‘Did you mention Aisha to them?’
‘No.’ Montoya’s relieved, a few days’ respite. ‘I have a very funny feeling. The factory isn’t a factory, it’s a stage set. Quignard isn’t a concerned boss, he’s a crook. And you, you’re no journalist, but I won’t ask who you are for the time being. As for me, I’m no longer a factory worker.’
Montoya reclines against the seat and sighs. It feels as if relations with Rolande are suddenly becoming very simple. She isn’t, or has ceased being, Stakhanova. And he doesn’t have to act the journalist any more, but that doesn’t stop him from continuing to brood. If Maréchal knows about those damn lists, how to tackle him without Quignard finding out about it straight away? A glance at Rolande’s profile. Interconnected networks, utterly impenetrable as far as he’s concerned, vaguely exotic, no further away than the next street. You can live your whole life without setting foot inside a factory. At last, the outskirts of Brussels. Rolande smiles at him.
Once in Brussels and with the car parked, she places her hand on his shoulder as they enter Léon’s: ‘Enough. We’re not going to talk about the factory any more.’
He follows her through a maze of staircases and dining rooms, amid the smell of mussels and chips and the waiters bustling about. In a cosy low-ceilinged dining room on the first floor, painted a cheerful orange and yellow, they sit at a window table overlooking a narrow street swarming with people. Mussels and chips for both of them, and a Sudden Death for him, Perrier for her. She attacks her mussels with impressive gusto.
‘What about that big photo of Venice, in the living room? Have you ever been to Venice?’ The question delights Rolande.
‘No, I haven’t, unfortunately. I’ve never been anywhere. I was born in Pondange, like my mother and my grandmother. My mother’s dependent on me, and dependent is the word. Yesterday evening you pretended not to hear the groans and the snoring from the next room, because you’re well brought up. I’d double-locked my mother in the end room, because she was drunk out of her skull, to stop her making a scene. I was already picking her up off the kitchen floor when I was ten. I can never leave her alone in the evenings or at night. This evening Aisha’s going to drop by to put her to bed. I’m not going to make a big deal of it, she’s my mother. I look after her, it’s only natural, but it’s hard work.’ She licks her fingers. ‘I’m going to have another plate of chips, with mayonnaise. And I’ve got a son. I’ve sent him to a boarding school run by Jesuits in Metz. I had no other option. He works hard, takes his baccalaureate in two years’ time. But I miss him a lot. In the evenings, when I come home from work, I’d like to hug him, cook special meals for him. And the boarding school’s costing me more and more.’ She stops, suddenly serious. ‘That’s why being reinstated mattered so much to me. I get back my entitlements, my allowances, time to look for another job …’
‘We said we wouldn’t talk about the factory any more.’
‘We did.’ She rests her chin on her two fists, her eyes wide, and smiles at him. ‘My travels are my lovers, as you see. Always casual affairs. Can’t take the risk of anyone wanting to tie me down. With my mother and my son, I’ve got enough on my plate.’
He returns her smile.
‘From what I understand, I belong to the category of those who wouldn’t tie you down, so I’m in with a chance. I’m very pleased. But what about Venice?’
‘I’ve already talked a lot. Now it’s your turn. Journalist or whatever, you must travel a lot. Tell me about a city that’ll give me something to dream about.’
Dream, nightmare, city, Tangier, a recurring memory these days. He looks at Rolande, a woman who quietly gets on with life without making a fuss. You’re not going to start crying? And he tells her about the old city clinging to the rocks, white, the intense light burning your eyes, the sumptuous villas from another era, a little dilapidated and their gardens tumbling down to the sea, or the ocean shores where, you never know, people can take refuge at night, in the cool air, to smoke kif under the bougainvillaea. And that morning when the sea washed dozens of plastic sachets filled with cocaine on to the rocks. The whole city went fishing and went crazy with music, singing, dancing, one long party that lasted for twenty-four hours until the US secret services turned up at dawn to take charge of things, as the Moroccan police lacked motivation and were already well stoned. They gathered up what was left and burned it in the boiler of a freighter in the port. It gave off a suffocating black smoke, in front of hundreds of children gathered on the quayside, silently weeping.
She’s enjoying this, he’s brilliant. In his memory, Tangier changes colour.
‘What about Venice? I’m not going to let you avoid my question.’
‘The photo was a goodbye present from an Italian, a Venetian. I was very young. I thought he was very handsome. He’s the father of my son. Thanks to him, I broke the curse on my family: single mothers, from mother to daughter, for generations. But I had a boy, the chain of misery is broken. For me, Venice is the pearl in life’s ocean.’
The desserts arrive: copious, plumed mountains of cream studded with garish colours. Montoya orders a brandy to wash it down.
The bill. He helps her on with her coat.
‘Let’s walk to the Grand’Place.’
He takes her arm, she leans against him. She’s almost as tall as he is. They walk hip to hip, their rhythmic steps in sync. A prelude to love, muses Montoya, his eyes half closed, attentive to every gesture, every tremor, to the mounting tension of desire. He stops in front of the entrance to a discreet luxury hotel, a few metres from the Grand’Place.
‘Shall we go in?’
She enters first, he follows. A vast room done out entirely in greys and whites, a huge copper bedstead, white duvet, drawn grey velvet curtains. The bathroom is in grey and white marble. Rolande removes her coat, takes off her shoes and, barefoot, turns on the bath taps, pours in some foam, then continues to undress without inhibition, scattering her clothes haphazardly on a chair, the edge of the bed, the floor. Propped against the washbasin, Montoya watches her. A long streamlined body, long legs, long thighs, narrow hips, not much of a waist, high, round breasts, lovely shoulders, a solid body, full, not many curves, with delicate, pale skin. The triangle of dark curly hairs emphasises the artificiality of her blonde helmet. As if she wore a wig, as if she weren’t completely naked. She comes towards him.
‘You’re not allowed to touch anything while you’ve still got your clothes on.’
And she steps into the bathtub, lies down and disappears under the foam. He undresses in the bedroom, carefully folding his clothes, then joins her. The warmth of the water, groping contact between two smooth bodies, barely glimpsed, slithering, eluding, seeking each other, passionately embracing, legs extended, intertwined, feet colliding, he kisses her in the foam, under water, breathless, eyes swimming, head spinning, weightless. Her hands seek his cock, find it, he’s inside her before he even realises it, a great shudder runs through him from the nape of his neck to the small of his back, specks of iridescent foam fly as far as the bedroom. He grasps her shoulders and, half drowning amid gales of laughter, climaxes, long shudders racking his entire body, and she seems to do likewise.
No sooner does she regain her breath than she gets out of the bath, gazes at him for a moment, streaming water. ‘Not a bad start,’ she says, slipping into a grey bathrobe embroidered with the hotel’s crest. She dries her hair and runs a comb through it. ‘Shall we continue in bed?’ And she goes into the bedroom. He hears her light a cigarette.
He relaxes in the water, no hurry. Savour this blissful feeling of blessed well-being. An athletic woman who takes the initiative in a luxury hotel. I’m reliving the flavour of my youth, other women in other luxury hotels, my early years of freedom. I was very young, fourteen, fifteen, they were older. I was a bit of a gigolo in those days, they were in charge, it was delicious and I had a good time.