10
The German and Lucile ran into each other once or twice in the dimly lit entrance hall. When she took her garden hat down from its peg on one of the antlers, she knocked against a decorative copper plate on the wall and made it jingle. The German seemed to listen for this faint sound in the silent house. He would go to the door to help Lucile, offering to carry her basket, her secateurs, her book, her embroidery, her deckchair into the garden. But she no longer spoke to him. Instead, she thanked him with a nod of the head and a forced smile; she thought she could sense Madame Angellier lying in wait behind the shutters to spy on her. The German understood and kept to himself. He went out with his regiment on manoeuvres almost every night; he never returned until four o'clock in the afternoon and then shut himself in his room with his dog. While walking through the village in the evening, Lucile sometimes saw him sitting alone in a café, reading a book, with a glass of beer in front of him. He avoided acknowledging her and would turn away, frowning. She was counting the days. "He'll be leaving on Monday," she said to herself. "By the time he gets back, his regiment may have already left. Anyway, he's understood I won't speak to him any more."
Every morning she asked the cook, "Is the German still here, Marthe?"
"Well, yes," the cook would say. "He doesn't seem so bad: he asked if Madame would like to have some fruit. He'd be happy to give us some. Good grief, they want for nothing, them! They've got crates of oranges. So refreshing…" she added, torn between a feeling of kindness towards the officer who offered her fruit and who always behaved, as she put it, "very nice, very kind; he doesn't scare you," and another feeling, a surge of anger when she thought of all the French people who couldn't get any fruit at all.
This last thought was undoubtedly the stronger. "Still, they're a rotten lot, they are!" she finally said in disgust. "I take whatever I can get from that officer, I do: his bread, his sugar, the cakes he gets from home (made with the best flour, I can tell you, Madame), and his tobacco that I send to my prisoner of war."
"Oh, you shouldn't, Marthe!"
But the old cook just shrugged her shoulders. "Since they take everything from us, it's the least…"
One evening, just as Lucile was leaving the dining room, Marthe opened the kitchen door and called out, "Could you please come in here, Madame? There's someone who wants to see you."
Lucile went in, afraid of being seen by Madame Angellier, who didn't like anyone to go into the kitchen or the larder. Not that she seriously believed Lucile would steal the jam, despite ostentatiously inspecting the cupboards in front of her, but rather because she felt the same sense of intrusion an artist feels when interrupted in his studio, or a socialite in front of her dressing table: the kitchen was a sacred domain that belonged to her and her alone. Marthe had been with her for twenty-seven years. And for twenty-seven years, Madame Angellier had gone to great lengths to make sure Marthe never forgot she wasn't in her own home, and that at any moment she could be forced to leave her feather dusters, her pots and pans, her stove; just as the devout must remember that, according to the rituals of the Christian religion, worldly possessions are granted only temporarily and can be taken away overnight on a whim of the Creator.
Marthe closed the door behind Lucile and said reassuringly, "Madame is at church."
The enormous kitchen was as big as a ballroom, with two large windows that opened out on to the garden. A man was sitting at the table. Lucile saw that a magnificent pike, its silvery body trembling in its final death throes, had been thrown on to the oilcloth, between a large loaf of bread and a half-empty bottle of wine. The man raised his head; Lucile recognised Benoît Sabarie.
"Where did you get that, Benoît?"
"In Monsieur de Montmort's lake."
"You'll get caught one of these days."
The man didn't reply. He lifted up the enormous fish by the gills; it flicked its transparent tail, now barely breathing.
"Is it for us?" asked Marthe, who was related to the Sabaries.
"If you want."
"Give it to me, Benoît. Do you know, Madame, that they're cutting back the meat rations again? It'll be death and the end of the world," she added, shrugging her shoulders while hanging a large ham from the joists. "Benoît, since Madame isn't home, tell Madame Gaston why you've come."
"Madame," said Benoît with difficulty, "there's a German at our place who's chasing after my wife. The Commandant's interpreter, a nineteen-year-old kid. I can't take it any more."
"But how can I help?"
"One of his friends is living here…"
"I never speak to him."
"Don't give me that," said Benoît, looking up.
He went over to the stove and absent-mindedly bent the poker, then straightened it again; he was extraordinarily strong.
"You were talking to him in the garden the other day, laughing with him and eating strawberries. I'm not criticising you, it's your business, but I'm begging you. Get him to talk to his friend so he sees reason and gets himself somewhere else to live."
"This village!" Lucile thought. "People can see through walls!"
At that very moment a storm broke. It had been brewing for several hours. There was a single, solemn thunderbolt, followed by the sound of cold rain falling in sheets. The sky darkened; all the lights went out, just as they usually did when the wind was up.
"I guess Madame will be stuck at the church now," Marthe said smugly.
She took advantage of the fact to bring Benoît a bowl of hot coffee. Lightning flashed through the kitchen; the water streaming down the window-panes looked green in the sulphurous light. The door opened and the German officer, forced out of his room by the storm, came in to ask for a few candles.
"Is that you, Madame?" he added, recognising Lucile. "Excuse me, I couldn't see you in the dark."
"There aren't any candles," Marthe said sourly. "There are no candles in all of France since your lot got here."
She didn't like the officer being in her kitchen. She could put up with his presence in other rooms, but here, between the stove and the pantry, it seemed scandalous and almost sacrilegious: he was violating the very heart of the house.
"At least give me a match," the officer implored, deliberately trying to look plaintive to soften up the cook, but she just shook her head.
"There aren't any matches either."
Lucile began to laugh. "Don't listen to her. The matches are on the stove, behind you. And actually, there's someone here who wants to speak to you, Monsieur; he has a complaint about a German soldier."
"Oh, really? I'm listening," the officer said eagerly. "We insist that the soldiers of the Reichswehr behave with perfect correctness towards the local people."
Benoît said nothing.
It was Marthe who spoke. "He's chasing after his wife," she said in a tone of voice that made it difficult to tell exactly what she was feeling: virtuous indignation, or regret she was no longer young enough to be prey to such outrages.
"Ah, but you overestimate the power we German officers have, my boy. Of course I can punish him if he bothers your wife, but if she likes him…"
"It isn't no joke!" Benoît growled, taking a step towards the officer.
"Excuse me?"
"It isn't no joke, I'm telling you. We didn't need you dirty…"
Lucile let out a cry of anguish and warning. Marthe jabbed Benoît with her elbow; she guessed he was going to say the forbidden word "Boche," punishable by imprisonment. Benoît forced himself to stop.
"We don't need you running after our women now."
"Well, you should have thought about defending your women before, my friend," the officer said quietly. His face had turned bright red; he looked haughty and upset.