37. The Book of the Dead

 

Hiro looked everywhere for the Book « the Child ». He returned muddy in the evening.

- Nothing! he answered to the dumb interrogation of the eyes of the old man.

The Master was worrying.

- You know, I looked carefully everywhere… I have slipped under each piece of furniture, passed the arm under everything… went through the rocks and the meadow. I have put about fifteen monks at work… I have dived into the frozen water of the river… I have…

- Yes, I know what you have done until the impossible… says gently the old man.

He kept silent a long moment. His old friend remained sitting close to him, confused not to have been able to go to the end of this mission.

Then, to occupy the silence of the space, he told what he had heard of the quarrel between Tong and Heidi in front of the temple. He was listening behind the low wall of the pavilion of the Master.

The old man sat up straight suddenly on his bed and Hiro precipitated to support his thin back. Then suddenly the body uncoiled as a spring. Hiro received all his weight in the arms.

- It is well, says the Master… My « action » continues.

-I do not understand what is well! … Heidi is taking the movement of the consciousness of Tong

- Not only of Tong, whispered the Master … But of all the monks.

- But it is awful! … A woman who directs and orders men!

- More than that, my friend, says the lying old man… She will become the Master of their soul.

- But…

- And Tong will become the Master of their body…

Hiro went away. He did not understand anything anymore. But he knew in his body the suffering of the old man and that also hurt him because he liked him so much!

- But it seems that he is happy with all this brothel!

The old man smiled.

« It is her which has the Book… It is well… The Gods of the Earth are with me! »

He sighed and he let his body really stretch. He felt his bones to crack and to bathe in the flesh which slackened.

« Now my suffering will have a sense! … How the Force of the Earth can rebound well! »

 

Tong did not discuss anymore. After the dinner, he came to join Heidi in the bedroom of the young White. They sat down near the bed, each one on an edge. She had lit the oil lamp near the pillow, where the head of the one lying on the bed should have been.

She gave him the Book.

- It is as if we did the reading for a patient in his bed, he says while smiling

She stared at him with her burning eyes.

- No, not of a patient… Of somebody dying! … Reads!

 

Tonio's wife

 

I did not have time to answer « Small Father » because I had to look for a quiet place before Paris to change me into a guy between two ages, all what there is of uncertain between the forty-five and the sixty, with the long and dirty blond hair on the neck, a thing like bleached with hydrogen peroxide. The wig thus makes me lose my dark brown hair, and from almost black I pass to the disgusting fair. Disgusting also the pallid skin of the guys who live only during the night and plot in the nightclubs for sailors. The continuation is the same with threadbare leather jacket and false shirt of cowboys who has never put the buttocks on a horse but who has the shoed boots, manner of kicking up a din when one arrives.

Naturally, these guys, since that does not have any guts in the belly, they need a fire to compensate. Without, they feel very naked.

You understand easily that I could not leave the inn dressed like that without a minimum of explanations; what would have screwed my peace up, because it is well for it that I have chosen this pad. Moreover, a friendly good piece of advice, by the way. Always look for a sympathetic place for you! Without recovery you are done for and above all do not hesitate! : hit direct and serious all what would come to bother you there. As you can see, I monopolize again the conversation. You have seen that I was a bit busy these last times, also a bit questioning about the Steph who still gives me trouble because, must not believe, this kid is a damned bloody scheming one and it is sometimes hard for me to track him.

As you have seen, I do my best, but there are always unhappy « people ».

I tell you that by the way, not to complain because I have understood since ages that sadness is only one manner of crying over oneself. I am only a little bit sorrow to have left you with yourself since such a long time. Hey! …You have not thrown the book? Ah! you reassure me. I will not have be cross with you, besides, because I am well placed to know how the Writers of the Family SHIN can be boring. I do not tell you the times where I have whirred while listening to the « edifying » reading of the Former Masters of this damned Family!

Therefore, I monopolize again the conversation and not ready to unload it on the grumpies now that WE will have some time to pass quiet together, the supply being placed and rolling all alone, or almost. I drive the BMW, an fantastic fast racing car by the way, and I believe well that I will need it at a time or another because, by dint of playing the fool, one always recovers a backfire and one must call the firemen quickly made not to be roasted. Me, as I am a quiet super guy, I prefer to beat it and take distance. Like that I look at the fire from far and MOREOVER, I appreciate the show. To be an actor and spectator: it's fantastic!

You have understood, I believe, serious as I know you, very attentive on the vicissitudes of a licensed killer paying an alarming professional tax so much so that I think of stopping this job because I cannot find my way… that to go to take the temperature on José's side I had to take a minimum of precautions after the two fights that I have given.

Like to park the heap three hundred meters further, the malicious muzzle in the direction of the way and the keys remaining on the contact.

Then only remains to play the fool, as usual, what will not change me much, I hear you from here. As I am the sympathetic super guy and that I like you well, I tip you off pronto, I will play the supervisory guy of the « trade union » which is grieved by the din which is there. Businesses are businesses and do not like this kind of advertisement which makes flee the customer who wants to go off the rails, of course! , and it is really his right, you agree, but in peace.

Well, the bar is crowed… guys around the place who look like to be the service of order of the house. Still hundred meters… Largely sufficient to place the two soft rubber balls against the cheeks, with the small whistle underneath to make the voice muted and lisping. I go between the five or six guys on the pavement with hustling the last one, just to show that it is not me who has to eclipse the shoulders.

- Hey, you!

Just to answer him in his home-made vocabulary, the one that he knows the best because the training started from the earliest age, I rub his belly with mine, so that he feels direct the metal thing that I have in the belt. The guy, in spite of his lice in his disgusting mop which runs on his shoulders has understood immediately that it is not a fly agaric and the glance which accompanies it lets him speechless.

Thus, without a superfluous word, look how it is easy, I have free entry, plus the advertisement at the bar with the small light which lights when the guy presses on the bell beside him as soon as I have a foot in the place. Thus, there is a stool which is released opposite me and the chick of Tonio's guy who clears dirty glasses and bottles with a blow of cloth to celebrate my arrival.

Then, there is the woman who asks me straight what « I wish » without me having to type on the counter to make to know that I exist.

- You are Tonio's mistress?

The introduction makes her frown and she makes a signal to two guys sitting in the bottom of room which rise with the slowness of those who like to think they are important. One of the guys of the entry throws a gobbledegook to those remained on the pavement.

I see all this mess in the mirror which finishes the bar, the fear in the eyes of the woman, the vacuum which is done on the stools around. In short, of very normal to which I am so accustomed that it does not make me frowned anymore.

It is thus as a blasé guy that I make turn the screw of the stool with a blow of heel on the metal bar ending the low part of the bar, slaps the Tonio’s chick on the way with sufficient force to send her going flying in her bottles, faces the guys of the bottom who have just the arse separated from the chair and I shoot. Direct. A gun cobra in instinctive shooting, that much is clear.

Be astonished afterwards, curious as I know you, than silence succeeds the noise unless it is the noise which manufactures the silence, I do not know very well because I must acknowledge you that I have never really concentrated myself seriously on the problem. What is sure, it is that the two guys do not remain standing up, which would not be easy, acknowledge it with me, with each one a kneecap in less. The surprise is always where it is less awaited. The door is emptied and fresh air comes to erase this prickly odor of powder.

- Hey, I have asked you a question, I believe? I says to the woman while putting the malicious muzzle of the gun well in the axis of her tits.

- Yes… she can hardly articulate, because whiter than this white, you do not find guy!

- So! … Why not to say it immediately!

- I have… I have been afraid? …

- And now, you are anymore scared ? I said to her, nice, by raising the hammer with the inch.

- Yes…

- So, tell me, babe, where is the difference now?

- I…

- Well! You do not know!. Because you are a bitch and that you cannot be differently because you are the plump of an idiot like Tonio.

- Yes…

- Well! You start to understand: to always say yes…

- Yes.

- I do not ask you so much! … tape recorder with repetition, you wouldn’t be sometimes?

- I… Do not know…

- Good, starts to tell your pals to clear out the two shitty who lose their blood and explains me a little what occurs here… WE question ourselves, you understand?

Me which always believe to be super clear, I am always flabbergasted in front of the eyes astonished and opened like portholes of ship in distress of which nobody has succeeded in receiving the S.O.S…

- NOOOOOOOOO… It is not possible these stupid bitches! … Hey, you will need a drawing calling card! I however believe to have shown you with the two guys that are drawing on the floor and who tighten the teeth not to howl with a knee in less… You want another proof to know WHO sends me?

- I… Sorry, I…

- Don’t worry! I am like that, I flies off the handle easily, but I am a good sort really… Well, as you have understood, the TRADE UNION starts to be hacked off.

- The Trade union! … but of what, my God?

- Leaves the Father, the Son and the remainder where they are… Saint Michel the Archangel, it is me for the moment! …

- I… What do you want? …

- Come on, I thought that you had understood that ONE finds too noisy this brothel… The businesses suffer from it, as THEY say.

- But… We are for nothing in that… Attacked twice in two days!

- Because of course, you do not know why?

- Of course not!

- Nor your man?

- Him! … It is quite simple, he did not understand yet that he has lost an eye…

- Curious!

- What! … Curious? … YOU, you can say to us what it is about ?

- We believe… At least, THEY believe and you know, kid, that when THEY believe, you must understand that THEY are certain…

- Ah yes! … And well I would like to know of what?

- Well, you see, you play the bitch and you are wrong…

- Really?

- Yes, you see bitch, you should ask you why WE come to interview you directly instead of going to see TARIN or ZAIMI… You understand?

Here, I have just touched her in the crotch seing how she stiffens. From dangerous smooth talker and killer, I have just passed straight in the class of the guys « who know » and so there, the murder supposes other assets.

- I do not understand…

- You will no longer be in the know when in two days it will come up in the newspapers, and IN FRONT PAGE, please! that it is here that the Kid STEPHANE COLA was blow away.

- But he did not receive bullets! … It is a coal bag which has fallen on him… What are you telling ?

- Are you thick, or what? … Bullets in the bide or cement bag in the gums, it is same difference… The important thing is to know how the journalists knew that the ORDER left from here … Understand ? … So, you do not have really anything to tell me before we start the cleaning ?

-The… Cleaning… but…

- Because you do not believe that one will leave the cops and the rest put their too long nose in the BUSINESSES… No. Order of the bigwigs.

- But…

- As you say « BUT »; there are thus those who know and which facilitate the accounts cleansing and the others, understand ?

- I…

- Don’t speak like that, you will finish to make me feel giddy. Tone it down and tell US what the kid had discovered about the tricks of Tonio, Tarin and Zaïmi so that one kills him ?

- I cannot! … I must see the others.

- Pointless… You have not understood the rules of the game… Why I am here… Therefore, bye my honey… Say hello to Tonio… If it is as idiot as you, you will again make the pair in the same bed.

Here, she sees in my eyes, because at these times there is a bloody turbo with the intuition, that I will press on the trigger. She is right, between us. I would not like to disappoint you, you all who have written to me to invite me to eat then, perhaps if the room temperature permitting… but a bluff functions only when in front of one knows in an absolutely unquestionable way that you will hold the promise.

And if you forgot it, I remind to you that I roll for someone called Steph, which one has pinched the life at twelve years.

Perhaps her, the idiot, she does not have education, but she knew suddenly that her death was going to spout out with short muzzle in front of her.

- Tonio is for nothing!

- In the death of the kid or just the trick ?

- The trick… It is the José who treated direct with Tarin… I swear you!

- And for the death?

- He… I swear you! , he cannot hide me anything! … It is not him… I swear you. He says that he did not know. It is the newspaper of the following day which taught him the death of the kid… He…

- He?

- I do not know anymore! … anymore…

Who left the first? « BITCH! » or the shot? Tonio’s woman got badly. He found the means of shooting her with the gun 45 held with two hands in the most beautiful version of the Yank cops .

« Jerk! »

I have just to draw him like a duck! … Stupidity! … And then the instinct has played right away when I have pressed on the trigger. I have made exploded the hand and the fire fell in the pad.

I still need the José. He was there to listen the conversation in this bar which had discretely depopulate. He, he was in the back room and he did not run away like the others. Not to my interest of not having checked. Now, I have a chick whose blood leaves by the blouse and a jerk who does not know what to do with his paw covered in blood and who thinks that it is an error of shooting and that I will now start to work serious; must see his peepers of kid! … In front of death, it is at each time the same hassle: oozing fear. Of course! the smashed up guys, it is always the others!… Then, one day of bad luck…

- Go away!

And I do not care of him to jump over the bar; perhaps there has still something to do for her. You understand, she has not tell me everything yet! It is not nice with this top of the body removed by the armor-plated ball. Not a lot of thing to do and she does not try to keep the peepers open on the life. All is closed one day and she knows that it is the punchline of the spectacle for her. After this closing of curtain, she will not be on the scene of the future representation.

And she will not be either in the room and she knows.

It is idiot. If she had received a slug from me, she would have chosen it… And then must a lazy-vicious-liar-timorous-coward like a José to draw in the corners and to receive the salvo! Shit. Not nice… And go ahead, my beautiful… You had had a not lovely life. Listen, what I can do for you apart from supporting your head so that you do not die like a floorcloth on the tiling and pressing on a point of anesthesia of acupuncture, manner of leaving without a grin of suffering. You know, my beautiful, the manner of leaving the life counts a lot. It is not now that I will hold you the spittoon with the karma, you have no longer the time… But I still try… In case where you would not have been too bitch.

Ok, my old woman, go ahead gently… breathes… I support you, do not make useless efforts… thinks of you, at least once! … I undertake the remainder… it is no longer hurting you, it is well. If you smile it is still better… breathes gently… gently. No, do not open the eyes on the world… go towards the other… no problem,… no fear… I accompany you… breathes… gently…

- Not TONIO… Swear…

Good-bye my beautiful. You allow that it is me which closes your eyes? Go… You see, the sirens which scratch the night, it is for you, but do not worry this time: they will not be able to go anymore where you are now. Do not worry for YOUR Tonio… I will save his life… Your last word saved him… unless it is you. I believe that it is you, go…don’t be afraid. You still have for three days to look for the way. I cannot be there. I hope that somebody KNOWS close to you.

He left by the scale on the roofs like Marc Antoine had shown him. The very close sirens hurt his ears. He lies down on a terrace which was on the last floor of a building, he did not know which one. He was lying on the back, looking at some stars which curled in the wind when the clouds opened. It was always thus with him when a life left in such an useless way. There were some people who had been born to die and they do all for that. For others, it was « my heart » at a curious place sometimes. Like her, he had felt her good housewife and she loves her Tonio. What a shame!

 

Preparation of the interrogation

 

Angel breathed gently, forcing the breath in the belly so that it involves the thought which hurt him. He hid always then, as a big cat which licks its wounds in the deepest of the forest and which returns one day, as if nothing had occurred because there are no other ways to live dignified.

How time passes. Two hours in the morning. A good hour for a visit at the hospital. Don’t you think? Nothing better than to be out the schedules billed to have peace. Nobody to ask you what you loaf about. If you are there, at this incongruous hour for the common of mortals, it is that you have a regular thing. Who could think that in these curious times you can work overtime for the pleasure.

Therefore, suffice to pick up the BMW which mopes on the pavement with its five bloody papers behind the windshield wiper.

At this hour, it is really calm in the streets of Paname. A true pleasure of driver. And then, there is place on the carpark. By reflex pro, I seek a spot not too near to a reverberator. I am the kind of guy which prefers the shade to the full light. It is as the rear entrances. I like. Moreover, astonishing as they are so little guarded. And then, in the vicinity, one finds the buildings of service… laundries… etc… etc… Forgive, my uncertainties of description, but I did not commit myself to describe you an hospital.

Therefore, firstly, a white blouse of doctor. Secondly, three doors further, it is the gear. The thing that one puts in his ears to listen to a small something in the body of the patients, and that one leaves dangle around his neck all the whole blessed day, that made pro…

Very serious. Better than an identity card. Besides, between us, who would decorate himself so idiot? If he was not obliged. And in this bloody world who flowers, there is only the job which « obliges ».

Therefore, to tell you straight, without wasting time to describe you my ruses of Sioux to crawl in the corridors, my hangings to the chandeliers in order to go unnoticed, my lungs flattened in the broom cupboards… that I go direct to the room of the brave Tonio who kips quietly. Everything’s fine for the peace of our friendly discussion.

As I am the serious guy who never wants to disturb, especially the kipping overloaded personnel, to avoid Tonio a too great demonstration of joy while seeing me, with the risk to awake the close rooms, I started to pull a package of surgical cotton between his teeth. He sleeps the open mouth! I benefitted from it. You would have done the same, wouldn’t you? Normal.

And then I help him to maintain correct his vocal cords instead of botching them to howl his joy at full speed. Must know to be nice in the life. It is besides what I try to explain you at each bend. You had realized it, of course? Must never leave the guys in states of exaggeration. They lose energy by it. For example, since we are in an hospital, you know of course that too much joy harms the heart, the Shen in particular; too many concerns harms the liver; too much thought harms the spleen; too much anger harms… Eh! you knew it, didn't you? I am sure that has belonged to your education. Because the thing is really important for the harmonious maintenance of the structure. And as one knows, the education, it is made to develop the harmony, isn't it true?

Therefore, me… yes, MEEE… as a guy perfectly educated by a qualified teacher, who has never bugged me more than three times instead of one, I take concern of the guy Tonio as a responsible guy who I am. I prevent a sudden overflow of energy to him which would be very prejudicial for his health. I know in advance the HUGE pleasure that he will have when he sees my mug above him after I will have shaken his ribs a little, just to make him go out of his idiotic dream where he is running after a chick in miniskirt, on the ring road of Paname. Must stop

urgently this type of overflow! He could peg out, the guy, of these dreams! Considering his arteries, the four packets of ciggies per day, the bottle of pastis and even without making the count of the grub absorbed.

I talk to you. I talk to you. Must say that takes time to pull this wadding with a tweezers of surgeon without touching the teeth which jump at each snore. I had said to you that he snores?

If that can reassure you on his health, he is not anymore snoring. Would rather be wondering how he will make to breathe, considering the first quality grip metal that I have just unloaded on his nose. And then as it is necessary to know to benefit from the material of these hospitals, I use the thin straps on each side of the bed to attach his wrists and his ankles to the metal posts.

You can see that I am a serious boy. I always prepare my job. Must not believe « Small Father ». Not always. I can tell you that I find that on my subject, he adds things as by pleasure. I believe, a manner of making believe that I am an original. A manner of guy to listen only with one ear… that of which besides, you would be right, it is me who says it personal, if you would like to live quiet. Here, I am the first to recognize that I am a bloody shit-stirrer.

I talk to you. I talk to you. But, you know, unless being sadistic, it is not pleasant to see what passes in the eyes of a guy as Tonio when he is awaking. At least when it is a guy like me which is the orchestrator.

You know, there are guys, whom besides you can also put as female in order not to be sectarian, who dream of revenge, hardness, manner of settling up in the strong way.

In a dream, it is perfect. But to lend a hand, it is another thing. You are then in front of the most complete vulnerability. Not beautiful. Even when in front of, it is a triple bastard.

If you take pleasure to his anguishes, it is that you also, you are beautiful one. Bastard.

But if sometimes you do not know to use the means which are given to you, you are a least that nothing in front of God. One something which is not yet close enjoying HIM. Because you do not know yet that there are prices to pay. Continue to dream your life as you are still doing it! … But the flood guaranteed at death’s door!

But if you know to hit direct, without letting the things go towards an absolute degradation, then, you will not need to do what I do. At present. But, remember, I roll for Stéphane Cola. A kid who did not know how to do. Because he could not say NO. And as he did not profit from a benevolent glance, he did it for himself, his dream. In technicolor three dimensions. Big screen. He died about it. And me, I must go up the slope. For him.

Do not believe that I am unhappy about it. There are prices to pay. I would not like to be boring.

But you start to know me. At least, a little bit. In all peace of spirit, I could say to you that if I am buddy with God, it is that I have always paid what I owe. Never try to prevaricate. I have never be profitable for the lawyers. We still have a little time to pass. The stories of God the father, the son, the holy spirit and all the family, you do not give a fuck at three in the morning. How I understand you! Good, of what we could talk. Of the decoration of the room, for example. Of his cordial, accessible, filled with smoothness nature, … While I question Tonio.

Ah! … You prefer? But, it had to be said! And me who speaks for nothing not to worry you by the management of the job. Me, who thinks that you prefer that I do not bother you with the difficult sides of the existence of killer.

Me who… And who boob once more. You thus want ? And well, you are in good health! But, believe well that I will be the last to reproach it to you. You know how I love tonic people. With them, one can do something. Nothing to see with all these guys and these chicks who spend their time to be caught in pity, i.e. to cry over them, to complain, to bring their sadness all the time, to trail it behind, to leave an oily furrow to be quite certain that ONE notices them. But with you, it is a piece of cake! Terrific, guys! Ah, like that, one would like to take part a little more actively in the discussion with the guy Tonio.

OK. No problem. One will keep company together.

But as you have taken a little delay, I must put you in the picture. So, there is a guy at the hospital because he has had a dart steel in the right eye. You will say, with very right reason, to bad for him, because must be idiot for still playing with these things. At his age! … Ok for me on all the line. Nothing to erase.

This guy, lying on the back, snores like a happy one who dreams of her chick after whom he runs in the corridors of the basement of his building of slum area, and that under the supports of his buddies who make circle of encouragement and prison for the woman, manner of being certain that she will not escape while calling for « Help! ». Very normal, you will agree on it with me. I hope.

There is a guy who passes the door of the place without preventing. But also very normal. In this kind of establishment, it is necessary to know to penetrate without noise to check if « all is well ». That this guy ties the wrists and the ankles. Very normal. It is really necessary to prevent the patients from hurting themselves. The thin straps on the metal spots of the bed were not invented for anything, of course.

That the guy puts a package of cotton in his mouth, that! it is perhaps not normal. And that becomes frankly abnormal when the guy, moreover! he blocks the hooter with a grip.

But the interest of the thing, is that, when the lying guy awakes, perhaps a little with a jump! , he has immediately understood that something abnormal was there, HERE and NOW, as ONE would say to him nicely in an asian monastery of my knowledge. And the principle of this truth becomes then obvious for everyone.

The guy, it is not in the past nor in the future that he can breathe. It is now. Here. In the present. You see that, whatever are the circumstances, one never should miss enriching the comprehension of a guy on the supreme principles of the Truth, these principles that he hurries to forget as soon as he finds himself in a « normal » situation.

Therefore, now, you are there?

Still a word. Presently I said to you that it passed funny distressing things in his eyes, when he saw my mug leaning on his face. Not completely right. Besides you had rectified all alone, attentive as I know you. Thus, as the house does not like the complaints, I make it clear to you once again, remake clear to you…well ! I recall you straight, that since an idiot guy in my kind has pinched an eye from him, from Tonio, he has now only the possibility of showing his interrogations by the SINGLE port-hole which remains to him.

Now, and HERE, data being posed, I can only to politely turn me towards you to solicit your advices since you ardently wish to take part in the action. Therefore, in first question, I would like to know what you would do to Tonio, to invite him to answer your questions. Because I recall you, if you are not enough concerned with French, that the word « interrogation » covers a large extent of human discussion which is reduced to the simple principle, because it is always necessary to return to simplicity and to the basic nature, what do I say ? … that it is about a phenomenon of questions and answers.

Of course, it is YOU who ask questions. The only method which is serious.

So ? I am waiting. The question will be noted about five. As I am not bastard, and that it appears necessary to open to you horizons too obstructed by the job at the office with the department head who wants to quarrel with you, I specify you: on the one hand, that the guy Tonio, he has a package of cotton between the teeth, which is an unquestionable handicap to talk.

 

Secondly, that all the set-up of the tied guy, of the grips and… good, is not necessary nevertheless that I remake you the story! is used for something in my own story. Since you have already noticed, since time that we know each other! , that I never do anything for nothing. Of course! lazy as I am. Would miss only that! I have many faults and you have already perceived a good number, not to say a great number. But I do not have that one yet.

Therefore, what are WE going to do ? Here is the question.

You will notice that contrary to a guy like Krisnamurti, me, I do not ask you an IMPOSSIBLE question. At least, I believe. Although that the one of the guy hanging by the mouth above the chasm and the other guy who asks the first guy without realizing, the guy, that the other is in an annoying posture and that the guy…. Perhaps ? In case. Please! Hurry up. You do not realize! The Tonio, must retain his breathing while waiting! It is soon a stiff whom YOU will interview.

I wait. Yes, I know… Not your fault… The express mail service! I said it well to you. Good, without joking. There is urgency. The Tonio, he turns into bright red.

But! You have not prepared your questions in advance?

Ah! … finally… Here is one reckless who raises the finger. Go, my small, drive out your timidity. Speak calmly? Articulate distinctly so that one can hear you at the end of the room. After these preambules, if you still have the desire to speak, it is that your destiny is the one of a arse-licker.

Because « after », in all peace of spirit, you must have forgotten the brilliant idea which crossed so suddenly your brain. What pushed you to intervene. « TO INTERVENE ».

Please, don’t be stupid. Do not intervene. You will see how right away, there would be nobody to make you blackmail. « If you leave me, I commit suicide… » Ok! I settle and I look at. Come on, hurry up. I have a date in one hour. So? … Since I leave you. Moreover, there is nothing else to do with somebody who dares to send you such a blackmail. Moreover, be convinced of a thing: the blackmail exists only in the certainty of its action. Therefore, one handles you at full speed. It is that the love, it seems.

If ONE knows that you will answer adequately the threat, i.e. to go away because in no case you could continue to live with a person who tries to handle you in such an unpleasant way, and well, there would be no more blackmail.

I hope that you have understood a small something on the maintenance of the structure since you walk with me?

Now, HERE, Tonio, he turns into white. Is necessary to make something! What? There is urgency! You do not realize guy! You are unconscious or what? Ah, I wonder what has happened to me to be with such a guy! Idiot, I was to be. Not port-holes that I had in front of the eyes. Palisades!

Calm, guy! Are you idiot, or what? You will not be agitated because one shouted « URGENCY » to you. If you take time to better look at, you will see that THE ONE who recalls you YOUR obligations is the same one which has created havoc… it is the same one the manipulation will always work. There are no two ways about it. Because it takes support on a constant principle of the thought and that it is through it that the question arises. You understand ? You know, the splendid play of the thought, it is to create problems to convince you then that it is the only one able to solve them. You realize how you are well served!

Therefore, guy, without wanting to order you, you stay MOTIONLESS.

That the Tonio manages all alone. Moreover, he has understood very well. With his good eye, with the assistance of his jaw, and also of his ears which he tries to stir up like an elephant, HE wishes to tell me… surely that he agrees to answer my questions. Not idiot, the guy. He has quickly understood the rules of the game.

So, since you did not answer correct my first question, here is another in correction:

And NOW, HERE, what do you make?

Good, I let you one moment. I go to the john. It is the advertising on telly. There is five minutes before the resumption of the film. It is besides this thing which makes the difference with the cinema. There, you have the advertising BEFORE. Never DURING. Nor AFTER.

Come on, guys, a play that I propose to you. If you decide in your sector, the street would be enough, to switch off your receivers during the advertising and not to relight them before the following day, at least on this channel? … Do the AUDIENCE RATINGS, you know?

I will piss. You look after Tonio in my absence?

 

 

Interrogation

 

Good, where are we? He keels over with his single eye, the Tonio. Normal. He cannot with both eyes. Ah! you have written your desires of interrogations on the paper that you have placed on the bedside table. Let me see.

But no! Motionless, I have said to you. Stay motionless! Gad! If you pull out all the stops from the first good will of the guy, you will again make you be browned in the pan with small onions. What do you thus believe? That the guy he releases his structure so quickly. The opposition, he has planned. Will catch up very quickly. As long as he is not convinced that his problem is not yours, he will always start again.

MOTIONLESS! … shit, is it clear? Hey! Have you only once wondered whether you were REALLY the guard of your brother? If he becomes convinced that it will be necessary, with you, that he looks after himself all alone, you will have finished once for all with a whole filth of manipulation.

No more affected, you will be. Even if this thing makes you feel sad, because it is not merry to realize that one must defend oneself. You will not rely on him anymore. But you will not say it to him. Because if you send him packing, there will be always another one to replace him.

You see well that I am not so killer than that! I do not invite you to screw everything up. A step towards the East is worth a step towards the West. No need to run, even on your two legs. There is no where to go. So, stay there, HERE and NOW. EVERYTHING will be said to you, there.

And the Tonio, he is realizing the thing. On the bad side of the thing, he is, you say. And so? YOU, on which side are you. Tell me a little? The sorrow, it is where. Thus, do not bug with false humane considerations.

Here we are. NOW, it is time to remove his grips of his nose, at Tonio. His respiration he will be able to have. Now.

Then, once he will have filled his lungs well, while regretting to smoke for the first time of his life, because he would have liked to take more air, the Tonio… and thus, HERE, you put back the grips to him. Normal, since you are not the guard of your brother.

And the guy, you see it well, he is thinking that the rules of the game have changed. Not prepared for, he was. You thus will be able to REALLY talk. Instead of telling you repetitions prepared thousand times. After this thing, possible to enter in real communication. Do not believe! The guy, he will not hold it against you. Your best buddy he will become. If it is your chick, better it will be. Must astonish, guy. Do not believe! The other, he is bored as much as you in these repetitions, this old story always and always on the tape recorder. But the hassle, it is that one does not see how to stop the juice of this machine. Is really necessary to do it, however, one day. And the thing is always turning out, HERE and NOW. No possible forecast. Otherwise, it is still a repetition which has turned in the brain. As a chess player who planes ten go in advance. Exit thus the preparation.

The Tonio, do you say? You can now remove the grips of his nose, the same with the package of cotton in the teeth. He will not shout. You can also continue, if you wish to check the experiment, to remove his ties. HE will not run away.

Another game that you play. He knows. He knows that you are not anymore his guard; what has been repeated to you always and always in an education of shit which wants you static to be certain to kill you in each bend if IT estimates that you have just exceeded the yellow line.

And you will not have to make the questions. The answers will come all alone. Because he knows, the guy, why you are there. No more the need to play the astonished ones, those for which it is necessary to repeat ten times to be about certain that information has passed.

Do not worry you. If you have really a face of idiot in front of you. A gob to not understand what you tell, thus! be certain that this one, on the contrary, he knows very well what you say to him. The age and the sex do nothing there.

The manipulation, it is in the reptilian brain. The installation, takes its support in the limbic brain. But if you play on that one to try to make you understand, you are killed in advance, guy. On the reptilian you must walk. And believe me… this one, it understands quickly. By instinct. The rest, it is padding. Do not bother you. Believe me, guy. Me, I have nearly to kick the bucket not to have understood this thing rather early. It is besides what, I believe, has arrived at Steph.

And if we come back to Tonio who looks at us curiously while we talk between friends. Must understand him. He does not have all the night to lose!

- It is not me which killed the kid! … Sworn… Me, I made him a dirty trick, I recognize it. But I did not want that goes until there! It is this idiot of Nervi. Gay, he was. Completely. ME, I only wanted to scare the living daylights out of him so that he ceases to disturb us by warning the guys that we were going to rob them. But this Nervi, he saw red when the kid has had the naked buttocks. He shagged him straight. And the cries of the kid, that excited him. I tried to stop him, but he was as strong as a horse. He has slapped me on the corner and I found myself in the brook. When I stood up, he had shagged him… It is after that I knew that he had the AIDS… An accident, I swear you! … I did not want!

- And TARIN, the legal adviser of Zaïmi, what does he come to do in the trick ?

- I do not really know… I believe that the owner was afraid of what the kid knew too much about our business. He wanted to force him to be quiet. Once for all, he said… Me, I did not agree. Not bad kid, he was. A little too emotive. He took everything with serious… You understand me? … Me, I am for nothing in the death of the kid, sworn… Moreover, I went away when they intercepted him.

- When?

- And well, the night that he died, of course! … You did not know? … But yes, you knew. You would not have come to chase after me here, otherwise! …

- Naturally!

- Me, I was with them this night. They said that the kid would agree to talk with me, if I were with his sis… Then, one has made like every night, around two in the morning… The sis sent small stones in the windows of his room. He understood. He came to open the door of the building without lighting not to awake the building. The sis could then go to bed without her folks knew that she had dislodged.

- When he has opened and that he saw you with his sister… How did that occur?

- He looked astonished… He wanted to close again the door, to shout… to awake the district. He said… But it is her sis which has flanelled him. It should be seen how! … « Timorous, third-rate » she said while laughing at his face… Just good to be fuck up, she added… You think! Me, in all this scene of family! I had come to excuse me, apparently. To explain him that I had not wanted that it goes so far. That I was overflowed by the Nervi…. That I regretted. What! … And her who nastily made fun of him! …

- And him

- He listened. He looked at the toe of his slippers… In his dressing gown, he really looked like the kid who he was… You cannot know! … To see him there, like that! I was sorry for him… I do not know how to say I had the impression to be very far from what had occurred between us. Hold! … even as nothing had happened! … I swear to God! And I can say to you that hurt me to see his sis making fun of him like that… A true bitch, this one! … You can believe my word. I know a lot in bastard. I saw many of them passing in my bitch of life, but like her… There are some, but not too many. You realize her own bro who went to no end of trouble for helping her to go out of the shit in which she was with José…

- And?

- He agreed… He opened widely the door… He did not shout. The sis went to bed … WE… and well, we looked ourselves in the eyes one moment… He, on the step of the door of the building… Me, in the middle of the pavement… You cannot know what occurs at this time. It is like a vacuum… I do not know… I said to you presently that I was at light years from our businesses. It is that… Very far… Then I stretched my hand out to him… Without lie!. sincerely… And…

- And?

- It is when he came towards me holding out his hand and then… as a small smile which floated on his lips. You know, it was odd, this small kid, because he was not tall for his age! Ah no, that! … and who comes as a man who facing you. And this smile! … I am sure that it was one. I cannot say, but since I am on this bed of hospital, it is this smile which does not leave. Always in front of my eyes, it is…

- And? What it occurred then?

- I would rather like to forget it, you know. It is true a dirty trick… It is when he was in the middle of the pavement,… our hands were going to be touched… Really… I swear you! , it was as if I felt already the heat of his hand in my hand…Yes, I know, it is what you want to know… Come on, I knew it as soon as you entered my boozer. There are messages which do not mislead… I know… Well, it is hard, especially after what I have just told you… Listen to me! Please… It is necessary that I talk BEFORE. AFTERWARDS, I will not be able anymore. And then, you would not believe me anymore… It is idiot. But it is the truth. The true one… I… I had forgotten why I have to lead him to go out of the building. Swear! … I did not know at this time there! Believe me! …

- Yes, I believe…

- It is at this time there that THEY left the corner. HE has belted the kid. The other, he has stuck an adhesive plaster on his lips. You cannot know! … The glance that he threw to me! … You cannot. He did not even defend himself! …

- Who, THEY; and who, HE?

- It is José and a Nervi… A killer, if you want! … It is José who has jumped on the kid… And then there is the car which came quickly. It waited at 20 meters, fires switched off… THEY have taken the kid away at the back… I did not want! … I swear you… Moreover, they left without me. I did not want to follow them.

- Two questions still.

- Oh, you know… I do not have an illusion. I know that you are not an ordinary cop… For the cleaning, you came, didn’t you? … Ok, this kind of thing, it is immediately felt… One does not arrive veteran like me without being very intuitive.

- Then, it is four questions that I have to ask you. No problems? The first: the sister, did she know?

- Of course! A bitch, I said to you! … There is only her José who counts. For him, she would cut the throat of father and mother… So, you think well that she didn’t care of what we were going to do of her bro… « Good riddance !» she has said… He became boring these last times, it seems.

- Precisely… José? HE seems to have an important place in the ring… Me, I believed that he worked for you.

- Yes… Before, he was one of my touts for the cars, breakages possible… Never for the fight because he is a small nature. Girls, that, yes… But it is malicious which has ideas. He often talked to… to the guy who represents the owner, because you know it, the owner, it is not me… Me, it is just the boozer, the counters of the girls, the drills, the teams of handbags, the small break-ins on the occasion…

- Tarin, his name is… Paul Tarin.

- Ah! you also know that… Therefore, the José, he spoke a lot with Tarin. Nebulous ideas which made us laughing… Then, you know as it is. One listens, one listens, one laughs and at the end one ends up thinking that really, some tricks were perhaps not so stupid. You understand ?… Then, Tarin and José have started to speak a lot in the back room. Me, I was not invited… But the girl Cola, her, she was there…

When I let myself thinking, I say to myself that it has just been six months since these low masses have started in my back and that… but perhaps it is not true… how to say? The Stéphane, he has not always been boring. At the beginning, when he came to fetch his sister to bring her back home, he was rather funny to play the freed ones who know what « the men » are. You see? … Then, it deteriorated. We have had hassles… and one realized that it was the Stéphane… And you see, the more I think of it, the more I find curious that he had changed like that, just at this period of the low masses…

- My third question: WHO warned you of my arrival at the bar?

- The girl Cola, of course! You went at her home with a card of special cop… She was not there. But the parents had a good laugh about it in all the district. Too right! A « special from the Elysée » who came to deal with them! … Of course! She had made us the description and then warned to be careful. If the official investigation could be channeled… There are people in the street who knows for Colas and the José’s band. Suffices that one of them talk wrong and it is the hassles… And then, she was anxious, the girl Cola … There are things which come up to me while talking… For example, she said that you must be a funny guy, considering the funny questions that you ask… Lastly, it is not completely that; she rather said that she was astonished that you do not ask a lot of questions, precisely. Thus, like that, she did the remark that you were perhaps better tipped off than other cops. And that it was curious that the old mummy which lives at the Elysée, he needed to send one of his sleuths for a kid whose « accident » was thought easy of as a suicide… She told that the girl Cola … And then, if that can interest you, at the point where I am, and I will tell you that I would be quite happy that this kid has a bleeding revenge… that she was VERY in a bit of a mess, the girl. And José too. And then, coincidence? The Tarin, he turned up one hour later. And I had seen that José was going to phone…

He had not left besides for a long time when you arrived with the storm that you know… I do not want to throw you congratulations, but the dart, I did not see it coming… Just saw these idiots who came in my line of sight… Enough ! Past. Remain only that… You will kill me, eh? You came for that. I know. An old fox like me knows when the hunter is at each end of its burrow and will send the beech marten… I will say to you. Without joking. What will bug me the more, it is to be killed by a guy who is not bigger than an ace of spades. And with naked hands, on top of that! …I have of course heard how you have bumped off these three jerks. It is not obviously full of nasty tricks! You are with super great hulk of guys all your life to make your thing… You get a right mouthful, you get, you fight… and then, it is a featherweight which comes to kill you… and without insulting you, moreover! … Hey! you could not force you a little. I do not want to slander, you do not make local color. I have the feeling that you bring me a death of jerk, of middle-class what! Force yourself a little, special guy. You have well seing Gabin in the movies! … Come on! … Give me my cues for the last ciggy… Please.

- My last question.

- Go ahead guy.

- WHO drove the car?

- Tarin.

- Well, well, well! I say.

- You know, that it has given me a nasty shock to learn the following day that the kid had been killed… And I can say it that the José, he was not well in his shoes, either… The walls, that they all hug, the following days.

He closed his eye a long moment. I leave him his silence. The time of a ciggy. Then he looked at me straight.

- Go ahead… now. I am ready.

- No, you have a reprieve… Your shepherdess has got you out of trouble… She loved you.

I rise and without looking at him I go to the door. When I open it, he knows that I leave.

- You do not let me in favorable position, you know… I am not certain that you make me a gift, guy.

There is mist in his eye.

 

***********************

 

 

-True death is not that of the body. Says Heidi.

Tong is interrogative.

-Do you have the Book of the Dead? asks the young woman.

- It must be in the library of the monastery.

- Then find it…

- But…

-We must accompany Tonio's wife… because he loved her… and to help Him too.

-… We must do what he could not have achieved… Thus we are in his trace and we support him…

- I do not understand.

- That will not change much, says the young woman a smile of benevolence for him on her lips… Go and seek the Book.

- But we must make the reading during three days, throws the long monk.

- We have time… and He also, she says while cherishing the bed at the place where his heart should be.

Tong left. She did not look at him. Light slipped on the bed. She paid more attention to it. It came from the bed!

Then she slipped her hand between the heavy sheet from underneath and the mattress. Her fingers met like a down and heat slipped into her hand. She took it with delicacy between two fingers and brought it back towards her. In front of her eyes, she recognized black hair of « his Angel »… In front of her nose they had also his so particular odor that she liked so much. She placed them on her heart, between her breasts, directly on the skin. The radiation of heat intensified. She did as he had taught it to her: to let the Force enter in her and to help it to circulate freely. The message came: « I will return »…

This message was for her. He had placed there some hair for her because only her, could find them here.

Happiness flooded her body, but she knew that from the first moment when she discovered the empty bed. It was an empty bed… full!

But now it was her who must go towards him… To finish with this habit to be a little girl who asks everywhere of the assistance.

« Becomes a true Woman » he often said to her, when she came each evening to sit down near him. They looked at the sun together disappearing behind the crests.

- How, she asked then…Tell me how to do!

- By having imagination which is not a copy, he said while laughing to see her muzzle of girl from the countryside in front of a too green apple.

Then he added:

- That proves with the enthusiasm of the body to be given to the life… for the life.

- Is this also that which you call « to have a body for Creation »? she asked once

 

He turned the eyes towards her and examined her lengthily. He did not look only at the eyes and the face, but the gleam of her heart followed the neck, the shoulders and the starter of the breasts, went down on the belly and continued on the thighs full of girl of the mountain.

- No, your question is false… It is that « to have a body for Creation ».

- But it is the same thing that I said!

- No, he says gently… It is not what you said in your heart and your body did not vibrate with this so particular state of this extreme Attention to « be » which is revealed by enthusiastic imagination for the movement.

These words accompanied her all the night and she cried in her bed, but she did not know why.

In the small hour, when the sudden silence of the night indicates that the day will come in a few minutes, in this single silence which one calls « the blue hour », renewed each day and always fresh of the new life which comes, she heard in her heart: « You do not love enough ».

She understood her tears this night and she knelt beside her bed. In front of this obviousness one can only pray. The memory of the true prayer came back in her. She was never again ashamed of this reflex that she had always in her to return in this attitude. But the others laughed at her! … Even here with all these monks.

 

It is since this night that she has started to call him « my Angel » in the secrecy of her lips. And the evening, she came towards him with her prayer in the secrecy of her heart and it is with it that she sat down near him.

« I know that you need that one prays for you! » … But these words never passed her lips.

She was well thus to feel his heat coming towards her very close shoulder.

 

Tong came back. He had the Book of the Dead in his hands.

- It is well the one to accompany the death, she asked.

- Yes, that this one…

- Then we can start to repair the Life.

- I do not understand… It is for the dying people!

- But no! … It is to accompany the Life which would like to leave and to help it to stay, she says in a smile of her heart because her prayer has already started.

« I pray for You, my Angel »

But these words in the secrecy of her body were not perceived by the long monk who continued to observe her with curiosity.

- But I can understand all the same « a little » if you explain me what occurs in your head!

 

She looked at him in the Gentleness of her heart.

- I do not believe that you can really understand,she says.

- But why…?

- Because you do not like enough…she says.

- I…

- No, does not lose time to understand whereas your heart is not enough open … For the moment you continue to be interested only in you and… still you! …

 

He opened the eyes which blinked with incomprehension.

- Open the Book and read, she requests, the lips hardly half-opened to let pass the sounds.

- But in which intention for this reading? … We must give an « intention » to direct the energy.

- He died… Isn’t it not enough as « intention » for you? She says a little astonished.

She showed with the hand the bed empty of body.

 

She kept the palm closed on the hair of the one she loves.

-Tell me the words… and I would repeat them… It is at me to pronounce them in the secrecy of my heart… with my Breath.

 

Tong started to shell the sounds. Heidi repeated in an extreme attention which surprised the long monk. He did not know this power of requirement to the Breath of the Life.

 

After long hours to read and to repeat in this attention, he remembered a sentence of the young White one day of storm :

« It is the love until the death which gives enthusiasm for life »

The body of the woman opposite him radiated this love there and he started to understand her.

 

 

*********************