A Long Silence (32 page)

‘Bring them in then,' crossly, ‘and wait here with them.' He got up and went into the inner office, sat down heavily behind the commissaire's desk, picked up the telephone and said ‘Headquarters.'

*

‘It is expedient,' I said with gloomy pomp, ‘that a man die for the sake of the people.'

‘It has to be voluntary though, doesn't it?' said Arlette.

‘I suppose – uh?' I felt thick and muddled. I poured out some whisky, aware I'd had too much already.

‘Shooting someone, or hanging them, or guillotining them – it just arouses nausea. And it helps nobody. Whereas Max Kolbe – '

‘Who's he?'

‘Oh stop being so dense. Max Kolbe was the Polish priest at Auschwitz who walked out and volunteered when they were taking hostages. They're making a saint out of him.'

‘We need one.'

‘They starved him for a fortnight and then got impatient because he wasn't dead yet. So the injection of carbolic acid.'

‘I remember now,' I said, belatedly, as usual. ‘He laughed.'

‘Yes,' said Arlette, ‘and it had more effect than a million deaths.' I woke up with a jolt.

‘My man,' she said calmly, ‘I saw him lying there on the ground in the rain. And he had a contented look. As though he knew that after all it hadn't been wasted.'

Yes.

Atqui sciebat quae sibi Barbarus
Tortor pararet. Non aliter tamen

Dimovit obstantes propinquos,

Et populum reditus morantem,

Quam si clientum longa negotia
Dijudicata lite relinqueret,

Tendens Venafranos in agros,

Aut Lacedaemonium Tarentum
.

—HORACE, Odes, Book III, No. V

He knew perfectly what torment his barbarous enemies held destined for him. Nevertheless he pushed gently aside his family that sought to prevent his passing: he made a way through the crowd that tried to delay his departure, and embarked for Carthage with mien as contented as if, having finished the affairs of his clients, he were leaving to unburden himself of painful labours in the fields of Venafrum or the smiling countryside of Tarentum.

Translation from the eighteenth-century French of Father
Sanadon (edition Wetstein & Smith, Amsterdam, MDCC XXXV.)
English version by N.F

Dans le jardin de mon père les lauriers sont fleuris:
Tous les oiseaux du ciel y viennent faire leur nid–
La caille, la tourterelle, et la jolie perdrix,
Et ma jolie colombe qui chante jour et nuit. Auprès de ma blonde, qu'il fait bon,
fait bon, fait bon—Auprès de ma blonde, qu'il fait bon dormir!

Et ma jolie colombe, qui chante jour et nuit,
Qui chante pour les filles qui n'ont pas de mari—
Ne chante pas pour elle: elle en a un joli!
Il est dans la Hollande, les Hollandais l'ont pris.
Auprès de ma blonde, qu'il fait bon, fait bon, fait bon
—Auprès de ma blonde, qu'il fait bon dormir!

Que donnerez-vous, belle, pour revoir votre ami?
—Je donnerai Versailles, Paris et Saint-Denis,
Les tours de Notre-Dame, le clocher de mon pays,
Et ma jolie colombe qui chante jour et nuit…
Auprès de ma blonde, qu'il fait bon, fait bon, fait bon
Auprès de ma blonde, qu'il fait bon dormir!

In my father's garden the bay-trees have bloomed. All the birds of the sky are come to make their nest: the amorous quail, the loving turtle-dove, the pretty partridge and my sweet bird of peace.

Sweet bird of peace sings night and day. Sings for the girls who have no man – but not for her; she has a man and a lovely one he is! He is in Holland. The Dutch have taken him …

What will you give then, pretty girl, to have your lover back again? I would give all of Versailles, Paris and Saint-Denis. I would give the towers of Notre-Dame, and my village steeple. And I would give too my sweet bird of peace, who sings to me all day and all night…

This electronic edition published in 2011 by Bloomsbury Reader
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Copyright © Nicolas Freeling, 1972
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ISBN: 9781448207008
eISBN: 9781448206919
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