Tropic Moon by Georges Simenon Read Free Book Online

floor of the hotel. He tried to open the door but it was locked, and he didn’t want to make a noise by knocking. There was the dead man, for one thing. He was so jittery that his knees were shaking. He was filled with irrational fear.
    He headed around the house to the courtyard door. A stray cat running away made him start. He was shivering even though he was covered in sweat, and it made him wonder if he was falling ill. The slightest movement made him sweat. He could feel himself sweating and smell himself sweating, could feel every pore of his body spitting out sweat.
    The courtyard door was also locked. When he returned to the front, the door swung open.
    There was Adèle, a candle in her hand, wearing her usual black silk dress and as calm as ever. There was just room for Timar to slip in the door before it closed behind him again. The candle stopped flickering in the café. He tried to think of something to say. He was appalled, furious at himself, at her, at the whole world. He was more upset than he had ever felt in his life.
    â€œYou weren’t asleep?”
    He looked at her suspiciously and had an unexpected reaction. Was it because of the disgusting displays he’d witnessed that night? Or was it more like an angry protest, a yearning for vengeance?
    He gave way, in any case, to a mean, brutal impulse.
    â€œYour new room’s on the left.”
    He followed her like a coward to the stairs they would both have to climb. He knew she’d stop and let him lead the way with the light.
    Right then he grabbed her by the waist, but without really knowing what he meant to do.
    She didn’t struggle. She was still holding the candle, and a drop of hot wax fell onto Timar’s hand. She simply pulled away from him. She was a woman, but her torso was muscular and strong—too strong for him to press her to him. All she said was, “You’re drunk, my dear. Go get some sleep.”
    He gave her a troubled look. He saw her pale face in the dancing candlelight and her shapely lips that seemed in spite of everything to be forming a smile that was both ironic and tender.
    He hurried awkwardly upstairs, tripped, and went to the wrong door. Without any anger, she said, “It’s the door on the left.”
    After he shut the door, he heard her climbing the stairs. She opened a door and closed it behind her. At last, one after the other, two slippers fell to the floor.

4
    A T THE cemetery Timar was overwhelmed by an unexpected wave of emotion. He felt utterly displaced. The feeling washed over him and filled him and left him almost gasping as if he’d been knocked to the ground by a breaker.
    Displaced—by the picturesque details, the jaunty palms, the singsong of native speech, the milling black bodies.
    But there was something else, too—the clarity and desperation with which he understood that to leave Africa you had to go by boat. There was one every month, and it took three weeks to get to France.
    It was eight in the morning. They’d left the Hotel Central at seven to miss the worst of the heat. But the heat wasn’t only from the sun: it rose from the ground, the walls, everything. Your own body even gave off heat!
    Timar had gone to bed at four. He’d felt sick ever since he got up, which convinced him that he must have been drunker than he’d thought.
    The loggers were there, along with Maritain and the rest of the regulars. As in a provincial town, they were stationed in groups several yards from the door. The only difference was that here everyone was dressed in white and that everyone was wearing a sun helmet, even Adèle, who emerged from behind the coffin wearing her black silk dress.
    The hearse was the little truck from the night before, now covered in black cloth.
    They set out walking along the red dirt road. They turned into a small steep lane lined with native huts. Was one of them Maria’s?
    In spite of the heat, they walked quickly: if