‘Who goes there?’ Besson shouted, and again: ‘Who goes there?’ But his voice was strangulated, not loud enough even to raise an echo.
Then he stood up, back still pressed against the caisson, to face the enemy. He waited, while the minutes ticked away: they might as well have been hours. Heart thudding, eyes hot, vision starred with bright diatomic patterns, legs and arms turning to water, he stood there watching for the monster to materialize. The head would appear first, perhaps, very pale, and floating, as though a detached entity, between two layers of mist. Or maybe the hands, all twenty fingers outstretched, tipped by dirty grey nails. He counted the steps under his breath: two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. Eleven. Twelve. Thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen. Seventeen. Eighteen. Nineteen, twenty, twenty-one. Twenty-two. Twenty-three. Twenty-four, twenty-five, twenty-six, twenty-seven. Twenty-eight, twenty nine … Thirty, thirty-one. Thirty-two, thirty-three. Thirty-four. Suddenly he felt as though an icy fist had grasped the back of his neck. His heart stopped beating, and a long shudder ran through his body. He put up a hand and tried to free himself, but his hand met only empty space. He half turned, and looked: nothing. He stretched out his arm to its full extent. Still nothing. Then his fear hardened into anger. He stopped listening to the sound of the footsteps, and began to mutter throatily, things like: ‘I’ll get you — you’re there somewhere — I know it, I know it, I’m going to get you — see if I don’t get you!’
Muscles tensed, he gathered himself to spring. His hand scrabbled on the ground, got hold of a big sharp stone, grasped it tight. The crunching footsteps were right on top of him now. Three more yards. Two more — Suddenly, like water gurgling in the pipe under the taps, a voice began to whisper in his ear: a voice, a breathy babble, a terrible humming sound, inarticulate, yet the very essence of life, worming its way into the very centre of his brain, seeking a hiding-place. This gabble of meaningless words reached him in the same instant as the man’s physical self, and it was as though one had suddenly passed into a vacuum-chamber. The man loomed out of the night in front of Besson, as though to swallow him up, a vast swaying mass all hung about with rags.
Besson gave a strangulated cry, hurled himself forward in blind fury, and struck. The edged stone in his fist hit something soft and slightly resilient. He struck again. The black silhouette slowly crumpled up and collapsed on the shingle, with a tiny moan and a rustle of clothing. Besson crouched over the body, raining blows on its prostrate limbs, his arm bouncing back each time he struck. He went on pounding away until the stone hit a softer part, slipped out of his hand, and went rolling across the ground. Then he got up and looked down at his feet. He saw there was something lying there, but no one could have said what it was. It made a kind of dark hump on the river-bed. The clothes were spread over it like an old coverlet, and from underneath there trickled little rivulets of some thick black tar-like liquid, which vanished in the gaps between the pebbles.
Everything was absolutely still again. Besson picked up his beach-bag and walked off along the line of the river. He no longer felt any desire to sleep. He stopped for a moment and looked at the lighted windows above the quai, and the blue haloes of light from the street-lamps. Then he plunged into the long tunnel that ran under the town. He could hear the sharp, resonant sound of people’s footsteps on the vaulting overhead, and the susurrus of car-tyres moving to and fro. He could also hear the echoes of his own tread rebombinating against the walls, and smell the deathly odour, that lay hidden at the heart of darkness. He plunged forward through this closed cylinder, where no daylight ever penetrated, his whole body exposed and in agony, like a small scrap of reason and common sense afloat on the bitter ocean of folly.
At one point he passed a secondary gallery, at the bottom of which four or five tramps had installed themselves. They had lit a fire, using old broken boxes for fuel, and were now either asleep or drinking: not a word passed between them. Besson hid behind a pillar and watched them for a moment. Then he made a detour, and continued his walk alongside the big central sewer, through which the river flowed with a noise like thunder. Ten minutes later he came out on the far side of town, facing the sea.
Chapter Twelve
In the public toilets — François Besson goes on a journey — Walking and looking about one — The earth seen from a dirigible balloon — The breath of eternity — A bird circling alone in the sky — Conversation between two children on the beach: a matter of monks and candlesticks — Between past and future — How François Besson became blind by staring at the sun
ON the twelfth day, François Besson began by going to the public toilets for a wash and a shave. He found himself in a big old strong-smelling room, with very clean walls and floor and ceiling, all covered with white porcelain tiles. On the left-hand side, close to the entrance, was an old woman sitting on a stool, and immersed in a paper. In front of her was a table, on which stood a little bowl with a few low-denomination coins in it. The first wall was occupied by a row of wash-basins with mirrors above them. The second was empty, the third had the urinals along it, and the fourth was accounted for by six closed toilets, of which five were marked ‘Free’ and one ‘Engaged’. Men came and went without saying a word. They washed their hands in the basins, combed their hair in the mirrors, dried themselves on the roller-towels. Others urinated facing the wall, pressed into the hollows of the bright white porcelain stalls, only half protected by the shallow divisions between them. They did not look at each other, apart from two or three who flashed quick furtive glances at their neighbours. Some stood at the mirrors and blew their noses, with a loud trumpeting sound, after, which they would stride out briskly, tossing a small coin into the bowl on the old woman’s table as they passed, with a tinkle of falling metal.