Papillon (5 page)

We telephoned for over two hours, oblivious to the danger. We were carried away. I told him that I had broken nothing, that my head was covered with bumps, but that I had no open wounds.

He had seen me being pulled down the stairs by the foot and told me that at each step my head had banged against the one above. He had never lost consciousness. He thought that Tribouillard had been badly burned and because of the wool was in serious condition. He was through for a while, at least.

Three quick taps warned me that there was trouble coming. I stopped. A few moments later the door opened. I heard someone shout:

“Get back, you bastard! Get to the back of the cell and come to attention!” It was the new trusty. “My name is Batton and my name suits my profession.” He trained a big ship’s lantern on the dungeon and my naked body.

“Here’s something to put on. But don’t you move. Here’s bread and water. Don’t eat it all at once; it’s all you’ll get for the next twenty-four hours.”

He let out a savage yell, then put the lantern up to his face. I saw that he was smiling, and not unkindly. He placed a finger to his lips and pointed to the things he was leaving me. There must have been a guard in the corridor, yet he wanted me to know that he was not my enemy.

And he wasn’t. In the bread I found a big piece of boiled meat and, in the pocket of the pants—oh riches!—a package of cigarettes and a lighter. Here such presents were worth a million. Two shirts instead of one, and woolen underwear that reached to my ankles. I’ll never forget Batton. What it meant was that he was rewarding me for getting rid of Tribouillard. Before the incident he had been only an assistant trusty. Now, thanks to me, he had the full title.

Since it required the patience of an Indian to locate the source of the “telephone” taps and only the trusty could do it, the guards being too lazy, Julot and I went at it to our hearts’ content. We spent the entire day sending messages back and forth. From him I learned that our departure was imminent: in three or four months.

Two days later we were led out of the dungeon and, each of us flanked by two guards, were taken to the office of the director. Three men sat behind a table facing the door. It was a kind of tribunal. The director acted as president, and the assistant director and the head warden were the associate judges.

“Ah, my fine fellows, so you’re here! What have you to say for yourselves?”

Julot was very pale, his eyes were swollen, and he probably had a fever. His arm had been broken for three days now; he must be in great pain. He answered very quietly, “I have a broken arm.”

“Well, you asked for it. That should teach you not to attack people. You’ll see the doctor when he gets here. I hope it will be within the week. The wait will be good for you; perhaps the pain will teach you something. You don’t expect me to have a doctor come specially for a choice character like you, do you? So you wait until the doctor has the time to come, then he’ll take care of you. Which doesn’t prevent me from sentencing both of you to the dungeon until further notice.”

Julot’s eyes met mine. He seemed to be saying: “That elegant gentleman has a nice way of disposing of other people’s lives.”

I turned back to the director and looked at him.

Thinking I wanted to speak, he said, “You don’t care for my decision? You take exception to it?”

I replied, “No, sir. It’s just that I feel an acute need to spit in your face. But I won’t because I’m afraid to soil my saliva.”

He was so surprised that he blushed, uncertain how to react. But the head warden knew. He called to the guards:

“Haul him away and take good care of him! I expect to see him groveling in an hour. We’ll break him in! I’ll make him clean my shoes with his tongue, both tops and bottoms. Give him the works. He’s all yours.”

Two guards grabbed my left arm, two others my right. I was forced to the ground, face down, arms behind my back, hands touching my shoulder blades. Handcuffs were put on me and a thumb-screw joining the index finger of my left hand to the thumb of my right. Then the warden pulled me up by the hair like an animal.

No need to go into further details. All you need to know is that I wore the handcuffs behind my back for eleven days. I owe my life to Batton. Each day he threw me the regulation piece of bread, but without the use of my hands I couldn’t eat it. Even when I pushed it against the bars with my head it was no use. But in addition Batton threw in bite-size pieces of bread—enough to keep me alive. I made little piles with my feet; then, flat on my stomach, I ate them like a dog. I chewed each piece thoroughly so as to get the full value.

On the twelfth day they took off my handcuffs. The metal had cut into my flesh and it was covered in spots with rotten meat. This scared the warden, especially when I fainted from the pain. When I came to, I was taken to the infirmary and washed, with sterilized water. The attendant insisted they give me an anti-tetanus injection. My arms were paralyzed; I couldn’t get them back to their normal position. Only after a half hour’s massage with camphorated oil was I able to bring them down to my sides.

I went back to my cell, and when the warden noticed the eleven pieces of bread, he said, “You’re going to have a feast! It’s funny, but you don’t seem very thin after eleven days’ fasting …”

“I drank a lot of water, chief.”

“Oh, so that’s it! I get it. Better eat a lot now so you’ll get your strength back.” And he left.

The idiot. He thought I hadn’t eaten anything for eleven days and that if I ate it all in one gulp, I’d die of indigestion.

Toward evening Batton slipped me some tobacco and cigarette papers. I smoked and I smoked, blowing the smoke into the heating duct, which of course didn’t work. I was at least putting it to some purpose.

A little later I called Julot. He also thought I hadn’t eaten for eleven days and advised me to go slow. I was afraid to tell him the truth for fear some bastard might decipher the message. His arm was in a cast, he was in good spirits, and he congratulated me for holding out.

According to him, the convoy would be leaving soon. The orderly had told him that the vaccine for the departing convicts had arrived. It usually came a month before the departure. Foolishly, Julot also asked me if I’d held on to my
plan
.

Yes, I’d held on to it, but I won’t describe what I went through to do it. My anus was painfully sore.

Three weeks later we were taken out of our cells. What was up? We were given sensational showers with soap and hot water. I felt myself come back to life. Julot laughed like a kid, and Pierrot le Fou was radiant with joy.

As this was our first time out of the dungeon, we had no way of knowing what was going on. The barber wouldn’t answer the brief questions I whispered to him.

An unfamiliar prisoner with an ugly face said, “I think we’re out of the dungeon. Maybe they’re scared of an inspection. The important thing is to keep us alive.”

We were each led into a normal cell. At noon, in my first hot soup in forty-three days, I found a small piece of wood. On the bottom side I read: “Departure in eight days. Tomorrow vaccination.”

Who had sent me this? It must be some prisoner kind enough to give us the news. He was aware that if one of us knew, all would know. It was surely pure chance that the message had come to me.

I quickly notified Julot by telephone. “Pass the word along.”

All night long I heard the telephone going. Once I’d given the message, I stopped. I was too comfortable in my bed and I didn’t want to get into trouble. And I wanted no part of a return trip to the dungeon—that day least of all.

E
N
R
OUTE TO THE
B
AGNE

D
URING THE EVENING
B
ATTON SLIPPED
me three Gauloises and a piece of paper on which I read: “Papillon, I know you’re leaving with a pleasant memory of me. I may be a trusty, but I try to do the prisoners as little harm as possible. I took the job because I have nine children and I’m in a hurry to get out. I’m going to try to win my pardon without doing too much harm. Good-by. Good luck. The convoy leaves the day after tomorrow.”

The next day we were assembled in groups of thirty in the corridor of the disciplinary section. Medics had come from Caen to vaccinate us against tropical diseases. Each of us got three inoculations and two quarts of milk. Dega stood near me. We were no longer observing the rules of silence for we knew we couldn’t be put back in the dungeon once we’d been inoculated. We talked in low voices under the guards’ noses; they didn’t dare say anything in front of the medics from town.

Dega was troubled. “Are they going to have enough paddy wagons to take us all at one time?” he asked me.

“I don’t see how.”

“Saint-Martin-de-Ré is pretty far, and if they take sixty a day it’ll take ten days. There’re almost six hundred of us here alone.”

“The main thing is that we’ve been inoculated. That means we’re on the list and we’ll soon be in the
bagne
. Cheer up, Dega, we’re on a new lap. You can count on me; I’m counting on you.”

He looked at me and his eyes gleamed with satisfaction. He placed his hand on my arm and said, “In life or death, Papi.”

The convoy was not worth describing except that we suffocated in our little closets in the van. The guards refused to let in any air, even to leave the doors ajar. When we reached La Rochelle, two men were dead of asphyxiation.

The people strolling on the quay—for Saint-Martin-de-Ré was an island and we had to take a boat to cross the channel—witnessed the discovery of the poor devils. They showed us no ill will. The police put the corpses on board with us, for they were supposed to deliver us at the other end dead or alive.

The crossing didn’t take long, but it gave us a chance to take in some good gulps of sea air. I said to Dega, “It smells of
cavale
.” He smiled. And Julot, who stood next to us, said:

“Yes, it sure does smell of
cavale
. Let’s try to stick together. At Saint-Martin they pick ten people at random for each cell.”

Julot was wrong. When we arrived, he and two others were summoned and placed apart. They were all escaped prisoners from the
bagne
; they’d been picked up in France and were going back for the second time.

In our cells, in groups of ten, we began a life of waiting. We were allowed to talk, to smoke, and they fed us well. The only danger was to the
plan
. For no reason you might suddenly be told to undress, then you were closely examined. First, every inch of your body down to the soles of your feet, then your clothes. Finally, “Get dressed!” then back to the cell.

That was our life: the cell, the mess hall, the yard where we spent long hours marching in line. One, two! One, two! One, two! … We marched in groups of one hundred and fifty. The queue was long, our wooden shoes clattered. Silence was obligatory. Then, “Break ranks!” Everybody sat on the ground; groups formed according to social categories. First, the men of the real underworld from all over—Corsica, Marseilles, Toulouse, Brittany, Paris, etc. There was even one man from Ardèche—me. And I must say in Ardèche’s favor that there were only two in that convoy of nineteen hundred men: a policeman who had killed his wife, and me. Conclusion: men from Ardèche are good men. The other groups just happened, for there were more amateurs going to the
bagne
than members of the underworld. Those days of waiting were called “observation” days. And they were; we were watched all the time.

One afternoon I was sitting in the sun when a man came up to me. He was small and thin and wore glasses. I tried to place him, but in our uniforms it was hard.

“Are you Papillon?”

“Yes, that’s me. What do you want?”

“Come to the toilets,” he said and left.

“That’s some Corsican square,” Dega said. “Most likely a mountain bandit. What does he want?”

“That’s what I’m going to find out.”

I went to the toilets in the middle of the yard and pretended to urinate. The man stood next to me, in the same position. Without looking at me he said, “I’m Pascal Matra’s brother-in-law. When he came to visit me, he told me that if I needed help, I was to come to you and use his name.”

“Yes, Pascal is a friend of mine. What do you want?”