The
pine forest leaned one way, each tree hung in the time between seed and
log, on those flat Landes, windy atlantic sands, shelterless among one
another where once wracked, various, noble, abundantly bled. There were
many barns of blackened pine, roofs generiously overhung, braced with
ornaments, and many wide houses of oak, brick, and terre, near large
sentinels, thickest trunks.
At the end of the second day, our traveler picked his way into some
factory yards, piled high and reeking; as he came out from a passage
between the logs, he found himself in front of a gypsy camp, into which
he instantly wandered.
Let us consider likely conditions of possibility for such movement,
such fair wind and errant-ghost presumption. The immaculate macadam and
the plaintive officialism of the little houses, also of pine, all
identical, with puck lights at the eves, among the vehicles, a féerie,
whimsical and cruel, the work of others, and the cache of junk,
generally considered available property, that he glimpsed in the depth,
and the smooth, gliding motions proper to bicycles, all, doubtless,
played their roles. He saw a flash of spokes in the trash and thought
"I'll look for bicycle parts", although his machine was in good repair.
As he pedaled up, he noticed a shirtless man and two children beside a
distant white van; the man was sitting on a wooden pallet; the pavement
about them was dark, newly wet. On the other side of the camp, the rear
door of one of the houses was half open and revealed a pale-walled
closet, empty but for a few lamp stands.
He stopped and fell to peering into the trash, which was coralled in
thick-walled concrete alcoves, then into the camp, which was all about
him, then into the trash again, and so on, back and forth. He noticed,
calmly, the approach of a man, walking, and a boy, riding a bicycle.
They reached him. The boy looked him full in the face, a hard,
knowlegeable stare, then passed on, pausing only for the instant of his
father's bonsoir. This
was Daniel, young, dark-complexioned, with unkempt black hair, wearing a
black-and-white sweater, and speaking a strident lightning-french.
C'est la dechetterie?
asked our traveler, of the store of money-heavy metals, aluminum, cuivre, and iron:
non
said Daniel, chopping the air with his hand, then explaining and
offering the bicycles in his alcoves. They spoke of the usine; charbon,
unclean; days, they add water and the steam interprets the smoke
mais quand la nuit tombe - tu sais c'que j'dis? t'as compris? - he nodded - c'est noire.
Daniel used tu throughout, while our traveler stumbled back and forth before finally following suit.
Est-ce que vous vivez en toute l'Europe?
A brazen question, but calmly recieved:
que France
he said, chopping down, then flinging his arm to the side, twice:
mais partout, partout.
A battered white van approached.
Mon frère
he
said, nodding towards it while keeping his eyes on his visitor and
winking once, like a camera shutter. There were three people in it, a
man and a woman and a child betweeen them; they paused briefly and
stared, just as the boy on the bicycle had, then passed on; their rear
doors were half open and tied with a cord, revealing complicated masses
of metal; the woman held a large green plastic tricycle by the
handlebars, out the window; our visitor cast about him for admiration
but his vocabulary faltered:
a good haul
he said.
Une drague
Daniel instantly proposed, adding
tu veux du chocolat?
Bien sûr
he replied. He was led by a whip-crack nod down the street, given a
plastic bag of hollow chocolate santas and packs of potato chips,
introduced in passing to Daniel's grandmother, a third stare, and sent
forth.
Coulisse and wings are
gossamer, marc.
De tonnerre, of Daniel,
the gossamer: him
calm, curious,
delicate-questioned, dont
Il faut trouver
à travers du bois
des gens comme moi.
