Peaches for Monsieur Le Curé (32 page)

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Friday, 27th August

ANOTHER NIGHT, WITH
no answers. My Mother’s cards are no help at all. I made chocolate for the children and drank mine out of Armande’s bowl; creamy, rich and very sweet. If only Armande were here now. I can almost hear her voice.
If heaven is half as good as this, I’ll give up sin tomorrow
. Dear Armande. How she would laugh to see me like this, so concerned about Francis Reynaud.

He can look after himself
, she would say.
Let him wander. Do him good
. And yet, every instinct screams at me that Reynaud is in trouble. I thought Inès Bencharki was the one I was meant to save; but I was wrong.
Reynaud
was the one. Reynaud was the one from the very start.

What was it Armande’s letter said?
Lansquenet will need you again. But I can’t count on our stubborn
curé
to tell you when that happens
.

No, because men like Reynaud never ask; never rely on anyone. Did he try to help Inès? Has he been stung by the scorpion?

Père Henri has reported him missing, but the police are proving unhelpful. There is nothing to indicate that Monsieur le Curé has been the victim of foul play; in fact, wasn’t it Père Henri himself who suggested that he take a leave of absence? As for the rumour that Reynaud left town because of new evidence concerning the fire at the old
chocolaterie
, there seems to be nothing to support this, much to Caro’s disappointment.

I dropped by the church. It was empty, but for a stack of new chairs and a couple of visitors sitting in front of the confessional. I recognized Charles Lévy and Henriette Moisson, and wondered if they, too, were looking for our missing
curé
.

‘He hasn’t really gone,’ said Charles, when I asked the question. ‘He wouldn’t leave us. Where would he go? Who would look after his garden?’

Henriette Moisson agreed. ‘Anyway, he has to take confession. He hasn’t done it for ages. I won’t talk to that other one – the
perverti
who hides in the church. He’s a shifty one.’

‘That’s Père Henri Lemaître,’ said Charles.

‘
I
know that,’ said Henriette.

Charles sighed. ‘She gets confused. I’d better take her home.’ He turned to Henriette and smiled. ‘Come on, Madame Moisson,’ he said. ‘Let’s get you home. Tati’s waiting.’

Joséphine has no news, either. I called by the café to find Paul-Marie, pallid and unshaven, looking at the same time both wretched and curiously triumphant.

‘Oh, hooray, it’s the cavalry. Come to set the world to rights? Heal the sick? Cure the lame? Oh, wait—’ He gave a humourless grin. ‘I guess your special powers must be playing up today, because as far as I can see, we’re still in a world of shit.’

‘I never claimed I had powers,’ I said.

He gave a snarl of laughter. ‘You mean there’s things you
can’t
do? Because if you believe that bitch I married, you can practically walk on water. And as for that brat of hers—’

‘Pilou.’

‘Well, according to him, you’re a cross between Mary Poppins and the Sugar Plum Fairy. Magic chocolates, invisible pets, you’ve got it all, haven’t you? What next? A cure for Aids? I’d settle for a working pair of legs – oh yes, and maybe a blowjob.’

I said: ‘Pilou’s an imaginative boy. I think he and Maya and Rosette might have been playing some kind of game.’

Paul-Marie made a sour face. ‘Is that what you call it?
Imaginative?
Playing around by the river all day with a pair of sissy little girls?
You
might call it imaginative. I say get him some proper friends – and by that I mean
boys
, real French boys, not that scum from Les Marauds—’

I did not rise to the bait. Paul Muscat is one of those men who love to provoke a reaction. Instead I said: ‘Where’s Joséphine?’

He shrugged. ‘She took the car this morning. I think she’s gone looking for that boat. Well, good luck to her, I say. They’re saying the gypsies have taken it, or maybe it was the
Maghrébins
. Don’t see why she cares, do you? She never uses it – I mean, not since that redhead of hers went away.’

That redhead of hers
. I wanted to say how wrong he was, but Joséphine’s secret is not mine to give away. Instead, I said: ‘Tell her I was here.’

He gave another mocking laugh. ‘If you think I’ve got time to sit around and deliver your little messages—’

‘Tell her I’ll come back tomorrow,’ I said.

‘I’ll be waiting,’ said Paul-Marie.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Friday, 27th August

WHEN I GOT
back to Armande’s house, I found Alyssa waiting for me. Dressed in her black
abaya
, the headscarf covering her hair, she looked so unlike the girl I have come to know that I almost mistook her for someone else.

‘I wanted to thank you before I left,’ she said.

‘You’re going home, then?’

She nodded. ‘Jiddo knows what I did. He says the
zina
was not mine. He also says Karim is not the man he pretends to be. My father is a good man, but perhaps too easily flattered, he says. And my mother … values appearances.’ She gave a rueful little smile. ‘My
jiddo
may be old, but he is a very good judge of character.’

‘Will he tell your parents what happened?’

She shook her head.

‘Will you?’

She shrugged. ‘My
jiddo
says it would only do harm. There’s no taking back what has happened. We can only pray that Allah will forgive, and try to continue with our lives.’

Is that even possible? Maybe it is, I told myself. Alyssa certainly thinks so; with the optimism of youth, she believes she can erase the past. But the past is an obdurate stranger that puts as many marks on us as we attempt to impose on it. Can Alyssa be content, living in that other world?

I tried not to think of what Inès had said.
A child sees a baby bird fall from the nest. She picks it up and takes it home. One of two things happens next. The baby bird dies almost at once; or it survives for a day or two, and the child takes it back to its family. But the scent of human is on it now, and the family rejects it. It dies of starvation, or a cat kills it, or the other birds peck it to death. With luck, the child will never know
.

But I am not a child, Inès. Alyssa is not a fledgling. Will her family take her back? I hope so. Maybe. Maybe not. If not, I think she is strong enough to survive alone, without their help. In the few days she has been with me, I have seen Alyssa change. No longer a frightened baby bird, she is starting to flex her wings. Can she really go back to the nest and pretend she doesn’t want to fly?

We walked her to the al-Djerba house, where old Mahjoubi was waiting. He looked outwardly composed, but his colours were turbulent; grey shot through with blood-orange and black, betraying his anxiety.

‘Will you be all right?’ I said.

‘
Inshallah
,’ said old Mahjoubi.

Maya’s face appeared at the door. ‘I want to come, too. I want to show Rosette where my Jinni lives. Besides, he owes me another wish.’

Rosette looked at me and signed:
I want to go and see Foxy
.

‘All right,’ I said. ‘But don’t go too far.’ I turned back to old Mahjoubi. ‘Would you like me to come with you?’

‘Thank you, no.’ He shook his head. ‘I think it will be easier if I can speak to my son alone. It is time I did; it has been too long. Pride and anger have stood in my way. This would never have happened if I had not allowed my pride to stand in the way of my conscience. I will not let this happen again. I have been blind, but now I see. Allah give me strength to make others see, too.’

I nodded. ‘All right. But if you need help—’

‘I know where to come,’ said Mahjoubi.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Friday, 27th August

I AWOKE TO
the sound of tapping from the metal grille high up the wall. I ran over to the piled-up crates, now mostly submerged in floodwater.

‘Vianne?’

It wasn’t Vianne, of course. But it
was
Maya, and she had brought a friend. That might have given me hope, except that the friend was Rosette, who barely speaks, and when she does, makes little sense. I tried not to let my frustration show. ‘Maya. Did you tell Vianne I was here?’

She nodded. Beside her, Rosette was watching with eyes as round as collection plates. Through the grille, the two little girls looked like a pair of cartoon kittens spying on a very big mouse.

‘Why haven’t you brought her?’

She made a face. ‘But you still owe me two wishes.’

I suppressed the urge to scream at her. ‘You know, Maya, I could grant your wishes a lot more easily if I wasn’t locked up down here.’

The two little girls exchanged glances. Maya whispered something in Rosette’s ear. Rosette whispered back, in a hiccupping voice interspersed with giggles. Then they turned to me again.

‘My second wish is for you to bring back the cat.’

‘
What
cat, for pity’s sake?’

‘You know, the cat that comes to our house. Hazi.’

‘Maya, it’s a
cat
,’ I said. ‘How should I know where it is?’

Maya looked solemnly through the grille. ‘You made my
jiddo
better,’ she said. ‘But he’s still sad, because of the cat. Now, would you please bring Hazi back? After that, we’ll let you go.’

Père
, I could have murdered her. It was like talking to Henriette Moisson. As it was, I gave a howl of impatience, and the two kitten faces pulled away as if a dog had lunged at them.

‘Maya, Rosette, I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘It’s just that I want to get out of here.’

She gave the grille a narrow-eyed look. ‘Not until you give me my wish.’

There is nothing more futile than trying to argue with a five-year-old, especially not through a metal slot barely the size of a letter-box. I returned to my place on the cellar steps – three of which are now underwater – and tried not to give in to despair. It can be only a matter of time before someone hears about Maya’s new game, and wants to see the Jinni for himself. Till then, I will try to be patient, and believe that there is some kind of sense to be found in this absurd situation. A week from now, I hope that I can look back on all of this and laugh at the misunderstanding. But at this moment, I see no light. And the water is still rising; not fast enough to present an immediate threat, but enough to be unnerving. I may not drown in here,
mon père
, but I may contract pneumonia. Is this what my God wants of me?

Here comes the call to prayer again.
Allahu Akhbar
. Underground, everything is curiously resonant. I have fallen inside a seashell, with the sound of the surf all around me. The voices of the everyday world float above me like jetsam. There is light, too, through the grille; brilliant, festive, fragmented light that dances and blinks like fireflies. The wind has dropped. The rain has, too. Maybe, at last, the Black Autan has run its course. I hope so.

Allahu Akhbar. Ash-hadu al-la
. The sound of the seashell is potent: its voice as persistent as memory. It makes me think of the giant dune, the big white dune at Arcachon where we used to go when I was a child; the blinding run towards the sea; the endless climb back to the top with the sun on the sand like hammered bronze and the nape of my neck growing red as I climbed.

And now, for the first time, comes the thought that maybe I will die down here – alone, forgotten, unwanted. Who would miss me if I were gone? I have no family, no friends. My mother, the Church, prefers Père Henri. No one will look very far for me. And who would shed a tear for Reynaud, except perhaps Reynaud himself?