Night Rounds

by Patrick Modiano

  La ville est comme un grand manège

  dont chaque tour

  nous vieillit un peu…..

  I was taking in the sights of Paris for the last time. Each street, each intersection brought back memories. Graff, where I met Lili Marlene. The Claridge Hotel, where my father stayed before he fled to Chamonix. The Mabille dance hall where I used to take Rosita Sergent. The others were letting me continue my odyssey. When would they decide to kill me? Their cars kept at a steady distance of about .fifty yards behind me. We're on the boulevards. A summer evening such as I've never seen. Snatches of music from open windows. People sit at sidewalk cafés or stroll casually in groups. The street lights flicker and go on. A thousand Japanese lanterns glow amid the foliage. Laughter bursting all around. Confetti and waltzes on the accordion. To the east, a firework spraying pink and blue streamers. I feel that I'm living these moments in the past. We're wandering along the quays of the Seine. The Left Bank, the apartment I lived in with my mother. The shutters are drawn.

  Elle est partie

  changement d'adresse …

  We cross the Place du Châtelet. I see the Lieutenant and Saint-Georges struck down again, on the corner of the Avenue Victoria. I'll meet the same end before the night is over. Each in his own turn. Across the Seine, a dark mass: Austerlitz station. The trains haven't been running for ages. Quai de la Rapée. Quai de Bercy. We're coming into completely deserted sections. Why don't they take advantage of it? Any one of these warehouses would do – it seems to me – for the payoff. The moon is so bright that we all have the same idea of driving without lights. Charenton-le-Pont. We've left Paris. I cry a little. I loved that city. My native ground. My Inferno. My aging mistress with too much make-up. Champigny-sur-Marne. When will they make up their minds? I want to get it over with. The faces of those I love appear for the last time. Pernety: what happened to his pipe and his black leather shoes? Corvisart: he moved me, that blockhead. Jasmin: one evening we were crossing the Place Adolphe Chérioux and he pointed to a star overhead: "That's Betelgeuse." He lent me a biography of Henri de Bournazel. As I turned its pages I came across an old photo of him in a sailor suit. Obligado: his mournful face. He would often read me excerpts from his political journal. Those pages are now rotting in some drawer. Picpus: his fiancée? Saint-Georges, Marbeuf, and Pelleport. Their solid handshakes and loyal eyes. The walks around Vaugirard. Our first meeting in front of Joan of Arc's statue. The Lieutenant's commanding voice. We've just passed Villeneuve-le-Roi. Other faces loom: my father, Alexander Stavisky. He would be ashamed of me. He wanted me to get into Saint-Cyr. Mama. She's in Lausanne, and I can join her. I step on the gas. I'm shaking off my murderers. I've plenty of cash on me. Enough to close the eyes of the most alert Swiss border guards. But I'm far too worn out. I long for rest. The real kind. Lausanne wouldn't do. Have they come to a decision? In the mirror I see the Khedive's II-hp coming closer, closer. No. It slows down abruptly. They're playing cat and mouse. I listened to the radio to pass the time.

  Je suis seul ce soir

  avec ma peine …..

  Coco Lacour and Esmeralda did not exist. I had thrown over Lili Marlene. Denounced the brave boys of the R.K.S. Lots of people perish on the highways. All those faces should be preserved, engagements kept, promises upheld. Impossible. I walked out instantly. Fleeing the scene of a crime. That kind of game can destroy you. Anyway, I've never known who I was. I authorize my biographer to simply call me "a man," and I wish him luck. I've been unable to lengthen my stride, my breath, or my sentences. He won't understand the first thing about this story. Neither do I. We're even.

  L'Hay-les-Roses. We've gone through other townships. Now and then the Khedive's II-hp would pass me. Ex­Commandant Costantini and Philibert drove along flanking me for about a mile. I thought my time was up. Not yet. They were letting me gain ground. My head bumps against the steering wheel. There are poplars lining the road. One slip will do it. I keep going, half asleep.

  A Note About the Author

  Patrick Modiano was born in 1947 in Paris, where he still lives. He received his secondary education at various colleges: Biarritz, Versailles, Chamonix, and Paris. His first novel, LA PLACE DE L'ÉTOILE, published in France in 1961, won the Prix Roger Nimier. This novel, his first to be published in English, has won the Prix Felix Fénéon, 1969, and the Prix de la plume de diamant, also 1969.