Yasmina Khadra - What the day owes the nigth

‘Can you believe it? All that work I put in, for nothing. Like an idiot, I got my figures wrong. I’m the only one who lost out. The way they explained it, everyone stood to make a profit, but when the delivery showed up, I’m the one who has to pay the difference out of my own pocket. I can’t believe I let myself get conned . . .’

‘That’s business, Simon.’

Jean-Christophe was waiting for us a couple of blocks away. Dressed in his Sunday best, he was freshly shaven, hair plastered down with a thick layer of Brylcreem, holding a big bunch of flowers and looking as nervous as an actor in his first role.

‘I feel embarrassed now,’ said Simon. ‘What are me and Jonas going to look like, showing up empty-handed?’

‘They’re for Émilie,’ Jean-Christophe admitted.

‘Émilie’s coming?’ I said, disheartened.

‘Of course she’s coming,’ said Simon. ‘She and Fabrice hardly spend a minute apart. But what are you doing bringing her flowers, Chris? She’s somebody else’s girlfriend, and that somebody else happens to be Fabrice.’

‘All’s fair in love and war.’

Simon frowned, shocked by Jean-Christophe’s comment.

‘Are you serious?’

Jean-Christophe threw his head back and laughed.

‘Of course I’m not serious, it was a joke.’

‘Well it’s not remotely funny,’ said Simon, who was a stickler for points of principle.

Madame Scamaroni had set out a table on the veranda. She met us at the door. Fabrice and his beloved were lounging in a pair of wicker chairs under a small arbour in the garden. Émilie looked stunning. She was wearing a simple gipsy skirt, her hair hung loose down her back and her shoulders were bare. She looked good enough to eat. I immediately felt ashamed and put the thought out of my mind.

Jean-Christophe’s Adam’s apple was bobbing like a yoyo, and his tie had almost come undone. He offered the flowers he was carrying to Madame Scamaroni.

‘For you, madame.’

‘Oh, thank you, Chris, you’re an angel.’

‘We all chipped in,’ Simon said, feeling jealous.

‘You did not,’ Jean-Christophe shot back.

Everyone burst out laughing.

Fabrice set down the manuscript he had been reading to Émilie and came over to greet us. He put his arms around me and hugged me a little hard. Over his shoulder, I saw Émilie’s eyes seeking mine. I heard Madame Cazenave’s voice in my head. Émilie is just a child. She is fickle. She can fall for a boy because of his laugh, do you understand? And I do not want her to fall for you. A wave of shame, worse than the first, meant that I did not hear what Fabrice whispered in my ear.

All evening, while Simon told jokes and had everyone in stitches, in the face of Émilie’s insistent offensive, I beat a retreat. Not that she put her hand on my thigh this time; in fact she did she not even speak to me. She simply sat opposite me, and in doing so obscured the whole world.

She was gracious. She pretended to be interested in the laughter and joking, but it was forced, she was just laughing to be polite. I watched as she fidgeted, plucked at her skirt, nervous and anxious like a frightened schoolgirl waiting to be called to the blackboard. Sometimes, when the others were falling about laughing, she would look over to see if I was laughing too. I only half heard the jokes. Like Émilie, I was only laughing to be polite; like her, my thoughts were on other things. I didn’t like what was going on in my head; thoughts blossoming like poisonous flowers . . . I had promised . . . I had sworn. Strangely, though my scruples caught in my throat, they did not choke me – I took a certain perverse pleasure in allowing myself to be tempted. Why did my promises, my vows suddenly mean so little to me? Time and again I tried to concentrate on Simon’s antics, but it was hopeless; I quickly found myself staring at Émilie again. I was enveloped in unearthly silence, which muffled the sounds of the night, the chatter on the veranda. I was suspended in a void and Émilie’s eyes were my only beacon. I couldn’t go on like this. What I was doing was treachery, it was a betrayal and I felt tainted. I had to leave, I had to go home as soon as possible. I was terrified Fabrice would realise what was happening. That was a thought I could not bear, any more than I could bear to look at Émilie. Every time her eyes met mine, they took away another fragment of my being; like ancient battlements worn by time, I was crumbling.

While the others were distracted, I went into the living room and phoned Germaine. I asked her to call me back; ten minutes later she did so.

‘Who was that on the phone?’ Simon asked, seeing the look on my face as I came back out on to the veranda.

‘It was Germaine . . . my uncle isn’t well.’

‘Do you want me to drop you home?’ Fabrice asked.

‘No, it’s okay.’

‘Call me if it’s something serious.’

I nodded and left as quickly as I could.

Summer that year was sweltering, and the grape harvest was superb. The usual round of lavish balls was in full swing. Every morning we headed for the beach, and every night, by the light of hundreds of Chinese lanterns, there was a party. A dizzying succession of bands and orchestras played in the marquees and we danced until we could barely put one foot in front of the other. There were weddings and birthdays, civic celebrations and engagement parties. In Río Salado, a banquet could be something as simple as a makeshift barbecue, and we could conjure an imperial ballet from a twist of the gramophone.

Half-heartedly I went to the parties and stayed for as short a time as possible. I was always the last to arrive, and often left so quickly no one realised I had come. Everyone was always there, and our gang would invariably be on the dance floor. I could not bring myself to interrupt Émilie and Fabrice during a slow dance; they looked so perfect together – although it seemed increasingly obvious that the relationship was one-sided. The eyes can lie, but the gaze cannot, and the glow in Émilie’s was fading fast. Whenever I was around, she would look at me imploringly. It was pointless to turn away, since her distress signals reached me loud and clear. Why me? I racked the depths of my brain. Why does she look at me like this and never say anything? Émilie’s beauty was matched only by the heartache that she tried to hide behind her radiant smile. She never betrayed what she was feeling, willed herself to be happy with Fabrice, but she was not happy. At night, when they huddled together in the sand dunes and Fabrice talked to her about the night sky, she did not see the stars. Twice I had almost stumbled on them in the darkness, wrapped in each other’s arms on the beach, and though I could not see their faces, I knew that when Fabrice held her, Émilie was elsewhere.

And then there were Jean-Christophe’s bouquets. He had never bought so many flowers. Every day he stopped by the florist on the village square and then went to the Scamaronis’ house. Simon took a dim view of his gallantry, but Jean-Christophe did not seem to care; it was as though he had lost all sense of judgement, all notion of propriety. In time, Fabrice began to notice that his dates with Émilie were often interrupted as Jean-Christophe became more brazen, more intrusive. At first he thought there was nothing to it, but finding that he rarely had a moment alone with Émilie, he began to wonder. Jean-Christophe barely let them out of his sight; it was as though he was watching their every move.

Finally, the inevitable happened.

It was a Sunday afternoon and we were all at the beach in Terga. Holidaymakers skipped across the scorching sand like grasshoppers and dived into the cool water. Simon was having his usual afternoon nap, having just wolfed down a string of merguez sausages and drunk a whole bottle of wine. His fat hairy belly rose and fell like a blacksmith’s bellows. Fabrice, however, was wide awake. A book lay at his feet, but he was not reading; he was watching Jean-Christophe and Émilie as they laughed and splashed in the waves, timing each other to see who could hold their breath longest, then swimming out to sea until they almost disappeared. As he watched them turn somersaults in the water, legs thrust above the waves, a sad smile played on Fabrice’s lips and doubts shimmered in his dark eyes. When they emerged from the waves, Émilie and Jean-Christophe, in a gesture that seemed to surprise them both, grabbed each other around the waist, and Fabrice’s face darkened as he watched his dreams and plans slip through his fingers.