On Sundays, Mersault played pool with Perez. The old fish-erman, one arm a stump cut off above the elbow, played pool in a peculiar fashion, puffing out his chest and leaning his stump on the cue. When they went out fishing in the morning, Perez rowed with the same skill, and Mersault admired the way he would stand in the boat, pushing one oar with his chest, the other with his good hand. The two men got along well.
After the morning’s fishing, Perez cooked cuttlefish in a hot sauce, stewing them in their own ink, and soaking up the black juice left in the pan with pieces of bread. As they sat in the fish-erman’s kitchen over the sooty stove, Perez never spoke, and Mersault was grateful to him for this gift of silence. Sometimes, after his morning swim, he would see the old man putting his boat in the sea, and he would join him. ‘Shall I come with you, Perez?’
‘Get in.’
They put the oars in the rowlocks and rowed together, Mersault being careful not to catch his feet in the trawling-hooks. Then they would fish, and Mersault would watch the lines, gleaming to the water’s surface, black and wavering underneath. The sun broke into a thousand fragments on the sea, and Mersault breathed the heavy stifling smell that rose from it like fumes.
Sometimes Perez pulled in a little fish he would throw back, saying ‘Go home to your mother.’ At eleven they rowed home and Mersault, his hands glistening with scales and his face swollen with sun, waited in his cool dark house while Perez prepared a pan of fish they would eat together in the evening. Day after day, Mersault let himself sink into his life as if he were sliding into water.
And just as the swimmer ad-vances by the complicity of his arms and the water which bears him up, helps him on, it was enough to make a few essential gestures — to rest one hand on a tree trunk, to take a run on the beach — in order to keep himself intact and conscious. Thus he became one with a life in its pure state, he rediscovered a paradise given only to animals of the least or the greatest in-telligence. At the point where the mind denies the mind, he touched his truth and with it his extreme glory, his extreme love.
Thanks to Bernard, he also mingled with the life of the vil-lage. He had been obliged to send for Bernard to treat some minor indisposition, and since then they had seen each other repeatedly, with pleasure. Bernard was a silent man, but he had a kind of bitter wit that cast a gleam in his horn-rimmed spec-tacles. He had practised medicine for a long time in Indochina, and at forty had retired to this corner of Algeria, where for several years he had led a tranquil life with his wife, an almost mute Indochinese who wore western suits and arranged her hair in a bun. Bernard’s capacity for indulgence enabled him to adapt himself to any milieu.
He liked the whole village, and was liked in return. He took Mersault on his rounds. Mersault already knew the owner of the café, a former tenor who would sing behind his bar and between two bleats of Tosca threaten his wife with a beating. Patrice was asked to serve with Bernard on the holiday committee, and on 14th July they walked through the streets in tricolour armbands or argued with the other committee-members sitting around a zinc ta-ble sticky with aperitifs as to whether the bandstand should be decorated with ferns or palms.
There was even an attempt to lure him into an electoral contest, but Mersault had had time to know the mayor, who had ‘presided over the destiny of his commune’ (as he said) for the last decade, and this semi-permanent position inclined him to regard himself as Napoleon Bonaparte. A wealthy grape-grower, he had had a Greek-style house built for himself, and proudly showed it to Mersault. It consisted of a ground floor and second floor around a court-yard, but the mayor had spared no expense and installed a lift, which he insisted that Mersault and Bernard ride in.
And Bernard commented placidly: ‘Very smooth.’ The visit had in-spired Mersault with a profound admiration for the mayor, and he and Bernard wielded all their influence to keep him in the office he deserved on so many counts.
In springtime, the little village with its close-set red roofs between the mountains and the sea overflowed with flowers — roses, hyacinths, bougainvilleas — and hummed with insects. In the afternoons, Mersault would walk out on to his terrace and watch the village dozing under the torrent of light.
Local history consisted of a contest between Morales and Bingues, two rich Spanish landowners whom a series of speculations had transformed into millionaires, in the grip of a terrible ri-valry. When one bought a car, he chose the most expensive make; but the other, who would buy the same make, would add silver door-handles. Morales was a genius at such tactics. He was known in the village as the King of Spain, for on each occa-sion he triumphed over Bingues, who lacked imagination.
During the war, when Bingues subscribed several hundred thou-sand francs for a national bond drive, Morales had declared:
‘I’ll do better than that, I’ll give you my son.’ And he had made his son, who was too young to be mobilized, volunteer. In 1925, Bingues had driven out from Algiers in a magnificent racing Bugatti; two weeks later, Morales had built himself a hangar, and bought a plane. The plane was still sleeping in its hangar, and was shown to visitors on Sundays. Bingues called Morales ‘that barefoot beggar’, and Morales referred to Bingues as ‘that lime-kiln’.
Bernard took Mersault to visit Morales, who welcomed them warmly to his huge farm, humming with wasps and fragrant with grapes. Wearing espadrilles and shirtsleeves because he could not endure a jacket and shoes, Morales showed them the aeroplane, the son’s medal framed in the living-room, and ex-plained the necessity of keeping foreigners out of Algeria (he was naturalized, ‘but that Bingues, for instance …’), then led them to inspect his latest acquisition.
They walked through an enormous vineyard in the middle of which was cleared space where a kind of Louis XV salon had been set up, each piece made of the most precious woods and fabrics. Thus Morales could receive visitors to his grounds. When Mersault courte-ously asked what happened when it rained, Morales shifted his cigar and, without even blinking, answered: ‘I replace it.’ On his way home, Mersault spent the time arguing with Bernard over the difference between the nouveau-riche and the poet. Morales, according to Bernard, was a poet. Mersault declared he would have made a splendid Roman emperor during the decline.
Some time later, Lucienne came to the Chenoua for a few days, then left. One Sunday morning, Claire, Rose and Cather-ine paid Mersault a visit, as they had promised. But Patrice was already very far from the state of mind which had driven him to Algiers during the first days of his retreat. He was glad to see them again, even so, and brought Bernard to meet them at the stop where the big yellow bus dropped them off.
It was a magnificent day, the village full of the fine red carts of itinerant butchers, flowers everywhere, and the villagers dressed in bright colours. At Catherine’s request they took a table at the café, and the girls marvelled at all this brilliant life, divining the sea’s presence behind the wall they leaned against. As they were leaving, an astonishing burst of music exploded in a nearby street: The Toreador Song from Carmen, but performed with an exuberance which prevented the instru-ments from keeping in tune or time. ‘The gymnastic society,’ Bernard explained. Then some twenty strange musicians ap-peared, each puffing on a different kind of wind instrument.
They marched towards the café, and behind them, his hat worn over a handkerchief on the back of his head, cooling himself with a cheap fan, appeared Morales. He had hired these musicians in the city because, as he explained, ‘with this depression, life around here is too sad’. He sat down at a table and grouped the musicians around him. Then Morales stood up and announced with tremendous dignity, making a sweeping movement towards the audience: ‘At my request, the orchestra will play “Toreador’ again.’
As they left, the girls were choking with laughter, but once they reached Mersault’s house and the cool shade of the rooms which emphasized the dazzling whiteness of the sun-drenched garden walls, they discovered a silent harmony which Cather-ine expressed by the desire to take a sunbath on the terrace. Mersault walked Bernard home. This was the second time the doctor had glimpsed something of Patrice’s life; they had never confided in each other, Mersault conscious that Bernard was not a happy man, and Bernard rather baffled by Mersault’s way of life. They parted without a word. Mersault and the girls de-cided to make an excursion the following day, starting very early.
The Chenoua was high and difficult to climb — ahead of them lay a splendid day of sunlight and fatigue.
At dawn they climbed the first steep slope. Rose and
