Now I understand why Laurence Dardel was bothered about me asking for that file. She knew a medical eye could easily pick out her father's malpractice.
Angele comes to sit on my knees, which is not easy, considering how long-legged she is.
"Does this help you? At all?" she asks softly.
I put my arms around her, nestling my chin in the crook of her neck.
"I don't know. What hurts is not knowing what really happened."
She strokes my hair.
"When I came back from school that day, the day my father shot himself, there was no note. He left nothing. It drove us mad. It drove my mother mad. Just before she died, a couple of years ago, she told me how dreadful it was, not knowing why he had killed himself even after all those years. There was no other woman. No financial problems. No health problems. Nothing."
I hold her tight, thinking of her at thirteen discovering her dead father. No note. No explanation. I shudder.
"We never knew. We had to live with that. I learned to. It wasn't easy, but I did."
And it dawns on me that this is precisely what I am going to have to do.
"It's time," says Angele vigorously. We are having our coffee after lunch, and the sun is so exceptionally warm that we are sitting outside on the patio, in front of the kitchen. The little garden is slowly coming to life. Spring is not far. I can smell it tickling my clogged-up Parisian nose. Grassy, humid, fresh, and pungent. Delicious.
I glance at her, surprised. "Time for what?"
"Time to go."
"Where?"
She smiles. "You'll see. Put something warm on. The wind can be tricky."
"What are you up to?"
"Wouldn't you like to know."
I used to be edgy, at first, riding behind her on the Harley-Davidson. I wasn't used to motorcycles. I never knew which side to lean on during a turn, and as a city boy, I was convinced that bikes were too dangerous to be trusted. I had never driven one in my life. And I had never ridden behind anyone, let alone a woman. Angele drove her Harley every day from Clisson to the hospital at Le Loroux, rain or shine, sleet or snow. She hated cars, being stuck in traffic jams. She bought her first Harley when she was twenty years old. This was Harley number four.
A pretty woman on a vintage Harley gets noticed, I soon discovered. The distinctive throaty exhaust roar of the Harley turns heads, but so does the black leather-clad, curvaceous creature sitting atop it. Riding behind her was much more pleasant than I had anticipated, as I am stuck to her in a quasi-sexual posture, my thighs engulfing her, my crotch glued to her stupendous ass, my stomach and chest fixed to her hips and back.
"Come on, Mister Parisian, we haven't got all day!" she yells, throwing me my helmet as the Harley growls invitingly.
"Are we expected?"
"Well, yes, we are!" she says exultantly, checking her watch, "and if you don't get a move on, we'll be late."
We weave down bumpy country roads lined with fields touched by the first magical promise of spring. The sun is positively warm, but the bite of the air stays nippy. We drive for what I guess must be an hour or so, but it doesn't seem long at all. It is in fact heavenly to be tucked snugly behind Angele, the Harley's rumbling vibrations strong in my loins, the sun caressing my back.
It is not till I see the signposts for the Gois that I understand where we are. I had never realized how close Clisson was to Noirmoutier. The scenery strikes me as completely different in the wintertime, browner tones, no green. The sand on the shore appears darker too, earthier, but no less beautiful. The first rescue poles seem to greet me, and the gulls circle overhead with piercing cries as if they remember me. The beach stretches far away, dark brown, touched with gray. The dark blue sea sparkles under the sun, and I can see the black, uneven lines of conches, shells, seaweed, rubble, cork, and pieces of wood.
There are no more cars on the Gois, and the tide is closing over from the right, the first lathered sheets of water already covering the causeway. The place is nearly deserted, not like in summer, when thick crowds gather to watch the sea conquer the land. Angele does not slow down. In fact she drives even faster, and I tug at her jacket to draw her attention, as I cannot be heard through my helmet and hers. She ignores me superbly, gearing the Harley up, and the few people who are parked on land point at us with startled expressions as we rocket past. I can almost hear them exclaim, "Hey, are they going to cross the Gois?" I pull on her jacket, harder this time. Somebody honks loudly to warn us, but it is too late. The Harley's wheels send impressive sprays of seawater gushing up on either side of us as they hit the paved causeway. I hope to God Angele knows what she is doing. I read too many stories as a boy about accidents on the Gois at high tide not to know this is a crazy feat. At least thirty people have died here in the past hundred years. And God knows how many more before that. I hold on to her for dear life, praying the Harley doesn't skid and send us plunging headfirst into the sea, praying the engine doesn't get swamped by one of those frothy waves that seem larger by the minute. Angele drives those four kilometers smoothly and with such cocksure self-assurance that I guess this is not her first time.
It is a wonderful, exhilarating ride. And I suddenly feel safe, gloriously safe, safer than I have felt since knowing the touch of my father's protective hand on my back as a boy. Safe, with my body clasped against hers as we seem to glide over water, over what is no longer a road, for it can no longer be seen. Safe, as I look up at the island ahead, at the familiar rescue poles dotting our way through the sea's glittering surface, beckoning us as a lighthouse leads a ship to security in the harbor. And I wish this moment could last forever, that the beauty and perfection of it would never leave me. We pull in on land amid the clapping and cheering of passersby who are standing near the cross guarding the mouth of the Gois.
Angele stops the engine and takes off her helmet.
"I bet you were scared shitless." She chuckles, a broad smile on her face.
"No!" I gasp, putting my helmet on the ground so I can kiss her wildly, more cheering and clapping going on behind us. "I wasn't scared. I trusted you."
"You can. First time I did that, I was fifteen years old. On a friend's Ducati."
"You drove a Ducati at fifteen?"
"You'd be surprised at what I did at fifteen."
"I'm not interested," I say airily. "How are we getting back? The Gois is closing over."
"We'll take the bridge home. Less romantic, though."
"Much less romantic. Wouldn't I love to get stranded on one of those rescue poles with you. I can think of all sorts of things to do to you."
The huge sweep of the bridge can be seen from where we stand, although it is more than five kilometers away. The road has gone now, entirely swallowed by the water. The sea has regained its supremacy, immense and shimmering.
"I used to come here with my mother. She loved the Gois."
"And I used to come here with my dad," she says. "We spent a couple of summers here too, when I was a kid. But not at the Bois de la Chaise, that was too chic for us, Monsieur! We went to the beach at the Gueriniere. My father was born at La Roche-sur-Yon. He used to know this spot like the back of his hand."
"So maybe we both came to the Gois on the same day when we were small."
"Maybe we did."
We sit down on the grassy hill near the cross. We sit shoulder to shoulder, sharing a cigarette, near where I sat with Melanie on the day of the accident. I think of my sister, wrapped up in a bubble of ignorance by her own will. I think of everything I now know that she never will unless she asks me. I take Angele's hand and kiss it. I think of the long line of ifs that led me to this hand, to this kiss. If I hadn't decided to organize a surprise for Melanie's fortieth birthday. If Melanie hadn't had that flashback. If there had been no accident. If Gaspard hadn't had that slip of the tongue. If he hadn't kept that invoice. But another if surfaces. What if Dr. Dardel had sent my mother to the hospital on February 7, the day she had the bad migraine? Could she have be
en saved? Would she still be alive today? Would she have left my father? Would she and June be living together? In Paris? In New York?
"Stop that," comes Angele's voice.
"Stop what?"
She puts her chin on her knees and looks oddly young all of a sudden, gazing out to the sea, the wind whipping at her hair. Then she says in a low voice, "Antoine, I looked everywhere for that note. As my father lay there, his blood and brains scattered all over the kitchen, before I called for help, I looked for that note, shrieking at the top of my lungs, tears streaming down my face, trembling from head to toe. I looked for it high and low, I combed that goddamn house for it, the garden, the garage. I kept thinking my mother was going to come home any minute from the clerk's office she worked in, and I had to find that note before she arrived. I never did. There was no note. And then this monstrous why loomed up. Was he that unhappy? What was it we hadn't seen? How could we have been so blind, my mother, my sister, and I? And what if I had noticed something, and what if I had come home from school earlier that day, or what if I hadn't gone to school at all? Would he have killed himself? Or would he still be here today?"
I can see what she is getting at. She goes on. Her voice is stronger now, but I pick up a vibrant note of pain that moves me.
"My dad was the calm, quiet type, like you, not talkative, much more silent than my mother. His name was Michel. I look like him. The same eyes. He never seemed depressed, he didn't drink, he was healthy, athletic. He liked to read. All those books in my house are his. He admired Chateaubriand, Romain Gary, nature, the Vendee, and the sea, and he seemed a tranquil, happy fellow, or at least so we thought. The day I found him dead, he was dressed in his best gray suit, one that I saw him wear only on special occasions, Christmas or New Year's Eve. And he had a tie on, and his best black shoes. He never dressed like that every day. He worked in a bookstore, and he wore corduroys and sweaters. He was sitting at the table when he shot himself. I thought maybe the note was trapped under his body, as he had slumped forward after the shot, but I hadn't dared touch him. I was afraid of dead bodies then, not like now. But when they came to get him, there was no note under him. Nothing. Then I hoped a letter might come in the mail, that perhaps he had posted us a note the day he died, but nothing turned up. It was only when I began my job as a mortician, and when I got my first suicide cases that the healing process slowly began in an unexpected way. But this was later, years later, ten years later at least. I recognized my anguish and my despair when I met the families of those who'd killed themselves. I listened to their stories, I shared their grief, sometimes I even cried with them. Many of them told me why their loved ones had chosen to die, many of them knew. Broken hearts, illness, desperation, anguish, fear--there were so many reasons. And then it hit me one day as I was tending to the body of a man who was my dad's age. He had shot himself because the pressure at his job was too great. This man was dead, and so was my father. This man's family knew why he had pulled the trigger, whereas we didn't. But what difference did it make? Only death was left behind. A dead body to embalm, to put in a coffin, and to bury. Prayers to be said and grieving to begin. Knowing would never bring my father back. Knowing would never make the grieving any easier. Knowing never makes death easy."
There is a tiny teardrop quivering at the side of her eye, and I gently wipe it away with my thumb.
"You are a wonderful woman, Angele Rouvatier."
"Don't get mushy on me, Antoine," she warns. "I hate that. Let's go. It's getting late."
She gets up and walks to the Harley. I watch her put on her helmet and her gloves and deftly kick-start the engine. The sun seems less strong now, and a chill is setting in.
We cook a leisurely dinner together, she and I, side by side. Vegetable soup (leeks, carrots, and potatoes), lemon and thyme (from the garden), roasted chicken with basmati rice, apple crumble. A cool bottle of Chablis keeps us company. The house is welcoming and warm, and I become conscious of how much I enjoy its peace and quiet, its size, its bucolic simplicity. I never thought an urbanite like me would revel in such a rustic setting. Could I possibly live here with Angele? Nowadays, with computers, mobile phones, and high-speed trains, it was technically feasible. I think of my future workload. Rabagny was in the process of clinching a lucrative deal for me concerning the Think Dome patent. I would soon be busy again for him and Parimbert, for a highly ambitious, exciting European project that would bring money rolling in. And it seemed there was nothing I couldn't do for them right here. It was merely a matter of organization and clever planning.
But would Angele want me here? I'm not the marrying kind. I'm not a family person. I'm not the jealous type. Don't get mushy on me, Antoine. Maybe Angele's tantalizing spell spawns from the fact that I know I will never fully possess her. I can fuck her blind, which she obviously enjoys, and no doubt she is truly moved by my mother's story, but she will never want to live with me. She is like the cat in the Just So Stories by Kipling. The cat that walked by itself.
After dinner I suddenly remember the DVD made from the Super 8 reel. How could I have forgotten it? It is in the living room with the photographs and letters. I rush to fetch it and hand it to Angele.
"What is this?" she asks.
I explain that it was sent to me by Donna Rogers from New York. June Ashby's partner. She slides it into her laptop's DVD drive.
"I think you need to watch this by yourself," she murmurs, caressing my hair, and before I can make up my mind whether I need her presence or not, she swings the Perfecto jacket over her shoulders and slips out into the dark garden amid a whoosh of cold country air.
I sit down in front of the computer and anxiously wait. The first image to flicker on the screen is my mother's face in the sunlight, filmed from close up. She has her eyes closed as if in sleep, but a tiny smile plays around her lips. Very slowly, she opens her eyes, shades them with her hand, and with a spasm of mixed pain and joy, I look into them, incredulous. How green they were, greener than Melanie's, how soft and gentle they were, such serene, luminous, loving eyes.
I had never seen a film of my mother. Here she is on the screen of Angele's computer, miraculously resuscitated, and I can barely breathe, fraught with exhilaration and emotion. Sudden tears trickle down my cheeks and I wipe them away hurriedly. I am amazed at the fine quality of the film. I was expecting coarse, poorly colored images. Now she is walking on a beach, and with a quickening pulse I recognize the Plage des Dames, the pier, the lighthouse, the wooden cabins, and her fuzzy orange bathing suit. I experience the strangest sensation. Somehow I know I am right around the corner building a sand castle, calling out to her, but June, who is no doubt filming, is not interested in a little boy's sand castle. The film then jumps to the rescue poles and the long stretch of the Gois passage, and I see my mother far away, a tiny silhouette, walking along the edge of the causeway at low tide on a gray and stormy day, wearing a red sweater and shorts, her black hair blowing in the wind. She seems far away at first, hands in pockets, but she walks closer and closer with her unforgettable dancer's walk, feet turned outward, back and neck straight. So graceful, so nimble. She is walking exactly where Angele and I drove that very afternoon, heading to the island as we were, toward the cross. Her face is still a blur. Then it becomes clearer, and I see she is smiling. She breaks into a run, right up to the camera, laughs, clears a strand of hair from her eyes. Her smile is full of love, brimming over with it. Then she puts one of her small tanned hands to her chest, exactly over her heart, kisses it, and places her palm on the camera. The pink flesh of her palm is the last image of the film. The last image I see.
I click on the video to start it over again, awestruck by the images of my mother alive, moving, walking, breathing, smiling. I don't know how many times I watch it. Over and over again. Until I know it by heart, until I feel I was there. Until I can watch it no more because my agony is unbearable. Until my eyes are so full of tears I can no longer see the screen. Until I miss my dead mother so much I want to l
ie down on the uneven stone floor and weep. My mother will never know my children. My mother will never know who I am now. What I have grown into. Her son. A man leading his life the best way he can, a man doing his best, whatever that best may be. Something inside me is unleashed, snaps, lets go. I feel it go. I feel the agony go. In its place, a dull ache remains, and I know it will have a hold on me forever.
I stop the video and eject the DVD. I put it back into its cover. The door to the garden is ajar, and I slip outside. The air is sweet and cool. The stars twinkle. A dog howls in the distance. Angele is sitting on a stone bench looking up at the stars.
"Do you want to talk about it?" she asks.
"No."
"Are you all right?"
"Yes."
She leans close to me. I put an arm around her shoulders, and we share the quiet cold of the night, the occasional faraway yelp of the dog, the starry radiance that shines down on us. I think of my mother's pink palm covering the camera. I think of the Harley gliding over the Gois. I think of Angele's supple back against my chest, her confident gloved hands on the wide handlebar. And I feel sheltered, as I did that afternoon, knowing that this woman, whom I may or may not spend the rest of my days with, this woman who may send me packing tomorrow morning or take me in forever, this extraordinary woman whose job is death, has given me the kiss of life.
Acknowledgments
Thank you:
Nicolas, my husband, for his patience and his help.
Louis and Charlotte, our children, for being the great people they have blossomed into.
Laure, Catherine, and Julia, my first readers.
Abha, for her feedback and advice.
Sarah, for her beady eye.
Erika and Catherine, for helping me imagine Angele.
Lauren and Jan, for their help on the U.S. edition.
Chantal, for giving me that space on the rue Froidevaux.
Guillemette and Olivier, for introducing me to Noirmoutier.
A Secret Kept Page 26
