Turning automatically to look, Nanny blanched and let out a strangled cry: "Jesus, Blessed Virgin Mary!"

A sort of hoarse howl came from the mouth of Madame Péricand; she threw back her black veil, took a few steps towards Hubert, then slipped on the pavement and collapsed into the arms of the driver, who had rushed forward just in time to catch her.

It really was Hubert, a lock of hair in his eyes, skin as pink and golden as a nectarine, with no bags, no bicycle, no wounds, walking towards them with a huge grin on his face. "Hello, Mother, hello, Grandmother. How is everyone?"

"Is it you? Is it you? You're alive!" said Madame Craquant, laughing and crying at the same time. "Oh, my darling Hubert, I knew you couldn't really be dead! Dear God, you're too mischievous for that!"

Madame Péricand came round. "Hubert? Is it really you?" she stammered weakly.

Hubert was both pleased and embarrassed by this welcome. He took a few steps towards his mother and leaned over so she could kiss his cheeks (which she did, not knowing exactly what she was doing). Then he stood in front of her, shifting from one foot to the other just as he did when he failed Latin translation at school.

"Hubert," she sighed, and threw her arms round his neck, hanging on to him, showering him with kisses and tears. An emotional little crowd had gathered around them.

Hubert, who had no idea what to do, patted Madame Péricand's back, as if something had gone down the wrong way. "Weren't you expecting me?"

She shook her head.

"Were you going out?"

"My poor boy! We were going to the cathedral to say a Mass for your soul!"

Hubert was taken aback. "You're joking!"

"But where have you been? What have you been doing these past two months? We were told you'd been killed in Moulins."

"Well, you can see that wasn't true since I'm right here."

"But you did go and fight? Hubert, don't lie to me! Did you really have to go and do that, you little idiot. And what about your bicycle? Where's your bicycle?"

"Lost."

"Of course! This boy will be the death of me! Well, come on, speak, tell us, where were you?"

"I was trying to find you."

"You would have been better off not leaving us in the first place," said Madame Péricand harshly. Then, her voice breaking with emotion: "Your father will be so happy when he hears."

She burst into tears and started kissing him again. It was getting late now. But, even though she wiped her eyes, the tears kept falling. "Go on, then, go inside and get washed! Are you hungry?"

"No, I had a good lunch, thanks."

"Get a clean handkerchief, change your tie, wash your hands, make yourself decent, for goodness sake! Hurry up, and meet us at the cathedral."

"What? You're still going? Since I'm alive, wouldn't it be better to go and stuff ourselves at a restaurant instead?"

"Hubert!"

"What? Is it because I said 'stuff ourselves'?"

"No, but…"

It would be terrible to tell him, like this, in the middle of the street, she thought. She took his hand and pulled him inside the carriage. "My darling, there have been two great tragedies. First Grandpa, poor Grandpa died, and Philippe…"

He took the shock in an odd way. Two months earlier he would have burst into tears, big fat salty tears rolling down his pink cheeks. Now he went very pale and his face took on an expression she had never seen before: manly, almost harsh. "I don't much mind about Grandpa," he said after a long silence. "As for Philippe…"

"Hubert, are you mad?"

"No, I don't much mind and neither do you. He was old and ill. What would he have done in all this chaos?"

"Well, really!" Madame Craquant protested.

But he ignored her and continued talking to his mother. "As for Philippe… But first, are you really sure? It couldn't be like what happened with me?"

"We are sure, I'm afraid.

"Philippe…" His voice trembled and broke. "He wasn't of this world. Other people talk about heaven all the time but they only think about this world… Philippe, he came from God and he must be very happy now." He hid his face in his hands and remained motionless for a long time. Then they heard the cathedral bells ringing.

Madame Péricand touched her son's arm. "Shall we go?"

He nodded. They all got into the carriage, the servants following in another, and made their way to the cathedral. Hubert walked between his mother and grandmother. They remained on either side of him as he knelt on his prayer cushion. He had been recognised; he could hear whispering, muffled cries. Madame Craquant had not been wrong: the whole town was there. Everyone had a good view of the survivor who had come to give thanks to God for his deliverance on the very day his family had gathered to pray for their dead. On the whole, everyone was happy: the fact that a good lad like Hubert had managed to avoid German bullets flattered their sense of justice and their craving for miracles. All the mothers who had had no news since May (and there were so many of them!) felt hope beat within their breast. And it was impossible to feel resentful about it, as they might have been tempted to do-"Some people have all the luck"-when, sadly, poor Philippe (an excellent priest, absolutely everyone said so) had died.

And so, despite the solemnity of the surroundings, many women smiled at Hubert. He didn't see them. His mother's words had thrust him into a state of profound shock from which he still hadn't emerged. Philippe's death was tearing him apart. He had returned to that terrible state of mind he felt when France was falling, before the desperate and vain battle of Moulins. "If we were all the same," he thought, looking over the congregation, "if we were all pigs and dogs, then it might be understandable. But saints like Philippe, why are they sent here? If it's to save us, to make up for our sins, it's like offering a pearl in exchange for a bag of stones."

The people around him, his family, his friends, aroused a feeling of shame and rage within him. He had seen them on the road, them and people like them: he recalled the cars full of officers running away with their beautiful yellow trunks and their painted women, civil servants abandoning their posts, panic-stricken politicians dropping files of secret papers along the road, young girls, who had diligently wept the day the armistice was signed, being comforted in the arms of the Germans. "And to think that no one will know, that there will be such a conspiracy of lies that all this will be transformed into yet another glorious page in the history of France. We'll do everything we can to find acts of devotion and heroism for the official records. Good God! To see what I've seen! Closed doors where you knock in vain to get a glass of water and refugees who pillaged houses; everywhere, everywhere you look, chaos, cowardice, vanity and ignorance! What a wonderful race we are!"

Meanwhile, he was absently following the service, his heart so heavy and hard that it caused him physical pain. Several times he sighed gruffly, which worried his mother. She turned towards him, her eyes shining with tears through her black veil. "Are you in pain?" she whispered.

"No, Mother," he replied, looking at her so coldly that he reproached himself for it, but he couldn't help it.

He judged his family with bitterness and a painful harshness. His grievances whirled around in his mind in the form of brief, violent images, without him being able to express them clearly: his father calling the Republic "this decaying regime…" but that same evening, twenty-four places set for dinner at their apartment, with their most beautiful tablecloths, wonderful foie gras and expensive wines, all in honour of a former minister who might be re-elected and might therefore be useful to Monsieur Péricand (God, his mother's tight little mouth saying, "Oh, my dear Minister…"); their cars full to bursting with fine linen and silver caught up among the refugees, and his mother, pointing to women and children forced to walk with just a few bits of clothing wrapped up in a piece of cloth, saying, "Do you see how good our Lord Jesus is? Just think, we could be those unfortunate wretches!" Hypocrites, frauds!