The Notebook + The Proof + The Third Lie (10 page)

"Did you confess?"

"No, Grandmother. We had nothing to confess."

"That's what I thought. And what happened to the policeman?"

"We don't know. But he certainly won't come back anymore."

Grandmother sniggers:

"Deported or shot, eh? The pig! We'll celebrate that. I'll go heat up the chicken I cooked yesterday. I haven't eaten any of it either."

At midday, we get up and go to the kitchen to eat. During the meal, Grandmother says: "I wonder why you wanted to kill her. You had your reasons, I suppose."

The Old Gentleman

Just after the evening meal, an old gentleman arrives with a girl who is bigger than us.

Grandmother asks him:

"What do you want?"

The old gentleman speaks a name, and Grandmother says to us:

"Go out. Go for a walk in the garden."

We go out. We circle the house and crouch down under the kitchen window. We listen. The old gentleman says:

"Have pity."

Grandmother replies:

"How can you ask me such a thing?"

The old gentleman says:

"You knew her parents. They entrusted her to me before they were deported. They gave me your address in case she was no longer safe with me."

Grandmother asks:

"You know what I'd be risking?" "Yes, I know, but it's a matter of life and death." "There's a foreign officer in the house." "Precisely. No one will look for her here. All you'll have to say is that she's your granddaughter, the cousin of those two boys."

"Everyone knows I have no other grandchildren but those two."

"You can say she's from your son-in-law's family." Grandmother sniggers: "I've never even seen my son-in-law!" After a long pause, the old gentleman goes on: "I'm only asking you to feed the little girl for a few months. Till the end of the war."

"The war may go on for years." "No, it won't last much longer now." Grandmother starts to snivel:

"I'm just a poor old woman killing herself with work. How can I feed so many mouths?" The old gentleman says:

"Here's all the money her parents had. And the family jewels. It's all yours if you'll save her." A little later, Grandmother calls us in: "This is your cousin." We say:

"Yes, Grandmother." The old gentleman says:

"You'll play together, the three of you, won't you?" We say:

"We never play." He asks:

"What do you do, then?"

"We work, we study, we do exercises."

He says:

"I understand. You're serious men. You don't have time to play. You'll look after your cousin, won't you?" "Yes, sir. We'll look after her." "Thank you." Our cousin says: "I'm bigger than you." We answer:

"But there are two of us." The old gentleman says:

"You're right. Two are much stronger than one. And you won't forget to call her 'cousin,' will you?" "No, sir. We never forget anything." "I'm depending on you."

Our Cousin

Our cousin is five years older than us. Her eyes are black. Her hair is reddish because of something called henna.

Grandmother tells us that our cousin is the daughter of Father's sister. We say the same thing to those who ask questions about our cousin.

We know that Father has no sister. But we also know that without this lie, our cousin's life would be in danger. And we've promised the old gentleman to look after her.

When the old gentleman has gone, Grandmother says:

"Your cousin will sleep with you in the kitchen."

We say:

"There's no more room in the kitchen."

Grandmother says:

"Straighten it out yourselves."

Our cousin says:

"I'm quite willing to sleep on the floor under the table if you give me a blanket."

We say:

"You can sleep on the seat and keep the blankets. We'll sleep in the attic. It's not very cold now." She says:

"I'll come sleep in the attic with you."

"We don't want you. You must never set foot in the attic."

"Why?"

We say:

"You have a secret. We have one too. If you don't respect our secret, we won't respect yours." She asks:

"Would you be capable of denouncing me?" "If you go up to the attic, you die. Is that clear?" She looks at us for a moment in silence, then she says: "I see. You two little bastards are completely crazy. I'll never go up to your filthy attic, I promise."

She keeps her promise and never goes up to the attic. But everywhere else, she bothers us all the time. She says:

"Bring me some raspberries." We say:

"Go in the garden and get some yourself." She says:

"Stop reading out loud. You're splitting my ears." We go on reading. She asks:

"What are you doing there, lying on the floor for hours without moving?"

We continue our immobility exercise even when she throws rotten fruit at us. She says:

"Stop being so quiet, you're getting on my nerves!"

We continue our silence exercise without answering.

She asks:

"Why aren't you eating anything today?"

"It's our fasting day."

Our cousin doesn't work, doesn't study, doesn't do exercises. Often she stares at the sky, sometimes she cries.

Grandmother never hits our cousin. She never swears at her either. She doesn't ask her to work. She doesn't ask her to do anything. She never speaks to her.

The Jewels

The same evening our cousin arrives, we go and sleep in the attic. We take two blankets from the officer's room and lay hay on the floor. Before going to bed, we look through the holes. In the officer's room there is nobody. In Grandmother's room there is a light on, which doesn't happen very often.

Grandmother has taken the oil lamp from the kitchen and hung it over her dressing table. It's an old piece of furniture with three mirrors. The one in the middle is stationary, the other two move. You can adjust them to see yourself in profile.

Grandmother is sitting in front of the dressing table, looking at herself in the mirror. On her head, over her black shawl, she has placed something shiny. Around her neck hang several necklaces, her arms are covered with bracelets, her fingers with rings. She is talking to herself as she contemplates her reflection:

"Rich, rich. It's easy to be beautiful with all this. Easy. The wheel turns. They're mine now, the jewels. Mine. It's only fair. How they shine, how they shine!"

Later, she says:

"And what if they return? What if they want them back? Once the danger is over, they forget. They don't know what gratitude is. They promise the moon and the stars, and then . . . No, no, they're already dead. The old gentleman will die too. He said I could keep everything. . .. But the girl.. . She saw everything, heard everything. She'll want them back, that's for sure. After the war, she'll claim them. But I don't want to give them back, I can't. They're mine. Forever.

"She'll have to die too. Then there'll be no proof. No one'll be any the wiser. Yes, the girl will die. She'll have an accident. Just before the end of the war. Yes, it will have to be an accident. Not poison. Not this time. An accident. A drowning in the stream. Hold her head under the water. Difficult. Push her down the cellar steps. Not high enough. Poison. There's only poison. Something slow. Small doses. An illness that eats away at her slowly, for months. There's no doctor. A lot of people die like that in wartime for lack of care."

Grandmother raises her fist and threatens her image in the mirror:

"You won't be able to do a thing to me! Not a thing!"

She sniggers. She takes off the jewelry, puts it in a canvas bag, and stuffs the bag in her straw mattress. She goes to bed, we do too.

Next morning, when our cousin has left the kitchen, we say to Grandmother:

"Grandmother, we have something to tell you."

"What now?"

"Pay close attention, Grandmother. We promised the old gentleman to look after our cousin. So nothing will happen to her. No accidents, no illnesses. Nothing. Or to us either."

We show her a sealed envelope:

"Everything is written here. We are going to give this letter to the priest. If anything happens to any of the three of us, the priest will open the letter. Do you understand, Grandmother?"

Grandmother looks at us, her eyes almost shut. She is breathing very heavily. She says very quietly:

"Sons of a bitch, a whore, and the devil! Cursed be the day you were born."

In the afternoon, when Grandmother goes off to work in her vineyard, we search her mattress. There is nothing in it.

Our Cousin and Her Lover

Our cousin is becoming serious. She doesn't bother us anymore. Every day she washes in the big tub we bought with the money we earned in the cafés. She washes her dress a lot, and her underpants too. While her clothes are drying, she wraps herself in a towel or lies in the sun with her underpants drying on top of her. She is very brown. Her hair covers her to her buttocks. Sometimes she turns over on her back and hides her breasts with her hair.

Toward evening, she goes off to town. She stays longer and longer in town. One evening, we follow her without her knowing.

Near the cemetery, she joins a group of boys and girls, all much older than us. They are sitting under the trees smoking. They've also got bottles of wine. They drink straight from the bottle. One of them keeps watch by the side of the path. If someone comes, the lookout sits quietly and whistles a well- known tune. The group disperses and hides in the bushes or behind the tombstones. When the danger is over, the lookout whistles a different tune.

The group talks in whispers about the war, and about desertions, deportations, resistance, and liberation.

According to them, the foreign soldiers who are in our country and who claim to be our allies are in fact our enemies, and those who will be here soon and win the war are not enemies but on the contrary our liberators.

They say:

"My father has gone over to the other side. He'll come back with them."

"My
father deserted when war was declared."

"My parents joined the partisans. I was too young to go with them."

"Mine were taken away by those bastards. Deported."

"You'll never see them again, you know. Me either. They're all dead now."

"You can't be sure. There'll be survivors."

"And we'll avenge the dead."

"We were too young. Too bad. We couldn't do anything."

"It'll be over soon.
They
will be here any day now."

"We'll be waiting for them in the Town Square with flowers."

Late at night, the group breaks up. Everybody goes home.

Our cousin leaves with a boy. We follow her. They go into the little lanes around the castle and disappear behind a ruined wall. We can't see them, but we can hear them.

Our cousin says:

"Lie down on me. Yes, like that. Kiss me. Kiss me."

The boy says:

"You're really beautiful! I want you."

"Me too. But I'm afraid. What if I get pregnant?"

"I'll marry you. I love you. We'll get married after the Liberation."

"We're too young. We must wait."

"I can't wait."

"Stop! You're hurting me. You mustn't, darling, you mustn't."

The boy says:

"Yes, you're right. But touch me. Give me your hand. Touch me there, like that. Turn around. I want to kiss you there, there, while you touch me."

Our cousin says:

"No, don't do that. I'm ashamed. Oh! Go on, go on! I love you, I love you so much."

We go home.

The Blessing

We have to go back to the priest's house to return the books we've borrowed.

The door is opened by an old woman again. She lets us in and says:

"Father is expecting you."

The priest says:

"Sit down."

We put the books on his desk. We sit down.

The priest looks at us for a moment, then says:

"I've been waiting for you. You haven't come for a long time."

We say:

"We wanted to finish the books. And we've been very busy."

"And what about your bath?"

"We have all we need to wash ourselves now. We bought a tub, soap, scissors, and toothbrushes."

"With what? Where did you get the money?"

"With the money we earn playing music in the cafés."

"The cafés are places of perdition. Especially at your age."

We don't answer. He says:

"You haven't been for the blind woman's money either. It amounts to a considerable sum now. Take it."

He hands us the money. We say:

"Keep it. You have given enough. We took your money when it was absolutely necessary. Now we earn enough money to give some to Harelip. We have also taught her to work. We have helped her dig her garden and plant potatoes, beans, squash, and tomatoes. We have given her chicks and rabbits to raise. She looks after her garden and her animals. She doesn't beg anymore. She doesn't need your money anymore."

The priest says:

"Then take this money for yourselves. That way you will not have to work in the cafés."

"We like working in the cafés."

He says:

"I heard you were beaten and tortured."

We ask:

"What happened to your housekeeper?"

"She went to the front to care for the wounded. She died."

We say nothing. He asks:

"Would you like to confide in me? I am sworn to keep the secrets of the confessional. You have nothing to fear. You can confess."

We say:

"We have nothing to confess."

"You are wrong. Such a crime is very hard to bear. Confession will relieve you. God forgives all those who are sincerely sorry for their sins."

We say:

"We are sorry for nothing. We have nothing to be sorry for."

After a long silence, he says:

"I saw it all through the window. The piece of bread . . . But vengeance belongs to God. You have no right to do His work for Him."

We say nothing. He asks: