She picked up my glass and finished it. As she crossed her long legs, I caught sight of one of the clips of the suspender belt holding up her stockings.

  ‘I’m Agathe.’

  Agathe? What he preferred was her downside.

  ‘What’s so funny?’

  ‘Nothing, I was thinking about a book.’

  ‘What’s it about?’

  ‘I don’t know, I haven’t read it.’

  ‘Why are you here?’

  ‘I’m Damien’s father.’

  ‘The sandman?’

  ‘That must be it.’

  ‘You don’t look like him but you remind me of someone. Are you on the telly?’

  ‘No. Would you like some more wine?’

  I opened another bottle. She was amusing, this beanpole. Like a puppy playing with a slipper, and the slipper was me.

  ‘I’m sure I know you.’

  ‘Perhaps I’m your father?’

  ‘I don’t think so. I can’t picture him gobbling down a pan of burnt rice at midnight in a kitchen that wasn’t his own.’

  ‘In truth, I’d rather not be your father, or my thoughts would be incestuous. I believe in morality and it would have ruined my life. I’m Jeff.’

  ‘Would you like to?’

  ‘To what?’

  ‘To screw me.’

  ‘Well, maybe I would, but right now what I would like is a big steak frites. Do you know anywhere nearby?’

  ‘There are brasseries at the station.’

  ‘Shall we go? I don’t know the area, I need a guide.’

  Agathe suited her name. Her eyes were like marbles with threads of green, yellow and gold.

  ‘You’re old and ugly; you remind me of an old sad dog.’

  ‘Charming!’

  ‘I’ll go and get my jacket and we can go.’

  I sat on the first step of the stairs waiting for Agathe. The cohort of Lille’s finest nightclubbers paraded past me. Nothing had changed since the dawn of time. Since the Lascaux caves. As soon as night falls we still gather together around any vague light, drowning our sorrows in primitive music and intoxicating substances. Man may have learnt how to fly beyond the stars, to walk on the moon, to gorge on the Milky Way, but he still returns to his cave, the fear of the bear deep inside him.

  ‘Jeff! What are you doing here?’

  I wasn’t all that surprised that Hélène had turned up, lugging a bag bulging like a cow’s udder. She had always carried a bag like that, filled with a jumble of completely useless items. Sometimes I wondered if she slept in it. ‘I’m waiting for someone. How are you?’

  She blinked several times, as if I were a ghost, then stared at me, fixing me with her minuscule pupils. ‘You came with Damien?’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘Little bastard! I’ve come to get my car back. Where is he?’

  ‘Somewhere in there. It’s been a while since we saw each other.’

  ‘Four or five years. What a little shit … I’ve come from the station.’

  She sat down beside me and, with a toss of her head, flicked back a stray lock of hair. I had often seen her make that gesture when she was annoyed. The soft bag at her feet made me think of those old dogs that you are desperate to keep alive. She still resembled a tall bent white lily, but perhaps it was time to think about changing the water in the vase. She kept scratching her nose and the back of her hands.

  ‘So you know about it?’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘Damien and me.’

  ‘Of course; you have to do something to pass the time in old age.’

  She shrugged and cracked a little smile that made her eyes radiate a thousand little sun wrinkles. ‘How are you? You’ve put on weight.’

  ‘Especially round the heart.’

  ‘Seriously, what are you doing here?’

  ‘I needed to get out, to see my son; I don’t really know to be honest, an impulse. I don’t regret seeing Damien again, I’ve enjoyed that, but I admit that I feel out of place here.’

  ‘You always feel out of place everywhere.’

  ‘True, and yet I am everywhere, as I’m demonstrating now.’

  ‘You really are an odd bod. But it is nice to see you again. You’re not so bad-looking as all that. When are you leaving?’

  ‘Tonight. I’m going to have dinner in town and then take the first available train. Don’t be too annoyed with Damien; I dropped in on him unannounced. We just wanted to take a little trip together. Ah! Here’s my guide.’

  Agathe wore a black leather coat which made her look like a baby shark. ‘Is that your wife?’

  ‘No, my son’s. Shall we go?’

  ‘I’m ready.’

  ‘See you soon, Hélène; look after yourself.’

  She was looking at us as if through the wrong end of opera glasses, incredulous and distant. ‘You never change, do you?’

  ‘I’ve tried, Hélène, I’ve tried. Kiss Damien goodbye for me.’

  VII

  For the first time in a long while, I felt at ease, light-hearted. It was pleasant to let myself be led through the maze of unfamiliar streets by this young giraffe, who was at least a head taller than me. It was a bit like walking with my eyes closed on a beach at low tide. As we moved forward, my memory emptied; I forgot Damien, Hélène, Eve; I became brand new. We are born into the world every day, even if we need forceps to achieve it. There were groups of young people clustered round the doors to bars and clubs. The road seemed to be paved in shining liquorice, splashed with the lights of the city; we were wading through pools of stars. Several times, Agathe greeted people she knew. I envied her; I wanted to belong here as well, to have friends, habits, a house. We crossed a large square that I thought I recognised, but maybe that was in another city … I had known so many of these places that I only passed through, long enough to do a signing at a bookshop, or take part in a discussion or a reading at a library. Restaurant, hotel, then the station or airport. They all merged into one after a while, from north to south, from east to west.

  ‘I remember this square. But there was a big wheel, or a roundabout.’

  ‘That must have been Christmas time. So, you know Lille?’

  ‘Not really; I spent probably twenty-four hours here, for work.’

  ‘What do you do?’

  ‘I sell lettuces.’

  ‘Are you making fun of me?’

  ‘No, lettuces, that’s all I sell.’

  ‘If you insist. It’s all the same to me.’

  ‘And what do you do?’

  ‘Me? I eat lettuces.’

  ‘We should do business together.’

  Even at that late hour, the area around the station was swarming with undesirables. Agathe led me to a large crowded brasserie, Les Brasseurs. It smelled of beer, choucroute and cigars. After the fresh night air, the heat struck your face like a mask of burning wax. I took my jacket off and rolled my sleeves up before studying the menu. Agathe ordered flammkuchen and I asked for pork knuckle and a Moselle wine. We might have been in a Breughel painting; we wanted everything twice over. Here, too, Agathe greeted one or two people.

  ‘Do you know everyone?’

  ‘Everyone knows me, there’s a difference.’

  ‘How does everyone know you?’

  ‘I help people out here and there. Like you, tonight.’

  ‘You’re a tourist guide, is that it?’

  ‘You could say that.’

  As our wine was being poured, a bleary-eyed, dishevelled woman in her fifties dripping with gold and pearls came to lean over me. ‘Excuse me, are you Jean-François Colombier? I’ve read your books and—’

  ‘No, I’m not, you’re mistaken, sorry.’

  ‘I apologise, you look just like him. He signed his book for me last year …’

  ‘Anyone can make a mistake. It’s not a problem.’

  The lady withdrew, stammering more apologies. I turned my head away, lighting a cigarette, a little embarrassed. Agathe looked at me, smiling.

  ‘Lettuce-seller, really?’

  ‘Apparently we all have a double somewhere.’

  ‘So we do. Well, here’s to ours! Wherever they are!’

  It wasn’t the first time something like this had happened. Normally I agreed to sign a corner of a napkin, but this evening I wanted to be someone else. A good fifteen years ago, before I had published anything yet, I had dinner with Hélène and one of her friends, a well-known film star. At the end of the meal, the waitress, hanging around the table with the determination of a dog looking for scraps, said clumsily, ‘Excuse me, could I have an autograph?’ Hélène’s friend took off the dark glasses that made her, since it was dark, about as anonymous as a fly on a glass of milk, and uncapped her Montblanc. But it was to me the waitress held out her piece of paper. ‘I can’t remember your name, but I saw you on television.’ The star replaced her dark glasses with a bitter smile, while I signed the first autograph of my life.

  ‘You keep laughing about something without saying what it is. It’s annoying!’

  ‘Personal memories – you wouldn’t find them funny.’

  ‘You’re right, my memories have never made me laugh.’

  Our food arrived. The pork melted in the mouth, a delight! Agathe picked reluctantly at her food, her gaze flitting all over the restaurant. Jean-François Colombier’s fan left her table accompanied by two rotund, ruddy-faced men. She blew me a kiss as if to say, ‘Your secret’s safe with me.’ Agathe followed her with her eyes, chin in hand, a contemptuous smile on her lips.

  ‘You should play with girls your own age.’

  ‘That’s not very nice. Would you like dessert?’

  ‘Just coffee.’

  ‘Me too. Are you trying to make me believe you’re jealous?’

  ‘As if!’

  ‘No, of course not. But I would have liked it. Will you excuse me a minute?’

  They were proper beer drinkers’ toilets, spacious and clean. You could have relieved yourself of litres and litres, comfortably at ease, legs spread, eyes lost in the expanse of white tiling. I wondered if I was going to screw Agathe. Probably not. For a start, there was nothing to indicate that she would accept, and secondly, I desperately wanted to go home. There’s nothing like a little perambulation elsewhere to rekindle a love of home. I’d just had a little wobble, that’s all. Now I was back on track. I would fetch my bag, take a hotel for the night and catch the train home in the morning. In Paris, I would buy a present for Eve, an expensive one, and soon I would be back by my fireside, with my cat. That’s what I was going to do and perhaps I’d also get a book out of my escapade, a book in which I would sleep with Agathe. I would send Damien a cheque, and a little note to Hélène, and everything would be back to normal, as it had always been before.

  When I returned to the table, I found only my jacket on the back of the chair. There was a little note folded and slipped under my glass: ‘I paid, thank you, Monsieur Colombier!’

  I called the waiter over. ‘Yes, the young lady paid, and then left.’

  I watched him walk away, perplexed. It was very kind of her to have paid for me but—

  ‘Fuck! The bitch …’

  Of course, my wallet had disappeared from the inner pocket of my jacket. But what was much worse was that I had no idea whose house Damien had taken me to or where it was. How would I find my way back? The change that I had in my pocket amounted to sixty-five francs, not even enough to get me a hotel room.

  In small laughing groups, customers were leaving the brasserie as the staff swept the floor. I found myself out on the pavement with no means of protecting myself from the rain that had started, except to pull up the collar of my jacket. I would be able to find my way back to the big square, but after that? I thought briefly of Tom Thumb. You should never go anywhere without a handful of stones in your pocket.

  There was nothing to be done except to walk, cursing everything there was to be cursed on earth as in heaven.

  VIII

  The rain drumming on my shoulders and the combined effect of the wine and coming down from the cocaine made me feel like a fly trapped in a spider’s web. All the streets looked the same. Three times in a row I crossed Grand-Place. The street lamps laughed at the sight of me passing, passing again and almost passing away; the whole city was in fits of laughter. There were fewer and fewer people in the streets and those there were looked at me strangely. I had stepped in a puddle and my right shoe made noises like a sinking boat. I would undoubtedly end up slipping into and drowning in the goddamn shoe. My nose was running; it was starting to be seriously cold. The more I panicked, the more I lost myself in the shroud of stone as if being sucked into quicksand.

  Calm, calm … I needed to keep a clear head. Why not smoke a cigarette under this porch, for example?

  I only had two left, all twisted because I had crumpled the packet in my pocket. I stuck one between my lips, but my empty lighter produced nothing but a couple of sparks.

  I chucked it into the gutter, causing a cat sheltering under a car to flee. Even animals were avoiding me. Oh, the beautiful eyes of Agathe! If I could hold her for even a few seconds, how I would grind my heels into those eyes! How gloriously I would strangle her, cut her up into little pieces, pull out her fingernails and teeth and then stuff her into a manhole, hoping that the rats would leave nothing of her but a handful of her dirty red hair!

  Imagining all that got me nowhere, but it was satisfying nonetheless.

  A bit further on, a neon bar sign showing a buxom blonde with a fishtail was winking at me. The Mermaid. I still had enough money to buy a coffee and a pack of cigarettes. At least I would be able to dry off for a moment. There were a few customers slumped at the bar. They stared at me when I entered, dripping wet.

  ‘A coffee and a packet of Camels.’

  ‘We only have Gitanes.’

  ‘I’ll have the Gitanes. And a box of matches! Please.’

  The customers ignored me. The presence of a drowned man is never that enticing. As luck would have it, no one recognised me here. It was here I should have happened upon the blonde woman from the brasserie. And how delighted I would have been to identify myself as Jean-François Colombier! I would have told her about my shipwreck and she would have taken me back to her cosy apartment, drawn me a hot bath, poured me a drink and cosseted me like a rare pearl! … But here no one knew me; they didn’t watch book programmes on television; they probably took me for some homeless guy, not someone you’d want to hang out with. That’s the problem with people who have no culture.

  As I was desperately searching my pockets for a tissue I discovered the card of the gnome I had bumped into at the motorway services: ‘Maître G. Billot, Lawyer, 45 Rue de Paris, 59800 Lille. Tel: 03 …’

  It was a bit cheeky to call up someone you don’t know at two in the morning but …

  ‘Can I make a phone call?’

  The bartender looked at me as if I had propositioned him. But he did push the telephone that sat on the end of the bar towards me.

  ‘Hello, Maître Billot?’

  ‘Speaking.’

  ‘I’m so sorry to disturb you at such a late hour but—’

  ‘Who is this?’

  ‘Jean-François Colombier.’

  ‘The writer?’

  ‘Yes, we met in a service station on the motorway, today …’

  ‘Oh yes! I remember very well. I was sure I recognised you. What’s happened?’

  ‘So stupid, I’ve had my wallet stolen and I’m lost in Lille. I don’t know anyone and—’

  ‘Where are you?’

  ‘I don’t know. Wait … Please, where is this place?’

  At the bar, all heads were turned to me, like cows watching a train go by.

  ‘The Mermaid Bar, 33 Grande-Rue.’

  ‘The Mermaid—’

  ‘I heard that; it’s five minutes from where I live. I’ll give you the entry code. It’s on the third floor, the door on the left.’

  ‘Thank you, Maître, thank you very much!’

  ‘My pleasure!’

  When I hung up, I felt about a hundred years younger.

  ‘That’ll be … including the telephone and the cigarettes … forty-eight francs.’

  After being told how to get to Rue de Paris, I left the bar, my eyes shining with the fervour of one who has seen a miracle. I crossed Grand-Place for a fourth time but now the square seemed splendid with the little square windows of the gabled facades reflecting all the golden hope in the world. They might have been covered in scrunched-up Christmas paper. I had no difficulty finding Rue de Paris; it seemed to offer itself up to me. It’s easy to panic but actually life is so simple it’s almost unseemly. Number 45 was a 1930s building, its door adorned with wrought-iron Munich roses on a frosted-glass background. I rang, it opened and, spurning the lift, I took the stairs to the third floor four by four. Sometimes lifts break down. Dring! And there was Maître Billot letting me in, wearing a dressing gown of wool from the Pyrenees which made him look like Dopey from Snow White.

  ‘Maître, I do apologise—’

  ‘No need, come in, quickly. Goodness me, you’re soaked!’

  The apartment smelled of biscuits, yellowing wallpaper and dust – of which there was a thick velvety layer on all the furniture. It felt as if no windows had been opened since the apartment had been built.

  ‘I won’t take you into the office, you’ll be more comfortable on the sofa in the sitting room. And, of course, you haven’t come for legal advice, have you?’

  ‘No, it’s just a silly situation.’

  ‘Like all situations, you must have had a hand in it. Do sit down, please. Would you like a cognac?’

  ‘Oh, uh … yes, please, that would be great.’

  It was amazing how dexterous he was with his flippers, opening a cupboard, taking out a bottle and two glasses, and putting them on the table.

  ‘Take your time, have a drink and tell me all about it.’

  I did. The cognac lit a lovely little fire in my belly, and then I told him my troubles without going too much into the details that would not reflect well on me. When I had finished, the lawyer scratched his ear, tilting his head onto his shoulder.

 

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