Anne didn’t cry out. She bucked one last time and fell onto him. A warm liquid trickled from her lower abdomen. For the first and last time in her life.
Sitting at Marc’s bedside, her face puffy with tears, Chloé dabbed at her nose with a tissue.
‘How did we get to this point? How could we …’
Even if his aching throat had permitted him to speak, Marc would not have known how to reply. Why was she saying ‘we’? Who was she talking about – the two of them, or the world in general? And which point had we got to? Agen? A hospital room? The beginning of another conundrum? This apparently simple question was a minefield, riddled with pitfalls from end to end, and Marc didn’t feel able to come to his wife’s aid.
He had barely recognised her when the police officer had brought her into his room. She looked terribly old. For the past twenty-four hours, the people looking after him – the police, nurses and doctors – had all been incredibly young. Chloé seemed out of place. Why had they brought her all the way here? It was cruel. She must have travelled through the night, found herself a hotel in this unfamiliar town. All alone … He had nothing to say to her. Not to her, nor to anyone.
From the moment the inspectors had pulled him, half suffocated, from beneath Anne’s body, Marc understood that any attempt at an explanation would be in vain. Besides, his crushed Adam’s apple left him barely enough space to breathe. The police officers had had a hell of a time prising Anne’s fingers from around his neck. It must be morning, everything was fuzzy, as if seen through a veil. He could make out figures, voices …
‘Jesus, that was a close call! He’s all blue. Monsieur …? Can you hear me?’
The camper van was swaying. Marc’s head was thrown about on the pillow like a jar of water sloshing from side to side.
‘According to Tito, she’s his daughter.’
‘What a family! He’s still got a hard-on, the prick. Monsieur, can you hear me?’
‘Look, here come the white coats.’
How could so many people be moving around in so little space? Between his eyelashes, he saw the soles of Anne’s feet passing under his nose, sticking out of a survival blanket along with her left hand, which was still gripping an invisible prey. He tried to sit up to get a look at her face, but they held him down and put a rubber face mask on him.
‘Don’t try to move, Monsieur. Breathe deeply … That’s it …’
Then they put him onto a stretcher. As they made their way out of the van, one of the stretcher-bearers stumbled.
‘Shit! What the hell’s this?’
Marc saw the fetish roll under the fridge. Outside, with the dark sky behind them, he had met the gazes of Tito and of Boudu, who was nestled in Tito’s arms. Both were equally stony-faced, in the way of those who have seen it all before. He smiled at them, but with the mask in the way, they probably didn’t see. The two of them were meant for each other, since they had nothing to say to one another. Then everything was white, nothing but white, as if he were drifting along on an ice float.
‘Please, Madame, it’s time to go.’
‘Yes. Yes, of course.’
Chloé’s lips felt icy against his forehead. She squeezed his hands.
‘I’m here, darling. I’m here …’
Marc made a lame attempt at a smile. He was here no longer. When the door closed behind her, he couldn’t help breathing a sigh of relief. The nurse leaned in:
‘They mean well, but they don’t understand.’
She had a very pretty smile, fresh and full of white teeth lined up like chinaware in a shop window.
‘Right, then. Could you say something, just one word, without forcing your voice.’
A word? Marc tried to find one in the shiny expanse of the ceiling. Then, having found none, he looked down and his gaze fell on the badge pinned to the nurse’s chest.
‘Anne.’
C’est la Vie
Pascal Garnier
Translated by Jane Aitken
‘A jeu d’esprit of hard-boiled symbolism, with echoes of Raymond Chandler, T. S. Eliot and the Marx Brothers’
Wall Street Journal
Writer Jeff Colombier is not accustomed to success. Twice divorced with a grown-up son he barely sees, he drinks too much and his books don’t sell.
Then he wins a big literary prize and his life changes for ever. Overwhelmed by his newfound wealth and happiness, he feels the need to escape and recapture his lost youth, taking his son, Damien, with him. And if strange encounters lead them down dangerous paths … well, c’est la vie.
ISBN 9781910477762
How’s the Pain?
Pascal Garnier
Translated by Emily Boyce
Death is Simon’s business. And now the ageing vermin exterminator is preparing to die. But he still has one last job down on the coast, and he needs a driver.
Bernard is twenty-one. He can drive and he’s never seen the sea. He can’t pass up the chance to chauffeur for Simon, whatever his mother may say.
As the unlikely pair set off on their journey, Bernard soon finds that Simon’s definition of vermin is broader than he’d expected …
New edition with an introduction by John Banville
Published July 2020
ISBN 9781910477922
A Long Way Off Page 8