Vertigo by Pierre Boileau Read Free Book Online Page B

something monstrous. If death had come to her, she simply wouldn’t have noticed it! He swore a mental oath never to let her out of his sight. From now on he would protect her against herself. She needed protection. She wasn’t quite normal, he felt sure of that now. He went back to the bistrot at the run, trying to get warm. The woman, with the baby still on her arm, was filling two glasses.
    ‘Where is she?’
    ‘In the next room, changing.’
    ‘Can I use the telephone?’
    ‘Yes. It’s over there.’
    She jerked her chin towards the far end of the bar. He rang up for a taxi.
    ‘I’ve got some blue trousers and a jersey,’ she said when he rang off. ‘Will that do?’
    ‘Perfectly.’
    At that moment, Madeleine came out of the kitchen, and he got another shock. In a cheap print dress, her bare feet in sandals, she was another Madeleine altogether, and one that was not in the least intimidating.
    ‘Go and change at once,’ she said. ‘… Really, I’m awfully sorry… Another time I’ll be more careful.’
    ‘I sincerely hope there won’t be another time,’ grumbled Flavières.
    He had expected her to thank him. It was to have been a rather touching scene. And here she was being jocular about it! Furious, he muttered to himself as he changed into clothes that were several sizes too big for him. He was going to look ridiculous into the bargain. In the bar the two women were hobnobbing together in an undertone. As thick as thieves! His joy had completely evaporated, and when he found the blue trousers to be covered with streaks of black grease he was angrier than ever. Against Gévigne. He’d pay for this! And he could have his wife watched by someone else in future. A motor-horn sounded outside. That was the taxi. Red and discomfited, he went back into the bar.
    ‘Are you ready?’
    Madeleine was holding the baby.
    ‘Hush!’ she said. ‘You’ll wake him.’
    She handed the baby very gently back to his mother and this solicitude still further exasperated Flavières. Hardly able to contain himself, he gathered up his wet clothes, put some money on the table, and stumped out. Madeleine ran after him.
    ‘Where can I drop you?’ he asked coldly.
    She got into the taxi.
    ‘We’d better go to your place first,’ she said. ‘I expect you’re in a hurry to get back into decent clothes. It doesn’t matter about me.’
    ‘Tell me where you live, all the same.’
    ‘Avenue Kléber… I’m Madame Gévigne… My husband’s a ship-builder.’
    ‘I’m a lawyer. Maître Flavières.’
    He opened the sliding glass panel between him and the driver.
    ‘Rue de Maubeuge. Drop us at the corner of the Rue Lamartine.’
    ‘I’m afraid you’re angry with me,’ said Madeleine. ‘I really don’t know what happened.’
    ‘I do. You tried to kill yourself.’
    He paused, expecting her to make excuses. As she didn’t answer, he went on:
    ‘You can have confidence in me. I’m quite ready to understand. You’ve been dragging some sorrow about with you… a disappointment perhaps?…’
    ‘No,’ she said softly. ‘It’s not what you think.’
    Once again she was the person he’d seen at the theatre, La Femme à l’Eventail ; once again she was the person who had stood lost in meditation at that neglected grave.
    ‘I wanted to throw myself into the water,’ she said, ‘but I swear I don’t know why.’
    ‘Come on! What about that letter?’
    She reddened.
    ‘It was for my husband. But what I was trying to explain to him was so extraordinary that in the end—’
    She turned towards Flavières and laid a hand on his arm.
    ‘Do you think it’s possible to live again, Monsieur?… I mean… is it possible to die and then… live again in someone else?… You see! You don’t want to answer. You think I’m mad.’
    ‘Look here.’
    ‘I’m not mad, I assure you… But I can’t shake off the feeling that my past goes back a long way—much further than my memories of childhood. Beyond the little