Toward the middle of the night, they remove her from her cage to return her to the same office. Another guest is already seated in one of the visitors’ chairs.
Sit down, Madame Hermant, orders the chief inspector. You will now tell me how the two of you met.
That’s her, Tony Boujon insists loudly, she’s the one that came up to me, then she wanted to go to my place, it’s her that planned it all!
Well, Madame Hermant, what do you say to that?
It’s true, says the humiliated woman. I saw his photo in the paper. I don’t know why I got the idea to follow him but I did and I regret it.
The story of this episode must be told. Everything must be gone over in extreme detail, the approach, the assault, the tangled limbs, and precisely how it went, including what fluids were exchanged, until the suspects agree on a common version. Which doesn’t present major difficulties, since the boy wants to downplay his guilt and the woman wants to comply. She says yes, it’s true, I threw myself at him then I don’t know what came over me, I scratched him, I bit him, he defended himself as best he could, and the boy enthusiastically endorses that version, repeating yes, that’s it, that’s totally what happened, she wouldn’t let go of me, I didn’t know how to get her off me. The policemen take down this version. Sometimes they look up, having trouble believing that two suspects would agree so zealously with each other. But in the other business, the important one, with the doctor, Tony Boujon has a cast-iron alibi. He is careful to bring this up, how he had to go to work earlier that day, a machine had broken down, they’d called him in to help out and three workmen can testify that he was there all night.
Then perhaps Madame Hermant is your accomplice, suggests the chief inspector; perhaps she is the hand and you the brains in this case. Everyone in the room looks at everyone else, considering this hypothesis, each one weighing it individually, and it’s so idiotic that in order to save face the chief inspector is the first to abandon it, rising and swatting the kid, who lands on the floor as the fat man leaves the office saying little bastard.
The two accused don’t dare turn around to see if the inspector is still behind them. Tony climbs painfully back onto his chair and they wait in perfect submission. Finally they figure out that they’re alone but still don’t move, staying on their chairs for long minutes that become hours. Shortly after dawn, an officer frees him and takes her back to her hole.
A few more hours pass during which she ties her hair in knots, rocking back and forth this time, hypnotized by her own movement. An officer enters the cell to place a glass of water next to her and asks if she wants to go with her to the toilet. She replies no thank you. At the end of the afternoon, someone opens the door again to tell her she is free.
She works her way slowly out of the cell, and hugging the walls so harshly illuminated by the ceiling light in the corridor, blinking and lightly touching these walls in case she has to lean on one, she reaches the elevator, crosses the lobby of the police station and finds herself outside. At first she can’t remember very well how to get home, what would be the best bus or métro line. She remembers that her arms are empty and that the child who belongs there is missing.
16
In your lap you’re rocking the case of knives you just retrieved from your husband’s apartment. This time you did not run into Madame Urdapilla. The apartment had not changed much since the other day, except that things belonging to the absent baby were lying around the second bedroom. You called Julien after leaving his place. Naturally you did not say where you were. You said I’ve been thinking: I got carried away the other day, we do have to get organized about the baby, adding I’m going to sell my mother’s apartment so do you want to meet with me late this afternoon to talk about things? Julien said okay. A week has gone by and Julien now understands what it’s like taking care of a child. He would be only too happy to get rid of her for a few days.
Outside the window, the snow still blankets the gravel of the railway beds and the sky looks like a sea of cotton. You stop the rocking chair, shove the knives into your purse, and leave.
The ruins of Arènes de Lutèce lie about five hundred yards from Place Saint-Médard in the Latin Quarter. You go through the gates and along the path by what remains of the Gallo-Roman amphitheater, then climb the stepped terraces to look down into the arena. Buildings of middling height close the perimeter to the north. To the south are trees, a thick wall of snowcapped branches shutting out the city. Perched atop the tiers, you see the gates through which were released the hungry lions, and through the stage door appears your mother.
She spots you right away, a large shape swaddled in your gray coat like a makeshift tent. When she reaches you she says aren’t you a little crazy, in this weather, you could have come to my place, after all. You reply I know, but I’m in a hurry. You observe the texture of her image. The extreme materiality of the features that are just as you’ve always known them, the bumps, the hollows, the special glow of the skin, the general allure like no other. You are really crazy she says again indulgently, and looks as if she’s about to reach toward you, but in the end she holds back, turns, and vanishes among the trees. You remain alone with the knives, delivered up to the snow that begins falling again.
Julien will arrive from the northeast. Getting off the No. 86 bus in front of the Institut du Monde Arabe, he’ll walk past the Faculté des Sciences, slalom among the poorly parked vehicles and the perpetual work in progress along that stretch of the sidewalk, then at the intersection with Rue des Écoles, take Rue Linné toward the Jardin des Plantes. After the small supermarket, he’ll turn onto Rue des Arènes to reach Rue Monge.
With your back to the arena, you walk toward the circular barred fence that surrounds the enclosure, following the curve of the street. There is one place, at the junction with Rue de Navarre, where one can observe the path of an eventual passerby — because for the moment there are none — from Rue Linné to Rue Monge. You are standing at that spot. Across the street are apartment buildings of noble discretion, stylish without excessive complications. Now and then a window opens to allow the shaking out of a tablecloth. A shadow passes a curtain; a cat behind a window demands the opening of his aquarium but by the time someone complies it’s too late, he has lost interest.
After half an hour you can definitely see your husband down the street. Julien seems to be carrying the world on his shoulders, which for an instant you again see naked against yours, enveloping you to perfection. You drive away that image. You replace it with the one of everything he owes you, the knives in your purse, your flyaway daughter, your runaway mother. You draw close to the barred fence but of course he doesn’t see you. Muffled by the snow, silent, invisible, you run toward the exit of the amphitheater and by the time you reach the sidewalk, he’s already turning onto Rue Monge. It’s too late to call to him discreetly, to lead him over to the métro entrance no one ever uses because it has a hundred steps whereas the main entrance over on Place Monge has an escalator.
Julien is striding along but you have no trouble matching his fleeing pace. Nothing happens along the way to Place Saint-Médard, where you’re careful to stay back, skirting the church garden while he’s busy with the keypad lock a few yards ahead of you. He vanishes into your mother’s building — the one that was yours as well for twenty-eight years, yes, that’s how long you lived there, but no one forced you to stay, you liked the place.
On the square there is a brasserie where the first floor offers an excellent view of the surrounding neighborhood. You choose a table near the window and order a hot toddy, never taking your eyes off the door through which Julien has disappeared, where he reappears a few minutes later, only to stop at the intercom. He taps on his cell phone and correlatively yours begins to vibrate in your pocket. You observe that three messages have already been recorded. You do not open the phone; you do not listen to the messages. The object continues to vibrate on the table and Julien’s name appears on the screen, calling and calling again in the void.