Read Online Out of the Dark by Patrick Modiano - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Patrick Modiano
Tags: Fiction
Ads: Link
at the table in the back of the café and laid the suitcase down flat on the bench. No one sitting at the tables. Only one customer was standing at the bar. On the wall above the cigarettes, the hands of the clock pointed to ten thirty. Next to me, the pinball machine was quiet for the first time. Now I was sure she would come and meet me.
She came in, but she didn't look around for me right away. She went to buy some cigarettes at the counter. She sat down. She spotted the suitcase, then put her elbows on the table and let out a long sigh.
'I managed to get rid of him,' she told me.
They were having dinner in a restaurant near the Place Pereire, she, Cartaud, and another couple. She wanted to get away at the end of the meal, but from the terrace of the restaurant they might have been able to see her walking toward the taxi stand or the métro entrance.
They had left the restaurant, and she had no choice but to get into a car with them. They'd taken her to a nearby bar, in a hotel called Les Marronniers, for one last drink. And in Les Marronniers she had given them the slip. Once she was free, she'd called me from a café on the Boulevard de Courcelles.
She lit a cigarette and began to cough. She lay her hand on mine just as I'd seen her do with Van Bever in the café on the Rue Cujas. And she kept coughing, that terrible cough she had.
I took her cigarette and put it out in the ashtray. She said: 'We both have to leave Paris … Is that all right with you?' Of course it was all right.
'Where would you like to go?' I asked.
'Anywhere.'
The Gare de Lyon was quite close. We only had to walk down the quai to the Jardin des Plantes and cross the Seine. We'd both touched bottom, and now the time had come to give the mud a kick that would bring us to the surface again. Back at Les Marronniers, Cartaud was probably becoming concerned about Jacqueline's absence. Van Bever might still be in Dieppe or Forges.
'What about Gérard? Aren't we going to wait for him?' I asked her.
She shook her head and her features began to crumple up. She was about to dissolve into tears. I realized that the reason she wanted to go away with me was so that she could put an end to an episode of her life. And me too: I was leaving behind me all the gray, uncertain years I had lived up to then.
I wanted to tell her again: 'Maybe we should wait for Gérard.' I said nothing. A silhouette in a herringbone overcoat would remain frozen forever in the winter of that year. A few words would come back to me: the neutral five. And also a brown-haired man in a gray suit, with whom I'd had only the most fleeting encounter, and never learned whether he was a dentist or not. And the faces, dimmer and dimmer, of my parents.
I reached into my raincoat pocket for the key to the apartment on the Boulevard Haussmann that she had given me, and I set it on the table.
'What shall we do with this?'
'We'll keep it as a souvenir.'
No one was left at the bar. I could hear the fluorescent lights crackling in the silence around us. The light they put out contrasted with the black of the terrace windows. It was too bright, like a promise of springs and summers to come.
'We should go south …'
It gave me pleasure to say the word south . That night, in that deserted café, under the fluorescent lights, life did not yet have any weight at all, and it was so easy to run … Past midnight. The manager came to our table to tell us that the Café Dante was closing.
IN THE SUITCASE we found two thin bundles of banknotes, a pair of gloves, books on dental surgery, and a stapler. Jacqueline seemed disappointed to see how thin the bundles were.
We decided to pass through London before heading south to Majorca. We left the suitcase at the checkroom in the Gare du Nord.
We had to wait more than an hour in the buffet for our train. I bought an envelope and a stamp, and I mailed the claim stub to Cartaud at 160 Boulevard Haussmann. I added a note promising to repay the money in
She came in, but she didn't look around for me right away. She went to buy some cigarettes at the counter. She sat down. She spotted the suitcase, then put her elbows on the table and let out a long sigh.
'I managed to get rid of him,' she told me.
They were having dinner in a restaurant near the Place Pereire, she, Cartaud, and another couple. She wanted to get away at the end of the meal, but from the terrace of the restaurant they might have been able to see her walking toward the taxi stand or the métro entrance.
They had left the restaurant, and she had no choice but to get into a car with them. They'd taken her to a nearby bar, in a hotel called Les Marronniers, for one last drink. And in Les Marronniers she had given them the slip. Once she was free, she'd called me from a café on the Boulevard de Courcelles.
She lit a cigarette and began to cough. She lay her hand on mine just as I'd seen her do with Van Bever in the café on the Rue Cujas. And she kept coughing, that terrible cough she had.
I took her cigarette and put it out in the ashtray. She said: 'We both have to leave Paris … Is that all right with you?' Of course it was all right.
'Where would you like to go?' I asked.
'Anywhere.'
The Gare de Lyon was quite close. We only had to walk down the quai to the Jardin des Plantes and cross the Seine. We'd both touched bottom, and now the time had come to give the mud a kick that would bring us to the surface again. Back at Les Marronniers, Cartaud was probably becoming concerned about Jacqueline's absence. Van Bever might still be in Dieppe or Forges.
'What about Gérard? Aren't we going to wait for him?' I asked her.
She shook her head and her features began to crumple up. She was about to dissolve into tears. I realized that the reason she wanted to go away with me was so that she could put an end to an episode of her life. And me too: I was leaving behind me all the gray, uncertain years I had lived up to then.
I wanted to tell her again: 'Maybe we should wait for Gérard.' I said nothing. A silhouette in a herringbone overcoat would remain frozen forever in the winter of that year. A few words would come back to me: the neutral five. And also a brown-haired man in a gray suit, with whom I'd had only the most fleeting encounter, and never learned whether he was a dentist or not. And the faces, dimmer and dimmer, of my parents.
I reached into my raincoat pocket for the key to the apartment on the Boulevard Haussmann that she had given me, and I set it on the table.
'What shall we do with this?'
'We'll keep it as a souvenir.'
No one was left at the bar. I could hear the fluorescent lights crackling in the silence around us. The light they put out contrasted with the black of the terrace windows. It was too bright, like a promise of springs and summers to come.
'We should go south …'
It gave me pleasure to say the word south . That night, in that deserted café, under the fluorescent lights, life did not yet have any weight at all, and it was so easy to run … Past midnight. The manager came to our table to tell us that the Café Dante was closing.
IN THE SUITCASE we found two thin bundles of banknotes, a pair of gloves, books on dental surgery, and a stapler. Jacqueline seemed disappointed to see how thin the bundles were.
We decided to pass through London before heading south to Majorca. We left the suitcase at the checkroom in the Gare du Nord.
We had to wait more than an hour in the buffet for our train. I bought an envelope and a stamp, and I mailed the claim stub to Cartaud at 160 Boulevard Haussmann. I added a note promising to repay the money in
Similar Books
