought that any casual passer-by might look into the car.
A minute later they were driving towards the station, choosing the less well-lit streets. In the Rue du Général Buat they jolted over the cobblestones.
‘No need to drive so fast,’ commented Lucienne.
But Ravinel was in a tearing hurry to leave the town and get out into the dark countryside. Gas pumps, red, white, flashed by, workmen’s cottages, the walls of a factory. At the far end of an avenue the barriers of a grade crossing were lowered, their reflectors scintillating. It was now that fear surged up within him. He stopped behind a truck and switched off
his lights.
‘Keep your lights on, silly!’
Was she made of wood, this woman? The train passed. A freight train. Cars full of ballast, drawn by an old locomotive from whose cab a segment of light glared up into the sky. The truck moved forward. The way was clear. Ravinel would have said a prayer if he had been able to remember one.
FOUR
Ravinel was used to driving at night. He preferred it, for he liked being alone and liked it all the more when tearing through the darkness at top speed. At night there was no need to slow down even at a village. The headlights lit up the road fantastically, making it seem like a canal stirred by a slight swell. Sometimes he could almost imagine he was in a speedboat. Then suddenly it would be like shooting down the slope of a switchback: the white posts bordering the road at the turnings would sweep giddily past, their reflectors glittering like precious stones. It was as if you yourself were conjuring up with a touch of your magic wand this unearthly fairy world, round which was a dim, shadowy void with no horizon. You dream. You leave your earthly flesh behind, to become an astral body gliding through a sleeping universe. Fields, streets, churches, stations. Created on the moment out of nothing and then swept away into nothingness again. A touch of the accelerator is sufficient to destroy them. Perhaps they have never really existed. Mere figments, created by you and lasting no longer than your whim, except, now and again, for an image that stamps itself on your retina like a dead leaf caught on your radiator—yet even that is no more real than the rest.
Yes. Ravinel loved the night. They had already passed Angers, which was now no more than a cluster of lights behind them. The roads were deserted. Lucienne sat silent beside him, her hands tucked into her sleeves, her chin buried in her turned-up collar.
As a matter of fact, Ravinel had not driven particularly fast since leaving Nantes. He took the bends gently, as though taking pity on the inert body behind, which might be thrown from side to side. Indeed, he probably wasn’t averaging much more than fifty kilometers an hour. At that rate they would still reach Enghien before dawn, as arranged. That is, if all went well. The engine had stalled once as they passed through Angers. Perhaps he ought to have had the carburetor cleaned. Silly not to have thought of it. A breakdown during this drive would be no joke. About as little as an engine failure in a flight across the Atlantic! Ravinel listened to the engine. It sounded all right, but he’d better keep it under observation.
She Who Was No More Page 4