Tropic Moon by Georges Simenon

go.”
    â€œWhat were you doing in there?”
    â€œDon’t worry about it. Women’s business.”
    It took him nearly three years to realize she’d gone in to collect her percentage of the price of the room.
    What had made him think of that, here on the river? He couldn’t say. Looking at Adèle, who was more animated than usual, he saw the other woman. He’d never learned her name.
    â€œIt was a black’s place?”
    â€œOf course! There aren’t any whites here.”
    And because he was frowning, “Don’t be that way, Joe. I swear—it’s nothing.”
    Impassive as ever under his ragged, oily sun helmet, the black looked straight ahead. Every now and then, he gave a slight turn to the wheel.
    Was the problem the incident at the hut? Exhaustion and the heat must have had done something to Timar’s state of mind. The sun shone down overhead and the flatboat moved too slowly to make a cooling breeze. The unchanging landscape became oppressive.
    He’d eaten a can of warm pâté and some stale bread. Already he’d had two shots of liquor.
    It was his time for it. Around the middle of the afternoon, he’d get a hollow feeling in his chest. He only felt like himself after he’d had a touch of liquor.
    Adèle was still in a good mood. Too good a mood—it seemed unnatural to Timar. Most of the time she didn’t work so hard to make him happy. She was more direct than that—and more reserved.
    What could she have been doing in the black man’s hut? Why the smiles and playfulness now?
    Finally, Timar sat down on the bottom of the boat, letting his gaze slip over the irregular treetops at the speed of the boat. His chest started to hurt again. “Hand me the bottle.”
    â€œJoe!”
    â€œWhat? I don’t have a right to be thirsty?”
    She looked resigned as she handed him the flask of whiskey. He almost didn’t hear her murmur, “Watch out.”
    â€œFor what? Black women I can go visit in their huts?”
    He knew he wasn’t being fair. It had been happening a lot recently. He couldn’t help himself.
    At those moments, he was convinced that he was unhappy, that he was the one making all the sacrifices. It gave him the right to hate the whole world.
    â€œYou shouldn’t gripe—you made a living getting people soused.”
    A rifle lay in the bottom of the boat in case they spotted some game, but they hadn’t seen anything except for a few birds. The air was teeming with flies, though. One hand was always busy waving them out of your face. Timar knew the river was infested with tsetses; every time an insect landed on him, he jumped.
    He stood up suddenly, at the end of his tether. He took off his jacket. Under it was just a short-sleeved shirt.
    â€œThat’s a mistake, Joe. You’ll get sick.”
    â€œSo?”
    It wasn’t any cooler with his jacket off. On the contrary. But at least he didn’t have that sticky sweaty feeling in his armpits and on his chest. It was a different sensation now—a feeling, almost voluptuous, of his flesh roasting through.
    â€œGive me the bottle.”
    â€œYou’ve had enough to drink.”
    â€œGive me the bottle, I said!”
    And he insisted because he knew that the black, who seemed so impassive, was listening to everything and judging them both. He drank with greedy defiance, then lay down on the bench with his jacket rolled up under his head.
    â€œListen, Joe, the sun is strong and …”
    He didn’t even bother to answer. He was sleepy. He was crushed with exhaustion. He was ready to drop dead, if it came to that. He couldn’t have gotten up if he’d wanted to.
    For several hours, he sank into a strange stupor. He slept, openmouthed, and his body became a world of mysterious occurrences.
    Was he a tree? A mountain? Two or three times, his eyelids parted and he saw Adèle trying to keep him in