LITMIR.BIZ

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‘The Orchidaceae is a broad family of perennial plants, characterised by one fertile stamen and a three-petalled flower.’ There’s a lot more in that vein. But no practical advice on how to care for them. The rest of the book is hopelessly scientific, meaningless. Damn the commandant for not having anything more relevant, less highbrow. Damn his nineteenth-century learning!

      What to do for this nursery he’s to build? The commandant has said nothing specific about it, save where it’s to be located. The only image that comes to mind is that of a greenhouse. Clearly, you don’t build greenhouses in tropical climates. At the back of the house, his men are lounging about near where the hedge is to be planted, smoking, doing nothing. He sets them to work on a low walled enclosure by the pond. He has a notion that the flowers will at least need protection from the harsh sun and beating tropical rain, so he envisages thick poles at each corner, and some sort of palm thatch. Rush matting for the inner walls, to let in the air. Beyond that, he has no particular idea. Then again, is the commandant going to know any better than him?

      Once he’s got the men working, he returns to the house – to think, to sit down, to smoke one of the commandant’s cigarettes. He should be looking for things to steal. And yet he feels emptied by the strain of last night. In a way, it’s been good having to organise the nursery; it’s occupied his mind. Masque’s murder now seems unreal. It’s the dream that lingers after you wake, then follows you around all day. At the same time, it’s impossible to focus on it directly. Instead, Sabir finds himself recalling other deaths. Distant ones. He thinks of his mother. Of his grandmother. Of all sorts of men he knew at the front. Their young faces surprisingly fresh in his mind.

      

      The commandant doesn’t arrive at his house until a little before dusk. In the early days of the garden, he’d carry out daily inspections of the work; now, he generally invites Sabir into the house to report on the day’s progress. And the first thing he usually does in these meetings is pour himself a rum. Today, for the first time, he offers Sabir a glass as well. This simple act raises their relationship to a different level, if only for the time it takes to drink the rum. There’s something fundamentally social about sharing a drink which makes it impossible to maintain roles of jailer and prisoner, punisher and punished. There’s something perverse about it as well.

      ‘You’ve got them started on the nursery?’

      ‘The men are building the outer wall, sir. I’m using the bricks we ordered for the retaining wall by the jetty. We’ll need around eight dozen more bricks, though, sir. Shall I place an order with the kiln? Or will we have to go to Saint-Laurent?’

      ‘Whatever you think necessary. Write it down and I’ll sign the order tomorrow morning.’

      Sabir has the impression that the commandant knows even less than he does about what’s needed, and that’s a comfort. He can feel the rum moving through his body: a prickling sensation crawling down his arms and legs. He hasn’t had any alcohol since that glass of rum at the store on the way out of Saint-Laurent. It’s easy enough to get here, and there are plenty of convicts who drink. But they all end up alcoholics. They’re old at thirty. They rack up huge debts. And they never, ever leave.

      ‘It’s for my wife, you see,’ says the commandant. ‘She loves orchids. When she was a child, I used to take her out on mountain rambles sometimes. There was one Alpine orchid flower we used to find all over the place … with its two yellow petals …’ The commandant quickly downs his rum and pours himself another. For a minute or two he’s silent, seemingly lost in memories. He snaps out of his reverie. ‘And that’s why I ordered the shipment. Something of an extravagance, of course.’

      Outside, it’s growing dim. The commandant tends to get carried away with his conversation, and often at these meetings Sabir has to remind him that he needs to go, if he’s to make the barracks for dinner and lock-up. Today, he pretends to forget. It’s partly the rum. But mostly it’s the murder. Masque’s blue body and his blue face. Would there be reprisals against Pierrot and Antillais tonight? When Sabir left the barracks this morning to be interrogated, the two seemed supremely calm. Antillais was still building his little boat, Pierrot was cleaning his nails with his knife – the same one that had killed a man. Perhaps they’re safe. Perhaps Masque had too many enemies and his empire has crumbled at first touch. All Sabir knows is that he can’t spend another night in the barracks. Not with his knife clenched to his side, in a delirious haze of insomnia.

      The commandant is pouring the rum again. ‘She’s been ill, you see. Not physically ill. A nervous complaint. She’s spent some time in Switzerland. Now she’s much better. I took this wretched job for her, do you see? She said she wanted to be as far away from Europe as possible. One of the African colonies, or Indochina. But when this post came up, she told me to take it. She couldn’t wait any longer. She said she wouldn’t marry me unless I took an overseas post. So I took it. Now I want everything to be just right for her arrival. I want her to regret nothing.’

      It’s not clear whether the commandant is talking to Sabir or himself. The man’s hands are shaking. Maybe from drinking, but Sabir thinks not. He gets the impression that the commandant is like a ravenous animal, physically hungry perhaps, emotionally starving certainly. This unceasing tide of words and plans – Sabir is a mere shadow to him, an object in a room, solid to touch but nothing more than a receptacle for this outpouring.

      Across the trees, a bell tolls, and echoes back across the river to ghostly effect.

      ‘The evening bell. You’ve missed lock-up.’

      ‘Yes, sir. I wasn’t thinking of the time. I’m sorry, sir.’

      ‘No. It’s my fault. I’ve been talking too much.’

      ‘They’ll probably send a guard down, once they do the headcount.’

      ‘Yes. They probably will.’ The commandant strokes his chin. ‘But they won’t open up the barracks for you. You’ll have to sleep out tonight. If a guard comes down, I’ll tell him what’s happened. I’ll make sure there’s no trouble for you.’

      ‘Thank you, sir.’

      ‘In the meantime …’

      Sabir can see what’s going through the commandant’s mind. His natural instinct is to offer Sabir a bed for the night, but that would hardly be appropriate, given their different circumstances. He could let Sabir sleep on the floor downstairs, but even that would be regarded as peculiar, should a guard come down.

      ‘Sir, if I might take a lamp, could I suggest that you allow me to sleep in the folly? We put the palm thatch on two days ago, so that way I could at least get some protection from the rain.’

      The commandant looks relieved. ‘Why, yes, I think that would be a good solution.’

      

      A few hundred metres from the house, at the back of the garden, there’s a narrow path that leads to a perfectly circular clearing, in the centre of which is the folly. It, too, is circular, with a diameter that’s just big enough for a man to lie down, fully stretched out. The floor decking is no more or less comfortable than the bed board in the barracks. But what a relief to be able to lie down on your own, with only your thoughts and dreams to accompany you. It’s as if the world has expanded and breathes again.

      The commandant has given Sabir a blanket. They waited in the house for a guard to come, but none did. In the meantime, the two dined on cold meat. For all the guards know back at the camp, Sabir could have murdered the commandant – and yet no one has bothered to come down to investigate. Tomorrow, he’ll ask permission to move out of the barracks and stay down here, in the folly. He knows the commandant will agree. Nonetheless, anger wells up in Sabir. The commandant, letting Sabir in on his plans and secrets like that – as if they’re the centre of this world, and Sabir’s own life and aspirations are of no consequence. He sits up, takes the photograph of the commandant’s wife from his pocket, holds it to the lamp and stares at it for a long time. Outside the folly, everything is obscure, lugubrious. A world of solid night. There’s nothing else here except Sabir, the lamp and the photograph.

      Staring

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