by Marcel Ayme
He cried a good deal that day and also on those that followed, and lost both sleep and appetite to such a degree that he began to waste away and a great tiredness overtook him, as well as an assortment of strange ideas. He believed that his wife had been taken by the tax office and he accused it of having effected a seizure of his spouse without due notice. On several occasions he directed formal complaints about this to himself, as representative of the tax office, complaints to which he received replies, from his own pen, that the business would be looked into by the proper authorities. Dissatisfied with these replies, which struck him as evasive, he decided to pay the tax office a visit. So, one morning, he came to the office a little before nine o’clock and went straight to the small room where he usually received taxpayers asking for some kind of reprieve. With his hat in his hand, he sat down on the chair reserved for visitors, facing the polished oak armchair and the table in front of it, and said the following:
“Monsieur Tax Collector, I have addressed three complaints to you on the subject of the seizure of which my wife was the subject, last October. Having studied your replies, I thought that a meeting with you would be required to shed some light on my case. Please note that, fundamentally, I am not disputing anything. I do not seek to question the fact that the tax office is within its rights in seizing my wife. On this point I insist, Monsieur. I should not like to be suspected of setting myself up as either judge or critic. Of course, I loved, I still passionately love my wife, but I could never entertain the merest thought of defying this new requirement of the tax office. It is sufficient that this has been formally decided. I’ve no need to go into the reasons. If taxpayers started to challenge the seizure of their spouses, they could quite well refuse to pay in money, and then where would we be? No, what upsets me in this business, I repeat, is not the rather exceptional nature of the payment, but that the legal forms have not been respected. Indeed, Monsieur Tax Collector—and this would appear to fall within your remit—I received no warning, either with or without costs being included that I should have to pay my wife in at the tax-collection counter, and no court order arrived before her seizure. Grave injury has thus been done to my feelings, not to speak of the imputation thereby made to my honour as a taxpayer. I could have had the pleasure of my wife’s company for several more weeks had the usual period allowed by warnings been deployed as it ought. But, I say once more, there was no sign of any warning. This is a flagrant irregularity. As a consequence, Monsieur, I dare to expect that you will not look askance on my requiring compensation from the authorities in charge.”
At this, Gauthier-Lenoir stood up, laid his hat on his chair and, going round to the other side of the table, took his place in the official’s armchair. After a moment’s thought, he replied in emollient tones:
“My dear Monsieur Gauthier-Lenoir, I will not deny that there have been irregularities in this matter. Is it a question of an oversight, or of some deliberate wrong-doing? Only a formal inquiry will be able to establish this. But, I must ask you here and now not to demand this inquiry, although it is quite within your rights. The trouble that would result for our administration would be of such infinite complexity that they could compromise the authority of the inquiry. Always poised to cry scandal, the opposition newspapers would not miss their opportunity to pick up the story and that, Monsieur Gauthier-Lenoir, you would not wish for; you would not reconcile your loyalty to the tax office with that. And, besides, what advantage would it bring to you? I know, you are within your rights to expect that your wife be returned to you for a further five or six weeks. But you know the time these things can take. Years, decades might pass before this inquiry were to reach a conclusion. When this wife is returned to you—for only a few weeks, remember—she will be wrinkled, quite old, losing her teeth, with sagging skin and thinning hair. Would it not be better to cherish your memory of your wife as she was when young and pretty? Well, you see my point. And besides, you’re a civil servant yourself, dash it, you ought to be setting an example of fiscal solidarity. And while I think of it, I must say that the observations in your last letter, on the subject of the unfair treatment of Monsieur Rebuffaud and yourself, and tolerated by the tax office, struck me as entirely reasonable. It is quite true that this Monsieur Rebuffaud fulfils his taxpayer’s obligations very poorly and I am glad you have brought him to my attention; I intend to set this issue in good order.”
Leaving his armchair, the tax collector picked up his hat from the chair where he had put it and went to hang it on the hat-stand. The audience was over.
The following morning, Monsieur Rebuffaud presented himself at the tax office. He had a document in his hand and appeared rather agitated. The tax collector received him more courteously than usual and asked him, kindly, what he had come about.
“It’s unbelievable,” replied the visitor, holding out his paper. “I’ve received a warning that I must pay my wife in at your office before the 15th of November of this year 1938. This can only be a mistake.”
“Let’s see. This first warning, did it include costs?”
“No, costs weren’t included.”
“In that case, everything is quite in order,” said the tax collector, with a calm smile.
Monsieur Rebuffaud was at first lost for words and simply stared back. Finally, he managed to stammer:
“This is unheard of! Take my wife! It’s against the law.”
“What can one do? It’s the new fiscal regime. Oh, I know! It’s hard, very hard.”
“I don’t believe it,” said Monsieur Rebuffaud. “To take my wife! And why me?”
“Alas, you are not the only one of whom such a sacrifice has been required! Others beside yourself received their warning this morning. I have, myself, already deposited my own wife. It’s extremely painful. But still, one must be resigned to it. We live in cruel times.”
“Nevertheless,” exclaimed Monsieur Rebuffaud. “Yes, nevertheless! I who have always been so careful in paying my taxes … ”
“Exactly, Monsieur Rebuffaud! Knowing your assiduity, the tax man has not hesitated to include you in the first round. But this time, if I may give you a piece of advice, don’t be in too much of a hurry to pay. Make the most of the time you have been granted.”
Monsieur Rebuffaud shook his head and stood there, reflecting. Already the business seemed less outrageous to him. The tax collector’s own example, the assurance that other taxpayers too would undergo the same ordeal, made the idea of abandoning his wife to the tax office almost acceptable. He began to feel sorry for himself, thinking of the magnitude of his sacrifice, even to admire himself, and the glow of heroism rose to his cheeks. When all was said and done, in truth, his wife had a rather gloomy disposition and had never been pretty. Deep down and without admitting it to himself, Rebuffaud was accepting her loss rather easily. Shaking the tax collector’s hand, he sighed, a touch too deeply.
“You must be brave,” said the tax collector.
“I shall do my best,” replied Monsieur Rebuffaud as he turned to leave.
While walking down the Rue Lefinat (Hubert Lefinat, born in Nangicourt in 1860. A patron of the town. Provided the hospital with three new beds and bequeathed to the town a part of his property which has become today’s Seaside Promenade, and where a bronze statue has been erected in his memory. He died in Nangicourt in 1923), Monsieur Rebuffaud was wondering, curiously, how other taxpayers affected by this new measure would be reacting. He walked across the town without observing anything unusual. That evening, among the drinkers at the Café du Centre there were half a dozen men who had received a warning and, indeed, despite making bitter complaints against the severity of the tax office, yet the tone of their condemnation remained subdued. The mood was more for lamentation than revolt. The men were drinking more than usual and by dinner several were drunk. Planchon, the pâtissier, a widower since the year before, was trying to rouse the taxpayers to rebellion—without success. “You aren’t really going to pay in your wife?” he asked of
the ironmonger Petit. “But I must,” replied Petit, and others echoed his words: “But we must.”
On the morning of the 15th of November, about thirty couples formed a queue to the door of the tax office, each taxpayer giving his arm to the wife he was about to pay in at the counter. Their faces were etched with painful resignation. Few spoke and then only in low voices, to exchange their last promises. Inside, the tax collector and his assistant clerk were proceeding with the wives’ collection. The room was divided in two by a low partition. Bent over a large book, the clerk was filling in useful information about the couple standing at the counter and preparing their receipt. The tax collector then asked the wife to come through to the other side of the partition, issued the husband with his receipt and dismissed him with a sympathetic word or two. Now property of the tax office, the women in the section that was closed to the public formed a silent group, watching as taxpayer after taxpayer came in bringing yet more wives to join their sorry troupe.
At around eleven, a motor car was held up by a gathering in front of the tax office. As luck would have it, that day the Minister of Taxation, accompanied by his private secretary, was passing through Nangicourt on the way to his constituency. Peering out of his car, he was surprised to see such a crowd at the door to a tax office and was curious enough to go and investigate.
The tax collector welcomed the minister and his private secretary calmly. He apologised for receiving them in the midst of such a great crowd of taxpayers and added, smiling:
“But I don’t dare be sorry. It shows that the taxes are coming in nicely. See here, Minister, I have already registered receipt of twenty-five wives.”
The Minister and private secretary looked at each other in astonishment. On questioning, the tax collector provided all the necessary explanations. When he had finished, the private secretary leant over to the Minister and whispered: “He is completely mad!”
“Hehe!” giggled the Minister for Taxation. “Hehehe!”
Apparently keenly interested, he was examining the troupe of wives who had been collected and, dwelling on the prettiest, wondering if they might not represent a significant new source of revenue for the State. Nor did it escape him that many of the women, due to a very feminine lack of logic, had answered the tax collector’s summons dressed in their prettiest jewellery. He remained deep in thought for a long moment. Respectful of his superior’s cogitations and having already a fair idea of the thoughts detaining him, the private secretary was watching the couples still patiently waiting for the ministerial diversion to conclude in order to have their turn at the counter.
“What impressive discipline all these good people show,” he observed.
“Indeed,” murmured the Minister. “It is quite remarkable.”
The two men exchanged a look laden with significance. Following which, the Minister shook the tax collector’s hand warmly and, with a last glance at all the tax office’s wives, stepped back into his motor car.
Two days after this memorable occasion, it was made public that Gauthier-Lenoir had received a promotion and was now a First Class Tax Collector. The Minister of Taxation was talking, albeit in veiled terms, of a vast project which would amount to a complete overhaul of the taxation system. But war broke out.
THE SEVEN-LEAGUE BOOTS
GERMAINE BUGE left Mademoiselle Larrisson’s apartment, where she had just finished two hours of housework, making the place ‘spick and span’ under the old spinster’s critical eye. It was four o’clock on a December afternoon and, for the last two days, the ground had frozen hard. Her coat offered poor protection against the cold. The cloth was thin, of wool and cotton, but use had reduced it to hardly more than the impression of a covering. Winter’s north wind drove through it as if through a wire grille. Perhaps it even blew through Germaine who appeared to have little more substance or reality than her coat. She was a frail shadow, her narrow little face drawn tight with worry; one of those creatures for whom poverty and humility seem like Destiny’s charity handout, as if they survive only due to the tenuousness of the hold life has on them. Men never saw her in the street and women only rarely. Shopkeepers did not remember her name and the people who employed her were almost alone in knowing who she was.
Germaine hurried along up Rue Lamarck. Reaching the corner of the Rue du Mont-Cenis, she found herself among some schoolchildren racing back down the street’s steep slope. But the children had only just begun to emerge. In front of the school, at the foot of the great stone stairway that winds up the hill of Montmartre, the liberated children formed a noisy and still tightly packed flock. Germaine positioned herself on the corner of Rue Paul-Féval and began looking out for Antoine. In a few minutes, the children had dispersed, scattering away down the local streets, and she was troubled not to see her son. Soon, only a group of half a dozen children was left in front of the school, talking about sports. Since they had to go in different directions, they were putting off the moment of separation. Germaine went up to them and asked if they knew Antoine Buge and whether they had seen him. The smallest child, who had to be about Antoine’s age, lifted his cap and said:
“Buge? Yes I know him. I saw him leave, but he was among the first out, with Frioulat.”
Germaine stood there for a minute longer, then turned back, disappointed.
However, from the other end of Rue Paul-Féval, Antoine had seen his mother waiting. He felt a pang of guilt. Worse, from the midst of the group that was hiding him, he wondered aloud if he oughtn’t to go back to her.
“Do as you like,” Frioulat had replied drily. “You’re always free to chicken out. You shan’t be part of the gang any longer, that’s all.”
Defeated, Antoine had stayed. He didn’t want to be taken for a mummy’s boy. Moreover, he did very much want to be part of the gang, even though its leader was rather prone to throwing his weight about. Frioulat was a super chap. No taller than Antoine, but stocky, sharp and afraid of nothing. Once, he had picked a row with a man. Naudin and Rogier had seen him, it was no fib.
The gang, which for now numbered five boys, was waiting for a sixth conspirator, Huchemin, who lived on this street and had gone to drop off his satchel and those of his comrades.
Huchemin rejoined the gang, now at full complement. Still regretful, Antoine lagged behind, looking back at the school and thinking of his mother going back to their lodging in the Rue Bachelet.
Guessing his thoughts, Frioulat cannily put Antoine in charge of a delicate mission.
“You’ll do the reconnaissance. We’ll see what you’re capable of. But watch out, it’s dangerous.”
Flushed with pride, Antoine galloped up the Rue des Saules and halted at the first junction. The daylight was fading, passers-by were few—all in all totalling two old ladies and one vagrant dog. On his return, Antoine reported on his mission, his voice grave.
“I was not attacked, but there are suspicious persons loitering on Rue Saint-Vincent.”
“I see how it is,” said Frioulat, “but I’ve taken precautions. And now, let’s go. Everyone in single file behind me; stay close to the walls. And no one is to break out of line unless I command it, even if I’m attacked.”
Baranquin, a short, blond and very young boy who was on his first expedition, appeared rather anxious and tried to enquire of Antoine as to the nature of the peril to which they would be exposed. He was sharply recalled to order by Frioulat and took his place in the line without another word. The scaling of the Rue des Saules was achieved without incident. Several times, Frioulat gave the order for his men to fall to the ground and lie flat, chest down on the icy pavement, without elaborating on the nature of the peril threatening them. He himself remained impassive, like an intrepid captain of old, standing and surveying their surroundings, hands held up to his eyes as binoculars. No one dared to say anything, but it was felt that he was rather pushing the limits of credibility. As they moved on, he twice let fly with his catapult down Rue Cortot, but he did not judge it worthwhile to expla
in himself to his companions. The gang made a halt at the junction with Rue Norvins and Antoine thought he might take advantage of the pause to ask what had happened on Rue Cortot.
“I’ve better things to do than engage in chit-chat,” replied Frioulat drily. “I’m the one in charge of this expedition.” And he added: “Baranquin, fix up a reconnaissance for me as far as Rue Gabrielle. And hop to it.”
Night had almost fallen. Hardly reassured, little Baranquin ran off. While waiting for him, their leader took a piece of paper from his pocket and examined it with knitted brow.
“Heavens, can’t you shut it,” he exclaimed to Huchemin and Rogier who were conferring loudly. “Can’t you see I’m thinking?”
Soon enough, the clattering of clogs was heard as Baranquin came trotting back. In the course of his reconnaissance he had seen nothing suspicious and, innocently, said so. Shocked at this dereliction of the rules, which in turn revealed a serious lack of dramatic sensibility, Frioulat called his companions to witness.
“Experienced at leading as I am,” he said, “I’ve never come across such a chump as this before.”
The friends understood this criticism perfectly well and thought it justified but, each having their own reasons for resenting Frioulat’s leadership, they did not make the appropriate response. After a silence, Antoine observed: