Trio (9 page)

Someone is speaking, someone is lying, someone is playing at dying by degrees and at killing his family circle.

Who is the uncle? Who is the nephew? Who is the maid?

A voice, the same from beginning to end, despite the diversity of tones.

Anamnesis, whose literal meaning is the recalling to memory of things past is, in the language of psychoanalysis, a patient’s remembrance of the early stages of his illness.

In the present case, the anamnesis is triple:

1) That of the narrator,

2) That of the chronicler (relative to the work achieved up to the present time),

3) Formal (relative to the structure of the book which, after the halfway mark, is recomposed or decomposed by reascending; in other words, the themes are resumed in the reverse order of their formulation.)

In the end the attempt proves too difficult, but this doesn’t matter since the primary aim was to capture a voice.

Robert Pinget

That Voice.

Cutting in from time immemorial.

Or that letter addressed no one knows to whom, you keep coming across rough drafts of it.

Ask Théodore to sort papers.

His name whispered, he screams, he wakes up sweating in that bedroom where everything is starting all over again, that table, the dark, he went out and retraced his steps from the courtyard to the fields, following a narrow path.

A missing link.

The days slimy, the horror of memory.

A background noise, a murmur, a whisper, pledge or prayer or long speech, a nonsuit without appeal, the Parca jabbering.

Everything frozen in the cataclysm.

What voice, what faith.

A schoolboy’s slate here, but above all its sponge.

Two or three words.

Traces of effacement.

Two or three words, you can’t hear very well, the rest unpronounceable, nothing, zero name age place, zero.

To emerge from less than nothing below zero, actually impelled by you don’t know what, that mercury suddenly become nostalgic, searching for let’s say maternal warmth, vague whiff of a symbol but what does it matter, no one left to consider, two or three words amongst which this one, psspss.

A missing link.

Step over a wall or a foundation, a brick or concrete construction, the memory of something rough and cold to the touch, it could be stone, then step over other constructions more or less cold to the touch, now tread on gravel now on grass and stumble into some equally vague foliage, yes but to say tread on, step over, is to exaggerate, given his unstable equilibrium, very weak on his legs, more often flat on the ground than on his feet, crawling as much as walking, falling, standing up again, trial and error.

A doubt too about what he had come into contact with, his epidermis couldn’t be in very good shape, in short all this in the dark, the dense shadows and the scents of the glebe, the earth, the humus, how to put it, to try to forget the word putrefaction, for indeed rather than remembering it it’s a question of forgetting what for years
 
…
 

An All Saints’ Day as shitty as they come.

The display outside a country grocery, a crop of multicolored plastic corollas alternating with the chrysanthemums which are sad by nature, for a whole week no sooner has the grocer’s wife rearranged her display on the sidewalk, dangerous corner, than her customers arrive to do their daily shopping, a salesman in artificial flowers is there trying to peddle his wares but he’s left it too late, they’re fully stocked for this year, he’s told to wait, these ladies have to be served, that’s this November day started, a chilly morning, its slight fog soon dispersed, the sun’s shining but it’s no longer the light you get in summer, have to make the best of it.

Well yes then, the cemetery practically overflowing with flowers in memory of our dear departed, your late mother, your late son-in-law, do you think they’re in hell, I’m only joking, do you believe in that absurd old wives’ tale, the resurrection, how could anyone, can you imagine coming back for all eternity after I’m dead, me with my great big ass, do you need corsets when you’re a glorified body, and with which of my two husbands, that’s a big problem, indissoluble marriage, one of them would have to be ditched, I wouldn’t know which one to choose, you see, the first one made me so very happy
 
…
 

From less than nothing, below zero in fact.

Ask Théodore to sort papers.

A missing link.

Not say another word, not make another gesture without repenting it, contrition has always been my weakness and was probably my downfall until the day when all activity ceased, and I mean all, until the day much much later, it isn’t a question of years anymore but of God knows what, when in the darkness I once again felt the need to move around, when I couldn’t help observing that I was moving around among the constructions in question, and that compact darkness today, that darkness, this new time that I still don’t know and that by trial and error I’m going to have to shape, reshape, organize for my own purposes, a poignant thing in itself if it weren’t for the still unconquered fatigue of an ordeal such as no one has ever before undergone, not me at any rate.

An All Saints’ Day as shitty as they come.

Three children, my God how young I was, and the second one, my little Alfred, such a good boy, always looking after me, never bad-tempered, always cheerful, at my service, oh yes I can say that, how spoiled I was, if I had my time over again I can’t think of anything I’d want to change, of course I believe in it, it’s the first principle of the catechism, the essence of the Christian, the life everlasting, it solves, it conditions, it perfects, it’s just life, and without it no point in being on earth, personally it’s rather that it helps me to imagine Paradise, I can’t make sense of those circles one on top of the other that artist painted, what was his name again, the chosen few on the clouds, I’d be afraid of losing my balance, or is heaven a different sort of sky, a solid one, not the one we see, but in that case why call the sky the heavens.

Just life.

There are numerous contradictions, what is there to prove the existence of God, I was at a loss to know how to answer that woman, my daughter-in-law has a friend who believes neither in God nor in the devil, she says that suicide is quite normal, and anasthasia too, that’s when you let useless old people die when they’re suffering a lot, in one sense yes, but Thou shalt not kill, what d’you make of that, that’s just it though, she says it isn’t killing but where’s the dividing line, it’s like with abortion, at what moment does the soul enter the organism because it’s only the soul that’s important, you say someone’s a body without a soul when he’s lost his way, when he’s unhappy, take old Magnin for example, ever since his wife put horns on him, that’s the first expression that comes to mind, which only goes to show that woman is man’s soul, say what you like that’s my opinion and there’s no doubt that every deceived husband and every bachelor agrees with me, wasn’t she going a bit far though, so used to being in the right, her husband never contradicts her, he’s a good sort, well let’s say a bit of a wet rag, unless he’s lost interest, it seems that for quite some time, have you heard, the Cruchet girl, quite so, but people are such scandalmongers, even so it would be rather droll, no one could call him a body without a soul, he’d have two.

Two souls, why not a dozen.

Numerous contradictions.

The entry of the soul into the organism.

Vagrant wind.

On my left, alley number three hundred and thirty-three, a few meters farther on side-alley number seven hundred and seventy-seven crosses it, symbolic numbers if ever there were any but I feel I have a right not to complain about that, let’s say not to make any pretensions to a somewhat dubious lucidity.

So, to go back to the story of my exit, I had to dodge into alley number three hundred and thirty-three and zigzag along it up to its intersection with the side-alley in order not to lose sight of the numbers written on the metal plates at right angles to each other, and this in spite of the darkness, which comes to the same thing as saying that I stumbled at this spot, that I fell flat on my face, and that the numbers were just a few centimeters away from my nose and I could read them in what may have been a fleeting moonbeam, or more plausibly the phosphorescence coming from a nearby tomb, unless my eye had become luminous like a cat’s, I’ll leave the question open.

It was Madame Thiéroux’s or Piéroux’s turn, the ladies were lining up on the sidewalk, it was such a lovely day that she was tempted to buy some frozen shrimps, are they at least edible, and chicory already, doesn’t time fly, those are the last grapes of the season, haven’t they gone up, but as sweet as honey, apropos of which she bought a pot while a lady from the town who was a bit lame made her way through the line to choose some chrysanthemums for her dead, she comes back every year on All Saints’ Day, she was born here, she must have left when she was very young but she’ll have herself buried here with her family, very comfortably off to judge by appearances, car driven by her husband, which of her two husbands, he opened the trunk for the flowers and when it was their turn they bought four pots, I’m all for people loving their deceased but even so, could it have been ostentation, she didn’t jib at the price, whereas the next one, Madame Dubard or Buvard, had a lot of trouble making up her mind, she counted the flowers in each pot to get value for her money, this question of different circumstances in the same little hamlet is rather shocking, everyone ought to have more or less the same possibilities, there are considerable discrepancies in people’s resources, I’m not talking about the lady from the town but about the rest of us who stayed in the region, what do
you
think.

Zero region, zero sou, zero centime.

The other replied, you wouldn’t have become a communist would you, what a way to talk, you such a religious woman, but it seems that the new Church is carrying on quite a flirtation with the Left, it’s becoming politicized, don’t talk to me about it it’s enough to disgust you with religion, didn’t God say the poor always ye have with you, well then you see, their modern theories are heretical, she wanted some candy too, some sweetmeats, but not just anything, something like licorice or bubble gum or whatever, you understand, that you get the most of for the least money, because she has hordes of grandchildren who show up on Sundays and holidays, she says they’ll be the death of me I can’t wait to see the back of them but she mopes about the whole week waiting for them, hasn’t she got fat by the way, it’s elephantiasis, have you seen her legs, she has to bandage them and walk as much as she can so they don’t explode, which means that she’s the only person you can see on the sidewalk, and after all it isn’t as wide as all that, she can barely efface herself
 
…

Traces of effacement

…
 
for the tourists, those disgusting swellings, poor thing, if I was the mayor I
 
…
how can you forbid a citizeness to go out, what an idea, what’s the matter with you this morning you aren’t your usual self, I know what it is, you didn’t sleep again, I’ve discovered, just imagine, a miraculous herb tea it’s called psspss, whispers its name in her ear, unless it was something to do with some intimate ailment, a vaginal discharge, salpingitis, how should I know, suddenly they start whispering interminable obscenities to each other taking not the slightest bit of notice of anyone else, the other woman carried on with her account of the death of her husband, all the gory details, his phlegm, his wind, his soul trying to find its way out, his death throes, his convulsive movements
 
…
choosing carrots, taking her time, well yes my dear, these indestructible females, their carcasses are built to enable them to perpetuate the race of maladies, annoyances, calumnies, obscenities, liturgies, posologies, necrologies, ah, it’s Mademoiselle Passetant, what a pretty dress, how’s your poor father.

But the children too, sneaking up to the chewing gum, the grocer’s wife gets mad then sees an adorable little cherub in a stroller outside, is that little darling yours, be careful, dangerous corner, they drive like idiots on Sundays, half drunk, the entire brood in the Peugeot going to visit their cousin, their grandma, their auntie, their uncle, shit, to think we still haven't got any farther than that in this day and age but you have to admit that they adore their families, spending your whole life putting up with your cousins, visits, Sundays, the same conversation from one end to the other, from one edge to the other, from one mouth to the other, their gab-holes going hell for leather, don’t let me go on, thanks, once I get started, well, that’s life, I was only thinking this morning while I was putting my socks on, no one has ever known whether happiness was any good to people, shh, someone’s coming, it was the tippler, concealing an empty bottle under her coat, the grocer’s wife took the bottle and handed her another, you can pay me next time, some people still call her Chenu’s or Chevu’s floozie just to make it quite clear, that antediluvian affair, women are such bitches, I’m not malicious but really, sometimes I wish they would find themselves in the shit like that poor woman, by the way Adèle too is back for All Saints’ Day, she’s never lacked nerve, though mind you, today at her age, but there’s no denying that no one ever slept around in this place the way she did, all the men she’s had, that she used to follow to Paris, and then come back, and so on for years and years, she finally got married, yes, you wouldn’t think it, that poor old girl, but I tell you there’s still something in her look, haven’t you noticed the way she eyes men, there, that one, look, psspss, funny isn’t it, well it amuses
me.

Vague whiff of a symbol but what does it matter.

Two or three words.

The soul looking for a way out.

A missing link.

These vagrant souls in their dozens or hundreds, you can’t hear very well.

The housewives on the sidewalk, their gab-holes going hell for leather.