"When the war is over, I wish a monument to be built to honour the dead for which I bequeath the sum of three thousand francs to be taken from my estate and to be erected on the town square in Bléoville. At the top, in large gold letters, the names of my two oldest sons, then a space, then…" he closed his eyes, exhausted, "… then all the other names in small letters…"

He was silent for such a long time that the notary looked anxiously at the Sisters. Was he…? Was it all over already? But Sister Marie of the Chérubins calmly shook her head. He wasn't dead yet. He was thinking. In his motionless body, his memory was travelling through immense spans of time and space: "Almost all of my fortune is tied up in American stocks and bonds, which I was advised would be a good investment. I don't believe it any more." He shook his beard mournfully. "I don't believe it any more. I wish my son to convert them immediately into French francs. There is also some gold, but it's not worth keeping. It should be sold. A copy of my portrait should also be placed in the château in Bléoville in the downstairs ballroom. I bequeath to my faithful valet an annual income of one thousand francs for the rest of his life. As for my future greatgrandchildren, I wish their parents to name the boys Louis-Auguste and the girls Louise-Augustine after me."

"Is that everything?" Maître Charboeuf asked.

He bowed his long beard, indicating yes, that was everything. For a few moments that seemed brief to the notary, the witnesses and the Sisters, but to him were as long as a century, as long as delirium, as long as a dream, Monsieur Péricand-Maltête moved back in time to recall the life he had been given on this earth: the family dinners, the Boulevard Delessert, naps in the drawing room, Albert the cat on his lap; the last time he saw his older brother when they had parted vowing never to have anything more to do with each other (and he had secretly bought back the shares in that deal). Jeanne, his wife in Bléoville, hunched up with rheumatism, lying on a cane chaise longue in the garden, holding a paper fan (she died a week later), and Jeanne, in Bléoville, thirty-five years earlier, just after their wedding, when some bees had come in through the open window and were gathering pollen from the lilies in her bridal bouquet and the garland of orange blossom thrown at the foot of the bed. Jeanne had rushed into his arms, laughing, so he could protect her…

Then he was certain he could feel death approaching. He made a startled little gesture (as if he was trying to get through a door that was too narrow for him, saying, "No, please, after you") and a look of surprise appeared on his face. "Is this what it is?" he seemed to say. "So this is death, then?" The surprise on his face faded and he looked stern, solemn.

Maître Charboeuf wrote very quickly, "… When the Testator was handed the pen to affix his signature to this Last Will and Testament, he tried to lift his head, but could not, and immediately breathed his last, in the presence of the notary and the witnesses, who nevertheless, after reading the document, signed their names to render the document legal."

24

Jean-Marie, meanwhile, was starting to come round. He had drifted in and out of sleep for four days, semi-conscious and feverish. It was only today he felt a bit stronger. A doctor had been able to come the night before to change the dressing; his temperature had dropped. From where he was lying on the bed, he could see a large, dark kitchen, the white hat on an old woman who was sitting in the corner, beautifully shiny pots on the wall and a calendar depicting a chubby-cheeked French soldier hugging two young women from Alsace, a souvenir of the previous war. It was strange to see how the memories of the last war were still so alive in this house. Four pictures of men in uniform had pride of place: a small tricolour ribbon and a crêpe rosetta were pinned up in a corner; and next to him, to keep him from getting bored during the long hours of his convalescence, was a collection of the 1914-18 editions of L'Illustration bound in green and black.

He kept overhearing the same phrases in the conversations around him: " Verdun, Charleroi, the Marne…," "During the other war…," "When I was part of the occupying forces in Mulhouse…" They hardly spoke about the present war, their defeat. It was something they couldn't quite believe yet. Something that would only become a living, horrible reality a few months later, perhaps a few years later, perhaps not until these little boys with dirty faces that Jean-Marie could see peering over the wooden gate in front of the door grew into men. Wearing torn straw hats, their cheeks rosy or dark-skinned, holding long green sticks, frightened, curious, they stood on tip-toes to make themselves tall enough to see the wounded soldier inside, and when Jean-Marie moved they disappeared, like frogs jumping into the water. Sometimes the open gate let in a chicken, a ferocious old dog, an enormous turkey. Jean-Marie only saw his hosts at mealtimes. During the day, the old woman in the white hat tended to him. In the evening, two young women would sit with him. One was called Cécile, the other Madeleine. For a long time he thought they were sisters. But no. Cécile was the farmer's daughter and Madeleine was a foster-child. Both of them were attractive, not beautiful but fresh-faced. Cécile had a round red face and lively brown eyes; Madeleine was more delicate, a blonde with bright cheeks, smooth as satin and pink as apple blossom.

From the young women he learned what had happened that week. As they spoke about it, in their slightly harsh accent, all those terribly serious events lost their tragic element. "It's really sad," they would say and, "It's not very nice to see things like that"… "Oh, Monsieur! It's really upsetting!" He wondered if all the people here spoke like them, or whether it was something much deeper, rooted in the very souls of these girls, in their youth, some instinct that told them that wars end and invaders leave, that even when distorted, even when mutilated, life goes on. His own mother, knitting while the soup was cooking, would sigh and say, "Nineteen-fourteen? That's the year your father and I got married. We were miserable by the end of it, but very happy at the beginning." Even that bleak year was sweetened, bathed in the reflection of their love.

In the same way, he thought, the summer of 1940 would remain in the memories of these young women as the summer they were twenty, in spite of everything. He didn't want to think; thinking was worse than physical pain, but everything flooded back, everything went round and round in his head endlessly: being called back from leave on 15 May, those four days in Angers, no trains running any more, soldiers lying on wooden boards, being bitten by insects, then the air raids, the bombings, the battle of Rethel, the retreat, the battle of the Somme, another retreat, days when they had fled from city to city, without officers, without orders, without weapons, and finally the train compartment in flames. He tossed and turned, groaning. He didn't know if the fighting was real, or if it was all a confusing dream born of his thirst and high fever. Come on, it wasn't possible… There are some things that just aren't possible… Hadn't someone said something about Sédan? That was in 1870. He could picture it still: it was at the top of the page, in the history book with the reddish cloth cover. It was… He quietly pronounced the words: "Sédan, the defeat at Sédan… the disastrous battle of Sédan decided the outcome of the war…" On the wall above him the image on the calender, the smiling rosy-cheeked soldier with the two women from Alsace who were showing off their white stockings… Yes, all that was a dream, the past and he… he started trembling and said, "Thank you, it's nothing, thank you, please don't trouble yourself…" while they slipped a hot-water bottle under his heavy, stiff legs.