Moon in a Dead Eye: Shocking, hilarious and poignant noir. Pascal Garnier

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СКАЧАТЬ wipe them with this. So, what did you make of it?’

      ‘Of what?’

      ‘The drinks at the Nodes’, obviously!’

      ‘Oh, it was all a bit fancy for my liking. All those little sweet and savoury nibble things, they’re too fussy. I like simpler stuff.’

      ‘I don’t mind it every now and then. They certainly didn’t hold back on the champagne – we must have drunk at least two bottles!’

      ‘Three! Maxime opened another just before we left. I think Marlène had a few too many …’

      ‘I was a bit tipsy too. I didn’t make a fool of myself, did I?’

      ‘I don’t think so. I was falling asleep by the end.’

      ‘It was well before then! I had to give you a nudge, you were snoring on the sofa … That sofa! It’s …’

      ‘Pachydermic!’

      ‘Exactly! All real leather – must have cost an arm and a leg. But it’s far too big for that sitting room. With the piano behind it, you can barely move. I’m not saying they haven’t got nice things, but it’s all a bit showy. They’re the same themselves, very nice people but they always have to go one better, with their holidays, and their friends in high places, and their son the lawyer …’

      ‘We still don’t know which of them plays the piano.’

      ‘We don’t, do we?’

      Inspecting the scrawny shrub, whose branches reached upwards as though imploring the sky, Martial came across a single bud the size of a boil.

      Since the Nodes had moved in, Martial and Odette had given up playing ‘the neighbours game’. There was no point now that they could get it all from the horse’s mouth, without even having to ask. The neighbours crossed paths almost every day, running errands for each other and sharing restaurant and shopping tips. Martial and Odette’s superior knowledge of the area made them seem pleasingly like trailblazers, the old hands of Les Conviviales. Piecing together what they had gleaned from all these conversations, they now knew that Maxime had spent his career selling greenhouses all over Europe; that Marlène had danced at the Paris Opéra in her youth; that before coming here they had lived in Orléans and that their son, Régis, was an exceptionally gifted lawyer destined for high office in the near future.

      ‘He’s always been able to pick things up just like that!’

      Whatever the topic of conversation, Marlène always found a way to turn it to her genius progeny, so that her audience ended up despising the man without ever having met him.

      Yes, they were a bit showy, with their clothes, their car and their furniture, but their hearts were in the right place and they were good fun, him especially. He was a real charmer, using and abusing his magnetic smile. He always had a joke up his sleeve and seemed at ease in every situation. In other words, a true salesman. As for Marlène, for all her fragile bird-like demeanour, she was no spare part. She knew her role like the back of her jewellery-laden hand, scolding her husband when his jokes went too far, acting the dizzy blonde when it suited her and always laughing in the right places. All in all, they were pleasant company. No one said they had to be intellectuals. As neighbours went, they were just fine; Martial and Odette could have done much worse. Going their separate ways the previous evening, the two couples had agreed to make a joint visit to a nearby château which was supposed to be very beautiful. Luckily they had not fixed a date for the outing, for which Martial was now thankful. A dinner a month was about enough socialising for him. Plus, it was one thing getting on well as neighbours, quite another to turn that into a friendship.

      ‘Martial?’

      ‘Yes?’

      ‘I was thinking it might be time to get a new dinner service.’

      ‘What for?’

      ‘For having people over, obviously!’

      ‘Like who?’

      ‘Like the Nodes, for starters. We’ll have to return their invitation. There’s a little shop under the arches. We could head over there now.’

      Monsieur Flesh always carried tons of things on his belt: keys, a mobile phone, a torch, pepper spray, a knife; he was a walking hardware shop. He was leaning against the gate smoking a cigarette and staring intensely at the empty sky. Martial slowed down as he drew level.

      ‘Morning, Monsieur Flesh! Beautiful day, isn’t it?’

      ‘Very nice, yes. Oh, there’s a new person coming, a woman.’

      ‘A woman on her own?’

      ‘Yes. Next week.’

      ‘Right … Well, have a good day, Monsieur Flesh.’

      ‘And you, Monsieur Sudre.’

      Sunshine was streaming through the windscreen. After all those months of grey, their eyes struggled to adjust to the riot of colour, as though emerging from a dark tunnel into bright daylight. Odette put on her sunglasses. Her mouth twitched with irritation.

      ‘Something wrong, Odette?’

      ‘No, nothing … Bit strange to have a single woman coming, isn’t it?’

      ‘Not really. She might be a widow.’

      ‘Yes, that’s true, she might be …’

      Standing in front of the bathroom mirror wearing only his underpants, Maxime was striking toreador poses. Chest puffed out, belly sucked in, fists clenched beside his hips, he held his breath for long enough to tell himself he still looked pretty good for a man of his age. Then he slowly exhaled, not entirely convinced. As his muscles relaxed, the skin sagged on his hunched skeleton like an oversized garment. He shrugged his shoulders and began to shave.

      ‘Here, at least …’

      All of this was down to a heart scare, a teeny tiny one, but a warning sign. The doctor had told him he had the heart of an ox. But he couldn’t push his luck, he wasn’t thirty any more. Drinks parties, good wine, good food and … all the rest of it would have to be reined in from now on. Nothing too serious. But it had been the last straw, hastening their decision to leave. Marlène had leapt at the chance. She had been thinking about it for some time, for other reasons. They had been burgled three times in recent years. The residential neighbourhood of Orléans where they had lived for many moons had become a prime target for the scum who came in from the outlying boroughs. Nothing could stop them, not the most sophisticated alarm systems or the patrols that took place day and night. They were everywhere and nowhere, gnawing away like vermin at the foundations of the stable, quiet life people had worked hard to build. The city centre had not escaped unscathed. Marlène had been mugged in broad daylight at the cash point next to the post office. It took her six months to get over it. Through a friend in the police, Maxime had got himself a firearms licence. His revolver only left his glove compartment at night, when he slid it underneath the bed. They could not go on like that. So it was a combination of things that had brought them to Les Conviviales. He couldn’t really complain about the place; it was new, clean, empty of both past and future. The problem was it would soon be filled СКАЧАТЬ