by Simon Pare
His heart was pounding away in his chest, his lungs felt more like crumpled waterskins, and his legs were threatening to give way.
(After all, he hadn’t killed that fell’s fucking brat, had he! Just… how should he put it…)
“What a load of crap!” he swore in a voice that sounded ridiculously hoarse to him.
Nervously he scratched his testicles – and was shaken by the thought that someone might well have chopped them off. He imagined himself with no balls and decided without laughing that the grand visit to the brothel in Constantine he had promised himself wouldn’t really be worth it anymore…
“If I carry on thinking like this, I’ll end up handing in my notice,” he reckoned, without daring to pursue the thought. He leaned against the trunk of an olive tree and took an unfiltered cigarette out of his battledress. He had the impression as he put it to his lips that it too stank of decaying corpses. He crushed it between his fingers and scattered the scraps of paper and tobacco, forcing himself all the while to concentrate on the beautiful scenery. A gust of wind blew the terrible scent of death into his nostrils again; the soldier bent over and threw up.
The cheeky and strangely familiar voice called out harshly to him: Hey Mathieu, you’re not going to get rid of it that easily this time… Between you and me, if this is bothering you so much, maybe that’s because you’re partly to blame?
“You what, you fucking…”
Insult at the ready, he span round with his fist raised to hit whoever had dared to fling such an accusation at him.
There was no one there.
No one at all.
Latifa came into the kitchen without knocking, as if she wanted to overhear their conversation. As she filled a glass from the tap, she gave the two men a suspicious look. Mathieu felt his heart stop beating; it seemed worn out, grown so old. A new wave of panic washed through him: no one would come out of this unscathed.
Overwhelmed by his own helplessness, he glanced at his watch. Less than a quarter of an hour had passed since he had decided to tell Aziz at least half the story. These few minutes might have proved awfully long to Shehera, exposed to the boundless imagination of the madman who was holding her.
Suddenly Mathieu was gripped by a familiar, intense longing for one never-ending swig of gin that would slide down his throat into his stomach before exploding in a merciful apocalypse at the centre of his brain, in the exact spot where love, hate, all those kind of things are born.
It had been so long since he had got absolutely blind drunk! The last time was at Tahar’s funeral, he seemed to remember.
Running his fingers through his hair, he sighed and every molecule of air was a concentrate of bitterness and regret. No, the time had not yet come for the shroud of drunkenness; no, the Algerian war was not yet over and he had told Aziz nothing of note apart from that, one day, by chance, he had captured an exhausted maquisard called Tahar not far from the mixed community of Melouza, a large village on the High Plateaux on the border between Kabylie and Constantine.
“When you’ve finished your drink, Mathieu, come and join us in the living room. That monster hasn’t phoned yet and Meriem isn’t feeling too well.”
A shadow passed across Aziz’s face and his fingers fidgeted nervously with the mobile phone lying in front of him.
Once Latifa had left the room, Aziz asked bitterly, making no attempt to conceal his annoyance: “So what happened to the rebel after that?”
“Just the normal routine in such situations, as you can imagine.”
“The routine? You mean you…”
The words (“tortured him?”) were written all over the Algerian’s stunned face, the words Mathieu feared and which Aziz, probably out of what little respect he still had for his father-in-law, was reluctant to pronounce.
Mathieu defended himself. “What are you suggesting? We threw him in a cell with a few regulation kicks up the backside, that’s all!”
The old man avoided his son-in-law’s suspicious gaze.
“But that’s not the main thing, Aziz. My prisoner had nothing to do with what had just happened at Melouza.”
“And what really did happen at Melouza?” his son-in-law asked him, his sugary tone indicating that he wasn’t fooled by this ploy.
“Some farmers were killed… Lots of them… A terrible settling of political scores with civilians paying the price…”
“And you say Tahar played no part in it?”
“That’s right… But someone else convinced themselves of the opposite…”
“And that someone was Algerian?”
The routine. That was the first of several misleading words, repellent as a turd, which he had used to describe to Aziz the treatment meted out to this strange prisoner – at first sight the worst kind of coward – who screamed and cried out in pain as much, if not more, than other men when they burnt his penis with electricity from the magneto, but not once begged for mercy – just to be killed.
To begin with, Mathieu, whom the DOP unit regarded as their ‘classifications’ specialist, had thought that this prisoner was a chicken who would pour out a torrent of confessions after just one ‘roasting’.
“Put your hand here,” he had said to his superior. “What can you feel?”
The officer had touched the man’s chin as he lay naked on the work surface.
“Well, he’s trembling, but that’s normal, isn’t it? They all tremble…”
“No, this one’s trembling all over. Look: his stomach, his legs and his butt-cheeks are all trembling – even his dick’s trembling!” he exclaimed as his colleagues looked on, giving the prisoner’s penis a pinch. “He’s a right poofter, his skin’s softer than a lamb’s. He’ll talk faster than I can piss, with all due respect, sir!”
However, the man hadn’t talked. The colonel had flown into a rage (because his own superiors were growing impatient…), accusing the members of the DOP unit in the harshest terms of bragging and of a lack of professionalism in dealing with these bleeding terrorists, repeating that every man, no matter how obstinate, had a breaking point and ordering them to find it as quickly as possible.
“But don’t spoil any ‘visible meat’!” he enjoined them. “I absolutely have to have a presentable witness to tell the whole story at the press conference. What we have here, gentleman, is a nice little massacre perpetrated by the enemy and I fully intend to use it to show that the French army is fighting not a resistance army but a pack of knife-wielding maniacs who deserve no respect! Don’t fuck this job up, boys, or believe me you’ll regret it!”
The more the DOP’s group of specialists went to work on the prisoner, the more obvious it became that not only would he not yield any information, but also that he was determined to find any possible means of taking his own life. He had been subjected to water-boarding. The session had taken up a good part of the afternoon, the only result being to plunge the interrogators into a horrid mood. The team were used to this kind of delicate operation, which involved pulling their customer’s head out of the water just before he drowned, taking care not to let the man pass out underwater because in that case he would lose all vital reflexes and be unable to struggle hard enough to survive. There was always one man nicknamed ‘the nurse’ who kept a close eye on this sort of thing if for some reason they didn’t want to ‘wear out’ the interrogation suspect too fast.
By the end of the afternoon, not only did Tahar no longer show any resistance when they re-immersed him in the dirty water, he had to be yanked out when they realised, a fraction of a second before he suffocated, that it was now he – and no longer they – who was intent on keeping his head in the putrid liquid. Mathieu had to ask a colleague to help him prise apart the fingers clutching the sides of the tub. The head of their unit – the man from Alsace who wept with emotion when, after his fifth or sixth Pils, he talked about the village on the Rhine where he was born –was so afraid of the dressing-down they were certain to receive from their commanding officer at headquarters
that he whipped the prisoner with his own belt, although he did avoid touching the future witness’s face or arms. In his characteristic accent, he yelled, “You towel-headed Kraut, we’re not impressed by your stupid bloody show of bravery. You want to commit suicide without chickening out, but we’re not going to let you, you dirty little throat-slitter. You don’t deserve a favour like that! Now it’s personal between you and me, and boy, are you going to suffer, believe you me. You’ll end up telling us who organised the massacre and where your mates from your unit are hiding! And don’t bother imploring heaven for help. If God hadn’t wanted men to be tortured, He wouldn’t have put their balls on the outside!”
The prisoner was taken to a makeshift cell in the barracks. A nurse – a real one this time – gave him some medical care. To avoid any further risks (the Alsatian had realised a little late that he might have been a bit heavy-handed), a member of the DOP team was given the task of watching over the Arab while he was asleep and, if necessary, alerting the nurse if the man’s health deteriorated dangerously or if he tried to escape them again by committing suicide. “We might get further if one of us mollycoddles him and plays the good cop surrounded by baddies. Hey Mathieu, would you like to have a go, since you’re meant to know so much about Arab psychology?” his superior chortled without quite managing to hide his disquiet.
That night Mathieu resigned himself to his chore, even if he would not stop cursing that he was neither a priest taking confession from weirdo criminals nor a faggot into young lads, let alone young Muslim lads. Someone spluttered, “Ask the fell to give you a fellatio. Fell and fellatio – that rhymes backwards. He’s trembling so much, you’d come in a flash!” and Mathieu snapped back that he’d prefer his colleague’s sister’s cunt or wife’s mouth.
The two men, one handcuffed to his bed, the other slumped on an old chair, spent most of the night without exchanging a word. Apart from the prisoner’s moans of pain as he searched for a better position, the only sound was the cicadas in the surrounding countryside rubbing their wings together with a frenetic energy unusual for the season. About four o’clock in the morning, Mathieu woke with a start from a restless sleep during which a soldier from the ALN, the National Liberation Army, who resembled his prisoner like two peas in a pod, suggested with friendly compassion that he check whether his crown jewels were still safely nestled between his legs. He heard himself roar in rage that he wouldn’t talk to criminals, that he was a soldier and not a murderer of civilians. The muddled dream ended with his imaginary interlocutor flashing a broad, surprised grin.
Mathieu’s first, ridiculous gesture was to put his hand to his testicles. Then, still thrown by his dream, he lit a cigarette and forced himself to think of a nice cold beer. The prisoner shifted on his makeshift bed, stifling a groan. Telling himself that professional conscientiousness required him to have at least one go at the famous good cop trick, Mathieu tapped him on the shoulder to pass him his cigarette. His eyes half shut, the man gave no reaction. Mathieu stuffed the cigarette firmly into his mouth, then lit himself one. The bound man coughed and then pushed the cigarette out with the tip of his tongue.
“Hey, don’t waste tobacco.”
“I don’t smoke,” the prisoner answered curtly.
“Scared the FLN’ll cut your nose off, are you? Or of dying of lung disease?”
“That must be it.”
“You’re right. Got to look after your health if you want to live nice and long, don’t you? Life’s beautiful and you’ve got to make the most of it. By the way, are you thirsty?”
“No.”
“That’s normal,” Mathieu said mockingly. “Almost drank a whole bathtub by yourself.”
Silence fell again, heavier than before, because now the two men were sizing each other up. The Frenchman furiously stubbed out his half-smoked cigarette, exasperated by his own confusion. Who did this fucking throat-slitter think he was? To hell with pretending to be the good cop…
“So what’s it like being a child murderer?”
The man kept silent, his eyes riveted to the opposite wall. It looked as if he had sunk slightly further into himself.
“I’m talking to you, wank-stain!” Mathieu chided.
Faced with his detainee’s immobility, the guard stood up, deliberately knocking his chair over.
“Answer when a French soldier speaks to you! Otherwise, what use does jabbering our language do you? I’ll ask you again: what did it feel like in your guts to slit open so many of your little Arab brothers’ throats? You Arabs will stop at nothing, eh?”
The man span round. With quivering nostrils, he stared at his guard through bloated eyelids. The general expression on his face still betrayed that disturbing mixture of intense, almost palpable fear that should have made him cave in long ago and even an greater stubbornness, drawn from some bottomless reservoir that allowed this shitty prisoner to hold his tongue.
“All right, so they’re all curly on top, but don’t go telling me you thought they were sheep for Eid? Kids make a different sound when you kill them! Is that what liberating Algeria is all about?”
Mathieu thought he glimpsed a flash of sorrow – or was it disdain? – in the Arab’s eyes, but the light from the bulb hanging from the ceiling was too dim for him to be sure. He was gripped by anger nonetheless, as if the man had insulted him by daring to feel emotions to which a murderer like him was not entitled.
“Why are you staring at me like that, you lump of shite?”
He wasn’t supposed to succumb to rage and his superior would definitely not appreciate the result, but the perverse blow rang out anyway. Despite the chirping of the cicadas, Mathieu heard the tiny cracking of cartilage. The fell made a sound like a muffled yelp and his nose immediately started to bleed. Mathieu repeated his question in a less confident tone of voice.
“So what does it really feel like deep down, eh, to murder so many people?”
The man, whose nostrils and lips were slowly becoming covered in blood and snot, screwed up his eyes, which were clouded with tears.
“You would know… euh…”
“What are you mumbling about, you bastard?”
“You…”
His voice had turned whiny, probably because of his fractured nasal septum. He needed a gulp of air before he managed to speak, with bitter mockery: “You torture, so (he had stressed the word) you know… brother…”
“Fucking… I’m not your brother!”
The Frenchman had raised his fist. The handcuffed man’s face tensed in expectation of the punch.
But, probably to the great surprise of them both, the punch did not come.
The next morning Mathieu left the room and came back with a bucket of water and a sponge. Face closed and eyes avoiding the prisoner’s, he set about washing away the scabs crusting his mouth and nose.
“Thanks,” the prisoner said once the job was finished.
“It’s not for your sake,” the guard objected sourly, “it’s for my superior’s. He doesn’t want us roughing your face up. You’ve got to look presentable.”
With a resigned sigh, the rebel said, a little quieter this time, “Thanks anyway.”
The soldier threw the sponge angrily into the water. “I don’t need your thanks. Remember I’m the one who smacked your face in, you son of a bitch.”Then, grabbing the bucket, he headed towards the cell door.
“Why do you want to die,” he asked him without looking round, as though the question and the possible reply were of no importance. “You’re shit-scared and yet you still want to die… Do you want to die for your country, Algeria? Want to go down in patriotic folklore, be called a freedom fighter or some bullshit?”
The prisoner sniggered faintly, then said to himself, “How easy that would be – to die for Algeria. I’d be a hero and everyone would mourn me… and…”
A gasp cut him off.
“So why do you want to die?”
Caught off-guard by his guard’s neutral tone of voice, the prisone
r answered with the same indifference. “Because… because I don’t deserve to live anymore.”
“Why don’t you deserve to live anymore?”
The man remained silent and Mathieu thought that he wouldn’t open his mouth again, like in a ‘real’ interrogation. He was turning the door handle when the man whispered, “One day, when you’ve become human again, you too will try anything you can to die…”
He coughed and Mathieu, filled with inexplicable anxiety, listened out for the rest of the husky words.
“…Until then, make the most of your luck. You’ll see – it’s unbearable when you find out you’re worthless.”
Mathieu still hadn’t said anything when the telephone on the kitchen table rang. Aziz and he looked at each other, paralysed.
“That’s your phone. Take the call,” the old man ordered. “He might get angry if you hang about.”
Aziz cautiously picked up his mobile. His hands were shaking.
“It’s a message. Just a message.”
Aziz’s ashen face had fallen as the disappointment hit home.
“What does it say?”
The Algerian pushed a few buttons, then his eyebrows arched in surprise.
“Nothing. It’s incomprehensible.”
His voice rang false. His complexion had gone even pastier. He flicked the lid of the phone shut.
“Show me, Aziz.”
Mathieu was too quick for his son-in-law and assertively grabbed the phone. He blinked at the tiny screen.
put fone on vibrate
be alone when I phone in morning
number to follow
