The House I Loved Read Online Free Page B

on our Emperor, as you will recall. Remember those flower-strewn streets after his coup d’état? Meanwhile, the Prefect awaited patiently in an enormous tent under the merciless sun. This was not the first time I had seen him either. He too, like the Emperor, was fond of parading, of having his portrait printed in every single newspaper. After eight solid years of demolitions, we all knew, as Parisians, exactly what our Prefect looked like. Or the Baron, as you preferred to call him. Despite the grueling heat, endless self-congratulatory speeches were given. The two men bowed to each other over and over again, and other men were called to the tent and made to feel most important. The oversized curtain masking the opening of the new boulevard swung open majestically. The audience cheered and clapped. But not I.
    I already knew, then and there, that that tall bearded man with the redoubtable chin was to become my bitterest enemy.

 
     
    I BECAME SO CARRIED away writing all this to you that I did not hear Gilbert’s knock. His is a coded one, two fast blows and one long scratch with the end of his hook. I do not believe you ever laid eyes on this particular fellow, although I recall you did enjoy conversing with a couple of ragpickers by the marketplace in the days when our daughter was small. I get up to unlock the door for him, ever so carefully, lest we should be seen. It is past noon now and the men will soon be back with the thunderous noises of their murderous enterprise. The door creaks, as it always does, as it has since the first day I set foot in this house, with you, all those years ago.
    He is frightening to behold, at first. Tall, emaciated, blackened with grime and soot, his hair a tangled mess, his face a flurry of gnarled lines like the bark of a withered tree. The yellow of rare teeth, the green gleam of his eyes. He slips in, and brings his stench in with him, but I am accustomed to it now, an odd comforting mixture of eau de vie, tobacco and sweat. His long black overcoat is in tatters and sweeps the floor. His back is straight, despite the heavy wicker basket strapped to it. I know he stores all his treasures in there, all the bits and pieces he carefully scavenges in the streets at dawn, lantern in one hand, hook in the other: string, old ribbons, coins, metal, copper, cigar stumps, the rinds of fruits and vegetables, pins, strands of papers, dried-out flowers. And food, of course. As well as water.
    I have learned not to turn up my nose at what he brings me. We share a hasty meal we eat with our fingers. No, not very daintily. Only one meal a day. As the winter deepens, it is less easy to find the coal to heat our frugal feast. I wonder where he gets the food, how he brings it back to me in our area that must now resemble a war terrain. When I ask him, he never answers. Sometimes I give him a few coins, from the little velvet purse I keep on me at all times, preciously, and which holds everything I own.
    Gilbert’s hands are dirty but exceptionally elegant, like a pianist’s, with long tapered fingers. He never talks about himself, his past, how he has ended up on the streets. I have no idea how old he is. Lord knows where he sleeps, or for how long he has been leading this life. I met him five or six years ago. I believe he lives near the Montparnasse barrier, where ragpickers camp in a no-man’s-land of shanty huts, and they make their way daily down to the Saint-Sulpice market through the Luxembourg Gardens.
    I first noticed him because of his height and his strange top hat, obviously discarded by a gentleman, a battered and pockmarked affair, balancing on the summit of his head like a wounded bat. He had stretched out his vast palm for a sou, throwing me a toothless grin and a flash of those green eyes. There was something friendly and respectful about him, which was a surprise, as those lads can be surly and rude, as you know. His polite benevolence appealed to me. So I gave him a few coins, and