The Three Evangelists

XXI

GOODNESS KNOWS HOW JULIETTE MANAGED IT, BUT THE FOLLOWING day, Alexandra moved into the garden house. Marc and Mathias helped to carry her luggage. With the help of this distraction, Alexandra relaxed a bit. Marc, who was knowledgeable about that kind of thing and could easily spot the signs, had been watching the shadows of some secret sorrow reflected in her face. He was glad to see them fade, even if he knew that the respite might only be temporary. During the respite, Alexandra proposed that they say ‘tu’ to each other and that they call her Lex.

Lucien, rolling up his floor rug, to take it back upstairs, muttered that the line-up of forces on the battleground was getting more and more complex. The Western Front had tragically lost one of its major players, leaving only a doubtful husband behind, while the Eastern Front, already reinforced by Mathias in Le Tonneau, was now being augmented by a new ally, accompanied by a child. The new ally had originally been marked out to occupy the Western Front, had temporarily stopped in no-man’s-land and was now deserting it for the eastern trenches.

‘Has the Great War really turned your brain?’ Marc asked, ‘or are you carrying on like this because you’re sorry Alexandra is leaving?’

‘I’m not carrying on, as you put it,’ said Lucien. ‘I’m rolling up my rug and I’m commenting on the present state of affairs. Lex-she said to call her Lex-wanted to get out of here, and yet she’s staying very nearby. Very near her Uncle Pierre, very near the epicentre of the drama. What’s she after? Unless that is,’ he said, straightening up, with the rug under his arm, ‘the whole Operation Eastern Base was dreamed up by you.’

‘Why would I do that?’ said Marc, defensively.

‘To keep an eye on her or to keep her within reach, take your pick. Personally I’d opt for the second. Anyway, congratulations. It seems to have worked.’

‘Lucien, you are really getting on my nerves.’

‘Why? You want her, that’s perfectly obvious. Well, look out, you’re going to get hurt again. You’re forgetting that we’re still up shit creek, and when that’s the case, you might slip. You have to go slowly, step by step. Certainly not go haring ahead like a madman. Not that I disapprove of a poor guy in the trenches having a bit of a distraction. Not at all. But Lex is too pretty, she’s too touching, and she’s too intelligent to be written off as a mere distraction. You’re not just going to have a bit of fun, you’re running the risk of being in love. That way madness lies, Marc, madness.’

‘What do you mean madness, you no-brain soldier?’

‘Because, you no-brain worshipper of courtly love, you suspect, just as I do, that Lex and her little boy have been chucked out or abandoned. Or something like that. So like an idiot knight on a white horse, you imagine that there’s a vacant place in her affections and that you can move in. Big mistake, let me tell you.’

‘Look, idiot of the trenches, I know more about empty hearts than you do. And I can tell you that the emptiness takes up much more space than when it’s occupied.’

‘You show remarkable lucidity for someone who stays behind the front line,’ said Lucien. ‘You’re not entirely stupid, Marc.’

‘Does that surprise you?’

‘Not at all. I’ve done a bit of snooping.’

‘I’m not installing Alexandra in the garden house next door because I want to pounce on her. Even if she does attract me. And who wouldn’t be attracted?’

‘Mathias for one,’ said Lucien, raising his finger in the air. ‘Mathias is attracted by the beautiful and brave Juliette.’

‘And you?’

‘As I told you, I move slowly and I observe. That’s all. For the moment.’

‘I don’t believe you.’

‘Maybe you’re right. It’s true that I’m not totally without feelings, or the urge to help. For instance, I suggested to Alexandra that she could keep my rug for the cabin if she wanted to. Answer: she couldn’t care less.’

‘Naturally. She’s got other things to think about than your rug, even without problems of the heart. And if you really want to know why I’d rather she stays close to here, it’s because I don’t like the turn of mind of Inspecteur en chef Leguennec, nor of my godfather, if it comes to that. They go fishing together, those two. Lex has been called in again for more questioning, the day after tomorrow. So I think we should be around, just in case.’

‘Oh, you really are the knight in shining armour, Marc. Even if you don’t have a horse. And what if Leguennec’s not entirely wrong? Have you thought of that?’

‘Of course I have.’

‘And?’

‘And it bothers me. There are some things I’d like to have cleared up.’

‘And you think that’s going to happen?’

Marc shrugged. ‘Why not? I asked her to come over here once she’s settled in. With the rather ignoble thought at the back of my mind that I might ask her some questions myself about the things that bother me. What d’you think?’

‘That’s bold and possibly painful, but the offensive could be an interesting one. Can I sit in on it?’

‘On one condition: that you stuff a flower in your rifle and say nothing.’

‘If it sets your mind at rest,’ said Lucien.