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Authors: Georges Simenon

A Man's Head (19 page)

BOOK: A Man's Head
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Then angrily:

‘I'm thirsty!'

Now they're on Rue du Pont-d'Avroy. All the cafés are shut. The only place open is a frying shop selling beer, mussels, pickled herring and chips.

‘Shall we go there?'

The cook, in white overalls, is seeing to his burners. A woman eating in the corner gives the two friends an alluring smile.

‘Two beers! And some chips! And some mussels!'

And after their first helping, they order some more. They're hungry. Terribly hungry. And they're already on their fourth beer!

They still can't look one another in the eye. They eat voraciously. Outside it's dark, and the few passers-by are walking quickly.

‘How much?'

Fresh panic. Will they even have enough between them to pay for their supper? Seven plus two fifty, and three and sixty cents and … Eighteen francs seventy-five.

Just one franc left for a tip!

Into the streets. Iron shutters drawn down on the shop-fronts. Gas lamps, and in the distance the footsteps of policemen on the beat. The two young men cross over the Meuse. Delfosse doesn't open his mouth, looks straight ahead of him, his mind so far removed from present reality that he doesn't notice when his friend speaks to him.

And Chabot, to avoid being left alone, to prolong their reassuring companionship, stops as they reach the door of a prosperous-looking house, in the best street of the district.

‘Come back a little way with me,' he implores.

‘No. I'm feeling ill.'

That's true. They both feel unwell. Chabot has only glimpsed the corpse for an instant, but his imagination has done the rest.

‘Do you think it really was the Turk?'

They are calling him ‘the Turk' for want of any other name. Delfosse does not reply. He has quietly put his key into the lock. Through the gloom they can see a wide corridor and a brass umbrella stand.

‘See you tomorrow, then?'

‘The Pélican?'

But the door is already closing. Suddenly a wave of giddiness. Oh, to be back home, and in bed! Then this will all be over, surely?

And now Chabot is alone in the deserted streets, walking quickly, breaking into a run, hesitating at street corners, then dashing off like a madman. In the main square, Place du Congrès, he keeps away from the trees. He slows down when he glimpses a passer-by in the distance. But the unknown figure turns off in another direction.

Rue de la Loi. Two-storey houses. A doorway.

Jean Chabot feels for his keys, puts one in the lock, switches on the light and goes towards the kitchen with its glass-panelled door, where there are still some embers glowing in the range.

He has to turn back, because he forgot to shut the front door. It's warm inside. There's a piece of paper on the white oilcloth covering the kitchen table, with a few words scribbled in pencil:

You'll find a mutton chop in the sideboard and a slice of

tart in the larder. Goodnight. Father.

Jean stares at it dazedly, opens the sideboard, sees the chop, and the sight of it makes him feel sick. On top of the sideboard is a pot holding a plant with blue flowers, forget-me-nots perhaps.

That must mean Aunt Maria called round. She always brings some kind of house plant. Her home on Quai Saint-Léonard is full of them. And she always gives you detailed instructions about how to care for them.

Jean switches off the light, and tiptoes upstairs in his stockinged feet. He goes past the lodgers' bedrooms on the first floor landing.

Another flight up, and he's at attic level. Cool air comes in from the roof. As he reaches the landing, a mattress creaks. Someone is awake, his father or his mother. He opens his bedroom door.

A muffled voice:

‘Is that you, Jean?'

Right, he'd better go and say goodnight to his parents. He goes into their room. The air is warm and stuffy. They must have been in bed for hours.

‘Late, isn't it?'

‘Oh not very …'

‘You really ought …'

But no, his father doesn't have the courage to scold him. Or guesses that it would be no use.

‘Goodnight, son.'

Jean bends down and kisses a damp forehead.

‘You're freezing cold. You—'

‘Yes, it's cold outside.'

‘Did you find the chop? Your Aunt Maria brought the tart.'

‘I'd already eaten with my friends.'

His mother turns over in her sleep and her chignon uncoils on to the pillow.

‘Goodnight.'

He can't stand any more of this. In his own room, he doesn't even put the light on. He throws down his jacket and lies on the bed, pressing his face into the pillow. He isn't crying. He can't. But he tries to catch his breath. His limbs are trembling, his whole body is shivering in spasms, as if he were seriously ill.

He just doesn't want to make the bedsprings creak. He wants to stifle the sob he can feel in his throat, because he guesses that his father, who hardly ever sleeps, will be lying awake next door, listening.

An image grows inside his head, a word echoes, swells, becomes monstrously loud as if it is about to destroy everything: the Turk!

And he is tormented, oppressed, stifled, as if in the grasp of something terrible – until suddenly the sun is streaming through the skylight, and his father is standing at the foot of the bed, muttering weakly, as if afraid of being too stern:

‘Look, you really shouldn't, Jean … You were drinking again, weren't you? You didn't even get undressed!'

From downstairs comes the smell of coffee, eggs and bacon. Trucks are passing in the streets. Doors slam. A cock crows.

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BOOK: A Man's Head
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