«I don’t think I’m a coward, not as a rule, anyhow. And I’ve had opportunities of putting it to the test. Only there are some thoughts I simply cannot endure.»
The doctor looked him in the eyes. «You’ll see her again,» he said.
«Maybe. But I just can’t stomach the thought that it may last on and on, and all the time she’ll be growing older. At thirty one’s beginning to age, and one’s got to squeeze all one can out of life. But I doubt if you can understand.»
Rieux was replying that he thought he could, when Tarrou came up, obviously much excited.
«I’ve just asked Paneloux to join us.» «Well?» asked the doctor.
«He thought it over, then said yes.»
«That’s good,» the doctor said. «I’m glad to know he’s better than his sermon.» «Most people are like that,» Tarrou replied. «It’s only a matter of giving them the
chance.» He smiled and winked at Rieux. «That’s my job in life, giving people chances.» «Excuse me,» Rambert said, «I’ve got to be off.»
On Thursday, the day of the appointment, Rambert entered the Cathedral porch at five minutes to eight. The air was still relatively cool. Small fleecy clouds, which presently the sun would swallow at a gulp, were drifting across the sky. A faint smell of moisture rose from the lawns, parched though they were. Still masked by the eastward houses, the sun was warming up Joan of Arc’s helmet only, and it made a solitary patch of brightness in the Cathedral square. A clock struck eight. Rambert took some steps in the empty porch. From inside came a low sound of intoning voices, together with stale wafts of incense and dank air.
Then the voices ceased. Ten small black forms came out of the building and hastened away toward the center of the town. Rambert grew impatient. Other black forms climbed the steps and entered the porch. He was about to light a cigarette when it struck him that smoking might be frowned on here.
At eight fifteen the organ began to play, very softly. Rambert entered. At first he could see nothing in the dim light of the aisle; after a moment he made out in the nave the small black forms that had preceded him. They were all grouped in a corner, in front of a makeshift altar on which stood a statue of St. Roch, carved in haste by one of our local sculptors. Kneeling, they looked even smaller than before, blobs of clotted darkness hardly more opaque than the gray, smoky haze in which they seemed to float. Above them the organ was playing endless variations.
When Rambert stepped out of the Cathedral, he saw Gonzales already going down the steps on his way back to the town.
«I thought you’d cleared off, old boy,» he said to the journalist. «Considering how late it is.»
He proceeded to explain that he’d gone to meet his friends at the place agreed on, which was quite near by, at ten to eight, the time they’d fixed, and waited twenty minutes without seeing them.
«Something must have held them up. There’s lots of snags, you know, in our line of business.»
He suggested another meeting at the same time on the following day, beside the war memorial. Rambert sighed and pushed his hat back on his head.
«Don’t take it so hard,» Gonzales laughed. «Why, think of all the swerves and runs and passes you got to make to score a goal.»
«Quite so,» Rambert agreed. «But the game lasts only an hour and a half.»
The war memorial at Oran stands at the one place where one has a glimpse of the sea, a sort of esplanade following for a short distance the brow of the cliff overlooking the harbor. Next day, being again the first to arrive at the meeting-place, Rambert whiled away the time reading the list of names of those who had died for their country. Some minutes later two men strolled up, gave him a casual glance, then, resting their elbows on the parapet of the esplanade, gazed down intently at the empty, lifeless harbor. Both wore short-sleeved jerseys and blue trousers, and were of much the same height. The journalist moved away and, seated on a stone bench, studied their appearance at leisure. They were obviously youngsters, not more than twenty. Just then he saw Gonzales coming up.
«Those are our friends,» he said, after apologizing for being late. Then he led Rambert to the two youths, whom he introduced as Marcel and Louis. They looked so much alike that Rambert had no doubt they were brothers.
«Right,» said Gonzales. «Now you know each other, you can get down to business.»
Marcel, or Louis, said that their turn of guard duty began in two days and lasted a week; they’d have to watch out for the night when there was the best chance of bringing it off. The trouble was that there were two other sentries, regular soldiers, besides themselves, at the west gate. These two men had better be kept out of the business; one couldn’t depend on them, and anyhow it would pile up expenses unnecessarily. Some evenings, however, these two sentries spent several hours in the back room of a near-by bar. Marcel, or Louis, said that the best thing Rambert could do would be to stay at their place, which was only a few minutes’ walk from the gate, and wait till one of them came to tell him the coast was clear. It should then be quite easy for him to «make his get-away.»
But there was no time to lose; there had been talk about setting up duplicate sentry posts a little farther out.
Rambert agreed and handed some of his few remaining cigarettes to the young men.
The one who had not yet spoken asked Gonzales if the question of expenses had been settled and whether an advance would be given.
«No,» Gonzales said, «and you needn’t bother about that; he’s a pal of mine. He’ll pay when he leaves.»
Another meeting was arranged. Gonzales suggested their dining together on the next day but one, at the Spanish restaurant. It was at easy walking-distance from where the young men lived. «For the first night,» he added, «I’ll keep you company, old boy.»
Next day on his way to his bedroom Rambert met Tarrou coming down the stairs at the hotel.
«Like to come with me?» he asked. «I’m just off to see Rieux.» Rambert hesitated.
«Well, I never feel sure I’m not disturbing him.»
«I don’t think you need worry about that; he’s talked about you quite a lot.»
The journalist pondered. Then, «Look here,» he said. «If you’ve any time to spare after dinner, never mind how late, why not come to the hotel, both of you, and have a drink with me?»
«That will depend on Rieux.» Tarrou sounded doubtful. «And on the plague,» said Tarrou.
At eleven o’clock that night, however, Rieux and Tarrou entered the small, narrow bar of the hotel. Some thirty people were crowded into it, all talking at the top of their voices. Coming from the silence of the plague-bound town, the two newcomers were startled by the sudden burst of noise, and halted in the doorway. They understood the reason for it when they saw that liquor was still to be had here. Rambert, who was perched on a stool at a corner of the bar, beckoned to them. With complete coolness he elbowed away a noisy customer beside him to make room for his friends.
«You’ve no objection to a spot of something strong?» «No,» Tarrou replied. «Quite the contrary.»
Rieux sniffed the pungency of bitter herbs in the drink that Rambert handed him. It was hard to make oneself heard in the din of voices, but Rambert seemed chiefly concerned with drinking. The doctor couldn’t make up his mind whether he was drunk yet. At one of the two tables that occupied all the remaining space beyond the half-circle round the bar, a naval officer, with a girl on each side of him, was describing to a fat, red-faced man a typhus epidemic at Cairo. «They had camps, you know,» he was saying, «for the natives, with tents for the sick ones and a ring of sentries all round. If a member of the family came along and tried to smuggle in one of those damn-fool native remedies, they fired at sight.
A bit tough, I grant you, but it was the only thing to do.» At the other table, round which sat a bevy of bright young people, the talk was incomprehensible, half drowned by the stridence of St. James Infirmary coming from a loud-speaker just above their heads.
«Any luck?» Rieux had to raise his voice.
«I’m getting on,» Rambert replied. «In the course of the week, perhaps.» «A pity!» Tarrou shouted.
«Why?»
«Oh,» Rieux put in, «Tarrou said that because he thinks you might be useful to us here. But, personally, I understand your wish to get away only too well.»
Tarrou stood the next round of drinks.
Rambert got off his stool and looked him in the eyes for the first time. «How could I be useful?»
«Why, of course,» Tarrou replied, slowly reaching toward his glass, «in one of our sanitary squads.»
The look of brooding obstinacy that Rambert so often had came back to his face, and he climbed again on to his stool.
«Don’t you think these squads of ours do any good?» asked Tarrou, who had just taken a sip of his glass and was gazing hard at Rambert.
