Léon and Louise (21 page)

Anyway, I enjoyed seeing you in the bosom of your family. Every time I did, it was like a trip to another dimension, an insight into a parallel universe or into the life I myself might have led, but for that shell-hole in the road or the mayor of Saint-Luc's infatuation with my incomparably graceful, swanlike neck. To me your family is a subjunctive made flesh, a three-dimensional subjunctive, a living, life-size doll's house, the only disadvantage being that I can't play with it.

Don't get me wrong, I'm content with my life and I'm not looking for another. Besides, I wouldn't know what to say or which I'd choose if I had the choice between indicative and subjunctive. The question doesn't arise in any case, because no one has that choice.

You've got a good-looking family and you're a good-looking man, Léon. Middle age suits you. Earlier on, when you were younger, one might have found your serious cast of mind a trifle dull, but now it suits you admirably. Have you started drinking a bit? It seems to me you're usually holding a glass of Ricard. Or is it Pernod? I'll refrain from commenting on the fact that you've taken up pipe-smoking since last winter. It does age you rather. If you were my husband I'd forbid you to smoke a pipe, indoors at least. I still smoke Turmacs, incidentally. I'll have to see if one can buy them where I'm going. If not, you'll have to send me some.

Strange to say, it's only now, when we'll be separated by so much – an ocean, a war, maybe a continent or two, not forgetting all the years that have already gone by and are still to come – that I can be really close to you again. It's only now, when a few thousand kilometres will insulate us against deceit, lies and underhandedness and we very probably won't see each other for a long time, that I feel really close to you once more. Only far away from you am I really at home with myself, only far away from you can I dare to open my heart without losing myself. Can you understand that? Of course you can. You're a clever boy, even though such feminine dilemmas and paradoxes are alien to your masculine heart.

You take a more straightforward view of all these things, I know. You do what you must and refrain from doing what you shouldn't. And if, for once, you do do something you shouldn't, you remain on good terms with yourself simply because a man sometimes has to do what he shouldn't. You stand by what you've done and take responsibility for it and make sure life goes on.

Incidentally, it isn't true you've never seen me all these years. I feel sure you spotted me that time you chased me round the bookstall in the Place Saint-Michel. I simply ran faster than you – I always was the quicker of us, wasn't I? – so I ended up chasing you, not the other way round. When you came to a stop and scanned the square, I was standing right behind you; I could have put my hands over your eyes and called peekaboo! And when you turned on the spot I turned too, keeping behind your back. It was like a Chaplin film – people laughed. But you didn't notice a thing.

So now I'm going overseas, I don't have the least idea where to. I don't know if it'll be dangerous or if I'll ever come back, and they still haven't explained what they expect me to do. I suppose I'll have to play the office girl somewhere, what else?

Last Saturday I drove to work as usual in my Torpedo, which is showing its age a bit (the bearings and gearbox have had it and the rear axle is bent out of true). I was intercepted at the main entrance by Monsieur Touvier, our general manager. The god of the demigods who inhabit the executive floor of the Banque de France, he normally takes no notice of lower forms of life like office girls from the ground floor. This time, however, he not only took me by the arm but inclined his majestic head and murmured in my ear in his soft but imperious voice:

‘You're Mademoiselle Janvier, aren't you? You're to go home at once and pack. Leave your car here and take a taxi.'

‘Yes, monsieur. Right away?'

‘This minute. You've an hour. Light luggage for a long journey.'

‘How long?'

‘A very long journey. Your tenancy has already been terminated. We'll take care of your furniture.'

‘What about my car?'

‘Don't worry about that, we shall compensate you. Be quick, you're expected at the Gare Montparnasse an hour from now.'

That was a statement, not an order, so I went home, packed a few clothes and some books and said goodbye to my worldly goods. I haven't left much behind, just a decent walnut bed with a horsehair mattress and a swansdown duvet, a chest of drawers, a leather armchair and a few kitchen utensils. But no broken heart, in case you're interested, and no faithfully waiting swain.

I've had a few romances and affairs over the years – nobody likes getting bored – but alas, they all became dull and insipid very quickly. Besides, I came to realize that I get less bored on my own than I do in the company of some man who doesn't altogether appeal to me.

So I'm still unattached, as they say – partly, no doubt, because by some miracle I've never become pregnant. Besides, it's amazing how easily you can live among a city's four million inhabitants for ten or twenty years without getting to know anyone apart from the greengrocer on the corner and the cobbler who nails new heels on your shoes twice a year.

And somehow – I don't know why, my dear Léon – you're the only man I've ever really fancied. Can you understand that? I can't. Do you think we would have made a go of it if we'd had more time together? My head says no, my heart says yes. You feel the same, don't you? I know you do.

On the way to the station all the streets were choked with refugees. So many panic-stricken people! I don't know where they thought they were going. There can't be enough ships to hold them all or places far enough away for the war not to catch up with them. The station and the trains were overcrowded, and our train for Lorient made a certain amount of progress only because, being a Banque de France special, it took priority throughout the rail network.

While I'm sitting writing in my cabin, soldiers are unloading our goods train. You won't believe it, but my luggage includes the bulk of the gold reserves of the French national bank, plus thirty and two hundred tonnes of gold respectively from the Polish and Belgian national banks, which we've been holding for them for the past few months. Two to three thousand tonnes of gold in all, I estimate. We're to take it to a place of safety.

Our ship, the ‘Victor Schoelcher', is a banana boat requisitioned by the Navy and converted into an auxiliary cruiser. It still looks a touch Caribbean for a naval vessel, with its green, yellow and red colour scheme. The only thing that's navy grey is a silly little popgun in the bow. I'm the only woman on board, so my cabin is forward near the bridge, immediately aft of the captain's.

It's as hot and stuffy in here as if we were already in the Congo or Guadeloupe. The condensation trickling down the lime-green steel walls collects into quivering lilac puddles on the red steel floor. Every ten seconds a plump, non-European cockroach crawls out of the plughole of my washbasin (I try to kill the creatures with my shoe). I'll spare you a description of the lavatory I share with the captain. I'm told there's a second lavatory below deck for the eighty-five members of the crew. God grant I never have to go anywhere near it!

We're supposed to be sailing tonight, or tomorrow morning at the latest. Everyone's in a tearing rush. German tanks are said to be in Rennes already, and a few hours ago a Heinkel flew over us and dropped some mines in the harbour mouth to prevent us from leaving. The captain intends to wait for high tide at 4.30 a.m. and reach the open sea at dawn by keeping to the extreme edge of the fairway, between the mines and the mud banks.

This is all top secret, of course – I shouldn't be telling you any of it. But be honest, who on God's good earth cares what a typist writes to a humble Paris police officer? Anything I tell you is very probably outdated already and consequently unimportant, and by tomorrow it's bound to be over and forgotten and utterly irrelevant. What's more, nothing I see can remain secret in any case. Or do you think it's possible to conceal the existence of twelve million refugees? Can two thousand tonnes of gold escape notice? Can Heinkels zooming overhead remain a secret? What's the point of all this mystery-mongering, when everyone can see everything and understands none of it? The bell is sounding for dinner, I must fly!

It's dark now. I had a bite to eat in the wardroom with the captain, the ship's officers and my three superiors from the bank. We had perch and fried potatoes. Conversation revolved around the strength of the Wehrmacht, which is apparently bearing down on us in a great hurry and can be expected here tomorrow afternoon, if not before. I also learned that the man the ‘Victor Schoelcher' was named after was responsible for abolishing slavery in France and her colonies in 1848. Nice, no? Over coffee the gentlemen flirted with me a little in a friendly way, though rather too perfunctorily and with insufficient enthusiasm for my taste.

After that I went into town to buy some emergency supplies for the long voyage. We don't know what we're in for, after all. I had to walk the darkened streets for quite a while, the street lights being masked with blue paint and the buildings blacked out, before I found a grocer's shop. Without much hope, I asked the grocer for some condensed milk. He pointed to a well-stocked shelf and asked how many tins I wanted. A dozen, I said on impulse, and you know what? The man sold them to me without turning a hair. I also bought some chocolate and bread and a sausage, and he didn't even ask me for any coupons. That just shows you – everything's in a state of flux and nobody knows what tomorrow will bring. So why all the secrecy?

I'm now sitting outside on the gangway, where a cool evening breeze is blowing, looking down at the quayside. Like a vast swarm of bees, soldiers are busy stacking heavy wooden boxes on top of each other. Working in teams of four to a box, they heave them out of the goods wagons, whose sliding doors are open, and carry them over to the loading area. I'm wondering how many boxes there will be. They'll be calling me any minute. Then I'll have to go down to the freight gangway and begin my office girl's night shift counting boxes of bullion. I shall spend all night seated at a little table with a well-sharpened pencil, and for every box that disappears into the ‘Victor Schoelcher''s hold I'll make a tick on a form I've personally designed and produced for the purpose.

Perched on the wall behind the goods station are some boys in caps and short trousers, watching. Their faces are expressionless and they're sitting quite still. It's hard to tell if they guess what a fortune is lying under their noses.

Officially the boxes contain explosives, but nobody here believes that. Standing behind me at this moment, smoking, are two young seamen. They've been bragging to each other that this is the biggest gold shipment ever to sail out into the Atlantic. They may even be right. I can't imagine that the Spanish conquistadors ever collected two thousand tonnes of gold into one big heap. Or, if they did, their wooden ships would have had to sail back and forth a couple of dozen times to transport it all across the ocean.

The wardroom radio is churning out music – no news broadcasts any more. Only the radio operator can listen to the BBC. His name is Galiani, and just to hear him roll his Italianate Rs makes you feel hungry for a bowl of bouillabaisse. He's so hirsute, curly black hair escapes from every chink in his uniform. In his spare time he enjoys strutting around the deck in his role as the best-informed man on board. He'll stroll past behind my back and say, ‘Have you hearrrd, mademoiselle? Norrrway has surrrendered.' Then he screws up his face into an expression of disgust, sticks a Gauloise in one corner of his mouth and spits out of the other. That's how he has kept me up to date with the course of world history in the last few days. ‘Have you hearrrd? Hitlerrr has bombed London.' Gob. ‘Have you hearrrd? The Wehrrrmacht has marrrched into Parrris.' Gob. ‘Have you hearrrrd? Rrroosevelt intends to rrremain neutrrral.' Gob. And he pulls his disgusted face every time and expects me to express my admiration, which I do – or rather, overdo. And because, although he's a show-off, he's also a sensitive southerner, he sees through me every time and walks on looking offended.

They're calling me, so I must stop. This may be my last spare minute before we sail. Tomorrow morning I shall give this letter to the postman, and then we'll be off. Strangely enough, and contrary to all reason, I'm feeling quite footloose and fancy-free. Just because I've no idea where this ship will be taking me, I have the deceptive sensation that the world is my oyster. That's a misapprehension, of course; in reality, the whole world is closed to me – with the exception of some desk on whichever continent the Banque de France has decided to send me to. Whatever happens, it can't be worse than dying. I love you and I'm very worried about you, my Léon – I haven't said that before. I dearly hope the Nazis don't do anything nasty to you. Take care of yourself and your family and steer clear of anything dangerous. Be as careful and as happy as possible, don't play the hero and keep fit and don't forget me!

Yours ever, Louise

P.S. Six hours later. It's 4.20 a.m. All the boxes are on board after a long night's pencil-ticking. 2208 of them, nett, gross and tare weight unascertained because of the sheer quantity and the rush, so not known, The ship has had steam up for the past two hours, the postman is leaning against the gangway and drumming his fingers on the rail. It's already getting light in the east, or is it my imagination? I must finish off this letter at once, right away, or it'll never get to you. Into the envelope, lick the flap and stick it down. Au revoir, my dearest, au revoir!

A
few days after the German occupation the surge in suicides abated and peace returned to Paris. But the invaders didn't render themselves invisible, as Léon had supposed they would. On the contrary, they spread themselves all over the place: in the parks and streets, in the Métro and cafés and museums, and above all in department stores, jewellers', art galleries and junk shops, where they spent their army pay, which had multiplied in value thanks to the new exchange rate, on buying up anything that could be had for money and wasn't nailed down.