nevertheless made it clear to Jean and Palfy that what they were asking was tantamount to finding a needle in a haystack. Thousands of refugees were flooding into Clermont-Ferrand. The hotels were full. There was not a bed to be had in any private house. And the inhabitants of Clermont, secretive at the best of times, recoiled from showy behaviour. Families lived discreetly, rarely showing themselves. Perhaps there were, all the same, two or three streets and Place de Jaude where one might position oneself in the hope of meeting the desired person. But their description of Claude was vague. Madame Michette promised to give the matter some thought.
The next morning the street’s residents were highly surprised to see the young women from the Sirène emerge as a group from their lodgings. This was not part of their routine. Speculation ran riot: the girls were on their way to the railway station to greet Monsieur Michette, who was returning with another palm to add to his Croix de Guerre; they were going to present a petition at the prefecture calling for their status as workers in a reserved occupation to be recognised, which would entitle them to extra food rations: 350 grams of bread instead of 250, a bar of chocolate a month and an extra 100 grams of butter; they wanted to complain en masse to the regional military commander about his rumoured decision to send the glorious 152nd infantry regiment to Montluçon – the 15–2 – first regiment of France, recently re-formed at the Desaix barracks. The spectators watched them go, their bottoms swaying briskly down the street, led by Madame Michette dressed soberly in grey, the appropriate colour for a secret agent. The girls were not laughing and walked with their eyes lowered, their faces unmade-up, swinging their patent handbags. In short, only Monsieur Michette was missing for them to start walking in step with each other.
As soon as they arrived in the town centre they dispersed according to a prearranged plan. Madame Michette installed herself at the Café Riche, next to the telephone booth. Palfy and Jean sat at a table some distance away, pretending to ignore their new friend, who ordered a beer and immersed herself in a spy novel. With a passion unexpected in a person as down to earth as she was, she had, in the space of a night, taken the bait put down by Palfy and decided, by every possible means including the consumption of pulp novels on the subject, to begin her training as a secret agent.
The wait lasted all morning. Palfy rejoiced in his machinations. Jean was the only one not to believe it would work, even though the preparations had crystallised in his mind’s eye an idealised image of the young woman he had glimpsed during the parade. In the shabby, heavily perfumed surroundings of the Sirène, that image was like a window open onto a scrap of sky, a hope that a world more sympathetic to his tastes and his aspirations still existed despite the debacle of the past month.
‘I feel we’re on our way to great things,’ Palfy murmured. ‘The era is eminently favourable to those who venture all. We shall have fun.’
‘I’ll admit it hasn’t got off to a bad start. I adore Madame Michette.’
‘France is full of Madame Michettes. We shall fill their heads with dreams.’
‘You’ll fill their heads. Not me.’
Palfy waved his hand irritably.
‘Are you starting again? Listen, dear boy, I don’t know how many times you’ve tried to back out, but it’s time to stop. I know your excellent soul, your rectitude, your honesty, your courage and loyalty. All well and good, I’m in the picture. You can’t shock me any more. But from now on, life is about living, so put all that on one side for the next few years. We own nothing, hardly even the shirts on our backs. We’re starting again from nothing. I have a few ideas and you’ve got a sweet mug – women like you. On my own I can’t do anything, and if you go it alone you’ll end up doing ghastly little jobs: delivering parcels, or bouncer at a nightclub. Think about it …’
‘Then explain to me,’ Jean said, ‘why your cheating makes me feel so uncomfortable. I should be getting used to it and recognising that it’s justified most of the time, because all you’re really doing is taking advantage of human stupidity. But I can’t help it: every time something inside me says no.’
‘My dear chap, I’m afraid these scruples of yours are metaphysical in origin. They’re an artificial distinction, produced by centuries of tradition, between good and evil. Trust me on this: get out of the habit, or you’ll be doomed to play the game of a society that doesn’t give a shit about your soul and will happily exploit you like a slave …’
A slave? Wasn’t one a slave to everything? To one’s social status, one’s passions, one’s stupidity or clear-sightedness for that matter? Jean would have liked to muse on the question at greater length, without immediately answering yes or no to Palfy, for whom, ever since they had enlisted, he had felt real friendship, even something close to admiration. Palfy shone a light on life, painted it in bold colours, set traps for him. Unfortunately, every time events seemed to point to perfect happiness, they had a tendency to come to grief and everything went back to square one. Staring out of the café window, Jean felt sceptical about the possibilities Palfy saw in the situation: he saw only a quiet street, women carrying shopping bags, a queue outside a butcher’s twenty people long, several closed steel shutters. After the emotions sparked by the parade, life was returning to normal, as dull as before, with the same hardships making themselves felt and starting to monopolise people’s thoughts, as night followed day. How could one hope to succeed in a defeated country that, since the unprovoked massacre of its sailors at Mers el-Kébir, no longer knew whether yesterday’s allies were not today’s enemies and whether the enemy currently occupying half the country in such a disciplined way would not become tomorrow’s friend? To be able to see clearly these days demanded a particular lucidity, one that no single person possessed. Reason dictated simply surviving until one could see things more distinctly. No one knew what was happening in Paris or the rest of France. Jean thought about his father. How was he feeling now, the old leftist pacifist who had remained so loyal to his ideas that he was willing to insult French officers in the street while a war was going on? Jean had disappointed him deeply by enlisting on the eve of the conflict.
‘I need to see my father,’ Jean said.
Palfy shrugged.
‘Forget it. You’ve got to leave all that alone now too.’
One of the girls from the Sirène came into the café. She brought an address. Madame Michette made a note. By the end of the morning she had half a dozen other addresses. Posted at different crossroads, the girls had observed six possible Claudes and trailed them to where they lived. Six was too many. Jean did not hide his scorn. He found Palfy’s new ploy risible, an ugly caricature of the carefree pleasure to be had from a sudden encounter with a desirable face and a tantalising outline in the morning sunshine. After lunch he refused to accompany Palfy when he set off, list in hand, to find the real Claude. He was thrown into an even greater panic when his friend returned triumphant. Claude existed! And she was waiting for him, in a café on Place de Jaude. First they had to put on an elaborate act for Madame Michette, whose chest had swelled to bursting and who expected a medal at the very least.
‘Get going!’ Palfy ordered. ‘I have a hunch that you’ve got an incredible opportunity waiting for you this time, one you can’t pass up. She’s much more beautiful than we thought when we first caught sight of her. A refugee from the north. Lives in Paris. Get a move on, I tell you! The future is yours.’
‘I won’t know what to say to her, I don’t know her.’
‘You’ll think of something.’
He went, pursued by Palfy, who, suspecting he might try to run away, did not want to give him the opportunity.
‘What did you say to her?’ Jean asked as they reached the café.
‘Nothing. I didn’t need to. She guessed.’
‘I haven’t even got enough to buy her a drink.’
‘I thought of that. Here.’
He held out a 500-franc note.
‘Where did you get that?’
‘What do you care?’
‘Was