Hector and the Secrets of Love (6 page)

Because you have to get up very early if you want to go sightseeing in hot countries, they soon said good-night to each other.

The next day, Hector and Jean-Marcel had difficulty finding a driver as no one would go near the temple. In the end, they found a man who kept laughing all the time, and Hector wondered whether he was quite right in the head. But maybe it was the custom of the country, in which case the driver was normal. But when he saw that all the other drivers were laughing as they watched them drive off he began to get worried.

T
HE country that had been ravaged by crazy leaders was still very beautiful. The road threaded its way through lush countryside full of tall trees and pretty wooden houses on stilts. In the shade of the houses you could see people sleeping in hammocks, women squatting as they did the cooking, children at play, dogs wagging their tails and sometimes cows with a hump on their necks and a tendency to cross the road without looking.

Hector said to himself that this country was very beautiful, but at the same time he knew that its beauty came from its poverty, because the moment it became richer, people would want to have ugly concrete houses with moulded plastic balustrades, like in the neighbouring countries, and minimarkets, factories and hoardings would spring up around all the villages. On the other hand, you couldn’t wish it on these people to remain poor.

‘That idiot has taken a wrong turning,’ said Jean-Marcel.

He was following the map while keeping an eye on the driver, and all credit to him as it isn’t easy finding your bearings in a foreign country. He made the driver go back and take the right road because, although he couldn’t speak much Khmer, Jean-Marcel was the sort of person who could make himself understood very well.

Then the driver began driving very fast, which wasn’t a good idea because of the cows, and Jean-Marcel had to tell him rather loudly to slow down.

‘For God’s sake, I don’t know where they dug this one up!’

‘He was the only one who agreed to take us,’ said Hector.

The driver began laughing again.

Jean-Marcel and Hector started talking to pass the time. People found it easy to talk to Hector, and so Jean-Marcel explained to him that things weren’t so good between him and his wife because she didn’t really like him travelling to Asia all the time on business.

‘She knows I’m no saint when I’m away from home. But I really don’t want to split up with her, I want us to stay together.’

Hector showed him what he had written on the plane:

‘I know,’ said Jean-Marcel with a sigh. ‘But so long as I’m only getting laid and not having a proper affair, I tell myself I’m not really cheating on my wife. What can I do? It’s the way we’re made. I know it’s nothing to be proud of.’

Hector remembered his own thoughts about the air hostess and the pretty waitress at the hotel, and he agreed that it was nothing to be proud of either.

Just then, Jean-Marcel looked at the driver.

‘He’s dropping off, the idiot! We need to keep our eye on him, for God’s sake!’

 

 

The temple stood crumbling in the middle of the forest. In fact it was not so much that the temple was in the middle of the forest as that the forest was in the middle of the temple because a few tall trees had grown through some of the walls and you could even see roots, like giant octopus tentacles, curled around a group of statues.

The driver stopped the car in the shade of a tree and watched Jean-Marcel and Hector walk off and, for some reason which only he knew, this made him laugh.

‘I don’t know how you say “pain in the neck” in Khmer, but that’s what he’s giving me,’ said Jean-Marcel.

‘Maybe it’s his way of saying see you later,’ said Hector, who was the kind of person who always liked to smooth things out.

They walked along a little path among the trees leading to the temple. Despite the shade, it was beginning to get very hot.

Hector noticed a small stake painted red next to the path.

‘That means it’s cleared of mines,’ said Jean-Marcel. ‘Everything’s okay.’

Even so, Hector said to himself that the stake wasn’t pointing in any direction, and they couldn’t know if the ground had been cleared before the stake, after the stake or along the whole path.

‘I can see footprints,’ said Jean-Marcel, walking ahead, ‘so there’s no problem.’

Hector told himself that, after all, Jean-Marcel already knew the country and he could be trusted.

They walked into the middle of the ruined temple, taking care anyway to keep to the path.

‘Magnificent!’ said Jean-Marcel.

And it was true. On the crumbling walls beautiful dancers sculpted in stone smiled mysteriously, no doubt because they knew that with those perfect curves they would never be short of lovers of art. Reading the guide to the region, Hector had understood why Professor Cormorant had wanted to come to this temple: it had been built by a prince who, after getting to know one of the dancers intimately, had dedicated it to love. For a moment, he envisaged Clara’s face on the bodies of all the stone dancers, and wondered whether if he built a temple like that just for her she would fall in love with him again. Well, she must still be in love with him a little, mustn’t she?

‘Over here is very beautiful,’ he heard Jean-Marcel’s voice say.

Hector carried on along the path and found Jean-Marcel admiring a large doorway that had become a bit lopsided over time.

The palace must have been magnificent when it was newly built, but now, in ruins, it had a still more poignant charm. A bit like a long-lost love, thought Hector.

Jean-Marcel explained, ‘This temple was in use for a century then they fought and lost a few wars, and the jungle reclaimed it.’

Hector noticed some more little red stakes amid the ruins.

‘Hmm,’ said Jean-Marcel, ‘it’s just for show – they can’t have gone to much trouble to clear mines in here; the mines were laid mainly around the temples.’

Hector wondered whether the temple was going to teach him something or whether he had come here for nothing. Perhaps all he had done was discover the splendour of a lost civilisation, like his might be one day, and Martians might visit the ruins of his city and mistake the remains of traffic lights for icons.

He was having difficulty keeping up with Jean-Marcel, who had begun climbing a big flight of steps the sides of which were collapsing, when, suddenly, they heard female voices.

They saw two young Japanese women walking in one of the upper galleries.

‘They shouldn’t be up there,’ said Jean-Marcel.

‘Because of the mines?’

‘No, because this whole thing is liable to collapse. Even though those Japanese girls don’t look too heavy.’

They gestured to them to come down. The young Japanese women jumped when they saw Hector and Jean-Marcel, then made their way back in their direction, taking very small steps in their Nike trainers, which looked bigger than they were, and their little white sunhats.

The two men introduced themselves to Miko, who spoke very good English, and Chizourou, who spoke none at all.

As Hector was a little hot and was beginning to feel quite tired, he stayed in the shade talking to the two young Japanese women, while Jean-Marcel climbed everything it was possible to climb in the temple.

The two women were great friends. As previously mentioned, people found it quite easy to talk to Hector, and Miko explained she had brought Chizourou sightseeing to take her mind off things, because she had recently had her heart broken. Hector looked at young Chizourou, who did have a very sad expression on her pale face. She had almost married a young man whom she loved very much, but he had decided it wasn’t a good idea. Why? Because the two of them had done the things people in love do, and afterwards the fiancé thought that if Chizourou was able to do that before she got married she wasn’t a responsible girl and he couldn’t possibly marry her. And now Chizourou was thinking about him all the time, and this Hector understood.

He tried to find something comforting to say to Chizourou. The first thing he thought of was that a boy who had ideas like that wasn’t right for a girl like Chizourou, who was visiting a temple recently cleared of mines in a region that wasn’t safe. So she wouldn’t have been happy with him anyway. Miko translated for Chizourou, who listened attentively and finally gave a little smile. In the end, her story made Hector think about his opinions on love: why do we go on being in love with someone who makes us suffer? And why do we fall out of love with someone who cares about us? Apparently, even Japanese women suffered from this problem. Thinking that reminded Hector of Professor Cormorant’s message about ‘silly cultural prejudices’.

Miko and Chizourou started talking to each other, and then Miko told Hector they had found a strange sculpture – very different from the row of dancers with their mysterious smiles – in a hidden recess of the temple.

Just then, Jean-Marcel came back, and he was also very interested in the strange sculpture. Miko and Chizourou showed them the way. They followed the two Japanese women through a series of passageways, where the sun filtered through huge sculpted windows, and suddenly they came out into the forest. Miko explained that they only needed to walk along the outer wall of the temple and they would come to the sculpture.

‘Hmm,’ said Jean-Marcel. ‘That will take us outside the temple.’

‘There are some little red stakes,’ said Hector.

‘I’m not sure that means much.’

‘Well, they’ve already been that way.’

‘Those girls don’t weigh much and the ground is soft,’ Jean-Marcel said, as though thinking out loud.

They carried on walking. Jean-Marcel took the lead, followed by Hector, Miko and Chizourou. Hector was glad Chizourou hadn’t taken the lead, because he thought she might not mind stepping on a mine and wouldn’t have been careful enough.

‘Is everything all right?’ Hector asked Jean-Marcel.

‘Yes, yes, everything’s okay.’

Even so, Hector noticed Jean-Marcel was looking down at his feet as he walked, and he said to himself that everything wasn’t as okay as all that, and maybe it was stupid to be blown up by a mine while sightseeing or even on a mission for a big pharmaceutical company.

But Jean-Marcel began singing, which showed he wasn’t too worried. Hector could make out the words:

And he thought to himself that it wasn’t surprising Jean-Marcel had a military appearance.

They reached a small opening in the temple wall and went through it. They came out into a tiny square courtyard, its walls sculpted with the same type of dancer, but one bas-relief was very different from the others.

What amused Hector was that it looked like a very early psychoanalysis session – a woman patient was lying on a couch and the analyst, also a woman, was sitting next to her. Of course, she was sitting on the couch and not in an armchair, and she was also massaging the patient’s legs, but as this was the tenth century naturally the technique hadn’t yet had time to evolve. The couch resembled a dragon, which might symbolise the patient’s neurosis, which she would learn to control thanks to psychoanalysis. Underneath it were numerous fish, turtles and other aquatic animals clearly representing the impulses originating in the depths of the unconscious. On the far left you could see the secretary making appointments.

Hector told himself that if the professor had seen this sculpture he must have found it very interesting.

‘Well, there’s more,’ said Jean-Marcel, ‘the tour isn’t over yet.’

Hector said he’d prefer to continue contemplating the little courtyard and the early psychoanalysis session. Miko had a word with Chizourou and it was decided that Jean-Marcel and Miko would carry on exploring the temple while Hector and Chizourou sat quietly in the shade.