Liberty Bar (17 page)

The young man broke into a run and
answered:

‘I don't know yet. It's
that way … In the water …'

His girlfriend remained where she was, her
hands clasped together, not daring to advance or retreat.

‘I can see him! … Come
quick!'

As the shouts grew feebler, they turned
into desperate gurgles. The young man could make out hands clinging to the plank and a
head sticking out of the water, but he had no idea what to do. He waited, with his face
turned towards the steps that led down to the wharf and kept repeating:

‘Come quick!'

A voice said tonelessly:

‘It's Gassin.'

Seven men now arrived, the five drinkers
from one bar and two from the other.

‘Come nearer … You take one
arm and I'll get the other.'

‘Go careful on
the plank'

It sagged beneath their weight. From a
hatch on the barge a female figure all in white, with fair hair, started to emerge.

‘Have you got him?'

The old man was no longer shouting. He
hadn't passed out. He was staring straight in front of him, uncomprehendingly,
making no attempt to help his rescuers.

They hauled him up out of the water by
stages. He was so limp that he had to be dragged on to the wharf.

The figure in white walked across the
gangplank. She was young, wearing a long nightdress, with nothing on her feet, and the
moonlight which lit her from behind picked out the lines of her naked body under the
cotton. Only she still stared down at the water, which was becoming calm again, and then
it was her turn to scream as she pointed at something as hazy and pallid as a
jellyfish.

Two of the men who were tending the
boatman turned to look, and when they too saw the milky patch on the black water they
felt the same chill run up and down their spine.

‘Over there! … There's a
…'

They all looked, forgetting the boatman,
who lay flat out on the stones of the wharf, which was by criss-crossed by water
runaways.

‘Bring us a boat-hook!'

It was the girl who fetched one from the
deck of the barge and handed it to them.

It was no longer the same. Neither the
atmosphere. Nor
even the temperature of the night air! It felt
suddenly colder, with pulses of warm air.

‘Have you got him?'

The iron tip of the boat-hook moved
through the water, prodding the shapeless mass in an attempt to hook it. One man lying
flat on his stomach on the plank was stretching with one hand, trying to get hold of the
clothes on the body.

And in the night, on the barges, there was
a stir. People were there, standing, waiting and not speaking.

‘Got him!'

‘Pull him in … gently
now.'

On the wharf water was draining out of the
old boatman as out of a sponge, while the body of a drowned man, bigger, heavier more
deeply inert, was being hauled up. From a tug some way off came a voice which asked
simply:

‘Dead?'

The girl in the nightdress watched while
the men lay the body down on the wharf, a metre from the first one. She did not seem to
understand: her lips trembled as though she were about to burst into tears.

‘Good God! It's
Mimile!'

‘Ducrau!'

Men who were upright stood over men who
were prone but none knew which way to look. They were shaken, shocked. They wanted to do
something and they all looked scared.

‘We should … straight away
…'

‘Yes … I'll go
…'

One of them ran off
toward the lock. They heard him knock with both hands on the lock-keeper's door
and shout:

‘Quick! Get your first-aid box!
It's Émile Ducrau!'

Émile Ducrau … Émile Ducrau
… Mimile
? The words were spoken, repeated from barge to barge. People
clambered over rudders and gangplanks while the landlord of the bar kept raising and
lowering the arm of the drowned corpse.

The old man was forgotten. No one even
noticed that he had sat up, obscured by the legs which hemmed him in, and was looking
around him in a daze.

The lock-keeper arrived at a run. A man
scurried down the stone steps just ahead of a policeman.

A window opened on the second floor of the
tall house and a woman leaned out, coloured pink by a rose-coloured silk lampshade.

‘Is he dead?' people
whispered.

No one knew. They could not know. The
lock-keeper set up his respirator. They could hear the regular action of the pump.

In the midst of the confusion, the
half-formed words, the muttered orders, the sound of soles crunching on gravel, the
boatman half propped himself up on his hands, slumped and collided with a man standing
next to him, who helped him to his feet.

It was all insubstantial and blurred,
muffled, distorted, as if it was all happening under water.

The old man, who was just managing to stay
upright, stared down at the other body as if he were dreaming it
all.
He panted, still drunk, his breath reeking more strongly of alcohol than ever.

‘He tried to grab me down
there!'

Seeing him standing up and, even more,
hearing him speak was as strange as if he had been a ghost. He gazed at the body, the
artificial respirator and the water, especially the water just under the gangplank.

‘The swine wouldn't let go of
me!'

They listened but didn't believe
him. The girl in white tried to put a scarf around his neck, but he pushed her away and
stayed rooted to the same spot, ruminating, suspicious, as if he had come up against a
superhuman problem.

‘It came up from the bottom,'
he muttered to himself. ‘Something grabbed my legs. I gave it a good kicking, but
the more I kicked the more it wrapped itself around me.'

One of the boatmen's wives brought a
bottle of brandy, poured a glass and held it out to the old man, who spilled more than
half of it, for he couldn't take his eyes off the body and went rambling on:

‘What exactly happened here?'
asked the policeman.

But the old man just shrugged his
shoulders and continued his one-track monologue, more quietly, in the thickets of his
beard,

Apart from those who were working the
pump, people hung around in groups on the wharf. They were waiting for the doctor.

‘Go back to bed,' someone said
to his wife.

‘Will you come and tell me if
…?'

No one had noticed the
old man purloin the brandy, which had been left on a block of dressed stone. He was now
sitting by himself with his back against the wall of the quay, drinking from the bottle
and thinking such bitter thoughts that his face was screwed up tight.

From where he sat, he could see the
drowned man. It was at him that his grumbling was directed. For he was blaming him for
something. He swore at him. He accused him of dark deeds and from time to time even
challenged him to come back and square up.

The girl in the nightdress tried to take
the bottle away from him, but all he said was:

‘Go to bed, you!'

He pushed her away, for she was preventing
him from seeing the man who had been rescued. They were about the same height, but the
other man was broader, bulkier, with an enormously thick neck and a square-shaped head
covered with mass of hair.

There was the sound of a car engine.
People turned to look at the shadowy figures which emerged from it up on the quay and
then came down the stone steps. There were policemen and a doctor. Even before they knew
what had happened, the police were telling the onlookers to move back. The doctor put
his bag down on a concrete block.

An inspector in plain clothes who had been
talking to bystanders turned his attention to the old man, who had been pointed out to
him. But it was too late to question him. He had emptied half the brandy bottle and was
glaring suspiciously at everyone.

‘Is he your
father?' the inspector asked the girl in the nightdress.

She didn't seem to understand. Too
many things were going on at the same time. The landlord of the bar stepped in and
said:

‘Gassin was already pretty drunk. He
must have slipped off the gangplank.'

‘And the other man?'

The doctor was undressing the other
man.

‘Émile Ducrau, the one who owns tugs
and quarries. He lives over there.'

He motioned to the tall house. The
venetian blinds on the first floor were still leaking thin streams of light and the
windows on the second still showed pink.

‘On the second floor?'

Bystanders explained hesitantly:

‘First,' said one.

Another added mysteriously:

‘On the second too. I mean,
he's got somebody on the second floor.'

‘You mean he's been playing
house with somebody else?'

High above them the window of the pink
room shut, and the blind came down.

‘Anyone told the family?'

‘No. We were waiting to know what
was happening.'

‘Go and put some stockings
on,' one boatman said to his wife. ‘And fetch me my cap.'

And so, from time to time figures were
observed moving from one boat to the next. Through hatches and portholes
oil lamps could be seen, and even framed photographs were visible
hanging on pine walls.

The doctor said in the inspector's
ear:

‘You'd better call the chief.
This man was knifed before being thrown into the water.'

‘Is he dead?'

It was as if the drowned man had been
waiting for just that question to open his eyes and, with a gasp, cough up water. He was
seeing everything at an angle because he was lying on his back, so that his horizon was
the star-studded sky. From where he was, the people round him rose giant-like into the
heavens, legs resembling interminable columns. He said nothing. Perhaps he was not yet
thinking anything. He looked with eyes that were slow and flinty, but gradually they
relaxed and became less fixed.

His gasp must have been audible, for
everyone started forward at the same instant, and suddenly the policemen imposed the
usual, official order on proceedings, that is that they formed into a line, held back
the crowd and let through only those who needed to be there.

The man on the ground saw the space around
him empty and then a lot of police uniforms and silver-braided police headgear. He
continued dribbling greyish water, which ran over his chin down on to his chest, while
his arms were being continuously pumped. They were his arms. He watched their movements
out of curiosity and frowned when someone at the back of the crowd said:

‘Is he dead?'

Old Gassin got to his feet, without
relaxing his hold on the bottle. He took three faltering steps, parked himself
between the rescued man's legs and spoke to him. His speech so
thick and his tongue so clotted that no one understood a single word.

But Ducrau saw him. He did not take his
eyes off him. He was thinking. He seemed to be racking his memory …

‘Move further back!' the
doctor said crossly and he pushed Gassin so roughly that the drunk went sprawling on the
ground, broke his bottle and stayed where he was, moaning and fuming, as he tried to
fend off his daughter, who was bending over him.

Another car stopped on the quay above and
a new group formed around the police chief.

‘Is he fit to be
questioned?'

‘No harm trying.'

‘You think he'll pull
round?'

It was the man, Émile Ducrau, himself who
replied, with a smile. It was a peculiar smile, still not fully formed, more a grimace,
but everyone had a clear sense that it was an answer to the question.

Somewhat uncertainly the police chief
acknowledged him by removing his hat.

‘I'm glad to see that
you're feeling better.'

It was awkward speaking down from a height
to a man whose face was turned up to the sky above while the rescue team were still
working on him.

‘Were you attacked? Was it far from
here? Do you know where exactly you were stabbed and then thrown into the
water?'

Water was still coming out of his mouth,
in weak spurts. Émile Ducrau was in no hurry to reply or even to try and
speak. He turned his head a little because just then the girl in
white passed through his field of vision, and his eyes followed her until she reached
the gangway.

She had gone, with the help of a
neighbour, to make coffee for her father, who resisted whenever anyone suggested he
should go home to bed.

‘Do you remember what
happened?'

And since he was still not responding, the
police chief took the doctor to one side and asked:

‘Do you think he
understands?'

‘I'd say so.'

‘But …'

They had their backs to the prone man when
they were stupefied to hear him say:

‘… you're hurting
me!'

All eyes turned to him. He was showing
signs of impatience. It seemed that trying to speak was a great effort to him. Moving
one arm painfully, he added:

‘Wanna go home.'

What his hand was trying to do was to
point at the house on six floors, a little way off behind him. The police chief looked
rather put out and hesitated.

‘Sorry to insist, but it's my
job. Did you see your attackers? Did you recognize them? Maybe they haven't gone
very far.'

Their eyes met. Émile Ducrau's gaze
was steady. Yet he did not answer.

‘There's going to have to be
an investigation, and the prosecutor's office is bound to ask me if
…'

What happened next was
unexpected. The shapeless bulk, which had looked so limp as it lay on the light-coloured
stones of the unloading wharf, roused itself briefly and pushed away everything that
cramped its movements.