crap about omertà and sealed lips. On the other hand, if you get out of it, I’ll get a list of rats long enough to keep me going for the rest of my life and it’ll pay for my retirement. It’s what Washington wants. Your survival is worth a lot to us, and you’re much more useful to me living than dead.”
“If that’s the only solution, then I want to go to Italy.”
“Out of the question.”
“It would give some sense to us being in exile, otherwise there’s none. Let me get to know the land of my fathers, I’ve never been there. I promised Livia the day we got married that we’d go there some day. Her grandparents were from Caserta, mine from Ginostra. They say it’s the most beautiful place in the world.”
“Sicily? Great idea! You might just as well walk around Little Italy with a placard saying HAVING FUN IN JAIL, DON MIMINO?”
“Let me see Italy before I die.”
“If I land you in Sicily, you’ll be made into spezzatini in less than ten minutes. Think of your family.”
“…”
“Talk to Maggie, we’ve still got a little time.”
“I know what she’ll say. It’ll be Paris, Paris, Paris – all women dream about it.”
“To be quite honest, I’ve spoken to my bosses, and Paris is one possibility. Also Oslo, Brussels, Cadiz, with a slight preference for Brussels – don’t ask.”
A few weeks later the Blakes were installed in a quiet building in the second arrondissement in Paris. Once past the first few months of adaptation – new life, new country, new language – they got into an everyday routine which, without really satisfying them, helped them get over the trauma of the move. That was before Fred began single-handedly undermining the protection programme.
Both arms in plaster, suspended by straps to the bed-head, Didier Fourcade, the most sought-after plumber in Cholong, watched his wife sleeping, not daring to wake her. The pain had subsided thanks to powerful analgesics.
He relived that morning in his mind – how, suffering the pains of hell, he had pushed open the double doors of the Morseuil clinic with his shoulder. He had presented himself at the admissions desk, with his arms in the air, like a flightless bird, torn between pain, shame and terror.
“I’ve broken my arms.”
“Both of them?”
“It hurts, for God’s sake!”
An hour later, in plaster up to the elbows, he had had to face questions from an intern who walked around him without taking his eyes off the X-rays of his arms.
“Fell down the stairs?…”
“I fell two floors on a building site.”
“It’s odd, you can see points of impact, as though you had been hit… Like hammer blows on the wrists and the arms. Look, there.”
Didier Fourcade turned away to avoid another wave of nausea. He was still haunted by the sound of his own screams as that psychopath had hammered at his wrists. He was taken home in an ambulance, the straps were fixed up and he was put to bed, all under the amazed stare of his wife, Martine.
They had got married twenty years earlier, surprised at wanting to commit to each other only three months after meeting, but unable to prevent themselves. However, as though to counterbalance the euphoria of the first years, the boredom of daily life had caught up with them sooner than with most couples. Both had begun to daydream, imagining a third party entering the equation, imagining a secret life, and in the end living one for real. As long as their relationship was not poisoned by bitterness and reproaches, they had remained together, nostalgic for their lost happiness, and always ready to believe that some small incident might bring it all back. Once their physical passion had died down, they had become prudish with one another: she would lock the bathroom door, turn her back to him when doing up her bra and draw away when she touched his skin by mistake. And for the last few years both had begun to wonder whether any couple could survive this physical distance.
Now
“If that’s the only solution, then I want to go to Italy.”
“Out of the question.”
“It would give some sense to us being in exile, otherwise there’s none. Let me get to know the land of my fathers, I’ve never been there. I promised Livia the day we got married that we’d go there some day. Her grandparents were from Caserta, mine from Ginostra. They say it’s the most beautiful place in the world.”
“Sicily? Great idea! You might just as well walk around Little Italy with a placard saying HAVING FUN IN JAIL, DON MIMINO?”
“Let me see Italy before I die.”
“If I land you in Sicily, you’ll be made into spezzatini in less than ten minutes. Think of your family.”
“…”
“Talk to Maggie, we’ve still got a little time.”
“I know what she’ll say. It’ll be Paris, Paris, Paris – all women dream about it.”
“To be quite honest, I’ve spoken to my bosses, and Paris is one possibility. Also Oslo, Brussels, Cadiz, with a slight preference for Brussels – don’t ask.”
A few weeks later the Blakes were installed in a quiet building in the second arrondissement in Paris. Once past the first few months of adaptation – new life, new country, new language – they got into an everyday routine which, without really satisfying them, helped them get over the trauma of the move. That was before Fred began single-handedly undermining the protection programme.
Both arms in plaster, suspended by straps to the bed-head, Didier Fourcade, the most sought-after plumber in Cholong, watched his wife sleeping, not daring to wake her. The pain had subsided thanks to powerful analgesics.
He relived that morning in his mind – how, suffering the pains of hell, he had pushed open the double doors of the Morseuil clinic with his shoulder. He had presented himself at the admissions desk, with his arms in the air, like a flightless bird, torn between pain, shame and terror.
“I’ve broken my arms.”
“Both of them?”
“It hurts, for God’s sake!”
An hour later, in plaster up to the elbows, he had had to face questions from an intern who walked around him without taking his eyes off the X-rays of his arms.
“Fell down the stairs?…”
“I fell two floors on a building site.”
“It’s odd, you can see points of impact, as though you had been hit… Like hammer blows on the wrists and the arms. Look, there.”
Didier Fourcade turned away to avoid another wave of nausea. He was still haunted by the sound of his own screams as that psychopath had hammered at his wrists. He was taken home in an ambulance, the straps were fixed up and he was put to bed, all under the amazed stare of his wife, Martine.
They had got married twenty years earlier, surprised at wanting to commit to each other only three months after meeting, but unable to prevent themselves. However, as though to counterbalance the euphoria of the first years, the boredom of daily life had caught up with them sooner than with most couples. Both had begun to daydream, imagining a third party entering the equation, imagining a secret life, and in the end living one for real. As long as their relationship was not poisoned by bitterness and reproaches, they had remained together, nostalgic for their lost happiness, and always ready to believe that some small incident might bring it all back. Once their physical passion had died down, they had become prudish with one another: she would lock the bathroom door, turn her back to him when doing up her bra and draw away when she touched his skin by mistake. And for the last few years both had begun to wonder whether any couple could survive this physical distance.
Now
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