Whatever: a novel (5 page)

On my return the theoretician was at her side and she was listening to him docilely. She'd managed, in short, to regain control; perhaps it was all to the good, for her.

12

This retirement drink was to constitute the derisory apogee of my relations with the Ministry of Agriculture. I had gathered together all the necessary material for preparing my courses; we'd barely be seeing each other again; I still had a week before leaving for Rouen.

A gloomy week. We were at the end of November, a time which is commonly taken to be gloom itself. For me it seemed normal that, for want of more tangible events, changes in the weather would assume a certain place in my life; besides, old people can talk about nothing else, they say.

I've lived so little that I tend to imagine I'm not going to die; it seems improbable that human existence can be reduced to so little; one imagines, in spite of oneself, that sooner or later something is bound to happen. A big mistake. A life can just as well be both empty and short. The days slip by indifferently, leaving neither trace nor memory; and then all of a sudden they stop.

At times, too, I've had the impression that I'd manage to feel quite at home in a life of vacuity. That the relatively painless boredom would enable me to go on making the usual gestures of life. Another big mistake. Prolonged boredom is not tenable as a position: sooner or later it is transformed into feelings that are acutely more painful, of true pain; this is precisely what's happening to me.

Maybe, I tell myself, this tour of the provinces is going
to alter my ideas
. Doubtless in a negative sense, but it's going
to alter my ideas
; at least there will be a change of direction, a shake-up.

Part Two

1

At the approaches to the narrows of Bab-el-Mandel, beneath the ambiguous and immutable surface of the sea, huge and irregularly spaced coral reefs are hidden which represent a real danger to navigation. They are barely perceptible except for a reddish bloom, a slightly different tinge to the water. And if the occasional traveller should call to mind the extraordinary density of the shark population which characterizes this area of the Red Sea (it has some two thousand sharks per square kilometre, if my memory serves me correct), then it will be readily understood if, despite the overwhelming and almost unreal heat that makes the surrounding air quiver with a viscous bubbling, he feels a slight shudder at the approaches to the narrows of Bab-el-Mandel.

Fortunately, because of the odd way the sky reacts, the weather is always fine, excessively fine, and the horizon never deviates from an overheated and blinding whiteness which can also be observed in metal foundries during the third phase of treating the iron ore (I am speaking of that moment when there blossoms forth, as if suspended in the atmosphere and bizarrely at one with its intrinsic nature, the newly-formed flow of molten steel). That is why most pilots clear this obstacle without let or hindrance and are soon sailing in silence through the calm, iridescent and limpid waters of the Gulf of Aden.

Sometimes, though, such things happen, occur for real. It's Monday morning, the first of December; it's cold and I am waiting for Tisserand by the departure gate of the train for Rouen; we're in the Gare Saint-Lazare; I'm getting more and more cold and more and more pissed off. Tisserand arrives at the last minute; we're going to have difficulty finding seats. Unless he's got himself a first-class ticket; that would be quite his style.

I might have formed a
tandem
with four or five other people from my company, and in the end it's come down to Tisserand. I'm not wildly excited about it. He, on the other hand, declares himself delighted. `We make a terrific team you and me,' he promptly declares, Ì reckon things'll work out just great.' He describes a sort of rotating movement with his hands, as if to symbolize our future mutual understanding.

I already know this young man; we've chatted many a time around the hot drinks machine. He generally told
dirty stories
; I have the feeling this tour of the provinces is going to be grim.

Moments later the train is moving. We install ourselves in the midst of a group of garrulous students who seem to belong to a business school. I settle myself near the window to escape the surrounding noise, at least a bit. From his briefcase Tisserand extracts various coloured brochures dealing with accounting software; these have nothing to do with the training we're going to give. I hazard the remark. He interjects vaguely, 'Ah yes, Maple, that's good too,' then goes back to his monologue. Where the technical aspects are concerned I've the impression he's counting on me one hundred per cent.

He's wearing a splendid suit with a red, yellow and green pattern - a bit medieval tapestry, you'd say. He also has a fancy handkerchief which sticks out of his jacket pocket, `Trip to the Planet Mars' style, and a matching tie. His whole outfit evokes the ultra-dynamic business management type, not without humour. As for me, I'm dressed in a quilted parka and `Weekend in the Hebrides' chunky pullover. I imagine that in the play of roles that's gradually falling into place I represent the `systems man', the competent but slightly oafish technician who doesn't have the time to worry about his appearance and is completely incapable of dialoguing with the user. That suits me fine. He's right, we make a good team.

In getting all his brochures out, I ask myself if he isn't trying to attract the attention of the young girl sitting on his left - a student at the business school, and very pretty. His discourse would only seem, then, superficially directed at me. I permit myself a glance or two at the landscape. Day is beginning to break. The sun appears, blood red, terribly red above the dark green grass, above the mist-shrouded ponds. Small clusters of houses smoke far away in the valley. The sight is magnificent, a little scary. Tisserand isn't interested by it. Instead, he's trying to catch the glance of the student on his left. The problem with Raphaël Tisserand - the foundation of his personality, indeed - is that he is extremely ugly. So ugly that his appearance repels women, and he never gets to sleep with them. He tries though, he tries with all his might, but it doesn't work. They simply want nothing to do with him.

His body is nonetheless close to normal. Vaguely Mediterranean in type, he is certainly rather fat; `stocky', as they say; added to which his baldness is coming along nicely. Fine, all this could still be arranged; but what isn't fine is his face. He has the exact appearance of a buffalo toad - thick, gross, heavy, deformed features, the very opposite of handsome. His shiny acned skin seems to permanently exude a greasy fluid. He wears bifocal glasses, because he's extremely short-sighted to boot

- yet if he had contact lenses it wouldn't change anything, I'm afraid. What's more, his conversation lacks finesse, fantasy, humour; he has absolutely no
charm
(charm is a quality which can sometimes substitute for physical beauty - at least in men; anyway, one often says `He has loads of charm', or `The most important thing is charm'; that's what one says). Given all this, he is obviously terribly frustrated; but what can I do about it? So I gaze out at the landscape.

A bit later he engages the student in conversation. We skirt the Seine, scarlet, completely drowned in the rays of the rising sun - one would really think the river gorged with blood.

Around nine we arrive in Rouen. The student says her goodbyes to Tisserand - she refuses to give him her telephone number of course. For a few minutes he will feel a certain despondency; it's going to be me who has to find a bus.

The Departmental Headquarters for Agriculture building is evil-looking and we are late. Here, work begins at eight - this, I will learn, is often the case in the provinces. The training session gets going immediately. Tisserand is first to speak; he introduces himself, introduces me, introduces our company. After that I assume he'll introduce the computer, the integrated software, their advantages. He could also introduce the course, the work method we are going to follow, lots of things. All this should take us to around midday, no problem, especially if there's a good oldfashioned coffee-break. I take off my parka, place a few sheets of paper before me.

The audience is made up of fifteen or so people; there are some secretaries and middle management, some technicians I imagine - they have the look of technicians. They don't seem particularly hostile, or particularly interested in computers either - and yet, I say to myself, computers are going to change their lives.

I spot straightaway where the danger lies: an extremely young guy in glasses, tall, lanky and lithe. He has installed himself at the back so he can watch everybody; I silently dub him `the Serpent', but in actual fact he will introduce himself to us after the coffee-break by the name of Schnäbele. Here in the making is the future boss of the computer service, and he has a very satisfied air about it. Sitting at his side is a guy of fifty-odd, extremely well-built, unpleasant-looking, with a fringe of red beard. He must be an ex-sergeant-major, or something of the sort. He has a beady eye - Indochina, I imagine - which he will keep trained on me for ages, as if summoning me to explain the reason for my presence. He seems devoted body and soul to the Serpent, his boss. He has something of the mastiff about him - the kind of dog which never lets go its bite, in any event.

All too soon the Serpent will fire off various questions whose object is to throw Tisserand, make him look incompetent. Tisserand is incompetent, this is a fact, but he's come across such types before. He's a professional. He will have no difficulty in parrying the various attacks, now dodging with grace, now promising to return to them at some later point in the course. He will sometimes even succeed in suggesting that the question might indeed have had a point at an earlier period in the development of computers, but that it has now been rendered meaningless.

At midday we are interrupted by the strident and disagreeable ringing of a bell. Schnäbele sidles up to us: `Do we eat together?' The question admits of no reply.

He tells us that, sorry, he has a few little things to do before lunch. But we can go with him, like that he can `show us round the place'. He leads us down the corridors; his acolyte follows, two paces behind. Tisserand manages to get it across to me that he'd have `preferred to eat with the two cuties in the third row'. He's already spotted the female prey in the audience, then; it was almost inevitable, but all the same I find it a little disturbing.

We go into Schnäbele's office. The acolyte remains rooted on the threshold in an attitude of expectancy; he is mounting guard to some extent. The room is big, even very big for such a young executive, and I instantly surmise that it's only to show us it that he's brought us here, since he does nothing - he contents himself with tapping nervously on his telephone. I sink down into an armchair in front of the desk, Tisserand immediately following suit. The other jerk chimes in with `Sure, take a seat. The same second a secretary comes through a door off to one side. She approaches the desk respectfully. She is a rather old woman with glasses. In her open hands she holds a file of letters awaiting signature. Here at last, I say to myself, is the reason for this whole performance.

Schnäbele performs his role most impressively. Before signing the first document he goes through it at length, with tremendous gravity. He singles out a phrase which is

`somewhat unfortunate at the syntactical level. The secretary, confused: Ì can do it again, Sir'; and he, the great lord: `No, no, it'll be fine.'

The fastidious ceremony is repeated for a second document, then for a third. I start to feel hungry. I get up to examine the photos hanging on the wall. They are amateur photos, printed and framed with care. They appear to represent geysers, ice formations, things of the sort. I imagine he's printed them himself after his holidays in Iceland - a Nouvelles Frontières tour, in all likelihood. But he has been prodigal with the solarizations , star-filter effects and I don't know what else besides, to such an extent that one recognizes practically nothing and the general effect is exceedingly ugly.

Seeing my interest, he approaches and says:

-It's Iceland ... It's really pretty, I find.

-Ah, I reply.

We're finally going to eat. Schnäbele goes on ahead of us down the corridors, commenting on the organization of the offices and the `spatial layout', exactly as if he'd just acquired the whole place. Now and again, at the moment of making a righthand turn, he circles my shoulder with his arm - yet without, happily, touching me. He walks quickly and Tisserand, with his little legs, is hard pressed to keep up - I hear him puffing at my side. Two paces behind us the acolyte brings up the rear, as if to forestall an eventual surprise attack.

The meal will prove interminable. To begin with all goes well, Schnäbele talks about himself. He informs us once more that at twenty-five he is already head of the computer service, or at least on the way to being so in the near future. He will remind us of his age three times between the hors-d'oeuvre and the main course: twenty-five.

Next he wants to know about our `training', probably to assure himself that it's inferior to his own. (He himself is an IGREF, and has the air of being proud of it; I don't know what this is but will subsequently learn that IGREFs are a particular kind of higher civil servant who are only to be found in organizations depending on the Ministry of Agriculture - a bit like the graduates of the École Nationale d'Administration, but less qualified all the same.) In this respect Tisserand gives him complete satisfaction: he claims to have been to the École Supérieure de Commerce in Bastia, or something of the kind, which is scarcely believable. I chew on my steak béarnaise, pretending not to have heard the question. The sergeant-major fixes me with his beady eye, and for a moment I wonder if he isn't going to start screaming Ànswer when you're spoken to!'; I turn my head squarely in the other direction. Finally Tisserand replies in my place. He presents me as a `systems engineer'. As if to give credence to the idea I utter a few phrases about Scandinavian norms and network changeovers; Schnäbele, on the defensive, twists in his seat; I go to get myself a crème caramel.