The Dancer at the Gai-Moulin Read online

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘One eye was open and the other closed.’

  Then angrily:

  ‘I’m thirsty!’

  Now they’re on Rue du Pont-d’Avroy. All the cafés are shut. The only place open is a frying shop selling beer, mussels, pickled herring and chips.

  ‘Shall we go there?’

  The cook, in white overalls, is seeing to his burners. A woman eating in the corner gives the two friends an alluring smile.

  ‘Two beers! And some chips! And some mussels!’

  And after their first helping, they order some more. They’re hungry. Terribly hungry. And they’re already on their fourth beer!

  They still can’t look one another in the eye. They eat voraciously. Outside it’s dark, and the few passers-by are walking quickly.

  ‘How much?’

  Fresh panic. Will they even have enough between them to pay for their supper? Seven plus two fifty, and three and sixty cents and … Eighteen francs seventy-five.

  Just one franc left for a tip!

  Into the streets. Iron shutters drawn down on the shopfronts. Gas lamps, and in the distance the footsteps of policemen on the beat. The two young men cross over the Meuse. Delfosse doesn’t open his mouth, looks straight ahead of him, his mind so far removed from present reality that he doesn’t notice when his friend speaks to him.

  And Chabot, to avoid being left alone, to prolong their reassuring companionship, stops as they reach the door of a prosperous-looking house, in the best street of the district.

  ‘Come back a little way with me,’ he implores.

  ‘No. I’m feeling ill.’

  That’s true. They both feel unwell. Chabot has only glimpsed the corpse for an instant, but his imagination has done the rest.

  ‘Do you think it really was the Turk?’

  They are calling him ‘the Turk’ for want of any other name. Delfosse does not reply. He has quietly put his key into the lock. Through the gloom they can see a wide corridor and a brass umbrella stand.

  ‘See you tomorrow, then?’

  ‘The Pélican?’

  But the door is already closing. Suddenly a wave of giddiness. Oh, to be back home, and in bed! Then this will all be over, surely?

  And now Chabot is alone in the deserted streets, walking quickly, breaking into a run, hesitating at street corners, then dashing off like a madman. In the main square, Place du Congrès, he keeps away from the trees. He slows down when he glimpses a passer-by in the distance. But the unknown figure turns off in another direction.

  Rue de la Loi. Two-storey houses. A doorway.

  Jean Chabot feels for his keys, puts one in the lock, switches on the light and goes towards the kitchen with its glass-panelled door, where there are still some embers glowing in the range.

  He has to turn back, because he forgot to shut the front door. It’s warm inside. There’s a piece of paper on the white oilcloth covering the kitchen table, with a few words scribbled in pencil:

  You’ll find a mutton chop in the sideboard and a slice of tart in the larder. Goodnight. Father.

  Jean stares at it dazedly, opens the sideboard, sees the chop, and the sight of it makes him feel sick. On top of the sideboard is a pot holding a plant with blue flowers, forget-me-nots perhaps.

  That must mean Aunt Maria called round. She always brings some kind of house plant. Her home on Quai Saint-Léonard is full of them. And she always gives you detailed instructions about how to care for them.

  Jean switches off the light, and tiptoes upstairs in his stockinged feet. He goes past the lodgers’ bedrooms on the first floor landing.

  Another flight up, and he’s at attic level. Cool air comes in from the roof. As he reaches the landing, a mattress creaks. Someone is awake, his father or his mother. He opens his bedroom door.

  A muffled voice:

  ‘Is that you, Jean?’

  Right, he’d better go and say goodnight to his parents. He goes into their room. The air is warm and stuffy. They must have been in bed for hours.

  ‘Late, isn’t it?’

  ‘Oh not very …’

  ‘You really ought …’

  But no, his father doesn’t have the courage to scold him. Or guesses that it would be no use.

  ‘Goodnight, son.’

  Jean bends down and kisses a damp forehead.

  ‘You’re freezing cold. You—’

  ‘Yes, it’s cold outside.’

  ‘Did you find the chop? Your Aunt Maria brought the tart.’

  ‘I’d already eaten with my friends.’

  His mother turns over in her sleep and her chignon uncoils on to the pillow.

  ‘Goodnight.’

  He can’t stand any more of this. In his own room, he doesn’t even put the light on. He throws down his jacket and lies on the bed, pressing his face into the pillow. He isn’t crying. He can’t. But he tries to catch his breath. His limbs are trembling, his whole body is shivering in spasms, as if he were seriously ill.

  He just doesn’t want to make the bedsprings creak. He wants to stifle the sob he can feel in his throat, because he guesses that his father, who hardly ever sleeps, will be lying awake next door, listening.

  An image grows inside his head, a word echoes, swells, becomes monstrously loud as if it is about to destroy everything: the Turk!

  And he is tormented, oppressed, stifled, as if in the grasp of something terrible – until suddenly the sun is streaming through the skylight, and his father is standing at the foot of the bed, muttering weakly, as if afraid of being too stern:

  ‘Look, you really shouldn’t, Jean … You were drinking again, weren’t you? You didn’t even get undressed!’

  From downstairs comes the smell of coffee, eggs and bacon. Trucks are passing in the streets. Doors slam. A cock crows.

  2. Petty Cash

  Elbows on the table, Jean Chabot pushed away his plate, keeping his eyes fixed on the little courtyard visible through the net curtains, its whitewashed walls dazzling in the sunlight.

  His father, observing him surreptitiously between mouthfuls, was trying to maintain some kind of conversation.

  ‘Do you know if it’s true that the big building in Rue Féronstrée is up for sale? Someone asked me about it yesterday at the office. Perhaps you could find out at work …’

  But Madame Chabot, who was also keeping a watchful eye on her son while preparing vegetables to make soup, interrupted:

  ‘You’re not eating anything?’

  ‘I’m not hungry, mother.’

  ‘Because you got drunk again last night, that’s why! Own up!’

  ‘No.’

  ‘If you think it isn’t obvious …! Your eyes are bloodshot! You look like death warmed up! What’s the point of killing myself trying to feed you to build you up! Come on, at least eat your eggs.’

  Jean wouldn’t have been able to, not for a fortune. His chest felt constricted. And the placid atmosphere at home, the smell of bacon and coffee, the white walls, the soup which his mother had begun cooking, everything made him feel sick. He was in a hurry to be outside, and above all to find out. He jumped at every sound from the street.

  ‘Got to go.’

  ‘It’s not time yet. You were out with Delfosse last night, weren’t you? And he still keeps coming round here for you! A rich kid who does nothing because his parents have money! That boy’s a bad influence, if you ask me! And he doesn’t have to get up early to go to the office, does he?’

  Monsieur Chabot said nothing, but kept eating his breakfast, his eyes on his plate to avoid taking sides. One of the lodgers came down the stairs, a Polish student who went straight outside, heading for the university. They could hear another getting up, in the room overhead.

  ‘Mark my words, Jean, this will end in tears! Ask your father if he went out on the town at your age.’

  And Jean Chabot did indeed have bloodshot eyes and drawn features. A reddish sore had appeared on his forehead.

  ‘I’m
off,’ he said again, looking at the clock.

  Just then someone rattled the flap of the letterbox. This was the method used by members of the household or friends, the bell being used only by strangers. Jean hastened to open the door and found himself facing Delfosse, who asked:

  ‘You coming?’

  ‘Yes, let me get my hat.’

  ‘Come inside, Delfosse!’ cried Madame Chabot from the kitchen. ‘I was just telling Jean, this has got to stop! He’s ruining his health. If you want to gad about all night, that’s up to your parents. But Jean …’

  Delfosse, tall and thin, even paler in the face than Jean, hung his head with an awkward smile.

  ‘Jean has to earn his living. We’re not made of money! You’re intelligent enough to know that, so I’ll thank you to leave him alone.’

  ‘Are you coming?’ whispered Jean, squirming with embarrassment.

  ‘Really, madame, I promise that we—’ Delfosse stammered.

  ‘What time did you get in last night?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know, one o’clock perhaps.’

  ‘Jean’s already admitted that it was past two!’

  ‘Mother, I’ve got to get to the office.’

  He had his hat on and pushed Delfosse out into the passageway. Monsieur Chabot got up in turn and pulled his coat on.

  Outside, as in every street in Liège at that hour of day, housewives were washing the steps and the pavements, cartloads of vegetables and coal were drawing up at doorways, and the cries of street vendors could be heard echoing from one district to another.

  ‘Well?’

  The two youths were now round the corner and could allow their anxiety to appear.

  ‘Nothing! This morning’s paper didn’t mention anything. Perhaps they haven’t found the—’

  Delfosse was wearing a peaked student cap. It was the time of day when students flocked to the university, almost a procession of them crossing the bridge over the Meuse.

  ‘My mother’s furious. She blames you.’

  They walked through the market place, threading their way between baskets of fruit and vegetables, treading cabbage and lettuce leaves underfoot. Jean’s eyes were glazed.

  ‘And what about the money? It’s the fifteenth.’

  They crossed the road, to avoid going past a tobacconist to whom they owed fifty francs or so.

  ‘I know. This morning I looked in my father’s wallet. He only had big notes in there.’

  And Delfosse added in a lower voice:

  ‘Don’t worry. I’ll go round to my uncle’s in Rue Léopold. I can usually manage to get left alone in the shop.’

  Jean knew the shop he meant, the main chocolate emporium in Liège. He imagined his friend slipping his hand into the till.

  ‘When will I see you?’

  ‘I’ll wait for you at midday.’

  They were reaching Lhoest’s, the solicitor’s where Chabot worked as an office-boy. They shook hands without looking at each other and Jean had an uneasy feeling, as if his friend’s handshake was different from usual.

  It was true that now they were accomplices.

  Jean’s desk was in the outer office. As the newest recruit, his job was mostly sticking stamps on envelopes, sorting the mail and running errands.

  That morning, he worked without a word, without looking at anyone, as though he wished to be inconspicuous. He was wary above all of the senior clerk, a severe-faced man of about fifty, on whom his job depended.

  At eleven o’clock, nothing had yet happened, but a little before midday the clerk came over to him.

  ‘Have you got the accounts for the petty cash, Chabot?’

  Jean had prepared his answer to this all morning and recited, looking sideways:

  ‘Sorry, Monsieur Hosay, but I put a different suit on, and I left the notebook and money at home. I’ll give it to you this afternoon.’

  He was white-faced. The senior clerk looked surprised.

  ‘Are you unwell?’

  ‘No … er … I don’t know. Maybe a little.’

  The petty cash was kept separate from the other accounts: it was the money used to buy stamps, and pay for postage or other minor everyday expenses. Twice a month, on the 15th and the 30th, Jean was given a certain sum and he was supposed to write down all the payments in a notebook.

  The office staff left for lunch. Outside, Jean looked around for Delfosse, and saw him not far from the tobacconist’s window, smoking a gold-tipped cigarette.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘I’ve paid this one off!’

  They fell into step. They needed to feel surrounded by people.

  ‘Let’s go to the Pélican. I went to my uncle’s. I only had a few seconds. I put my hand in and took more than I meant to—’

  ‘How much?’

  ‘Nearly two thousand.’

  The figure terrified Chabot.

  ‘Here’s three hundred for the petty cash. And we’ll share the rest.’

  ‘No!’

  They were both equally on edge, with the difference that Delfosse’s intensity was almost threatening.

  ‘Why not? Don’t we always share everything?’

  ‘I don’t need the money.’

  ‘Neither do I.’

  They glanced automatically up at the stone balcony on the first floor of a building: this was where Adèle, the dancer at the Gai-Moulin, lived in a furnished room.

  ‘You haven’t been down there have you?’

  ‘I went past the club, Rue du Pot-d’Or. The doors were open, like every morning. Victor and Joseph were sweeping the floor.’

  Jean clenched his fingers, making the joints crack.

  ‘But you did see him, didn’t you, last night …?’

  ‘I’m sure it was the Turk,’ said Delfosse firmly, with a shiver.

  ‘And there weren’t any police in the street?’

  ‘No, nothing. It all looked normal. Victor saw me and said hello.’

  They went into the Pélican, sat at a table looking on to the street and ordered English beer. And Jean immediately noticed another customer, practically facing him.

  ‘Don’t turn round. Look in the mirror. He was there last night in … You know what I mean.’

  ‘That big fellow? Yes, I recognize him.’

  It was the customer who had come last of all into the Gai-Moulin, a large imposing-looking man, who had been drinking beer.

  ‘He can’t be from Liège.’

  ‘He’s smoking French tobacco. Careful, he’s watching us.’

  ‘Waiter,’ Delfosse called. ‘How much? And we owed you – forty-two, was it?’

  He held out a hundred-franc note, letting others be seen.

  ‘Keep some for yourself.’

  They didn’t feel comfortable anywhere. Hardly had they sat down than they were setting off again and, in his anxiety, Chabot turned round.

  ‘That man’s following us! At any rate, he’s behind us.’

  ‘Shut up. You’ll get me scared now. Why would he be following us?’

  ‘They must have found the … the Turk by now. Or else he wasn’t dead.’

  ‘Shut up, can’t you,’ snarled Delfosse, more angrily.

  They went another few hundred metres in silence.

  ‘Do you think we should go back there tonight?’

  ‘Yes, of course. It’d look funny if we didn’t.’

  ‘I say! Perhaps Adèle knows something?’

  Jean was so jumpy that he had no idea where to look, what to say. He dared not turn round, but behind him he could sense the presence of the man with broad shoulders.

  ‘If he crosses the Meuse when we do, it means he’s following us!’

  ‘Are you going home?’

  ‘Yes, I have to. My mother’s furious.’

  He might almost have burst into tears right there in the street.

  ‘He’s coming on to the bridge! You see, he is following us.’

  ‘Shut up. See you tonight. This is my house.’

  ‘Ren
é?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I don’t want to keep all that money. Look—’

  But Delfosse was going into his house with a shrug of his shoulders. Jean walked on more quickly, glancing in shop windows to check whether he was still being followed. In the calm streets of the district on the other side of the Meuse, no further doubt was possible. His legs began to tremble. He almost had to stop, feeling dizzy. But on the contrary, he walked even faster, as if drawn onwards by fear.

  When he reached the house, his mother asked him:

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘You’re as white as a sheet.’

  And then, angrily:

  ‘This is a fine thing, isn’t it? At your age, getting into such a state. Where were you last night? Trailing about with what kind of people? I don’t understand why your father doesn’t take a firmer line with you. Come on. Eat up.’

  ‘I’m not hungry.’

  ‘Still?’

  ‘Mother, please leave me alone. I don’t feel well. I don’t know what it is.’

  But Madame Chabot’s piercing gaze showed no sympathy. She was a sharp, fussy little woman, on the go from morning to night.

  ‘If you’re not well, I’ll call the doctor.’

  ‘No, no, please …’

  Footsteps on the stairs. Through the glass panel in the kitchen door, they could see the head of one of the students. He knocked, then looked in, his face anxious and wary.

  ‘Madame Chabot, do you know the man who’s walking up and down in the street?’

  He had a strong East European accent, and blazing eyes. He got excited at the least occasion.

  He was older than most students. But although he was officially enrolled at the university, he never attended any lectures. They knew he was Georgian, and that he was involved in politics back home. He claimed he was a nobleman.

  ‘What man, Monsieur Bogdanowski?’

  ‘Come and see.’

  He drew her across to the dining room, which overlooked the street. Jean hesitated to follow them, but in the end he too went to the window.

  ‘He’s been there a quarter of an hour, walking up and down. I know what that means! He’s from the police.’

  ‘No,’ said Madame Chabot with a show of optimism. ‘You see police everywhere! He’s just waiting for someone.’