The Most Beautiful Book in the World (6 page)

“It's dreadful,” she explained. “The locks were changed this morning, I'm the only person who has a new set of keys, and yet this woman found a way to get in and out again.”

They sat down across from her to take notes.

“Ma'am, forgive us for insisting on this point: are you absolutely sure you saw this old woman again?”

“I knew you were going to say that. You don't believe me . . . I wouldn't believe it either if I hadn't experienced it. I cannot blame you for thinking I'm mad . . . I understand only too well . . . No doubt you'll advise me to go and see a psychiatrist—no, no need to protest, that's what I'd say too if I were in your shoes.”

“No, ma'am. We're just keeping to the facts. Was the old woman the same one as yesterday?”

“She was dressed differently.”

“Does she look like anyone?”

This question confirmed in Odile's mind that the policemen thought this was a matter for a psychiatrist. How could she blame them?

“If you had to describe her, who does she remind you of?”

Odile grew thoughtful: if I confess that she looks vaguely like my mother, they will definitely take me for a nutcase.

“Nobody. I don't know her.”

“And what does she want here, in your opinion?”

“I haven't the faintest, I told you I don't know her.”

“Why does she frighten you?”

“Listen, dear sir, don't go trying some amateur psychoanalysis with me! You're not a therapist and I'm not a patient. This person is not some projection of my phantasms but an intruder who has been entering my apartment, for what purpose I have no idea.”

Because Odile was getting carried away, the policemen murmured some vague excuses, and that is when she had a sudden revelation.

“My rings! Where are my rings!”

She hurried to the dresser next to the television, opened the drawer, and brandished an empty dish.

“They're gone! My rings are gone!”

The policemen's attitude changed instantly. They no longer thought she was deranged, and the case now followed its rational, routine course.

She listed and described her rings, put a value on each one, could not help explaining what was behind each of her husband's gifts, and signed the report.

“When will your husband be back?”

“I don't know. He doesn't keep me informed.”

“Will you be all right, ma'am?”

“Yes, don't worry, I'll be all right.”

After they had gone, everything seemed banal again, the intruder now reduced to a vulgar thief who worked with disconcerting discretion; but such banality got to Odile's fragile nerves, and she began to cry, loud and long.

 

“Two thousand seven hundred victims in the heat wave. The government is suspected of hiding the true figures.”

Odile was convinced of that, too. According to her own calculations, the number should be higher. That very morning, hadn't she seen, in the gutter in the courtyard, the corpses of two sparrows?

The bell rang.

Since there hadn't been a buzz from the entry phone downstairs, this had to be either a neighbor or her husband. Although her husband had his set of keys, he was in the habit of standing in the hallway and ringing the bell to announce that he was home from his assignment, in order not to startle Odile unduly.

“Dear Lord, if only it were him!”

When she opened the door, she reeled with joy.

“Oh my darling, I'm so pleased to see you! You couldn't have come at a better time.”

She threw herself at him and wanted to kiss him on the mouth; however, without actually pushing her away, he continued to hold her in his arms. “He's right,” thought Odile, “I'm crazy, getting excited like this.”

“How are you? How was your trip? Where were you, already?”

He answered her questions, but she had trouble registering his replies; she also found it difficult to ask the right questions. From two or three dark glances he gave her, followed by a heavy sigh, she understood that she was irritating him somewhat. But she found him so handsome that she couldn't concentrate. The effect of his absence? The more she gazed at him, the more irresistible she found him. Thirty years old, dark, not a single gray hair, his skin bronzed and healthy, his hands long and elegant, his powerful back ending in a narrow waist . . . How fortunate she was!

She decided to unburden herself at once of her bad news.

“We've been burgled.”

“What?”

“Yes. My rings have been stolen.”

She told him the story. He listened patiently without asking any questions or calling anything in doubt. Odile noted with satisfaction the difference between her husband's reaction and the policemen's. At least he believes me.

When she had finished, he headed for their room.

“Are you going to take a shower?” she asked.

He immediately came back out of the bedroom with a box containing her rings.

“Here they are, your rings.”

“What?”

“Yes, all it took was checking in the three or four spots where you usually put them. Hadn't you checked?”

“I thought . . . well, I was sure . . . the last time was in the dresser in the living room . . . next to the television . . . how could I have forgotten?”

“Now, now, don't get angry. Everybody forgets from time to time.”

He came over and kissed her on the cheek. Odile's surprise did not dissipate: surprised she had been so silly, surprised that her silliness could elicit Charles's kindness.

She hurried to the kitchen to fix him something to drink, and came back with a tray. And then she noticed that he hadn't left any luggage in the entrance.

“Where's your luggage?”

“Why should I have any luggage?”

“You've just come back from a trip.”

“I'm not staying here.”

“Pardon?”

“I haven't lived here in long time, or hadn't you noticed?”

Odile put the tray down and leaned against the wall to catch her breath. Why was he speaking to her in such a rough manner? Yes, of course, she had noticed, more or less, that they did not see much of each other, but to go so far as to declare that they no longer lived together . . . What on earth . . .

She dropped to the floor and began to sob. He came over, took her in his arms, and was kind once again: “Come now, don't cry. There's no point in crying. I hate to see you like this.”

“What have I done? What did I do wrong? Why don't you love me anymore?”

“Stop this nonsense. You haven't done anything wrong. And I love you very much.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“As much as before?”

He took his time to reply, for his eyes were filling with tears while he caressed her hair.

“Perhaps even more than before . . .”

Odile, reassured, stayed like that for a long moment, leaning against his powerful chest.

“I'm going to get going,” he said, helping her to get up.

“When will you be back?”

“Tomorrow. Or two days from now. Please don't worry.”

“I'm not worried.”

Charles left. Odile had a heavy heart: where was he going? And why such a sad expression on his face?

When she came back into the living room, she picked up her bowl full of rings and decided to put it away in the dresser in the bedroom. This time she wouldn't forget.

 

“Four thousand have died in the heat wave.”

No two ways about it, the summer was turning into an exciting one. From her apartment, where she had the air conditioning on non-stop—when was it that Charles had installed it?—Odile followed the news report soap opera as she lit one Virginia cigarette after another.

She had made an arrangement with the concierge, quite a while ago actually, to have her do her shopping. From time to time, in exchange for a few banknotes, the concierge would prepare her meals, for Odile had never been much of a cook. Was this why Charles had drifted away from her? A ridiculous idea . . .

This was the first time he had ever inflicted such a punishment on her: to come back to Paris and stay elsewhere. She struggled to find some reason in their recent past that might justify his behavior, but nothing came to mind.

This was not her only concern: the old woman had come back.

Several times.

It was always the same thing: she appeared suddenly, then vanished.

Odile no longer dared call the police, because of the business with the rings: she would have to confess that she'd found them. To be sure, she could have contacted them, because even though she had made a mistake, she wasn't cheating anyone: after Charles's visit she had tossed the insurance claim form into the garbage . . .

Nevertheless, she sensed that the policemen would no longer believe her.

All the more so in that she had finally discovered what it was that was attracting the intruder—and this, too, was something the police would find hard to believe. The intruder was not dangerous, she was neither a thief nor a criminal, and yet she had shown herself to be a repeat offender often enough to make it amply clear what she was up to: the old lady was breaking in, in order to move things around.

Yes. As odd as that might seem, that was the sole purpose of her surprise visits.

Not only did Odile find the rings that she repeatedly thought had been stolen a few hours later in another room, but the old lady hid them each time in increasingly absurd places, the latest being the freezer compartment in the refrigerator.

“Diamonds at the back of the freezer! What can she be thinking?”

Odile had eventually come to the conclusion that this old lady, even if she was not a criminal, was certainly nasty.

“Or crazy! Completely crazy! Why take so many risks just to play such an absurd joke? One day I'll catch her red-handed, and then I'll find out.”

The bell rang.

“Charles!”

She opened the door and found Charles on the landing.

“Oh, what a joy! Finally!”

“Yes, sorry, I couldn't come back as soon as I had promised.”

“Don't worry about it, you're forgiven.”

As he came into the apartment, he ushered in a young woman who had been standing behind him.

“You remember Yasmine, don't you?”

Odile did not dare contradict him by admitting that she did not remember the pretty slim brunette who followed him in. It was such a handicap, having no memory for people's physiognomy . . . “Don't panic. It will come back,” she thought.

“Of course. Come in.”

Yasmine came forward, kissed Odile on the cheeks, and as she embraced her Odile sensed that it mattered little whether she managed to identify this young woman: she despised her in any case.

They went into the living room, and began talking about the heat wave. Odile valiantly took part in the conversation, although her mind could not help but wander from the words they exchanged. “This is absurd, talking about the weather in a worldly way in front of a stranger when Charles and I have so much to say to each other.” Suddenly she interrupted the discussion and stared at Charles.

“Tell me, is it children that you're missing?”

“What?”

“Yes. I've been wondering these days what went wrong between us, and it occurred to me that you must have wanted children. As a rule, men don't care as much about having children as women do . . . Would you like children?”

“I have children.”

Odile thought she must have misheard.

“What?”

“I have children. Two of them. Jérôme and Hugo.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Jérôme and Hugo.”

“How old are they?”

“Two and four.”

“Who did you have them with?”

“With Yasmine.”

Odile turned toward Yasmine, who gave her a smile.
Odile, wake up, you're having a nightmare, this isn't real.

“You . . . you . . . you've had two children together?”

“Yes,” confirmed the schemer, elegantly crossing her legs, as if it were nothing special.

“And you come into my house, not the least bit bothered, with a smile, to tell me this? You are monsters!”

What happened after that was somewhat confused. Odile's sorrow so upset her that between her cries and her tears she had no idea what people were saying around her. Several times Charles tried to take her in his arms; each time she violently shoved him away.

“Traitor! Traitor! It's all over, you hear, it's finished! Go away! Get out of here, now!”

The more she tried to make him leave, the more he clung to her.

They had to send for a doctor, get Odile to lie down in bed, and force her to take a tranquilizer.

 

“Twelve thousand victims in the heat wave.”

“Good for them!” cried Odile jubilantly to her television screen.

Over the last few days, things had taken a turn for the worse: Charles revealed the ugly side of his nature and ordered her to leave the apartment.

“Never, you hear,” she had responded, on the phone. “You will never live here with your slut! These walls are mine by law! And don't try coming around, I won't open the door. Anyway, you don't have the right keys anymore.”

At least the intruder had served some purpose! A providential intruder, that old lady.

Thus, Charles rang several times at the door, trying to negotiate his entrance. She refused to listen. Stubborn, he sent for the doctor.

“Odile,” declared Dr. Malandier, “you are exhausted. Don't you think a short stay in a convalescent home would do you a world of good? We'd be better able to look after you.”

“I can manage perfectly well on my own, thank you very much. To be sure, I'm behind with my articles because of all these problems; however, I do know myself: after a few nights, once I'm better, I'll finish writing them all at once.”