On Leave (15 page)

Valette protested.

“I'm not saying that to be unkind,” he said, forcing them to walk on. “But it comes to the same thing. You don't know a thing about … all that!” And with a nod of his head he pointed to the Boulevard de Grenelle and the elevated metro. “I could have shown you a thing or two! We should have got together more often these last few days…”

“Loads of tricks to pass on,” he went on, his voice now rasping. “Because you're chums … Strange to say, I used to really like hanging out of an evening with my chums. Didn't you? I bet you didn't. You're not the sort as wastes time hanging out.”

“I grew out of it,” Lachaume said. “Wasting time doesn't really matter.”

“You're making progress,” Lasteyrie said cheekily. “But watch out! If you carry on the same way, your career as a teacher will hit the rocks…”

He suddenly stopped and gave a short burst of laughter.

A tramp emerged from the shadows and saluted Valette at three paces.

“Corporal!” he said. “Have you got anything for an ex-Legionnaire?”

Valette pulled some coins out of his pocket and tried to make out what they were by the light of a streetlamp.

“It's for a former Legionnaire,” the guy insisted. “The genuine article. I've got the tattoos. Wanna see?”

“No,” Valette replied.

“Yes,” Lasteyrie said. “Show me everything.”

The guy rolled up the sleeves of his parka and in the light of the streetlamp showed off two faded bluish tattoos on his forearms: one side of each design was marked Verdun and the other Sidi Bel Abbès.
*

“That's impressive,” Lasteyrie said.

The guy nodded agreement and glumly held out his hand. When he saw he had an alloy coin worth 100 francs, he suddenly put his hand over his face, shot a sideways glance at Lasteyrie as if to stifle a laugh, and whispered, “There's something wrong with those as come from Brittany. Something missing. How come we all end up at the bottom of the pile?” He moved even closer to Lasteyrie, rubbing his cheeks, still seeming to be stifling a laugh behind his hand.

“He's Breton, all right,” Lasteyrie said. “Do you see how he covers up a laugh? It's a habit they all have.”

“I'm from Brittany! Yes, I'm a Breton, from Avranches,” the man said, thumping his chest.

“You're a churchie,” Lasteyrie said.

“No, I am not!” He added less loudly: “I hate the men in black frocks. The other day I went into Notre-Dame, I crossed myself [he crossed himself as he said this] … It comes naturally to Bretons…”

“Let's go,” Lachaume said.

“Give him a chance!” Lasteyrie said, seizing him by the arm.

“So I crosses myself [he crossed himself again] … and I sees a confession box, you know what I mean … So I goes in and has a nap. But at six in the morning he comes in and puts on the light and I asks myself, How do I get out of here? So the watchman says to me, What are you doing there? You just wait! I understood—he was off to fetch the cops … So I says to them, What's the fuss? I had a little prayer, then I had a snooze. They go through all my pockets and then say, No, he didn't steal nothing. So what's the fuss? I did my little prayer and then dozed off … Ah! But in the night I saw loads of banknotes—big ones, too.”

“You had a dream?” Lasteyrie asked.

“No, no, in the … What are those things called?…
for the poor
! I saw thousand-franc notes, but I didn't take none. Just had a nap … It's a crying shame, ain't it? Us Bretons aren't allowed to sleep anymore!”

“Notre-Dame would make a great hotel, wouldn't it?” Lasteyrie said. “You could make heaps of rooms out of it.”

The tramp suddenly moved closer to him, hiding his face behind his hand.

“Yes, you could!” he whispered. “You could turn it into a hotel!… If someone like Robespierre came back, like they had in the old times, they would! Yes, they would! And what about the Foreign Legion, eh?” he added, with a malicious wink in one of his little eyes. “What would we do with the Foreign Legion then?”

“What are you talking about?” Lasteyrie whispered.

“The Revolution!” he said with a giggle, stroking his cheek. “The Revolution! First thing, the Legion would expel all the foreigners … The French don't know what's going on! And Bretons have got a screw loose. Something missing…”

“That must be why you've got spare room for a crate of plonk,” Lasteyrie said.

The tramp laughed behind his hand and then shook his head. “We've got a screw loose! How come we all sink to the bottom of the pile?”

“Because of the plonk,” Lasteyrie said casually.

“Yes, that's right! Because of the plonk!” the man responded with anger and conviction. “That's what's wrong with us! Drink!”

“You got it!” Lasteyrie said.

Meanwhile, the couple had vanished. The three friends looked for them in neighboring streets, then returned to shelter under the elevated metro from the rain that had started to come down.

“Now we have to make a decision,” Lasteyrie said. “We've got just enough time left. Montparnasse or Clichy?”

Lachaume and Valette looked at each other with doubt in their eyes.

“I'm taking charge now. Forward march!” Lasteyrie said.

“Where to?” Valette asked.

“Clichy. It's more…” He made a gesture with his hand.

“More what?”

“It's a better prospect for a threesome. Up there the chicks parade in flocks. Forward!”

“But it's farther away,” Lachaume said.

“Farther than what?” Valette asked.

“Farther than Montparnasse,” Lasteyrie answered. “It's true, it's a longer walk. Okay. Montparnasse it will be!”

“No,” Lachaume said. “Montparnasse turns my guts.”

“True, it is squalid,” Lasteyrie said.

“So why do you want us to go there, then?” Lachaume said in a burst of anger.

“Don't blame me! It was your idea.”

“We're off to a fine start!” Valette said.

“Forward march, Clichy-bound!” Lasteyrie said.

They walked a few steps. Lachaume stopped and said, “What the fuck are we supposed to do when we get there?”

“It's for tourists,” Valette said.

“Oh, you are thick!” Lasteyrie shouted, putting his fists on his hips.

“Honestly,” Lachaume said, “do you really like going to Clichy, Pigalle, Barbès, and so forth? All those garish lights and ghastly colors, those ugly barkers outside the clubs putting on an act, a whole crowd that would sell their fathers and mothers, tarts showing off in bars, all in slow motion, without the slightest conviction … Honestly, do you like it?”

“Shut up!” Lasteyrie said. “I can hardly hold myself back.”

Lachaume came back at him in a state of icy fury. “If you'd grown up in the provinces like I did, if you'd been to a music-hall show in the Municipal Theater at Arras, then you'd never want to set foot in Pigalle! But you Paris folk, you don't recognize shams, because you only see outsize versions! Do you understand what I mean?”

“Well, well, just listen to that,” Lasteyrie said mockingly. “You guys from the backwoods make me laugh. Tell me, Prof, where have you seen anything that wasn't a sham? Everything is a sham! All of this”—nodding toward Boulevard de Grenelle. “Forward!”

They started walking again.

“Look lively!” he said. “After midnight all girls are fair game.”

He took their arms and made them move on.

“The other girls get the last metro,” he said. “Parisian chicks watch their pennies! You can't imagine…”

“In any case, I'm leaving you,” Valette said. “My last train home is at one o'clock from Saint-Lazare.”

“You piss me off!” Lasteyrie suddenly bawled as he let go of their arms. “We've been freezing our balls off for an hour! So I'm off. Gimme my case. Cheery-bye!”

“Hang on, hang on,” Lachaume said.

“No more time to lose. Bye!”

He picked up his case, cast a glance around in all directions, then moved off.

“Where are you going?” Lachaume shouted after him.

By way of answer, Lasteyrie just waved his hand without turning around and shrugged his shoulders. Lachaume caught up with him and took his arm.

“Just where are you going?” he repeated suspiciously.

“Let go. No time to lose!”

He's agitated, and his dark little eyes won't meet Lachaume's; he's struggling to get his arm free of the sergeant's grip.

“Don't you ruin my suit!” he says. Then he switches mood entirely and giggles as if he'd just said something funny.

“Come on, let go,” he went on less roughly. “Look, I'm not an intellectual. I want a girl tonight and I don't care if she's faking it.”

But Lachaume had no intention of letting him go. “I want a girl, too,” he said. “We'll get one together…” His suspicions and his crazy hopes all disappeared beneath a lie that Lasteyrie registered with a taunting smile.

“At any rate, I have to get a room,” he said in a mocking tone. “I'm not going to spend all night walking around with my case.”

Lachaume jumped on the excuse.

There they were in a taxi on their way to Lachaume's hotel. The three of them sat in the back with Lasteyrie in the middle, like a prisoner. They were shivering from the freezing wind that blows along Boulevard de Grenelle from the Seine, making it one of the coldest thoroughfares in Paris.

“What about my train?” Valette said.

“It'll wait!” Lachaume answered. “Anyway, you're loaded. You can take a taxi.”

“All that way?” Valette whistled without thinking.

In the dark they could both feel Lasteyrie shrugging his shoulders in between them.

The hotel in Rue Cujas was full. Because of the bank holiday. The black at the reception was very sorry.

They went to Lachaume's room nonetheless, and the black brought them up hot toddies. Then they overpaid for the rest of the bottle of rum, about three-quarters full. They just couldn't get warm.

They had another drink, to break the ice that was now forming between them. They had never been so far apart. It was getting unbearable.

Lasteyrie got up and went to the door, carrying his suitcase.

“Where are you going?” Lachaume demanded, standing in his way.

“Let me through,” Lasteyrie answered, with a shrug.

Lachaume stood his ground. Lasteyrie carried on staring straight at him as he wedged his case against his knee and undid the catch.

“For once, Prof, you're making me laugh!” he sneered. It went like an arrow into Lachaume's heart.

As he spoke, he jerked the case upward with his two hands and spilled its contents onto the floor. Lasteyrie's army boots made a dull thump, then came the trousers, the shirt, and the dress cape. It looked like a cardboard cutout of human remains on the carpet.

“There you are,” Lasteyrie said hoarsely. “That's what was in the case, you twit!” Then he cleared his voice with what was left in the bottle of rum.

Lachaume ordered another bottle on the phone, and the black brought it up straightaway. He looked anxiously at the khaki remains on the floor. They were all sitting around them, Lasteyrie with his back to the only armchair in the room, Lachaume and Valette sitting against the bed, side by side. The bottle did the round slowly, through a haze of cigarette smoke. But it wasn't the drink that was restoring their friendship. It was the khaki outfit, grotesque and bizarre under the soulless light of a hotel room, that seemed to be bringing reconciliation. They'd rediscovered what they had in common: despair and the absurd. They celebrated it with rum and dropped the ash from their cigarettes onto Lasteyrie's uniform, which made them laugh with more and more hilarity as the drink took hold.

When Lena came in, pointed in astonishment at the remains on the floor, and, suppressing her laughter, said in her German accent, “Vot is dat? Haf you killed someone?” they collapsed in fits.

They clutched their ribs, wobbled to the side, mimicked her gesture, opened their mouths to try to say something, but just laughed ever louder.

At last Lachaume managed to haul himself upright with the help of the bedpost, and pointing at the kit the way Lena had, he forced out: “That's our youth on the floor! Best years of our lives!”

Lena opened her eyes wide, ready to join in laughing.

“The best years of our lives just went missing!” Lachaume repeated in a loud and dignified voice. Then Valette pulled him back down to the carpet, and he collapsed in a pile amid guffaws from everyone.

Lena was soon settled on the carpet, too, with her legs crossed, between Lachaume and Lasteyrie, who kept her supplied with cigarettes and rum.

“But who is the other guy?” she asked, pointing. “I see who this one is (she meant Valette, who was in uniform), but the other guy?”

They all laughed at her for keeping on asking, “Who is the other guy?”

“Just a working lad in the garment trade,” Lasteyrie said, drawing closer to her. “Just makes clothes … for ladies!” he added, nibbling her ear.

“And what's that?” she asked again, pointing at the uniform.

“The best years of our lives!” Lachaume repeated, as if it was obvious. “It's our best years that have gone AWOL … our youth!”

“So that's why we shot it,” Valette said, pretending to aim a gun at the khaki. “Bang! Bang! There's an end to it!”

 

CHAPTER NINE

There was a knocking at the door. Sharp, quick taps, one after the other. Lachaume half-opened an eye for a split second and smiled. He was in Arras and being woken by his mother. There was more knocking, and in his dream he yawned and stretched, wallowing in the thought of a big bowl of milky coffee awaiting him in the kitchen. After that he would shower and freshen up and cycle to the sports ground just outside town to train with his friends before the first class of the day at his high school. It was spring, the war was over, he wasn't a boy anymore, the girls were crazy about him, and life was great! There was more knocking. He stretched out his arm, trying to prop himself up on the floor so he could do a side roll out of bed, as he usually did, but as the hotel bed was higher off the ground than at home in Arras, his hand flapped around in the void, and he woke up with a start just as he was about to fall off. The knocking hadn't stopped.