One thing perplexed him, however. He had chosen to be a writer, that was certain, but what astonished him was that he felt that nothing about him had changed. He was still the same person, still with the same vague ideas about what he was supposed to do — except, of course, that he had to write like a demon in order to create the most beautiful possible work. In fact, he hadn’t even started to do that; he was still fussing about with the outline for his great adventure novel, still gathering material — his precious preparatory notes — and telling himself that a brilliant, compelling idea would leap into his head at any moment and provide him with the unifying vision that would allow him to organize his material. So far all he had were a few dim observations about life (reading them over now, he found most of them pretentious and empty), a few personal memories (almost all of them painful), a welter of notes of an erotic nature (fairly crude), and some thoughts engendered by his recent reading, most of which had been the novels that made up Balzac’s The Human Comedy.
All in all, it wasn’t much to go on. A few days ago, Blonblon had told him that before he could write, he had to live. Charles didn’t think that was always the case. Wasn’t writing a form of living? If you were going to create an entire imaginary world, wasn’t it necessary to keep to the margins of the real one? How could Balzac have written his ninety-five novels and short-story collections if he’d lived the same life as everyone else? He’d had to withdraw, or rather retreat, into his writing, and from there make his observations about life — and with what penetrating insight! He had to trust in his writing, throw himself completely and blindly into it, and to hell with the rest. Nothing else mattered, except one thing: lack of talent! Obviously, that one missing item could bring the whole house of cards down around his head. And there was only one way to find out if he were afflicted with such a terrible and incurable malady: he had to write!
So he set to work. He covered three and a half pages (he typed with only two fingers, but fairly fast), then suddenly felt the urge to get dressed. The apartment was beginning to feel chilly, since the heat hadn’t yet been turned on; Charles had decided to wait for the first snowfall before buying a kerosene heater, in order to save a bit of money.
Around eleven o’clock he began to feel very hungry, as though a hook had gone in and scraped out his stomach and spread the feeling throughout his entire body. He’d prepared for that by laying in a dozen boxes of Kraft Dinner from the local Family Food Mart, a charitable euphemism that allowed the poor of the district to buy low-priced groceries without having to advertise their poverty at a huge supermarket.
The directions, which he was following for the first time, called for a dab of butter, which he didn’t have. He went out into the hallway and was about to descend the stairs when the door of the neighbouring apartment opened and an old man appeared, wearing a green woollen vest and a grey fedora, stuck sideways on his head. The man smiled, leaned against the door jamb, and seemed unable to walk any farther.
“Good day,” he said. He took three feeble steps towards Charles and held out his bony hand. “So you’re my new neighbour. Welcome to the shack!”
“Hello,” Charles mumbled. His face had turned pale and he touched only the tips of the old man’s fingers.
“Would it be asking too much,” said the old man, apparently not noticing his interlocutor’s discomfort, “for you to go down and bring my dog up from the backyard? He’s very gentle, no need to be afraid of him. I’d go myself, but I try to avoid taking the stairs as much as possible, on account of my legs, you see. It’s all I can do to get him down there in the mornings. My doctor tells me I should get a wheelchair, but it’s out of the question! My niece usually comes to make a meal for me at eleven,” he continued, seeming at a loss for something to say, “and I send her down to fetch Prince, but she’s not coming today, I’m not sure why.”
“I’ll bring him up,” Charles said without looking at the man.
A few minutes later he returned with the dog, which followed him obediently at the end of its leash. Boff heard, or perhaps smelled, them through the door and began barking furiously. The old man was waiting for them at the top of the stairs, and was about to launch into long-winded gratitude when Charles, to his neighbour’s astonishment, turned abruptly on his heels, took the stairs two at a time, and slammed the outside door of the building.
Charles walked away quickly, chewing his lips. His throat was dry, his heart beating wildly, and he was so distraught he had no idea where he was going.
“It’s him! He, of all people, is my neighbour! A million people in Montreal, and I have to land next door to him! If only I’d known, if only I’d … son of a bitch! And to break my lease now would cost me three months’ rent! What am I going to do, for the love of Christ?”
Charles had recognized the frail old man as Conrad Saint-Amour, the former hairdresser and pederast on whom he had taken such spectacular revenge those many years ago, but without expunging the memory of that horrible afternoon.
The box of Kraft Dinner remained open on the counter beside the pot of cold water waiting on the burner of the stove. Unable to return to his apartment, Charles ate at a snack bar, reading handwritten messages tacked to the wall, then spent the afternoon job-hunting. At five o’clock, tortured by the need to confide in someone, he called Blonblon.
“Where are you?” Blonblon asked, alarmed at the tone of his friend’s voice. “Hang on, I’ll be right there.”
Ten minutes later Blonblon appeared at the Rivest Tavern, his hands still covered with contact cement (he’d been repairing an old Prussian teapot for Mademoiselle Laramée, his former schoolteacher, who had recently moved into one of the Frontenac Towers). Stretched out in a captain’s chair in front of two draft beer glasses, one empty, the other half empty, Charles had been waiting for his friend to join him. The latter took the seat across from him, ordered a beer, and listened to Charles’s story.
“If I didn’t like dogs so much,” Charles said when he’d finished his recitation, “I think I’d have beaten the damn thing to death with a piece of wood just to make the old bastard suffer! Ah, if only he’d croak! If only someone would grab him by his bloody scrawny neck and squeeze until his eyes popped out of his head and his lungs burst! Christ on a crutch! I finally find the perfect apartment, at a rent I can afford, and now I’ve got to sublet it and go out looking for another one!”
“Charles, Charles,” said Blonblon, “listen to me. Please. You’ve just said yourself he can hardly walk and he didn’t even recognize you. So forget about him, that’s all you have to do. Just pretend he doesn’t exist. He certainly isn’t going to bother you again; he doesn’t sound capable of bothering anybody.”
Charles leaned forward over the table, tears filling his eyes.
“It’s all right for you, you’re not the one who fell into the bugger’s clutches. It turns my stomach just to feel him close to me. I’d throw up every time he looked at me. He’ll find out who I am sooner or later, make no mistake…. And then, my friend … I don’t know what I might… I’m afraid I’d … No, it’s impossible. I’ve got to move out of that place.”
The conversation went on for a long time, stimulated by the arrival of fresh beer. Gradually, Charles was able to calm down. Blonblon was even able to make him laugh, describing to him in minute detail Ginette Laramée’s fussiness when she’d handed over her precious teapot. Her personality had not changed a bit in the years since she’d been their teacher.
“I’ll come up and say hello to her sometime,” Charles promised. “I haven’t seen her in ages. I like that woman a lot, despite the fact that she acts like a police chief. I was thinking about her just the other day, when I was arranging my books. I even wondered if she was still alive. You say she hasn’t changed much? You know, I think I’ll get her a little gift — that should bring a tear or two to her eye. I should have done it before this. After all, she helped me at a time when I most needed it.”
The two went to the Villa Frontenac
for smoked-meat sandwiches. Then Charles, having calmed down, thanked his friend with unusual warmth and hurried off to join Céline, who was waiting for him at the apartment.
That night, in a moment of candour, he told her the sad story of the former hairdresser and the foul trick he played on a little boy, who still hadn’t recovered from the incident. Céline listened in horror. From the next apartment they could hear a fit of coughing rising above the murmur of a television.
“You can see why I can’t stay here?”
Céline nodded and stroked his face. They remained quiet for a long time, stretched out side by side on the bed, which smelled of freshly laundered sheets and young, overheated bodies. Charles’s arm rested on her stomach as he dozed, a small smile curving his lips. Now two people knew his terrible secret, the two who were closest to him. Their knowing eased his pain, as though the weight of his suffering was no longer his alone to bear.
As he walked Céline home, he could already anticipate the insomnia that awaited him, the excruciating stretch of interminable minutes ticking slowly by through the solitude of the night, the hopeless search for the one position, the new method of breathing, the elusive comforting thought that would finally carry him off into dreamland.
When he awoke it was still dark. Boff was sitting up in the middle of the bed, gazing at him with an expectant eye and gently beating his tail against the blankets to remind him of food. Charles’s first thought was to go and have breakfast with Fernand and Lucie. He missed them. But he resisted the idea as a matter of pride. He had his own coffee maker, a toaster that, though somewhat the worse for wear, toasted bread like a flame-thrower, and bread, butter, and jam.
He got up, dressed, and went over to the bedroom window to look down into the yard. The big, brown dog was already at its post beside the drum. Who had taken it down so early? He then heard footsteps on the stairs, slow and heavy, as though whoever was treading the steps was carrying the entire world on his shoulders, and he recalled Saint-Amour saying he took the dog outside and tied it up himself every morning. Charles’s expression tightened and his face flushed with anger. He rushed to his door and burst out into the hall just as the former barber arrived at the top of the stairs, out of breath, his frail hand gripping the banister tightly. The two men looked at each other in silence for a moment, then the old man, somewhat taken aback, squeezed out a weak smile.
“Do you know who I am?” Charles asked him abruptly.
Saint-Amour was too out of breath to reply. He simply shrugged and shook his head.
“I’m Charles Thibodeau. Does the name ring a bell?”
The old man’s face lit up and he slapped his thigh. He leaned against the wall and tried to catch his breath.
“Charles?” he finally said in a small, husky voice. “Is it really you? I can hardly believe it! You’ve changed so much! I’d never have recognized you in a million years! How strange that we are now neighbours … I’m delighted to see you again.”
The old man’s response left Charles at a loss, disgusted, and vaguely alarmed. What was this? Senile forgetfulness? Instinctive hypocrisy? For seconds he didn’t know what to say. He eyed the former hairdresser, who maintained his thin smile despite the fact that the effort of talking had exhausted him again.
“Listen to me, you piece of crud,” Charles finally burst out. “You know I could lodge an official complaint against you at any time. Any time, do you understand what I’m saying? Little boys don’t know that, but when they grow up they find out things. Never speak to me again, understand? Never! If you say one word to me I’ll send you flying head-first down these stairs. You got that?”
Ten days passed, during which Charles had no occasion to carry out his threat. He looked for another apartment but found nothing suitable. He also looked for a job. The Canadian Postal Authority sent him a letter telling him that, unfortunately, it was unable to retain his services at that time. But he at last settled down to his adventure novel, spending four or five hours a day at it. The story had changed completely. It still took place in Montreal but in the 1970s, and recounted the courageous efforts of a young police officer, a member of the Criminal Investigation Unit who had helplessly witnessed the rape of a young woman by three men in a remote corner of the La Ronde amusement park. Despite the wishes of the victim, who refused to lay charges against the men, and unknown to his superiors, our hero launched himself on the trail of the rapists.
The work went slowly. Descriptions gave him brain cramps, and he had to stop every few sentences to verify certain technical details. But writing gave him a deep feeling of satisfaction, unlike anything he had done before.
Céline read the rough draft of Chapter One and was transported. There was no doubt about it: Charles was headed for a huge success as long as he kept it up to the end.
As for Conrad Saint-Amour, he seemed to have barricaded himself in his apartment since his encounter with Charles in the hallway. Most mornings there was not even a sign of the dog in the backyard. Gradually, Charles became accustomed to the presence of his horrible neighbour, and his zeal for finding a new apartment abated. Daily visits from Céline, who brought with her the heady delights of heedless love, and the less frequent appearances of Steve and Blonblon, slowly lessened in Charles’s mind the painful effects of the old pederast’s proximity.
On the 4th of November, Charles worked on his novel until three o’clock in the morning, after which he made himself something to eat, shared his meal with Boff — who wolfed down the crusts of a huge banana-and-peanut-butter sandwich in two gulps — then went to bed, exhausted but satisfied with the night’s results. He fell immediately into a profound sleep. He was sitting at his typewriter, still pounding out the chapters, but now with a marvellous effortlessness; the sheets of paper were luminous and multicoloured, and they piled up on the table at a ridiculous rate until they formed a column of light that reached all the way to the ceiling, in fact pushed through the ceiling, until suddenly he was enveloped in a cloud of suffocating dust and bits of plaster; a sharp pain in his shoulder woke him up with a start.
Boff was scratching at him with powerful claws and barking in his ear. With difficulty, Charles sat up in bed, his head alarmingly heavy and his brain so befuddled he had no idea where he was. He was seized by a fit of coughing, his throat made raw by acrid smoke that seemed to fill the room. For several seconds he stayed where he was, not knowing what to do, while the dog, now looming above him, began to nip at his legs.
Suddenly Charles leapt to his feet, grabbed the dog in his arms, and hurried off into the darkness, his eyes burning with smoke and a new fit of coughing wracking his lungs; he banged into furniture, ran up against a wall, tipped over a chair, feeling his way desperately towards what he hoped was the door. All the while, rising up from the ground floor, he heard a heavy rumbling sound made up of crackling and sucking and low whistling. Without knowing how he got there, he found himself at the top of the stairs, now filled with even thicker smoke, and let himself tumble down them, holding the silent, inert dog against his body with all his remaining strength. A blast of hot air hit him square in the face, and he heard shouting as though from a great distance, then hands gripped his legs and dragged him outside.
He vomited again and again, then stood up. Supported by a fireman, he watched in dazed amazement as the building turned into a blazing wall of fire. He suddenly realized Boff had disappeared, and turned frantically around, shouting his name. He heard a feeble bark and, looking down, saw his dog lying on the ground behind him. Then he heard muffled laughter, and saw someone pointing a finger at him. A plump woman with a maternal, compassionate face, looking embarrassed, handed him a bathrobe and a pair of slippers. He realized he was naked, standing in the street in an icy drizzle that was trickling down his body. Rivers of steam rose above the burning building among twisted cords of smoke.
The circumstances under which the building had caught fire were so obscure that an inquest lasting six hundred years wouldn’t sort them o
ut.
Which is how things happen in Montreal, a rather unusual city in which modern urbanization often proceeds through methods that are almost occult. Two days after the fire, a bulldozer appeared and erased every sinister trace of the conflagration; the following Saturday, the gap where the building had been was as flat and smooth as a football field. All that was missing was grass. Before a week had passed, a layer of asphalt, warm and odoriferous, covered the terrain, and the city had been enriched by yet another parking lot. The automobile had hacked off one more chunk of Montreal’s old soul. Parking lots were springing up everywhere, with such implacable regularity that one wondered how long it would be before they took over the greater part of the city and citizens would find themselves stacked into three or four hundred skyscrapers rising like pylons above an immense checkerboard interlaced by highways and enveloped in smog, with only a few spindly trees, planted here and there at great cost, to perpetuate the illusion to some that they still lived in a space designed for humans.
Charles had watched the fire burn until the small hours, interrogated off and on by gawkers who exclaimed at the account of his narrow escape and went to give old Boff a vigorous petting. Boff, looking morose, never moved from the side of his master. No one had seen Conrad Saint-Amour, and it was assumed he was still in the building. Towards six o’clock in the morning, the back of the structure collapsed, and when the smoke cleared they could see, perched atop a heap of smouldering rubble, an incinerated corpse enfolded in the carcass of an easy chair.
A Very Bold Leap Page 2
