Jean and Josianne Lascaux returned from the funeral for Père Philippe, held in Carcassonne with all pomp and circumstance, even the hierarchy in Montpellier having roused itself to come and pay homage. The priest was remembered for the many spiritual insights he helped those who sought him out achieve, as well as for the charm of his homilies.
One in particular stood out in Jean's mind. Père Philippe was saying that the goodness of God was such that, not only had he given his only Son to redeem man, but that, notwithstanding the trials and tribulations of this world, in the end, even the devil would submit. And did that fact not illustrate how small, when you came right down to it, the devil really was, that he could be defeated by goodness?
Delphine had been summonsed, Cibiche had been hailed, the man in the red T-shirt, the smoker, had been arrested for the murder of Père Philippe, as well as the attempted murder of Delphine. A Frenchman from Carcassonne, whose family went back generations in Languedoc-Roussillon, he had a history of offenses against women. The Police Nationale were interested because he was from Carcassonne, but because the murder took place in Caunes, the gendarmerie arrested him. It was the Police Nationale, however, that suspected he might have played a role in a few local cases involving women and told the gendarmerie to go through their cold case files, one of which was Irine Fantôme's. Put in a line-up, Irine recognized the man as the tile installer about whose work she had filed a complaint demanding his license be revoked.
The disfigured woman testified at his trials for the murder of Père Philippe, the attempted murder of Delphine, and her own. Delphine was not permitted to testify, despite her many protestations. Her history of insanity made her an unreliable witness, even if, in fact, she was the only witness to Père Philippe's courage.
Tuesday, August 27, 2013
Faith
Père Philippe was in the sacristy, sweeping out the dried leaves that had blown in since he opened the window this morning. Today there would be a larger turnout than usual for the Mass celebrating the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary into Heaven. The paintings of the life of the Virgin that framed all sides of the altar have particular significance today, thought the priest: Mary being educated by her mother, Saint Anne; Mary betrothed to Joseph, each one of them kneeling in the presence of the other; Mary giving birth to Jesus; Mary ascending into Heaven; Mary's mercy presiding over the world.
Père Philippe put his white alb on over the simple black robe of the Passionists. Pulling the white hood over his head, he then put on the chasuble, then the stole. There came a knock to the sacristy door just as he finished putting on the vestments. It was Delphine.
Père Philippe had tried to counsel Delphine many times. Whether he was succeeding never seemed obvious. Delphine, while sincerely loving Christ and his saints, was a prodigal. Her manias could only be controlled by medication, but Delphine tended to think the elated moods were divinely, rather than genetically, ordained. The dangers of that thinking were obvious to many, Père Philippe included; but Delphine was an adult and beyond the reach of the authorities until something she did required them to intervene. That had never happened: Delphine in her mania hitchhiked, or, if she could not get a ride, walked the roads, all perfectly legal actions, however, questionable.
Delphine looked radiant, Père Philippe observed to himself. "What was she up to?" It would be like her to do something dramatic on today, of all days. She entered the sacristy moving in the direction of the chair in which parishoners made their confessions. Before she reached it, she knelt down facing Père Phlippe, who was standing diagonally opposite, by the long table on which he kept his books.
"Père, I have a gift to make in the name of the most Blessed Virgin, in honor of this day, the anniversary of her Assumption--". And she reached into the pocket of her white dress, taking out a man's cowhide wallet. From it, she removed two hundred denomination Euro bills, putting the wallet back into her pocket.
"Here, Father-- Like a Magdalene repentant, I offer you this--" And she stretched out her hands to Pére Phlippe, her head bowed in a gesture of submission.
Just then, the curtain which separated the sacristy from the chapel was drawn back and the man in the red T-shirt, the smoker, penetrated the sanctuary. Eyeing Delphine he did not hesitate.
"You bitch! You thieving little bitch!" With that, he took out a small pistol and aimed it at the kneeling figure.
Père Philippe did not hesitate: instinctively he walked into the line of fire, feeling the bullet burn into his chest.
Delphine looked up, startled. Outside, in the chapel, the parishoners gave a collective gasp, and several of the men entered, including Jean La Croix. The man in the red T-shirt was wrestled to the floor and knocked out cold --by Cibiche.
Père Philippe put his white alb on over the simple black robe of the Passionists. Pulling the white hood over his head, he then put on the chasuble, then the stole. There came a knock to the sacristy door just as he finished putting on the vestments. It was Delphine.
Père Philippe had tried to counsel Delphine many times. Whether he was succeeding never seemed obvious. Delphine, while sincerely loving Christ and his saints, was a prodigal. Her manias could only be controlled by medication, but Delphine tended to think the elated moods were divinely, rather than genetically, ordained. The dangers of that thinking were obvious to many, Père Philippe included; but Delphine was an adult and beyond the reach of the authorities until something she did required them to intervene. That had never happened: Delphine in her mania hitchhiked, or, if she could not get a ride, walked the roads, all perfectly legal actions, however, questionable.
Delphine looked radiant, Père Philippe observed to himself. "What was she up to?" It would be like her to do something dramatic on today, of all days. She entered the sacristy moving in the direction of the chair in which parishoners made their confessions. Before she reached it, she knelt down facing Père Phlippe, who was standing diagonally opposite, by the long table on which he kept his books.
"Père, I have a gift to make in the name of the most Blessed Virgin, in honor of this day, the anniversary of her Assumption--". And she reached into the pocket of her white dress, taking out a man's cowhide wallet. From it, she removed two hundred denomination Euro bills, putting the wallet back into her pocket.
"Here, Father-- Like a Magdalene repentant, I offer you this--" And she stretched out her hands to Pére Phlippe, her head bowed in a gesture of submission.
Just then, the curtain which separated the sacristy from the chapel was drawn back and the man in the red T-shirt, the smoker, penetrated the sanctuary. Eyeing Delphine he did not hesitate.
"You bitch! You thieving little bitch!" With that, he took out a small pistol and aimed it at the kneeling figure.
Père Philippe did not hesitate: instinctively he walked into the line of fire, feeling the bullet burn into his chest.
Delphine looked up, startled. Outside, in the chapel, the parishoners gave a collective gasp, and several of the men entered, including Jean La Croix. The man in the red T-shirt was wrestled to the floor and knocked out cold --by Cibiche.
Charity
Delphine smoothed down her skirt, leaving the man lying on the bed sleeping. She combed her curly hair back into place, grabbed her bag, then took a look around the room.
Sacrifice was implict in a holy life. One accepted hardship in order to be able to rise above it, steering one's natural inclinations away from fulfillment so that the gem-like heart of a saint might have room to grow. It was a hard path, but Delphine had sought nothing else since she was a child. As an adult woman she had grown only more aware of the higher reality. Thanks to Père Philippe she had learned more about facing her demons with patience and concentration. Nothing was what it seemed at first, the true nature of an act emerged only upon meditation, a consideration of its essence.
Sleeping with the man in the red shirt might be slutty to some, but Magdalene was a friend of Christ's, Dephine reflected. Eyeing the wallet by the bed Delphine thought herself a bit of a Magdalene, slipping it into her handbag, then, on tiptoe, making her way to the door of the apartment in Carcassonne and down the stairs.
She walked to the bus stop and picked up the Tessier back to Caunes.
Returning to her tiny home on one of the narrow 'ruelles', Delphine crept inside, so as not to wake her mother, who was sleeping in a chair near the fireplace.
She walked up the narrow and vertiginous flight of stairs to her side of the house. She took off her white clothes and showered, then crawled under the quilt, clean and fresh again.
After several hours sleep, she awoke feeling alert and refreshed. It was 10:00 a.m. She had enough time to walk out of the village and up the road to Notre Dame du Cros in time to see Père Philippe before the Mass for the Feast of the Assumption.
Her mother asked where she had been, her face bewildered. "I told myself I would wait until this morning before I called the gendarmerie. You know that last time they scolded me, when you walked in, right under their noses. Delphine, please, please --the worry is going to kill me. Try to stay home."
Delphine was already on her way out the door, her mother's words resounding in the background, thinking of how surprised Père Phlippe would be when she handed him her gift for the Assumption collection.
Sacrifice was implict in a holy life. One accepted hardship in order to be able to rise above it, steering one's natural inclinations away from fulfillment so that the gem-like heart of a saint might have room to grow. It was a hard path, but Delphine had sought nothing else since she was a child. As an adult woman she had grown only more aware of the higher reality. Thanks to Père Philippe she had learned more about facing her demons with patience and concentration. Nothing was what it seemed at first, the true nature of an act emerged only upon meditation, a consideration of its essence.
Sleeping with the man in the red shirt might be slutty to some, but Magdalene was a friend of Christ's, Dephine reflected. Eyeing the wallet by the bed Delphine thought herself a bit of a Magdalene, slipping it into her handbag, then, on tiptoe, making her way to the door of the apartment in Carcassonne and down the stairs.
She walked to the bus stop and picked up the Tessier back to Caunes.
Returning to her tiny home on one of the narrow 'ruelles', Delphine crept inside, so as not to wake her mother, who was sleeping in a chair near the fireplace.
She walked up the narrow and vertiginous flight of stairs to her side of the house. She took off her white clothes and showered, then crawled under the quilt, clean and fresh again.
After several hours sleep, she awoke feeling alert and refreshed. It was 10:00 a.m. She had enough time to walk out of the village and up the road to Notre Dame du Cros in time to see Père Philippe before the Mass for the Feast of the Assumption.
Her mother asked where she had been, her face bewildered. "I told myself I would wait until this morning before I called the gendarmerie. You know that last time they scolded me, when you walked in, right under their noses. Delphine, please, please --the worry is going to kill me. Try to stay home."
Delphine was already on her way out the door, her mother's words resounding in the background, thinking of how surprised Père Phlippe would be when she handed him her gift for the Assumption collection.
Wednesday
At the Café de la Fontaine Wednesday morning, the story about the broken doorknob made the rounds. The talk was of the petty thievery perpetrated mostly against the seasonal owners. The consensus was that while whoever stole was committing a crime, giving them the opportunity to do so --by leaving a door or window open-- was almost as bad.
Jean Lascaux listened to the hubbub around the bar with half an ear as he read l'Equipe, concentrating particularly on the soccer standings. It was going to be a very hot day, as was usual in the Midi in the middle of August.
"The Police Nationale won't do anything, and the Gendarmerie could care less, but if I caught one of them in my house, I'd cut his hand off faster than you could sing La Marseillaise" said the man dressed in fatigues, the former Legionnaire officer. It's not easy to accept that prison is a punishment, Lascaux thought to himself, when you come across the most violent regularly. The foreign Legionnaires are often hard cases saved from prison by enlistment, fighting their more refractory former comrades. Home again, the French officers bring all their prejudices to local matters.
"Look, they're just trying the doors. One puts the other up to it. This isn't Marseille, 'Thank God'. Nobody's celebrating their birthday by holding up a tabac," said another man.
The reference was to the robbery of a tabac in Marseille over the weekend, caught on videotape: three young men from the banlieue walked into a tabac brandishing pistols. They emptied the cash register then walked out. A retired man, 60, tried to stop them from getting away. As the three ran, one of them fired, killing the good samaritan.
"What has France become?" wailed the café owner, a husky, auburn-haired man with a beard. "In my parents' day, anyone who didn't fall into line got sent to the Army, where those who made a career of it gave him the message --conform or get to like prison. Most of the rest of us, the worst we could do was to have to put on the ring before we were intending, so the child would have the father's name. Not too serious, but you would have thought it was the end of the world, the way everyone carried on about the girl being ruined. Those were the days! Les Trentes Glorieuses! Who will bring them back now?" The last was said rhetorically.
"We're not even sure who's French and who's not, because even if they have a French passport, they don't think like us--the Maliens, the Algeriens, particularly. The Sénégalais and the Marocains, they made the most of what we offered them. The others, they hate us." This from a veteran of the Algerian War.
"The other day one of the Nazaris called me about a lamb to buy for a family event," said a local farmer. "My wife took the call. 'How much would one cost?' I told Marie to tell him that I would call him back. If I give him the price I would normally sell for, he will bargain. It offends me because it's aggressive and means I have to calculate my price higher than I would for one of you, because that's how they do business. If he finds out that one of you got a lower price than he paid, next time he'll remind me of that and ask for a still lower price. So if I want to do business with them, I have to do it their way. --And I have to do business with everyone, if I'm going to sell my lambs and make it pay."
Jean Lascaux had heard it all before. France was no longer what it was, but everyone over fifty who grew up hearing his parents speak French retained a memory of a time when French ways counted for something all over France, if not the world. The different immigrant communities --those who grew up acutely aware that their parents did not speak French-- were all asking when France --the shopkeepers, the artisans, the small farmers, the teachers, the railway workers for life, not to mention the bureaucrats-- would recognize their France. Their France was the France of the parents who couldn't speak French and did not interact with their longer-established neighbors, their France was the France of the HLMs and social housing, the France of the jobless, growing every day, and disproportionately immigrant-- living side-by-side with the other France, but each ignoring the other.
The children of the immigrant communities were restless, and took it out on those more established, while the established communities demonized the newcomers. The conflict was sharpest between those from each group closest on the social scale. So the small farmers in l'Aude, who were barely making ends meet, were most resentful of the children of the laborers who built their houses, preferring to side with the foremen, who were often the children of Spanish immigrants who arrived in the 1940s, and whose children learned French while speaking Spanish at home. By the third generation, these grandchildren of Spaniards spoke only French and thought of themselves as French. Whether the newcomers, too, would become "French" --everyone talked in those terms. Not if these peasants had anything to say about it, Jean thought to himself, retreating further into his newspaper.
Jean Lascaux listened to the hubbub around the bar with half an ear as he read l'Equipe, concentrating particularly on the soccer standings. It was going to be a very hot day, as was usual in the Midi in the middle of August.
"The Police Nationale won't do anything, and the Gendarmerie could care less, but if I caught one of them in my house, I'd cut his hand off faster than you could sing La Marseillaise" said the man dressed in fatigues, the former Legionnaire officer. It's not easy to accept that prison is a punishment, Lascaux thought to himself, when you come across the most violent regularly. The foreign Legionnaires are often hard cases saved from prison by enlistment, fighting their more refractory former comrades. Home again, the French officers bring all their prejudices to local matters.
"Look, they're just trying the doors. One puts the other up to it. This isn't Marseille, 'Thank God'. Nobody's celebrating their birthday by holding up a tabac," said another man.
The reference was to the robbery of a tabac in Marseille over the weekend, caught on videotape: three young men from the banlieue walked into a tabac brandishing pistols. They emptied the cash register then walked out. A retired man, 60, tried to stop them from getting away. As the three ran, one of them fired, killing the good samaritan.
"What has France become?" wailed the café owner, a husky, auburn-haired man with a beard. "In my parents' day, anyone who didn't fall into line got sent to the Army, where those who made a career of it gave him the message --conform or get to like prison. Most of the rest of us, the worst we could do was to have to put on the ring before we were intending, so the child would have the father's name. Not too serious, but you would have thought it was the end of the world, the way everyone carried on about the girl being ruined. Those were the days! Les Trentes Glorieuses! Who will bring them back now?" The last was said rhetorically.
"We're not even sure who's French and who's not, because even if they have a French passport, they don't think like us--the Maliens, the Algeriens, particularly. The Sénégalais and the Marocains, they made the most of what we offered them. The others, they hate us." This from a veteran of the Algerian War.
"The other day one of the Nazaris called me about a lamb to buy for a family event," said a local farmer. "My wife took the call. 'How much would one cost?' I told Marie to tell him that I would call him back. If I give him the price I would normally sell for, he will bargain. It offends me because it's aggressive and means I have to calculate my price higher than I would for one of you, because that's how they do business. If he finds out that one of you got a lower price than he paid, next time he'll remind me of that and ask for a still lower price. So if I want to do business with them, I have to do it their way. --And I have to do business with everyone, if I'm going to sell my lambs and make it pay."
Jean Lascaux had heard it all before. France was no longer what it was, but everyone over fifty who grew up hearing his parents speak French retained a memory of a time when French ways counted for something all over France, if not the world. The different immigrant communities --those who grew up acutely aware that their parents did not speak French-- were all asking when France --the shopkeepers, the artisans, the small farmers, the teachers, the railway workers for life, not to mention the bureaucrats-- would recognize their France. Their France was the France of the parents who couldn't speak French and did not interact with their longer-established neighbors, their France was the France of the HLMs and social housing, the France of the jobless, growing every day, and disproportionately immigrant-- living side-by-side with the other France, but each ignoring the other.
The children of the immigrant communities were restless, and took it out on those more established, while the established communities demonized the newcomers. The conflict was sharpest between those from each group closest on the social scale. So the small farmers in l'Aude, who were barely making ends meet, were most resentful of the children of the laborers who built their houses, preferring to side with the foremen, who were often the children of Spanish immigrants who arrived in the 1940s, and whose children learned French while speaking Spanish at home. By the third generation, these grandchildren of Spaniards spoke only French and thought of themselves as French. Whether the newcomers, too, would become "French" --everyone talked in those terms. Not if these peasants had anything to say about it, Jean thought to himself, retreating further into his newspaper.
Friday, August 23, 2013
Doorknobs
The door handle to one of the houses on on of the 'ruelles' off Avenue du Minervois had been snapped off. The house belonged to the mother of Delphine, the woman in white.
The door led to a second apartment attached to a larger house, rented out on a seasonal basis. The violence with which the door had been forced had caused the handle to break off. The owners, an ex-pat couple, were furious, and also discomfited. The gendarmerie in Peyriac was as uninterested as if the apartment door had been left open and there had been a theft.
While there was a garage adjoining, no car could have struck off the doorknob, which was recessed. The doorknob had served for several years, and ought to have served for many more. To have destroyed it someone would have had to push down swiftly, and with great force. Whoever the attempted burglar was, it was not one of the young men normally suspected of pilfering. The forcing of the door was not the act of a petty criminal trying to commit a crime of opportunity, but of someone more menacing, someone operating from a conviction without conscience.
The door led to a second apartment attached to a larger house, rented out on a seasonal basis. The violence with which the door had been forced had caused the handle to break off. The owners, an ex-pat couple, were furious, and also discomfited. The gendarmerie in Peyriac was as uninterested as if the apartment door had been left open and there had been a theft.
While there was a garage adjoining, no car could have struck off the doorknob, which was recessed. The doorknob had served for several years, and ought to have served for many more. To have destroyed it someone would have had to push down swiftly, and with great force. Whoever the attempted burglar was, it was not one of the young men normally suspected of pilfering. The forcing of the door was not the act of a petty criminal trying to commit a crime of opportunity, but of someone more menacing, someone operating from a conviction without conscience.
Monday, August 19, 2013
Delphine
"You are arrogant! You pose! You are not what people think!"
The woman in white screamed these words as Père Philippe entered the sanctuary from the refectory. Delphine, the woman in white, had been praying in front of the statue of Notre Dame du Cros when the sight of Père Philippe impelled her outburst.
Delphine was always dressed in white, a leather belt around her waist carrying a wallet in which she kept her money and her keys. She had black, curling hair and a few grey ones, but the heart-shaped face, the childlike voice and the swiftness of her movements, made Delphine seem very young, a virginal milkmaid suffused with religious feeling. Yet the rapturous expression before the statue turned harsh as she shouted the denunciation, which rang through the chapel.
Accompanying a surprised visitor to the exit of the chapel, Père Philippe explained, "She is not in her right mind, she hasn't been taking her medication."
Delphine remained at the altar, now arranging the flowers and singing to herself softly, smiling up at the paintings of Mary.
Père Philippe returned after saying goodbye to his visitor, heading for the rectory. Again, Delphine shouted, this time,
"You are not a man of God! You are a false prophet!"
The skirt of Père Philippe's black robe made a rustling sound against the marble floor as he walked, briskly and imperturbably, back to the rectory.
It was Tuesday, two days after the kermesse. The fair had been considerably more successful than last year's, more foreigners attended, seeking bargains at the church bazaar, and helping themselves to wine and sandwiches. Monday, as usual, the chapel was open, but there was no Mass. Today the regular schedule of daily Mass at 11:30 a.m. resumed, hence Delphine's presence. She would tend the flowers by the marble statue of the Virgin and Child, although the women canons automatically did so. Delphine, however, obeyed no laws in her devotion, which made encounters with her disconcerting to many in the village. Père Philippe, however, saw no reason to restrain her gestures of adoration, and counseled her to continue to take the medication prescribed for her mania. He was not always successful, as today indicated.
Delphine walked back to Caunes after the Mass, observed by another regular Mass-goer, a man from Villeneuve who drove a car to the chapel and back. At the intersection of the road to the chapel and the main highway, he saw Delphine stop to talk to a man in a panel truck, then get inside.
The woman in white screamed these words as Père Philippe entered the sanctuary from the refectory. Delphine, the woman in white, had been praying in front of the statue of Notre Dame du Cros when the sight of Père Philippe impelled her outburst.
Delphine was always dressed in white, a leather belt around her waist carrying a wallet in which she kept her money and her keys. She had black, curling hair and a few grey ones, but the heart-shaped face, the childlike voice and the swiftness of her movements, made Delphine seem very young, a virginal milkmaid suffused with religious feeling. Yet the rapturous expression before the statue turned harsh as she shouted the denunciation, which rang through the chapel.
Accompanying a surprised visitor to the exit of the chapel, Père Philippe explained, "She is not in her right mind, she hasn't been taking her medication."
Delphine remained at the altar, now arranging the flowers and singing to herself softly, smiling up at the paintings of Mary.
Père Philippe returned after saying goodbye to his visitor, heading for the rectory. Again, Delphine shouted, this time,
"You are not a man of God! You are a false prophet!"
The skirt of Père Philippe's black robe made a rustling sound against the marble floor as he walked, briskly and imperturbably, back to the rectory.
It was Tuesday, two days after the kermesse. The fair had been considerably more successful than last year's, more foreigners attended, seeking bargains at the church bazaar, and helping themselves to wine and sandwiches. Monday, as usual, the chapel was open, but there was no Mass. Today the regular schedule of daily Mass at 11:30 a.m. resumed, hence Delphine's presence. She would tend the flowers by the marble statue of the Virgin and Child, although the women canons automatically did so. Delphine, however, obeyed no laws in her devotion, which made encounters with her disconcerting to many in the village. Père Philippe, however, saw no reason to restrain her gestures of adoration, and counseled her to continue to take the medication prescribed for her mania. He was not always successful, as today indicated.
Delphine walked back to Caunes after the Mass, observed by another regular Mass-goer, a man from Villeneuve who drove a car to the chapel and back. At the intersection of the road to the chapel and the main highway, he saw Delphine stop to talk to a man in a panel truck, then get inside.
Sunday, August 18, 2013
Kermesse
At shortly after 8:00 a.m., Josianne Lascaux was at the staging area for the kermesse to begin after the 11 o'clock Mass to help with the set-up for the meal. Katy had organized everything, brought tomatoes from her own garden, ordered the Auvergnât ham, pork pâté, melon, roast chicken thighs for those who would not be having tripes, cheese, bread, apple tart and coffee. Jean was cooking the tripes, Marcel had brought the rosé, the red and the bottled water; others, like Simone, had organized the sale of handicrafts, and still others, the betting on the bottle toss and which of the ten rabbit hutches stuffed with carrots the animal would go after.
For 15 Euros, each person would have a plate of slices of melon, ham and pâté, accompanied with a beverage of choice, followed by either tripes or chicken, followed by camembert, followed by tart, followed by coffee. Those who wanted an apèro before the start of the meal could buy pastis, or any of the wines, plus hors d'oeuvres in the form of small sandwiches. It was important to have a good, long apèro before the meal, because the individual drinks purchased filled the coffers of the kermesse; but not too long, because everyone was supposed to fast for at least an hour before the Mass, so by noon everyone was hungry and drinking on an empty stomach.
Katy's helpers worked like slaves, cutting each tomato into fine slices, placing them on plates onto which the chicken thighs went, for those who could not appreciate tripes. After that the line went into production of the first course, lining up two slices of cantaloupe next to one of mountain-cured ham and a triangle of páté, altogether almost three hundred paper plates, each wrapped in plastic wrap to keep the bees away until the apèro ended and it was time to start the service.
The service had to go like clockwork: once one table saw another being served, it became impatient to get its own food. In a group, people who were otherwise very reserved made outrageous demands: if one table had a few missing members, that beside asked whether they could eat the portions as seconds, forgetting that perhaps the portion had been paid for and the table members would be late arrivals.
At the dessert course, everything began to calm down. Josianne was able to sit down and enjoy a glass of blanquette de Limoux with Jean, who, the tripe recipe having gone down well, could rest on his laurels. The games began while the coffee was being served, the ham strung up so its weight could be guessed, then the cards for Loto distributed. Marcel called out the numbers for 90 minutes, then the tombola drawing, a jackpot including a coffee service, a bottle of blanquette in a cooler, locally made confections and a coffee pot. The prize went to a widowed parishioner who rarely entertained.
Père Philippe, whose sermon touched on why the chapel drew visitors to the kermesse who never went inside the chapel, made a brief appearance among the attendees, stopping to talk at a table near where Josianne and Lascaux were seated. The man has an amazing ability to understand human beings, Lascaux thought to himself. Instead of criticizing those who come to the kermesse for a good meal for little and never set foot inside Notre Dame du Cros, he chooses to talk about the roots of their attachment to the chapel and to describe it as a link, however distant, with the God so many find inside. Was Jesus like that? Lascaux wondered to himself. Père Philippe's internal stillness, while not always on display, was the essential part of his nature. Although, Lascaux amended, living in an hermitage it was probably easier to keep that part of himself to the fore than had Père Philippe been assigned to serve, say, in one of those parishes in Marseille --The Three Kings for instance-- where gunshot rang out and fleeing go fasts burned rubber every night, whatever the police did to try to reduce the drug trafficking.
Père Philippe would say, however, that had he been assigned to such a parish, his work would not change essentially. His calling as a priest was not to change the world, but to make those who would hear aware that a world beyond the impermanent world existed, was within the reach of those willing to seek it. It would reveal itself as superseding the immanent, although immanence is a property of God. However, to think God is only immanent is to deny that the world is without evil and to ignore that it is transcendence that ultimately gives human beings the capacity to supersede human limitations.
After eleven years of sitting in the pews of Notre Dame du Cros, Lascaux could call to mind Père Phlippe's homilies without effort. He was a remarkable priest, even if the villagers found him too much of an intellecto, with his books about what it all means.
For 15 Euros, each person would have a plate of slices of melon, ham and pâté, accompanied with a beverage of choice, followed by either tripes or chicken, followed by camembert, followed by tart, followed by coffee. Those who wanted an apèro before the start of the meal could buy pastis, or any of the wines, plus hors d'oeuvres in the form of small sandwiches. It was important to have a good, long apèro before the meal, because the individual drinks purchased filled the coffers of the kermesse; but not too long, because everyone was supposed to fast for at least an hour before the Mass, so by noon everyone was hungry and drinking on an empty stomach.
Katy's helpers worked like slaves, cutting each tomato into fine slices, placing them on plates onto which the chicken thighs went, for those who could not appreciate tripes. After that the line went into production of the first course, lining up two slices of cantaloupe next to one of mountain-cured ham and a triangle of páté, altogether almost three hundred paper plates, each wrapped in plastic wrap to keep the bees away until the apèro ended and it was time to start the service.
The service had to go like clockwork: once one table saw another being served, it became impatient to get its own food. In a group, people who were otherwise very reserved made outrageous demands: if one table had a few missing members, that beside asked whether they could eat the portions as seconds, forgetting that perhaps the portion had been paid for and the table members would be late arrivals.
At the dessert course, everything began to calm down. Josianne was able to sit down and enjoy a glass of blanquette de Limoux with Jean, who, the tripe recipe having gone down well, could rest on his laurels. The games began while the coffee was being served, the ham strung up so its weight could be guessed, then the cards for Loto distributed. Marcel called out the numbers for 90 minutes, then the tombola drawing, a jackpot including a coffee service, a bottle of blanquette in a cooler, locally made confections and a coffee pot. The prize went to a widowed parishioner who rarely entertained.
Père Philippe, whose sermon touched on why the chapel drew visitors to the kermesse who never went inside the chapel, made a brief appearance among the attendees, stopping to talk at a table near where Josianne and Lascaux were seated. The man has an amazing ability to understand human beings, Lascaux thought to himself. Instead of criticizing those who come to the kermesse for a good meal for little and never set foot inside Notre Dame du Cros, he chooses to talk about the roots of their attachment to the chapel and to describe it as a link, however distant, with the God so many find inside. Was Jesus like that? Lascaux wondered to himself. Père Philippe's internal stillness, while not always on display, was the essential part of his nature. Although, Lascaux amended, living in an hermitage it was probably easier to keep that part of himself to the fore than had Père Philippe been assigned to serve, say, in one of those parishes in Marseille --The Three Kings for instance-- where gunshot rang out and fleeing go fasts burned rubber every night, whatever the police did to try to reduce the drug trafficking.
Père Philippe would say, however, that had he been assigned to such a parish, his work would not change essentially. His calling as a priest was not to change the world, but to make those who would hear aware that a world beyond the impermanent world existed, was within the reach of those willing to seek it. It would reveal itself as superseding the immanent, although immanence is a property of God. However, to think God is only immanent is to deny that the world is without evil and to ignore that it is transcendence that ultimately gives human beings the capacity to supersede human limitations.
After eleven years of sitting in the pews of Notre Dame du Cros, Lascaux could call to mind Père Phlippe's homilies without effort. He was a remarkable priest, even if the villagers found him too much of an intellecto, with his books about what it all means.
Saturday, August 17, 2013
Carcassonne
"Carcassonne is like an old lady who has not changed her make-up in fifty years", Jean Lascaux thought to himself as he drove around Place Gambetta. "The façade is still the essentially the same, but looking a bit worn" he smiled to himself, appreciating the parallelism.
Driving from Caunes was not difficult, although occasionally something lying on the road caught his attention and he would pull over to have a closer look. Force of habit, nurtured over years, so many incidents requiring the gendarmerie taking place on roads. Today he had stopped to pick up a license plate, seemingly new, for a French car, CG-180-EE 34, the last two numbers indicating its registration in Languedoc-Roussillon. Across the road, he found the decaying carcass of a long-dead fawn, probably struck by a car, dried grass growing through its rib cage, head and teeth intact, one of the front legs gracefully genuflecting to its fate. Not too much further away, a brown rabbit's carcass, the well-dried bones of the rib cage shaped like a lovely bentwood basket. With all the flesh gone, cadavers lost their gory aspect and became, Lascaux thought, just another roadside attraction, unlike the plastic bottles that dotted the roadside ditches, and never became part of the soil.
He was in Carcassonne to see a tile installer about a repair that needed to be done to an installation of terra cotta tiles on the terrace of the house. He had not been there when the work was finished, he had been bicycling with his cycling club, and Josianne was the last woman in the world who would question a workman. "He must know his job, otherwise they wouldn't pay him", she would say. And Jean, of course, would check the work. Lascaux relied on her to make sure their menage --the cooking, the laundry, the shopping, the contacts with the family-- all ran smoothly. He had put a roof over their heads, and those of their son and daughter. Now he took care of technical matters --the car, the appliances, dealing with the Mairie, taxes, going to the dechetterie with the week's worth of plastic and cans, leaving the household garbage in the plastic bags the Mairie gave out for free, and packing it in the dumpster for pick up three times weekly. To amuse himself, he cultivated the potager from which they got their vegetables, one among many growing behind the abbey, the plots rented from the Mairie, which kept track of whose plot was whose, not that anyone did not know.
Lascaux cut across Carcassonne's center to arrive at the tile warehouse, which was near the little airport of Salvaza, on the west side of town. It was from Salvaza that the Ryanair flights landed, dropping tourists and seasonal residents, many British, within an easy drive of their final destinations. The big box stores abounded in the Z.I. - zone industriel -- but for once, the GPS in his car got Lascaux directly to his destination. He liked his car, a Seat "Lion" --the product of a merger between the Spanish company and a German partner. The parts were available everywhere, not like that new Renault, the Clio 4, a sports-car type of car whose unique battery meant the factory at Flins had to supply the part as a special order. The Seat was an ugly car, but that made it almost theft-proof, Lascaux had reasoned. A little like some of the cars the gendarmerie drove in France Outre-Mer.
Lascaux pulled up easily in front of a large warehouse painted grey with a sign, "Carrelage Carcassonne" on it. Outside a dark haired, broad-shouldered and deeply-tanned man in a worn red t-shirt bearing the name on the sign was smoking a cigarette. He saw Lascaux, put out his cigarette, and went into the building. Lascaux followed him as soon as he turned off the ignition and locked the car.
Inside, under fluorescent lights, were hundreds of tile displays, affixed to the walls; and, filling the floor space, simulations of dining areas, playrooms, bathrooms and kitchens. In the middle of the space there was a white module where business was done, and where the smoker now stood.
"Good day--"
"Good day, Monsieur, 'What can I help you with?'" the smoker asked, with an amusement, that seemed almost insolent, Jean thought.
"An installation of tile of the terre cuite variety was done at my home in Caunes earlier this week. The floor is not level, and this is a problem."
"Ah, well, we'll see whether you have any redress, although I doubt it--"
"How can that be?" Jean, said, looking directly at the smoker.
"That is how we work. When you are there, it is your responsibility to guide the artisan to your satisfaction. Did you sign the receipt?"
"I did not, my wife did, I was away--"
"Then you should have been there. I doubt there is any claim you can make--"
"That seems unprofessional--"
"Look Monsieur, we do business all over. We explain our terms before we arrive, when we arrange for the visit to lay the tile. If you signed, you take the floor as it is, now that the mortar has dried. You can arrange to have us remove the part of the floor whose placement you don't like, but you will pay for the removal and reinstallation. Got it?"
The smoker walked around the counter and towards Jean. Lascaux was burning with indignation, but he judged the man a brute, so he merely stared at him, his blue eyes, clear as a cloudless sky, expressing little, before he turned, saying,
"Yes, I 'Got it.' --Good day, monsieur. Do not expect return business from us."
As he walked out, he thought he heard the man laugh.
Driving from Caunes was not difficult, although occasionally something lying on the road caught his attention and he would pull over to have a closer look. Force of habit, nurtured over years, so many incidents requiring the gendarmerie taking place on roads. Today he had stopped to pick up a license plate, seemingly new, for a French car, CG-180-EE 34, the last two numbers indicating its registration in Languedoc-Roussillon. Across the road, he found the decaying carcass of a long-dead fawn, probably struck by a car, dried grass growing through its rib cage, head and teeth intact, one of the front legs gracefully genuflecting to its fate. Not too much further away, a brown rabbit's carcass, the well-dried bones of the rib cage shaped like a lovely bentwood basket. With all the flesh gone, cadavers lost their gory aspect and became, Lascaux thought, just another roadside attraction, unlike the plastic bottles that dotted the roadside ditches, and never became part of the soil.
He was in Carcassonne to see a tile installer about a repair that needed to be done to an installation of terra cotta tiles on the terrace of the house. He had not been there when the work was finished, he had been bicycling with his cycling club, and Josianne was the last woman in the world who would question a workman. "He must know his job, otherwise they wouldn't pay him", she would say. And Jean, of course, would check the work. Lascaux relied on her to make sure their menage --the cooking, the laundry, the shopping, the contacts with the family-- all ran smoothly. He had put a roof over their heads, and those of their son and daughter. Now he took care of technical matters --the car, the appliances, dealing with the Mairie, taxes, going to the dechetterie with the week's worth of plastic and cans, leaving the household garbage in the plastic bags the Mairie gave out for free, and packing it in the dumpster for pick up three times weekly. To amuse himself, he cultivated the potager from which they got their vegetables, one among many growing behind the abbey, the plots rented from the Mairie, which kept track of whose plot was whose, not that anyone did not know.
Lascaux cut across Carcassonne's center to arrive at the tile warehouse, which was near the little airport of Salvaza, on the west side of town. It was from Salvaza that the Ryanair flights landed, dropping tourists and seasonal residents, many British, within an easy drive of their final destinations. The big box stores abounded in the Z.I. - zone industriel -- but for once, the GPS in his car got Lascaux directly to his destination. He liked his car, a Seat "Lion" --the product of a merger between the Spanish company and a German partner. The parts were available everywhere, not like that new Renault, the Clio 4, a sports-car type of car whose unique battery meant the factory at Flins had to supply the part as a special order. The Seat was an ugly car, but that made it almost theft-proof, Lascaux had reasoned. A little like some of the cars the gendarmerie drove in France Outre-Mer.
Lascaux pulled up easily in front of a large warehouse painted grey with a sign, "Carrelage Carcassonne" on it. Outside a dark haired, broad-shouldered and deeply-tanned man in a worn red t-shirt bearing the name on the sign was smoking a cigarette. He saw Lascaux, put out his cigarette, and went into the building. Lascaux followed him as soon as he turned off the ignition and locked the car.
Inside, under fluorescent lights, were hundreds of tile displays, affixed to the walls; and, filling the floor space, simulations of dining areas, playrooms, bathrooms and kitchens. In the middle of the space there was a white module where business was done, and where the smoker now stood.
"Good day--"
"Good day, Monsieur, 'What can I help you with?'" the smoker asked, with an amusement, that seemed almost insolent, Jean thought.
"An installation of tile of the terre cuite variety was done at my home in Caunes earlier this week. The floor is not level, and this is a problem."
"Ah, well, we'll see whether you have any redress, although I doubt it--"
"How can that be?" Jean, said, looking directly at the smoker.
"That is how we work. When you are there, it is your responsibility to guide the artisan to your satisfaction. Did you sign the receipt?"
"I did not, my wife did, I was away--"
"Then you should have been there. I doubt there is any claim you can make--"
"That seems unprofessional--"
"Look Monsieur, we do business all over. We explain our terms before we arrive, when we arrange for the visit to lay the tile. If you signed, you take the floor as it is, now that the mortar has dried. You can arrange to have us remove the part of the floor whose placement you don't like, but you will pay for the removal and reinstallation. Got it?"
The smoker walked around the counter and towards Jean. Lascaux was burning with indignation, but he judged the man a brute, so he merely stared at him, his blue eyes, clear as a cloudless sky, expressing little, before he turned, saying,
"Yes, I 'Got it.' --Good day, monsieur. Do not expect return business from us."
As he walked out, he thought he heard the man laugh.
Thursday, August 15, 2013
Sergeant Créancier
Caunes is one of the most beautiful villages in France, Sergeant Créancier said to himself as he looked at the case file for the women who had lost an eye the night before. On the other hand, he concluded, Caunes is as beset, in microcosm, as any ordinary village or town in France. With Algerians, Moroccans, rosbifs, Americans, pieds noirs, Caunois, and émigrés from elsewhere in France all commingled, the stew is not always tasty.
There have been break-ins of late, mainly targeting résidences secondaires of part-time residents. Too, sometimes someone leaves a door open and, invited, a greedy beggar enters and removes the contents of a wallet. The foreigners, in particular, complain --but if they left a door or window open, it is no concern of his.
The attack on Irine Fantôme did not fall into either of these categories, though. Créancier, a large man who had spent his career in the gendarmerie, sitting in cars, patrolling the countryside of Languedoc-Rousillon, thought violent crimes perpetrated against women particularly reprehensible. A man who would steal nothing, yet beat a sturdy woman so badly she lost an eye must be both physically very powerful and quite dangerous.
This kind of crime was not perpetrated by the Algerians in town. They were most usually suspected when property disappeared. Two sons of one family, raised by an older sister, had linked up with a gang operating out of Perpignan, to raid foreigner's homes. They were opportunists and found homes with latches unlocked or windows open until one day they decided to try a bigger caper, robbing one of the big homes in the hills. It had a radio alarm that brought the police there within minutes: Karim and Wassim spent six months in the penitentiary in Béziers before returning to their sister's house and work-release jobs at the SMIC rate at Kentucky Fried Chicken outside Carcassonne . They spoke of going to Canada, but so far they remained in Caunes. Neither was violent, Karim younger and less sure of himself, Wassim older and more serious. Créancier thought they had girlfriends, but after Béziers no illusions about prison or fame, their hip-hop hats notwithstanding.
Until their capture, Wassim and Karim had been the most enterprising of Caunes' petty thieves. All the others were just juvenile delinquents. They stole to brag to their friends, but only wallets, or the occasional stereo from an open car. Caunes was, Créancier thanked himself, very much a quiet place to live, where everyone knew everyone and one neighbor's curiosity about another operated as well or better than any security system.
Why, then would Irine Fantôme have been attacked? She lived on the main street, had for years. Known to everyone in Caunes as a good neighbor, a bit solitary. Divorced long before she came to Caunes, she set up a notions shop, selling anything you might need in a pinch, but didn't want to drive to Carcassonne for: a needle, an envelope, a bottle of glue, a screwdriver, a plug for the bathtub, all sold in quantities of one usually. Thrifty Caunois preferred to visit Irine than spend money on gasoline, particularly these days, when no one had any Euros to spare. That is to say everyone visited and knew Irine, because the Caunois are by nature thrifty. Visitors from the north might laugh, call them ploucs, and hillbillies, but Caunes had not survived for a thousand years because anyone threw away a piece of string.
It was hard to believe the attacker was from the village. With the exception of that one Algerian family, everyone in Caunes was neighborly, according to his merits. Even Cibiche, that pathetic charity case adopted by the Café de la Fontaine, would not so much as pick up a centime that was not his, nor raise his fist in anger against another Caunois. What could have provoked an attack on a woman at an age that could easily have led to her death, not just disfigurement?
What provoked men --if not drunkeness, which made beasts of men, but whose effects usually dissipated as the alcohol left the system --to conceive a plan to commit violence that required elaborate planning to avoid detection? Nothing had been stolen or destroyed in Irine Fantôme's apartment and the entry had not been forced. Fantôme said she had not left the door open by mistake, but even if she had, a man in black with his face covered does not just happen to open the door in the middle of the night so he can hit you in the face with all his strength.
The woman talked a bit too much, that was true. Instead of keeping her opinions to herself, she spoke and acted on them. When she first arrived in Caunes, wanting to make a good impression, she signaled to the Mairie that the sale of the dilapidated property next to hers at the end of Avenue du Minervois was being sold for a lower than reasonable price, probably because money was passing under the table. Indeed, the seller and the buyer had come to an agreement that the purchase price would be supplemented by a tax-free payment for the "furniture", which meant the State might have gotten less than it was entitled to. The Mairie looked into the terms of sale and found that the "antique" dining room table and chairs were worth much less than the 60,000 Euros the buyer paid. Thanks to Irine, the sale was canceled, the Mairie exercised its right of first refusal, buying the property for the contract price, then selling it at a handsome profit, plus the taxes. Both the buyer and the seller moved away from Caunes, but everyone remembered the history of the property, now a restaurant that catered to tourists.
Irine was right to tip off the Mairie, but she might have done better to keep very, very quiet about it. Instead, out of moral outrage, she told one of her neighbors, the biggest mouth in town, and when the Mairie took the property, everyone knew it was Irine who had informed. This, in a town where you had only to mention that a particular house was for sale and most people could tell you who the owner was fifty years ago.
There have been break-ins of late, mainly targeting résidences secondaires of part-time residents. Too, sometimes someone leaves a door open and, invited, a greedy beggar enters and removes the contents of a wallet. The foreigners, in particular, complain --but if they left a door or window open, it is no concern of his.
The attack on Irine Fantôme did not fall into either of these categories, though. Créancier, a large man who had spent his career in the gendarmerie, sitting in cars, patrolling the countryside of Languedoc-Rousillon, thought violent crimes perpetrated against women particularly reprehensible. A man who would steal nothing, yet beat a sturdy woman so badly she lost an eye must be both physically very powerful and quite dangerous.
This kind of crime was not perpetrated by the Algerians in town. They were most usually suspected when property disappeared. Two sons of one family, raised by an older sister, had linked up with a gang operating out of Perpignan, to raid foreigner's homes. They were opportunists and found homes with latches unlocked or windows open until one day they decided to try a bigger caper, robbing one of the big homes in the hills. It had a radio alarm that brought the police there within minutes: Karim and Wassim spent six months in the penitentiary in Béziers before returning to their sister's house and work-release jobs at the SMIC rate at Kentucky Fried Chicken outside Carcassonne . They spoke of going to Canada, but so far they remained in Caunes. Neither was violent, Karim younger and less sure of himself, Wassim older and more serious. Créancier thought they had girlfriends, but after Béziers no illusions about prison or fame, their hip-hop hats notwithstanding.
Until their capture, Wassim and Karim had been the most enterprising of Caunes' petty thieves. All the others were just juvenile delinquents. They stole to brag to their friends, but only wallets, or the occasional stereo from an open car. Caunes was, Créancier thanked himself, very much a quiet place to live, where everyone knew everyone and one neighbor's curiosity about another operated as well or better than any security system.
Why, then would Irine Fantôme have been attacked? She lived on the main street, had for years. Known to everyone in Caunes as a good neighbor, a bit solitary. Divorced long before she came to Caunes, she set up a notions shop, selling anything you might need in a pinch, but didn't want to drive to Carcassonne for: a needle, an envelope, a bottle of glue, a screwdriver, a plug for the bathtub, all sold in quantities of one usually. Thrifty Caunois preferred to visit Irine than spend money on gasoline, particularly these days, when no one had any Euros to spare. That is to say everyone visited and knew Irine, because the Caunois are by nature thrifty. Visitors from the north might laugh, call them ploucs, and hillbillies, but Caunes had not survived for a thousand years because anyone threw away a piece of string.
It was hard to believe the attacker was from the village. With the exception of that one Algerian family, everyone in Caunes was neighborly, according to his merits. Even Cibiche, that pathetic charity case adopted by the Café de la Fontaine, would not so much as pick up a centime that was not his, nor raise his fist in anger against another Caunois. What could have provoked an attack on a woman at an age that could easily have led to her death, not just disfigurement?
What provoked men --if not drunkeness, which made beasts of men, but whose effects usually dissipated as the alcohol left the system --to conceive a plan to commit violence that required elaborate planning to avoid detection? Nothing had been stolen or destroyed in Irine Fantôme's apartment and the entry had not been forced. Fantôme said she had not left the door open by mistake, but even if she had, a man in black with his face covered does not just happen to open the door in the middle of the night so he can hit you in the face with all his strength.
The woman talked a bit too much, that was true. Instead of keeping her opinions to herself, she spoke and acted on them. When she first arrived in Caunes, wanting to make a good impression, she signaled to the Mairie that the sale of the dilapidated property next to hers at the end of Avenue du Minervois was being sold for a lower than reasonable price, probably because money was passing under the table. Indeed, the seller and the buyer had come to an agreement that the purchase price would be supplemented by a tax-free payment for the "furniture", which meant the State might have gotten less than it was entitled to. The Mairie looked into the terms of sale and found that the "antique" dining room table and chairs were worth much less than the 60,000 Euros the buyer paid. Thanks to Irine, the sale was canceled, the Mairie exercised its right of first refusal, buying the property for the contract price, then selling it at a handsome profit, plus the taxes. Both the buyer and the seller moved away from Caunes, but everyone remembered the history of the property, now a restaurant that catered to tourists.
Irine was right to tip off the Mairie, but she might have done better to keep very, very quiet about it. Instead, out of moral outrage, she told one of her neighbors, the biggest mouth in town, and when the Mairie took the property, everyone knew it was Irine who had informed. This, in a town where you had only to mention that a particular house was for sale and most people could tell you who the owner was fifty years ago.
Cibiche
It was 7:30 a.m. on the first Monday morning in August and Cibiche was wiping down the plastic tables at the Café de la Fontaine off avenue du Minervois in Caunes.
Cibiche's real name was Jean, but everybody called him after the perennial cigarette stub that hung from his thick lips, smoked intermittently down to the filter. No one knew his age, nor much about him, other than that he was from Lespinassière, eleven kilometers up the road in the Montagne Noir. Cibiche wiped down the tables in the morning, moved them as needed, in return for a morning beer, which he drank with the other alcoholics for whom the Café de la Fontaine was a second home.
Cibiche, with his black hair cut close to the skull, dark eyes and sun-browned skin could have been a wolf-cub in human form. He spoke little, often growling his words, and everyone knew to steer clear, although his bad humors were short-lived and limited to epithets, as when he referred to the Café de la Fontaine as that putain bar because Marie-Jo, the barmaid, told Cibiche to put out his cigarette if he was going to stand at the bar.
It was not much of a bar, but it was the one place in Caunes that opened early and closed late with no afternoon shut down. The rugby club met there to watch matches, the tourists sat and drank café crèmes, locals bought a newspaper or a Loto or cigarettes. Once the ban on smoking in bars and restaurants was imposed agents began monitoring compliance, even in small villages in the Midi. The Café de la Fontaine was closed for several days for not abiding by the regulations. After that, anyone who wanted to smoke had to do so outside, which gave rise to Cibiche's denunciation.
Outside, commiserating with the other smokers by a nod of his head, whenever anyone said anything critical of the government or the inspectors, Cibiche took a sip of his beer and felt better.
Cibiche's real name was Jean, but everybody called him after the perennial cigarette stub that hung from his thick lips, smoked intermittently down to the filter. No one knew his age, nor much about him, other than that he was from Lespinassière, eleven kilometers up the road in the Montagne Noir. Cibiche wiped down the tables in the morning, moved them as needed, in return for a morning beer, which he drank with the other alcoholics for whom the Café de la Fontaine was a second home.
Cibiche, with his black hair cut close to the skull, dark eyes and sun-browned skin could have been a wolf-cub in human form. He spoke little, often growling his words, and everyone knew to steer clear, although his bad humors were short-lived and limited to epithets, as when he referred to the Café de la Fontaine as that putain bar because Marie-Jo, the barmaid, told Cibiche to put out his cigarette if he was going to stand at the bar.
It was not much of a bar, but it was the one place in Caunes that opened early and closed late with no afternoon shut down. The rugby club met there to watch matches, the tourists sat and drank café crèmes, locals bought a newspaper or a Loto or cigarettes. Once the ban on smoking in bars and restaurants was imposed agents began monitoring compliance, even in small villages in the Midi. The Café de la Fontaine was closed for several days for not abiding by the regulations. After that, anyone who wanted to smoke had to do so outside, which gave rise to Cibiche's denunciation.
Outside, commiserating with the other smokers by a nod of his head, whenever anyone said anything critical of the government or the inspectors, Cibiche took a sip of his beer and felt better.
Eyeless
- ... Promise was that I
- Should Israel from Philistian yoke deliver;
- Ask for this great deliverer now, and find him
- Eyeless in Gaza at the Mill with slaves ...
Milton, Samson Agonistes
Irine lay in the hospital bed in Carcassonne, wondering what happened to her eye. Her right eye, the weaker one, where was it? She could feel the outlines of an enormous patch with a metal surface covering part of her cheek and the sense that her eye socket was not as it had been before she closed her eyes to sleep, lying in her bed in a house on the main avenue in Caunes.
When the man climbed on the bed, waking her, he delivered a violent punch to her face. She remembered that she felt her nose cave in, but even startled she was alert enough to start swinging her arms and butting with her head to try to throw the intruder off the bed. For a woman in her sixties, she was stronger and taller than average, but the man, who was fully masked and dressed in camouflage gear, was strongest. He punched her in the face again, this time hitting her directly in the right eye, at which time she lost consciousness.
She feared for her life, but more, that she would be sexually assaulted. So after a few seconds, when she regained something like consciousness, she lay still as if dead, hoping the man would ignore her and take whatever he wanted.
She heard some tromping around --the man was heavy enough that his boots reverberated on the tile floor-- then she heard a door close loudly. She thought it was the front door, but she did not dare move yet. After waiting, counting to one thousand, then two, then three, then four, then five thousand, she was satisfied that the intruder would not return, and allowed herself to try to open her eyes. Only her left eye was intact, but she could see the phone by the bedside. She pulled the receiver off its base and punched in "17" for the police, mumbling her address and the word attaqué before she fainted again.
Inspector Lascaux
Inspector Lascaux brushed the dry leaf from his shoulder and surveyed the the vineyards from the porch of his house at 12 avenue des Cathars. Even in the August heat, sitting on the porch of the house was all he could have asked for, whether he had a pastis in his hand or not.
After fifty years serving the forces of order in France --first in Algeria, then Cameroon, then the blissful years in Martinique-- he had returned, with Josianne, to the village he was born in, which had of late enjoyed some success in attracting buyers of the villager's houses from that odd country, le Royaume Uni. Mainly English, but some Scots and Irish, too, paid good money for quaint houses wedged in close together in the village. After they put down their money, many found that the tiny ruelles were more difficult to drive in and out of than they had imagined, and that angling their left-hand drive vehicles into crevices to park stripped paint off. But after a few glasses of the solid Minervois reds, it was all put into perspective. They could be sitting in a caf, looking at the rain coming down somewhere in the British Isles, or they could be here, helping the local economy and their states of mind. Once settled here, few Brits ever looked back.
He, too, scarcely ever looked back. His work had had very disagreeable aspects --not just the need for force, which was rare; but the aftermath of force unleashed by others against others, which Inspector Lascaux came upon, whether in a bedroom, on a street, in a shop, or in a car, as a mere witness to the detritus of human emotions of the most negative kind willfully given into. He was not sorry he had retired, he and Josianne. The fierce curiosity that had turned a young country recruit from the Midi into a cool professional had been a refining fire: the more he worked at his investigations, the more his faculties were engaged, and that engagement bred results, which pleased his superiors and led to promotion.
At some point, though, he began to sense that he had seen about everything that police work could capture within its net. The perpetrators appeared less sociological studies than instruments of a malevolent instinct that reappeared over and over again despite the efforts of social workers and defense attorneys to introduce mitigating factors into consideration of the responsibility of the accused. When he found himself filled with contempt for a ten-year old boy who had, fatally, set fire to the bed his grandmother slept in, he told himself his soul was at risk and he had better get out.
Here in the Minervois, writing reports concerning break-ins into the houses of part-time residents was the main preoccupation of the gendarmerie. The foreigners demanded them for insurance purposes, so they were produced by the officers called to the scene. Their main occupation was riding around the villages, checking to see that no one had inadvertently left a door or window open, a service for which the villagers were glad to pay taxes. For Inspector Lascaux, buying the home on avenue des Cathars was a return to a distant past, now more prettily remembered because both he and the village had prospered in each other's absence. He had no more to do with the gendarmerie than any other citizen, although the outlines of his career were known among them. They accorded him the respect of, if not a senior colleague, of one who had plied their trade beyond the perimeters of Metropolitan France, in places however legitimately of French concern, none of them would have willingly served.
The Epistemology of Père Philippe
Père Philippe sat on the floor of the sanctuary, his legs tucked under him, before the monstrance, adoring the Blessed Sacrament. His black robe, the grey heart and cross embroidered near his heart, normally hung slightly short over his lanky arms, but he had rolled the sleeves up, the better to sit in contemplation.
Since he had become a Passionist, particularly since he had become the hermit of the chapel in the Black Mountains, he had found his place. From the time of his childhood, death had been a familiar: it was not just that he was regularly in attendance at the bedsides of those who had died, whose earthly bodies lay in state, usually in the beds they had slept in in the villages they had lived. It was the village custom, so he and other children shared the same experience, although his mother was more pious than most, his father not so much, his brothers and sisters still less.
It was that he was incapable of distracting himself for long from the brutal fact that however one distracted oneself, in the end, whether the casket was ornate or just a pine box, the physical ceased to be. Watching others (which he did naturally, without judgment) he marveled at their ability to plunge into their studies, or games of soccer, or whatever activity seemed most pressing at the time.
He was not without a sense of humor, or incapable of affection. Even as he watched others, he delighted in their natures: some persons were cheerful, others choleric, a few melancholic, still others agitated, or indolent. Few he thought malicious; most deviated from their resolutions, whether to save more, or work harder, or settle down; but that which caused their natures to, at times, betray them into acts they later regretted, was not something in their own natures, but their susceptibility to false promises, whether in advertisements, on the radio or from salesmen of one sort or another.
In the end, most lives would be put right, he firmly believed that. For himself, though, he felt a call that was stronger than that of any advertisement, radio announcer or salesman. He wanted to be closer to the presence of that he had experienced in the quietest moments of his life, whether by the bedside of a man whose agony had ended in a sigh, then stillness; or the radiance of a bride and groom fully committed to each other on the day of their wedding;, or alone, walking in the mountains around the village, or reading the life of St. Paul of the Cross, the mystic.
His decision to join the Passionists was not taken lightly. The Passionists' mission is to teach the world how to pray. To teach how to pray, one must first know how. Yet prayer can mean many things: supplication, confession, glorification, are only three of the purposes of prayer. The prayer the Passionists teach is that prayer that would lead to union with God, a state beyond which there is no more to know.
Yet to reach that state beyond which there is no more to know is very, very hard. Père Philippe had been a Passionist for eighteen years and he had struggled at first to understand exactly what he was doing and why. Even among his fellows, he was unusually solitary. After ten years in various parishes in cities, he was assigned to this chapel, where he could work alone, an assignment he relished secretly because in an hermitage he could practice his devotions while remaining at the disposal of any villagers who chose to celebrate the Mass with him, rather than in the church in the village.
In this way, he devoted himself to saying Mass (everyday but Mondays), leading the prayers to Mary, the Blessed Mother; adoring the communion wafer and writing about the Holy Spirit. He had had some success with his writing: a religious publisher had printed two of his books, one about the Apocalypse, the other about Babel. His superiors at the seminary and the diocese's office were pleased.: someone so retiring, so ill-suited to running a parish, with its financial demands and intrigues, had managed to draw a following.
Those who prayed the Mass with Père Philippe would often say that they had never encountered a priest like him.
"He has the real faith--"
"When he preaches, he is full of feeling--"
"He speaks from his heart--"
"But his books are difficult to understand--"
He could be said to be a philosopher, a lover of wisdom. But his approach, which led to detachment about money concerns, encouraged prayer and simple charity towards others, could be summed up as not so much a way of thinking about the world, as a technique for managing in it.
That technique involved the development of a finely-tuned interior antenna from which God could transmit. Everything that interfered with the frequency at which God worked, only blocked the signal or caused it to come in at a weak frequency. Prayer, such as most were instructed in --the recitation of words of adoration during a weekly liturgy, -- could help, followed by the taking of communion, through which God freely gave of himself. Yet despite providing a base from which the faithful could take strength, there was more to be had, Père Philippe knew.
Not everyone was prepared --or needed-- to know God as Père Philippe knew HIm. When he said the Mass, he frequently did not look directly at his congregants, but upwards, beyond the stained glass of the little chapel in the Black Mountains, to God. The reason being that when he was saying the Mass he felt the most outward signs of God's presence, invisible but immanent, coming through the ancient stones.
During the Revolution of 1789 and the Terror that followed, the authorities tried to sell the chapel to have it demolished. A curé's brother managed to buy it, preserving the building until it was safe again to say the Catholic Mass in France. The chapel had been a dependency of the 8th century Benedictine abbey in the village and was now almost a thousand years old. Of course God was comfortable here, Père Philippe thought, which was why Mass was a daily conversation with the Lord, and not an empty ritual.
Père Philippe looked at his watch: there were five minutes to go before the start of Mass. He had been sitting on the floor of the chapel for almost thirty minutes, along with a handful of his parishioners. He got up from the floor and walked over to the monstrance. Lifting it from the altar, he raised it high over the heads of his parishioners, turning first to their right, then to the center, then their left. He set the monstrance back down on the altar table, opened the cut glass door in which the sacrament was kept and gently removed it, placing it on the paten, on which he carried it to the tabernacle, while his parishioners watched him walk to the side altar. At the altar, he removed a quantity of communion wafers and added them to the one on the paten. He returned to the altar table and left them there.
In one swift movement, he slipped through the side door that led to the sacristy. It was time to put on his celebrant's attire. Mass would begin once he returned in his vestments, the assembled standing in a gesture of respect. As he made the sign of the Cross, God would make himself known again, not as he had in the Blessed Sacrament, but through the person of Jesus Christ, who would then become the Blessed Sacrament, remitting sins and if only briefly, giving those present a glimpse of the possibility they might overcome the finitude of the body via the Spirit.
Père Philippe prayed quickly, before he began the liturgy, only to God, that he might be His worthy servant. Only an empty vessel could take the Spirit in, could send it out to others, Père Phlippe was happiest when he most emptied himself. It happened rarely, but sometimes he felt himself only an instrument. At those times he felt also the most wonderful release from anything that had been troubling him. After so many years as a priest, he had made so little progress. Yet he felt the call again, each time he entered the sanctuary, a new beginning. Then and there, at that moment, a new beginning: it called him on.
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