What will it be? said the barman.
When we need you we’ll tell you, said Camier.
What will it be? said the barman.
The same as before, said Mercier.
You haven’t been served, said the barman.
The same as this gentleman, said Mercier.
The barman looked at Camier’s empty glass.
I forget what it was, he said.
I too, said Camier.
I never knew, said Mercier.
Make an effort, said Camier.
You intimidate us, said Mercier, good for you.
We put a bold front on it, said Camier, though actually shitting with terror. Quick some sawdust, my good fellow.
And so on, each saying things he ought not to have said, till some kind of settlement was reached, sealed with sickly smiles and scurrilous civilities. The roar (of conversation) resumed.
Us, said Camier.
Mercier raised his glass.
I didn’t mean that, said Camier.
Mercier set down his glass.
But why not, after all? said Camier.
So they raised their glasses and drank, both saying, at the same instant or almost, Here’s to you. Camier added, And to the success of our—. But this was a toast he could not complete. Help me, he said.
I can think of no word, said Mercier, nor of any set of words, to express what we imagine we are trying to do.
Your hand, said Camier, your two hands.
What for? said Mercier.
To clasp in mine, said Camier.
The hands fumbled for one another beneath the table, found one another, clasped one another, one small between two big, one big between two small.
Yes, said Mercier.
What do you mean, yes? said Camier.
I beg your pardon, said Mercier.
You said yes, said Camier.
I said yes? said Mercier. I? Impossible. The last time I abused that term was at my wedding. To Toffana. The mother of my children. Mine own. Inalienable. Toffana. You never met her. She lives on. A tundish. Like fucking a quag. To think it was for this hectolitre of excrement I renegued my dearest dream. He paused coquettishly. But Camier was in no playful mood. So that Mercier resumed perforce, You are shy to ask me which. Then let me whisper it in your ear. That of leaving the species to get on as best it could without me.
I would have cherished a coloured baby, said Camier.
Ever since I favour the other form, said Mercier. One does what one can, but one can nothing. Only squirm and wriggle, to end up in the evening where you were in the morning. But! There’s a vocable for you if you like! All is vox inanis save, certain days, certain conjunctions, such is Mercier’s contribution to the squabble of the universals.
Where are our things? said Camier.
Where our umbrella? said Mercier.
As I was trying to help Helen, said Camier, my hand slipped.
Not another word, said Mercier.
I dumped it in the sluice, said Camier.
Let us go from here, said Mercier.
Where? said Camier.
Crooked ahead, said Mercier.
Our things? said Camier.
Less said the better, said Mercier.
You’ll be my death, said Camier.
You want details? said Mercier.
Camier did not answer. Words fail him, said Mercier to himself.
You remember our bicycle? said Mercier.
Just, said Camier.
Speak up, said Mercier, I’m not deaf.
Yes, said Camier.
Of it there remains, said Mercier, securely chained to the railing, as much as may reasonably remain, after a week’s incessant rain, of a bicycle relieved of both wheels, the saddle, the bell and the carrier. And the taillight, he added, I nearly forgot. He struck his forehead a blow. What an addle-pate to be sure! he said.
And the pump of course, said Camier.
Believe it or not, said Mercier, it’s all one to me, our pump has been spared.
And it such a fine pump, said Camier. Where is it?
Thinking it was a mere oversight, said Mercier, I left it where it was. It seemed the right thing to do. What is there for us to pump up now? That is to say I turned it upside down, I don’t know why.
Does it fit as well so? said Camier.
Oh quite as well, said Mercier, quite, quite as well.
They went out. It was blowing.
Is it raining still? said Mercier.
Not for the moment, I fancy, said Camier.
And yet the air strikes damp, said Mercier.
If we have nothing to say, said Camier, let us say nothing.
We have things to say, said Mercier.
Then why don’t we say them? said Camier.
We can’t, said Mercier.
Then let us be silent, said Camier.
But we try, said Mercier.
We have got clear without mishap, said Camier, and unscathed.
What did I tell you? said Mercier. Continue.
We advance painfully—.
Painfully! cried Mercier.
Laboriously … laboriously through the dark streets, dark and comparatively deserted, because of the late hour no doubt, and the unsettled weather, not knowing who is leading, who following, whom.
By the ingle, said Mercier, snug and warm, they drowse away. Books fall from hands, heads on chests, flames die down, embers expire, dream steals from its lair towards its prey. But the watcher is on the watch, they wake and go to bed, thanking God for the position, dearly won, permitting of such joys, among so many others, such peace, while wind and rain lash against the panes and thought strays, spirit unalloyed, among those who have no refuge, the unable, the accursed, the weak, the unfortunate.
Do we as much as know, said Camier, what the other was up to all this time?
Again, said Mercier.
Camier repeated his remark.
Even side by side, said Mercier, as now, arm to arm, hand in hand, legs in unison, we are fraught with more events than could fit in a fat tome, two fat tomes, your fat tome and my fat tome. Whence no doubt our blessed sense of nothing, nothing to be done, nothing to be said. For man wearies in the end of trying to slake his drought at the fireman’s hose and seeing his few remaining tapers, one after another, blasted by the oxyhydrogen blowpipe. So he gives himself over, once and for all, to thirsting in the dark. It’s less nerve-rending. But forgive, there are days when fire and water invade my thoughts, and consequently my conversation, in so far as the two are connected.
I should like to ask some simple questions, said Camier.
Simple questions? said Mercier. Camier, you surprise me.
Their couching will be of the simplest, said Camier, all you have to do is reply without thinking.
If there’s one thing I abominate, said Mercier, it’s talking walking.
Our situation is desperate, said Camier.
Now now, said Mercier, none of your bombast. Would it be on account of the wind, do you suppose, that the rain has stopped, if it has?
Don’t ask me, said Camier.
Let me tell you, said Mercier, before you go any further, I haven’t an answer to my name. Oh there was a time I had, and none but the best, they were my only company, I even invented queries to go with them. But I sent them all packing long ago.
I don’t mean that kind, said Camier.
And what kind so? said Mercier. This is looking up.
You’ll see, said Camier. First, what news of the sack?
I hear nothing, said Mercier.
The sack, cried Camier, where is the sack?
Let’s go down here, said Mercier, it’s more sheltered.
They turned into a narrow street between high ancient houses.
Now, said Mercier.
Where is the sack? said Camier.
What possesses you to bring that up again? said Mercier.
You’ve told me nothing, said Camier.
Mercier stopped in
his stride, which obliged Camier to stop in his too. Had not Mercier stopped in his stride, then Camier had not stopped in his either. But Mercier having stopped in his stride, Camier had to stop in his too.
Told you nothing? said Mercier.
Strictly nothing, said Camier.
What is there to tell, said Mercier, assuming I told you nothing?
Why, said Camier, if you found it, how things went, all that.
Mercier said, Let us resume our—. At a loss he gestured, with his free hand, towards his legs and those of his companion. There was a silence. Then they resumed that indescribable process not unconnected with their legs.
You were saying? said Mercier.
The sack, said Camier.
Would I appear to have it? said Mercier.
No, said Camier.
Well then? said Mercier.
So many things may have happened, said Camier. You may have looked for it, but in vain, found it and lost it again or even discarded it, said to yourself, It’s not worth bothering about, or, Enough for today, tomorrow we’ll see. How am I to know?
I looked for it in vain, said Mercier, longly, patiently, carefully, unsuccessfully.
He exaggerated.
Do I ask, said Mercier, how exactly you came to break the umbrella? Or what you went through before throwing it away? I combed innumerable sites, questioned innumerable parties, made allowance for the invisibility of things, the metamorphoses of time, the foible of folk in general, and of me in particular, for fabulation and fibbery, the wish to please and the urge to hurt, and had as well, just as well, stayed quietly where I was, no matter where, still trying to imagine against the endless approach, the shuffling slippers, the clinking keys, some better remedy than the yelp, the gasp, the whine, the skedaddle.
Camier said briefly what he thought of this.
Why do we insist, said Mercier, you and I for example, did you ever ask yourself that question, you who ask so many? Shall we fritter away what little is left of us in the tedium of flight and dreams of deliverance? Do you not inkle, like me, how you might adjust yourself to this preposterous penalty and placidly await the executioner, come to ratify you?
No, said Camier.
They held back on the brink of a great open space, a square perhaps, all tumult, fluttering gleams, writhing shadows.
Let us turn back, said Mercier. This street is charming. That brothel perfume.
They set about the street the other way. It seemed changed, even in the dark. Not they, or scarcely.
I see distant lands—, said Mercier.
Where are we going? said Camier.
Shall I never shake you off? said Mercier.
Do you not know where we are going? said Camier.
What does it matter, said Mercier, where we are going? We are going, that’s enough.
No need to shout, said Camier.
We go wherever the flesh creeps least, said Mercier. We dodge along, hugging the walls, wherever the shit lies least thick. We stumble on an alley in a thousand, all we need do is pace it to and fro till it’s no better than the others, and you want to know where we are going. Where are your sensibilities this evening, Camier?
I recapitulate, said Camier.
He did, then asked his simple questions. This brought them to the end of the alley where, as one man, they turned back yet again.
We talk too much, said Mercier. I have heard and said more inanities, since you took me in tow, than in all the rest of my life.
Tis I am in tow, said Camier. He added, The days of our talking together may well soon be ended. So let us think twice before we hold our tongue. For then you will turn to me in vain, and I to you, to me and you not there, but elsewhere, no better off, or barely.
What’s all this? said Mercier.
So much so that I often wonder, said Camier, quite often, if we had not better part now, here and now, without more ado.
If it’s my feelings you’re appealing to, said Mercier, you should know better.
No later than today, for example, said Camier, I was on the point of not keeping our appointment.
So they had an appointment.
How strange, said Mercier, I had to wrestle with just such an angel.
One of us will yield in the end, said Camier.
Quite so, said Mercier, no need for both to succumb.
It would not be a desertion, said Camier, not necessarily.
Far from it, said Mercier, far from it.
By that I mean a forsaking, said Camier.
I took you to, said Mercier.
But the chances are it would, said Camier.
Would what? said Mercier.
Be one, said Camier.
Well obviously, said Mercier. To go on alone, left or leaver … Allow me to leave the thought unfinished.
They paced on a little way in silence. Then Mercier said:
I smell kips.
All is in darkness, said Camier. No light of any colour. No number.
Let us ask this worthy constable, said Mercier.
They accosted the constable.
Pardon, Inspector, said Mercier, would you by any chance happen to know of a house … how shall I say, a bawdy or brothelhouse, in the vicinity.
The constable looked them up and down.
Guaranteed clean, said Mercier, as far as possible, we have a horror of the pox, my friend and I.
Are you not ashamed of yourselves, at your age? said the constable.
What is that to you? said Camier.
Ashamed? said Mercier. Are you ashamed of yourself, Camier, at your age?
Move on, said the constable.
I note your number, said Camier.
Have you our pencil? said Mercier.
Sixteen sixty-five, said Camier. The year of the plague. Easy to remember.
Look you, said Mercier, to renounce venery because of a simple falling off in erotogenesis would be puerile, in our opinion. You would not have us live without love, Inspector, were it but once a month, the night of the first Saturday for example.
And that’s where the taxpayers’ good-looking money goes, said Camier.
You’re arrested, said the constable.
What is the charge? said Camier.
Venal love is the only kind left to us, said Mercier. Passion and dalliance are reserved for blades like you.
And solitary enjoyment, said Camier.
The constable seized Camier’s arm and screwed it.
Help, Mercier, said Camier.
Unhand him please, said Mercier.
Camier gave a scream of pain. For the constable, holding fast his arm with one hand the size of two, with the other had dealt him a violent smack. His interest was awakening. It was not every night a diversion of this quality broke the monotony of his beat. The profession had its silver lining, he had always said so. He unsheathed his truncheon. Come on with you now, he said, and no nonsense. With the hand that held the truncheon he drew a whistle from his pocket, for he was no less dexterous than powerful. But he had reckoned without Mercier (who can blame him?) and to his undoing, for Mercier raised his right foot (who could have foreseen it?) and launched it clumsily but with force among the testicles (to call a spade a spade) of the adversary (impossible to miss them). The constable dropped everything and fell howling with pain and nausea to the ground. Mercier himself lost his balance and came down cruelly on his hipbone. But Camier, beside himself with indignation, caught up the truncheon, sent the helmet flying with his boot and clubbed the defenceless skull with all his might, again and again, holding the truncheon with both hands. The howls ceased. Mercier rose to his feet. Help me! roared Camier. He tugged furiously at the cape, caught between the head and the cobbles. What do you want with that? said Mercier. Cover his gob, said Camier. They freed the cape and lowered it over the face. Then Camier resumed his blows. Enough, said Mercier, give me that blunt instrument. Camier dropped the truncheon and took to his heels. Wait, said Mercier. Camier halted. Mercier picked up the truncheon
and dealt the muffled skull one moderate and attentive blow, just one. Like partly shelled hard-boiled egg, was his impression. Who knows, he mused, perhaps that was the finishing touch. He threw aside the truncheon and joined Camier, taking him by the arm. Look lively now, he said. On the edge of the square they were brought to a stand by the violence of the blast. Then slowly, head down, unsteadily, they pressed on through a tumult of shadow and clamour, stumbling on the cobbles strewn already with black boughs trailing grating before the wind or by little leaps and bounds as though on springs. On the far side debouched a narrow street the image of it they had just left .
He didn’t hurt you badly, I hope, said Mercier.
The bastard, said Camier. Did you mark the mug?
This should greatly simplify matters, said Mercier.
And they talk of law and order, said Camier.
We would never have hit on it alone, said Mercier.
Best now go to Helen’s, said Camier.
Indubitably, said Mercier.
Are you sure we were not seen? said Camier.
Chance knows how to handle it, said Mercier. Deep down I never counted but on her.
I don’t see what difference it makes, said Camier.
You will, said Mercier. The flowers are in the vase and the flock back in the fold.
I don’t understand, said Camier.
They went then mostly in silence the short way they had still to go, now exposed to the full fury of the wind, now through zones of calm, Mercier striving to grasp the full consequences for them of what had chanced, Camier to make sense of the phrase he had just heard. But they strove in vain, the one to conceive their good fortune, the other to arrive at a meaning, for they were weary, in need of sleep, buffeted by the wind, while in their skulls, to crown their discomfiture, a pelting of insatiable blows.