The Stone Boy by Sophie Loubière Read Free Book Online Page A

table where the phone sat. She was not quite sure she could continue standing. The return of her ex-daughter-in-law to her son’s life was the worst news she could have heard.
    “How long have you been hiding the truth from me?” she said flatly.
    “A year.”
    “And that’s why we can’t have dinner together on Thursdays anymore?”
    “Yes.”
    “She doesn’t want you to see your mother?”
    “Now, that’s not really it. Audrette thinks that—”
    “You do what you like, Martin. It’s all the same to me. As soon as I’ve heard from my grandson… Apropos, how is Bastien? He still hasn’t sent me a postcard.”
    When Madame Préau had finished her conversation and returned to her room, the neighbors’ garden had been emptied of its occupants, which greatly upset her.
    Madame Préau left the bread in the toaster for too long. She dined on onion soup with an aftertaste of sulfur, listening to the newsreader on France 3 summarize the cases of swine flu in France. At nine, a fight broke out among the tomcats in the garden near the shed. Madame Préau had to go out in her slippers and dressing gown to restore order and chase away the one-eyed cat who liked to wreak havoc. Then she closed and bolted the door. She turned off her bedside lamp as usual at half past ten.
    At ten past midnight, Madame Préau switched on the bedside lamp, awoken with a start by a noise coming from inside the house, on the floor below. The sound of metal being struck violently, followed by a muffled cry and an animal’s moan. She listened, motionless under the covers, her heart beating.
    It will not start again. It must not start again.
    Madame Préau thought things through. She had put the heating back on that morning. The woodwork was settling, creaking out its displeasure. The metal shutters were warped, victims of the wintry night. And the cats were tearing strips off of each other in the garden, which was disputed territory. But the most rational explanation did not cure her fear. A moment later, she was walking around the house, hammer in hand, turning on the lights one by one. Going around the house with a tool that belonged to her father, she inspected every room, every nook, looking behind the doors, and then swallowing one of the pills prescribed by her son to clear up any nightmares—ah, that was better.
    At twelve forty-five, the hammer went back into the drawer of the bedside table. Madame Préau noted the time the noise had occurred in her notebook, and then lay down again, leaving the hall light on, like when she was a little girl and her mother came to see her as a surprise.

16
     
    The area around the train station was just a vast construction site. The roar of dump trucks spewing their contents of earth and rubble on land sold off by the municipality for the construction of a private residence and a rehabilitation center joined the dogs barking at the noise of the pneumatic drills that hurt their ears.
    Isabelle ran the brush along the kitchen windowsill outside with a sigh. More ochre dust!
    “When will they finish the construction work?”
    A few meters away, Madame Préau was cutting back the plants in the rock garden for the winter, her neck wrapped in the foam brace.
    “We’re lucky, Isabelle. Imagine the hell that the people on Rue des Petits Rentiers are living, with that huge crane overhead and a cement mixer that lets its motor run all day. That smell of diesel is horrific.”
    The housekeeper nodded with a sad smile, holding her dustpan across her body.
    “Will I put all this in the jar as usual?”
    “Do, Isabelle. Do.”
    She returned to the kitchen, saying to Madame Préau that they were almost out of floor cleaner and Ajax for the windows, but that there was no hurry. The housekeeper felt the ground vibrate under her slippers. A truck was going down the road, giving the barking dogs a second wind. Madame Préau also felt the vibration but paid no attention, too busy using the handle of the shears to