I do, said the old man.
Isabela Jakab, do you take Christophe Guillot to be your husband? Do you promise to be true to him in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health, to love him and honor him all the days of your life?
Lea said nothing. Her feet squirmed together.
I do, whispered Christophe. He opened his eyes. He slipped one hand from beneath Lea’s and searched in one pant pocket, then the other. His eyes went wide and his face drained of emotion.
I do not have the ring, he said.
Christophe turned to Florian.
Father, he said.
The boy, whose eyes had been downcast, looked up at the old man.
Do you have it? said Christophe.
Florian licked his teeth and said nothing.
I must have let it fall, said Christophe.
The old man dropped to his knees and scuffed his palms in the dust, which raised swirling around him. He coughed and crawled away from the children, stopping to inspect a stone between his grey fingers, then throwing it aside.
This place is dirty, he said to himself.
Christophe picked up another stone. He held it very close to his face, so that his eyes converged and made him look ridiculous. After a long moment he threw it aside. The children sat, watching the old man in silence. A few of them shifted around as they grew increasingly distressed.
The owner does not honor his professional agreements, said the old man as he shook his head.
The trill of birds and the skittering of pebbles echoed in the courtyard. Lea smelled her hair. Florian scratched himself, his eyes darting about the courtyard. Marc glared at the old man.
Will none of you help me find this ring? Christophe said.
The children did not move. He glared at them angrily.
Help me find this fucking ring, Christophe said.
The children were scared. They did not understand what the old man wanted, but scattered across the courtyard and set about imitating him, some running their hands through the dirt, some plucking stray grass, others collecting stones, which they stored in their pockets. All the while they kept an eye on the old man who seemed to despair more with each passing moment. His eyes revulsed and dark patches of sweat spread beneath his arms and in the crook of his back. Dust covered his hands and knees. He pounded the ground with his fist, raising more dust. Rodolphe did the same until the knuckles of his right hand were as bloody as Christophe’s and both their wounds were caked with dirt.
It was scratched out in the crimson dirt that Rodolphe saw the path he must take. He would leave the farmhouse with the other children and never return. He would go to a place where neither Christophe nor Marc existed, a place where he could find a strength of his own.
Lucien and Joseph had taken three quarters of an hour to hobble from their home to the top of the farmhouse path. They were old and their bones ached and their joints creaked and they did not hurry. Several times they stopped altogether and used their handkerchiefs to mop their brows and blow their noses. Once they had reached a good vantage point, the old men stopped and observed the courtyard. Human shapes swarmed there like hens pecking at the dirt. Two stood out: a girl wearing a white dress, shabby and soiled, and the larger shape of Christophe in tones of grey and white, no cleaner than the girl. Shoeless, the old man cut a pathetic and twisted figure as he scrabbled about in the dirt. Neither Lucien nor Joseph said anything, nor did their leathery faces move. They had long ago ceased to wear expressions, having become accustomed to the solitude of each other’s presence. In one hand Joseph held a plastic bag containing half a dozen eggs. For a long time they observed the scene. Then they turned back.
20.
In the corner of the room, where the shadows gathered, the old man undressed slowly. Lea observed the dark hair between his legs as he bent over to pull his underwear off, lifting one leg, staggering to regain balance, and placing one hand against the wall to avoid falling. His body was orange in the dusk light, skin flaccid beneath his jutting shoulder blades, spine like a rope curving leftwards down the center, each rib delineated by shadow. The old man was smiling when he turned towards her. His eyes no longer frightened Lea. They glowed empty and pure behind the black creases of his face. These were not the eyes of an all-watching being. The old man could not even see what was right in front of him. He stared right through Lea as if she were made of glass. She could no longer afford to fall from her bicycle because he would not be there to pick her up. She felt a tightness behind her jaw where the tears refused to come.
A thin band of filth marked the waistline of the old man’s underwear. Lea watched the orange squares of the windowpanes slipping quietly up Christophe’s naked body as he approached, becoming more brilliant before they disappeared above his head into the darkening ether. He crouched and slipped into the permanent shadow of the bed, where the old man lay beside the child and looked upon her with vacant adoration. Lea sat cross-legged, picking at her toenails, holding the grime to her nose, that acrid and familiar smell, and finally pulling her hair in front of her face so she would not have to see the old man, who looked pitiful lying there naked on his side, elbow bent on the mattress and head propped in his open palm.
Isabela was drunk but so was he. Too much champagne with dinner, and champagne after dinner, and that sickly-sweet prune digestif Monsieur Chen had insisted they drink. It had put everyone in a good mood, so that even Chen’s wife seemed to loosen up and enjoy herself a little. And they had found the ring somehow and finished their vows and kissed. Afterwards most of the guests called taxis, even though they lived nearby, except of course for Isabela’s uncle who insisted on driving. But now Isabela was drunk. He knew this because she swayed slightly as she sat on the corner of the mattress, against the wall, still wearing the filthy white gown, hair disarranged, and ordered him to undress. He did so in the corner of the room and lay on the bed beside her and watched her, not wanting the moment to end, so terribly did he feel the ache of love in that moment. He knew he would die without putting words to the feeling. It excluded all else.
Lea watched the old man’s eyes glance down to his unmoving prick, hanging limp and larval from his body. She watched his eyes squint and his brow knit and his cheeks lift so that his upper teeth became visible. He looked at Lea and back to his prick. She watched his face become more pallid and sunken. He began sweating. Then with his right hand he reached down and pulled his prick from side to side. After a few moments he withdrew his hand and looked at Lea.
I am sorry my darling, he said. It must be all the champagne.
Lea did not answer. She wished to be upstairs in her bed, not far from Florian, luxuriating in his sleeping presence, and pressed to the cold side of her pillow until it came time to flip it. She wished the old man would return to his former self and cook for them, tend to the garden and wash them, even beat them when it was fair. Lea did not understand why he would choose to become this new thing.
No, said Christophe. Of course not. You are beautiful. You know you are. But there is nothing I can do about it.
The old man closed his eyes and began to snore. Lea watched the flesh of his face and neck tremble and his arm tremble, until it no longer followed the rhythm of his breathing and his wrist loosened and Christophe’s head slipped onto the bed, causing him to wake. He looked off into the distance and smiled, his face relaxed and blissful in the dim light. Lea smiled also.
21.
The tomato was rotten. There were blue and white growths on its thin underbelly which split open as Marc lifted it, letting fall a red pulp. The boy dropped the tomato and shook his hands and wiped the transparent pink liquid on the knees of his jumpsuit. The vines were bare and the ground was littered with rotting fruit. Sabine stood squinting in the sunlight as she looked up into an apple tree. She picked an apple from the branch and turned it over in her hands, seeking the wormhole. There was none. Still she did not trust it. She walked over to Marc who was squatting over a rotten lettuce. His smell was buried beneath the general stench of decay. The boy was startled when she tapped his shoulder. His body had become thin and he looked exhausted.