Journey to the End of the Night (52 page)

Rivers aren't happy in the South. They seem to be sick, always drying up. Hills, sun, fishermen, fish, boats, ditches, wash troughs, vines, weeping willows?all want some, all clamor for water. Much too much water is demanded of them, so there isn't much left in the riverbed. In places it looks more like a badly flooded road than a genuine river. Seeing we'd come for pleasure, we had to hurry up and find some. When we'd finished our French fries, we thought we'd take a little boatride before lunch, that would be fun, me rowing of course, the two of them, Robinson and Madelon, facing me, hand in hand.

So off we go, merrily down the stream as they say, scraping the bottom here and there, she letting out squeals and he not quite easy in his mind either. Flies and more flies. Dragonflies everywhere, watching the river out of their big eyes and giving frightened little flicks of their tails. Amazing heat that makes the surface steam. We glide over the water from those long flat eddies back there to this tangle of dead branches ... We hug the burning bank, looking for whiffs of shade that we grab as best we can under a few trees not too riddled with sunshine. Talking makes you even hotter, if that's possible. On the other hand, you're afraid to admit you're not comfortable.

Robinson, naturally enough, was the first to be fed up with navigation. I suggested landing near a restaurant. We weren't the only ones to have that little idea. Every fisherman on that reach of the river was already settled at the bistrot before us, jealously nursing his
apéritif
, entrenched behind a siphon. Robinson didn't dare ask me if this cafe I had chosen was expensive, but I set his mind at rest by assuring him that the prices were posted and perfectly reasonable. It was true. He never let go of his Madelon's hand the whole while. Now it can be told that we paid our bill at the restaurant as if we had eaten, but we had only tried to eat. The less said of the dishes they served us the better. They're still there. After that, to spend the afternoon, it would have been too complicated to arrange a fishing party, and it would have made Robinson unhappy because he wouldn't even have seen his float. As for me, I was sick and tired of rowing, just from the morning's effort. That had been plenty. The training I'd had on the rivers of Africa was far behind me. I had aged in that as in everything else.

For a change of exercise, I suggested that a little walk along the bank would do us a lot of good, at least as far as the tall grass you could see up there less than a mile away, not far from that line of poplars.

So there we went, Robinson and I arm in arm, and Madelon a few steps ahead of us. It was easier that way through the grass. At a bend in the river we heard accordions. The sound came from a barge, a beautiful barge moored at that point in the river. The music attracted Robinson. Which was understandable in his situation, and besides he had always had a weakness for music. Glad to have found something that amused him, we parked right there on the grass, which wasn't as dusty as on the slanting bank nearby. We could see that it wasn't any ordinary barge. It was neat and well turned out, not meant for hauling anything, more of a houseboat than a barge, with flowers all over it and even a spanking little kennel for the dog. We described the houseboat to Robinson. He wanted to know all about it.

"I'd like to live on a clean little boat like that myself," he said then. "How about you?" he asked Madelon ...

"I see what you mean," she replied. "But that's an expensive idea you've got, Léon! I'm sure it would cost you a lot more than an apartment house ..."

We all started reckoning how much that kind of a houseboat might cost, and we couldn't get together ... Each of us insisted on his own figure ... Regardless of what we were counting, our class of people used to do it out loud ... Meanwhile, the accordion music came over to us as caressingly as you please, we could even hear the words of a song they were singing ... Finally we agreed that the houseboat, just as it was, must be worth at least a hundred thousand francs ... A figure to set you dreaming ...

Close your lovely eyes, for the hours are short ...

In the wonderful land, the beautiful land of drea-eams ...

That's what they were singing inside the boat, men's and women's voices mixed, a little out of tune, but very pleasant all the same because of the setting. It went with the heat and the country and the time of day and the river.

Robinson persisted in driving his estimates sky-high. The way we'd described the houseboat, he was sure it would cost a lot more ... Because it had a big glass window to let in more light and brass fittings all over, luxury in short ...

"Léon, you're knocking yourself out." Madelon tried to quiet him. "Why don't you stretch out on this nice thick grass and rest a while ... A hundred thousand or five hundred thousand, who cares? ... You haven't got it and neither have I ... So really there's no sense in working yourself up ..."

He lay down, but he kept working himself up about the price all the same, he wanted to know for sure, and he wanted to see this houseboat that cost so much ...

"Has it got a motor?" he asked ... We didn't know.

Just to please him, since he insisted, I took a look at the stern, to see if I'd see the exhaust pipe of a small motor.

Close your lovely eyes, for life is a dream ...

Love is a fan-ta-sy ...

Close your lovely eyes!

The people in there went on singing. We were drooping with fatigue ... They were putting us to sleep.

Suddenly the spaniel came bounding out of the kennel and stood on the gangplank barking in our direction. We woke with a start, and we gave the spaniel hell. He had frightened Robinson.

So then a character who seemed to be the owner came out on deck through the little cabin door. He said he wouldn't stand for anybody shouting at his dog, and we talked back. But when he noticed that Robinson was as good as blind, the man calmed down and felt foolish. He changed his mind about bawling us out and even let us call him a few names to get even. To make up for his rudeness, he invited us to come and have coffee on his boat, to celebrate, he added, his birthday. He wouldn't hear of our baking out there in the sun, and so forth and so on ... And besides it was lucky we'd turned up, because they were thirteen at table ... He was a young man, an eccentric ... He liked boats, he explained ... We could see that. But his wife was afraid of the sea, so they had moored their boat out here, on the beach, so to speak ... We went aboard, and everybody seemed glad to have us ... First of all his wife, a fine-looking woman, who played the accordion like an angel. Anyway, it was nice of them to have us over for coffee. We could have been almost anybody. It was trusting of them ... We realized right off that it wouldn't do to shame our charming hosts ... Especially in front of their guests ... Robinson had his faults, but as a rule he had a certain fine feeling. Just by the sound of their voices he realized that we had to behave and abstain from bad language. True, we weren't very well dressed, but we were neat and clean. The owner of the houseboat, I looked him over, must have been about thirty, with poetic brown hair and a nice sailor-type suit, but custom-made. And his attractive wife had really "velvety" eyes.

They had just finished lunch. Plenty of leftovers. We didn't say no to a piece of cake, certainly not. Or a glass of port to go with it. I hadn't heard such high-class voices in a long time. High-class people have a certain way of talking that intimidates you and frightens me personally, especially their women. It's really just a lot of half-baked, pretentious phrases, but as highly polished as antique furniture. Meaningless as they are, their phrases are terrifying. When you try to answer, you're afraid of slipping up. And even when they take the tone of the gutter and amuse themselves singing the songs of the poor, they hang on to that high-class accent, which inspires suspicion and antipathy. That accent always has the kind of whiplash that's needed for talking to servants. It's sexy, but it makes you want to tumble their women, just to see their dignity, as they call it, melt away. In a whisper I told Robinson about the furniture, all antiques. The place reminded me a little of my mother's shop, except naturally it was cleaner and more orderly. My mother's shop always smelled of old pepper.

The walls all around were hung with paintings by the owner. A painter, as his wife told me with lots of simper and gush. His wife loved her man all right. He was an artist, nice penis, nice hair, nice income, everything needed to make a woman happy; in addition, she had her accordion, her friends, her reveries on the meager, swirling water, she was quite content never to go anywhere ... Here they had all that plus all the sweet coolness in the world, enclosed between the half-curtains and the breath of the ventilator. And God-given security besides.

Seeing we were there, we thought we might as well make ourselves at home. Iced drinks, then strawberries and cream, my favorite dessert. Wriggling and simpering, Madelon accepted a second helping. She too was improving her manners. The men were taken with Madelon, especially the rich father-in-law. He seemed delighted to have Madelon beside him and went to no end of trouble to give her pleasure. He ransacked the whole table for delicacies just for her, and she lit into them with such enthusiasm that the tip of her nose was soon covered with whipped cream. To judge by the conversation, the father-in-law was a widower. If so, he'd forgotten it. Soon, what with the liqueurs, Madelon was tipsy. The suit Robinson was wearing and mine, too, showed signs of fatigue, of seasons and more seasons, but maybe in that dim light no one would notice. Still, I felt rather humiliated among those people, so comfortable in all respects, as clean as Americans, so well washed and well groomed, fit for a fashion parade.

Once liquored up, Madelon didn't behave so well. Aiming her little profile at the pictures, she started talking rubbish. The hostess noticed and took to the accordion again to gloss it over. Everybody sang, the three of us joined in under our breaths, but listlessly and out of tune, the same song as we'd been listening to outside, and then another. Robinson had managed to strike up a conversation with an elderly gentleman who seemed to know all there was to know about growing cacao trees. A splendid subject. A gettogether between colonials. To my amazement I hear Robinson saying: "When I was out in Africa? I was working for the Compagnie Pordurière in those days as their agronomist in chief? I used to mobilize a whole village to harvest the crop ..." And more of the same. He couldn't see me, so he gave himself free rein ... The sky was the limit ... Phony memories ... He really gave the old gentleman an earful ... A pack of lies ... Anything he could think of to put himself in the class of the old gentleman, who was really an expert. It exasperated and dismayed me to hear Robinson, who had always been rather reserved in company, shooting off his mouth like that.

They'd given him a place of honor in the depths of a big scented sofa. In his right hand he held a glass of brandy, while his left hand, with sweeping gestures, evoked the majesty of the untamed forests and the fury of the equatorial tornado. He was launched, well launched ... Alcide would have had a good laugh if he could have been there in the corner. Poor Alcide!

I can't deny it, we were very comfortable on their houseboat, especially as a light breeze had come up on the river and, framed in the windows, the fluted curtains began to flutter like merry and cool little flags.

More ices were served and then another round of champagne. It was the owner's birthday, he told us so a dozen times. For once he had decided to give everyone, even the wayfarer, pleasure. For once that was us. For an hour or two or possibly three, we would all be reconciled under his aegis, we'd all be pals, the known, the unknown, even strangers, even we three whom they had picked up on the riverbank
faute de mieux
, so as not to be thirteen at table. I was going to start singing my little song of good cheer, but then I changed my mind, suddenly too proud, too conscious. At that point, to justify their invitation that lay heavy on my mind, I saw fit to reveal that in my person they were entertaining one of the most distinguished physicians of Greater Paris! They could hardly have suspected it from my dress! Or from the low estate of my companions for that matter! But the moment they knew who I was, they declared themselves delighted and flattered, and every one of them started telling me about his very special little ailments. I took the opportunity to make friends with a tycoon's daughter, a sturdy young cousin of the skipper's, who suffered from hives and developed acid stomach on the slightest provocation.

When you're not used to the comfort and luxuries of the table, they go to your head in no time. Truth is always glad to leave you. With next to no encouragement it will set you free. And we manage very nicely without it. Amid this sudden plethora of comforts a fine megalomaniacal delirium finds no difficulty in overwhelming you. I started telling tall ones in my turn, intermittently discussing hives with the young cousin. You extricate yourself from your daily humiliations by trying, like Robinson, to put yourself on a level with the rich by means of lies, the currency of the poor. We're all ashamed of our ungainly flesh, our inadequate carcasses. I couldn't make up my mind to show them my truth; it was as unworthy of them as my rear end. I had to make a good impression at all costs. I started answering their questions with fantasies, same as Robinson had done in his confab with the old gentleman. I, too, was invaded by pride! .... My enormous clientele! ... The dreadful overwork! ... My friend Robinson ... the agronomist who had offered me the hospitality of his chalet ... on the outskirts of Toulouse ...

And besides, when your table companion has eaten well and had plenty to drink, he's easily convinced. Luckily! Anything goes! Robinson had preceded me in the furtive delights of impromptu cock-and-bull; it cost me very little effort to follow in his footsteps. Because of the smoked glasses he was wearing, the people couldn't see exactly what was wrong with Robinson's eyes. We generously attributed his misfortune to the war. From then on we were sitting pretty, raised first socially, then patriotically, to the level of the other guests, who had been rather taken aback at first by the whimsy of the painter husband, though to be sure his status as a fashionable artist obliged him now and then to do something weird and unexpected ... The guests began to find all three of us ever so charming and inconceivably interesting.