Read Online Solea by Jean-Claude Izzo, Howard Curtis - Free Book Online

home. Then he tried to contact his daughter at her office. But she’d left. At the same time as usual. So he called here. He thought that with it being as hot as it was, Sonia might have come home first to take a shower and . . . But there was no answer. That’s when he started to get worried, and phoned her neighbor. Sonia and this neighbor often did favors for each other. When she came to the door, she found it half open. She was the one who called us.”
    The apartment filled with noise, voices.
    Béraud stood up. “Hello, captain,” he said.
    I looked up. A tall young woman was standing there in front of me. In jeans and T-shirt, both black. An attractive woman. I extricated myself as best I could from the armchair I was sitting in.
    â€œIs this the witness?” she asked.
    â€œHe used to be a cop. Fabio Montale.”
    She held out her hand. “Captain Pessayre.”
    She had a firm handshake. Her hand felt warm. Sharp black eyes, full of life and passion. For a fraction of a second, we stood looking at each other. Long enough to believe that the law could abolish death. And crime.
    â€œTell me all about it.”
    â€œI’m tired,” I said, sitting down again. “Tired.”
    And my eyes filled with tears. At last.
    Tears are the only cure for hate.

5.

I N WHICH EVEN SOMETHING POINTLESS
CAN BE GOOD TO SAY, AND GOOD TO HEAR
    I hadn’t spat at the stars. I couldn’t.
    Off the Riou Islands, I’d cut the motor and let the boat drift. It was here, more or less, that my father had held me under the armpits and dipped me in the sea for the first time. I was eight. The same age as Enzo. “Don’t be afraid,” he’d said. “Don’t be afraid.” It was the only baptism I’d ever had. And whenever life became too painful, this was where I came, here, between the sea and the sky. As if it was only here that I might be able to make peace with the world.
    I’d come here when Lole left, too. I’d come to this spot and stayed here the whole night. One whole night running through all the things I blamed myself for. It had needed to be said. At least once. Even if it was just to the empty sky. It was December 16th. The cold chilled me to the bone. Even though I kept knocking back Lagavulin as I wept. Getting back home at dawn, I’d felt as if I was returning to the land of the dead.
    I was alone now. In the silence. Wrapped in garlands of stars. Stars up above me in the blue-black sky, and below me, reflected on the surface of the sea. The only movement was the lapping of the water against my boat.
    I stayed there for a long time, motionless, with my eyes closed. Until I felt the lump inside me, that mixture of disgust and sadness, start to dissolve. The cool air restored a human rhythm to my breathing. Liberating it from the anguish of living and dying.
    Sonia.
    â€œShe’s dead,” I’d told them. “Murdered.”
    Fonfon and Honorine had been playing rummy on the terrace. Honorine’s favourite card game. She always won, because she liked winning. Fonfon always let her win, because he liked to see her joy when she won. Fonfon had a
pastis
in front of him, Honorine what was left of her Martini. They’d looked up at me. Surprised to see me back so early. Worried, of course. And all I’d said was, “She’s dead. Murdered.”
    I’d looked at them, then, a blanket and my jacket under my arm, and a bottle of Lagavulin in the other hand, I’d crossed the terrace, gone down the steps to the boat and set off into the darkness. Telling myself, as I always did, that this sea, which my father had offered me as a kingdom, would never belong to me, because I always used it to offload all the dirty tricks the world had played on me.
    When I opened my eyes and saw the stars glimmering, I knew, once again, that this wasn’t true. It was as if the world had stopped moving. Life was suspended. Except in