Desert (33 page)

Outside in the main avenues, there’s a great deal of light because it’s being carried in on the wind. It’s leaping about, sparkling on the hulls of the automobiles, on the windows of the houses. It gets inside of Lalla’s head too; it vibrates on her skin, makes her hair sparkle. Today, for the first time in ages, she can see the eternal whiteness of stone and sand all around her, shards as sharp as flint, the stars. Far out ahead of her, at the end of the large avenue, in the haze of light, mirages appear, domes, towers, minarets, and caravans mingling with the swarm of people and automobiles.

It’s the wind of light, coming from the west, and blowing in the same direction as the shadows. Lalla can hear, just as she used to, the sound of the light sizzling on the asphalt, the long sound of it reflecting off the windows, all of the crackling sounds of the embers. Where is she? There’s so much light it’s as if she were alone in the midst of a network of needles. Maybe she’s walking over the immense expanse of stones and sand right now, in the place where the Hartani is waiting for her, in the middle of the desert? Maybe she’s dreaming as she walks along, because of the light and the wind, and the big city will soon dissolve, evaporate in the heat of the rising sun after the horrid night?

At the corner of one street, near the flight of stairs leading up to the train station, Radicz the beggar is standing in front of her. His face is tired and anxious, and Lalla has a hard time recognizing him because the boy now looks like a man. He’s wearing clothing Lalla isn’t familiar with, a brown suit that sags around his bony body and big, black leather shoes that must certainly be wounding his bare feet.

Lalla would like to talk to him, tell him that Mr. Ceresola is dead, and that she’s never going to go back to work at the Hotel Sainte-Blanche, or in any of those rooms where death can strike at any minute and turn you into a wax mask; but there’s too much wind and too much noise to talk, so she shows Radicz the wad of rumpled banknotes in her hand.

“Look!”

Radicz opens his eyes wide, but he doesn’t ask any questions. Maybe he thinks Lalla stole the money, or worse yet.

Lalla puts the bills back into her coat pocket. That’s all that is left of the days she spent in the darkness of the hotel, scrubbing the linoleum with the couch-grass brush, sweeping the gray rooms that smell of sweat and tobacco. When she told the owner of the hotel she was leaving, he didn’t say anything either. He got out of his old bed, which was never made, and walked over to the safe at the back of his room. He took out the money, counted it, added a week’s advance, and gave it all to Lalla; then he went and lay back down again without saying anything else. He did all of that in a very leisurely fashion, in his pajamas, with his un­shaven cheeks, and his dirty hair; then he went back to reading his newspaper again, as if nothing else were of any importance.

So now Lalla is drunk with freedom. She looks around, at the walls, the windows, the automobiles, the people, as if they were nothing but shapes, images, ghosts that the wind and the light would sweep away.

Radicz looks so unhappy that Lalla feels sorry for him.

“Come on!” She takes the boy by the hand, pulling him through the swirling crowd. Together they go into a very big store with bright light, not the beautiful light of the sun, but a harsh white glow, reflected in the profusion of mirrors. But that glare is also inebriating; it numbs and blinds you. With Radicz stumbling slightly behind her, Lalla goes through the perfume department, through cosmetics, wigs, and soaps; she stops almost everywhere, buys several different colored bars of soap that she has Radicz smell, then small bottles of perfume that she breathes in briefly as she walks along the aisles, and it makes her feel dizzy, almost nauseated. Red lipsticks, green eye shadow, black, ochre, foundation, brilliantine, creams, false eyelashes, false hair extensions – Lalla asks to be shown it all, and she shows it to Radicz, who doesn’t say anything; then she takes a long time choosing a little square bottle of brick-colored nail polish and a tube of bright red lipstick. She’s sitting on a tall stool, in front of a mirror, and trying out the colors on the back of her hand, while the salesgirl with strawlike hair gazes at her stupidly.

On the first floor, Lalla weaves through the clothing, still holding Radicz by the hand. She picks out a T-shirt, some blue denim work overalls, some canvas sandals, and red socks. She leaves her old, gray smock-dress and rubber sandals behind in the dressing room, but she holds on to the brown coat because she likes it. Now she walks more buoyantly, bouncing on the springy soles of the sandals, one hand in the pocket of her overalls. Her black hair falls in heavy curls on the collar of her coat, gleaming in the white electric light.

Radicz looks at her and thinks she’s beautiful, but he doesn’t dare tell her so. Her eyes are sparkling with joy. There’s something like a fiery glow to Lalla’s black hair and red copper face. Now it seems as if the electric light has brought the color of the desert sun back to life, as if she had stepped directly from the path out on the plateau of stones into the Prisunic store.

Maybe everything really has disappeared and the big store is standing alone in the midst of the boundless desert, just like a fortress of stone and mud. Yet it is the entire city that is surrounded by the sand, held tightly in its grips, and you can hear the superstructures of the concrete buildings snapping while cracks run up the walls and the plate glass mirrors of skyscrapers fall to the ground.

Lalla holds the burning force of the desert in her eyes. The light blazes on her black hair, on the thick tress she’s braiding in the hollow of her collarbone as she walks along. The light blazes in her amber-colored eyes, on her skin, on her high cheekbones, on her lips. And so, in the big store full of noise and white electricity, people step aside, stop as Lalla and Radicz the beggar go by. The women, the men stop, surprised, because they’ve never seen anyone like them. Lalla strides along in the middle of the aisle, wearing her dark overalls, her brown coat which opens to show her throat and her copper-colored face. She isn’t tall, and yet she seems huge as she moves down the center of the aisle and goes down the escalator to the ground floor.

It’s because of all the light streaming from her eyes, her skin, her hair, the almost supernatural light. Behind her comes the strange, skinny boy, in his men’s clothing, barefoot in his black leather shoes. His long black hair frames his hollow-cheeked, sunken-eyed triangular face. He tags behind silently, not moving his arms, walking a little bit sideways, the way cowering dogs do. People also look at him in surprise, as if he were a shadow detached from a body. Fear is visible on his face, but he tries to hide it with an odd smirking smile that looks more like a grimace.

At times, Lalla turns around, gives him a little wave, or takes his hand, “Come on!”

But the boy quickly lets himself fall behind. When they are outside again in the street, in the sun and the wind, Lalla asks him, “Are you hungry?”

Radicz looks at her with shiny feverish eyes.

“We’re going to eat now,” says Lalla. She shows him what’s left of the handful of rumpled bills in the pocket of her new overalls.

Along the wide straight avenues, people are walking, some hurriedly, others slowly, dragging their feet. The automobiles are still driving along near the sidewalks, as if they were on the lookout for something or someone, a place to park. There are swifts up in the cloudless sky; they swoop down the valleys of the streets giving shrill cries. Lalla is happy to be walking like that, holding Radicz’s hand, not saying anything, as if they were going off to the other side of the world and never coming back. She thinks about the lands across the sea, the red and yellow soil, the black rocks standing up tall in the sand like teeth. She thinks of the eyes of fresh water open on the sky, and of the taste of the chergui, which lifts up the thin skin of dust and makes the dunes move forward. She thinks of the Hartani’s cave again, up on top of the cliff, the place where she’d seen the sky, nothing but the sky. Now it was as if she were walking toward that land, along the avenues, as if she were going back. People step aside to let them pass, eyes squinting in the light, not understanding. She moves past them without seeing them, as if through a crowd of shadows. Lalla isn’t talking. She’s squeezing Radicz’s hand very tightly, walking straight ahead, toward the sun.

When they reach the sea, the wind is blowing even harder, heaving against them. The automobiles are honking aggressively, caught in the traffic jams around the harbor. Once again fear is visible on Radicz’s face, and Lalla holds his hand firmly, to reassure him. She mustn’t hesitate; if she does, the giddiness of the wind and the light will go away, leaving them on their own, and they won’t be brave enough to be free.

They walk down the wharves not looking at the ships with hollow clanking masts. The reflections of the water dance on Lalla’s cheek, setting her copper-colored skin, her hair aglow. The light around her is red, the red of burning embers. The boy looks at her, allows the heat emanating from Lalla to enter him, make him light-headed. His heart is pounding heavily, pulsing in his temples, in his neck.

Now the high white walls, the plate glass windows of the fine restaurant appear. That’s where she wants to go. Over the door, colored flags are snapping in the wind on their masts. Lalla knows this place well; she’s been noticing it from afar for quite some time now, very white, with its plate glass windows shooting off flashes in the setting sun.

She goes in without hesitating, pushing open the glass door. The large dining room is dark, but on the round tables, the cloths make dazzling splashes. Lalla sees everything in a glance, very clearly: the bouquets of pink flowers in the crystal vases, the silver utensils, the cut-glass goblets, the immaculate napkins, and the chairs covered with dark blue velvet, the waxed hardwood floor over which the waiters dressed in white slip by. It is unreal and remote, and yet this is the place she has come into, walking slowly, silently, over the parquet, and holding Radicz the beggar’s hand very tightly.

“Come on,” says Lalla. “We’re going to sit over there.”

She points out a table, near a plate glass window. They cross the dining room. Men and women sitting at the round tables lift their heads from their plates and stop chewing, stop talking. The waiters are stopped short, the spoon sunk into the dish of rice, or the bottle of white wine slightly tilted, pouring into the glass a very fine trickle of wine tailing off at the end like a flame going out. Then Lalla and Radicz sit down at the round table, on either side of the lovely white tablecloth, separated by a bouquet of roses. So the people start chewing, talking again, but in lower voices, and the wine starts pouring again, the spoon serves the rice, and the voices whisper a little, drowned out by the commotion of the automobiles passing in front of the large plate glass windows like monstrous fish in an aquarium.

Radicz doesn’t dare look around. He’s keeping his eyes trained solely on Lalla’s face with all of his might. He has never seen a more beautiful, more luminous face. The light from the window shines on her heavy black hair, making a flame around Lalla’s face, on her neck, on her shoulders, all the way down to her hands laying flat on the white tablecloth. Lalla’s eyes are like two pieces of flint, the color of metal and fire, and her face is like a smooth copper mask.

A tall man is standing in front of their table. He’s dressed in a black suit, and his shirt is as white as the tablecloths. He has a large, bored, flabby face, with a lipless mouth. He is precisely just about to open that mouth of his and tell the children to leave immediately, without making a scene, when his sad eyes meet those of Lalla, and he suddenly forgets what he was going to say. Lalla’s stare is as hard as flint, filled with such strength that the man in black has to look away. He takes a step backward, as if he were going to leave, but then says, in a funny, slightly strangled voice, “Would ... would you like something to drink?”

Lalla is still staring at him unblinkingly.

“We’re hungry,” she simply says. “Bring us something to eat.”

The man in black walks away and comes back with the menu, which he lays on the table. But Lalla hands the piece of cardboard back and keeps her eyes trained on his. Perhaps later he’ll remember his hatred and be ashamed of his fear.

“Bring us the same thing as they’re having,” Lalla orders. She motions to the group of people at the next table, the ones who are peering at them over their eyeglasses every now and again, turning halfway around in their seats.

The man goes and says something to one of the waiters, who comes up pushing a small cart loaded with dishes of all different colors. On the plates, the waiter places tomatoes, lettuce leaves, filets of anchovies, olives and capers, cold potatoes, eggs in a yellow powder, and still many more things. Lalla watches Radicz eating quickly, leaning over his plate like a dog gnawing at a bone, and she feels like laughing.

The light and the wind are still dancing for her, even here, on the glasses and the plates, in the mirrors on the walls, on the bouquets of flowers. The dishes are brought to the table one after the other, huge, flamboyant, filled with all sorts of delicacies with which Lalla isn’t familiar: fish swimming in orange sauces, mounds of vegetables, plates full of red, green, brown, covered with silver domes, which Radicz lifts to sniff at the smells. The maître d’hôtel ceremoniously pours them an amber-colored wine, then in another wide, very fragile glass, a ruby-colored, almost black wine. Lalla dips her lips into the drink, but it is rather the color that she drinks, looking at it against the light. They are more inebriated with the light and the colors and smells of the food than with the wine. Radicz eats rapidly, everything at the same time, and he drinks the glasses of wine one after the other. But Lalla hardly eats anything; she just watches the boy eating, and the other people in the room, who seem to be frozen in front of their plates. Time has slowed down, or maybe it’s her gaze, coupled with the light, that is immobilizing everything. Outside, the automobiles continue to drive past the windows, and you can glimpse the gray color of the sea between the boats.