Michel Déon - The Foundling Boy

As he was contemplating one of the friezes, a bald man in his fifties, with red lips and dressed in the black suit and white collar of a clergyman, approached him.

‘Are you French?’

‘Yes,’ Jean said, surprised to be so easily identified.

‘I thought as much from the way you look.’

‘The way I look?’

‘Something which is unmistakable and common to every French person. I’ve lived in your country. Are you interested in Greek sculpture?’

‘Er … yes, sir.

‘Do you like Greek history?’

‘It’s very interesting.’

‘It’s much better than that!’ the minister said, raising his finger. ‘It’s the only history that matters.’

He spoke so close to Jean’s face that Jean felt gusts of cold tobacco buffet him. The minister looked into his eyes with chilling insistence.

‘Greek beauty!’ he said again. ‘Impossible to imitate. It has disappeared for ever, corrupted by foreigners. Look at that young athlete, his slender neck and his torso, in which you can follow the play of muscles beneath the skin and even the ripple of the veins in their exertion …’

The man’s hand grasped Jean’s arm and squeezed it with unexpected force, as if to prevent him from running away.

‘And yet … and yet!’ he went on. ‘Yet one does find sometimes, like a gift from heaven, yes, I really mean a gift from heaven, without blaspheming, the trace of Greek beauty in isolated individuals. Its seed has mysteriously come down the centuries, and beauty is reborn, unaccountably, in almost all its purity … You don’t have any Greek ancestors, do you?’

‘No,’ Jean said, trying to disengage himself and distance his face from the other’s with its blue, staring gaze that was making him nervous.

‘I thought so. Well now, come and have a look at this extraordinary coincidence: a young athlete who is twenty-five centuries old and looks like your brother.’

The minister dragged him to the end of the room. A twisting staircase led to a dark room where spotlights illuminated a series of metopes in a line, the metopes of the temple of Bassae.

‘Look! Look!’

Jean saw nothing but some high reliefs of definite grace, but whose faces all looked the same and who, he felt, bore no resemblance to him whatsoever. On the other hand, he definitely felt the minister’s arm slip around his waist and pull him close; and when the tobacco-breath mouth tried to press itself against his own he gagged, wrenched himself away and stood ready to defend himself.

‘You horrible pig! Dirty old man!’

‘Be quiet! Be quiet!’ the minister hissed, his cheeks puce.

A couple appeared in the doorway, and Jean dashed away, hurtled down the stairs and ran as far as the museum’s exit, his cheeks burning. He must be as red in the face as the minister. Nothing like that had ever happened to him before. He did not actually know what it meant, only having heard about such things in crude conversations between those of his classmates who were always thirsty for smut, but just from the gagging sensation he had had, he was certain he had escaped from something horrible. He should have … oh yes, what shouldn’t he have done! Smashed his fist into the nose of the dirty old swine, called an attendant, got the old lecher arrested. He became ashamed that he had run away. Wasn’t it the churchman who should have run away? If only Salah had been there! But Salah was having his French lesson and would not be back for half an hour. Visitors were coming and going, staring at the tall boy with red cheeks and dishevelled hair. Jean thought that people must be able to read on his face, as clear as day, what had just happened. He had seen the direction the Hispano-Suiza had taken after it left him, and he started walking that way. Odeon Street was difficult to find in the labyrinth of narrow streets lined with pubs, nightclubs and restaurants. By a stroke of luck, and what he considered to be an unheard-of thing, a youngish woman, albeit rather heavily made up, smiled at him. He stopped and asked, ‘Odeon Street, please.’

Expecting not to understand a word of her reply, he was startled to hear her say, with a pretty Toulouse accent, ‘Young man, are you sure you’re old enough to be hanging around here?’

‘You’re French! Oh what luck. I’m thirteen.’

‘Well, at the age of thirteen you don’t hang around in Odeon Street. Do me a favour and go home to maman.’

‘I’m looking for the chauffeur.’

‘What chauffeur?’

‘You haven’t seen a big yellow Hispano-Suiza, have you?’

‘Salah’s Hispano?’

‘Do you know it?’

‘Do I know it … a bit.’

‘It’s time for his French lesson.’

The painted lady raised her black-pencilled eyebrows.

‘Oh … ah, I see, Monsieur. Well, take the second street on the left and you’ll see his Hispano. Good luck, young man …’

‘Thank you, Madame!’

He quickened his step and almost immediately he came upon the car parked outside a fairly run-down house. On the half-open door he saw three printed cards:

Miss Selma Undset

Swedish massages

Massages suédois

Massagii suedese

1st floor, 1er étage, 1 0piano.

Beneath in gothic letters:

Fräulein Loretta Heindrich

Elocution lessons. Oral only.

2nd floor.

The third card must be the one:

Madame Germaine

French teacher

very strict

3rd floor, 3e étage.

The building was wretched. A spiral staircase climbed upwards between walls corroded by saltpetre, but instead of the habitual smell of sprouts that oozes from this sort of building there was a stomach-turning mixture of face powder and disinfectant. On the third floor he stopped outside Madame Germaine’s door. A cord of multicoloured hemp cloth hung above the notice that announced the same words as on the ground floor, this time underlined: ‘ very strict’ . Poor Salah! Who was this person he trusted to teach him perfect French? Jean listened for the sound of raised voices. All he could hear was murmurs of encouragement, and he pulled on the cord. There were whispers, the sound of steps, then a small panel he had not noticed slid open beneath the printed card and a woman’s voice with a southern accent said, ‘It’s not time yet, love.’

‘Yes I know, but I need to speak to Salah.’

‘Who are you?’

‘Jean. Jean Arnaud.’

From the other side of the door he heard Salah’s voice.

‘Open it, let him in, it’s a friend.’

A chain rattled and the key turned twice. Why did they need to lock themselves in for a French lesson? It was true that the district seemed pretty shady, and there were all sorts and races in the streets and a lot of over-made-up ladies. Eventually the door inched ajar and a woman appeared in the half-open doorway, her black hair loose, her face coated in cream, her lips mauve. She seemed to be wearing a dressing gown or long dress of gold polka dots. Jean couldn’t see all of her, and Salah had already moved her aside to step onto the landing.

‘What’s going on? It was agreed that I would come and pick you up at the British Museum.’

Jean recounted his ordeal at the metopes of Bassae. Salah looked dismayed.

‘I shouldn’t have left you on your own, even for such a short time. It’s my fault.’

‘No it isn’t, it really isn’t. How could you have known?’

‘I should know everything. Would you like me to find him and smash his face in?’

‘Oh no, not a scene, that’s the last thing I want! I want to go back. I’ll ride my bike and you can go in front to show me the way. Have you finished your French lesson?’

‘That’s not at all important. Let’s go.’

The door was still half open. Jean glanced behind Salah. Madame Germaine was brushing her hair in front of a mirror, and all around the mirror hung whips and chains. Their eyes met, the woman’s reflected in the mirror, sultry and velvety and at the same time loaded with menace, to such an extent that Jean felt a shiver in his spine, for no more than a second, because Salah immediately shut the door behind him after calling ‘till the next time’ to Madame Germaine. As they went past the second floor, they passed a man who pulled his hat over his eyes and covered his mouth with a handkerchief. He was on his way to an elocution lesson with Fräulein Loretta. Despite its mysterious ways, its grimy appearance and its smell, the house was a serious place of work. The masseuse on the first floor was the only element that was out of place in this artistic and intellectual atmosphere. On the way down they heard a guttural voice, chanting in time with the sound of slapping: one, two, three … one, two, three … without pity for the raucous, panting breath of its patient. Salah led Jean quickly outside.