The Wondrous and Tragic Life of Ivan and Ivana

by Maryse Conde

  Ulysses lived in the very center of Paris in a handsome building on the boulevard Voltaire, which had the serious disadvantage of not having an elevator. Ivan had to hobble up the six steep flights of stairs covered with a threadbare carpet. When Ulysses came to open the door, Ivan had trouble recognizing him. Gone was the immigrant cramped into a shabby-looking parka and trousers he had met a few weeks earlier. Ulysses was wearing the latest fashion, dressed to the nines like Mansour used to be, in a salt-and-pepper suit with a large blue silk scarf tied around his neck. Where did this transformation come from? How could he account for it? Ivan refrained from asking and followed his host through a maze of well-furnished rooms to a charming bedroom in the middle of which was a bed covered with a richly embroidered Moroccan blanket.

  “My goodness! You must have won the lottery!” Ivan said to Ulysses jokingly.

  Ulysses shook his head seriously.

  “I told you, I’ve found work.”

  He lit a cigarette, for not only did this lapsed Muslim drink alcohol, he also smoked.

  “It’s a special kind of job which I’ll describe to you because I think for a boy like you, built like you are, it might very well suit you. You’ve no idea of the nightmare I endured for three long years at the Cambrésis camp. I can’t describe the filthy showers and toilets that had to be shared between ten and twelve men. I’ll spare you the revolting food served up in bars that went by the name of restaurants. No, I’m talking about the constant promiscuity, the daily rape of women, teenagers, and even children: in short, all those who were particularly vulnerable. I had the good fortune to meet a couple who helped me get out of there.”

  After a moment’s silence he continued, slightly embarrassed.

  “They offered me the job of escort.”

  “Escort?” Ivan repeated, somewhat puzzled. “What does that mean?”

  Ulysses became even more embarrassed. He gestured vaguely.

  “I think it’s an English or Spanish word, I don’t know exactly. Anyway, it doesn’t matter. You know, women are very different from what they used to be. They’re not what our countries tell us they are. Women have a will of their own, they have energy, they have desires, I mean desires of the flesh. They know what they want and they want men capable of satisfying them and helping them taste the pleasures of life. Every type of pleasure, you know what I’m saying?”

  No, Ivan did not know what he was saying.

  “What are you talking about?” Ivan asked again.

  Ulysses decided to lay his cards on the table.

  “What I’m saying is you can make thousands of euros a month if you know how to use the tools you were born with. How long is your penis?”

  “What!” Ivan shouted, thinking he had misheard.

  Ulysses waved a calming hand.

  “I’m joking, I’m joking. Let’s be serious. At the present time I’m escorting three women: one of them is the manager of an advertising company, another is an actress with a promising career, and the third is a cosmetic surgeon. None of them balk at giving me all the money I need.”

  Gradually the truth dawned on Ivan, for he was not entirely naive. Worse than anything he might have imagined, Ulysses surrendered his body to women in exchange for money. He was nothing better than a prostitute. A bitter taste of bile filled his mouth. He almost vomited, then he stood up and headed rapidly for the exit.

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Ulysses said, trying to hold him back.

  Ivan was no longer listening. He dashed down the stairs, landed on the sidewalk, and in his haste almost knocked over a passing couple. Without knowing exactly what he was doing he crossed the boulevard and began running, the likes of which he hadn’t done for years, and people stood in fright to let this tall black man run past, swifter than the legendary Thiam Papagallo. He pushed open the gate to a square which, during the day, was crowded with babies in their strollers and children pedaling their tricycles, but for now was deserted, and collapsed onto a bench whose cold surface penetrated his clothes. He couldn’t stop feeling nauseated, disgusted, and soiled. He would have liked to become the small boy again when Simone soaped and lathered his body and poured calabash upon calabash of warm water over his head. While he remained petrified with disgust, a young man approached him and with an unmistakable smile, simpered, “Aren’t you cold?”

  Ivan’s blood boiled over and he lost control of his hands which grabbed the seducer’s throat. This is what the world had to offer: prostitutes, homosexuals, escorts, every type of depravity.

  We have managed to reconstruct exactly the events of that fatal evening. We use the word “fatal” on purpose because, having attempted to follow and understand him all through our story, to our thinking it was at that very moment Ivan’s radicalization came to completion. Up till then certain events, such as the deaths of his beloved Alix and Cristina, had not radically changed him. Suddenly all these incidents took on a striking new meaning: the death of Mansour and the depravity of Ulysses assumed a decisive character.

  The screams of the man who Ivan had grabbed around the neck did not fail to attract the attention of passersby who were making their way to a concert at the Bataclan. By punching and kicking they managed to free the victim. But Ivan was so strong and tall he was able to escape, and jumped into a taxi cruising along the boulevard Voltaire. The taxi driver was a Guadeloupean, Florian Ernatus, who, seeing a man of his race in difficulty, and being pursued by a horde of white folk, naturally came to his aid. Such behavior is becoming increasingly rare and deserves to be mentioned. As for white folk, they have always killed each other: for example, the Nazis and the Jews. Black people, on the contrary, inspired by their theory of Negritude and racial solidarity, once believed they owed it to themselves to help each other. Nowadays such ideas have become obsolete.

  “Where are you going?” Florian Ernatus asked Ivan, pushing hard on the accelerator.

  “I don’t know. Oh yes, take me to Villeret-le-François,” Ivan stammered.

  Lying flat out on the back seat while the lights of bars and buildings flew past as the taxi picked up speed, Ivan, who never talked about himself, began to tell the story of his life.

  “It’s the same for everyone,” Florian told him, shrugging his shoulders. “You think things were different for me? First of all, I’ve never known my father. After pestering my mother, she ended up telling me his name was Bong, a Filipino who cleaned the cabins on board the cruise ship Empress of the Seas when the company used to make the Antilles their port of call. My mother was nanny to the baby of a rich family of mulattos who were traveling to celebrate their tenth wedding anniversary. Was she telling the truth? I’ve no idea. For years I walked barefoot or with sneakers because I didn’t have the money to buy a solid pair of shoes. There was a time when I worked on the Filipacchi plantations. Unfortunately, one fine day a gust of wind blew down all the banana trees and I found myself out of work. Then I worked for the Salomon pig farm but the pigs caught swine fever and the facility had to close. It was in Paris I found work again. This taxi isn’t mine, I’m just the driver.”

  What Florian didn’t say was how he’d searched everywhere for his father. He had gone to Jamaica where the cruise company had its headquarters and was hired three times in the ships’ kitchens. But among the hundreds of Filipinos who cleaned the cabins he never found trace of anyone called Bong.

  We can only give thanks for the way Florian Ernatus treated Ivan. He drove him to Villeret-le-François and, despite the twists and turns he had to make, no thanks to his GPS, he didn’t charge him a penny. Once they arrived at the André Malraux housing estate Florian helped Ivan climb the stairs in Tower A where Ivan hung out. He accompanied Ivan into Hugo’s tiny apartment, opened the futon and put him to bed like a mother would have done. We can now certify that from that moment on a visible change came over Ivan. He became increasingly somber; never a smile, even less a burst of laug
hter, and always prepared to dissect the slightest incident in his daily routine.

  Ivan spent the week huddled up on his futon, his forehead covered with compresses. Ivana missed two days of classes to look after him. Even though Mona insisted it was just a bad cold and there was no need to call the doctor, Ivana was worried. Finally Ivan opened his eyes, got dressed, and went to the mosque, determined to have a conversation with the imam Amiri Kapoor. He sensed that this man would change his life.

  Amiri Kapoor received Ivan in his office whose luxuriousness amazed anyone who entered it. In this shabby-looking mosque, once a gymnasium, a gift from the municipality to its growing Muslim population, he had managed to create a space filled with beauty. Black and gilded calligraphies covered the walls as well as photos of the main places of worship in the world: Mecca rubbed shoulders with Golgotha, Notre-Dame in Paris, and Westminster Abbey. The imam’s profile had a lot going for it. He was the son and grandson of two imams, moral rigorists who proclaimed loud and clear the name of God in the small village of Ragu located a few kilometers from Lahore. He was fifteen when his father forced him to write a letter of congratulations to Ayatollah Khomeini, who had just declared the fatwa against Salman Rushdie. “So must perish all bad Muslims,” his father had thundered. The imam had then spent three years in Medina, that austere city where the call of the muezzins rang out from early morning on. When he had lived in Kano he had done wonders revamping and reorganizing the institutions of this holy city where all too often the call to prayer was little more than a monotonous recitative.

  Amiri Kapoor cast a penetrating look at Ivan.

  “First question: why did you convert to Islam? I know that Christianity reigns in the part of the world you come from. Why such a conversion?”

  Ivan hesitated for a moment.

  “I don’t know really. I lived in Mali. In the compound where we lived my sister and I were the only Catholics and I always felt foreign, out of place. I believe, too, that I wanted to get closer to my father with whom I didn’t get along.”

  The imam looked surprised.

  “You have a sister, then?”

  “A twin sister,” Ivan replied, unconsciously infatuated every time he mentioned Ivana. “I came out of our mother’s womb first. I’m a boy. These two reasons should have been enough to make me feel superior. But I feel nothing of the sort. She is so accomplished and I’m so inferior, I adore her.”

  “You should only adore God,” the imam cut in sharply.

  This brutal reprimand upset Ivan.

  The imam continued more gently.

  “Is your faith in God as sharp as a weapon? Are you capable of killing for it?”

  Ivan once again hesitated. Although he had belonged to the death squad which had killed El Cobra, he had merely obeyed the diktat of the Army of Shadows out of fear or cowardice. It was not the result of a personal decision.

  “Yes,” he claimed, nevertheless. “I’m capable of doing it.”

  There then followed a long exchange of looks. Amiri Kapoor understood that this simple-minded boy, incapable of using his wits, was, however, made of exceptional stuff, the material for making first-class disciples. All it needed was to help him get rid of a few dregs, such as this excessive love for his sister.

  He rummaged through the drawers of his desk and brought out a fat file, which he opened.

  “Are you free on Tuesday and Thursday evenings?” he asked. “If so, I’ll put you in charge of helping the students at the Koranic school. You’ll reread their homework, grade them, and help them get closer to God. I feel you’re capable of doing that.”

  After a moment’s silence he continued.

  “I must confess that in exchange for your services I can only offer a small payment. You know the financial situation of the mosques in France.”

  Ivan waved his hand.

  “It’s not a question of money between us. I’d do it for free if you asked me.”

  How surprising life turns out to be! In one week Ivan was offered two types of decent jobs. The principal of the Marcellin Berthelot College, who had never paid him any attention, summoned him to his office. To Ivan’s great surprise he was offered the job of replacing a school supervisor who had been hospitalized for many months following an unfortunate car accident.

  “You won’t have much to do,” he assured Ivan. “Simply supervise the students during their study period. Madame Mona Hincelin tells me you were an excellent pupil in Guadeloupe and I can easily get your file from the education authorities.”

  Ivan gave thanks to God, who for once seemed to be treating him well.

  Henceforth he divided his time between the Marcellin Berthelot College and the mosque’s Koranic school. He had a soft spot for the hours he spent at the mosque for, without really knowing why, he loved to be around young people. He who had never heard of the expression “second and third generation” immediately understood its meaning. These teenagers had never been to the country of their ancestors. It was unknown territory. Born in France, they believed themselves to be French, proud at having built the Eiffel Tower or having dug the Saint-Martin canal. Some of them were grandchildren of Harkis and knew full well that their grandparents had given France more than a helping hand when it was needed. They lived in blissful ignorance about themselves. Until the unexpected insult “filthy Arab” flew out because of a lost pencil sharpener or a torn text book. Of course, they had curly hair and a creamy pale complexion. But did that make them Arabs, they wondered? Moreover, what is an Arab? Those of them who investigated further discovered they were blamed mainly for their religion: Islam. They had trouble understanding that this mumbo jumbo on which they placed little value made them responsible for attacks committed in unknown lands as far away as Pakistan or Indonesia.

  For the first time, Ivan was obliged to reflect on the meaning of Islam. A warlike religion, some people said. Aren’t all religions warlike since they proselytize and take pride in the number of their converts? Misogynistic, others said. Isn’t Christianity just as much? It wasn’t that long ago when it questioned whether women were endowed with an immortal soul like men.

  By contrast, Ivan disliked his new job at the Marcellin Berthelot College and considered his students pretentious, interested only in being admitted to the prestigious institutions of higher education. Most of his time was spent preventing the brutes in eighth grade from bullying the little pupils in sixth grade. He outfoxed rackets and set matters in order whereas before there was nothing but chaos; behind his back he quickly became known as Batman. When he learned of his nickname he asked Serge, a boy with whom he had become friends, “Batman? Why have you decided to call me Batman?”

  Serge replied without hesitation. “Because you always fly to the rescue of the weakest.”

  Ivan was not satisfied with this answer. It was not what he wanted. He wanted to change the world. The only problem was that he still had no idea how to go about it. He had hoped that the imam Amiri Kapoor could help him, but nothing had resulted from their meeting. Sometimes he got the impression that the imam was watching him and was taking time to think things over.

  Needless to say Ivan and Ivana had less and less in common and lived more and more on different planets each day. Although Ivan suffered acutely from this situation, Ivana didn’t seem to notice. She was happy and overjoyed at having all that she wished for. She had passed her exams and was admitted to the second year at the police training school. She had already been put in charge of minor duties and was proud of patrolling unsafe neighborhoods, standing guard outside schools, helping parents with children cross the road, and sometimes even volunteering for traffic duty. On Sundays she remained invisible. There was no longer any question of Ivan having lunch with her. She would go on visits to Notre-Dame, Montmartre, the Châteaux of the Loire, and especially to the Château of Chambord of which she was particularly fond. “Built at the heart of Europe’s bi
ggest enclosed wooded park, Chambord is the largest château in the Loire valley. It enjoys extensive gardens and hunting grounds listed as classical monuments.” Ivana’s close friend was Maylan, a blonde police student originally from Bulgaria and endowed with a pretty little voice. Already imagining herself as Sylvie Vartan she sang solo in concerts organized by charitable associations. Ivana and Maylan were inseparable. When they were not together, they were conversing endlessly over mobile phones glued to their ears. For all these reasons Ivan hated her.

  Why did Ivan agree to go to Fontainebleau where Maylan was performing at her parents’ farm? It was probably Spring that was lending him wings. His veins seemed to be injected with fresh blood. Instead of the blazing sun of Guadeloupe followed by long periods of rain, or the suffocating heat all year long in Mali, this change of seasons was beneficial. The same landscape was transformed month by month as if by enchantment, as if a magician had waved his magic wand over it.

  Maylan’s parents lived on a large farm not far from the forest of Fontainebleau. For their daughter’s concert they had left nothing to chance. In the main courtyard they had set up huge white tents housing round tables and chairs. If it hadn’t been for the disastrous smell of a nearby pig farm blown in sporadically by the wind, everything would have been perfect. Ivan took his seat next to his sister who very soon met up with her friends, whose company she seemed to enjoy. On the stage two men performed a duo: Perrine était servante, Perrine était servante chez monsieur not’ curé. Dingue Dengue Dongue. It was an old traditional song from the region, Ivan was told. Apparently the guests loved it and it brought the house down. Ivan was not amused and after an hour he could no longer put up with the boredom and the insipid warbling of the guests. Leave, he had to leave.