When his friends asked him why he’d tempted the Devil by throwing his cap so far, he told them the Devil could never contend with God. He explained that “He who reigns both on Earth and on Heaven” told him to toss the cap far enough to give the guard time to think. And that He took care of the rest. Another miracle on His side, if we’re to believe Caraco. Those few spoonfuls of cold soup, whose contents should not be speculated on, may have saved his sick friend. Like my father and Caraco, he survived – broken, of course – and saw his native Normandy again.
SIXTEEN
“Are you ready, Dominique? Time to go to Nova Era!”
“Just five more minutes, Nela.”
They’re always tasty, those bifanas! We return home, loaded with a pound of dough (for the oreillettes that Nela will make based on Aunt Henriette’s recipe) and a variety of breads: ultra-light caraças, pão saloio, heavy and compact, and pão de milho, even more compact – an acquired taste, made from maize). And a small cake, a toucinho do céu (sugar, eggs, butter, and crushed almonds – impossible not to love).
Back home and not even four o’clock. Two hours to relax: Nela at her piano; me in my office. Where, once again immersed in memories of childhood, with the scent of pistou wafting through the house, I return to my daydreaming, travelling back through the years.
Tonight, like yesterday and the day before, we speak few words. We have gathered around the kitchen table, under the lamplight, on the edge of darkness. My mother is mending a few things, bent over her work. Sewing a button back on Gérard’s grey shirt, she pulls the needle and cuts the thread with her teeth.
Not a word is spoken.
Gérard draws another mountain. Never has his eraser worked so hard, yet he should be able to draw the shape of the mountain with his eyes closed by now.
“You aren’t drawing the star?”
“No.”
“Why?”
No answer.
I go back to Big Bill. Big Bill, le casseur: the bee’s knees! It came by bus yesterday and I’ve been re-reading it ever since. Aunt Henriette discovered this new comic book when she went to buy her paper. Big Bill is a lawyer in a small town in the Far West – a lawyer for the downtrodden who never makes his clients pay. And he can afford the generosity, being the owner of a huge ranch with plenty of horses, thousands of head of cattle and a few dozen cowboys at his service. Big Bill is a real giant: his biceps are at least twice as big as Uncle Roger’s. And the size of him! Bill’s shirt would billow around Uncle Roger like a flag. But Bill wouldn’t hurt a fly. Except when he puts on his red shirt, his black mask, and picks up his whip to punish the bad guys. When that happens, Evil-Doers beware! And nobody recognizes him except his horse Silver and me. Gérard doesn’t like Big Bill; he says he’s “full of hot air” and calls him Big Butt and “butter-dish breaker.” But he only says that to annoy me, because he reads every new issue down to the last page.
Pretty soon I’ll have at least thirty issues: once a month adds up fast. All of them lost, by now, gone up in smoke in Roger’s garage, in Aubagne, at the end of the forties: he used to use them to start his gasifier! I’d gone to live with my father in Marseille to go to high school, and Uncle must have thought I had better things to read than some kiddie magazine that probably didn’t interest me anymore. The truth is that I mourned them for a long time and looked for them in every bookstore in Marseille until I started university. I would have gladly traded Camus’ The Stranger or Sartre’s The Words for them. At least those books would have been easier to find again.
That Roger! He was the cause of our silence in the summer of 1945. We had no news of him for a long time – forty-seven days, to be precise.
Finally, doe gratis! In mid-September, Uncle Roger returned from the war, overflowing with compliments and a flower in his gun. The fight was hard, we heard. But he didn’t like speaking about it in front of us, the children.
The horizon brightened. Once again we could be filled with wonder at the blue waves of the mountains. We celebrated his triumphant return. On the terrace table, homemade jam, apple pie, cool, silky water (brought by Gérard from the nearby spring) and “national coffee” – an infusion of acorns sweetened with saccharine. Our faces began to glow again.
“What do you say we play a little belated, all four of us, Roger?”
“The kids know how to play?”
“Of course, Uncle.”
“And you, Dominique?”
“Yes, but not with four people.”
“It isn’t hard, you’ll see.”
Indeed, not hard at all. After a few practice rounds, I was playing as well as the others, according to Uncle, who was satisfied with his new partner. I played my hand with more and more confidence, and my voice dared participate in the conversation particular to card players: “Trump, I cut it: eight of clubs! I’ll raise it: ten! Discard: jack of hearts!” From time to time, I needed a little encouragement: “All right, it’s your turn, Nicou!” Gérard, carefully watched, had to swallow his light-hearted jibes.
“Belated, rebooted, last card!”
My mother concluded the round with panache, then counted their total. “Don’t forget the belote, Auntie.” Gérard, from the older boys’ division, added up the points on a small piece of paper, counting them on the fly. “We won, Auntie: 1060 to 780!”
The let-down of defeat. But there was no time to be sad, as Uncle announced excitedly, “Now that I’ve taken my old rifle from its case, we’ll go hunting, kids! We’ll be eating meat soon enough.”
For four long years, Roger had hidden his rifle from the authorities. He hadn’t waited for the Vichy regime to fall to start setting traps and snares and giving us the chance to taste, whenever he could, a few thrushes or hares. But now, as he said with great conviction, “Fan de chichourle, let the bullets fly!”
In the département of the Basses-Alpes, hunting season officially opened on the first Sunday of October 1944.
SEVENTEEN
“The moon is wearing a halo, so tomorrow will be a beautiful day. We’d better go to sleep if we want to be up by dawn.” Gérard is first in bed, no complaints. The prospect of tomorrow’s hunt completely pacified him. On the surface, at least; I’m certain that under his calm exterior, he’s as agitated as a bag of cut snakes. Truthfully, between him and Roger, I don’t know who’s the most impatient. Uncle probably, since he’s been waiting for this day to come for a long time. Finally, hunting season has opened.
I was about to turn eight, of age to participate in the hunt, too. The week before, Malou had cut my hair and given me the same look as Gérard. But nothing was certain yet: my mother still had to be convinced. Uncle Roger managed to be persuasive enough – perhaps not that hard a task considering that my mother never refused him anything.
“Don’t you think he’s still a little young to go hunting?”
“Of course not! He’s tireless, always running everywhere!”
“Exactly. He could do something stupid, get lost or fall into a gully…”
“He’s a good kid, he never disobeys. Isn’t it true, Nico, you won’t stray far from me?”
“No, Uncle, promise!”
“And if you come upon a German, hiding in the bush?”
“Bah! They’re all gone, the Germans.”
I answered as quick as a torpedo, as much to reassure myself as my mother.
“If we do see a German, he’ll get it for sure! Uncle’ll have his twelve-gauge with him!” Gérard added.
“But I think we’d have trouble fitting him into the game pouch.”
Uncle chose laughter to sweep away my mother’s fears. And it worked.
Gérard was asleep in a second. I barely had time to put my pajamas on. Curled in a ball, nose in his pillow, he was already snoring away.
Roger had just put on his coat and was getting ready to return to his house. But as often happens, he decided the time was ripe for a good prank. This time, Gérard would be his victim. My mother seemed a little worried.<
br />
“Nico, put a sweater over your pajamas and put your hat on.”
“Why?”
“Shush, you’ll see.”
Hat on, he motioned me to follow him into our room where Gérard, on his stomach, was snoring loud enough to deafen us, sounding like a motor with a broken piston.
“Get-up, kiddo,” Roger told him. “We’ll be late because of you.”
“Huh, what? I’m coming!”
Putting his money where his mouth was, Gérard sat up for a moment on the edge of his bed, rubbed his eyes, then, bang! completely exhausted, he solemnly turned his back on us and buried his face in his pillow.
When the alarm rang at five in the morning, he came to wake me up. My mother, still a little upset, decided she would stay in bed and not get involved in our preparations.
At exactly quarter past five, Roger knocked at our door, dressed for the occasion, neatly resembling Nimrod, minus the moustache. Since my mother really didn’t get up, it was up to Uncle to make breakfast, a rather frugal one at that: a slice of greyish bread with a thin spread of ersatz margarine, dipped in a bowl of ersatz coffee sweetened with saccharine, lightened with a drop of milk that at least came from a real goat. Then he made lunch: the same bread, sliced thicker though, and a large piece of ham and rind, looking so tasty Gérard and I started salivating. Uncle had a way of finding things. The meat came from Hamel the butcher, whose son Jules was a childhood friend.
“Gérard, you’ll carry the game bag. It’s light, there’s only the canteen in there. But when we return, daïse! It’ll be much heavier, I guarantee that!”
“But when we return, Uncle, we’ll have drunk all the water.”
“You, Nico, you’ll be responsible for the biasse with our lunch and the three apples. It isn’t heavy.”
He meant the blue haversack that was used to carry food back from the market. We had two like it, but one was enough for today’s hunt.
“Yes, Uncle, I’ll take care of the casse-graine. You can even put a bottle of wine in it.”
“That’s a great idea!”
“There’s a half-bottle in the cupboard. It’s the one you brought over last week.”
“Hmm, let’s see. That should be enough. I’ll fill this smaller bottle with it.”
“But for the three of us, one canteen won’t be enough!”
“Hey, smarty-pants, there’ll surely be some springs along the way… I bet Uncle knows where they are.”
“You’re right, Gérard. There are at least four on our hunting grounds.”
My imagination soared at the sound of those words. Our own hunting grounds! Uncle sure was swell.
Finally, we were ready! The preparations were done and we were eager to get going. “On the road, hop-toad!”
We headed off in single file – Gérard first, Uncle closing the march, and me sandwiched in between. That way, my mother, who was spying on us from the window, thinking we hadn’t seen her, would be reassured and go back to bed.
We quickly climbed the slope in front of the house, and soon we were treading the Riou road. We walked past Cousin Marcel’s garden and then passed through the village’s old fortified gate. “An arch mounted with a fifteenth-century dripstone,” the very voluble Roger explained to us, virtually quivering with enthusiasm and sputtering with impatience. We reached the Riou waterfalls with its giant swimming holes that we loved to dive into, sometimes sensing a trout brushing against our feet… The falls fell away behind us. We barely noticed the swimming hole today.
In the sky, the slow circling of cawing crows.
“You don’t hunt those birds, Uncle?”
“No, Nicou, not crows. The meat is tasteless and tough. They aren’t worth the price of the lead.”
“Hey, bumble-head, don’t you remember anything?”
“You, Gérard, don’t you start.”
Of course I remembered. On a cold day last winter, when we were particularly hungry, Uncle resigned himself to hunting crows, bare-handed. He had come this way, where they were forever circling over the rocks, and had brought back one that barely weighed half a pound. He had caught it in its nest after climbing a steep cliff and killed it by choking it with its own wing. “Just one. But it wasn’t easy to go get them so high up,” he apologized, laying his haul on the kitchen table. Maman plucked it and thrust the poor thing into a court-bouillon. Gérard was the first to offer his opinion: “Ick!”
“I told you, Mireille,” Roger said, “it’s tough meat, and it doesn’t have much taste.” Mother agreed, decreeing that such a mere pittance wasn’t worth the danger involved in fetching it. We ate with little enthusiasm. But Gérard refused the dish, declaring, “Yuck, it’s worse than rutabagas!” In those times of permanent privation, when my mother would perform daily miracles to provide us the strict minimum for survival, my cousin, the son of a dyed-in-the-wool gourmet, often elegantly turned up his nose on our feast.
A few more steps and we reached the side of the mountain, in the midst of thick, acrobatic olive trees, twisted around the rocks. Higher still than the church steeple. Down below, Moustiers was making the most of its last hours of sleep. A milky sky above us. To the east, the sun was clumsily beginning to add some colour: its streaky red lines bled over the silhouette of the distant hills. The moon, translucent like a jellyfish, had not yet left the frame.
We had been climbing the steep slope for a while now. Uncle Roger was in the lead, his gun on the inside of his elbow. “Stay behind me!”
A little later: “Kids, look at the hawk!” Up in the expanse of the sky, gliding majestically, perfectly horizontal, almost stationary, as if the bird of prey were hanging by a wire.
“Are you going to shoot it?”
“No, it’s too high. But if it’s staying around here, it means there’ll be better things waiting for us.”
Indeed. A furtive rustling in a neighbouring thicket and – just like that! – a golden pheasant practically flew between our legs and lifted noisily into the air. Two loud shots. Stopped in mid-flight, the heavy bird fell earthward, twenty metres away, like a shining meteor. A few steps and Gérard was on it, brandishing the trophy over his head. A good way to start!
Annoyed, the hawk glided farther away. Suddenly, the wire broke and the black shape dove straight into the valley.
During our two-hour walk, we made our way through olive trees and terraced vines, broom beds, rosemary tufts, small forests of green oaks, two or three pinewood stands – my first botany lesson, all of it well described by Uncle and echoed by Gérard, who showed an unusual degree of patience towards me. We also came across a pheasant (in Gérard’s game pouch), a hare (still running), two rabbits (the second, of the beautiful pre-myxomatosis variety, a good four pounds of lean meat, keeping company with the pheasant), and two flights of young partridges – my first zoology lesson. Uncle waited a bit too long before shooting, and the entire squadron flew off right under our noses.
Two good catches in two hours: our hunt seemed to be going well. And it would get better. By the end of the day, we added a woodcock, a blackbird, and a dozen sanguins, those mushrooms you find at the foot of pine trees and that secrete brick-red sap when you break them open. “Well, a rather nice opening day, no?” Uncle Roger declared. “Though I would have liked to bring back a partridge!”
But the most salient memory of that wonderful day is neither the abundant harvest of new words and new things, nor the well-stocked game-sack, nor the odour of gunpowder that I can still smell today, nor even the deafening din of gunshots and the subsequent buzzing in my ear, it was – marked forever by the seal of infamy – our spoiled picnic that was all my fault.
Around seven-thirty, thirst forced us to take a short break. In less than a minute, we drank down the entire contents of the canteen. “There’s a spring about five hundred metres away. We’ll stop there, have a bite to eat and fill the canteen.”
We started walking again. We had almost reached the top of the slope, and the walk was easier. Up ahe
ad was a small stand of pine that sent its perfume wafting towards us. Uncle, hand shading his eyes, got his bearings. “This way, we’re almost there.”
He was right. Soon we found ourselves in front of a tiny stream, sparkling between two rocks like a viper; we could have walked right by and missed it completely. “Daïse, Daïse, pitchounets! Not so fast!” With a stick, Uncle beat the grass around the stream. “Asps love the freshness. Okay, now you can go.” We made for the stream, lapping up the cool, clear water.
Even in Moustiers, I had never tasted water so delicious. Water for happy days – even better than the kind Uncle slipped me from time to time, with a few drops of pastis in it, when my mother wasn’t looking.
“And now, let’s have a bite!”
I opened our precious biasse that I had guarded and protected all the while. How dreadful! It was full of dirty clothes!
“And what are we going to eat now, idiot?” Gérard said to me in a rage.
This time, I had no answer.
“You see, his mother was right. We should have left the little snot at home!”
I swallowed my tears and tried to hide my shame.
“How did this happen, moun bèu?”
“I don’t know, Uncle...”
“Where did you take this biasse from?”
“From the hook, near the chimney.”
“That’s not a hook, idiot! That’s a peg for clothes!”
Gérard wasn’t done with me yet.
A Pinch of Time Page 8