The A26: Shocking, hilarious and poignant noir. Pascal Garnier

spend hours leafing through it. She had done all the crosswords, every rebus and sewn the entire wardrobe for Bleuette (a 29-centimetre doll, real curled hair, eyes that shut, and unbreakable posable head). She loved the smell it gave off when the pages were opened, a musty smell of old biscuits. The Germans would be back. She wasn’t especially waiting for them but she knew they’d be back.

      It was the drop of water falling on her newly shaven head which had hurt her the most, a deafening sound like the stroke of a gong which had stayed in her head ever since. As for everything else, she had let them get on with it, like a sheep, there was nothing else to be done with idiots. For as long as they kept her in the café, amidst their yelling, she had been outside her body. She was a past master at switching off, what with her lunatic of a father who would bawl her out for the slightest thing. She’d had enough time to practise. But on leaving the Café de la Gare, after they’d let her go, a large drop, plop! filled with all the absurdities of the past four years. You’d have thought that ever since they’d dragged her out of her house, the sky had been holding itself back so as to descend on her with all its might in that drop.

      Yolande didn’t even remember the Boche’s name. To tell the truth, it wasn’t so much for what she’d done with him that they’d shaved her head, more for what she’d refused to do with some of her ‘barbers’.

      What did it matter anyway? She had never liked them, they had never liked her. It had let her get shot of all those bastards for good and all. Besides, they must all be dead by now. But what had he been playing at in the lav for the past hour?

      ‘Bernard, what are you doing in there?’

      ‘Trying to unblock the toilet. How many times have I told you not to use newspaper!’

      ‘I didn’t have anything else. You forgot to get toilet paper when you were at Auchan.’

      ‘There’s tissues.’

      ‘They’re no use to me, there’s nothing to read on them.’

      The sound of the flush drowned out Bernard’s reply. He emerged from the toilet, wiping his hands. He was wearing a white shirt, the collar gaping wide round his thin neck.

      ‘What are you dressed up like that for? Are you going to a wedding?’

      ‘No, it’s Jacqueline’s nephew’s First Communion. I told you that last night.’

      ‘You didn’t tell me a thing. You’re always up to something behind my back.’

      ‘For one thing, I did tell you, and for another, I’m not up to anything. I’m going to the Communion, and that’s all.’

      ‘So basically you’re going to get yourself filled full of liquor by that cuckold she calls a husband.’

      ‘Yoyo, that’s enough. I won’t be staying long. I’m done in but I’ve got no choice. I won’t be late back. The toilet’s unblocked and I’m begging you, please don’t put any more newspaper in there.’

      Yolande shrugged and buried herself in La Semaine de Suzette again. Bernard rolled down his sleeves, slipped on his jacket and planted a kiss on his sister’s neck.

      ‘Come on now, don’t sulk – I’ve got a present for you.’

      The pendant on its gilt chain was dangling over the book like a pendulum. Catlike, Yolande caught at it.

      ‘What does that mean, “More than yesterday and much less than tomorrow”? Is it about the blocked toilet?’

      ‘No, it means I love you more than yesterday and much less than tomorrow.’

      ‘You’re going to love me less tomorrow?’

      ‘No, it’s the other way round.’

      ‘It’s beyond me. Can you put it on for me?’

      Bernard’s fingers had a little difficulty in doing up the clasp. Strange, the skin on Yolande’s neck wasn’t an old lady’s but a baby’s, all soft, warm little folds.

      ‘You’re very beautiful.’

      Yolande put the pendant into her mouth.

      ‘I used to have one with the Virgin Mary, a blue one, it tasted of electric wire. At school when you went for an X-ray, you had to put it in your mouth so you wouldn’t see right through to the Virgin’s bones. This one doesn’t taste of anything.’

      ‘See you later, Yolande.’

      The countryside, accustomed to low skies and drizzle, looked ill at ease done up in its Sunday best in the sunlight. The bricks were too red, the sky too blue, the grass too green. It was as if Nature felt embarrassed at being so extravagantly made up. As if for the camera, she was quite still except for the occasional crow hopping about in the middle of a field. At the wheel of his car Bernard was feeling good, for the first time in a long while. He loved these expanses of brown stretching as far as the eye could see, you could almost fancy you were by the sea. He passed a motorcyclist at the roadside, leaning against his bike. He was smoking a cigarette, at right angles to the horizon. There was no house nearby. Here was a chap who had simply said to himself, ‘I know what, I’ll stop here for a cigarette because this is absolutely the best place in the world for that.’ It was over in seconds, just the time it took for the motorcyclist’s image to disappear in the rear-view mirror, but Bernard felt every bit of that man’s happiness in his own body: ‘I feel good.’

      ‘And what’s going to happen to me as long as Yolande’s still alive?’ He realised he had never asked himself that question before. He would very much have liked to be a biker stopped at the roadside for eternity. No doubt Yolande had never asked herself that question either.

      She didn’t care, had never cared about anything but herself. It couldn’t really be called egotism, she had simply never been aware of other people. They were bit parts, at most, even her brother. When she had come home with her head shaven, never to leave the house again, she had appeared relieved, her face serene like that of a young nun. They didn’t want her any more, and she had never wanted them. At last things were clear, ordered, everyone in his own place. She had never wanted anything but this cat’s life of cosseting and food.

      Bernard slowed down as he passed the works on the A26. The pillars supporting the slip road had advanced a few steps. RIP Maryse.

      ‘Now, Bernard, that’s not an empty glass, is it?’

      ‘Yes, but I’m fine, thanks.’

      Roland’s eyes looked like two egg whites, pastis yellow shot through with red.

      ‘It’s lovely to see the young ones having fun, so full of life!’

      In the back room of the café, where the tables had been arranged in a horseshoe, the young ones were jigging to one of the summer’s hits. The acrylic of the girls’ little skirts was stretched out of shape over their bulging thighs. The boys, a glint in their eye, were blowing themselves a smoke screen to hide their acne and drinking out of cans. Jacqueline, hair dishevelled, was zigzagging amongst the dancers with a tray in her outstretched arm. She looked like a statue carrying its upturned plinth.

      ‘She’s not bad, even now, huh?’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘Even with a few miles on the clock she’s still a catch, don’t you think?’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘I’m telling you, Bernard, not only am I not angry with you, I feel sorry for you. Yes, I do, don’t argue. What’s more, out of all the men who’ve come sniffing around after her, you’re the one I like best. You are! Because you’re going to kick the bucket soon – before me. Not by much maybe, but before me.’

      Roland’s brow was dripping with sweat. The few hairs he had left were plastered to his temples. He’d been a very good footballer, the best goalkeeper Subligny had ever had, and had inherited the café-restaurant from his parents.

      ‘I