Vertigo by Pierre Boileau Read Free Book Online

him. He went on.
    Heaps of sand, heaps of stones, then more heaps of sand… Here and there a rustic wharf, a crane, some tip-trucks on narrow rusty rails. They were opposite the Ile de la Grande Jatte.What was she doing in this dismal suburb? Where was she leading him? They were all alone there, one behind the other, yet she showed no sign whatever of being conscious of his existence. She was too absorbed in the river to look behind her.
    Little by little, Flavières was assailed by a vague fear. No, she wasn’t out for a walk. Was this some eccentric escapade? Or an attack of amnesia? He knew something of the latter, as the police often had to deal with people who had lost their memories, strange bewildered people who spoke like sleepwalkers. He was overtaking her again. They were approaching an isolated building, one of those little bistrots which cater for bargees. Outside it were three iron tables under a discoloured sunblind. She sat down at one of them. Flavières hid behind a stack of barrels on the quay, but without taking his eyes off her.
    She took a piece of paper out of her bag, and a fountain pen. With the back of her hand she made sure the table wasn’t wet. The innkeeper didn’t put in an appearance. She wrote carefully, her features slightly puckered.
    ‘She loves someone,’ thought Flavières, ‘someone who’s been called up.’
    But that supposition was worth no more than the others. Nor did it explain why she should come all this way to write a letter she could have written just as easily—more clandestinely, in fact—at home. Her pen went steadily on; she never paused to grope for a word. Perhaps she had been composing the letter in her head while walking. Or during that half-hour at the hotel. Suppositions again! Really he had nothing to go on… Was she breaking with Gévigne?… That might explain her restless ambulations. Not her visit to Pauline Lagerlac’s grave, however.
    No one came to serve her. The innkeeper was no doubt at the front, like the others. Madeleine folded up her letter, put it in an envelope, addressed it, and carefully licked it up. She looked round her, rapped on the table to attract attention. Still no one came. Finally she got up, holding her letter in her hand. Was she going to retrace her steps? She hesitated. Flavières would have given anything to have been able to read the name on the envelope.
    Still uncertain, she wandered down to the edge of the quay, passing quite close to the barrels, so close that once again he caught a whiff of her perfume. A soft breeze was blowing, just strong enough to make her skirt flutter. Her face, side-view, was calm. If there was any expression on it at all, it was one of discouragement. She looked down, turned the envelope over, then suddenly tore it in two, in four, and finally into tiny pieces, which she scattered in the breeze. They fluttered down, some on to the stone coping, some on to the water, where they floated for a while; and she stood gravely contemplating them. She rubbed her thumb against her forefinger as though wanting to rid herself of an undesirable contact. With the toe of her shoe, she extricated some fragments caught up in a tuft of grass, and they too disappeared. Quite calmly she took a step forward.
    The splash came up right on to the quay, almost wetting Flavières’ feet.
    ‘Madeleine!’
    For a moment, Flavières stood where he was, non-plussed. The last fragments of the letter had blown into the water except one solitary bit which fluttered along the quay, stopping, then going on again in sudden spurts, like a white mouse.
    Madeleine!
    He threw off his jacket and waistcoat and rushed towards the edge. A ring of wavelets was still spreading out across the river. He dived in. The cold took his breath away. But that didn’t stop her name welling up to his lips from the very centre of his being.
    Madeleine! Madeleine!
    For a second or two he floundered in the dirty water, then came to the surface.