Revenge of the Translator. Brice Matthieussent

a small crown of violets that has been withering for a long time and, attached to the shriveled and brittle stems by a thin metallic thread twisted around them several times, a note written in faded violet ink: “To my beloved Dolores, with all the love from the lover of words. For your hundredth. Maurice.”

      David places this token of affection back on the shelf, then goes to the living room to serve himself another glass of port. He feels like he’s jumped seventy years into the past, to the strange summer solstice evoked by that love letter and by the article he just read from Paris-Soir. Ubiquity. Like father, like son. Same tricks. Same fondness for manipulation. Back in front of the armoire with the open panels covered in things he never wears—ties and bow ties—in the middle of that sparse display case, next to the crown of violets that’s been withering for several decades, David notices a book with the title Fragments épars. Since these two words mean nothing to him, he sets the book back down right away and then notices a musty odor, a cave-like humidity. He moves closer to the armoire, almost steps inside, feeling vaguely ridiculous; he examines the bottom, riddled with large dark cracks, where these deleterious emanations seem to be coming from.

      He has an idea. Taking off his jacket, he tries to jiggle the shelves on their brackets. First he puts the objects on the ground, then he takes down the shelves one after another and leans them against the wall. Excited, he finds himself in front of a large white perforated panel that resists his pressure. In the shadow of the armoire, a gleaming keyhole catches his eye. David thinks immediately of the silver key that he recently pocketed. He takes it, slides it into the small opening, watches it go in without much effort. Then, like a door, the panel at the bottom of the armoire pivots on its hinges and opens onto a dark space. He needs a candle, a lamp, a lighter … David goes into the kitchen, opens cupboards and drawers, finally finds a flashlight that seems to be working. Just in case, he also grabs a few candles and matches, which he finds above the old-fashioned stove.

      He goes back into the hallway, walks along the seaside fresco with the dislocated puppet, then turns to face the rigged armoire. The bottom is now wide open. Stepping over the impeccably arranged shoes (it is indeed a starting line, but David crosses it in the wrong direction, as if at the last minute he renounced the competition, preferring invisibility, solitude, and anonymity to the gregarious glory of sports competitions), he takes a step into the forbidden zone, nevertheless with the confused and disgruntled feeling that someone has whispered the path to him, that he’s following in the footsteps of another.

      He turns on the flashlight; the meek beam illuminates a staircase descending into darkness. The cold air smells like the humidity of caves, must, decomposition. Placing a hand on the oozing mossy wall, David cautiously begins the descent down the stairs that he imagines are slippery. He turns around and suddenly freezes, discovering, perfectly framed in the rectangle of the still-open doorway, illuminated by the bare bulb, the dislocated puppet who seems to levitate above the horizon and the green waves. David feels then that he is wading beneath the sea, a reluctant pearl fisherman, or else a criminal thrown into the water with his feet ballasted in a basin of cement, or else a puppet launched toward the ocean by a capricious child or a tired puppeteer.