The Little Man From Archangel

by Georges Simenon

  A Samoyed village, or a group of Tajiks beside a cornfield plunged him into the same dreamland as a child with a book of holy pictures.

  The idea of going back there had never occurred to him, and it was not due to fear of the fate which might await him, nor, as with Shepilov, hatred for the Party, From the moment he had come of age, on the contrary, two years before the war, he had renounced his Nansen passport and become a naturalized Frenchman.

  France itself was too big for him. After school he had worked for several months in a bookshop in the Boulevard Saint-Michel and the Shepilovs had been unable to believe their ears when he had told them that he preferred to return to the Berry.

  He had gone back alone, had taken a furnished room with old Mademoiselle Buttereau, who had died during the war, and had gone to work as a clerk in Duret's bookshop, in the Rue de Bourges.

  It was still in existence. Old Duret had retired, almost gaga, but the two sons continued the business. It was the chief newsagent-bookshop in town and one of its windows was devoted to devotional objects.

  He had not yet taken to eating at Pepito's at that time, because it was too expensive. When the bookseller's shop where he now lived, had become vacant, he had moved in there as if the Rue de Bourges only a stone's throw away, had been too far.

  He was back once again in the heart of the Old Market of his childhood and everyone had recognized him.

  Gina's departure had suddenly destroyed this equilibrium, acquired by perseverance, with the same brutality as the Revolution, earlier on, had scattered his own family.

  He did not peruse the album to the end. He made himself a cup of coffee, went and removed the handle from the door, turned the key in the lock, shot the bolt, and a little while later went up to his room.

  It was, as always when there was no market, a quiet night, without any noise except for the occasional distant motor horn, and the even more distant rumble of a goods train.

  Alone in his bed, without the spectacles which made him look like a man, he huddled up like a frightened child and finally went to sleep, with a sad twist to his lips, one hand in the place where Gina ought to have been.

  When the sun woke him, coming into his room, the air was still as calm as ever and the bells of St. Cecilia's were sounding out the first Mass. All of a sudden he felt the void of his loneliness again, and he almost dressed without washing as sometimes happened before Gina's day. But he was intent at all costs on following the same routine as every other day, so that he even hesitated when he was being served his croissants at the baker's opposite.

  'Only three,' he filially murmured regretfully.

  'Isn't Gina there?'

  These people didn't know yet. True, they were almost new to the Square, where they had bought the business only five years before.

  'No. She's not there.'

  He was surprised not to be pressed, that the news was received with indifference.

  It was half-past seven. He hadn't closed the door to go across the Square. He never did. When he came back he had a shock, for a man rose before him and as he was walking with his eyes cast down, plunged in thought, he had not recognized him immediately.

  'Where is my sister?' Frédo's hard voice was demanding.

  He stood in the middle of the shop, in a leather jerkin, his black hair still damp, showing the track of his comb.

  Since the day before, Jonas had been expecting something to happen, but he was taken by surprise, and still holding his croissants in their brown tissue paper wrappings, he stammered:

  'She hasn't come back.'

  Frédo was as big as, and broader in the shoulders than his father, and when he became angry, his nostrils would palpitate, alternately dilating and closing together.

  'Where has she gone?' he went on, without taking his suspicious gaze off Jonas.

  'I . . . but... to Bourges.'

  He added, and perhaps it was a mistake, especially addressed to Frédo:

  'At any rate she said she was going to Bourges.'

  'When did she say that?'

  'Yesterday morning.'

  'What time?'

  'I don't remember. Before the bus left.'

  'Did she take the 7.10 bus yesterday morning?'

  'She must have done.'

  Why was he trembling in front of a mere boy of nineteen, who was taking liberties in demanding an explanation from him? He wasn't the only one in the neighbourhood to be afraid of Frédo. Since his earliest childhood the Palestri boy had had a sullen character, some even said sinister.

  True, he didn't seem to like anybody, except his sister. With his father, when the latter had had too much to drink, he behaved intolerably and the neighbours had overhead some highly unsavoury rows. It was said that once Frédo had hit Palestri, and that his mother had gone for him, locked him up in his room like a ten-year old.

  He had climbed out through the window over the roofs, had stayed away for a week, during which time he had looked in vain for work at Mondugon.

  He had not passed his certificate at school and had refused to learn any proper trade. He had worked with a few shopkeepers as errand boy, delivery-man, later as a salesman. Nowhere had he remained for more than a few months or a few weeks.

  He was not lazy. As one of his ex-employers said:

  'That lad rebels against any form of discipline. He wants to be a general before being a plain soldier.'

  As much as Jonas liked the Old Market, Frédo appeared to hate it, just as he despised and hated, in the mass, its inhabitants, as, no doubt, he would have hated anywhere he had happened to be.

  Angèle alone liked to treat him as if he were still a child, but it was by no means certain that she wasn't a little afraid as well. When he was fifteen she had found a long clasp-knife in his pocket, which he spent hours fondly sharpening. She had taken it away from him. He had said, unconcerned:

  'I'll buy another.'

  'I forbid you to do any such thing!'

  'By what right?'

  'Because I'm your mother!'

  'As if you'd become it on purpose! I bet my father was drunk!'

  He didn't drink himself, didn't go dancing, used to frequent a small bar in the Italian quarter, in the shady part of the Rue Haute where Poles and Arabs mixed and where there were always to be seen groups of men holding disquieting conferences in the back of the room. The place was called the Luxor Bar. Following Marcel's hold-up the police had taken an interest in it, for Marcel, before Frédo, had been a regular customer.

  All they had found had been a retired boxer on probation, whose papers were not in order. Ever since they had nevertheless kept their eye on the Luxor Bar.

  Jonas was not afraid in the real sense of the word. Even if Frédo had hit him in a moment of fury, it would not have mattered to him. He was not brave, but he knew that physical pain does not last indefinitely.

  It was Gina whom he felt he was defending at this moment, and he had the impression that he was making a mess of it, he could have sworn that his face had reddened to the roots of his hair.

  'Did she say she would not be coming back to sleep?'

  'I . . .'

  He thought very rapidly. Once already when the question of Bourges had arisen, he had spoken without thinking. This time he must take care.

  'I don't remember.'

  The young man sneered derisively.

  'So you can't remember whether you were to expect her or not?'

  'She didn't know herself.'

  'Well then, did she take her travelling-case?'

  Think fast, all the time, and not get caught out, not contradict himself. He couldn't help glancing at the staircase.

  'I don't think so.'

  'She didn't take it,' Frédo stated.

  His voice grew hard, became accusing.

  'Her case is in the cupboard, and her coat.'

  He was waiting for an explanation. What could Jonas reply? Was this the moment to admit the truth? Was it to Gina's brother that he was to make his confession?<
br />
  He stiffened, managed to say curtly:

  'Possibly.'

  'She didn't take the bus to Bourges.'

  He feigned astonishment.

  'I had a friend in the bus and he didn't see her.'

  'Perhaps she took the train.'

  'To go to see La Loute?'

  'I imagine so.'

  'Gina didn't go to see La Loute either. I rang her up this morning before coming here.'

  Jonas did not know that La Loute had a telephone, or that Frédo was on speaking terms with her. If he knew her number perhaps he had already been to call on her there himself?

  'Where is my sister?'

  'I don't know.'

  'When did she leave?'

  'Yesterday morning.'

  He almost added:

  'I swear!'

  He almost believed it, by sheer force of repetition. What difference did it make if Gina had left on Wednesday evening or Thursday morning?

  'Nobody saw her.'

  'People are so used to seeing her passing that no one takes any notice now.'

  Frédo, who was a whole head taller than he was, seemed to be hesitating whether to seize him by the shoulders and shake him, and Jonas resigned, didn't move. His eyes didn't flinch until the moment that his visitor turned to walk over to the door, without touching him.

  'We'll soon see . . .' Frédo growled heavily.

  Never had a morning been so bright and so calm. The Square had scarcely come to life and the sound of the grocer lowering his orange blind could be heard, with the handle squeaking out in the silence.

  Standing in the doorway, Frédo was a huge and menacing shadow.

  As he turned his back, he opened his mouth, no doubt for some insult, thought better of it, walked across the pavement and started up his motor-bike.

  Jonas was still standing motionless in the middle of the shop, forgetting his croissants, forgetting that it was breakfast time. He was trying to understand. Already the day before he had had a premonition of danger hanging over him, and now he had just been threatened under his own roof.

  What for? Why?

  He had done nothing except to take a wife into his house, whom Angèle had given to him, and for two years he had done his best to give her peace.

  'She's gone to Bourges . . .'

  He had said it without thinking, to stave off questions, and now it was bringing new ones in its wake. While he was at the baker's Frédo had not only come into his house, but had gone upstairs, opened the cupboard, searched the wardrobe, since he knew that his sister had not taken her suitcase or coat.

  Was it possible that they might be thinking what had suddenly come into his mind?

  From red, he turned suddenly pale, so absurd and terrible was the notion. Did they really believe it? Had it really occurred to anybody, whether Frédo or not, that he had disposed of Gina?

  Didn't they all know, everybody in the Old Market, and in the town as well, that it was not his wife's first escapade, that she had had them before marrying him, when she still lived with her parents, and that this was the reason they had given her to him?

  He had no illusions about that. Nobody else would have married her. And Gina did not have the calm, sangfroid of La Loute, who more or less got away with it in Bourges.

  She was a female who could not control herself, that they all knew, including her father.

  Why in Heaven's name would he have . . .?

  Even in his mind he hesitated to formulate the word, or to think of it. But wasn't it better to face the reality?

  Why would he have killed her?

  It was that, he was sure, that Frédo suspected. And perhaps, the day before, the same idea had already come, in a vaguer form, into Palestri's mind.

  Otherwise why were they pestering him so?

  If he was jealous, if he suffered every time Gina went off after a man, every time he detected an alien smell about her, he had never let anybody see it, not even her. He had never reproached her. On the contrary! When she returned, he was more gentle than ever, to help her forget, to prevent her from feeling uncomfortable in his presence.

  He needed her as well. He wanted to keep her. He did not consider that he had the right to shut her up, as Angèle had once shut up her son.

  Were they really thinking that?

  He was on the point of running round to the Palestris at once to tell Angèle the truth, but he realized that he was too late. He would no longer be believed. He had too often repeated that she had gone to Bourges, had given too many details.

  Perhaps she would come back, in spite of everything? The fact that she had not taken her coat perplexed him. For if she had hidden in some part of the town why should she have taken the stamps, which she would not have been able to sell?

  Mechanically he had gone into the kitchen, and once again, with mechanical gestures, he was making coffee, sitting down to drink it, and eat his croissants. The Chaignes' lime tree was full of birds and he opened the door into the yard to throw them crumbs as usual.

  If only it had been possible for him to question the clerk at the station, he would know, but it was too late for that, too.

  Was somebody waiting for Gina with a car? That would have explained her going off without her coat. He could still present himself to the police and tell them everything, ask them to make enquiries for him. Who could tell? Tomorrow they would very likely reprimand him for not having done so, and see in that a proof against him!

  Still unthinking, he went up to the bedroom where the door of the cupboard and the two doors of the wardrobe stood wide open. There was even a pair of his trousers on the floor. He put them back in their place, made the bed, cleaned out the bathroom and changed his dirty towel. It was laundry day and he thought about getting the dirty washing ready, as Gina was not there to do it. In the basket, which he emptied, there were some petticoats and brassieres; he had begun to list the various items, when he was interrupted by steps downstairs.

  It was Madame Lallemand, the mother of the little invalid girl who had been to Bourges the day before. She had come in to change some books for her daughter.

  'What did the doctor say?' he remembered to ask.

  'It seems there's a specialist in Vienna who might be able to cure her. It isn't certain and there'd be the business of the journey, and staying there several months in a foreign country without being able to speak the language. It all costs a lot of money. My daughter says she would rather stay as she is, but all the same I'm going to write to her uncle, who has a good business in Paris and may be able to help us.'

  While he was choosing the books, the woman seemed to notice the silence in the house where, at that time, Gina would normally have been heard moving about.

  'Isn't your wife in?'

  He confined himself to a shake of the head.

  'Yesterday somebody asked my daughter if she'd been with her on the bus.'

  'You don't know who?'

  'I didn't ask. I have so little time for other people, you see . . .'

  He did not react. From now on he was prepared for everything. His principal feeling was not even fear, but disappointment, and yet he had never expected anything from other people, had been content to live in his own corner, as humbly as possible.

  'I think she would enjoy these two.'

  'There's nothing about sick people in them?'

  'No. I've read them.'

  It was true that he sometimes read novels meant for young girls and actually enjoyed them. On these occasions he would think of Doussia, whom he would picture as each of the heroines in turn.

  After that the gas bill was brought and he opened the till, paid, intended to go upstairs to finish off the laundry, when a young man brought in some school books to sell to him. Jonas was sure that he would come in a week or two to buy them back, that he was selling them only because he was short of pocket money. But as other peoples' affairs were no concern of his, he made an offer.

  'Is that all?'

  He was stil
l a businessman.

  'If they were not in such bad condition . . .'

  There were three shelves of them, all school books, and it was these that brought in the most money, because the editions seldom changed, and the same books would pass through his hands a great many times in a few years. There were some he recognized, by a stain on the cover, for example, before he so much as touched them.

  In the end he was able to go upstairs, finish off his list, tie up the dirty washing in a pillow case which he hid under the counter to await the arrival of the laundry man. It did not seem odd to him to send Gina's washing to the laundry, In his mind she was still, always would be, part of the household.

  At ten o'clock he went over to Le Bouc's bar, where there was only a lorry driver whom he didn't know. He heard the usual.

  "Morning, Monsieur Jonas.'

  And he gave the ritual response:

  "Morning, Fernand. An espresso coffee, please.'

  'There you are.'

  He picked up his two bits of sugar and began to unwrap them. The driver held his glass of white wine in his hand and said nothing, all the time keeping an eye on his lorry through the window. Contrary to his usual habit, Le Bouc worked the percolator in silence, and Jonas thought he seemed uncomfortable.

  He had been expecting one question, and as it did not come, he volunteered:

  'Gina hasn't come back.'

  Fernand murmured, placing the steaming cup on the counter:

  'So they tell me.'

  So they had been talking about it here too. Not Frédo, surely, who did not frequent the bars of the Vieux-Marché. Was it Louis? But how would Louis have known, since his son, when he left, had gone off in the direction of the town?

  They had certainly questioned the young cripple as she stepped out of the bus!

  He couldn't understand it any longer. There was something entirely beyond him in this undercurrent of distrust. The time that Gina had been away for three days there had been no talk and, at most, a few people had given her a lewd glance. Only the butcher had commented: 'How's your wife?' He had replied: 'Very well, thank you.'

  And Ancel had exclaimed, with a conspiratorial look at the assembled company: 'Heavens above!'

  Why were they making a tragedy out of what had amused them only six months earlier? If he had been alone with Le Bouc, he would have been tempted to ask him. He probably would not have done so when all was said and done, from pure shame, but he would have felt like it.