The Closed Harbour (21 page)

Madame Marius had not stirred in her place, and was sitting a little back from the table, hands flat in her lap, head a little forward, she seemed to be contemplating these hands. She heard an outer and an inner door close. "You were out?"

"Yes mother?"

"Were you looking for him?"

"No mother."

"Do you think I'm cruel, Madeleine?" She stretched the little finger of each hand towards the thumb and pressed, suddenly loosened them, she twirled all her fingers, she turned her hands over and lay them flat on her knee, stared at the wedding ring upon her third finger. With the tip of another finger she burnished the stone in it. "Did you find him?"

"No."

"You have well considered this step you take?"

"Yes mother."

"You are sure of that? There is then nothing in the world that would draw you out?"

"Nothing."

"You realize that I shall stay where I go."

"I do, mother, I do."

"You realize also that you are free to do as you wish. I am not forcing you."

Without waiting for the answer she went on, "do you think that if we went back from where we came, we could carry on as though nothing had happened. Or that if I followed that Father Nollet's advice and we all three were together again, that we would go on as from that time
...

"You understand that I am asking you some questions and I would like to hear what you say."

She glanced up. Madeleine was seated at the table.

"Can't you speak?"

"It was the sailing-ship that frightened me," Madeleine said, "the ship he never put foot on."

From the sleeve of her blouse Madame Marius withdrew a handkerchief and handed it to her daughter.

"Wipe your eyes, child," she said.

She put a finger under her daughter's chin and raised her face, and looked at her and said, "it is bitter for me also. I'm going upstairs to dress and be ready, then I shall lie down and wait for the man to come. You're sure he will be here at three?"

Without waiting for a reply she went out and shut the door behind her.

"One clumsy lie behind another, now he's pretending that he's mad, no end to the devilry."

She entered her bedroom and flung the door to with a sudden rage.

Into a red and blue basket she packed the few objects that she wanted. She sat down in front of the mirror and started to arrange her hair, she tried on a hat, and with this on sat looking at her reflection in the mirror, and then Madeleine came in.

"I look terrible in this hat," Madame Marius said.

She took it off and put it down on the table. She gathered her coat, and her gloves and laid them across the chair. Then, fully dressed she lay down on the bed.

"There'll come a time," she said, "when he will be glad to tell me, his own mother. Lie down, Madeleine and rest yourself, we shall hear the knock."

They lay side by side on the bed.

"The nights we have lain together," her mother said, "ever since we came to this place, night after night, just you and I," she felt for Madeleine's hand, "I'm afraid," she said, "being alone, Madeleine, I couldn't be alone, ever, I'm too old."

X

L
ABICHE
folded up his surplice, and as he picked up his coat the note fell from the pocket. He opened it and read:

"Dear
Labiche,

I have a Requiem mass in the morning at eight o'clock, and I wonder if you can come and serve me. Sauret is taken ill. You know Sauret. He is a man I like very much, and indeed, if it were permissible I would have none other behind me at the altar
—
your good self excepted
—
but I have never been in favour of too young boys serving at the Mass. I hope you can manage to come. Also I have some news for you. Yours sincerely, Dominic Nollet."

Labiche put the note in his pocket. Then he closed the heavy drawer of the great oaken chest, the shining top of which threw up a blurred reflection of himself. Father Nollet passed him by, on his way to disrobe, and he patted his altar-boy on the shoulder and said, "don't be long, Labiche, breakfast is ready."

"No Father, I'm coming directly."

This was Labiche's world, and he was happy on its threshold. Kneeling behind the priest and giving out the responses he felt he was singing out his own peace and contentment, his whole being rose to receive the single acknowledgement. He passed through the vestry and at the door of the dining-room knocked, and went in. Housekeeper Morell was already serving breakfast.

"Sit down, Labiche," said Father Nollet, and indicated his chair.

His voice seemed somewhat grave, as though he were not quite beyond the threshold of his own high hour. But when the housekeeper went out, closing the door softly behind her, Father Nollet smiled across at the man and said kindly, "Eat well, Labiche."

Labiche remained silent for a moment or two, his head bowed. The priest was looking at the small, soft, almost hairless hands, the fingers holding lightly and nervously to the immaculate linen cloth. He looked up and smiled at Father Nollet.

"It was good of you to come," Father Nollet said.

"I was pleased to do so, Father," replied Labiche. "My wife would have liked to have come also, but at the last minute, Blanchette, who sometimes looks after our children, could not come."

"What a shame. I hope your family are well, Labiche."

"They are quite well, thank you, Father."

The priest leaned forward in his chair, looked steadily at the dwarf-like man.

"Labiche," he said, "do you know you are a very good man?"

"No Father," Labiche replied, and he looked straight into the other's eyes.

"Then I am glad of that," said the priest.

"And now I have some news for you," he went on. "It has now been decided, and at long last, that you should be permanent secretary of your branch of the Society. For this reason it will no longer be necessary for you to serve with the Heros people, but the decision is yours entirely."

Labiche paused in his eating. Father Nollet refilled his cup with coffee.

"Why, of course, Father, I am only too glad to accept it, but—"

"There will be a salary, Labiche, you will be a paid, full time secretary, there is no reason to worry about your family. And I feel sure that this is your real place. You are that kind of man. May I congratulate you, Labiche."

They held hands over the table.

"I have known you since you were a boy, Labiche," began Father Nollet, and then, "eat your breakfast, man, have some more coffee."

For a moment or two Labiche seemed unable to speak, then he said, "thank-you, Father," and resumed his breakfast.

"I remember your father," Father Nollet said.

Labiche looked up. "It's a long time since I was a boy, Father."

"Your father was very ill, and I had come to anoint him. You had just left school. I remember your showing me your prize for the composition. You showed me your little essay."

"I can't recall it, Father, it's a long time ago."

Labiche seemed nervous, embarrassed.

"You called it The Glory of France," Father Nollet said.

Labiche dropped his bread, spilt his coffee.

"For a fourteen year old boy," said the priest, "it was a very good essay."

"I have quite forgotten it," Labiche replied.

"The box on the Marne has burst, Labiche, and the spirit of the man is flowing all over our country, like a sea."

"Yes Father," Labiche said, and he was still shy, bewildered.

Suddenly he shouted excitedly, "well yes, Father. Of course. I still have the photograph over my bed. I remember the morning it came, from Paris. I nailed it on the wall. He was my hero."

"Peguy is moving strongly," Father Nollet said.

He got up and pushed in his chair, and Labiche immediately stood up, but the priest waved him back again, saying, "the other matter I wished to see you about, Labiche, those two women in the Rue des Fleurs. Did you call there? The—"

Labiche sat down.

He said quietly, "those people, Father. They're gone."

"Gone."

Father Nollet was standing looking out of the window, his back to the other.

"You mean away?"

"Yes Father. I called there last evening. I had, after much trouble, got Monsieur Gallois to take an interest in Captain Marius. You know the name, Father. Monsieur Gallois is a great help to our Missions in Africa. But now he is going into shipping, and he will see this man, papers or no papers. He is a man like that. No words. Deeds only. It is Marius's one chance. Other shipping firms are sick of the sight of him, and they have not forgotten the reputation he had years ago. Still I do not myself think that the worst ships attract the worst of men, Father. But now he has not been seen for two days
...

"When did the Marius women go, Labiche? Why it is only a few days since I called there, and only a few hours ago I wrote the mother a letter advising her on a matter of some importance to her."

"It was the lady next door who told me," continued Labiche. "It was the third time I had called trying to see the man, but always for some reason he was running away from me. That Madame Lustigne for instance, she told me that Marius thought I was an odd lot from the Sûreté. I was at her place twice, but he has not been seen, and Madame Lustigne seemed almost glad to hear that he had at last got lost, as she termed it. He had become known in certain Bistro also, but they have not seen him. There was one chance, the quays. But I was also unlucky there."

Father Nollet walked back to the table and sat down.

"What made you interested in this man, Labiche? There are so many others, I mean—"

Labiche interrupted quickly, "If the Heros had been civil, Father, if that Philippe had said Yes instead of No, but the once, perhaps I would not have noticed so much
...
"

There was a sudden silence, and through it Labiche had passed. For a few moments he was back at his desk in the office. He was absorbed in his work. He was hearing the opening and shutting of the Heros door, hands on the bell demanding attention, Philippe coming out of his cubby-hole.

There were always people calling at the Heros, all conditions of men; commercial travellers, agents, brokers, the busy bees of shipping, but mostly sailors looking for work, and sometimes in their absence, their wives. Out of this assembly, that grew with the days Labiche had lifted clear the impression of a single man. A tall lean man, wearing an old uniform, a dissolute-looking person, haggard, with a curious mistrustful eye, who, day after day called and asked for Follet. Like Philippe he had come to regard a certain stroke of the clock with the act of looking up, of seeing him there, grown yet another day older. He remembered when Philippe had barely looked up, though he heard the door open, the steps across to the counter, Philippe waiting for the parrot mouth to open.

"My name is
...
I would like to see Monsieur Follet."

He, Labiche would look up, at Philippe and at the man, then bend to his work again. But now, day after day he anticipated the arrival of the tall man, the same question.

The Vincentian finger was pointing, "this one."

Labiche looked straight at the priest.

"It was just like
that
, Father," he said, "I knew he needed help. Something made me interested in him"
...
he paused. "He looked desperate," he said.

"One does what one can," thought Labiche.

Vincentian fingers were pointing everywhere, the arm was ever out-stretched, opening a door, stifling a cry, revealing a hole, unveiling a man, drawing aside a curtain, opening a window; this all-embracing arm, was to Labiche, as real as his own.

"They are all of them lost," Father Nollet said, "they are complete strangers here."

"I have since found out," said Labiche, "that our Monsieur Follet did indeed have some acquaintance with the Marius family, some twenty years ago, and perhaps Marius had come all the way there to get help from him. I am only guessing, but I have never seen such stubborn-ness, such persistence, day after day, asking for the same man
...
"

"But surely, Follet himself must have known he was being enquired for, the man ceaselessly calling there
...
"

"Nevertheless to my knowledge, Father, Follet never once saw him."

"He may have had his reasons," the priest replied.

He rose from his seat, looked at the clock, then at Labiche. It was the sign for him to go.

"If you can find this man, Labiche, I would like you to bring him along to me."

He accompanied his altar-boy to the door, shook hands and said good-bye.

"Good-bye, Father. Thank you for my breakfast."

As he reached the end of the gravel path he half turned, waved to Father Nollet, and was gone. And in ten minutes the green bicycle had landed him outside the Heros. He placed it in the shed, then went into the office.

He sat down and began to drag from the desk yesterday's unfinished work. Looking across to the other office he noticed that Philippe was not there. There was nothing unusual in this, and Labiche began his work. A few minutes later Philippe came in.

"I say, Labiche," he exclaimed excitedly, as he shut the door and went and stood over the little clerk, "d'you remember that bum who used to come here day after day asking for Monsieur Follet?"

Labiche held the pen in his teeth, he glanced up at the other man.

"To-day he is going to see him. Think of that. After four months
...
"

"Why now?"

Philippe shrugged his shoulders.

"You're asking me," he said. He smiled, "perhaps like you, Labiche, he has had a vision. But he arrived five minutes earlier this morning, an unusual thing, he is generally that much late. He seemed in such good humour, too. I thought, 'maybe that father of his has died and left him all his money, not to mention the farm
...
'"

"Well?"

"If that Nantes bum looks in on us to-day," he said, "I'll see him in my office. But I will not see anybody else to-day, Philippe."