Chourmo (20 page)

“What happened, for him to change like that?”

“Prison. At first, he played the big shot. He got into fights. ‘You gotta be a man,' he'd say. ‘If you're not a man, you're fucked. They walk all over you. It's dog eat dog.' Then he met Saïd. A prison visitor.”

I'd heard about Saïd. An ex-convict who'd become a preacher. An Islamist preacher belonging to the Tabligh, a movement originating in Pakistan, which recruited mainly in poor suburban areas.

“I know him.”

“Well, after that, he didn't want to see us anymore. He wrote us crazy things. Like . . . “ He thought about it, searching for the exact words. “‘Saïd is like an angel who appeared to me.' And ‘His voice is as sweet as honey, and as wise as the voice of the Prophet.' Saïd had kindled a light in him, that's what he wrote. He started learning Arabic and studying the Koran. And he didn't cause any more trouble in jail.

“They reduced his sentence for good behavior. When he came out, he was different. He didn't drink or smoke anymore. He'd grown a little goatee beard and refused to say hello to anyone who didn't go to the mosque. He spent his days reading the Koran. He'd recite it out loud, like he was learning whole sentences by heart. He'd lecture Naïma about modesty and dignity. Whenever we went to see Grandpa, he'd bow to him and recite some sacred words. Which made Grandpa laugh, because it must be a long time since he last went to the mosque! He even tried to lose his accent . . . Nobody in the project recognized him.

“Then some guys came to see him. Fundamentalists, in djellabas, with big cars. He'd leave with them in the afternoon, and come back late at night. Then there were other guys, wearing white abayas and turbans. One morning, he packed his bags and left. To follow the teachings of Muhammad, he told my mother and father. To me, he said—I can remember it word for word—that he was leaving to take up arms, to liberate our country. ‘When I come back,' he added, ‘I'll take you with me.'

“He was away more than three months. When he came back, he'd changed again, but he didn't bother with me anymore. All he ever said to me was, you mustn't do this, you mustn't do that. And he also said, ‘I don't want anything more to do with France, Mourad. It's a country of idiots. Put that in your little head! Soon, you'll see, you'll be proud of your brother. He's going to do things people will talk about. Great things.
Insh'Allah!
'”

I could imagine where Redouane had gone.

In among Serge's papers, there was a big file about the “pilgrimages” organized by the Tabligh—though not only by them—for its new recruits. Mainly to Pakistan, but also Saudi Arabia, Syria, Egypt . . . Visits to Islamist centers, study of the Koran, and most important of all, initiation into the armed struggle. That mostly took place in Afghanistan.

“Do you know where he went during those three months?”

“Bosnia.”

“Bosnia!”

“With a humanitarian association called Merhamet. Redouane joined the Islamic Association of France, which champions the Bosnians. They're Muslims, you know. They're fighting to defend themselves against the Serbs, and against the Croats too. Redouane explained it all to me. At first, anyway. Afterwards he hardly ever talked to me. I was just a dirty little kid. I couldn't find out anything more. About the people who came to see him. Or the money he brought home every week. All I know is that one day he and some others went to beat up some dealers in Le Plan d'Aou. Not marijuana dealers, heroin dealers. Some of my friends saw him. That's how I found out.”

We heard the front door open, then voices. Mourad rushed to the dining room, to bar the way to the corridor.

“Get out of my way, kid, I'm in a hurry!”

I walked out of the bedroom, the plastic bag in my hand. Behind Redouane was another young guy.

“Shit!” Redouane cried. “Let's get out of here!”

There wouldn't have been any point in running after them.

Mourad was shaking all over.

“The other guy's name is Nacer. He's the guy who was driving the BMW. It's not just Anselme who thinks so. We all know. We've already seen him around here in that car.”

And he started crying. Like a kid. I went up to him and hugged him. He only came up to my chest. His sobs increased in intensity.

“It's nothing,” I said. “It's nothing.”

Nothing, except that there was too much shit in this world.

I
'd lost all sense of time. In my head, my thoughts were shooting off in all directions. I'd left Mourad outside Anselme's building. He'd slipped the plastic bag with the gun in the glove compartment, and said, “Ciao.” He didn't even look back, didn't even make a sign. I knew he was upset. Anselme would know what to say to him. How to cheer him up. In fact, I was happy to know he was with Anselme rather than with his grandfather.

Before leaving La Bigotte, I'd looked all over the parking lot for Serge's car. I wasn't under any illusions. So I wasn't disappointed when I couldn't find it. Pavie must have driven off in it. I hoped she really had a license, and hadn't done anything stupid. The usual pious wishes. Like believing she was somewhere safe right now. At Randy's, for example. I didn't believe it, but it had given me an incentive to get back in my car and drive back down to the center.

Now Art Pepper was playing
More for Less
. A real gem. Jazz had always had the effect on me of putting the pieces back together. At least as far as feelings were concerned. Affairs of the heart. But this was a whole other ball game. There were too many pieces. Too many opinions, too many leads. And too many memories coming back to the surface. I needed a drink badly. Maybe two.

I drove past the quays, past the basin of La Joliette, as far as the Quai de la Tourette, then drove around the Butte du Parvis Saint-Laurent. The Vieux-Port was there, girdled with lights. Immutable and magnificent.

I remembered some lines of Brauquier:

 

The sea,

Half asleep, took me in her arms,

As if welcoming a stray fish . . .

 

I slowed down in front of the Hotel Alizé. That was my destination. But I didn't have the courage to stop. To see Gélou. Meet Alex. I couldn't handle it right now. I had a thousand excuses not to get out of the car. There was nowhere to park, they must be out somewhere having dinner, that kind of thing. I promised myself I'd call later.

A drunkard's promise! I was already on my third whisky. My old Renault 5 had led me with my eyes closed to the Plaine. To Hassan's bar, Les Maraîchers. Where you're always welcome. A bar popular with young people, the friendliest in the neighborhood. Maybe in the whole of Marseilles. I'd been hanging out there for years. Since before all the little streets between the Plaine and Cours Julien filled up with bars and restaurants and clothing stores. The neighborhood had become quite hip these days. But everything was relative. You still didn't parade around in Lacoste, and you could drink
pastis
until dawn.

One night, a few months earlier, Hassan's bar had been torched. Because, it was said, the draft beer was the cheapest in Marseilles. Maybe it was true. Maybe it wasn't. People say all kinds of things. In this town, there always had to be something behind anything that happened. Some mystery. Some secret. Otherwise, it would be an ordinary news item, without any interest.

Hassan had repaired the bar. The paintings, everything. Then, calmly, as if nothing had happened, he'd hung on the wall the photo of Brel, Brassens and Ferré together at the same table. To Hassan, that photo was a symbol and a testimonial. You didn't listen to just any old crap in his bar. The music he played had to be meaningful, and it was only meaningful if it had heart. When I'd entered, Ferré was singing:

 

Oh Marseilles it seems the sea has wept

Words that once walked arm in arm

That once were so ardently kept

On lips that now have lost their charm

Oh Marseilles . . .

 

I'd found a seat at a table, in the middle of a group of young people I knew a little. Regulars. Mathieu, Véronique, Sébastien, Karine, Cédric. I'd bought a round when I sat down, and it had been followed by other rounds. Now Sonny Rollins was playing
Without a Song
. With Jim Hall on guitar. From his best album,
The Bridge
.

It was doing me a lot of good, being here, in a normal world. With young people who felt good about themselves. Hearing that frank laughter. That talk, flying happily on fumes of alcohol.

“You mustn't hit the wrong target, dammit!” Mathieu was yelling. “Why do you want to screw the Parisians? It's the State we should be screwing! Who are the Parisians? The most affected, that's who. They live next to the State, that's why. We're far away, so of course we get along better.”

The other Marseilles. The Marseilles with a tradition of being a touch libertarian. This was a city where the black flag had flown over the prefecture for forty-eight hours during the 1871 Commune. Five minutes from now, they'd suddenly change the subject. They'd start talking about Bob Marley, and Jamaicans, and how if you have two cultures, you're more likely to understand other people and the world around you. They could spend the whole night talking about that.

I stood up and pushed my way to the bar to find a phone. She answered at the second ring, as if she'd been waiting for a call.

“Montale here,” I said. “I hope I didn't wake you?”

“No,” Cûc said. “I was thinking you'd call. Sooner or later.”

“Is your husband there?”

“He's in Fréjus, on business. He'll be back tomorrow. Why?”

“I wanted to ask him something.”

“Maybe I could give you the answer?”

“I'd be very surprised.”

“Ask it anyway.”

“Did he kill Hocine?”

She hung up.

I dialed the number again. She answered immediately.

“That wasn't an answer,” I said.

Hassan placed a glass of whisky in front of me. I winked at him in gratitude.

“It wasn't a question.”

“I have another one, then. Where can I get in touch with Mathias?”

“Why?”

“Do you always answer a question with another question?”

“I don't have to answer you.”

“I'm sure Naïma is with him!” I cried.

The bar was full to bursting. Around me, people jostled. B. B. King's
Rock Me Baby
was playing so loudly the sound was distorted, and everyone was screaming along with it.

“What of it?”

“What of it? Stop screwing around with me! You know what's going on. She's in danger. So is your son. It's obvious! It's obvious!” I repeated, shouting now.

“Where are you?”

“In a bar.”

“I can hear that. Where?”

“Les Maraîchers. In the Plaine.”

“I know it. Don't move, I'll be right there.”

She hung up.

“Everything OK?” Hassan asked.

“I don't know.”

He served me again, and we clinked glasses. I went back to the table where my young friends were.

“You've gotten a head start on us,” Sébastien said.

“Old people are like that.”

 

Cûc made her way through the crowd to my table. All eyes converged on her. She was wearing tight-fitting black jeans, an equally tight-fitting black T-shirt, and a denim jacket. I heard Sébastien say, “Wow! What a looker!” I'd done a stupid thing, letting her come here, but I was no longer in a fit state to think clearly about anything. Except her. And how beautiful she was. Even Jane March might as well put her clothes back on and go home.

She found an empty seat, as if by magic, and sat down facing me. The young people were trying to keep out of it, sounding each other out about going somewhere else. How about the Intermédiare, nearby, where a blues singer named Doc Robert was performing? Or the Cargo, a new venue on Rue Grignan, where the Mola-Bopa quartet played jazz? They could spend hours like that. Talking about places where they might finish the night, and not moving.

“What are you drinking?”

“The same as you.”

I signaled to Hassan.

“Have you eaten?”

She shook her head. “A snack, around eight.”

“We'll have a drink, and then I'm taking you to dinner. I'm hungry.”

She shrugged, then pushed her hair back behind her ears. The gesture that got me every time. Her face, now revealed, was turned toward me. She'd painted her lips, discreetly. She smiled and looked into my eyes. Her own eyes were like those of a wild animal that knows it will get its prey in the end. Cûc seemed to exist on that border where a human being takes on a kind of animal beauty. I'd known it since the first time I'd seen her.

Now, it was too late.

“Cheers,” I said.

Because I didn't know what else to say.

Cûc liked to talk about herself, and she didn't hold back during the meal. I'd taken her to Chez Loury, on Carré Thiars, near the harbor. The food is excellent, whatever Gault and Millau say. And they have the best selection of Provençal wines. I chose a Château-Sainte-Rosaline. Definitely the greatest of Provençal reds. The most sensual.

“My mother came from an important family. Well-educated and aristocratic. My father was an engineer who worked for the Americans. In 1954, when the country was partitioned, they left the North. For him, it was like being uprooted. He was never happy again after that. His relationship with my mother deteriorated. He became more and more withdrawn. They should never have gotten together . . .

“They weren't from the same world. In Saigon, the only people who came to our house were friends of my mother. The only things we ever talked about were things that came from the United States or France. By that time, everyone knew the war was already lost, but . . . It was strange, but we weren't really aware of the war. Later, yes, during the big Communist offensive. I mean, there was an atmosphere of war, but not the war itself. It was like being suffocated. A lot of nighttime visits and searches.”