No Man's Land (58 page)

JEAN GIONO

THE SALT OF THE EARTH

from
To the Slaughterhouse

translated by Norman Glass

M
ADELEINE WIPED HER HANDS QUICKLY
on the dishcloth. Her body shook when she thought about the rendezvous whistle. She was about to leave when her father came in. ‘Come here,' he said, ‘come and read this letter. Give Julia a call.'

Through the window, in the spring air, she could see the blue tops of the mountains above the almond trees, and down there, under the oaks, Oliver would be whistling.

‘Oh, it's always the same…' Madeleine muttered.

‘What's that?' Jerome asked.

‘Nothing. Give me the letter.' She closed the window and took her brother's letter.

‘Julia!' the father called.

Julia's big healthy body took up all the doorway. Her thighs were plump under her skirt. She ran a hand through her hair, black and shining like oil at the bottom of an earthenware jar.

‘We've got a letter from Joseph,' Jerome said. ‘Read loudly, Madeleine.' Leaning on his stick, he turned his good ear towards her. Julia looked out of the window, towards the spring, the mountains, and the almond blossoms.

‘“Dear wife and father…”'

‘What's the date?'

‘March 22nd… “Dear wife and father. Here's some good news for you. When I got the parcel we were on the march and you know my feet don't take too kindly to the road, so I waited. Thank you for the meat pie. Please send me some lard because I need it as usual to rub my feet. I can't walk for an hour without getting blisters. It's not so bad now that I've got the slippers, I put them on as soon as we arrive. But they let the water in. I was glad to get a card the other day from cousin Maria and hear she's taking life in her stride. I wanted to reply, but she scribbled the address and I can't make it out. If she's changed her farm, she'll come to Chauranes for sure. I know her. Be sure you don't lend her my old plough. That's what she's after. And as for getting anything back from her!…”'

‘Wait a minute,'the father said. ‘Come to think about it, Julia, how is that old plough?'

‘It's hung up by the hook and the handles,' she said. ‘I had a look at it. The wood's straight. It hasn't warped and it's nearly a month now since I poured on the remains of the oil.'

‘That's good, because we have to think about using it. Maria's at Saint-Firmin, isn't she?'

‘Yes, at Chauvinières near Saint-Firmin.'

‘Read on…'

‘“Life isn't much fun here, but there's nothing we can do about it. Let's hope we'll all soon be home. It was snowing a while ago, now it's raining. Don't forget the lard. Dear wife, I was at a farm where they've found a use for pig manure. I saw them putting it on the little plants. But it burns them up, I told them. They told me no, because it's the piss which burns, so they make a drain for the piss to run down and then they can use the dung. The ground isn't bad at all, it's been taken over from the landowners. Remember the fellow I told you about who came from Perpignan where he worked in a shoe factory, well, he got killed yesterday, but it was his own fault. They've told me that we may be going to the real fighting. I can't tell you where it is, but you must have read about it in the papers. Don't worry. It isn't even certain yet. Anyhow, we don't have any choice. Oh, I've got something else to tell you. A fellow from Valensole who's got relations at Colon told me that Bonnet's son had been killed. Tell his mother how sorry I am. Also I want to tell you what dolts you are for missing the Casimir farm. It was up for sale so you should have bought it, even if it wasn't ready yet for planting. I'll look after that myself when I get back. And how are things with Casimir? You told me his son, Oliver, is going to the front, so this time don't miss the opportunity. Those young ones always want to play the hero. Even if he doesn't get killed, there's only the grandfather and the mother and they might want to sell the land at the foot of the hill. That would be fine for us. Father, keep an eye on what's happening there. Soon as Oliver leaves, look the ground over. I don't seem to have anything more to say. A kiss for my sister, Madeleine. Don't forget what I've told you. I'm thinking about it. I kiss my dear wife and father. Joseph.”'

Julia sighed. She took the letter from Madeleine, folded it and put it in her pocket.

‘He's right,' the father said. ‘We haven't been very smart. I'll go have a look at Gardette's place this evening. It's Oliver's last…'

Julia interrupted him with a glance. ‘The man from the town hall is already on the fields,' she said.

‘Who did he want?' the father asked, scarcely opening his lips.

‘Not us,' Julia said. ‘He was opposite the door and when he saw me come out, he signalled to me to say no.'

‘So who did he want?'

‘It's Arthur, Arthur Buissonnades.'

‘Arthur!' the father exclaimed. ‘That tall fellow? Felicity's husband? The one who was so good at plucking grapes? The one who helped us the year of the storm? Is that the fellow?'

‘That's the one,' Julia said. ‘Felicity's alone with the child.'

‘Give me my stick,' the old man said. ‘I'm going there. A woman can't stay alone on a beautiful day like this with all that on her mind. What wretched times we live in!' He took his stick, went out and banged the door. Madeleine pressed her face to the window and watched her father. He hurried as fast as he could along the Buissonnades' road.

‘Too many have died,' Julia said. ‘Too many. It doesn't seem possible. Arthur! You remember, Madeleine?'

Madeleine's tears streaked down the window.

‘And we're all involved, you know,' Julia said. ‘Madeleine, that's something we don't think about often enough.' She went back to the cattle-shed.

The window felt cold against Madeleine's forehead. The glass was misty with her tears. She could no longer see the green corn, the almond blossoms and the swallows. Arthur! He was never that close to us, but that doesn't make it any easier to bear. A handsome man he was and so well built! And how he could laugh! The whole world was heavy with mist. If she opened the window everything would be clear again. She'd feel the fresh wind. She'd see tulips and watch the almond blossoms falling. God pardons us for not always thinking about death.

JEAN GIONO

NEWS FROM JOSEPH

from
To the Slaughterhouse

translated by Norman Glass

W
HERE COULD SHE HIDE
, where could she hide? Wherever she ran, things rose up against her. Her feet no longer recognized the threshing-floor, or the courtyard, or the path that led to the fountain, nor that fragment of meadow, nothing. Everything capsized around her. She stumbled against the stones and her skirt got tangled in her legs. Where could she hide herself?

She couldn't bear to see old Jerome as he looked at his hand; nor the sight of his earthy face furrowed by old age and ancient sorrows, his old man's mossy, earthy face all wet with big white tears; those trembling lips, that fallen chin which he couldn't lift to close his jaws, and the saliva and tears, and the moaning of a man at the end of his days. If that was all! But no. Through his tears he stared at his big right hand. It was deformed.

No. She had buried her head in her apron and wept with him, but suddenly she could stand it no more. Go away? No. Hide herself, get into some little corner like an animal, writhe on the ground, roll up into a hole in the earth and stay there. Stay there, huddled up, with her flesh, her tears, her sorrow.

Julia pushed open the stable door. The old horse turned its head and looked at the woman. It wasn't feeding time.

‘Move over,' Julia said.

She slid against the horse, went to the back of the stable and lay down in the straw under the trough, in the warmth, reassured by the horse's shadow, comforted by its smell and heat. The horse jangled its chain and gently tapped its hoof in the straw. So, just like that, they'd cut off Joseph's arm! His right one. It's done. There's nothing more to do, that's how it is. She'd got the news in a letter. The arm! The hand and all. They cut off his arm! Is it possible? How did they do it? Why did they do it? He must have suffered! Oh, Joseph, my poor love! And now there's nothing more on your right side? No more arm? That explained the long silence. That was why they hadn't heard from him for over three weeks. It was as though he'd been rubbed out with an eraser. No more Joseph! Lost in the wind. And that was when they'd cut off his arm. Where? At the elbow? Is there a stump or has it all been levelled off? Oh, my poor love!

‘Oh, Bijou,' Julia called to the horse. The old horse lowered its head towards her and sniffed her, spraying its heavy breath over her through the two jets of its nostrils. ‘You, you're happy!'

The horse's large, kind eyes were green and red. It had spent all its life looking down at the earth and up at the trees. Its eyes were brimming with sweet and ancient things.

She had been happy too. There was the dance-hall down in the village, which they used to decorate every Sunday with box-tree and oak branches. And Jerome came down from the hills with his accordion on a shoulder-strap, and young Mercier came down also with his brightly polished cornet. From one o'clock onwards the benches used to be packed with girls. But Julia went to stand behind the houses, at the edge of the apple trees from where you could see the road. She watched Madeleine arriving in her blue dress, her face red from the bright sun, but there was always a lovely blue air about her from the reflection in her eyes. ‘He's coming,' Julia used to say. ‘He's put on that handsome hat.' Then she ran across the orchard towards the hall. She just had time to sit down with the others, on the edge of the bench near the door, when he appeared, Joseph, standing in the doorway, almost filling it with his broad shoulders, and his big black hat tilted to the left of his head. The horse rubbed its forehead against Julia's shoulders.

‘Oh, Bijou, yes, my beauty!'

She had loved Joseph at once with the whole of herself, without holding anything back. She was smitten by him, by the way he swung his shoulders when he walked, by his solidity, the health glowing in his reddish-brown eyes. Jerome played the accordion, young Mercier said: ‘One, two,' then put his cornet to his mouth. And Joseph took her in his big arms.

‘Oh, my love, my poor love!'

His arm! They've cut off that arm. The one he put around me. Warm and firm around me when we waltzed! That was the hand that he touched me with the first time, there, on the cheeks, on the eyes, on the mouth. We were in the hay-shed at seven o'clock. We looked up through the sky-light at the night, violet like a plum. The smell of crushed hay when we sat down!

And all that happiness made me giddy as we nestled together and we were drunk with joy that ran through our bodies to our finger-tips. That was the hand he touched me with the first time. On my cheek. He touched the round of my cheek. Then my mouth and eyes. That was the hand he knew me with afterwards…

‘Oh, Joseph, oh, my poor love!'

And now there's only half of you left. You won't be touching me any longer with that hand, will you? It was a clever hand, darting around like a little animal, hot and hard, and no stranger to any part of me. Never again, will you? Why? Tell me. I haven't had that hand for very long. So, you'll have to learn to touch me with the other hand, won't you?

She was sitting in the straw. The old horse lowered its head again, stuck out its tongue and tried to lick Julia's cheek, but the bridle was too short.

‘Julia!' a man's voice called. It was Jerome.

‘Yes,' Julia said. She came out from under the trough.

‘I was looking for you. I was afraid. I saw you running away so wildly. Be reasonable, try to…'

They stood and faced each other in silence. Tears streamed down their faces.