Read Online Scissors by Stephane Michaka - Free Book Online Page B

from work later and later.
    Robert wanted to be clear about what was going on. He decided to pay a visit to the Greek.
    The man lived a few minutes from their house. To give himself courage, Robert made a detour to his usual bar. Gus, the owner, received him with that mixture of embarrassment and cordiality barmen reserve for the heaviest drinkers.
    “I’m on the wagon,” Robert announced, taking a stool at the bar.
    Gus was adjusting the sound system, lowering the volume. He nodded.
    “I’m devoting myself completely to my garden.”
    “So what’ll it be?”
    For the space of an instant, Robert had the feeling he’d never replanted his garden and all that activity had existed solely in his imagination. He was a penniless writer who cheated on his wife and had shown up in this bar to drown his shame.
    “Bourbon,” he said, laying his hands on the bar.
    He was staring at his spread fingers, but out of the corner of his eye, he could see Gus’s hairy hands go into motion. A glass of liquor landed under his chin.
    He took a swig and put the glass down again. It was nearly empty. The other customers—a mustached man in asleeveless undershirt, a buxom redhead, and a puny old man Robert had never seen before—darted questioning looks at the barman. They took Robert for an eccentric or a wino.
    He waited until Gus’s eyes came back to his and then said, “I have a garden now. A garden and a family. I have no intention of leaving them to someone else.”
    “You’re right,” Gus said, putting up the bottle of bourbon.
    “Yeah!” the old man spluttered.
    “You gotta stand up for yourself, handsome,” the redheaded woman said.
    Robert thought he recognized her as a former actress who had always appeared in supporting roles. The two of them, the redhead and the old man, were drunk. Their half-closed eyes gleamed. Why were they laughing at something that wasn’t funny? He threw some coins on the bar and left.
    When he reached the Greek’s house, he checked the address. Yes, he’d come to the right place. On a copper placard, letters in the same style as those he’d seen on Nikos’s shop sign spelled out a single name: CHARMANCE .
    It was hot. The buzzing of insects grew louder and louder. Robert began to tremble. He was burning to see the guy come out of his house. Would he be able to refrain from hitting him?
    “ ‘Charmance,’ ” he muttered, as though it were a swearword. Robert hated neologisms, seeing in them only contempt for good usage. And he added that word to the list of his grievances against the Greek.
    The house was either old or fixed up to seem so and decorated with rustic accessories. A few little granitefountains, some wooden barrels painted with green varnish, and several black-lacquered buckets were set out on the terrace. A horseshoe adorned the front door. The shutters were open, but the house seemed empty. Robert’s gaze fell on a cart with no wheels but fitted with a handle and paddles, most probably an old machine for beating laundry. The Greek was using it as a flower planter. Robert recognized the columbine that Emma had introduced into the garden.
    A walkway ran along the right side of the house. He clenched his fists and started down the walkway.
    He could already imagine the blood reddening the gravel and the Greek’s body dragged under the plow that stood next to the path.
    Behind the house Robert found the garden. He stared at it openmouthed. The Greek’s garden was three times the size of his.
    The profusion of petals and stems, the alternation of greens and blues, violets and yellows, formed figures like those of an agile skater. Here and there, broad, flat areas of lawn reposed the eye. A water-lily basin made a crystalline, murmuring sound. Behind some brightly spotted orchids, Robert spotted a ginkgo tree, the kind he dreamed of possessing. It exhaled a pollen that combined each flower, each stamen, each pistil. And for the first time, Robert felt the inner peace, the