A Silver Ring in the Ear

by Tony Duvert

  XXIV

  Superintendent Rênal is at her ease. Her bed-linen is fresh this evening: it was changed to-day. She prefers to sleep enveloped in pale colours only; like a sugared almond: white, pink or sky blue. This week she has white sheets.

  The more her legs hinder her, the more does her bed inspire her with affection. After five P.M. she thinks of it with tenderness. Her impeccable little flat, this nest where she tastes all the sweetness accessible to her in this world, is her one and only reason for existence.

  Every day the housekeeper leaves in the kitchen the semi-prepared elements of a dinner. There is nothing to do but reheat them, or turn off the simmering saucepans. Madame Rênal adds to this repast a few little treats that caught her attention along the way, in the windows of the butchers, the pastry shops, the caterers, or the quality grocers. She never turns on the television while she is eating, and hardly ever after dinner; once she has eaten her fill she wants her bed, her tit-bits, her cognac and an agreeable book. The work she has chosen this evening is A History of Capital Punishment.

  At the table, before her desert, she suddenly had an audacious idea: why not consume it, this desert, in her lovely fresh and soft bed? It was apple fritters, especially golden, melting and rich. She put them in the oven while making her toilet and her preparations, a little anxious at the idea that the fritters could become hard. And at once she promised herself she would flame them in rum.

  With the rolling table, the fritters, the rum, the matches, the sugar-sprinkler, a napkin and a finger-bowl filled with tepid water: smug as a little girl who pinches some cake and nibbles it secretly, Superintendent Rênal got into her bed.

  The fritters seemed to her a little too crisp, but delicious. She finished them, and there were too many. The fumes of rum made her tipsy. So she forgot her chocolates and her drop of cognac. What remained for her were the stories of punishments, which tortured neither her stomach nor her spirit. All forms of capital punishment were depicted by the author, including the most ancient, the most exotic, and, appropriately, the most horrible. […] Gilberte Rênal was in heaven.

  But it can happen that even more innocent pleasures are punished: the book back on the shelf, the lamp extinguished, the superintendent could not get to sleep. The Brisset case was unimportant: Madame Rênal thought it was almost solved, that little Sorel had handled it well, the big boss was satisfied. No: her complaint was that she was no longer making herself tired enough, and sleep was not speaking to her.

  XXV

  “Good, we’re in agreement,” said Beatrice. “But on one…”

  The man cut her short, assuming an expression of slight regret:

  “I would like to have that in cash, and in fact every day following my report.”

  He was the fifth private detective that Beatrice had consulted. He was as shabby-looking as the others. But she was weary, and this one was the dearest.

  “I don’t want you to harass my son,” said Beatrice. “Don’t be zealous. Just observe, and then tell me what you have seen. I will pay you in cash, that’s agreed.”

  The detective, a small bald man of fifty, with maroon eyelids and an alcoholic lip, stood up with the exaggerated politeness of a drunkard and traitor.

  Before leaving the drawing-room, he asked:

  “What is his name? That could be useful to me.”

  “I don’t think so. My son’s Christian name is of no importance to you,” Beatrice responded dryly.

  […]

  Philippe, on his bed, stopped his waking dream, turned onto his stomach, and burst into tears.

  XXVI

  “Do you like it when the weather’s fine?” asked Marc.

  The man looked at the sky, the sun, the streets, the houses, and the boy.

  “Yes,” he said. “But when it’s raining it’s nice too.”

  “That depends on whether you go to the pool,” said Marc.

  The man nodded his approval. He looked at the little boy he was holding by the hand, he saw the silver ring that was sweetly shining in the sunlight, and the little white-rimmed ear from which the jewel hung. Marc had a profile in which his large and intelligent eyes radiated, taking in everything, under the delicate camber of his forehead.

  “Shall we go back to my place?” suggested the man.

  “No,” replied Marc.

  “Why?”

  “It tickles me too much. It scratches me. You know, if we’re friends, I’d rather you lick me.”

  The man began laughing gently.

  “Does it hurt?”

  “You only have to be a woman,” said Marc.

  A bald man, quite short, with a tired look, sepia eyes, and a suit out of shape, walked past them slowly: he was reading a newspaper.

  “Did you see that?” asked Marc. “He wasn’t really reading.”

  “He’s pretending?”

  “It’s like that in the cinema,” said Marc.

  He suddenly pulled the man’s hand towards his breast.

  “What have you got there?” he asked.

  Marc was interested in a precious stone that the man was wearing on his finger.

  “I forgot to take it off, it’s nothing,” said the man. “One puts that thing on when one is dressing as a woman, you understand.”

  The stone was red and very large.

  “I’ve got one too,” said Marc. “But mine’s better. Yours doesn’t shine well.”

  “Would you like an ice-cream?” asked the man.

  Marc accepted. They sat down on the terrace of a cafe in Saint Germain des Prés. The boy sat out of the sun, to be calm. That’s burning hot! But from his position the passers-by could no longer be seen. He changed his seat and watched people while blinking his eyelids, with his forehead wrinkled.

  “It’s hot!” he said. “Hey, there he is again!”

  The bald man who walked along reading the paper had just gone by in front of them.

  Marc ordered a chocolate ice-cream, and the man took a Vichy. The little boy sampled the ice, then filled his spoon and offered it to the man; he should try a little bit! Otherwise it wouldn’t be so good. The man accepted. Marc’s serious beauty drew all the women’s eyes.

  “Marc,” the man said suddenly, “are you sure that I really love you? Do you have confidence in me?”

  “No, I like you better as a kind lady,” said Marc. “I haven’t got what you said.”

  “Sorry.”

  The man drank his water. The bald passer-by went past again.

  “You’re right, he’s going past very often, that character,” said the man. “And he looks at us every time.”

  “He’s a detective!” Marc said confidently. “You understand, because of the newspaper.”

  “But what’s he doing?”

  Marc shrugged his shoulders and took some ice-cream from the little polished-steel cup.

  “He’s making sure you’re not bothering me, didn’t you see?

  The man started to laugh. The sun was so beautiful on the little boy, that one felt compelled to contemplate the boy and the light together until sunset. What a curious immaterial animal was that boy, Impalpable and fleshy. And what a strange sun, which privileged his beauty and denounced the ugliness of others.

  “You think he’s a cop?” asked the man.

  Marc did not reply. His ice-cream was finished. He had another impulse of curiosity towards the ring that the man wore on his finger: he took the embellished hand, drew it right across to him, and examined the red stone more attentively.

  “It’s not plastic,” he confirmed.

  “No, I don’t think so,” said the man.

  “Well yes, because plastic shines more,” Marc repeated. He hesitated, fondling the hand and turning the stone:

  “Would you like to give it to me?”

  The hand Marc was holding closed timidly over Marc’s:

  “Your fingers are too small,” said the man gently.

  “That’s not important, you know, I’ll wear it later. One day,
later on.”

  XXVII

  Julien Sorel was wondering whether he should say ‘His Eminence’ or ‘Your Eminence’ to the cardinal he was about to interview.

  When one is a cop from nowhere in particular, it’s not every day that one can meet a cardinal. Especially in such stirring circumstances: the cardinal had drawn Julien into an apse of the Notre-Dame cathedral, and, leaning over the little inspector, he listened with an air part condescending and part charitable.

  Julien made up his mind:

  “His Eminence certainly understands what is at stake in this affair. For us it’s not a question of compromising the Church. But we have a duty, which is to conform with the laws of this land.”

  “I understand you, certainly, inspector my son,” said the cardinal. “You are quite right.”

  “Then His Eminence understands,” said Sorel, “that Monseigneur the Archbishop Renou poses at present a very delicate problem for the French Police. In my own person, especially.”

  “But I do understand, definitely,” said the Eminence.

  “That being the case, then, His Eminence should certainly understand that I need the freedom to interrogate Monseigneur Renou simply as a private individual.”

  “Of course, of course, I understand that, inspector my son,” said the cardinal, growing a little stiff in his scarlet robe.

  “… And you understand,” Julien Sorel went on, “that were Renou’s responses to my questions unsatisfactory, it could happen, your… his Eminence, that Renou is thrown into irons and subjected to hard interrogation.”

  “The Church is all understanding and all love,” declared the cardinal. “But that is precisely the proof that my son Archbishop Renou is not to blame.”

  “Which is not to say that as suspect there is no one more likely!” cried Inspector Sorel. He moved close enough to the cardinal to press against his stomach.

  “No one is perfect, er yes, perhaps,” admitted the cardinal.

  “His Eminence is not as hard as I expected,” answered Sorel, whose hand had slipped over a swelling in the soutane.

  “About that, you little pouf, you shouldn’t speak too soon!” growled the cardinal.

  He immediately drew Julien Sorel into a recess, opened like Superman his ecclesiastical habit, exposing a muscled, tanned body upon whose stomach of steel was raised an enormous cock, thicker than, and also almost as long as, a prelate’s cross, and then he savagely ripped Julien’s trousers off and sodomised him mercilessly against a prayer-stool, breaking it into pieces in the process.

  “You should choke me a bit,” said Julien after the scarlet athlete had discharged into him.

  “You’re being boring, that soutane scratches me, it’s synthetic!” responded Gabriel de Lorsange.

  XXVIII

  The taxi drew to a gentle halt: as it slowed it had followed all the house numbers in the street, so as to find the one that the lady passenger had indicated.

  “Yes, that’s it, that’s definitely it!” said Superintendent Rênal jovially. “Give me a docket, my boy, it’s for the Ministry of the Interior.”

  The driver handed her a printed invoice. He said:

  “Ah those things, I believe you, they’re the way to do it!”

  Which was not stated in a laudatory tone; the superintendent took the paper, paid, was inclined not to give any tip, but she remembered that she was incapable of alighting alone from a car with such low seats.

  “It would be kind of you to help me get out,” she said in an unkind tone. But she had added a weighty coin to the price of the trip.

  The driver did not answer, but got out of the car and supported his passenger’s steps up to the door she had indicated.

  She did not thank him. He did not say good-bye. She rang.

  “What a marvellous Sunday, Gilberte!” cried Oriane Brisset when she saw Madame Rênal. “Come and see my tulips!”

  “My dear, that would be my greatest pleasure!” said the superindendent. “And imagine! My legs are not bothering me this morning!”

  “Is that so?” asked the widow Brisset indifferently.

  Marc had taken a shower, because the weather was fine: this afternoon he would put on a bathing costume and play in the garden, on the grass and in the sun. Play what? Digging holes was what he liked best.

  He had not rinsed the shower, he went back to his room. His ironed clothing was waiting for him, arranged on his bed by the new maid, that fat lady who was called goodness knows what. At the Brissets’, on Sunday, one dressed: the old professor, a son of poor people, had had this custom and insisted on it; after his death they continued to observe it.

  Marc, sitting on the edge of his bed, looked at his body, and went hard. He attempted to suck himself. He didn’t manage to bend over sufficiently. He put on his slippers. He suddenly thought of the ring, the new ring. The ring that the man had given him. About that ring, Marc had understood that it would not do to show it to anyone. The great red stone, rather opaque and not beautiful, seemed to him to be a little disturbing now. Contemplating it in his bed (he had slid the ring onto his thumb), he remembered certain jewels that his grandmother wore, which had similarly dull stones. Perhaps it was a true red that cost millions, this ring. The idea gave him a little thrill of pleasure in the nape of his neck, a little perspiration. He put on his slip, which was orange: he really loved to look at his penis with the slip over it. It was much better than being totally naked. Later, he slid cleanly into a white shirt, with the ridiculous pleated shirt-front; he went soft.

  His clothing, with short trousers, was in ultramarine blue flannel, rather washed out (an effect of the fabric, which, seen close-up, displays a multitude of little white bristles). Marc was seriously putting on his pants – and he heard a distant, angry voice, a voice he recognised. The voice of Philippe.

  Marc went up to the wall between the two rooms, knelt down, and pressed his ear against the wall-paper. He laughed as he listened.

  Philippe had woken in a very bad humour. At his college, the lessons were beginning again to-morrow; he would take the train after lunch. Among his rotten idiotic comrades, and his rotten idiotic family, he found no one to like. On the other hand, he had two fathers to hate: the real one, Bertrand, who had not made an appearance – and the other one, the parâtre, Dr. Brunet.

  It was always Dr. Brunet that Philippe thought about when he made up his dreams of vengeance. There was no particular reason for that: Brunet had the kind of face that you wanted to reduce to pulp, that’s not open to discussion and that’s all.

  This morning, the film of the tortures of which Brunet was victim had restarted after Philippe, in the bathroom of his apartment, had hesitated between the bath-tub and the shower. Which of the two would he choose to wash himself? In principle, he preferred showering, because that makes one more virile, more sporty; but he had a vague desire for a bath; only the bath took too long and there was something weakening about it, something feminine. The worst part was that Philippe, since he woke up, had been suffering from a terribly hard erection that refused to go down and prevented him from pissing. He could have masturbated to fix that, but he detested touching himself; that was not virile, and it made one impotent. One can no longer lord it over girls, if one wanks oneself.

  Finally, his ideas for torture and the problems of his toilet combined: he decided on a shower and, while he was adjusting the water, which was too hot at first, he began to recite aloud the punishment of the miserable Brunet. And his big penis softened.

  […]

  “You’re exaggerating,” said Beatrice. “I can assure you, madam,” replied the detective with maroon eyelids and bald skull, “I’ve done everything possible.”

  “I’ve agreed to the improbable price that you demanded. But I’m expecting, in return, a flawless service,” said Beatrice. “I’m not paying you to steal from me.”

  “But I cannot, I cannot!” groaned the detective. “You understand nothing of our life, of our…”

  “Su
rely you can telephone here. You have the number. Anyway it doesn’t matter. Have you at least a report to give me?”

  “Yes, madam.”

  “I will listen. And don’t speak too loudly. There are many people in this house to-day.”

  “Family Sundays… Ah yes, I noticed. I don’t keep my eyes in my pockets. Only in the pockets under my eyes,” the bald man joked weakly.

  “I’ve listened enough, sir,” she said. “What have you discovered?”

  The detective assumed an embarrassed air; he looked at the door.

  “It’s… it’s very embarrassing, madam.”

  “Oh, that’s enough cinema!” cried Beatrice, exasperated. “Say what you know, and then get out!”

  “Yes, yes, certainly. Certainly. I know. I know,” wailed the detective. “I’ve known it for fifty years. But I do still have my pride, madam. And I humbly beg you not to insult me.”

  Beatrice shrugged her shoulders, sighed, and moderated her tone of voice:

  “No one is insulting you, Mr. Fouchet. But do change your approach. You are being ridiculous!”

  “There’s nothing wrong with my approach; if you want another agency just call one,” said the detective. “If you believe that I enjoy this sort of thing, well I don’t think it right! You would do better to look after your little boy, Because then there…”

  “Sir! You are a… a… I don’t even want to know what you saw. Leave immediately. And you are not getting a centime.”

  “Oh no,” whined Sir Fouchet, alias Lorenz and Wilson, shadowings, “whatever happens, there are the expenses. Six hundred francs per day. And then the set-up fee, two thousand three hundred and seventy francs. And then drawing up the dossier, a thousand and fifty-two. And then the tévéha. I haven’t included my own salary on top of that, of course, since you won’t have me: we are honest at Lorenz and Wilson.”

  Beatrice acknowledged the coup. She had foreseen that she might be trapped. But now? After a silence, she made a grimace of disgust and said quietly: